Bachelorette (USA) Directed by Leslye Headland Written by Leslye Headland Starring Kirsten Dunst; Isla Fisher; Lizzy Kaplan; Rebel Wilson; James Marsden; Adam Scott; Hayes MacArthur; Kyle Bornheimer; Horatio Sands; Arden Myrin; Andrew Rannels; Ella Rae Peck

Comparisons to The Hangover and, especially, Bridesmaids are, of course, inescapable. Written and directed by Leslye Headland, the film varies very little from the course one would expect. In this one the bride-to-be, Becky (Rebel Wilson), is the overweight/ugly duckling in the group, cruelly nicknamed Pig-Face by her supposed friends since high school, a fact that is frankly hard to get beyond, and one that is reinforced by their current day attitude toward her. The three bridesmaids we actually get to know (there are more but we are told they aren’t part of this group of friends) are insecure/unhappy/hard-partying/slutty/control-freak/mean girl blonde Regan (Kristen Dunst); super dumb/slutty/unhappy/hard-partying red head Katie (Isla Fisher); and hard-partying/slutty/unhappy/angry/sarcastic brunette girl Gena (Lizzy Kaplan).

After some minor build up, the film revolves around the ensuing chaos surrounding the drug and alcohol fueled night before the nuptials. There are some laughs to be had, and the cast is solid, though it’s difficult to know whether to applaud the chances the film takes by focusing on this threesome of largely unlikeable protagonists, or chastise the creators for using a plus sized, average looking woman as a butt of jokes. Is this approach akin to resorting to the lowest form of mean, cheap shot humor, or is it merely doing the same thing as poking fun at Zach Galifinakis’ overweight character in The Hangover or Melissa McCarthy’s in Bridesmaids?

Perhaps because Becky is painted as something of a good natured innocent as opposed to the previously mentioned characters, who have their own set of oddball baggage and can be offensive in their own right, there is something different here that feels gratuitously cruel? In the same breath, is it possible that there is some level of deeper commentary going on about the nature of female relationships? Is making a comedy about women who are angry, cynical, promiscuous substance abusers some form of equal opportunity? There are certainly enough examples of their male counterparts to point to in modern comedies.

Regardless, Bachelorette does a fair job of weaving in some reasonable scenes having to do with the disillusionment and unhappiness of the three bridesmaids. In fact, Caplan, Dunst, and Fisher are strong enough that there is the feeling that the entire wedding set-up could have been dropped for a more narrow film about single women in their late twenties/early thirties who are dissatisfied with their life options. Since the Becky character isn’t allowed the full breadth of a living, breathing human being, the artifice of the wedding seems like one big excuse to put the people the film really cares about in one place with a common mission.

What results is a short-shrifting of both the friendship between the bridesmaids, as well as their budding relationships with the male love interest characters played by Adam Scott, James Marsden, and Kyle Bornheimer. While there are some relatively funny bits, including some requisite over-the-top/gross-out shocker moments; and admittedly there is also a certain vicarious thrill coming from observing attractive women behaving badly; the constrictions imposed by genre come with a hefty price as far too much time is devoted to the quest that is set up prior to the wedding.

Ultimately, the film seems like one that might have been a potentially interesting and funnier indie piece about the friendships and love/sexual relationships of a small group of young women, but instead comes off feeling overly packaged and uncomfortably fitted into a new sub genre that smothers the best parts of the film and reduces the story to something far less than it might have been.

A Damsel in Distress (USA) Directed by Whit Stillman  Written by Whit Stillman  Starring Analeigh Tipton; Greta Gerwig; Carrie MacLemore; Megalyn Echikunwoke; Ryan Metcalf; Caitlin Fitzgerald; Zach Woods; Aubrey Plaza; Hugo Becker; Adam Brody; Jermaine Crawford; Billy Magnissen; Alie Shawkwat; Taylor Nichols

Sixty year old writer/director Whit Stillman’s fourth feature (and first in thirteen years) is another stylized look at the young and privileged. Set in a Northeastern Ivy League-like college, Damsels focuses on a foursome of female students who subscribe to a self-conceived, developed, and regulated set of beliefs involving their dating inferior men and assisting fellow students through depression and suicidal thoughts.

On registration day, sophomore transfer student Lily (Analeigh Tipton) is approached by the girls. Led by the whimsical, and possibly unstable Violet (Greta Gerwig), they proceed to school her with a series of strange life lessons mostly concentrated on the minutiae of manners relating to dating the opposite sex. Though the four actresses - the group includes Magalyn Echikunwoke as Rose and Carrie MacLemore as Heather - all do their darnedest to handle the Stillman-speak, and the efforts of the talented Tipton and Gerwig improbably threaten to to make it all work, part of the issue is the girl’s overriding philosophy is so disjointed and sleight that it’s difficult to care one way or another.

