Sunday, November 20, 2005
Prime
Since Harry Potter was off the available schedule last evening, we saw Prime instead. The Girl was much happier to see this one anyway, as she's only seeing Harry Potter with me as part of my birthday gifts.
Prime wasn't very crowded (9:45 pm show), but of course after we're nice and comfy in our seats, spread out from the other various couples and small groups of people, these three older teen/early twenty girls come giggling in and decide they have to sit in the three empty seats between us and the nearest couple. Mind you, the row behind us and the row ahead of us are all but vacant. No, they've got to sit next to us.
But back to the flick. If you've seen the commercials, you know the premise. Uma Thurman is Rafi, a 37-year-old recently divorced woman who starts dating a 23-year-old man who happens to be the son of her therapist, Meryl Streep. No one realizes the situation at first, but of course pieces start falling into place and issues ensue.
I enjoyed it, but it's not one of my favorites. Uma Thurman was great, and manages to portray a woman who's a grownup without being a stiff - something largely lacking in film these days. Bryan Greenberg is the younger man who's trying to make the transition into being a grownup, but still has many of the markers of a teenager. At one point Rafi gives him a tip: "One piece of advice - never begin a sentence with 'My mom...' " Meryl Streep's therapist/concerned mother character is a little shallowly portrayed. We're supposed to see that she's torn between her concern for her patient and her concern for her son, and conflicted by the fact that the advice she would give her patient depends on whether her son is involved, but mostly we just see that she's a neurotic mess at this point. A little more grounding would have been nice.
The B-story is the son's friendship with Morris (Jon Abrahams), who is a Jack Black, never-going-to-get-it sort of guy who can't understand why he never gets a second date with any woman and whose response to this is to pie them at close range the day after the first date. Funny, huh? Yeah, I didn't really think so either.
The fun surprise hidden in this box of cracker jacks is Ato Essandoh, who plays the front desk guy at Rafi's plush Fifth Avenue apartment building. He shows us more depth of character with his occasional brief scenes and sparse dialogue than Meryl Streep gives us with her leading role. Essandoh was also most excellent in Saving Face, a flick The Girl and I caught on Netflix the other day.
Anyway, Prime was fun, with some great scenes, but overall left me less than satisfied.
Reality Check: The Girl was very excited to see this one, but when it was done summed it up with, "It was okay."
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Prime wasn't very crowded (9:45 pm show), but of course after we're nice and comfy in our seats, spread out from the other various couples and small groups of people, these three older teen/early twenty girls come giggling in and decide they have to sit in the three empty seats between us and the nearest couple. Mind you, the row behind us and the row ahead of us are all but vacant. No, they've got to sit next to us.
But back to the flick. If you've seen the commercials, you know the premise. Uma Thurman is Rafi, a 37-year-old recently divorced woman who starts dating a 23-year-old man who happens to be the son of her therapist, Meryl Streep. No one realizes the situation at first, but of course pieces start falling into place and issues ensue.
I enjoyed it, but it's not one of my favorites. Uma Thurman was great, and manages to portray a woman who's a grownup without being a stiff - something largely lacking in film these days. Bryan Greenberg is the younger man who's trying to make the transition into being a grownup, but still has many of the markers of a teenager. At one point Rafi gives him a tip: "One piece of advice - never begin a sentence with 'My mom...' " Meryl Streep's therapist/concerned mother character is a little shallowly portrayed. We're supposed to see that she's torn between her concern for her patient and her concern for her son, and conflicted by the fact that the advice she would give her patient depends on whether her son is involved, but mostly we just see that she's a neurotic mess at this point. A little more grounding would have been nice.
The B-story is the son's friendship with Morris (Jon Abrahams), who is a Jack Black, never-going-to-get-it sort of guy who can't understand why he never gets a second date with any woman and whose response to this is to pie them at close range the day after the first date. Funny, huh? Yeah, I didn't really think so either.
The fun surprise hidden in this box of cracker jacks is Ato Essandoh, who plays the front desk guy at Rafi's plush Fifth Avenue apartment building. He shows us more depth of character with his occasional brief scenes and sparse dialogue than Meryl Streep gives us with her leading role. Essandoh was also most excellent in Saving Face, a flick The Girl and I caught on Netflix the other day.
Anyway, Prime was fun, with some great scenes, but overall left me less than satisfied.
Reality Check: The Girl was very excited to see this one, but when it was done summed it up with, "It was okay."
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Posted by Rogueslayer at 10:17 AM 
