BRIDESMAIDS - chicks aside, pretty conservative

BRIDESMAIDS is getting massively hyped because, contra-vention, it's a bromance starring chicks and, shock, horror, chicks sometimes talk about sex! The reality is that, once you get over the shock of the all-female cast, BRIDESMAIDS is actually a deeply, boringly, conventional movie with a predictable plot, pedestrian direction, and over-written jokes. (Not to mention a random Irish cop - they try to make a joke about it - but seriously, why?) It all just makes me deeply depressed about how reactionary Hollywood is that such a simplistic gender-switcheroo can have everyone salivating.

Anyways, on to the plot, such as it is. Kristen Wiig plays Annie, a thirty something woman whose life is falling apart. Her business failed, she is divorced, her fuck-buddy treats her like shit, her house mates are kicking her out, and her boss is about to fire her. When her best friend Lillian (Maya Rudolph) becomes engaged and, despite picking Annie to be her Maid of Honour, seems to be gravitating toward her new glamorous friend Helen (Rose Byrne), Annie has a mini-breakdown. The pressures of the wedding combined with Annie's low self-esteem, lead to her pissing off everyone who cares for her, not least Lillian and Officer Rhodes - a sweet police-officer whose attentions she scorns. Still, this being Hollywood schmaltz, you just know that all this pain is leading toward a moment of self-revelation, a last minute reconciliation with Lilian, and a Happy Ever After with Rhodes.

I didn't have a totally bad time watching this flick. It was funny enough to get me through the two-hour run-time, although I didn't as many did, laugh at Kristen Wiig's physical comedy and the gross-out humour of the entire cast. Rather, I was kept in play by Jon Hamm's hilariously oleaginous turn as the fuck-buddy; by Matt Lucas and Rebel Wilson as Annie's fat flat-mates; and by the normally very pretty Melissa McCarthy ugly-ing up as the butch Megan. I also liked how Rose Byrne managed to transform Helen from an out-and-out baddy into a really sympathetic character, whose insecurity was far more pitiable than Annie's. After all, Annie gets Rhodes while Helen stays where she is. Take a look at Rose Byrne's subtle double-take as she sees Annie look at Rhodes for what she thinks is the last time. Now that's good acting.

BRIDESMAIDS is on release in the USA, Canada, Romania, Slovenia, Iceland, Australia, Hungary, Ireland, Kazakhstan, Russia, Norway and the UK. It opens on July 7th in Greece, Hong Kong, Malaysia, the Netherlands, Portugal, Singapore and Estonia. It opens on July 22nd in Germany, Finland, Lithuania and Sweden. It opens on July 29th in Poland. It opens on August 4th in Denmark; on August 10th in France; on August 10th in France; on August 19th in Italy; on August 25th in Thailand; on August 28th in Spain and on September 9th in Brazil.

Random DVD Round-Up 1 - SHREK FOREVER AFTER

SHREK THE THIRD was a desperate movie - a commercial enterprise designed to squeeze every last buck from a franchise, no matter that the plot was confused and cobbled together. I barely sat through it, and hated every moment. When the franchise began, Mike Myers's Shrek was a loveable anti-hero subverting our idea of a fairytale Prince into a farting ogre and Cameron Diaz' Princess Fiona wasn't just a passive pretty girl waiting to be rescued but a feisty, whip-smart woman whose true self was fat and happy. The joy of those films was to see unlikely friendships form between Shrek, Donkey (Eddie Murphy) and Puss In Boots (Antonio Banderas), and to see Shrek and Fiona fall in love. To be sure, the humour was subversive of the Disney myth, but it was always warm-hearted, and after a pretty straight-forward adventure our anti-heroes would always emerge triumphant and true to themselves.

By contrast, by SHREK THE THIRD, Shrek had turned into a whiny little bitch, and the humour was particularly snarky and mean - coming in the form of cheap, lazy Exorcist spoofs of ROSEMARY'S BABY and teen-rom-coms. Fiona was less feisty woman that put-upon wife, and the whole thing had a rather mean-spirited, vulgar feel. So, when SHREK FOREVER AFTER rolled into our cinemas, complete with that ultimate commercial shake-down - 3D - I decided to give it a miss. Imagine, then, my surprise to discover that SHREK FOREVER AFTER isn't have bad at all!

