The Expendables Movie Is Ruling Every Orbit!

He is really a macho man! Yeah, it points towards Sylvester Stallone whose much-awaited movie The Expendables has hit theaters this month. The Expendables movie, an ensemble action directorial venture, is released in Hindi and English. After coming to theatres, it has beaten all its competitors be it Vampires Suck, Eat Pray Love, Lottery Ticket and whichever you name!

Sylvester Stallone has claimed that it’s the right time for The Expendables movie. The man also adds that he won’t have been able to make the movie two decades ago. The reason is that it would have been too expensive and his pocket might not have allowed paying the prices. He adds, “It would have been impossible back then, everyone wanted their price, but they’re dropping drastically now, and people want to work. This was all favours, all done on a really low budget. Some even wanted to work for nothing, meaning me. I don’t think we could have got Arnold back then, never. He would have been too busy”.

Well, things have worked as of now and The Expendables movie is out in cinemas. It has not only ruled the hearts of the viewers but has also received positive reaction from critics around the world. The movie is also released over 400 screens in India and it has become a great hit in India as well. If you too wanna enjoy this outstanding movie, a tribute to the blockbuster action movies of the 1980s and early 1990s, download The Expendables movie right now! Make other movie download.

Tinker Bell and the Great Fairy Rescue Review

the upcoming movie Tinker Bell and the Great Fairy Rescue is just for you. All set to open on September 21, 2010, Tinker Bell and the Great Fairy Rescue movie is a computer-animated movie and it’s a sequel to 2009 movie Tinker Bell and the Lost Treasure. The first movie in the series was Tinker Bell released in 2008. These are occasionally magical kids’ movies.

Is there any need to mention that Tinker Bell and the Great Fairy Rescue movie centers on Tinker Bell, a fairy character and showcases how a lonely girl befriends Tinker Bell? As the story unfolds, we see that Tinker Bell is a pint-sized pixie. She leaves her home to walk around the world of humans. Within no time, she happens upon Lizzy. Lizzy is seen living in a cottage with her inattentive pa and she believes that there are fairies at the bottom of the garden. Tinker Bell gets trapped in the house, which Lizzy has made to capture fairies. Soon, Lizzy and Tinker develop a special bond. Lizzy’s greedy pa has some other plans and he tries to deliver to the museum. A rescue mission is launched to protect Tinker! This is what Tinker Bell and the Great Fairy Rescue movie is all about.

Although Tinker Bell and the Great Fairy Rescue movie is intended for children, it’s going to enchant the grown ups as well. Hey gals…it’s something special for you! Renowned voice actors voice the characters of the movie…. in simple and short, it’s not something worth missing…grab it!

The Switch’ Movie Review

Every time a deviant (and possibly felonious) act is at the crux of a light-hearted romantic comedy, big shot criminal defense lawyers smile and update their Netflix queue.

Sometime, somewhere, someone will be charged with artificial date rape (or whatever they’ll call it), and that big shot attorney will pop in a DVD of “The Switch” to show the jury that the same scenario can result in laughs, love and butter-fingered hand-holding.

I smell an acquittal – and an MTV Movie Award for “Best On-Screen Chemistry.”

In “The Switch,” Jennifer Aniston has the thankless, “help the plot move along” role of Kassie, a 40-year-old mother of none itching for a rug rat. Jason Bateman gets the fun role of Wally, a sweater-vest-wearing neurotic still pining for the former flame-turned-platonic brunch buddy.

When Kassie decides to have a three-way with a sperm donor and a turkey baster, Wally reacts by getting sloshed at the preggers party celebrating the sexual experiment au jus. And when he finds, fumbles and accidentally spills the baby-making goo in the bathroom, he’s left to his own devices to…ughm…”refill” the jar. Queue blackout.

