"It Had To Be You"

"It Had To Be You" Movie Review

"It Had To Be You"

Posted on June 24, 2016 on CWAtlanta.cbslocal.com

Wayback Machine Archive Post

“It Had To Be You”  (2015)

Film is reviewed from the 2016 Terminus Film and Gaming Festival screening.

When we first meet Sonia (Cristin Milioti) she is sitting on the toilet with her shorts down around her ankles, music coming through the open bathroom door. She reaches for the toilet paper that isn’t there. Given that she has no toilet paper on the roll next to her, she calls for her husband, Chris (Dan Soder) for a new roll but Chris can’t hear her over the music. After several attempts to get his attention, she decides to venture out of the bathroom on her own, with her shorts still down around her ankles. She enters the hallway and notices some red rose petals on the floor. Intrigued, she waddles toward the bedroom that Chris is in, coming closer to the source of the music behind his partially closed door. As she reaches the door, she peers into the bedroom and sees lit candles; the room is filled with flowers, in vases and petals on surrounding the bed. Chris is sitting on the bed, making last-minute adjustments to a cake with the words “Will You Marry Me” in icing. She can’t believe her eyes and makes a hasty retreat out of the apartment and down to the street, calling her best friend before even leaving the apartment.

Sonia gets ahold of her friend, Nora (Halley Feiffer) and starts to panic, not knowing how to handle the situation. She is nervous, scared and almost horrified that he is going to propose. A proposal is the furthest thing in this relationship that she wants. She expresses, in no uncertain terms that she does not want to marry Chris. She turns slowly around to discover that Chris has been there the whole time, realizing that the woman he loves doesn’t want to marry him, even after his elaborate attempt to propose to her. Chris is heartbroken, not understating why she doesn’t want to even hear his proposal. Sonia slowly convinces Chris that she just needs time to mull over the idea and that eventually she will say yes. How much time will Sonia need to decide or will she be forever hesitant to tie the knot and how much time is Chris willing to wait, no matter how strong his love for Sonia is?

I liked this fun and innovative look at the romantic comedy genre by first-time writer/director Sasha Gordon. Gordon’s main character, Sonia isn’t a damsel in distress waiting for the white knight to ride up on his horse and sweep her into his arms as they ride off into the sunset. Instead, we get an annoying character who keeps messing up a good thing with her boyfriend, as she hesitates and questions if marriage is even in her future. While it is sometimes hard to root for Sonia, because she consistently creates self-inflicted wounds, to Gordon’s credit we never stop liking Sonia and her quirky outlook on love.

Of course, a lot of the credit for our affection for Sonia goes to Cristin Milioti, who takes a part that is at times frustrating and hard to root for, and still, we like Sonia and want her to find happiness. Milioti works her charm on the audience from that opening scene and doesn’t stop until the end of the film. She has such an expressive face and what seems like boundless energy makes her so much fun to watch on the screen. Milioti best scenes aren’t always with Dan Soder, who plays her put-upon boyfriend (though their scenes do work) but with her tribe of girlfriends (at one point she compares her group to the “Sex in the City” gang in an amusing sequence about her friends). Kate Simses, Erica Sweany, and especially Halley Feiffer, play off of Milioti with an ease that makes us believe that these women have known each other for a long time and support each other to the fullest.

Gordon, before this film, has composed music for films for over a decade, including one of my favorite films of last year, Leah Meyerhoff’s “I Believe in Unicorns.” It’s no coincidence that Sonia’s occupation is composing music for commercials, and some of the funniest scenes of the film are where she is working on the music for a sports bra or a baby product. Gordon wrote most to the music for the movie, and it fits perfectly with the films look and feel. I also enjoyed the small bits of animation that bring comic relief to some of the more emotional scenes.

