Bad Moms

**Spoiler Alert**

Director: Jon Lucas, Scott Moore/Starring: Mila Kunis, Kristen Bell, Kathryn Hahn, Christina Applegate, Jada Pinkett Smith, Jay Hernandez, Annie Mumolo, Clark Duke, David Walton, Oona Laurence and Emjay Anthony

Another distaff ensemble makes its way to the multiplex just a fortnight after the release of Ghostbusters with Jon Lucas and Scott Moore's Bad Moms. The preview and the premise seemed very promising; a group of mothers fed up with the taxing demands of parenting and running a household, as well as the fascistic PTA, rise up against the overwhelming rigors of motherhood. But Lucas and Moore's film becomes a bundle of hit and miss funny moments--mostly misses. Nevertheless, it succeeds as an enjoyable bauble and is a helluva lot more fun than most other summer comedies we've seen in 2016.

Set in a modern day suburb of Chicago, Bad Moms tells the story of Amy (Mila Kunis), a mother of two whose career and extracurricular life have severely bogged her down. Though she's young, Amy finds she isn't young enough for the gourmet coffee company for which she works part-time, which is staffed by young, hipster twenty-somethings who play ping-pong during work hours and are immune to the stresses of adult life. Her young, entrepreneurial boss; Dale Kipler (Clark Duke), undervalues her and can't understand why she won't side-step a heavy workload to watch the staff play ping-pong. But Amy's problems extend beyond her job, for she must contend with her husband Mike (David Walton); an unhelpful slob who works out of their home and two children; Jane (Oona Laurence), who stresses about making the school soccer team and her son Dylan (Emjay Anthony), who is failing science and can't complete a homework assignment without his mother's help. When Amy tells Mike that Dylan is failing science, the father shares a congratulatory fist-bump with his son.

Amy's life trials also involve the school PTA president Gwendolyn (a very inspired Christina Applegate); who wields great, intimidating power over the mothers and the school faculty. Gwendolyn and her two obsequious minions; Stacy (Jada Pinkett Smith) and the dim-witted Vicky (Annie Mumolo), say catty, mean things about the other mothers while they stand on the school steps every morning like two-faced sentinels. Gwendolyn and company offer Amy some venomous compliments about how she is able to work and raise her kids. Amy's response to Gwendolyn's question about why she doesn't devote more time to being a mother is quite funny: "because I work."

Over-burdened at home and weighed down by her job and the PTA, Amy's troubles begin to mount when she happens upon her husband watching a naked woman on his computer. Her husband admits to a cyber-affair, which prompts Amy to expel him from the house. Amy presses on, but finds herself coping with yet another problem. When Amy arrives at the PTA meeting, she finds Gwendolyn onstage, dictatorially addressing an audience of mothers. In one of the film's funniest scenes, an absurdly long list of forbidden bake sale ingredients plays on a large video screen behind Gwendolyn as Amy walks slowly down the aisle toward the stage, dumbstruck by what she sees. Gwendolyn proposes the formation of a bake sale police, which is accompanied by images of black clad policemen in jack boots on the screen. Funnier still is how Gwendolyn's idea is juxtaposed with an image of someone being beaten by a police officer with a baton on the screen behind her.
Having had enough, Amy voices her objections to Gwendolyn's agenda by explaining how difficult and exhausting her life is already. She turns her back on an angry Gwendolyn and walks out of the auditorium to the sounds of gasping mothers.

She retires to a local bar for a drink and is approached by a mother named Kiki (Kristen Bell), who expresses her admiration for Amy for defying Gwendolyn and the PTA. The two meet another mother who happens to be sitting next to Amy; Carla (Kathryn Hahn); a salty, sexually aggressive woman who has also become disgruntled with the pressures of motherhood. Commiserating, the three make drunken, spirited pledges to be bad moms. After leaving the bar, we see the three enter a supermarket in slo-mo. The montage that follows shows them drinking in the aisles, mixing alcohol with milk and generally making a spectacle of themselves.

In her new commitment to being a bad mom, Amy refuses to make her kids breakfast and as a symbol of her rebellion, she appropriates her husband's muscle car before speeding her kids to school. Ignoring Gwendolyn's dietary proscriptions, Amy shows up at the bake sale with store-bought glazed munchkins. Furious at the sight of her offerings, Gwendolyn accosts Amy at the table and after an unpleasant exchange, she violently clears the munchkins from the table. The hostile encounter prompts Amy to declare her intention to run against Gwendolyn in the next PTA election.

The film was doing so well up to this point, but I was disappointed that Amy wasn't spurred on to something nastier than a PTA campaign. Just when the story needed more bite, it settled for timidity. But being that the PTA is everything for someone like Gwendolyn, Amy's response makes sense, story-wise.