Kassie succeeds in getting knocked up, moves from NYC to Minnesota and raises her son, Sebastian (Thomas Robinson). Flash forward seven years, and mother and son move back to the Big Apple. Wally is still running in place and Greco-Roman wrestling the demons Woulda, Coulda and Shoulda. After babysitting Sebastian, he notices the two have shared idiosyncrasies and an uncanny resemblance.

Questions will be answered: Will Wally tell Kassie how he feels? Will Wally tell Kassie the bad, bad thing he did – or even remember? Will Kassie shack up with the narcissistic Sperm Donor, played by creepy Patrick Wilson? And does Jeff Goldblum, who plays Wally’s bizarre best bud, wear the same purple shirt in every scene spanning seven years because of a lazy costume designer or just because he’s g–d— Jeff Goldblum and he can do whatever he damn well pleases?! He was The Fly before Aniston was slumming under the rainbow in “Leprechaun” and Bateman stood in Valerie’s family photos. Goldblum can wear purple if he wants too – he can dress up like Grimace and throw eggplants around the set if he so chooses. Do not question Goldblum.

All this makes for an amusing little rom-com. Sure, it’s predictable, gets a little lazy around the 60-minute mark and will probably only spark mild protests from the bored-to-death Family Foundation. But the writing is snappy – and it’s not easy to write for Bateman or Goldblum. The kid is cute and weird; you’re glad it’s not your kid but you’d babysit the hypochondriac half-pint just for the stories. Plus, Aniston and Bateman have more onscreen chemistry than “Mr. Wizard.” (Run with the rumor, US Weekly.)

Like the last effort of directors Josh Gordon and Will Speck, “Blades of Glory,” I think “The Switch” will be another entertaining yet easily forgettable flick fit for date nights or rainy daze. Then again, it won’t be so forgettable if it inspires a drunken Romeo to bust into a sperm bank to make a mystery deposit into the cryo-chamber. After all, sperm can’t file a restraining order.

Lottery Ticket movie review

To quote the late rapper Notorious B.I.G., “the more money we come across, the more problems we see.” This, in short, is the premise of Lottery Ticket, which follows 18-year-old Kevin (played by rapper-turned-actor Bow Wow) as he wins $370-million in the lottery but must wait three days to cash in his ticket.

Produced by Ice Cube, another successful rapper-turned-actor, it manages to squeeze drama, humour, romance, action and even a few sobering lessons in greed all into a 95-minute run time.

We begin with a scene of morning domesticity in a housing project, somewhere in an unnamed American city, whereupon viewers are introduced to Kevin’s grandma, played by the wonderful Loretta Devine — an actress who occasionally stars in films such as Crash, but also doesn’t hesitate to appear in Beverly Hills Chihuahua.

She recalls a dream from the night before in which Jesus was forced to drive the Number 17 bus on account of the recession. After a bit of chit-chat, he gave her the winning Lotto numbers.

“How did Jesus even get a driver’s license without a birth certificate?” asks Kevin’s friend.

An excellent question, but it hardly matters — the real point of the dream is that one of them has to stop by the corner store and play these numbers.

More scene-establishment transpires after this, with a host of characters discussing what they’d do if they won the lottery, whether it would be cooler to buy a pimped-out stretch Hummer or a helicopter, whether they’d donate some cash to a charity or keep it all to themselves.

Finally, the moment comes: Kevin has the winning ticket. Cue the trademark “happy dance” and reckless consumption of alcohol. Then, cue the panic.

That’s the thing about winning the lottery — suddenly, everyone wants a piece of it. What makes Kevin’s situation even worse is that it’s Friday afternoon on a long weekend and the lottery office is closed until Monday.

All anyone has to do in order to steal the money is grab the ticket and be the first to claim it (Kevin doesn’t realize that he could simply sign the back and relax).

So, how to avoid the greedy mob? His friend has one idea, except it involves the Underground Railroad and following the North Star. His grandmother believes the safest place for the ticket is in the well-protected space between her bosom and her bra.

