The Roses + The Toxic Avenger

 

The Roses

Score:  B

Directed by Jay Roach

Starring Benedict Cumberbatch, Olivia Colman, Andy Samberg, Kate McKinnon, et al

Running time: 105 minutes

Rated R

The Roses is an entertaining movie, thanks especially to great comedic performances from both the leads and the supporting cast, but the whole ends up less than the sum of its parts.  The basic plot of the movie is the inexorable - excruciating yet often hilarious - dissolution of a once-happy couple's marriage.  Since there isn't much else going on, the filmmakers wisely invert the chronology at the beginning.  It starts off with a very funny counseling session with Cumberbatch's Theo and Colman's Ivy, which has a surprising but appropriate ending, before rewinding to the beginning of their relationship, in much happier days.  The movie also tries to keep up the energy, mood, and pace by consistently going over the top (usually by a little, sometimes a lot) of realism.  This works at times, such as Theo's professional disaster and pretty much all of Sandberg and McKinnon's lines.  But it also can be unnecessary and/or jarring, like their children's extreme upbringing (any scenes with them are odd) and the ridiculous lengths to which Theo and Ivy eventually take their conflict.  Much of the dialogue is really good, and Cumberbatch and Colman are as sharp as you would hope for.  The movie also shows hints of subtler understandings of the more realistic tensions and conflicts in a modern relationship - I just wish that the entire movie had been built around a similarly modest story and action.  It can't seem to help but constantly top itself in the ugliness of the relationship battles, which becomes numbing in a similar way to the violent action in a shoot-em-up movie.  It's not a long movie, but it could/should have been even shorter.  Still, a fun, very watchable movie - I am just focused more on the negative because it had the potential to be much better.

The Toxic Avenger

Score:  C+

Directed by Macon Blair

Starring Peter Dinklage, Kevin Bacon, Jacob Tremblay, et al

Running time: 103 minutes

Rated R

The Toxic Avenger is an 80s throwback, an intermittently entertaining remake of a cult favorite that tries several different styles, not entirely successfully.  I saw the original Toxic Avenger years ago (although also years after its original release in 1984) and remember it vaguely as a bizarre but interesting movie.  Well, it got a reboot, and the surprise involvement of some significant star power in Dinklage, Bacon, and Lord of the Rings' Elijah Wood.  The premise is a pretty simple one: Dinklage's Winston, a lowly employee of a sinister chemical/pharmaceutical company, is transformed in an accident into a grotesque monster who becomes a hero by taking down the villains terrorizing his community.  The movie's strengths are its fun 1980s aesthetic and feel, and a frequently very silly, gentler style of humor (i.e., a doctor trying to give Winston an important diagnosis but being drowned out by construction noises; and a stereotypical yet clever forest-dwelling wacko scene).  If anything, the movie would have fared significantly better with much more of both those things.  Dinklage is also endearing as a struggling single dad, pre-transformation.  But the filmmakers play it too straight overall, despite the kind of dull, and definitely ridiculous, premise.  It's hard to tell if a lot of the dialogue is just poorly written, or intentionally cheesy (probably both).  And there is a good bit of over the top action and gore, with Toxie mauling baddies with a "magic mop" and brute strength.  It's gross but cartoonish; the most offensive thing about it is that it's not entertaining enough.  Not a complete failure, but this is not one worth watching, either.

***

As you can tell, I saw two very different movies in this late summer/early fall movie season!  Both were at least a little disappointing, but also offered a change of pace in style.  Ironically, critics gave a better score to The Roses, a remake of a European movie, than they did to The Upside (2019) and Downhill (2020), two other remakes of European originals that I thought were much, much better.  And I'm shocked by the 86% that critics gave to The Toxic Avengers remake, which is what nudged me to the theater to see it.  Oh well.  Looking ahead at the fall movie calendar, I'm not sure I see a lot to look forward to, but hopefully there will be some good surprises or I just get more information on the best to come.  If not, I'll just enjoy football season for awhile!

* By source IMP Awards, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=79646366

** By source Legendary Pictures - http://www.impawards.com/2025/toxic_avenger_ver2_xlg.html, Fair use, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=74608794