Here are capsule reviews of some movies scheduled for the Fort Lauderdale Film Festival, which opens today:
ABOUT FIFTY (10/21, 7:30 p.m., Sunrise Civic Theatre; 10/24, 6:15 p.m., Sunrise Civic Theatre; 10/29, 7 p.m., Muvico Pompano) — Most rites-of-passage films have been about the mysteries of puberty, but as filmmakers age they begin confronting the latter passage of midlife. So it is for Adam (Martin Grey) and Jon (Drew Pillsbury), two California pals who have recently passed the great divide of their 50th year with varying states of unease.
Adam is separated from his wife, Jon remains a perennial bachelor, and they head off for a getaway weekend to Palm Springs for some golf and, perhaps, a bit of female companionship. Note the dynamic of the party guy and his more reticent buddy, substitute wine tasting for golf and it would be easy to see marked similarities between About Fifty and Alexander Payne’s Sideways. Co-writers Grey and Pillsbury (along with director Thomas Johnston) may lose a few points for lack of originality, but the writing is incisive and any comparison to Sideways is high praise indeed.
The plot thickens when Jon comes on to Alix, an attractive sales clerk (Michaela McManus) half his age, and wangles a dinner invitation for Adam and himself with her and her roommate. But the roommate turns out to be Alix’s divorced mother (Wendie Malick), who is just as rusty and awkward at dating as Adam is. Fortunately, director Johnston keeps matters more subdued than sitcom as the two arrested-development guys grow a bit over the course of the weekend.
Grey and Pillsbury project a very credible friendship, complete with the accompanying antagonisms. The well-cast McManus brings to mind a younger Virginia Madsen (of Sideways) and Malick ably handles the more dramatic opportunities than she usually is dealt on television.
Apparently About Fifty was tailor-made for the Palm Springs Film Festival, where it premiered. But with careful marketing and word-of-mouth, it might be able to find a receptive commercial audience far beyond there. (A-)
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THE PILL (10/25, 8:15 p.m., Cinema Paradiso; 11/3, 8:00 p.m., Sunrise Civic Theatre) — Finding a new angle for a romantic comedy must rank high on the challenges of a screenwriter, but J.C. Khoury (who also wears the hats of director and producer) manages that winningly in The Pill, a contemporary urban comedy about a one-night stand of unprotected sex and the social protocol of the morning-after pill.
After a boozy evening in Mindy’s bed, Fred freaks out over not using a condom. For her part, she is not using oral contraceptives because she is Catholic. Still, he insists she take a morning-after pill, and then has to feign continued interested in Mindy to ensure that she takes the complete dose 12 hours later.
In case we start caring about these two, Khoury keeps escalating their unlikeability. Fred, we soon learn, has a live-in girlfriend and whiny Mindy tricks him into attending a family party at her overbearing parents’ apartment. With obstacles in place, we do not exactly root for Mindy and Fred, but we do remain involved with each improbable plot twist.
Besides the better-than-average script, The Pill works because of the cast. Noah Bean mines Fred’s duplicity for its multi-layered potential and Rachel Boston is well-matched with him as understandably suspicious Mindy. While there are plenty of reasons that their relationship should not work, the chemistry between the two actors is combustible. (B+)
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TROUPERS (10/25, 4 p.m., Sunrise Civic Theatre; 10/29, 5:30 p.m., Sunrise Civic Theatre; 10/30, 11 a.m., Cinema Paradiso; 11/4, 1 p.m., Muvico Pompano) — Whatever happened to ….? Nostalgia fans should eat up Troupers, a valentine to a dozen veterans of stage and screen, each of whom is over 80 (and a few of whom have died since filming their interviews.)
This documentary is probably a hard sell to teenagers, but mature moviegoers should appreciate checking in with such stars of the past as Kaye Ballard, Pat Carroll, Betty Garrett, Carl Ballantine and Harold Gould.
Co-directors Sara Ballantine (Carl’s daughter) and Dea Lawrence get no points for their unimaginative editing — introducing a topic and then piecing together the responses in a dull linear fashion — but the personalities that shine through and the anecdotes of the former days of show business retain their fascination.
Many of the subjects covered are misty-eyed recollections, but Troupers also delves into the devastation of the anti-Communist blacklisting — which destroyed the career of Garrett’s husband, Larry Parks, and drove Allan Rich to give up acting and open an art gallery, which proved quite lucrative. Otherwise the film sticks to softball questions about how these folks got started in show business, their favorite roles, how they handle rejection and what advice they have for young performers trying to enter the business.
No one seems reluctant to talk and while few of the answers are startling they make a nice time capsule of the good old days of the biz. (B)
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MAN ON THE TRAIN (10/25, 8:00 p.m., Sunrise Civic Theatre; 11/1, 7:00 p.m., Cinema Paradiso) — Few if any foreign-language films remade in English have been as satisfying as the original movie, and that goes for the new version of Patrice Leconte’s 2002 gem Man on the Train. It is not that Irish director Mary McGuckian has messed up the story or gotten the tone wrong, merely that her film is too much like the earlier one, rendering hers superfluous except for those who avoid movies with subtitles.
She does get credit for casting Donald Sutherland and U2 drummer Larry Mullen Jr. as the chatterbox retired teacher and the taciturn robber who comes to town to knock over its one bank. Very similar in type and performance to Leconte favorite Jean Rochefort and singer-turned-actor Johnny Hallyday, as effective as the new leads are, they only reinforce the feeling of déjà vu.
Chance — or is it fate? — causes them to meet in the town pharmacy, and soon after, the lonely Sutherland invites the stranger to stay in his home for the week. At week’s end, each has a day of reckoning, heart surgery for the old man and the robbery for his houseguest. Before that, though, in the tradition of “odd couple” yarns, they begin to rub off on each other.
McGuckian lacks Leconte’s deft, puckish touch, but the character-driven tale still retains its punch in this less subtle, surprise-challenged version. (B-)
The Fort Lauderdale International Film Festival opens today and runs through Nov. 11. For more information, visit www.fliff.com.