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Kevin Phillipson (10018 KP) rated Tag (2018) in Movies
Jul 5, 2018
Kevin Phillipson (10018 KP) rated Coffee & Kareem (2020) in Movies
Apr 26, 2020
Erika (17788 KP) rated Chappaquiddick (2017) in Movies
Apr 14, 2018 (Updated Apr 14, 2018)
So, I'm not sure if I was supposed to by sympathetic towards Teddy Kennedy with everything surrounding this whole incident... But I'm not. It didn't change my thoughts on him at all. Dirtbag. Jason Clarke did well as Ted, and with the mannerisms and everything. I loved Ed Helms in this film. He was legitimately the only thing interesting.
I know they were billing this as the 'unknown story' and everything, maybe for people that know absolutely nothing about it.
The 5 is for Ed Helms alone.
I know they were billing this as the 'unknown story' and everything, maybe for people that know absolutely nothing about it.
The 5 is for Ed Helms alone.
Entertainment Editor (1988 KP) created a video about Father Figures (2018) in Movies
Nov 6, 2017
Gareth von Kallenbach (980 KP) rated Jeff, Who Lives at Home (2012) in Movies
Aug 7, 2019
Everyone knows a guy like Jeff (Jason Segel). Someone who never really left home, opting instead to sit around waiting for a sign. Jeff’s family is not much better. His daft, unaware brother, Pat (Ed Helms), has his life centered on a marriage that is devoid of connection or even much conversation. Jeff’s mother, Sharon (Susan Sarandon), spends her days de-stressing by staring at a waterfall picture in a drab office environment. But today a change is going to come in a big way to the people in Jeff’s life.
In “Jeff, Who Lives at Home” both Segel and Helms have taken on roles that are slightly more serious than the comedic standards that these actors are known for. Still the film is not so far removed as to alienate the fans who diligently follow these two actors to the theater time and time again.
The film’s plot is full of unexpected yet mildly realistic twists and turns. There are no big explosions or giant leaps of faith. This serpentine story is much more subtle. Many of the standout moments are realistically bizarre yet prove relevant, sweeping the audience into lives that have hit the final dregs of acceptability.
Visually the film is lack-luster. More than once viewers experience uncomfortable close-up shots of the less than attractively decorated characters. Still the script is well composed and crafted with such care that every word seems to naturally flow from the actors’ mouths. The story delves into so many facets of the human experience, from marriage to the building of a brotherly bond, that the tale itself is engrossing.
The characters are nervous, inexperienced, and closed off but the tale that defines “Jeff, Who Lives at Home” is entirely relatable. The film is not exactly enchanting but it was significantly better than I had originally anticipated.
In “Jeff, Who Lives at Home” both Segel and Helms have taken on roles that are slightly more serious than the comedic standards that these actors are known for. Still the film is not so far removed as to alienate the fans who diligently follow these two actors to the theater time and time again.
The film’s plot is full of unexpected yet mildly realistic twists and turns. There are no big explosions or giant leaps of faith. This serpentine story is much more subtle. Many of the standout moments are realistically bizarre yet prove relevant, sweeping the audience into lives that have hit the final dregs of acceptability.
Visually the film is lack-luster. More than once viewers experience uncomfortable close-up shots of the less than attractively decorated characters. Still the script is well composed and crafted with such care that every word seems to naturally flow from the actors’ mouths. The story delves into so many facets of the human experience, from marriage to the building of a brotherly bond, that the tale itself is engrossing.
The characters are nervous, inexperienced, and closed off but the tale that defines “Jeff, Who Lives at Home” is entirely relatable. The film is not exactly enchanting but it was significantly better than I had originally anticipated.
Gareth von Kallenbach (980 KP) rated Father Figures (2018) in Movies
Jul 11, 2019
Expectations, all of us have them and occasionally our expectations live up to exactly as we assume they will; other times, we are wrong. The movie Father Figures, a comedy film directed by Lawrence Sher and written by Justin Malen is not only about two brothers searching for their biological father, but the journey and the expectations that go along with the journey.
