Cyrus (Jay and Mark Duplass, 2010)

I really wanted to like this movie (and I suppose I did, slightly), especially given how much I enjoyed Baghead (2008) in a completely different manner than I expected going into it. Though devoid of the element of surprise present in the filmmaking and construction of Baghead, there are things to admire here starting with the assured and likable cast. Jonah Hill plays Cyrus who, at 22, still lives with his mother Molly, near-convincingly brought to life by the embodiment of can-do-no-wrong, Marissa Tomei. (If I could take credit for pulling this observation from the mire I would: my wife Melissa pointed out that in Molly, we have a seemingly rational, intelligent, genial person who is so inept at recognizing the co-dependent relationship she has with her son and detecting his devious and parasitic activities that the minute you start questioning how these contradictive qualities can exist in the same person—which is almost immediately—her character, along with the film itself, crumples beneath the weight of it.) And the always excellent John C. Reilly plays divorcée John, the poor sap whose falling in love with Molly (apparent immediately in a well-scripted yet entirely unbelievable post-modern “meet cute”) threatens—at least in Cyrus’s eyes—to decimate the all-encompassing bond between mother and son.

The film has a few other grace notes. One worth mentioning, oddly, is the use of locations, especially the house where Cyrus and his mother live and setting where a pivotal party scene unfolds, which uncannily ground the proceedings in reality, nearly making you believe the goings-on as they unfold. Also, the film’s ending is better than most of its kind, and Cyrus has exactly one great, kinetically giddy scene, where John confronts Cyrus in the middle of the night: the momentum builds to a fever pitch, but rather than capitalizing on this momentum, the film subsequently grinds to a halt without ever regaining its footing.

I admire the gentle nature of the screenplay and that the film never goes for a cheap and easy laugh; say what you will, but Cyrus isn’t lazy. But in the end, it’s either a comedy that’s not particularly funny or a drama that’s a little too quirky to resound with any gravitas. Cyrus is generically sweet like kindergartners’ exchanging valentines that they’ve each scribbled their perfunctory signatures on, because that’s what they do, rather than achingly sweet like a working stiff trying to find the perfect Valentine’s Day present for his lady when he only has $20 in his bank account and doesn’t get paid again until the 15th, because that’s what he has to do. Which is what, I think anyway, the Duplass brothers are aspiring to here.

Inspector Bellamy (Claude Chabrol, 2009)

Terrifically nuanced performances from Gérard Depardieu as Bellamy and Marie Bunel as his impossibly graceful wife propel this strange, laconic crime drama, the last film from Claude Chabrol (1930–2010), who along with contemporaries Jean-Luc Godard and Francois Truffaut wrote for Cahiers du cinéma in the ’50s and went on to found the French New Wave of cinema. The titular character (apparently based on George Simenon’s Inspector Maigret mystery novels, none of which I have read or was even aware of when I watched this film), a famous Parisian inspector, stumbles into a mystery involving a horrific car crash while vacationing with his wife.

It’s a treat to watch Depardieu’s Bellamy as he not so much investigates the mystery as lets it wash over him, almost as if he’s in a perpetually meditative state. And the plot is important, yes, but perhaps less so than the way the characters relate to each other, specifically Bellamy and his wife and Bellamy’s fuck-up brother, who brings a black cloud up for a visit. Their relationships bristle with joie de vivre, jealousy, denial, longing, relapse, and deep-rooted regret, sometimes all at once. Even with a few missteps—some of the point-of-view camerawork seems woefully out of place, especially given its (thankfully) minimal use, and, though the interaction between characters on the whole digs at truth, the day-to-day interactions and reactions of the major characters seems faintly at odds with the naturalistic filmmaking—it’s a beautiful film, with a conclusion that offers up an unexpected bookend that chills to the bone.

Super 8 (J.J. Abrams, 2011)

It’s funny: film critics used to accuse the genre-defining blockbuster films of Steven Spielberg (starting with Jaws) of bullying the surrender of meaningful cinema in favor of box office receipt-driven bombast and spectacle, and now the critics are calling J.J. Abrams’ homage to these films, Super 8, the antidote to standard summer trash like the Transformers films because of its firm emotional core. Though Super 8 may be a little nastier and harder edged than such films (perhaps reflecting the times we live in), the critics are onto something: the idea of caring one bit about let alone shedding tears the way people did in, say, E.T. over any character’s demise in the Transformers franchise is beyond improbable. But Super 8 is magically burdened with real emotional heft, and it's something to behold. Sure there’s drooling monsters, single-minded villains incapable of summoning an ounce of compassion, and things exploding left and right, but there’s a feeling of there being more at stake than in many summer films of late, because you genuinely care about what happens to the people on the screen. This is because the writing and performances plant these characters firmly in the "reality" created for them. In fact, the fate these characters may suffer due to the travails threatened by the fantastical elements in the films may be bested by those in their everyday existence.

