MY MOVIE SHELF: Horrible Bosses

The Task: Watch and write about every movie on my shelf, in order (Blu-rays are sorted after DVDs), by June 10, 2015.  Remaining movies: 54 Days to go: 38

Movie #386:  Horrible Bosses

I’ve had some great bosses over the years. I’ve also had some godawful ones. For every boss I’ve had who really valued me and appreciated my work, I’ve had one who would encourage me to be casual and friendly with her, then assess me as unprofessional on my reviews, or one who would use me as a scapegoat to get out of jams, or one who would be openly sexist and demeaning, or one who would be basically incompetent and would need me to do my job and his too. I think a lot of people have these experiences from time to time, so Horrible Bosses is hugely relatable as fantasy wish-fulfillment. It’s also rip-roaringly funny.

Jason Bateman, Jason Sudeikis and Charlie Day are great as friends Nick, Kurt and Dale. In their own ways, each of them portray both the straight man and the comic role at different times. Their interactions are goofy and spastic one minute, sarcastic and snarky the next, but somehow it all works. However, if you were to think in terms of a comedy duo where one guy is the straight man and one is the banana man, than really all three friends (Nick, Kurt and Dale) are the straight men while all three of their respective bosses — Harken (Kevin Spacey), Bobby Pellit (Colin Farrell) and Julia (Jennifer Aniston) — are their counterparts. (Julia is definitely a big banana fan.)

Each boss character is played to the nines, at the extreme end of the scenery-chewing, batshit crazy spectrum. They look like seriously the most fun characters in the world to play, because they just go all out inappropriate in every conceivable way. Harken is a sadistic, jealous, ball-busting, manipulative, calculating, murderous fuck. Pellit is a sexist, misogynistic, bigoted, dickweed cokehead d-bag (with a comb-over and a pot belly that is HILARIOUS to behold). And Julia is a psychotic, oversexed lunatic.

To the shock of no one, I’m sure, Jennifer Aniston’s performance is my absolute favorite of the entire film (even including Jamie Foxx as the hysterical pseudo-thug Motherfucker Jones). She plays diametrically opposed to type as a dentist with an extreme capacity for sexual harassment. (“That’s rape! You’re a raper!”) For reasons completely unknown, Julia is obsessed with Dale’s junk and she will do absolutely anything to get a piece of it. It’s a nice role reversal, actually, on your typical sexual harassment storylines, and it’s incredibly funny because it’s so balls-to-the-wall. Aniston has no fear whatsoever being as sexual and as bold as she can possibly be, which, let’s face it, should be a regular thing because it’s so great. Shrinking, insecure violets are so last century. Embrace your sexuality, ladies! (Just don’t sexually harass and/or assault anyone. That’s bad.)

Horrible Bosses is chock full of jokes and rich with stellar performances. And it also confirms my suspicions that watching lots of Law & Order will one day come in handy if I’m ever accused of a crime. That’s a win-win.

MY MOVIE SHELF: Working Girl

The Task: Watch and write about every movie on my shelf, in order (Blu-rays are sorted after DVDs), by June 10, 2015.  Remaining movies: 132 Days to go: 92

Movie #308:  Working Girl

Has anyone ever thought about the title of this film? If there had been the Internet and Twitter in 1988, I’m sure there would’ve been a dozen clickbait thinkpieces on it, but I’ve no idea if it had ever really been discussed in the traditional formats of the day. Working girl is a term for a prostitute, as we all know, and while the movie Working Girl is not about a prostitute but about a woman trying to make it in corporate America, it is a clever little play on words about how difficult that actually is. Women (even today, not just way back in 1988) aren’t always taken seriously, are sometimes objectified, and are almost always required to play by men’s rules in order to get ahead. This particular working girl, in fact, (Tess McGill, played to perfection by Melanie Griffith) is quite literally prostituted out by  her boss (Oliver Platt) over to some cokehead in Arbitrage (Kevin Spacey), the assumption being she could maybe sleep her way into a better position. It’s gross, but not really all that surprising, and I find the double meaning of the film’s title to be an intriguing detail, an added layer to the richness and depth of the story.

Working Girl is not just about the struggles of women in the business world, though. It’s also about the Haves versus the Have-Nots. After the unfortunate moment with the cokehead from Arbitrage and his porn limo, Tess gets a job working for Katharine Parker (Sigourney Weaver). It’s her first time working for a woman, so she thinks things will finally be different. Katharine, however, is not of the same ilk as Tess. She comes from money, has been afforded every advantage, and has never really had to work or hustle for anything. She thinks Tess is beneath her, and she takes advantage by trying to pass off Tess’s idea for a business deal as her own. Like everything else, Katharine considers it her due.

