Blu Velvets - 1

Some flicks I have been catching up recently on Blu-Ray.

1.  "The Art Of Getting By"  is a cute coming-of-age mixed with a bittersweet first love type of movie. It's been done a million times, so there is nothing too original here that makes it stand out. Unfocused boy falls in love with a girl who is much more experienced than he is in life and love - you know what happens next. I wish it was less predictable than it was, and I totally did not agree with the happily-ever-after ending, because  you end up asking, what are the lessons learned here? But then again,   should all life experience have a lesson? Perhaps not, or maybe I am just overanalyzing this film that really does not aim for much. 

2.  Sarah Jessica Parker still cannot escape the ghost of Carrie Bradshaw and that was all I kept thinking about when I was watching "I Don't Know How She Does It," or as I call this film: Bradshaw Does Wall Street. I remember when the book was a monstrous hit, but I never did have a chance to read it, though I still have it now on my Kindle. The film is a bore, and a bit unfocused, and her character, Kate, comes out as one of those entitled bitches I used to work with and despised. Sadly, SJP couldn't make it more likeable, and really, she really should portray characters outside of her comfort zone. And I remember the book was set in London, but they moved the location to Boston, only for most of the movie to be shot in New York City. And that kind of bothered me. Nothing else in the movie worked for me, and the ending kind of defeated the whole feminist slant of the book, not to mention the movie. 

3.  I was very angry after watching "The Green," a film I had been waiting to see since it was featured in the New York Gay and Lesbian Film Festival this year. I was angry because the story and the characters infuriated me. A teacher gets accused of sexually molesting one of his students. Simple enough,right? But the warnings were all there, and any one with any kind of common sense would not have been caught in the situation that the main character of the movie got himself into. Plus, the promising premise had a resolution that was kind of trite. And Cheyenne Jackson was wasted in the movie. So I think, do I laud the movie for getting a rise out of me? Or should I just file this movie with all the other things that annoy me in life, right The Kardashians and lumpy oatmeal?

4.  I was looking forward to seeing "One Day" when it came out over the Summer, but it's opening weekend coincided with our Baltic Holiday, so I missed it. When I got back, it was already gone. I loved the book, and hoped that the translation to film would be successful. It wasn't. The "gimmick" of the book - taking a day yearly in the lives of two people over a period of 20+ years - didn't quite work in the screenplay. Perhaps if the movie was written in direct narrative, it would have been better. But all was not lost, though. There is an electric chemistry between Anne Hathaway and Jim Sturgess that you root for them to get together, and let's face it, you know they were going to be together, and if you read the book, you know that getting together isn't the point of the story. I kind of concur that Anne Hathaway, in theory, did not fit her role. Her character was supposed to be plainer, but more intelligent, and smarter, and funnier. Sturgess' character relied on his looks, and Sturgess fit that role to a T. I mean, he is one handsome bloke. Both actors work hard, and they mostly succeed when not bogged down by the script. And the story is still heartbreaking, and found myself crying at the end.