Tag: The Way Way Back

2020, Reviews N - Z

The Way Back (2020)

by Daniel PrinnLeave a Comment on The Way Back (2020)
The Way Back (2020)

The Way Back posterDirected by: Gavin O’Connor. Starring: Ben Affleck, Al Madrigal, Janina Gavankar. Runtime: 1h 48 min. Released: March 6, 2020.

Gavin O’Connor’s The Way Back is the latest addition to an unofficial cinematic universe – films with the key words Way Back in the title, starting with Emilio Estevez’ The Way, then a few months later with Peter Weir’s adventure drama The Way Back, and then in 2013 with my personal favourite The Way, Way Back.

Obviously these films have nothing to do with each other, but four is too many films with a generic name like this. The generic title is fair for O’Connor’s sports drama because it’s familiar, but it is also very good.

Jack Cunningham (Ben Affleck) was a high school basketball legend on his way to earning a scholarship before he walked away from the game. Years later, he’s given a shot at redemption coaching the team at his alma mater, a Catholic high school called Bishop Hayes.

Jack isn’t exactly the poster boy for the Catholic image. He’s an alcoholic skilled at hiding his boozing. We see him sneak liquor into his thermos at his construction job, and then plow through a fridge full of beer cans while deciding to take this coaching job. The scenes when Jack needs to be helped home because he can barely stand are hard to watch.

Affleck brings his A-game as the character and it’s the best male performance I’ve seen so far this year. It’s a quiet, tortured performance as he battles his inner demons. When we learn more about these demons, it is crushing, and I wouldn’t dare spoil that. I’ll just say this is one of Affleck’s finest performances and he is heartbreaking and powerful.

The Way Back article
Al Madrigal and Ben Affleck in The Way Back. (IMDb)

He’s great in the sports scenes, too. When Jack puts down the bottle and takes an interest in these kids, The Way Back inspires, and it inspires on and off the court. There are a couple of players that we learn about. Jack’s dynamic with Brandon Durrett (Brandon Wilson), a quiet player with a deep understanding of the game, is the most interesting. Brandon’s father doesn’t approve of the game as a career path and it’s fascinating watching Jack turn him into a leader.

Another main player is Marcus Wiggins (Melvin Gregg). He has attitude problems and thinks he’s the star of the team, and I like how his character is handled. Another player, Kenny Dawes (Will Ropp), is one-note as a ladies man, but he gets some good laughs. We learn the names of the other players – like Chubbs (Charles Lott Jr.), Bobby Freeze (Ben Irving) and Sam Garcia (Fernando Luis Vega), but the rest feel like they’re there to fill out a roster.

The film’s also not so much about the kids, it’s about Jack and how they change him. I like how Jack changes the team, too, and his coaching strategy brings a lot of comedy since it’s a Catholic school and he swears a lot, much to the chagrin of the team’s chaplain, Father Mark Whelan (Jeremy Radin). The dynamic with assistant coach Dan (Al Madrigal) is also strong in the film. Jack brings a winning mindset to the team and it charms in its sports moments. The dramatic scenes are also beautiful, and I like the way director Gavin O’Connor shoots drama.

The film is about Jack’s trauma and basketball. Basketball gives Jack a purpose and it’s used as healing, but the film never shows that it could cure everything for him. O’Connor and screenwriter Brad Ingelsby write a strong film here. There’s a good balance to The Way Back. There’s importance in its sports scenes, but an equal importance to being a character study on alcoholism and trauma. That makes Jack’s way back even more compelling.

Score: 75/100

2018, Reviews # - M

Action Point (2018)

by Daniel PrinnLeave a Comment on Action Point (2018)
Action Point poster
IMDb

Action Point. Released: June 1, 2018. Directed by: Tim Kirkby. Starring: Johnny Knoxville, Eleanor Worthington-Cox, Dan Bakkedahl. Runtime: 1h 25 min.

I like Johnny Knoxville. He’s funny. But then a terrible film like Action Point comes along and no matter how contagious his laugh is, you (probably) won’t laugh with him. Keep in mind, this is a film that thinks alcoholic bears and Chris Pontius wearing thongs is the funniest thing in the world.

Knoxville stars as D.C. Carver, who we first meet as an old man reminiscing about the good old days when his daughter, Boogie, would visit him at his amusement park called Action Point which the daredevil runs with his friends, complete with a waterslide and an alpine slide and all.

The summer’s 1979 and Boogie (Eleanor Worthington-Cox) comes to visit, but attendance is down because a corporate amusement park opens in town. Action Point’s employees need to figure out a way to attract people to the park, and meanwhile a villainous land owner named Knoblach (Dan Bakkedahl) really wants the property shut down for some reason. It’s a half-decent plot in the 80s or even the mid-2000s, but in 2018 it’s dull and unfunny.