Peter Reynolds (Ed Helms) is a man who is disenchanted with his life. He’s a doctor who’s still struggling with his divorce from three years ago, and the prospects of connecting with a son who wants nothing to do with him. His fraternal twin brother Kyle, on the other hand, has the picture-perfect life. Wealthy for being nothing more than a surf bum on the beach and being at the right place at the right time; with a new baby on the way with his long-term (6 month) relationship.
An unlikely event opens Peter’s eyes to the life he has known; a life where the father he believed to be his died of colon cancer, which dictated his career and life choices. The event exposed the lies that their mother had told them and the man they believed to be their father all along, never was.
The realization sends the two brothers on a mission to discover who their real father is, and also discover a bit about themselves along the way. Their journey of discovery will take them from Florida to Massachusetts, and several places in-between. All of this, with of hopes of unraveling the mystery of who their real father is and what role, if any, he could fill in their existing lives.
Ed Helms, portrays his character brilliantly. A man who is kind, good-hearted and responsible. The one who even with all his good intentions, never feels like he is able to get ahead. Owen Wilson plays what I feel is one of his best roles to date, as the ying to Ed Helms yang, the happy-go-lucky, never have a care in the world character. The two have a chemistry on the screen that draws you into their personal struggles with lots of laughter along the way.
The cast of “fathers”, are all brilliantly portrayed, whether it’s Terry Bradshaw portraying himself; J. K. Simons, as the lovable “jerk”; and the always talented Christopher Walken as the family veterinarian Dr. Walter Tinkler. Glenn Close does an absolutely amazing performance as the brother’s mother Helen Baxter.
There are plenty of laughs to be had through the movie, but it’s the amount of heart that the movie shows that really drew me in. As I spoke in the beginning, about expectations, I myself had expectations that the movie would be just another slap-stick comedy, with the characters getting into one hilarious situation after another. While this certainly did happen (it is still a comedy after-all), none of the bits seemed outrageous or done for the sake of shock value. As with most movies that fall into this genre, there are scenes which some may feel provided nothing to the story, and were there simply for adolescent humor or to justify the R rating, but none of these detracted from the film as a whole. I didn’t expect to come out of this movie not only quoting some of the very memorable lines, but also reflecting on where their journey began and where it ended.
Father Figures is much more than a simple comedy, and it’s far more than simply a “who’s your daddy” adventure. It’s a movie about self-discovery and more importantly, the journey to get you there. The folks at Warner Bros. Pictures should be commended on not only the casting of the roles, but for producing a story they can be proud of.
Peter Reynolds (Ed Helms) is a man who is disenchanted with his life. He’s a doctor who’s still struggling with his divorce from three years ago, and the prospects of connecting with a son who wants nothing to do with him. His fraternal twin brother Kyle, on the other hand, has the picture-perfect life. Wealthy for being nothing more than a surf bum on the beach and being at the right place at the right time; with a new baby on the way with his long-term (6 month) relationship.
An unlikely event opens Peter’s eyes to the life he has known; a life where the father he believed to be his died of colon cancer, which dictated his career and life choices. The event exposed the lies that their mother had told them and the man they believed to be their father all along, never was.
The realization sends the two brothers on a mission to discover who their real father is, and also discover a bit about themselves along the way. Their journey of discovery will take them from Florida to Massachusetts, and several places in-between. All of this, with of hopes of unraveling the mystery of who their real father is and what role, if any, he could fill in their existing lives.
Ed Helms, portrays his character brilliantly. A man who is kind, good-hearted and responsible. The one who even with all his good intentions, never feels like he is able to get ahead. Owen Wilson plays what I feel is one of his best roles to date, as the ying to Ed Helms yang, the happy-go-lucky, never have a care in the world character. The two have a chemistry on the screen that draws you into their personal struggles with lots of laughter along the way.