Instead, however, Kevin decides to simply keep it in his pocket and sleeps with one eye open.

This decision leads to a series of frantic antics, which are mostly fun to watch. But it should be said that, despite being a very plot-driven movie, there are diverse characters in here as well.

Mike Epps has a cameo as a lunatic preacher at a Baptist church who gives a PowerPoint presentation about why he needs money to, well, pimp his congregation. Then there’s Ice Cube, who takes a surprising turn as a reclusive boxer who lives in a basement apartment and survives largely on red Kool-Aid and beef jerky. And there’s also Sweet Tee, the loan shark and so-called “godfather of the projects,” played by Keith David, an actor who stars in pretty much everything (seriously — last year alone, the man was in 11 feature films and two TV shows).

Director Erik White and writer Abdul Williams show a lot of promise, considering they don’t have much else on their resumes — while their romance scenes are ridiculously corny, they deftly incorporate some moments of truth and sobriety. It’s truly saddening, for instance, when the beautiful Nikki (Teairra Mari) gestures toward her half-naked body and says “This right here, Kevin, is my lottery ticket.” And Stacie (Naturi Naughton) makes a very astute point later on about how rappers often “give shout-outs to their ‘hood” but rarely ever give back to their communities in a meaningful way.

In the end, then, Kevin must learn that stretch Hummers and $5,000 sneakers don’t necessarily bring much happiness, and that helping others is far more rewarding. It’s a simple lesson, but after all the complications that winning the lottery brings, simplicity feels pretty nice.

Tales from Earthsea movie review

To date, I have seen four Studio Ghibli movies; Princess Mononoke, Spirited Away, Howl’s Moving Castle and most recently, Tales From Earthsea. All have been visually spectacular, that is basically standard now when you see things put out by Gibli: they will be stunning. That, though, is only part of a movie.

In case you didn’t know, plot is another. Tales From Earthsea is based on a spread of book releases by Ursula K. Le Guin about the world of Earthsea which started in the mid sixties and run all the way up to the nineties. Originally, the co-creator of Studio Ghibli and director of most of their features Hayao Miyazaki asked for the rights from Le Guin in 1984, and she denied him as well as any others who asked. It wasn’t until she saw My Neighbour Totoro twenty years that she completely fell head over heels for the Ghibli guys, and said yes. Unfortunately, Hayao was busy doing Howl’s Moving Castle and on behalf of Studio Ghibli, his son Goro Miyazaki took charge of this film adaptation.

At this point, the father and son stopped talking. Hayao felt that his son did not have the experience to direct a film and the two were not on speaking terms throughout the movie’s development. Personally, I agree with the man. The movie is pulled from a lot of different source material, over the span of at least three of the original novels, and has a very unfinished feel to it. Scenes with conversations in them end without notice or conclusion and the world of Earthsea is overlooked completely in lieu of scenes with violence or dragons. Now, I like both of these things in movies, I do, and in fact, the opening of the movie has an amazing dragon battle, but I never felt connected enough to the characters to worry about them in any way. Goro Miyazaki’s inability to explore the characters he is working with is terrifying, and it’s no wonder, he was between being a landscape gardener and a museum curator until this project landed in his lap!

The whole opening sequence of the movie has barely any relevance on the rest of it, and could have been, and is, summed up in one sentence later in the movie. As well as this you are constantly given information which you don’t really need, or haven’t a clue what relevance it has to the current plot line. So theres half the movie out of the window. Already, by taking that out, the movie feels better in my head.

Excusing the movie for a moment, Cineworld listed this movie as having English subtitles. Well, don’t be fooled, it’s the dubbed version. Personally, I have never ever understood why movies need to be dubbed. Sure, it might be funny in old kung fu movies, but the only reason to do it is to attract a dumber audience that can’t read. Even if you have Willem Dafoe as one of the leads, it still doesn’t save you. Speaking of Dafoe, does a man with a really gruff voice match a guy who looks like a girl with big nails? No. And what about Cheech Marin and Timothy Dalton, silly voiced folk who just do not fit these roles. At least Willem Dafoe has a cool voice, just unluckily it doesn’t match. Anyway, that’s another matter.

