20 jayplay
thursday, august 28, 2003
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reviews in brief.
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Ashton Kutcher, as a publishing house employee, and Terrence Stamp as his boss, star in My Boss's Daughter.
MY BOSS'S DAUGHTER
PG-13. 85 minutes. South Wind 12
In the romance comedy My Boss's Daughter, Ashton Kutcher (the not-so-bright character in That 70's Show, Just Married, and...well, he plays the not-so-bright character in every movie he does) stumbles over furniture, his own feet and costar Tara Reid (American Pie).
Unfortunately, the movie also stumbles over itself, making for an awkward mess that audiences will have little interest in sitting through.
Kutcher plays Tom, a kind push-over who has an unexplained job at a publishing house. Tom has a workplace crush on his co-worker, Lisa (Reid). Lisa happens to be the daughter of the head of the publishing house, Jack Taylor (Terrence Stamp, The Limey). When Tom finally gets the nerve to talk to Lisa, he ends up agreeing to watch her father's house while he's away for the weekend.
Upon arriving at the house, Tom realizes he's bitten off more than he can chew when dealing
with his boss' anal-retentive ways, nice furniture and sickly owl.
As soon as Tom's boss leaves, a coterie of off-beat guests stop by the house, making for scene after scene of non-stop non-hilarity.
For a comedy, this movie has a difficult time finding its style of humor — it dabbles in prattfalls, bathroom, racist, drug and alcohol humor, and jokes that target the disabled. All of these different styles are horribly unfunny, and at times even offensive.
The only thing worse than the jokes in this movie is the acting. Reid moves from scene to scene reciting her lines with almost no emotion at all. Both Kutcher and Stamp play the same characters they always play, Kutcher the bumbling nice guy and Stamp the icy British guy. Molly Shannon (Saturday Night Live) goes into over-the-top gear as she tries to hammer home each line playing Jack's secretary, Audrey. Her forced energy exhausts rather than entertains.
David Koechner (Saturday Night Live) is the only actor in this picture who seems to have any sense of what is funny. One of
the most underrated comedic actors in entertainment today, Koechner plays Speed, Audrey's friend, whose white-trash wisdom and hilarious pool exits afford the only few giggles of the movie.
Perhaps the most disappointing aspect of this movie is that David Zucker directed it. This man created Airplane! and The Naked Gun, two of the funniest movies ever. It is disheartening to think that Zucker's name is not just associated with this awkward flop, but that he helmed it as well.
AMERICAN WEDDING
Cal Creek Grade:D+
R. 102 minutes, South Wind 12
The ability to gross you out to the point of wanting to vomit, make you laugh like a kid and deliver scenes filled with the sweet innocence of youth all in one movie made the American Pie movies work. American Wedding, the third film in the series, lives up to its predecessors and, at times, surprisingly
exceeds them.
Jim (Jason Biggs) and former band geek Michelle (Alyson Hannigan) are getting married. Most of the old gang returns for a third helping of the franchise.
The movie revolves around everyone's favorite cretin Steve Stifler (Sean William Scott), who tries to sneak his way into the wedding, even though Michelle had hoped it would be Stiflerfree. Stifler quickly sets his eyes upon Michelle's beautiful sister (January Jones), and his willingness to impress her makes some positive changes in him but also gets him eating dog feces.
The series shows some signs of wear, but when the film focuses on the adorable Biggs and Hannigan, it becomes a sweet and charming relief from the grossout aspect that comes with these movies. Since American Pie directors Chris and Paul Weitz moved on to bigger and better things (About a Boy), director Jesse Dylan (How High) takes over the reins.
American Wedding is good enough to fit nicely into the American Pie family, but one can only hope that this will be the last serving.
—Lindsey Ramsey
Grade: B
DIRTY PRETTY THINGS R. 94 minutes, Liberty Hall
The rapturous star of Amelie, Audrey Tautou, returns to the screen as Senay, a Turkish chambermaid who works on the cleaning crew at a West London hotel. One night, Senay's co-worker, Okwe, finds a human heart floating in one of the toilets - the first clue to a crime Senay finds to be much more sinister than the drug-dealing and prostitution that go on behind the closed doors of the hotel.
This gritty crime thriller from Stephen Frears zeroes in on the struggles of the modern London working class, making it especially relevant in these economically fragile times. Already a critical favorite, the film should continue the Frears streak that
began with 2000's marvelous adaptation of Nick Hornby's High Fidelity.
Stephen Shupe Not reviewed
FREDDY VS. JASON R. 98 minutes. South Wind 12
During the late 80s, many a teen-aged boy wondered: who would win in the fight between Freddy Krueger and Jason Voorhies?
All those boys finally get an answer with Freddy vs. Jason, possibly the most entertaining film of both horror series.
In this encounter, the children of Elm Street have forgotten about Freddy Krueger because their parents have wiped his existence out off all memories, databases and files in the town. For some reason, this renders Freddy powerless. Freddy begins having Jason Voorhies, taking form of his mother, convict the hockey-masked killer to Elm Street to kill people so will remember the maj Freddy once maintained they remember, Freddy wi his power back.
While the plot is ridiculous and the acting sub par, the movie still works for one reason: it's not really a horror film, it's an extremely dark comedy that almost mocks the previous 17 films. Various "teen" actors throughout the film drop several clever lines.
The action scenes are quite entertaining. Each gore fest delivers both high-flying special effects and high body counts that leave the audience delightfully nauseated.
Cal Creek Grade: B+
THE ITALIAN JOB
PG-13, 105 minutes, South Wind 12
One of the summer's most purely entertaining movies, The Italian Job begins and ends with a heist and coasts along in between with charm, wit and a script that actually works.
Y