Thighs Wide Shut

meanwhile, on our sister stations…

off to Klauder Krab Kfeast XLXXLMIXXLIXX

where this ye olde pic originated!!

HAVE A GREAT WEEKEND ONE AND ALL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

30 Minutes or Less
Less Is… Less
Official Website | Trailers & Mo
R | 83 min

Two dumb dudes (Danny McBride &  Nick Swardson) want to become rich, so they take an idea from a stripper to knock off one of the dude’s dads (Fred Ward), inherit his money and become rich!  In order to do so, they need 100K to pay someone to do the killing (Michael Peña), so they come up with their own idea to kidnap some random person (Jesse Eisenberg), strap a bomb to them, and force them to get the money for them!  All hell will break loose, and hilarity will ensue, won’t it?

Ruben Fleischer‘s 30 Minutes of Less sounds like the stuff of comedy dreams come true – a sharp storyline (by Michael Diliberti and Matthew Sullivan), a killer & lovable cast, and a runtime under 90 minutes (wish more movies would follow suit).  So, why then does 30 Minutes feel like a stretch times itself by 3?  Um, cause it’s only mildly funny, and when it is funny, it’s barely funny (Netflix jokes about never watching the DVDs one gets sent in the mail seems so 2004), and yer mainly giving it charity laffs cause you think McBride is funny.  McBride is pretty much doing his Kenny Powers shtick with a game Swardson doing the Stevie Janowski even dumber sidekick thing.  And we know Eisenberg can be funny, cause he is and has (Zombieland, Adventureland), but if he isn’t given the material to be funny, he can’t be funny.  Unfunny Aziz Ansari doesn’t help matters neither.  He’s more of a comedian than an actor (cause he is), and there’s only so much of his over-exciting yelling thing one can take (maybe you dig that, but we don’t)

Sill, there are far worse offending comedies, with lesser talent that have no story to tell.  But still, this felt like a slightly better Cop Out.  What does that tell ya?  Not much AND a lot.  This has rental written all over it

Pakistan Packing Heat:

Dilshad Vadsaria

Verdictgo: Sum Merit But No Stinkin Badges

30 Minutes doesn’t go a long way at a theater near jews tomorrow

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…

The Help
Maid In America
Official Website | Trailers & Mo
PG-13 | 137 min

We’re not super big on southern styled movies revolving around sassy women doing sassy things in sassypants (never have seen Steel Magnolias, Driving Miss Daisy, or Green Fried Tomatoes), but we do like us some sappy movies that make us cry and semi-revolve around pie and fried chicken.  The Help is just such a movie, but this one’s got a message, about dicey race relations or something, but with a hope for a better tomorrow, or something!!!  And guess what, WE LOVED IT TO TEARS!!!!!!!!!  NOW FEED US SOME FRIED CHICKEN, NOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Based on the runaway bestseller of the same name by Kathryn Stockett (that we haven’t read a word of, snatchurally), no-name writer/director Tate Taylor takes the story about the stories of two black maids (stoically solid, and Oscar-worthy Viola Davis, and an outrageously enraged Octavia Spencer) and the one white woman (not even fugly wigs can make Emma Stone un-hot/awesome) ‘brave’ enuff to tell their stories, and makes all these stories about stories of stories well worth telling and watching… even if they never happened, and even if some have accused the movie of candy-coloring & white-washing elements of the Civil Rights era.  So what if Skeeter (Emma Stone’s stoopid character’s name) is the white vehicle for these oppressed black women to be courageous and let them have their say?  It’s a freakin movie, and one, FOR ONCE, that’s appealing to both white AND black audiences!!!  Name another movie that is… that isn’t a crummy Eddie Murphy movie!!!????

Maybe The Help is lame, and we’re juss over-loving it cause it’s a summer Hollywood movie without any superheroes, and we’re beyond sick of summer superheroes.  Or maybe it’s not lame cause The Help has super heroes, but the only special powers they use are kindness, caring and compassion!!!!  (this review is starting to sound as sappy as the movie is, but WHO CARES!????).  Maybe The Help works cause Julia Roberts isn’t in it?  Maybe cause it juss looks great and feels right?  Maybe cause peeps like Bryce Dallas Howard, Jessica Chastain, Allison Janney, Cicely Tyson and Sissy Spacek are supporting acting the sh#t outta it?????  Maybe the movie is juss a great fracking movie, with tenderness, laughter and has pie AND fried chicken in every 5th scene????? MAYBE!!!

