Comedy is a funny business. It can be as light as candyfloss or as sinister as an oil slick, which is probably why some people find clowns so very disturbing – on the one hand a thing of ridicule on the other, a disturbingly ‘masked’ embodiment of uncertainty. Ben Wheatley and Robin Hill’s debut feature is as serious as the tears of a clown, pulling the plug on the usual gangland cliches and taking their killers back to the kitchen sink. The result is a black comedy reminiscent of the likes of Alan Bleasdale and early Ken Loach, but which is also distinctly unnerving.

And yet, what can be more ordinary than a terraced house? Sitting innocently in suburban Brighton, the family it contains are at once utterly banal and worryingly psychotic. Karl and his Dad Big Bill (played by Hill and his real-life father Robert) are fresh from escaping a prison term after four months’ remand and, back home, they and their extended family consider who may have grassed them up over tea and a biccie.

Big Bill has a mostly zen approach to the art of criminality, seemingly preferring to play folk tunes on his guitar, although it is clear he is not to be crossed, while Karl, despite the outward appearance of normality, soon comes to display a high level of arrested development and very short fuse. Watching over both is long-suffering matriarch Maggie (the fabulous Julia Deakin), who quickly shapes up to be Lady Macbeth in Marigolds. And if a snitch in their midst is not enough, Karl’s ex (played by Robin’s real-life wife Kerry Peacock) arrives on the doorstep with a bun in the oven she claims he put there.

By mixing the situations of a crime drama with dysfunctional family dynamics, the everyday becomes accentuated, meaning that outbreaks of violence are absurdly comic but still retain a nasty edge. Additional characters push this absurdity even further, such as hitman Pringle (Michael Smiley), who in a flourish of modern parenting problems, brings his three-year-old son (played by Robin’s real-life daughter Kitty Blue) along on a job.

There is no denying the film is low-budget. In addition to Robin Hill casting just about everyone in his family (his sister-in-law and mum also turn up in a very brief cameos), with the exception of a handful of scenes, the entire film is set in his parent’s home, facts which only add to the documentary feel.

Director of Photography Laurie Rose deserves praise for his excellent handheld camerawork that makes a virtue of the claustrophobic nature of the house. His intuitive use of the camera is all the more impressive when you consider that most scenes were done in one or two takes, one of which would be semi-improvised and, when they are in the confines of the house, he keeps his framing in the face of the central characters. The acting is uniformly excellent, with a resolute downplaying of each scene which gives the humour an organic, natural feel.

As the body count begins to stack up, the tension begins to haemorrhage out somewhat but the climax of the film is a fitting one even if it does stray into predictable territory. With wins at Raindance and the British Independent Film Awards and plenty of festival play in the US, Wheatley, Hill and Rose are all on the rise and it will be interesting to see what they do with a bigger budget and less familiar setting in the future.

If the clumsy title is any indication (what “Life”? What are “We” supposed to “Know”?) then, states Kimberly Gadette, we may be in for another rom-coma. But if it’s prettier than The Ugly Truth and livelier than Killers, perhaps there’s hope.

For critics who complain that the set-ups for rom-coms are all too predictable, this one’s certainly not been done before. Inventive? Sort of. Believable? Not on your life.

And yet the opening is still reliably formulaic. The Boy (Josh Duhamel’s Messer) shows up for a blind date with the Girl (Katherine Heigl’s Holly). He’s surly and rude, and she won’t stand for it. In what may rival the shortest date in history, he’s kicked to the curb within minutes. And so we have the usual set-up of instant enemies who will eventually go ga-ga for each other.

In a quick montage, we watch these two over a three-year period, their initial hostility transformed into aggressive teasing. Since they are the mutual best friends of the couple who had set them up (the Novaks, played by Hayes MacArthur and Christina Hendricks), whenever the Novaks have a gathering, Messer and Holly are in attendance – at the wedding, the baby shower, the first birthday of the Novaks’ baby Sophie (played by Alexis, Brynn and Brooke Clagett). When the Novaks suddenly die in a car accident – hold onto your rom-com hats, here comes mission, um, implausible – it turns out that without any prior conversations, the Novaks had appointed their two best friends as co-guardians of their child, with the stipulation that they move into the Novak home together.

