Charlize Theron plays Mavis Gary; a reasonably successful ghost writer of YA, young adult novels, whose personal life sucks. Mavis picks up blokes in bars, anywhere really, takes them to her home and jumps their bones, then wriggles out from underneath them the morning after. She is never around long enough for them to awaken in her presence, thereby avoiding a relationship.
Commitment to Mavis is akin to becoming a Communist; she can be the only totalitarian power in her little world, which is about to start shrinking, as her YA books are not selling well anymore.
Mavis is chillingly indifferent to cute babies, but does have a cute little fluff ball doggie, which figures in her life more as an accessory than a responsibility; think Paris Hilton with her handbag dog, but with more brains.
poor little doggie
Mavis thinks anyone who lives in a small town is a total loser, probably because she left one to make something of herself. Initially, this aspect of her character is highlighted when she receives an email from her ex-boyfriend Buddy Slade (Patrick Wilson) who invites her to his hippyesque baby shower for he and his wife's newly delivered baby.
Then a large baby photo appears, so she decides to print it out, using her spittle to lubricate the ink reservoir...
The resultant colour distorted 'bespittled' baby picture now stares smilingly back at her, sticking out of her handbag by her bed, amidst a sea of Coke and Bourbon bottles and other detritus, that she can't be bothered cleaning up. House proud she is not!
Shopping for more than ice cream...
After yet another drunken pick up, as she wriggles out from under the unconscious and unwanted conquest, Mavis has a change of attitude and decides to flee the city for her old small town home of Mercury, where she left her high school sweetheart, Buddy Slade, the now proud father. Mavis has other ideas.
On the false pretext of looking into real estate purchases in Mercury, Mavis arrives and gets to work; to find happiness at all costs, except to herself. Mavis tempts her old flame out for a drink, but he has baby duties, a temporary setback, as Mavis not only likes to get her way, she is used to it.
Mavis has found that copious amounts of strong booze helps anaesthetise her feelings of insecurity and possibly guilt, although that is most unlikely, as Mavis comes across as a totally self absorbed sociopath.
poor Matt (Patton Oswalt)
Mavis, while investigating her old towns bars to kill time, finds a temporary playmate, a guy she only remembered as being beaten up for being gay, leaving him lame in one leg. In fact, Matt Freehauf (Patton Oswalt) is not gay, as he repeatedly corrects everyone, but admits being a total geek, and does not have a busy social calendar.
A most unlikely friendship brews between them, then, as Matt discovers her plans, to steal her ex-boyfriend away from his partner and baby, he tries to counsel her by appealing to her better nature...
The film has a great support cast, all of whom contribute to the dramatic and comedic aspects of the film through the normality of their reactions, becoming perfect foils for Mavis awful behaviour and the black humour in the film.
Ignoring the reality, that Buddy does not want to leave his life for her, Mavis rails against the chorus of quiet indignation she is creating. Mavis does her best to win, and in some disturbed and twisted way she did; for she leaves the same as she came, if not worse.
For now she feels justified in her attitude to life, due to the well meaning but naive sister of Matt, Sandra Freehauf (Collette Wolfe), who cheers her up at the moment Mavis was about to have some insight into her negative character, then begs Mavis to take her with her when she leaves this town of over weight losers. Mavis' response to Sandra is a dark comedic gem!
Look out Buddy! (Patrick Wilson)
In the end, as the credits rolled, it occurred to me I just saw a rare film from Hollywood; where the protagonist is an attractive but thoroughly unlikeable bitch who, in the end, reveals nothing has changed; she emerges just as self-centred and compassionless as she started.
Charlize Theron obviously enjoys playing this role, and she gives it a full throttle performance throughout.
This dramedy is well worth a look for that aspect alone!
Rating: MA 15 (Strong coarse language) Release 19/1/12 (93mins)
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The latest in the famous series of Mission Impossible is as explosive as ever; with groovy gadgets galore and lots of death defying action, and Tom Cruise, as ever, doing all his own stunts, some of which raise the hair on the back of your neck.
In fact, I suggest you see the film as I did, at IMAX, and not just to admire Cruise's perfect teeth twenty feet high, but the experience of image saturation puts you right in there with the action.
Actually, I would caution anyone who suffers from vertigo not to see it at IMAX, as the experience may well and truly send you to the floor in a screaming heap.
Baddie with a big baddie bag
For the rest of us, it is akin to a really huge roller and threatening coaster ride, and as such, is quite enjoyable.
Now, I am not trying to avoid the fact I have some gripes about the film, it is always the logical aspects, rather our logical expectations that derail the suspension of disbelief, so hard fought for in any film.
Anyway, I will not spoil it for you those who have not seen it, but, think missile, think what would happen if an ICBM launched...at America....really...
The team
However, apart from some other annoying moments, because we are just not as dumb and naive as we were in the 1960's, when the TV show Mission Impossible played to millions of devoted fans across our nation, we were enthralled as every gadget did some miraculous thing, but now, we have a lot of miraculous gadgets and also know what the near future holds, we use things today even the 1960's show never dreamt of, such as mobile phones etc, in our everyday lives.
