Olivia Wilde

DON’T WORRY, DARLING: misfire (but with Huell Howser’s cool house)

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Don't Worry Darling (2022) - IMDb
Photo caption: Florence Pugh and Harry Styles in DON’T WORRY, DARLING. Courtesy of Warner Brothers.

Don’t Worry, Darling is a paranoid thriller that, most unfortunately, stops thrilling halfway through.  We’re in the late 1950s, and Alice (Florence Pugh) is a housewife married to Jack (pop star Harry Styles), an engineer.  They live in a company town, an idyllic, color-saturated suburb improbably planted in the remotest corner of the Mojave Desert.  All the men work on a highly secret R&D project, and no one is to leave the company’s property, “where it’s safe.”

Everyone is going full Mad Men with cocktails and cigarettes, Alice and Jack are gloriously oversexed, and Don’t Worry, Darling sports a delightful period soundtrack.  It’s a much better Stepford Wives, only really hedonistic.  So far, so good.  

But Alice sees some things that are disturbing.  Is she hallucinating?  Or has she stumbled upon the company’s evil secret? During this Am I Going Crazy part of the movie, I started to think that this is taking way too long.  And then it got less and less interesting.

Part of the problem is heavy-handedness, with an unnecessarily overt Order vs Chaos message.  Poor Alice even utters the words, “you’re gaslighting me.” In case we don’t get it, I guess.
And there are (I think two) brief scenes with Alice and Jack at their same ages, but set in the present, where they are having a lot less fun.  These bits are confusing and superfluous.
None of this is the fault of Pugh or Styles.  It’s all in the increasingly less gripping and less coherent story.

Don’t Worry, Darling especially disappointed me because director Olivia Wilde and screenwriter Kate Silberman had previously collaborated on the smart and sweet Booksmart.

Olivia Wilde the actress is very good as the pack leader who wrangles the other wives.  Nick Kroll shines as her husband, a good timer who has drunk the Kool-Aid.  I always love seeing Chris Pine, and he’s predictably good here as the corporate leader admired by the other men to a cult-like degree.  Timothy Simons (Veep) is perfect as the company physician/enforcer.

My friend Keith that he was distracted from the story when he recognized the building that stands in for the evil corporation’s secret headquarters.  It turns out that it is a home in Twentynine Palms, California, owned by the late Huell Howser, the relentlessly affable host of California Gold, where each week he would discover another a-MAZ-ing roadside attraction.

All I’ll say about the film’s off-screen controversy is that no one would raise much fuss about a male movie director dating a much  younger female star, which has been going on since the birth of cinema.

Don’t Worry, Darling is in theaters.

BOOKSMART: fresh, smart and funny

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Beanie Feldstein and Kaitlyn Dever in BOOKSMART Credit: Francois Duhamel / Annapurna Pictures

In Olivia Wilde,’s wildly successful comedy Booksmart, Molly (Beanie Feldstein) and Amy (Kaitlyn Dever) play super-achieving kids who have followed every rule and refused to be distracted by high school frivolity; appalled to learn that their more conventionally fun-loving classmates have also gotten admitted to elite colleges, Molly and Amy decide to consume four years of teen fun in one night of graduation parties. This is an entirely fresh take on the coming of age film, and a high school graduation party romp like you’ve never seen.

Booksmart is the directorial debut of actress Olivia Wilde, and was written by Emily Halpern, Sarah Haskins, Susanna Fogel and Katie Silberman. The impact of the all-female creative team, to my eyes, is not in any particular scene or character, but woven throughout. These women have gotten the rare chance to make a movie, brought their talent and fresh eyes to it and knocked it out of the park.

Beanie Feldstein and Kaitlyn Dever in BOOKSMART

Kaitlyn Dever and Beanie Feldstein are special talents. Dever played one of the most compelling characters in TV’s Justified as Loretta McCready and was excellent in the Lynne Shelton drama Outside In. Feldstein sparkled as the protagonist’s high school best friend in Lady Bird. Here’s a particularly fun NYT interview with Dever and Feldstein.

