Ingrid Goes West

First Hit:  A wonderful reflection of the impact of social media on people.

This is an interesting story about how getting caught up in social media, like Instagram, can alter one’s perception of what relationships consist of.

The film begins with Ingrid Thorburn (Aubrey Plaza) getting herself in a tizzy over not being invited to a wedding. She perceives that she is a best friend of the bride. Breaking into the wedding, she squirts pepper spray into the eyes of the bride and escapes. We learn that the bride never met Ingrid before – just through Instagram.

Ingrid’s mom has just died and because Ingrid was her caretaker, this probably contributed to her isolation and use of social media to reach out to the world. After the wedding fiasco, she isolates herself and searching social media, discovers Taylor Sloane (Elizabeth Olsen) on social media.

Taylor makes her living by being an “influencer” on Instagram. She photographs herself in locations and with products and because of the size of her audience, companies pay her. Taylor lives in Southern California with her artist husband Ezra (Wyatt Russell). Ingrid, armed with money her mother left her, heads to CA to find Taylor and to find a new life.

She rents a studio from Dan Pinto (O’Shea Jackson Jr.) who ends up becoming her friend. Her first step after “following” Taylor on Instagram, is to track her down by going to the places she posts on Instagram. One day she runs into Taylor and stealthily follows her to her home. Noting that Taylor and Ezra have a dog, named Rothko, she creates a plan to steal the dog and return the dog to get in good, close graces with Taylor.

This plan works and they end up becoming pals hanging out together. What Ingrid doesn’t know is that Taylor has no teal intention of making Ingrid a real friend. As long as Taylor gets something from the relationship, she lets Ingrid hang out with her and Ezra.

The film evolves to where it gets pretty twisted because Ingrid will do anything to be close to and hang out with Taylor. As Taylor’s brother Nicky (Billy Magnussen) comes into the picture, he brings new audiences for Taylor and so Ingrid slips out of favor and importance to Taylor.

As we see how far Ingrid goes to stay in good graces with Taylor, I started to cringe. Nicky adds additional leverage against Ingrid by stealing her phone and threatening Ingrid with exposing her phone’s negative and intimate posts of Taylor to Taylor.

Spiraling into oblivion, Ingrid finds out that there are people who care, even if they were only known to her through social media. She also learns that she has the possibility of creating a real human relationship.

What I liked was how well Ingrid showed what it is like to be obsessive about pings on her phone. She made the feeling that her life depended on the pings, perfectly real.

Plaza is wonderful in this role. Her eyes and behavior really reflected the desperateness of her trying to connect the only way she knew how. This was a strong performance. Olsen was very good as the influencer who really didn’t care about the people who followed her. Russell was OK as Taylor’s husband. His abdicating to his wife’s preferences was well done. Jackson Jr. was strong as the landlord, friend, and lover with a Batman obsession. The story how he came to this obsession was wonderful. David Branson Smith and Matt Spicer wrote a fun script that came alive with the actors and direction by Spicer.

Overall: I liked how the social media obsession was portrayed as I am aware of people who’ve been hooked.

Table 19

First Hit:  Poorly conceived, not funny, and poorly executed.

When a film isn’t clearly defined, and has no real point, the audience will struggle. When a film adds poor execution to a lack of direction it ought to be tabled.

There is so little about this film that works, I cannot imagine the producer seeing it for the first time in the screening room saying, I can’t wait to get this distributed. So why did someone put this in theaters? They may have been hoping that the stars who are in it would fill seats ($).

Briefly, Eloise (Anna Kendrick) has become the ex-maid of honor after being dumped via text from the bride’s brother Teddy (Wyatt Russell). The story tells us she had known the bride her whole life and she was shocked to find out that she was also dumped from the bridal party as maid of honor. I did like the scene where she kept checking both the regrets and acceptance boxes on the wedding invitation. In her own disgust at her behavior, she finally sets it on fire and then puts out the flames and sends the burnt invitation back to the bride Francie Millner (Rya Meyers). Arriving at the wedding, her seating assignment is Table 19 the table furthest from bride a groom. This is the table for outcasts, people who the bride and groom wished had sent their regrets.

