The Film Junkie

I am not really one for concert films, but if you are gonna watch one it might as well star Janis Joplin. The Band and The Grateful Dead. 

This movie is a documentary of a bunch of bands on a train travelling across Canada from Toronto to Calgary trying to spread some musical love while various groups protest the high cost of tickets ($16!).  The bands drink, sing and party and try to appease their fans.

It is a great chance to hear these bands, but I wish there was more footage from the actual time and place of those talents musing, instead of the their guilty reflections years later.

The music is great, but that’s about all there is.

Grade: B

I was not expecting to like this movie.  First off, it stars Bow Wow and a former rapper trying to become an actor is rarely a good thing.  Secondly it is about roller skating, and I was very skeptic on how that would make a good movie.

However, this film is more the story of growing up black in the 1970’s and trying to be cool.  Bow Wow is certainly not a great actor, but he is somewhat believable and is helped out by a strong supporting cast of dudes playing his friends.  Chi McBride is good as ever as his struggling single father and he brings a weight to the film that few actors other than him would be able to (and no that is not a comment on his size).

The plot concerns a big roller skating competition where Bow Wow must showdown with Sweetness (’What I Like About You’ star Wesley Jonathan), the kingpin of skating from the classy North side.  Bow Wow and his boys, a mixed bag of jokers, are from the poorer South side and thus are fighting for their cred.  There are also some ladies involved, ‘Stomp The Yard’ (2007) hottie Meagan Good plays the object of Bow Wow affection while Jurnee Smollett (1997’s ‘Eve’s Bayou’) plays the gal pal to all the boys.  Smollett is a real find, she has great timing and hopefully she will get some bigger parts soon.

The film is a glossy and fake version on the 70’s and race is almost a non-issue, but it is kind of nice to see such false representation of the era, we get that for white people in every decade, so why can’t we have a film where black people are functioning and thriving without constantly fighting for a voice, it is nice to see a film that shows black people have always had a voice.

A fun, sweet little movie.

Grade: B

This film is a remake of the far superior ‘The Philadelphia Story’ (1940) has the exact same character names, but is now a musical with Bing, Grace and Frank!

Unfortunately, this movie is nowhere near as good as the original.  There are some great musical numbers, but the casting of Grace Kelly in a musical is too weird, add that to Bing Crosby as her ex-husband when he looks more like her father, and you have an odd film-going experience.

The film is the story of a woman torn between her ex-husband, her fiance and a reporter who ultimately makes the right decision.  Originally it was Katharine Hepburn who has torn between the gents and revelled in her crazed drunken night, here Kelly is over-acted and underwritten and just plain annoying.

The best part of this film is undoubtedly the chemistry between Frank Sinatra and Celeste Holm as newspaper reporters sent to cover Kelly’s wedding.  These two sparkle in the few scenes they have together and it is a great experience, even if we don’t get a good enough ending out of it.

Cole Porter songs are great, but they need a great plot to highlight them…’High Society’ just doesn’t have it.

Grade: C+