The film’s inspired by a notoriously unsafe New Jersey park called Action Park and Knoxville was inspired to make the film after he saw a 14-minute documentary called The Most Insane Amusement Park Ever (link here). It’s interesting and makes the lawlessness of the place look totally fun. It’s a shame because this lifeless film doesn’t capture any of that nostalgia or spirit.

The characters aren’t developed outside of D.C. and Boogie. The twentysomethings that work at the park have cool jobs and that would have been fun to explore (like the summer jobs in Adventureland or The Way Way Back) but screenwriters John Altschuler and Dave Krinsky don’t give them anything to do.

Benny (Chris Pontius) is also an employee at the park. He’s a lifeguard but has more interest in telling stupid stories than saving anyone drowning. The character’s awful, and so is Pontius, but he hangs out with D.C. more than the others, so much so he even gets a love interest (Camilla Wolfson).

Action Point alpine slide
Johnny Knoxville in Action Point going down the alpine slide. (IMDb)

A decent part about the film is the father-daughter chemistry between Knoxville and Worthington-Cox as his daughter Boogie. The relationship humanizes the boring D.C., as he’d be a complete asshole otherwise.

The relationship’s one-note and the main drama of it is that Boogie wants to see The Clash in concert this summer and brings it up repeatedly to D.C. When there’s drama because of this it’s not believable because it stems from bad communication from Boogie, and simply shouldn’t be a conflict. The film also thinks you’ll care about the conflict, but you won’t.

The story’s truly where Action Point falls flat on its face. At least with the Jackass movies we knew it was just stunts, and Jackass Presents: Bad Grandpa had a decent story and good stunts. Action Point has mediocre stunts and a terrible story. Maybe this would have been better if most of the Jackass crew would have been in the film besides Knoxville and Pontius – but these two seem to be the only ones interested in still doing this stuff while in their 40’s. Still, props to Knoxville to doing his own stunts.

The plot’s so paper-thin I’m convinced it only has the scenes of D.C. as a grandpa to pad the 85-minute runtime. It’s 15 minutes of filler throughout and it offers nothing to the story. It’s either filler or Knoxville just wants to be dressed as an old man in all his films, but in Bad Grandpa at least there was a reason.

There’s a scene of him as a grandpa here that’s so bad I considered walking out. It’s a gross-out gag with his granddaughter painting his hideous looking toenails the colour of blood. There’s no comedy here and my gut was telling me this film would never get any better, and I should have listened.

Score: 25/100

2013 films, Anticipated Movies List; Monthly/Yearly Recaps, Uncategorized

Top 20 Films of 2013

by Daniel Prinn6 Comments on Top 20 Films of 2013

This list is a lot late, but I still wanted to see a few more films before making my list. I still have a lot to go, but I’m pleased with the current Top 20 I have at the moment. I might do an article later in the year with an unofficial updated list, just to show how what films might have made the cut if I’d seen them before making the list. Without further ado, here’s my Top 20… I was going to have the whole list displayed in pictures, but the formatting was off for the first half so only the Top 10 are displayed with pictures.

20. Pain & Gain
19. The Kings of Summer
18. Spring Breakers
17. Dallas Buyers Club
16. The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug
15. The Place Beyond the Pines
14. Captain Phillips
13. Evil Dead
12. The Conjuring
11. The World’s End

10. The Way Way Back
10. The Way Way Back
9. 12 Years a Slave
9. 12 Years a Slave
8. This is the End
8. This is the End
7. Mud
7. Mud
6. The Hunger Games - Catching Fire
6. The Hunger Games – Catching Fire
5. Frozen
5. Frozen
4. Her
4. Her
3. About Time
3. About Time
2. Prisoners
2. Prisoners
1. The Wolf of Wall Street
1. The Wolf of Wall Street

 

Honourable mentions: Monsters University, Fast & Furious 6, 42, Saving Mr. Banks and The Great Gatsby. 

 

Now this is my bottom 5 of 2013…

The Lords of Salem
The fifth worst film of 2013: The Lords of Salem
The fourth worst film: The Hangover Part III
The fourth worst film: The Hangover Part III
Third worst: Movie 43
Third worst: Movie 43
Second worst: Grown Ups 2
Second worst: Grown Ups 2
The worst film of 2013 is... Scary Movie 5
The worst film of 2013 is… Scary Movie 5

 

Any thoughts on my thoughts? Sound off in the comments if you still want to do a bit of reminiscing of what 2013 had to offer! 🙂

 

2013 films, Reviews N - Z

The To Do List (2013)

by Daniel Prinn7 Comments on The To Do List (2013)

The To Do ListReleased: July 26, 2013. Directed by: Maggie Carey. Starring: Aubrey Plaza, Johnny Simmons, Bill Hader. Runtime: 104 min.

