Yesterday, the Thriller and I took off to Mansfield to catch a matinee and do some pre-Odyssey shopping. Eclipse was our film of choice; it started at 11:00. Well, thanks to endless traffic jams due to heavy construction, we were late enough to have missed the first part of the movie. So, he says to me, “You go ahead and pick another one. I’ll watch whatever you want.”

On a whim, I chose Knight and Day, the new film with Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz. What a hoot! A perfect movie for a carefree day. We both loved it.

I’m sad that half the critics at Rotten Tomatoes.com disliked it. No, it didn’t have any heavy or lofty themes, and no, it wasn’t about dastardly Americans destroying the earth and creating a dystopia that only helpless but politically and environmentally correct malcontents can fix. Rather, it’s a spy story with lots of great car chases and shoot-outs, accompanied by a good dose of mystery and silliness.

I think Tom Cruise is a wackjob in real life. But people, he is positively adorable in this movie, playing a rogue spy who goes against the “Agency.” His perfect foil is Cameron Diaz, a likable character with a small ditzy streak whom Cruise endeavors to protect. That’s where the comedy comes in. Diaz is an absolute spaz, flipping out regularly at the dizzyingly dangerous situations in which she finds herself, while Cruise shows total calm — indeed, he is the ultimate gentleman and perfect nice guy, calmly and kindly giving instructions to Diaz while the pair is bombarded by machine gun fire, or gently reassuring her as he sedates her for her safety.

It was funny and entertaining, and that’s all. If you won’t feel the need to assign national importance to its message, and you can find it within yourself to just enjoy a crazy romp, then you need to see this film. If you can’t, then maybe you could be a movie critic. Honestly, sometimes they’re just uptight goons.

On the Rat-O-Meter scale of five cheeses, I give the following to Knight and Day, simply on its entertainment merit:

I have seen some strange films in my day. Some I’ve enjoyed, and others made me think, “Hm. That was two and a half hours I’ll never get back.”

But this one — The Imaginarium of Doctor Parnassus — takes a couple of cakes. Not only is it the weirdest movie I’ve seen in quite awhile, but its peculiarity (and huge requirement for the audience to suspend disbelief and accept profound anachronisms) ended up being what I actually liked most. I enjoyed this bit of odd from the mind of Terry Gilliam, who is no stranger to weird, having written the Python television series & films, Fear & Loathing in Las Vegas, Time Bandits, 12 Monkeys, and The Adventures of Baron von Munchausen.

Knowing precious little about the film before we watched it, we were a bit confused by the opening scene — When does this take place? What year? — not to mention the impossible physics of two horses drawing a skinny wagon built two stories high. And that’s just the first 30 seconds of the story.

The plot develops around a troupe of travelling vaudeville players, out of place and out of touch in modern-day London. The 1,000-year-old Dr. Parnassus (the ubiquitous Christopher Plummer — I still don’t see him as anyone but Captain Von Trapp) and his two gorgeous young assistants attempt to scrape together a living by showing bafflingly apathetic street audiences their wildest dreams come true, if only they’ll step into the doctor’s magic mirror.

Their fortunes turn for the better when they take on Tony, the Hanging Man, played wonderfully by Heath Ledger, in his last-ever role. (Gilliam is to be congratulated for deftly and almost seamlessly working in Johnny Depp, Jude Law and Colin Farrell to play Ledger’s character in subsequent scenes, filmed after Ledger’s death.) Things get really interesting when the Devil — played by Tom Waits, who unfortunately can only play bad guys — arrives.

The movie has a bizarre, dark, almost depressing feel — kind of like Tim Burton doing Lewis Carroll. (Oh, wait…) Little person Verne Troyer adds a rather misplaced comic presence, with his hard American accent and distinctly 21st-century delivery. But somehow, it all works.

I’d say if you haven’t seen it, try it. After the first 15 minutes or so, the story becomes easier to follow. And one of the characters turns out to be someone totally different than you thought at the beginning, so the predictability element is diminished.

Even the Thriller liked it, and he is often the first to poo-poo something that strikes him as pointless or predictable. I was impressed that he immediately saw something in the plot (involving a metal whistle) that I totally didn’t get.

Surprise!

Edit: Yipes! Forgot to close with my Rat-O-Meter rating. On the scale of one to five cheeses, I give Doctor Parnassus:

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So, happy 4th of July to all my American fiends. *kA-BLaM*

The Thriller and I retried the movie night thing, and this time, it worked. Only we didn’t finish Daybreakers or whatever it was called. Instead, we watched Shutter Island, starring Leo D.

If the final season of LOST taught me anything, it’s that some questions simply don’t have answers. This point will be driven home at the end of the movie. But that’s all I’ll say about that, lest I ruin it for those who have yet to see the film.

