comedy – Page 18 – The Movie Gourmet

3 STILL STANDING: the comics who spurned LA

November 8, 2015 by movie gourmet

the stars of 3 STILL STANDING: Larry "Bubbles" Brown, Johnny Steele, Will Durst — The stars of 3 STILL STANDING: Larry “Bubbles” Brown, Johnny Steele, Will Durst

The San Francisco comedy club scene of the 1980s was a Golden Age for the art form of stand-up comedy – and its practitioners do consider it an art form, not just an entertainment product. That Bay Area scene launched major careers: Robin Williams, Dana Carvey, Paula Poundstone, Ellen DeGeneres, Bobby Slayton, Kevin Pollack, Whoopi Goldberg and Rob Schneider. The documentary 3 Still Standing tells the story of three of their comedy peers who flourished in the 1980s but chose not to “go to LA” and how they’ve dealt with the “downsizing”, when cable TV killed the market for stand-up comedy in clubs.

The three comics – Will Durst, Larry “Bubbles” Brown and Johnny Steele – are what make 3 Still Standing so compelling. Durst is a master of sharp political comedy in a society that is now more interested in vacuous celebrities. Steele’s observations are too subversive for a mainstream that is less hip and a whole lot less smart. Brown, whose appearances on Letterman were 21 years apart, is no longer young enough for the decision-makers who book comedy. But they’re all experts in their craft, and their material is hilarious.

Larry “Bubbles” Brown is a revelation. His comic persona is based on his half-empty world view and his self-deprecating view of his looks.

“It’s been a great day for me. Haven’t passed any blood.”

“I’m in the medical textbooks as one of the major causes of vaginal dryness”.

“Giving me Viagra is like giving a doorbell to a homeless guy.”

We’ve seen the global and technological economic changes that end once-promising career paths and force us to adapt or else. Here, the catalysts are both techno-economic (the supplanting/absorption of the comedy market by cable television) and cultural (the continued dumbing-down of our society). But it’s rare that the aging victims among us are so damn fun to watch as these three artists.

Filmmakers Donna Locicero and Richard Campos started the project “as a Valentine to the era that we enjoyed so much”. That would have been an entertaining movie. But 3 Still Standing gained more depth and texture when it evolved into the character-driven story of these three guys and their plight. In a post-screening Q & A, Campos also noted that “the San Francisco Bay Area is a character in the film”.

Robin Williams and Dana Carvey are prominent parts of 3 Still Standing. Locicero said that Williams had seen several versions of the film, including the final cut – all to ensure that his segments didn’t overshadow the story of the three principals.

3 Still Standing opens on November 12 at Camera 3 in San Jose. On November 11, the San Jose Improv will host a screening with outtakes from the movie and live appearances by Durst, Brown and Steele.

Durst, Brown and Steele are inventive originals and important artists. They prove that you can be on the wrong side of the marketplace and still be on the right side of history. I saw 3 Still Standing at the Camera Cinema Club.

ADDICTED TO FRESNO: mediocre writing sabotages a sex comedy

November 2, 2015 by movie gourmet

Natasha Lyonne and Judy Greer in ADDICTED TO FRESNO

In the limp comedy Addicted to Fresno, the appealing Natasha Lyonne (Slums of Beverly Hills, Orange Is the New Black) plays an inspirational, plays-by-the-rules Fresno hotel maid. She has taken in her wayward sister (Judy Greer), whose sex addiction has made her otherwise unemployable, and gotten her a similar job. Having just left Sex Addiction Rehab, the sister is supposed to be in recovery, but is far from it. Misadventures ensue.

The problem with Addicted to Fresno is that the screen-writing is mid-level sit-com, only much dirtier. I generally like sex comedies, but Addicted to Fresno is pretty much unwatchable.

Addicted to Fresno is (justifiably) hard to find in theaters and also streaming on Amazon iTunes and Vudu.

Scare Week: WITCHING AND BITCHING

October 28, 2015 by movie gourmet

The rockin’ Witching and Bitching (Las brujas de Zugarramurdi), by Spanish cult director Alex de la Iglesia, features a gang of robbers – one is dressed as a silver Jesus on the cross and another as a Green Army Guy – on the lam rocketing into an occult nightmare. They run smack dab into a coven of witches – the full-out Macbeth-stir-the-cauldron kind of witches. This film has the feel of an early Almodovar madcap comedy – if Almodovar were into goth horror. It’s all rapid-pulsed fun – and surprisingly smart.

The underlying theme is misogyny. The male characters grouse about the stereotypical complaints about women – all while themselves exemplifying the worst of the stereotypical male flaws. For example, one guy complains that his ex won’t consent to joint custody on the grounds of his irresponsibility – yet he brings their seven-year-old along on an armed robbery. One underlying joke is that the men see women as bitches, but it’s the men who spend the whole movie bitching. Another is that the men become trapped by REAL witches whose ball busting far exceeds the men’s most negative misogynistic fantasies.

