More mystical phenomena occur to young boys Timothy Green and Norman. The former is a literal flower child; the latter is a young boy who can talk to dead people, but presumably without the creepily lingering shrink who needs a doctor of his own. If you’re up for killing a few fifths of vodka and blowing $14, The Expendables 2 is bound to create a shortage of Geritol and Metamucil while Sparkle gives us Whitney Houston’s last film performance.
The Odd Life of Timothy Green: Something strange and mystical happens in The Odd Life of Timothy Green, and this something strange and mystical occurs in a cliched fashion as all of the films that portend body / mind exchanges and preternatural influences: a rainy, windy night, and a creaking gate. The premise here – a young couple is unable to have a child, so they jot down various traits that their non-existent, hypothetical child would have – is cute and bound to conjure some sort of emotion from parents and perhaps even children, but it probably follows the same path worn by Jack, Powder, or any other movie that features a narrator touting her extraordinary tale of a mother who doesn’t “want our son to be seen as different.” I’m sure there’s a lesson in tolerance here, but there’s also an irony of the absurd. Enlightenment suggests that we can say that difference is embraceable when it comes to race, creed, sexual preference, etc. However, this theory is a bit bunked when someone arrives as a seven year old who sprung fresh from the garden and has foliage sprouting from his skin. I’m sure the boy is cute, kind, and honest to a fault (one of the traits that they write that is bound to come back around in the screenplay), but the boy’s existence is abnormal and absurd, and, as curious creatures ourselves, we would want to investigate it. Movies like this are cute, but less about tolerance, and more about easy narratives.
Expendables 2: In part, this movie is appropriately timed with Mitt Romney’s selection of Paul Ryan as his running mate. If perchance Romney and Ryan take the White House, and Ryan’s Medicare Reform bill becomes the law of the land, then Stallone, Norris, Lundgren, et al. will have an additional paycheck with which to purchase their private insurance policies. In a way, we’re kind of being guilted into helped these folks stay healthy (and relevant).
Sparkle: This film might become evidence that American Idol is little more than sarcastic, cynical entertainment that draws more viewers for the condescending culling of the herd than for the talent it portends to uncover. With all due respect to Carrie Underwood and Kelly Clarkson, the rest of the little boxes that fell from the Fox factory have gone on to do little – except make movies to promote themselves in a way that the serialized competition could not. Case in point, Sparkle.
ParaNorman: In this animated feature from the makers of Coraline, a young boy, Norman, can communicate with the dead. And, here, I’m reminded of the eeriness of a child from The Sixth Sense and the morbid, dark humor of The Frighteners, and I’m intrigued. While I didn’t really dig The Sixth Sense, it wasn’t on account of the premise. Plus, I’m fascinated by the idea of using children as protagonists. They signify innocence and inexperience, but often see through that which we have had washed out of our perceptions. There is no boogie man under my bed, but what if I’ve just been conditioned to believe that ghosts don’t exist just so that mom and dad could get a good night of sleep without my paranoia waking them throughout the night?
