Characters throughout The Great New Wonderful feel stifled and jilted, unable to emote or react as they slog through their mostly ordinary, mundane lives. They jockey for position in the business world, try to manage unmanageable kids, meet with therapists and flirt with romance in their later years… all really to little effect. It’s a film entirely dedicated to life in a post-9/11 world, though it never actually refers to the terrorist attacks by name or even directly discusses the incident. Instead, it suffices to have slow motion shots of the New York skyline, characters staring out of windows at nothing in particular and title cards referencing “September 2002” just so you know what you should be thinking about. It does manage to create a sense of interweaving storylines in spite of the fact that these characters rarely, if ever, cross paths, and has some competent acting (with a nice Stephen Colbert cameo), but it isn’t enough. There’s nothing memorable about The Great New Wonderful. It has nothing to offer and nothing to say... except that if you send your troubled kid away, your sex life will improve dramatically! That's enough to make anyone want to pick up a chair and hit someone.
4 comments:
Nobody could have have summarized this film better hun. Stephen Colbert was by far the best part, and of course being an educator myself, I found him to be hilarious. Every teacher secretly wishes he or she could say what he said to those parents about their kid. hahaha. Love it!
As for the rest of the movie, very forgetable. Not sure why Gyllehaal chose this to be a part of it. Random cast. Wasn't it this film you said the casting director should be fired? haha.
Nah, that was the film Awake... with the unholy tag team of Jessica Alba and Hayden Christensen.
If ever someone deserved to be fired for their casting choices it's that guy.
This one isn't so much the casting as the writing. These characters aren't given much to work with so I can't necessarily blame the actors. Still, there was a lot that needed improving.
I haven't seen this film, but I remember being curious about it becuase it is directed Danny Leiner, he of "Harold and Kumar" and the acclaimed "Dude Where's My Car." I love Harold and Kumar, but Dude sucks. Still seeing that guy go on to do a 9/11 drama sounded really interesting.
The guy has done a lot of directing in TV though including Arrested, the Tick, Strangers with Candy, Sports Night, and Freaks and Geeks. That is like a list of some of the best shows of the last ten years right there.
Also you can't fire the casting director for Awake because they casted Fisher Stevens. Fisher Stevens is always a good choice. I totally forgot his over the top performance as the bag guy in Hackers. That was a great movie right there.
Also Terrence Howard was in that film too. But I imagine he just needed a paycheck to start up his rapping career he plans on undertaking.
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