Smart People

Directed by Noam Murro
Stars Dennis Quaid, Sarah Jessica Parker, Ellen Page (aka that Juno girl), and Thomas Haden Church (aka the guy from Sideways who isn't Paul Giamatti)

I've heard people describe average movies as being "good simply for not being bad." Smart People just might be the opposite. There's nothing glaringly horrible about it at first look, but the movie is emotionally empty, and not in the cool, detached Jean-Luc Godard way.

That's not to say the movie doesn't try quite hard to convey some sort of emotion. 90% of the movie is spent wallowing through the sorrow of Prof. Lawrence Wetherhold, who would probably have been a much more sympathetic character through the hands of a better director. Ellen Page plays his smart and quote-unquote "funny" daughter. Insert Juno comparisons here. Their world is flip-turned upside-down when Lawrence suffers a seizure and his lazy brother (Church) moves in to help as a driver.

Prof. Wetherhold begins dating a former student of his, the same doctor who helped him recover from the seizure (Parker). One would assume she's supposed to be seen as a likable and intriguing character, but she just comes off as cold. They have about as much chemistry one would imagine 50 Cent would have with Laura Bush, and despite this, the movie tries its hardest to make us believe that there is something magical happening between them. It fails.

A lot of potentially good scenes are ruined by replacing dialogue with canned adult contemporary guitar jams. Most of the other potentially good scenes are cut off too soon before anything spectacular can actually happen. In some movies, it works when characters develop off screen. In Smart People, it doesn't.

In fact, Smart People's biggest flaw is that it only scratches the surface of things that have the potential to be interesting. Most obvious is Wetherhold's son's relationship with one of the women who is on the committee for the selection of head of the English department, a position in which Wetherhold is vying for. We aren't given any insight into what implications this relationship could have, and ultimately, it ends up becoming utterly pointless to even show the two of them together. Page's friendship with Church, one of the more interesting parts of the first half of the film, is cut off all too suddenly.

At best, the film shows that director Noam Murro has potential to be a decent filmmaker, and for a first film, Smart People is a respectable attempt at being a comedy-drama a la Sideways 2: Electric Boogaloo. Speaking of which, the film is advertised as being "from the producers of Sideways" - making its influence and even more clear.

Smart People doesn't really ever take off. As a comedy, it's not funny, and as a drama, it's not engaging. But it does make a good attempt, which is likely to win it a few fans.

The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou

Directed by Wes Anderson
Stars Bill Murray, Owen Wilson, and a crapload of other people.

Wes Anderson only hinted at his fascination with Jacques Yves-Costeau in his 1998 sophomore picture, Rushmore. The Life Aquatic is a complete send up of Costeau, filled with colorful stop-motion marine life and a soundtrack filled with actual David Bowie recordings and cover versions by Brazillian musician Seu Jorge, who also plays a member of Zissou's team.

It's also the worst film Anderson has made.

That's not to say that The Life Aquatic even approaches being a bad film - the technical aspects are even more refined than in his previous film, The Royal Tenenbaums. The cinematography is perfectly composed, and the cast all turns out great performances. Most notable is Owen Wilson as Ned, Zissou's long lost son from a previous relationship. Rather than playing the shady, insecure characters he is known for, the change of pace as an emotionally honest and forgiving character works wonders. There are also a few great scenes which used a cross-section of Zissou's boat as an anthill-like stage built for the theatre.

It's the script, co-written by Anderson and The Squid and the Whale director Noel Baumbach, that is the film's only real flaw. Unfortunately, it's a large flaw. The Life Aquatic has all the things that made his best film, the aforementioned Rushmore, excellent: lead characters in serious need of counseling, jokes that go for the cerebrum rather than the gut, and a sense of loss that makes aforementioned characters easy-to-relate for the audience.

The catch is that the characters are too messed up, and the sense of loss is so dark and so grand that the audience is likely to feel more depressed and disappointed than the characters. The cerebral jokes won't do much to heal this feeling.

Two disasters happen to the crew in the film. While one of the disasters that occurs in the film leads to an exciting and unpredictable subplot, the latter disaster feels tacked on and brings the weight of the film to an unlikable low.

The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou is likely to disappoint both fans of Bill Murray and Wes Anderson, but it isn't without its merits. Casual film fans will probably detest it. Perhaps this is a film that gets better with repeat viewings.