As Amy kicks-off her campaign with Kiki and Carla's help, the three women form a close, commiserative bond. Subplots begin to take shape as the narrative progresses. Amy is courted by the stud single parent; Jessie Harkness (Jay Hernandez) before her husband returns home, hoping to fix their marriage. Never abandoning her motherly duties, Amy discovers Gwendolyn has bullied the school soccer coach into benching Jane, which necessitates personal intervention. Amy also tries to teach her son self-reliance, which requires her maternal patience and care.

Hoping to attract PTA mothers to her cause, Amy hosts a party, which initially is a dud. Amy, Carla and Kiki discover Gwendolyn chose the same night to host her party; a more successful gathering of wall-to-wall moms. Gwendolyn's party is so well-attended, even Martha Stewart turns up as a guest serving hors d'oeuvres, which makes for a very amusing cameo. While Amy, Carla and Kiki concede defeat, their fortunes suddenly turn when Gwendolyn begins bullying her guests and boring them with tedious campaign talk, which causes the gathering to abandon the party. The mothers show up at Amy's party, which subsequently becomes a raucous affair; one even Martha Stewart can't resist.

It is isn't difficult to see where the story will go. We know everything will come down to an election night showdown between Amy and Gwendolyn. We also know other plot-points, like Amy's troubles with her boss, her burgeoning relationship with Jessie and her troubles with her kids will be addressed in typically tidy, Hollywood narrative fashion. There is even enough narrative space for Kiki's problems with her uptight, Napoleonic husband and Carla's inability to relate to her jock son.

The movie has a point to make about how mothers are overworked and saddled with too many worries and tasks men typically ignore or avoid. It makes its case in a reasonably compelling and sometimes funny way.

Being a Hollywood production, it is unsurprising that the laughs drizzle instead of pour. Some moments that should be funny somehow fall flat, such as a scene where Kiki and Carla help Amy choose something sexy to wear for their night out. We expect the two women to make some witty and sharp comments about Amy's drab wardrobe but it doesn't happen. And the subsequent scene at the bar, where Amy finds her flirty banter with men is really repellent motherly advice could have been funny--or funnier.

But the film was cast well. Kathryn Hahn is amusing as the foul-mouthed mom, as is Kristen Bell though she should have had more comedic screen time. For me, Christina Appelgate's Gwendolyn was a juicy bit of comedic business. She plays the bitch well and she's very funny.

One of the film's most creative moments came during the end credits, when the female cast-member's mothers share their experiences of being moms.

Bad Moms is a coulda-been movie. If it had just sharpened its satirical edge a bit more, the laughs might have been more frequent but Amy is just too nice. If and when a sequel is conceived, the filmmakers might keep that criticism in mind. If you include the word bad in your title, then having the characters be bad becomes an imperative.

Captain Fantastic

**Spoiler Alert**

Director: Matt Ross/Starring: Viggo Mortensen, Frank Langella, Kathryn Hahn, Steve Zahn, and George MacKay

I came to Captain Fantastic; director Matt Ross' second feature film, expecting an annoying contribution to the insufferable quirky-family genre. Though I can't stomach the genre I found Ross' film to be touching at times and surprisingly engaging though the characters and situations are neatly conceived and executed. The film wraps everything in a digestible, easy-on-the-palate denouement that keeps real-life adversity at bay.

Set somewhere in present day Pacific Northwest, Captain Fantastic tells the story of a family living off the grid in their presumably edenic forest home. Ben (Viggo Morntensen), the father of six, rears his kids in an environment where food is grown and meat hunted and prepared. Reveille-like morning alarms rouse the kids for arduous, pre-meal exercise in the woods. Self-defense instruction and rock climbing round out the physical instruction while a sophisticated home-schooling system allows the kids to discuss Marx and Nabokov's Lolita. We also see the family meditating outdoors. Ben is no doomsday survivalist but more of a hippy with a curriculum whose focus is self-reliance and vigorous self-improvement. Though Ben's parenting seems unorthodox, we also see how his tough love makes the family a close knit group. During an evening around the campfire, Ben's impromptu guitar strumming inspires the others to pick up instruments, which leads to a spirited family jam.

We learn early on the mother was committed to a psychiatric hospital. We also learn Bo (George MacKay), Ben's oldest; has been hiding acceptance letters from his father from various Ivy League schools. We know his secret will only lead to discord later on, which it does.

After a trip into town aboard the family bus, Ben learns from his father-in-law Jack (Frank Langella) that his wife killed herself in the hospital. Blaming Ben for his daughter's death, he also forbids him to attend the funeral in New Mexico under the threat of arrest. He also doesn't hesitate to express his direct and forceful disdain for the way Ben raises his children.

