Theatrical Review: Despicable Me 3

Date: Sunday, July 9 2017
Time: 11:45am
Party: 3 (my mom, sister and I)

Directors: Pierre Coffin (directed previous "Despicable" films), Kyle Balda (directed Minions & The Lorax) and Eric Guillon (a character designer for "Sing" and several other films)
Writers: Cinco Paul & Ken Daurio

Cast:
Gru & Dru- Steve Carell
Lucy- Kristen Wiig
Minions- Pierre Coffin
Balthazar Bratt- Trey Parker (yeah, one of the 2 guys behind "South Park")
Fritz/Ramsbottom- Steve Coogan
Margot- Miranda Cosgrove
Edith- Dana Gaier
Agnes- Nev Scharell
Clive the Robot- Andy Nyman

Duration: 90 minutes (+2 trailers)

Write-up:

Opening Comments

I forgot which movie we were going to see when they aired the trailer. The music and all the fun action happening was enough to sell me on this movie, not to mention it's been a good franchise up to this point.
Although part of me wonders if it's already worn out its welcome.
We got to the theater and a sign on the door said two of the theaters didn't have air-conditioning. This is a small local place, so it doesn't have the best facilities. But hey, it's close by. That's kinda hard to argue with.
It was the three of us and three other people. Then maybe a dozen other people showed up during the trailers or the first couple minutes of the movie. But considering we had to be told we were in the wrong theater (it said 3 Despicable, so we thought it was the right movie- not because it was where the 3D version would be later... but at least there was no issues with the screen or sound system, so I really shouldn't complain).

Trailers

First there was a teaser for the Emoji Movie. It was narrated by the "meh" emoji with various other things going on. We get more from the trailers shown on TV, but they only show one trailer where it seems like the poo emoji is one of the most famous because he's very full of himself.
Me, I like these things as much as the next person. Heck, my favorites are the :P face, followed by the winkie face, and on Twitter, I've gotten into using the purple umbrella with rain drops for my Prince tweets and comments. And prince.org (a messageboard where I got my start in the fan community 10 years ago) used these things LONG before they were popular for cell phones. But we called them emoticons. And I still like that name better than "emojis"... I'm sorry, that always sounded lame to me. And by extension, this movie looks kinda lame. Like they're trying to commercialize emojis even more with a storyline that reads like a cheap imitation of "Inside Out."
I believe "Angry Birds" failed at the box office, but the fact the game isn't as popular as it used to be might have more to do with it than the idiocy of trying to do a movie about something you find on your phone. And don't get me started on the TV game show of "Candy Crush." What the heck is Mario Lopez even doing hosting that? He's probably the most successful alum from "Saved by the Bell" with various other hosting gigs on better shows and he's a part-time DJ. It's not like he needs the money... I don't think...
I'd spent way too much time on this thing I'm deeming a waste of time, moving on...

Leap!, by contrast, has the potential to be something really good. In a year where there really haven't been any standout animated movies, I can see this winning an Oscar. But I'm getting ahead of myself.
It's a story about a boy and girl who grew up in an orphanage and both have big dreams. The girl (played by Elle Fanning... whatever happened to her sister, Dakota... did Twilight "ruin her career" too or did she just outgrow her niche, which was precocious child star?) wants to be a dancer for a ballet company. The boy (played by Nat Wolff- this guy from two movies based on books by an author whose name escapes me...John Green... he's really getting a lot of good material coming his way) wants to be a world-famous inventor.
I was thinking while watching this that animation has come such a long way since Walt Disney did "Snow White"-- THAT was groundbreaking, but we now have 3D animation with really life-like human characters.
We'll see how the critics react (I don't put a lot of stock in critics, but I still check out what they say on some things), but this has a lot of potential, I think.
I just don't know if these kids are brother and sister or friends because there's a scene where the guy seems to be falling for the girl...and that'd be icky and not-so-kid friendly if they were related.

Geesh... I've had so much to say about the trailers, and I don't know if I'll have as much to say about the actual movie.