Thanks to Katharine being laid up with a broken leg in Europe, though, when Tess finds out about the subterfuge, she goes to work correcting it. She contacts the man Katharine was going to reach out to, Jack Trainer (Harrison Ford), and fakes and stumbles her way through this new world, passing herself off as Katharine’s colleague instead of her secretary. It’s crazy, and yet you can’t help rooting for her — because she’s been wronged, because she’s smarter and works harder than almost anyone else around, and because the deck has always been and will always be stacked against her.

There are close calls and shenanigans in all sorts of settings: tropical themed weddings, “lust and tequila,” changing shirts at the office, failing to check the dosage on the Valium, and Tess’s boyfriend Nick (Alec Baldwin) screwing some skinny chick while Tess is supposed to be at class and then still having the cajones to get pissed when she answers “Maybe” to his marriage proposal. It’s a rollercoaster.

Harrison Ford is at maximum charming in this film, shorting circuits for miles in every direction with his serious sexiness overload. Whether he’s making up stories about where he got his chin scar or discarding the idea that Tess might not like him or admitting that he MIGHT have peeked when he got her undressed for bed, he is the most desirable man on the planet or any other planet in this movie. Han Solo IS a scruffy-looking nerf herder next to Jack Trainer. He’s sharp, witty, quick on his feet, and never once patronizing or condescending to Tess the way literally almost every other person she’s met up to that point has been. “The Earth moved. The angels wept. The Polaroids are … are … uh … are in my other coat.” More’s the pity.

This particular tale also benefits tremendously from the presence of Tess’s best friend Cynthia (Joan Cusack), who is loving and supportive but who also doesn’t want to see her friend get hurt by all this social-climbing and who frequently tells it like it is. “Sometimes I sing and dance around the house in my underwear. Doesn’t make me Madonna. Never will.”

Some people might dub Working Girl a Cinderella story, but it’s not. Tess works and strives for every single thing she has. She knows her stuff, she’s aware of the stakes, and she plays their game. And she wins. “You can bend the rules plenty once you get to the top, but not while you’re trying to get there. And if you’re someone like me, you can’t get there without bending the rules.” It’s a gamble, but it pays off in spades. She gets the better of Katharine’s “bony ass,” she gets the guy who is WAY BETTER BY LIKE A MILLION TIMES than the disconcertingly hairy guy she was with before, and she even gets a much better position than she thought when Oren Trask (Philip Bosco) offers her a job at his office. And she never once had to prostitute herself.

It kind of makes you want to sing a soaring Carly Simon song, doesn’t it?

MY MOVIE SHELF: The Usual Suspects

The Task: Watch and write about every movie on my shelf, in order (Blu-rays are sorted after DVDs), by June 10, 2015.  Remaining movies: 145  Days to go: 98

Movie #293:  The Usual Suspects

Some people may think I overreact with regard to a movie’s running time. Maybe I’m a little oversensitive about a movie I think is too long. To those people, I present The Usual Suspects. One of the most elaborate and intricate stories filmed in at least the last quarter century, if not ever, The Usual Suspects clocks in at 106 minutes. One hour and forty-six minutes, total. A film doesn’t have to be long to be incredibly smart and impressively layered. The Usual Suspects reveals itself incrementally, in pieces, then doubles back on itself to put different pieces of the puzzle together before moving slowly forward again. And it does all that with none of the bloat that plagues a lot of the current film industry.

The Usual Suspects is ostensibly the story of five criminals involved in a huge shootout on a boat in San Pedro — the story of how they came together, how they operated, how they succeeded, and how it all fell apart — the story of Keaton (Gabriel Byrne), Hockney (Kevin Pollack), McManus (Stephen Baldwin) and Fenster (Benicio Del Toro), as told by their compatriot Verbal (Kevin Spacey), the only one of the five to survive the night — but the real star of the film is the mystery man no one ever sees, the criminal kingpin pulling all the strings behind the scenes, a man called Keyser Soze. Who is he? Is he anyone at all? That’s the true crux of the film, and it’s such a brilliantly crafted mystery that Gabriel Byrne himself famously thought he was Keyser Soze all the way up until he saw the finished film for the first time.

