Fun with Dick & Jane Review

The premise of the movie is pretty basic, a white collar worker (Carrey) in a high tech company, Globodyne, is promoted and, when the company implodes ala Enron, he loses his life bit by bit, from his expensive car to his manicured lawn to his furniture.

He spends months looking for work and finally gets an interview after having given up on finding anything. It turns out to be one of the funniest scenes in the whole movie. After that disappointment, he lowers his standards and goes off to work for a Walmart/Costco type company and is promptly fired. A stint as a migrant labourer follows and so on. After a while, he comes up with the idea to knock off a convenience store to make his mortgage payment. Eventually he finds his ex-boss (Alec Baldwin) and tries to swindle him out of his ill-gotten riches while he was Globodyne’s CEO.

Jim Carrey does as good a job as possible with the rather weak script. Tea Leoni doesn’t add much to the movie, although she does show she can do physical comedy (though not as well as the master, Carrey). Many of the funny scenes were in the trailer for the movie, so it is a little disappointing that there isn’t more humour in the movie.

This was, all in all, not a bad film, just not up to what is to be expected of Carrey. If you’re looking for a laugh, I’d recommend waiting until it goes to the cheap theatres or comes out on DVD.

5 out of 10

Memoirs of a Geisha Review

After being sold into slavery by her parents as a child, Sayuri (Ziyi Zhang) is resigned to a life of hardship and abuse in Kyoto. Raised amongst geishas, including the bitter Hatsumomo (Gong Li), Sayuri dreams of their educated and venerated lifestyle. When an unexpected benefactor (Michelle Yeoh) comes looking for Sayuri, the frightened girl begins her arduous training to become a geisha. Eventually, Sayuri rises to power, commanding the attention of every man she meets, and enraging Hatsumomo further. Nevertheless, all the adoration in the land can't help satisfy Sayuri's love for the one person, the Chairman (Ken Watanabe), who was kind to her while she was a frightened little girl.

Based on the best-selling book, Memoirs of a Geisha is also director Rob Marshall's long awaited follow-up to Chicago. It might sound absurd, but Marshall is an appropriate choice for "Geisha," as the story centers on the theatricality of these women, and how they hide their emotions in the pursuit of performance. Meticulously produced and detailed, Geisha is a feast for the eyes, but cold to the touch. In the end, Geisha is more of a soap opera than a real movie, with each character scheming and plotting against others, trying to inflict pain and/or sorrow on each other.

7 out of 10

King Kong Review

I just saw the advanced screening of King Kong last night in Edmonton. I thought that the movie was good overall, but there are some things that could've been better.

First off, the movie is too long, and Kong doesn't show up for almost 45 minutes. Don't eat a big dinner before you head out or you'll fall asleep like my friend did. The action scenes are frenetic and also vertigo-inducing, due to Jackson's love of slo-mos and odd camera angles. The special effects range from jaw-dropping to campy cheese from a 50s B-movie. Kong looks awesome, as do the rest of the creatures on Skull Island, but some scenes of the crew running or paddling/sailing are very lame (whether this was intentional or not I'm not sure). 1930s New York also looks fantastic.

Jack Black proves once again he is one of Hollywood's worst actors. Fortunately, Naomi Watts and Adrian Brody have some chemistry and do a good job. Kyle Chandler provides some excellent comic relief as the stereotypical spoiled, pretty boy Hollywood actor. One thing that adds to the campiness of the movie is the dozens of lines lifted right out of the 1933 version. Personally, when some of these lines were spoken, I started chuckling, thinking of the Simpson's spoof -- King Homer.

The best part of the movie is when Kong is in New York. His rampage and subsequent climbing of the Chrysler Building were excellent. By the end of the movie, you are actually cheering for Kong to knock down all the biplanes that are harassing him.

My guess is that this movie will make a lot of money (if you enjoyed LOTR, you'll probably enjoy this one too), but I'd still recommend waiting a while to see this one. Either way, you will either love it or hate it.

6 out of 10