Duplicity (2009)

Genre: Drama/Crime/Romance

Starring: Clive Owen, Julia Roberts, Tom Wilkinson, Paul Giamatti

Many a times many people have tried to emulate the Oceans series of movies but the original is the original no matter how hard you try. Claire (Roberts) and Ray (Owen) are a smart duo who love making other people with lots of money look stupid. Not just that, they passionately love each other and cant trust the other person with an even bigger passion. Howard Tully (Wilkinson) and Richard Garsik (Giamatti) are heads of rival FMCG companies. Garsik has hired a team of sleuths which includes Claire and Ray to find out what is that big thing that Howard Tully is so eager to announce at his shareholders meet. Garsik wants the product specifications stolen from Tully and wants to announce it before he can. Claire and Ray, however, have different plans. The movies kicks off on a very confused start, going back and forth into time and it takes a while to get the hang of things. The movie doesn't have the sort of excitement that it should have and the background score was the only thing that was trying to make the movie look funny. The twists are fun but could have been with a little more excitement and suspense. On the acting front, Julia Roberts and Clive Owen look like they are made for each other were probably the big thing that kept the movie going.

Thumbs up: Efforts by the entire star cast
Thumbs down: Uneventful and unexciting

Rating: 6.1/10

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Black Sheep @ The Box Office: Christmas Comes Early ... Too Early

It seemed promising enough on Friday. Robert Zemeckis's expensive remake of A CHRISTMAS CAROL, starring Jim Carrey, debuted strong, prompting some to expect a weekend take north of $40 million. The final tally came in around $31 million and begs the question, why? Could be that audiences aren't ready for Christmas just yet but it could also be that audiences are not connecting with Zemeckis's obsession with motion capture animation. His previous effort, THE POLAR EXPRESS, was hardly a resounding success and the word on A CHRISTMAS CAROL is that some of it works but it is just as cold and lifeless this time out with Carrey as it was with Tom Hanks. The past and present are pretty shaky for motion capture animation so unless the ghost of Christmas future has a few tricks in store, Zemeckis might have to go back to making movies the old fashioned way ... just once.


This week's big winner is a pleasant surprise. Yes, it won the Audience Award at this year's Toronto International Film Festival. Yes, Mo'Nique was on Ellen and Mariah did Larry King this week. And yes, Oprah has been telling all of her minions to see it for weeks now. Still, PRECIOUS: BASED ON THE NOVEL "PUSH" BY SAPPHIRE is difficult movie to watch so it would naturally repel certain viewers. I'm happy to report that audiences in the four cities that it is currently playing in decided not to cower but to face the harshness head on. PRECIOUS earned over $1.8 million on just 18 screens in all of America. That makes its $100K per screen average a record breaker for an urban picture and one of the 25 greatest per screen averages of all time. It should be noted that the greater per screens are for lower screen counts, making PRECIOUS look even more impressive. Best Picture, here we come? (Note: Black Sheep's interview with the director and star is coming soon!)


There was a lot of other activity in the Top 10 and for the first time in while, it wasn't paranormal. PARANORMAL ACTIVITY did continue to hold up well though. I can't say I understand why now that Halloween is done with and everyone should know by now that it isn't anywhere near as scary as was suggested. Its continued success may explain why THE FOURTH KIND did not blow up, instead managing a respectable fourth place finish. Coming in ahead at number three was the George Clooney/Ewan MacGregor war farce, THE MEN WHO STARE AT GOATS. Adult films are harder and harder to sell and subsequently, the $13 million debut is considered to be a win for Overture. Neither film was able to take down MICHAEL JACKSON'S THIS IS IT. I finally caught that one this weekend and the theatre was definitely packed so Jackson's music is alive and well. I cannot say the same for Richard Kelley's follow-up to DONNIE DARKO, THE BOX. The film, which fizzled in sixth place, asks if you would take a million dollars if you knew someone random in the world would die. The answer: Nobody cares.


NEXT WEEK: PRECIOUS will expand slowly and Wes Anderson's first foray into animation, FANTASTIC MR. FOX, debuts on 4 screens. I caught it this week ... see it! PIRATE RADIO wants to dominate the airwaves on 900 screens but none of this matters. Nope because next week the world ends when 2012 debuts on 3000+ screens. It was nice knowing you.