Never sparing his children stark truths, Ben tells them that same night as they sit around the campfire that their mother is dead. Sobbing, the children ask to see their mother, only to be told they can't attend the funeral due to their grandfather's threat. Angry at their father, their pleas to see their mother's body are rebuffed until Ben defies his father-in-law's threat by setting out on the road to attend the funeral. Along the way (and throughout the film), Ben has vivid visions and dreams and memories of his wife.

While on the road, the sight of shopping malls and the endless sprawl of stores elicits Ben's critical comments about capitalism and rampant consumerism, which his kids digest and sometimes echo. We get some sense at how far removed the family is from mainstream culture during a stop at a diner. When the kids mention hot dogs, hamburgers and soda, Ben promptly leaves the diner with the family to go shopping for "real food" at a grocery store. But the shopping trip becomes a mock-military shoplifting operation that Ben refers to euphemistically as "liberating food." Why a father would allow their kids to steal food is explained later.

A sequence in the film where the family's oddball life is brought into sharp relief takes place during Ben's stop at his brother Dave's home. During a dinner with Dave (Steve Zahn), his wife Harper (Kathryn Hahn) and their two sons, Ben's youngest asks Harper if she killed the chicken she is serving. Her awkward, slightly embarrassed response later turns to indignation when Ben shares details about his wife's death. After she excuses herself from the table, Ben surprises his brother when he serves each of his kids wine. Justifying his action to his brother, Ben refers to its accepted practice in other countries.

Dave's two sons express disbelief when the Ben's children's ignorance of pop culture is made embarrassingly manifest. Later, Dave and Harper confront Ben about what they see as excessive permissiveness in his parenting. In one of the film's most startling scenes, Ben proves a point about his sophisticated parenting when he quizzes Dave and Harper's sons about the Bill of Rights (they are woefully ignorant) before doing the same with his youngest (his grasp is exceptional). Whatever value judgement the viewer assigns Ben's parenting, the scene makes a case for rigorous education.

Though the family is highly educated, the limits of Ben's instruction becomes apparent during a stop at a RV site. A young, sexy girl takes to Bo, only to discover he is appallingly ignorant about boy/girl romantic interaction. His embarrassment and humiliation prompts a confrontation with his dad, when he admits not knowing anything about things that aren't in books.

The family's arrival in New Mexico predictably leads to a confrontation between Ben and Jack about how the kids are being raised. The touchy subject of Ben's wife's will, which details her Buddhist-inspired wish to be cremated and flushed down a toilet, also becomes a heated bone of contention. Exacerbating the problem is Jack's threat of custody. But just when we think Ben's concession to his father-in-law's demand is definitive, we find the children have their own agenda.

As mentioned earlier, the ending is emotionally and narratively tidy but somehow it works, though barely. The subplot dealing with Ben discovering Bo and his wife submitted applications to universities, is also dealt with neatly. What becomes of Bo? Given Ben's parenting, his life choice is hardly surprising.

A movie like Captain Fantastic succeeds because the offbeat, unpredictable moments outweigh the sentimental and predictable. Buttressing the drama are the fine performances by Viggo Mortensen, Frank Langella, Steve Zahn and Kathryn Hahn, who give the film much needed gravitas.

Where the family ends up seems like a nod to pragmatism, which makes sense in our 21st century world. I like that the film neither condemns nor extols Ben's parenting. The seemingly irresponsible things he teaches his kids are weighed equally against the amazing lessons and skills he imparts.

Taken as a whole, the movie is quite enjoyable. Its shortcomings are minor and can be easily overlooked. It doesn't establish any great truths but its numerous quirks are appealing. Just don't think of it as a parenting Bible.

The Visit

**Spoiler Alert**

Director: M. Night Shyamalan/Starring: Olivia DeJonge, Ed Oxenbould, Deanna Dunagan, Peter McRobbie and Kathryn Hahn

The man who puts the hack in hackneyed; M. Night Shyamalan, has brought his latest horror flick to theaters but its only horrifying quality is its famished imagination. Like most of Shyamalan's films; the premise shows promise but he is unable to exploit his own ideas for real scares or suspense though he isn't bad at establishing mood and atmosphere. What we get mostly is horrible dialogue, even worse acting (Shyamalan's fault, mostly) and a once-imaginative horror-film storytelling innovation that should be retired once and for all. I'm talking of course about character-generated film footage--a close relative to found-footage--which has become the default horror film gimmick in this century. That Shyamalan would resort to its usage tells me he's become lazy or his already-shallow well of storytelling tricks has become parched.

The Visit tells the story of a mother (an unconvincing Kathryn Hahn) and her two children; the teen Becca (a stomach-churningly annoying Olivia DeJonge) and her younger brother Tyler (Ed Oxenbould, who manages to one-up DeJonge in the annoying category). Though their mother has been estranged from her parents since she was nineteen, she has agreed to let Becca and Tyler stay with them for a week. Becca, an aspiring documentary filmmaker, hopes to film the experience.

