As you can see or may have noticed, I’ve been on a bit of a hiatus. Of course I’m still watching films but just too busy to sit down and write reviews. Even a short, 500 word review is too taxing (late summer sunlight depression has zapped my will to be creative) for me recently. So, here’s a gigantic 323 word review for probably the worst film I’ve seen all year.10 Items or Less is terrible. It is a phony, undeveloped, humorless and highly unbelievable story of a supposedly famous actor (Morgan Freeman) spending a day with a regular person (Paz Vega) and the bond the pair have despite their differences. Okay, not all that original but I rented it from Netflix so I’ll give it a try.
The film ends up being only 70 minutes long! If I was in NY or LA or some large metropolis that charges $10 for movies and the film ends after 70 minutes I’d be extremely angry. Especially since the film is complete garbage that has no chemistry, a terrible script with all kinds of silly full-of-itself scenes and bad dialogue. Actually, the 70 minute length might have been the filmmakers treating us to a gift: so we don’t have to sit through any more of their dreck!
One thing that really irritated me about this that I couldn’t stop thinking about was the fact Freeman’s character is supposed to be a hotshot, big time actor who wears $100 designer t-shirts and is wowed by an afternoon trip to Target. He can’t imagine the amazing quality buys the store has for the consumer (how much Target paid for this two minute advertisement we’ll never know). I find the fact he’s agog over Target kind of shocking since he’s wearing Wrangler jeans. Come on, anyone wearing Wrangler jeans can’t be so awed by a friggin’ Target store. Absurd. Maybe I’m nitpicking but I could not stop thinking about his Wranglers and how phony the film was because of it.
There is nothing redeeming or worthwhile about 10 Items or Less. It takes two fine actors—Freeman and Vega—and puts them into a going nowhere scenario and then just lets them flounder in a bad idea/bad script world for 70 minutes. At least it wasn’t a whopping 90 minutes so we saved ourselves 20 minutes of misery.
2 comments:
Morgan Freeman shows up in a lot of crappy movies, doesn't he? My sister recently rented (or "Redboxed") The Contract and I watched it with her since it also stars John Cusack (a Top 5-er from way back). The movie was so ridiculous - the best part being when it started raining and suddenly EVERYBODY was wearing a poncho, even though they were all running around in the wilderness, obviously miles from the nearest Ponchos 'R Us. I turned to my sister and asked, "Where did they all get a poncho?" For the next couple of days, all it took was for one of us to say, "Ponchos!" for both of us to fall into hysterics.
Those ponchos were The Contract's Wranglers, for sure.
What's "redbox"? Is that what you call renting something from Netflix?
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