The cast of “fathers”, are all brilliantly portrayed, whether it’s Terry Bradshaw portraying himself; J. K. Simons, as the lovable “jerk”; and the always talented Christopher Walken as the family veterinarian Dr. Walter Tinkler. Glenn Close does an absolutely amazing performance as the brother’s mother Helen Baxter.
There are plenty of laughs to be had through the movie, but it’s the amount of heart that the movie shows that really drew me in. As I spoke in the beginning, about expectations, I myself had expectations that the movie would be just another slap-stick comedy, with the characters getting into one hilarious situation after another. While this certainly did happen (it is still a comedy after-all), none of the bits seemed outrageous or done for the sake of shock value. As with most movies that fall into this genre, there are scenes which some may feel provided nothing to the story, and were there simply for adolescent humor or to justify the R rating, but none of these detracted from the film as a whole. I didn’t expect to come out of this movie not only quoting some of the very memorable lines, but also reflecting on where their journey began and where it ended.
Father Figures is much more than a simple comedy, and it’s far more than simply a “who’s your daddy” adventure. It’s a movie about self-discovery and more importantly, the journey to get you there. The folks at Warner Bros. Pictures should be commended on not only the casting of the roles, but for producing a story they can be proud of.
LoganCrews (2861 KP) rated The Hangover Part II (2011) in Movies
Sep 29, 2020 (Updated Oct 1, 2020)
Better than I remembered from the theater, but it's impossible not to notice that the pitch for this was just "the first movie... but worse!" The original will forever be one of my favorite comedies with an ingenious main plot device that I truthfully don't mind them at all reusing (an investigative 'search for clues' procedural wrapped into the raunchy comedy framing device of trying to figure what four drunk fucks did the night before) but I think they went too much 'crime movie' and not enough 'comedy movie' with this one. Has some laugh-out-loud moments but as everyone has already said they're few and far between, then the last 45 minutes of this devolves into everyone screaming and asking each other expository questions for the rest of the runtime. Though one thing I don't think even this franchise's supporters give these enough credit for is the acting. Ed Helms, Bradley Cooper, Zach Galifianakis, Justin Bartha, and Ken Jeong are phenomenal both comedically and dramatically here and find a very reasonable balance between the two. Not to mention each of their respective performances is definable from one another and heavily idiosyncratic. But then you have crap like Bryan Callen in brownface, a monkey hanging out with them for half the movie, and Mike Tyson shows up and raps at the end. So you win some, you lose some I guess. Pretty lovingly depraved at least.
Gareth von Kallenbach (980 KP) rated Tag (2018) in Movies
Jul 8, 2019
When you hear about a movie being based on a true story, especially this film, the first thing you ask yourself, “Wait a second, this actually happened in real life?” This movie is about 5 lifelong friends who have been playing the kids’ game Tag for 30 years. Every year during the month of May, it’s no holds barred attempt at tagging each other.
The movie starts out with Hoagie (Ed Helms) trying to procure a janitor job at his friend Callahan’s (Jon Hamm) company for the sole purpose of the game. This year, Hoagie is on a dire mission to tag Jerry (Jeremy Renner), who has never been tagged. After heading out to tag Chilli (Jake Johnson), and Sable (Hannibal Burress), the guys find out they were not invited to Jerry’s wedding mainly because he didn’t want to get tagged.
Jerry has spent decades calculating every move and hidden attempts and is hellbent on never being tagged. You can pretty much guess what ensues once the gang arrives to the wedding. There is an exorbitant amount of slapstick humor in this film, that it masks the absolute absurdity of adults playing tag. There isn’t very much substance to this movie’s storyline. It’s pretty much vulgar humor, physical antics, and everything you’ve wanted in a film about adults playing a kids game. If you’re looking to spend 2 hours laughing immensely at a movie that will most likely win a Razzie, go see this one.
