Trouble with the Curve

Trouble with the Curve – Dir. Robert Lorenz (2012)

Gran Torino was supposed to be Clint Eastwood's last hurrah as an actor. Something must have lured him back for Trouble with the Curve. It certainly wasn't the chance to play a radically different character than he usually portrays. Once again Eastwood slips into the role of the dusty old timer searching for that one last glory. It's a role he's played numerous times dating back to 1982's The Honkytonk Man. Then, there's the aforementioned Gran Torino, Unforgiven, Space Cowboys, Million Dollar Baby, and In the Line of Fire, which was the last time Eastwood starred in a film he didn't direct. You wouldn't be able to tell since Trouble with the Curve looks and feels just like an Eastwood picture. It does feature many of Eastwood's regular collaborators including Editors Gary Roach and Joel Cox, Production Designer James Murakami, Costume Designer Deborah Hooper, and Cinematographer Tom Stern with Eastwood's long-time producer Robert Lorenz making his directorial debut.

Eastwood is Gus Lobel, an aging talent scout for the Atlanta Braves. Eastwood gets one of his least flattering introductions in a while as he has problems peeing in the morning and tripping over his own furniture. They have to let the audience know that Gus is old, dammit. He has a disdain for the "interweb" and refers to yoga as "voodoo." Gus is coming on with a case of glaucoma and he's got a young hotshot (Matthew Lillard) bucking for his job. Gus is out to prove decades of knowledge and intuition will trump a computer any day when he hits the road to look at a high school power hitter named Bo Gentry (Joe Massingill). With his eyesight fading, Gus's friend, Pete (John Goodman), convinces Gus's estranged daughter, Mickey (Amy Adams), named after Mickey Mantle, to accompany him. Mickey doesn't have the warmest feelings for her father since the old man shipped her off to boarding school after her mother died. Along the way, they pick up Johnny "The Flame" Flanagan (Justin Timberlake), an ex-pitcher whose career fizzled after he blew out his shoulder. He's hoping to make it as a scout in order to transition to the broadcast booth.

Trouble with the Curve is the anti-Moneyball with the new school proponents of technology and sabremetrics cast as obnoxious and willfully ignorant while the old-school scouts battle to uphold baseball tradition. As a baseball themed drama, the filmmakers also get the chance to trot out ham-fisted sports analogies about life handing you extra innings and such. The screenplay by newcomer Randy Brown trades in Hallmark homilies and sitcom solutions with a few inert jokes about Dr. Phil and Desperate Housewives. Gus will learn to open up and rely on others while Mickey, a type-A personality, will learn to put down her smartphone. The resolution doesn't rest on a big game, but it does take place in a stadium where every plot point is wrapped up neatly.

Eastwood, Timberlake, and Adams make for an easygoing trio. Adams, in particular, is a joy as the feisty, strong-willed female lead. Those of you who enjoy playing 'Spot the Character Actor' will be kept busy by a supporting cast that includes Robert Patrick, Bob Gunton, George Wyner, Chelcie Ross, and Ed Lauter.

Trouble with the Curve isn't a deep film, but it is the sort of sweet and safe drama that scores with Middle America and the elderly.

Rating: ** (*****)

The Descendants

The Descendants - Dir. Alexander Payne (2011)

Alexander Payne has a knack for spinning tales about middle age malaise and disillusionment. His high school comedy, Election, followed Matthew Broderick as a failed variation of Ferris Bueller desperately trying to sabotage the campaign efforts of Type A personality Tracy Flick (played by Reese Witherspoon). In Sideways, Payne followed Paul Giamatti as a stagnant writer confronting his own misery and loneliness on a trip through wine country with his adulterous best friend. Payne pushed these themes even further with what may be his best work yet in About Schmidt, he showed that things don't get any easier during the twilight years. And they don't get better in the idyllic island of Hawaii, according to The Descendants, Payne's newest film based on the novel by Kaui Hart Hemmings and adapted by Payne, Nat Faxon, and Jim Rash, who plays Dean Pelton on NBC's Community.

George Clooney stars as the appropriately named Matt King, a lawyer whose family is descended from King Kamehameha and the first white settlers in the fiftieth state. They own one of the largest tracts of unspoiled land in Hawaii and Matt must ultimately decide on its fate. Most of his cousins (headed up by Beau Bridges) are pushing for a lucrative deal with a local developer while others prefer not to sell. This sandy beach property is the least of Matt's problems.

His wife, Elizabeth (Patricia Hastie), has been left in a vegetative coma following a tragic water skiing accident. The doctors inform Matt that Elizabeth will not improve and they must honor her living will by removing her from life support. A self-described "back-up parent," Matt is forced to deal with two daughters he has absolutely no way of connecting with. His youngest, Scottie (Amara Miller), has eccentric tendencies and constantly curses. His eldest, Alexandra (Shailene Woodley), is a defiant teenager sent off to boarding school to curb her wild ways. Alexandra confesses to her oblivious father that mom was cheating on him. A road trip to inform family and friends about Elizabeth's impending death becomes a cathartic search as Matt and Alexandra look to confront her lover, a real estate agent named Brian Speer (Matthew Lillard).

The Descendants depicts a different side of Hawaii from the picturesque tourist traps seen on Hawaii Five-0. Payne prefers sterile office buildings and languid suburban neighborhoods to white sands and tiki torches. He sets the mood in the opening voice-over narration in which George Clooney declares, "Paradise can go fuck itself." Just as he defies our expectations of the locales, Payne also defies our expectations of certain characters and standard situations. Tagging along with the King family is Alexandra's friend, Sid (Nick Krause), a mish-mash of every stoner and sun-baked surfer stereotype imaginable. Yet, he turns out to not be as dumb as everyone thinks and shares a rather profound moment with Matt.

As the lead character, Clooney carries a heavy amount of baggage. He is George Clooney, after all. He can't play a sad sack that way Paul Giamatti or Philip Seymour Hoffman can, but Clooney brings an aura of weariness to the role that recalls his performance in Up in the Air. It's unfortunate that his character is so underwritten and overshadowed by the supporting characters. Clooney's young co-stars, Shailene Woodley (from ABC Family's The Secret Life of the American Teenager) and Amara Miller are both good while the usually comedic Judy Greer gets to stretch her dramatic muscles as Brian's oblivious wife. But, it is Robert Forster who commands the film as Matt's father-in-law, an ornery old timer, who lambastes Matt and Alexandra while overlooking (either knowingly or unknowingly) his own daughter's infidelity.

The weakest element of The Descendants is the superfluous narration that bogs down the first act and trails off as the movie progresses. The narration serves purely to explain emotions and subplots that are exceedingly apparent to the audience.

Visually, The Descendants represents a high point for Alexander Payne as a director. It's undoubtedly his best looking and most maturely handled work as a filmmaker. Payne does his usual blend of tear jerking drama, low-key humor and broadly played comedy. Yet, The Descendants stands as one of Payne's lesser pictures, one that isn't nearly as compelling as Election, About Schmidt or Sideways. It's a middle of the road crowd pleaser sure to impress the easily wowed awards voters.

Rating: ** ½ (*****)