Tag: Open Road Films

Cinema Dispatch: Before I Fall

~ Matt Vetrano ~ 1 Comment

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Before I Fall and all the images you see in this review are owned by Open Road Films

Directed by Ry Russo-Young

Oh look!  It’s that movie that looks like that one movie that came out two decades ago!  Okay, so maybe it’s not a TOTALLY original concept, but it at least looks more interesting than other YA novel adaptations like Divergent or The 5th Wave, and it does so without having to be set in the apocalypse!  The trailers seem to be leaning into the central conceit of the movie, and while it still has that YA aesthetics that look more drab and cheap than anything else, there seems like there’s some more effort thrown into this one than you’d typically expect.  Does this manage to rise above its peers and be one of the better examples of the genre, or are they just getting better at marketing these kinds of films to the general public?  Let’s find out!!

The movie begins with Samantha Kingston (Zoey Deutch) waking up on CUPID DAY which is NOT Valentine’s Day because these super hip and cool teenagers say so… even though it’s celebrated exactly the same way; down to the roses being handed out which I’m sure by any other name would still make this Valentine’s Day.  Anyway, she’s going through her day like it was any other; hanging out with her friends Lindsay, Ally, and Elody (Halston Sage, Cynthy Wu, and Medalion Rahimi), dodging the creepy kid who’s been pining after her for years (Logan Miller) and making out with her boyfriend (Kian Lawley) who’s honestly not much of a prize considering the dude wears his baseball cap backwards AT ALL TIMES.  Still, thing seem to be going fine in their lives and the four of them go to a party that night at the creepy kids place in celebration of Love Day or whatever the hell this is.  Hey, say what you will about his social skills; the dude has an awesome house!  The party however turns out to be less awesome because the creepy girl at school Juliet (Elena Kampouris) starts some beef with Samantha’s friend and is swiftly run out of the party by everyone there.  Feeling deflated, the four of them leave the party and WHAM!  They get in a car crash which… I THINK kills them?  Either way, Samantha wakes up the next day… EXCEPT IT’S NOT THE NEXT DAY!  She’s stuck in a time loop where she wakes up on the same morning each day and has no idea what it would take to break out of it; if that’s even an option.  Can Samantha find a way to escape the purgatory that she’s found herself in?  What can she learn by having to repeat the same day over and over again, and is this a wake-up call for her to become a better person?  I feel like I’ve seen this in a movie before.  Have they done this in a movie before?

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She’s not the only one feeling Déjà vu!

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Cinema Dispatch: Snowden

~ Matt Vetrano ~ Leave a comment

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Snowden and all the images you see in this review are owned by Open Road Films

Directed by Oliver Stone

So first we got the Sully movie, and now THIS!?  What’s other movies are we gonna get about things that just freaking happened?  Has someone already polished off a treatment for the Charles Ramsey story!?  Well at least as far as these recent OF THE MOMENT BIOPICS go, this one has some relevance outside of the one event it’s focused on; namely the current state of US (and global) surveillance programs.  Does this manage to be an interesting and nuanced take on how all this information came to light, or is it a thinly veiled propaganda piece that no one bothered to make into a compelling film?  Let’s find out!!

The movie follows the career of Edward Snowden (Joseph-Gordon Levitt).  Some guy you MIGHT have heard about a few years ago.  Spoiler Alert!  He stole documents from the NSA and revealed to the public the existence of certain programs they were using such as PRISM and XKeyscore.  That’s towards the end of the story though.  Where we start is with him being discharged from the army (broke both his legs) and instead choosing to serve his country by applying to the CIA and doing computer stuff for them.  He barely manages to get the job and ends up soaring above his peers, going from job to job and always being at the best wherever he was (or at least that’s how the movie tells it).  Unfortunately, he finds out the US security agencies are doing a bunch of shady shit, and he’s not only having to deal with the guilt of spying on US citizens in an unconstitutional manner, he’s also having to keep this secret from his girlfriend Lindsay Mills (Shailene Woodley).  Will his sense of obligation to his fellow man be too strong for him to keep his head down!?  Well we all know the answer to that, but how’s it gonna play out when ACADEMY AWARD WINNING DIRECTOR OLIVER STONE shows it to us!?

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Chances are he’ll lose his freaking mind at some point.

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Cinema Dispatch: Mother’s Day

~ Matt Vetrano ~ 1 Comment

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Mother’s Day and all the images you see in this review are owned by Open Road Films

Directed by Garry Marshall

Seriously.  It’s not funny anymore Garry Marshall.  Whoever’s paying you to do this or whoever has your family hostage NEEDS to be stopped.  For the third time in a damn row, Garry Marshall is trying to rip off Love Actually by taking the formula and centering on other holidays that seem to be chosen at random.  I wouldn’t be surprised if the next movie is about Arbor Day and Julia Roberts plays a tree in it!  So is this one just as bad as the rest?  Yes.  Yes it is.  No point in giving you false hope.  Let’s just get this one over with…

The movie is separated into four stories.  Jennifer Aniston has to deal with the fact that her ex-husband has remarried a much younger woman and they are both dazzeling the kids with fun trips, junk food, and rock concerts while she’s at her house doing everything else for them.  Jason Sudeikis is a widower whose wife passed away about a year ago and he’s still dealing with the grief while trying to raise his two daughters.  Britt Robertson is a woman who’s raising her infant daughter with her boyfriend, but she also has her own demons to work out as she has never met her birth mother who is an HSN host played by Julia Roberts.  And finally, KKate Hudson and Sarah Chalke play sisters who have married people their parents would not approve of (an indian man played by Aasif Mandvi for the former and another woman played by Cameron Esposito for the latter) and they are no longer able to hide this fact from them since they have made a surprise visit.  Each of these stories are loosely connected by the fact that some of the characters know each other as either friends or in a professional sense, and we follow our heroes as they learn to get over their problems, make up for mistakes they’ve made, and become better people in the process.  Oh and there’s a holiday in here… I guess.

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“Holy hell!  Is… is this what the rest of my career is gonna be like!?”     “Yep.  Welcome to the old ladies club.”     “BUT I’M ONLY TWENTY SIX!!”     “Yeah, and I’m only thirty seven.  It’ll get easier after a while.”

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