Horrible Bosses Deserves a Promotion

by Jon James

Horrible Bosses starts off with a cast rock-solid enough to sink a body with. Kevin Spacey, Jennifer Aniston, and Colin Farrell star as three supervisors despicable enough to lead average men Nick (Jason Bateman), Dale (Charlie Day), and Kurt (Jason Sudeikis) to consider homicide. Spacey shines brightest, playing a manipulative, demanding, white-collar company president who would probably make a pregnant woman work until her water broke and then bill her for carpet cleaning. Aniston delivers a sex-addicted, extorting dentist that makes you really start to see the advantages of Novocain over nitrous gas. Colin Farrell kicks it up with a sleazy, coked-up, chemical-waste-disposal-company heir that would personally dump DDT right into a lake if it would save him ten bucks for more blow. The morbidly-inclined employees bring a synergy that’s not unlike the (original) Three Stooges, if they had turned into a manhunting trio. Day steals the show with a whiny, dim-witted but lovable incompetent that is straight out of his It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia character, only slightly less malefic. Bateman’s character is also similar to the role he’s known for in Arrested Development, but minus the family holding him together. Sudeikis’ womanizing character leaves something to be desired, though whether that is the actor’s fault or is just a universal trait of Jung’s ancient archetype “Himbo” is hard to say. The three play off each other well, though, and their chemistry really drives the humor part of this dark comedy.
Jamie Foxx also shows up, as a heavily tattooed “murder consultant” whose name would have more asterisks than letters if it were printed here. The character is used to make a few jabs at the racial ignorance and stereotyping that is still present in well-meaning middle class white men, but the character himself stands out as being just slightly more absurd than the other characters, like a mime corpse in a clown hearse. As with many movies with all-male leads,the movie’s next big jokes revolve around homophobic humor. A few of the scenes were funny and contributed to the development of the plot, such as when a urophilic gigolo shows up instead of a hitman, but mostly the jokes are passe and only distract from the tension-comedy waltz that fuels the movie. The pacing is well-orchestrated and effective, culminating in a plot climax that coincides with, well, another sort of climax. The humor and suspense develop up to this point is unrelenting, without a slow moment, and managing to generally avoid the awkward comedy motif that has been in vogue since The Office started airing in the U.S. The plot itself is driven by a decent degree of unexpected twists without falling back on various unjustified dei ex machina. In the meantime, Horrible Bosses manages to take some jabs at such cultural absurdities as movie piracy, outsourcing, stereotyping, and male sexual harassment, while keeping the jokes light and nondistracting.
In all, Horrible Bosses uses its A-list cast well, and revisits the Shakespearean art of balancing comedy and drama. Most of the jokes are fresh, with the exception of a bit of stale homophobic and chauvinistic humor, for which the creators should be berated. But if you’re looking for a refreshing comedy and don’t mind plenty of justification for an R rating, Horrible Bosses is worth a shot.

Knockdown

by Courtney Hilden

In the latest chapter of Castle's hunt for Becket's Mom's murderer, Becket gets a break when contacted by the detective originally on her case nine years ago.  Just before he tells her what she needs to hear, he too is murdered, setting off a string of events that leads the cast to pursue two related cases: who murdered the retired cop and who murdered Becket's Mom. 
The best thing about this episode was the guest casting.  The actor playing Raglan was perfect.  Even his younger-self picture was nice, making him look a lot like Sheldon from The Big Bang Theory.  This episode's villain was possibly the best villain the show's ever had.  He had a smooth voice and was confidently, quietly menacing.  We really need to see this guy again. 
Becket's smashing of the villain was also great.  We so rarely get to see women express their rage, and it was so gratifying and such a relief to see her angry.  We need more angry women; we need more women expressing their feelings without people reacting in fear and disgust but with understanding.  Props to Castle for letting Becket's feelings always be understood by her male colleagues and never be considered hysterical. 

Detroit 1-8-7

by Courtney Hilden
Spoiler Alert!: The mystery's ending is revealed in this review.

