Exceedingly average ensemble comedy that will son be forgotten in the sands of time and past comedies that you only remember when flipping channels at 2 in the morning. The basic premise is that one couple want to save their marriage at a resort that you obviously have to sell your soul to go to, but need three other couples to go with them to get a nice group rate. Yes, they really want to save their marriage, but they're cheap. I think you have your first problem right there. When they arrive it turns out the fun time is put on hold because couples group sessions are mandatory. Whoops! But at least we got to go fr cheap, you suckers.
The couples obvious come out of the typical canned character department at the studio. You have the wired ones who are too cheap (Jason Bateman and Kristen Bell), the poor recently divorced guy (Faizon Love), the couple on the rocks that look like they're going to have affairs, but don't (Jon Favreau and Kristen Davis) and the de-factor leader and his wife (Vinve Vaughn and Malin Akerman). Jean Reno plays the messiah of self help, sporting a speedo which has rendered an image which I never wanted to see during my existence on this world. His right hand man is Jango Fett, for all you nerds out there. Oh and Ken Jeong is in this too, competing with Jason Bateman for the "I'm In Everything" award.
During the first five minutes you know exactly how everything is going to play out. It eventually gets there the way you thought it would with the same cliches and processed script writing that turns us into psychics. I want to call this a middle aged Forgetting Sarah Marshall. Holy shit! Sarah Marshall's in this! Weird, huh?
The movie did have some funny parts, but they were few and far between with jokes and sequences that fail (mainly Favreau attempting to masturbate twice and the whole shark thing). It's an acceptable movie to kill two hours, but after a day you will file it away with such classics as anything Vince Vaughn has been in during the last two years.
Plot: Tommy Lee Jones=Texas Ranger (stretch). Longhorn cheerleaders= murder witnesses. Tommy Lee Jones + murder witnesses = hilarity when worlds collide.
Paper thin plot that fails miserably. Thank god he followed this up with No Country For Old Men or I would have to call him Cuba. A pure shit sandwich kids.
I Hope They Serve Beer In Hell is yet another in the continuation of films trying to carry the jock of the film known as Bachelor Party, failing miserably in the process. The basic premise is that Drew (Jesse Bradford) is getting married, but his fiance doesn't want him going to a strip club three hours away. The local strippers are fine, but not elsewhere. Maybe she worked there or something. I don't know, but serial sex pervert Tucker (Max Czuchry)
has other plans, which include using his friends impending marriage as an excuse to go far, far away and hump a midget stripper. Throw in Drew (Geoff Stults), who is the token guy who just got dumped and hates all women (remember Bachelor Party?). All hell breaks loose, there's anger, there's midget sex, and everything works out in the end. Right?
Now the first mistake that will happen is the comparisons with The Hangover. First, The Hangover was actually funny with a plot that worked. I Hope They Serve Beer In Hell is shit, a massive, steaming pile of crap that just sits there waiting for the next crap scene that makes little sense. The acting is garbage, the script is worthy of a nice flushing with characters that are not even one dimension. Can we go to fractions on this? The characters did the same schtick for the 90 plus minutes of the film, even until they have their moments of clarity. This movie goes no where, which is fine when the film is actually funny. Hell will be 24 hour showings of this film and Spider-man 3 over and over again. Hitler is probably watching this film right now.
Don Siegel's follow up to the legendary Dirty Harry finds the title character Charley Varrick (Walter Matthau) down on his luck to the point that he hatches a plan to rob a small town bank. Charley and his gang (featuring Harry alum Andrew "Scorpio" Robinson) pull off the robbery, though with some hitches. But there's a problem- the bank served as a Mafia money laundering operation and, of course, the mob is after Charley in the form of a sadistic hit man (Joe Don Baker) and the head of the bank (John "The Mayor" Vernon).
One of the things about Siegel's films is that he loves to support the anti-hero. Dirty Harry, The Shootist, Escape From Alcatraz each contain a character that isn't the hero in the white hat, yet we sure as hell cheer for them. Charley is no different. He's a robber, a manipulator, and he's willing to sacrifice people to achieve his goals. We still cheer for the guy until the bitter end.
Matthau is perfect as Charley, a sharp guy dumped into a situation beyond anything he could have imagined. He downplays the character in a cool and calm manner, even though there's a hint of being scared to death of what's out to get him. The remaining cast is also great, particularly Robinson as a dumb kid that's stereotyped in being the guns blazing proponent, never fully trusting Charley or anyone else for that matter. Joe Don Baker relishes his role as the cowboy hit man that slaps women around, then beds them as he rolls like a tornado toward his goal. And John Vernon is John Vernon, the greatest authority figure in 1970's cinema.
Even though some of the plot devices get silly (and dull what would have been a perfect film) Charley Varrick is a thriller that doesn't feel like a thriller; a action piece that doesn't feel like an action piece. It's there to be consumed with no definable genre other than cops and robbers and goons and hoods. This is one of those great 1970's films that have been buried to posterity.
I was haunted while watching Papillon. When Papillon (Steve McQueen) is stuck in solitary confinement, I kept thinking back to the Cooler King from The Great Escape. Shockingly, I discovered that Nazi were more humane than French colonists in Guyana. Weird, huh?
Papillon follows the prison term of the title character, nicknamed for the butterfly tattoo on his chest. Sent to Devils Island for life Papillon strikes a deal with Dega (Dustin Hoffman) that in exchange for protection Dega will finance an escape attempt. Dega is loaded and carries his money in a new fangled prison wallet called his ass. Talk about money in need of laundering. The film continues to be one screw job after another as the innocent Papillon tries to get off of Devil's Island.
You can see the complaints some people may have with this film. Sure McQueen and Hoffman have little chemistry, but on screen it's basically a business arrangement that turns into a strained friendship because of all the failures the pair go through. A massive film directed by Patton's Franklin Schaffner Papillon does drag in some points, particularly the solitary scenes. These could be considered too much, but McQueen really expresses the role of the anti-Cooler King, ready to break and eating insects in the dark. It's too long because any kind of confinement is too long.
Really, Papillon isn't the Great Escape II. It's more of the breaking of men in the middle of the jungle. I can't forget another piece of casting brilliance with Vic Tayback playing a French guard. Dingy!
