Up and Coming Weekly is a weekly publication in Fayetteville, NC and Fort Bragg, NC area offering local news, views, arts, entertainment and community event and business information.
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This is Stupid and I am Bored The Dilemma (Rated PG-13) by HEATHER GRIFFITHS If you’ve seen the poster, you might be confused. Apparently, Vince Vaughn has a much younger brother, with better skin, nicer hair, and actual eyes instead of the deep set dark lined pits that he uses to see with. Unfortunately, this younger brother is not in the film, and these days Vaughn is looking more than a little bit tired. Apparently, even he is over himself. Is there anyone in America at this point who isn’t totally over Vince Vaughn’s tired persona? I was over him WAY be- fore Couples Retreat, but Ron Howard directed The Dilemma (111 minutes), so it can’t be that bad, right? Right? After all, Ron Howard picks good movies! He directed Willow! Back in 1984! And that was an AWESOME movie! Oh dear. This could be bad. Well, Ronny (Vaughn) and Nick (Kevin James) are pale shadows of men. They have not quite maintained a state of man-boyishness, but neither are they fully functioning adults in the sense of being able to deal with reality, at any level. While they do hold down jobs (of some kind), they have no clear means of support even though they continue to spend money like it’s going out of style. For some reason, Chef Beth (a reasonably well fed and utterly luminous Jennifer Connelly) is content to go slumming with the recovering gambler and natural born liar Ronny. Even though he lies. A Lot. Meanwhile, Spock’s Mom, who is named Geneva in this movie, (Winona Ryder) is trapped in a loveless ex- ploitative sham of a relationship with Paul Blart, Mall Cop (James). Weirdly, despite being complete toolio tools, Ronny and Nick manage to score an interview with some old dudes and Susan Warner (a totally gorgeous Queen Latifah). Since they have their fingers on the pulse of the modern auto industry, they manage to talk their way into some kind of deal by calling fuel efficient space saving cars “gay.” You know what? IT’ S NOT OK. Dear Writer Allan Loeb, Vince Vaughn, and Ron Howard: South Park can do an episode about the changing meaning of the word and pull it off, because Trey Parker and Matt Stone have something interesting to say. When you do it, it doesn’t work. Also, your movie sucked. Thank you for your time. Anyway, Nick and Geneva are so miserable in their mar- riage, they decide to distract themselves from the endless darkness that their lives have become by putting pressure onto Ronny to marry Beth. Honestly, they would have more success pressuring Beth to propose to Ronny, since he is a falling body looking for soft place to land and she is evidently totally co-dependent. Their evil plan to trap an emotionally fragile man into a sacred union nearly succeeds, but then Ronny catches Geneva smooching with Zip (Channing Tatum). Rather than confront them directly, he decides that sneaking around with a guilty look on his face is the way to go. Even though opin- ions are in no way divided that he needs to tell his best friend what he has seen, he keeps asking passers-by for advice, hoping that eventually someone will make his life easier and tell him what he wants to hear. That does not happen. At this point, I am so bored I start making up my own movie in my mind. My movie is much more entertaining, since Hector Elizondo is in it. This movie, on the other hand, is a waste of both my time and yours. Don’t say I didn’t warn you. HEATHER GRIFFITHS, Contributing Writer COMMENTS? 484-6200 ext. 222 or editor@upandcomingweekly.com WWW.UPANDCOMINGWEEKLY.COM FEBRUARY 2-8, 2011 UCW 21