The Main Event

Here's the basic story-- Gru and Lucy (his new wife from the previous movie) are given the mission to bring Balthazar Bratt to the Anti-Villian League and thwart his attempt to steal a rare pink diamond (they don't call it the Pink Panther, but it might as well be).
However, while they manage to retrieve the diamond, Bratt gets away. And the new leader of the AVL fires Gru for this mistake (and Lucy, who says in the trailer that she'll have to fire her as well).
The Minions take this news in a positive way. Led by Mel, they decide they want to go back to villainy. Something Gru doesn't want now that he's happily married to someone who catches bad guys. So the Minions abandon him and due to some shenanigans they commit, they wind up in jail.
Gru also finds out that he has a twin brother named Dru. The whole family goes to another country to meet him. Dru reveals that their father was a great villain and he wants the two of them to go into the villain business together. Not telling his brother, Gru's plan is to gnab Bratt and bring him to the AVL to get his and Lucy's jobs back. Meanwhile, Agnes, the youngest of the three girls, is on a quest to find a real-life unicorn after hearing a barkeep in town rave about one.
And Bratt has another evil plot in mind and it involves getting back at Hollywood.
Balthazar Bratt is probably one of the most unique, most slyest, but goofiest villains I'd seen in any movie. He was a child star who had a show where he committed heists. The show got cancelled the moment he hit puberty and it got super awkward super fast to see a pimpled teenage Bratt say his noted catchphrase "I've been a bad boy."
His methods, funny enough, are real-life versions of things he did in his show. Only in an animated movie would they be able to get away with this and I thought that was kinda cool.
The best part, for me personally... his show was big in the 80's, so this guy is all about the 80's references. He wears a purple body suit with big shoulder pads. He has a keytar that not only produces a killer soundtrack for dance fights, but it literally blew Gru away and his clothes right off his back.
However, it did get to a point where I thought to myself: did the writers really love the 80's, as I do... or were they making fun of all the pop culture cheese that decade produced? It's hard to tell. Because after a while, I was even tiring of it, which made me sad. I guess you really can have too much of a good thing.
Then everything was okay after when he first unreleased a legion of his own action figures (merchandise that nobody bought, apparently) and calls them... wait for it... The Bratt Pack! [Brat Pack movies are among my all-time favorites... although the best of them is The Breakfast Club, followed by Ferris Bueller and the rest aren't quite at the same level]

As for the soundtrack... 80's songs included
"Bad" by Michael Jackson
"Into the Groove" by Madonna (my favorite song by her, by the way)
"Sussido" by Phil Collins (if you're one of those people who accused him of stealing this song's synth line from Prince's song "1999"... this movie has that 80's pop trifecta... I am not nearly THAT crazy)
"Money for Nothing" by Dire Straits (one of the best 80's videos ever!)
"Take on Me" by A-Ha

...I'm sure there were more, but those were the best of the bunch.

We've gotten to know Margo, Edith and Agnes a bit over these three movies. Margo is only 12, but she comes off as 16 (but she's also played by 20-something Miranda Cosgrove). She went from being the one in charge to the boy-crazy teenage to... kinda being embarrassed by her new stepmom, who makes her be nice to this local boy. Something that backfires, but how it resolves gets them closer as a result.
Agnes's cuteness still hasn't grown out its welcome, at least for me anyway. She represents the kid in all of us who wants to believe that unicorns are real and she just might get her wish this time to have a real one.
Edith... I still don't know what her character is supposed to be. She spent all of the last movie dressed in a karate/ninja outfit. In this movie, she likes pranking Fritz, the butler at Dru's mansion and she goes with Agnes to find the unicorn, but she's not quite believing it. I don't know-- so much attention has been given to the other two girls, I just don't get her the same way. And we're three movies in.

Of course, we have the Minions. They spend most of the movie in jail and, maybe because they have the numbers, they wind up ruling the roost. (At least it makes a lot more sense than Austin Powers 3 where Dr. Evil and Mini-Me manage the same thing with just the two of them). All the while, Mel (a Minion we hadn't gotten to know before this movie) starts regretting his decision to leave Gru and reflects on their time together. He acts like such a tough guy by leading this revolt, but the flashbacks show he was kind of a baby.
Sure, their cuteness legitimized them getting their own movie with origin story and everything... but I think that might have worn out its welcome a bit.

