20130928: Comedy Review--Next Stop Wonderland
- Fundamentals
- American live action feature length film released in 1998, rated R, 104 minutes, comedy, drama, romance, chick flick.
- IMDB: 6.5/10.0 from 3,389 users. Estimated budget: one million USD.
- Rotten Tomatoes: 74% on the meter; 68% liked it from 3,695 audience ratings.
- Written and directed by: Brad Anderson.
- Starring: Hope Davis as Erin Castleton, Alan Gelfant as Alan Monteiro (the plumber/diver), Philip Seymour Hoffman as Sean (the ex), Callie Thorne as Cricket, Ken Cheeseman as Rick, Pamela Hart as Berit, Diane Becket as Seana, Holland Taylor as Piper Castleton, Robert Klein as Arty Lesser, Victor Argo as Frank, Roger Rees as Ray Thornback (Alan's professor), Cara Buono as Julie, Jose Zuniga as Andre de Silva.
- Setup and Plot
- Erin's boyfriend (Sean) has dumped her. I see why immediately. Why she would ever do anything with Sean is not so easy to see.
- The film is irritating and all too self-aware; incidental music is all too often wretched.
- Halloween at the hospital: the nursing staff scares the hell out of the toddlers.
- Erin's mother Piper places a personal ad for Erin in the local newspaper without advising Erin.
- Sub-plot: the aquarium where Alan is working is planning an addition. Not everyone likes this, and the aquarium grounds are vandalized. Arty Lesser and his construction company want to build a prison there.
- At an aquarium party, Frank asks Alan to kill one of the aquarium attractions and Alan's money loan from Frank will have the interest removed.
- The ad does its work; Erin gets 60 messages on the first time she checks. Yikes, so many people, so many losers, at least in their telephone presentations of themselves. She skips most of these, and the skips most of those that she meets. The men she meets are unacceptable for one reason or another. The Emerson quote (a foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds) was a deal-breaker for three of the possibles, one of which was Alan's brother. She notices that two men watching her with a third were men she had met before.
- 'The only person who can help you is yourself.' Right. Women do not need men. Point asserted again and again and again.
- Seventy-eight minutes into the film, she still has not met Alan, but a Brazilian man (Andre) is very interested in her. Erin likes Brazil and Brazilian music, so that goes smoothly for a time. Alan is with Julie; this is doomed from the start. Alan with Julie heats up for a moment; so does Erin with Andre.
- Sean comes back and wants to re-unite with Erin. No such luck.
- Andre is about to go back to Brazil, and wants Erin to come with. She gears up to do this.
- Alan gets to meet Arty Lesser, who tells Alan that he is at a turning point in his life.
- Erin gets held up in traffic. She tries to make it using a train. More rotten camera work.
- Missed connections. Erin does not go to Brazil. Alan does not solidify his position with the big-time gangster Lesser.
- During the last two minutes, Erin and Alan connect on the Emerson quote, and go for a walk on the beach.
- Conclusions
- Who cares?
- One sentence summary: It was not good, it was not bad, it was as interesting as porridge.
- Three stars of five.
- Scores
- Cinematography: 4/10 Never in focus. The poor framing and wobbly camera movement is distracting and counterproductive as well as amateurish.
- Sound: 7/10 Some of the jazz by named artists is rather good, but does not really add much.
- Acting: 4/10 Hope Davis is uniformly bad; the extra layer of chain smoking was a layer I could have done without. Holland Taylor was fine, Alan Gelfant was OK. Hoffman was as irritating as usual. Just about nothing seems to have enough buoyancy to counterbalance the dead weight of Hope Davis.
- Screenplay: 6/10 Slow developing. Is the payoff worth the long wait? No. So many sub-plots were left unresolved. The Brazilian trip goes down the tubes. Too many characters, too many dangling ends.
No comments:
Post a Comment