WCBE 90.5 FM: "A Good Year," "Flushed Away," "Stranger Than Fiction," "Babel"

WCBE 90.5 FM
It’s Movie Time:
"A Good Year," "Flushed Away," "Stranger Than Fiction," "Babel"
Co-hosts, writers & producers: John DeSando & Clay Lowe
Aired: Friday, 3:01 pm and 8:01 pm, November 10, 2006
Streaming live on the web at http://www.wcbe.org .

John

"A Good Year" is good to go en Provence . . .

Clay

"Flushed Away" demonstrates that girl sewer rats are more assertive than house mouse males . . .

John

“Stranger Than Fiction" is no stranger to the danger of fiction . . .

Clay

"Babel" is a four-part parable about the fragility of our interconnections . . .

HIT MUSIC, THEN UP THEN UNDER FOR:

Richelle Antczak McCuen

"It's Movie Time" in Columbus with John DeSando and Clay Lowe. .

MUSIC BRIEFLY UP THEN SLOWLY DOWN AND OUT

John: I'm John DeSando

Clay: And I'm Clay Lowe

John ("A Good Year" 129 words)

Clay: I have excessively drunk the house table wine at lunches in Provence, and I won’t forget them for their savory simplicity and seductive subtext. A Good Year is about Max Skinner (Russell Crowe), a Brit en Provence who loves wine and women although he could skin you alive as a world-class stock trader.

As the new owner of an aging estate in Provence, however, he is as likely to be fleeced by local vintners and irritable restaurant owners.

A Good Year is an endearing fluff piece about the intrigues of wine making, estate ownership, and that French staple, love. The film has a hearty, occasional slapstick I don’t remember in the romantic novel.
No matter, the beauty of Provence and its ladies are fully exploited in this midlin’ comedy.

Clay ("Flushed Away" 128 words)

Well, John, no midlin’ comedy is “Flushed Away.” Rather, it is a rip roaring animated feature created by the artist who delighted us with his very clever “Wallace & Gromit.” Featuring Hugh Jackman, as the voice of Roddy the shy Kesington mouse, and the voice of Kate Winslet, as the movie’s more aggressive sewer-rat heroine, Rita; “Flushed Away” WILL hold its young audience’s attentions, that is until it finally manages to deaden them.

Seven year old Jacob, who watched it with us during the preview, gave it four stars, and called it one of the best movies he’s ever seen. But his six year old sister, Maddie, said she could only give it three stars because she hasn’t seen enough movies, yet, to give it that high of a high rating.

John ("Stranger than Fiction" 130 words)

Here’s one of the worst movies Maddie will see this year.

Death and Taxes is the telling name of the novel Stranger than Fiction’s writer (Emma Thompson) is trying to finish. She needs to figure out how her protagonist, Harold Crick (Will Ferrell) will die.  The only problem is he lives and carries out daily the life she is writing for him.

The film has Twilight-Zone quirkiness.

Stranger than Fiction is a slow starter partly because Ferrell slowly underplays his I.R.S. agent as an introverted nerd obsessed by his job, numbers, and rigid daily routine.  Ferrell doesn’t crack a smile and makes me long for his Talladega Nights redneck race driver.

The film deals superficially with the limitations of authorship, the frustration of writer’s block, and the urge to break through the barriers writers build for themselves in their own narratives.

Clay ("Babel" 127 words)

Well, folks, there’s nothing superficial about Alejandro González Iñárritu’s newest film called “Babel.” 

A spin off on the Old Testament story of the builders of the tower that reached too far into the heaven’s, “Babel,” the movie, further illustrates the consequences of our hubris that drives us to create worlds we are unable to control.

Set, respectively, in Morocco, San Diego, Mexico, and Tokyo, the players in this drama eventually, as in all of Iñárritu’s movies, find they have been bound together in worlds that, like it or not, interrelate.
Most dramatic is the movie’s implied message: Those from the world’s center of powers become equally vulnerable when they have to play by the same rules that govern those who weren’t born into power.

Confusing?  You bet.

But enough of romantic sunsets, flushing toilets, anal tax men, and desperate lives, John, because it's grading time.

HIT DRUMS

John

Holy TAXABLE TRUFFLES, Hooray!

"A Good Year" earns a “B” for BEING just BON . . .

Clay

"Flushed Away" gets a "B" because you should never throw out rats with the BATHWATER . . .

John

"Stranger Than Fiction" earns a “C” for a CLUELESS CHARACTER . . .

Clay

"Babel" gets an "A" because ALL nuclear families are under ARDUOUS stress.

DRUMS OUT

John

Clay, the electorate this week overcame its writers’ block by preparing political demise for its taxing twit of a protagonist president.

Viva la revolution.

I'm outta here.

Clay

John, all of us are revolting at some time or other, it’s just that some of us are more revolting than others.

I’m outta here too.

See you at the movies, folks.

HIT CLOSING THEME THEN UNDER FOR

Richelle:

The Award-Winning "It's Movie Time" with John DeSando and Clay Lowe iswritten and produced by John DeSando and Clay Lowe in conjunction with 90.5 FM, WCBE in Columbus, Ohio.

MUSIC UP, THEN DOWN AND OUT

Copyright by John DeSando & Clay Lowe, 2006