Review of "Cop Out"

'Cop Out" is foul-mouthed, puerile, crude, haphazard, superficial, silly and funny a lot of the time.

Of course it is. It's supposed to be that way.

That's why the producers hired indie wisenheimer, director Kevin Smith ("Clerks," "Chasing Amy," "Zack and Miri Make a Porno") to helm what would otherwise be a standard black-and-white, buddy-cop flick.

Smith certainly does his thing here, delivering a film that's part celebration and part parody of the well-worn genre.

When our heroes go to bust a major car thief, they end up with an expletive-spitting 11-year-old. When they catch a thief, they're aided by a wild-eyed housewife brandishing a gun. Whenever the duo goes to question a suspect, they break into a litany of film references. And when they rescue a hostage, it turns out she only speaks Spanish and the two never do understand a word she's saying.

The heroes in question are Bruce Willis, playing Jimmy Monroe, and Tracy Morgan ("30 Rock") as his partner Paul Hodges. Hodges is a complete buffoon -- at one point he's dressed in a cell phone costume and stealing a bike from a kid -- while Monroe is the cooler veteran who seems to enjoy his longtime partner's erratic behavior.

As the film begins, Monroe is faced with the impending cost of his daughter's (Michele Trachtenberg) wedding, while Hodges is worried his wife (Rashida Jones) might be having an affair. Hodges decides to spy on his wife; Monroe decides to sell a baseball card worth $80,000 to pay for the wedding.

Neither plan works out too well.

Soon enough our boys are mixed up with a bunch of Mexican drug dealers, rescuing the aforementioned hostage, screaming along the streets of New York in an obligatory car chase and shooting people left and right. Good times.

Actually, they are good-enough times. The basic script by Robb and Mark Cullen may or may not have had a whole lot of Kevin Smith attitude, but the end product certainly does, and it makes the experience better than it should be.

Ultimately, though, "Cop Out" works as a lot of funny bits with funny characters played by good actors, not as a movie per se.

Seann William Scott pretty much steals the film as a motor-mouthed, irritating thief, but it's not like he's integral to anything. Same goes with the delinquent car thief, the hilarious hostage and Kevin Pollak and Adam Brody, as a pair of cowboy-boot comparing detectives.

They're all funny. You don't believe any of them for a second. And the story could go right on without any of them. But given how trite the story is, you're glad it doesn't.

The designated funny man here is Morgan, but in truth the bigger laughs come from Willis as he reacts to his partner. Willis never strains for a laugh; he just swoops in and grabs them.

Morgan, on the other hand, is about the broadest comic around, and he attacks scenes like they're his wife's new boyfriend. A bit of Morgan can go a long way -- there are those who find his moronic persona offensive -- and there's quite a bit of Morgan in "Cop Out," although Smith does manage to capture his best notes.

"Cop Out" is nothing special, and it runs about 15 minutes too long; but it's funny enough if you're up for mounds of swear words, some dumb bathroom humor, standard action stuff and a series of affectionately absurd characters.

Smith goads the cop-buddy genre while embracing it, offering up some harmless fun sprinkled with satire. It ain't great, but it ain't bad.

Review of "Strongman"

Stanless Steel can bend pennies with his fingers. He can lift a 9,000-pound truck with his legs. He can twist a rod of steel into an S.

But he can't get his girlfriend Barbara's sister to move out of their apartment. And he can't figure out how to make it in show biz.

Stan's quest for glory and self-realization and Barbara's patience are the subjects of "Strongman," a warts-and-all documentary from first-time director Zachary Levy that moves in close and stays there.

The film isn't that far from last year's "Anvil! The Story of Anvil," which tracked the thin line between dream and delusion as a Canadian rock band tried (and tried and tried) to come back to its '80s glory.

The difference here is that Stan has yet to come forward in the first place. He picks up an occasional TV gig (he lifts three people at once with one finger), he does stunts at local shopping malls, he even plays a birthday party.

But basically he's a burly, aging scrap-metal collector who uses his white-haired girlfriend as an emcee (and she's pretty bad, although she tries).

He works out regularly -- lifting sledgehammers with one hand, toting cement across the yard of his parents' run-down cabin, crimping assorted pieces of metal. And he espouses a pure life of positive thoughts and healthy food.

But then again, he also seems to get wasted pretty regularly, smokes the occasional cigarette or whatever and possesses your basic New Jersey gut.

"Strongman" isn't just about Stan's physical power, though; it's also about his waning strength both in the marketplace and in his relationship with Barbara.

Progress in both areas seems to have stalled, and why doesn't her sister just move out?

That and many other questions are never answered. Levy offers no background on Stan -- although he hangs out a lot with Stan's family and that explains a lot -- and he doesn't press any one point of view or judge.

Ultimately, Levy isn't making a movie about muscle; he's making a movie about flesh, blood, frailty and the sad-sweet illusion of hope.

Review of "White Lightnin'

There's a crazy-dirty energy to "White Lightnin'" that's rarely seen in films, a raw beauty and awfulness that's both scary and exciting.

It's B-movie homage, art-house bloodletting, cultural expose and psycho salvation psalm all in one. You watch the movie and immediately start to wonder -- who are these guys?

They are a bunch of unknowns, except for the clever casting of Carrie Fisher in her best role in decades. But these unknowns -- chiefly director Dominic Murphy and actor Edward Hogg -- are on fire.

"White Lightnin' " is a faux biopic that follows the life of one Jescoe White, a bad boy born in rural Appalachia who finds brief salvation as a mountain-dancing fool. But the devil inside him never lets go.

That devil is evident from the beginning as the young Jescoe (played with surly wisdom by Owen Campbell) inhales any deadly substance -- gasoline, lighter fluid, paint thinner -- he can get access to.

