Category: 2000s

A deathbed promise has lonely baker Robert Carlyle attending a dance class run by Mary Steenburgen to search for John Goodman’s childhood sweetheart. A very uneven bit of filmmaking that is only sold on its performances, it seems that the story is made of a half dozen ideas cobbled together incongruously. The one clever piece that it has going for it is working in director Randall Miller’s much earlier short film which allows Elden Henson to portray two characters at vastly different ages.

After surviving a car accident, clinical psychologist Halle Berry awakens as a patient in the mental institution where she works, accused of murdering her husband Charles S. Dutton. This certainly is not Halle’s best work nor is the story a particularly good one, but I was surprised at the direction it went and it kept me interested. I originally probably checked this out mostly for Robert Downey Jr. in a role that is tiny when compared to his position in the credits, but came away most impressed with Penélope Cruz’s supporting role as one of Berry’s troubled patients.   

High school teacher and unpublished writer Robin Williams is cursed with a vulgar and ungrateful teenaged son, Daryl Sabara. When Daryl dies during an unfortunate accident, Williams alters the death scene so that it looks like a suicide, a misunderstanding that he ends up taking advantage of in unexpected ways. An earlier and better take on the concept of Dear Evan Hansen, it effectively depicts the lionizing of the tragically deceased, especially for someone who was an asshole to everyone while living. Williams is great at portraying the beaten down personality of a father who, along with other misfortunes of life, has been burdened with such a child and the changes that being relieved of that burden brings to him. I have to appreciate a film that is so obviously filmed in Seattle, but does so without relying on flashes of the Space Needle or mountains and water.

After the sudden death of her beloved beagle, lonely forty-something Molly Shannon embarks on a time of self discovery as an animal rights activist. A quirky bit of independent filmmaking, the character’s arc is a strange one, but Shannon sells it well. All of the supporting characters are low key crazy from her over-protective sister-in-law Laura Dern to her knife obsessed neighbor John C. Reilly with co-worker Regina King being a true over-the-top standout.  

The United States Coast Guard finally gets its chance to shine in this film about superstar rescue swimmer Kevin Costner who is temporarily given an instructorship at the Aviation Survival Technician training school after his entire crew dies during a rescue. The training sequences where Costner butts heads with champion swimmer Ashton Kutcher are really good. Kutcher surprisingly holds his own against the veteran Costner. But then the film just refuses to end and each new potential ending just muddies whatever message the film was trying to sell. The film could have probably excised either of the love interests and a handful of other characters and it would have been stronger for it.

Lying in hospital near Los Angeles due to an injury on a film set, stunt man Lee Pace regales fellow patient Catinca Untaru with a fantasy tale in exchange for her procuring him more pain medications. It’s a gorgeous film throughout, effortlessly weaving the real life scenes with the story telling, in director Tarsem Singh’s unique style. I’ve adored Lee Pace since seeing him in the incredible Wonderfalls and while he’s fantastic here in roles that require quite a bit of subtlety and complexity, he’s often upstaged by the adorable innocence of young Catinca.