200 Movies, 1 Woman, 1 Blog

21 Jump Street, 2012, USA

Quite frankly, despite the good reviews this movie got, I wasn’t expecting a whole lot. But, this meant that I was very pleasantly surprised by how good it was. I was in hysterics from the first minutes of the movie.

Schmidt (Jonah Hill) was unpopular in high school and mocked relentlessly by Jenko (Channing Tatum). Years later they are reunited as they are training to be police officers. Schmidt has the book smarts that Jenko lacks, and Jenko is physically capable, which Schmidt lacks, so they help each other out and become friends. After their first arrest is botched, they are transferred to 21 Jump Street, an undercover program which sends them undercover into a high school.

I’ve never seen the TV show the film is based on, but this film is a satirical adaptation of it. It’s incredibly funny, and I’m glad they went with the satirical tone, because I don’t think a more serious tone would have worked for the film. 21 Jump Street is an R-rated comedy, and it certainly earns its R-rating. The comedy is sharp, and it’s an often-hilarious satire of contemporary youth culture and police dramas. Too often comedies don’t push the envelope enough in order to ensure a PG-13 rating, so I always appreciate a good R-rated comedy.

I’ll be the first to admit that I generally don’t care for Tatum, but I actually really liked him in the role. He’s a decent comedic actor and I think I’d appreciate him more if he moved away from the romantic dramas and stuck to comedies. He doesn’t have a whole lot of range or charisma, but he does have comedic timing.

Hill was very good, as well. Both characters grew over the course of the film, and I really appreciated how they changed thanks to their experiences returning to high school years after they originally graduated. It was funny, but it was also surprisingly touching, in a way. Jenko is likely the most complex character I’ve seen Tatum play – and certainly my favourite performance of his.

Don’t underestimate this movie the way I did. It’s a good time, and I regret not seeing it in theatres.

Moneyball, 2011, USA

I need to be honest: I’m not a baseball fan. This is probably the first baseball film I’ve ever seen. But I truly enjoyed it, and my lack of detailed sporting knowledge didn’t hinder the experience too much.

The Oakland Athletics are a lower budget baseball team and cannot afford the top players and the salaries they come with. Billy Beane (Brad Pitt) is their General Manager and has to find a way to replace their best players who have signed contracts with more lucrative teams. He meets Peter (Jonah Hill), an economics major who uses statistics to determine which players are the best, instead of the traditional scouting system. His claim: many players are undervalued because of quirks in their playing style or their personal life. Billy hires Peter and together they come up with a new roster of undervalued players. Their strategy is an unpopular one, and they face opposition from the team’s coach (Philip Seymour Hoffman).

The film does use statistics at times throughout the film, and of course, those all went over my head. I don’t know a thing about batting averages or on plate averages. But that wasn’t a big deal as the filmmakers were careful to make it accessible to everyone. If our protagonists were happy with the players they were picking, I just assumed they had good averages.

I’m not the biggest Brad Pitt fan, admittedly, but he did a decent job with the film. Him and Jonah Hill had good chemistry and worked well together. Hill is playing the same awkward sort of character he often plays, but he was a charming sidekick. The story itself was very interesting. I had no idea that this sort of analysis was possible in baseball, and is apparently pretty commonplace today. I often underestimate the amount of skill it takes to put together a sports team. The folks who build a team (whether professional or not) need to look at the skill of the players and work to complement all of the people on the field (or ice) at any given time. It must be a ton of work.

Would it be possible to adapt this sort of analysis for other sports, such as hockey? I thought of the Winnipeg Jets as I watched this film. We must have one of the smaller budgets in the league, so if we were able to sign talent that has been “undervalued”, that would be great for the team.

While Moneyball definitely isn’t the sort of movie I see often, I really enjoyed it. It was a nice surprise.

Get Him to the Greek, 2010, USA

I decided to change it up a bit tonight, and go see a movie in the theatres, instead of watching one at home. I decided to go see Get Him to the Greek, because it was playing at the local second run theatre, which means that a night out would be fairly cheap.

This is not the sort of movie for the easily offended. The humour is very dark, and there is explicit sex and drug use throughout the movie. In other words, it’s your standard Judd Apatow produced movie.

Get Him to the Greek is a spin-off of Forgetting Sarah Marshall. Famous rock star Aldous Snow (Russell Brand) is no longer sober, and has quit performing, after his last album “African Child” bombed both critically and commercially. Aaron Green (Jonah Hill) works for a record company, and suggests that they organize a ten year anniversary performance of his biggest gig, at the Greek Theatre in Los Angeles.  His boss, Sergio (Sean ‘Diddy’ Combs, who is hysterically funny in his role) orders Aaron to go to London and escort Aldous to New York, and then to Los Angeles. The task is easier said than done, as Aldous is a hard partier, and reluctant to listen to what Aaron has to say. Most of the movie consists of the duo’s misadventures trying to get to Los Angeles in time.

The movie is a pretty ridiculous comedy, and it is hilarious at times. However, what I liked best was the glimpse it gave into Hollywood life. I actually don’t think it is quite as “far fetched” as it seems to be at first glance. I actually started to think about Lindsay Lohan, and her problems with substance abuse. The basic premise of the movie is getting Aldous to the theatre, no matter what, and I wonder how many people in Lohan’s life will do whatever it takes to get her to work for them. I’ll bet Hollywood is full of enablers. Does anyone in Lohan’s life care enough to keep her away from the drugs, to get her into rehab (that’s not court mandated) far away from the media…and to do so without expectation of media coverage or financial gain? It makes me sad to think that she probably doesn’t have someone in her life like that.

After Michael Jackson died, my mom made a really good observation. She said that Jackson’s physician would have been fired if he refused to give him the drugs he was seeking. Celebrities are rich and powerful enough to make any demands they want, and they can simply remove anyone from their “circle” that doesn’t let them behave in the way they want. I think she’s very right about that.

I honestly went into the movie thinking that it’d be a dumb, forgettable comedy, but it really made me think. Of course, the movie also really made me laugh. There’s some great dialogue in the movie. I was also really impressed with the music featured in the film. It was written by a variety of people, including Jason Segel, writer and star of Forgetting Sarah Marshall. The lyrics of the songs featured in the film were hilarious, and the song, “The Clap” reminded me of my friend and classmate J Williamez’s musical comedy (warning: not safe for work).