When Eloise gets to the table, she finds Nanny Jo (June Squibb), Bina and Jerry Kepp (Lisa Kudrow and Craig Robinson) Renzo Eckberg (Tony Revolori), and Walter Thimple (Stephen Merchant). Eloise explains the entire room table setup because she did the seating chart and why the people she’s sitting with are not important to the wedding party. With this knowledge, the table leaves the wedding party and spends time outside learning more about each other.

There are several scenes when the camera is aimed at the wedding reception and wedding party and it is just wasted film. There is no reason for the camera pan and these scenes add no value to the story. There is a set of scenes when Eloise meets a handsome guy named Huck (Thomas Cocquerel) who dances with her, but the team at Table 19 find out later he’s the groom to a wedding just down the hall. There are several set-up scenes which could have evolved into a funny sub-plot or something interesting but they all failed.

The film tries to be funny and it has some wonderful actors who could have made it funny like Kendrick, Squib, Kudrow, Robinson, and Merchant, but most everything failed to be funny. The other side of the film wanted to be dramatic with the subplot of having Eloise pregnant with Teddy’s baby but it failed to gain traction.

Kendrick was as good as she could be with the material she had. I’d suggest that she do a better job of script selection. Squib was thoroughly underutilized and didn’t have an opportunity to share her comedic chops. Kudrow and Robinson as a couple failed. There was no chemistry and I could buy their story of how they got together. We know they both can be funny given good material but… alas. Merchant had a very odd role which if stretched could have been funny, but again the script and direction failed. Revolori was interesting as I couldn’t figure out why he was in the film. His character didn’t fit and the comedic scenes with him didn’t work. Walking up to a table and telling a young woman about the size of his penis didn’t work. Meyers was gracious in her minimal dramatic role. Russell was mediocre in his role. I know the role has him being a bit slow and not too bright, but it didn’t work. Jay and Mark Duplass wrote this strangely weak and poorly constructed screenplay that really had no real beginning, middle, or end. It just started at one level, ran for a couple hours and fizzled out all-together. Jeffery Blitz had no chance to make this film work because of the script, but it is important to note that his direction didn't help the film either.

Overall:  One of the worst films that will come out in 2017.

Everybody Wants Some!!

First Hit:  The music was to die for and the story grew on me as it evolved.

This film takes place over 3 – 4 days by following Jake (Blake Jenner) arriving on a Friday afternoon at an unnamed Texas University to take up residency in the baseball team’s campus home provided by a school sponsor and ending on the following Monday.

As with most Richard Linklater films, dialog and time period is clearly identified. When Jake gets in his car and drives off to the university he turns up the stereo in the vintage Oldsmobile 442 to blast out The Knack’s “My Sharona”. This perfectly sets the tone for the film.

Other music includes Blondie, Van Halen, The Cars, and Cheap Trick. As a jock hanging out with other jocks there is a perception about his intellectual capabilities. However, as the film points out a couple of times, each sub-group of people have their own ranges of intelligence and abilities. It reflects what is true in society. In other words, jocks are not all stupid.

That said, without any structure to their lives over the weekend they attend multiple parties, go to multiple nightclubs, and because they’re in college multiple types of pranks are pulled on each other. But in the end, you see these disparate personalities coming together in cohesive groups on their way to learning more about who they are.

Jenner was well cast as the young freshman baseball jock who is thoughtful. His quiet and inclusive ways made him very likeable. Justin Street (as Jay), Ryan Guzman (as Roper), Tyler Hoechlin (as McReynolds), Wyatt Russell (as Willoughby), Glen Powell (as Finnegan), Temple Baker (as Plummer), J. Quinton Johnson (as Dale), and Will Brittain (as Beuter) we’re all wonderful as the primary members of the baseball team. Each brought a strong and unique personality. Zoey Deutch as Beverly, Jay’s love interest, was very strong and an interesting character. Linklater wrote a very strong script with dialogue that really worked and his direction was spot on, especially the detail of in the scenes.

Overall:  This was a wonderful slice of life film that has deeper meaning.