Drew Barrymore

Bad Girls (1994)

Bad Girls (1994)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(In French, On Cable TV, July 2020) There were a surprising number of revisionist westerns in the 1990s, each one poking and prodding at various aspects of the classic Hollywood western tradition. The male domination of the genre is clearly the thing that Bad Girls wants to discuss, but there had to be a better way of doing it. With Madeleine Stowe, Mary Stuart Masterson, Drew Barrymore and Andie MacDowell, Bad Girls attempts to upend the usual western clichés by making the prostitutes the heroines of their own stories, taking revenge over bad men. It’s not a bad premise, but the way the film goes about it feels subservient to a male gaze in its execution. (Not to mention rape as a near-omnipresent plot device.) Our heroines are often scantily clad, going for titillation as much as empowerment. It really does not help that the film is executed flatly, with little in terms of wit and grace in the dialogue and situations. Director Walter Scott seems content to play with the images of the genre without doing anything much with them. Even in presenting women as western heroines, the film errs in caricatures. I still think that the premise holds a lot of potential, and I am a bit surprised that a quick search for “feminist western” doesn’t reveal any well-known successors. But Bad Girls doesn’t set much of an example—it simply doesn’t know what to do with its potential, and wastes almost all of it along the way.

Grey Gardens (2009)

Grey Gardens (2009)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On Cable TV, April 2020) Mere hours after I watched the 1973 documentary Grey Gardens on TCM, its more modern fictional adaptation played on HBO—an ideal occasion to do some comparative analysis. Both films are about two old women (mother and daughter, respectively aunt and cousin to Jaqueline Bouvier Kennedy Onasis) living together in a vast but decrepit house in the Hamptons. Rather than the unfiltered cinema-vérité of the original, this adaptation provides a scripted narrative for the actresses, hopping between the glory days of the pair and the aftermath of their downfall. While it may not be as striking a cinematic artifact as its predecessor, nor capture the story as nakedly, it’s a great deal more interesting to 2020 viewers than the original thanks to material attempting to explain what is happening. (This is true all the way to repeated CGI fly-bys showing the differences between the house in 1936 and 1973.) Having seen both movies practically back-to-back, I can testify that this reconstitution nails the visuals of the original film with an uncanny fidelity, especially when it recreates the shooting of the documentary. The hand of fiction is comforting here, allowing the insertion of additional material to heighten the dramatic impact and ensure that it all makes sense. Jessica Langue and Drew Barrymore star (with Jeanne Tripplehorn playing Jacqueline Kennedey) and even I have to admit that Barrymore has a great role here. Also of interest: the film’s insistence on providing a happy ending… of sorts.

Firestarter (1984)

Firestarter (1984)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(In French, On TV, April 2020) 1980s Stephen King adaptations span the scale from terrible to terrific, and Firestarter lands right in the middle of it, meaning that it’s both mediocre and bland. Anyone who has read the novel will be disappointed at how much of the humanistic material has been stripped away, leaving in its place a blunt blend of paranoid thriller, paranormal powers, secret government experiments and endangered children. Some of it does work, mind you: the father-daughter relationship is effectively sketched, and Firestarter remains more interesting than it could have been because it doesn’t settle for a simple chase narrative. Special effects are not bad for a lower-budget mid-1980s film, with some spontaneous combustion out of thin air. A very young Drew Barrymore stars, and much scenery is chewed by George C. Scott. Still, while much of what works here is taken straight from the novel, the film itself simply refuses to go anywhere beyond a mediocre middle-of-the-road adaptation. There’s little life to Mark L. Lester’s direction, and aside from a climax that appropriately burns everything up, the film has trouble sustaining the pacing that a thriller should have. I suppose that King fans weren’t too disappointed in Firestarter back in 1984—after all, no less than seven King adaptations were released in 1983–1985. Not all of them could be complete successes.