But if Keyser Soze is the unseen star of the film, the five main characters are an integral part of the foundation that makes it great. Each character is different and specific, bringing their own style and verve to the mix. Keaton is gruff and no-nonsense. McManus is obnoxious and manic and crazy. Hockney is a wiseass who couldn’t give less of a fuck about anybody. Fenster is a mush-mouthed slickster with a silly sense of humor. Verbal is seemingly weak and innocent, underestimated on purpose, with an answer for everything. These five personalities, and the performances that surrounded them, and the amazing, memorable, quotable lines of dialogue they were given, give the movie breadth and depth and form. They make it three-dimensional. They make it genuine — which is why it’s just as much of a gut punch to us, the audience, as it is to Agent Dave Kujan (Chazz Palminteri) when he lets Verbal go, looks at the bulletin board, and realizes it’s all a facade.

There is no Redfoot (Peter Greene), for all we know. The real name of Kobayashi (Pete Postlethwaite) might as well be Joe Miller. There was no barbershop quartet in Skokie, Illinois. Verbal never picked coffee beans in Guatamala. There was no coke on that boat. And Dean Keaton is not Keyser Soze.

And then POOF. He’s gone.

MY MOVIE SHELF: A Time to Kill

The Task: Watch and write about every movie on my shelf, in order (Blu-rays are sorted after DVDs), by June 10, 2015.  Remaining movies: 154  Days to go: 109

Movie #284:  A Time to Kill

There are a lot of things I like about A Time to Kill — things I liked when it came out, and things I like still. The affinity levels may have changed a little bit over the years, one way or another, as I’ve grown and changed as a person, but not drastically. It’s a good film, and I get a lot out of it. One aspect of it that has always made me a little uncomfortable, though, is the closing argument defense attorney Jake Brigance (Matthew McConaughey) gives at the end of the film.

Jake’s client Carl Lee Hailey (Samuel L. Jackson) is on trial for killing the two men who brutally raped and almost murdered his ten-year-old daughter. The entire trial, Jake has been trying to get details of the rape on the record, and his closing statement is a perfect opportunity to do that unencumbered and uninterrupted. It’s also his opportunity to, as Carl Lee has made clear, say the thing to the jury that will help them relate to this crime. Jake, like the jury, is “one of the bad guys,” as far as Carl Lee’s concerned, and that’s why he picked him. He sees black people and white people on different sides of a wall — “However you see me, you see me as different.” — and he enlisted the enemy to make the rest of the enemies see it his way. It’s a cold outlook, whether you believe it has merit or not, and although Jake is taken aback by this admission (He’s always looking for someone to be on his team in this film, yet he finds himself repeatedly alone.), he uses his closing to giving a detailed and emotional accounting of the brutality Carl Lee’s daughter endured, while the jury, with their eyes closed, are meant to imagine it and picture this girl. “Now imagine she’s white,” he says, and suddenly everything clicks. Even the judge and District Attorney Buckley (Kevin Spacey) and Carl Lee himself know what an impact that statement makes. But does it? Or should it?

Essentially, what that statement boils down to — and what the entire movie is getting at, really — is that we’re all people, and yet we rarely see each other as such. I find that incredibly depressing, even more so because as much as I hate to admit it, it’s probably true. If there’s one thing being on Facebook makes clear, it’s that a lot of people have no capacity to look at life through the eyes of another person. The things we post, the things we share, the things we argue about and debate at length, all lead me to believe that more often than not we’re all so clouded by the lens of our own experience, we have a hard time accepting that other people, other races, other cultures, other income levels experience things differently than we do. I’m guilty of it myself. There have been many times I’ve struggled to understand how anyone could see something differently than I’ve seen it, or how anyone could hold onto anger over an issue that wasn’t that big a deal, or could prioritize something I found inessential. And yet it happens, all the time. How did compassion and commiseration become such specialized skills? How do we fix that? Certainly not by an impassioned monologue that promises if we can only see a black rape victim as a white rape victim, all will be well in the world. It feels simplistic and kind of insulting to me, and yet I appreciate the idealism of the thought.

I’ve never felt the way Carl Lee does here, that there’s a my side and a his side, but it’s entirely possible, too, that I live in a state of blissful ignorance on the matter. Being a woman, I know full well many of the prejudices women face as I’ve experienced them first hand. As a white woman, however, I don’t have that same connection to the prejudices African-Americans face, even though I know they exist. The best I can do, therefore, is to take their accounts at face value and work to correct them, work to dispel them. And that comes from following their lead on how they feel and what they want to accomplish, just as Jake eventually follows Carl Lee’s lead on how to approach this trial. So maybe it’s not perfect and maybe it’s a little too pat and a little too idealistic, but maybe it’s the best we can do, metaphorically: Strive to be better. I can get behind that, absolutely. Does it make the ending more palatable? I still haven’t decided.