The good news is that the writers have decided to focus on just one idea - and the big grand concept is that Shrek is so peeved with being a harassed father that he allows Rumpelstiltskin (Walt Dohm) to trick him into signing a contract in which he never existed. What then follows is a sort of IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE meets STAR WARS movie, in which Shrek sees what would have happened if he hadn't existed, and must get Fiona to give him "true love's kiss" in order to get back to normal. Donkey blanks him; Puss In Boots has become fat and lazy; Far Far Away is ruled by a tyrannical Stiltskin, and Fiona, having rescued herself, has become a Rebel Leader leading her fellow ogres in arms against Vader, sorry, Stiltskin! The great thing about this conceit, is that we get to see Fiona back to being feisty, and we get to relive what was wonderful in the first films - seeing Shrek and Fiona fall for each other again, and seeing Shrek and Donkey and Puss become friends again. It's as though the film-makers didn't want the franchise to end on the downer of Part Three and so restored us to the feel-good feeling of Part One. SHREK FOREVER AFTER is, then, a pleasingly good watch. Not as brilliant as Part One, partly because we can't get back that initial surprise, but good fun nonetheless. Hopefully, the film-makers will have the good grace to end it here.

SHREK FOREVER AFTER was released in summer 2010 and is now available to rent and buy.

London Film Fest 2010 Day 14 - HOWL

HOWL is a beautifully made film about Allen Ginsberg's iconic Beat poem, published in 1955. Honest, raw, sexually explicit, Ginsberg described the reality of life on the road in the counter-culture - how young urban hipsters were really living and feeling. That rawness and authenticity - the proud joy at enjoying sex, drugs, literature, music and good company - and the anger at the establishment, the bourgeoisie, still translates. I guess a lot of us can remember a time in our teenage life when we first read Howl, and then maybe Kerouac's On The Road or Burrough's Naked Lunch.

Acclaimed documentarians, Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman (THE TIMES OF HARVEY MILK) have produced a film that has the authenticity and immediacy of a documentary, recreating iconic photographs of Ginsberg; using a script that is almost entirely based on interviews and transcripts of the court-case wherein publisher Lawrence Ferlinghetti was charged with obscenity for having published the poem. This is, however, no court thriller - especially as we know the outcome! Rather, Epstein and Friendman use the court-case as a door through which to explore contemporary reactions to the poem - from prudish shock and patronising contempt through to bewildered admiration and excitement. And that's the genius of HOWL. It's a movie that dares to give us what is, essentially, literary criticism rather than a prurient examination of The Beats' sex lives or a conventional biopic. In other words, the film-makers want us to understand why Howl was important, artistically and socially. And in doing so - in showing us Ginsberg talking about how he wrote, and why he wrote, we get as much of a picture of the man as any straight-ahead biopic would've given us.

Stylistically, one has to give Epstein and Friedman credit for the sterling recreation of the 1950s - from cramped apartments to the costumes. The attention to detail in recreating photos is superb and DP Edward Lachman LIFE DURING WARTIME, FAR FROM HEAVEN) moves with ease from honey-coloured 1950s court-rooms to grungy beat apartments in black-and-white.

We also get an imaginative animated version of the poem that is inter-cut with court-room discussion of the same lines, and then Ginsberg reading them, or explaining them. All this adds up to a rich discussion and understanding of the text, although I personally could've done without the pictures - the words are enough for me. I wish they'd trusted more in the power of the words to carry our interest. The film is also populated with a fine cast of major names even in very slight roles - principally Jon Hamm as the prosecuting lawyer; David Strathairn for the Defence; Bob Balaban as the judge; and Mary-Louise Parker as a particularly amusing defence witness. These actors are all great, but in such small roles I found them to be more of a distraction, and wished that the film-makers had used character actors instead.

However, for all that, I still loved this film. It was an hour and a half of pure literary indulgence. And what really sets this film a cut above is the performance of James Franco as the young Ginsberg, with his perfect reproduction of that bizarre lilting way in which Ginsberg spoke and the physicality of how he carried himself. It was marvellous to see Ginsberg young and striving, rather than as the old balding man, established, that we often remember. Here he was - here the the Beats were - at the creation. It's exhilarating to watch. But a more interesting question is perhaps how far this film will translate to people who aren't as familiar with the poem. Will they be won over to its importance and artistry?  And will they find Ginsberg's speech patterns bizarre and off-putting rather than charming and particular? Evidence from my Gentleman Secretary suggests the latter.

HOWL played Berlin and Sundance 2010. It was released in Italy in August and in the the US in September. It opens in Denmark on November 25th. It opens in Germany on January 6th, in the UK on February 25th and in Finland on March 25th.