Others in the relatively underseen cast – especially Diana Silvers, Molly Gordon, Billie Lourd, Austin Crute, Noah Galvin and the skateboarder Victoria Ruesga – bring interesting presences to the film. One wonders if Booksmart will become an American Graffiti/Animal House/Fast Times at Ridgemont High/The Breakfast Club phenomenon, and launch a cohort of movie careers.

Booksmart is smart, funny and a very fulfilling start to 2019’s slate of summer movies.

DVD/Stream of the Week: DEADFALL – dysfunctional families converge just in time for Thanksgiving

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Charlie Hunnam and Olivia Wilde in DEADFALL
Charlie Hunnam and Olivia Wilde in DEADFALL

Deadfall is a solid recent thriller that has flown flew under the radar. Eric Bana and Olivia Wilde are brother and sister running for the Canadian border after a casino heist. They wreck their car and split up. The brother sets off overland, leaving a trail of murderous carnage. The local cops are on the alert, including the sheriff’s deputy daughter (Kate Mara). Meanwhile, a bad luck boxer (Charlie Hannum of Sons of Anarchy and The Lost City of Z) is released from prison, impulsively commits another crime and is headed for his parents’ (Sissy Spacek and Kris Kristofferson) remote northern cabin. The sister hitches a ride with the boxer. Everybody converges at the boxer’s parents’ place for an extremely stressful Thanksgiving dinner.

An essential element of this thriller is that all of the families are dysfunctional. The siblings have survived a hellish upbringing, from which the older brother has rescued his little sister; unfortunately, he has emerged as a psychopath himself and has infantilized the sister. The relationship between the boxer and his father has been poisoned by a long-festering dispute. The sheriff resents and belittles his bright and highly professional daughter while doting on her idiot brothers.

The core of the movie is the evolving relationship between Wilde’s sister and Hunnam’s boxer. Neither knows that the other is on the lam. She cynically seduces him because he is useful. But then she starts to fall for him, and, by Thanksgiving dinner, her loyalties are uncertain.

Sissy Spacek is brilliant as the boxer’s mom, who must steer over the wreckage of the relationship between her son and her husband, and who must then serve a Thanksgiving dinner to a volatile killer who is holding a shotgun on the other guests. She is a great actor, and she’s as good here as in any of her signature performances.

The cinematography, characters, acting and the directorial choices by Stefan Ruzowitzky are excellent. What keeps Deadfall from being one of the year’s best is some trite, TV movie level dialogue along the way. Still, it’s a good watch. Deadfall is available to rent on DVD from Netflix and Redbox and can be streamed from Netflix Instant, Amazon, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube and Google Play.

Note: This is NOT the 1993 Deadfall, with Nicholas Cage even more over-the-top than usual.

DVD/Stream of the Week: DRINKING BUDDIES – an unusually genuine romantic comedy

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Drinking Buddies

In Drinking Buddies, Olivia Wilde plays the only female employee of an urban craft brewery. She and her co-worker best buddy (Jake Johnson) eat their lunches together every day, kid around on the job and join the crew for beers after work. They really connect and share trust with each other, and the two have achieved an enviable level of interpersonal comfort. If this were the typical idiot Hollywood romantic comedy, we could stop watching now, because we would know that they would dump their current significant others (Anna Kendrick and Ron Livingston) in the third act because THEY ARE MEANT FOR EACH OTHER.

But, instead, writer-director Joe Swanberg surprises us with an unusually genuine romantic comedy. The characters act and react – not in the way we’ve come to expect rom com characters to act – but as unpredictably as would real people. Real people can be complex. Real people can make choices out of short-term self-gratification – or they can make sacrifices for the greater good – you don’t always know what’s coming. Swanberg trusts that the audience isn’t demanding a tired formula – and it pays off for him and for us.

Swanberg has also made the first Mumblecore movie that I’ve liked. I was on the verge of writing off the entire cinematic genre because I don’t like to watch self-involved twits obsess over their own avoidable, First World problems. Although Swanberg’s male characters have the Mumblecore bedhead, he makes this movie about a situation that could happen to any of us – discovering a potential soul mate outside our existing relationship. And the characters don’t wring their hands and kvetch – they struggle through the untidy challenge and move on.

The cast is solid, and the glammed-down Olivia Wilde is especially very good here.

