I'm Like My Mother. I Stereotype. It's Faster.

Ah, finally we're getting closer to today.


Up In The Air was the only major contender from last year's Oscar race the I didn't see (well, major in a sense. I have no desire to watch The Blind Side, for example. Besides, Up In The Air was nominated for a hell of a lot more Oscars than the Bullock helmer.) I spotted it a couple of weeks back and thought, what the hell. It looked like a nice easy-watching film to ease myself back into things post parental departure. So I grabbed it, and I was right.

Ryan Bingham (George Clooney - no relation to the Oscar winning composer behind The Weary Kind - funny they both turned up at the same Oscars ceremony, hey?) is employed by a company that contracts out its services to companies too afraid or kind hearted or whatever to fire their own employees. Basically, Ryan flies around the United States firing people for a living. He sits across the table from them, tells them that they're fired, and then doesn't take any of their anguish home with him because he doesn't know them - their pain doesn't affect him on an emotional level because he has no connection with them outside of that office. Thinking about it, it actually starts to make sense in a twisted way. I don't want to be told that I have lost my job by anyone, but it doesn't really make a difference if that initial news comes from my actual employer or someone they have contracted in. The initial shock and upset is the same, so one may as well spare the employer from having to deal with it. I can always question my boss later and find out why, once the shock and anger has calmed a little, and it becomes true curiosity driving my questioning, rather than a quest to prove my boss wrong.


But I digress. Ryan. Fires people for a living. He is constantly in the air, has no close family, no friends. He has so many frequent flier miles it hurts. On one of these trips he meets Alex (Vera Farmiga), someone in the same position as him - always on the road (or, ba-doom, up in the air), and the two begin a complex, schedule-defying affair. Just sex, right? Around the same time, Ryan's boss (Jason Bateman) takes on a new employee, Natalie (Anna Kendrick), who proposes to revolutionise the company by keeping the employees grounded - they can fire people using telephone and video hookups - wham. The boss tasks Ryan with showing Natalie the ropes on the road while they set up the new system, against Ryan's very strong wishes. He is happy on his own, with his solitary time in airport lounges and in hotel rooms. He mentions that he is in the air, what was it, 320+ nights a year, which means he has to spend a lousy and miserable 40-odd nights a year in his apartment. He gives lectures on how to construct your life so that it will quite literally fit in a suitcase, so you could life it on your back - get rid of those loved ones! Who needs possessions?


While on the road Natalie is dumped by text message by her long-term boyfriend, whom she had uprooted her life and moved to Nebraska for, passing up numerous great job offers. She is devastated, but shortly Ryan and Natalie are called back to the office as the remote firing system is about to be put into effect. Ryan doesn't go straight back, instead heading to Wisconsin to go to his sister's wedding (played by Melanie Lynskey - Melanie Lynskey fest!) where he begins to realise that his life isn't all it's cracked up to be - his family is happy to see him, but only in the sense that they figure they should be. He's like a distant relative you only see at weddings and funerals, but you don't really know. The sister even has someone else, a family friend, organised to walk her down the aisle, since her father has passed away.


Back in the office, one of the employees fired remotely has killed themselves, turning Natalie into a wreck who resigns and goes home and putting a stop to the wireless business plan. Instead, Ryan is back on the road - but does he really want to be? Has he maybe realised that the life he is living isn't really a life at all?


There are hints of great George Clooney in the film, but only hints. The depth shown in that final scene of Michael Clayton, for example, wasn't really on offer here. He is, however, eminently watchable in anything he does. He has great charisma, so really all he needs to do is show up and it's fine. Sure, it's nice when he puts his back into it, but he doesn't really have to. Kendrick and Farmiga both shine in their respective roles, Alex as the emotionally cool older woman who knows the deal and Natalie as the fresh-faced girl with hope bursting out of every pore. And the excesses discussed are timely (flukily timely) considering the whole bad money business going on over the last couple of years - within the context of the financial crisis and subsequent near global recession it managed to function not as a reminder of better days, but a reminder of what unmitigated greed can inspire us to do.


Writer-director Jason Reitman is good at making easy-going, watchable films. Much like George Clooney. Juno was a terrific little film, and Thank You For Smoking was a good debut. This, however, just felt a little too cold, a little too distant. I enjoyed watching it, but I felt absolutely nothing for Ryan, and very little for Natalie. Surprisingly I felt for Ryan's sister and also for Alex, but when the two dominant characters are so distant from the audience emotionally, it makes it hard to buy into it. You can watch it, you can laugh at it, you can even shed tears in it (not that I think this is a cryable film, I'm just saying you could if you wanted to), but that doesn't mean you actually care. The situations can be quite sad. But you're still not crying for the people.


