Leap Year

I now realize that this blog has become a review of each new chick flick that comes out mainly because that is what I primarily watch. I know there are great serious movies out there and people recommend them all of the time, but I can't resist every absurd romantic comedy that somehow gets made. Naturally I had to see Amy Adams in Leap Year. This movie didn't get a lot of attention and wasn't in theaters long. This isn't surprising considering the plot. Amy Adams plays some interior decorating woman who helps people make apartments look nice and sellable. She is about to move in with her long time surgeon boyfriend and expects a proposal. After he doesn't propose at some fancy celebration dinner, he flies off to Ireland for some medical conference. Amy Adams then takes it upon herself to fly to Ireland and propose to her boyfriend because according to Irish tradition, a woman can propose to a man every leap year.

Despite that premise, the movie wasn't nearly as bad as I expected. I know it is kind of weird to watch a movie that I expect to be cheesy and terrible, but I still watch every one of them religiously. The only romantic comedy I refused to watch was Fever Pitch because it involved the Boston Red Sox. But back to Leap Year, Amy Adams ends up stranded in Ireland and makes a long journey with some Irish guy to find her boyfriend. Of course she falls for the Irish guy (in the poster) along the way and realizes that he is right for her. I still don't really like movies where the characters switch their significant others so easily, but at least the surgeon wasn't likable in this movie. This was much better than the Accidental Husband because that one made absolutely no sense why Uma Thurman would ditch Colin Firth. Their relationship didn't have problems and he wanted to marry her.

New York, I Love You

Based on the successful french film Paris, je t'ame, New York I Love You tells about 11 short stories about love in New York City. I read reviews about this movie and it did pretty well, but I didn't really get it. I only understood a few of the movies and the rest didn't really feel finished. I guess I wanted to see more. I like the format of movies that tell multiple stories in one film like Love Actually, but a lot of these stories didn't have an ending or work out. A few of them were cute and made sense, but others I had on idea what happened. I think I would need to watch it again to understand. There were quite a few famous people in it like Natalie Portman and Orlando Bloom and there were also a lot of characters. I guess my problem is that you don't really spend a lot of time with any of the characters or learn their stories completely. Some of the characters I didn't even understand why they were even in the movie. A lot of the stories were also pretty sad and involved death of some kind. It was definitely not a chick flick or romantic comedy.

I did find it interesting how they incorporated New York city into the plot. The movie could be viewed as a tribute to New York City where the characters are in fact insignificant, but what is important is showing how many people are interacting and having some kind of story in the beautiful scenery of the city or central park. It does show different parts as well as cultures that are in New York so it creates a mixture of different economic and racial backgrounds. It also shows people of different professions from writers to artists to business men. It was also interesting how many scenes involved smoking cigarettes. It felt like the way most of the characters interacted was by smoking a cigarette outside with another person. Given how smoking is banned from television advertisement and pretty much vilified in society, it was interesting to show it as a way for strangers to interact and meet in the city.

The Accidental Husband

I really have no idea why I watched this movie. My friend had it and it was a chick flick so I naturally I couldn't resist. I can believe most plots in chick flick movies but for some reason the story and inconsistencies really bothered me. Uma Thurman plays a relationship advice radio person who in the beginning scene advises a caller that her fiancee might not be right for her. The fiancee is played by Jeffrey Dean Morgan. He was in P.S I Love You. So he hears the whole conversation on the radio with his co-workers. He is a fireman. Obviously he is pretty mad this random lady could end his relationship, even though they must not have had a very strong one to begin with seeing as how she was seeking radio advice. To punish her, he has some techno kid he knows break into some database legal thing and make a marriage license so that they are legally married. This way she is punished because she really is engaged to Colin Firth, who incidentally is very angry when he finds out she is married. The rest of the plot doesn't really make that much sense. Spoiler alert they do fall in love. The rest of the movie is a bunch of random scenes that don't make logical sense as to what the characters are doing. For example, when Thurman first confronts her actual husband, which I am not entirely sure that document would hold up in court, he tricks her into getting drunk by making fun of her for not drinking with the fireman guys. Her life begins to spiral apart. He then finds her at work where he walks with her to the cake tasting. Makes a complete fool of himself with eating all of the cake. These two old ladies, however, love him and ask about how they met. This whole elaborate story of meeting could be avoided by saying yeah we are not engaged, he's just helping me or something like that. What really bothered me about this scene was that it didn't make sense why these two old women, already married to their respective husbands were at a wedding cake tasting place. They were like just eating a slice of cake and the beginning of the scene showed that the shop was only a wedding cake place.