The opening scenes where Becca and Tyler interact are marred by unnatural dialogue one might hear on any Nickelodeon sit-com. Becca talks earnestly into the camera about documentarian techniques while her brother quickly becomes an irritant with his lispy witticisms, which sound too smart and pat for a kid his age.

We learn the father left the mother sometime in the past, which hasn't caused the kids any undue stress or grief.

While they set off for their grandparents, their mother goes on vacation with her new boyfriend.
When Becca and Tyler step out of the train, their grandparents wave and welcome them with a large sign. Their grandmother--Nana (Deanna Dunagan) and their grandfather--Pop Pop (Peter McRobbie), seem to be typical, genial grandparents; baking biscuits and cookies and taking the kids for walks in the woods. Becca and Tyler learn their grandparents also spend time as counselors for a rehab center.

All seems normal until Becca and Tyler begin hearing strange noises after bedtime. Upon opening the door to their bedroom, they find a naked Nana scratching the walls. Spooked, they immediately shut the door. Perplexed and anxious, the kids begin to notice other strange behavior. Seeing Pop Pop chopping wood, Tyler calls to him, only to be ignored. When he does turn to acknowledge Tyler's call, he turns away without calling back. Pop Pop also issues a mysterious warning about the basement, which he says is full of dangerous mold.

Later, Tyler finds a pile of soiled adult diapers in the tool shed--a very disturbing development. Out of Pop Pop's earshot, Nana explains to the kids that the soiled diapers are their grandfather's way of dealing with an embarrassing problem. Later, Pop Pop and Nana sit Becca and Tyler down in the living room to explain their odd behavior, which they attribute to Sundowning syndrome; a condition where symptoms such as disorientation, confusion, auditory hallucinations, yelling, pacing and suspicion become common. Pop Pop issues another ominous warning to Becca and Tyler about keeping their bedroom door locked after 9:30 p.m.
More creepiness ensues when Nana asks Becca to clean the oven by climbing inside. Entering the oven tentatively, Nana urges her to climb further in. The nail-biting moment, when we anticipate Nana shutting the oven door, never comes but the scene effectively establishes a feeling of dread.

Becca and Tyler decide to film their grandparent's odd behavior and even interview a former patient from the rehab center named Stacey (Celia Keenan-Bolger), who comes to the house with a blueberry pie. The interview, like most of the others Becca conducts, sound very unnatural and phony. The ubiquitous cameras she and her brother always have on their person or situate in the house become unrealistically intrusive, which is a narrative shortcoming in most films of this variety.

Curious about what Nana and Pop Pop actually do after 9:30 p.m., Tyler sets up cameras about the house to capture the weird happenings. In a subsequent scene that is unforgivably Paranormal Activity, we see the living room from the perspective of Tyler's strategically-placed camera. The living room's stillness is disturbed by Nana's frenetic presence, which includes pacing and racing about the room. A jolt at the end of the scene seems very obvious and cheap. That Shyamalan would deliberately employ the fixed camera scare tactic that Paranormal Activity has bled to the grave shows a glaring, creative lapse in his film-making.

After Becca and Tyler decide the situation at their grandparent's house has become too dangerous, they contact their mother via Skype, who, when she sees Nana and Pop Pop, reveals something shocking that provides the film a clever twist for which Shyamalan is famous.
Following on the heels of their mother's revelation is Becca and Tyler's basement investigation, which provides horrific corroboration for their mother's claim.

I credit Shyamalan for imparting some creepiness to the climactic sequence, where Becca is locked inside a bedroom with Nana; who paces madly and makes all manner of hissing sounds, threatening the teen's life. Meanwhile, downstairs, Pop Pop and Tyler have a showdown of their own, which partly involves unpleasantness with his soiled diapers.

The film, like many of Shyamalan's other works, deals with families in crisis or who have become symbolically fractured. In this case, the Norman Rockwellian conception of blissful grandparents/grandchildren relations is turned on its head. Becca and Tyler's own family, where divorce has sundered familial cohesion, serves the film's overarching theme about family dysfunction.

I think Shyamalan's film had the makings of a satisfying horror film but so many things conspire against it, namely the acting; the movie's biggest liability. Shyamalan is mostly to blame for this. Very little of the dialogue sounds natural; most of it seems canned and in Becca and Tyler's cases, it is often too-sophisticated and irritatingly precocious. Dunagan and McRobbie could have been a lot more menacing. Most of the time Pop Pop and Nana behave like over-the-top community theater actors rather than dangerously volatile psychotics. The performances also come off as jokey; Pop Pop and Nana often seem more comical than frightening though they have their creepy moments.

