Other than a prologue flashback to a Transformerzilla-<em>ish</em> creature attacking South Korea, there’s nothing irregular about the setup for this story of an irresponsible drunk (Anne Hathaway) who gets kicked to the curb by her boyfriend and moves back into her parents’ abandoned home. Whether she wants it or not, the only one offering assistance is a former childhood admirer and grown-up town barkeep (Jason Sudeikis). Their bad-blood backstory doesn’t officially surface until the third act, but it’s apparent in Sudeikis’ every movement. It’s best that writer-director Nacho Vigalondo never once tries to explain how Hathaway, and subsequently Sudeikis, telepathically control the aforementioned Michael Bay rejects from the safety of their neighborhood playlot; that might have sapped some of the fun of watching the duo go all Rock’em Sock’em Robots through the streets of Seoul. If you’re in the mood for a monster movie, revenge-tinged romance, social satire, or simply a good time at the multiplex, consider <em>Colossal</em> entertainment.
“Why is Anne Hathaway the most hated star in Hollywood?” is just one of the first-page results when you google “Anne Hathaway Hollywood.” The others are similar. It’s almost enough to make you love her just for spite, especially when she’s doing work like Colossal, an oddball monster movie that totally tickled fellow critic Scott Marks. Ignore the haters, Miss Hathaway.
Lone Scherfig’s adaptation of Lissa Evans’ better-titled novel <em>Their Finest Hour and a Half</em>, set in London during the early days of World War II, is as polite, charming, and English as its star Gemma Arterton, who sails through the chaos and calamity with the good sense, pluck, and grace of a motherly angel. (The bomb blasts are muffled, so as not to distract from the delicate register of emotions, and a gauzy haze tends to obscure the various bodies.) The sly wit of the story is there from the first, as our heroine enters the man’s world of wartime screenwriting by stepping her way through a maze of swollen fire hoses. Once there, she snags a gig writing women’s dialogue — “slop,” in the parlance of her embittered but empathetic boss Buckley (Sam Claflin) — for a ginned-up account of twin sisters taking part in the evacuation of Dunkirk. The story sails along without a ripple, even as relationships fray and peripheral characters die — until art and life start to blur and the melodrama slips off the screen and into Arterton’s heart. Bill Nighy comes nigh unto stealing the show as an aging actor who makes the most of his bit as a drunken uncle.
Speaking of actresses carrying films, Gemma Arterton is just so gosh-darn appealing in the WWII movie-making movie Their Finest. Americans may, as the movie suggests, want more oomph, but we’re also helpless, hopeless Anglophiles in the right circumstances.
And if one actress is good, surely two is better? Maybe not, says Marks: he was a little let down by the delivery on the freaky fairy-tale concept of The Lure, which features not one but two mermaids. Oops: myrgyrls. Not exactly maidenly, these two.
Two is better than one, however, when it comes to the Tommys in Tommy’s Honour: old and young, father and son, greenskeeper and golfer. And two become one in the gay-marriage doc The Freedom to Marry, while two united in the bonds of friendship suffer a painful break in the historical drama Cezanne et Moi.
Finally, we regret to report that we didn’t get to the screening of Chris Evans’s gifted-kid drama Gifted — the publicity vortex for The Fate of the Furious was just too strong, alas. The good news is that Fate is actually fun.
Other than a prologue flashback to a Transformerzilla-<em>ish</em> creature attacking South Korea, there’s nothing irregular about the setup for this story of an irresponsible drunk (Anne Hathaway) who gets kicked to the curb by her boyfriend and moves back into her parents’ abandoned home. Whether she wants it or not, the only one offering assistance is a former childhood admirer and grown-up town barkeep (Jason Sudeikis). Their bad-blood backstory doesn’t officially surface until the third act, but it’s apparent in Sudeikis’ every movement. It’s best that writer-director Nacho Vigalondo never once tries to explain how Hathaway, and subsequently Sudeikis, telepathically control the aforementioned Michael Bay rejects from the safety of their neighborhood playlot; that might have sapped some of the fun of watching the duo go all Rock’em Sock’em Robots through the streets of Seoul. If you’re in the mood for a monster movie, revenge-tinged romance, social satire, or simply a good time at the multiplex, consider <em>Colossal</em> entertainment.
“Why is Anne Hathaway the most hated star in Hollywood?” is just one of the first-page results when you google “Anne Hathaway Hollywood.” The others are similar. It’s almost enough to make you love her just for spite, especially when she’s doing work like Colossal, an oddball monster movie that totally tickled fellow critic Scott Marks. Ignore the haters, Miss Hathaway.
Lone Scherfig’s adaptation of Lissa Evans’ better-titled novel <em>Their Finest Hour and a Half</em>, set in London during the early days of World War II, is as polite, charming, and English as its star Gemma Arterton, who sails through the chaos and calamity with the good sense, pluck, and grace of a motherly angel. (The bomb blasts are muffled, so as not to distract from the delicate register of emotions, and a gauzy haze tends to obscure the various bodies.) The sly wit of the story is there from the first, as our heroine enters the man’s world of wartime screenwriting by stepping her way through a maze of swollen fire hoses. Once there, she snags a gig writing women’s dialogue — “slop,” in the parlance of her embittered but empathetic boss Buckley (Sam Claflin) — for a ginned-up account of twin sisters taking part in the evacuation of Dunkirk. The story sails along without a ripple, even as relationships fray and peripheral characters die — until art and life start to blur and the melodrama slips off the screen and into Arterton’s heart. Bill Nighy comes nigh unto stealing the show as an aging actor who makes the most of his bit as a drunken uncle.
Speaking of actresses carrying films, Gemma Arterton is just so gosh-darn appealing in the WWII movie-making movie Their Finest. Americans may, as the movie suggests, want more oomph, but we’re also helpless, hopeless Anglophiles in the right circumstances.
And if one actress is good, surely two is better? Maybe not, says Marks: he was a little let down by the delivery on the freaky fairy-tale concept of The Lure, which features not one but two mermaids. Oops: myrgyrls. Not exactly maidenly, these two.
Two is better than one, however, when it comes to the Tommys in Tommy’s Honour: old and young, father and son, greenskeeper and golfer. And two become one in the gay-marriage doc The Freedom to Marry, while two united in the bonds of friendship suffer a painful break in the historical drama Cezanne et Moi.
Finally, we regret to report that we didn’t get to the screening of Chris Evans’s gifted-kid drama Gifted — the publicity vortex for The Fate of the Furious was just too strong, alas. The good news is that Fate is actually fun.
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