Now Playing At a Theater Near You

I liked it. One thing I liked as a South Asian was that every minority character had a fully realized personality and desires. There was no real "HELEN MIRREN IS GOING TO SAVE YOU ALL."

Ooo, now I want to see it. I was a little worried that it would be stereotypical and superficial.

No. That is one aspect that is done well. They are also not presented as magical saviours of white people either. The relationship that the two chefs have is mutually beneficial and almost prickly. And all the characters are well shaded.

It is fluffy. Like I went with a girlfriend who I see these kinds of movies with (Julie and Julia, Its Complicated, etc). If you like that prestige-y, not really going to challenge you but well done, taking up the fifth best comedy film (and maybe best actress) at the Golden Globes (which I do, they are fun) you will.

Although how Lasse Hallstrom went from My Life as a Dog and What's Eating Gilbert Grape? to being high end Nancy Meyers, I do not know. I guess I blame Chocolat.

But no it was super well acted. Helen Mirren is great, though I think the performance of the film is Om Puri's. He is always fantastic. And much like I said with Dev Patel and Suraj Sharma, if there was justice in the world Manish Dayel would be the next new it boy. He is so handsome and charming. Do NOT go on an empty stomach though.

Although how Lasse Hallstrom went from My Life as a Dog and What's Eating Gilbert Grape? to being high end Nancy Meyers, I do not know. I guess I blame Chocolat.

Heh, right? He married Lena Olin, he was like, I have achieved all there is to achieve in life, I'll just make the money now.
The Hoax was pretty good, in a truly interesting not vaseline on the lens way. I want to see it, because I love Helen Mirren, food, and Lasse, but it's playing 45 miles away from me so....I'm gonna wait for the rental.

Yes I liked that one quite a lot too. And you know even though they were in the same intelligent fluff category, I have a fondness for Casanova and Salmon Fishing in Yemen as well.

And yes, your not missing much renting it. Although like most of Hallstrom's films it is beautiful to look at.

Kiran wrote:Yes I liked that one quite a lot too. And you know even though they were in the same intelligent fluff category, I have a fondness for Casanova and Salmon Fishing in Yemen as well.

I totally forgot that Casanova was a Hallstrom film! I really enjoyed that one when I saw it in college. I went in with no expectations and thought it was good, fluffy fun!

But no it was super well acted. Helen Mirren is great, though I think the performance of the film is Om Puri's. He is always fantastic. And much like I said with Dev Patel and Suraj Sharma, if there was justice in the world Manish Dayel would be the next new it boy. He is so handsome and charming. Do NOT go on an empty stomach though.

Yes to all these things! If it had been all about Om Puri and Helen Mirren's characters I would have loved it even more, even if it would have meant less Manish Dayal. Charlotte Le Bon is like, straight out of central casting for "pretty brunette French girl" and also disturbingly resembles old-school Winona Ryder, but I found her character's confidence and naturalness refreshing. Like, she actually had a personality and you could see why it clashed with Hassan's. I wish I weren't this happy about character development. I've been watching too many crappy movies.

It's cliched as anything but I laughed like a nut when

Spoiler:

Also, yeah, don't go on an empty stomach. I mean, even if you go on a full stomach you will still be like GIVE ME ALL THE INDIAN FOOD. The only things stopping my friends and me were that it was a small New England town at ten o'clock on a weeknight. You know, a real hotbed of culinary diversity.

I saw The F Word, which is apparently being called What If in the US. It's cute enough. Daniel Radcliffe and Zoe Kazan have very good chemistry together, and I enjoy the depiction of Toronto in it, which you don't get to see very often in movies. I wasn't always fully on board with all the humour (a bit too slapsticky at times), but it was generally a real fun time. I was a little surprised by the ending, which seemed very definite given the general vibe of the movie. Now, I am reading they reshot scenes to add to the ending, which was apparently too open ended for audiences when they did some early screenings.

Spoiler:

That annoys me a bit because the ending it currently has, while okay, didn't really feel necessary. It put too much of a bow on the story.