Ultimately I didn't feel Ryan's character arc. I saw it, I understood it was there, but I didn't feel it. Which has a little to do with Clooney and a little to do with Reitman, I think. The film didn't warm, to speak in a spurious fashion. Those cold lines and tones didn't soften. It held you at arms length to start with, and then kept you there. And so, whilst I don't regret watching it, I know I'll never see it again. Like Julie & Julia, that doesn't make it a bad film, but here especially I was hoping for something more. 2.5 stars.

I Modified This Tube Sock.

Bit of a hiatus, but I went on a mini-break to Copenhagen, which turned into a much longer stay thanks to a certain Icelandic volcano spreading ash everywhere and causing a bit of a European airspace shutdown - you may have heard something about it. That's all right, trains and ferries saved the day.

Now, that doesn't mean I'm still not well behind. I am. I watched Fantastic Mr Fox a while ago, and I'm a little rusty on it because of that. But I know I liked it. I didn't love it, but I liked it. I think the vocal talent was very, very charismatic (with George Clooney doing his thing, and Meryl Streep showing that even without her physical presence, her comic timing is terrific.) I think it looked really cool - I loved the stop-motion, cute little characters and the production design of the whole thing. It didn't quite grab me, but it was a nice little romp. Jason Schwartzmann was hilariously petulant, Willem Dafoe was brilliantly disguised, Eric Chase Anderson held well against far more experienced cast, Bill Murray and Jarvis Cocker worked, Owen Wilson just made me think of Owen Wilson, and I'm not a huge Owen Wilson fan so...


Alexandre Desplat (who? Who's he? Oh, him) did great things with the score, unsurprisingly. It's really a pity he doesn't score more films than he does. What? He did seven scores for 2009 films? Lazy. He's scored five films I've seen in the last six months? Work harder, man!


Look, I'm not going to knock Wes Anderson, really. He at least goes for what he wants to do. You can feel his style, whether you love it or hate it. As I think I mentioned here, I liked his Life Aquatic, but from what I've seen of the rest of his work I'm a little ho-hum. But you do know what you're getting, and you must admit that that has things going for it. Still... 3.5 stars.

How Much For My Other Kid?

Woops. Turns out my weekend wasn't spent catching up on here after all.


Syriana. I see what writer/director Stephen Gaghan was trying to do. It worked so well for him with his screenplay for Traffic, after all. But it didn't work for me here. All those multiple narrative strands revolving around oil and the Middle East - it was noble, a valiant effort, but ultimately it was just too much going on, making it damned hard to actually know what the hell was going on.

George Clooney plays a CIA agent assigned to assassinate various people in Iran, but keeps doing things to upset his employer. Matt Damon is a Swiss based energy analyst whose son dies at a party thrown by an Emir, and out of sympathy his company wins a big oil contract. Damon becomes his economic advisor as he tries to modernise and bring his country away from its dependence of oil in the long term for growth. Chris Cooper is the head of a major American energy company merging with a smaller power, who are currently losing their grip on the oil fields of the same Emirate after said Emir grants a contract to a Chinese company. The merger is shady, but they have a big law firm (headed by Christopher Plummer) give the impression of due diligence by going through all of their documents and files. Unfortunately for them, the lawyer in charge, Jeffrey Wright, is too damn good and starts to find stuff out.


I guess that's about it. It's a great cast (also with Amanda Peet and William Hurt), and they all do fine. Strangely, I particularly liked Damon - his conflicted father throwing himself into work in the aftermath of tragedy was very well crafted. I don't fully understand the acclaim given to Clooney - he was fine, but there was nothing really exciting in his performance. It was just there. Wright I'm slowly falling in love with, each performance I'm seeing adding to my respect for him. Why he's not a bigger star is anybody's guess.


Score by Alexandre Desplat. I'm getting to a point where I think I'll just assume every score is by Desplat. Seriously, does the man never sleep? And they're always good! Damn him and his talent and work ethic. Robert Elswit makes the film kind of look like Traffic. It was nice lensing, but it didn't bring much of a new look to the region. Also reminded me a bit of films like Three Kings and Jarhead.


All up, a bit meh. One of those films that would probably make a lot more sense if I watched it again, but for this I just don't have the inspiration. Unlike, say, Mulholland Drive, which I didn't really understand but I knew I loved it and had to watch it repeatedly, Syriana probably won't become a brilliant film if I watch it again - it'll just give me clarity of storyline. And that's now what narratives are all about. 2.5 stars.

I Am Shiva, The God Of Death.

When Michael Clayton was out in cinemas I didn't have that strong a desire to go and see it. I don't mind George Clooney, I think he is very charismatic and he plays certain characters very well, but I also think that he plays riffs on the same character most of the time. Maybe he's just too big a star and made too many major films riding off his charm for me to now be able to see past George Clooney and instead see the person he's playing, believe the character behind his eyes.

