There was one final show of lightning before it went away- it spanned across my line of sight like a huge electrical web. I gasped and cursed at the same time. I think it waited for my battery to run out.
I feel so amazed and impressed each time I witness one of those storms, like I’m a chronic lightning storm virgin. It doesn’t matter how many I sit through, it always feels like the first. I get that way with the first snow fall of the year as well.
Back to the films:
Smart People: Starring Dennis Quaid, Thomas Haden Church, Ellen Page and that transvestite who’s popularity perplexes me… Sarah Jessica Parker.
Synopsis
An unexpected romance with a charming former student (Sarah Jessica Parker) and a surprise visit from his wild adopted brother (Thomas Haden Church) conspire to turn the life of surly widowed professor Lawrence Wetherhold (Dennis Quaid) upside down. But after nursing his bitterness for so many years, is the self-absorbed academic ready for change? Ellen Page and Ashton Holmes co-star in this witty dramedy from director Noam Murro.
The writing is what let me down. The performances were of course spot on (I mean really… there was no real stretch of talent here “Act like you guys normally do in practically each piece you’ve ever been in.”)
It had its charming moments and SJP was almost tolerable in her performance as jilted student turned ER doc turned love interest. I felt for the widowed professor- but Page’s performance as the academic outcast had me do a montage in my head of all the characters I’ve seen her play over the past two years. Swap the outfits and rename the description and it’s the same freaking person. “Okay- do the ‘loner’… perfect! Now lets see you go for awkward social reject… brilliant! I want you to do the same performance… but wash your hair this time…”
It was no ‘The Squid and the Whale’ (another expiring college professor who is dealing with transition and immediate family), but it did have its enjoyable moments and unlike The Squid and the Whale, you didn’t feel like you needed therapy afterward.
Now onto ‘The Invisible’
Director David S. Goyer’s supernatural thriller is an unsettling journey into one man’s nightmarish limbo. When high schooler Nick is brutally attacked and left for dead, he regains consciousness only to discover that he’s invisible to everyone — except for a troubled young girl running from authorities. From the producers of The Sixth Sense, this mystery explores the elusive place between the world of the living and the land of the dead.
I think the synopsis is a little misleading. Nick *is* brutally and falsely attacked by a deeply troubled young girl and her lackeys. Let me start this all over. ‘Nick, a bright, intelligent young man who is on the brink of graduating- enters into adulthood dealing with the death of his father and a mother who focuses primarily on Nick’s future than she does on him and what he’s been going through. On the other side of the tracks, Annie is surviving her family dysfunction after her mother dies and she’s left dealing with a trampy step mother and her own inner turmoil. This films takes us to two different minds almost coping with the same situation and the explosive encounter when those paths cross.
Nick is left for dead after the attack and soon discovers that he’s trapped between life and death and while his life is ticking away- he must lead the cops to his body, only the one person who can hear him is the one who put him there.’
Teenagers these days, I swear…
