Despicable Me

Despicable Me is the latest movie from Netflix that I got for my kids. I usually allow for one per month, though it looks like they will also be getting Megamind this month. Well, actually, I think Despicable Me counts as February and Megamind will count as March. So we're good.

Despicable Me is a animated movie (read cartoon) made by Universal Pictures. It stars Steve Carell as Villanious Gru, the evil mad scientist who is plotting to steal world-wide monuments. For his latest swipe he needs the incredible shrinking machine, but younger evil mad scientist Victor "Vector" Perkins (Jason Segal) has swiped it first. Now Gru's only chance of getting the shrinking ray gun is by exploiting the 3 young female orphans: Margo (Miranda Cosgrove, duh - Carly Shay from iCarly!), Edith (Dana Gaier), and Agnes (Elsie Fisher) and having them swipe it. And how in the world did 3 young girls in today's society end up with old lady names like Margo, Edith, and Agnes?

Despicable Me also stars the voices of Julie Andrews as Gru's mother, Russell Brand as Gru's older scientist mentor, Will Arnett as the evil bank administrator, Danny McBride as Gru's neighbor, and Kristen Wiig as Miss Hatie, the mistress of the orphanage.

Rated PG for crude humor and mild action (sounds like something else I know), Despicable Me is 95 minutes long.

My kids loved this movie. It made all of them laugh - the 11 year old, the 9 year old, even my 3 year old. This movie is great for them. I thought it was okay, too. They all lived the little yellow working guys.

Together, we give Despicable Me 4 stars.

The Americanization of Emily

I love watching Turner Classic Movies. Today, April 7th, is James Garner's birthday. In his honor, they are showing a James Garner-a-thon. Today I watched The Americanization of Emily, staring Garner and Julie Andrews, best known for The Sound of Music.

The comedy is set in London during World War II, prior to the D-Day invasion. The premise is that Garner is sort of an aide-de-camp to Admiral Jessup (Melvyn Douglas). His job is to make sure that the Admiral has all of the goods, drinks, company, and back-rubs that he needs. Anything the General wants - Garner makes sure he gets it.

Upon arriving Garner meets Emily Barham, a staff member at headquarters. His flirtations with her are scoffed, though he does not end his pursuit. Over time she opens up to him, but learns that he is not what he appears on the outside. Instead, he's a coward who hates war, and is spiteful towards the arrogant and hypocritical British.

His plans to stay where it's safe get torpedoed when General Jessup goes nuts and decides that in an effort for the Navy to get more of the action in D-Day, they will make a documentary filming the invasion. The General wants the first casualty of the invasion to be a sailor and he wants Garner to be there to film it.

This movie is an adaptation of Paddy Chayefsky's play, based on the book by William Bradford Huie and directed by Arthur Hiller, not Arthur Miller. Being a big fan of James Garner and older movies, I found this black and white (talkie) movie to be very funny.

Too old to be rated, the movie is fairly innocuous, though Garner does make some sexual references that may have been taboo at the time, and we do see some girls in bras, and a naked back of a girl caught in bed with James Colburn. It probably would have been given a PG-13 rating had it been rated today.

I like this movie and gave it 4 stars. Happy Birthday, James Garner!