Tonights movie - Paul Blart: Mall Cop (iTunes)

Kevin James at his best being Kevin James. It seemed like King of Queens with more action and no character as interesting as Arthur. The cell phone seller guy’s daughters ex-boyfriend was probably the most entertaining and he had a total  of about a minute of screen time. The pen seller guy was creepy and loserish all in one.

The plot was predictable as any of the loser hero genre. The guy is in a no brain, dead end job that he loves because that is all he has in his life. Somehow he saves the day after the worst things happen. Sometimes I don’t get why movies are so unrealistic and we let them be that way. After Paul Blart finds out that the situation he says to himself, “Remember what you are trained to do…, Nothing!” Then he goes about taking out bad guys one by one. Uh, no!

It had some good laughs but the end was in sight from the beginning so sometimes that ruins a movie.

A Thousand Years of Good Prayers

I saw a preview of this movie many months ago on Apple’s Trailer site. The preview was intriguing enough that I search for it on Netflix. It eventually made it to DVD so I ordered it up.
I must admit that the part I found interesting was that the father visiting from China had the LDS missionaries knock on the door and the father invited them in. The seen was vaguely familiar yet somehow seeing it played out in a movie was very awkward.
So the movie is about a father that come to visit his daughter who lives in the US. He is a widower and she is separated from her spouse. The scenes repeat themselves over and over. The daughter goes to work and the father stays home. He goes through her things. He read the newspaper. He goes to the park and “communicates” with a woman that doesn’t speak Chinese or English. Those are weird scenes with the two of them gesturing and speaking in a language the other cannot understand. The daughter returns from work they have a large dinner prepared by the dad, who just happens to have mastered cooking at the old people university.
These daily scenes repeat until the daughter starts to get annoyed at her father asking too many questions about her failed marriage.
The movie builds to a scene where the father shares a “secret” from his past. But the crazy part is he is talking quietly and the daughter is not even in the room.
Oh! And the whole thing has subtitles. I guess I missed that part from the preview. The story was based off a book from Yiyun Li.

Here’s a quick heads up: the playlist has an end and thank goodness it does. So by the movie poster one might think that this movie is about two kids just walking around the city at night listening to their iPods. You know how it goes, share one ear bud with someone so they have to get close. Yeah like sitting on someone else’s lap since the car that is really a robot is driving… yes, cheesy like that. 

The movie is rated PG-13 and for good reason. While the intro credits are rolling the main character drops and F-bomb. Of course it only happens once to keep the PG-13 rating. A sprinkling of other not safe for work words are thrown in for good measure, just to keep it real. Teenage drinking at night clubs in NYC, not too hard to imagine but when the entire bar/club is filled with high schoolers I have to question the reality meter. On scene at the recording studio leaves us wondering what really happened. The noise (read: moaning) leads us to believe on thing but then the camera is on them too fast for them to have gotten dressed. Norah’s has to do the zipper and button on her pants…? What just happened? Maybe I missed. 

On the predictability scale Nick and Norah rank up there 9.5 out of 10. Almost every movie cliche is there. They meet, hit it off, discover something small they don’t like about each other, have an argument, go their separate ways, get back together to help a friend (and also to be together), find out they really do like each other. Then both have to deal with jealous ex’s who want the back after seeing them with someone else. All while trying to find their favorite band that does mystery shows at random places so the fans have to find them. 

The music and well delivered humor of Michael Cera are about the only redeeming qualities. Oh, and it was a fairly short movie. Did any one else waste their life watching it?