We’re probably as confused as Messer and Holly as we try to factor in the obvious. What if one of the singles wants to someday get married and have a family of his or her own? What if living under the same roof becomes unbearable? And how is it that neither of these two supposedly responsible parents, now dead, thought to consult their best friends before they wrote this guardianship into the will?

Though screenwriters Ian Deitchman and Kristin Rusk Robinson have created some amusing supporting characters, and have peppered the script with very funny one-liners, it’s in their overall plotting that the film suffers. We want to enjoy the ride; but at the same time, this initial device of throwing two enemies together, neither of whom has had any child-rearing experience, into parenting an infant under the same roof is hard to swallow. Other glaring faults include the fact that the writers first introduce us to a churlish Messer, verging on the mean. Which makes the actor work doubly hard to win our affection. Surprisingly, we get no ensuing admissions from Messer as to why he first behaved like a cretin; we’re left to plug in that plot hole for ourselves.

As for the threat of the other lover (isn’t there always at least one?), we never understand why the smitten Holly decides that perfect Dr. Sam (Josh Lucas) isn’t “The One.” Again, we can assume the reasons on our own dime, but since we’re not the ones being paid to write the script, it would be nice to hear from the talent that did.

This is a case where the acting outshines the problematic writing at every turn. Heigl has returned from the lower depths of The Ugly Truth and Killers, back to her earlier, Carole Lombard-like glory. She is appealing and vulnerable, a beautiful klutz. Not only do she and Duhamel get to play for laughs, but they each get the opportunity to explore their quieter, darker sides. The loss of their beloved friends, the frustrations of rearing an adopted child, the fright balanced with relief when the possibility looms that that same child may be taken away.

And Duhamel, far more familiar to audiences as the humorless Major Lennox in the Transformers series, is a rom-com lately. (Avoiding all mention of last January’s catastrophic When in Rome. Seriously. Don’t mention it.) His easy charm, quick grin and generous demeanor blend with a genuine depth of feeling. The first time his Messer sees baby Sophie after learning of his friends’ untimely death, his eyes fill with such emotion that it catches us by surprise.

As for that oft-clucked lack of chemistry: happy to report that here, the heat’s on high. These two make a spirited, sparring couple, a delightful duo that may indeed prove to be the best rom-com coupling of 2010. (Sadly, given this year’s competition, it’s not that much of a contest.)

As for the assortment of supporting cast members, the spotlight shines brightly on the overweight diva neighbor (Melissa McCarthy, speaking with the only credible Atlanta accent in the film), bulldozing her outwardly-obsequious hubby who smiles as he mutters insults under his breath (Andrew Daly), the pushy social worker Janine (Sarah Burns) and the all-knowing 11-year-old babysitter (Britt Flatmo).

Though it won’t take your baby’s breath away, thanks to Greg Berlanti’s energetic direction and the combined efforts of an effervescent cast, Life As We Know It is one of the better rom-coms we’ve seen this year.

Rating on a scale of 5 infantile ideas: 3

Release date: US: 8 October 2010; UK: 8 October 2010
Directed by: Greg Berlanti
Written by: Ian Deitchman & Kristin Rusk Robinson
Cast: Katherine Heigl, Josh Duhamel, Josh Lucas, Hayes MacArthur, Christina Hendricks, Sarah Burns, Jessica St. Clair, Britt Flatmo, Melissa McCarthy, Andrew Daly
Rating: US = PG-13; UK = 12A
Running time: 112 minutes

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Craig is a sharp kid. He’s got a cool, supportive family. He goes to an elite Manhattan high school and will probably be accepted into an elite pre-college business program. He’s crushing on his best friend’s girl, and his best friend is kind of a dick, but otherwise Craig has a pretty good life.

Craig is also suicidal.

Anyone who thinks the first paragraph and the second ought to be mutually exclusive does not understand clinical depression—nor, necessarily, do Anna Boden and Ryan Fleck, the writer-directors of It’s Kind of a Funny Story. The filmmakers set their film in a mental ward, but it’s rarely clear whether they want you to laugh or cry at its long-term residents, the sight of whom nearly scares Craig (Keir Gilchrist) sane after he talks an ER doctor into admitting him. (Doc doesn’t think his suicidal tendency is serious.) The patients stare and shuffle, shout random thoughts to no one in particular, never get out of bed. When Craig first meets them—mouth agape in horror—he asks the staff if there’s a place “for people more like me.” Cue audience laughter?

