Monday, December 21, 2009
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Monday, December 21, 2009
MOVIE REVIEW
Did You Hear About The Morgans?
Carrie/Grant: You’re Not In Manhattan Anymore
Sarah Jessica Parker as Meryl Morgan
and Hugh Grant as Paul Morgan in "Did You Hear About The Morgans?".
Sony
By
Omar P.L. Moore/PopcornReel.com
Monday, December 21, 2009
Sarah Jessica Parker and Hugh Grant muck about in the rain, on the rodeo course
and on the run from killers and bears in Marc Lawrence’s new film “Did You Hear
About The Morgans?”, which opened last Friday across North America, but none of
it -- as comedic as it may read here -- is funny at all.
Infidelity roils the marriage of the Manhattan-ite Morgans (Parker and Grant)
and the fallout surrounding it is interrupted by a murder the couple witnesses.
The murderer sees them. And from
there a wild goose chase consisting of painfully unfunny one-liners and
threadbare screenwriting unfolds as the troubled couple is ushered into a
witness protection by the U.S. Marshals, which lands Paul and Meryl Morgan in
Wyoming with new identities. They are
welcomed to the American west by a gun-toting Annie Oakley type (Mary
Steenburgen) and her husband (Sam Elliott).
“Did You Hear About The Morgans?” suffers from the idea that it has something
new to offer audiences, who’ve seen this movie before.
Films like “Sweet Home Alabama”, “Crocodile Dundee”, “The Out-Of Towners”
(which the director wrote) and a hundred thousand others (including the Steve
Martin-starrer “My Blue Heaven”) have played the fish-out-of-water theme song
with varying degrees of success or failure.
When watching “Did You Hear…,” you get the sense its filmmakers are
vigorously shaking a coin-filled tin can saying, “a penny for your laughs,
please.”
The endless, needless cleavage shots and glimpses of women’s behinds are meant
to somehow wake men from their slumber but even these sights don’t keep us from
falling asleep. (“Nine”, in context
works better, at least, for its desired effect and main character’s viewpoint,
if nothing else.) The
look-at-those-idiot-local-yokels cliché has also worn a gaping hole in the movie
red carpet.
Ms. Parker’s Meryl comes across as a whiny drone and Mr. Grant’s British
witticisms are as repetitive and one-dimensional as endless imitations of “Taxi
Driver” character Travis Bickle’s “you talkin’ to me” line, which Mr. De Niro
himself must cringe at each new time he hears it.
Mr. Grant, who appeared in the director’s “Two Weeks Notice” surely has
other talents but with the exception of
“Music And Lyrics” (which Mr. Lawrence also directed) audiences expecting
originality from him will be disappointed.
As for Ms. Parker, any of her “Sex And
The City” fans bravely subjecting themselves to this messy material will be
counting down to May 2010, when Carrie Bradshaw will be safely ensconced in
Manhattan for more single adventures.
“Did You Hear About The Morgans?” is
rated PG-13 by the Motion Picture Association Of America for some sexual
references and momentary violence. The
film’s duration is one hour and 43 minutes.
Read more movie reviews and stories from Omar
here.
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