Post by bigdaddy on Nov 17, 2018 13:35:42 GMT -5
So, I was lucky and got to see a copy of DESTINATION WEDDING, from a DVD with Japanese subtitles on the right side. I'm saying I was 'lucky' because this movie was not really released as much as it was DUMPED. You know a movie has DIED at the box office when you cannot get a straight answer as to how much it made at the domestic box office on movie reference sites. We know it was released in August and was dead and gone by September. Beyond that...not much...it's in colour and 90 minutes and filmed in beautiful San Luis Obispo, California. And Wikipedia says it made half a million.
I can find no evidence of a wide American release or any Canadian release.
Okay, some stuff to know so what I'm about to say will make SENSE.
First off, there was a genre in the 30's to the early 40's called 'the screwball comedy'. THE PHILADELPHIA STORY, BRINGING UP BABY, THE LADY EVE, THE PALM BEACH STORY. You would have a mismatched couple with the woman usually being the live wire in the relationship. The guy would have his life turned 90 degrees into anarchy, but everything would come out in the end. In our algorithm age, those titles will be a fine entrance in, with more guaranteed to pop up once you hit the vein.
Now do not turn up your nose. These ARE black and white, but also feature great writing, witty performances, and are laugh out loud funny. Even for guys. Honest. (Hold that thought, by the way...)
The genre is dead now, and nothing seems to be able to bring it back. (Believe me, people have TRIED.) Part of the reason is movies are now as strictly divided as American politics and society. I've heard guys say with a straight face that a movie with over 90 minutes of shooting, car chases and killings was 'a chick flick' because it had two or three scenes where a couple kissed....at the end.
Thus, the birth of 'the rom-com' (romantic comedy) that is as rigid a genre as the slasher film or the car-fu movie and totally distained by anyone not into the genre. Hence the disclaimer up above to watch the movies I mentioned anyway.
This time of year, Hallmark and the "W" channel are full of Rom-coms, having morphed into a Christmas romance movie genre that is just as regimented, predictable and contrived as WWF grudge matches.
Second; there was a subdivide of screwball comedies, let's call it MURDER CAN BE FUN. (This used to be the name of a not-bad magazine in the wide open 80's.) Think Bob Hope's version of THE CAT AND THE CANARY, or THE THIN MAN with Powell and Loy. The fact that they solved crimes was NOT the important part. The pay off came from seeing Powell eyeball Loy with a look that said he thought she was finger licking good and what he would like to do, and her responding with a smoky glance back informing him to keep his hands inside the ride at all times.
Okay, now back to DESTINATION WEDDING.
The biggest thing wrong with this movie is that they didn't sell it to TV first, and the didn't make it ten years ago. The length (90 min) is just right. You get beautiful scenery. Good looking leading lady and leading man. Everything you would expect in a Hallmark romance.
But you also get a subversive script with some great lines. These guys have their knives out and hit more times then they don't with pointed attacks at the Hallmark genre. On TV, programmed against the Christmas stuff you are bound to see until New Year's, it would have been a breath of fresh air and paved over everything by sheer word of mouth. You have to look to even see the bride and groom.
It should have been made a decade earlier, because stuff like FAMILY GUY and SOUTH PARK were in their prime, and snide nasty one liners on top of snide nasty one liners could still be funny. At the time, kicking the crap out of anything that moved was funny and seen as subversive.
That doesn't work nearly as well as it did then, a big reason being that people are sick of the comedy equivalent of drinking a beer and taking a whiz all over everybody and everything. You wind up with a sour audience who don't see the point in trying to fix anything, and think both sides are to be blamed equally.
You know the gig is up when SOUTH PARK revisited the episode where they made fun of Al Gore. it's called TIME TO GET CEREAL and aired Nov. 7th. The guys behind SOUTH PARK are libertarians, and mocked Gore as a hypocrite and liar in 2006, really because they don't like government regulation as a point of principal.
Now, 12 years later, when global warming is pretty much an excepted FACT, and everybody knows we HAVE to DO something, they had to walk it back or else look like heartless, stupid smug bastards instead of just smug bastards. And neither Parker or Stone want to be thought of as stupid.
This is where DESTINATION WEDDING goes off the rails; it has the wrong tone. I'll bet a burrito that if you just read the script it was as funny as hell. Problem is, they made Reeves and Ryder nasty, boring and unlikeable.
We have all suffered through tedious self involved weddings. Their resentment at the destination wedding is understandable. But if you're THAT miserable, WHY pay out what would be a small fortune to a lot of the audience just to kvetch at a different supper table?
They also have more in common with each other then they do with the stiffs at the wedding. You would make an alliance immediately.
And also, these two LOOK LIKE WINONA AND KEANU!
There is no NEED for a first act where they are obliged to infuriate each other, as according to rom-com rules. A better tone for Reeves would have been his approach in TUNE IN TOMORROW (look it up; it's an attempt at screwball comedy with Keanu as a reporter totally befuddled by a foul mouthed Peter Falk and an older female relative he falls for.) He can seem bored for the first two minutes, but the minute Ryder walks in, he should go into something just short of cardiac arrest. He might not LIKE her right off. But he sure as shooting is going to try and taste the hot sauce.
Ryder should have waltzed in looking drop dead gorgeous, take one look at Keanu and do everything but smack her lips and pull out a salt shaker of meat tenderizer and some charcoal. Points will be scored, yards will be gained. But only when she is good and ready.
Hepburn pulled the same thing off in BRINGING UP BABY. She plays Cary Grant's ball at a golf course, and then smacked into Cary Grants' car and didn't even care. You knew right from the get go what she was really after. Cary, on the other hand feels himself going down for the count in his life. He's scheduled to be married to a sour puss and even though you see him trying NOT to look at Hepburn, you know he is wondering just how much of a live wire she is when the lights go low.
