Hey, we’re back with this week’s Weekend Movie Alert, which points out movies opening over the weekend you might want to know about. Back to back this time around are two movies with completely different feels. If you wanted either one of these, you would be completely horrified to find yourself in the theater of the other movie. That sentence might not make sense outside of my head, but if you read on, I’m sure you’ll understand.
First, the Zac Efron vehicle “17 Again”. This is a genre of film that gets the generational treatment — every 10 years or so Hollywood reiterates on this theme. It’s got an element of comedic body switching like “Freaky Friday”, but it’s more like “Big” with Tom Hanks. A 37 year-old Matthew Perry finds himself aged back to being 17 … again. This is his chance to guide his teenaged children and learn to appreciate the true joys of his older life. Or so I imagine; these things kind of play within narrow boundaries, story-wise.
I’ve not seen anything Zac Efron has done, but the trailer makes it look kinda fun, and Efron might be trying on a little Perry-ish comedic timing and intonation, it’s hard to tell. If so, good for him. Matthew Perry, when he’s on, is untouchable in that kind of I’m-super-aware-of-my-own-life style of acting. So, for a mild, amusing, first-date kind of flick, go give it a shot. You might just learn something about yourself. And if you do: I’m sorry.
Next up: “Crank 2: High Voltage”, starring Jason Statham.
That’s it. That’s all you need to know.
But I guess I have more space here to use, so I’ll go on. Statham reprises his role as Chev Chelios, the man with the worst life ever. Apparently this follows the events of the first movie directly, but really, all you have to do is watch the trailer. Just watch it.
If watching that doesn’t make you want to see this movie, then there’s nothing more I can tell you. You’re done. Stop reading this and go bowling or something. Because if you didn’t bolt out the door as soon as the last frame finished playing in that trailer, on your way to the theater to see “Crank 2″, then clearly you have decided that your life has no room for incredibly stupid awesome filmmaking.
“Crank 2: High Voltage” is the kind of movie that makes you want to go out and windsurf rush hour traffic while fistfighting a grizzly bear. I’m pretty sure that it was pitched by the filmmaker’s 12 year-old son as a response to the question “If you could make a movie, what would it be like?” Forget reason. Forget physics. Forget rationality. To properly experience this movie, you have to suspend your suspension of disbelief, then drop it over the side of a 50-storey skyscraper. I don’t even know why I’m still writing this article. I got somewhere to be. In fact, boom; I’m gone.
17 again just looks like a ripoff of Big, except he gets younger instead of older.