SOURCE: Box Office Mojo

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Ajab Prem Ki Ghazab Kahani (2009)

Genre: Drama/Romance/Comedy

Starring: Ranbir Kapoor, Katrina Kaif, Upen Patel

With a string of flop movies, Ranbir Kapoor decided to do a movie based on his life. Half-way through Wake Up Sid he realised the movie was getting a bit too serious and hence decided to do Ajab Prem Ki Ghazab Kahani. Prem (Kapoor) is president of the Happy Club, a club for unemployed and useless youths. He keeps getting put down by his father for not earning money and supporting the family. The members of Happy Club specialise in helping two lovers get together. Jenny (Kaif) is the new beauty in the neighbourhood and Prem is all head over heels over her. He tries to do everything within his reach to keep her happy and win her love. Usual love story saga ensues where the guy loves the girl but cant tell her and 'too-dumb-to-realise' girl loves someone else which she later realises is not made for her but the first guy who cares for her and loves her so much. In spite of very promising trailers the movie was a big no-show. The humour in the movie is definitely fresh but parts of it seem to have been inspired by Govinda movies. Katrina Kaif should condemn any form of emotional acting and admit that it is beyond her. Her British accent kept getting into the way of Hindi dialogues and should also pledge to not do her own dubbing. Upen Patel was overtly ridiculous with a very lose piece of acting and the even more obvious fake English accents. I still haven't figured out the logic behind one scene where Katrina runs past Ranbir shouting 'Prem, Prem' and does an about turn and comes back into his arms!? One can safely rename it as Bechare Ranbir ki Intni Bhi Ghazab Nahin Hai Kahani.

Thumbs up: Ranbir Kapoor and his attempts at humour
Thumbs down: Katrina, Upen and the duos accent problems

Rating: 5.7/10

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ABC: E is for EDWARD SCISSORHANDS

EDWARD SCISSORHANDS
Written by Caroline Thompson
Directed by Tim Burton
Starring Johhny Depp, Winona Ryder, Dianne Wiest and Alan Arkin


I can’t say how many years it has been since I last saw Tim Burton’s EDWARD SCISSORHANDS but I can say that I wasn’t prepared to have it come over me the way that it did when I watched it again recently. There I was, just sitting in my living room alone one night, taking notes on this variation of the “Frankenstein” story, and before it ended, I was crying. I was fully moved by the palpable love that was emanating from my screen and then I remembered something … This is a Tim Burton movie and I’m overwhelmed with love. Hmmm …


In case you’re not familiar, this 1990 film, tells the story of Edward, a man-made man who was unfortunately unfinished at the time of the inventor’s death. He had a head, a heart and a soul but he had no hands. In their place, he had scissors. Having scissors for hands and no interaction with anyone for an undetermined amount of years left Edward detached from society and, without the reassuring touch of another human being, he felt incapable of connecting. He lived in peace, albeit lonesome, atop a hill in a mansion that overlooked this quaint suburban Burbank neighborhood, until one day, when none other than Peg, the Avon lady, knocked on his door. When Peg (Dianne Wiest) saw that Edward (Johnny Depp) needed so much more than cosmetics, she decided to take him home with her. What she didn’t anticipate was how a supposedly normal society would react to such a supposed freak.


Burton considers EDWARD SCISSORHANDS to be one of his most personal works and, when you consider it to be the birthplace of so many recurring Burton themes and motifs, it is easy to see why. Burton himself grew up in Burbank and, although I cannot personally attest to his accuracy in recreating it, I can certainly feel what it must have been like for such a unique artist to have grown up in this type of environment. Edward, with his pale skin, unkempt black hair and, well, scissors for hands, is at first the object of total fascination in this community that consists of cookie-cutter houses that vary in pastel exteriors. Inside these houses are men who all leave for work at the same every day and their wives, the originally desperate ones, who need the drama of the neighborhood to give their lives meaning. With everyone playing house, there is no room for different and no reference as to how to deal with it.


Being the outsider, being misunderstood, being dark and having people wrongly equate that with evil – these are all themes that Burton is obsessed with and certainly also themes that spring directly from his own experiences with society. EDWARD SCISSORHANDS allows him to put himself out there and allows the viewer to see what he presumes to be how a wider audience will react to him. And so, his expectation is that they will embrace and admire his differences at first but eventually come to revile him for them. A burst of excitement is all these rutted people crave but they learn quickly that they prefer the comfort that ruts also often offer. Of course, Burton’s onscreen representation is exaggerated by Depp. At this stage in his career, Depp was seen as merely a teen idol, which was not meshing with how he wanted to be seen or where he wanted his career to go. With his sweet face covered in makeup and scars, Depp was able to show audiences his Keaton-esque side – his humour, his empathy and his charm.


At one point, Edward is on a daytime talk show and one of the audience members asks him if he would have his scissors replaced by hands if that were possible. Edward doesn’t hesitate and says, “Yes.” But then, the lady in the audience points out, he would be just like everyone else, that there would be nothing special about him. This is where this unexpected Burton-esque optimism fills the screen. Peg, sitting next to Edward, says that he will always be special. In that moment, we are all Edward. We all have something unique about us that, if we cannot hide, ostracizes us from everyone else. When you live your life removed from everyone, you do not know the healing qualities of human touch. And when no one has touched you in a long time, you can lose the confidence to reach out and touch someone else. You may even think that you are not even capable of it.