This sets him off on a continual loop of juvenile prison and insane asylum visits where what's left of his mind and soul get pummeled regularly. Young Jescoe is always either getting high, getting in trouble or in some wretched institution.

All of which mightily disappoints Jescoe's father, D. Ray (Muse Watson), a man famous for his mountain dancing ability, a skill he's able to pass to his son during a brief period when the boy's brain isn't completely fried.

The years pass, D. Ray is murdered, Jescoe sets about dancing professionally, eventually hooking up with an older woman (Fisher) who abandons her family and moves into a trashy trailer with him.

Life is good. Except the devil can't leave Jescoe alone.

Playing the grown Jescoe, British actor Hogg manifests both the charisma of a backwoods Elvis and the jitters of a hillbilly Charles Manson. This is the kind of role that makes Hollywood notice an actor.

But it's director Murphy, working from a script by Eddy Moretti and Shane Smith, who makes "White Lightnin'" crackle. From the drawling narration to the near black-and-white tone to the fades that end every scene, Murphy manages to meld biker movie grease, dirty "Deliverance" clichés and the quasi-documentary feel of a British ghetto film into a beast that bites.

"White Lightnin'" plays the Burton Theatre in Detroit this weekend, another example of the fascinating, off-the-beaten-path programming going on there. True movie lovers take note.

Review of The Last Station

History, expectation, age and idealism collide to good effect in "The Last Station," which follows the final months of Leo Tolstoy.

Tolstoy (Christopher Plummer, in a rich performance) is the most famous writer alive in his latter years. Indeed, a social movement of "Tolstoyans," led by Vladimir Chertkov (Paul Giamatti), sprouts up espousing celibacy and love for all things in the writer's name.

As the film begins, a young Tolstoyan named Valentin Bulgakov (James McAvoy) has just been handed the job of the writer's personal secretary. What he finds when he meets the great man is a domestic life filled with fury, most of which is generated by Tolstoy's longtime wife and muse Sofya (Helen Mirren, on all burners).

Sofya is concerned that her husband is about to give away the rights to his books -- thus letting "the people" have free access to them -- a move that may mean financial ruin for the family.

"The Last Station" then becomes a battle between a protective wife and an aggressive adviser as the grand master's age hangs over everything, with young Valentin's idealism taking a series of blows as he's caught in the middle.

Obviously this is a uniformly fine cast; and Kerry Condon adds a bit of spice as a Tolstoyan beauty who steals Valentin's heart.

Director and writer Michael Hoffman, adapting Jay Parini's novel, lets the history play out, and this little-known chapter plays out nicely indeed.

Mirren gives the film a slightly crazed urgency while Plummer offers a powerful portrait of serenity disturbed. They fight, laugh, manipulate and ultimately share as only longtime lovers can.

And in the end, "The Last Station" shows a great man to be human after all.

Review of Valentine's Day

Just the sort of scattered collection of sitcom confections one might expect, "Valentine's Day" is a star-sprinkled movie filled with "aww" moments and occasionally funny bits.

It's a date movie that asks you to check your brain at the door and adjust your cliché tolerance meter to high. Then again, most date movies do that.

But most date movies do not have this cast (take a breath) -- Jennifer Garner, Julia Roberts, Emma Roberts, Ashton Kutcher, Taylor Swift, Taylor Lautner, Jessica Alba, Jamie Foxx, Kathy Bates, Shirley Maclaine, Patrick Dempsey, Bradley Cooper, Topher Grace, Anne Hathaway, George Lopez, Queen Latifah, Jessica Biel and Brad Pitt.

OK, Brad Pitt's not in it, but you get the idea. Just about everybody else with an agent is.

Directed by 75-year-old Garry Marshall, the on-off creator of everything from "Happy Days" and "Mork and Mindy" to "Pretty Woman" and "The Princess Diaries" (thus the appearances by Ms. Roberts and Ms. Hathaway), "Valentine's Day" is one of those films that follows the romantic ups and downs of a wide variety of people over the course of one Valentine's Day in Los Angeles (where else?).

If there's a center here it's Kutcher, playing a successful florist who starts the film out by proposing to Alba's character. From there on, most of the storylines involve flowers either coming or going.

There's the little kid (Bryce Robinson) who wants roses delivered to someone during recess. The two-timing doctor (Dempsey) buying roses for both his wife and mistress. The teen girl (Roberts the younger) planning to lose her virginity with roses scattered about the floor.

This being both Los Angeles and a Garry Marshall film, eccentric characters abound: The nice girl (Hathaway) who earns extra money by talking dirty on the phone, the hunky football quarterback (Eric Dane) with a shocking announcement, and the absurdly beautiful, candy-addicted publicist (Biel) who throws an annual I Hate Valentine's Day party.

Marshall, working from a script by Katherine Fugate, lightly tosses all these ingredients together, spices things up with a bit of heartbreak and betrayal balanced by newfound love and long-lasting affection, and arrives at the general conclusion that love is a good thing.

True, not exactly earth-shattering news. But again, who wants earth-shattering news in a date movie?

"Valentine's Day" is sappy and somewhat predictable, and watching it can feel a lot like watching two hours of "Happy Days" reruns minus The Fonz.

But just as in "Happy Days," the players here are all pros -- well, except for Swift, but she's just goony enough to come across as sweet -- the writing and direction are in rhythm and the whole thing is kind of weightless fun.

"Valentine's Day" is a passing nod to love, like a box of chocolates or flowers that soon wilt. It's star-studded amiable fluff with no real value, but it's kind of a tickle if you're in the mood.

And if you're going on a date, you're probably in the mood.