These Spanish actors are wonderful, including the great Carmen Maura (Almodovar’s Women on the Verge of a Nervous Breakdown and Volver) and appropriately named hottie Carolina Bang. They’re very adept at the deadpan delivery of lines like this:

Driver: This village is damned. They hold witches sabbaths.
Boy: What’s that?
Robber: Like a kegger but medieval.

De la Iglesia maintains a deliciously frantic pace throughout. The final orgiastic ritual goes on a long time but maintains audience engagement.

This was the first de la Iglesia movie that I’d seen, but I’m definitely going to check out more of his work. Speaking of which, he nicely sets up a sequel. But go ahead and watch Witching and Bitching now – streaming in Amazon Instant, iTunes and Xbox Video.

MEET THE PATELS: a documentary funnier than most comedies

September 24, 2015 by movie gourmet

Meet the Patels is both a documentary and a comedy – and ultimately, a satisfying crowd-pleaser. Over several years, filmmaker Geeta Patel filmed her own brother Ravi and their parents in their quest to find a wife for Ravi. Ravi and Geeta’s parents were born in India, had a traditional arranged marriage which has resulted in decades of happiness. Their American-born kids, of course, reject the very idea of an arranged marriage. But Ravi finds the pull of his Indian heritage compelling enough to dump his redheaded girlfriend and try to find a nice Indian-American girl. His parents try to help him with unbounded and unrelenting enthusiasm.

Meet the Patels is very funny – much funnier than most fictional comedies. It’s always awkward when parents involve themselves in their child’s romantic aspirations. That’s true here, and produces some side-splitting moments. It helps that the Patel parents are very expressive, and downright hilarious. The dad is so funny that I could watch him read a telephone book for 90 minutes, and the mom is herself a force of nature.

We learn that the Patels of Gujarat have adapted an entire menu of marriage opportunities to American society: a matchmaking profile system called “biodata”, matrimonial fairs, “the wedding season” and more.

Meet the Patels has its share of cultural tourism and the clash of generations. But is so damn appealing because it’s much more than that – it’s a completely authentic saga of family dynamics, dynamics that we’ve all experienced or at least observed. The family members’ mutual love for each other drives family conflict and, finally, family unity.

I saw Meet the Patels at the Camera Cinema Club earlier this year, and it opens in the Bay Area tomorrow. It’s hilarious and heart-warming. Go see it.

DVD/Stream of the Week: WILD TALES

September 23, 2015September 22, 2015 by movie gourmet

Okay, here’s the first Must See of 2015 – the hilariously dark Argentine comedy Wild Tales. Writer-director Damián Szifron presents a series of individual stories about revenge. It’s still high my list of Best Movies of 2015 – So Far.

We all feel aggrieved, and Wild Tales explores what happens when rage overcomes the restraints of social order. Think about how instantly angry you can become when some driver cuts you off on the highway – and then how you might fantasize avenging the slight. Indeed, there is a story in Wild Tales that has the most severe case road rage since Spielberg’s Duel in 1971. Now Wild Tales is dark, and you gotta go with it. The humor comes from the EXTREMES that someone’s resentment can lead to.

One key to the success of Wild Tales is that it is an anthology. In a very wise move, Szifron resisted any impulse to stretch one of the stories into a feature-length movie. Each of the stories is just the right length to extract every laugh and pack a punch. The funniest stories are the opening one set on an airplane and the final one about a wedding.

The acting is uniformly superb. In one story, Oscar Martínez plays a wealthy man in a desperate jam, who buys the help of his shady lawyer fixer (Osmar Núñez) and his longtime household retainer (Germán de Silva) – until their prices get just a little too high. The three actors take what looks like it’s going to a thriller and morph into a (very funny) psychological comedy with a very cynical view of human nature.

One of the middle episodes stars one of my favorite film actors, Ricardo Darín, who I see as the Argentine Joe Mantegna. I suggest that you watch Darín in the brilliant police procedural The Secrets in Their Eyes (on my top ten for 2010), the steamy and seamy Carancho and the wonderful con artist movie Nine Queens.

Wild Tales has been a festival hit (Cannes, Telluride, Toronto and Sundance) around the world and was nominated for the Best Foreign Language Picture Oscar. I saw Wild Tales at Cinequest 2015. It’s now available on DVD from Netflix and streaming from Amazon Instant Video, iTunes, Vudu and Xbox Video.

