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May 2, 2008

Weekend Movie Forecast: Iron Man vs. Mister Lonely

050208ironmanmisterlonely.jpg

Robert Downey Jr. finally gets his big paycheck job with Iron Man, adapted from Marvel’s comic book series. Hollywood-Elsewhere’s Jeffery Wells calls it underwhelming: “I was never twitching in agony, but the advance word had suggested it might lift me out of my chair. Forget it.” He’s also troubled by “the jingoistic get-the-dumb-terrorists plot that John McCain or Dick Cheney will be totally delighted by if and when they see it. That's supposed to be what....cool? We all need to climb into the Bush tank for a couple hours in order to enjoy this thing?” Hooray for everything!

For something completely different, check out Mister Lonely, Harmony Korine’s first feature since 1999’s bold Julien Donkey-Boy. Opening at IFC after screening at Tribeca, the idiosyncratic story hovers over a Michael Jackson impersonator who follows a Marilyn Monroe impersonator (Samantha Morton) to an impersonator commune in the Scottish Highlands! A.O. Scott says the movie confirms Roger Ebert’s assessment a decade ago that Korine has “the soul of a real filmmaker… It demonstrates that Mr. Korine, who showed his ability to shock and repel in earlier films, also has the power to touch, to unsettle and to charm.

050208sonoframbow.jpgIn the spirit of Napoleon Dynamite and Dirk Calloway, the new British comedy Son of Rambow has arrived to further indulge Generation Y’s infantile hankering for ‘80s nostalgia. In this one, some precious little rascals get a camcorder and make a no-budget homage to Rambo. Nicolas Rapold says it seems promising at first but ends up “disappointingly unimaginative." Depending on your temperament, this sentence should make it or break it for you: “The ’80s references pile up, culminating in a prolonged party that spotlights a joke about the candy Pop Rocks.

In the 'don’t even go there' category, the Voice’s Robert Wilonsky says the Patrick Dempsey vehicle Made of Honorshould only entertain those still getting adjusted to the idea of talkies.Manohla Dargis at the Times likes David Mamet’s martial arts flick Redbelt, but Newsday’s dissenting review is more fun: “You've seen teen breakdancing flicks with better plots, and cooler acrobatics, than this.” And this weekend Film Forum kicks off five – count ‘em – five weeks of Godard’s films from the ‘60s with Breathless.

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Comments (7) [rss]

"Hollywood-Elsewhere’s Jeffery Wells calls it underwhelming"

I can never read anything by a critic again without thinking of this line from Ratatouille:

But the bitter truth we critics must face, is that in the grand scheme of things, the average piece of junk is more meaningful than our criticism designating it so.

 

son of rambow sounds like the guys from robot chicken and family guy. Just pile on the pop culture references and sprinkle stupid jokes like Optimus prime has hemmorrhoids or something like that.

 

Trust Gothamist to spotlight one of the rare critics who hates Iron Man. Rottentomatoes.com has 94% of critics liking the movie, including critics from the Times, Post, Daily News, USA Today, Newsweek and Time magazine. Meanwhile, Gothamist quotes somebody from "Hollywood-Elsewhere." Who? Never heard of them. I guess anybody can put up a website and call himself a critic nowadays. Personally, considering the overwhelming preponderance of critics favoring the film and Rottentomatoes calling it one of the best superhero films of all time, I may just make one of my annual forays to the theater for this one.

 

Kill me now before I have to see any of this shit.

 

Really? The one Iron Man review you use is from a site with a hyphen in its URL and a feature about how surprising it is that movie lighting can make a scene look good? What the Fe?

 

"Jen Yamato of Rotten Tomatoes reported that Iron Man was the best-reviewed film of the year so far and 'also potentially one of the highest-rated superhero movies of all time'."

Ignoring the overwhelming consensus to push a marginal, highly unpopular point of view based on few to no real facts? Looks like Gothamist has jumped into the Bush tank.

 

It leaves me rather speechless that one of the more respected blogs out there has decided to take the "hate something for the sake of hating it just so we seem cool" route.

You published excerpts from what, the ONE bad review you could find of Iron Man? Who does that?!

Not cool, Gothamist

 
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