Tag: review

DVD review: I Am Big Bird

Caroll Spinney’s first performance before legendary Muppets master Jim Henson was disastrous.

bigbirdThere was a Kickstarter campaign to make a movie about a guy named Caroll Spinney back in July of 2012, which successfully raised $124,115 USD from 1,976 backers.

Who’s Caroll Spinney? Why, he’s the guy who, for over 40 years, has played the iconic character on the children’s television show Sesame Street named… Oscar the Grouch. Well, yes, he does, but he also occupies the costume of an internationally-known, eight-foot-tall, yellow avian creature.

The movie I Am Big Bird garnered some success at film festivals, so it wasn’t until a couple of months ago that I had a chance to see it digitally (and, because I was too busy, I didn’t). Finally, this yellow envelope arrived in the mail in early August, and I got to watch the film.

I’m oddly fascinated by negative reviews of movies I like. Though it got 84% positive reviews on Rotten Tomatoes (53 out of 63), those who were less enthusiastic suggested that it was a puff piece with “little sour to temper the sweetness of this portrait.” One critic thought the tension between Spinney and a Sesame Street director was contrived, even though Emilio Delgado (Luis on Sesame Street) and Bob McGrath (Bob) confirmed the conflict onscreen.

Those critics must have missed the part about his painful growing up with his father’s hair-trigger temper that he seemed to find ways of bringing out. This was mitigated by his mother’s introduction of puppet shows, but his “dolls” became a source of bullying by some of his classmates. His first performance before legendary Muppets master Jim Henson was disastrous. His early days on Sesame Street, aggravated by his failing marriage, were so bad he considered quitting the job, or worse.

When I was in college, I used to watch Sesame Street (the show didn’t start until I was in high school), and few things on television have made me more verklempt than when the human cast explained to Big Bird that Mr. Hooper, the shopkeeper on Sesame Street, had died, a programming decision based on the death of his portrayer, Will Lee. Seeing it again brought back that sentiment.

There were other less upbeat aspects, including Spinney’s loner status, Jim Henson’s funeral, and the Challenger disaster. There’s this story. And the movie told of the physical wear of being Big Bird, as well as the Bird being supplanted on Sesame Street by the Muppet Elmo.

Yet maybe the critics didn’t find enough drama because Caroll Spinney is a great guy. The story of how he met his second wife, Deb, is absolutely charming. His now-adult kids adore him, his coworkers are touched by his continued sense of wonder.

You should check out I Am Big Bird: The Caroll Spinney Story. If it lacks a sufficiently dramatic narrative arc, it is nevertheless a loving portrait of an interesting man.

MOVIE REVIEW: Trainwreck

I wonder what Amy Schumer’s cousin, U.S. Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY) thought about the movie Trainwreck?

trainwreckThere’s a TV show on Comedy Central called Inside Amy Schumer. I’ve never seen it, but it is described as “straight from [her] provocative and hilariously wicked mind,” exploring sex and relationships.

So the language and sexuality was not a shock to my system when The Wife and I saw Trainwreck, written by and starring Schumer as a thirtysomething named Amy, who learned early on, from her father Gordon (Colin Quinn), to eschew romantic commitment; so she is either sex-positive or slutty, depending how one views these things.

She can be snarky about the marriage of her younger sister Kim (Brie Larson) to Tom (Mike Birbiglia), which meant instant family, with Tom’s son Allister (Evan Brinkman).

Amy is a magazine writer for a publication trying too hard to be cutting edge. She is assigned by her editor Brianna (Tilda Swinton, ever the chameleon) to write about a successful sports doctor named Aaron (Bill Hader), who hangs out with his patients, such as basketball player LeBron James (well played by LeBron James). Aaron has the audacity to ask her for a second date, and the tensions ensue.

Despite its explicit nature early on, at the heart of this film is a rom com, though, in the traditional roles, Amy’s the guy. That is not a putdown, only a description, as many of the mostly positive reviews suggested. Plus there are some interesting family dynamics; Amy’s dad was the original trainwreck. The movie’s a tad long, for which I blame director Judd Apatow, and it’s more than a bit sappy at the end.

I liked it when The Wife and I saw it at The Spectrum Theatre a couple of weeks ago. She was unsure early on whether she’d like it, but it turned out to be a winner for her too.

