Two out of three ain't...Topher Grace

I don't HATE Topher Grace. Really, I don't. It's just going to take me a little while to get over this:
You could say I still (ahem) have VENOM for him...after that performance. The rest of the world must as well, because I swear since that movie came out he waited on me at Applebees. Good news, he's joining a cast way more talented than he is for Bobby Blue Sky, which will tell the tale of three siblings warped by their father's inclusion of one of them in a popular children's book. The other two siblings?

Mr. Paul Rudd

Ms. Kristen Wiig

So, as you can see, young Topher has his work rather cut out for him in keeping up with these two. Also, I don't know if the father has been cast yet, but if the call isn't out for Bill Murray, someone isn't trying hard enough. Is it just me, or can you see this being a Wes Anderson movie if done one way and an Adam McKay/Will Ferrell movie if done another? Weird.

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Movie Review: MacGruber

I was busy writing a Summer Movie preview and getting ready for/watching "Lost" to be productive enough to also review a movie this weekend. Thank God for Justin Senkbile, who turned in this!

G.I. Joke
Macgruber versus the legacy of SNL films
by Justin Senkbile

How can you possibly stretch Macgruber, the briefest of "Saturday Night Live" sketches, into a feature-length film? Well, you can't. Director Jorma Taccone (one third of The Lonely Island), along with co-writers Will Forte and John Solomon, apparently realized that, as opposed to Wayne's World, for example, where the characters were already fleshed-out beforehand, they'd have to invent Macgruber before they could film him.

The hapless dork we know from the show, who always sidetracks himself with trifling conversation and runs out of time before he can de-fuse the bomb, has been developed into something quite unexpected. Here, he's more of a misguided egomaniac than a simple fool.

He’s been playing dead for nearly ten years, but explosives expert Macgruber (Forte) is suddenly brought back into action when a massive nuclear warhead goes missing. The thief, Dieter Von Cunth (Val Kilmer), who also happens to be Macgruber's arch-nemesis, has plans to hurl the bomb towards Washington D.C. during the State of the Union address.

Macgruber, of course, isn't about to let that happen. With his team members Vicki St. Elmo (Kristen Wiig) and Lt. Piper (Ryan Phillipe), he sets out to stop Cunth and save America.

It's not nearly as funny as one would hope but, if nothing else, Macgruber is a pretty perceptive parody of 80's action movies and Reagan-era patriotic paranoia. Many of the interior scenes are flooded with that gaudy, soft white light that used to indicate romance, the stakes are the infinity of American pride, and the villains are all eastern European.

To make all these ingredients work together, Macgruber needed to be a little less twisted Dr. Phil and a little more bloodthirsty G.I. Joe. Unfortunately, the laugh-ratio seems to suffer because of this.

This shouldn't give the impression, though, that the Macgruber here really has a handle on much of what's going on, or that this movie isn't as loony as any other big screen "SNL" offerings. Macgruber's obsession with a certain license plate number is a wonderfully stupid touch, as are two of the weirdest sex scenes in recent memory (which come back to back, mind you).

The important thing here is that Macgruber, in spite of its shortcomings, doesn't come close to being one of the worst "SNL" films. When it's funny, it's very funny, it just unfortunately doesn't do justice to Forte's talent, or to the brilliant sketches from where it came.
Grade: B

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I heart Kristen Wiig

Hopefully, by this time next month, we're talking about how Kristen Wiig is going to be a big movie star. She's been doing the yeoman's work on "SNL" for years now, doing everything from thankless bit roles to carrying the whole damn show on her back. She's funny, she's clever, she's hot.
Seriously, hot, funny women who can write as well as she can shouldn't be forced to be supporting characters in Katherine Heigl and Drew Barrymore movies. That's beneath them. Anyway, I know it's not like she's not famous, but she deserves to be a movie star. I hope she's taking steps in that direction with her next flick, Clown Girl. Deadline says she picked up the rights to it with intent to develop it as a starring vehicle. Also, it's batshit insane. It's about a girl who plays "Sniffles the clown" who gets involved in a darkly comedic world of clown fetishists and nonsense. It sounds spectacularly hilarious and has the potential to be the funniest thing that happened to clowns since Bobcat Goldthwaite did his thing back in the day with Shakes. Wiig has had some supporting roles before, but she deserves better. I'm not saying I wouldn't miss her on "SNL," but she's just about run her main characters into the ground and I'm ready for some new, fresh blood. Doesn't it just feel like we're in for a transition to the next "great" "SNL" cast? That's really a post for a different day, but with Betty White and Jay-Z tag-teaming our sense of reality this weekend, it's been on my mind.

This can't be true...can it?

Raise your hand if you're excited for MacGruber, the full-length movie based on the "SNL" sketch based on the 1980s TV show "MacGuyver." Okay, officer, you're going to want to shoot those people with their hands up. Seriously, I don't care if Kristen Wiig is talented as hell, there's just no way you can breathe 90 minutes of funny into this concept...can you? Well some anonymous test screening subject told The Vertex that, in a nutshell, this is the funniest "SNL" movie since Wayne's World, which is really just saying it's marginally humorous. Apparently, they've taken the concept a bit further, fleshing out characters and...what am I saying? I mean, if this guy isn't some sort of studio plant job, he's at the very least soft-brained, right? I mean, the villain is played by fat Val Kilmer. I make that statement not because I am obsessed with physical perfection but to distinguish this guy:

from this guy:

,

Yeah, so, somebody ATE Val Kilmer and is now wearing his face to star in movies like MacGruber. Maybe I'm wrong, maybe we'll see the best of Will Forte and Wiig...and fat Val Kilmer (seriously, let's give this guy another name, calling him Val Kilmer seems wrong to the memory of Val Kilmer before he was eaten by this new guy...let's call him Lav Likmer). I'm guessing not still, though. No matter what "anonymous test screening subjects" have to say.

People do realize that these are all women, right?

As is my nature, I've been bitchin' and kvetchin' recently about the total ridiculous and explicitly sexist make-up of the Hollywood establishment (it's fun, you should join in). Unless there is a trick to operating a camera that uses the male sex organ, I have no idea why more women aren't behind the camera (and behind the women behind the camera). For now, the ascendancy of women into those roles will likely have to come in the way that Whip It! has come. The directorial debut of Drew Barrymore (who has parlayed her adorable lisp and kickin' curves into a production company), the film is (gasp) WRITTEN BY THE WOMAN WHO WROTE THE BOOK on which the film is based. It also primarily stars women (Ellen Page, Kristen Wiig, Drew, Juliette Lewis), appears to be intended FOR women, and yet doesn't appear to be full of the exact same repetitive bullshit that each and every rom-com/chick flick is stuffed with. No, it seems to be somewhat funny and could be, you know, good. Yes, it does seem a bit cliche, but you know what, if it's charming and sweet, I'm okay with that. Really, this is me being late to the party giving you a chance to see a trailer for a film totally powered by estrogen. I believe this brings the year's tally thus far to one.

'Whip It' Theatrical Trailer @ Yahoo! Video