He’s Ted Lasso. No wait, he’s an ex-con

 

   In South of Heaven, Jason Sudeikis sounds an awful lot like he does as Ted Lasso, but he’s playing an entirely different character, a man who’s worlds away from the amiable American football coach who finds himself coaching soccer in England. 

     This time out, Sudeikis portrays Jimmy Ray, a former convict who’s paroled from prison after serving 10 years for a bank robbery. Jimmy wants nothing more than to marry Ann (Evangeline Lilly), the woman he loves and who is dying of lung cancer. She has waited 10 years for him.

    Director Aharon Keshales (Big Bad Wolves) takes Jimmy’s story through too many mood swings to be effective. The movie alternates hard-boiled drama, tender exchanges, and, finally, a grotesquely out-of-place shootout that pits Jimmy against a small army of foes. 

     The story’s complications begin when Jimmy is tempted into more criminal behavior by a corrupt parole officer (Shea Whigham). 

   In the course of picking up some money, Jimmy has a car accident in which a motorcyclist dies. Turns out the cyclist was a courier for Whit Price (Mike Colter), a smooth-talking but brutal gangster who was waiting for the delivery of $500,000. Price wants his money and believes Jimmy stole it.

      Eventually, Price kidnaps Ann, forcing Jimmy to kidnap Price’s son (Thaddeus J. Mixson). The movie softens as the respective kidnappers get to know and, of course, like their victims.

      The relationship between Jimmy and Ann is well-drawn, but too much of the rest of the movie can’t accommodate the screenplay's wild variations. 

Fatale: A shiny surface with pulp beneath

 

     It always starts with infidelity.

    An otherwise successful man veers from the straight-and-narrow by sleeping with an alluring woman who seems free of any moral constraints. Of course, it’s an illusion and his slip will lead to catastrophic consequences.

    Fatale — which stars Hilary Swank and Michael Ealy— presents itself as an unashamed piece of pulp entertainment that bends itself out of shape trying to add new wrinkles to a Fatal Attraction formula. 

     Ealy portrays Derrick Taylor, a  highly successful sports agent and partner in a super-profitable company. Swank’s Valerie Quinlan, the movie’s femme fatale, is a detective.

    I won’t say more other than to tell you that Derrick winds up as the suspect in a double murder that introduces more infidelities and betrayals into an already strained plot.

    Director Deon Taylor takes full advantage of the upscale aspirations of his characters. Derrick's home proves magazine-worthy and even Valerie's downtown loft seems stylish and desirable. 

    Put another way, just about everyone in the movie seems to have lost touch with the meaning of the words “middle class.” 

    At the same time, the screenplay by David Loughery imagines that the nouveau-riche sports agents — who happen to be black — can’t entirely escape motivations that push them into dangerous territory.

    Whatever the movie has to say about race comes across as inadvertent as Fatale tries to score with a mixture of glitz and voyeurism to which it applies dabs of violence and motivation.

    Mike Colter appears as Derrick's partner, a businessman who's eager to sell the firm, and Damaris Lewis appears as Derrick's beautiful wife. Neither actor gets much chance to stand-out.

    Danny Pino portrays a corrupt councilman who once was married to Valerie and now has custody of their daughter.

    Swank gives Valerie just enough suggestions of sanity to create some doubt about her motivations but formula demands that her character yield to the required extremes. 

    The rest of the cast serves the story but Fatale winds up as another helping of glamorized nonsense that shows little interest in anything more than its own glossy surface.

'Girls Trip' offers major laughs

A raunchy comedy about four women who reunite in New Orleans.

Malcolm D. Lee, who directed the Best Man movies and Barbershop: the Next Cut, knows how to make crowd-pleasing movies -- and that's a good thing.

Girls Trip, a raunchy comedy based on the enduring bonds of black sisterhood, is Lee's latest foray into the lives of 40something black people who -- for the most part -- are leading successful lives.

In this case, four women -- former college roommates -- spend a reunion weekend in New Orleans. But where movies such as the recent -- and deeply abysmal -- Rough Night, strained to push women into the Bachelor Party/Bridesmaids oeuvre, Girls Trip leaps in with remarkable aplomb.

Lee builds the movie around big comedy scenes of the kind that make you laugh in spite of yourself. One involves torrential urination and the other, a grapefruit. No fair describing either, but you should know that they're not for those who shy away from R-rated comedy.

In addition to some funny writing (intermittent, I admit), the movie features four actresses who create appealing characters: Regina Hall, Jada Pinkett Smith, Queen Latifah and Tiffany Haddish. Haddish portrays a firecracker of a woman whose profane expressions and attitude qualify as one of summer's better special effects.

The story revolves around Hall's character. Hall's Ryan is a best-selling author who espouses a you-can-have-it-all philosophy that has great appeal among women. She's married to a former NFL star (Mike Colter). Billed as an ideal couple, the two are on the verge of signing a lucrative TV contract, thanks to the efforts of Ryan's white agent (Kate Walsh).

Hall's Ryan travels to New Orleans to give the keynote speech at Essence Fest, a gathering for black women. She invites her former college pals along. They call themselves "The Flossy Posse."

Queen Latifah portrays Sasha, a journalist who has been reduced to running a celebrity gossip blog. Pinkett Smith portrays a divorced nurse and mother of two, a woman poised to reveal her wild side, and Haddish appears as the loyal member of the group, a woman whose irrepressible energy seems boundless and who's not afraid to unleash a powerful punch or get everyone drunk on absinthe.

At one point, the women drink too much absinthe and hallucinate, an occasion for Lee to bring ridiculous freshness to what could have been a giant misstep.

The absinthe symbolizes the women's goal. They're supposed to let loose, but a bit of harsh reality stands in their way. As it turns out, Ryan's life is far from perfect. Her husband philanders and his current partner (Deborah Ayorinde) happens to be in New Orleans.

To further complicate the proceedings, Ryan runs into a former classmate with whom she obviously shares an unkindly romantic spark (Larenz Tate).

As for Pinkett-Smith's Lisa, she's contending with a young man (Kofi Siriboe) with a very large ... well .... you know.

As is the case with most raunchy comedies, Lee's -- co-written by Kenya Barris and Tracy Oliver -- is not without sentiment nor can it resist a bit of morale-boosting cheerleading for female empowerment. Oh well, those are standard ingredients in this kind of fare, as well.

All this is bolstered by brief appearances from Common, Diddy, Mike Epps and more.

Raunchy comedies aren't everyone's favorite, but for those who like them, Girls Trip will do quite nicely. It may even turn out to be one of summer's few real surprises.