There’s no such thing as an over-familiar story. There’s just a story that its creators haven’t figured out a way to make fresh or new, or valuable, or even valid. There is “The Oranges.” British director Julian Farino’s 2011 comedy sets suburban New Jersey next-door neighbors on each others’ throats and our nerves when a black sheep returns for Thanksgiving. And boy, isn’t a teenage protagonist’s explanatory voiceover always welcome, just to clarify the muddy waters just a little? It’s a terrible, terrible film that thinks it’s funny when it’s just crass, and makes a convincing case that it’s really, really simple to waste a cast the likes of Catherine Keener, Oliver Platt, Allison Janney, Hugh Laurie, Leighton Meester, Alia Shawkat and Adam Brody. Broad comedy? More like a “board” comedy, as in a two-by-four upside the head. Painful. Pitiful. Oh my. The bizarrely misjudged music by Klaus Badelt and Andrew Raiher is like having a stranger spit into a wound. 92m. (Ray Pride)
“The Oranges” opens Friday at Landmark Century and Renaissance.
Ray Pride is Newcity’s Senior Editor and Film Critic. He is a contributing editor of Filmmaker magazine.
Ray’s history of Chicago Ghost Signs is planned for publication next year. Previews of the project are on Twitter and on Instagram. More photography on Instagram.
Heart: A Review of Soul The real world is soulful, too, in Pixar's bountiful life of the mind.
Seeing The Elephant: A Review Of Babylon The boisterous, brawling yet melancholy "Babylon," is a variation on film history, but more drawing for drama. It's gaudy and mean, celebratory and sorrowful.
Fine Line: A Review Of Shortcomings It's a season for the comeuppance of a curmudgeon in Randall Park's smart, biting "Shortcomings," adapted by Adrian Tomine from his graphic novel of the same name.
Spawn Sacrifice: A Review Of The Creator "The Creator" is richly detailed, punchy, pulpy, punkish entertainment that still has highly serious subjects in mind, without growing didactic and with substantial heart.
