Review: The Fundamentals of Caring (2016)

There are some health-related movie themes forming just lately. 2015 was the year of children with cancer (The Fault in Our Stars, Me and Earl and the Dying Girl), and I’m hailing 2016 as the year of carers for the disabled (Me Before You, the upcoming movie The Carer and of course The Fundamentals of Caring). After being slightly traumatised by Me Before You earlier this year, I’m not sure why I stuck this one on whilst flicking through Netflix, but perhaps I like to torture myself.  I was bored on a Sunday afternoon and then I saw Paul Rudd's face and had to give this a go!

Ben (Paul Rudd) is a retired writer who has been through a traumatic experience. To fill his time, he qualifies as a carer, and lands himself a job caring for a teenage boy named Trevor (Craig Roberts), who is suffering from Duchenne muscular dystrophy (you totally had to google this!! Lies!). He has a set routine, mainly revolved around eating waffles and watching TV, and he has a fascination for American roadside attractions, his favourite being the world’s deepest pit, for how depressing it sounds.

Thankfully, The Fundamentals of Caring takes a ‘Little Miss Sunshine’ approach rather than something fully depressing, and soon into the movie, Ben takes Trevor on a road trip to see some of the sights Trevor has seen on TV. They also make an impromptu visit to see Trevor’s father who left when he was diagnosed at the age of 3, as he has been writing to Trevor ever since. Along the way they pick up a teenage girl on the run from her father (Selena Gomez) and a woman very close to giving birth (Megan Ferguson).  I don't know about you but I was on edge the whole time, I wasn't sure if this was a drama, a comedy or a dramedy so I was constantly panicking that something was going to happen to Trevor on the trip.  Part of me wants to watch it again so I can actually enjoy it for what it is now that I know what happens.

As Drama/Comedies go, the humour is dark, and mostly comes from Ben and Trevor’s banter with each other. Jokes about wiping arses are common, and on more than one occasion Trevor fakes choking and fitting, leaving Ben (and me! and me!) in an absolute state of panic. Haven’t you ever heard about the boy who cried wolf for goodness sake?! Although, this is exactly what I love the most about these kinds of movies. I can chuckle for the full runtime of a pure comedy, but these drama have those few absolute laugh out loud moments, and they end up being that much more memorable.  This had the same feeling for me as The Road Within, where the comedy moments were made all the more funny because of the dark drama on either side of it.

Still, the movie isn’t without fault. It’s a fairly short movie, and I’d have sat through another 20 minutes just to find out a little more about the supporting characters. It was a good idea to add to the cast rather than stick with Ben and Trevor, but I just didn’t care enough about the others. It’s not often I complain a movie isn’t long enough as well, normally I’m a fidget! I also felt something was lacking. There are certain key moments here dealing with trauma, loss and dejection, but they didn’t go quite deep enough to have me sobbing into my cup of tea. I felt those moments could have been ramped up a little, to pull on our heart strings a little more.  I was kind of glad they weren't ramped up this time, it was kind of nice to watch an emotional film without actually becoming a sobbing mess!!

I loved the chemistry between Roberts and Rudd, I wasn't sure about the addition of Selena Gomez to the group and I'm still not sure she added much value.  Mainly, as Allie suggested that we didn't get to know the supporting characters enough to actually care.

All in all though, I really enjoyed The Fundamentals of caring. I’ve always been a Paul Rudd fan but only noticed now how well he can handle a drama. Craig Roberts is one to watch out for, too. He was a delight to watch! I have to agree, I still want to watch it again though without being fully on the edge of my seat!!

Review: Hotel Transylvania 2 (2015)

As I have reiterated numerous times, I like Adam Sandler, most people don't like him and I will happily admit he has made some terrible films but Hotel Transylvania is one of my favourites so the sequel had to be watched.

It took me ages to eventually watch Hotel Transylvania, but I was surprised at how much I loved it, so I was really looking forward to the sequel.

Hotel Transylvania 2 follows on from the first one with Mavis (Selena Gomez) and Jonathan (Andy Samberg) married with a half human half vampire baby, however Dracula (Adam Sandler) is worried that his monster side hasn't come through yet.  To rectify the situation, Dracula sends Mavis to visit her human in-laws and recruits his monster friends to try to encourage Dennis' evil side to come out.

You didn't warn me the first few scenes would make me cry! I'm deep in the middle of a wedding hotel room drama so anything sweet and wedding related sets me off right now. Watching Dracula and Mavis' sweet moments made me do a bit of an ugly cry.

Straight up, this is not as good as the first one.  The jokes aren't as good and the story is pretty poor, however when it does pull a funny, it was really funny.  I laughed out loud countless times and was thoroughly entertained, no naps in this film!! I left my adult self at the door and spent an hour and a half being a kid again, laughing at fart jokes and trying to work out the which voice belongs to who from various Adam Sandler movies.  I was gobsmacked to find Nick Offerman yet again, that man is literally in everything...ever!  Also, did we know that he is married to the awesome Megan Mullally, why did I not know this?!  I would love to be a fly on the wall in that house!

You also didn't warn me that Nick freaking Offerman was in this! We need to talk. Also I had no idea until now that Nick Offerman and Megan Mullally are married. That's awesome on so many levels!

The animation is fantastic as well, the attention to detail never fails to amaze me in modern animation.  Particularly the scenes with big group, such as the birthday party, there are soo many other things happening in the background, I want to watch it again and again to catch them all.

I really enjoyed the story, although this is another case of the sequel not being quite so good. The jokes were okay, but not laugh out loud for me, other than one moment which struck a weird funny bone for me. That moment when both families are having a big meal together, and there's that phantom of the opera styled guy playing the organ. Someone says something a bit controversial and the organ guy just shouts 'AWKWARD' and I don't know why, but it was one of the funniest things I've ever seen!

Don't overthink it and you'll love it!

Definitely worth a watch, but I prefer the original!