Last year, between the two of us, we watched an average of 317 movies.
This year our goal is to top that by watching at least one a day.
And as an extra special torture, we've decided to write about all of them.

29 September 2008

Smart People

Director: Noam Murro
Writer: Mark Poirier
Released: 2008
Cast: Dennis Quaid, Sarah Jessica Parker, Thomas Haden Church, Ellen Page

NIKKI says: How does Hollywood let an audience know characters are smart? By having them use big or obscure words. Dennis Quaid knows the meaning of the word "eft" -- he must be a genius.

I'm really starting to hate Hollywood's idea of the "smart person". Seems those of us who might be book-schooled a bit more than the rest of the world also need to be repressed and smart-assy, and entirely unable to have any fun.

Take this movie... Dennis Quaid is the smartest professor in the world and he just snaps at the lower class, and thinks he's just so above everyone. His daughter is the same way -- super-smart, and a super-bitch, mean to people for no reason because life is too short to deal with, well, anyone else. Even Sarah Jessica Parker gets the treatment here -- she's smart, too, and a doctor no less, and you can tell from her limp hair, make-up-less face, and desire to sneak a cigarette when she's upset that she's also horribly repressed.

Who does it take to come into the fold and make everyone's lives happy again? A dope-smoking sponge, without any education whatsoever. If only life were so simple.

I found myself surprised at many turns in the story, which I put down to poor development. I didn't get a sense of why Sarah Jessica and Dennis Quaid even had their affair. I didn't get what prompted Juno to kiss Ned. And just for the life of me I don't understand the drama at the end when Sarah Jessica thinks she's pregnant. Why did she suddenly become a cruel bitch? She went into the affair knowing this man was utterly self-involved. So, why am I shocked when she finds out he's still that way later on?

No, the more I think about it, the less this worked for me. It's another one of those Squid and the Whale type movies where we're supposed to think all involved are on a higher plain but they just go around acting like assholes for no real, deep reasons.

2/5