Behind the scissors that keep everyone at a distance, Edward is just a man and, like any man with a sensitive heart, he simply wants to love. And what could be more lovely than the image of a young Winona Ryder spinning freely underneath the snow-like shavings of an ice sculpture that Edward is carving just for her? With EDWARD SCISSORHANDS, Burton shares this wonderful gift with his Edward, with his audience and with himself. Suddenly, the Burbank boy that always felt different knows what its like to touch the hearts of others.

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Paranormal Goat Activity

Ok, so I love this trailer. I thoroughly enjoyed THE MEN WHO STARE AT GOATS and actually thought that PARANORMAL ACTIVITY was one of the biggest disappointments of the year, a lame goat, if you will. That said, I am loving this mashup!

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Best of Black Sheep: THE MEN WHO STARE AT GOATS

I’m not sure what I was expecting considering the title. I can say that what I got from Grant Heslov’s new film, THE MEN WHO STARE AT GOATS, I could never have expected even if I tried. Heslov tells you right away that most of what you’re about to see is truer than you would think, which implies that at least some of what you’re about to see is a fat lie. What actually follows is so entirely ludicrous that it’s hard to imagine it as either made up or the truth. The other thing I wasn’t expecting before going in was laughing as hard and as often as I did.


Ewan McGregor is back in familiar territory as an earnest, likeable lead. He plays reporter and underachiever, Bob Wilton. His wife has just left him and he has, in turn, left the United States for Iraq. It is 2003 and he wants to prove to the world and himself that he is worth something by writing the best post-Iraq war feature ever written. He decides the best angle for his story is to be found with Lyn Cassidy (George Clooney). Cassidy, an army man himself, used to roll with the U.S. Army’s New Earth Division, a division based on the principal that peace is the only thing that can actually win a war and that takes from the paranormal studies to develop its weaponry and calls its top soldiers Jedi warriors. Cassidy himself is said to be able to stare at goats long enough to make their hearts stop. How the U.S. army could have funded any of this is beyond me but it was … or at least some of it was.


I’ll be honest; I am not sure whether Heslov is suggesting that this approach is just as nonsensical as the military methods that we’re familiar with now or that war makes no sense no matter what your plan of attack is. All I know is that when McGregor asks Clooney what a Jedi warrior is, the theatre erupts in laughter. Now, that’s using the force.

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Best of Black Sheep: FOOD INC

Written and Directed by Robert Kenner


“It looks like a tomato but it’s more of a notional tomato, the idea of a tomato.”

Editor's Note:
FOOD INC, one of the most compelling and essential documentaries of the year is now available on DVD courtesy of Alliance Films. The DVD release itself contains the following extras:

- Deleted Scenes
- Celebrity Public Service Announcements
- Resources
- ABC News Nightline "You Are What You Eat": Food With Integrity
- "The Amazing Food Detective" and "Snacktown Smackdown": Stay Active and Eat Healthy

Please take the time to check out this fantastic film. I know that knowing what you're really eating is frightening but it is also vital to your health. In the meantime, here is my review of the film from its theatrical release ...


If we are what we eat, then none of us are going to make it. FOOD INC is one of the scariest movies of the year and also one that will sadly not be seen by as many as it should. Our parents watch over us when we’re young and stop us if we are going to put something in our mouths that we shouldn’t, like gum we find on the floor or something equally bacteria ridden. And yes, these same parents would put the best possible food they could on the tables but no one wants to ask any questions about how this food actually got from the farm to the table. Whenever I have recommended to anyone that they see FOOD INC, the first thing they ask is if this is the kind of movie that shows us what we’re really eating. When I tell them it is, they want nothing to do with it. Apparently, when it comes to food, ignorance is bliss … with a big fat side of fries.


First time feature filmmaker, Robert Kenner has put together an important film that is actually a lot easier to chew and digest than you would expect. Watching FOOD INC is not going to make you lose your lunch. It will however open your eyes to what you really were packing for lunch. At first, Kenner had been working with author, Eric Schlosser, to make a documentary of Schlosser’s fascinating expose, FAST FOOD NATION. That was unfortunately made into a lackluster fictional work instead but now FOOD INC is the movie I always wanted FAST FOOD NATION to be. Schlosser is still on hand as an expert (whose favorite meal, ironically, is burgers and fries) but this film does not focus solely on the role fast food has played in the decline of our food production. Instead, it starts there and looks at the cleanliness of slaughterhouses, the conglomerate control of farming and the government bias that ensures that manufacturers are better protected than the consumers.


FOOD INC is not some prejudicial disparagement of the American food industry. In fact, it is almost forgiving of the corporate driven field as it states a number of times that the situation we find ourselves in today was likely unintended at the onset. Like other documentaries that cry out for change that will benefit humanity though, it offers little advice to go forward with. There are a number of suggestions at the close of the film of how we the little people can make a difference for our selves and for others but after seeing just how much excess fat we are already drowning in, it is hard to think that these suggestion truly will better future generations. Still, we must start somewhere and we should all start by seeing FOOD INC.

For a list of things you can do right now to improve how you eat, visit the film’s website.

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