Identity Thief

COMEDY

She's Having the Time of His Life

★ ★ ★ out of 5 | DVD or Rental

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Rated: R Sexual content and language.
Release Date: February 8, 2013
Runtime: 1 hour 51 minutes

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Director: Seth Gordon
Writers: Craig Mazin, Jerry Eeten
Cast: Jason Bateman, Melissa McCarthy, Jon Favreau, Amanda Peet, T.I., Genesis Rodriguez, Morris Chestnut, John Cho, Robert Patrick, Eric Stonestreet

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SYNOPSIS:  Mild-mannered businessman Sandy Patterson travels from Denver to Miami to confront the deceptively harmless-looking woman who has been living it up after stealing Sandy's identity.

REVIEW: Seth Gordon, director of big screen Horrible Bosses and Four Christmases and small screen Breaking In, takes another crack at slap-stick comedy with Identity Thief. Reteaming with Jason Bateman, Gordon takes a story by The Hangover Part II writer Craig Mazin and The Watchman writer Jerry Eeten to find out how far a man will go to reclaim his name.

Sandy Bigelow Patterson (Jason Bateman, Horrible Bosses) works for PFG as an internal accounts manager. When he mistakenly gives up his personal information to an identity thief posing as Sandy Bigelow Patterson (Melissa McCarthy, Bridesmaids), his world is turned upside down with sudden overdrawn credit cards, defaulted payments, and an arrest for a failure to appear in front of a judge in Florida. When the Denver PD detective Reilly (Morris Chestnut, Think Like a Man) shows Sandy a mugshot of the real female culprit, Sandy is still unable to clear his name in time to avert issues at home with his wife Trish (Amanda Peet, 2012) and a lucrative new job he hired on for with boss Daniel Casey (John Cho, Total Recall). Bent on clearing his name, Sandy travels to Florida with the plan to confront and transport the faux Sandy back to Denver to clear his name. But his plans go out the window when the fake sandy, aka Diana, becomes the target of disgruntled criminals Marisol (Genesis Rodrigeuz, The Last Stand) and Julian (Tip 'T.I' Harris, Takers) who were cheated with bad fake credit cards. Sandy talks Diana into traveling on the road with him over staring down the barrel of a gun meant to kill her. But every tank of gas and every swipe of a card get the duo into more danger and more dire situations. Can Sandy clear his name before he has to resort to Diana's criminal methods to get home?

Jason Bateman plays a role that he loves to play. His character Sandy is just trying to make ends meet and provide for his family. Like roles played by the put upon Ben Stiller, Jason Bateman is usually the put upon guy who just can't seem to rise to the occasion to make a better life for himself and his family. But as he tries to do the right thing to reclaim his life, Jason's Sandy is forced to face the fact that the way he's been brought up to provide is not necessarily the only way to deal with things. Couple Bateman's Sandy with the hurricane that is Melissa McCarthy's Diana and there really is no chance for Sandy to come away unscathed. Melissa McCarthy brings her own brand of kinetic and physical humor to her role as Diana as the thief just trying to get by in life in her own way.

But for as much friction Diana causes Sandy, it's not the only conflict with the film. Genesis Rodriguez's Marisol, T.I.'s Julian and Robert Patrick's (Gangster Squad) skiptracer bring even more angst to the already angst-ridden Sandy Bigelow Pattersons. With gun battles, car chases, police intervention and more, Sandy and Diana have much more to contend with than just each other.

The trailers make Identity Thief look like a simple goofball comedy. The laughs in the trailer and commercials aren't the only laughs, but there is more to it the story that just silly comedy. At the center of the story is a drama that goes deeper than just stealing tchotchkes under an assumed name. Melissa McCarthy surprises with her range as an actress, while Jason Bateman reinforces why he is one of the go to guys for stoic split-second comic timing.

Identity Thief is a silly comedy with a good mix of action, drama, and a touching moral theme. Bateman and McCarthy are a fine team, even if they tend to hit each other over the head with  an acoustic guitar or punch each other in the throat. You will chuckle, and maybe feel a little. Just keep a watch on your wallet.

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Gangster Squad

DRAMA

New Territories

★ ★ ★ ★ out of 5 | Movie - DVD - Rental

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Rated: R Strong violence and language.
Release Date: January 11, 2013
Runtime: 1 hour 53 minutes

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Director: Ruben Fleischer
Writers: Will Beall, Paul Liberman
Cast: Sean Penn, Josh Brolin, Ryan Gosling, Emma Stone, Nick Nolte, Robert Patrick, Michael Peña, Giovanno Ribisi

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SYNOPSIS: In 1949, the chief of the LAPD enlists a group of police hard cases to form a gangster squad to go against Los Angeles crime boss Mickey Cohen.

