Search

Search only in certain items:

Where'd You Go, Bernadette (2019)
Where'd You Go, Bernadette (2019)
2019 | Comedy, Drama
Contains spoilers, click to show
Judging by the size of the auditorium and the number of people who went to my screening, this film did not have a successful marketing campaign. Maybe people do not care about Antarctica or artists or perhaps the people who read the book are not habitual moviegoers (that is very likely). More probably Annapurna is struggling and couldn't market the movie. The film is tough to pigeonhole into a blurb. Bernadette Fox was a visionary architect who suffered a major setback when her dream project was bought and destroyed by a financial giant, a metaphor for the way the moneyed crush the dreams of artists and creators. For the past few years, she has turned into an anxiety-ridden wife and mother. When she gets swindled by a Russian identity thief ring, she decides to take that trip to Antarctica the family has been planning but she was anxious about. Basically, a case of when her imost recent dentity gets taken, Bernadette is given an opportunity to reinvent herself as the person she was always meant to be. Directed by master experimental filmmaker Richard Linklater, the film is a tale of turning your worst into your best. He makes a great back and forth between husband and wife as each tells a story from different viewpoints at a dining table. Cate Blanchett has a blast playing an anti-social artistic. It is too bad that there could not be more scenes between Kristen Wiig and Cate Blanchett as they bond over their ineffectual parenting.
  
40x40

Kristy H (1252 KP) rated Those People in Books

Sep 13, 2019  
Those People
Those People
Louise Candlish | 2019 | Thriller
5
7.0 (4 Ratings)
Book Rating
So I was really excited to read my first Louise Candlish novel and while I found this one interesting enough, it wasn't as intriguing as I'd hoped after all the hype over OUR HOUSE. I'm all for neighborhood tensions and drama, but my goodness, it feels like this book took forever. And while I get that this was probably the overall point, these people were mostly all so insufferable that I really didn't care if they all just killed each other!

The book makes some good points about social class, but it does it all so slowly. There are a few twists, yes, but they don't come often enough, and I had a decent idea about a few of them. Maybe the drawn out element was meant to mimic the neighbor's "agony," but good grief. The book is told via police reports and narratives. We learn early on there was an incident in the neighborhood, but don't know what happened or who was involved. I was definitely interested in knowing what went on, which is why I kept plugging away. It's pretty clear early on that nearly everyone has a reason to harm everyone else; kind of makes me glad for my eight acres.

So, overall, while curiosity kept me reading on this one, and I enjoyed a few of the twists, it was definitely a slow read filled with a lot of annoying characters. Maybe if I'm brave enough to pick up OUR HOUSE, it will be more my jam. 2.5+ stars.