Robert Luketic
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Connections, in both directions
The film’s title may be a nod to Leo McCarey’s The Awful Truth, and while Robert Luketic’s synthetic rom-com is, of course, worlds away from McCarey’s comedy-of-remarriage masterpiece, the charmingly brittle chemistry between leads Katherine Heigl and Gerard Butler keeps things moving pleasurably enough along.
The title of The Ugly Truth echoes that of The Awful Truth, the 1937 Cary Grant-Irene Dunne battle-of-the-sexes film that essentially invented the comic-romantic persona that Grant would wear with such panache for the duration of his career.
A studious loner, Elphaba couldn’t be less like her popular classmate Galinda, whose cheery exterior and princessy pink outfits can’t help but recall another blonde, Elle Woods, as portrayed by Reese Witherspoon in Legally Blonde.
Meanwhile, it's Grande who steals the show with a sparkling performance that seems modeled on two great Reese Witherspoon roles: the despicable Tracy Flick from "Election" and the endearing Elle Woods from "Legally Blonde."
It’s a movie about bucking traditions and shaking up the old boys’ network and a woman finding a place at the table — and yet for all its modern sensibilities and up-to-the-minute social commentary, the style and tone are reminiscent of light, last-decade fare such as “Legally Blonde” (2000) and “The Devil Wears Prada” (2006).
More Legally Blonde than Support the Girls , Late Night is content to be a fluffy, formulaic crowdpleaser with a sweet and uplifting message, and only has so much interest in reckoning with the depressing, nigh-Sisyphean trials of being a woman, and especially a woman of color, in a white-male-dominated workplace.
So you see, 21 really is a composite of three separate films: Spider-Man, Rain Man and Steven Soderbergh's Ocean's Eleven.
Just compare the almost transcendent beauty of the penultimate scene from Steven Soderbergh’s Ocean’s Eleven (2001) with the Bellaggio fountains “choreographed” to Debussy’s “Claire de Lune” with a view of those same fountains here.
Spacey and Sturgess are on good form, but 21 doesn't achieve the satisfaction of The Pursuit of Happyness and falls well short of Ocean’s Eleven's cool.
They can't muster the sexy asides or smart-alec banter typical of movies of this genre, the Ocean's Eleven franchise being the prime example.
From "Swimming with Sharks" to "L.A. Confidential," "The Usual Suspects" to "Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil," Spacey was as deadly and dazzling as a cobra.
It's a cool concept, with equally cool Kevin Spacey ("The Usual Suspects," "Superman Returns") cast as the professor-turned-blackjack coach, who hatches the plan to use his job at MIT to recruit the most promising minds on campus for his underground team of brainy hipsters.
So you see, 21 really is a composite of three separate films: Spider-Man, Rain Man and Steven Soderbergh's Ocean's Eleven.
Moviegoers might remember it from "Rain Man."
While Ben's raking in the bucks and crushing on his teammate (Kate Bosworth), a Vegas casino consultant (Laurence Fishburne) starts to wonder if some "Rain Man"-style cheating is going on.
One can easily understand why one would need an analytical brain to be successful, and Ben is more "Beautiful Mind" John Nash than Dustin Hoffman's "Rain Man" though his story arc follows the same "rags to riches" formula as "Boiler Room" and "Wall Street" where Ben's success has to lead to an inevitable fall as lets it go to his head.
But unlike similar movies like "True Lies" or "Mr.
Variations on this story are the foundations of such films as True Lies and the 2005 Mr. & Mrs. Smith and even the Tom Cruise/Cameron Diaz feature Knight and Day, which is scheduled for release later this month.
In a plot reminiscent of True Lies and Mr. and Mrs. Smith, the audience is left to wonder if this is just an uninspired and lame take on an already used concept, or does Killers offer a unique and refreshing experience?
Confessions of a Shopaholic (2009)
Directed by P.J. Hogan
influenced by Legally Blonde (2001)
Plot Characters Themes
Based on the novel by Sophie Kinsella but seemingly more inspired by " Legally Blonde " and " The Devil Wears Prada ," the movie strains to follow the tried-and-true formula of a perky fish out of water who is in over her head but with the determination and intelligence to prevail.
If you gave Bernie Madoff custody of your life savings mere days before the FBI knocked on his door last December, your timing still wouldn’t be as wretched as that of Confessions of a Shopaholic, a bright, cheery hybrid of Legally Blonde and Sex and the City that seeks to offer escapism from our current economic crisis via the story of a precious young Manhattanite who just can’t stop being fiscally irresponsible.
Despite a plot filled with contrived and cheesy moments and virtually no palpable romance between Rebecca and Brandon, what makes the film mildly engaging is its lively, energetic cast, especially Isla Fisher who radiates plenty of offbeat charisma much like Reece Witherspoon did in Legally Blonde.
A gloss of “The Devil Wears Prada,” “Legally Blonde” and “Bridget Jones’s Diary,” “Confessions” was directed by Brit P.J. Hogan (“My Best Friend’s Wedding”), adapted by Tracey Jackson, Tim Firth (“Kinky Boots’) and Kayla Alpert (“Ally McBeal”) and is at times wildly uneven.
