Julie’s biological clock is ticking, so she convinces her best friend, Jason to father a child with her. Unlike their married friends, they have an easier time as parents without the complication of being in a relationship. But as they start to date other people, they find their special arrangement unraveling.
Starring Jennifer Westfeldt, Adam Scott and Maya Rudolph.
Directed by Jennifer Westfeldt.
Written by Jennifer Westfeldt.
Produced by Joshua Astrachan, Riza Aziz, Jon Hamm, Jake Kasdan and Joey McFarland.
Genre: Romantic Comedy.
So you’re going along living your life and suddenly find yourself at a point where most of the people in your inner circle are having kids and you’re the last woman standing so to speak. The dynamics have changed within your relationships and you realize you’ve embarked on a new phase of your life so you end up asking yourself…”Self, what happens next?” Well if you’re Jennifer Westfeldt you partner up with your gorgeous boyfriend who happens to be wonderfully talented and round up your equally smart, funny, talented friends and you write, produce, direct and star in your own film and name it Friends with Kids. Recently I had a chance to sit down with the ever lovely and multi-talented Jennifer Westfeldt to discuss women in entertainment making it happen for themselves, our ten year reunion and of course her wonderful new movie “Friends with Kids”.
I think I laughed maybe twice over the course of the two trailers for Bridesmaids. Despite this, I decided that I would check out the film for a couple of reasons – the producing directing team of Judd Apatow and Paul Feig, and the combination of Kristen Wiig, Rose Byrne and Melissa McCarthy. It didn’t hurt that Wiig also co-wrote the film. The result is about 75% hilarious and 50% cringeworthy [there’s a 25% overlap…].
Ben Affleck gets a bad rap from critics and fanboys alike. The problem is a few years ago he had a year when he was over exposed and in 5 or 8 movies in one year, then he hooked up with J. Lo and that bread more contempt from moviegoers. Personally, I was never on the Affleck hate bandwagon, I thought he was good in Armageddon and I don’t get the hate for the Daredevil movie – it’s about what I would have expected from it, no it wasn’t a great movie but I didn’t think it was the worst thing since Ishtar either. Beyond over exposure, the other issue with Affleck is he can only play one type of character – The Boston “Southy”. That is his wheelhouse and he needs to stick with it for a while. Nowhere is this more evident than in his latest effort, the crime drama The Town.
With “Awards Season” in full swing, we come to my favorite awards show to watch – The Golden Globes [the Globes' new look featured, above]. Where else can you see an award winner rush from the little girls’ room to the stage, trailing a piece of toilet paper from her shoe [Christine Lahti, you are immortal because of this], or another award winner insist upon giving his award to the actor who inspired him to become an actor [the only award Jack Lemmon ever got that was voted for by a panel of one – and who knows how many other actors he inspired...?]. Thank you speeches that come from the heart or, on occasion, from a few too many drinks… The Golden Globes are fun because you get more moments from real people than all the other awards shows combined [excepting, possibly, The Spirit Awards]. Plus, the Globes honor movies and television – so there are twice as many opportunities for entertainment. So, here, after the jump, here are the nominees and my choices.
The Robert Wise film, The Day The Earth Stood Still, was a metaphor for a cold war that was threatening to go hot. The remake is an ecological horror tale – if we can’t take care of the earth, we – and everything we’ve created – will be removed.
It seems that we are at the edge of a great precipice – not unlike the civilizations that grew on a handful of other planets out there in the universe. Klaatu [Keanu Reeves] has been sent to carry out the removal of the one major blight on the planet – us. Where the precipice comes in is when a beautiful scientist, Dr. Helen Benson [Jennifer Connelly], asks him if the other civilizations Out There had come to such a precipice and what happened.
So, despite the governments and people of Earth behaving like paranoid imbeciles – and even Helen’s stepson, Jacob [Jaden Christopher Smith] says we should kill Klaatu – even though all that violence and paranoid is only offset by a bit of Bach and the love Helen has for Jacob, Klaatu has had the answer he needed all along. It just takes one beautiful lady scientist to ask the question that shakes the answer loose. That’s drama, folks!
For the third time in three weeks, I’ve seen a film that held a certain amount of promise and discovered that promise is wonderful for trailers, but films need a bit more than that. The Day The Earth Stood Still is well made. It moves at an appropriate pace; most of the effects are quite effective; most of the cast give solid performances [Reeves is his usual Tabula Rasa self – you see what you want to see in his transparent performance... or not...], and there’s even a moral to the story.
Too bad that that the whole thing just so damned silly.
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