Academy Award Losers That You Should Still See

Nebraska

It takes a while to finally see any good in Bruce Dern's character in Nebraska, but there sure are a lot of laughs before we get to that point.

Even though this little independent film had gotten rave reviews and Academy Award nominations, I wasn't really expecting that much from it. But it really is a lovable movie. And Will Forte really keeps his streak going alongside one of my favorite TV shows of the moment, The Last Man on Earth. His mother in Nebraska is an absolute hoot. She really tells it like it is, and Bob Odenkirk is also perfect for the role of the less-than-there brother.

It lost the Academy Award to 12 Years a Slave in 2014, but was indeed probably the second-best flick behind the winner for that year.

****1/2 out of ***** stars

Working Girl

The wild 1980s hair of the many women in the office pool wasn't the only influential part of Working Girl. It's main service to society was how it helped influence the breaking of the glass ceiling on Wall Street and throughout the U.S.

Melanie Griffith's character Tess McGill uses her ingenuity to plan a wise deal for a major conglomerate to acquire a radio network, if only the smoothly evil Sigourney Weaver doesn't sabotage her first. Good-guy Harrison Ford helps her out, while Alec Baldwin doesn't help much.

The views of New York City from the perspective of the Staten Island Ferry add to the power of the 1988 film, which was nominated for best picture, while Griffith was nominated for best actress, and Weaver and Joan Cusack for best supporting actress.

**** out of ***** stars

Horrible Bosses 2

Four years ago, I gave Horrible Bosses 3 out of 5 stars. If you liked that one enough, you'll like this one enough to at least watch it. Nothing great, but great comedic actors and a few laughs make it worthy enough.

Jason Bateman and the gang decide to get out from under the world of bosses and build an empire of their own with the Shower Buddy.

Umm, I don't think it was nominated for an Oscar.

**1/2 out of ***** stars

The Stones and the Holocaust Lead the Pack of Stuff You Should Watch Now

I've been doing a lot more TV- and movie-watching lately than blogging. What have I liked and what has stunk, you ask?

Crossfire Hurricane (***** out of ***** stars), a documentary about the darker side of the Rolling Stones, including the drug busts, Altamont, and the death of guitarist Brian Jones, is hands down the best thing I've seen this spring.

The runner-up, although extremely sad and very difficult to take, is another documentary, called Night Will Fall (***** out of ***** stars). It's the story of British and American filmmakers who were given access to the final days of the Nazi death camps. They film endless horrors but also capture everyday moments of at-least-momentary sanity behind the camp walls. The Germans decided the movies would hurt their attempts to move on as a people and buried the footage for years until now. I began watching because of the promise that Alfred Hitchcock would be featured as the man hired to direct the films. I stayed watching because this part of the Jewish people's history is too important to all of mankind and it's our duty to watch.

I finally got around to Martin Scorsese's The Wolf of Wall Street (****1/2 out of ***** stars) and I have to admit it is pretty great. If this 2013 fictionalization isn't reason enough for Congress to reform the investment sector, then at the very least Scorsese and star Leonardo DiCaprio have taken a step forward in helping us all realize the sliminess of the profession.

Three little films I didn't expect much from but ended up being pleased by include:

• This Is Where I Leave You (**** out of ***** stars): I guess it's just too difficult for Jason Bateman to do any wrong. It helps that the all-star cast works really well together. It includes Tina Fey, Adam Driver, and Jane Fonda.
• The Way, Way Back (***1/2 out of ***** stars): Fourteen-year-old shy kid Duncan has to spend the summer on Cape Cod with jerky relatives played by Steve Carell and Allison Janney. Luckily, he finds shelter with a new group of friends, including Sam Rockwell and Maya Rudolph, at the local water park.
• Talk Radio (*** out of ***** stars): I haven't missed many Oliver Stone flicks over the years, but this one from 1988 slipped past me. Eric Bogosian turns in a powerful performance as the talk host who passionately and offensively argues against everyone who calls the station.

I thought I would like A Million Ways to Die in the West (*1/2 out of ***** stars), but Seth MacFarlane rips off Blazing Saddles with absolutely none of that classic's charm. Painful.

I also looked forward to the sci-fi Ender's Game (*1/2 out of ***** stars), but the story of a kid sent to military school to train for an alien attack is an absolute snoozefest. Even Harrison Ford's cool can't save it. In fact, Ford is pretty bad and seems flat-out uninterested waiting around for his turn in the upcoming Star Wars reboot.

Also worth mentioning are four TV shows I have really been getting into: Bloodline, Breaking Bad, Orange is the New Black, and Bate's Motel. They're all well worth watching.

Bad Words Battles Unlikability to Become So Good

Jason Bateman's character Guy Trilby has issues. Those issues certainly make Trilby unlikeable and threaten, for a while, to make Bad Words unlikeable.

But then that risky setup unfolds and turns a ridiculously awful premise into a really compelling and creative one.