Though much has (deservedly) been written about Elle Fanning's performance, the cast (especially the kids, led by the remarkable Joel Courtney) is uniformly (and unusually) solid. Without giving too much away (the less said the better), a group of misfit, film making kids (you can be forgiven for comparing them to the characters from The Goonies) navigating their way through small-town life in late '70s witness a horrific train crash while filming their latest opus, and find themselves witnesses to something that defies simple explanation.

The film doesn’t transcend the criticisms leveled by Kael and her contemporaries when the summer blockbuster was in its infancy, criticisms that, though they have their detractors who argue that such critics are humorless snoots, impervious to the charms of special effects, certainly hold water. And there are clunky passages, a few plot device missteps here and there, and interweaving themes (film making being the primary one) that never gel 100 percent. But at this point on the trajectory in the lineage of what the summer popcorn film template has become, it’s refreshing (and familiar) to surrender to a film that uses bombast and thrills in a manner that furthers the storytelling, rather than obliterating it to fiery metallic bits.

Midnight in Paris (Woody Allen, 2011)

It would be just as easy (and lazy) to ascribe the words “whimsical” or “charming” to Woody Allen’s 41st(!) film as “well-intentioned” and “creaky.” But the truth lies somewhere in the middle—the conceit of the film is an interesting one, and though the execution of it works more often than not, the misfires occur often enough to all but ensure a disconnect between the audience and what’s happening on the screen.

Still, Owen Wilson as all-but-defeated screenwriter Gil Pender, on vacation in the city of the title with his improbably shrewish fiancée (Rachel McAdams, dutifully allowing herself to be trapped by the character’s confines) and cartoonishly dreadful in-laws, comes off as one of the better Woody Allen surrogates, either because he’s savvy enough to steer clear of Allen impersonation or he’s too “Owen Wilson” to effectively impersonate anyone. Either way, it’s a winning, slightly revelatory performance. And Allen frames and photographs Wilson’s face without cutting prematurely, allowing us to be persuaded by Gil's reactions to the fantastical events (each night at the stroke of midnight, Gil is transported back to the Paris of the 1920s populated by the likes of Hemingway, Dali, and Fitzgerald) unfolding before his eyes; rather than seeing things through Gil's eyes, we see them registered on his face.

If you’re a Paris-in-the-'20s fetishist (I’m guessing you’re probably not), there’s a lot to feast on here—the set design and photography have a much-needed and impressive transportative quality—even if some of the setup is hackneyed. Some scenes come off as near-miss variations on tighter-scripted Allen moments, where closing-scene punchlines meant to linger as the film segues into its next scene are instead only suggested by the cutting, relying on the audience's collective recall of similarly structured, more successfully mounted scenes from other Allen films rather than the precision of the punchline. And I think we can all agree that it’s more than a little tiresome to have the Woody Allen surrogate as the only character with any perspective; his fiancée is a drag, his object of affection (a thoroughly winning but elegiac Marion Cotillard) lives in a bygone era, and the impossibly glowing, agreeable and fetishized sales clerk he encounters at a flea market is way too young for him (which makes for, in the universe of Woody Allen, a perfect match).

Midnight in Paris is a clever, slight, handsome little diversion, and you might just enjoy it, as I did, as long as your tolerance for known celebrities playing historical figures is high, and you’re not looking to laugh out loud too much or be moved emotionally.

The Switch (Josh Gordon and Will Speck, 2010)

You know you’re in trouble when the ineffable charm and comic wares of Jason Bateman can’t rescue your film from coming off as an affront to mediocre romantic comedies, a sub-genre defined by its apologists (I know it’s schmaltzy, but, etc.), or the poster is by far the best thing about it.

Both are true of The Switch, a film whose contrivances are bested only by the level of boredom it manages to inspire in its audience. Apparently based on a short story, "Baster" by Jeffrey Eugenides, the film deposits us in New York seven years in the past, marked by the insane and impressive mass that is Jason Bateman's hair. Wally (Bateman) finds out best friend Kassie Larson (a blander-than-normal Jennifer Aniston) has decided to find a sperm donor and have a child. What better way to do this than have your kooky friend (Juliette Lewis) throw you a party where you artificially inseminate yourself, which, we're ensured, is what everybody's doing these days. Wally, who doesn't particularly like the donor—could it be because he's in love with Kassie?—gets really drunk and happens upon the donor's canister of semen in the bathroom. While fucking around with it, he accidentally spills it in the sink. Therefore, he must replace it with his own. Due to his state of extreme inebriation, he has no recollection of this occurrence.

Seven years later (the present day), the story picks up as Kassie, who had moved away, is moving back to New York with her fucking annoying son Sebastian (Thomas Robinson), who seems to have similar characteristics to a now more reasonably coiffed Wally. One of these similar qualities is the particular brand of hypochondria that befalls people only inasmuch as it indicates a character trait for the purpose of comparison rather than an actual condition. Someone like Sebastian exists only in the movies, coming off as an amalgam of that "special child" you've seen countless times (the character is even endowed with Jonathan Lipnicki character's penchant for using big words and spouting out weird facts in Jerry Maguire). But Sebastian's character quirks are so unlikely—he collects picture frames and keeps the generic pictures they come with and creates stories for each of them—you'll find yourself rolling your eyes when your not scratching your head.

