Sisters (2015)

I do not have sisters. I am the only girl with three younger brothers. Nothing against sisters or girls but I have never wanted a sister. I do not know how to handle being a girl myself let alone living with another hormone infused bitch. It is nice to know I am the only one in the house besides my mom that has that bitch time. I have never had to share clothes or even a room. I have had it pretty good in my family being the only girl.

            I do have girl friends that I definitely consider being like sisters to me. I have one friend I have known since fourth grade and we definitely became like sisters over the years. That is the kind of friendship my two favorite actresses Tina Fey and Amy Poehler have. Fey and Poehler have known each other for a very long time and it is very evident when they are together that they are close like sisters. And how fitting it is for them to be in a movie titled Sisters where they actually get to play sisters.

            Kate (Fey) and Maura (Poehler) Ellis are sisters who are complete opposites. Kate is the rebellious, crazy, unserious one who likes to have a good time and party. Maura has always been the goody-two-shoes selflessly thinking of other people who never really had fun growing up. Maura gets a call from her parents that they are selling their old house down in Florida to move to an adult community. They want Maura and Kate to come down and clean out their old room.

            When they get down to the house Kate and Maura freak out because their parents had already sold the house and moved out they just needed them to come clean out their old rooms like they said. As they start going through their stuff Maura comments that she never had any fun she was always the one who drove everyone home and helped everyone out when they needed to puke. Kate gets the idea to throw one last crazy wild party at their house like she used when they were in high school. They call their party Ellis Island Revamped.

            Their house party gets a little out of hand like it is a high school party all over again. And also some tensions come out between the sisters and as usual they all get resolved by the end of the movie.

            Tina Fey and Amy Poehler are two of my idols. I remember watching them religiously on Saturday Night Live. I love how they do not give any shits with their comedy they are so unapologetic. I adore them as comedians and human beings. Usually it is Amy Poehler who plays the batshit crazy kind of trashy person and Tina Fey is the straight laced no nonsense one. In Sisters their usual roles got completely reversed and Tina Fey was fucking amazing! Seeing Tina Fey as the batshit crazy one was one of the highlights of my life. I was laughing so hard in every one of her scenes. It just so not her and that is what made Tina Fey playing this crazy person all the more hilarious. I was crying laughing every time the word “fuck” came out of her mouth. There was one scene at the end where she takes a selfie with a graffitied dick on the wall and I lost it. It may sound weird but I felt so unsettled watching Amy Poehler not be the crazy one. She was a bit of a wilder Leslie Knope but not by much. I love the character of Leslie Knope and Amy Poehler was perfection in role but I just always feel uncomfortable watching the character. That is how I felt with Maura but I still liked her because Amy Poehler is amazing.

 

            The rest of the cast was brilliant. Maya Rudolph and Rachel Dratch are two of Fey and Poehler’s close friends so of course they were in it and of course I loved seeing them in it. Kate McKinnon and Bobby Moynihan are in it. Ike Barinholtz plays Poehler’s love interest and he was not over the top annoying I liked him. John Cena has possibly one of the best cameos in a movie. Kate was trying to get with his character and those scenes were hilarious because he just stood there while she tried her best.

            Sisters is everything I could have hope for, for Tina Fey and Amy Poehler to make. All their humor is there. It is raunchy and silly and crazy and totally hilarious from start to finish. I was dying for them to make a movie that was rated R so they can be as raunchy and outrageous as they wanted and Sisters delivered! I can only hope that if I had a sister that we could have a relationship like Tina Fey and Amy Poehler’s friendship and Kate and Maura. Definitely go see Sisters as soon as you can it is one of the best laughs you will have. 

Are You Here (2013)

“That's the thing about friendship - it's a lot rarer than love; there's nothing in it for anybody.”

            I always tend to watch movies just for a specific actor or actress. Most of the time I have no clue whatsoever what the movie is about I just want to see it for that person on the screen I happen to adore. Sometimes I have been surprised by how good the movie is and wind up really liking it. Other times the movie has been super boring but the actor or actress was really good. And at other times the movie on the whole was shite and the actor or actress was not that great (I am looking at you god awful TV movie Certain Prey and Tatiana Maslany who is normally awesome but was only alright and really awkward). With Are You Here? I had to watch it for Amy Poehler who is one of my all time favorite people in this world and I also like Zach Galafinakis. This movie happened to me the second of the three types of feelings I am left with when I watch a movie for an actor or actress I like.