The most aggravating flaw in the film is the aforementioned first-person footage, which becomes quickly tiresome. The second most aggravating aspect of the film are the two leads. Why Shyamalan would cast two annoying Australian actors (DeJonge and Oxenbould) when America has a warehouse chock full of its own is mystifying. Hahn is given little to do except appear via Skype, where her transmissions seem as unconvincing as her acting. Never for a moment was I convinced Hahn was Becca and Tyler's mother.

Once the pivotal Shyamalanian twist arrives in the story, the film staggers toward a predictable end.

I think Shyamalan has storytelling gifts but his Achilles heel are his scripts. I think he would do better to adapt someone else's material. His films have great twists but are always uneven. The violent climax in this film should have been harrowing and pulse-quickening but it only made me feel impatient.

I didn't stick around for Tyler's silly hip-hop performance over the end credits; I had already had enough of it earlier in the film when he entertained a black ticket man aboard the train, who was implausibly friendly and accommodating.

Shyamalan has become the film-goer's whipping boy, for very valid reasons, though he has made a few interesting films. The Visit will do little to mend his reputation. Too bad; I thought the film's story showed promise. Oh well; I'm sure he'll keep trying.

Tomorrowland

**Spoiler Alert**

Director: Brad Bird/Starring: George Clooney, Britt Robertson, Hugh Laurie, Raffey Cassidy, Tim McGraw, Kathryn Hahn and Keegan-Michael Peel

It's hard to say whether Tomorrowland is a Disney flick or director Brad Bird's film because at times it seems the futuristic city seen therein is little more than a re-imagined DisneyWorld. The film also seems like a plug for its theme parks. Even in a scene where a child named Frank Walker (Thomas Robinson) walks into the 1964 World's Fair with his jet-pack prototype, we see Disney's It's A Small World exhibit, replete with the signature song. Talk about a product placement! And try as this talented director (Ratatouille, The Incredibles), might, I couldn't help but feel that the film was nothing more than a story smothered in a corporate infomercial. But we may give ample credit to Bird for pulling a mildly watchable (remember my mantra: mildly watchable can never be equated with good) story from a George Clooney-hosted theme park ride.

But the film takes a shot at a story, as a young woman named Casey Newton (Britt Robertson) tries desperately to prevent a NASA launch pad from being dismantled. Her father, Eddie Newton (Tim McGraw); a NASA engineer, is facing unemployment after his project is complete. During one late night stealth mission on the grounds (is NASA security so lax?), Casey is caught and arrested. Freed on bail, she collects her belongings at the police station, only to find a button with a prominent "T" on the face. Upon touching it, she is instantly transported to a wheat-field where she sees the Oz-like skyline of Tomorrowland; a futuristic city gleaming on the horizon. But Casey also finds that she is transported back to our world when she lets go of the button. The phenomenon naturally startles her and when she tries to demonstrate it for her already angry father on the way home from jail, it fails to work for him.

Finding a large field in which to re-activate her button, she is able to re-visit Tomorrowland and wander around the city. She sees people zipping around in high-tech jet packs, monorails gliding through the air without actual rails and many other wonders which leave the visitor dazzled. Unfortunately she also finds a miniature, digital readout on the button that is rapidly counting down to zero. When it does just that, she is transported back to our world and unable to reactivate the button.

Through her sleuthing, she finds the pin is actually a replica of one sold at the 1964 World's Fair. Her brother locates a store in Houston that carries the pin, which she travels to while her father believes her to be on a camping trip. The place that carries it is a funky, sci-fi collectible establishment run by two offbeat characters played by Kathryn Hahn and the Keegan-Michael Peel. They immediately become suspicious when she shows them her pin and when she tries to leave they lock the door before targeting her with high-tech blasters. As she races through the aisles trying to elude them, a young girl named Athena (Raffey Cassidy) arrives to dispatch the two owners, who we learn are actually robots. Athena warns Casey they need to hurry away before dangerous operatives arrive who intend to kill her. As the two escape, Athena tells Casey the operatives have been sent by a man named Nix who is intent on tracking down the "chosen"; those who have been invited to Tomorrowland via the pin.

Athena suggests Casey visit a previous occupant of Tomorrowland; a man since exiled from the place for inventing something deemed very dangerous though what it is isn't immediately divulged. When Athena drops (almost literally) Casey on the driveway of said inventor, she approaches his unprepossessing abode, only to find he has no intention of allowing her in. When she tricks him and gains entry, she finds his home is a paranoiac's dream; surveillance gew-gaws and computers galore and an advanced security system. The man; Frank Walker (George Clooney), who we saw as little boy in the 1964 World's Fair; learns why Casey has shown up at his doorstep. He also discovers Nix's operatives have discovered his hideout. Frank and Casey manage to escape with the help of his ingenious techno-wizardry but not before Nix's thugs violently renovate his home.

