GORE VIDAL: THE UNITED STATES OF AMNESIA - LFF 2013 - Day Six

Nicholas D Wrathall's Gore Vidal biodoc is a fascinating movie for anyone who's a fan of Gore Vidal! I'm not sure it'll have a wider appeal except maybe to social historians of twentieth century America.  For Gore Vidal was at the very heart of things - a novelist, essayist, public intellectual and social gadfly. A man who was born into immense wealth and privilege in 1925 - a stepbrother to Jackie Kennedy - who turned his back on his class to become one of the leading defenders of the liberal left on TV, in print, and on the podium.  

The documentary benefits from great access to Vidal in his final years, still witty, still biting - and we see him guide us through his life, loves, politics and triumphs.  If you love Gore, there's a lot of him here!  This leads to a problem: there's no criticism.  We get hints of his disagreement with The Hitch, when The Hitch joined the neocons.  But in general, those who oppose Vidal are seen as numskulls (many of them were) - but is it really helpful to have Vidal skewering William Buckley in that infamous TV debate, but no real right wing voices to give context and perspective to Vidal's career? 

I love Gore Vidal. I enjoyed reading his essays in the New York Review of Books.  And I miss his voice. But this movie was more like 90 minutes of nostalgia rather than telling me anything knew. And if you can't tell the fans something knew, what are you here for? 

GORE VIDAL: THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA has a running time of 83 minutes.  The movie played Tribeca and London 2013. 

17 AGAIN - crimes against the R8

First up, I may not be the target demographic for this flick (teen chick) but I am a great fan of body-switch comedies like FREAKY FRIDAY and BIG, and I also really liked Zac Efron in HAIRSPRAY and the HIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL flicks. Therefore, I came to this film predisposed to like it.

Sad to say, I didn't just NOT laugh, I was positively squirming in my seat for most of the film. This is because screen-writer Jason Filardi (no previous work of note) has totally mis-conceived this movie. The whole point of body switch movies is that you get a double-comedy. On the one hand, we see a young kid act preternaturally mature, which is cute. (viz. Fred Savage in VICE VERSA or Jodie Foster in the original FREAKY FRIDAY). On the other, we see a grown-up goof off, which is adult wish fulfillment (the best example of this is Jamie Lee Curtis rocking out in the FREAKY FRIDAY remake).

But 17 AGAIN breaks this fundamental rule. Instead of a body switch comedy, adult loser Mike O'Donnell (Matthew Perry) is magicked back into a 17 year old body (Zac Efron). In said body, he gets to turn his teenage son (Sterling Knight) from loser to basketball team member and comfort his daughter (Michelle Trachtenberg) when her school bully boyfriend dumps her. Instead of being preternaturally mature in a cute way, he preaches abstinence in an awe-shucks absurd manner, kills the reputation of the Audi R8, and makes eyes at his adult soon-to-be ex-wife (Leslie Mann). I found the love story between the 17 and the 40 year old deeply, deeply disturbing to watch.

Because there's no statutory adult-goofing-off in this movie, the writer has had to invent a comedic sub-plot all of his own. Accordingly, he casts Thomas Lennon as Mike O'Donnell's geeky, infantile, adult best friend, and shows him wooing the similarly geeky school Principal (Melora Hardin). It's a piss-poor attempt at humour.

And what of the target demographic? I took The Kid and she was similarly unimpressed. And the cinema of mostly teen girls squealed at the opening shot of a topless Zac Efron shooting hoops, but after that, ominous silence.

HIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL is on release in Australia, the UK, New Zealand, Singapore, Iceland, South Africa, Sweden and the US. It opens next weekend in France, the Netherlands, Denmark and Estonia. It opens on April 20th in Spain and Romania and on May 6th in Belgium, Argentina, the Czech Republic, Greece and Lithuania. It opens on May 14th in Egypt, Germany, Italy and Japan and on May 28th in Russia and Bulgaria. It opens on June 5th in Finland, on June 19th in Norway, on July 10th in Brazil and on July 23rd in Portugal.

Speaking of weak rom-coms: HOW TO LOSE A GUY IN TEN DAYS

This limp and lifeless movie comes as a disappointment given that it was directed by Donald "Miss Congeniality" Petrie and co-scripted by Burr "Igby Goes Down" Steers. Matthew McConaughey and Kate Hudson play New Yorkers who, for reasons of Wildean subtlety, have to make the other love them/dump them within ten days. She annoys him; he refuses to dump her; they fall in love; they find out that they were set up; they break-up; they make-up. The humour is scarce despite bit parts for Adam Goldberg and Bebe Newirth. The romance falls flat, highlighting the fact that while Sarah Jessica Parker may be irritating there's a certain role that she does best. Overall, not even one for DVD.

HOW TO LOSE A GUY IN TEN DAYS was released in 2003 and is available on DVD.