Mann, Leslie

Subterms

    Latest story

    75 Shares179 Views

    ‘The Bubble’ Review: Swabs, Camera, Action

    by

    Judd Apatow’s new film is a comedy about actors trying to make a dinosaur movie during the pandemic that plays more like a documentary of actors trying to make a Covid comedy.“The safest place in the world right now is a film set,” an agent (Rob Delaney) tells his actress client Carol (Karen Gillan) to encourage her to join the quarantined production of “Cliff Beasts 6.” “The Bubble,” a new comedy from Judd Apatow, tells the story of how the stars of this apparently long-running dinosaur franchise spent their pandemic while doubling as a sort of documentary about how Apatow, who wrote the screenplay with Pam Brady, spent his.Carol, who skipped “Cliff Beasts 5” and stretched herself by playing a half-Israeli, half-Palestinian space-alien fighter, is being edged out as the series’ youth appeal by a TikTok sensation (Iris Apatow). Their fellow stars and bubble occupants include Keegan-Michael Key as an actor trying to build a lifestyle brand, Leslie Mann and David Duchovny as ex-spouses who can’t keep their hands off each other and Pedro Pascal as a drugged-out playboy with designs on a hotel employee (an underused Maria Bakalova, from the “Borat” sequel).Ask those real-life actors (and these characters) to work together under strict Covid protocols, and it would be hard not to get some laughs. Gillan’s escalating exasperation is especially funny.But elements that have the potential to become running gags — the prospect of forced re-isolation when a crew member tests positive, a rash not of Covid but of the flu, a mysterious security chief (Ross Lee) who uses violence to prevent escapes — either languish or are dropped, as if Apatow simply cut together what he felt were inspired improvisations without regard for flow (or the uncharacteristically cheap-looking visuals). And the Hollywood satire, with Fred Armisen as the Home Depot employee turned Sundance darling hired to direct “Cliff Beasts 6,” is not just safe. It’s airless.The BubbleRated R. Drugs, sex, violence — life on a film set. Running time: 2 hours 6 minutes. Watch on Netflix. More

    More stories

    • 100 Shares149 Views

      in Movies

      ‘Blithe Spirit’ Review: Dead, but Not Loving It

      by

      #masthead-section-label, #masthead-bar-one { display: none }What to WatchBest Movies on NetflixBest of Disney PlusBest of Amazon PrimeBest Netflix DocumentariesNew on NetflixAdvertisementContinue reading the main storySupported byContinue reading the main story‘Blithe Spirit’ Review: Dead, but Not Loving ItDan Stevens stars as a writer taunted by the ghost of his dead wife in this grating adaptation of the 1941 play.Dan Stevens and Leslie Mann in “Blithe Spirit.”Credit…Rob Youngson/IFC Films Feb. 18, 2021, 7:00 a.m. ETBlithe SpiritDirected by Edward HallComedy, Fantasy, RomancePG-131h 35mFind TicketsWhen you purchase a ticket for an independently reviewed film through our site, we earn an affiliate commission.A comedy that’s more screw-loose than screwball, Edward Hall’s “Blithe Spirit,” a ludicrous adaptation of Noël Coward’s 1941 stage play, reimagines its source material as little more than a slip-and-fall farce.Dan Stevens stars as Charles, a near-parody of a blocked writer who’s introduced literally eating the words he has just typed. Commissioned to write a screenplay of one of his best-selling novels, Charles is desperate: Bedeviled by bedroom dysfunction (“Big Ben’s stopped chiming,” he whines to a friend), he hopes to find inspiration by inviting a disgraced psychic (Judi Dench) to host a séance in his imposing Art Deco mansion.[embedded content]What gets released, though, is not what Charles expects as the ghost of his first wife, Elvira (Leslie Mann), killed in a riding accident years earlier, moves in and takes umbrage at her replacement (Isla Fisher). Elvira, visible only to Charles and the audience, and blessed with a well-stocked ghostly wardrobe, is anything but blithe: Wrecking the garden and throwing knives at the help, she proves as hard to get rid of — and about as entertaining — as black mold.Propelled by tiresome characters and tortured setups, “Blithe Spirit” (originally filmed by David Lean in 1945) is a dated curiosity. Merging upper-crust twittery with hocus-pocus nonsense not even Dench can sell, the dialogue encourages Elvira to nag and everyone to over-emote. Surplus buffoonery and a new ending add nothing to the original, leaving us with a movie that obsesses over death while showing all too few signs of life.Blithe SpiritRated PG-13 for spiked drinks and saucy dialogue. Running time: 1 hour 35 minutes. In theaters and available to rent or buy on Google Play and Vudu. Please consult the guidelines outlined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention before watching movies inside theaters.AdvertisementContinue reading the main story More

    • 100 Shares129 Views

      in Movies

      ‘The Croods: A New Age’ Review: More Civilized

      by

      No one would call it a huge leap on the evolutionary ladder, but the animated sequel “The Croods: A New Age” is slightly funnier than its serviceable 2013 predecessor. That movie followed a family of cave persons — whose patriarch was the lunkheaded but big-hearted Grug (voiced by Nicolas Cage) — as they left the safety of the rocky alcove they called home and, thanks to the creativity of an outsider, Guy (Ryan Reynolds), embraced more innovative ways of thinking.“The Croods: A New Age,” directed by Joel Crawford, accelerates the Crood family’s clash with modernity. The clan stumbles into a verdant utopia that’s a cross between Shangri-La and Gilligan’s Island. This paradise is maintained by a family called the Bettermans, headed by Hope (Leslie Mann) and Phil (Peter Dinklage), who wear new-age garb and snobbishly show off their advanced ideas, like private rooms, windows and fruit baskets.[embedded content]They also have plans to set up Guy, who has been going steady with Eep (Emma Stone), the Croods’ eldest, with their daughter, Dawn (Kelly Marie Tran), in a subplot that the writers — perhaps because the world’s still-tiny population left them without enough characters to pair off — leave at least partly unresolved.While Dawn and Eep become besties, the dueling dads negotiate the common ground between Grug’s vestigial Cro-Magnonism and Phil’s proto-metrosexuality. Paradoxically, the movie’s energy ebbs as the proceedings turn more antic. The culture clash comedy becomes secondary once “A New Age” introduces a tribe of pugnacious, subtitled monkeys who appear to have a fairly advanced society of their own.The Croods: A New AgeRated PG. Hybrid animals — such as wolf spiders — that might frighten children. Running time: 1 hour 35 minutes. In theaters. Please consult the guidelines outlined by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention before watching movies inside theaters. More