And now for the good things about the movie. Firstly, the visuals, as always, are absolutely stunning and I would be proud to have a print of one of the sunsets on my wall. Secondly, a choice few scenes, including a fantastic acapella singing section from the young female character Tenar and a humorous magical face alteration in lieu of being caught by guards. Thirdly, the opening sequence of two dragons battling it out above a clashing ocean. It may not have had any bearing on the movie, but it was pretty cool!

In conclusion, Tales from Earthsea is a fairly poor movie for the standard of Ghibli work. That being said, there wasn’t enough cause for a walk-out or a shouty, sweary review. (I’ll say it for a third time, just so you can completely grasp this.) The visuals in every Ghibli movie I’ve seen have been utterly spellbinding, and this is no different. If the review were based purely on that, this review would be completely different. Well done visual department, but shame on you Goro – better luck on number two.

2 out of 5

Danny: “Twenty or so years ago,” wrote Ursula K. Le Guin in her blog last year, “Mr Hayao Miyazaki wrote me expressing interest in making an animated film based on the (then only three) books of Earthsea.” The sci-fi novelist, an inspiration to authors such as Neil Gaiman, refused the offer until she saw My Neighbour Totoro, after which she became “a Miyazaki fan at once and forever.” Twenty (or so) years after the Japanese director sent his wishes in a letter, Studio Ghibli’s take on Le Guin’s Earthsea novels has surfaced in cinemas. And – it pains me to say this – it’s a mess.

Directed by Goro Miyazaki, son of Hayao, Tales From Earthsea draws plots and characters from Le Guin’s books (mainly The Farthest Shore and Tehanu) into a three-act tale of guilt, inner peace and magic, rich with the luxurious visuals we have come to expect from the studio. As a matter of fact, there’s a whole bunch of the things we love about Ghibli’s output – a wild imagination at work; an excellent score; the familiar battles of Mother Nature vs man, man vs himself, Ghibli vs narrative cohesion – so what can the problem possibly be?

The problems are abundant. Tales From Earthsea is not only boring: it is baffling, it is po-faced, it is poorly scripted and it is never quite sure what to do with itself. It seems almost illegal for this to happen to such delicious-sounding source material: wizard Sparrowhawk (voiced with Timothy Dalton with a warm authority, despite the unintentionally hilarious name) is the Archmage, the most powerful wizard in all of Earthsea. He becomes the mentor to a guilt-ridden young prince by the name of Arren (Matt Levin), who is part of the evil wizard Cobb’s (Willem Dafoe, falling asleep) plans. The script, by Miyazaki and Keiko Niwa, tells us of things without ever actually bothering to explain them, assured that we, the audience, are already clued-up on Le Guin’s deep-running mythology. Even if we were, why try to sum everything up into the space of a two hour visit to the picture house? The film does the books both a great service and disservice: Le Guin herself said that she found “much of [the film] incoherent” but, you know, it’s also a fantastic advert for the novels (in the same way Michael Bay’s The Island was an advert for Blade Runner).

Of course, it’s not bad. There are moments of great beauty (aside from the super-detailed animation, of course), especially in the farm-set second act with scenes of ploughing having a charming calming effect, and a folk-like song that a girl sings in one important scene is both touching and haunting – poetic, almost. But these only serve to make Tales From Earthsea more of a frustrating experience. When these hints of brilliance surface, they are quickly swallowed up by the humourless murk of the toffee-thick plot – so much, in fact, that the behind the scenes story of a Miyazaki family rift captures the heart far greater than the film itself. (“For me, [my father] gets zero marks as a father,” writes Goro in an entry on his production blog, “but full marks as a director of animated films.”)

