Seven Pounds

There is a terminal heart patient who answers to the call of Emily Posa (Rosario Dawson). She runs a pressed wedding card business – the one that used to be run in the days of old. The one which had to be worked upon manually to set the print or the one that is semi automatic. Machines which are over 50 years old at least. She is weak but by her own claim – and I must agree to it – used to be – unauditably hot.

Then there is a a blind man who is called Ezra (Woody Harrelson). He works at a call centre for a meat packing business but is a vegan by choice and a virgin by chance. Quite a weird combination right? And an unfortunate combination which one has to accept I guess. He likes the local waitress at a café a lot but has never gotten around to tell her that in as many words. Just doesn’t have the courage.

There is a middle aged woman who has two children – a boy and a girl. She is called Connie Tepos (Elpidia Carrillo). She is a Spanish immigrant – a legal one thought. Divorced. Her current boyfriend is a no good person. He beats her up quite often. And despite the best efforts of people close to her, she refuses to report it to the cops and get her boyfriend behind bars. Sigh. The vagaries of the female mind.

What connects these three to Ben (Will Smith) who seems to be a man on the verge of a suicide and has a past that keeps flashing through his head? Is it the car crash which seems to be a fatal one? One that obviously involving 7 people whose names he keeps calling out in absolute angst. Ben visits each one of these people, representing the Internal Revenue Services, and tries to help them in some way or the other. Connie Tepos gets his house. Emily gets a relief for her tax payments. And Ezra gets a gentle push towards that waitress of his after receiving a very rude earful from Ben.

Written by Grant Nieporte, Seven Pounds is the kind of movie I should have seen at the time of release itself. And I have no clue to how I missed it. The screenplay is written extremely well to figure out the story only towards the end. While one gets reasonable clues as regards the past, one doesn’t really get clarity on the reason for Ben’s actions till the very end. The editing by Hughes Winborne and the music by Angelo Milli create an extremely haunting aura around the movie.

Full credit to director Gabriele Muccino (The Pursuit of Happyness) for giving us another poignant and heart wrenching story that has been executed to near perfection. But be forewarned that Seven Pounds could result in a lot of exercise for the lachrymal glands. That one of the best actors of our time – Will Smith – leads the cast is just an added reason to watch the movie. I have never seen Woody Harrelson in such a helpless role ever in the recent or distant past. Everyone in the cast seems to have given the movie a 100%. Even the poor Hotel owner who has to endure Ben’s nuances and the horse (read great Dane) that Ben gets along with him for a day or 2 when Emily is at the hospital. Seven Pounds easily makes the cut to anyone’s must watch list. 7.5 on 10.

Trailer on http://www.imdb.com/video/imdb/vi1057359641/

The Zookeeper

Not sure how many of you like Kevin James but every time I see him, I am reminded of The King of Queens. I am also encouraged and immensely thrilled at the end of a not so believable movie or an even more unbelievable episode of any serial that he is part of. Now how else do you think us wide at the centre folks would generate any hope of finding the woman of our dreams and all that crap that people keep giving us stories about . So we generate inspiration in a manner of speaking from watching the likes of Kevin James making a complete and utter fool of himself in front of hotties such as Leslie Bibb who in her right sense of mind would not have given a second glance to the likes of a James but then this is Hollywood and this is the movies. They are meant to show the impossible to provide us with – as I mentioned earlier – LARGE DOSES OF HOPE.

And as if the ego boosters and the hope were not sufficient with one girl in the frame, director Frank Coraci gets in the angle of a second woman played by Rosario Dawson – who I must say was a complete revelation. I haven’t seen her look as good as she did half way down The Zookeeper. Enough to make me change my priorities from wanting to get back my ex-girlfriend of 5 years back who dumped me on a beach when I proposed to her saying, “I don’t think I want to be with a Zookeeper for the rest of my life”. Now why would one go back to exactly the same girl? But unfortunately, it is the truth as I see so often around me. What is it that they say about the known devil? So anyways, our hero is suckered into the known devil and doesn’t notice the absolute goddess that is standing right in front of him with her arms open because she doesn’t look like much of goddess when she is playing the vet in the zoo right (Sigh!!! Men with always be men). All of this after the animals in the zoo decide to gang up and teach him how to attract the female of the species in their own animalistic manner. Cute eh? Not really. Starts getting on your nerves after a bit.

Zookeeper is a weak comedy and if that wasn’t enough, it is also slapstick. There is nothing much to write home about the direction, acting, screenplay, editing or whatever it is that makes a good movie. It is an all out average movie with all the departments coming up only to a base level score of 4 on 10. Some sequences of the animals talking are reasonably shot but that’s about it. Really nothing to look forward to. 4 on 10 as declared a couple of lines back. Easy to give a miss.

Trailer on http://www.imdb.com/video/imdb/vi593927449/

25th Hour

Montgomery Brogan (Edward Norton) has lived his life with his name thanks to his mother being a huge fan of Montgomery Clift. His father James (Brian Cox) wasn’t too pleased with it but doesn’t really bother with a debate with the wife. Monty loses his mother when he is 11 years old and his dad goes into a depression that drives him to alcohol. However, Monty gets into a prestigious school on a scholarship thanks to his above average intelligence. Now it is the same above average intelligence that gets him started very early in life with drugs. We are not talking about consumption – Monty is way too smart for that. We are talking about dealing. Pressures at home are increasing continuously with Dad getting into a financial mess and Monty wants to help him out. So he chooses the easiest way out that he sees at that time. Marks the beginning of a hugely successful and profitably career as a drug dealer which gets him thrown out of school but gets him into the company of Uncle Nikolai (Levan Uchaneishvili) a Russian Drug dealer who has made New York his home and Nikolai’s henchman Kostya Novotny (Tony Siragusa).


