Jude Law

SPY: Melissa McCarthy spoofs Bond

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Melissa McCarthy and John Cusack in SPY
Melissa McCarthy and Jude Law in SPY

Melissa McCarthy spoofs James Bond-type spy movies in the winning comedy Spy. She plays a put-upon back-of-the-house CIA operative who supports a glamorous super spy (Jude Law). She is extremely skilled, but he gets all the credit for their successes. She is so low self-esteemed that even SHE doesn’t recognize her own competence and achievements. Then circumstances pull her out of the basement at Langley and into the field for an operation – and the joke is on everyone else.

McCarthy carries Spy with her gifts for both verbal and physical comedy. She is so damned appealing, and she represents every one of us who has felt underestimated. And NOBODY delivers a filthy insult with more comic effect.

Law is as suave as he can be. Jason Statham sends up his own scowling action hero roles by playing an agent swaggering with macho braggadocio but who really a buffoon. The villainess is played by Rose Byrne, who broke out as a first-rate movie comedienne in last year’s Neighbors; she’s at least as good in Spy. New York City-born swimsuit model Nargis Fakhri has starred in a few Bollywood movies, and she has a rockin’ action sequence here that indicates that she has a future in mainstream American films.

Spy was written and directed by Paul Feig, the creator of Freaks and Geeks who directed the hit picture that McCarthy stole, Bridesmaids , and the hilarious McCarthy vehicle The Heat. In Spy, he starts us off with a Shirley Bassyesque title song, and then parodies all the conventions of the super spy movie genre, one by one.

Spy sustains its laughs throughout. It’s maybe not quite as funny as The Heat, but it’s a an entertaining diversion, and a great chance to enjoy the unique talent of Melissa McCarthy.

Dom Hemingway: full throttle into a brick wall

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dom hemingway
The title character in Dom Hemingway is always in a determined hurry, one of those guys whose brow is always 12 inches in front of his feet.  He is played by Jude Law as a force of nature who takes a lickin’ and keeps on tickin’.  Dom Hemingway is a none-too-smart professional safe-cracker who has taken the rap for his partners and is just getting out after twelve years in the slammer. He’s been fantasizing about what he wants to do when he gets out, and he intends to do it all in as compressed a time period as possible. Unfortunately, as he tells a small boy, “Dom is English for unlucky sonofabitch”.  His headlong onslaught into misadventure is ribald, profane and pretty funny.

This movie is not a masterpiece.  Think of Dom Hemingway as The Wolf of Wall Street Lite.  Still, Jude Law is very watchable and very funny, as is Richard E. Grant as his almost-as-unlucky and almost-as-dim buddy.  Director Richard Shepard made a much better movie in 2005, The Matador with Pierce Brosnan and Greg Kinnear.  Still, Dom Hemingway works as a pedal-to-the-metal romp.

I saw Dom Hemingway three weeks ago at Cinequest 2014.

DVD/Stream of the Week: Side Effects

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Jude Law in SIDE EFFECTS

Side Effects is a psychological thriller that keeps thriller-lovers on the their toes by constantly changing its focus.  First one character is on the verge of falling apart, then another and then another.  Initially, we think that the story is about mental illness and prescription psych meds, but then it evolves into something else quite different.   The plot might have seemed implausible in the hands of a lesser director, but Steven Soderbergh pulls it off with panache.

Soderbergh got superb performances by his leads: Jude Law, Rooney Mara and Catherine Zeta-Jones.  Mara, so striking in The Social Network and The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, serves notice that she is a perfect fit for psychological dramas; she can turn  apparent fragility and unknowability into menace like few other film actresses.  And few actors can take a character from charming confidence to a desperate meltdown like Law does here.  Zeta-Jones shows that she play a frigid mistress of the universe who is passionate and needy underneath.  The supporting players are all perfectly cast.

The insistent music by Thomas Newman, while never obvious, is an integral part of the suspense.  Soderbergh, a master who has repeatedly elevated genre films, has another winner in Side Effects.

Side Effects is available on DVD from Netflix and streaming from Vudu,YouTube and GooglePlay.

Side Effects: a thriller for thriller-lovers

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Side Effects is a psychological thriller that keeps thriller-lovers on the their toes by constantly changing its focus.  First one character is on the verge of falling apart, then another and then another.  Initially, we think that the story is about mental illness and prescription psych meds, but then it evolves into something else quite different.   The plot might have seemed implausible in the hands of a lesser director, but Steven Soderbergh pulls it off with panache.

Soderbergh got superb performances by his leads: Jude Law, Rooney Mara and Catherine Zeta-Jones.  Mara, so striking in The Social Network and The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo, serves notice that she is a perfect fit for psychological dramas; she can turn  apparent fragility and unknowability into menace like few other film actresses.  And few actors can take a character from charming confidence to a desperate meltdown like Law does here.  Zeta-Jones shows that she play a frigid mistress of the universe who is passionate and needy underneath.  The supporting players are all perfectly cast.

The insistent music by Thomas Newman, while never obvious, is an integral part of the suspense.  Soderbergh, a master who has repeatedly elevated genre films, has another winner in Side Effects.

360: 11 characters plus 11 life choices equal 1 snoozer

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Eleven (count ’em, eleven) main characters traipse through Paris, London, Bratislava and Denver and each faces choice that can change the direction of a life.  Unfortunately, we don’t care that much about any of the characters and their stories aren’t that compelling or even original.  It’s not a bad movie, but the story (stories) make it a snoozer.

360 is otherwise well-made by acclaimed director Fernando Meirelles (The Constant Gardener) and well-acted by an international ensemble cast that includes Jude Law and Rachel Weisz (completely unrecognizable behind a full set of bangs).  The two most interesting characters are the father of a missing crime victim (Anthony Hopkins) and a convicted sex offender in a very fragile recovery (Ben Foster).  Foster (The Messenger, Rampart, 11:14) is one of my favorite actors, as is also Jemel Debbouze (Let It Rain, Angel-A, Amelie).  But even these actors can’t really punch up a story that isn’t there.

Hugo: Scorsese’s revelatory 3D tale

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Martin Scorsese’s Hugo is both a delight and a lessons in the possibilities of 3D in the hands of a master filmmaker.  The story follows a young orphan living in the bowels of a 1920s Paris train station who strives to survive by his wits, keep his independence and solve the puzzle of an discarded automaton.

Scorsese’s use of 3D is revelatory.  We feel entirely transported to WITHIN the worlds of the station, of its industrial inner workings and Paris itself.  When the orphan walks into a bookstore, we are immersed ourselves in the many stacks of books.  Scorsese’s 3D always works to advance the story, not to distract us with assaultive gimmicks.

As an extra treat for movie lovers, the very story becomes one of movie making, film as art and film preservation.  We see the early movie magic of George Melies, especially his 1902 A Trip the Moon. We also see Lumiere’s 1896 The Arrival of a Train, and the main characters even sneak into Harold Lloyd’s 1923 Safety Last.

Sacha Baron Cohen is very, very funny as the boy’s foil, the bitter and preening station policeman.  The cast is very good, with the most pleasing turns by Emily Mortimer, Helen McCrory and Richard Griffiths.

Hugo makes my list of Best Movies of 2011.