Z is for... [part 2]

If there's been a zombie apocalypse and you're road-tripping alone though the wasteland, you could do worse than run into Tallahassee (Woody Harrelson), a bourbon-swilling bad-boy butt-kicker with a really cool car. This is where the careful hero of Zombieland, a kid nicknamed Columbus (Jesse Eisenberg), finds himself early in the film, and you can hardly blame him for hitching a ride with this swaggering Alpha Male. Still, they have their hands full not only with gibbering zombies but also with two sisters (Emma Stone and Abigail Breslin) who will stop at nothing to reach a Disneyland-like amusement park in L.A. Although Zombieland gets off to a rocky start with Columbus's overly-cute narration (he's got a list of rules for surviving in the zombie world), it settles into an amusing comedy, regularly interrupted by bouts of blood-letting. The road-trip stuff is enough fun that when the movie does arrive at its version of Disneyland, the air goes out of it a little; sure, there's a giant zombie blowout, with entrails flying, but it's not quite the same. Director Ruben Fleischer keeps the gags coming, although the movie is often funnier in its odd little asides (both Eisenberg and Harrelson are expert at this) than in its official jokes. Comic high point: an interlude at the home of a very famous movie star, who plays himself--and we'll leave the spoiler unspoiled, in case anybody hasn't heard about this funny extended cameo. (synopsis provided by Amazon.com)

released 2009

directed by Ruben Fleischer

Easy A [2010]

High school girl, Olive, tells her friend a lie about losing her virginity – the lie is overheard – overblown – and suddenly everyone thinks Olive is a slut and ostracized like in The Scarlett Letter. Olive embraces the persona – allows others to “use” her and brag that they slept with her to hide various issues (homosexuality & feeling undesirable) – until this backfires in a huge way.

What I really liked about EASY A was the idea that “it’s none of your fucking business when and if I lose my virginity” – which is something I quite appreciate because there are too many films that revolve around teens losing their virginity and the glorification of it.

I liked Olive’s family, Thomas Hayden Church as the aloof teacher and Emma Stone as Olive. The writing was pretty solid for a teen flick – though it was a bit thin and cliché – it wasn’t bad.

What I didn’t care for was the webcam self-aware narrative aspect – Olive claims that she’s invisible – and writes it off as not being cliché high school girl film – but the entire film even when she was getting all the attention – she was still not listened to and not cared about for herself. It may have been me – but it seemed like almost every time she spoke – she was interrupted or ignored. Even when she embraced her bad girl persona – she found a certain level of self-respect – but no real respect from others.

I didn’t like how some of the characters were razor thin - even Olive was a bit thin. It took her no time to invent the persona and just accept and act the part. I would assume more outrage and denial would’ve gone on in real life before the embrace and full turn into the mega-slut persona.

Also, I know that 80’s romantic comedies and John Hughes films are ingrained in certain people’s hearts – but the references in this film were unnecessary. Yes, an acknowledgement of those films is fine – but you should create your own memorable scene instead of co-opting a famous previously used scene – you may think you can’t do better than what has been done – but you’ll never know unless you try. Just try.

[Guess it showed back up again - - so here you go]

Overall – it sounds like I have more complaints than love for this movie – but I really liked it for what it was. It was cute and fun at times – though it was flawed – I can appreciate it.

Easy A [2010]

Son of a bitch...

I had a whole entry written up about my likes and dislikes and they were well thought out and well put and interesting - published it Thursday for Saturday... but Blogger apparently lost it all. I have a habit of thinking my reviews out in my head - writing them out in a Word doc on the side while I'm doing other things - and then once done - I copy and paste - schedule - and close (and not save) the word doc and forget. So, my review for EASY A is lost. Okay... Here's the rundown...
It's a good movie - I agreed that the whole approach of "who cares when you lose your virginity" approach - sick of those other teen movies that obsess about it. I liked the acting for the most part - even if I felt the characters were written without a lot of depth. I liked the questions raised about perception versus reality of which is worse. Didn't care for how no one ever seemed to listen to Olive at all - even when she was getting the attention - that really bothered me. Also, didn't find it realistic how quick Olive embraced her "bad" girl persona - a little bit of time denying would've been more realistic instead of going out and going nuts buying corsets to wear to school.

Zombieland [2009]

I was hesitant to see Zombieland in the theater – as it looked like it’d either be really good – or dreadfully bad. Sometimes those stylized “hip at the time” kind of films – especially comedies - can lead you in with it’s sweet promises – only for you to walk out cursing that you were duped again.

The United States has been overrun by zombies. An overly cautious boy named Columbus (Jesse Eisenberg) meets a violent Twinkie obsessed guy named Tallahassee (Woody Harrelson)– they join up to travel and to survive. They meet a girl named Wichita (Emma Stone) and her younger sister named Little Rock (Abigail Breslin)– and a cat and mouse chase develops.

This film tries to have some varying themes and zombie like messages – but that’s coated so very thin – that it’s almost not worth mentioning. The main theme would probably be the detachment of people from each other – given the fact that Columbus was basically a shut-in – and they all call themselves by the town they grew up in – in order not to get too attached to one another.

The film is pretty much all fun and zombie killing from there. It provides some VERY solid laughs – some good zombie kills – and a special cameo that was quite satisfying. The movie felt like a video game at times – which is fine – but it does lack substance for it.

Everybody was as good as can be expected in their respective parts – with a special nod to Woody Harrelson who hits a big home run in the role of Tallahassee. The performances – really don’t equate into the liking of the film – you just basically don’t want to follow around a bunch of unlikable characters – so as long as the parts are written right – there’s no problems.

As Columbus ticks off his “rules to survive” there’s graphics showing up on the screen – and demonstrations of what he’s talking about. The graphics don’t added or detracted from my personal enjoyment of the film – but in other films I know it’s really gotten to me. Don’t try and be too cute or try to bee too cool “look at us” – or else I’ll turn off right away.

There's plot holes the size of something very big and there’s a couple of really stupid decisions made my some of the characters – that you just want to shout at the screen and ask “why?” – but it’s no more dumb than giant robots who can transform into stuff in order to hide in plain site but not transforming when they need to because they want to play peek-a-boo around the corner of a fucking house while that stupid fucking kid is having some inane conversation with his dumber than rocks family in that one really fucking stupid film that makes me want to punch myself in the head over and over and over and over... Sorry.

Zombieland is fun – just plain fun – I won’t tell you to turn off your mind and enjoy it because life doesn’t work that way – but if you want to watch it I won’t tell you not to – if you are on the fence I would give you a nudge toward the ‘watch it’ side – if you have no interest I won’t tell you you’re missing a lot. In my book - Woody and the cameo make it worth it - I’m giving it a solid 4 out of 5.