So, the modern era audience needs to be not just tricked, amused and amazed by gadgetry, we need to believe it is, at the very least, feasible and that it is backed up by the laws of physics and commonsense. We are also aware of the sophistication of spying and satellite observation and tracking, so todays audience expects a film to reflect the reality we all live in today.
Simon Pegg in control...sometimes
Technically, I felt the set ups for some of the bigger action sequences were either trite and/or implausible, which caused me to disengage from the film momentarily. Ethan Hunts team includes the Benji Dunn character from Mission Impossible 3; Dunn brings a new suite of IT sophisticated gadgetry to the team, along with a few humorous moments, as he is now an 'in the field' officer, but he is no Cruise karate kid, that is for sure. Cruise handles his role with expected ease and style, and his fight scenes and huge action stunts are top notch.
SUCH GLOVES! Perfect for hanging around in...
I wish to take a moment to digress; I want to share a little story with you, that involves one of the key guys who created some of the gadgets in the original 1960s TV show and how, one day, he was approached by two (real) CIA operatives, who asked him, How does that Zippo lighter with the steel cutting laser inside it work? Can you make us one?
The special effects man was gobsmacked and just a little disappointed in their naivety, as he had to explain it was all make believe. Later on, this man retired from his career in film and TV special effects and one of his pupils and greatest admirers, an Australian man, who is arguably the best special effects maker we have had in our film industry, went to visit his American friend, who now lived in Virginia.
It came as a surprise then, when the Aussie discovered his American mate had not retired at all, but now worked at Langley, the CIA Headquarters in Virginia!
His friend even took him to his laboratory, but he told his Aussie mate he could only show him one floor, the others were restricted. He was now designing all manner of things that scientists would turn into reality. The Aussie SFX guy described to me, many moons ago (and many years after he saw the CIA lab) some of the things he saw there, and it was rather scary to say the least. Those secrets are probably common knowledge now, in fact, I know the odd thing invented for the TV show was made a reality, which made me wonder, what the hell were they hiding on the other two floors?
No, I am not giving any names...
So, sometimes, life and art meld together.
Back to the movie...
Putting all that aside, at the end of the day, excusing the odd lapse in physics and plausibility, I found the film very entertaining and a great improvement on previous incarnations of the franchise.
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No...this is not about the movie...last time I saw that film I was a young laddie in the 1960's and I thought it was vewwwy impressive...
Rather, this post exists because the Orble robot, no, that's right, there are no human administrators working at Orble anymore, haven't you noticed?
Anyway, the Orble robot wrote to me threatening to take my site off me because, HORROR OF HORRORS.. I had not made a post on infognito for 55 days...
gee....I guess Orble would collapse and fall into the sea in one huge firey ball if I did not post, so here it is...for what it is...an insincere epistle to the void.
Hello void....me here...NOW PISS ORFF!!!!
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Author: Maren Winter
Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License, Version 1.2
Any ideas or opinions expressed in this article, for want of a better description, do not represent the opinions of the author of the photograph of the duck. Nor does the duck in the photograph, presuming in the utter unlikelihood that it is still alive, and not swimming in hoisin sauce on a plate, have an opinion either way regarding this article and its inclusion here is not suggesting that this duck would, if it could, support my opinions as expressed in this article. RIP DUCK!
.."and way beyond the lame self-conscious stylings of Jennifer's Body "
haha!
Ans I agree, Juno was extremely likeable, but it dod come across as someone of the portagonists' age having written it, and not a more mature intellect. This film definitely has "balls" (as Craig Ferguson's robot would say)
tanx mate, and upon consideration, it has so much grit that I'd definitely see it again on DVD.
good one, I liked this too, as I put in my rant on it in the mags; it must be the first time Hollywood has left its female protagonist without a redeeming feature at the end, and totally unrepentant!
It smacks of real life and the caustic barbs are the highlights.
you must have been in an extraordinarily generous mood when you saw this one!
I am about to put up my take on it, I have already had a practise run, with the magazines, and mercifully, for the production, they had to be brief...here I can expand my withering assault!
but 'twas not directed at you, or my other Orble pals, not even the non-pals, but at the admistration...or lack of it!
As for money...don't make me laugh! I just got payed $151- after three years doing this nonsense!
As for the duck, I know what you mean, if I had to kill the poor animals, face to face, I could not do it...I continue to sit on the edge of converting to vegetarianism, but my doctor does not want me to do it, as I am diabetic.
Anyway, I shall continue to contribute until I find a better site and I will let you know what it is, maybe we can all make a mass exodus!!
A well thought through review Linh, and I agree, at least on this point, that the balance between her ruthlessness and a more sympathetic view, was skewed more to the sympathy side, however, as I saw it, the 'device' of reminiscence, was more a new take on an old hackneyed way to reveal the past through memories.
I am yet to put a review on Orble, being too busy, however, what got my goat was the missile, they totally abandoned reality with that one, which annoyed me more than the other nonsense, but, it isn't meant to be rocket science, as I put in my mag review, but, they could at least respect the intelligence of the average punter these days!
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Comment by Mountain Fog
on Chronicle
Infognito
Screen Trek
QUOTE ME NO QUOTES!
didn't read your review, as have not seen it yet. By the way, who is the distributor?
cheers
fog