Jennifer Garner: A Big (and funny) girl

After all that sexy ass-kicking on Alias and such films as Daredevil and the upcoming Elektra, it’s nice to see Jennifer Garner finally flex that comic muscle with the irresistible romantic comedy 13 Going On 30. Just call it Big with boobs: The year is 1987, and dorky 13-year-old Jenna Rink (Christa B. Allen) so desperately wants to be part of the Six Chicks (think Mean Girls’ Plastics in ‘80s outfits), headed by Tom-Tom (Alexandra Kyle). Jenna invites the clique to her birthday party, but then the event quickly spirals into disaster. Angry and frustrated, she makes a wish that she could be all grown up, and with the help of some magic wishing dust from best friend Matt (Jack Salvatore Jr.), Jenna wakes up the next day 30 years old; the once gawky teen who use to dance in her bedroom to Rick Springfield and Michael Jackson’s Thriller video is now a beautiful woman in a fabulous Manhattan apartment with fabulous clothes and is the fabulous editor of big-time fashion mag Poise – and her colleague? Tom-Tom (Judy Greer), now known as Lucy. Unsure about what’s happening, she locates the also-grown Matt (Mark Ruffalo) for answers: turns out Jenna did become a Six Chick, which is when their friendship began to dissipate. But as Jenna and Matt reconnect and relive their friendship, sparks begin to fly.

Okay, so an original plot it ain’t; it’s virtually a remake of the 1988 aforementioned Tom Hanks hit. But that even makes it more remarkable when the film achieves so much: 13 Going On 30 proves that a recycled storyline doesn’t stand in the way of sparkling wit, bubbly intelligence and an extraordinary leading lady. Director Gary Winick, who helmed 2002’s delightful sex comedy Tadpole, spotlights cinematic execution in place of an innovative premise, and what could’ve been a fatal move he is able to more than successfully pull off. The screenplay by Josh Goldsmith, Cathy Yuspa and Niels Mueller bursts with clever wit and humor, and has the right amount of balanced nostalgia and sugar-sweet effervescence.

But 13 Going On 30 also features Jennifer Garner’s star-making role: We’ve seen her do action and drama, and with this film she proves she can pull off comedy equally well, if not even better. Her performance as the 13-year-old in a 30-year-old’s body is reminiscent of Jamie Lee Curtis’ brilliant performance in last year’s Freaky Friday; Garner is able to convey a luminous warmth and innocence as Jenna, at the same time a sense of wackiness and clueless likeability, especially during her whole Thriller number at the Poise party, one of the film’s memorable highlights.

Trite as this statement sounds, 13 Going On 30 really is the rare comic gem that is able to please both age demographics: Tweens will revel in the film’s seemingly perpetual sweetness; the older crowd will love its nostalgic irony and humor (in one of the many fantastic scenes, grown-up Jenna quotes Pat Benatar’s Love is a Battlefield to a bunch of 13-year-olds at a slumber party: "We are young, heartache to heartache we stand…").

Bottom Line: Whether you drink Cosmos or from juice boxes, the compelling irresistibility of 13 Going On 30, one of the best, smartest, and funniest romantic comedies of the year, is undeniable.

Grade: A-

‘Exorcist: The Beginning’

Before all the pea soup-spewing and Linda Blair head-turning, Father Lankester Merrin, the priest who performed Regan’s exorcism in the 1973 classic, was an archaeologist whose faith was fleeting at the aftermath of World War II. In this prequel to The Exorcist, the scariest film of all time, Merrin (Stellan Skarsgard) travels to an archaeological site in Kenya where the British have discovered something extraordinary: An ancient church dating back centuries, long before Christianity arrived in Africa. However, as the dig continues, strange incidents occur among Merrin, Father William Francis (James D’Arcy), Sarah (Izabella Scorupco), the resident doctor, and the neighboring Turkana village. Something malevolent and evil has awoken underneath the church, and Father Merrin must find a way to it.

What is one of the most troubled film productions ever developed, Exorcist: The Beginning has endured ceaseless pitfalls to reach the big screen: First, it was the sudden, unexpected death of its first director, then its initial leading man, Liam Neeson, quit. Skarsgard was then hired with Paul Schrader set to direct, but Schrader was subsequently fired by the studio after he supposedly submitted a film that was too artsy and wasn’t scary enough. Final director Renny Harlin was hired, and he shot the entire movie all over again with a brand new cast, excluding Skarsgard. (I’d love to see Schrader’s version, and Warner Bros. has said it would eventually release it on DVD.)

Exorcist: The Beginning is nowhere near how terrifying or groundbreaking the original was. However, you should’ve already known that going in; I don’t think I will ever encounter a movie as scary as The Exorcist – at least not in my lifetime. But Exorcist: The Beginning does do a decent job as a typical horror film: It provides a good number of scares and chills, many of which are able to evoke real screams. But Harlin is truly able to frighten with his visuals; the cinematography sets a creepy, eerie mood, while there are several visually disturbing scenes, many with gore, that will stay with you, burnt into your memory.

Plot holes aside, Exorcist: The Beginning is a good, satisfying film that delivers the frights, and is the best Exorcist sequel/prequel to date. (Now that I think about it, that isn’t much of an achievement. Remember what a disaster The Exorcist II: The Heretic was?)

Bottom Line: Exorcist: The Beginning is a sufficiently scary, visually disturbing prequel, though it’s nothing (nothing!!) compared to the original.

Grade: B

To-Do List

Movies

•Watch 13 Going On 30, which opens this Wednesday, September 15.

•Watch Exorcist: The Beginning, which also opens this Wednesday, September 15.

TV

•Watch the MTV Video Music Awards tomorrow at 1:30 p.m. with an encore presentation on Sunday at 8:30 p.m. Has it already been a year since Britney and Madonna swapped spit at the VMAs? Oh, how time flies.

•Watch the 58th Annual Tony Awards, Sunday at 8 p.m. on Star World. Broadway’s most prestigious award had a number of surprises this year, namely the glorious upset of the critically lauded Muppets-for-adults musical Avenue Q over audience fave Wicked in the Best Musical category. But it’s the always-spectacular musical performances I really watch out for.

Award Show Countdown

Nine days left till the 56th Annual Emmy Awards

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For comments, e-mail me at lanz_gryffindor@yahoo.com.