With Metropolitan; Barcelona; and Last Days of Disco, the dialogue was no less quip-filled and meandering, but somehow Stillman was able to draw the audience in with sharply honed, wickedly intelligent, and often very funny words spoken by characters wonderfully embodied by the likes of Chris Eigeman; Taylor Nichols; Mira Sorvino; Chloe Sevigny; and Kate Beckinsdale. Despite the archness in each of his previous three films, the worlds depicted felt fully realized, and while Damsels in Distress stays almost entirely within the confines of the campus, both the characters and the surroundings never feel like more than overly self-conscious movie constructs.

Filmmakers creating highly stylized work always walk a fine line, constantly in danger of going too far and wandering into cartoon territory. From the very start, Damsels feels dated, as if Stillman wanted to create an 80s period piece but didn’t have the budget for it. And while in each of his previous films there were laugh out loud moments, and a wealth of amusing and unique ideas being spoken in a monotone, stilted manner by an array of characters, here the words often seem stale and many of the jokes fall flat. Furthermore, most of the supporting characters struggle with the rhythms of Stillman’s speech, creating too many uneven moments throughout. Though everything about Stillman’s films is supposed to occur in a bubble of altered quirky reality, here the tone is inconsistent and often simply doesn’t work.

Worst of all, none of the events seem even remotely realistic, and the precious, fey eccentricity that is so appealing and often delightfully surprising in Stillman’s previous work is replaced by a number of predictable, hackneyed scenes that feel like they needed to be exorcised. In fact, all of the male characters depicted are uniformly uninteresting, with frat boys Frank (Ryan Metcalf) and Thor (Billy Magnussen) so inanely written (they are supposed to be funny stupid) that one wonders how on earth a filmmaker of Stillman’s skill could possibly allow this level of embarrassing material into his final product.

There is something sad about a talent like Stillman’s long period of struggling to get films made, but perhaps equally as depressing is the fact that so many enthusiasts waited well over a decade for his next work, only to find a result that is almost wholly inconsequential.

Shame (BRIT) Directed by Steve McQueen   Written by Steve McQueen; Abi Morgan  Starring Michael Fassbender; Carey Mulligan; James Badge Dale; Nicole Beharie; Lucy Walters; Hannah Ware

Following his critically acclaimed debut Hunger (2008), forty three year old British director Steve McQueen brings us Shame, the story of an emotionally disconnected thirty-something New Yorker (one wonders why not London?), Brandon Sullivan, who seeks escape through an all encompassing sexual addiction.

Working from a spare script he co-wrote with Abi Morgan, McQueen’s visual style is in evidence in his long takes and use of focus, but his Manhattan is a far less stylized palette than The Maze prison of his first outing. Dominated by a series of single shots, Brandon’s world (a projection of his interior life) is largely empty and quiet, devoid of some of the hustle and bustle and noise we normally associate with the city. He travels alone from one modern hi rise to another, his underwater existence claustrophobic and small. Seeking out his pleasures by trolling the internet for porn and hookers, his eyes are perpetually trained in search of the next human conquest (and/or visual masturbatory memory material) as he rides the train, walks the streets, or drinks alongside his mostly nameless work-mates.

There are few specific details provided about Brandon or his sister Sissy’s (Carey Mulligan) background, though we learn that they were originally from Ireland and there is an indication that their shared past wasn’t a good one. There is also a strange sexual element to their relationship that at least leaves open the question of what might have gone on between the two of them, but like so much of the film the answers are not explicitly provided. We are unsure exactly what Brandon does for a living, only that he appears to make a nice living, works a job with responsibility in a modern looking professional office, and resides in a nicely adorned, orderly apartment.

The relationship between Brandon and Sissy is central to the story because she is seemingly the one person in his life who holds any weight, with whom he has some personal stake. Though he ignores her calls in the beginning of the film, Sissy eventually moves in with him temporarily, almost immediately disrupting his carefully constructed, no attachment existence. A bleached-blonde former cutter and currently depressed lounge singer, Sissy is a mess, and is reaching out to her brother in a potentially last resort attempt at contact.

The film has gotten a lot of publicity over the NC-17 rating and Fassbender’s display of frontal nudity, though the actual sex depicted is not overly graphic - rather, it is rolled out with the kind of matter-of-factness normally reserved in the U.S. for extreme violence. It is that very mundane nature, perhaps, the fact that McQueen refuses to turn his gaze away from the nihilism at neatly timed intervals that might be disquieting to some American audiences. We are voyueristically gazing at one man’s carnality, an ongoing descent of personal debasement driven by a need for connection without emotion.