Whip It (2009)

Whip It (2009)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On TV, March 2020) The familiarity of Whip It, which blends a girl’s coming-of-age struggle with an underdog sports comedy, isn’t really a handicap. It offers reassuring guide rails in which to set this story of a young woman from rural Texas discovering her true character thanks to… competitive roller-derbies. Okay. Directed by Drew Barrymore and featuring a heavily female cast, Whip It can be seen as a charming girl-empowerment film (and one that’s more honest about it than today’s films, but I digress) with good performances and a very good soundtrack. It features a thick Austin atmosphere, some punk girl fun and plenty of small details. Ellen Page is quite cute in the lead role, but the entire cast is remarkable in-between Alia Shawkat, Kristen Wiig, Zoë Bell, Juliette Lewis, Barrymore herself and others. (Plus, Jimmy Fallon as an announcer.) In the end, Whip It is a celebration of oddball affirmation, and I’m completely on-board with it.

Altered States (1980)

Altered States (1980)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(Google Play Streaming, December 2019) As someone who watches way too many movies, one of the best things I can say after seeing one is “Wow, that was weird.”  It doesn’t always link with quality, but it does correlate with memorability. Altered States is one weird movie, especially seen outside its 1980s sociocultural context. Circa-2020 society has plenty of issues, but it does feel as if we’re less likely to believe woo-woo parasciences than in 1980, and Altered States depends on taking these things seriously in order to work. There’s plenty of psychobabble as the film sets up a premise in which American academic parapsychologists start messing with isolation tanks and take heroic quantities of drugs in order to unlock other states of consciousness. This being a thriller, it goes without saying that the efforts are successful and homicidal as one of the characters physically regresses to an earlier species and naturally starts murdering people. The final act is a trip put on film as hallucinogenic visions (as executed by dated special effects shots) represent how the protagonist is slipping in and out of reality, endangering his family along the way. It’s bonkers, and it’s that crazy quality that makes the film compelling even as not a single word of it is credible. According to legend, director Ken Russell and screenwriter Paddy Chayefsky clashed during the film’s production (to the point of Chayefsky being credited under a pseudonym), and this tension can be seen in the contrast between the script’s earnestness and the wild colourful direction. If wild movies aren’t your thing, consider that the film has early roles for William Hurt and Drew Barrymore, as well as a turn for Bob Balaban. Altered States is not good Science Fiction: In the biz, we’d call it “not even wrong” for its delirious depiction of science and scientists at work. But it’s an over-the-top hallucination and as such is likely to stick in mind far longer than more sedate works of the period.

Fever Pitch (2005)

Fever Pitch (2005)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On TV, December 2018) As the legend goes, Fever Pitch was designed to be a bittersweet romantic comedy featuring Jimmy Fallon as a lifelong dedicated fan of the Boston Red Sox—who always lost in the playoffs. Except that, in shooting the movie … the Sox won the World Series, breaking a multi-decade curse drought. That’s kind of adorable (especially since the movie was shooting at some of those unexpectedly victorious playoff games), which is very much in-keeping with the tone of the film. As a romantic comedy focusing more than usual on the male character (shown to have issues with his sports fandom), it’s the kind of sweet and forgettable film that can be watched at any time with any kind of audience. It’s harmless, buoyant, not without its dramatic trials and coincidentally set against one of the most improbable events in American sports history. (Well, until 2016 rolled around with all kinds of freakish wins.) The portrait of an obsessed sports fan is not bad, as are the complications that come with it. The portrait of Boston is convincing, and the human leads don’t do poorly either: Fallon is not annoying here, and Drew Barrymore is surprisingly sympathetic. I’m not normally a fan of either actor, but the film does manage to give them likable roles. While I’m not going to put Fever Pitch on any best-of list (even as a Boston film, I can think of a few better choices), it’s harmless and fun and the unexpected win at the end of the movie where the plot and real-life events intersect is just the cherry on top of a tolerable romantic comedy.

Music and Lyrics (2007)

Music and Lyrics (2007)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On TV, May 2017) Innocuous but likable, Music and Lyrics manages to exceed the familiar average for romantic comedies, largely based on the strengths of its lead actors and the interesting backdrop in which the familiar rom-com situations occur. Hugh Grant stars as a washed-up popstar eking a living through royalties and small concerts in dismal places. When he’s asked to pen a song for a young and impulsive signer (Haley Bennett, playing a character that now seems like a slightly demented blend of Taylor Swift and Katy Perry), he comes to rely on an eccentric woman (Drew Barrymore, less bland than usual) to break through his creative block. The music-industry backdrop adds a lot to the film, especially in its high-comedy moments. Meanwhile, Grant and Barrymore work effectively together despite the fifteen-year age difference. Given those assets, it’s somewhat disappointing that the film can’t do anything else beyond relying on stock rom-com situations and false conflicts to juice up the drama. Even a mildly intriguing subplot about the female lead being the inspiration for a popular fictional antagonist eventually peters out to nothing much. Still, the film can coast a long time on its lead and backdrop, which helps make Music and Lyrics slightly more interesting than most of the other rom-com of the time. Give it a shot if you’re in that kind of mood.