To be fair, the teenager is mildly rebuked for thinking himself better than the others; still, many of these patients are too caricaturized for you to believe they’re there for anything but a giggle. It’s rather heartbreaking—you know their real-life counterparts exist—but so is the flip side: When Craig shows up at the emergency room at 5 a.m. asking for help yet is nearly sent home because he just seems like a kid with the blues, the doctor is both throttle-worthy and completely realistic. Few people who look at Craig see someone mentally unbalanced. Those who do, including the ward’s psychiatrist (Viola Davis), stress medication and communication about the pressures he’s feeling. Even Bobby (Zach Galifianakis), the middle-aged eccentric who takes Craig under his broken wing, seems to recognize a kindred walking wounded.

Until he doesn’t, that is. As Craig adjusts to life in the ward, befriending the freaks and chatting up the cute girl (a luminous Emma Roberts), Bobby’s relative togetherness starts to unravel. Slowly, the guy with the dry humor, dating advice, and short-escape plans isn’t so smooth when he has to face life outside the hospital. Which is also believable—but then the character turns into another there’s-nothing-wrong-with-you sounding board, suggesting that a little perspective is all a suicidal teen needs to climb out of a soul-sucking depression.

The message is contradictory at best and dangerous at worst, though it seems that Boden and Fleck, the team behind the indie hits Half Nelson and Sugar, at least intended to make a life-affirming film. Just as there are aching moments, there are soaring ones, including a shoulda-been-hackneyed group performance of “Under Pressure” and a jubilant going-away party. And the topic certainly isn’t too sacred to be mined for humor. (“I want to kill myself,” Craig tells the intake staffer. “Fill this out,” she replies.) The unimpeachable highlight of the film, in fact, is Galifianakis, who’s understated and charming as the melancholy Bobby; turns out that the lower the actor dials it down, the higher his appeal.

Gilchrist, best known as the gay son in Showtime’s The United States of Tara, is rather vanilla here, as the filmmakers clearly poured their colors into supporting characters. But the story may not have worked had Craig been a stronger personality. His milquetoast demeanor is what propels the debate over exactly how much help he needs. If only the answer wasn’t so fumbled and disappointing.

Life as We Know It Directed by Greg Berlanti

Life as We Know It, in contrast, knows how to take serious things seriously. Despite the presence of Katherine Heigl, director Greg Berlanti’s second film is more drama than romantic comedy—and a good drama at that. The plot’s not the only thing that offers something unexpected.

The film does begin with some typical Heiglisms. She plays Holly, a Type-A caterer who’s scrambling through her closet of at least 27 dresses until she finds the tightest wrap and the highest heels. Then she waits. When her blind date, Eric (Josh Duhamel), shows up, he’s an hour late. When Eric takes an obvious booty call and responds, “Really?” when Holly suggests they don’t have to go through with their mutual friends’ setup, they both get huffy and pretty much declare themselves Enemies for Life.

Cut to a couple of years later, when their besties Peter and Alison (Hayes MacArthur and Christina Hendricks) get married and have a baby. Through each of the milestones up until baby Sophie’s first birthday, Holly and Eric are shown fighting. So it’s a bit of a shock—though not so surprising in Movieland—when the happy couple dies in a car accident and leave custody of Sophie to the two people who can’t stand each other. Hijinks will surely ensue, right?

Mercifully, there are hardly any at all. First-time scripters Ian Deitchman and Kristin Rush Robinson deliver a story that quickly forgets its wacky introduction yet never brushes off the devastating turn of events that truly sets the plot in motion. Peter and Alison’s deaths are handled with understated taste—and are all the more gut-wrenching for it—and the needs of darling Sophie (played by triplets Brynn, Brooke, and Alexis Clagett) are kept in the foreground. Holly and Eric, after the requisite wha-wha-what? moment in which they learn of their new responsibility, don’t whine or bicker over stupid shit. Yes, they doubt they can make their situation work. No, they’re not happy about the upending of their lives.

