Style Sunday.

Jessica Biel might not have my greatest esteem as an actress but she's one helluva dresser.
She's a lovely overachiever in luscious Giambatista Valli for a premiere of The A-Team.
The simple Grecian draping is very in right now and her loose tresses compliment the ensemble in a beautifully understated way.


Unlike some of her Glee costars, Jayma Mays proves that in order to impress you don't need to forget what you are all about.
In a simple outfit consisting of a BCBG mini and Jimmy Choo clutch and shoes, Mays brings a certain something to a look that would've been more appropriate for a day out shopping, not a red carpet.
She's the epitome of humble grace.

Which look do you like best?

Knight and Day *

Director: James Mangold
Cast: Tom Cruise, Cameron Diaz
Peter Sarsgaard, Jordi Mollà, Viola Davis, Paul Dano
Marc Blucas, Celia Weston, Dale Dye

When thinking of Knight and Day, the word "throwback" might come to mind but it's definitely not the word that best helps describe it.
It reminds us of a throwback because we understand the film wanted to be something in the tradition of The African Queen or Charade; a show for grownups featuring two big movie stars who romance each other while running away from peril.
In execution though the movie feels more like a bad TV pilot, done just to pair Diaz and Cruise (who had been wickedly good together in Vanilla Sky, her more than him, but still there was something there).
This time around the tables are turned and it's Cruise who's in control as he plays Roy Miller, a seductive rogue spy who teams up with unsuspecting ditzy civilian June Havens (Diaz) as he tries to clean his good name from the people who framed him...or so we think.
After meeting "by accident" in an airport, Roy takes a liking to June (some might call it plain old stalking) and spends most of the movie trying to convince her he's a good guy trying to do his best to protect an important weapon designer (Dano in full geeky glory).
She's approached by an FBI agent (Sarsgaard) and his boss (Davis) who tell her, Roy is in fact an agent who lost his mind...
But who to believe?
The film in a way acts like an analogy for Tom Cruise's latter days career. On one side we have Cruise trying to remind us how he's the irresistibly charming movie star we always thought he was, this part is essentially conveyed by Miller, who needs to do not more than flash his million dollar smile and scoff (in that very Tom Cruise way) to get away with anything.
On the other side we have what seems to be the voice of reason in the shape of the FBI who informs us that despite our best knowledge this man is in fact insane. This could very well represent, well, our opinion of what Cruise has been doing for the past seven years; meaning action after action to convince us something's not quite working up there.
So on a very basic level the film is an endurance test of how much Cruise you can take. If you think he's an obnoxious midget you'd be better off watching something else because besides the whole lotta Tom we get, the plot also asks us to push the boundaries of coherence in order to accept what's going onscreen as something remotely real.
There is a recurring gag throughout the film where Roy drugs June, mostly to move locations without her having a panic attack, which are represented visually by a series of mostly blurry snippets that give us an idea of what the hell is going on.
We see Roy hanging upside down, Roy on a plane, Roy on a boat etc...the difference between this and say something like North by Northwest (another example of polar opposites in a cross continent adventure) is that we don't care where June will wake up next, or if she'll even wake up at all.
Deep inside we know everything will turn out well for these two and the movie fails to raise even a second of real excitement, thrills or even fun.
The one thing that remains a mystery throughout the film is what got Sarsgaard and Davis to star in this?

This Kiss You Give Is Never Going to Fade Away.

On a day like today in 1945, the first atomic bomb was dropped on the Japanese city of Hiroshima.
Let us take a moment of silence while thinking about the repercussions this asinine act of violence had in the world.
If the silent treatment is too much for you, take a listen to OMD's brilliant synthpop masterpiece which deals with those events under the light of a completely different approach, in this case music.
It's not a coincidence that this tune was prominently featured in the brilliant Waltz With Bashir.
Isn't it amazing how art made in reaction to historical regret usually affects other art forms?

She's a Force of Bloody Nature.

Until a few days ago I'd never heard the name of Andrea Riseborough.
Then writing a piece for The Film Experience I found out she was Madonna's new "it" girl. After Vera Farmiga had to quit her movie about Wallis Simpson, the Queen went and cast Riseborough, an actress that's virtually unknown outside of Britain but there seems to be some sort of new national cause (at least according to the comments on the article).
Anyway with that in mind, I checked out Andrea's BAFTA nominated turn in Margaret Thatcher : The Long Walk to Finchley where she plays, well, Margaret Thatcher.
The movie was nothing special (too much of a The Queen wannabe) but Andrea was indeed just amazing.


¨Knitting?"
- ponders Margaret Roberts to an interviewer asking her about her interests.
She then makes up her mind and answers she likes politics.


It's especially interesting to see her make all the Thatcherisms her own. The movie might rely too much on that "before they were famous" gimmick where we're supposed to go "oh, so this is where she got that" or "ah, this is why this and that happened later".
Regardless of the film's confused and often confusing tone (is it a drama, is it a biopic parody?) it's impossible not to be fascinated and engrossed by Riseborough.
Her Thatcher neck move is remarkable and her personality trespasses every boundary of what comedic and serious acting should be about.
The best thing that can be said about her is that she makes Thatcher incredibly likable, despite the fact that she was a conservative...