In time, Frank explains that a machine of his design previously used to show people the possibilities of the future has since been re-purposed to show people disasters and war and everything negative. As a consequence, humanity is overcome by its own dark vision of the future, making it necessary to destroy the machine before the world is destroyed by man-made catastrophes. In order to accomplish this, Frank, Casey and Athena must defeat Nix and his minions, which involves finding a way back to Tomorrowland, whose entrance has since been destroyed.

And so the stage is set for a blah blah climax that only Disney could conceive. And in the end, we get an optimistic It's a Small World reprise of sorts with a host of multi-ethnic young folk answering the call to become mankind's visionaries.

Okay, so I get Disney's agenda to leave us with an upbeat, cheery coda but I'm not sure how the army of Tomorrowlanders will deal with the REAL problems gripping our world. If I sound like an incorrigible cynic, that's because I am and no amount of young folk appearing in a wheat field with Tomorrowland in walking distance can convince me that creative imagineering is enough (though I guess it's at least a start). I'm all for celebrating and fostering ingenuity but what the film peddles seems more like Disney's all-you-can-eat lip-service with some platitudes one might buy in Epcot Center.

George Clooney's charisma keeps the film from completely sinking and he probably comes along just at the right time because Britt Robertson, with all her hysteric hamming, is too feeble a presence to carry the story.

The film isn't beaten into submission with CGI the way The Avengers is, which is one positive assessment I can make about the movie.

If the trailer seemed monotonous to you, you'll be pleased to find the movie isn't as bad as that but whether one wants to spend ten bucks to arrive at this revelation is a decision best left to you. That's right, folks; I have seen the future--more specifically Tomorrowland--and it looks like DisneyWorld with glassy towers. All the film needs is a Mickey Mouse with the advanced AI seen in Ex Machina to fully realize its true marketing potential.

The D Train

**Spoiler Alert**

Directors: Andrew Mogel, Jarrad Paul/Starring: Jack Black, James Marsden, Kathryn Hahn, Jeffrey Tambor and Mike White

Many people carry some residual high school anxieties in their psyche; the fear of alienation, being hopelessly uncool and probably worst of all, the sentence of social pariahdom. And for many, the high school experience stigmatizes one almost permanently. Though most people I know (including myself) would rather be water-boarded than attend any school reunion, others find the idea appealing.

Dan Landsman (Jack Black), the self-appointed chairman of his high school reunion committee, pursues the task of organizing his class reunion with passionate earnestness. Unfortunately, his fellow committee members (who are also former classmates), treat him with the same low regard he probably endured in high school. When the film begins, we see him setting up an ad hoc committee call center with dedicated meticulousness; setting out donuts and setting up phones for his peers. When he mentions going out for a beer with the committee after an evening of cold calling classmates, the others casually decline his offer. But on his way home, he sees the committee members enter a bar together.

At home, we see Dan enjoy a more favorable estimation from his wife Stacey (an excellent Kathryn Hahn) and his son Zach (Russell Posner).

One evening, while watching T.V., Dan sees an ad for Banana Boat tanning lotion. The spot features a beef-cakey life-guard monitoring a busy beach. Dan realizes the lifeguard is none other than his former classmate Oliver Lawless (a very excellent James Marsden). Excited, Dan annoys Stacey by rousing her from her sleep to show her the ad, only to be scolded harshly.

Seeing Oliver inspires a plan in which Dan will fly to L.A. to convince the actor to attend the reunion. Imagining himself walking into the reunion with a very hip-looking Oliver; gaining social prestige and maybe respect from his classmates only strengthens his resolve. Of course the plan entails some measure of prevarication, as Dan explains to Stacey that his week-long mission to L.A. is a business while he proposes the trip to his boss Bill (the always amusing Jeffrey Tambor) as a bold initiative to lure a new client for the consulting business. The plan backfires when Bill insists he join Dan on the trip, for which no amount of dissuasion from the latter will discourage the former. The fact that Dan would lie to both his boss and his wife then create a situation in L.A. that demands he fake a meeting with a fictitious client is plausible if Dan's reunion anxieties are severe, which they are. Does Dan seem like the type of person who would cast discretion and common sense to the wind in a reckless pursuit of something so seemingly trivial? Not really, but we read of stranger acts undertaken by people who are otherwise levelheaded and risk-averse.

The obsession to sell the reunion idea to Oliver has unfortunate consequences at home; Dan begins to ignore Zach and his girl troubles; a neglected issue which has long-reaching ramifications.

Directors Mogel and Paul, who also co-penned the script, set up a juicy, tension-filled scenario (if not entirely believable) where Dan's job, marriage, father/son relations and his shaky standing with the reunion committee are all highly jeopardized.