But when Sophie is hungry or needs to be changed, it’s all about her, even if said changing elicits gagging and lines such as, “It’s like Slumdog Millionaire!” This is, after all, a comedy, but the jokes are generally dry and original and help the whole baby business be cute instead of cloying.

The romantic angle has to play out, too, but here the baby isn’t as much of a roadblock as Sam (Josh Lucas), a handsome pediatrician whom Holly meets at her bistro the day of her friends’ death. Of course, rom-com rules require that they meet again afterward, and get along quite swell. Of course, Eric is a little jealous. And with both Holly and Eric devoted to their careers (Eric works in broadcast sports and is eyeing a promotion), some crazy schemes will be hatched to smooth over the bumps in their schedules.

Hey, this film may not be exactly what you’re expecting, but the filmmakers and the marketing campaign can’t completely ignore the carrots they dangle. Life as We Know It is both feel-sad and feel-good, which is a tricky balance yet one that’s so satisfying when the film hits the right marks. “Hit” is not a word our stars may be used to when it comes to the big screen—at least not critical ones, anyway—but this movie may change that.

Recently I interviewed Noah Buschel, the director of The Missing Person, for a podcast on the various ways the independent film world works and how it has changed over the past ten years. Noah would know better than most about this subject, because he made three films in three different eras of independent films, always having to change his approach to selling the film to potential financiers and eventually getting distribution (or not). One of his films was Neal Cassady, a fractured biopic about the titular figure who was the inspiration for Jack Kerouac’s Dean Moriarty character in On the Road. Not knowing much about that era of writing, or beatniks, or Ken Kesey (author of One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest), I was going into Neal Cassady practically blind on the subject matter. And to Noah’s credit he did not dumb his movie down for the mass audience. As a result, I had no idea what was going on for most of the 80 minute film, as there’s no really no in for an outside party, and I complimented him on sticking to his guns and making a movie I had no way of understanding.

Rob Epstein and Jeffrey Friedman’s Howl about Allen Ginsberg’s controversial poem that became the subject of an obscenity trial, threatened to leave me in a similarly excluded lurch. Ginsberg was both inspired by and was a lover of Cassady, and as with Kerouac, Ginsberg employed a rambling, self-indulgent style of writing. Whether you identify with his themes of anger, confusion, and bottled up sexuality is helpful to your potential enjoyment of Howl, but the movie is made in such a way as to alienate both fans of Ginsberg and those who are novices of beat poetry.

Friedman and Epstein (who made The Times of Harvey Milk on his own and The Celluloid Closet and Common Threads with Friedman) had intended to make a documentary on the trial but couldn’t find enough footage to justify a feature. So, instead of making a short subject, they were forced to cobble together an 85 minute mix of staged court footage and Ginsberg, played by James Franco, explaining the origins of Howl¸ accompanied by computer generated animation (a typewriter morphs into a jazz musician) to further break down the sexual imagery (“alcohol, cock, and endless balls”). The scenes in court are stiff and have no power, not helped by the overqualified actors playing lawyers (David Straithairn as the DA, Jon Hamm as the defense attorney, Bob Balaban as the judge) and witnesses with literary pedigrees (Jeff Daniels, Treat Williams, Mary Louise-Parker) in glorified walk-ons, and especially because the public context of the obscenity trial isn’t explored. We never know how this trial affected any writer or politician outside of those in the courtroom or how obscenity laws and trials changed because of it. It’s funny that one of the interpretations that are harped on is, “literary value sometimes is a book which will survive any test of time,” and yet the movie doesn’t evaluate its own subject in that manner.

And since these scenes in the courtroom are limited to the lawyers asking a question and the witnesses simply reciting their personal analysis of Howl, the movie turns into a cliff notes version of the poem. Franco’s performance, which considering the photos of Ginsberg shown throughout the film, isn’t nebbishy enough, except for his attempt to play the part as if he were doing a half-hearted impression of Jeff Goldblum (Flight of the Conchords’ Jemaine Clement would be best suited for the role, since Goldblum is now a bit too old for the part). It’s not that Franco has much to do anyway; he’s either on stage reading his poem, or explaining it to an unseen reporter. There’s no deliberate irony in this choice either, despite the fact that the entire trial appears to be based on the objection to individual words and profanities, intending to remove them from their context. Did Friedman and Epstein not notice that by having Franco reveal the meaning of each word and phrase, they’re just as bad as the district attorney who filed the case?

