The Aggressive Stupidity of 'Happy Gilmore 2' And Stupid Aggression of 'Eddington'
#328: "Happy Gilmore 2," "Eddington," "Billy Joel: And So It Goes," "The Penguin Lessons"
Edition 328:
Hey movie lovers,
Sorry for the couple of weeks off
This week: Sorry for the couple of weeks off, but I’m back and doing my best to catch up on all that I missed, beginning with the dumbest movie Netflix can come up with and a reminder of just how awful Covid was. Then a documentary on one of my music favs and a guest review. In this week’s “Trailer Watch,” George Clooney goes goofy once again.
Eddington
(Two weeks late…sorry!)
Hey, remember Covid? Remember the confusion, anxiety, fear and rage that spread across the entire population?
Maybe you’re not eager to revisit that particular moment in history, but Ari Aster (Hereditary, Midsommar) does a better job than anyone at recreating it, centering his story on a small New Mexico town where an anti-mask sheriff (Joaquin Phoenix) faces off against a hobnobbing mayor (Pedro Pascal).
And despite what you’re thinking, the movie is not so neatly political. Both sides are murky, incoherent and ineffective, and the movie is really about the Covid-era breakdown in societal normality as people slowly retreated into their own fragmented bubbles.
That’s heady stuff, and at times this movie does tend toward the abstract and the unexplained, but as the stakes of the story continue to escalate, far beyond the bounds of reality, the movie becomes basically a modern shoot-em-up Western. Stylistically, Aster proves himself to be a filmmaking virtuoso, capable of creating moments that are totally captivating, and though his movies have become increasingly inaccessible (Beau Is Afraid being the peak of that), this movie strikes a nice balance between challenging and watchable.
Sometimes I get asked, how do you know a filmmaker is good? The most obvious answer is the confidence with which they construct scenes and make bold storytelling choices. Anyone could watch this movie versus the average movie and tell the difference. Aster is getting exactly what he wants on-screen, something even those viewers who don’t connect with it have to admit.
Actors clearly buy into his uncompromising vision. This movie features not only Phoenix and Pascal but Emma Stone and Austin Butler in thankless minor parts (though it’s a perfect use of Butler as a charismatic cult leader…stock continuing to rise for my favorite of the young movie star class).
It remains to be seen whether audiences will have the same buy-in. Whereas Aster was once hailed as the rising king of horror, his recent ambitions have become incredibly divisive, with some (like me) seeing him as one of the best filmmakers working today and others finding his stuff far too weird to get into. My advice — make a habit out of sprinkling in more challenging movies! I for one am happy that, for the time being, we can still see this guy getting a budget and a handful of movie stars to play with.
Something New
Happy Gilmore 2 (Netflix): I’m not entirely certain this mish-mash of gags, flashbacks and cameos could actually be called a movie, but the book on Netflix-era Adam Sandler is pretty well written. He’s going to cast his wife, daughters, friends and every famous person on the planet to fill this world so cartoonish it can’t even be compared to reality in any meaningful way.
It’s funny to see these legacy sequels come for every popular thing from the 90s and 2000s, and see people around my age get defensive about the aggressive stupidity somehow ruining the hallowed pop cultural artifacts of their childhood. But the truth is that the first Happy Gilmore was just as stupid and unserious — it just had less resources (this movie literally ends with a joke about how Sandler…err I mean Gilmore forgot to charge his all-electric Rolls Royce).
As an act of filmmaking or storytelling, sure, Happy Gilmore 2 is pretty much bankrupt. But it’s not that. It’s a two-hour gag reel built for the TikTok age. Every minute or so the movie cycles wildly through scenes, tones, colors, and celebrities. While many of them are duds (every professional golfer) some are actually funny (Bad Bunny, Travis Kelce…Enimem??).
This movie knows it’s not Citizen Kane. It’s meant to be dumb fun. It is exceptionally dumb, and at least a little fun.
Something Old
Billy Joel: And So It Goes (HBO Max): This two-part documentary is brand new, but the something old in this case is Joel, who at age 76 is making a career-spanning legacy play that is twice as indulgent as it sounds, ringing in at about 4hr30min in runtime. I’m not the first to make this point, but it’s so clear that artist-produced documentaries have replaced ghost-written memoirs as the medium of choice for self-mythologizing.
While Joel does allow his struggles with alcoholism and his failed marriages to come to the surface, this is far more of a hagiographic celebration than an open heart procedure. Nothing wrong with that if you know what you’re getting into!
As a big fan of Joel’s music, but mostly unaware of his personal life, I’d consider myself to be in the exact target market for this documentary. And it’s true that I loved hearing about the backstory behind some iconic songs like “Piano Man,” “Always A Woman” and “Vienna,” even I got worn down a bit by the insistence that every sneeze and elbow scratch was the most historic moment in history.
Something To Stream
The Penguin Lessons (Netflix): I’m staying this week with my parents, and my dad told me I HAD to watch this 2024 indie he loved. So I asked him to write-up a recommendation for the rest of you all below.
Greetings Cinephiles! When perusing the internet for names of streaming movies that we haven’t seen, The Penguin Lessons jumped out. I had absolutely no clue what this film could be about, but like a pinch hitter with a full count, I took a full cut to watch this less than two hour film, and it paid off with an unexpected home run.
Based on a true story of a disillusioned English teacher in a politically torn Argentina in 1976, our protagonist Tom, played by comedian Steve Coogan, fits the bill perfectly. His quirky personality and dry British humor made the role very believable as a teacher at an all-boys school full of unteachable students. The plot throws you a huge curveball as Tom recuses a penguin from a life threatening oil-slicked beach, and immediately I’m left wondering where in the world the story was headed.
As the film progresses, we come to see that the tuxedoed bird is not just an adorable pet, but instead serves as a link to bring people together in a politically and emotionally torn world. Contrasted with the strict headmaster played by Academy Award nominee Sir Jonathan Pryce, the movie brings into focus how something as simple as a waddling, black and white bird can change your outlook on everything. By the end of the film I was choking up with tears about what happens to the boys and their newly adopted mascot.
If you want a surprise vacation away from profanity, violence, political unrest, or repeatable Marvel films, this enjoyable film might be exactly what you’re looking for.
Thanks Dad! My two cents? Putting a wise-cracking poetry teacher at a boarding school is a proven emotional cheat code, though I can’t help but wonder what Robin Williams would’ve done in Dead Poets Society if there was a live penguin running around. Oh, and someone give that penguin an Oscar nomination for a very nuanced performance!
Trailer Watch: Jay Kelly
Leave it to Noah Baumbach to keep getting the best of serious Adam Sandler every few years, when he’s not busy making slop for Netflix and then waving Brinks trucks full of gold on into his Scrooge McDuck-sized vault.
Here Sandler plays a manager, along with Laura Dern, supporting a fading movie star played by George Clooney, in what looks to be one of those internal, reflective movies like Baumbach’s Greenburg or Mistress America but this time, hopefully, with more of a sense of humor (Clooney seems to be channeling some O Brother Where Art Thou style goofiness). As with all his movies, I am a sucker for the acid-tipped cleverness of his writing so I’m all the way in.
“It is exceptionally dumb, and at least a little fun.”
Couldn’t have put it better myself😂