It would have gone a long way to letting people know it's okay to have fun on your own terms. AS IT IS, the movie tries to be just a rom-com for cranks. It's worth a look, but could have been better.
I can find no evidence of a wide American release or any Canadian release.
Okay, some stuff to know so what I'm about to say will make SENSE.
First off, there was a genre in the 30's to the early 40's called 'the screwball comedy'. THE PHILADELPHIA STORY, BRINGING UP BABY, THE LADY EVE, THE PALM BEACH STORY. You would have a mismatched couple with the woman usually being the live wire in the relationship. The guy would have his life turned 90 degrees into anarchy, but everything would come out in the end. In our algorithm age, those titles will be a fine entrance in, with more guaranteed to pop up once you hit the vein.
Now do not turn up your nose. These ARE black and white, but also feature great writing, witty performances, and are laugh out loud funny. Even for guys. Honest. (Hold that thought, by the way...)
The genre is dead now, and nothing seems to be able to bring it back. (Believe me, people have TRIED.) Part of the reason is movies are now as strictly divided as American politics and society. I've heard guys say with a straight face that a movie with over 90 minutes of shooting, car chases and killings was 'a chick flick' because it had two or three scenes where a couple kissed....at the end.
Thus, the birth of 'the rom-com' (romantic comedy) that is as rigid a genre as the slasher film or the car-fu movie and totally distained by anyone not into the genre. Hence the disclaimer up above to watch the movies I mentioned anyway.
This time of year, Hallmark and the "W" channel are full of Rom-coms, having morphed into a Christmas romance movie genre that is just as regimented, predictable and contrived as WWF grudge matches.
Second; there was a subdivide of screwball comedies, let's call it MURDER CAN BE FUN. (This used to be the name of a not-bad magazine in the wide open 80's.) Think Bob Hope's version of THE CAT AND THE CANARY, or THE THIN MAN with Powell and Loy. The fact that they solved crimes was NOT the important part. The pay off came from seeing Powell eyeball Loy with a look that said he thought she was finger licking good and what he would like to do, and her responding with a smoky glance back informing him to keep his hands inside the ride at all times.
Okay, now back to DESTINATION WEDDING.
The biggest thing wrong with this movie is that they didn't sell it to TV first, and the didn't make it ten years ago. The length (90 min) is just right. You get beautiful scenery. Good looking leading lady and leading man. Everything you would expect in a Hallmark romance.
But you also get a subversive script with some great lines. These guys have their knives out and hit more times then they don't with pointed attacks at the Hallmark genre. On TV, programmed against the Christmas stuff you are bound to see until New Year's, it would have been a breath of fresh air and paved over everything by sheer word of mouth. You have to look to even see the bride and groom.
It should have been made a decade earlier, because stuff like FAMILY GUY and SOUTH PARK were in their prime, and snide nasty one liners on top of snide nasty one liners could still be funny. At the time, kicking the crap out of anything that moved was funny and seen as subversive.
That doesn't work nearly as well as it did then, a big reason being that people are sick of the comedy equivalent of drinking a beer and taking a whiz all over everybody and everything. You wind up with a sour audience who don't see the point in trying to fix anything, and think both sides are to be blamed equally.
You know the gig is up when SOUTH PARK revisited the episode where they made fun of Al Gore. it's called TIME TO GET CEREAL and aired Nov. 7th. The guys behind SOUTH PARK are libertarians, and mocked Gore as a hypocrite and liar in 2006, really because they don't like government regulation as a point of principal.
Now, 12 years later, when global warming is pretty much an excepted FACT, and everybody knows we HAVE to DO something, they had to walk it back or else look like heartless, stupid smug bastards instead of just smug bastards. And neither Parker or Stone want to be thought of as stupid.
This is where DESTINATION WEDDING goes off the rails; it has the wrong tone. I'll bet a burrito that if you just read the script it was as funny as hell. Problem is, they made Reeves and Ryder nasty, boring and unlikeable.
We have all suffered through tedious self involved weddings. Their resentment at the destination wedding is understandable. But if you're THAT miserable, WHY pay out what would be a small fortune to a lot of the audience just to kvetch at a different supper table?
They also have more in common with each other then they do with the stiffs at the wedding. You would make an alliance immediately.
And also, these two LOOK LIKE WINONA AND KEANU!
There is no NEED for a first act where they are obliged to infuriate each other, as according to rom-com rules. A better tone for Reeves would have been his approach in TUNE IN TOMORROW (look it up; it's an attempt at screwball comedy with Keanu as a reporter totally befuddled by a foul mouthed Peter Falk and an older female relative he falls for.) He can seem bored for the first two minutes, but the minute Ryder walks in, he should go into something just short of cardiac arrest. He might not LIKE her right off. But he sure as shooting is going to try and taste the hot sauce.
Ryder should have waltzed in looking drop dead gorgeous, take one look at Keanu and do everything but smack her lips and pull out a salt shaker of meat tenderizer and some charcoal. Points will be scored, yards will be gained. But only when she is good and ready.
Hepburn pulled the same thing off in BRINGING UP BABY. She plays Cary Grant's ball at a golf course, and then smacked into Cary Grants' car and didn't even care. You knew right from the get go what she was really after. Cary, on the other hand feels himself going down for the count in his life. He's scheduled to be married to a sour puss and even though you see him trying NOT to look at Hepburn, you know he is wondering just how much of a live wire she is when the lights go low.
It would have gone a long way to letting people know it's okay to have fun on your own terms. AS IT IS, the movie tries to be just a rom-com for cranks. It's worth a look, but could have been better.