Amy and her father’s cousin, U.S. Senator Chuck Schumer (D-NY), have teamed up to fight for gun control following a mass shooting at a screening of the movie in Louisiana.

 

MOVIE REVIEW: Spy

In general, I didn’t find the film Spy laugh out loud funny.

spy-posterThis, I suppose, is an embarrassing admission for someone who purports to care about movies: I have not seen, all the way through, any James Bond movie. I’ve seen bits and pieces on TV occasionally, mostly from the Sean Connery era, but never from beginning to end.

There, I said it.

Yet I recognized the spy movie tropes that ran through the movie comedy Spy, which I saw with my friend Mary at the Spectrum Theatre in Albany a few weeks ago.

Not familiar with the level of violence in an R-rated comedy, I was briefly taken aback by the first good joke, which involved the failure to take one’s allergy medication. Once that happened, I said, “OK, so it’ll be THAT kind of movie,” and I went with it.

This is the story of behind-the-scenes CIA analyst Susan Cooper (Melissa McCartney), who fed information through the earbud of super slick spy Bradley Long (Jude Law). But when Bradley is feared dead, and another top field spy, Rick Ford (Jason Strathan), goes rogue, Susan convinces her boss Elaine Crocker (Allison Janney) to allow her to go undercover to infiltrate the world of a deadly arms dealer, Rayna Boyanov (Rose Byrne).

I didn’t find the frumpy aliases and clothing the agency gave to Susan, on assignment in various cities, all that hilarious. More humorous was when Susan bought her own clothes and Rayna found them inadequate.

In general, I didn’t find the film laugh-out-loud funny. I’m told that Strathan, e.g., is playing on the roles in series for which he’s best known – Transformers, Fast & Furious, The Expendables, etc, – except that I’d NEVER seen him in ANY movie. And with all the double-crossing and triple crossing, I was a tad muddled in the middle about who was on whose side. I confused one dark-haired woman with another for a time.

Yet I enjoyed the movie as a whole, as an empowerment treatise, that the “behind the curtains” spy got to ultimately shine. The character of Nancy (Miranda Hart), who was Susan’s backup person, was appropriately awkward. Rose Byrne, who played the Bridezilla in Bridesmaids, also produced and directed by Paul Feig, was even more over the top here. Actually, the best comedy may have been in the end credits, which much of the audience missed, naturally, detailing Susan’s future spy exploits.

I’m glad I went, and I understand why the critics liked Spy, but I doubt The Wife would have enjoyed the language and violence.

MOVIE REVIEW: I’ll See You In My Dreams

The critics really liked the movie I’ll See You In My Dreams more than the public.

ill see youBefore I can even begin to write about the movie I’ll See You In My Dreams, which The Wife and I saw on a Tuesday night at the Spectrum Theatre in Albany, I have to talk about the MAKING of this film.

It was a Kickstarter project, in which Brett Haley, a 2005 University of North Carolina graduate, was able to promise Blythe Danner and Martin Starr to be in his film. Haley managed to raise $61,365, or 102% of the $60,000 goal. All 127 people who have put in $100 more, were listed in the end credits.

In recent years, Blythe Danner is probably best known for plugging Prolia, an osteoporosis drug for a condition she is said to have had. Too bad: in the Northeast US, she’s known as a fine stage actress, on Broadway, and especially on the stage of the Williamstown (MA) Theater Festival, where my spouse had seen her perform more than once.

The first time I ever saw Blythe Danner was on Adam’s Rib, a 1973 “TV adaptation of the Tracy/Hepburn classic” film, where she played opposite Ken Howard. Howard, incidentally, would go on to play the coach in the high school basketball series The White Shadow; the executive producer of that show, and of the hospital drama St. Elsewhere, was Bruce Paltrow, Blythe’s husband until he died in 2002. They had two children, Gwyneth and Jake.

Martin Starr, I first saw as arguably the geekiest of the Freaks & Geeks on that too-short-lived TV show. Here’s a short scene from that show.

I mention all of this because I’d be fascinated to find out how Haley got Danner, a woman now in her early 70s, and a widow for about a dozen years, to play Carol, a woman in her 70s, and a widow for a few decades.