Given the city of Detroit's reputation as the world's most dangerous city, Detroit 1-8-7, a cop show, should have probably existed before. Given the show's depiction of race, it might be possible to imagine that this was the reason the show as only just premiered. The show's depiction of race is not outright racist, but there are some strange moments that deserve dissecting:

1. Although it is great to see so many of the characters are people of color, it is sad that the main character, Finch, is white. Detroit, save its metro area, is predominately African American, and it feels wrong that the story is told from a white perspective. A story set in Detroit should be told by a person who does a better job of representing its population.
2. It is also really sad that the comedy is being done mostly by the sidekick African American character, Washington. He is inept, he is comical, he is suppose to be a minstrel character, which is so disappointing, again, considering that he is a better representation of the city's population than Finch.
3. Some of the suspects were white, which was a nice change of pace, considering so many of the bad guys on other cop/detective/procedural shows are minorities. Two of the suspects, including a drug addict, were white. The night's bad guy, James Burke, was white. Although many (white) people imagine that there is a lot of black-on-white crime, the case is actually the opposite. Within the episode, the bad guy committed violence against both whites and African Americans, again, different from the mainstream, white imagination. Of course, the drug dealers were African American, so for every bit of progress of racial subversion, something typical and cliche seemed to happen.
4. The episode also depicted an interracial family, one that was sadly dealing with a father in prison and a recently-murdered mother. No comment is made, by anyone, on the fact that a white woman was raising her biracial grandchildren with her African American daughter-in-law. Is this what the so-called post-racial America looks like? Imaginary Detroit?
5. The choice in homicide itself was significant. If you have ever watched Detroit News, you know that the most common murder appears to be the "Baby Momma Murder." By that, I mean husband/boyfriend kills his wife/girlfriend, who is almost always the mother of his children. It is so common that these murders are barely given more than thirty seconds on the news. Often, these murders involve only African Americans, but here it involved a biracial family, one where the white man was killed his African American wife and tried to kill his biracial kids and white mother. This was both confirming to certain ideas about murder in Detroit but also subverted it. It adheres to an all-too-common and tragic story, but it also changed the stereotype, by showing white men just as capable of that sort of violence that is so linked to African American men. It implicitly questioned the idea that this violence is inherently linked to African American men, who are so frequently stereotyped as dangerous savages.

Some other non-race-centric notes about the pilot episode:
1. I also loved how the medical examiner does roller derby in her spare time. Finally, a cop show where the characters at least make attempts at having a life outside the job. And points for giving her a cool, feminist-hailed hobby.
2. The phone conversations between our two main characters, Finch and Washington, were an interesting detail. Previously, the audience had been led to believe Finch is unable to express himself. Those calls show he is capable, he is just choosing not to do so.
3. And finally: Coney Islands! Any good Detroiter can tell you their favorite Coney, and usually knows what is best at a few of them. Points for adding something all too real.

"There Are Things God Will Never Forgive"

A Review of Murder on the Orient Express
by Courtney Hilden
Spoiler Alert!: Some of the clues to this shockingly good mystery are revealed in this review.

There are few murder mysteries that are recognizable even to non-mystery fans: Ten Little Indians, The Fall of the House of Usher, The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and Murder on the Orient Express. The last has recently been adapted for a movie, and it blows most mysteries out of the proverbial snow drift, painting everything in snow white and murky gray, meditating on faith and justice, filled with hubris and the empty feeling of being near death, leaving the main character and the audience as cold as the winter world outside the train cars on the Orient Express.
The story follows Poirot on a trip aboard the title train. It is only through befriending the train's owner that he secures for himself aboard. Sometime the first night the lodger in the room next to him dies after being stabbed several times in several odd ways. Poirot, despite his reluctance, begins to solve the crime.
Smart choices are made by the creators. The music during the opening scene (in which Poirot gives one of his celebrated analysis-turned-interrogation only to have the criminal commit suicide in front of him) is dissonant and perfect, like the sound Lost used to signify it was flashing back, forward, to the side or where ever else that show wanted to go.
Toby Jones, last seen playing the Dream Lord on Doctor Who, brings another thankless but great small performance in the role of the victim. He gives us no question to his vileness or how he is used to getting what he wants, but leaves us to ponder his repentance. David Morrissey and Hugh Bonneville also give their normal level of top-notch performing.
There are even brief moments of humor in an otherwise deeply serious film. At one point a character uses the word “Bastard” and then apologizes, asking everyone to excuse “her French.” “It is indeed a French word,” Poirot replies.
Thematically, the connection between faith and justice is made. Poirot, a Catholic, believes in justice through the courts, yet many of the other train passengers clearly believe in picking up where God, if he exists or not, exacting revenge. Shots of rosaries, one of the few things that could logically be on a train are used throughout. The thing that is particularly smart about all of this is that the story never makes a blatant judgment on the moral standings of these characters. It would be easy to descent into this, but by making no one right and no one wrong, the audience if left to contemplate the nature of right and wrong on their own. Films without answers are always the ones that stay with us the longest, and, even though the mystery of who murdered the train passenger is solved, the mystery of what is right and wrong, of what God asks us to do, and what justice really is remain as mysterious as the murder was in the beginning.

