Is It Really That Bad?

Writers and critics tend to make, sometimes shameless, use of hyperbole. That's what calling the summer of 2010 the worst summer at the movies ever is. Strangely, I've read, if not exactly that statement, something close to it more often than not. Even many reviews of Inception seem to need to first provide some context by letting readers know that this movie has come out in an awful summer. But what are people basing this on? We need some context for the context. What are you defining as a "bad summer?" Is there another bad summer which we are using for a comparative starting point, or is there a clear definition of what a good summer at the movies needs to look like?

If anything, this summer is no worse than last summer. Actually it may be a little better, and it's not even over yet. Sure, not many of the titles will go down in history, but how many of them actually ever do? The summer is about kicking back, having fun, letting the critical safety net slip a little and just enjoying yourself. Sure, Hollywood is phoning it in this summer but who cares that few of these movies will stand the test of time? The point is, as Pauline Kael once wrote in one of the most important pieces of American film criticism every put on paper, to not consume great art, but to enjoy ourselves.

And enjoy myself I have been. Sure the box office is down on a lot of films and maybe next year Hollywood will have learned their lesson and give us less films edited in blenders on full speed and more big budget entertainments made by competent artists who know how to walk the line between commercial and quality. But on that note, we work with what we have not what we want, and what we have, when you look at the titles, isn't half bad.

Sure there were some big stinkers. Sex and the City 2 is about as bad a movie as I can think of, The A-Team was just about the worst made action movie of the year and Twilight:Eclipse was bad, but who thought it wouldn't be? And even with the latter titles, there were some out there who sincerely enjoyed A-Team and argued that Eclipse was the best of the three movies thus far, whatever that means. Also Marmaduke and Killers crashed and burned and although Shrek 4 raked in the dough, Shrek hasn't been good since the first film. And oh ya, The Last Airbender. 'Nuff said.

And then, there were a lot of good ones. The Losers opened the summer to embarrassing numbers but was still a highly enjoyable action movie with a nice performance from Jason Patrick. Both Get Him to the Greek and The Karate Kid were sequels/remakes with no expectations that delivered on the goods. Iron Man 2 didn't quite work for me but it did for a lot of others and even though I think Toy Story 3 is more minor than many have given it credit for, Pixar still managed to deliver again.

Although some of the more cynical and jaded skipped Knight and Day because it's star once jumped on a couch, it was a genuinely well made, funny action flick and now Salt (review this week) is supposed to be even better, getting a four star review from Roger Ebert. Even kid flicks Despicable Me and Ramona and Beezus with Selena Gomez are getting surprisingly good reviews. Not to mention the smaller charmers that snuck through the cracks like the wonderful basketball romance Just Wright, Cyrus with Jonah Hill and The Kids Are Alright with Julianne Moore. And, of course, Inception, which was praised by critics, loved by audiences and certainly the kind of large scale entertainment that every summer needs.

And look, we still have a whole month to go. August, which used to be the month where studios dumped their leftovers has some very promising titles. Will Farrell will maybe redeem his last two or three bad movies against Mark Whalberg in The Other Guys, guilty pleasure series Step-Up will be hitting 3D, Middle Men about the start of Internet porn looks like a teen sex comedy meets Goodfellas, Sylvester Stallone's The Expendables will hopefully bring back the 80s action movie hero aesthetic and give action movies exactly what they've been missing all these years, and Scott Pilgrim doesn't quite have me sold because Edgar Wright still hasn't proven himself to be a great director but many are foaming at the mouth waiting for this.

There's also Eat Pray Love, a human drama with Julia Roberts, a new Nanna McPhee movie, a new Drew Barrymore romantic comedy with the always charming Justin Long, Takers, an interesting looking heist movie and could The Last Exorcism be the new Paranormal Activity? I'm looking forward to finding out.

Just Wright (4 out of 5)

Finally, at long last, Just Wright is a romantic comedy that doesn’t deal in contrived plot gimmicks, shallow condescension and unlikely, lowest-common-denominator comedy. Instead it’s a film about two good people who fall in love because they get to know each other, explore each other’s personal depths and are legitimately attracted to one another. I didn’t know that was still allowed. One character even has a father who is kind, helping and supportive. It’s a film about people who so rarely have films made about them any more: ordinary people who work, live, pay the bills and want to meet the one that they can’t live without. That’s it. Films are becoming so big, but here’s one of the few that still wants to play on the level. We need to cherish them while they last.

Leslie Wright (Queen Latifah) is a New York physiotherapist who loves basketball. She dresses up and takes her old Mustang beater on dates which seem to go well but always end with the same story: always a home girl never a bride. Her favourite team are the New Jersey Nets whose star player is Scott McKnight (rapper Common). One night, at a gas station, after a game, Leslie helps McKinght find his gas cap while he is distracted on the phone organizing a charity event. He’s grateful, assists her back into her car and invites her to his birthday party this upcoming Saturday.

The invite is great news for Leslie’s best friend Morgan (Paula Patton from Precious) who is crashing at Leslie’s until she can score an NBA husband and be set for life. Her sights are on Scott and indeed, at the party, they hit it off.

Soon Scott and Morgan are engaged until a knee injury on the court threatens the rest of Scott’s career; even if he can be healed by playoffs, his contract is up at the end of the season and rumours abound whether the Nets will even want to resign him. In comes Leslie who takes leave from her job and becomes Scott’s live-in personal trainer, while Morgan gets cold feet. There’s no success in being the wife of a has-been after all.

You can see where this is going. And yet there’s something so pure and honest about the rapport that builds between Leslie and Scott that even as the plot weaves through dramatic peaks and valleys (some of them contrived, some not) there is a life and truth to the romance that develops. This isn’t the product of some screenwriter who dreams up wild and zany situations. The film is never forceful; it doesn’t beat the audience over the head with slapstick or melodrama. It just stands back and let’s emotions grow, with patience, over time. Love is more than a feeling, it’s a realization. Just Wright gets that, well, just right.

Maybe we have to thank the stars for that. Queen Latifah has a natural film presence. She’s not a star or a diva, but a real person. She brings depth, presence, intelligence and wisdom to films that is easily relatable. You just can’t help but like her. The discovery here may be Common, who has spent his film career playing thugs and muscles but here gets to show that he’s a likeable guy and can play on a natural level. His McKnight is not an egocentric basketball star, plays the game for love and not glory or fame and is a good boy that was raised by a strong woman. In a universe where men are always the villains of romance this one has the courage to see he's on the level.

The film was directed by Sanaa Hamri who, one film at a time is becoming the most valuable filmmaker in her chosen genre. Her underrated debut Something New was about a relationship between a white man and a black woman and her Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants 2 took a whimsical fairy tale plot and stretched it out with human characters. There are no forced sentimentality in these films, no characters working at the convenience of the plot and no situations that fly beyond the limits of human emotion. Leslie drives a beat-up car, not because she can’t afford it, but because it has sentimental value, Morgan is not so much a villain as a confused woman looking for happiness in all the wrong places and Scott has a secret room, the contents of which, when revealed, don’t implicate him in perverse misgivings but provides one of the films most touching moments.

Sure the film stretches plausibility a tad towards the conclusion, but that’s simply generic requisites. Hamri really gets to the heart of these people, looks at them, understands them, loves them and respects them enough to let them exist in a real world with real love, confusion, joy and heartbreak. Sure those last scenes are cheesy, but when a film deals in what seems like real human emotion that has a tendency to soar above these bothersome plots. Thus the end of the film made me happy because I’m glad these characters found the outcome they deserved. That’s all that ever matters.