Shame is not always an easy watch. Nor should it be. The vacuousness of Brandon’s life is a modern day affliction. All around him, in fact, are people searching for relief from whatever ails them, the loneliness and desperation so palpable it fairly bubbles to the service. His married boss Dave (James Badge Dale) speaking to his son by Skype (technology that dually brings us together and maintains distance), but ineptly trying to pick up random women in dimly lit downtown bars; newly separated co-worker Marianne (Nicole Beharie) searching for love; a married female stranger on a train (Lucy Walters) exchanging lustful looks.

As the disaffected and clearly seriously troubled Brandon, Fassbender gives an excellent, restrained performance, refusing to betray the secrets McQueen clearly wants to hold onto, though a a major sequence toward the end seems an affront to the largely plotless asceticism achieved so skillfully throughout the rest of the film.

Based on a book by James Sallis, Drive also shares a number of similarities with the 1978 Walter Hill/Ryan O’Neal cult classic, The Driver. In both films the main character is a getaway driver, never referred to by name, whose silence is a prominent running theme. Like Hill’s actioner, Drive is strongest when it manages to remain grounded in a minimalistic approach that marks long passages of each film - however, both are also ultimately weakened by a series of plot excesses, and particularly in the case of Drive, over the top violence.

Danish Director Nicholas Winding Refn (the Pusher trilogy; Valhalla Rising; Bronson), 41, is no stranger to brutally violent films - in fact, his career to this point has been made up exclusively of work featuring violent protagonists. Gosling’s hand picked man impressively imbues the film with 80s flourishes, and, from the pink colored titles, to the electronic based soundtrack, to Gosling’s satin racing jacket and gloves, one cannot help but feel the overwhelming influence of films from that period - including Hill’s aforementioned fraternal twin; Friedkin’s 1985 cop drama, To Live and Die in L.A.; and particularly Michael Mann’s Miami Vice (84-90); Manhunter (1986), and Thief (1981).

Earlier in his career, Refn’s portrayed violence with far more restraint, making these well chosen/crafted scenes more disturbing, explosive, and realistic. His last two films, however, have seemed to take an increasing interest in revelling in all the blood and guts, ala Quentin Tarantino. What starts out as a moody, atmospheric neo-noir, compelling, even hinting at potential greatness for the first forty minutes, eventually devolves into utter cliche, becoming yet another cartoonish revenge action thriller.

Predictably, Gosling is the standout as the mysterious, soft spoken Driver (also referred to as ‘The Kid’), but there is some interesting casting going on - Albert Brooks, against type, as Bernie Rose, one half of a bad guy duo of sorts (in fact, the other half, Ron Perlman’s character Nino, seems in retrospect unnecessary); Christina Hendricks, underutilized as trashy Blanche; and Oscar Isaac as ex-con/other man Standard. Carey Mulligan is love interest Irene, and Bryan Cranston grizzled boss, Shannon, and their performances, like those of the rest of the cast are fine; unfortunately, the trod upon nature of the plot somehow eventually works to cast a shadow over the stronger elements of their individual turns.

It’s as if director Refn and screenwriter Hossein Amini didn’t trust that the style, pace, and the budding relationship of their leads could sustain for an hour and a half and felt the audience needed distractions aplenty as the film progresses. Though we start out with an edgy, restrained piece of cinema that seems to be easing into its story at a pleasingly leisurely pace, we are suddenly forced into an amped up roller-coaster ride that, unlike the previously referred to Thief, doesn’t feel at all earned. The third act is thusly filled with answering questions to a plot no one cares about, forgetting all about what was interesting in the first place.

Early on, though presented with a hackneyed set up, we as audience are willing to take the ride because the tone is so well attenuated, and there is mystery involving the people we meet. However, just as the intrigue is mounting, further character development is abruptly halted by a series of clumsily handled Charles Bronson moments, where a man who doesn’t carry a gun becomes an avenging angel of the highest order. There are plot details galore, including a tacked on ‘twist’, and all that wonderful subtly dominating most of first half of the film simply dissipates in a puff of smoke.

The real magic here is Gosling, and (for the first half anyway) an overall moodiness recalling an under-appreciated sub genre of films. What could have been a spare neo-noir with a slick retro vibe, instead becomes another hyper-violent, over-plotted action flick.

