THE MUPPETS

Written by Jason Segel and Nicholas Stoller

Directed by James Bobin

Starring Jason Segel, Amy Adams, Chris Cooper and Kermit the Frog

Kermit the Frog: Maybe you don't need the whole world to love you. 

Maybe you just need one person.

The first Muppet movie in over 10 years, simply called THE MUPPETS, was tailor made for people just like me – fans of the show that long for simpler times, when frogs both ran theatres and away from pigs. With the threat of losing their long abandoned Muppet Theatre, the whole gang – joined by Amy Adams, brand new Muppet, Walter, and co-writer (and new personal hero) Jason Segel  – band together to put on one more show to prove to the world, and themselves, that they still have what it takes. At the risk of giving it all away, I can assure you, The Muppets definitely still have it.

In today’s fast paced world of crude humour and low attention spans, The Muppets run the risk of being perceived as no longer relevant. Segel, and co-writer, Nicholas Stoller (director of Segel collaboration, FORGETTING SARAH MARSHALL), weave this danger into their plot. The setting is the present and, as we Muppet fans know, there has been very little Muppet presence in the media for some time now. Fans have not forgotten but they have long since moved on. Segel plays Gary, a character that mirrors his real life devotion to The Muppets. Together with his brother, Walter (a Muppet voiced by Peter Linz), they use their deep rooted appreciation for The Muppets to convince them to come out of retirement. It remains unknown as to whether contemporary audiences will still care but the sense of nostalgia that permeates every moment of this film draws fans in and gets the whole audience rooting for the comeback they so truly deserve.

In that sense, it is brilliantly written, modernized without feeling inauthentic. If you were a fan of The Muppets, you will be inundated with warm memories and fuzzy feelings throughout this film. From a strictly critical perspective, there are a few musical moments (written by Bret McKenzie, one half of the Flight of the Conchords duo) that drag, a few plot holes that could have saved their theatre without having to actually put on a show and a few cameos (from Sarah Silverman to Neil Patrick Harris to Jack Black) that were clearly longer to begin with, but when you’re caught up in this much fun, these kinds of things hardly matter. When it comes down to it, I laughed; I cried; and I wanted to watch it again as soon as it ended. THE MUPPETS is without question the family movie of the year!

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THE COMPANY MEN

Written and Directed by John Wells

Starring Ben Affleck, Tommy Lee Jones, Chris Cooper, Rosemarie DeWitt and Kevin Costner

Phil Woodward: You know what's the worst part? The world didn't stop. I mean, my life ended and nobody noticed.

I’m not sure if you were aware of this but the world’s financial markets crashed hard in the later part of 2008. Thousands upon thousands of people lost their jobs, their homes and their lives as they knew them. Two years later, the situation is on a reasonable mend but many are still without work and still losing their livelihoods. I don’t mean to make light of these difficult times; obviously, you were already aware of everything I just wrote. John Wells, one of the men behind the long-running television series, “E.R.” and the director of THE COMPANY MEN, however, seems to just be joining the table with his first feature. The ensemble drama attempts to tackle the fallout from this economic crisis but only ends up playing out like a whiney reluctance to let go of America’s overinflated financial hay day.

THE COMPANY MEN opens on Bobby Walker (Ben Affleck), strutting into his fancy office after playing a few rounds of golf before coming in. Little does he know, he is about to get canned. The company Bobby has worked for for 12 years, where he earns a salary of more than $120K plus incentives and bonuses, is downsizing in light of the crash. What follows this, is one overwrought termination cliché after another. Will Bobby be able to make his next mortgage payment? Will Phil Woodward (Chris Cooper) be able send his child to an Ivy League university in the fall? Will that other random unemployed guy be able to find another job in his field or will he have to lower his expectations in order to make ends meet? And it doesn’t stop there either. Before the movie ends, some executives will feel great guilt over sacrificing people at the hands of the shareholders, while others will collect their bonuses despite massive layoffs. All that was missing was some suit caving under the pressure and killing himself. Oh wait, it has that too.

Wells clearly believes he is telling an important story and the men of THE COMPANY MEN (also including Tommy Lee Jones, Kevin Costner and Craig T. Nelson) do their best to make the plights feel real, but the truth of it is that the problems they face are those of people who were already privileged to begin with. No one here has to face homelessness or hunger. No, everyone here has their savings to fall back on. Everyone here had a great job to start with, which gives them an advantage over all the other people who were already struggling to begin with, when they lost their jobs. All spending time in the company of these men accomplishes, as they lament the good old days when they used money for toilet paper, is the highly unsympathetic reminder that they were living way too large to begin with.

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TIFF Review: THE TOWN

Written by Peter Craig, Ben Affleck and Aaron Stockard

Directed by Ben Affleck

Starring Ben Affleck, Jon Hamm, Rebecca Hall and Jeremy Renner

By now, we all know that Ben Affleck is from Boston. His first film as director, GONE BABY GONE, is set there and he has now returned home for his second feature, THE TOWN. The titular town in question is Charlestown, a town in Boston that has seen more bank robberies than apparently any other in the world. Personally, I would think twice about even opening a bank there with statistics like that, but people need their money and other people need to steal it. In THE TOWN, Affleck gives us a delicate, albeit straightforward, balance between these people.

There is nothing particularly new and exciting about the premise. A group of four “townies”, including director himself, Affleck, and new “It” boy, Jeremy Renner, hold up a local bank and take the bank manager (Rebecca Hall) hostage. Affleck stalks her a little afterward to make sure she doesn’t know anything that the FBI can use to find them, but then something unexpected happens; he falls for her. It isn’t really unexpected for us but rather for him. All he’s known his whole life is crime; even his father (Chris Cooper) is doing time and proud of it. I think what he didn’t expect was that he might want something else from life, something more stable and meaningful – something that you actually can’t steal but rather have to earn.

Affleck is quickly becoming a more relevant persona as a director than as an actor, but it is his lead performance in THE TOWN that anchors the film. The supporting cast, including Jon Hamm without a cigarette hanging out of his mouth all the time, is stellar, but Affleck is the big winner here. He may not have found a way to inspire insight from his work as a filmmaker just yet but he knows how to control the story, command the audience’s attention and, most importantly, keep us entertained. My money says he is going to continue to grow on this path. I just won’t be putting that money in any townie bank any time soon.

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