There aren’t two movie theaters in Columbus much more different than the Drexel Grandview and Studio 35. The Drexel is home to Columbus’ aspiring urbanites, all arty films and self-conscious punctuating laughter. Studio 35 has aging arcade games in the ladies room, a full bar and alternately plays slacker second-runs and the Rocky Horror Picture Show. Friends took me on my first visit to both over the last week – for an overrated “film of the year” and a double feature of twenty-something distraction.
Sideways: Full of wallowing and unlikely romance (why in moves do they never explain why the hyper-desirable person likes the obviously undesirable person?), it is a well-told story of a lost soul looking for inspiration. There are moments of pure emotion and genuine laughter and, too, the tiresome, slightly embarrassing feel of spying on the struggles of middle age. After all, our wine-slugging oenophiles aren’t just connoisseurs, they are problem drinkers who get fall-down drunk on a “quaffable but hardly transcendent” red.
The unlikely cast - Paul Giamatti (Pig Vomit in Howard Stern's Private Parts) and Thomas Haden Church (Lowell in TV's Wings).- plays the snooty, self-important moments perfectly. An odd mix of pathetic (and) snobbery, they taste their fine wines in the tourist-trap town of Solvang (a place sufficiently tacky as to make Las Vegas resemble Versailles)
The movie’s pace is subtle… lots of prelude that feels very much like it’s wanting to take off, but never quite gets there. Fans would say that I’m addicted to Hollywood and don’t appreciate the nuance of a genuine slice of life. Maybe so.
Garden State: First, I should note that it’s a bit disconcerting to watch a movie with someone who is a dead ringer for the lead on the big screen … but, anyway, on with it then…
Lithium, percocet, vicodin, a medicine cabinet with wall-to-wall prescription bottles … Andrew Largeman’s psychiatrist-dad has created the perfect zombie. Boss yelling at him? Customers complaining? Phone ringing? Plane crashing? It doesn’t even touch him. Andrew cruises through life in perfect calm… I am entirely jealous.
Witty and observant, Zack Braff delivers a heart-rendingly authentic story. The characters are the perfect portraits of small-town stagnation, clumsily fumbling their dreams in an anesthetized blur. “Andrew” (Braff) tosses his own pharmaceuticals when he heads home to that town for his mother’s funeral. The barrage of naked emotion – from regret and mourning to love and friendship are as overwhelming to the audience as they are to the players.
These are the type of characters – from the owners of a houseboat at the bottom of a strip mine to a love interest burying her twentieth dead gerbil - who you’ll feel like you know, who you’ll miss as the movie ends… Garden State is easily the most under-rated movie of the year.
I Heart Huckabees: Certainly no “Royal Tenenbaums,” Huckabees likely suffered from too-high expectations. The story was a great one – a truly original idea: existential detectives seeking to correct life crises in a set of overtly connected and incongruous characters.
Full of self-identifying moments and gratifying make-overs (a vacant model ditching her hot pants and pursed lips for an Amish bonnet, overalls and black-and-white an Oreo-crusted smile), it is entirely charming.
Though something of a peculiar film, Huckabees is genuinely enjoyable, full of people gnashing out life’s biggest questions in something more like a campy romp. Who could resist?