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What’s so wrong about a dude who met a
chick, and the chick helped the dude learn how to live his life, and now
the dude has a different outlook on life than the dude before him?
Nothing. Nothing! I’ve been that dude, I’ve met that chick, and I say
more, Cameron, more, dude! Cameron Crowe is not all about the pimple
dick man being helped by a strong woman, it’s a young man learning about
life from a special woman. I love that. As for Kirsten Dunst, the melon
head is an actress I rather enjoy. In her high points, and utter low
points, the woman is easy to look at, and easy to endure.
I always try to give my favorite directors
the benefit of the doubt. Regardless of their work, I always try to give
them the benefit of the doubt. With “Elizabethtown,” the benefit of the
doubt only goes so far. I’m still trying to figure out what the hell was
the point to the entire film. We have a jaded young man in the shoe
industry, his dad dies before he decides to off himself, then he comes
into a small Southern Americana town, and comes across a slew of quirky
Southern characters. How utterly original. Some are slack jawed yokels,
some wave their American flags, and hell, even our jaded young man Drew
has a cousin who loves Lynyrd Skynyrd. Throw in a hoedown and jug, and
you have a bonafide cliché-athon! And the question inevitably trails
back to: What is the whole point? I’m still confused on that little
specific.
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I’ve seen better slice of life coming of age
bullshit from other directors, and “Elizabethtown” is not
one of those better flicks of the sub-genre. It’s scattered
and at most times it feels like two different movies
sloppily smashed together. One involves a stupid death plot
with Drew trying to decide if he’s sad his father died, and
one involves Drew romancing a pretty blonde stalker. Neither
of which are even remotely as good as they have the
potential to be. |
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Any attempt at character focus that is not
on Drew is minimal and utterly paper thin, while Orlando Bloom is stale
in this lead role. When he’s supposed to be quirky, he’s
wooden, when he’s supposed to be emotional, he’s over the top, and he’s
just not as charming as he should be. I wish there was someone else in
this role. Crowe’s flop is a flop in every sense of the word. The
emotions are flat, the delivery utterly trite, and I just didn’t buy
anything that went on here. I mean, how is a girl who takes mental
pictures by miming a camera endearing? It’s not. Why is going to a
Southern town suddenly the path to a refreshed outlook on life? A pretty
blonde who wants to bed you, now that will keep you from suicide.
Otherwise, it’s sucky, and I’m disappointed.
Sentimental, sappy, and sometimes just
crappy, “Elizabethtown” surpasses any hope of being a surprisingly good
film, by giving us a brutally cliché plot, bland acting, millions of
unresolved sub-plots, and a pointless end result. Though Dunst is a
saving grace, it’s an awfully clunky, self-indulgent little heap of
garbage.
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