            The story starts off with this guy named Steve (Owen Wilson). He is shown going on dates with several women and not really being able to pay for dinner or even being with a prostitute. He works as a weatherman at a local news station. Steve usually arrives for his job high but manages to pull off doing his job without making a fool of himself. He has a friend named Ben (Galafinakis). Ben has some mental issues and comes off as eccentric. He lives alone in a trailer that Steve helps to pay for.

            One day Ben comes by the news studio to tell Steve his dad died. They drive out to Amish country in Pennsylvania to the town they grew up together in. Ben’s dad owned a very successful grocery store in town and had hundreds of acres of farm land. At the reading of the will Ben gets all the money and the land while his sister Terry (Poehler) is left with only $100,000 and a couple hundred thousand more in bonds. Terry is pissed off big time because Ben is such a screw up with crazy ideas. She thinks Ben will burn the away the money on some insane idea and run the grocery store into the ground. Terry in general has a stick up her ass with life: she and husband (played by the eternally handsome and wonderful Joel Gretsch) have not been successful with starting a family and she hates her father’s much younger wife Angela. Angela is left nothing because she did not want the father to leave her anything.

            With his father’s death Ben starts to fly off the handle and his mental issues get out of control. He gets arrested and he finally sees this as a sign to give in and start taking medication. Once he starts the medication, Ben becomes a different but better person. Terry likes seeing him take more responsibility and acting like an adult. The only person who does not like Ben’s change is Steve. Steve had come to depend on his friend depending on him. He never saw anything wrong with Ben and let him be who he wanted even if it was not good for him.

            I am going to end my summary here. The story kind of bored me and could have been over with much sooner. Some of it is a bit predictable too. 

            Despite the not-too-great story the cast was really good. I said at the beginning Amy Poehler is an actress and personality I idolize and have for years. I did not know what the story was about I figured it was a comedy and she would be hysterical with Zach Galafinakis. I was very pleasantly surprised that Terry this was a dramatic movie and Poehler did a fantastic job playing a serious character. I am so used to her playing these crazy silly characters to see her play a serious one was fantastic she really does have a great range you do not see very often. Galafinakis, it is the same as with Poehler, I am so used to seeing him funny not serious. He also did a great job with the drama. Owen Wilson I do not like as an actor. There is something about him that annoys me and his character was a piece of crap. Jenna Fischer gets her name on the poster but she was barely in the movie. She was in it for a total of like five minutes toward the end. I also adore Fischer to no end as an actress so it was great to see her in something. Joel Gretsch is one of my TV crushes. He is not in a lot of things but whenever I see him on a show as a bit character I go a little silly. My love for Gretsch started when he was on the criminally underrated awesome show The 4400 when he played Tom Baldwin. Peter Bogdanovich makes an appearance as a judge. That to me was funny for some reason.

            Are You Here? was a bit boring. The characters were good except for Steve. I can kind of relate to the character of Ben to a certain extent. I suffer from depression, anxiety, and ADHD and for a while I was very leery about going on medication I felt ten times better. I saw all the things I was doing that were not good and changed them. Now I feel a lot better and more stable. Sometimes it takes something bad happening to make the light bulb in your head go off to snap you into getting some help. I liked that aspect of Are You Here? with the character of Ben. Other than Ben’s story and Amy Poehler, Joel Gretsch, and Jenna Fischer I was not impressed with the movie. Damn these kinds of movies with crappy stories but great actors. 

They Came Together (2014)

Whatever happened to good spoof movies? It seems like after Mel Brooks made Robin Hood: Men in Tights all the spoof movies after that just went to shit. With Brooks’ movies and other such as Airplane they were subtle spoofs. Nothing was in your face or trying to be funny they were just funny. I cannot even tell you how many times I have seen Brooks’ Young Frankenstein or Blazzing Saddles or High Anxiety and I catch things I did not catch the other thousands times I watched them. The only modern movie I can think of that follows in the same line as Brooks’ spoofs has been Wet Hot American Summer from 2001 which spoofed a summer camp in 1980. That movie was written and directed by David Wain and Michael Showalter and they recently wrote and directed They Came Together. Yet again it is a spoof movie and it is one of the best spoofs on the romantic comedy genre.

            Joel (Paul Rudd) and Molly (Amy Poehler) are at dinner with their friends Kyle (Bill Hader) and Karen (Ellie Kemper). Kyle and Karen discuss how they first met and want Joel and Molly to discuss how they first met and fell in love. Right away they say their relationship was like a romantic comedy with the third character being New York City and that if it were to be a movie it would start off with aerial shots of the city. And sure enough it does.

            They say their relationship was hate at first sight. Neither was looking to be in a relationship at the moment. Joel worked for a large corporate candy company and Molly had her own small candy store. Joel’s company was creating a large store right across from Molly’s and planned to put her store out of business. They wind up meeting at a party at their friends house. They hate each other and say really funny and very stupid things.