And Lucy spends most of the movie trying to adjust to her new role as stepmom. Which isn't perfect, but then again, who is?
One of the most often aired trailers for this movie has her saying to Gru and Dru "so you're villians now?"... that scene never happened in the movie! At one point, it appears she's starting to get the scent that something isn't quite right with those two, but there's no confrontation scene.

Of course, Steve Carell plays both roles of Gru and Dru. And they both have their individual quirks. It's kinda funny how each was raised by a single parent and that parent told their kid that they were the biggest disappointment. Yet when Gru is part of this job he's pulling with his brother, it really seems like he's a better villain than he appeared to be in the original Despicable movie. Meanwhile, Dru is a big klutz that nearly ruins everything. But they do come together in the end and come out on top.

Bratt may seem like a goof super obsessed with the 80's, but he does have moments of brilliance in his own villainy. Although there was one moment that happened that I saw through the deception almost immediately... maybe the writers wanted it easy for the adults to guess or they didn't... either way, I liked feeling super smart for a moment as long as it lasted.

The movie as a whole... it's not bad, but being the 2nd sequel of one really good movie... there were times where I was thinking it's getting stale and maybe they should quit while they're ahead.
However, the final act of the movie is really good. Very action-packed and exciting and it was fun to be back in the 80's again.

Grade: B+

The Way, Way Back (2013)

Writers/Directors: Nat Faxon and Jim Rash (also co-wrote "The Descandents")
Sound Editing/Mixing: Rob Simonsen

Cast:
Duncan- Liam James
Pam- Toni Collette
Trent- Steve Carell
Betty- Allison Janney
Kip- Rob Corddry
Steph- Zoe Levin
Peter-  River Alexander
AnnaSophia Robb- Susanna
Joan- Amanda Peet
Owen- Sam Rockwell
Caitlin- Maya Rudolph

Introduction

I think I first heard about this movie on Reelz channel. Leonard Maltin or Richard Roeper said it was one of the best films to come out in the upcoming summer. I remember seeing commercials for it when it was getting critical acclaim at the Sundance Film Festival.
Then I watched it for the heck of it one night when it premiered on HBO. First because of the props and second because Steve Carell was in it.
Little did I know how terrible a character he was playing. One of the biggest jerks I've come across in recent memory... more on that later.

Summertime Comparisons

This area runs a little long, so feel free to scroll to the 2nd spoiler alert banner

In all likelihood, this is going to become one of my summer staples. The trick is getting the DVD so I can leave it at our shorehouse. So much time has passed since it came out that I could probably get it for cheap at Target or Wal-Mart.

Much like with "Fast Times at Ridgemont High [scroll to the way bottom for what I'm talking about here specifically]
http://moviegoerconfessions.blogspot.com/2015/04/fast-times-at-ridgemont-high-1982.html
I got the idea to review this movie because I heard a song from the movie and immediately thought of it.
That's an aspect of music I love so much- you hear a song and it automatically transports you to another place. And sometimes that's a movie where it's featured prominently or at least referenced in the dialogue.

The song in question: "Kyrie" by Mr. Mister
It's playing in the background and the actors are putting their own words to it. Steve Carell I think was the one who said it was "carry a laser."
I remember looking it up myself and I had no idea what the words were.

Here's the chorus, in case anyone cares and wants to save themselves the Google search:

"Kyrie eleison, down the road that I must travel
Kyrie eleison, through the darkness of the night
Kyrie eleison, where I'm going will you follow
Kyrie eleison, on a highway in the light"

Apparently the first two words is Greek for "Love, have mercy."
You learn something new every day.

As for the whole comparison bit...

I guess you could say that this movie has a lot of similarities to "Adventureland," which stars Jesse Eisenberg, Kristen Stewart and Ryan Reynolds. Both take place in summertime and the characters are working at a theme park.
Ok, maybe just those two similarities. It's not a coming-of-age story because Jesse Eisenberg seems well established as a person. And working at the theme park is equivalent to purgatory for him. He'd just graduated and was planning on going to college, but his parents spent all the money he/they saved up... so he needs to take a summer job.

