February Movies I Won’t Be Seeing (and One I Might)

Sometimes I bemoan the fact that I have very little time to go to the movies.  Then I look at what’s out there, and I start to think that I’m not missing out on much.  Some of the February movies that have just been released, or will soon be released, look entirely skippable and make me feel justified in getting most of my audiovisual entertainment from television.

First up is Just Go With It, with Jennifer Aniston and Adam Sandler.

Summary: Adam Sandler is a “lovable” rake who has a “perfect” system for seducing young women into having one-night stands: he wears a wedding ring and tells the women in question that he’s in an unhappy marriage with a wife who beats him (HAHA DOMESTIC VIOLENCE LOL!)  Then, he meets the woman of his dreams, and you can tell she’s the woman of his dreams because she’s blonder and with more boobage than the other women he sleeps with.  She is unimpressed when she finds his fake wedding ring.  He convinces his boss to pretend to be his soon-to-be ex-wife so that his Dream Girl (Brooklyn Decker) is satisfied.  The boss is played by Jennifer Aniston, who is playing a wildly different role than she normally does.  Instead of being The Girlfriend, she’s the Fake Wife.

Predicting the ending: In pretending to be a couple, Adam Sandler and Jennifer Aniston fall in love for real. Brooklyn Decker probably turns out to be a bitch. 

Verdict: I will forgive Adam Sandler an awful lot of stupid, predictable movies, because I adored Punch-Drunk Love just that much.  But forgiving him doesn’t mean I have to see this.  I’ll miss it.

Next up is Hall Pass, starring Owen Wilson and Jason Sudeikis.

Summary: Owen Wilson and Jason Sudeikis are married to Jenna Fischer and Christina Applegate, respectively.  Despite having attractive wives, both men have wandering eyes.  It’s clear that they’ve never actually cheated, but they look at other women and desire them.  The women decide to give their husbands a “Hall Pass” where they have one week off of marriage, with no consequences.  The men go on this quest and proceed to act like idiots, striking out with all the hot younger women they see, and make jokes about chloroform and date rape (LO…L?)

Predicting the ending: Owen Wilson and Jason Sudeikis will almost cheat but won’t be able to go through with it because they REALLY LOVE THEIR WIVES (awwww).  Along the way, they will probably run into a character with a disability, actually played by a real person with a disability, because this is a Farrelly brothers movie and they show surprising sensitivity and a progressive attitude towards people with disabilities.

Verdict: There’s nothing feminist about having female characters play mommywives to their manchild husbands.  I’ll skip it.

Finally, we have a Shakespeare adaptation in Gnomeo & Juliet:

Summary: When humans go to sleep, their garden gnomes come to life.  Two rival garden gnome families try to destroy each other, but the children of the different families (Gnomeo and Juliet) meet and fall in love.

Predicted ending: Somehow, I don’t think this version is going to end in a double suicide.

Verdict: This looks cute.  I’m all for adapting Shakespeare for children, and Juliet looks feisty and daring.  Nowadays, it seems as though animated films have a lot of strong female characters that show agency and make decisions.  In fact, animated movies seem better than a lot of live-action movies in that regard.  I can’t decide if that’s kind of awesome or sad.