StephenRoot Tagged Articles at Cinematical

Hollywood loves to stereotype people with mental illnesses as being merely quirky, or easy to cure if you just give 'em a lot of the right kind of love. The Soloist aims for a more realistic portrayal, and even tries to build awareness about the problems of homeless people in America. Unfortunately, the overall film isn't compelling, and the plot falls into the easy traps of traditional melodrama.

Steve Lopez's nonfiction book was adapted by Susannah Grant (Erin Brockovich, Catch and Release). Lopez (Robert Downey Jr.) is always on the hunt for more material to fill his LA Times column space, even cannibalizing his own cycling accident to tell a good story. When he encounters Nathaniel Ayers (Jamie Foxx) playing violin by a statue of Beethoven, and learns that this homeless man once attended Juilliard, he figures he's hit the columnist jackpot. Little by little he starts to try to "fix" Nathaniel -- finding him a cello and a safe place to play, taking him to symphony rehearsals -- but it's not all that easy. And naturally, Steve's life starts to change too, and he's not sure how to handle it.

Yes, that's a printer on the red carpet for the 10th anniversary screening of Office Space at the Paramount Theatre in Austin on Sunday night. The guys swinging baseball bats are the same ones you saw attacking the printer in the 1999 movie -- Ajay Naidu and David Herman. We like our red carpet scenes lively here in Austin.

Mike Judge, who wrote and directed Office Space (and played the manager at Chotchkie's), appeared at the event with nine other actors who played major characters in the movie -- everyone except Ron Livingston and Jennifer Aniston, essentially. The theater was sold out, and watching Office Space with 1,200 people who've seen it before was amazing and hilarious. Everyone frequently contributed cheers, whoops and applause for certain actors or memorable bits of dialogue ("Looks like you've been missing a lot of work lately." "I wouldn't say I've been missing it, Bob.").

I have this theory that on the set of 1991's Father of the Bride, Steve Martin and Diane Keaton turned to each other and said, "You know what? From here on out, let's just keep doing this. Let's just play cute, cuddly versions of our formerly edgy and interesting selves -- slightly goofy mothers and fathers, that kind of thing -- and watch the cash roll in!" Then they high-fived and fell into an awkward, melancholy silence.

Through one unchallenging project after another, Keaton has served up the same old eye rolls, squeals, and stutters until you can't really tell one role from another. And what's really frustrating about watching her squander her talents is that -- as with Martin -- no matter how embarrassing the performance, you can't help but love her anyway. She's at her most unhinged in Mad Money, and painful as it is to watch at times, she does -- just barely -- manage to keep the film afloat.

No Country for Old Men, the new film from Joel and Ethan Coen, is an unquestionable return to form. It is scary, funny, moving, violent, and meaningful, in pretty much equal measure. The Coens' take on the Cormac McCarthy novel of the same name is a pairing as successful, as seamless, as delicious as that of chocolate and peanut butter.

Josh Brolin gives the finest of his four excellent performances this year as Llewelyn Moss. Moss is a struggling everyman who stumbles upon a circle of trucks and dead Mexicans in the desert -- a heroin deal gone bad. Real bad. The lone survivor asks Moss for some agua, and Moss ignores the request. He surveys the scene and eventually comes upon a suitcase filled with $2 million dollars. Moss' response upon finding the money? A simple "Yeah." It's a perfect moment in a movie packed with them. Moss takes the money and returns home to his trailer and his wife Carla Jean (Kelly MacDonald). Soon, his conscience begins to nag at him, and he decides to head back to the scene of the crime to give the dying man a drink. A compassionate decision, but not, as you can probably imagine, an intelligent one.

Javier Bardem plays Anton Chigurh (start to say Chicago and then growl and you're close to the pronunciation). I'll leave his specific involvement in the proceedings up to you to figure out, but just know that he really wants that $2 million. Moss will come to refer to Chigurh as "the ultimate badass," and that's about right. Chigurh is a classic screen villain, the kind we haven't seen in far too long. Every time he appears on screen, cattle stunner in tow, it just makes your heart sink -- somebody is going down. Much like Hannibal Lecter, the guy is a vicious, remorseless killer, but he has a strangely sensible logic and one can't help but be seduced by him. Bardem, sporting a Prince Valiant haircut, gives a flawless performance here, one that will likely be noticed come Oscar time. He completely disappears into Chigurh.

Ropeofsilicon has six new shots from the Coen Brothers' upcoming crime drama No Country for Old Men. "Coen Brothers' upcoming crime drama" -- just typing those words fills me with excitement! The photos include: a shot of Javier Bardem sporting a Prince Valiant haircut and walking down the road with what appears to be insect repellent (?); the Coen Brothers on set; a mustachioed man that appears to be Josh Brolin walking toward a truck in the desert; a mustachioed man that is definitely Josh Brolin covered in blood and pointing a gun; Tommy Lee Jones looking disapprovingly at something while reading a newspaper; and a pretty shot of a man running at sunset. The film also stars Josh's father and Mr. Streisand -- James Brolin, Woody Harrelson, Kelly MacDonald, and Stephen Root from Office Space, Dodgeball, and one of the funniest sitcoms ever -- Newsradio.

The Coens are responsible for five of my favorite movies of all time, and they've been away from the cinema for far too long. Their last couple films weren't quite up to snuff, but this one promises to be pure gold. Based on Cormac McCarthy's critically acclaimed novel, which I plan to dive into this weekend, Old Men's plot concerns "dead bodies, a stash of heroin and more than $2 million in cash near the Rio Grande." Nobody does that kind of thing better than the Coens. The film is set for release on November 9th of this year, and the wait is just killing me. In the meantime, let me recommend a tiny movie to you that a lot of people missed: The Three Burials of Melquiades Estrada. With that catchy title, I'm not sure how it didn't find an audience, but it really should have. Written by Guillermo Ariaga, directed by and starring Tommy Lee Jones, it's an excellent film and one that, judging by the photos, appears to have a similar feel to Old Men.