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Movie Review: Hall Pass
- Details
- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Reviews
- Published on Saturday, 26 February 2011 20:58
- Written by Lloyd Carroll
Hall Pass
Directed by: Peter & Bobby Farrelly
Starring: Owen Wilson, Jason Sudeikis, Jenna Fischer & Christina Applegate
By Lloyd Carroll
The brotherly directing team of Peter and Bobby Farrelly, who have brought us Something About Mary, Shallow Hal, Kingpin and Me, Myself & Irene among others, are back after a fairly long period of dormancy with Hall Pass. As has long been their wont, there is the usual amount of defecation, flatulence, vomiting and masturbation jokes and sight gags, but it seems as if they’ve gone to the well one time too often because the humor feels forced and contrived where in the past it seemed to flow seamlessly with the plot.
Rick (Owen Wilson) and Fred (Jason Sudeikis) are childhood friends from Providence, RI (the Farrellys’ hometown and the locale for nearly all of their films, although a lot of filming took place in Atlanta) and sell real estate and insurance, respectively. Rick is happily married to Maggie (Jenna Fischer) and has three kids while Fred (Jason Sudeikis) is similarly content with his wife, Grace (Christina Applegate).
Both guys, though, drive their wives nuts with their habit of ogling attractive women that they see in the street or in a supermarket. Maggie and Grace fear that their hubbies are getting a little bored with them. When they explain their fears to their friend, motivational speaker/psychologist Dr. Lucy (Joy Behar of ABC’s daytime talk show, The View), she tells them that they should give their men a hall pass. The expression, long used by students for giving them permission to go to the bathroom during class time, means in this case giving Rick and Fred a week off from marriage so that they can pretend to be single.
Rick is not happy with his wife’s proposal to spice up their lives, but Fred is all in after Grace gives him his hall pass. Their wives agree to go to Cape Cod for a week while Rick and Fred try to recapture their golden single days of a decade ago. Not surprisingly, they find that the realities of being alone don’t measure up with their fantasies.
Hall Pass generates some laughs and the film is watchable because of the film’s cast. Owen Wilson normally plays the goofball party animal in flicks, but he is surprisingly credible as the guy who is a homebody at heart. Jason Sudeikis, best known for being current cast member of NBC’s Saturday Night Live, is terrific playing Rick’s gung-ho wingman and taking the abuse and humiliation that comes with the role. Sudeikis reminds me in many ways of a charter SNL cast member who has gone on to have an enduring film and television career: Dan Aykroyd.
The film’s best moments come towards the end when veteran supporting actor Richard Jenkins shows up as the guys’ longtime friend, the eternal bachelor Coakley. Coakley, with his porkpie hat, black t-shirt and jeans, can read which women in a bar or dance club are interested in hooking up the way that quarterback Peyton Manning can read the most complicated of NFL defenses.
The biggest problem of Hall Pass is that it is rather predictable. It is not a major revelation that once people get married they still can find others attractive and even occasionally be a bit flirtatious. Frankly, there is nothing unnatural nor unhealthy about that. It is not giving away the store to report that Rick and Fred, who have always loved their wives, have a greater appreciation for them at the end of the movie. The Farrellys always make their lead characters easy for us to root for despite the trouble that they get themselves into.
I’ll give Hall Pass a passing grade in spite of its many flaws.
The Bartered Bride Review
- Details
- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Reviews
- Published on Thursday, 24 February 2011 09:49
- Written by Jack Angstreich
On the afternoon of February 20th, 2011, at the Peter Jay Sharp Theater (where the acoustics are excellent) at Lincoln Center, I attended an enjoyable performance of Bedřich Smetana's lovely comic opera, The Bartered Bride, a collaboration between theMetropolitan Opera and theJuilliard School, sung in English to a libretto translated by the distinguished poet and critic J.D. McClatchy.
Stephen Wadsworth's production was fundamentally uninteresting as theater but, then, rendering opera truly compelling as a total artwork is a formidable challenge, only rarely accomplished (as, for example, by Robert Wilson, in the Metropolitan Opera's recent version of Lohengrin). (One can only presume that the esteemed early film version of The Bartered Bride by the master cinéaste, Max Ophüls, is artistically the most successful effort in setting this opera.) Benjamin Millepied's choreography here was a pleasure but what there was of it was rather modest in its contribution and in no way imaginatively integrated into the production as a whole.
Great Music & Milestones
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- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Reviews
- Published on Tuesday, 22 February 2011 18:31
- Written by Lloyd Carroll
There are a number of milestones that occurred recently that should be of interest to a lot o
f Baby Boomers.
At the annual Toy Fair, held last month at New York City's Javits Convention Center, Ohio Art celebrated the 50th anniversary of Etch-A-Sketch -- which, for a lot us, was our first introduction to drawing.
Also at Toy Fair, Discovery Bay Games introduced its "Saturday Night Live" trivia board game (an iPad version is expected later in the year) in honor of SNL’s 35th birthday. The first show aired October 11, 1975 with guest host George Carlin, and musical guests Janis Ian and Billy Preston.