EverAfter (1998)

EverAfter (1998)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On TV, December 2015)  Everyone’s got irrational dislikes for particular actors, and one of mine is Drew Barrymore.  I can’t explain it, shouldn’t proclaim it but won’t try to hide it.  While I can actually name a few movies of hers that I like (including a few in which she played a central role, such as the Charlie’s Angels films) and find that I’m disliking her less and less lately, EverAfter has taught me that my dislike of her in earlier roles remains real: Her turn as the protagonist of this reality-based take on the Cinderella fairy tale left me cold and wishing that just about any other age-appropriate actress could have taken the role.  It doesn’t help that the film itself feels so dull: Being quite familiar with the Cinderella story beat by virtue of having a young daughter, I find that any attempt to take supernatural elements out of the story makes it far less interesting.  Here, the insistence to “keep it real” by setting it in medieval France feels as if it’s holding the film back, especially when adding Leonardo da Vinci as a character makes a mockery of the whole realism thing.  Hammering modern social notions into that framework also feels beside the point, adding to the increasing lack of interest in the film as it rolls along.  Now that I think of it, you can add “making fairy tales gritty and realistic” to the list of my pet irrational dislikes: it doesn’t add much, takes a way of lot of potential greatness and misses the point of the fairy tales.  EverAfter feels rote, especially after the recent slew of revisionist takes on other classic fairy tales.  At this point, I can’t help but compare it to the live-action Disney remake of Cinderella and find it severely lacking in the wow department.  But, as they say, your mileage may vary… especially if you don’t quite have the same irrational dislikes as I do.

Duplex (2003)

Duplex (2003)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On TV, July 2015)  There’s a particular type of domestic bourgeois horror at the heart of Duplex, which is to say: what happens when a tenant not only refuses to leave, but makes your life miserable?  Ben Stiller, in his classic manic mode, and an unremarkable Drew Barrymore star in this black comedy whose main claim to fame remains that it’s directed by Danny DeVito.  Duplex is, for the most part, a reasonably entertaining accumulation of mayhem, as a sweet old lady proves to be the bane of our protagonist landlords.  It escalates quite a bit, in ways that don’t feel entirely natural.  The point of the film being embarrassment and violent intentions, it’s not the kind of comedy fit to be appreciated whole-heartedly.  The deliberately frustrating ending plays along that vein, making this a film for specific audiences.  At least it works on a basic level: most of the film is reasonably entertaining, moves from one plot point to another and packages everything in a neat bow (although, once again, you have to wonder about the sanity of antagonists trying those dangerous long-cons.)  Neither particularly good nor bad (albeit maybe irritating), Duplex seems to be the kind of film you see once, shrug off and then make no particular effort to see again.

Blended (2014)

Blended (2014)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On Cable TV, February 2015) Low expectations are a powerful thing: Given my track record with Adam Sandler’s most recent comedies, my overall lack of affection for Drew Barrymore, my general exasperation at broad family comedies and the rather pointed criticism of Blended as a borderline racist comedy, I really wasn’t expecting much from the time.  But it turns out that once you’re willing to cut a pick of slack to the film, Blended work relatively well as your average Hollywood family comedy.  Sandler of late seems to be settling into an innocuous father-figure comic archetype, not particularly funny but more palatable than his younger angry man-child persona.  Barrymore is unremarkable and there is some truth to the racism accusations (still, signing Terry Crews is hilarious even in his thankless role), but the African scenery is spectacular, the feeling of being in a five-star resort is credibly rendered, and there are amusing character moments here and there.  It’s not much (and Blended does not end on a high note by stretching out its foregone conclusion past the resort experience) but with the power of lowered expectations it’s just enough to be entertaining.