i carried a watermelon
The television may own my weeknights, but my weekends belong to the theater, darlings!
Friday, I went to see L'arnacoeur (Heartbreaker) in lieu of The Romantics (which, I didn't hallucinate.. the ticketing guy told me that it had been on the schedule, and was pulled last minute with no explanation that he'd heard, so, poop.), and it was awesome. I kind of wasn't sure how Vanessa Paradis would do.. I'm always kind of leery of those singer-turned-actress transitions; it's a bad cliche for good reason. But she was actually really delightful, with good comic timing. Romain Duris was hilarious, a perfect comedic rake (so much so that I didn't even recognize him as Pierre from Paris until after the fact), but convincing in the sincere moments as well. Duris plays Alex Lippi, a man working as a professional heartbreaker, hired to break up unknowingly unhappy relationships (his code of honor bars him from mucking with the truly happy, in theory). As these things go, Paradis's character, Juliette Van Der Becq poses a particular problem, in that her relationship is seemingly perfect, and in working his way into her life as the job requires, he starts to fall for her. Like most rom-coms, the plot is fairly ridiculous, and depends primarily on the likability of the leads, to which end, L'arnacoeur succeeds with flying colours. Despite what could have been kind of an unlikable scenario, the characters were charming and funny, without ever falling into caricature despite the rote nature of a lot of the hijinks, and had great chemistry, all the while filmed in some of the most beautiful locations. Andrew Lincoln wasn't in it near enough for my tastes, but he was fairly cutiepie when he was, and I might be kind of sort of starting to crush on him a little bit. It was just a really sweet and funny movie, and I anticipate watching it again and again.
Saturday was Easy A, which was also hilarious and wonderful, just like you all promised it would be. I think everyone knows what it's all about already, but it was all that, and successfully done, due in large part to the awesomeness that is Emma Stone, and the adult cast (PATRICIA CLARKSON! STANLEY TUCCI! WOO!) that was so much better than your average teen comedy deserves. Thankfully, Easy A was no average teen comedy. The one thing that really, really bugged me about it was not just the hyper-reaction to the rumor that she'd slept with someone (which, yes, wholly unrealistic, but I don't expect rom-coms to be heavy on the verisimilitude front) but that she had no support from any of her peers. I thought that put kind of an ugly bend on the whole thing, to no particular end. I don't see why the events that played out for Olive couldn't still have done so with the aid of a stalwart BFF at her side.
And I think it's kind of funny and awesome that both of the movies I saw over the weekend were heavily inspired/influenced by the 80s teen comedies that I loved so much growing up (Dirty Dancing was prominently and loltastically featured in L'arnacoeur, and of course, basically all of the best of Hughes/Crowe/etc.). And in that same spirit, I found myself also purchasing a pair of skinny jeans for the first time in forever. However, if I ever mention that I'm considering a side ponytail of any sort, you have permission to have me committed until this whole 80s revival has concluded, because I will have clearly lost my faculties.
Friday, I went to see L'arnacoeur (Heartbreaker) in lieu of The Romantics (which, I didn't hallucinate.. the ticketing guy told me that it had been on the schedule, and was pulled last minute with no explanation that he'd heard, so, poop.), and it was awesome. I kind of wasn't sure how Vanessa Paradis would do.. I'm always kind of leery of those singer-turned-actress transitions; it's a bad cliche for good reason. But she was actually really delightful, with good comic timing. Romain Duris was hilarious, a perfect comedic rake (so much so that I didn't even recognize him as Pierre from Paris until after the fact), but convincing in the sincere moments as well. Duris plays Alex Lippi, a man working as a professional heartbreaker, hired to break up unknowingly unhappy relationships (his code of honor bars him from mucking with the truly happy, in theory). As these things go, Paradis's character, Juliette Van Der Becq poses a particular problem, in that her relationship is seemingly perfect, and in working his way into her life as the job requires, he starts to fall for her. Like most rom-coms, the plot is fairly ridiculous, and depends primarily on the likability of the leads, to which end, L'arnacoeur succeeds with flying colours. Despite what could have been kind of an unlikable scenario, the characters were charming and funny, without ever falling into caricature despite the rote nature of a lot of the hijinks, and had great chemistry, all the while filmed in some of the most beautiful locations. Andrew Lincoln wasn't in it near enough for my tastes, but he was fairly cutiepie when he was, and I might be kind of sort of starting to crush on him a little bit. It was just a really sweet and funny movie, and I anticipate watching it again and again.
Saturday was Easy A, which was also hilarious and wonderful, just like you all promised it would be. I think everyone knows what it's all about already, but it was all that, and successfully done, due in large part to the awesomeness that is Emma Stone, and the adult cast (PATRICIA CLARKSON! STANLEY TUCCI! WOO!) that was so much better than your average teen comedy deserves. Thankfully, Easy A was no average teen comedy. The one thing that really, really bugged me about it was not just the hyper-reaction to the rumor that she'd slept with someone (which, yes, wholly unrealistic, but I don't expect rom-coms to be heavy on the verisimilitude front) but that she had no support from any of her peers. I thought that put kind of an ugly bend on the whole thing, to no particular end. I don't see why the events that played out for Olive couldn't still have done so with the aid of a stalwart BFF at her side.
And I think it's kind of funny and awesome that both of the movies I saw over the weekend were heavily inspired/influenced by the 80s teen comedies that I loved so much growing up (Dirty Dancing was prominently and loltastically featured in L'arnacoeur, and of course, basically all of the best of Hughes/Crowe/etc.). And in that same spirit, I found myself also purchasing a pair of skinny jeans for the first time in forever. However, if I ever mention that I'm considering a side ponytail of any sort, you have permission to have me committed until this whole 80s revival has concluded, because I will have clearly lost my faculties.