Maybe the last word should go to the creator of Earthsea herself: “Very few authors have any control over the use made of their books by a film studio… such labels as “creative consultant” are meaningless.” Le Guin writes on her blog, before pleading: “Please do not hold any writer except the script-writer responsible for anything in a film. Don’t ask the book’s author “Why did they . . . ?” She is wondering too.” And there, in the audience, so are we.

Lebanon movie review

The four soldiers at the center of Samuel Maoz’s Lebanon, which opens on the first days of Israel’s 1982 invasion of Lebanon, are confined to the cramped, sweltering interior of a rickety tank nicknamed Rhino. And so are we. With the exception of two book-ending shots of swaying sunflower fields, the narrative remains grounded inside the tank; four other men will enter the tank at one point or another but the only vision of the outside comes with crosshairs from the bombsight. Indeed, one has to wonder if those crosshairs weren’t permanently etched on every Israeli soldier’s eyes during the war.

The view from inside the tank isn’t pretty: The film’s most shocking moment details one woman’s horror and humiliation as she witnesses the death of her husband and loses her daughter before her dress is burned off, leaving her to helplessly wander the rubble for a piece of cloth to cover herself with, all within a few minutes. There are also sidewalks littered with corpses, fallen soldiers gushing blood, and secretive dealings between the Israeli command and Christian Phalangists, all filtered through the tank’s gunner and Maoz’s proxy, Shmulik (Yoav Donat).

At first, Shmulik is incapable of shooting, resulting in a military casualty; his first successful shot blows up a harmless chicken truck and leaves the driver a bloody, wailing paraplegic. This essentially maps out the inescapable existential dread into which Lebanon submerges the viewer; an experiential drama par excellence, no other film this year has left me as emotionally and cerebrally drained as Maoz’s. At the whim of an inept commander (Itay Tiran) and a gruff, dedicated ground leader (Zohar Shtrauss), Shmulik and the other two soldiers are caught in a personal hell, at once in the war and detached from it. Not for nothing does the inside of Rhino drip, ooze and collect oil and filth on its walls and in puddles on the floor.

The casualty caused by Shmulik, coded as “flower” in military speak, is the first of four bodies to descend into Rhino for the exterior chaos. The far more fascinating one is a Syrian P.O.W., who awaits his own unimaginable torments when he exits the tank. This promise is made by a Falangist soldier who, by speaking Arabic, disguises his promise to cut out one of the prisoner’s eyes so that he can watch him cut off his genitals. But of the countless things Maoz, a first-time director and screenwriter at the age of 48, does brilliantly here, the  most affecting is the fact that no one side of the war is seen as especially heartless; war itself is conveyed as a condition bereft of such meaningless stamps as good and evil.

Even at 94 minutes, the sheer density of political, religious and philosophical allegories that Lebanon presents makes repeat viewings mandatory. And yet, as has been pointed out, Maoz’s film is also, quite simply, a great war film and a rare instance where the name of the master, Sam Fuller, may be fairly uttered in comparative terms. Lebanon has also been coined  “the next” Waltz with Bashir, Ari Folman’s groundbreaking phantasmagoria — an unfair comparison seeing as Bashir deals with memory and grief and Lebanon, though based on Maoz’s personal memories of serving in the war, is concerned with the urgency and clear-eyed detail of battle. The only memory that is uttered inside Rhino is Shmulik’s lengthy diatribe on a sexual encounter with one of his teachers following his father’s sudden death.

Disconnected from their commanders and left in a nest of unseen Syrians, the men inside Rhino finally fall apart in the film’s final moments, one soldier screaming for his mother and his home. This instance betrays the first thing Shmulik sees inside Rhino at the top of the film: A small inscription that reads, “The Man is Steel, The Tank is Only Iron.” Tossed into a psychological abyss, the soldiers are abandoned and hopeless; given the strongest weapon on the ground, they are also a proxy government seized by hysteria. That Israel remains in the grips of that hysteria to this day is a testament to the one unimpeachable truth of Lebanon: There is no escape.