There’s a lot more to this movie than that, though. There’s Kiefer Sutherland leading the KKK, and his father Donald as a broken old drunk of a lawyer. There’s Oliver Platt as the morally compromised Harry Rex, and Ashley Judd as Jake’s ever-sweaty wife Carla (I swear, they rubbed her in baby oil before every take). There’s the awesome Charles S. Dutton as the tough Sheriff Walls and Chris Cooper as the (accidentally) one-legged deputy. And then there’s Sandra Bullock as law student and sexy assistant Ellen Roark. When I was younger, I was really irritated that Jake and Ellen didn’t take advantage of that insane sexual chemistry they had. As I’ve gotten older, I really appreciate the restraint given their relationship. It’s super easy for two sexy actors to have sexy sex in a movie; infidelity is like a go-to plot twist in films of every genre. But for two characters to be attracted to each other and to want to have sex but to not because it would be wrong? That is a rarity, and I find it all the more commendable for that reason.

Of course, this being a John Grisham story, I once again can’t really speak to the plausibility of the legal things that occur. It seems to me a lawyer can’t throw an elbow to a guy’s face even if that guy tried to blow up his house. And if I was the one guy on the jury ready to vote not-guilty when the foreman took an informal poll at the restaurant, I’d probably go to the judge about him using the n-word, which at the very least should get that guy kicked off and might lead to a complete mistrial. And of course, don’t shoot anyone for raping your daughter. I cannot guarantee you’ll get the same outcome as Carl Lee Hailey.

I actually volunteered as a rape crisis advocate several years ago, which amounted to me going to emergency rooms whenever a rape victim came in while I was on call. I would hold their hands and sit with them and listen to them and just be there for them when all the other people (cops, social workers, hospital staff, etc.) had specific jobs to do and couldn’t just be support. I was called in once for two fifteen-year-old girls, one of which asked me to phone her father because she was too embarrassed and humiliated to. I called him up and told him what happened and had to talk him down from killing the boys who did this. I understand the impulse, but trust me: Your daughter will need her father with her, not in jail. If a girl’s dad ends up imprisoned for murdering her rapist, it’ll just be one more thing for her to blame herself for. I know the justice system isn’t perfect, and a lot of times these d-bags go free, but vigilantism is not the answer. Sorry, Carl Lee.

“There ain’t nothin’ more dangerous in this world than a fool with a cause.”

MY MOVIE SHELF: The Ref

The Task: Watch and write about every movie on my shelf, in order (Blu-rays are sorted after DVDs), by June 10, 2015.  Remaining movies: 162  Days to go: 156

Movie #221:  The Ref

Obviously I love Christmas movies; I own quite a few of them. The Ref is a Christmas movie unlike most, however, and I love it all the more for it. This is a movie about the frustrations of Christmas, the resentments of family, and ripping off insults as fast as you can think them up. Also, there’s a burglar on the loose.

In 1992, I watched Denis Leary’s No Cure For Cancer so many times I could recite it from memory. I probably still could, it was pounded into my brain so many times. I can definitely still sing his “Asshole” song. I bought the album, too, and listened to it incessantly. It was one of the funniest things ever. In The Ref, Denis Leary plays Gus, who is basically an entire character based on the comic ideology of No Cure for Cancer, and it’s fantastic.

Gus is a master thief who falls into a “roadrunner booby trap” and has to improvise on his getaway by taking Caroline and Lloyd Chasseur — “that’s 18th century French Huguenot” — (Judy Davis and Kevin Spacey) hostage on Christmas Eve. Lloyd and Caroline are a married couple who hate each other, hate their lives, and bicker incessantly. (“I don’t believe it. You want to have sex with him!” “What??” “‘Use the ouchless. We have bungee cords.'” “I’m frightened. Humans gets frightened because they have feelings. Didn’t your alien leaders teach you that BEFORE THEY SENT YOU HERE?!”) But Gus has a gun. “Married people, without guns — for instance, you — DO NOT GET TO YELL.”

Gus is hiding out until his partner can secure them a boat to escape on, but Lloyd and Caroline’s son, Jesse (Robert J. Steinmiller Jr.) — who “has the kind of imagination–” “that the mafia gives scholarships for” — is heading home from military school (where he’s blackmailing Lt. Siskel, played by J.K. Simmons), and Lloyd’s oppressive and meddling mother Rose (Glynis Johns) is en route with his brother Gary (Adam LeFevre), sister-in-law Connie (Christine Baranski) and their two children for Christmas dinner (after they stop to eat first, because “God knows what disaster your Aunt Caroline is making.”) It makes for one hell of a dinner party, and that’s without taking into account the wreath of lit candles everyone has to wear — “in honor of Saint Lucia” — for their “traditional Scandinavian Christmas feast.” (“My forehead is blistering.”)

