In Her Shoes (2005) - Stars delight in Hanson's terrific romantic dramedy

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A girly shoe closet-set image of co-stars Toni Collette and Cameron Diaz as recognizably opposite sisters makes up this poster for Curtis Hanson's In Her Shoes

When two adult sisters for a short time live together again in the older sister's apartment, it leads to a painful rift between them, whereupon the destitute younger sister seeks out their alienated grandmother.

 

In Her Shoes is written by Susannah Grant (Pocahontas (1995)), adapting the same-titled 2002 novel by Jennifer Weiner (Best Friends Forever (2009)), and directed by great Nevadan filmmaker Curtis Hanson (Sweet Kill (1972)).

Many make harder judgments on In Her Shoes, which cling ungratefully to what the film really is, and I find that these detractors should re-watch it. Because, God, there is a lot to love in this film!

Cameron Diaz (Annie (2014)) and Toni Collette (The Sixth Sense (1999)) are both fantastic, moving and empathic. In fact, this may be Diaz's best dramatic performance. Shirley MacLaine (Irma la Douce (1963)) is also fine in the more downplayed part of the grandmother who has become wise with age. Hanson applies the perfect insightfully humanistic direction to the fine story about family break-up, sisterhood and forgiveness. He consequently goes for the drama here but still also manages to create funny situations regularly.

Also delightful in small parts are here Richard Burgi (Rush Hour (2016, TV-series)), Mark Feuerstein (Coyote (2021, TV-series)), Jerry Adler (The Good Fight (2017-18)), Honey Bun the dog and some old geezers. The age span between the characters may be a bit off, but In Her Shoes is a wonderful film.

 

Related post:

 

Curtis Hanson: The Hand That Rocks the Cradle (1992) or, The Nanny Terror! 

 

 

Watch a trailer for the film here

 

Cost: 35 mil. $

Box office: 83.6 mil. $

= Minor flop (returned 2.38 times its cost)

[In Her Shoes premiered 14 September (Toronto International Film Festival) and runs 130 minutes. Diaz was paid 15 mil. $ for her performance in the film. Shooting took place from May 2004 - ? in Florida, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and in California, including in Los Angeles. The film opened #3, behind fellow new release Wallace & Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit and holdover hit Flightplan, to a 10 mil. $ first weekend in North America, where it spent one more weekend in the top 5 (#5), grossing 32.8 mil. $ (39.2 % of the total gross). The 2nd and 3rd biggest markets were the UK with 7.7 mil. $ (9.2 %) and Germany with 7 mil. $ (8.4 %). The film was nominated for a Golden Globe, among other honors. Roger Ebert gave it a 3.5/4 star review, equal in rating to this one. Hanson returned with Lucky You (2007). Diaz returned in The Holiday (2006); Collette in Little Miss Sunshine (2006); and MacLaine in Rumor Has It... (2005). In Her Shoes is certified fresh at 74 % with a 6.80/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

 

What do you think of In Her Shoes?

The Green Inferno (2015) - Roth - of course - exhumes cannibal horror

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A snarling native Amazonian indigenous man with questionable teeth look positively fearsome on this poster for Eli Roth's The Green Inferno

A searching female graduate student from New York joins an idealistic group of activists, who venture to the Amazon jungle to save an indigenous tribe and some trees from the pending destruction of modern civilization. But the world isn't as they think.

 

The Green Inferno is written by Guillermo Amoedo (Que Pena Tu Vida (2010)) and great Massachusett co-writer/cp-producer/director Eli Roth (Cabin Fever (2002)).

Instead of the direct homage to the cannibal horror subgenre of the 1980s that one may have expected, Roth creates his own entry in the long-dead discipline, effectively unearthing it for a show: He builds a good, very entertaining story around a group of more or less insufferable idealists, (several of whom Roth humorously give Spanish accents.) A lot of typically Rothian, cynicial fun springs from the underlying misanthropy. And the film never pauses or gets dull, which is a feat.

No doubt there is something amoral about the very creation of films like The Green Inferno, (although it may have been more pronounced in the 80s, when real animal slayings were also integral to the cannibal movies,) but it seems fitting for an exploitation movie, which is supposed to be on the border region of what is moral (and not too concerned about stepping over that border.)

The protagonist Justine is played well by Lorenza Izzo (Feed the Beast (2016, TV-series)), SPOILER who in the end prefers to fall back on the tit of political correctness rather than inform the worldviews of the ever-'correct' New-York class with the actual, revolutionizing facts of her trip (about the savage tribesmen.) Richard Burgi (Hostel: Part II (2007)) garnishes in a small part.

Unfortunately the film's photography (by Antonio Quercia (No Filter/Sin Filtro (2016))) and aesthetics are not too exciting, just very contemporary, and another criticism: Ugly CGI-mega-ants instead of a male castration scene or another classic bestiality just isn't okay, Roth!