Scott Pilgrim vs. The World Movie Review

While Scott Pilgrim vs. the World might not be the best film based on a comic book or graphic novel, it’s damn close, and it brings new life to the genre of films targeted towards the video game generation. After directing Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz, Edgar Wright has awarded us with another cult classic, but this time he introduces a new and proper way of seamlessly integrating artistic styles from the original Scott Pilgrim graphic novel series onto the big screen in a way that is neither cheesy nor out-of-place and is sure to be imitated by many movies in the future. Not being a big comic book reader myself, I had never heard of Scott Pilgrim until news of the film’s production started hitting the net. For others who might not be familiar with the Scott Pilgrim series: Edgar Wright’s film is based on Bryan Lee O’Malley’s graphic novel series and is shot very similarly to how O’Malley drew the original series. The film tells the tale of Scott Pilgrim (Michael Cera), an unemployed hipster and bass player in a local Toronto band called “Sex Bob-Omb”, who falls in love with Ramona Flowers, literally the girl of his dreams and new girl in town… with tons of baggage, of course. But before turning into another sappy love story, the film takes a quick turn towards the action genre once one of Ramona’s evil exes reveals himself as said baggage and challenges Scott to a fight for her love. The stunning visuals are by far the best part of Scott Pilgrim vs. the World and are what make the film not another romantic comedy. Even the slower scenes use CGI pop-ups to illustrate reactions from characters and sounds made by objects, which all keep the film feeling like a true comic book / video game adaptation, in a way that no other movie has ever been able to successfully accomplish. Although the entire movie is filled with comic book-inspired visuals, the battles between Scott and the evil exes are where they really shine, with each evil ex having his own form of super-powers, which forces Scott to come up with new and creative ways to defeat them. With the film never taking itself too seriously, the action sequences are still totally awesome and packed with real fighting that will keep will viewers on the edge of their seats — similar to Stephen Chow’s Kung Fu Hustle and how the terribly executed Dragonball: Evolution film should have been directed. (Take note, James Wong.) With the story’s protagonist being a ladies’ man who kicks the asses of seven evil exes, Michael Cera might not seem like the best choice for the leading role of Scott Pilgrim. But with the film never explaining how a guy like Scott gets so many girls and is able to instantly transform into a world class fighter, Cera is able to nail the role by being typical Cera. In addition to Cera’s usual quick-witted humor, the film’s supporting cast are equally as funny and each character is able to stand out, despite being given limited screen time. But Edgar Wright’s film is not without its flaws. The film feels somewhat rushed during its second half, which is understandable with the original graphic novel featuring six volumes that have been trimmed down to under two hours for the film; however, it would have been much more enjoyable if Wright had stretched it out a little longer to help develop some of the characters more and not rush battles between the exes one after another. Mary Elizabeth Winstead is great as Ramona Flowers, yet her character never gets enough time to develop as anything more than an attractive punk rocker chick with little to say, which will leave many rooting for Scott’s other love interest in the film, Knives Chau (Ellen Wong), a 17 year-old Japanese school girl who simultaneously fights for Scott’s love. Although Scott Pilgrim isn’t the “epic of epicness” and perfect film I had hoped it to be after months of following the film, there are many fight scenes that do indeed feel epic. I’m sure some fans of the original graphic novel would disagree, but most people can agree that this is the role Cera was born to play. From the over-the-top visual styles and fight scenes to the hipster video game generation humor, Edgar Wright has created a new style of making comic book films that feels spot-on and will be used as inspiration for many future movies. With Christopher Nolan’s Inception still being the real masterpiece of 2010 and Matthew Vaughn’s Kick-Ass also being slightly better, Scott Pilgrim vs. the World takes a close 3rd place in the battle for movie of the year, but in the process it wins over the hearts of the geeky video game nerds in us all.