REVIEW: 30 Minutes or Less and Zombieland director Ruben Fleischer goes dramatic Los Angeles mobster noir with a screenplay by Will Beall (Castle, the announced Justice League) from the book of the same name by Paul Lieberman. What happens when the law is not enough to keep organized crime in check? You create a task force with members more ruthless than the criminals ever were.

Ex-boxer Mickey Cohen (Sean Penn, Milk) only knows violence and power. He led with his fists in order to gain an upper hand in 1949 Los Angeles. As he controlled more and more of the city's organized crime, the cops and politicians not under Cohen's thumb are near powerless to combat the power hungry thug turned crime boss. Chief Parker (Nick Nolte, Warrior) enlists the service of homicide squad Sgt. John O'Mara (Josh Brolin, Men In Black III) to put together a squad of men who would work beyond the boundaries of the law in order to dish out justice against Cohen and his syndicate.

Gangster Squad is inspired by a true story as the men and women of post-war Los Angeles suffer under the rule of the mob. Part L.A. Confidential and part The Untouchables, Brolin's O'Mara puts together a squad of hard cases to work without the protective shield of the L.A.P.D. badge. Sgt. Jerry Wooters (Ryan Gosling, The Ides of March) is the young capable cop who has as many vices as he does virtues. African American Officer Coleman Harris (Anthony Mackie, Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter) on the beat is the only thing that stands in the way of heroin hitting his local streets. And Sgt. O'Mara's wife's urging, O'Mara ends up picking up old-style western six-shooter Officer Max Kennard (Robert Patrick, Trouble with the Curve) to give some accuracy to the boys' shooting. Tagging along with Kennard is a companion Officer Navidad Ramirez (Michael Peña, End of Watch) who doesn't seem to be right for the job but stands behind his guns when necessary. Rounding out the squad is Officer Conway Keeler (Giovanni Ribisi, Ted) who counterbalances to team's brawn with some brains as a former Army intelligence officer with skills and wiretapping to try to get at the bottom of Cohen's criminal mechanisms. 

There may be several members to the righteous Gangsters Squad but Mickey Cohen has his own men surrounding him loaded to bear. Most serve as cannon fodder and human shields to protect, but Cohen does surround himself with a trusted bodyguard and his number one lieutenant who serve him above all else. But none of the men who carry Tommy guns and carry out Cohen's orders are no match for the power-hungry man himself. Brolin's O'Mara has his hands full with the weathered, progressive-thinker brute with a plan grander than the city itself. The Chicago mobs may have clung to the old ways just a little to long, allowing themselves to be lulled into thinking their empires couldn't be toppled.

Tommy guns roar and bullets riddle both personal property and torsos. The film pulls no punches as hot lead and closed fists lead to sprays of blood. Embroiled with men on both sides of the law, Grace Faraday (Emma Stone, The Amazing Spider-Man) serves as the softer side of a story filled with hardened and driven men. A girl just trying to make it in Hollywood Land, Faraday ends up being an evening gown swishing, crimson-lipped dame on the air of both the domineering Mickey Cohen and the charismatic Jerry Wooter. Stone smokes up each scene she walks her gams into, but sometimes does not have enough to do to warrant part of the story.

Gangster Squad is the perfect post-noir period piece for your hard-boiled enjoyment. Of course, there are moments of Hollywood Land cinematic bravado. Such things are inevitable when there is such a vast library of storytelling already projected on the silver screen, plus guns and gristled men of action. Quentin Tarantino would be proud of the mob/gangster squad standoffs. And Kevin Costner, remember that scene at the train station with Elliot Ness in The Untouchables? Brolin, Gosling, and Penn ellipse that with more bullets and blood on the carpeted steps of a posh hotel. Director Fleischer and writer Beall ramp up the violence, the intrigue and the humor. Michael Peña and Giovanni Ribisi add their own sense of style to the keep the mood as light as it can handle.

Gangster Squad is the perfect blend of bullets, blood, and classy babes. Brolin's square jaw, Penn's piercing stares, Gosling's charisma, and Stone's sultry eyes make for fine entertainment taking place on the streets of the City of Angels.

Trouble with the Curve

Low and Inside

★ ★ ★ ★ out of 5 buckets | Matinee and DVD

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Rated: PG-13 Language, sexual references, some thematic material and smoking

Release Date: September 21, 2012
Runtime: 1 hour 51 minutes

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Director: Robert Lorenz
Writers: Randy Brown
Cast: Clint Eastwood, Amy Adams, Joe Massingill, Matthew Lillard, Robert Patrick, John Goodman

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SYNOPSIS: An ailing baseball scout in his twilight years takes his daughter along for one last recruiting trip. 