Herb Alpert & Lani Hall
I Feel You
(Concord Jazz)
Trumpeter Herb Alpert has never received the critical praise accorded to Miles Davis or Chet Baker because he made no apologies about aiming for mainstream pop instead of the snootier jazz market. Ironically, both Davis And Baker were big fans of his.
Alpert turns 76 this year, and he shows no signs of slowing down. Having sold A&M Records -- the company he and his partner, Jerry Moss, founded in 1962 -- to Universal Music Group back in the ‘90s, he has been able to dedicate himself to making music without distractions.
"I Feel You" is a rare chance for Herb to work with his wife of 38 years, Lani Hall, who was the expressive lead singer for Sergio Mendes and Brasil ‘66. ("Mas Que Nada," "Pretty World," "Fool On The Hill," and "Night and Day" should help jar some memories).
A&M Records is part of Alpert’s DNA, and he revisits some of the label’s early history by recording a pair of Chris Montez hits, "Call Me" and "There Will Never Be Another You" with Hall and him sharing lead vocals. He also pays tribute to his old backing group, the Tijuana Brass, with an updated, more somber version of "What Now My Love."
The two best tracks are covers of the Beatles’ "Here Comes The Sun" (whose lyrics are all the more poignant given the lousy winter we’ve endured) and Van Morrison’s "Moondance" which gets a Sergio Mendes-style samba facelift thanks to Alpert and Hall.
I Feel You is classy stuff, which, sadly, is getting harder to find in what is left of the record business.
The Ronettes
Very Best Of
(Sony Legacy)
It is somewhat ironic that as Phil Spector is serving his sentence in California for the murder of actress Lana Clarkson, Legacy Records has begun to re-release the great records he produced in the 1960s.
While Spector was associated with a number of artists, such as the Righteous Brothers and Darlene Love, there is little doubt that his greatest success was with a family vocal trio from Washington Heights, New York: sisters Veronica and Estelle Bennett and their cousin, Nedra Talley, better known as The Ronettes.
Yes, hits as the overplayed "Be My Baby," "Do I Love You?" and "The Best Part of Breakin’ Up" are here, as well as "Walking In The Rain," "Baby, I Love You" and "I Can Hear Music" (which turned out to be bigger hits -- and rightfully so, for Jay & The Americans, Andy Kim, and the Beach Boys).
But what makes this collection special is the number of tracks that have stayed in the vaults for 40 years as "Here I Sit," "Everything Under The Sun" and "You Came, You Saw, You Conquered."
SOS Band
Icon
(Tabu/UME)
Before producers Jimmy "Jam" Harris and Terry Lewis hit it big with Janet Jackson and Alexander O’Neal, their pet project was the Atlanta-based SOS Band. Led by lead singer Mary Davis, the SOS Band was able to merge catchy hooks and intelligent lyrics to create infectious dance records as "Take Your Time (Do It Right)," "Just Be Good To Me," "The Finest," "Sands Of Time," "Just The Way You Like It" and "Weekend Girl."
Icon is a reminder of how the SOS Band has never gotten their due.
Various Artists
Rock & Roll Playground
(Putumayo)
Putumayo is a record company whose primary market is young people, but the company has always found a way to entertain adults as well with their albums. A good case in point is Rock & Roll Playground.
There are some familiar tunes, such as blues guitarist Taj Mahal’s take on Johnny Otis’s "Willie and the Hand Jive" (a tune that was also a hit for Eric Clapton in 1974), Rosie Flores’ rendition of Bobby Darin’s "This Little Girl’s Gone Rocking," and Uncle Rock’s (songwriter/actor Robert Burke Warren’s spoof of Kid Rock) cover of Steppenwolf’s "Magic Carpet Ride."
Toss in uptempo originals as Dan Zanes’ "Let’s Shake," Billy Harley’s "Sleep The Whole Day Through" and Brady Rymer’s "Jump Up," and you have a CD that does both kids and rock proud.
One of the more memorable TV commercials in the 1960s was the Starkist Tuna ads that starred Charlie the Tuna, who was voiced by the late Herschel Bernardi. A few weeks ago, Starkist held an event in Times Square to honor that animated Fish with Good Taste on his 50th birthday. Yes, Charlie did get his AARP card.
The Cinefantastique Round Table 02:07
- Details
- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Reviews
- Published on Tuesday, 22 February 2011 15:16
- Written by Daniel Persons
This week offers a wide-ranging edition of the Cinefantastique Round Table Podcast, including capsule reviews by Dan Persons of three films currently in release: GNOMEO & JULIET, Disney’s animated adaptation of Shakespeare; VANISHING ON 7TH STREET, an independent film with a TWILIGHT ZONE vibe making its way around the country with art house engagements; and WE ARE WHAT WE ARE, a cannibal horror story from IFC Films, currently playing exclusively in New York. Also up for discussion: the news that Michelle Pfeiffer is being courted to play Elizabeth Collins in DARK SHADOWS, the big-screen adaptation of the Gothic soap opera, set to be directed by Tim Burton with Johnny Depp as reluctant vampire Barnabas Collins. And Steve Biodrowski celebrates Christopher Lee’s recent BAFTA Fellowship Award with a double-bill screening of SCREAM OF FEAR and THE GORGON. All this, plus the usual round-up of news, theatrical events, and home video releases.
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