Bateman also directed the movie and clearly had a vision and a passion for the story. Trilby has a childish streak that is rooted in abandonment issues. It becomes clearer throughout, which helps slowly build suspense for the viewer, why he has entered himself into a prestigious national spelling bee.

Meanwhile, he leaves poop at his hotel's front desk, drives his reporter "friend" batty with his brooding silence, and befriends (in a roundabout way) one of his competitors, an independent and stubborn youngster.

Bateman is excellent as usual, with some unusual dramatic acting mixed in with his comedic talents. His supporting cast is excellent too. Kathryn Hahn is his "love interest," in a plot point that kind of fizzles but perhaps rightly so. Philip Baker Hall is classic as usual as the spelling-bee chief. And it's no wonder the adorable Rohan Chand will play Mowgli in The Jungle Book: Origins. He helps make Bad Words so good.

If one chooses not to view Bateman's character as a sorta sociopath, the movie is a funny, dramatic, and touching look at how damaging a childhood-deprived life can turn out.

**** out of ***** stars

(Also, I would place this at #6 on my list of the best Jason Bateman movies.)

The Top 10 Jason Bateman Movies

Who would have thought that all those episodes of Little House on the Prairie, Silver Spoons, and The Hogan Family would have led to something great. But that's just the case with Jason Bateman. I'll go ahead and say it: he's my favorite comedy actor. Take a look at this slate of powerhouse laugh-a-thons:

10. The Change-Up (2011)
09. Horrible Bosses (2011)
08. The Switch (2010)
07. Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story (2004)
06. Couples Retreat (2009)
05. Extract (2009)
04. Up in the Air (2009)
03. Juno (2007)
02. Forgetting Sarah Marshall (2008)
01. Arrested Development (I know, it's a TV show, but it's unbeatable, and supposedly there will be a movie version someday)

What do you think?

Bateman and Reynolds Surprisingly Bring the Laughs in The Change-Up

I went into watching The Change-Up with surprisingly low expectations. You know me: I love stupid comedies, especially the ones starring Jason Bateman.

But this one looked to be so bad and unoriginal. And although it is indeed pretty stupid, it's much more aligned with the "bromance" or even "chick-flick" genre than is usually expected of these kinds of silly productions.

Bateman plays a family man who has been too focused on his high-powered lawyer job. He sleepwalks through the abuse that his baby twins shoot at him. Into his mouth, to be semi-specific.

Ryan Reynolds (Adventureland, The Proposal, Harold and Kumar Go to White Castle), like Bateman, is lovable and funny. He plays a stoned playboy. The plot of the two of them switching bodies is admittedly lame, but these two work well as a comedy team, and The Change-Up proves to be a great option for a brain-dead Netflix night of laughs.

***1/2 out of ***** stars

Playin' Those Mind Games with Black Swan and Horrible Bosses

Shows you just how busy I've been at the UN climate talks in Durban, South Africa for the past two weeks: I haven't even reviewed the two movies I watched on the international red-eye over here.

One was excellent, and the other was a bit of a comedic let-down. First, the excellent.

Black Swan had been on my list for a while. Certainly not because of the ballerina plot line, but rather because two of my favorite actresses (Winona Ryder and Mila Kunis) star in it. And they don't disappoint, with Ryder as a washed-up superstar and Kunis as this generation's Winona Ryder (cute-and-dirty in the same package).

The psychological thriller watches the also-excellent and Academy Award-winner Natalie Portman fall into a tailspin as she tries to play both the white swan and the black swan in the upcoming production. The black part gives her fits, and her forceful director (the perfectly-cast Vincent Cassel) is just the tip of the iceberg of her problems.

Portman and Kunis trained hard to do a lot of their own ballet moves in the film, despite a controversy that flaired up from one of their body doubles saying they didn't do as many of the moves as the actresses said they did. Nevertheless, this is a film on par with some of Alfred Hitchcock's best. And Hitchcock being my favorite director, that's saying quite a lot.

The second movie I watched on the plane also involved mind games, albeit of much-less-dramatic sort. The comedy Horrible Bosses doesn't always work, but it generally supplies a good time, and the cast is hard to beat.

Jason Bateman is tormented by his satanic corporate boss Kevin Spacey, who is at his ruthless best. Charlie Day plays nearly the same role he plays in It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, which is fine, since that role is so hilarious. He is trying to keep his mind on his fiancee, but an over-the-top seductress boss by the name of Jennifer Anniston does her best to spoil his efforts. And Jason Sudeikis, who has never stood out for me on Saturday Night Live, is very solid as the good guy at a company with an uncaring, coke-snorting sleazeball of a boss.

Much as I love many of the actors here, the true star is Jamie Foxx, in a bit part as the gang's hitman they hire to off their three horrible bosses. Every line that comes out of his mouth is brilliant, and he actually saves this movie from becoming an unexpected stinker.

It took the director six years to make this film because of all types of production issues, and word is there's a sequel in the works. That may be the worst part about this movie, because this one would've probably been a good one to just let rest.

Black Swann: ****1/2 out of ***** stars
Horrible Bosses: *** out of ***** stars