In L.A., Dan meets Oliver for drinks and clubbing. Sporting trendy facial hair to offset his inveterate un-coolness, Dan also affects cool dude patter in his attempt to cajole Oliver into attending the reunion. While Bill spends time in his hotel room, preparing for a phantom meeting, Dan and Oliver party ferociously, making the club rounds, drinking heavily and partaking of a powdery substance in the process. Unfortunately for Dan, Oliver casually dismisses the reunion idea.

Over a few days course, we begin to see how Dan's lofty estimation of Oliver grows out of proportion. In an attempt to impress Dan and create the illusion of celebrity, Oliver pretends to know Dermott Mulroney (yes, the real Dermott Mulroney), who they spot sitting in a booth; his entourage very present. Mulroney is naturally puzzled after Oliver initiates conversation. The ruse works. Oliver returns to an admiring Dan, who sees him as someone herculean.

At this point in the film, the story takes a risk I found to be pretty mind-blowing for multiplex fare. In the afterglow of the evening, Dan finds himself in Oliver's shabby apartment. As the two trade bro-talk, they find themselves standing closer and closer until the two spontaneously embrace then engage in a passionate kiss. Where it leads we can guess as the two men wake then next morning; side by side. Though Oliver is unphased by the encounter, the act leaves Dan shaken and confused.

On the Bill front, Oliver pretends to be the client the two men are supposed to meet. Just when Oliver pretends to kill a deal that might free Dan from a potential disaster, the actor gets caught up in the emotional excitement of the deal. In a moment of detrimental spontaneity, he agrees to Bill's deal.

Returning home, Dan faces personal and professional ruin as his ruse is tenuously maintained while the emotional aftershocks of sex begins to wildly affect his behavior. Dan tries to discourage Oliver from attending the reunion for fear of their secret becoming public consumption. To his dismay, he discovers his erstwhile lover is dead set on attending.

In the second half of the film, we see Dan trying to put his family back together, dealing with possible job loss while a major confrontation at the reunion turns the event on its head.

I was particularly taken with the performances, especially James Marsden's and Jack Black's. Marsden hasn't really had the opportunity to shine in any film but he does so here. Jack Black has shown he has the acting chops to take on dramatic roles; an opportunity he doesn't waste as the socially vilified Dan Landsman.

Though we live in slightly enlightened times, the sex scene remains a surprise. The filmmakers don't treat the act as something freakish but as something two non-gay men might enjoy given the circumstances. And the secret they share doesn't crowd out the rest of the story, which deals with other issues, most notably Dan's search for social redemption and its lack of proportion in meaning to the idea of marriage and family.

I was a little disappointed to find the film didn't arrive at any great truth. Dan learns he must appreciate what he has, namely his wife and son but is it that all? Given what's transpired, it's hard to imagine someone would glean such prosaic wisdom from something out of the ordinary. How does the fling and the cataclysmic reunion affect him? Does the film give us a convincing clue?

I did find the final scene between Dan and Oliver refreshingly honest. What is obvious to everyone and the audience is articulated by Oliver as he disabuses Dan of his greatest illusions; his lack of celebrity status and his faked encounter with Dermott Mulroney.

I was taken in by the story; it offered something unusual and was a radical departure from traditional Hollywood fare. I didn't find the film to be hilarious but was amusing at times and if it doesn't posit anything profound, it also refuses to be business as usual. It takes the familiar suburban milieu with its stock inhabitants then wrenches it; defying the ordinary.

The D-Train is a Spring surprise. But my prognosis for the film is total and complete burial. In this cinema season where blockbusters crowd out anything with a modest budget and little marketing muscle, a film like Mogel and Paul's will lose out to costumed super things whose success is all but forcibly assured. Theirs isn't a great film but for first-time directors, it is a helluva start. I say see it before theater managers hurry the film canisters on UPS trucks and ship them back to the studio. I guess I should give the studio itself credit for letting it exist, albeit briefly, in cineplex venues. Will this happen again? Who knows? But sometimes anomalies morph into something commonplace. We'll wait and see.

This is Where I Leave You

**Spoiler Alert**

Director: Shawn Levy/Starring: Justin Bateman, Jane Fonda, Rose Byrne, Tina Fey, Kathryn Hahn, Adam Driver, Connie Britton, Timothy Olyphant and Corey Stoll

I wonder if Hollywood will ever tire of comedy/dramas centered around families gathering at a funerals. I've seen three such films this year: the awful August: Osage County, the awfuler Lullaby (which employs a dying father as motivation for a family to gather) and now This is Where I Leave You, which is not the awfulest of the tribe but pretty damn close. All the films use the done-to-death funeral plot contrivance as a way for characters to air out grievances, address past wrongs and renew old familial feuds.