REVIEW: Robert Lorenz, longtime producing partner of Clint Eastwood and first assistant director on such films as Mystic River, Million Dollar Baby, and Space Cowboys, moves into the director's chair for the first time to direct favorite actor Clint Eastwood as an aging and ailing baseball scout. Based on a story by new scribe Randy Brown, Lorenz continues with Eastwood's late career as the gristled old man with regrets and something still to prove. 

Atlanta Braves' veteran talent scout Gus Lobel (Clint Eastwood, Unforgiven) fights against the tide of modern technology to try and find baseball talent the old fashioned way - with decades of firsthand experience. But with a contract nearing its end and his eyesight failing, Gus must travel to North Carolina to scout out new prospect Bo Gentry (Joe Massingill, Glee) as a possible first round draft pick, keeping his failing eyesight a secret. Longtime friend and co-worker Peter Klein (John Goodman, ParaNorman), worried about Gus, asks Gus' daughter Mickey (Amy Adams, The Fighter) to meet her father on the road to help him with his work. A hard working lawyer on a fast-track to a firm partnership, Mickey puts her work partially on hold to help her father and to try to repair their fragile relationship. Back in Atlanta talent scout Phillip Sanderson (Matt Lillard, The Descendants) looks to undermind Gus' work and help push him into retirement with the help of computer models and statistical protection reports. Sitting on the bleachers with the other scouts is Johnny 'The Flame' Flannigan, a promising pitcher who was worked too hard, too fast on the way to a torn rotater cuff and a forced switch in careers, takes a shine to the man who originally signed him and a shine to the daughter who knows too much about baseball to be a lawyer.

Trouble With the Curve marks another in a long line of films by veteran actor Clint Eastwood. From the Sergio Leone spaghetti westerns where he played 'The Man With No Name', to the iconic Dirty Harry with his .44 Magnum, to a couple stints with an orangutan, to a later prolific career as a boxing coach and a retired Korean War vet, Clint Eastwood's career has been varied and successful. His latest effort simply adds to his canon of quality films.

Like Gran Torino and Million Dollar Baby before it, Trouble with the Curve continues with Eastwood's gristled old man character just trying to deal with the concept of getting old while still being relevant. Eastwood's Gus Lobel realizes that his way of doing things, although a perfect mix of experience and historical significance, finds that he is becoming a relic in the new world of computers and statistical projection programs. But its not only the age of technology that is the problem. It is also the younger scouts with an reliance on those computer models without the 'feel' for the game. Sure, a computer can project whether a player can hit against left handers, but can it pick up the nuances of how a player fares and picks himself up after going 0 for 4 in the game the night before. Lobel considers the personal connection to the players and the game to be the pure experience.

Clint Eastwood is pure Eastwood. With a gravely voice and dialogue that barely registers over a whisper at times, Eastwood's Lobel says the most with his steely gray eyes and a rumbling growl. Amy Adams, Oscar nominated for The Fighter, continues to prove that she is a quality actress with talent beyond the crazy senator's daughter from Wedding Crashers. As a woman with a 'dysfunctional sense of taking care' of her father, Mickey just wants to reconnect with her father and expel the feelings of abandonment from her youth. John Goodman as Pete Klein anchors the film as Gus' gentle and concerned front office friend, ready to go to bat for Gus a moment's notice. Justin Timberlake, as the former superstar in the making turned talent scout turned possible future broadcaster Johnny 'The Flame' Flannigan, brings a hope and lightness to the film that balances Gus' harder edge. Both have an appreciation of the game and it history of the sport, while representing the polar ends of their careers. Rounding out the cast are Matt Lillard as Gus' main Braves scout nemesis who feels technology is the ultimate replacement for the old-timers traveling in the field. And the focal point of the film, first round draft prospect Bo Gentry, shows that the allure of the majors is sometimes less about the purity and love of the game and more about possible endorsements and all that comes with a superstar status.

Trouble With The Curve is a warm-hearted, bitter-sweet tale of aging, the regrets we endure for the semblance of the greater good, the fight for relevance, and the love for the purely American game of baseball. The story does have a few moments of predictability, but a stellar case hits this story out of the park. Eastwood may growl at the rest of the world, but he still loves the roar of the crowd. 

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Safe House

Safety in Numbers?

