Thighs Wide Shut

Café Society
Cup Half Empty
Official Site | Trailers & Mo
PG-13 | 96 min

There’s something to Woody Allen‘s latest entry – Café Society – but also, there’s not much to it.  You watch it and you go – hey, I’d love to be there, in that time period and in those fabulous places, with those endlessly beautifully sun-drenched lit scenes, and down some of those lush-looking drinks, and take a puff from those slow smoking c-gars!  This is like the gilded version of his 1999 film Sweet and Lowdown (one of my favorite modern Woody pics) – but somehow, his new jaunt is devoid of heart, soul and humor

It’s not the fault of our characters.  We like them, and we want to watch them do things.  There’s something to Jesse Eisenberg (playing the Woody role) chasing Kristen Stewart round ole Hollywood, but there’s not much to the chase.  There’s something to Jesse’s uncle Steve Carell, but not really anything to him, and the same goes to his uncle’s friends Parker Posey & Paul Schneider, and Eisenberg and his uncle’s kinfolk - Corey Stoll (all gangster schtick, zero personality), Sari Lennick (as if she just walked off the set of A Serious Man and right onto Society‘s set!), Stephen Kunken, Ken Stott and Jeannie Berlin.  There’s even something about Blake Lively, when usually there’s nothing to her except her body.  We want to spend time with these people, but not really given any good reason to, or to fully care about what happens to them

Well, there was one thing that was a thing – but it was more personal.  Jesse falls for a girl, and then another with the same first name.  This happened to me, although unlike in the movie, I didn’t continue to pine for the 1st girl, while the 2nd girl became my wife!!

Anywho, it was a decent try Woody.  You have a nice looking Café, with a nice set of drinkers, but there’s not much niceties to your Society at all.  See you next summer!

Verdictgo:  Sum Merit But No Stinkin Badgers

Café is juss OK at a theater near jews

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…

Beloved
(Les bien-aimés)
How Long Must We Sing This Song?
Official Website | Trailers & Mo
NR | 135 min

Beloved‘s a love story (times two), for the ages, and by ages, we mean it takes 9ever to go from Paris’ swinging 60s, to the morose post-9/11 world, but at least there’s singing all along the way!  in French!!!

Yes, we’ve been down this Christophe Honoré path before, with 2007’s Love Songs (Les Chansons d’amour), and we haven’t stop singing that film’s praises.  More like singing that film’s soundtrack (we actually do, and the songs are all in French!!!), and less so about the film itself.   And that’s OK, cause them songs were AMAZING!!!  And the movie itself was pretty darn good too

So what about try #2, with some returning regulars (Catherine Deneuve, Ludivine Sagnier, Chiara Mastroianni, Louis Garrel) + some newbies (Paul Schneider, Radivoje Bukvic & Milos Forman!!!)?  The song remains the same?  Kinda, but with more emotional weight (AIDS!), which also weighs down the affair a lil too much, cause 135 minutes is a long time to hear French people sing about anything (even if it was about naked women eating Popeyes), when we’ve basically already seen this movie before

BUT!  It’s a French modern musical and you can’t really hate on French modern musicals, unless you hate hot & sexy French people singing songs about love and love’s lost and love found, again and again!!!  And do you not want to see mother Deneuve play screen-mother to her real life daughter Mastroianni, again?  Heck, we wish every movie employed Deneuve/Mastroianni to play mother-daughter!  Heck, we wish that they were our mother and our sister (no offense to our mother and our sister)!  Heck!!!  And they sing, a lot!!!! IN FRENCH!!!  And so does Paul Schneider (in English)!!!!  PAUL SCHNEIDER SINGS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Verdictgo: it’s no Love Songs (Les Chansons d’amour), but we’ll take it over not having a quasi-sequel, so low end Jeepers Worth A Peepers

Beloved sings its song this Friday in limited release

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…