There are issues that could have been explored other than the time-honored “what is obscenity?”, such as Straithairn’s specious argument that if you don’t understand the meaning of something, it must be obscene or how the entire notion of determining public decency is based on protecting a theoretical person. It’s a condescending notion that still goes on today (“I don’t find it racist/homophobic/xenophobic, but the public might”), but in Howl, it turns out it’s just a legal device, not intended as anything other than a transparent attempt to sway the judge in absence of real evidence. And since the judge ignores it, why exactly should I care?

Viewed as part of the 2010 Philadelphia QFest.

If you want to read more of Adam’s reviews, you can find them at his site, A Regrettable Moment of Sincerity.

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Or you can go to Rotten Tomatoes and mock him in the comments section of his reviews.

-By Ethan Alter

For movie details, please click here.

Gasper Noé’s heady and unintentionally hilarious exploration of
life after death, Enter the Void, is an example of
exceptional technique used in service of a half-baked idea that’s
been dragged out to interminable length. But oh, that technique! If
Noé were any less skilled a showman, it would be easy to dismiss
Enter the Void as a grand filmmaking folly that the general
moviegoing public would be better off avoiding. And as it is, this
isn’t the sort of movie you’d casually recommend to a co-worker or
acquaintance unless you’re deliberately planning on burning that
bridge for good. But serious film buffs and fans of cult movies in
general owe it to themselves to check out what Noé hath wrought
here, if only to witness the rare sight of a director going
completely off the deep end in service of his vision.

That vision includes, among other things, onscreen drug trips that
strive to outdo the famous Stargate sequence from Kubrick’s
2001, graphic and prolonged sexual encounters, a suicide
attempt followed by a queasy depiction of an abortion and, last but
certainly not least, what may very well be the first cum shot ever
filmed from the perspective of a woman’s vaginal canal. Lest you
think that Enter the Void is nothing but a
two-and-a-half-hour parade of depravity, there are also moments of
startling grace and beauty courtesy of Noé’s visual conceit (or, if
you prefer, gimmick) for the movie. See, Enter the Void is
shot entirely from a first-person perspective…even after the death
of its main character.

Confused? Here’s how it works: The film’s first half-hour
chronicles the final night in the life of Oscar (Nathaniel Brown),
an American living abroad in Toyko who earns a modest living by
dealing drugs. So far, it’s shaping up to be an average evening for
the twenty-something dealer and recreational user: He snorts some
cocaine, experiences a far-out vision, welcomes over a buddy and
shoots the shit about this crazy book he’s reading, The Tibetan
Book of the Dead. Then he goes out to a nearby nightclub to
meet a connection, where he’s promptly set upon by undercover cops
and shot to death in a toilet stall. All of this plays out entirely
through Oscar’s eyes, with Noé even regularly fluttering the camera
shutter to mimic the effect of blinking.

Once Oscar is killed, the camera follows his spirit out of his body
and hovers above the action, looking down on the world and people
he’s left behind, specifically his emotionally fragile sister,
Linda (Paz de la Huerta). As foretold in The Tibetan Book of the
Dead, Oscar’s spirit also travels back in time, reviewing the
highlights of his sad little life—the violent death of his parents
when he was a child and his subsequent separation from his sister,
moving to Tokyo and falling into drugs, bringing his sister across
the Pacific only to watch her embark on a career as a stripper—as
he prepares to move onto the next stage of existence where he’ll
have the chance to be reincarnated.

This brings us to the movie’s sure-to-be-legendary final act, where
Noé reveals that the next stage of existence is, in fact, a
neon-red lit carnal palace where men and women writhe in passion as
glowing light emanates from their nether regions. After observing
and rejecting countless pairings, Oscar’s spirit finally follows
the light into a thrusting couple and rides a wave of sperm to his
host’s uterus, from which he emerges nine months later as a
bouncing baby.

