I had really anticipated spending the large portion of my evening watching live tennis from any of the three Australian tennis tournaments going on even as I write this, but since American television is terrible terrible terrible, I decided to watch a movie as I did some schoolwork. Or, rather, I decided to do some schoolwork as I watched a movie.
It's been hitting me the last couple days as I've been doing this activity that the process of choosing movies can be difficult for a person like me if you're planning on watching so many. For example, I might not want to watch two movies from the same era simultaneously, or from the same genre, or with the same actor(s), or by the same director, etc. and frankly, it's exhausting me much more than the actually watching and blogging. So I decided to not worry nearly as much about it; whatever sounds good (or maybe not even "good" in all cases) at the time is going to be good enough for me, and it's going to have to be good enough for all of you.
Way to go Phil, way to alienate your readers. I fully expect the number of "followers" to decrease by 5. Or 12.
And as such, I make zero apologies for the fact that my new pick also has a common actress with pick #5 in Amy Adams.
Sunshine Cleaning came with only a 3.7/5 rating (based on my own preferences) from Netflix, which I felt was awfully darn low. I mean, I like quirky, offbeat, dark-ish comedies. I live for "out of the mainstream". I love Amy Adams and Emily Blunt. Basically, they got their formula wrong. Maybe they knew that my generally picky-ness and critical outlook (especially about movies) would pit my overall enjoyment of the movie against its flaws.
Ding!
First off, I do want to say that I really enjoyed the movie. The basic premise is that Adams and Blunt begin a business (the title cleaning business) that specializes in decontaminating and cleaning up crime scenes.
I thought Amy Adams was really terrific, and her oftentimes slightly-wounded affectation that she's perfected was able to really show through. Of all the characters, she's the one I responded to the most. Emily Blunt was fine as her sister, somewhat of a ne'er-do-well whose otherplot involved tracking down the daughter of a woman whose house the girls were cleaning up. Adams certainly has the bigger part in the movie, and as such, she is able to do more with it.
The supporting cast has some hits and misses:
Clifton Collins Jr. (I know him only as the "In Cold Blood" killer from Capote) was exceptional in the few minutes of screen time he was given, as the proprietor of the cleaning supply store Adams frequents. I was mesmerized by his character, each word delivered with the exact right and appropriate tone. He never missed. The biggest fault with this all is that he was in the movie for about four scenes.
Mary Lynn Rajskub, a longtime favorite of mine from when my friend Dan introduced me to Mr. Show, was also pretty great in her role as the aforementioned daughter Blunt seeks and befriends. My gripe about her is not in her acting, but in the character and situation itself. At no point did I find this subplot at all believable, beyond Blunt's initial reactions about the artifacts. There's no authenticity about the situation; it's so contrived that it didn't matter how well Rajskub performed, especially during the scene where they go to a party together. Mary Lynn, for you, and only for you, am I glad that your character in this movie existed at all.
Alan Arkin, Oscar winner for his role as Little Miss Sunshine's vulgar grandpa, is just weird. At the age of (I don't know, 65?), he's trying several different ways to make money, including making his own flavored popcorn and... a failed shrimp-selling-to-restaurants venture? I still have no idea what on Earth that was doing in the movie. None at all. I think it's supposed to be woven in with the fact that his wife, the girls' mother, isn't around anymore, but I can't even really be sure with that. I refuse to just "accept" that he's "eccentric-ish".
And finally, Adams's son is played by a young boy named Jason Spevack (yes, I had to look this up) who does really quite a nice job. Him I believe from beginning to end. He's really a great character. His interactions with Adams, Blunt, Collins, and Arkin really make me like each of these characters more than I would have without these moments.
I hit upon the movie's biggest plot weaknesses in the summations of the actors and their roles, so I do feel it needs to be said that much of the writing of the movie was quite clever and believable, and the idea itself was pretty neat. I liked the idea that they become the kind of people who take up this kind of venture, and I especially like Adams's characters idea that the cleaning company comes in when people are at their lowest and they offer just a little something that may offer some comfort to those who remain. They are help, and they can proffer more than just the ability to clean up decomposition; they can take care of one thing that the family won't have to.
This all brings me back to the 3.7 rating Netflix
Score: 7.5/10
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