Drinking Buddies: an unusually genuine romantic comedy

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Drinking Buddies

In Drinking Buddies, Olivia Wilde plays the only female employee of an urban craft brewery.  She and her co-worker best buddy (Jake Johnson) eat their lunches together every day, kid around on the job and join the crew for beers after work.  They really connect and share trust with each other, and the two have achieved an enviable level of interpersonal comfort.  If this were the typical idiot Hollywood romantic comedy, we could stop watching now, because we would know that they would dump their current significant others (Anna Kendrick and Ron Livingston) in the third act because THEY ARE MEANT FOR EACH OTHER.

But, instead, writer-director Joe Swanberg surprises us with an unusually genuine romantic comedy.  The characters act and react – not in the way we’ve come to expect rom com characters to act – but as unpredictably as would real people.  Real people can be complex.  Real people can make choices out of short-term self-gratification – or they can make sacrifices for the greater good – you don’t always know what’s coming.  Swanberg trusts that the audience isn’t demanding a tired formula – and it pays off for him and for us.

Swanberg has also made the first Mumblecore movie that I’ve liked.    I was on the verge of writing off the entire cinematic genre because I don’t like to watch self-involved twits obsess over their own avoidable, First World problems.  Although Swanberg’s male characters have the Mumblecore bedhead, he makes this movie about a situation that could happen to any of us – discovering a potential soul mate outside our existing relationship.  And the characters don’t wring their hands and kvetch – they struggle through the untidy challenge and move on.

The cast is solid, and the glammed-down Olivia Wilde is especially very good here.

Drinking Buddies is available on DVD from Netlix and Redbox and streaming from Amazon, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube, GooglePlay and XBOX Live.

The Incredible Burt Wonderstone: Jim Carrey gets to be funny again

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In The Incredible Burt Wonderstone, Steve Carrell plays the title character, a schlub who has lucked into Vegas headliner success as a magician and has developed narcissistic entitlement, along with some destructive spending habits.  Steve Buscemi plays his long suffering partner.  Their prop-driven act, with its Siegfried and Roy schtick, is challenged by an emerging street magician a la David Blaine (Jim Carrey).  Laughs result when the clueless Burt Wonderstone sabotages his own successful act and must come to terms with his own limitations; this being show biz, there’s a lot of unabashed backstabbing.  There’s also a brief but very funny poke at celebrity charity in the Third World.

As we remember from his breakthrough performance in 1994’s The Mask, there are things that Jim Carrey can do that no other performer can.  His movie vehicles since The Mask, however, have tempted him to preen and wink at the audience.   Here, he has a well-written role that is perfect for his rubber face, physicality and sheer force of character, and he takes it to the max. It turns out that, while he can make us wince in a Jim Carrey movie, Carrey can make us belly laugh in a Steve Carrell movie.

The Incredible Burt Wonderstone benefits from a deep cast.  The very game and able Olivia Wilde plays the exploited intern.  James Gandolfini plays a deliciously ruthless and self-interested casino tycoon.  The great Alan Arkin just gets funnier as he ages.  And Jay Mohr is delightful in one his best recent roles, a hopelessly unsuited comedian named Rick the Implausible.

The Incredible Burt Wonderstone is fluff, but it’s fun fluff.  And a showcase for Jim Carrey.

 

 

 

 

 

DVD of the Week: Deadfall

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Deadfall is a solid thriller that flew under the radar during the holidays.  Eric Bana and Olivia Wilde are brother and sister running for the Canadian border after a casino heist.  They wreck their car and split up.  The brother sets off overland, leaving a trail of murderous carnage.   The local cops are on the alert, including the sheriff’s deputy daughter (Kate Mara).   Meanwhile,  a bad luck boxer (Charlie Hannum of Sons of Anarchy) is released from prison, impulsively commits another crime and is headed for his parents’ (Sissy Spacek and Kris Kristofferson) remote northern cabin.  The sister hitches a ride with the boxer.  Everybody converges at the boxer’s parents’ place for an extremely stressful Thanksgiving dinner.

An essential element of this thriller is that all of the families are dysfunctional.   The siblings have survived a hellish upbringing, from which the older brother has rescued his little sister; unfortunately, he has emerged as a psychopath himself and has infantilized the sister.  The relationship between the boxer and his father has been poisoned by a long-festering dispute.  The sheriff resents and belittles his bright and highly professional daughter while doting on her idiot brothers.