There’s a bit of a knock-down drag-out eventually, with everyone getting involved. (“Just who do you think you are?” “Slipper socks. Medium.”) And it all works out in the end, in the spirit of Christmas. (That is not the spirit of Christmas. The spirit of Christmas is either you’re good or you’re punished and you burn in hell.”) “We should unwrap them in the morning. It’ll be more festive.”

Everyone — and I mean everyone — is fantastic in this. Dialogue flies back and forth, joke after joke, insult after insult. Davis and Spacey are unsurprisingly phenomenal, and Leary is very comfortable in this particular persona, so there are no fumbles on his part either. And while I enjoy all the supporting cast, extra attention should really be paid to Johns and Baranski, who go completely balls-out committed to each character’s own particular pathologies. (“Don’t make me nuts today. It’s Christmas!”) “And I still say getting laid by an eighteen-year-old linebacker is JUST WHAT SHE NEEDS.”

Add in a drunk Santa Claus, and it’s a Christmas movie for the ages. Ho ho ho!

MY MOVIE SHELF: American Beauty

The long and the short of it is, I own well over 300 movies on DVD and Blu-ray (I’ll know for sure how many at the end of this project). Until June 10, 2015, I will be watching and writing about them all, in the order they are arranged on my shelf (i.e., alphabetically, with certain exceptions). No movie will be left unwatched . I welcome your comments, your words of encouragement and your declarations of my insanity.

Movie #14:  American Beauty

You know who gets absolutely no credit for being great in this movie? Mena Suvari. American Pie came out three months earlier and instantly became pop culture legend, which is why I assume Mena’s performance gets overlooked here — as if people assumed she was just a kid from a teen sex comedy and didn’t have any substance, unlike Thora Birch (playing Jane Burnham), who had a bit more cachet as a serious young actress at that time.

It’s unfortunate, because Mena, as Jane’s snotty friend Angela Hayes, full of profanity and braggadocio, is perfect. She does nothing but throw her weight around at school, reveling in how beautiful she is and how much men want her, boasting of sexual encounters that never happened, pushing the envelope too far to make people notice and talk about her. She fears nothing more than being ordinary and alone, so she clumsily wields whatever power she has, whether it’s speaking down to the other kids at school, or intentionally making Jane feel uncomfortable and inferior, or flaunting sexuality she doesn’t quite have a handle on yet in front of Jane’s father Lester (Kevin Spacey). When Lester, feeling really strong and confident and free for the first time in the whole film, responds to her obviously calculated flirting without fear or uncertainty, she immediately freezes and flees. And later that night, when he tells her how beautiful she is and kisses her, all her bravado has fallen away. As she lies on the couch, her shirt open and exposing her, she cops to her virginity and is suddenly, to Lester and the audience, just a vulnerable, scared little girl.

The character of Angela Hayes is also a perfect distillation of what the film has to say about people. That is, we are all selfish. We are all locked in our own little worlds, seeing only ourselves, our difficulties, our struggles. Our only concerns are with how we feel and how we feel the world treats us, how the world sees us. We are not interested in, or not capable of, seeing how we treat the world. Only Ricky (Wes Bentley), through the lens of his camera, sees other people. Everyone else — Lester, his wife Carolyn (Annette Bening), Ricky’s dad (Chris Cooper), Angela, and even Jane — is blind to things happening outside his or her personal sphere. And Ricky’s mom (the always great Allison Janney) is so locked in her own mind, after no doubt years of being emotionally beaten down by her hostile and controlling husband, she almost literally can’t see beyond it.

We are meant to see Lester’s transformation through the movie as a liberation, when in truth he’s just as blind and selfish when he buys his Firebird as he is when he’s still working his office job. It’s only actually at the very end of the movie, just before his untimely demise, that he sees Angela’s vulnerability instead of his own desire, and that he asks after his daughter instead of complaining about how much she despises him. And then he’s gone.

I read once that director Sam Mendes originally meant to structure the film as a mystery, with Jane and Ricky on trial for Lester’s murder. There are still traces of it here and there — the video, the multiple cuts to the people in and around the house (all with motive and opportunity) at the time of the fatal gunshot — but I’m glad they took it out. The movie says much more this way, and I like not knowing what happens afterward, in the wake of Lester’s death, save the desperate collapse of a broken-down Carolyn, hugging the clothes in his closet and wailing with grief.

Someone once told me that this movie changed his life, that it made him reevaluate his priorities and that he’s now a much happier person. I like that. I like to think movies are capable of that. They certainly have always been that way for me. It’s nice to know I’m not alone.