The Wolf of Wall Street

4 out of 5 stars

The only reason I'm not giving this movie 5 out of 5 is that the characters are so disgusting, that they make the film hard to enjoy at times. That being said, that basically means that Scorsese was doing his job... Everything else about this film was amazingly well done, as you would expect from a master like Martin Scorsese.

Moneyball

Moneyball is the adaptation of Michael Lewis' book of the same name, originally to be directed by Steven Soderbergh, who was dropped after coming to the table with a vision that the producers didn't feel fit the film. Enter Bennett Miller (director of Capote), and, with Brad Pitt still signed to star, Moneyball, the story of Oakland A's general manager Billy Beane and his use of stat's and mathematics to build a winning team for Oakland out of overlooked and forgotten players, all of whom had individual strengths that led to a strong team, versus building a team around a few stars.

Pitt is always perfect, but the real stand out in this film was Jonah Hill, as Peter Brand, a Yale graduate who turns Beane onto the concept of using stat's and math to pick players. This is Hill's first "serious" role, and he does a great job at it. It would be nice to see him in more stuff like this, as opposed to just playing "Jonah Hill" over and over again. Everyone else feels like they have such small roles that it's hard to even talk about performance here. Even Philip Seymour Hoffman, a power house actor, has very little screen time, and spends most of it scowling and silent. This film was about Beane, though, his tribulations and eventual triumph, and you really feel like you've experienced it by the time it's over. Moneyball is one of my favorite of the year. Understated, with a great story and great acting, with equal amounts drama, and humor.

Cyrus

The Duplass Brothers have been working steadily in independent film since they started shooting short films in the early 2000's. Their debut feature, The Puffy Chair, followed by their psuedo horror film Baghead were both highlights of the last couple of years. Their hard work has finally paid off and, with Cyrus, the Brothers move into the low budget studio territory, but still manage to keep the spirit that got them here in the first place.

John C. Reilly plays John, a guy who is looking for love as his ex-wife is about to get remarried. He meets Molly (Marisa Tomei) at a party that his ex-wife and fiance are throwing, and the two hit it off. Molly is very secretive, though, when it comes to talking about her life. When John follows Molly home, he finds out what she's been hiding - Her grown son, Cyrus (played by Jonah Hill), still leaves with her, in a sort of time capsule single mother/son relationship. They do everything together. They're best friends, and when John starts horning in on his mother's time, Cyrus becomes jealous, and when Cyrus becomes jealous, things get weird.

Cyrus is a humorous indy, and, maybe, the Duplass Brothers best film to date. Everyone brings in a great performance, including Jonah Hill (who I've never been a huge fan of). It's not the kind of film that has you rolling around on the ground laughing, but it definitely has its great moments, especially when things escalate between John and Cyrus. The Duplass Brothers have made something super solid and funny, and have shown what studio heads seemed to forget regularly - that a funny film, or any film, really, can be made for a reasonable amount of money.

Funny People

Everybody's looking for the end of Judd Apatow. Ever since The 40 Year Old Virgin came out (and people rediscovered the genius of Freaks and Geeks), Apatow has been somewhat of a golden boy in Hollywood. The only problem is the law of diminishing returns in Tinseltown, meaning, the more stuff you slap your name on, the higher the possibility is that the stuff your slapping your name is going to be crap. In a way, that's one of the things that Funny People is about, but its also an attempt, by Apatow, to marry his brand of humor with more mature storytelling.

Adam Sandler plays George Simmons, a famous comedic actor who is dying from an unnamed "blood disease". He's taken a lot of things for granted in his life, and he decides that in his final days, he wants to take as much advantage of life as he can. When he makes a surprise visit to a comedy club to do some stand up, he meets Ira Wright, played by Seth Rogen, a struggling comedian who gets some laughs for making fun of George's rusty attempts at stand up. George hires Ira to write jokes for him, and the two bond with each other as Ira helps George prepare for his last days. Everything begins to fall apart, though, when George finds out that the experimental drug treatment he has been taking is actually working.

Sandler is a decent actor, pretty much always (its his choice of roles that tends to keep him down), and I really liked Rogen in this film because it felt like he was finally not playing the same old douche bag that he does in every Apatow movie that he's been in (which is most of them). The direction is pretty good, but if I had one complaint about this movie, its just that the story is just not up to par. The first half of the film is pretty good, but then, when George learns he's going to live, every part of the film becomes this uber-predictable jumble of who cares? I feel that if Apatow would have taken a bigger chance and either killed of George, or took him to a place that wasn't so obvious, maybe he would have had his perfect "mature" movie, but, unfortunately, he didn't. Funny People's biggest fault, for me, at least, is the fact that it is funny but it is also terribly predictable.