            After this the movie follows the typical rom-com formula but this being Amy Poehler and Paul Rudd in a comedy made by David Wain and Michael Showalter with so many popular comedic actors the way the story plays out is anything but typical. It takes the typical rom-com clichés and completely blows them out of proportion. I cannot even explain what happens because nothing would be funny you would have to see the movie to understand. There are a lot of running gags that usually happen in rom-coms like a character telling another to wait and then they something important like “Thanks” or “I’m sorry.” Another one has Joel and his younger brother Jake (Max Greenfield) talking about how Jake does not have a job and he is trying to start up a company that will not go anywhere, and that Joel had to raise Jake after their parents died, etc. It's got a montage, crazy parents, crazy ex-boyfriends and girlfriends, and silly life-realization scenes that are just totally genius. 

            They Came Together is absurd, ridiculous, and perfectly entertaining. To me it is one of the best comedies I have ever seen. The cast could not have been better. Amy Poehler and Paul Rudd were fantastic together. I do not think either one of them has a serious bone in their bodies. Christopher Meloni is in a few scenes, yes Stabler from Law and Order: SVU is being funny and hilariously so (if you want to die laughing at him watching Wet Hot American Summer). I just love the way it makes fun of rom-coms. The way rom-coms are written today is just awful. They are so predictable and just stupid. They Came Together shows just how predictable and stupid they have become. Yet you know the characters are just comedic versions of “serious” rom-com characters and, oddly enough, you still root for Joel and Molly to be together.

            My review of They Came Together really does not do the movie justice. Just trust me when I say that if you enjoy comedy movies in any sense you will like this one. As you watch it you can pick out about ten different rom-coms that this movie is making fun of and you will most likely never see them the same way again. As I said it follows in the steps of Mel Brooks and does a pretty damn good job. 

Blades of Glory (2007)

“I see you got fat.”
“I see you still look like a fifteen year old girl, but not hot.” 

            Blades of Glory is one of my all time favorite comedy movies and I am so not ashamed to admit it. Yes, I know this is coming from a person who is constantly watching classic films that are sophisticated and well made but even I sometimes like a really stupid modern comedy movie with some of the worst acting and ridiculous plot. I remember seeing this movie when it first came out and just dying laughing the whole time.

            Chazz Michael Michaels (Will Ferrell) and Jimmy MacElroy (Jon Heder) are two of the best men’s figure skaters in the world. They are complete opposites in every way: Chazz is a macho sex addict who likes to improvise his routines while Jimmy is a clean very girly looking and acting guy whose routines are very precise. They are loved by fans all over the world. At the World Figure Skating competition in Stockholm they tie for first place and neither are very happy. On the podium to accept their gold medals they get into a massive fight and are then banned from men’s figure skating.

            Three years later Jimmy’s former stalker Hector (Nick Swardson) finds in the rule book that Jimmy can still skate if he can find a partner for the pair skating category. Jimmy goes to Coach (Craig T. Nelson)- his former coach- to let him know about the findings. Coach gets all upset because there is not enough time to find a partner since try outs are in a few weeks.

            Chazz is now a drunkard working at a skating show for little kids. Jimmy just happens to go to the place where Chazz works to find a partner. The two continue their feud and get into a brawl. The fight is shown on the news and Coach sees them. He sees that they would be a perfect pair after he notices they lifted each other with skating lifts.

            Neither Jimmy nor Chazz are very happy about their paring since they are night and day but they bear because they want to skate professionally again so bad. The skating community is not too pleased about the pairing especially the brother and sister team of Stranz and Fairchild Van Waldenberg (Will Arnett and Amy Poehler). They have been very happy wither Michaels and MacElroy out of the picture they saw the attention and the medal as theirs for the taking. At the press conference and signups for the competition they notice that Jimmy and their younger sister Katie (Jenna Fischer) like each other which leads to not very nice things.

            Jimmy and Chazz hate working together but of course as time goes on they begin to get along. Katie begins to really like Jimmy and feels bad that her brother and sister are forcing her to sabotage the pair’s skating routines and their relationship. Coach has Jimmy and Chazz do a very dangerous routine for the finals, it so dangerous that the first pair to do it one of the skaters was killed! But Chazz and Jimmy want to win again they agree to do it.

            Stranz and Fairchild almost get their wish when Katie causes a (hilarious) rift between Chazz and Jimmy but the two eventually see what happened and forgive each other. They go on to win the gold medal.