SHE’S FUNNY THAT WAY: comic fluff from a master

September 18, 2015 by movie gourmet

Jennifer Aniston in SHE'S FUNNY THAT WAY — Jennifer Aniston in SHE’S FUNNY THAT WAY

The new comedy She’s Funny That Way from 75-year-old master filmmaker Peter Bogdanovich is a light-hearted diversion about the unlikely career path of an escort-turned-screen actress (Imogene Poots). Bogdanovich is responsible for the screwball comedy masterpiece What’s Up Doc? and the grossly under-rated comedy romance They All Laughed. So he knows knows how to choreograph mad cap moments. There’s also an unexpected cameo at the very end, along with very funny end credits.

Along with Poots, Bogdanovich has attracted a top tier cast: Owen Wilson, Rhys Ifans, Will Forte and Kathryn Hahn. It’s especially welcome to see survivors of Bogdanovich’s 1970s oeuvre – Cybill Shepherd, Tatum O’Neal and Austin Pendleton.

But the real revelation here – and the main reason to see the movie – is Jennifer Aniston’s turn as the most emotionally unhealthy therapist conceivable. It’s written as an extreme character – absolutely no boundaries, utterly self-absorbed, dangerously resentful and completely unprofessional. But Aniston’s performance is so full throttle that the audience delights every time her character comes on-screen.

She’s Funny That Way is just fluff, but it’s well-crafted fluff. It’s is now available to stream from Amazon Instant Video, Vudu, YouTube and Google Play.

DIGGING FOR FIRE: a couple goes wild, then looks inside

September 16, 2015 by movie gourmet

The romantic comedy Digging for Fire is a reflection on that moment when two people who have loved each other have become so consumed by day-to-day child rearing that they have lost heir way as a couple. She’s (Rosemarie DeWitt) fed up and drops the three-year-old with her parents, hoping for a wild weekend with girlfriends while he (Jake Johnson) does the taxes. Of course, he invites his guy buddies over for a bro-bacchanal. Things don’t go exactly as planned for either of them, and their separate weekends morph into adventures that challenge their marriage and trigger some self-examination.

Writer-director Joe Swanberg has a gift for creating characters that act like real people – and NOT like they know they are characters in a romantic comedy. Swanberg created the 2013 Drinking Buddies, a film I found to be “an unusually genuine romantic comedy” and the first Mumblecore movie that I’ve ever liked.

DeWitt and Johnson are very good, and Brie Larson is outstanding as a good time girl who is more – and looking for more – than she seems. Digging for Fire also features Anna Kendrick (against type as an uninhibited party girl) and Sam Rockwell (who has made playing an unreliable character into its own art form). We also see almost everyone who has been in an independent film: Mike Birbiglia, Chris Messina, Melanie Lynsky, Sam Elliott, Judith Light and Jane Adams. Orlando Bloom even drops in as a boor at a bar (albeit an upscale bar).

Two thing for sure: Joe Swanberg’s characters are never predictable and he is definitely a romantic. Digging for Fire is available for streaming from Amazon, Vudu, You Tube and Google Play.

Stream of the Week: I’LL SEE YOU IN MY DREAMS

September 8, 2015 by movie gourmet

Sam Elliott and Blythe Danner in I'LL SEE YOU IN MY DREAMS — Sam Elliiott and Blythe Danner in I’LL SEE YOU IN MY DREAMS

The gentle, thoughtful and altogether fresh dramedy I’ll See You in My Dreams is centered on 72-year-old Carol (Blythe Danner), a widow of 21 years living a life of benign routine. Every day, she rises at 6 AM in her modest but nicely appointed LA house, reads by the pool, hosts her gal pals from the nearby retirement community for cards and is in bed by 11 PM to watch TV with her elderly canine companion. It’s not a bad life, but it’s an unadventuresome one.

Then some things happen that give her an opportunity to choose to take some chances. In short order, she has to put down her dog and deal with an unwelcome rodent. Her friends (Rhea Perlman, June Squibb and Mary Kay Place) suggest that she try speed dating. She opens her social life, developing a friendship with a much younger man (Martin Starr – Gilfoyle in Silicon Valley) and being courted by a dashing man of her own age (Sam Elliott).

What happens is sometimes funny, sometimes sad and always authentic. This is NOT a formulaic geezer comedy, but a story about venturing outside one’s comfort zone – with all the attendant vulnerability – to seek some life rewards. Carol may be 72, but she is still at a place in her life where she can grow and be challenged. I’ll See You in My Dreams proves that coming of age films are not just for the young.

I saw I’ll See You in My Dreams at the Camera Cinema Club, at which director, editor and co-writer Brett Haley was interviewed. Haley said that he and co-writer Marc Basch wanted to “avoid the obvious joke of older people doing what younger people do”. Instead, they intended to make a movie “about love, loss and that you can’t get through life unscathed – and that’s okay”. Haley and Basch certainly succeeded in creating a film about “living life without the fear of loss”.

