It is to her everlasting credit that a famously exasperating perfectionist like Barbra Streisand could survive a limp noodle like The Guilt Trip. This cheesy comedy concerns a nerdy, 30-something loser named Andy (Seth Rogen) and his obnoxious, overbearing mother Joyce (Ms. Streisand) on a road trip from Manhattan to San Francisco that is understandably Read More
Welcome to New York Observer‘s Golden Globe coverage of the 2012, where you’ll be able to read (and participate!) in real time as Drew Grant and Dan D’Addario take bets on which acclaimed actor will be the first to slap that lopsided grin right off Ricky Gervais‘ face. Let the fun begin! Read More
In the pantheon of tastelessness designed to make you laugh at diarrhea, menstruation, masturbation, yeast infections, fellatio and worse, you can now add a stupid horror called 50/50. Artificial, irresponsible, filthy and forgettable, it knocks itself cross-eyed trying to make you roar with laughter at chemotherapy, with the nauseating Seth Rogen milking most of the yuks. But a stoner comedy about cancer? I don’t think so.
Joseph Gordon-Levitt has two expressions — sleepy and catatonic — and he wears them ragged as Adam Lerner, a 27-year-old reporter for National Public Radio stationed in Seattle who sinks into an understandable depression when malignant tumors are diagnosed on his spine and he is given only a 50/50 chance of survival. Read More
We found ourselves plenty surprised by Judd Apatow’s Funny People. Apologies to our own Rex Reed—whose vitriol over the film was epic in its proportions—but it wasn’t nearly as bad as we had anticipated. Quite the opposite, in fact: We sneaky loved it! Funny People was vicious, biting, messy and altogether human. Read More
Perhaps Judd Apatow is smirking all the way to the bank. Funny People, the hirsute director’s third film, opened in the No. 1 position at the box office this weekend, scoring an estimated $23.4 million in ticket sales. Unfortunately, that makes Funny People the lowest-grossing film to reach No. 1 this summer, Read More
We weren’t planning on becoming a big Katherine Heigl defender. After all, our hatred for her character Izzie Stevens on Grey’s Anatomy reaches such apoplectic proportions that we’re surprised we haven’t thrown a glass through our television screen by now. (Oh the horror of seeing Heigl-as-Izzie in cancer patient makeup and a bald cap Read More
We sure hope you had a good summer at the movies: With Aug. 1 falling on Saturday, we’re looking at five whole weeks of middling-to-crappy Hollywood genre fare that wasn’t strong enough to open during the big-boy months of May, June and July. As we do every Friday, here’s a handy guide to Read More
Funny People
Running time 146 minutes
Written and directed by Judd Apatow
Starring Adam Sandler, Seth Rogen, Leslie Mann, Jonah Hill, Jason Schwartzman
I’d like to tell you how vile this deviation from sanity called Funny People really is, but it is one of those rare times when I am at a loss for Read More
Here’s a question for the advertising executives out there: Why is Universal doing such a lame job marketing a major summer movie like Funny People? We’re now a few weeks shy of the July 31 release date for Judd Apatow’s latest would-be blockbuster (or as the smug posters say, “The third film from Read More
Sometimes watching how Hollywood studios operate is more entertaining than the movies they produce. Case in point: Moneyball. For those of you haven’t been following the chaos surrounding the now-dead adaptation of Michael Lewis’s nonfiction baseball best seller: Steven Soderbergh and Brad Pitt were all set to make this film for Sony Pictures—with Read More