Spoiler:

I saw an indie film called The One I Love because the screenplay was by a close friend's former film school classmate. I expected the movie to be pretentious and/or nonsensical but walked away from the theater blown away by it. Elizabeth Moss was spectacular, and now I finally understand the fuss over her. I loved how the film handled the notions of trust and infidelity between couples, and there was a slightly sinister undercurrent that I would have thought would be inappropriate and yet seemed completely sensible and integral as the story moved along. I highly recommend the film and would love to hear what anyone else has to say about it.

Saw The Hundred Foot Journey. It was pretty forgettable and overly saccharine but Manish Dayal is freaking adorable. Why isn't he a huge star?

Saw Gone Girl today, and I think they did a really good job with it. The cast was great: Rosamund Pike was a perfect choice for Amy, and few people could play a sleazy-but-nice guy like Ben Affleck. Tyler Perry was a pleasant surprise to me, too - I don't know that I've ever seen him in anything, but he was delightful in this.

Spoiler:

I thought they did a great job with Gone Girl too. The casting was excellent all around.

If you're interested in seeing this movie and haven't already read the book - don't read any reviews or plot summaries! Just go! The less one knows the better.

Does it stick pretty closely to the book, especially the ending? I have heard conflicting reports on this.

Puddingcup, it's been a while since I read the book, but I thought it was really close, yes. They took out (book spoilers)

Spoiler:

, but the overall end result was the same.

I thought it was really good too, but I wasn't completely sold on Rosamund Pike in the first half or so of the movie. She was great at the end, but she kind of annoyed me in the earliest scenes. Also, there was something about her voice that grated, was she trying to disguise an accent of some kind?

I really enjoyed Tyler Perry in the lawyer role. I also thought the actress who played Margo did a nice job. The parents were more overtly weird than I remember them being in the book (but I couldn't completely remember all the details).

Spoiler:

mayram wrote:I thought it was really good too, but I wasn't completely sold on Rosamund Pike in the first half or so of the movie. She was great at the end, but she kind of annoyed me in the earliest scenes. Also, there was something about her voice that grated, was she trying to disguise an accent of some kind?

I really enjoyed Tyler Perry in the lawyer role. I also thought the actress who played Margo did a nice job. The parents were more overtly weird than I remember them being in the book (but I couldn't completely remember all the details).

Spoiler:

Pike is English, so yes.

I enjoyed it, ending and all. Though I feel like the movie softened Nick a bit to where you hate him for being an idiot but, at least in my view, I didn't hate him for anything leading up to the morning of July 5. Like - that's crappy married life, good or bad. He was wrong in a lot of ways, but he wasn't particularly bad, or an awful human being. I feel like readers of the book expect me to hate him more.

Though I feel like the movie softened Nick a bit to where you hate him for being an idiot but, at least in my view, I didn't hate him for anything leading up to the morning of July 5. Like - that's crappy married life, good or bad. He was wrong in a lot of ways, but he wasn't particularly bad, or an awful human being. I feel like readers of the book expect me to hate him more.

I read the book last year so my memory is not completely sharp, but I didn't hate Nick in the book and your description of him matches how I felt about him. He did some bad things and was kind of an idiot sometimes but I didn't have the white-hot hatred of him that I've seen in so many reviews.

Anybody else love that orange cat they had? He/she seemed to have quite a presence in the movie though I can't remember there being a cat in the book. The staging of

Spoiler:

To me the movie doesn't work because of Rose Pike. It's like "Did you kill your wife" and I'm like hell no it's Rose Pike! Anyone married to her couldn't wipe the smile off his face!

Anybody else love that orange cat they had? He/she seemed to have quite a presence in the movie though I can't remember there being a cat in the book.

The cat was the real star of the movie. And Affleck was weirdly attractive lugging that cat around when he walks into the house and finds the crime scene. Is that weird? My sister assures me that reaction wasn't weird, but maybe she's just weird, too.

I thought they did a great job with the movie.  I HATED Nick in the book.  Hated, hated, flames on the side of my face, wanted him to be guilty within the first 15 pages because I JUST. COULD. NOT.  His is a personality type that I obviously have some issues with.  I thought Affleck would be perfect in the part, and he basically was, but my hatred was softened somewhat by the fact that I mostly like Ben Affleck in movies.  What helped more, though, was not being in his head.  Since the book was first-person, we were privy to every douchetastic thought in Nick's brain.  Since movies can't do that, we were spared a lot of that, which made it easier to rein in that urge to punch I felt when reading the book.