Maybe we need help, but maybe you need to see The Help

Help Wanted:  here’s someone we’d like to see in a French maid outfit – former James Franco flame…

Ahna O’Reilly

Verdictgo: Breast In Show

Help helps itself to a theater near jews tomorrow

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…

Crazy, Stupid, Love.
It’s Not So Complicated Too
Official Website | Trailers & Mo
PG-13 | 118 min

Are you a fan of Steve Carell(‘s sad sack funny guy shtick), Ryan Gosling(‘s serious hotness), Julianne Moore(‘s less is moore approach) and/or Emma Stone(‘s beyond sexy Daisy Duck eyes)? If yer a human being living on planet earth and go to the movies, then the only answer can be ‘yes, to all the above‘.  If not, you might be Hollywood Elsewhere.  Crazy, Stupid, Love is not crazy, nor is it stupid, and nor nor did we out right love it.  BUT, if you love (or even juss like) Carell, Gosling, Moore and/or Stone, then you will dig on them digging on each other.  Here’s another litmus test –  Did you like It’s Complicated?  If you did, you will like CSL.  Nuttin fancy, juss cute people making cute.  No harm, no foul.  Lots of smiles, and if there aren’t smiles, you know eventually that those frowns will be turned upside down

So what’s this movie about?  Who even cares, but we will say that there was a lil bit of a twist that even took us by sirprize!!!  And that sirprize isn’t that Josh Groban is pretty decent at playing a dork, or that Kevin Bacon is beyond decent at playing an unlikable person, or that Analeigh Tipton is solid at being awkward, or that Marisa Tomei can make good use of a bad useless role, or that John Carroll Lynch really is the Zodiac, or that Jonah Bobo has an odd name and should totally play a young Brian Wilson in that 5thcoming biopic

Crazy Stupid Hot Chicks: there were plenty on hand, but we’d like to get our hands on these two the mostest!!

Crystal Reed

&

Karolina Wydra

Verdictgo: Jeepers Worth A Peepers

Stupid isn’t so at a theater near jews tomorrow

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…

The Guard
The Blue Meaningless
Official Website | Trailers & Mo
R | 96 min

Brendan Gleeson is one giant framed bag o’ fun.  He’s witty, winsome and wears a varied wave of emotions on his most eggsalad acting sleeves.  He’s often relegated to playing the 2nd or 9th fiddle, and is rarely allowed to carry a film.  So, what if he was allowed that chance to shine in the center stage spotlight?  Could he pull it off?  What kinda question are we asking ourselves here???  Of course he can, he’s Brendan F$%king Gleeson, who’s worth about 1/2 the price of any admission!!!! And that’s what makes his starring turn in The Guard 1/2 worth seeing

What about the other 1/2?  It doesn’t hold up its end of the bargain.  The Guard is juss way too simple-minded stuff, like opening a box of Lucky Charms (or Irish Spring?).  Gleeson is an absolute joy to watch here, but we wish there was a little more to John Michael McDonagh‘s flick than ‘charming, but surly cop does the right thing against clichéd bad people, his way‘.  Speaking of McDonagh, his brother Martin also tapped into that Gleeson magic, but gave him a much better narrtive backing in his In Bruges.  If you haven’t seen that, see it, and treat The Guard as its b-side, or maybe even c-side

We forgot to mention that Don Cheadle and Mark Strong are both in this, but we almost forgot that they were in the movie altogether (we seem to have memory issues), cause they don’t really help anything along.  Gleeson doesn’t need any help onscreen, but help was needed offscreen.  Maybe they should have let Gleeson write the script and play every role.  That would have filled us with more glee, son, than the cancellation of Glee

Wee Lasses Wit Nice A$$es: we’ve previously profiled hotties Sarah Greene and Dominique McElligott, but here’s what they look like in Gleeson’s arms/our dreams

and now lets turn our attentions to newbie Katarina Cas, aka KC and her sunshine brand of hotnness!!

Verdictgo: Sum Merit But No Stinkin Badges

Guard is not the most arresting thing in NY & LA this Friday, and elsewhere elsewhen

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…