Crazy Stupid Love (USA) Directed by Glenn Ficara; John Requa   Written by Dan Fogelman  Starring Steve Carrell; Julianne Moore; Ryan Gosling; Analeigh Tipton; Jonah Bobo; Marisa Tomei; Kevin Bacon; John Carroll Lynch; Beth Littleford; Liza Lapira; Josh Groban; Liza Laira

Without Judd Apatow there probably would be no Crazy, Stupid Love. The go to comedy guy re-imagined what R rated comedies should be, and Crazy follows the same basic formula he established in genre melding films like Knocked Up, delving into real life issues in a humorous way.

Directed (but not written by) Glenn Ficara and John Requa, the writing team behind I Love You Phillip Morris (which they also directed) and Bad Santa, Crazy is a romantic comedy of sorts, in the same way that 500 Days of Summer was - a kind of anti-romantic comedy perhaps, but at it’s heart (as the title would imply) this one is about men and women and the way we relate to one another. From a script by Dan Fogelman (Cars 2; Fred Claus) there is nothing new or trenchant happening here, and it is the quality of the acting, and some assured direction, that keeps the film from landing on the wrong side of another multi-character story about love bearing a number of similarities to this one, Love Actually. Like it’s British counterpart (and later films like Valentine’s Day and the upcoming New Years Eve) there are a number of inter-related characters facing relationship/love dilemmas, and no small amount of treacliness and self-satisfaction. Crazy, Stupid Love is a little too filled with coincidences; a little too ironic; and a little too reliant on cliche’d ground covered in many other places, but particularly given the current dire straights of the Hollywood product, there is also much to recommend it.

Playing boring forty four year old father/husband/suburban accountant, Cal, this is probably Steve Carrell’s best dramatic performance. His half-articulated mumbles and trailing thoughts being notably effective as he portrays an average Joe beaten down by his mundane (though privileged) life. Despite his best efforts, Carrell is still not in the same universe as Julianne Moore in the way that a competent actor like Emma Stone, as Hannah, is not residing in the same district as Ryan Gosling, playing Lothario extraordinaire, Jacob. There are nice supporting turns from an underutilized Kevin Bacon and Marisa Tomei, but regardless of the order of the billing and/or screen time it’s mostly Gosling and Moore’s show.

What separates Crazy, Stupid, Love from the insipid romantic comedies that Hollywood continues to spit out on a regular basis is that it does, ala Apatow, take some chances with tone. The set up is nothing special (to say the least) as Carrell emerges as the Eliza Doolittle to Goslings’s Professor Higgins. The very nature of the storyline thus dictates that there will be learning in the end for all concerned, and the film dutifully follows that path, failing ultimately to veer from the accepted chartered genre course. It’s the amusing stops along the way that count here, however, and the film does contain a number of funny bits.

As was the case with their previous effort, I Love You Phillip Morris, Ficara and Requa, along with British cinematographer Andrew Dunn (Precious; Gosford Park; The Madness of King George), do well with the visuals, elevating the film from the usual flat style typical of comedic fare. In this way the film compares favorably to something like Soderbergh’s The Informant, and at least points to the work of the great PT Anderson, and Alexander Payne, auteur directors with a firm command over the look and tone of their material. Make no mistake, Crazy, Stupid, Love is hardly comparable to any of the films made by those two directors, but there is an obvious attempt here to treat the characters and the look as something more than disposable elements, and with only two films under their belts this directing duo could certainly be considered in the company of someone like Jason Reitman, who is also producing reasonable adult fair for the masses.

There are times when the alchemy of the serious and ridiculous feels strained. Until Funny People, Apatow usually defaulted to his his roots, grounding his characters as human beings, but ultimately leaning toward the comedic moment. In the same way that Funny People tread a precarious line between drama and comedy, Crazy tries to bounce from sincerity to near parody, and that tension is felt throughout. While, theoretically, this creates a more complex bag, it also highlights some very obvious plot construction. There is nothing wrong with sticking to the basic conventions of a particular genre, but there is an inherent problem with a genre as stale as the romantic comedy. When nothing (the twist notwithstanding) is done to push the envelope with plot we’re left with good dialogue, solid visuals, and some excellent actors who are hampered by the complete lack of originality vis-a-vis the storyline.

There is also something disquieting when one invests in characters as real, live people, and they then behave in erratic ways that simply don’t seem entirely true to life. Sometimes going for that easy laugh comes at the expense of the film as a whole, and resorting to some cloying lowest common denominator moments reduces what might have been a special film to something less than that. Though there is an attempt to make this feel like an ensemble piece, the other sub plots (the unrequited love of the babysitter Jessica (Analeigh Tipton) and preternaturally wise son, Robbie (Jonah Bobo), et al) are mostly given short shrift.

Still, while we know exactly where we are going the entire time, there is something to be said for at least using the right ingredients in the stew. Post viewing, one may not be left pondering Crazy, Stupid, Love, but it is undoubtedly a well done diversion.