In Michael Clayton, Clooney plays the titular character, a 'fixer' at a major law firm. He has a gambling problem and has managed to get himself into $75,000 worth of debt, thanks in part to his gambling and in part to his failed attempt to set up a bar with his alcoholic brother. Meanwhile, Arthur (Tom Wilkinson), a leading attorney at his law firm, appears to be completely breaking down, stripping off in the middle of a deposition and beginning to deliberately undermine the litigation - the firm is defending an agricultural company against a class action lawsuit worth billions of dollars, and Arthur has come across some memos that he is finding impossible to deal with. Lead counsel within the agricultural company, U-North, is Karen (Tilda Swinton), who is growing more and more paranoid regarding Arthur's behaviour and Clayton's involvement, and is trying to make it all go away. But it's Clayton's job to make sure it doesn't all go away, and his loyalty to Arthur means that he cannot do it. With the rest of the firm in the dark, convinced that Arthur is simply going mad and that he may undermine millions of dollars in fees that the firm desperately needs, Clayton does what his conscience dictates, possibly for the first time in his career. Having almost lost his life, he is going to make sure that somebody pays.


Clooney plays Clooney for the most part, but, particularly in the closing scene, he pulls out a little moment of magic that I hadn't expected. As he sits in a taxi as the credits role, the camera lingering on his face, you can really feel everything going on inside Clayton, as opposed to Clooney. It's very subtle, but very effective. The supporting performances are well recognised, with Wilkinson picking up a Supporting Actor Oscar nom and Swinton taking home the golden man. Sydney Pollack (who also produced) was very good in the small role as Clayton's boss at the firm, with a raft of smaller players holding up their end of the bargain.


And the film works. It's a legal drama, and I am somewhat prone to liking them, I must confess. I get caught up in the game of law, so they work with me. Tony Gilroy, who wrote the screenplay and was also responsible for the Bourne series among other works, took up directing duties for his first outing here, and proves himself worthy of the title. It's a tight film, tense and dramatic, well crafted and well executed. Robert Elswit (who did the amazing work on There Will Be Blood) creates a sleek, slick world, just the right mix of grimy and shiny to befit these characters who are a mixture of nobility and scum. James Newton Howard (who has picked up eight Oscar nominations in the last eighteen years without a win) does a great job with the score, very light and never overbearing.


It's a very accomplished piece of filmmaking, ticking all the boxes, even if it doesn't quite break out into the territory of a classic or masterpiece. A very enjoyable watch, but probably a film that will fade from memory by the close of this, new decade. Props to the whole work, though. 4 stars.

Ask Angela Lansbury

I have literally just walked in the door from seeing The Men Who Stare At Goats. For some reason I was quite looking forward to this film. I don't know why, it might have simply been the ridiculousness of the title. The cast is pretty good (Clooney, Bridges, Spacey, McGregor) and it's a pretty cool name for anything.

I'm quite gobsmacked by it. Either something went waaaaay over my head, or everyone involved with it was drinking water spiked with acid (that's an in joke you'll get if you see it... and that's not something I'd really recommend.)

Ewan McGregor plays a journalist who is posted to write a story on a local man claiming he was part of a secret US military division who were developing superpowers - as in, we can walk through walls and predict things, rather than Russia and the USA during the Cold War. After his marriage breakdown he goes to Iraq to try and prove himself a man and rather fortuitously happens across George Clooney in a bar, who was once a part of this division. We learn through McGregor retelling what Clooney told him about the history of the corp, the people involved (Jeff Bridges founded it, Kevin Spacey undermined it), and the ultimate downfall of the unit. But in Iraq some strange things happen and maybe McGregor starts to believe...

It actually starts out all right. It all seems very far-fetched, but as McGregor's character (and what is with his accent? It's fine for a lot of it, but, particularly at the beginning, it falters quite noticeably quite a few times) warms to it so do we. But it does completely lost the plot. I'm not sure whether it was trying for some sort of I Heart Huckabees existential commentary, an anti-war film, a pro-war film, a supernatural film... whatever it was trying for, it completely missed. It's a mess, especially towards the end (and the ending - WTF? Seriously. W. T. F.), though it does look quite good. Clooney also produced, so one must assume that he saw something in it that tickled his funny bone (and there are some funny parts, with the funniest being the line marking the title of this entry) and now has enough might to pull together the US$25mil to make it. Director Grant Heslov is a dual Oscar nominee for his writing and producing credits on Good Night, And Good Luck, but he also has over 60 credits on IMDb as an actor. This is his debut feature as director, and possibly having the writer of How To Lost Friends And Alienate People as the adaptor of this novel didn't help matters. I think the script needed some serious work, especially that ending. I'm not going to go into too many details, but seriously. Seriously.

I don't know how many stars to give this film. It was so diabolical as to get one, but two seems a little generous, so I'm going to run with 1.5 Stars. I rate out of five. So that a 30% score. Head out and see it, however, if it sounds interesting, because I'd definitely be interested to know if I just missed something amazingly important somehow. It has boggled my mind.