Movies out today: Slapstick, teens and Germans

-
Three very different movie open in South Africa today. I can't say any of the trio particularly appeal to me but perhaps one will be up your alley.

Mad Buddies:
Sure to break local box office records from today is the latest lowbrow comedy from Leon Schuster. Eschewing candid camera gags for a fictional narrative, the funnyman plays a former anti-poaching operative who is forced to road-trip from Durban to Johannesburg with his sworn enemy (Kenneth Nkosi). Little do they know their bickering misadventures are being filmed by an ambitious TV producer (Tanit Phoenix) for a new reality show.

If you have a more sophisticated sense of humour, stay far away from Mad Buddies, which sticks to the Schuster formula of slapstick gags ad nauseum - typically involving body functions or an accident-prone midget. If, however, you enjoy puerile poop jokes, you'll probably love the film. For the record, The Movies.co.za gave Mad Buddies 3 and a half stars out of 5... although that score didn't come from one of our regular reviewers.


LOL:
If you've ever wanted to watch a movie where Miley Cyrus plays with her cellphone for 97 minutes, here's your chance! In this comedy coming-of-age tale - based on a successful, award-winning French film - Cyrus plays a high schooler who is so busy living her life and sharing her saucy adventures via social media that a massive communication gap has widened between her and her mother (Demi Moore).

LOL wasn't screened for critics when it was released in the US back in May. So few people watched it that the film doesn't even have a Rotten Tomatoes rating. It has however earned itself 1.8 stars out of 10 on the IMDB user review scale. Words like "vapid," "painful," "moronic" and "made for TV" have been used to describe the film. Beware.


Goethe!:
Screening at select Ster Kinekor cinemas is this German-language historical romance, also known as Young Goethe in Love. Seriously. Alexander Fehling plays the 18th Century philosopher, poet and politician in his youth. Sent to the sleepy countryside after failing his law exams, Goethe falls for a local beauty, Lotte (Miriam Stein), who is betrothed to another man.

Apparently in the vein of Shakespeare in Love, Goethe! mixes romance, humour and drama to (mostly) satisfying effect. Sporting a Rotten Tomatoes rating of 61% Fresh, the film is far from deep but offers some lighthearted and charming escapism. Probably not the most realistic portrayal of Goethe though.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Is the rebooted Lara Croft gay? Evidence for and against...

-
Image
As some of you know, I’ve been fangirling hard over the new Tomb Raider , the first entry in the video game series since 2008, and ostensibly a reboot for the entire franchise . Taking the form of an origin story, Tomb Raider 2013 depicts the events that transformed a beautiful, if bookish, archaeology graduate into a pistol-packing adventurer with a devil-may-care attitude. We meet Lara Croft as a pretty, fairly ordinary 21 year old, brooding over her work notes, listening to her mp3 player and very much confined to the shadow of her male mentors. By the end of the game, however, she’s taken charge – she’s had to! – and, battered, bruised and bloody, she’s both a survivor and hero, right down to rescuing the princess and carrying her away in her arms. Yeah, this is probably the best point to mention that there will be some Tomb Raider 2013 spoilers in this post, so read ahead with caution. Anyway, I loved the game. Technically it’s near faultless, it looks beautiful, the ov...
Read more

Lara Croft: Tomb Raider and Queer Icon (Part 4)

-
Image
Part 4: The mystery of Lara Croft’s sexuality “Now what’s a man gotta do to get that kind of attention from ya?” – Larson Conway (Tomb Raider, 1996) Despite being an icon for many queer pop culture consumers, Lara Croft’s own sexual orientation remains ambiguous. Outside of the Top Cow comics and live-action films – where Lara is blatantly heterosexual, with a fondness for slightly scruffy bad boys (who keep betraying and hurting her) – the character comes across as primarily asexual. Kurtis Trent is the only male figure who even comes close to being a love interest in the game series. Lara's apparent sexual disinterest is despite the adventurer appearing very sexually attractive herself; a figure of desire with bee-stung lips, voluptuous breasts, toned stomach and impossibly long, athlete’s legs. Yet Lara is never dominated by sexual yearnings or romantic affections. She is very much in control of herself at all times. It’s worth noting, however, that over time th...
Read more

Ladies I Love: Part 2 - Rhona Mitra

-
Image
Following on from the first post in this series , you may realise that I have a very definite type. Anyway, today we profile model-turned-actress Rhona Mitra . This 36 year old Briton is of English, Irish and Indian descent. You'll have seen her pop up on the big and small screen multiple over the past decade and a half, although Mitra's claim to fame is that she was the second ever model (some say first if you rule out "unofficial"  Nathalie Cook ) to play iconic video game character Lara Croft . From 1997-1998, Mitra could be found in PR material, as well as at trade shows, events and conventions as a flesh-and-blood embodiment of Tomb Raider 's kick-ass archeologist lead. There have been many official Lara Croft models over the years , but as far as I'm concerned Mitra remains the best. In my mind, of all of them, she most closely resembles the video game character in terms of facial features. Plus she comes from money and had a rebellious boarding...
Read more