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kristen bell

Sep 12 2012
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Review: Hit and Run, The Watch and Hysteria

By Cinema, Reviews

Readers of last week’s column will know that I am cur­rently over­seas on a quest, a mis­sion – a pur­suit if you prefer – hop­ing to dis­cov­er a new kind of cinema. After a week at the Telluride Film Festival in Colorado I am now in New York and have got a clear­er idea of what that vis­ion should look like.

I think I’ll name this new cinema good cinema and it’s main char­ac­ter­ist­ic will be the absence of films like Hit and Run and The Watch, two of this week’s new releases. Is it pos­sible to redefine rub­bish like this out of existence?

Hit and Run movie posterThe first is a Dax Shepard van­ity pro­ject about a man choos­ing to give up his place in a dull wit­ness pro­tec­tion pro­gramme so that his girl­friend (Kristen Bell) can get a job in the big city. In the space of a single day his pre­vi­ous iden­tity as a top get­away driver is revealed to her and his new iden­tity as a dreary small-town non-entity is revealed to the dim­wit­ted but single-minded hoods who he rat­ted out.

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Dec 14 2010
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Review: Get Him to the Greek, The Last Station and Amreeka

By Cinema, Reviews

Get Him to the Greek posterForgetting Sarah Marshall was one of the sur­prise pleas­ures of 2008. An Apatow com­edy that was rel­at­ively mod­est about it’s ambi­tions it fea­tured a break-out per­form­ance from English comedi­an Russell Brand, play­ing a ver­sion of his own louche stage persona.

As it so often goes with sur­prise hits, a spinoff was rushed into pro­duc­tion and we now get to see wheth­er Mr Brand’s brand of humour can carry an entire film. Get Him to the Greek sees Brand’s English rock star Aldous Snow on the comeback trail after a failed sev­en year attempt at sobri­ety. Unlikely LA A&R man Jonah Hill (Knocked Up, Funny People) sells his record label boss, Sean “P Diddy” Combs, on a 10th anniversary con­cert fea­tur­ing Snow and his band Infant Sorrow at the Greek Theatre of the title.

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Mar 14 2010
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Review: It’s Complicated, Cirque du freak: The Vampire’s Assistant & Astro Boy

By Cinema, Reviews

It's Complicated posterThe first thing you need to know about It’s Complicated is that it isn’t very com­plic­ated at all. The plot, the char­ac­ters, the gags (dear God, espe­cially the gags) are all per­fectly com­pre­hens­ible – even to those of us with only mod­est intel­lec­tu­al fac­ulties. Rest assured, at no point will any­one be talk­ing over your head in this one.

Nancy Meyer’s pre­vi­ous film was The Holiday, which eas­ily remains in the bot­tom ten of the 1200+ films I have reviewed in these pages, so It’s Complicated earns a single point for not being that bad, but that’s where I run out of positives.

Meryl Streep plays Jane, suc­cess­ful baker and busi­ness­wo­man, who has a drunk­en one-night-stand with her rogue-ish ex-husband, played by Alec Baldwin. He thinks that they should try again. She isn’t so sure – mainly because he is now mar­ried to the woman he left her for ten years earli­er and she really doesn’t want to be the “oth­er woman” to the “oth­er woman”.

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Aug 12 2008
Love0

Review: Forgetting Sarah Marshall, The X-Files: I Want to Believe, Closing the Ring, Smart People, Married Life, Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day and Journey From the Fall

By Cinema, Conflict of Interest, Reviews

Forgetting Sarah Marshall posterForgetting Sarah Marshall is an ideal post-Festival pal­ate cleanser: a saucy com­edy fresh off the Judd Apatow pro­duc­tion line (The 40 Year Old Virgin, Knocked Up). Here he gives the spot­light to one of his sup­port­ing play­ers: Jason Segal (Knocked Up) plays tv com­poser Peter who with­in two minutes of the start of the film is dumped by tv star Sarah M. (Kristen Bell from “Veronica Mars”). He goes to Hawaii to recov­er only to dis­cov­er that his ex is also there – with her new English rock star boy­friend. Very funny in parts, sur­pris­ingly mov­ing at times thanks to a heart­felt per­form­ance from big lump Segal, FSM gets an extra half a star for fea­tur­ing pro­fes­sion­al West Ham fan Russell Brand, play­ing a ver­sion of his sex-addicted stage persona.

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