On a high level, Confessions of a Shopaholic is trying to fuse The Devil Wears Prada with Legally Blonde , but it lacks the darkly satirical edge of the former and the frothy innocence of the latter.
Birds of Prey (and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn) (2020)
Directed by Cathy Yan
influenced by Legally Blonde (2001)
Themes
Think John Wick with a Legally Blonde vibe.
The whole thing is a breakup movie, like a rebellious riff on Legally Blonde .
No matter, these are minor nits to pick compared to the brilliant character work by Williams and co-writer Nell Benjamin, who joined her husband Laurence O’Keefe to adapt “Legally Blonde” for Broadway in 2011, then adapted “Mean Girls” for the stage in 2018.
Partially that’s because it’s so reminiscent of the Jim Sturgess-Kevin Spacey casino-based thriller “21.”
2008's cool, chic, informative card-counting drama " 21 ," this is not, and the further "Runner Runner" bumbles along, the more synthetic it appears.
The script seems modeled on too many luridly escapist books like Ben Mezrich’s Bringing Down the House and The Accidental Billionaires, and the film resembles 21 and The Social Network, beautiful sagas of smart guys getting into trouble—and increasingly wide and mobile frames—once they leave the dorm room.
From the writers of Rounders, but closer in quality to 21 , Brad ( The Lincoln Lawyer ) Furman’s online gaming thriller is a strange beast.
It won’t satisfy anyone looking for action or thrills or, you know, actual card playing, nor will it sate viewers hoping for the substance of “The Social Network” or the flashy fun of “21.”
Every time the film threatens to rise to the greatness of another gambling film like Rounders (one of the previous credits for the screenwriters, Brian Koppelman and David Levien), stilted voiceover, predictable plot twists and style over substance bring it crashing back into the company of something more like 21.
In fact, the formula employed here follows that of Spider-Man, right up to the point when Peter Parker is bitten by the radioactive spider and actually becomes the wallcrawler.
Vanity Fair (2004)
Directed by Mira Nair
influenced by Legally Blonde (2001)
Characters Themes Visuals
Like a slightly more educated Legally Blonde, Witherspoon plays these scenes well.
There’s a fair bit of Legally Blonde here after all.
After Election and even Legally Blonde, Witherspoon seemed like ideal casting: that big, sharp—Becky Sharp!—jaw line; that crack comic timing; that laserlike stare.
But since then, the young actress has become America's new box office sweetheart, starring in her own "Legally Blonde" franchise, followed by the insipidly saccharine romantic comedy "Sweet Home Alabama."
In fact, the prevailing tone is pink -- the kind of pink that Reese Witherspoon, who plays Rebecca Sharp, made her trademark color as Elle Woods in ''Legally Blonde.''
It makes for an odd coupling: Instead of the coldly calculating heroine of the novel and her requisite downfall, Nair's Becky Sharp (Witherspoon) seems more like a sharp cookie who's able to roll with the punches, more Elle Woods (of Legally Blonde fame) than epic heroine.
That plot is kind of like Elle Woods heading to Harvard Law in “Legally Blonde,” but absent the basic feminism of that iconic 19-year-old comedy.
The Taming of the Shrew (1967)
Directed by Franco Zeffirelli
influenced The Ugly Truth (2009)
Themes
Astute film goers will note similarities to previous tales of love and woe, including, in no particular order, He's Just Not That Into You, Cyrano de Bergerac, When Harry Met Sally and The Taming of the Shrew.
The supporting characterizations are thin and nondescript, almost as if McCarthy and Falcone watched films like Neighbors , The House Bunny , Legally Blonde and the aforementioned Back to School and decided to see if they could create situations and characters that would purposefully blur the line between homage and plagiarism.
As much as "Stop-Loss" deals with weightier issues, the film is as polarizing as the war in Iraq itself, handling the subject of shell-shocked veterans in a similar way as "Coming Home" and "The Deer Hunter."
Director Robert Luketic ("Legally Blonde," "Monster-in-Law") has aimed for a "Casino" 90210 style that works until its third act revenge story takes it beyond the realms of belief.
The story can be conveniently summarized by the title of the Ben Mezrich bestseller the film's based on (Bringing Down the House: The Inside Story Of Six MIT Students Who Took Vegas For Millions), so let's just skip over to the carping: Luketic's direction is both lethargic and over-edited, the cast of rejects from The Hills (Jim Sturgess, Kate Bosworth, etc.) couldn't show emotion if Joe Pesci went at them with a hammer a la Casino, Kevin Spacey, Laurence Fishburne, and even Las Vegas phone in their performances.
The movie is also the inferior also-ran to Canadian-made The Last Casino, a well-played 2004 TV film based on the same book that screens regularly on The Movie Network.
Samantha (Duff ) has fallen victim to her evil stepmother (Jennifer Coolidge from the "Legally Blonde" movies), who makes her do all the dirty work in the family diner while her two airhead stepsisters chase boys.
In the supporting bits, veteran comic actress Coolidge , best known for her hilarious turns in Best in Show and Legally Blonde , is adequate doing the evil stepmother thing but is much better as the neurotic, liposuction-lovin', botox-injectin' freak.
But the least inspired character is the stepmother, played by gifted comic actress Coolidge, from "Legally Blonde'' and "A Mighty Wind.''