To smooth that rough touch

Shakespeare in Love

(1998)

Of all the legion of perfections of this strangely underpraised film, that I have always admired most is its fluid gender bending, so what better to act as synthesis to the hormonal thesis and antithesis of this afternoon?

Rip 'em to shreds

The dueling testosterone and estrogen double feature--though frankly, the women are at least equally vicious, if less destructive of actual flesh.

Jûsan-nin No Shikaku (13 assassins)

Crit

This is like Seven Samurai/The Magnificent Seven as written by John Webster and directed by Tarantino, assisted by Michael Bay for the pyrotechnics. In case that sentence doesn't make it clear, yes, I really liked it: beautifully choreographed and shot, sometimes funny, and with memorable heroes and an indelibly nasty villain.

Hmm . . . John Webster . . . about time to watch Shakespeare in Love again?

Bridesmaids

Crit

OK, two questions: how does Kristen Wiig pronounce her name? And is Saturday Night Live this good again? 'Cause if it is, I'm gonna have to make some adjustments to my schedule and find room for it. Brutally funny film written by Wiig and Annie Mumolo (who has a cameo as a nervous plane passenger) and directed by Paul Feig. So if a man directed, and the comic riffs include the results of food poisoning, is it really a chick flick? Who gives a shit in the sink?

Also of note: great soundtrack (anything that starts with Blondie's "Rip Her to Shreds" is halfway to seducing me already, and if you add Wanda Jackson . . . ) and (sigh) Jill Clayburgh, her last role, I gather.

Trailers

• Larry Crowne--Tom and Julia, killingly cute.
• Don't Be Afraid of the Dark--Well, maybe: written and produced by Guillermo del Toro.
• What's Your Number?--Ooh, makes me sad to see that Anna Faris felt the need to get boob & face work.
• One Day--Anne Hathaway and My Future Wife Patty Clarkson with Brit accents?
• The Change-Up--Ah, the old identity swap never gets old, does it? Oh, wait: it does?

Aw, Father, there ain't no future playin' basketball

Angels with Dirty Faces

(1938)

Got this in a Warner set of gangster films, and this is only the second time I've ever seen it. And notwithstanding the sometimes-too-cutely-criminal Dead End Kids, for a half-hour, maybe more, this is pretty good (though I never like seeing Bogart play a lily-liver, do you?).

But after a while, the gooey goodness of Pat O'Brien's priest--the childhood friend of James Cagney's gangster, natch--just gums the works up beyond any salvation but the eschatological. So--anybody want it?

Diamond in the rough

Everything Must Go

Crit

Excruciatingly well-played descent into hell--well, no, we don't actually see the descent; Nick Halsey (Will Ferrell) is already there at the start. Downsides of hell: there's nothing to drink but PBR and no place to pee but the koi pool. Upside of hell: Rebecca Hall lives across the street (but, this being hell, the upside has a downside: she's married and very pregnant).

This is about as sad bastard a movie as can be imagined, so why did I come out feeling good? Somehow the hopelessness has a little hope, I guess.

Incidentally, this is one of two films with the same title dated 2010 by IMDb, and the other one's blurb begins "After getting fired from his job and losing his girlfriend, Mac craves hard drugs," which pretty much fits this one, substituting "wife," "Nick," and "beer.

Trailer

• Project Nim--Documentary by James Marsh (Man on Wire) about the rearing of Nim Chimpsky; sure, probably.

Don't mess with Mr. In-between

L.A. Confidential

(1997)

Great plot, great atmosphere, great performances from top to bottom, even a great McGuffin in Rollo Tomassi--does noir in the past decade and a half get any better?

Fathers and sons

The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou

(2004)

Wtff????!!! When the fuck did IFC follow AMC into the hell of commercial interruptions? Do they not have any idea how fucking annoying that is? Christ! Doesn't the I still stand for Independent? Like of commercials?

Oh, the movie, yeah: don't know why, but it didn't altogether work for me the first time; don't know why, but it worked a lot better this time--still not my favorite Wes Anderson film, but much closer than when it was new. Notwithstanding the fucking commercials. Christ!

Wrath of gods

La Princess de Montpensier

Crit

Oh, come on, critics. If this were in English, it would be dismissed for the bosom-heaving swashbuckler that it is. But it's got to be better than that, 'cause It's French! Oh, yes, it has a veneer of Prots vs. Papists historicity (I guess that's the Catholics' response to the St. Bartholomew Day's massacre at the end), and it aspires wanly to some Shakespearean language (well, you know: only in French) and stage business (disastrous misidentification at a masqued ball, anyone?), but at bottom (well, tops get more focus than bottoms), it's just a filmed Harlequin romance. In French.