 

Related posts:

Eli Roth: The Last Exorcism Part 2 (2013) or, The Not So Last Chicken Exorcism (co-producer)
Aftershock (2012) - Extreme tastelessness in one of 2012's worst films (co-writer/co-producer/co-star) 
Corman's World: Exploits of a Hollywood Rebel (2011) - Stapleton's Corman doc. is among the year's best films (interview subject)
Inglourious Basterds (2009) - The Movies take revenge on Nazi scum (co-star)
2007 in films - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I]  

2007 in films - according to Film Excess 

Hostel: Part II (2007) - Roth's return to Eastern Europe is a wicked horror blast 
Cabin Fever (2002) - Eli Roth's awesome skin-rash-inspired breakthrough (co-writer/co-producer/director)

Roth gives a five-minute interview about the movie here

Cost: 5 mil. $

Box office: 12.6 mil. $

= Box office success (returned 2.52 times the cost)

[The Green Inferno premiered 8 September (Toronto International Film Festival) and runs 100 minutes. The film is especially inspired by Ruggero Deodato's masterpiece Cannibal Holocaust (1980), which has a film within the film titled The Green Inferno. Shooting took place from November - December 2012 in Peru, Santiago, Chile and in New York. The film opened #9 to a 3.5 mil. $ first weekend in North America, where it grossed 7.1 mil. $ (56.3 % of the total gross). The 2nd and 3rd biggest markets were Russia with 3.8 mil. $ (30.2 %) and Italy with 686k $ (5.4 %). The film was met with praise from horror writer maestro Stephen King and condemnation from indigenous peoples activist group Survival International. A sequel was announced but has not materialized. Roth returned with Knock Knock (2015). Izzo returned in I Am Victor (2013, TV movie) and theatrically in The Stranger (2014). The Green Inferno is rotten at 38 % with a 4.90/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of The Green Inferno?

Hostel: Part II (2007) - Roth's return to Eastern Europe is a wicked horror blast

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+ Best Horror Movie of the Year + Best Gore Movie of the Year + Best Exploitation Movie of the Year + Best Comeback Actress of the Year: Heather Matarazzo 

Heather Matarazzo is caught upside down in an undeniably terrifying state of helplessness on this appropriately nasty poster for Eli Roth's Hostel: Part II

3 young women are lured to take a detour on their European interrail vacation from Rome to Slovakia, where they become victims of a clandestine society of upper class torture and murder patrons.

Hostel: Part II is written and directed by great Bostonian filmmaker Eli Roth (Cabin Fever (2002)), a sequel to his thrilling Hostel (2005), in which three male tourists experience the same type of grueling reception in Eastern Europe. Part II tops the wicked first film as an evil, grim and staggering work of exploitation horror.
Although the film by no definition of the word could be said to have a star cast, it does have a super cast: Stand-outs are Heather Matarazzo (Scream 3 (2000)), SPOILER whose death by scythe must rate as among the sickest movie death scenes in recent history, - unforgettably sadistic, - and Richard Burgi (Fatal Instinct (2014)) as a grotesque businessman. Horror fans will also appreciate Italian master filmmaker Ruggero Deodato (Cannibal Holocaust (1980)) in a cameo as an Italian cannibal, naturally.
Hostel: Part II is a refreshingly inhumane, hardcore gore horror classic.

Related posts:

Eli Roth: The Last Exorcism Part 2 (2013) or, The Not So Last Chicken Exorcism (co-producer)
Aftershock (2012) - Extreme tastelessness in one of 2012's worst films (co-writer/co-producer/co-star) 
Corman's World: Exploits of a Hollywood Rebel (2011) - Stapleton's Corman doc. is among the year's best films (interview subject)
Inglourious Basterds (2009) - The Movies take revenge on Nazi scum (co-star)
2007 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED II]
2007 in films - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I] 
Cabin Fever (2002) - Eli Roth's awesome skin-rash-inspired breakthrough (co-writer/co-producer/director)

Watch a terrific teaser for the film, introduced by Eli Roth SPOILER from the set of Matarazzo's death scene here

Cost: 10.2 mil. $
Box office: 35.6 mil. $ 
= Box office success (3.49 times the cost)
[Hostel: Part II premiered 7 June (Australia, Argentina and Slovakia) and runs 94 minutes. Shooting took place in Iceland, Slovakia, the Czech Republic, including Prague, and Monaco from November 2006 - January 2007. SPOILER Bijou Phillips (Black Limousine (2010)) has explained that her scalping death scene required around 45 camera setups, and that her experience on the film made her lose interest for doing more horror. SPOILER Matarazzo completed the shooting of her upside down nude death scene without a stand-in, hanging for 5 minute intervals during the two days the scene was shot. The film opened and peaked #6 to an 8.2 mil. $ first weekend in North America, (less than half of the first film's #1 19.5 mil. $ opening), grossing 17.6 mil. $ (49.4 % of the total gross). The film's 2nd and 3rd biggest markets were the UK with 3.5 mil. $ (9.8 %) and Germany with 2.1 mil. $ (5.9 %). The release encountered resistance of many types: Its meat-themed poster above was removed from US theaters after complaints. It was released cut in Germany, Singapore and Malaysia and banned outright in New Zealand. In UK's House of Commons in 2007, having stills from the film was cited as illegal, an offense of 'extreme pornography'. Worst for the film; a pirate version of it leaked online days before the release and was downloaded millions of times, which Roth blamed for the less impressive box office, compared to the first film's 80.5 mil. $ world gross. Roth returned with short Stolz der Nation (2009), featured a clip of in Inglorious Basterds (2009), which Roth also co-starred in, and with an episode of Hemlock Grove (2013, TV-series), which he also executive produced (2013-15), before he returned theatrically with The Green Inferno (2013). Hostel: Part III (2011) by Scott Spiegel was the much inferior straight-to-DVD so far last film in the Hostel franchise. Hostel: Part II is rotten at 44 % with a 5/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of Hostel: Part II?