Guilty Pleasure No. 50: Maid in Manhattan (dir by Wayne Wang)

Posted on December 24, 2020 by Lisa Marie Bowman

Whenever I see that the 2002 film, Maid in Manhattan, is going to be playing on HBO or Cinemax, I always think to myself, “I can’t understand why everyone hates on this film. I mean, it’s not that bad. It may be predictable and silly but it’s kind of sweet and Jennifer Lopez and Matthew McConaughey have a tame but sexy chemistry.”

Of course, then I watch the film and I discover that Maid in Manhattan is not the film where Jennifer Lopez and Matthew McConaughey fall in love. That’s The Wedding Planner. Instead, Maid in Manhattan is the one where Jennifer Lopez is a maid who works in a big fancy hotel and who is a single mother to a precocious child who is obsessed with Richard Nixon. Maid in Manhattan is also the one where Jennifer Lopez falls in love with Ralph Fiennes. Fiennes plays a candidate for the U.S. Senate. Everyone is worried that he’ll never make it to Washington if people discover that his girlfriend is a maid. I think his bigger problem is that he’s a Republican running for the U.S. Senate in New York. (At least, I assume he’s a Republican because — as we learn from his conversations with Lopez’s son — he certainly seems to know a lot about and be rather sympathetic to Richard Nixon.)

I still like Maid in Manhattan, though perhaps not as sincerely as I like The Wedding Planner. Some of that is because Maid in Manhattan takes place during the Christmas season and I love a good wintry romance. Some of it is because this is probably the only mainstream film to feature people discussing the good points of Richard Nixon. There’s the fact that Jennifer Lopez is always perfectly cast as someone determined to make something out of her life, regardless of whether or not the world supports her or not. She’s always had the ability to make steely ambition sympathetic and that’s a good ability to have when you’re playing a maid who is determined to get promoted into management.

Finally, there’s the odd romantic pairing of Ralph Fiennes and Jennifer Lopez. It’s one of those things that shouldn’t work and yet, strangely, it does. Fiennes always brings a certain off-center, neurotic energy to his performances, which not only explains why he’s played so many villains but also why it’s strange to see him starring in a romantic comedy. And yet, that odd energy is exactly what Maid in Manhattan needs. It keeps the viewer on their toes and it makes the surprising discovery that Fiennes and Lopez have romantic chemistry all the more rewarding.

Don’t get me wrong, of course. This is a deeply silly movie and there’s a lot of less than sparkling dialogue and the plot falls apart if you even start to think about it. The entire story revolves around mistaken identity, with Fiennes not realizing that Jennifer Lopez is a maid and …. well, it’s all a bit unnecessarily complicated. The film also takes Fiennes’s political aspirations a bit too seriously. It’s not quite as bad the whole thing with Matt Damon running for the Senate in The Adjustment Bureau (“Due to his charming concession speech, he will someday be elected President,” — whatever, Beto) but it gets close.

But, still — I love romance and I love New York and the pairing of Jennifer Lopez and Ralph Fiennes in Maid in Manhattan is just too strange (and oddly effective) for me to resist.

Previous Guilty Pleasures

Quick Review: Chef (Dir. by Jon Favreau)

Posted on May 9, 2014 by Leonard Wilson

One of the cool things about WordPress is that you can write on the go. 80% of this review was written from a cell phone sitting in a packed subway train.

I recently caught Jon Favreau’s new film Chef at the Tribeca Film Festival, where it won the Heineken Best Narrative Category. The story of a Chef who falls big time and then turns a corner, the movie has some fun performances, a great soundtrack and loads of food. When the lights finally came up after the sold-out showing, the film received tons of applause. It’s a cute and compact film, so much so that most of the movie is wrapped up in the trailer. I went into the movie completely blind and loved it. As the hype machine grows, I don’t know if it’ll have the same impact, but I hope it does. Even though you know what to expect, it’s still worth the ride.

After Favreau’s fall with Cowboys & Aliens, Chef is a major scale down from the big budget flicks he’s done. This isn’t Iron Man with all of the J.A.R.V.I.S. hologram interfaces. It’s Ratatouille, minus the rats. You have food, friends, and twitter posts that take flight, spreading some word of mouth. Social Media plays a big part of Chef, and while it can date the film years from now (will Twitter and Vine even be around then?), it makes sense for the moment.

