Opening this week
Neighbors
Seth Rogen, Zac Efron
No, it’s not a remake of the 1981 John Belushi comedy of the same name. Instead, Neighbors aspires to be a much funnier Belushi comedy: Animal House. In this R-rated comedy, a couple (Rogen, Rose Byrne) with a newborn baby face unexpected difficulties after they are forced to live next to a fraternity (Efron, Dave Franco, Christopher Mintz-Plasse). The Plus: The genre. From The Hangover ($277 million) to Project X ($100 million) to Horrible Bosses ($117 million) to Ted ($218 million) to Jackass Presents: Bad Grandpa ($102 million), American moviegoers love their Hard-R comedies. Here, Nicholas Stoller (Forgetting Sarah Marshall, Get Him to the Greek, The Five Year Engagement) directs Rogen (This is the End), Efron (That Awkward Moment), Byrne (Insidious: Chapter 2), Franco (21 Jump Street) and Mintz-Plasse (Kick Ass 2). The Minus: The odds. From The Change-Up ($37 million) to 21 & Over ($25 million) to Movie 43 ($8 million), American moviegoers are finicky when it comes to their Hard-R comedies. Rogen is certainly no stranger to finicky audiences (Paul, The Guilt Trip).
Chef
Jon Favreau, Sofia Vergara
In this R-rated comedy, a prominent chef (Favreau) loses his restaurant job and starts up a food truck in an effort to reclaim his creative promise and estranged family. The Plus: The player. Years ago, before he become an A-List director following the blockbuster success of Iron Man, Jon Favreau found H’Wood renown co-writing and co-starring in the indie comedy Swingers with Vince Vaughn. Chef looks to be a back-to-basics return for this player. Here, he’s enlisted help from Vergara (ABC’s Modern Family), Robert Downey, Jr. (Iron Man 3), Scarlett Johansson (Captain America: The Winter Soldier) and Dustin Hoffman (Little Fockers). The Minus: The odds. Favreau also had a hand in writing the painfully unfunny Couples Retreat, which should’ve been called Couples: Retreat!
Now playing
The Other Woman
Cameron Diaz, Leslie Mann
** — Woman of Ill Repute
Despite some winning femme fatales, er, pratfalls, The Other Woman comes on to us aggressively, but just doesn’t have enough feminine wiles to make audiences fall head over heals with the end results. In this PG-13-rated comedy, three women (Diaz, Mann, Kate Upton) team-up to plot mutual revenge on their three-timing SOB of a husband/boyfriend (Nikolaj Coster-Waldau). It appears that most of the adult comedy bits have been spayed so that the movie warrants a more general audience-friendly PG-13 rating … because teens are obviously the target demographic for comedies about a three-timing married man and the mostly middle-aged women left in his wake. Based on the boffo box office of Bad Santa, Bad Teacher and Bad Grandpa, the decision to go soft should’ve gotten the flick retitled Bad Decision. Now, it just plays out like thinly veiled knock-off of First Wives Club.
The Amazing Spider-Man 2
Andrew Garfield, Emma Stone
**1/2 — 2 Webbed Feet
Though it should’ve been an outright Spectacular Spider-Man, the supposedly Amazing second adventures of our friendly neighborhood web crawler end up to be occasionally entertaining but entirely too screen-burstingly busy. In this PG-13-rated comic book adventure, Peter Parker and his alter-ego Spider-Man (Garfield) run the gauntlet as the mysterious company Oscorp sends up a slew of supervillains against him and his loved ones (Stone, Sally Field). It’s so ironic how Marvel Studios is planning a TV series around Daredevil but Sony, in its bid to spin Spidey’s web into an Avengers-sized franchise, gives this deuce enough story for a full network run. Not that it’s boring, mind you! The CGI swings and connects, the fight sequences shoot and score and some of the moments (dramatic and comedic) evince a strong bite. It’s the tone overall that falls down the waterspout, however. Chock full of supporting characters bound for their own features and plotlines threading into future installments, all of the world-building can’t help but wash the spider out of his own sequel. Hiring Andrew Garfield: That’s the one thing this reboot of a classic comic book gets letter perfectly right. He nails a ridiculously beloved fictional character that’s inhabited comic readers’ hearts and minds to the same extent that Daniel Day-Lewis channeled a living breathing American forefather in Lincoln … if only the production got mounted a decade earlier. Based on Marvel Studios’ successful formula (Spider-Man might be a Marvel comic, but the rights are owned by Sony), everybody’s rushing to create a supergroup brand of their own a la The Avengers and The Amazing Spider-Man 2 shows the signs of studio tinkering along the lines of “We’re gonna do this so you gotta include that.” Beyond this, there are some screenwriting grievances. With an acclaimed package deal of writers (Star Trek Into Darkness’s Roberto Orci, Alex Kurtman) plus one additional scribe (Jeff Pinker), the voices of these separate cooks show through. The patchwork of scenes are inconsistent (Garfield’s scenes with Stone and Field shine with an authenticity while his interactions with villains play out archly laughable like this was a Saturday morning cartoon). Still, it’s an improvement upon its predecessor, despite the padding. Hell, even a buffet has some standout dishes.
Heaven is For Real
Greg Kinnear, Kelly Reilly
** — Heaven Can Grate
A small screen message movie trying to put on its big boy pants for the big screen, Heaven is For Real puts forth a message worth ruminating about even if the story feels like it just came off of a greeting card rack. In this PG-rated drama, a small-town pastor (Kinnear) must find the courage and conviction to share his son’s life-changing near-death experience with his congregation. The family sings hymns together in the car. The parents say just the right things at the right times and are still madly in love with each other. The son looks as impossibly cute as a Gerber Baby. The father won’t take money for services provided to cash-strapped clients. His best friend quips one-liners when things get too heavy. Yep, it’s a formulaic feel-good story. Even if it unapologetically aims itself squarely at the Christian demographic, the movie’s talking points smartly prove universal (the book it was based on, after all, became a universal bestseller). Also, the story earns brownie points for boldly flying in the face of conventional Christian doctrine, raising further spiritual questions about the afterlife more than preaching scripture down to audiences. Still, despite the best efforts of a great cast trying to act their way around stale dialogue, Heaven is For Real plays out like a sermon that’s way too polished to be a truly effective thought-provoker. Oh, real life comes complete with comic relief, but it’s rarely on cue and never obligatory. People need to relate — not wonder how their lives can look like a Norman Rockwell painting, too.
Brick Mansions
Paul Walker, RZA
**1/2 — Escape from New Yawn
Propulsive and explosive but not quick witted enough, late actor Paul Walker’s penultimate adventure moves fast and furiously but still manages to come across as slow witted. In this PG-13-rated crime thriller, an undercover Detroit cop (Walker) navigates a dangerous neighborhood surrounded by a containment wall in order to bring down a crime lord (RZA). The story unapologetically embraces preposterousness at an automatic clip. Still, some of the sequences hit moviegoers like a ton of Brick Mansions, especially those involving free running fisticuffs. Sadly, however, all involved don’t think twice about including poorly edited filmic tricks like jump shot editing in lieu of continuity. Despite knowing exactly what it is, this “Slam Bam Thank You, Ma’am” actioner gets average results because it holds back. It should’ve been built like an R-rated Brick Craphouse. With a set-up this ludicrous, this flick needed to be funnier, ballsier, and out-and-out crazier like the flick it’s based on, Escape from District 13.