The Expendables movie review

Imagine if Quentin Tarantino, Robert Rodriguez, and Michael Bay had never made action films, and if the Hong Kong action cinema had not influenced Hollywood. The action films of the 1980s with their flash bang shock-and-awe effects and little underlying structure have long been replaced by cerebral thrillers and action fantasies. The time of the larger-than-life all-American action hero is long past.

Who else but the iconic Slyvester Stallone would continue to make movies like nothing had changed? And yet, much has changed, even in the genre he recreates almost effortlessly. THere is no more the sense of American exceptionalism and triumphalism that was the hallmark, and some might say, blight of the 1980s American action blockbuster. The lone hero is not the centerpiece of The Expendables, featuring an ensemble cast of mercenaries, played by the classic action heroes of times past, almost everyone except Kurt Russell and the legendary Chuck Norris.

The shoot-’em-up has all the failings of the heavy-handed genre and yet it is a fun film, with acerbic dialogue, intense action sequences and some real mean bad-asses. THe backstory gives the film some depth, with the Expendables off to save a tinpot South American country from a dictator who is at the bidding of an ex-CIA man, growing cocaine in its fields and peddling arms, a mission apparently funded by the CIA with whom the bad guy, Eric Roberts, opening against his sister’s Eat, Pray, Love, has had some sort of falling out, never quite explained. The Expandables are a globalized bunch of tough guys, featuring Stallone, Jason Stratham, Jet Li, Dolph Lundgren, and in a weakly funny cameo, Bruce Willis and the Terminator himself, who’s too busy “wanting to be President” to sign up for this mega-mission.

These escapees from the Sergio Leone Home for the Violently Abled have just wrapped up a mission foiling some Somali pirates, before taking on the cleansing mission in South America. The initial recon job is botched, and Stallone meets Sandra, who we discover is the evil general’s daughter. The inevitable chivalrous urges lead the Expendables back to finish the job, and all the left over whizz-bangs go up, with the typical finale, and no Expendable expended, as it were.
Films like this play an important role in recessionary times. Escapism has long been seen as appropriate fare, with the hope that the 99ers will satiate their anger and frustration through the flickers on the silver screen. This particular reel is played out, however, and the wrap-up with the geriatric hopefuls almost pitching a sequel is nauseating, but par for the course.

Eat, Pray, Love movie review

Who will benefit more from a big-screen adaptation of Elizabeth Gilbert’s best-seller, Eat, Pray, Love: travel agents or divorce attorneys?

Ryan Murphy’s travelogue drama of the soul — like the memoir he loyally adapts — romanticizes such selfishly liberating decisions as leaving your husband, abandoning your job, and circling the globe to find your inner balance. But vibrant editing, an intelligible screenplay, and a magnetic performance by Julia Roberts keep Eat, Pray from dipping too far into self-indulgence.

Roberts plays Gilbert at a crossroads. While her close friends are slowing down and having babies, the magazine writer with lofty ambitions has woken up to the fact that she married a child (Billy Crudup). Against the advice of her gal pal, Delia (Viola Davis), Gilbert divorces her husband and embarks on a journey to find herself.

Her first port is a safe but similarly limiting relationship with a handsome young actor (James Franco). Realizing she needs major changes to shake the dust off her existence, Gilbert grabs her passport and heads overseas. The Eat of the title refers to Italy, where Gilbert hopes she’ll rekindle her appetite for life. Pray takes her to India, and the ashram of a wise guru. And in Bali, she learns to Love again with the help of an impossibly charming Brazilian divorcee (Javier Bardem).

This is not news to Gilbert’s devoted fan base, though they’ll want to hear that Murphy treats the author’s cherished insights with a not-entirely-warranted reverence. If Gilbert’s bite-sized life lessons like “God dwells within you as you” speak to you, then Eat, Pray will provide the cinematic bible you seek. It can be a Chicken Soup for the Restless Wanderer’s Soul, a manifesto condensed into one gorgeously photographed, 2-hour-and-13-minute escape.