In most films with this kind of moral conundrum, the murderers would then be shown as self-made monsters, who, now that they have taken the law into their hands once are willing to do it once again. Instead, they wisely speak to one another, as a counsel, as their own appointed God, and this leaves their previous actions look all the more noble, since they are capable of sticking themselves to a very hard, though different from Poirot’s, moral standard.
It's not a flawless film. Poirot's habit of speaking in third person is still irritating.
The film also flirts around an Imperialist interpretation of the so-called Middle East. Turkey, where the film begins, is depicted with every stereotype of the region you can think of: violent, hateful towards women and uncivilized.
Poirot himself has always been the weakest thing about these outings. These days, with characters on tv on other mystery shows like Bones, Law and Order, CSI, etc. that contain detectives as dark, interesting and surprising as their suspects, it's no longer acceptable to have detectives who blandly sit in as the observer for the audience. They have to being going through something during the crimes, they have to be emotionally invested, and, if possible, dark and just barely able to put on the show of being okay.
Poirot, despite the revelation at the end, stays as static at the end of the film as he was at the beginning. He’s shaken, sure, but he shows no signs of changing his views. He’s just as much as an unfeeling and severe hardass at the beginning as he is at the end. No matter how glazed over his eyes are through much of the film or the waterworks that happens at the end, the audience is left with no question as to his unbowed point of view. What would be really fun to watch is him changing his mind, or even better, changing how he handles crime. As chilling as the weather or the crime in this story, nothing is as chilly as someone unable to consider the other side’s argument. No one wants to watch a guy so hard-wound that he specifies to waiters that he wants his eggs to be the exact same size.

The Mirror Crack'd from Side to Side

by Courtney Hilden

Miss Marple has recently come back to the screen, and this time the mystery is around the poisoning of Heather Babcock (Caroline Quinten), who was murdered at a party being held by Marina Gregg, a movie star. At first, no one can discern why Babcock was killed, and Gregg insists that she was the target. As Miss Marple investigates, she discovers that lots of characters have motivation for killing Gregg, but she also realizes it's not as simple as that.
Marple almost seems to be playing with the police detectives, giving them enough clues to solve the crime without mentioning how they are pertinent to the story. One of the things that was disappointing about the first series in this new version of Marple was the lack of information on her. She was just a detective that the audience could use to see the crime. Marple here has more of a personality and flaws, including friends and fragility. Marple goes so far as to taunt characters with what she discerns about them, making her much quicker and tougher than the average old woman gumshoe. Some of the other characters were delightful, including Marple's best friend Dolly (Joanna Lumley), a snoop, and Ella Blunt (Victoria Smurfit), Jason Rudd's too-devoted assistant, who both brought surprising style to their characters. The interactions between Marple and Dolly were particular authentic to the relationships between friends. Miss Bence (Charlotte Riley) was also great, coming off as world-weary and totally disinterested. Riley's deadpan delivery adds a touch of humor over all the murder and intrigue.

The film has an incredible sense of enthusiasm. You get the feeling that the creators love the material, the time period, and everything about classic movie stars. The soundtrack of this episode was particularly fun, since it imitated the dramatic incidental music that is associated with old movies. The set designs for the movie of Nefertiti were beautiful and glamorous.
By far the most charming of the new Marple series, and a good time for mystery or classic movie fans.