Mother's Day

First Hit:  Schmaltzy in so many ways, and yet I was touched by the four major mother’s day stories.

The stories are:  A divorced mother Jennifer Aniston (as Sandy) dealing with her husband’s new young wife Tina (Shay Mitchell) and he children’s interaction with the new step-mom.

Britt Robertson and Julia Roberts (as Kristin and Miranda respectively) who represent an adoptive child finding and reconciling with her mother.

Jason Sudeikis (as Bradley), whose wife was killed while serving her country, raising two girls alone and how will he treat this emotive day.

Lastly Kate Hudson and Sarah Clarke (as Jesse and Gabi respectively) as sisters who have marriages (one sister marries a foreigner and the other is in a gay marriage) that their parents reject.

As with most Garry Marshall films, the film has multiple interrelated stories and they are not hard hitting. Even though they aren't amazingly dynamic or intellectually challenging, the stories touch on themes the general population knows about and has experienced in some way.

Marshall makes it easy for the audience to laugh about these situations, which really have much deeper roots and societal impact.

Aniston is really good. I loved when she was sitting in her car while in the grocery store parking yelling to herself about her situation. As the mother who is now dealing with a rival, she’s tells this story well. Mitchell is good as the new step-mom. Robertson is very good as the young mother being hesitant to marry her child’s father because of the uncertainty she has from not ever meeting her biological mom. Roberts’ smile makes her role as TV sales spokeswoman work well. When she meets her grandchild for the first time, the emotion welling up in her is perfect. Sudeikis is strong and funny as the dad learning how to be the sole support for his two smart wonderful daughters. Hudson and Clarke are great as sisters hiding their lives from their parents. The screenplay, although its grit level is softball in nature, was written by Tom Hines, Anya Kochoff Romano, and Matt Walker. Garry Marshall directed this with his usual easy listening manner, which was entertaining, included funny bits, and there were a couple of tears due to my own life experiences.

Overall:  Although it’s a light softball type film, there are deeper roots Marshall is letting the audience ponder.

Tomorrowland

First Hit:  Interesting scope, parts that excelled, but overall this movie fails to deliver an engaging film from beginning to end.

The film’s early opening scenes included Casey, a truly curious smart girl (Britt Robertson), trying to hamper a rocket’s launch thereby keeping her engineer father employed. It also included Frank Walker (Young Frank played by Thomas Robinson and older Frank played by George Clooney) telling the story through two sets of eyes, the young curious smart boy and the wise old man who’s given up hope.

These three characters are pulled together by Athena (Raffey Cassidy); a robot created from the future whose mission is to find hope in the human race and give them the clue to the possibilities by giving out Tomorrowland pins.

The point of the film finally comes towards the end, when Nix (Hugh Laurie) gives a speech about how humans don’t care enough to fix the problems they are facing. The lavish way this film is presented is wonderful and engaging. The movie felt long which isn’t good and at 130 minutes, it was long.

Robertson was good and I felt that she did a great job of embodying her role. Robinson was cute and his early scenes were wonderful to watch. Clooney was good but there was something missing that kept me thinking “Clooney” and not about the role he was playing, Frank Walker. Cassidy was fantastic. I was fully engaged when she was on the screen, her way of being this robot was amazing. Laurie was a wonderful antagonist and his colloquy on the future was on target. Damon Lindelof and Brad Bird wrote a lengthy screenplay which is a commentary on how we are mortgaging our future and not paying attention to our self-created predicament. Bird did a great job of creating wonderful pictures of the now and the future, but it dragged on and could have used some snipping to tighten it up.

Overall:  A bit overblown, visually nice, but in the end not a very good film.