“The To Do List” is an occasionally funny film but, when it’s not that funny, it’s intensely boring. And that’s too often for it to tell a compelling story. The premise is reminiscent of “American Pie” with one central female, and taken to more extreme lengths. No one screws a pie, but a character does something much more disgusting – she takes a bite out of what looks like a Snickers bar floating in the local pool, taking it as a new employee hazing… Well, you can figure out how that ends… That’s also another way to show that the girls can get just as raunchy as guys in comedies.

The story follows Brandy Klark (Aubrey Plaza) who, in the opening scenes, gets ridiculed during her valedictorian speech for being a virgin. She is too embarrassed to even make much of a speech, or impression. Her friends Fiona (Alia Shawkat) and Wendy (Sarah Steele), who are nicknamed the slutty Oompa Loompa’s by Brandy’s father (Clark Gregg), take the virgin to a kegger celebrating their graduation. When the local dream boat Rusty Waters (Scott Potter) mistakenly sticks his tongue down her throat in a very awkward encounter, she doesn’t know what to do. Taking this as a sign that she is sexually inexperienced to say the least, she puts together a to-do list of all the sex acts her sister (Rachel Bilson) can tell her about, all of which she will do before going to college, finishing with the endgame of going all the way with the guy who started it all: Rusty Waters.

We should be thankful for little favours. If the setting were actually 2013 instead of 1993, this would be a four-hour movie if she were to list all the sexual acts from UrbanDictionary.com. Her raunchy to-do list has everything from giving oral, cunnilingus, going all the way, motor-boating… The only thing not on the list is anal sex, because god forbid anyone takes the backdoor – said by Gregg in the amusing trailer. It seems he has a lot of the best lines – as well as Brandy’s slacker boss, portrayed by Bill Hader. As far as films where the main protagonist works at a public pool for the summer, who else would take “The Way, Way Back” any day over this?

It’s just that the cast isn’t utilized very well in a film purely concerned with sex, but at least you know what you’re going into before you see this. When films have such sexual subject matter, they should at least be funny. Right? I think they should at least have some nudity, too (for a film rated 18A that expectation is not unreasonable) but apparently Maggie Carey doesn’t think so. The reason the cast gets under utilized is because the material really isn’t that funny, and these cast members are funny people delivering crappy dialogue. Bill Hader is probably the funniest character, and Clark Gregg is funny, too, when he shows up. Donald Glover gets a few laughs, too. There aren’t many good characters to root for, however. Aubrey Plaza’s talent derives mostly on sarcastic witticism; but the character just comes off as bitchy and unlikeable. Admittedly, Plaza gets a few laughs in the beginning, but not much else. She is miscast because there’s hardly anything witty about the character she’s playing. She’s just throwing around her kitty to anything that moves.

When things go wrong for our “hero,” she sports a Why does everyone hate me? attitude. She’s inadvertently hurting people for the sole reason of gaining sexual experience, and it’s just not that entertaining. The only decent chemistry there is shared between Plaza and her two besties. The only time they don’t talk about sex is when they’re talking about watching “Beaches” before the summer expires (so it just passes the Bechdel test). I think this film is supposed to show that women like casual sex, too; and that sex isn’t everything. Plaza doesn’t have good chemistry with anyone else because her character is just so bossy and unlikable, really. If she has to go out for another leading role, she should pick her characters better. The plot is utterly predictable, and it is partly inspired by events from Carey’s life – so it expresses that life can be pretty predictable, too; as well as mostly unfunny romantic comedies like this one.

Score: 30/100

 

2013 films, Reviews N - Z

The Way Way Back (2013)

by Daniel Prinn4 Comments on The Way Way Back (2013)

The Way, Way BackReleased: July 5, 2013. Directed by: Nat Faxon and Jim Rash. Starring: Sam Rockwell, Steve Carell, Toni Collette. Runtime: 103 min.

As I’m sure you’ve been able to tell; I love coming-of-age movies. Well, I love movies in general – but I find myself really enjoying movies like these. I think there’s something important about finding one’s place in the world; or even if it just means gaining confidence and growing as a person. The latest movie to the coming-of-age summer movie cannon is “The Way Way Back” helmed by Nat Faxon and Jim Rash.

Now, it may seem like I’ve seen Faxon through an unfair eye, mostly because I’ve said “who is surprisingly an Oscar winner” time and time again. Is it unfair that I was surprised to hear he has won an Oscar? I don’t think so. If one only looked at his on-screen filmography prior to this, he’s been in such mediocre hits as “Slackers,” “Club Dread,” “Beerfest,” “Bad Teacher” and “The Slammin’ Salmon.” Now, I don’t think any of those scream, or even whisper, Oscar contenders. He just doesn’t seem like he’d be pinned as an Oscar winner. (By the way, both he and Rash have won their Oscars for co-writing “The Descendants.”)

