WARWICK SHOWCASE

THE GOOD HOUSE

* * * ½

(Romantic Drama)

Sigourney Weaver stars as Hildy Good, a realtor with a drinking problem.

Hildy sells expensive houses in her hometown on Massachusetts’s North Shore where she competes with a former employee.

The 72-year-old woman is divorced but on friendly terms with her former husband. She still has a crush on the local character, Frank Getchell (Kevin Kline).

Hildy likes her wine and denies that she has a problem with it, even though everyone knows she does.

“The Good House” is a pleasant little adult love story with interesting characters that you care for.

Hildy is a lovable person who swears that she doesn’t have a problem, even when her family attempts an intercession, and even when she is out of control.

But you still love her and hope she wises up and gets help.

“The Good House” is a rare movie about interesting people like the ones you find in small, close-knit communities. If you could afford it, you might enjoy living in the picturesque North Shore.

BROS

*

(Irritating, Badly Made Comedy

“Not that there’s anything wrong with it,” Jerry Seinfeld would say when dealing with gay men.

Then why is “Bros” so bad?

Billed as the first Rom Com feature movie to deal with the subject of two men in love, “Bros” should have a wide open playing field for good comedy writers.

Billy Eichner plays Bobby Lieber a podcaster who is building a gay men’s museum.

Reaching 40 and never been in love, he participates in the gay New York City dating scene, meeting a self-assured jock, with quite a different personality (Luke MacFarlane). The on and off relationship plays like a heterosexual relationship.

The difference is twofold: The writing is sophomoric. A bad joke is a bad joke, no matter who says it.

But the spoiler is Eichner will get on your nerves from the opening scene and it will never let up.

Lots of dumb running gags, poorly edited vignettes, guest appearances by actors who are given dumb soliloquies and then disappear all drag the movie down.

Hopefully, someone will try again and make a better movie. It won’t be hard to do.

AVON/

WARWICK SHOWCASE

THE STORIED LIFE OF A. J. FIKRY 

* * * ½

(Romantic Tale)

When people gather under the marque after an Avon film engaged in deep discussion, you know they have seen a good movie.

Taken from the New York Times best-selling novel, “… A. J. Fikry…” tells the sentimental tale of a bookstore owner who finds himself in a deep funk after the death of his wife.

A.J. runs the financially troubled book store on a small island off the coast of Massachusetts. He has lost interest in life and finds himself falling asleep every night inebriated from too much wine.

A mystery occurs when he awakes and finds his valuable possession of Poe’s poems missing.

Two people enter and change his life dramatically: a two-year-old girl left among the book stacks and a young lady selling the new editions.

Add his writer friend, his wife, and the chief of police, and you have a nice little mystery that eventually comes together in a sentimental ending.

The folks under the marque were praising the movie for being true to the book.

NETFLIX

1. HARRIGAN’S PHONE

* * *

(Taken From Stephen King’s Short Story)

Donald Sutherland gets better with age.

The great actor plays the title character, a wealthy businessman who has left the New York City rat race to retire in a remote mansion in Maine. (Where else? It’s a Stephen King story.)

He hires a young boy to read to him three times a week. They bond. In fact, Craig (Jaeden Martell) is his only friend.

Mr. Harrington introduces Craig not only to wonderful novels, but to lessons he extracts from them.

Craig, in return, teaches his mentor everything there is to know about this new fad called the iPhone.

Craig is bullied at school. Harrington gives him advice on how to handle his situation, which is not quite in the “turn the other cheek” mode.

When something bad happens to the bully, the story takes a dark, Stephen Kingish turn.

Whether or not you like the ending largely depends on your King perspective.

I loved the relationship between the boy and the old man.

I did not care for the ending.