Sean Penn did an excellent job entering the life and mind of Willie Stark, and Jude Law was also very good. The women actors - Kate Winslet, Talia Balsam and especially Patricia Clarkson -- were also great. Gandolfini was Gandolfini. Anthony Hopkins was Anthony Hopkins, not his best work. But the script was over the top, the direction was heavy-handed and mired in bathos. The Louisiana settings were effective, but did they really have to have it rain so portentiously? Lingering shots, stupid montages meant to be heartfelt, and high-school quality profundity at every turn. Yecch to the writer-director. He might want to make a little movie to get down to who he really is. This was phony baloney and pseudo symbolic from the get-go.
Reviews
3 Reviews
A Love Song for Bobby Long
(2004)
Real as down-home dirt
21 August 2006
You don't see many movies where the music fits in seamlessly and is just as important as a supporting player. Bobby Long used music perfectly in this way, as a complement to the emotional dimensions of a story paced by poetry. Remember the great movie Tender Mercies? There is a kinship between the two films, although their stories are very different. In both movies you have a wounded genius, a musical milieu, and Bobby Long (like Robert Duvall) finds his redemption through love. There is much more to the experience of watching this movie, lots and lots of little pleasures, and it takes its own time showing you. You just have to see this one. Travolta is as good as it gets. Hey, Scarlett Johansson is worth the price of admission all by herself, but the many supporting roles -- including Gabriel Macht and Deborah Kara Unger -- are what make this movie real as down-home dirt. I don't know who Shainee Gabel, the director, is, but she took an almost-forgotten novel and she made it sing. I can still hear its echo in my soul.
A Man's Gotta Do
(2004)
charming suburban satire
8 February 2006
Enjoyed this one very much, witty and well-executed screenplay with terrific performances and a gentle undercurrent of humor throughout. John Howard was amazing as Eddy, the dad, and Alyssa Mclelland was pitch perfect as his gorgeous daughter with the voice of an angel. I am not sure why some find this movie to be less than wonderful, but I enjoyed it immensely from the first moment I laid eyes on it. It is satirical, yet evokes genuine emotion; it is very laid back, yet kept me on the edge of my seat as the plot twisted up in a knot and then unraveled (almost) before kinking up again. The fortune teller was a key plot device and the script ran a fine line between nearly serious and tongue-in-cheek in those scenes. Are all housewives in Oz as suggestible as Rebecca Frith's Yvonne? No matter, she was lovely and seductive. Gyton Grantley as Dominic wins you over from the first, too. I'd enjoy seeing all of these actors again.
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