The rest of us who dismiss Gilbert’s actions as selfish might have to work a little harder to meet this character halfway. It’s here, then, that Roberts becomes invaluable to Eat, Pray’s success. Her natural likability, her openness, her radiance, her fragility, and her resiliency sell Gilbert’s journey to the skeptics. As my wife pointed out after our screening, an Eat, Pray with a self-adoring actress in the lead (say, Cameron Diaz) would be insufferable.

It has been ages since Roberts put a production on her back — or, more appropriately, on that award-winning smile — and carried it across the finish line as she does here. Roberts doesn’t demand that we follow Gilbert on this path. In fact, Murphy peppers in characters who routinely question the woman’s actions. But those who give in to the story benefit from Roberts’s warm handling of some coarse, emotional material.

Murphy’s durable ensemble picks up the gauntlet that the actress has thrown down. Each male actor excels in Roberts’s presence, with Richard Jenkins emerging as a frontrunner for Oscar consideration, thanks to his wise-beyond-years performance as a Texan seeking peace in India.

I also love that Brad Pitt’s Plan B Entertainment helped produce Eat, Pray, so that a stark, black-and-white “Plan B” logo is the first and only title card we see before Murphy’s introspective journey begins. How appropriate. For isn’t this a story about one woman searching for her Plan B after the first life she set up for herself didn’t work out the way she’d hoped?

Gilbert’s final monologue details her belief in the physics of a quest. I believe in a similar formula applied to a satisfying drama, and Eat, Pray, Love follows it to the letter.

Mao’s Last Dancer movie review

It is rare for a film to be better than the book it is adapted from, and Mao’s Last Dancer  is disappointingly no exception. It is hard to take seriously a film which presents the inner politics of a ballet company as more cutthroat than those of Communist China.

Li Cunxin’s story is an incredible one and hugely worthy, hence the success of his autobiography. Unfortunately director Bruce Beresford isn’t able to convert this story to film in a way that does justice to the extraordinary source material.

In the early 1970s, the young Li is plucked from his rural commune at age 11 to join the Beijing Ballet School, overseen by Madame Mao. Surviving the hard work and purges, at 19 he catches the eye of the travelling Houston Ballet’s artistic director, Ben Stevenson (Bruce Greenwood). Li is given a scholarship to study ballet in Texas. Here his talent as a performer is recognised, and after achieving success, Li is not ready to go back to China and its insular society. His application to extend his stay in the USA is rejected and Li faces the tough decision of defecting and risking the safety of his family or going back and risking his career.

The major drawcard for the film is the dancing, which is beautiful. Chi Cao from the Birmingham Royal Ballet, plays the adult Li. He is an incredible athlete, with amazing strength, poise and grace. It feels a little mean to say it, but he should stick to his day job, because his acting abilities pale in comparison to his exquisite dancing. The actors playing the young Li (Huang Wen Bin) and teenage Li (Chengwu Guo) both do a great job inhabiting the character.

As Sydney, more precisely Glebe, takes on the persona of Houston, there are also some Aussie actors posing as Americans. The casting director should be forced to write lines, ‘I must try harder’ for some very dubious female casting. It is difficult to engross yourself in the film when you are pulled out by some truly terrible acting.

When adapting a book for screen, often time-frames have to be played with and characters condensed. This is understandable, it is impossible to transfer exactly from page to screen. It is however unacceptable to lose the essence of the story, which is what has happened here. Li’s defection to the West is not given the gravitas it deserves and the depiction of smiling Chinese peasants is downright insulting.

It feels like a half-hearted, budget attempt to tell the story of a man with immense determination, who worked hard for everything he got. It is sad that the same can’t be said for the cast and crew of this film. Please read the book, don’t allow the film to be your only experience of Li Cunxin.