You’ll think it’s unbelievably ridiculous, you can’t help but love it!
The movie starts out with Hoagie (Ed Helms) trying to procure a janitor job at his friend Callahan’s (Jon Hamm) company for the sole purpose of the game. This year, Hoagie is on a dire mission to tag Jerry (Jeremy Renner), who has never been tagged. After heading out to tag Chilli (Jake Johnson), and Sable (Hannibal Burress), the guys find out they were not invited to Jerry’s wedding mainly because he didn’t want to get tagged.
Jerry has spent decades calculating every move and hidden attempts and is hellbent on never being tagged. You can pretty much guess what ensues once the gang arrives to the wedding. There is an exorbitant amount of slapstick humor in this film, that it masks the absolute absurdity of adults playing tag. There isn’t very much substance to this movie’s storyline. It’s pretty much vulgar humor, physical antics, and everything you’ve wanted in a film about adults playing a kids game. If you’re looking to spend 2 hours laughing immensely at a movie that will most likely win a Razzie, go see this one.
You’ll think it’s unbelievably ridiculous, you can’t help but love it!
LoganCrews (2861 KP) rated Dr Seuss' The Lorax (2012) in Movies
Jul 4, 2021
Everyone who claims the weird Once-ler fandom from 2012 died don't realize that it simply morphed into all those people who want to fuck that TikTok Willy Wonka dude tbh. Another aimless round of empty visual inertia from Illumination which painfully crawls at hardly 87 minutes in length. How you all feel about 𝘔𝘪𝘯𝘪𝘰𝘯𝘴 (which I think is just mediocre) is how I feel about this - an endurance test to see how long the human brain can tolerate such abominable annoyances without snapping like a twig. I fucking loathe those dumbass fish that wouldn't shut the fuck up or those sickly-sweet bears. Somehow not even the worst Seuss adaptation from this company though, the Lorax's design and choice of DeVito for voice actor is essentially a dead-ringer. Not to mention how impressed I am with Ed Helms' multifaceted voice performance and some stuff in the last thirty minutes is kind of half-decent too. It also doesn't exactly have the wrong aesthetic, either - but it's in service of such thorough vapidity, I mean what an aggressive non-story going on here. Plus - surprise - it's totally performative; you know those marketing execs would have happily chopped down a million of those forests to make some Illumination-brand Lorax plushies. Tried so hard to be 'in the now' that it features side-banged fedora hipster twinks with emo hair and ends with nasty-ass amounts of early-2010s autotune you'd already forgotten existed. Not only a fundamental misunderstanding of Seuss but a pathetic excuse for a movie as well.
Movie Metropolis (309 KP) rated Vacation (2015) in Movies
Jun 11, 2019
Family holidays will never be the same
It was 1983 when Chevy Chase and Beverly D’Angelo made the infamous decision to take their family across the US to “America’s Favourite Family Fun Park” in National Lampoon’s Vacation.
Being the best in the long-running series, it seemed natural for it to receive a fully-fledged sequel of some kind, but it has taken up until now to get the balance right, but does Vacation evoke memories of that brilliant road-trip comedy?
Ed Helms takes on the role of an adult Rusty Griswold as he, like his father makes the epic trip to Walley World theme park alongside his long-suffering wife Debbie (Christina Applegate) and his two sons James and Kevin, played by Skyler Gisondo and Steele Stebbins respectively.
Everybody’s favourite thunder-god, Chris Hemsworth makes a rather revealing cameo as Rusty’s brother-in-law and ladies’ man, Stone Crandall, and helps lift Vacation out of what could have been a half-way lull.
Naturally, there are many tasteful references to its predecessor but this isn’t just a lesson in comedy history. Writers Jonathan Goldstein and John Francis Daley inject some much-needed modern humour into the film – this is most definitely a movie from the 21st Century.
