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Connie and
Carla
(2004)
Starring:
Nia Vardalos, Toni Collette, David Duchovny
Director: Michael Lembeck
Rating:
PG-13
Studio:
Revolution
Release Date:
04.16.04
Review
Posted: 04.16.04
Spoilers:
Minor
"Connie
and Carla" a Real Drag
By
Sara M. Fetters
There is a point in
the exhaustingly unfunny new comedy “Connie and Carla” where I almost
felt I would change my mind about the film. With all the movie’s main
characters gathered together on a busy Southern California sidewalk,
an intruder has the indecency to call a man’s drag queen brother and
his group of friends, “freaks.”
What follows is one
of the most honest and undisturbed uncomfortable silences in recent
film memory. The two people most affected by the comment, flamboyant
bartender Robert, a.k.a. Peaches (Stephen Spinella, “Bubble Boy”), and
his confused straight brother Jeff (David Duchovny of “X-Files” fame),
can barely hold the other’s gaze. It is a chilling scene, one that
opens up “Connie and Carla” to travel into intriguing, thought
provoking dimensions. But the moment is quickly lost, the movie
instead choosing to travel down an insipid road of sitcom banality,
wasting its fine cast and the good will of an audience eager for just
this dynamic.
Not that I should
have been too surprised. In her first film since wowing audiences –
but not critics – with the hugely successful “My Big Fat Greek
Wedding,” screenwriter/star Nia Vardalos is not the most subtle of
filmmakers. Like her fist produced picture, this one hits viewers over
the head with its predictability and by-the-numbers comedic
sidestepping. Like an episode of particularly bad network television,
this movie hasn’t a clue as to do anything that doesn’t feel contrived
or unoriginal. It just doesn’t work, and even with a cast of
professionals working overtime to prove otherwise, this is one
dismally depressing motion picture reeking of missed opportunity.
In true “Sister
Act” meets “Victor/Victoria” fashion, “Connie and Carla” begins with
two airport lounge singers, Connie (Vardalos) and Carla (Toni
Collette, “The Japanese Story,” “About a Boy”), witnessing the brutal
murder of their employer by a drug dealer named Rudy (Robert John
Burke, “Confessions of a Dangerous Mind”). Quickly, they head
cross-country in their beat up brown and red station wagon to
Los Angeles, the one city in the country so devoid of dinner
theater Rudy would never think to find them there.
One night they
stumble into a local nightclub, conveniently located next door their
apartment, aghast to find it’s a gay bar. Aghast, that is, until
Connie has an epiphany: why not try out for the club’s opening for a
new drag queen act? As she points out to Carla, they know more about
being women than any drag queen does, and with their repertoire of
show tunes they can’t help but be a big hit. Even better, they can
really sing, none of that phony lip synch crap for the two of them.
Faster than you can say, “Julie Andrews,” this Adam’s Apple-impaired
duo are belting out songs to an adoring crowd of gay and straight
alike, their time-worn dreams of stardom finally becoming a pink
triangle-fueled reality. Things become complicated when Connie starts
falling for Jeff, risking their cover and credibility as L.A.’s
top drag duo. In short, Connie and Carla find themselves stuck in a
gender-bending struggle of their own g-stringed creation.
In all fairness,
there are some laughs to be found here. Some of it, like an opening
airport production number featuring excerpts from “Yentl,” “Jesus
Christ Superstar” and “Oklahoma,” is painfully comedically absurd,
while the banter between Lee and Robert is suitably bitchy to be
snickeringly enjoyable. Heck, almost all of the musical numbers are
fun to watch, both Vardalos and Collette beautiful singers bringing a
sublime elegance to the illusionary setting they find themselves in.
If only the film
had a pulse, or at least an ounce of originality! This isn’t just
paint-by-numbers, it’s outright plagiarism. Vardalos cribs so freely
from “Victor/Victoria,” “Tootsie,” “Some Like It Hot,” “Mrs. Doubtfire,”
even television’s “Bosom Buddies,” that at a certain point I wanted to
throw my arms up and start screaming. There isn’t a moment that isn’t
contrived, an emotion that’s not telegraphed, a scene that isn’t
dragged out of a better picture, “Connie and Carla” never generating
either the good will or the pleasing atmosphere it desperately needs
to be even remotely successful.
Even worse, it is a
waste of some of the best comedic talent working today. Duchovny is
wasted as the token – pardon the pun – straight man, having to endure
no matter of insults and slights by Vardalos’ acrid screenplay. As for
Collette, she disappears for such long stretches of the picture that I
couldn’t help but wonder if Vardalos was purposefully writing her out.
She keeps hinting at something more in her performance, finding shades
to Carla that are woefully untapped in the script. Director Michael
Lembeck (“The Santa Claus 2”) apparently had no idea what to do with
“Connie and Carla,” the picture drowning in its own predictability.
“Connie and Carla” is a drag.
Sara's Film Rating:
ê1/2 (out of
4)
"Connie and
Carla" Lavishes In Boredom
By
Christopher T. Bryan
Oh, Hollywood, how you astound me. Just
when I thought I could show my face in the multiplexes again you
go and disappoint me. When will you learn that dressing people
as the opposite sex, or as is the case in Connie and Carla,
women dressed as men dressed as women, is just not funny to
anyone over the age of 5?
After the huge
success of My Big Fat Greek Wedding, and the dismal failure of
the subsequent television series, Nia Vardalos (Connie, Screenwriter,
and Executive Producer) furthers the notion that Wedding was a
fluke. Sadly, when this ship sinks it takes the otherwise talented
Toni Collette (Carla) and David Duchovny (Jeff) with it.
Connie and Carla
are trying to live out their childhood dream of performing in a dinner
theater. During their performance at a local airport’s lounge they
witness a murder and come into possession of a package full of
cocaine. The killer sees them, so they make a run for it, leaving
behind their failing show, deadbeat boyfriends, and mothers (whom they
live with). The girls wind up in Los Angeles where, with very little
money, they somehow afford an apartment, manage to eat out, and go bar
hopping before they land jobs as drag queens at a local club. Of
course they can’t tell their secret to their new queen friends and
Connie falls in love with a man to whom she can’t reveal that she is
really a woman. All the while Carla feels more and more isolated by
not being her true self. Reasonably, lessons are learned by all,
self-fulfillment ensues, and in the end all of the t’s are crossed and
i’s dotted with everyone living happily ever after.
Except for the
audience that has to sit through this shamelessly poor movie that
drags out all of the stock characters, situations and songs that
Hollywood has up its sleeve. There are few things more awkward than
when a moment in a film passes that was intended to get a laugh and,
other than the munching of popcorn, the theater remains silent. The only
interesting part of the film is the relationship between Jeff
(Duchovny) and his cross-dressing brother, Robert (Stephen Spinella).
Jeff has been out of contact with Robert for years and finds him only
after tracking him down through a return address on a letter that
Robert sent home in a moment of weakness. Jeff must learn to accept
his brother’s lifestyle and make him feel as though he is part of the
family again. This sub-plot raises some interesting questions, and is
far more worthwhile and heart-felt than the premise of the movie, but
unfortunately, it is underplayed.
The acting is too
poor to comment on. At least Vardalos is enjoying herself as she sings
show tunes and plays dress-up. Collette, once an Academy Award
nominee, has no place in this movie. David Duchovny; did you really
leave the X-Files for this?
Avoid this
movie, instead go rent Tootsie and watch one of the lone funny
films involving characters dressed in drag
Chris' Film Rating:
ê (out of
4)
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