Spurring Bodine’s decision is the opportunity to beat her rival, Pat Candy – played by fellow Oscar victor Billy Bob Thornton – who is with the opposition. The film opens domestically October 30. That would mark another low turnout for Time Warner Inc.-owned studio Warner Bros. after high-profile flops like “Pan”. Entertainment Inc. and Ratpac-Dune Entertainment LLC. Plus better endings for all actors than what Our Brand Is Crisis offers only because it’s a lovable star like Bullock. She was introduced to George and they talked and spent time with one another. She looked more handsome than ever in this sheer cutout dress – do you agree? The do-anything candidates and unscrupulous mercenaries in “Our Brand is Crisis” are especially resonant now, she notes.
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In the movie, which fictionalizes material from a far superior 2005 documentary of the same name by Rachel Boynton, the Carville character has been changed into a female screwball who comes out of retirement to fix one more election-this time, for unpopular, do-nothing former Bolivian president Pedro Castillo.
Bullock is awfully entertaining as the no-nonsense, sardonic Jane-she’s not unlike her character in The Blind Side, except here she doesn’t have to be sweet at all-and her flirty standoffs with the cocky, contemptuous Pat are the film’s constant highlight.
When an audience member asked me why Sandra Bullock would agree to star or George Clooney would produce (with Grant Heslov), I could conjure only one explanation: They think this story will stagger us by revealing the double-dealing inherent in modern elections. “This is based on absolute reality”.
It’s more interesting to watch Jane struggle to turn her cold, conservative candidate into a warm and likeable victor, even when he punches a constituent in the face. Of course, the movie doesn’t see it that way: It’s too busy relying on a swelling orchestral score so that we’re moved by the film’s the-people-have-the-power message near the end. From scene to scene, she understands what the movie is supposed to be, and so she finds a tone, from the very first seconds, of balancing comedy and drama on a knife edge. She bought two of those.
Bullock rewards both attention and inattention. Without Jane and her team of American experts, the spirit of Bolivia is like the deflated football Jane sees in Eduardo’s ramshackle apartment. “This film is really about big business”, she said. And in the real Bolivian election of ’02, there was no rivalry between warring American spin doctors working for different candidates, because Goni was the only candidate who got that kind of help, in clear preference to his populist opponents on both the right and left. That means selling the notion that the country actually is in crisis – hence, the title. Our Brand is Crisis sends you home with this bumper sticker-sized sentiment.
Bullock: My quest started before this film when I was looking at comedies. The humor arrives as a result of the absurd things they’ll do to get the upper hand-or it should be where the best laughs are. Despite mixed early reviews, I loved it. and her.
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The problems are compounded by an ending that is hard to buy, not only in terms of story but in the direction it steers the main character. Ironically, Carville also figures in “Crisis“.