The critics really liked the movie I’ll See You In My Dreams (94% positive on Rotten Tomatoes), more than the public (72% positive), and I think I know why. It’s rather well-acted, particularly by Sam Elliot as the charming Bill, and Rhea Perlman from Cheers, Mary Kay Place from Fernwood 2night and June Squibb from the movie Nebraska as Carol’s friends. But the script, by Haley and Marc Basch, is perhaps too subtle. too low-key.

Somehow, I think the story might have fared better as a play. The movie, as good as it was, had a low-budget feel. Other than a scene on a boat, a few golf scenes, and a walk home from the supermarket at night (which easily could have been replicated), it might have been better on stage.

The story had some interesting twists, including conversations between Carol and the directionless pool man Lloyd (Starr), who interestingly seemed to be somewhat in the same boat. I never felt quite as invested as the narrative suggested I feel, about the tricky nature of aging.

At 92 minutes, I was glad to spend the time seeing pros at work but was left wanting more…something. On the other hand, I always cared about Carol’s specific journey, and on that basis, I mildly recommend the film.

MOVIE REVIEWS – Love & Mercy; Glen Campbell: I’ll Be Me

The last major scene was Glen Campbell recording a song Gonna Miss You, for his wife,

love-mercy-movie1You don’t have to be a fan of Brian Wilson and the Beach Boys to like the film Love & Mercy, but it may enhance an appreciation of the music.

After The Wife and I saw it at The Spectrum Theatre in Albany when we both had a Monday off, she asked to borrow Pet Sounds, for she had never heard the album, while I might put it on a Top Ten list. She was most struck by I Guess I Just Wasn’t Made For These Times [LISTEN], which, for her, seemed to encapsulate the message of the movie.

In the mid-1960s, as the creative soul of the Beach Boys, Brian was hearing sounds that he just had to get out, even if they weren’t the songs about cars and surfing, the themes most associated with the group.

As Brian quit touring, he got Hal Blaine and other professionals, known collectively as the Wrecking Crew, to help produce the intricate music. The band had fired Murry Wilson, the abusive father of Brian, Dennis, and Carl, but Brian went literally crazy still trying to please him.

In the 1980s, a quack named Dr. Eugene Landy (a brilliant and hirsute Paul Giamatti) controlled Brian with pills and an ever-present coterie of bodyguards. Brian meets Melinda Ledbetter (Elizabeth Banks) while trying to buy a car, then their relationship gets more complicated.

This movie works, and works well, even though perhaps it should not. Paul Dano as the younger Brian and John Cusack as the older version don’t especially look alike. Yet during the weaving back and forth between past and present, the narrative was clear, as clear as a story about a man who suffered a mental breakdown can be in painting a portrait of a brilliant, complicated man.
***
Glen_Campbell_I'll_Be_Me_PosterCountry-music legend Glen Campbell was diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease in 2011. Glen and his wife Kim shared the news with the world.

The farewell tour, with his three youngest children in the band, was documented in the film Glen Campbell: I’ll Be Me (2014), which I watched on CNN recently. It showed how the music, for a time, may have slowed down the ravages of the disease, for his guitar skills remained intact for much of the journey.

But as the three-week engagement turned into 151 shows, we see how nerve-wracking it was, especially for Kim, her kids, and the crew he’d worked with for years but could not always remember their names. It was quite telling that, early on, he mocked the disease, saying that he was happy to forget some things, notably his failed marriages.

When he got a Lifetime Achievement Award at the Grammys in 2012, he could not remember why we were going. I wondered when Paul McCartney hugged him afterward whether Glen, best known for songs such as Rhinestone Cowboy, Wichita Lineman, and Gentle on My Mind, even knew who he was. He didn’t even always recognize films of himself.

The Campbell saga was broken up by other musicians, such as Kathy Mattea and Bruce Springsteen, talking about how they dealt with their family members dealing with the illness. The last major scene was Glen, who was briefly a Beach Boy, recording a song, Gonna Miss You [LISTEN], for his wife, backed by Hal Blaine and others from the aforementioned Wrecking Crew, of which Glen Campbell before he became famous, was once a member.

Despite the sadness of the disease, this was an emotional, intimate, and triumphant look at life fully lived. Here’s Mark Evanier’s take; since it’s probably not CNN anymore, catch it on video.

Ramblin' with Roger
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