Joan Cusack

Nine Months (1995)

Nine Months (1995)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On TV, March 2020) Writer-director Chris Columbus’ assignment on Nine Months was simple: turn in a slightly hysterical portrayal of a commitment-phobe young man in the process of becoming a father. Whether he succeeded is debatable. There are certainly good arguments in favour: Hugh Grant is in full befuddled floppy-raised butterfly-blinking mode here, almost sending up his own early-career persona. If you care about cutie redheads, there’s a young and soft Julianne Moore, plus Joan Cusack as an unexpected bonus. A strong supporting cast includes Tom Arnold, Jeff Goldblum and Robin Williams doing an Eastern-European shtick. Nine Months is luminously shot in beautiful San Francisco, and has a few amusing comic moments. Alas, it’s not all good, and what’s not good arguably overwhelms the rest. Columbus has significant problems striking an even tone between the universality of its premise and the wild comic extremes of some sequences. Much of the character drama that should emerge organically instead seems contrived through characters who make dumb choices because the script requires it to prolong the tension. Even for comic effects, the protagonist seems remarkably clueless. Suspension of disbelief snaps a few times, whether it’s from perplexing character actions, or even simple physics. (No, you can’t be suddenly hit in the face by a swing you’re casually pushing.) Nine Months tries hard, and probably too hard: it tries to take two directions at once and ends up confused about what it was trying to do.

Broadcast News (1987)

Broadcast News (1987)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On Cable TV, March 2020) This almost counts as a second viewing of Broadcast News for me—I distinctly recall seeing the last half of it sometime during the 1990s and being both impressed by the film’s intelligence and disappointed at the somewhat sad ending. But half a film isn’t the same as the entire one, and watching this in middle age doesn’t hit quite the same as an older teen. One thing remains constant, and it’s that Broadcast News still captures the organized madness of TV news like few other films: writer-director James L. Brooks uses the medium’s fundamental tension (entertainment versus substance) as an engine through which to propel a romantic triangle and a series of thorny ethical crises. Holly Hunter is the rock on which the film rests, as a news producer attracted to two very different reporters—William Hurt as the pretty-boy anchor, and Albert Brooks as the solid but prickly expert. (Meanwhile, Joan Cusack is very cute in a supporting role, and owns a flashy action sequence in the first act. Oh, and Jack Nicholson has a cameo as, well, pretty much that universe’s equivalent to God.) It’s all very clever and witty—filmmaking for middlebrow adults able to tolerate a bit of theatrics in order to illustrate a more subtle point. I liked Broadcast News even more this almost-second-time around now that the ending doesn’t strike me as particularly sad, just appropriate.

The Allnighter (1987)

The Allnighter (1987)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On TV, January 2020) I’m about this close to declaring a critical forfeit about The Allnighter, my reasoning being that this is really a movie produced for someone else entirely—female twentysomethings of the mid-1980s… and what do I really know about that? I ogled them at the time, and I suppose that I can still appreciate the big curly hair today. There have been silly movies for teens for decades and there will still be many of them in other decades as well—this just happens to be time-stamped 1987. As such, The Allnighter is a curiously tame “sex comedy” from the point of view of college girls as they go out to have the best night of their lives. There are a few references for celebrity trivia fans: Bangles singer Susanna Hoffs stars in a film directed by her mother, with a young Joan Cusack as a co-lead, and Pam Grier as a police officer in the inglorious phase of her career. It’s all more amiable than funny, and I think that this is one of those films enhanced by time rather than damaged by it: It’s a bubble-headed comedy, but it now has the atmosphere, colour and fashions of the 1980s going for it. The Allnighter is not essential viewing by any means, but not that objectionable either.

Snatched (2017)

Snatched (2017)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On Cable TV, March 2019) The issues with Snatched start from the first title card, where a wittier “The kidnappers were also to blame” was replaced by a much cruder and dumber formulation. But so it goes throughout the entire film—while the premise and structure aren’t bad, the execution rushes to irritating, gross and dumb material every chance it gets. For an actress as polarizing as Amy Schumer, it’s not the best decision to spend the first five minutes of the film establishing the maximally irritating nature of her character. Much of the film goes on in much of the same vein, with Schumer’s vulgar comic persona harming whatever strengths Snatched may have. Not that she’s the sole irritating character in a film that has another character (her brother) also defined by his self-absorbed annoying nature. The film does get a few laughs and has a few high points, mind you: There is a certain welcome unpredictability to the adventures along the way, as plans go awry for both prey and pursuer. Much of the film’s go-for-broke humour should have been reined in, though: the tapeworm sequence depends on an amazing disregard for human biology, is grosser than funny and never leads to a worthwhile laugh, petering out into an unrelated next scene rather than ending on any kind of note high or low. (I suspect that improv is to blame — actors goofing off on a set are far less adept at crafting a punchline as screenwriters tying away with a plan.) And so it goes for the rest of the film. While Wanda Sykes is quite funny (alongside an unrecognizable Joan Cusack), while it’s actually good to see Goldie Hawn making a comeback after fifteen years, while Schumer can manage an occasional moment of comedy, Snatched as a whole is just dumb, exasperating and hypocritical in its attempt to be heartfelt, and far from being as good at it could have been.

My Sister’s Keeper (2009)

My Sister’s Keeper (2009)

ByChristian Sauvé Movie Review

(On Cable TV, February 2017) I expected much, much worse from My Sister’s Keeper. On paper, it reads as the kind of weepy manipulative Hollywood drama that got satirized out of existence decades ago: a mixture of cancer-afflicted kids, precocious protagonists and ineffectual adults manipulated into melodramatic actions. On-screen, though, it’s not quite as bad … even though its nature as a tearjerker remains intact. Part of it has to do with good actors and small moments where the script doesn’t quite go as expected. I quite liked Alec Baldwin’s lawyer character, for instance, and the ways in which an entire movie’s worth of motivations is suggested for Joan Cusack’s judge character. Professionally directed by Nick Cassavetes (no stranger to weepies) from Jodi Picoult’s eponymous novel (apparently changed to much better effect), My Sister’s Keeper also benefits from a great performance by Abigail Breslin in the lead role, and a borderline-unlikable Cameron Diaz as the mother antagonist. But perhaps less identifiably, the film does have a good moment-to-moment watchability that can often doom less well-executed attempts on similar material. It remains a straight character drama, but one put together with some skill. And that makes all the difference between something that sounds terrible, and something that’s engaging.