Ed Helms and Christina Applegate have real chemistry as the married couple but it is in their children that most of the laughs are. James and Kevin are the stereotypical, bickering siblings but like everything in Vacation they are turned up to eleven.
From raw sewage infested hot springs to a would-be maniac truck driver, the gags on the whole hit the spot every single time – by no means an easy feat when writing a comedy over 90 minutes in length. There are a couple of ill-placed laughs like a Four Corners police brawl that threaten to stop the film in its tracks, but thankfully these are few and far between.
Short but sweet cameos for Chevy Chase and Beverly D’Angelo towards the climax anchor Vacation to what came before it and it’s nice that the writers didn’t forget to honour those roots in more ways than sickly nostalgia.
The direction is also positively inspired. Acting like a tourist brochure for the USA, Vacation makes you feel like you’re part of the vast locations. From desolate highways to bustling cities, it’s all here and beautifully shot.
Unfortunately the plot seems to run a little out of steam towards the end. After all, there’s only so much déjà vu a story can take and it seems that the writers put all their best work in the first two thirds of the movie, as is the case with many films in the genre.
Nevertheless, Vacation is a confident film that knows exactly what it’s trying to be. Acting as a standalone comedy for newcomers and a decent sequel for fans of the original, it has something for everyone.
The acting is sublime and the casting choices are spot on, only a lacklustre final third pull it back from the edge of glory.
I probably won’t be planning that road trip any time soon.
https://moviemetropolis.net/2015/08/23/family-holidays-will-never-be-the-same-vacation-review/
Being the best in the long-running series, it seemed natural for it to receive a fully-fledged sequel of some kind, but it has taken up until now to get the balance right, but does Vacation evoke memories of that brilliant road-trip comedy?
Ed Helms takes on the role of an adult Rusty Griswold as he, like his father makes the epic trip to Walley World theme park alongside his long-suffering wife Debbie (Christina Applegate) and his two sons James and Kevin, played by Skyler Gisondo and Steele Stebbins respectively.
Everybody’s favourite thunder-god, Chris Hemsworth makes a rather revealing cameo as Rusty’s brother-in-law and ladies’ man, Stone Crandall, and helps lift Vacation out of what could have been a half-way lull.
Naturally, there are many tasteful references to its predecessor but this isn’t just a lesson in comedy history. Writers Jonathan Goldstein and John Francis Daley inject some much-needed modern humour into the film – this is most definitely a movie from the 21st Century.
Ed Helms and Christina Applegate have real chemistry as the married couple but it is in their children that most of the laughs are. James and Kevin are the stereotypical, bickering siblings but like everything in Vacation they are turned up to eleven.
From raw sewage infested hot springs to a would-be maniac truck driver, the gags on the whole hit the spot every single time – by no means an easy feat when writing a comedy over 90 minutes in length. There are a couple of ill-placed laughs like a Four Corners police brawl that threaten to stop the film in its tracks, but thankfully these are few and far between.
Short but sweet cameos for Chevy Chase and Beverly D’Angelo towards the climax anchor Vacation to what came before it and it’s nice that the writers didn’t forget to honour those roots in more ways than sickly nostalgia.
The direction is also positively inspired. Acting like a tourist brochure for the USA, Vacation makes you feel like you’re part of the vast locations. From desolate highways to bustling cities, it’s all here and beautifully shot.
Unfortunately the plot seems to run a little out of steam towards the end. After all, there’s only so much déjà vu a story can take and it seems that the writers put all their best work in the first two thirds of the movie, as is the case with many films in the genre.
Nevertheless, Vacation is a confident film that knows exactly what it’s trying to be. Acting as a standalone comedy for newcomers and a decent sequel for fans of the original, it has something for everyone.
The acting is sublime and the casting choices are spot on, only a lacklustre final third pull it back from the edge of glory.
I probably won’t be planning that road trip any time soon.
https://moviemetropolis.net/2015/08/23/family-holidays-will-never-be-the-same-vacation-review/