Tag: Shailene Woodley

The Fault in Our Stars

The adaptation of John Green’s book by Director Josh Boone lacks the attitude that made the novel distinctive.

The blockbuster YA novel of today has become so closely aligned with all the Hollywood clichés of the last decade: dystopian futures, chosen one teenagers, dark overtones, epic CGI battles for the fate of all mankind and one book needlessly split into two films.

“The Fault In Our Stars” by John Green is as big as they come but has been adapted into a single, trim, two-hour love story and tearjerker, and a modest one at that. Both the success of the book and the movie is that they can take big, melodramatic themes of death, disease, heartbreak and even oblivion and make them feel intimate and personal.

Green’s novel is the story of a 17-year-old cancer patient named Hazel Lancaster (Shailene Woodley) who meets 18-year-old and now cancer-free Augustus Waters (Ansel Elgort) at her cancer support group. He’s forward, strangely eloquent and a bit awkward, and she’s sarcastic and pessimistic with a slight frump and eye roll to send his way. Gus dubs his crush with the new identity of Hazel Grace and they soon fall in love, but she fears the damage she’ll do to both Gus and her parents when she inevitably passes away.

The screenplay by pair Scott Neustadter and Michael Weber (“500 Days of Summer”, “The Spectacular Now”) follows the source material as well as any major YA adaptation, even lifting full passages out of the book, but it’s missing the punchy, brash and flippant energy to Green’s novel. Continue reading “The Fault in Our Stars”

Divergent

Shailene Woodley and Theo James star in the adaptation of Veronica Roth’s YA novel.

“I’d like to think there’s more to a person than just one thing.” That’s a line spoken by Shailene Woodley in the indie romance “The Spectacular Now.” Now Woodley stars in “Divergent,” in which that line has been blown up into a complex metaphor and the crux of everything that happens in this dystopian sci-fi action movie based on Veronica Roth’s popular YA novel.

It’s a strong idea, but a shaky premise. “Divergent” is so devoted to the notion that an individual can have multiple personality traits, whether in its plot, dialogue or narrative fabric, it smacks as a largely strained story telling device rather than part of a fleshed out idea or story universe.

That may be a swipe at Roth’s novel more so than the film, but it would matter less if the direction by Neil Burger (“Limitless”) took a lesson from Roth and likewise displayed an individual style and personality. Evan Daugherty and Vanessa Taylor’s script is too faithful to its source material to distinguish itself in the way that its peer “The Hunger Games” has. Continue reading “Divergent”

The Spectacular Now

James Ponsoldt’s “The Spectacular Now” channels John Hughes-era dramas but is challenging, thought provoking, touching and has a rich subtext.

I’d like you to meet Aimee Finicky. She’s the girl you didn’t notice in high school. She doesn’t wear makeup, but she also doesn’t wear glasses like you maybe expected. She’s nice, smart, responsible, has never had a boyfriend and enjoys reading manga comics. Aimee is kind of adorable in her own way, but then she’s also fairly soft-spoken, timid, without any quirks or real passionate interests. She’s like the anti manic pixie dream girl, which is its own special blessing.

So who is Aimee? What’s her thing? “I’d like to think there’s more to a person than just one thing,” she says, which is a more mature, adult thought than any high school kid will give her credit for.

James Ponsdolt’s third film “The Spectacular Now” is filled with such universal wisdom. It channels John Hughes era dramas but embeds its coming of age tale with challenging, thoughtful and moving subtext that makes it anything but a “teen movie.”  It’s a light, good-hearted, beautiful and romantic film that feels spectacular both now and forever. Continue reading “The Spectacular Now”

The Importance of Being Oscar

What will we say about 2011 as a year for movies when the potential Best Picture winner quite literally doesn’t say anything at all?

“The Artist” was once the controversial contender for Best Picture. Not since the first Oscars in 1927 had a silent film won, and it was doubtful this French crowd-pleaser would be the one to change that.

The narrative even fit the tumultuous Academy landscape with the lop-sided number of nominees and changing rules in other major categories.

Now however, ‘The Artist” seems like the safe bet, and in just a few weeks since the nominations, the race has lost its energy as obvious frontrunners make their way ever closer to the podium.

The Oscars remain the last important awards ceremony, but the movies nominated need to reflect their significance.

Consider for a moment that of all the films nominated for Best Picture, not one is a dark, feel-bad movie like “Drive,” “Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy” or “The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo.”

There is also only one film, “The Help,” which grossed over $100 million at the box office.

And of those, only “The Descendants” or “Moneyball” can be called 21st Century films.

There is still something to be said about a silent film winning Best Picture, namely that a movie, in this case a foreign film that would typically be Best Picture poison, can be universal.

But the problem is that “The Artist” will not inspire a wave of silent films from young, aspiring filmmakers. It may temporarily generate some fascination in the silent era, but the nostalgia of Michel Hazanivicius’s film, as well as the many other backwards-looking films in 2011, is fleeting.

If something like “The Tree of Life” could win, heads would really turn. Films like “No Country for Old Men,” “The Hurt Locker” and “The Lord of the Rings” are all masterpieces in their own ways, but Terrence Malick’s film carries with it the aura that still belongs to “2001: A Space Odyssey.” Rarely is such an important film this close to being recognized as such by a populist voting body.

Short of ensuring that the best films always win, I’m struggling to think what the Oscars still need to do to remain relevant.

Many have criticized that the Oscars can seem like an old man’s club, and this year is no exception. The average age of the nominees in the Best Supporting Actor category is 62.6, and even the Best Director field is stacked with aging masters.

The Oscars could very easily slate younger if only they nominated Shailene Woodley, “Bridesmaids” or included performances by “The Muppets,” but part of what makes the Oscars special is that they are distinguished and made to be taken seriously. If the Oscars are anything, they are not the Grammys or the MTV Movie Awards.

There’s the thought to go back to five nominees, but even if nominating “Inception” and “Toy Story 3” meant little in terms of ratings, a changing, broader field of films has kept movies like “The Tree of Life,” “Bridesmaids,” “Tinker Tailor,” “Drive,” “Dragon Tattoo” and even “Harry Potter” or “Rise of the Planet of the Apes” in the conversation for long enough for them to actually be recognized.

Even if the nomination for “Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close” was infuriating, it at the very least created some buzz and actually got people out to see the damn thing.

Fixing the Oscars may not come easy, but it’s clear that something must be done to address the Oscars’ problems. They’re too important to just ignore.

The Descendants

“The Descendants” is a complex family drama that provides lots of inner details without ever delving into them and becoming bloated

“The Descendants” is a film filled with bitterness, resentment and judgment. And yes, I would say it’s a comedy and that it’s quite lovely.

If the film’s idyllic Hawaiian setting or quirky indie comedy trailers seem deceptive, that is exactly the point. “The Descendants” is a film about appearances, and with each character there is a long lineage of Hawaiian heritage who show us that with every meeting and action, we carry along with us emotional baggage and sins of the past that skew our perception of the present.

We want to be honest about the here and now, but in others we only see the past. Sometimes what we see seems unfamiliar, and it’s tough to forgive. Continue reading “The Descendants”