So, what’s the story? Chef Carl Caspar loves what he does, being the head Chef at a major restaurant and expressing his creativity through his different culinary dishes. With his cooking buddies at his side (John Leguizamo & Bobby Canivale) he’s the talk of the town, though it’s at the expense of his relationships, particularly the one with his young son. After a social media meltdown involving a Food Critic (played by Oliver Platt), Casper is forced to come up with a Plan B for his love of cooking. The free time gives Casper a chance to bond more with his son. As the commercials & trailers give away, the result includes a food truck.

That’s what you get, plain and simple.

The story feels a lot like Ratatouille in the way it touches on criticism at one point. The film suggests (or at least I felt I gave the suggestion) that a critic, sitting on the outside, can’t always grasp the effort that goes into creating something. Words can come across as harsh, dismissive and in some case abusive. I’m not sure I agree with that point, but that part of the storyline doesn’t hurt the film overall.

For Chef’s cast, Favreau reached out to quite a few people. From his work on the Iron Man movies, both Scarlett Johannson and Robert Downey, Jr. have small roles here. Also on tap are Dustin Hoffman and Sofia Vergara, who both put through some smile worthy performances. The film, however, belongs to Favreau, Leguizamo, and Emjay Anthony, who plays Casper son, Percy. Anthony in particular is the scene stealer of the movie, with his character introducing his father to the ins and outs of social media while learning a few things in the process.

As it’s a smaller film, there isn’t a lot in the way of visual effects, save for elements where Social Media is in play. Tweets are displayed in windows near characters and transform into blue birds that fly as it’s sent. It’s a cute representation of what many of us do at least once or twice a day. The same can be said for the camera work. It’s very simple, nothing too extravagant. I would almost say it’s an indie film, but considering the other films I saw at Tribeca, this felt like there was a bigger budget behind it.

If Chef suffers from any problems, it’s almost too cookie cutter clean. It’s not very damaging, but if your mindset is more cynical or critical, you may find the Casper route from his Plan A to Plan B a little out there, perhaps too easy. It does show how important networking is, that much I’ll say.

One of Chef’s major standouts is the soundtrack, a mixture of Latin Music, New Orleans big brass, and what I can only describe as “Jazzy Hip Hop”. A band called El Michaels Affair has a version of the Wu-Tang Clan’s C.R.E.A.M. that’s a smooth mix of a classic. The soundtrack is already available for purchase and the songs are all on Spotify. If you can, it’s definitely worth giving them a listen.

Chef is currently playing in select theatre’s in NYC and L.A.

Lisa Marie Adopts Puss In Boots (dir. by Chris Miller)

Posted on November 12, 2011 by Lisa Marie Bowman

A few days ago, I finally went and saw Puss in Boots, the new animated entry into the Shrek franchise and a film that has spent (at least) two weeks at the top of the box office. Now, before I launch into my review, I should admit that I’m biased. I love cats, I love fairy tales, I loved all of the Shrek movies (even the ones that weren’t that good), and I love Antonio Banderas. Puss in Boots is one of my favorite characters of all time and I fully expected to love this movie. And you know what?

I did love it.

Taking place before Shrek, Puss in Boots follows the titular feline (voiced by Antonio Banderas, who seriously deserves some sort of Oscar for Best Sexy Voice) as he swashbuckles his way across Far Far Away. Reuniting with his childhood friend Humpty Dumpty (Zach Galifianikis, and not Jonah Hill as I assumed while listening to his voice durin the film) and with the equally skilled cat thief Kitty Softpaws (Salma Hayek), Puss finds himself stealing magic beans from the notorious outlaws Jack and Jill (Billy Bob Thornton and Amy Sedaris) and using the resulting beanstalk to help Kitty and Humpty to steal the goose that lays the golden eggs. Along the way, we also get some flashbacks to Puss’s kittenhood at the orphanage and oh my God!, is it ever adorable.

Puss In Boots is a pretty simple film and, to be honest, it’s almost too simple. There’s none of the subversive satire or subtext that distinguished the best of the Shrek films. But then again, as a character, Puss in Boots has little of the existential angst that defined Shrek and, as a film, Puss in Boots probably makes the right decision to just keep things simple, cute, and fun. When all is said and done, the main appeal of Puss in Boots is that he’s a cute little kitty who acts like a cute little kitty and who sounds exactly like Antonio Banderas. He’s an adorable character and here, he stars in an adorable movie and that’s more than enough to make me happy.