Here’s the plot summary from IMDB:

It’s 1954, and up-and-coming U.S. marshal Teddy Daniels is assigned to investigate the disappearance of a patient from Boston’s Shutter Island Ashecliffe Hospital. He’s been pushing for an assignment on the island for personal reasons, but before long he wonders whether he hasn’t been brought there as part of a twisted plot by hospital doctors whose radical treatments range from unethical to illegal to downright sinister. Teddy’s shrewd investigating skills soon provide a promising lead, but the hospital refuses him access to records he suspects would break the case wide open. As a hurricane cuts off communication with the mainland, more dangerous criminals “escape” in the confusion, and the puzzling, improbable clues multiply, Teddy begins to doubt everything – his memory, his partner, even his own sanity.

OK, suffice it to say that the above explains a whole lot of nothin’ — for a reason. Again, can’t go there.

Likes

• Leo has come a long way. His character was believable; tortured, brooding, hidden. Yet, his honesty and passion came across in such a way that, even though he was not a “happy” character, it was still easy to like him. Best of both worlds.
• I love any role Ben Kingsley plays. I have always secretly wished to see him as Salieri in Amadeus, even though F. Murray Abraham was great (he actually won the BSA Oscar for that film, if memory serves).
• The photography was amazing. The ocean, cliffs and caves were visually awesome, and everything “period,” right down to the neckties and bed frames, was spot on.

Dislikes

• The score was bizarre. A grotesque, dissonant crescendo, reminiscent of old 1950s horror movies, accompanied the simple approach of a ferry boat to the shore. Huh? Loud, violent chords at inactive or inopportune moments. The music just missed the mark for me.
• Well…the ending. Doesn’t mean it wasn’t effective, or what it should have been, but all the same…
• One big question remained unanswered at the conclusion. The Thriller picked up on it right away.

Still, we both really enjoyed it. I enjoy Scorsese movies (Casino, Color of Money, Goodfellas, Gangs of New York, The Departed — all good ones, and can’t wait to see his George Harrison docu later this year). It’s worth watching a second time — maybe that nagging question was actually addressed, and both of us missed it.

On the Rat-O-Meter movie scale of five cheeses:

RNF before the review:

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(Is this a classy dude or what? Ohio’s finest. Yark. I’m sure he’s great and his mama loves him, but he just always looks dirty to me.)

Seems Big Ben is in a lil trouble again for pushing hisself on the ladies. Dandy hanky there, sport.

So the Thriller and I watched 2012 last night. For a doomsday movie, it felt surreal. I mean, I found myself thinking, “Is it OK to laugh here?” Faced with his house and entire street being swallowed in seconds by a massive earthquake, Jackson (played by quirky/cute John Cusack) jumps behind the wheel of his limo, family in tow, and makes wisecracks about his wild driving. I guess the director felt it was necessary to pad the horror with a little comic relief.

The story’s reality walls are thin at times (e.g., the world is crumbling but we still have all communication/internet/satellite services up and running perfectly?), but the special effects are beyond cool. Check out how they did it. It will impress you, even if the incredibly convenient date of “12/12” doesn’t. (Notice the dyslexic gaffe in the graphic.)

So, totally over the top in every way, garishly dramatic while keeping smart-aleck lines in tact, probably a metric ton of Chicken Little hogwash thrown in for good measure….yeah, I liked it OK.

On the Rat-O-Meter movie scale of five cheeses:

Happy weekend, fiends. Yay!

Kay and I went to Mansfield last night and saw Robert Zemeckis’s A Christmas Carol. Truth be told, I wasn’t overly thrilled about going; it was to have been the umpteenth retelling I’ve seen, and I was cold and a bit tired, and I had my concert (tonight) on the brain, and those blasted 3-D glasses anyhow…

Boy, was I glad we went! It was a delight. You can hardly match anyone’s CG appearance with their voices (with the exception of Gary Oldman, who plays Bob Cratchet, and Bob Hoskins as Fezziwig). I saw almost no likeness to Jim Carrey in Scrooge’s character at all. Kinda bugged me because I really tried to find some. It ended up not being an issue, though. The movie was nothing grand or groundbreaking; it was just a great way to spend a couple of hours with a friend. Very entertaining.

The fly-action shots reminded me of the Back to the Future attraction at Universal Studios in Orlando. My guess is they closed the ride long ago, but if you ever had the chance to go on it, you know it was a huge thrill. And effects like watching the snow fall were fun — you could almost reach out and touch it. Of course, the message of the story is timeless and true (life isn’t about the things you amass, but the love you give away), so there was no reality grappling or paradigm shifting involved. Just a nice night out with a friend before three days of insanity starts.

And since the insanity starts in about 2.5 hours, I’d better get the move on. Come to the high school choir concert tonight, 7 p.m. Good times to be had. Bando, break a leg on your concert as well. Looking forward to some serious Panera time with you over break.

Happy Monday — if there is a such an animal.

FO

Image credit: Disney