Mr. & Mrs. Smith

Saturday-I have been working all week on the documentary, Discover Hetch Hetchy. It's been busy, but at least I get the weekend off. We saw the movie, Mr. & Mrs. Smith, which while fun, was cold. There's a moment where the two main characters ask each other if they ever lost any sleep over the assasinations they committed. Neither one ever did. Now that's harsh. They're both sociopaths, I thought. No wonder they're meant for each other. I liked the first half hour where the two actors do a great job of playing a man and wife in a marriage where neither one can ever really say what they want to each other, whether about their jobs, or about what they think about the new drapes. Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie look terrific, even under serious gunfire. I guess that's why they're movie stars. Or why there's a hairdressing and make-up department. There are also some funny moments where they hide their superhuman abilities, highly toned reflexes, balance, etc. Of course, there is no basis in reality here. I don't care how good you are, you can't be that physically perfect all the time. And why, after 5 years of marriage has Mr. Smith never figured out where his wife works? I guess it shows how neglectful they both were, but I just didn't buy it. Also, neither one of them get's seriously hurt even when surrounded by people shooting at them with machine guns. It's a kind of weird reality that only exists in movies. A kind of reality where being a hired killer somehow makes you the good guy in the movie. Well, it is only a movie, after all. Vince Vaughn has some really good moments here and you really do think he could turn in his best friend for a million dollars. He has the right mixture of opportunistic desperation and cold-bloodedness. And there's a great kind of Get Smart/James Bond production design, with guns and knives hidden in a compartment under the oven, accessed by a code punched in on the microwave keypad. The movie is violent in the way that movies are that want to apppeal to a PG-13 audience. People get shot through their kevlar vests, but they don't bleed. Also, it's surprisingly funny to kick a man you just killed and then to run over him as you steal a car. It's almost as if it's one of those violent video games where there is no moral or legal ramification for running over a person deliberately. Fun and witty, but cold, cold-hearted. It also reminded me of Fight Club, a very different Brad Pitt movie where the ramifications of violence were made very clear. Every single bruise and injury was emphasized and never lost their meaning-you get hurt and you hurt others when you fight. Whereas here, the effects of violence only serve to glorify the people committing violence without any effect on their emotional or physical life. Weird, huh?