Danner sparkles in the role (and gets to nail a karaoke rendition of Cry Me a River). Always special when playing solid-valued but rascally guys, Elliott still retains his magnetism.

We don’t often get to see realistic movies about people in their early 70s, but I’ll See You in My Dreams respects its protagonist Carol by putting her in plausible situations. Neither farcical nor mawkish, I’ll See You in My Dreams is a surefire audience pleaser.

I’ll See You in My Dreams is available to stream from Amazon Instant Video, iTunes, Vudu, YouTube and Google Play.

MISTRESS AMERICA: another self-absorbed misfire

August 27, 2015 by movie gourmet

Lola Kirke (right) with the always annoying Greta Gerwig in MISTRESS AMERICA

In director Noah Baumbach’s failed comedy Mistress America, an insecure young college student meets her step-sister-to-be (Greta Gerwig), who turns out to be a human whirlwind, dancing on the razor’s edge between frantic excitement and chaos. The premise of an unsure young person becoming captivated by a high energy and charismatic personality is an interesting one. Unfortunately, the movie fizzles because of the shipwreck of a screenplay (co-written by Baumbach and Gerwig) and another aggravating performance by Gerwig.

In the first half of the film NOT ONE WORD seems genuine, like a real character would have uttered it. Mistress America’s worst misfire is the extended screwball sequence at a house in Connecticut – the cast is just flinging the lines as if in a high school play (until a really good actor, Michael Chernus, shows up as a real character).

No actor could save this screenplay, but Greta Gerwig has the gift of making any movie worse and she does here, too. Gerwig plays the same character in every move because she thinks it’s Cute Kooky like Annie Hall. But she’s neither cute nor kooky – just annoying to the point of loathsomeness. Here, her character is a goofy-clumsy social loser, but just so Smart and Wonderful that she uses words like “autodidact” and “my nemesis”. Gerwig tries to be knowing and ironic, but she’s just cringeworthy, the most embarrassing moment coming when her character explains her own jokey “pretend rewind” gesture.

After the screening, another audience member said that Gerwig’s character is obviously not functional because of a bipolar disorder. Well, I’ll bet that Gerwig didn’t think that her character was ill – just charmingly idiosyncratic.

The other lead is played by Lola Kirke, who is pretty engaging; I’d like to see her acting with a real script. There’s also excellent acting by the veteran Chernus (Higher Ground, Men in Black 3, Captain Phillips, The Messenger, Love & Other Drugs). Jasmine Cephas Jones is stuck in a one-dimensional role as a hyper-jealous girlfriend, but she pulls it off with distinction. Rebecca Henderson is excellent as the bitter woman from Gerwig’s past.

I’m not the audience for Mistress America since I avoid Baumbach and especially Gerwig; I only saw Mistress America because I went to a mystery screening. Now I haven’t liked any Baumbach movie since his initial indie hit The Squid and the Whale in 2005. I have nothing against a naval-gazing filmmaker filling his movie with neurotic New Yorkers. Woody Allen has made over thirty of those and seven or eight are masterpieces. But – as sharp as Woody’s lines are crafted – you believe that this characters have thought them up on their own, not so with Baumbach.

One scene in Mistress America is inspired and true to the characters – a bitter woman confronts the clueless Gerwig character with a grudge from high school. But that wonderful moment isn’t worth the nails-on-the-chalkboard experience of the film as a whole. Skip Mistress America (and any upcoming Baumbach/Gerwig project, too, for that matter).

IRRATIONAL MAN: not bad, but empty

August 22, 2015 by movie gourmet

Woody Allen’s latest, Irrational Man, is about a burn-out who revives his joie de vivre by committing a very grave crime, in the process self-administering a shot of metaphorical adrenaline. That’s all there is in Irrational Man, an entirely plot-driven movie. Skip it.

To be sure, as one would expect with a Woody Allen movie, it is well-acted. Joaquin Phoenix plays the kind of iconoclastic academic whose womanizing and drinking was part of his dashing charm until he sagged into middle age. The ever-lively Parker Posey is a faculty member who is bored with her life and her marriage. Emma Stone plays the precocious but impressionable coed. Besides the cast, the best thing about Irrational Man is the music, especially a wonderfully raucous version of The In Crowd by the Ramsey Lewis Trio.

Here’s my discussion on Woody Allen and his filmmaking career. Despite Irrational Man, I’m a fan.

[SPOILER ALERT: I don’t understand how it’s possible to make a non-exciting movie scene centered around Russian Roulette, but we don’t even momentarily cringe at this one. Maybe it’s the combination of having to explain what Russian Roulette IS (to a character who had somehow made it to college without hearing of Russian Roulette), and then having the ONE CHARACTER who we all know is going to make it to the climax of the movie pull the trigger at the mid-point. Yawn.]