Review No.115: The Five Year Engagement

I was woken up today with the sad news that writer-director Nora Ephron, most known for her role working on romantic comedies, had passed away only a day after I'd watched the best romcom in a good while. That film was The Five Year Engagement which is written by Nicholas Stoller and Jason Segal, who most recently worked on the script for The Muppets together, with the latter starring alongside Emily Blunt as a couple who have to postpone their wedding. The film starts with Segal's chef Tom trying to arrange a romantic way to propose to Blunt's Violet however she works out something's going on before he has a chance to do it eventually she makes him go through with his elaborate plan before agreeing to it. After an awkward engagement party Violet's sister Suzie, played by Community's Alison Brie who pulls off a very convincing English accent, and Tom's fellow chef Alex get together before having baby and eventually getting married essentially stealing the thunder of Violent and Tom. The next setback is when Violet is asked to take up a post-grad position at Michigan University after a discussion with Tom they agree to move however he fails to tell her that he was offered a head chef job at his boss' new restaurant. While Violet thrives in her new position it is Tom who struggles to find work eventually working at a deli making sandwiches and basically filling up his days waiting for his fiancée to come home. Tom becomes unhappy in Michigan which means that Violet has to confide in her professor, played by a suitably slimy Rhys Ifans, but will she give into temptation and risk wasting the engagement that has been going on so long?

Something else that goes on far too long is this film, at just over two hours The Five Year Engagement suffers from too many similar scenes as Tom struggles to adjust to his Michigan lifestyle. I think at least fifteen to twenty minutes could've been trimmed either from these scenes or some of the latter parts of the film building up to the inevitable conclusion. The other element of the film I wasn't too keen on one was the fact that the problems in Violet and Tom's relationship arise from a stale doughnut but I won't go into that as I'm expecting most of you haven't seen the film. I don't think the Michigan tourist board will be too happy with this film as their state is presented as a complete hole in which there is nothing to do, there are no job opportunities for culinary-minded chefs and the only place of note is the university but I suppose at the end of the day the film's setting is where most of the jokes are found. Thankfully the film has more negatives than positives mainly due to the brilliant chemistry between real-life friends Blunt and Segal who seem like a believable couple from their first meeting at a new year's party through to their ups and downs depicted in the film. Blunt is perfectly charming a great counter-balance to Segal's usual goofy routine which here is completely endearing. Segal and Stoller's script is also full of laughs throughout with my favourite moment being Alex's song about Tom's former conquests set to the tune of 'We Didn't Start the Fire' as well as a rather uncomfortable version of 'The Birdy Song' danced after a shocking revelation. Ifans is also brilliant as the smarmy professor who tries to entice Violet throughout her time at the university while these scenes are also spiced up by her post-grad colleagues who all have increasingly bizarre ideas about what would work best as a test experiment. Overall this reminded me of Segal and Stoller's earlier film Forgetting Sarah Marshall as both are peppered with decent jokes but suffer from being overlong and having a bad narrative structure. That being said I definitely enjoyed The Five Year Engagement more as it had bigger laughs, more chemistry between the central couple and most crucially of all no Russell Brand. So it's a very sad RIP to Nora Ephron and while The Five Year Engagement may not be on the same level as When Harry Met Sally or Sleepless in Seattle but I think she'd be glad to know that even after she's gone the genre she created is still going strong.

Verdict: A charming and funny romcom that boasts plenty of jokes plus an easy chemistry between the leads is let down by being overlong as well as becoming repetitive in its final third so for those reasons it gets a very high 7/10