The main difference between the two: this one is way better.
"Adventureland" loses its way when it gets to the third act. Most of it is the fault of Kristen Stewart's story arc.
unrelated SPOILERS

She gets a raw deal from a lot of people over "Twilight" and the fact she cheated on Edward Cullen [yeah, WTF happened to Robert Pattinson?] with the "Snow White and the Huntsmen" director. People have picked her acting apart for years following those movies.
While I DO NOT understand why her character had to be involved with Ryan Reynold's [it's icky- she's practically a teenager and he's a married adult], I feel bad for her character and how she feels out of place in her family. Her step-mom is such a bitch.
And the ending was kinda... blah... didn't do a whole lot for me and it felt thrown in at the last minute.

Also, both movies have memorable moments involving 80's music.
"New Sensation" by INXS is another from this one that I recall.
Meanwhile, "Adventureland" had a lot more songs (apparently it takes place in 1987 despite all the anachronisms) including "Obsession" by Animotion and ...

"Amadeus, Amadeus, Amadeus
Amadeus, Amadeus, Amadeus
Amadeus, Amadeus, oh, oh, oh Amadeus"
and this exchange to follow:
James: Jesus F***ing Christ! They play this song like 20 times a day!
Joel: F***ing Sadistsl F***ing Sadists!

***

ok, I'm done talking about unrelated movies. Maybe the next time I see "Adventureland," I'll give it its own review. It has its issues, of course, but I still enjoy it and its characters very much.
But for now, back to this movie.

By the way, here are the quotes about their "Kyrie" lyrics... and my bad, it wasn't Steve Carell. It was Allison Janney and Corddry.

Joan: Carry a laser down the road that I must travel!
Kip: Why would it be 'carry a laser'?
Joan: Because it's a song about outer space.

That dude plays such a jerk in this movie [I know, I already said that, but it's a valid point] that I shouldn't be giving him any more credit than he deserves... which is none.

I love Steve Carell, don't get me wrong. But movies like this... I guess I just prefer he does comedies because his dramatic roles aren't as fun to watch. You know, because they're all dramatic and shit...
sorry...

The Story
FINALLY moving on... my apologies. I could edit all that out, but I want my creative process to be there. In fact, I'll just put a notation in the beginning that say to scroll down to this point.

related SPOILER ALERTS
The trailer includes the very first scene. And actually, the first time I saw the movie, I had to miss the first 10-15 minutes because I had to finish watching something else... I was kinda broken up about it. I hate watching movies mid-progress. I worry that I'm going to miss a crucial detail or I'm going to be lost.
[Goes to make a reference about catching "Purple Rain" halfway through and realizes that a future entry needs to address Prince's short-lived cinematic career... and by that I mean he only did 4 theatrical releases, all in the 80's, and one practically was a concert film]

Enough stalling!

The scene in question: Steve Carell asks our protagonist how he rates himself on a scale from 1 to 10. Duncan says he's a 6 and Steve Carell says he's a 3. Mainly because he lacks ambition, doesn't put himself out there and hangs around the house all the time.
Sure, he might have a point, but saying someone is a three is just mean. And who's he to say that? He's only the jerk his mom is dating. And even if they were married, he still had no right to be such a jerk to him.

Okay, I'm done Steve bashing... for now.

Duncan is a very withdrawn teenage boy that really doesn't know what to do with himself because he lacks self-esteem more than anything else.
I saw comments in the IMDB messageboards that made reference to this: why are all these types of roles done by guys?

[Personal rant and some unrelated SPOILERS... again, feel free to skip]
On the plus side, they had this characterization for Duncan without using childhood molestation as an explanation for it. I say this now because that plot device was used in "Perks of Being a Wallflower" and "Love Letters for the Dead." The latter has a female protagonist and that about ruined the story for me. Mainly because I am an introverted wallflower myself and I don't have that in my past.
I had pressure from my parents to succeed in school and [non-condescending] tempers flared the few times I was getting C's and D's [9th and 11th grade nearly killed me]. Also, kids were mean to me in elementary school and in high school, I didn't really succeed in making m/any friends. That's always been hard for me and I don't know why. Breaking the ice in of itself is terrifying and I feel like I can't add much to an ongoing conversation unless I REALLY know the subject matter. I'm 30 now and I still have social anxiety issues that I can't explain and have no real way of resolving other than practice makes perfect.

