Healthy: Henry Poole Is Here (DVD). Hardly anyone in this sweet yet sad little drama is a picture of health. Certain characters are mute, have bad eyesight, and are even on the verge of death. All of these problems begin to change however when a bleeding Christ-like stain emerges on the side of depressed Henry Poole's (Luke Wilson) house. He just wants to be left alone, but a crisis faith and hope will not be so easily dismissed. Miracle or mistake? The film wisely let's you decide. The ending might cheat a little, but did it exactly the way I wanted it to. If your level of faith is not quite 100% this might be the the film to nurse it back to health. But if this film does not quite have you running to your nearest church, it might at the very least restore your faith in films about faith. B+
Wealthy: The Informant! (Theaters). The first half of Steven Soderbergh's corporate tattle tale plays like a kinder, gentler version of The Insider. Mark Whitacare (Matt Damon) puts his career on the line in order to expose his greedy corporation's price fixing schemes. The second half is more like the vastly underrated Shattered Glass. Another film involving a seemingly good guy getting caught in a lie that continues to grow, only to reveal him as the villain he always was. The music cues (serious business suits and cops marching down hallways to Sesame Street-like songs), and the interruption/narration of random thoughts of Damon's character during scenes that you know are important to the story are often quite humorous. The Informant! might just inform you on how to swindle millions from your company, but you'll have to be a top-notch liar if you want to keep it. B
Wise: Community (TV). The Soup's Joel McHale stars as lawyer Jeff Winger. He is forced to attend community college when the bar discovers his education is not up to par. In the pilot episode Jeff tries to bribe the Dean (an old friend/client of his) into giving him the answers to all of the semester's tests, with less than successful results. Jeff also lies to an attractive fellow student named Britta (Gillian Jacobs) by telling her he is a certified Spanish tutor, and convinces her with hilariously inaccurate translations. This leads to him running a motley crew study group of students including Chevy Chase. The show is very witty, funny, and fast. The jokes fly at you at rapid speed. With everyone going crazy for the lackluster Glee, they might miss out on a true winner here. This is a new show that you would be smart not to miss. B+
1 comments:
I have to say if you missed Henry Poole the first time around and are looking for a break from typical Hollywood films, I encourage you to check out the recently released family version. It was such a great story about a real life guy who was struggling with his faith and accepting it. This is something that I've been struggling with myself for the past couple of years. It was such an encouragement to see this played out. And it's really cool that I've found a site, http://www.henrypoolebelieves.com. Right now it looks like they are giving away 10 copies of the movie for free. If you haven't seen the movie yet, or even if you have, you could always give it to a friend, but it's definitely worth checking out! A GREAT film for a FAMILY movie night!
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