ONCE UPON A HONEYMOON (1942)

Five years after making one of my favorite movies of all time (THE AWFUL TRUTH), Leo McCarey and Cary Grant team up once again to make this wildly uneven and depressing romantic comedy/spy caper set in pre-World War II Europe.  Radio broadcaster Grant is working on a hot story about a Austrian Baron (and his gold digging American wife Ginger Rogers) who's going around Europe and wherever they go, soon falls to the Nazis.  Sounds hilarious!  Anyway, Grant falls for Ginger Rogers (who is somehow too stupid to realize that her husband is a top ranked Nazi!) and naturally she falls in love with him.  Trouble is she's married to one of Hitler's most loyal henchmen.  All kinds of funny stuff happens like assassination attempts, a successful assassination, city's getting bombed, a man turning his wife over to the Nazis, Jews fleeing, children crying, a guy drowning and Grant and Rogers getting thrown into a prison camp for Jews.  It's a feel good laugh riot!

I'm sure there's fans of this movie, but I found ONCE UPON A HONEYMOON painful to get through.  The pace was slow, the story was all over the place, Ginger Rogers acting was terrible, hell even Grant's wasn't anything to brag about and the patriotism!  Oh my god!  At one point Rogers and another actor actually raised their right hand and recited the Pledge of Allegiance!!!  If that's not enough to turn you away then go for it.  Maybe you'll like it.  As for me, I hope I never see this propaganda misfire ever again.

BURN AFTER READING (2008)

BURN AFTER READING is a nice little self-contained story about a bunch of dueling idiots.

Longtime CIA analyst John Malkovich has just been fired because of his drinking problem.  To combat his boredom and in hopes of getting a book deal he starts writing his memoirs about his career.  When a CD holding his manuscript and financial data ends up in a local gym locker room (thanks to Malkovich's wife's divorce lawyer's secretary) it ends up in the hands of two personal trainers, Brad Pitt and Frances McDormand, who think that they can blackmail Malkovich into paying for it's safe return.  Other equally selfish and idiotic characters included in this mess are: gym manager Richard Jenkins who's in love with McDormand despite that fact that she's a moron; Malkovich's wife who's having an affair with the sex-crazed George Clooney and two CIA higher ups who observe the whole thing from CIA headquarters.

Some viewers might be troubled by the lack of plot and likeable characters, but I think that might be the entire point of the film.  Even if it wasn't I enjoyed it and would gladly watch it again.  Extra bonus points for George Clooney's dildo machine...I think I just came up with a great name for my new punk band!

Recommended.

LOVE AND A .45 (1994)

Back in the early 90's there was a whole slew of these criminal/murderer lovebirds road trip movies: WILD AT HEART, THELMA & LOUISE, TRUE ROMANCE, NATURAL BORN KILLERS, KALIFORNIA, THE DOOM GENERATION and so on.  LOVE AND A .45 is another one and it tells the story of Watty and Starlene.  Watty pays the bills on their crappy little trailer by doing small time hold up jobs.  Starlene sometimes acts as a diversion.  After one job goes horribly wrong (thanks to their high as a kite buddy, Billy, going nuts and killing a woman), they head out on the road to Mexico.  Of course, if things went according to plan there wouldn't be much of a movie, so to add to the drama we got some macho policemen, strung out criminal tough guys and a left for dead but not quite so dead Billy hot on their trail.  That doesn't stop them though from seeing the sights, getting married, visiting Starlene's folks and even stopping off to buy camera film.

I remember seeing this film when it came out and enjoying it, but watching it now it doesn't hold up very well.  There's very little action and I never once got a feeling that Watty or Starlene were ever in much trouble.  The whole movie Starlene's just giggling away.  You would think they were on a road trip to a petting zoo not on the run for their lives.

Average pace, dated everything, Peter Fonda in a small role, Rene Zellweger actually looking attractive, a nod to PINK FLAMINGOS, nice looking old cars, $279 VCR's, nice Texas scenery, a skull tattoo, Jeffery Combs as a mobster bill collector, fork to neck stabbing, a young Gil Bellows and a soundtrack featuring stuff like The Jesus and Mary Chain, Mazzy Star, The Reverend Horton Heat and Johnny Cash.

For a low-budget movie you could definitely do worse,  but I wouldn't go out of my way to watch it.