A young politician’s life changes forever when he is confronted with a new reality in the drama “The Adjustment Bureau.” Matt Damon stars as a Congressman who discovers that his life is being manipulated by a group of “adjusters” who are trying to keep the Congressman’s life on a certain track. The story’s concept is strong and could have been used to make an intriguing and thoughtful film about a man fighting for freedom from outside forces. Unfortunately, “The Adjustment Bureau” is not that film.

Damon plays David Norris, a “bad-boy Congressman” who is running for the United States Senate. He’s an up-and-coming political rock star who spends time with real-life political figures like Terry McAuliffe, Wesley Clark, and Madeleine Albright, who all have brief cameos in the film alongside commentators like Jon Stewart, Mary Matalin, and James Carville.

Norris’ campaign eventually derails when a secret from his past is revealed and he ends up losing the Senate race. However, on the night of his concession speech, he meets a young woman named Elise Sellas (Emily Blunt) hiding out in the men’s bathroom.  Although the politician and the young woman have little in common, they are soon making out with each other like overeager teenagers on a Friday night. Afterward, Norris uses his concession speech to talk about how fake and poll-driven his campaign was. (more…)

As a Christian, I’ve grown up with the debate between free will and predestination. Is my faith in Christ my choice, or did God choose me so that I had no choice in the matter? The Adjustment Bureau, a new film from established writer and first-time director George Nolfi explores the balance between fate and free will in a story that spans the genres. 

“The Adjustment Bureau” is all things to all people. For sci-fi fans it’s based on (though largely changed from) a short story by Philip K. Dick,who wrote “Blade Runner.” For thriller fans, it’s written and directed by one of the writers of “Ocean’s 12” and “The Bourne Ultimatum.” For comedy fans, the dialogue is witty and fresh, and for romantics, it’s a love story. 

The Adjustment Bureau is the story of David Norris (Matt Damon), a young politician on the verge of becoming one of New York’s senators. A chance meeting with a ballerina named Elise (Emily Blunt) threatens to ruin his dreams however, when the agents of Fate itself step in and try to steer him back onto the political course outlined for him, and away from the woman he loves. Ultimately, they give him a choice: a chance to change the world, or the freedom to be with the woman he loves. 

I’m typically not a fan of films that are written and directed by the same person. Having a director who can reign in a writer, or who knows how to edit out needless dialogue or scenes is essential. Unless you’ve got the talent of George Nolfi, who has kept the dialogue real throughout the film. 

The acting is solid. Damon and Blunt play off each other expertly, and the agents of fate are neither friendly or villainous. They are doing their job. 

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You might think that there’s no way young kids would be interested in Shakespeare plays, but Elton John has found a way to get their attention. By taking out all the sex and suicide, putting in a mix of two catchy new songs amid an array of his all-time greatest hits, and updating the story to focus on star-crossed lovers from warring teams of garden gnomes in modern-day Stratford-upon-Avon, he (as executive producer) has led a team of cutting-edge animators to create the 3D  film “Gnomeo and Juliet” – a fun-filled romp that should entertain adults just as much as their children.

The story focuses on the garden gnomes found in two neighboring yards, who are distinguished respectively by their red and blue outfits. Each side has been at war with the other for as long as they remember, largely due to the fact that their human owners hate each other.

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Amid the intricate worlds of each garden – which are laid out in snappy musical montages – are the two title characters, who each wonder why their side has to hate the other. They meet in cute fashion and start a secret romance, and just like in the original “Romeo & Juliet” things go awry when they are caught together, leading to a series of seemingly tragic events.

The key word here, in this G-rated rendition of the tale, is “seemingly.” For in keeping with the need to protect young minds while ultimately using the storyline to teach a message of tolerance in an entertaining rather than heavy-handed fashion, Elton John and his talented team reinvent the play’s third act to create a much happier outcome than the original. While this might upset particularly uptight purists, for most this will mean that the storyline has not only been rendered with more innocence, but with a sense of the unexpected as well.

The film is packed with amusing references to John’s musical career, including a hilarious moment in which a gnome named Benny dances on a computer keyboard while it inadvertently blasts out the opening keyboard riff from “Bennie and the Jets” and another gnome’s twisted take on “Your Song” to describe his nasty cold.  Director Kelly Asbury  (“Shrek 2”) also handles the frequent action scenes with just the right blend of mischief and danger, while also subtly wringing tears with a sad montage that details the way a lawn flamingo lost his greatest love in a gripping new John ballad called “Love Builds a Garden“ that ranks with his finest tunes. (more…)

[Editor's Note: Script reviews of upcoming projects have been around for as long as there's been an Internet. Therefore it's no secret that a film can evolve into something quite different from its screenplay. Please keep in mind that this article represents a look at a particular script and not the final product.]

They say exposing Hollywood’s liberal sucker punches is like a drug, and Big Hollywood’s secret script source had just handed one over that was practically ticking:  The Adjustment Bureau, coming out in March.  John Nolte ran down the situation for me:  Zinn-loving Hollywood half-wit Matt Damon is the star.  He plays a liberal politician.  And since it’s a fantasy, the liberal politician is the hero.

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This could have been the H-Bomb of sucker punch movies.  I knew that if I didn’t handle it just right it could detonate and splatter me with razor sharp shards of progressive clichés and jagged fragments of left-wing memes.  “Suit me up,” I said, “I’m going in.”

Sweat collected on my furrowed brow.  I cut the red wire.  Nothing.  I cut the blue wire.  Nothing.   I had defused a sucker punch dud.   

I was actually let down.  Where was the thrill?  I felt like trotting over to Safeway and acting bewildered by all the choices in the cereal aisle.

