It's Complicated (2009) - Meyers' delightful romcom star vehicle

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+ Best Poster of the Year

Meryl Streep and Alec Baldwin make a terrific bed couple on this luxurious, instantly likable poster for Nancy Meyers' It's Complicated

After having been divorced from each other for 20 years, Jane (Meryl Streep (Mamma Mia! (2008))) begins an affair with her newly remarried ex-husband Jake (Alec Baldwin (The Cooler (2003))), which she balances with a budding romance with a sweet architect (Steve Martin (Cheaper by the Dozen (2003))) and her relationship with her three grown children.

It's Complicated is the wonderful 5th film from great Pennsylvanian writer-director Nancy Meyers (The Parent Trap (1998)). It is a super-funny all around good experience with all three abovementioned stars giving terrific performances in each their own way. John Krasinski (Leatherheads (2008)) is good in a supporting role as a son in law, and Hunter Parrish (All Nighter (2017)) makes for first class eye candy, although the film maybe overdoes its lust for eye candy a bit in other instances. Meyers goes in for the lush Santa Barbara high-style of living that her well-off Jane character enjoys, where everything seems beautiful, large, clean, well-functioning and new.
It's Complicated is polished alright, but it is also a great, fun film.

Related posts:

2009 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED IV]
2009 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED III]
2009 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED II]
2009 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED I] 

Watch a trailer for the film here

Cost: 85 mil. $
Box office: 219.1 mil. $
= Box office success
[It's Complicated premiered 10 December (Westwood, Los Angeles) and runs 120 minutes. It was shot in New York and California from April - August 2009. The film opened #4, behind hold-over hit Avatar and fellow new releases Sherlock Holmes and Alvin and the Chipmunks: The Squeakquel, to a 22.1 mil. $ first weekend in North America, where it stayed in the top 5 for another 2 weeks (#4; #5) and grossed 112.7 mil. $ (51.4 % of the total gross). The 2nd and 3rd biggest markets were Australia with 14.1 mil. $ (6.4 %) and the UK with 13.8 mil. $ (6.3 %). Roger Ebert gave the film a 2.5/5 star review, translating to two notches harder than this review. The film was nominated for 3 Golden Globes, a BAFTA and won a National Board of Review award for Best Acting by an Ensemble. It's Complicated is rotten at 57 % with a 5.8/10 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of It's Complicated?

Olive Kitteridge, TV miniseries (2014) - McDormand is sublime in Chodolenko's fine adaptation

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+ Best Miniseries of the Year + Best Maine Title of the Year

 

Frances McDormand stars as Lisa Chodolenko's Olive Kitteridge

Olive Kitteridge is a 4-part HBO drama miniseries adaptation of Elizabeth Strout's (The Burgess Boys (2013)) same-titled 2008 novel, written by Jane Anderson (Mad Men (2008), TV-series) and directed by great Californian filmmaker Lisa Chodolenko (The Kids Are All Right (2010)).

Olive is a school teacher in a small Maine community, where her kind husband Henry runs a pharmacy. With very different temperaments and outlooks on life, the two raise their son and grow old together.

Chodolenko and Anderson have done a bang-up job with Strout's marvelous novel, and the miniseries format is auspiciously chosen for the piece. Olive Kitteridge makes me wonder if climates across nations might affect people in the same way. - The Maine folks here certainly remind me of Scandinavians, who come from a very similar climate and landscape.
Frances McDormand (Friends with Money (2006)) enjoys one of her career's best characters here, and she is wonderful as Olive, whom she tackles with total disregard for her own vanity. - A bold and terrific performance. Equally well-cast and spectacular is Richard Jenkins (Burn after Reading (2008)) as Henry Kitteridge. The family share several dinner scenes in the series, - but many are hilariously short, as Olive has a way of ending them prematurely, quite dictatorially.
Sentimental Henry's colleague and compassion project Denise is played with admirable grace by Zoe Kazan (What If (2013)); Brady Corbet (Force Majeure/Turist (2014)) is good as her short-time husband; Cory Michael Smith (Carol (2015)) is terrific as the mentally ill Kevin Coulson, and Bill Murray (The Grand Budapest Hotel (2014)) is perfect as Jack Kennison. Besides the top notch cast, Olive Kitteridge has Carter Burwell (Carol (2015)) composing its effective score.
This is a story of life as it unfolds in Olive Kitteridge's case. There will be situations and arguments that most can relate to. The series is both funny and sad, poignant and surprising, warm and human. It moves fast in a few places, and it's few experiments with digital effects are not altogether successful. But these are minor details of a whole which is extremely recommendable, a moving snapshot of everyday life.

Related posts:

Lisa Chodolenko: 2014 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED V] 

2014 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED IV]
2014 in films and TV-series - according to Film Excess [UPDATED III]
The Kids Are All Right (2010) - Chodolenko's excellent indie crowdpleaser

 

Watch a trailer for the miniseries here

 

Cost: Unknown

Box office: None - TV miniseries

= Unknown

[Olive Kitteridge debuted on HBO Sunday November 2 with 559k viewers tuning in in North America for the first two episodes. The two remaining episodes were shown the following evening. Those ratings are not impressive for an HBO miniseries compared to other recent works and TV movies by them, but when taking into account that this focuses on an acclaimed but not superstar actress portraying a schoolteacher in Maine growing old, the ratings must look better. Olive Kitteridge should also have a significant life after its premiere on other platforms as a high-quality drama with universal appeal. Filming took place in Massachusetts and Maine. The miniseries was nominated for 3 Golden Globes and 13 Emmys, winning 8. Olive Kitteridge currently rests at #231 at IMDb's user-generated TV top 250 and is certified fresh at 96 % with a 8.6 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of Olive Kitteridge?

Ruby Sparks (2012) - Dayton & Farris' high concept romcom failure

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An effective, well-made poster for Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Farris' Ruby Sparks

 

A successful, lonely writer with writer's block completes an assignment for his shrink and in doing so creates the fictional female character of his  dreams in reality!

Ruby Sparks has its moderately funny patches, but this basically high-concept romcom has perched itself wrong; on the low-budget-quirky-indie chair, - replete with discordant, foreign language music and an eccentric parent couple, - instead of a higher chair, the mainstream approach. It is also problematic that the protagonist's writing issues take up as much space in the film as they do. It is fundamentally hard to get genuinely interested in this character, the central rock of Ruby Sparks, and the affluent Los Angeles milieu he resides in. To make matters worse, the film isn't romantic, because the titular character isn't a real person in the film but only a figment of the writer's imagination.

Paul Dano (L.I.E. (2001)) attempts to pull up the funny factor but spends the majority of the film looking like an owl. Zoe Kazan (Meek's Cutoff (2010)), who also wrote the film, her first and only movie writing job to date, is sweet enough as Ruby Sparks, but the film is regrettably failed. It is directed by great Californian directors and marrieds Jonathan Dayton & Valerie Farris (Little Miss Sunshine (2006)).

Watch a trailer for the film here

Cost: Estimated 8 mil. $

Box office: 9.1 mil. $

= Big flop

[Ruby Sparks was released July 25 and runs 104 minutes. Filming took place in LA and Big Sur, California from July - August 2011. The film opened #28 to a 140k $ opening weekend in 13 theaters, expanding to 261 and #17, grossing 2.5 mil. $ (27.5 % of the total gross) in North America. Its 2nd and 3rd biggest markets were Australia with 1.6 mil. $ (17.6 %) and the UK with 1.2 mil. $ (13.2 %). Ruby Sparks is certified fresh at 79 % with a 7.1 critical average at Rotten Tomatoes.]

What do you think of Ruby Sparks?