Agreed Gillian, I think that lack of first person helped me with the ending too. In the book you are held utterly hostage to these two assholes, but in the movie you don't feel as anchored to their shitty POV's. You get so many other characters side eyeing BOTH of them. There was even a line about being inside the house v. outside the house, the movie allows you to switch back and forth, in the book you were stuck inside the fucking house. Nick may deserve Amy, Amy may deserve Nick, but I DO NOT deserve either of them! With that distance I could really appreciate and enjoy the outcome, even if I think it's still kind of bullshit.

I want to know who trained that cat to pose perfectly, and get them to come to my house and train Opie not to claw the shit out of my furniture.

I thought Ben was perfect as Nick but am hesitant to even call it acting, like for real he appeared to be wearing his own clothes in several scenes. Pike was heh heh Amazing as Amy!

The cat was the real star of the movie. And Affleck was weirdly attractive lugging that cat around when he walks into the house and finds the crime scene. Is that weird? My sister assures me that reaction wasn't weird, but maybe she's just weird, too.

Not weird to me, I loved that his first move was to pick up the cat. Also loved that the cat had his own room.

Agreed Gillian, I think that lack of first person helped me with the ending too. In the book you are held utterly hostage to these two assholes, but in the movie you don't feel as anchored to their shitty POV's. You get so many other characters side eyeing BOTH of them. There was even a line about being inside the house v. outside the house, the movie allows you to switch back and forth, in the book you were stuck inside the fucking house. Nick may deserve Amy, Amy may deserve Nick, but I DO NOT deserve either of them! With that distance I could really appreciate and enjoy the outcome, even if I think it's still kind of bullshit.

That's a really good point, though I do slightly wonder if I would have picked up on certain things if I hadn't read the book. For example, the scene where Nick accidentally smiles for the cameras at the press conference, that's a goof explicitly described in the book as a reflex that he instantly realizes and regrets, but in the movie, it stands on its own. (I loved the smile Ben Affleck pulled in that scene, it made me laugh out loud.) I think I would have gotten it anyway, but I'm not sure.

I thought the parents were played more comically in that scene than I remember them in the book with the ready-made web address and catchphrases.

My book club + most of our moms went to see Gone Girl today. I thought it was an excellent adaptation.

Spoiler:

The actress who played the detective was great AND one of the other officers (the one who fed Nick's cat) was Minkus from Boy Meets World. I'm ashamed how quickly I recognized him.

Unlucky Bear wrote:AND one of the other officers (the one who fed Nick's cat) was Minkus from Boy Meets World. I'm ashamed how quickly I recognized him.

THANK YOU! I thought that was him, but I completely forgot to look him up once we got out of the movie. Now I have to go blow my sister's mind with this information (we mostly still call him Chuckie Lee Torkelson, but Minkus'll do in a pinch).

I saw it Friday night and was glad it had been a while since I'd read the book because I think it made it a little bit less predictable than if it had been fresh in my mind. I remembered the ending, but not some of the details of it, so that made it more effective.

Overall, it was a very good rendition of the book, but I do remember loathing the characters a lot more on the page than onscreen. And yes, the cat was definitely the star for me because I kept thinking of my two cats every time he was in a scene and knowing both of them would have been kicking and clawing in wild-eyed, abject terror if some strange guy tried to pick them up and carry them around in front of cameras and crew. To me the cat was more amazing than Amazing Amy.

Gone Girl. I really, really liked it (and I've read the book). My husband watch it too, and it properly terrified him, heh. He did point out that the dialogue in the beginning was kind of clunky, and I agreed with him when he said it afterwards, but when the film picked up pace during the second half I kind of forgot about it. Rosamund Pike was.fucking.fantastic. Holy shit, I didn't know she had that much nuance in her. Carrie Coon as Go was also one of my favourites, where in the book the character was just background noise to me. She really brought her to life onscreen.

Commentary about Nick:

Spoiler:

Overall, awesome movie. It was super fun and gives a lot for one to think about afterwards.