Monty seems to be doing quite well for himself not only monetarily but also on the personal front with a very hot Puerto Rican girlfriend with an exotic name – Naturelle Riviera (Rosario Dawson – who of late hasn’t been looking too hot but was quite sizzling in 2002 I guess). He continues to be close to his bum chums Frank Xavier Slaughtery (Barry Pepper) and Jacob Elinsky (Philip Seymour Hoffman). Frank is a successful broker on wall street and Jacob is a high school teacher who is lusting for a 17 year old Mary D'Annunzio (Anna Paquin). Yep its quite a warped bunch I guess. But the story is still due. Monty gets squealed upon to the DEA who raid his house only to find a kilo of narcotics and loads of cash. They try to set him up to compromise Nikolai which Monty wriggles out of. He gets 7 years in the pound in return (surprising coz he should have got 15 for a first offence with so much of narc). He is spending his last day as a free man (didn’t know you could plan your dates for going to prison but I trust Spike Lee to have done his research. Damn convenient arrangement right?) and is tearing his hair apart to figure out who gave him away.

Spike Lee weaves a slow but intriguing story primarily focused on the emotions that Monty seems to be going through and the emotions of people who are closest to him. The fear of being beaten up in prison, being degraded to the level of someone’s bitch and a host of other worries. His doubt about Naturelle being the one who gave him away. His best friends who are caught in the conflict of being there for him through the seven years or just moving on. And most of all his dad who in the hypothetical 25th hour convinces him to run away from all of this into some remote place where he cannot be traced back to ever in his life. 25th Hour is a mélange of emotions which could have been pulled off only by a director as talented and under rated as Spike Lee. Other than the fact that it was very slow, I for one could not find out any errors in the movie per se. Maybe I wasn’t looking hard enough. The acting performances were all above par making it into a movie that more than made the cut but wasn’t too brilliant over all. I give it a 6.5 on 10. Worth a dekko when u find the time.

Watch the trailer at http://www.imdb.com/video/screenplay/vi3350397209/

Unstoppable

Frank Barnes (Denzel Washington) has lost his job. He is serving out is notice period with NWVR, a railroad company and is in his last 3 weeks now. All this after 28 years of committed work for the organization. He is an engine motorman. Several older personnel in the organization are being replaced with younger blood. Many of his close friends particularly Judd Stewart (David Warshofsky) have also been victim of this sudden move by the organization. Whats worse, they get only half the benefits that they are eligible for (Sometimes I feel it is so much better to work in India than anywhere else ). Frank has lost his wife about 4 years back to cancer. He has 2 daughters aged 18 and 19 - Maya (Meagan Tandy) and Nicole (Elizabeth Mathis). They are working their way through college by waiting tables @ Hooters – not the most respectable job one can have but not one that they keep their father in the dark about. All in all they seem to be one small happy family with the regular father daughter fights etc.


With the jobs being lost around, it is no surprise that when Will Colson (Chris Pine) joins the company as a conductor, he is given an ice cold welcome on the first day itself. But Chris has problems of his own and does his best to ignore the cold vibes. His wife, Darcy (Jessy Schram) has served a restraining order against him thanks to a very close cop friend. Story goes that Will suspected something fishy between Mrs. Colson and her cop friend and gets a little harsh with her – no beating up or physical abuse but just some pushing and shoving. To make matters worse, he leaves home that very instant and goes to the cop’s place to give him a piece of his mind and surprise surprise – pulls a gun on him – I mean what kind of a nit wit would pull a gun on a cop???? Not Mr. Colson’s proudest moment especially when he realizes that Darcy was only messaging her sister – the message was the core reason for the fight to start and then finish with a restraining order. What a waste!!!!

Nevertheless, fate provides both Frank and Will an opportunity to become heroes when Train 777 turns into what is termed in railroad parlance as a COASTER. A Coaster is a train that has an unmanned engine running on auto, usually at low speeds say under 10 miles per hour. Gileece (T J Lewis) and Dewey (Ethan Suplee) are 2 employees who are charged with the responsibility of pulling out a half a mile long goods train to make way for kids coming for a field trip. Since it’s a small job, they don’t put the air brakes on. Worse still, the not so slim Dewey gets off the train to manually switch tracks but slips in the bargain. The train picks up speed and Dewey is unable to get back onto it (must remember to start working out sooner than later or may land up like Dewey). And worse still, the throttle was @ the max level – so my friends we now have a super coaster. So fasten your seat belts and let the excitement begin.

Unstoppable is based on a true story it would seem. Not sure about the extent of the truth though. But one thing is for certain, it is far from famed director Tony Scott’s best to date. For a guy who has given us – hold on to your horses – Top Gun, Beverly Hills Cop, Days of Thunder, Crimson Tide, Enemy of the State, SPY GAME (what a movie!!!), Man on Fire, Déjà vu and Taking of Pelham 123 he seems to have kind of lost his edge. Maybe he got so carried away by Taking of Pelham that he decided to extend his love for trains and move onto creating Unstoppable. Not pointing fingers at direction out here. But just the content didn’t seem sufficient for it to seem like a Tony Scott movie. It starts off slowly but picks up pace and before you know it, it is done. But in that limited period of time, he does show that there is a huge action director talent who has given us some of the best movies that we grew up with. Its compact for certain. Editing is very slick. But the really edge of the seat moments are few and far between.

Denzel Washington seems to be the director’s favourite and does full justice to the role but is quite wasted. Chris Pine seems more constipated than troubled. The rest of the cast has only bit parts with the exception of Rosario Dawson who plays the role of Connie who co-ordinates the entire effort of train 1206 to successfully stop 777. Overall nothing great. Also nothing you would miss if u see it on DVD. I give it 5 on 10.