“It Had to Be You” does not disappoint, as Cristin Milioti delights us with a sparkling performance in this cute and winning turn at a romantic comedy.    My Rating: Full Price

My movie rating system from Best to Worst:  1). I Would Pay to See it Again  2). Full Price  3). Bargain Matinee  4). Cable  5). You Would Have to Pay Me to See it Again

“It Had to Be You” Website

"Maggie's Plan"

"Maggie's Plan" Movie Review

"Maggie's Plan"

Posted on June 10, 2016 on CWAtlanta.cbslocal.com

Wayback Machine Archive Post

“Maggie’s Plan” (2016)

Maggie (Greta Gerwig) is a single woman living in New York City. She works at a local university, connecting art students with potential employers. When we first see Maggie, she is meeting her best friend Tony (Bill Hader). As they walk around the park with Tony’s adorable son in tow, Maggie is complaining that she has never been in a long-term relationship. She feels that love is not in her future, and therefore, she should just get artificially inseminated using the sperm of a mutual friend of their’s named Guy (Travis Fimmel). Tony’s only objection to this idea is that Guy is a “close talker.”

Maggie meets with Guy, an artisanal pickle maker running his own business to discuss the possibility of the insemination. Guy is in and is excited that Maggie doesn’t want any participation from him when the child is born. Later that afternoon, Maggie is at the bursar’s office when she meets a part-time professor, John (Ethan Hawke) who convinces Maggie to go for a walk. Their talk goes so well, and John is so impressed with Maggie, that he gives her the first chapter of the novel he is working on.

Maggie finds out from Tony’s wife, Felicia (Maya Rudolph) that John is considered the heartthrob of the university, and that he is in an unhappy marriage to a Columbia University professor (Julianne Moore), a woman that has an incredibly successful career. It turns out that John doesn’t have the greatest of a reputation on campus, though some of that maybe due to his cold and impersonal wife. Maggie decides to continue to see John, and he tells her that he is miserable in his home life because his wife is only interested in her career, which eclipses his, and won’t let him blossom. Finally, John leaves his wife and shows up at Maggie’s door ready to advance their relationship. Maggie should have remembered the old adage “Careful what you wish for.”

Writer/director Rebecca Miller, like her past work including The Private Lives of Pippa Lee and Personal Velocity, brings us a smart, whimsical film that centers on a strong, yet slightly neurotic woman who just might be better off without the men she chooses to get involved with. The dialogue is sharp and natural, making the characters seem real. While Maggie’s Plan is rarely laugh out loud funny, it is a sly, humorous look at a modern-day woman and the choices she makes in her life. That’s the subject of the movie, we don’t always make the right decisions, especially when we go against our better judgment. It’s also about how putting other people’s wants and desires over your’s aren’t invariably for the best; sometimes you need to put you first. Miller does an excellent job of knowing when to slow down the storyline so that we can get to know the characters better and when to speed up the pace for comic effect.

There are a number of memorable scenes in this film that show off Rebecca Miller’s comedic touch. The first time we meet John’s wife, played by the brilliant Julianne Moore is a perfect example of Miller’s ability to mine comedic gold. John is so enameled with Maggie that he realizes he is incredibly late for an appointment and takes off in a run across the park. He enters a theatre to where a woman is being interviewed by a moderator on stage. We quickly realize as John takes the open seat on the stage and grabs a mike, that the event is a kind of point/counterpoint interview with his wife. As he debates the Occupy Wall Street movement with his wife, we realize that they both relish a fight, and both think they are more intelligent the other.

You couldn’t ask for a better cast than this movie has. Bill Hader is exceptional as the opinionated friend of Maggie’s that has only her best interests at heart. He plays off of Greta Gerwig extremely well, their back-and-forth banter makes some of the most amusing scenes of the film. Maya Rudolph is equally good as Maggie’s brash friend.

Rudolph has that ability to deliver a slight line and make it memorable just using her facial expressions. Ethan Hawke is perfect as John, a man that thinks his looks and talent mean the world should give him everything that he wants. Julianne Moore is priceless as John’s wife, Georgette, who has a personality full of hostility that dominates everything in the room. Georgette is Danish and Moore gives her an accent that is just funny listening to it. Moore gives us a character that why not likable; you can feel sympathy for. I am sure that Rebecca Miller wrote this film with Greta Gerwig in mind because I would have a hard time with anyone else in the role. Gerwig has great comedic timing that the movie uses to the utmost. She gives us a memorable performance that you don’t know how she does it, but she commands you to concentrate on her character even when you have scene stealers like Rudolph and Moore up on the screen with her. Gerwig gives a performance that while sweet doesn’t go overboard, making us root for Maggie even more.