Oh and of course as they end up together, Colin Firth easily lets her go because he can see that he lost her. Yea that would really happen. How can you be engaged to someone else, they had been dating for years, living together, and she easily ditched him. Oh and he was pretty casual about it. Of course they waited until the wedding to do so, which is just rude to all of those guests who came and brought presents. Oh and the fireman was really angry when he lost his fiancee at the beginning of the movie because she was the love of his life. But he got over that loss just fine.

I believed the premise of When in Rome easier. And that movie involved a plot where a woman steals coins from a fountain and those men who through the coins fall madly in love with her and stalk her in New York City. I guess movies where characters are in love with people and then ditch them right before the wedding bothers me. At least in this one the two dumpees didn't end up together because those endings are annoying as well.

Up

I never thought a kids cartoon movie would make me cry in the first fifteen minutes. People I know who saw it told me it was sentimental and made them tear up, yet I did not believe. I didn't get to see the movie in 3d because I had to rent it, but the visuals of the colorful balloons and animated people were still really cool. I really liked this movie because it was so well done and actually had a plot. So many kids movies now are really bad like the talking chihuahua ones that parents are forced to sit through for their kids. The fact that Up appeals to both children and adults is probably the reason it was so successful. It really touches on the idea that relationships are so important in our lives and that we need to appreciate the people we are with while we are still together with them. I thought that the little boy was cute, albeit annoying at many times. I guess I liked him from the moment that he stood on the porch and tried to help the old man to earn his patch. I thought that the way he advertised his help was really funny. The middle of the movie dragged on kind of long and I was sort of waiting for their adventure to end, but the ending of the movie was really good. It is strange how you can feel so much sympathy for these weird square headed people, but you really connect to them. I know that I am one of the last people to see this movie, but I would recommend it to people.

How to Marry a Millionaire

I really like watching old movies, so this week I decided to watch one that I haven't seen yet. How to Marry a Millionaire is a 1953 romantic comedy starring Marilyn Monroe, Betty Grable, and Lauren Becall. The three young women rent a fancy penthouse in New York City from a man who is trying to avoid the IRS by living in Europe. The three women plan to use their location to attract millionaire men they can marry. The movie follows the three women as they date various men and plan and trap them into marriage. All of the women are really funny and compliment each other perfectly. The brains behind their plan is Becall who is being courted by a millionaire, that she believes is poor. He obviously knows that she is a gold digger and wants to marry for love and to teach her a lesson in the importance of money. Betty Grable plays a ditzy blond who loves food and actually meets men by having them pay for her groceries when she "forgets" her money. Marilyn Monroe's character is definitely the funniest as her character refuses to wear her glasses because she believes men would not be interested in women who do. The comedy around her character comes from her running into walls and not knowing who any of the men are in the film. The movie is actually really funny and well done. The ending is perfect and you grow to love all of the characters, even though the women are gold diggers. It is funny to watch old movies like this and see how women are portrayed in the movies. Marilyn Monroe plays the same dumb blonde character in every movie I have ever seen her in. Lauren Becall is the actual smart female lead as she is the brains behind their operation and devises their whole apartment plan. There is one scene in the movie when all three women escort rich men to dinner and they are wearing long pretty dresses and sit there nodding and sounding impressed every few minutes. Their profession in the movie is modeling clothes for stores and using their looks to find men. It is just kind of interesting when you compare women in movies then and now and see how the stories have changed. But you really can't blame these women as their only chance at money and happiness seems to be from marring a wealthy man.