Makes me wonder sometimes if I'm borderline autistic or I need Xanax or a therapist to cut down my anxiety.
At least my temp job recently got an upgrade to full-time, so I have one less thing to worry about for a while.

... I'll make another note. I don't know what's with me today, honestly :P it's been a pretty good day for me, albeit an uneventful one in my case.
I didn't even think any of this when I was watching the movie the first time. And it would have made sense to do so... I was in a major rut with my unemployment status.
***

"The Way, Way Back" got its title: 1) because "The Way Back" was already taken and 2) it refers to the wayback seat of a station wagon, which Duncan was occupying at the start and end of the movie. But he's in a much different state of mind from start to finish, which we get to see unfold.

He's going with his mom, his mom's jerkish boyfriend and his daughter, Steph, to his summer home upstate that's nextdoor to his sister... my bad, it's not his sister. They're just neighbors.
I feel like the worst person that could write for this movie. I forget all these details.

Anyway, Allison Janney's character almost reads like an audition for her current role on "Mom" where she's an alcoholic. Except she's far less apologetic in "Mom"... which I'd barely seen, so I really shouldn't comment.
She has a son and daughter. Peter wear an eye patch because his eyes are cross he has a lazy eye. And Susannah kinda becomes Duncan's love interest, but the romance gets to a VERY slow start due to his sheer awkwardness.
There's a cute scene (which I only just remembering searching for that "Kyrie" quote) where he's singing some REO Speedwagon ("Can't Fight This Feeling"), she catches him, he dismisses it as something from his mom and she jokes that he practically screamed it at the top of his lungs just for the hell of it.

Zoe Levin plays Steph and her role, I could say a similar thing about. That it was practically an audition for her character in "Red Band Society"- except she has a little more character development in the latter.
Sometimes, I REALLY miss that show. It really deserved a 2nd season. And a 3rd and so on...

One day, he decides to get out of the house and ends up meeting Owen (Sam Rockwell) at a local dive. They immediately develop a rapport over a Pac-Man machine. Duncan says "you know there's a pattern, right?" and Owen dismisses him, saying that he needs to make his own pattern.
He sees that he's wearing a T-shirt that has the name of a local theme park, so he goes there another day to find him again. He winds up getting a job there and really finds himself as a person.
So many cute scenes where Owen is teaching him the ropes and in trying to put a stop to a break-dance party, he gains a reputation and a cool nickname. I think it's Back Slide?
I'm sorry, I'm so bad at remembering this movie :P

Mainly because Sam Rockwell practically STEALS the show for me in the best possible way. I didn't think too much of him after "Iron-Man 2" (I SO wanted him to be collateral damage in that movie- payback for being such a jerk).
He has a wicked sense of humor, some I think was even improvised. And he's also very good to Duncan. He really seems to care about him and gives him so much good advice.
I actually spent a great amount of this movie hoping and PRAYING that there wouldn't be this great reveal later on where Owen is revealed to be a bad person or he does something really bad to tarnish everything Duncan and I liked about him.
THANKFULLY, that was not the case. But you have to admit- movies do that so often that it's cliché at this point.

And Owen has a cute love-hate relationship with Maya Rudolph's character. She can be really over the top on SNL and stuff, but here, she was a little more serious and heartfelt. So that was really nice to see. [And the fact she loves Prince as I do doesn't hurt either]

At least Duncan gets the courage to finally speak his mind to Trent (Steve Carell) and also lets his mom know what he thinks of him. This is coupled with the fact Trent is having an affair with one of the neighbors.The ending of this movie where Duncan reveals what he's been doing all summer and his mom meets "[his] friend Owen"... it's one of the best pay-offs you will ever see in movies. It's really nice to see it when the bullied and downtrodden find confidence and get acceptance from their peers or families.