Shawn Levy's film, based on a novel by Jonathan Tropper, employs all the familiar aforementioned narrative traits. And like other movies of this breed, it becomes unbearably monotonous...and fast. That Levy assembled such a talented cast for this nonsense is quite impressive but it becomes less so when it becomes clear they have nothing to say, though they say it compulsively. Whenever anyone feels the need to verbalize, which is frequently, they spew stagy dialogue where everyone has a pithy rejoinder to a smart-ass or self-consciously inappropriate comment.

The story centers on Justin Bateman's character Judd Altman; a producer of a popular shock-jock radio show whose star Wade Beaufort (Dax Shepard) is the Platonic ideal of jerkitude. When Judd arrives home early one day with a birthday cake for his wife, he finds Wade in bed with his wife. If that isn't enough of a cross to bear, he also receives a phone call from his sister Wendy (Tina Fey), informing him of their father's death.

As Judd's family gathers for the funeral, we meet each member and become acquainted with their quirks, personal issues and internecine, sibling strife.

Hilary Altman (Jane Fonda), the family matriarch, has just lost her husband and though bereaved, wears mourning attire that highlights her newly augmented breasts. This becomes joke-fodder for the family, which left me feeling queasy. I don't know if it's a cultural norm with those of the Jewish persuasion, but we hear the Altman family make many explicit comments about sex, particularly when it involves siblings or the mother. I'm no prude, but I would think most families would find sharing comments about their mother's breasts and their brother's masturbatory habits taboo subjects. As Judd and his mother lay out a basement bed for his stay, Hilary's breasts dangle from her bathrobe. After urging his mother to cover up, she gently chides him for finding the sight of her breasts objectionable.

Judd's family and extended family arrive at Hilary's home with their respective life-baggage. Wendy's husband is emotionally unavailable and overly devoted to his career, brother Phillip (Adam Driver) is unemployed, unemployable and in therapy, and another brother Paul (Corey Stoll) is having trouble impregnating his wife while also struggling to maintain control of the family sporting goods business, of which the siblings all share part-ownership.

Phillip also has his therapist/girlfriend in tow; Tracy (Connie Britton), an older woman whose attraction to the younger man conflicts with her misgivings about his immaturity and penchant for seeing other women.

What one is wont to find in films of this variety are former classmates, crushes or friends the characters encounter. Judd runs into Penny (Rose Byrne), a former schoolmate for whom he develops a romantic interest. His volatile relationship with his wife of course complicates the attraction.
Wendy also has her romantic furnace stoked by family friend and sporting goods employee Horry Callen (Timothy Olyphant). Horry is afflicted with a mild mental impairment which stems from a head injury he received while in Wendy's company during an accident in the past. Like Judd's affection for Penny, Wendy's attraction to Horry fills an emotional void in her marriage and represents some unfinished, romantic business. Upon the first meetings between Judd and Penny and Wendy and Horry, we know intuitively--as if it were written in sky--where these sub-plot developments will lead.

It seems impossible to square Phillip's ability to charm women with his personality. How any woman could find such an a-hole supernova like Phillip attractive sorely tests our ability to suspend disbelief. Adam Driver seems to have no difficulty playing such obnoxious lunkheads, for only recently he played another in What If. I sincerely hope he strays from this pigeon-holing in the future otherwise he may not be able to play anything else convincingly.

It seems Jane Fonda can only appear in a film (these days, anyway) to show us how great she looks. Of course she can hardly be blamed for her character limitations when Hollywood has no idea how woman older than 40 behave and think. And they don't want to know. It is mind-blowing to consider Fonda is now 77 though her figure is that of someone less than half her age. If only someone could and would write her a character with some depth and dimension to challenge her beauty.

As the family occupies Hilary's house, animosities arise and secrets are unearthed. Most character's secrets seem to be revealed like clockwork; every 15 minutes or so, which are followed by blather like "why didn't you tell us/me?," and glib jokes and comments. When Hilary divulges her big secret near the end, it comes off more as a plot accessory rather than something plausibly organic. And what is typical of this genre is behavior that screams "though we're dysfunctional, aren't we so quirky and lovable?"

I saw the film with a capacity crowd, one that laughed uproariously at what I found to be somewhat clever but unfunny jokes or gags. Some aren't so clever. Paul's son's potty-training tendencies, which involve his hauling his potty around, are played for laughs but are just painfully cutesy.

A crowd's reaction is never a reliable gauge of a film's comedic or dramatic value. Though it is fun to watch a film with a large audience, collective laughter or applause can distort one's perception of the film. Over the din of laughter, I somehow managed to see through the formulae and the stock characterizations. I'm sure critics and other filmgoers will too.

I really wished I could have told the characters to shut up for five minutes. The noise generated by the family's incessant chatter made my head hurt. When smart-alecky jokes and jibes weren't being sprayed like buckshot, dime-store platitudes made reliable surrogates.

I may have to avoid films like This is Where I Leave You forever hereafter. But given my inability to ever learn a lesson, I could very well grouse next time too.