Sure, I’m disappointed – you don’t need me if a movie doesn’t treat half its audience like borderline morons.  But The Adjustment Bureau still has some important lessons – like how to be a liberal, make movies according to your vision, and still not gratuitously alienate potential moviegoers.

First, a quick look at the plot.  We’re not here to blow the lid off of the script’s surprises, so if you want more detail it’s probably lurking out there on the web.  In short, the story involves the aforementioned Matt Damon as a liberal congressman with a fateful destiny that an unexpected infatuation threatens to derail.  The infatuee is a quirky ballet dancer – she’s wacky in a kind of “Look at me! I’m wearing Doc Martens with this vintage prom dress!” kind of way that is only slightly less tiresome on-screen than it is in real life.  (more…)

In 1941, Universal Studios released the horror film, The Wolf Man, depicting the tragedy that befalls men when the animal inside is unleashed. In 2010, Universal partnered with Relativity Media to recreate the 1941 classic. 

The Wolfman is far darker than the original. Where once random chance turned Larry Talbot (Lon Chaney Jr.) into a werewolf, fate turns his modern remake, Lawrence (Benicio Del Toro), into the stuff nightmares are made of. 

In The Wolf Man, Larry Talbot returns home to visit his father after spending years away from home. While there, he meets a town beauty, Gwen (Evelyn Ankers). When he tries to defend one of Gwen’s friends from a werewolf, he is bitten. In turn he becomes a werewolf himself. Not long after, it becomes apparent that both his human, and animal side, are after Gwen. 

In its 2010 reboot, Lawrence Talbot, a Shakespearian actor and the second son of Sir John Talbot (Anthony Hopkins), is returning from a long absence in America to Talbot Castle in Blackmoor, England. But from the start the film’s focus is much darker. Lawrence is returning because his elder brother’s body was found mutilated by a terrible beast—the third finding of its kind. He returns to a castle laid waste by time, adorned with the heads of African beasts, trophies of Sir John’s. Upon arrival he meets his late brother’s fiancée, Gwen (Emily Blunt), who he slowly falls for. But his investigation into his brother’s death, and a bite he sustains when trying to find the raging creature haunting the forests nearby, reveal a darker side to himself and his past—from which he can’t escape.  (more…)

As the central figure in the new horror film “The Wolfman,” Lawrence Talbot has suffered through what you might call a rough life. He’s stumbled across his parents just after dad brutally killed mom in the middle of the night, was banished to an asylum before getting shipped to America from his posh English countryside home, and now his brother has been eviscerated by a mysterious creature lurking in the woods outside his childhood home.

Determined to find, capture and kill whatever beast offed his brother, Lawrence has not only traveled back to his birthplace and its haunting memories, but now has to confront his father head-on for murdering his mother and ward off area townspeople who fear he’s become a beastly ‘wolf man’ himself after surviving a a vicious bite from the monster. Through it all, his primary battle is to maintain his strong sense of decency and underlying humanity from slipping away forever.

Sounds like a heady mix of action and emotions, doesn’t it? Thankfully, “The Wolfman” largely delivers on its promises – particularly through the moving performance and powerfully expressive eyes of Oscar-winning actor Benicio del Toro (“Traffic”), who rebounds from a mostly hitless past decade to sink his teeth (ok, pun intended) into the role of Lawrence Talbot and add genuine gravitas to a tragic character. It also features a strong, yet slightly oddball, performance from Anthony Hopkins, who has also suffered more than his share of box-office setbacks in the last few years but digs into the role of Lawrence’s father Sir John Talbot with the menacing glee of his famed Dr. Hannibal Lecter enjoying a dinner of Chianti and fava beans. (more…)

It’s hard to argue Newsweek hasn’t fully embraced the ideological left. Just how many times did the magazine put fawning images of Sen. Barack Obama on the cover last year? And its recent unflattering cover photo of Rush Limbaugh, not to mention the accompanying article, spoke volumes of its editorial choices.

Why a news weekly would decide, in a very difficult market, to parrot nearly every other magazine’s liberal bent is a head scratcher. But Newsweek can’t even get its celebrity interviews right.

The latest assault on basic journalism comes courtesy of Ramin Setoodeh who chatted up actress Emily Blunt for the issue on newsstands now. If you’re squeamish, please read no further. Here’s how it starts: (more…)

The Great Buck Howard is a funny, knowing gift for anyone who loves old-fashioned show business: It celebrates the entertainer who is in it for the fun of putting on a good show, and for bringing a little pleasure to anyone who cares enough to come out and watch. 

Buck Howard the man is an old-fashioned show-business type: He is a mentalist—a magician who does mind-reading tricks. But he is preternaturally good at what he does (in contrast to his complete lack of self-awareness), and he was once a pop-culture fixture, a regular on The Tonight Show. (“The real one—with Johnny Carson,” he constantly reminds—this will have its intended melancholy effect only on those over 40 or so.) Now he plays half-empty halls in third-tier markets. Not that this tempers his enthusiasm, or that of his fans. Which is exactly the point. (more…)

Hollywood execs seem to be waking up to the power of women at America’s multiplexes. The success of He’s Just Not That Into You (Warner Bros) and this weekend’s Confessions of a Shopaholic (Disney) can be traced to Meryl Streep’s witty riff on the tyrannical Anna Wintour in The Devil Wears Prada in the summer of 2006. Prada opened to a $27.5M weekend on its way to a $124.75M domestic cume (Streep also earned an Oscar nomination).

Then in July of 2007, New Line grabbed an almost identical $27.47M with the opening weekend of the female-skewing Hairspray, translating to $118.87M domestic. Also Enchanted, starring Amy Adams, was a hit for Disney over the holidays reaching $127.8M domestic.

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