Monday, August 10, 2015

Solo at the Movies: "Trainwreck" at AMC Marina Marketplace 6

I’m still behind after skipping this project in June. Perhaps August will be the month where I catch up by doing two!

Theater Info:
AMC Marina Marketplace 6
4335 Glencoe Ave, Marina del Rey
Cost: $6.30 for a matinee showing

Movie Stats:
Released 2015 (USA)
American, in English (a small amount of mostly translated Mandarin)
Director - Judd Apatow
Stars - Amy Schumer, Bill Hader

Plot Summary:
Commitment phobic Amy (Schumer) finds her life turned upside when she meets Dr. Aaron Conners (Hader), a man she actually develops feelings for.

Warnings:
Lots of blue language; fairly graphic sexy times; male nudity (butt only); minor drug use; some gore (surgery related).

Bad Stuff:
It’s way too long.

The character of Amy isn’t very likable, and it’s not because she’s a commitment phobe who likes to have a lot of sex. She’s simply not a very nice person, and the film doesn’t spend a lot of time trying to redeem her. In the end, it was difficult to root for her or to feel like she got what she deserved.

It’s really not that funny.

Good Stuff:
A lot of the secondary characters are great. I got my biggest laughs from Amy’s boss, Dianna (holy crap it’s Tilda Swinton I didn’t even recognize her), from Amy’s sort-of-boyfriend Steven (John Cena; who knew he had great comedic timing), and from Aaron’s friend LeBron James (actually LeBron James), who’s hilariously awkward and sort of creepy.

There’s a sweetness to it that I wasn’t expecting but rather enjoyed.

While I might not have done a lot of LOLing, I did spend most of the film feeling amused.

The Verdict:
It’s okay. I found both “The 40-Year-Old Virgin” and “Knocked Up” far funnier. I went to see this because the last movie I saw for this project was so oppressively serious. I wanted to mix it up a bit. Unfortunately, it didn’t quite tickle my funny bone in the way I wanted it to. I was mildly entertained for a couple of hours, but it’s not something I would ever watch again. I wouldn’t even recommend it to someone else. All in all, I was disappointed.

I give it 3 stars.

About AMC Marina Marketplace 6:
I had no idea that this movie house existed. It’s rather weird because it’s quite literally just across the street from Marina’s other movie house, the dine-in theater where I saw Kingsman. You would never guess that it’s there because it’s in the middle of one of those flat strip malls. When I looked it up, I sort of felt like someone was pulling my leg. “Really?” I thought. “There’s a movie theater in there?” At any rate, like a lot of movie houses around here, it seems recently renovated because it’s really nice on the inside. The whole “getting my ticket” portion of the morning took a lot longer than it should have. Other than that, I had a pleasant experience. In my particular theater, the very cushy seats were rockers. Oh, and the parking is both free and plentiful. Bonus!

2 comments:

Patricia said...

We've already discussed this movie, but I will add to our discussion that I've had several instances since watching it and being underwhelmed where I wanted to quote parts of the movie to Matt, but couldn't, because he hadn't seen it. So I think it does well in the funny lines department. It may be that eventually when Matt does see it, we will integrate lines into our conversations a la "they feel like sand" which is from the 40 Year-Old Virgin and makes an appearance in our back-and-forth more often than I would like actually tally.

Also, Tilda Swinton! I had to read her name in the credits because I didn't recognize her. And there's an example of a great line, "Does she have an accent, or is she just awesome!?!"

Also: I'm sweating much more than I feel proud of right now.

balyien said...

See, I'd completely forgotten all the funny lines already. I think maybe I'm particular when it comes to comedy.