“Maggie’s Plan” is a funny and surprisingly, quite moving film that capitalizes on great writing and incredible cast to give us as a pleasurable and gratifying film centered around a woman. We need more of these type of films, and I hope Rebecca Miller keeps giving them to us.    My Rating: Full Price

My movie rating system from Best to Worst: 1). I Would Pay to See it Again 2). Full Price 3). Bargain Matinee 4). Cable 5). You Would Have to Pay Me to See it Again

“Maggie’s Plan” Website

"Dark Horse"

"Dark Horse" Movie Review

"Dark Horse"

Posted on June 3, 2016 on CWAtlanta.cbslocal.com

Wayback Machine Archive Post

“Dark Horse”  (2015)

There are some stories that may be improbable but are so heartwarming and uplifting that you just want them to be real. In the case of “Dark Horse,” the rags to riches documentary about a horse owned by a Welsh group of retired coal miners, that goes on to win so many races that it is invited to the biggest race in Great Britain, The  Grand National Steeplechase, the story is true.

The documentary takes place in a Welsh winning town, which has recently had all its mines close, ruining the local economy. A barmaid hears that a group in the town once owned a racehorse (it lost money), and she decides that it would be fun to own one. She puts up a sign in the bar, and over 30 people agree to put in ten pounds a week in the fund to eventually buy a racehorse. Instead of the purchasing of a grown racehorse, they decide to buck the odds even more and breed one. They find a mare that had three races under her belt (losing all three races so badly that no one wanted to bet on her). Then they find a stallion that has the incredibly low stud price of 3000 pounds.

A colt is born, and the alliance decides to name the horse “Dream Alliance.” To say that Dream Alliance early accommodations were rustic would be an understatement as its pen looks like an abandoned lot. Soon the horse is big enough for training, and finally, they are ready for the first race. Once the race starts, this improbable tale just gets better and better because this horse can run and win.

“Dark Horse” isn’t just about horse racing, it’s about the power of animals to help us heal, to feel better and bring people to together. It’s an incredibly uplifting film that will bring a tear to your eye from time to time. It’s also a “Rocky” tale of a working class group of people taking a “working class” horse that has no chance of winning in the high-price stakes of racing and turning their world on its ears, because not only does this horse win, it win’s big. The horse wins the 2009 Welsh Grand National; an incredible feat that no one thought it would happen (40-1 odds).

The film is so much fun to watch due to the cast of characters that make up the Welsh village. There is Jan, the barmaid who started the idea. She talks about Dream Alliance as if he can talk to her. Jan is so committed to the horse that she works two jobs and because of Dream Alliance, she becomes a bit of a celebrity in the grocery store she does cleaning in. Her husband, a toothless man with a big heart, is hilarious in his telling what happened to his group and the horse. My favorite moment from the film is when the group of owners go to their first race. One of the group decides that he doesn’t want to pay for an overpriced lunch and brings along a sandwich and two beers. When the ticket takers try to stop him at the gate, he gleefully tells them “You have to let me in, I’m an owner!”

I loved this warm and funny film. The love between the horse and its owners is almost overpowering. Each and every one of them felt by the end of his racing career that Dream was part of their family. “Dark Horse” is about beating the odds; that even though you might not belong there, as long as you believe in yourself, you can succeed. If you like rooting for the underdog or the little guy, this is the film for you. “Dark Horse” is a winner no matter how he places in the race.   My Rating: Full Price

My movie rating system from Best to Worst:  1). I Would Pay to See it Again  2). Full Price  3). Bargain Matinee  4). Cable  5). You Would Have to Pay Me to See it Again

“Dark Horse” is playing in Atlanta exclusively at Landmark Midtown Art Cinema.

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