That the characters relate to each other in ways that people don't relate to each other may be perplexing ("Hi, I'm out of town with this dude I like right now, and I really don't want to have to come back there, but I just found out my son has lice. Can you do me a favor and go pick him up and perform a rigorous regimen of rituals to see if you can get rid of them? Thanks. And when I come back, and you've taken care of my son for me, and scrubbed his head and laundered his sheets, and gone through his hair with a fine-toothed comb, I might yell at you for not being happy for me and my new boyfriend," says the heroine of the film), but the film's real downfall is the laziness inherent in Allan Loeb's screenplay. It seems defiant in its tendency to string together elements we've seen before in other movies, but without any meaning behind them. Bateman's voiceover, offering the coda to the film displays this perfectly, as he declares "Maybe the human race isn't a race at all," possibly hinting at slowing down and enjoying life? Who knows, because this sentiment is completely independent of anything that happens in the fucking movie.

Only Jeff Goldblum, who manages to wring one or two laughs from the hackneyed material, seems like he's having any fun here; on the sinking ship, where everybody's running around waving their arms and panicking, he's sitting back and getting drunk, because, Why not? We're all going to die anyway.

Thoroughly improbable, utterly unfunny, and sometimes even mean-spirited (the film seems to have something against homeless people, offering at least two shameful throwaway jokes at their expense), The Switch foolishly relies on the knowledge of its audience to make inferences from and draw comparisons to other, better movies it's already seen and apologized for, even while recommending.

Friday the 13th (Marcus Nispel, 2009)

You can be forgiven for not knowing that the depraved serial killer Jason Voorhees appeared only peripherally as a deformed young boy in the original Friday the 13th (1980). But fans of the series know that Jason's mother was responsible for the slaughter of the now-standard cabal of generic, sex-crazed teenagers in the original—the entirety of which is summed up in the first few minutes of this version—so this is more an update than it is a remake. The whole thing feels a little paint-by-numbers and designed by committee; you get the feeling that everyone here is unified in their ideology of performing a job-for-hire, strictly because there’s money to be made, the only thing at stake being performing dutifully enough to ensure future employment. But there’s one great moment of invention in Friday the 13th's screenplay when, about 20 minutes in, after Jason has dispatched with what the viewer can be forgiven for thinking is the group whose journey we will follow through to the film’s conclusion, the title is introduced, revealing the preceding sequence to be a foreword. Not only is it impressive in its concept but also in its resourcefulness: by having two groups of teenagers to kill, there’s less time needed for plot development. Which is presumably a good thing, depending on whether your tolerance is higher for watching teens get stalked and mutilated by a madman than it is for excusing flimsy plot construction.

Though screenwriters Damien Shannon and Mark Swift offer a modest improvement over their screenplay for the D.O.A. Freddy vs. Jason—I liked that there were little homages to fans of (or at least those familiar with) the original series, such as Jason wearing as he did in Friday the 13th Part 2 (1981) a pillow case (or burlap sack, whatever) over his head before finding, as he did in Friday the 13th Part 3 (1982), the hockey mask that would make him (and it) an icon—none of it is scary. Part of this is because all of the sets look constructed, Jason looks and moves like a stuntman, and the score is lousy. The multi-ethnic cast (the presence of which begs the question Is it progressive to allow blacks and Asians to be brutally murdered alongside their white peers? and, strangely, I think it may be) comprises a series of "types," the white kids included. (The most ridiculous and perplexing being the guy obviously meant to look like the screen persona of Seth Rogen, though with none of his awkward charisma or self-effacing sense of humor.)

The Friday the 13th movies have always seemed oddly puritanical and conservative in their values (smoke pot and fuck, you die) given their penchant for employing inventive forms of brutality. This notion is only complicated when you find yourself siding with the killer (a surrogate for imposing these values) due to the brash, obnoxious behavior of the callous teenagers. While it may indeed be brisker (and arguably better) than any of the films of the original series, it’s still pretty thin. And at 97 minutes, it feels way too long. Fairly generic and offering a bit of restraint, given the post-Saw world we live in, it's best not to expect much here, because that’s precisely what you’ll get.

The Kids Are All Right (Lisa Cholodenko, 2010)

The Kids Are All Right is certainly well acted, subtly directed, the writing is sharp and focused, and it is overall engaging. But I couldn't help but be a little put off by the story's chosen trajectory, especially in the wake of numerous critics' lamentations about how, even though the parents here are both women, in the end, it's about "family." Because that's not entirely true. It's about a family facing a crisis, which is a different thing altogether. I suppose I was (naively) expecting more Cassavetes, less sensationalism and soap-operaish plotting and gloss. True, it's by no means a product of the branch of Hollywood that produced Transformers, but in ways aside from Annette Bening's involvement it reminded me of American Beauty, with its characters participating in a scandal that betrays their essence, and kind of deflates the whole thing.