weird

Happy Times [Tiempos felices]

Video posted on by moviebloke

(Mexico 2014)

Breaking up is hard to do, but for thirty-something cartoonist Max Quintana (Luis Arreita) it’s impossible: he fails every time he tries to dump his domineering girlfriend, Monica (Cassandra Ciangherotti). When she misreads his intentions as a marriage proposal, he “hires” an agency to do his dirty work for him. What did he get himself into?

Wry, cynical, and weird, I really liked Happy Times. It was paced using a similar plot device that the Coen brothers use, which worked really well keeping the story moving along in an interesting way. This was fun to watch—and the ending is not happy. Bonus!

(St. Anthony Main) B+

Minneapolis-St. Paul International Film Festival

http://www.tiemposfelices.mx

Grey Gardens

Video posted on by moviebloke

(USA 1976)

Seminal semisweet documentary about “Big Edie” and “Little Edie” Bouvier Beale, the eccentric and probably mentally ill aunt and cousin of Jackie Kennedy Onassis living on a ramshackle estate in East Hampton, New York. Grey Gardens makes anyone who has ever appeared on Hoarders look like an amateur poseur. Just like any other train wreck, it’s impossible to look away even if it’s hard to watch at points. Yet, neither Edie seems miserable, wanting, or joyless. I guess whether you call it a happy or a sad film depends on perspective– something Albert and David Maysles no doubt intended.

In 2010, the United States Library of Congress deemed Grey Gardens “culturally, historically, or aesthetically significant” and selected it for preservation in the National Film Registry (https://www.loc.gov/programs/national-film-preservation-board/film-registry/complete-national-film-registry-listing/).

(Music Box) B

http://greygardensonline.com/the-documentary/

Inherent Vice

Link posted on by moviebloke

(USA 2015)

Paul Thomas Anderson’s Inherent Vice is a total stoner flick. It’s loaded with amusing moments and notable actors—Joaquin Phoenix, Josh Brolin, Owen Wilson, Reese Witherspoon, Maya Rudolph, and Martin Short to name a few—having fun with their parts. It’s an entertaining farce—entertaining only to a point, that is.

Unfortunately, the plot meanders with spurts of energy and dead stops, and ultimately fails to go as far as maybe it hoped. The running time—two and a half hours!—does not help. I found myself underwhelmed, though I certainly didn’t hate it. Inherent Vice lost me before it got to the end. I’ve never read anything by Thomas Pynchon, and I’m in no hurry to after seeing this.

With Joanna Newsom, Katherine Waterston, Jordan Christian Hearn, Taylor Bonin, Jeannie Berlin, Eric Roberts, Serena Scott Thomas, Martin Dew, Michael Kenneth Williams, Hong Chau, Shannon Collis, Christopher Allen Nelson, Benicio Del Toro, Catherine Haena Kim, Jena Malone, Vivienne Khaledi, Yvette Yates, Andrew Simpson

148 minutes
Rated R

(Landmark Century) C-

http://inherentvicemovie.com