Review No.101: Jeff, Who Lives at Home

After the last few days of dull or dire epics I felt the need to lighten the mood with two films that are both comedies of sort starting with Jeff, Who Lives at Home. The film stars two of my favourite US sitcom stars How I Met Your Mother's Jason Segal and The Office's Ed Helms as brothers Jeff and Pat who are both a strain on their mother Sharon who is played by Susan Sarandon. As the title suggests Jeff lives in his mother's basement and is obsessed with the movie Signs so has started connected mundane events together such as when someone calls his house looking for Kevin it starts him on an odyssey which means he forgets to buy superglue for his mother's cabinet. Pat meanwhile is stuck in some sort of middle management position married to Judy Greer's Linda and constantly upsetting her with his decisions such as his one to buy a new car. The two brothers randomly meet up throughout what is their mother's birthday due to Pat's belief that Linda is having an affair and Jeff's quest to find the elusive Kevin. The third part of the film follows Sharon who works in a dull office bemoaning her lot in life however throughout the film she starts to receive mystery messages from someone claiming to be a secret admirer. As you would imagine the film ends with a big set piece bringing these trio of stories together in what I personally considered to be a fairly surprising ending.

At the start of Jay and Mark Duplass' film I felt I knew what I was getting, I mean after all these were the directors who last bought us the ultra-indie Cyrus, however what I found was a sweet-natured comedy about small incidents creating life-changing moments. Though at first both of the brothers annoyed me the talent of Segal and Helms created two wonderfully rounded characters who had both dealt with the death of their father in different ways Jeff by regressing into a childlike state while at the same time being obsessed with finding the meaning in things and Pat by frivolously spending money that he doesn't have. It is Sarandon though who is magnificent here as Sharon giving one of her best performances in year as a cubicle-dwelling woman who has long given up on finding love again and has even fallen out of love with her two sons. The film's ending really surprised me and put a tear in my eye as an event changes everything for everyone and for me it changed my opinion of this film. Sure it may be a little twee and quirky for some while some will also find Michael Andrews' score a tad annoying but overall this was a sweet little comedy film that shows how a loss can affect us in different ways.

Verdict: Though a time a little too indie for its own good this film is sweet-natured and well-acted with a surprising conclusion so for those reasons it gets 7/10

Review No.30: The Muppets

OK after a family film that I hadn't connected with to one that I hoped would be excellent seeing as its the big screen return for The Muppets. Although it's sort of standard for everybody to say their favourite Muppet Movie is A Christmas Carol for me it's always been Muppets Take Manhattan due to its knowing references and snappy musical numbers. Thankfully this film, simply titled The Muppets, has all that and more and focuses on brothers Walter and Gary the former of whom is a Muppet and the latter who is played by Jason Segal the man responsible for getting this latest Muppet film off the ground. When Walter, Gary and Gary's girlfriend Mary played by Amy Adams journey to L.A. and tour The Muppet Studios Walter finds out that Chris Cooper's Tex Richman plans to buy The Muppet Theatre, knock it down and drill for oil. The only way to save it is to get The Muppet gang back together and put on a show that will raise the required $10 Million to get the theatre back. Kermit rounds up The Muppets but has trouble getting Miss Piggy on board as she is now living in Paris and working for Vogue Magazine in scenes reminiscent of those in The Devil Wears Prada. Of course the highlight of the film is the show itself featuring old school songs such as Rainbow Connection, celebrity cameos from the likes of Jack Black and Selena Gomez and tie-ins to the main plot involving whether Walter considers himself to be a Man or a Muppet.

And it's this question that forms the backbone of The Muppets because even though the reconciliation of the group is what everybody is going to the film to see I certainly got quickly involved in Walter's story. Indeed by his own opening monologue I felt more sympathy for him than I ever did for the kid in Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close so maybe this should've got a Best Picture nod instead. Both Jason Segal's script and his performance as Gary shows that he has a great love of The Muppets and a respect for the tradition however I never really took to Amy Adams' Mary who was an odd breed of smiles and resentment. Chris Cooper was excellent as the villain especially when he started rapping while Brett McKenzie's songs were amazing and more than deserve the Oscar nod that they have been given. The only problem for me was the overuse of knowing looks to camera and a cavalcade of in-jokes which sort of took away from the old school charm of The Muppets. But overall this was a charming slice of nostalgia but one that doesn't alienate younger viewers who just want to see chickens singing Cee-Lo Green songs.

Verdict: I was always going to love this film but I didn't expect it to be as near-perfect as this so I'm going to give it an impressive 8.5/10