The core of the movie is the evolving relationship between Wilde’s sister and Hunnam’s boxer.  Neither knows that the other is on the lam.  She cynically seduces him because he is useful.  But then she starts to fall for him, and, by Thanksgiving dinner, her loyalties are uncertain.

Sissy Spacek is brilliant as the boxer’s mom, who must steer over the wreckage of the relationship between her son and her husband, and who must then serve a Thanksgiving dinner to a volatile killer who is holding a shotgun on the other guests.  She is a great actor, and she’s as good here as in any of her signature performances.

The cinematography, characters, acting and the directorial choices by Stefan Ruzowitzky are excellent.  What keeps Deadfall from being one of the year’s best is some trite, TV movie level dialogue along the way.  Still, it’s a good watch.

Note: This is NOT the 1993 Deadfall, with Nicholas Cage even more over-the-top than usual.

Deadfall: Two killers, one shotgun and Thanksgiving dinner

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Deadfall is a solid thriller that is flying under the radar this holiday season.  Eric Bana and Olivia Wilde are brother and sister running for the Canadian border after a casino heist.  They wreck their car and split up.  The brother sets off overland, leaving a trail of murderous carnage.   The local cops are on the alert, including the sheriff’s deputy daughter (Kate Mara).   Meanwhile,  a bad luck boxer (Charlie Hannum of Sons of Anarchy) is released from prison, impulsively commits another crime and is headed for his parents’ (Sissy Spacek and Kris Kristofferson) remote northern cabin.  The sister hitches a ride with the boxer.  Everybody converges at the boxer’s parents’ place for an extremely stressful Thanksgiving dinner.

An essential element of this thriller is that all of the families are dysfunctional.   The siblings have survived a hellish upbringing, from which the older brother has rescued his little sister; unfortunately, he has emerged as a psychopath himself and has infantilized the sister.  The relationship between the boxer and his father has been poisoned by a long-festering dispute.  The sheriff resents and belittles his bright and highly professional daughter while doting on her idiot brothers.

The core of the movie is the evolving relationship between Wilde’s sister and Hunnam’s boxer.  Neither knows that the other is on the lam.  She cynically seduces him because he is useful.  But then she starts to fall for him, and, by Thanksgiving dinner, her loyalties are uncertain.

Sissy Spacek is brilliant as the boxer’s mom, who must steer over the wreckage of the relationship between her son and her husband, and who must then serve a Thanksgiving dinner to a volatile killer who is holding a shotgun on the other guests.  She is a great actor, and she’s as good here as in any of her signature performances.

The cinematography, characters, acting and the directorial choices by Stefan Ruzowitzky are excellent.  What keeps Deadfall from being one of the year’s best is some trite, TV movie level dialogue along the way.  Still, it’s a good watch.

Note: This is NOT the 1993 Deadfall, with Nicholas Cage even more over-the-top than usual.

Cowboys & Aliens gets a Super Bowl commercial

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The Super Bowl audience just got a glimpse of the newest genre mutant – a sci fi blended with a Western.  Universal recently released the trailer for its $100 million summer 2011 blockbuster Cowboys & Aliens.  In this article, the New York Times reports that the trailer’s first showing to a live audience evoked gales of laughter – but it’s not supposed to be a comedy.

According to the trailer, Harrison Ford’s torch-bearing mounted lynch mob is interrupted by laser attack from an alien spaceship.  Daniel Craig, playing a Clint Eastwoodesque Man With No Name, awakes with his memory erased by aliens and a futuristic bracelet.  Saloon gal Olivia Wilde (House, The OC) is pulled into the sky by alien forces.

It turns out that this isn’t the first Western with space aliens, although Oblivion aimed a lot lower. This 1994 schlockfest starred Andrew Divoff (as the alien Redeye), Richard Joseph Paul, Meg Foster, Isaac Hayes and Julie Newmar, with George Takei as the Jim Beam-swilling town doctor.  Amazingly, Oblivion rated a 1996 sequel, Oblivion 2:  Backlash.

Here’s the real trailer for Cowboys & Aliens.