Despicable Me **

Director: Pierre Coffin, Chris Renaud

It's probably quite lame to bring Pixar up into every discussion about digitally animated films; however, movies like Despicable Me make it impossible to ignore how the vastly superior studio has spoiled audiences with the top notch quality of their work and probably has terrified the competition into thinking that in order to achieve some of their success, they must make thinly disguised versions of Pixar movies.
This one borrows from The Incredibles and Toy Story to tell the story of Gru (voiced by Steve Carrell) a world class villain with big issues.
Threatened by the arrival of a hipper villain named Vector (voiced by Jason Segel) and his lifelong desire to please his mother (voiced by Julie Andrews) he decides to show 'em all once and for all that he's the ultimate badass by stealing the moon.
For this he adopts three cute, little orphaned girls, don't ask, because they're the only way for him to steal a shrinking laser, again don't ask.
Soon we have established several archetypes that will obviously be fulfilled by the film's eventual positive message and give the filmmakers enough wacky situations to make the most out of 3D technology.
But that's it. Oh and there's Gru's minions, a lazy copy of the Toy Story aliens who ooh, aaah and are shown doing cute things whenever the plot doesn't know where to go. The movie is comprised of a series of situations during which we're either supposed to laugh, go "awww" or, well that's pretty much it.
The action sequences have a Loony Tunes meets Spy vs. Spy feel to them that might steal a giggle now and then but get tiresome after a while, the more emotional scenes are made out of sweet moments where the awkward Gru begins to love the little girls (and who can blame him when one of the kids has the same eyes as the cat from Shrek?)
What the movie lacks is complete character development. Just because we know Gru had a father-less childhood (his dad might be the Russell Brand voiced Dr. Nefario but this is never made clear) doesn't mean that all his problems will be solved by becoming a father himself.
It's this kind of facile way out that makes the movie almost instantly forgettable.
Also, who's there to protect people from these villains? Doesn't comic book style evil and good appear at the same time?
What are Vector and Gru gaining from being villainous? In the end don't they become each other's antithesis and therefore a hero/villain dichotomy develops?
Perhaps not, the filmmakers don't intend for you to question this because...ZOMG look at how cute those minions are!

The Twilight Saga: Eclipse *1/2

Director: David Slade
Cast: Kristen Stewart, Robert Pattinson, Taylor Lautner
Bryce Dallas Howard, Anna Kendrick, Michael Welch
Sarah Clarke, Peter Facinelli, Kellan Lutz, Billy Burke
Dakota Fanning, Daniel Cudmore, Cameron Bright

By this point it should be more than obvious that the Twilight movies are definitely not meant for everyone.
The minute you walk into this movie you should know what you're getting yourself into. For those obsessed with the celibate vampirism and nonsensical romance between Bella (Stewart) and emo vampire Edward (Pattinson), no force on Earth would be able to make them see that there is not a single artistic quality to be rescued in this movie.
Unless of course, you choose to think that Taylor Lautner's body has a classical Greek aestheticism to it...
Those on the other side who only see the lackluster filmmaking aspects of the saga will no doubt indulge themselves in a constant trashing of what makes this so inefficient and will indulge in quoting the terrible dialogue, bashing Ms. Stewart's utter lack of soul and laugh out loud at the way Pattinson delivers his lines like a parody of a Victorian hero.
This time around Bella is torn because she can't decide if she wants to marry Edward and be turned into a vampire, if she has sudden feelings for werewolf friend Jacob (Lautner), what to do with the band of rebel vampires coming all the way from Seattle to kill her and what to wear for the upcoming graduation.
Nothing of much importance seems to occur in this chapter and we don't really learn anything new about the characters to justify its existence. It feels too much like a transition especially for the casual viewers.
This feeling of inconsequence is best evoked by the film's initial and final sequences during which Bella and Edward sit in a sunny field while they mope about their love.
That the film begins and concludes in the same way, just reassures us of the fact that everything that occurred in between was merely an excuse for these tow to put some drama into their lives.
Hey, if they're not having sex, at least they can channel their hormones through murder huh?
What can be rescued about this movie is the fact that it buys its message in such an un-selfconscious way that to loathe and attack it would be to do so to a being so into itself that it would never open its eyes to anything else.
Of course this doesn't have any sort of Dostoievskian magnitude and the film is far from being a clever examination of anything other than old fashioned values and the need for abstinence in a world where sex is only bad if other people know you're doing it.

First Lady Debut.

"I’d like to — you know — when I’m a grandmother, to have done a Woody Allen film. I cannot in my life miss an opportunity like this."
- Carla Bruni-Sarkozy to the AP on shooting Midnight in Paris.

I might never become a grandma but boy do I want some Woodsman for myself too.