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Rated: R  Some language and strong violence throughout.
Release Date: February 10, 2012
Runtime: 1 hr 55 mins

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Director: Daniel Espinosa

Writers: David Guggenheim
Cast: Denzel Washington, Ryan Reynolds, Vera Farmiga, Brendan Gleeson, Sam Shepard, Robert Patrick

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SYNOPSIS: Young inexperienced CIA agent Matt in charge of a safe house in Cape Town suddenly plays host to ex-CIA fugitive Tobin Frost. When the safe house is breached in attempt to assassinated Frost, Matt finds himself on the run protecting the man he is supposed to keep under guard.

REVIEW: Easy Money (2010) director Daniel Espinosa and Exit Strategy writer David Guggenheim team up with A-listers Denzel Washington and Ryan Reynolds for a fast-paced cat-and-mouse, spy versus spy, keep-you-guessing, tale of survival. 

Cape Town, South Africa CIA safe house keeper Matt Weston (Ryan Reynolds, Green Lantern) spends his shifts in a bored state, wondering when he will be reassigned to a real case officer position elsewhere on the globe. Even his CIA Langley contact David Barlow (Brendan Gleeson, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1) can't guarantee Matt any change in his current post. Soon, though, the U.S. Consulate receives a visitor, Tobin Frost (Denzel Washington, Unstoppable) as he turns himself in. Transferred to Matt's safe house, the CIA sends an interrogation team to extract whatever information Frost has gained since turning traitor nine years ago. When a heavily armed team led by a man named Vargus (Fares Fares, Easy Money) breaches the safe house after Frost, Matt makes the decision to move off-site with Frost in an attempt to protect him as an intel asset for the Agency. In Langley, senior analyst Catherine Linklater (Vera Farmiga, Source Code) and Barlow square off against each other to bring Frost in, while deputy director Harlon Whitford (Sam Shepard, The Notebook) orders them to work together to flush out both Weston and Frost before either or both are killed in the field.

Part Man on Fire and The Bourne Identity, Safe House is a white knuckle ride that doesn't let up until the very end. The story begins slowly and innocently enough as we watch Matt mindlessly throws a ball against an empty safe house wall listening to language lessons on his headphones and wishing for more adventure in his CIA career. Across town Tobin Frost meets with an ex-MI6 spook with possible incendiary information on a microchip to be sold to the highest bidder. Once Frost arrives at the safe house a 'walk-in guest', Matt unwittingly gets his wish as all hell breaks loose with automatic weapons fire, flash bangs, double-taps, and a high body count. But while the safe house ends up being anything but safe, the streets and bergs in and around Cape Town are no more safe as Weston and Frost take part in brutal high-speed chases on the run from relentless armed thugs desperate to reacquire Frost. But while Vargus and his men are on the hunt for the mysterious microchip, we soon realize that something more shadowy and covert is afoot.

The action is fast-paced and relentless. But even when the story slows down, Reynolds' Weston and Washington's Frost pace each other like coiled cobras. Every move Frost makes or statement he utters is a calculation he uses to further his own ends. The young Weston, anxious to prove his worth to the Agency he has dedicated his adulthood to, learns quickly that he has to up his own physical and mental game to go toe-to-toe with Frost, as well as unravel the tightening noose created by their pursuers and, possibly, his own Agency. Can Weston be a superior agent to the dangerous Frost? Can he trust the Agency as he continues to try to bring Frost in? Will he start questioning the directives of the Agency as Frosty burrows deeper into his psyche? Guns, chases, fights, conspiracies, and unavoidable and more difficult obstacles - all have a place in Safe House. Simmering and boiling over, the entire film is a lesson in kinetic and forward momentum.

Somewhat safe in their Langley, Virginia bunkered command center, Catherine Linklater, Davis Barlow and Harlan Whitford also master their dance of half-truths, office politics, and real or imagined conspiracies against the Agency and each other. Is there a information leak in the bureaucracy of the business, or are the men pursuing Weston and Frost just that lucky each time they catch up to the pair?

Shot in a grainy, washed-out, contrasted style, Espinosa makes the most out of the Cape Town, South Africa locales. From the center of downtown and a crowded soccer stadium, to a dirt road and isolated villa in the shadow of picturesque mountain ranges, Safe Town is a rock solid story cast against a exotic diverse landscape. The mix of rigged and handheld camera styles finish off a feast for the eyes, jostling around the cityscape during downtown high-speed automotive escapes and settling in close and steady between Frost and Weston as they glare at each other in distaste, adrenaline and testosterone.

Safe House is a high-octane thrill ride, covering all of the bases of the typical actioner. Some parts of the story work on all cylinders, some other could have been done better. As a conspiracy, some points are obvious to the genre initiated. But all in all Safe House will entertain and please, resting on the talents and on-screen presence of Washington and Reynolds, as well as as some great ass-kicking!

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WORTH: Primetime and DVD