Romance

A Post-Apocalyptic Zombie Love Story

/ / Movie Reviews
  • Title: Warm Bodies
  • IMDB: link

warm-bodies-posterNever was there a tale of love condemned more than that of Julie (Teresa Palmer) and her zombie boyfriend (Nicholas Hoult). One is a human-acting zombie from the wrong side of the tracks. The other is the tempestuous daughter of the leader (John Malkovich) of the army obsessed with blasting the brain-eaters off the face off the Earth.

From writer/director Jonathan Levine (50/50, All the Boys Love Mandy Lane) comes a post-apocalyptic zombie love story take on William Shakespeare‘s classic Romeo and Juliet which definitely has a pulse.

Presented from the point of view of R (Hault), a thoughtful zombie who begins to believe he can be more than just an undead scavenger after meeting Julie (Palmer) and eating her boyfriend’s (Dave Franco) brains, Levine’s script is far more clever than I expected. Warm Bodies may not reach the heights of Shaun of the Dead, but with some heart and a good sense of humor this new take on a classic love story embraces the more absurdist elements of it’s premise and is a surprisingly compelling and entertaining story.

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Romanticized Plagiarism

/ / Movie Reviews
  • Title: The Words
  • IMDB: link

the-words-posterIt’s like Inception but with all the fun, action, and humor taken out. The Words provides stories within stories within stories. After all, why settle on a single plot with one narrator, when three will do? The film by directing and screenwriting duo Brian Klugman and Lee Sternthal certainly does its best to fill all the major roles with capable actors but somehow still comes off as a bland romance novel which never justifies its existence.

Dennis Quaid stars as Clay Hammond, a celebrated author who, as the film opens, is giving a dramatic reading of his latest novel. Clay’s narration introduces and concludes each of the passages as we find ourselves in a world of his imagination invoking yet another author and a story about yet another book.

Bradley Cooper stars as Rory Jansen, the main character in Clay’s novel, a struggling young author, with a wife (Zoe Saldana) who is obviously too good for him, who has finally hit the big time with his first best seller. The trouble is, Rory didn’t actually write the book that made him famous.

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Ruby Sparks

/ / Movie Reviews
  • Title: Ruby Sparks
  • IMDB: link

“This is the true and impossible story of my very great love.”

ruby-sparks-posterAnyone who has ever sat down to write has done so with the desire to see their creation burst from the page and come to life in front of their eyes. For Calvin Weir-Fields (Paul Dano) this literally comes to pass when the renown young novelist solves his current state of writer’s block by writing about the perfect girlfriend who one day magically shows up, living in his apartment.

At first it may seem odd that Zoe Kazan wrote the screenplay in mind casting herself not as the writer but the creation. However, it’s Ruby Sparks (Kazan), not Calvin, who has the far more demanding role as the woman whose entire behavior must change on a dime depending on what her creator decides to type next.

Dano is well cast as the writer whose best work came far too soon and seems lost, unprepared to deal with his mother’s (Annette Bening) current boyfriend (Antonio Banderas), the suggestions of his psychiatrist (Elliott Gould), the lovable but annoying antics of his dog Scottie, or the advice of his brother (Chris Messina). Calvin instead chooses a solitary life which makes his creation of Ruby Sparks all the more remarkable.

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Guilty Pleasure – The Pirate Movie

/ / Home Video
  • Title: The Pirate Movie
  • IMDb: link

pirate-movie-dvd

Loosely based on Gilbert and Sullivan’s The Pirates of Penzance, 1982’s The Pirate Movie starred Kristy McNichol as mousey young Mabel lost in a dream of swashbuckling, and singing, pirates. After an accident leaves her thrown overboard and washed up on a beach, Mabel’s imagination creates a fantasy world casting herself as the youngest daughter of a Major-General (Bill Kerr) who falls for a young pirate named Frederic (Christopher Atkins) adamant on leaving his service of the Pirate King (Ted Hamilton) to start a new life.

The plot, which involves Fredric’s attempt to leave his old life behind while trying to stay true to his word and duty, is secondary to how insanely everything is played including some memorable music numbers such as “Pumpin’ and Blowin'” (you can find the video below). I’ll be honest, the film doesn’t work as well for me as it did when I was seven years-old, but it still provides enough enjoyment for me to classify it as a guilty pleasure.

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To Rome with Love

/ / Movie Reviews
  • Title: To Rome with Love
  • IMDB: link

to-rome-with-love-posterThe latest from writer/director Woody Allen is a return to the absurdest formula from his earlier career that crafts a tale of Americans and Italians dealing with love, fame, passion, death, and dreams. Unlike most of the director’s films over the past two decades To Rome with Love is a true ensemble that grabs absurdity with both hands and runs full speed right into a brick wall, producing some glorious insanity and plenty of laughs.

Broken into four separate vignettes, which are not forced to intertwine in the film’s final act (as many Hollywood movies of this type often do), To Rome with Love focuses on the absurdity of love set against the beautiful backdrop of one of Europe’s grandest cities. Given its setting, the film will undoubtedly be compared to last year’s acclaimed Midnight in Paris, but in truth To Rome with Love is far closer to Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex* (*But Were Afraid to Ask) (although we sadly don’t get a sequence with Gene Wilder and a sheep).

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