            Trust me the movie is ten times funnier than I have explained it. I am not a huge Will Ferrell fan he goes over the top too much but in this movie he is so funny. Everyone in the cast is perfect it is one of my favorite comedy casts ever. Amy Poehler and Will Arnett are hysterical together and what makes them funnier as a brother and sister team is knowing they are married in real life. They are both so outrageously silly they really do make the movie. Jenna Fischer is beyond adorable I wanted to just hug her the whole time. Before this she was always sweet cover up Pam Beasley from The Office and in a few scenes in the movie she has her boobs hanging out of tight shirts and saying “sex sex sex what can I say I love sex” when she went undercover to one of Chazz’s sex addict meetings. My favorite scene is when she went to Chazz’s room in a sexy outfit and Will Ferrell was groping her boobs haha. Needless to say Pam Beasley was forever ruined for me but in a funny way. Jon Heder was alright he was supposed to be the straight, innocent man. Nick Swordson as Jimmy’s stalker Hector is a panic I love seeing him in movies.

            Blades of Glory is one silly ridiculous movie I can sit through all the time. It is a mindless comedy that is just fun to watch. Heder and Ferrell are so polar opposites with their comedy that they actually complement each other and bring so much more to the movie. Blades of Glory reminds me a little of the good old screwball comedies that provide a much needed laugh

Martin and Orloff

“Why’d you try to kill yourself?”

            The question is asked quite a lot throughout the movie. For those of who are special enough to have ever seen the show “Upright Citizens Brigade” then you know right off the bat what will be happening in Martin and Orloff and what kind of insane, crazy, out of control antics all the characters will be getting into. But for those of you who have no seen anything by the UCB… you’ve been warned this movie is odd and ridiculous to all proportions.

            Ian Roberts plays Martin Flam with Matt Walsh playing Dr. Eric Orloff. Throughout the movie we see that Martin is actually the sanity while Orloff is the insanity. Orloff surrounds himself with the oddest of people including his friend Keith who has a problem with shitting in sinks. Orloff drags Martin all over New York starting with a softball game he had to get to in the middle of Martin’s first session. From then on Orloff drags Martin to a hot dog vender where the guy’s face and hands got messed up from oil exploding on them, to a strip club where his girlfriend is a striper and has the best sweet potato pie, and to a theater play that is about someone killing themselves. Orloff is always saying to Martin “this will be good for you” and then something crazy winds up happening.

            As with the show, everything is all crazy from start to finish and comes together nicely at the end. He meets Kasha who is Eric’s stripper girlfriend, her friend and fellow stripper Patti, Patti’s overweight and very well endowed ex-boyfriend Jimbo, a writer named Dan Wasserman, and a patient of Orloff’s with severe daddy issues. All these people come together at the end and help Martin with his problem and standing up to his boss.

            Martin creates character costumes for a marketing company. He was to make an eggroll costume for this company called China Chef. The guy from China Chef is out of his mind and did not want Martin to make a costume with eye holes because he did not want people to be reminded there was a human inside he wanted it to look as real as possible. The actor in the eggroll costume went for a smoke but because he could not see where he was going he walked off a pier and drowned. The guys from China Chef covered the whole thing up and cut eye holes in the costume when the body was brought up.

            On the way back to Orloff’s office in one scene they stop for Chinese food (“It’s the best in the city.”). When they get back to the office Orloff takes out an eggroll and tosses it to Martin. Martin freaks out seeing the eggroll and says “I don’t want to talk to you I want to talk to the eggroll.” We along with Orloff that Martin tried to kill himself because he blamed himself for the actor in the eggroll costume dying.

            Martin and Orloff is one of those movies that you need to have a special kind of humor for. The story is outrageously ridiculous and the characters are all out of their minds in some way. This is a fun movie to watch for all the actors: Kim Raver plays Kasha who is affectionately called “Strippy” by Orloff, Amy Poehler plays Patti, David Cross is Dan Wasserman, Matt Besser is Martin’s boss, and Tina Fey, Rachel Dratch, and Janeane Garofalo play the Southern Ladies a dinner theater play. This movie was before Amy Poehler was on Saturday Night Live, you can tell because her top front teeth were not capped yet. It was odd in one part to see her kissing Ian Roberts in the scene when Patti takes Martin back to her place, I can’t explain what makes the whole thing awkward and weird but it just is.  

            If you are in the mood for some dark, ridiculous, non sophisticated, humor watch Martin and Orloff. This is a movie I show all my friends at least once, it’s different from all the other comedy movies that have been made in the last ten years. Martin and Orloff is fun to watch when you think the weight of the world is upon you and nothing has been going your way, you see Martin and what he is going through and you realize that your life no matter how insane it is at the moment is nothing compared to what he goes through.