Both have definitely made a splash in the writing department, and this is no different. They’ve grown from being That One Guy Who Shows Up in the Broken Lizard Movies and the Dean on “Community,” to real above-average filmmakers that I love (but it’s not as if I didn’t like them before). I guess you could say, in my eyes, they’ve come of age in terms of their careers.

The story concerns Duncan (Liam James), a fourteen year-old boy who is dragged to a summer vacation spot with his mother (Toni Collette) and her over-bearing boyfriend Trent (Steve Carell). Duncan has a rough time fitting in, but he finds a friend in the manager, Owen (Sam Rockwell) of the Water Wizz water park.

Faxon and Rash design the film like experts. As soon as we’re introduced to the characters, they’re either instantly likeable, or you’ll just as instantly get a bad feeling about them. The only character one will get a sudden bad feeling about is Trent, portrayed by Carell. That’s his purpose. He’s the sort-of character that will be a total dick just because he can. When crappy situations happen, his mindset is to simply forget about them the next day. Carell plays the character well. Take Carell’s Burt Wonderstone and subtract the obnoxious way about him; replace it with the everyday soon-to-be stepfather, and you have the biggest dick in the movie, Trent. He plays a major role in stalling Duncan’s confidence.

Toni Collette’s Pam (Duncan’s mom) is usually likeable. Like most of the adults in the film, they take their kids along with them to this vacation spot. As one character puts it, “it’s Spring Break for adults.” This expresses the selfishness of many adults in the film (save the workers at Water Wizz, but more on that later). They’ll party and have a good time, but they won’t bother to include the children. That is very much the case with Allison Janney’s eccentric performance of Betty, mother of Susanna (AnnaSophia Robb), and Peter (River Alexander), where she constantly points out his horrible case of lazy eye. The actress is hard not to love, even when she’s criticizing a character. It’s the way some mothers do, and it’s downright hilarious for the audience.

Of course, there is Duncan. The hero of the film. He has a difficult time feeling he belongs. He’s awkward and shy, which it seems many can be at the age of fourteen. (Like I was.) But he grows as a person throughout the film and it’s a treat to watch. We get to see the good, the bad and the ugly of adolescence through his eyes, and just like the tagline states, “we’ve all been there.” The ugly is, of course, his stepfather. He’s also the bad. The good is Water Wizz water park and Susanna. (A potential love interest of Duncan’s, and she’s older, to boot!)

He meets Rockwell’s Owen, a person who teaches him that it’ll get better and makes him feel welcome. He offers him a job at Water Wizz, and he slowly gets Duncan out of his shell. Owen is the type of person that can make anyone feel welcome. He jokes about everything. He’s the type of person everybody knows. He could be your uncle (my Uncle Danny in my case), a father or a best friend. Sometimes his constant jokery gets in the way of personal interests (mainly Maya Rudolph’s character), but he’s the type of shoulder everybody needs at some point in their lives.

“The Way Way Back” might not pack the largest emotional punch. It didn’t make me cry, though I was close. Perhaps I wasn’t in the crying mood? Compared to the other coming-of-age movies so far this year, there’s more of a punch than “The Kings of Summer,” but less than “Mud.” More than a few scenes in the film pull at the heartstrings, and this is an uplifting and well-acted tale. It’s entertaining, hilarious and very enjoyable, if a little light-hearted at times.

Liam James may not be the strongest performer out of the bunch (who could be against Rockwell, Carell, Collette, Janney, Robb, Rob Corddry and Amanda Peet?!), but he has a timid charm about him. He shows promise, especially because his eyes are super expressive. I’ve always been attracted to Robb’s delicate kindness about her, and the characters she portrays. I want to see more of her.

Rash and Faxon show up in supporting turns as employees at the Water Wizz water park. Jim Rash plays a hilarious germaphobe named Lewis; Faxon is another employee named Roddy, master of the holding technique where he asks hot girls to wait to use the slide. These two truly understand what being a teen is like, because, like everyone else, they’ve been there. Faxon and Rash, and Stephen Chbosky (author, writer/director of “The Perks of Being a Wallflower”), may be their generation’s John Hughes. We’ll see in time.

One last thing. There is a concept of going your own way in this film. Characters are taught to not follow patterns and to choose their own path. There’s a point where characters (minor and major) are trying to pass each other in a water slide. Perhaps this is only boys will be boys tom-foolery. Maybe it’s about doing things differently, not following the norm, and making your own path. I’m not certain; it’s ambiguous and that’s the purpose. I am sure, though, that Faxon and Rash have penned a smart coming-of-age dramedy.

Score: 90/100