Descriptions of Enter the Void don’t really do the movie
justice—it’s even more overwrought and hysterical than this
synopsis indicates. Noé’s self-seriousness just makes the damn
thing funnier, especially in the reincarnation sequence, which is
difficult to watch with a straight face. At the same time, though,
the filmmaking is so absorbing, it’s possible to be enthralled by
what’s happening onscreen even while you’re rolling your eyes and
laughing. Coming off a diet of rigidly programmed summer
blockbusters, there’s something liberating about seeing a director
unshackle himself from convention in such an outlandish way. No
doubt aware of the ridicule and scorn his movie will invite, Noé
nevertheless fully commits himself to this depiction of the
afterlife, never holding back even when restraint would be the
wiser course of action.

But his admirable artistry behind the camera doesn’t excuse some of
the movie’s more glaring flaws, beginning with the fact that Oscar
and Linda are generally irritating and unlikeable people for whom
the audience has little sympathy. And at two-and-a-half hours, the
film is punishingly long; the middle section in particular drags on
and on, rubbing the audience’s face in the characters’ misery and
needlessly repeating scenes we already witnessed in the first act.
One thing’s for sure—if you make it to the other side of Noé’s
demented trip through the void, it won’t be a journey you forget
anytime soon.

YOU WILL MEET A TALL DARK STRANGER

Considering Woody Allen, 74, makes a film a year, the question to be asked is not why so many of his movies are uneven, but why so many are to be treasured. Even in this past decade, there’s been Vicki Cristina Barcelona (2008), Match Point (2005), Hollywood Ending (2002), and Small Time Crooks (2000). Although none achieve the magic, wit, or depth of Crimes and Misdemeanors (1989), The Purple Rose of Cairo (1985), or Annie Hall (1977), they all are embraceable entertainments, worthy of numerous viewings.

You Will Meet a Tall Dark Stranger, however, is middling Woody. Not unwatchable as The Curse of the Jade Scorpion (2001) or as annoying as Melinda and Melinda (2004), the film still has a rushed quality to it. The proof is a horrendously off-putting voiceover (supplied by a dreadful Zak Orth) that is consistently employed to fill in plot points the screenplay is unable to incorporate with any grace.

The tale centers on upon a divorced couple, Alfie (Anthony Hopkins) and Helena (Gemma Jones). After 40 years of wedded life, Alfie has developed a fear of aging and winds up marrying Charmaine (Lucy Punch), a youngish prostitute, whom he satisfies with the aid of Viagra and his dwindling bank account.

A distraught Helena, at loose ends, seeks the aid of Cristal (Pauline Collins), a fortune teller, who convinces her of her former glamorous lives and a future romance.

Meanwhile, the marriage of the ex-couple’s daughter Sally (Naomi Watts) to a one-time promising writer, Roy (Josh Brolin), is falling apart. She’s attracted to her boss (Antonio Banderas) and he has the hots for his neighbor, a young guitar-playing woman in red (Freida Pinto).

All the ingredients are here for a successful Woody romp, but they never gel. Bookended between Shakespearean quotes and the tune “When You Wish Upon a Star,” the film seems more the product of a work-for-hire sensibility than an inspired act of love. The bon mots are few and far between. The cinematography by Vilmos Szigmond (Close Encounters of the Third Kind) is seldom flattering to the stars. And numerous scenes are awkwardly staged.

Yet Jones as the alcoholic, dithering Helena, Collins as her soothsayer, and Roger Ashton-Griffiths as her new beau, are splendid, and Lucy Punch steals the show. As she did in Dinner for Schmucks playing the nightmare ex-date of all time, Punch supplies a high-powered comic energy that makes you mope every time the camera leaves her presence.

In conclusion, my prognostication for this bit of celluloid is that it will encounter a short, overlooked run in the theaters and be favored with a few clicks now and then on Netflix. As Woody himself has noted, “If you’re not failing every now and again, it’s a sign you’re not doing anything very innovative.” – Brandon Judell

Mr. Judell is featured in the forthcoming documentary Activist: The Times of Vito Russo and has been edited out of Rosa von Praunheim’s New York Memories. In the fall, he’ll be teaching “American Jewish Theater” and “Theater into Film” at The City College of New York. He has written on film for The Village Voice, indieWire.com, The New York Daily News, and The Advocate, and is anthologized in Cynthia Fuchs’s Spike Lee Interviews (University Press of Mississippi).