I saw this movie today, and it was surprisingly funny. I hadn’t particularly wanted to go, but I was glad I did.
The entire audience laughed a lot. There were only a few really dumb things, and one character I could have written out, but the main character is so delightful and watchable and innocently kind that she is a pleasure to watch. And she holds many lessons.
There are a couple of questionable things for very young children and some bad language, but not a lot. My girls would love it, at 10 and 12. I think they can handle it.
Shelley (Anna Farris is charming in the part and makes the movie) is living the life of her dreams at the Playboy Mansion. She feels the mansion has given her the home she never had before. (The movie begins with a short montage of her early childhood spent in an orphanage, until she finally found acceptance and a sense of family. This is not dwelt upon, but you might need to be aware of it.)
Hugh Hefner plays himself in several cameos in the movie. It’s good to see his health has improved. I hadn’t realized he was in it.
When Hugh goes off for a time, immediately after Shelley’s 27th birthday party, she is presented with a letter from him giving her 2 hours to leave the premises as she is now ‘too old.’ 27 is now evidently 59 in Bunny years.
How she finds herself the housemother of what likely began as Zeta (Zeta Tau Alpha) but morphed into a close cousin in name, is part of the poignancy and fun. The girls in the house need to pledge 30 girls in order not to lose their charter. How she turns them into a viable sorority is a delight.
There is a typical sorority bitch that has shown up in several movies. (And there is a Bunny bitch too.) In a way this movie is like a female version of Sydney White, but we liked it better. (The theater rated it 3 out of 5.)
It’s easy to imagine Elle Woods living this life. (Colin Hanks plays her love interest.)
She’s definitely a likeable bimbo, and you can’t help but root for her. Many scenes touched my heart.
Fearless Fourteen continues the comic saga of Stephanie Plum and her cohorts in bond enforcement. Along the way there are the requisite crimes to solve to the tune of $9 million missing from a heist. Then add to the mix being stalked by the perpetrators who are dying one by one. Complicate it with the kidnapping of a cousin of Morelli’s, and it gets more and more crazy.
If you are a fan of this saga, you will appreciate this latest caper. So many of the characters seem like old friends — Lula, the overweight ex-’ho, who has no concept that she dresses for a woman half her size; Grandma Mazur, who is always a hoot and never acts her age; Joe Morelli, the longsuffering cop who loves Stephanie in his own way; Ranger, hot as hades; and assorted other characters who add to the zaniness — Zook who is totally absorbed in an online game until he is asked to watch Morelli’s house –saved by potatoes; Brenda, the 61 year old singer, who is being stalked by a man who claims to be prescient, then she wants to be an interviewer…
Ranger was sort of periphery in this book. He could have had more of a part. Lula is planning her wedding to Tank, who can’t quite remember how he got roped into it. Stephanie holds it all together, while at the same time she creates situations that for any other person would mean disaster.
I laughed a lot, either because it was funny or because it was so hard to believe.
I give it a 2.5. It wasn’t as good as some of her books, but it was a happy read for summer.
I enjoyed this book by Fern Michaels. It is only the second one I’ve read by her.
Central to the story are three sisters ranging in age upwards from 69. They were so funny to me, especially when they instigate a ‘kidnapping’ of sorts, which is really a rescue. I suppose what I like about them is that I want to be like them when I get to that point in life — feisty, involved, loving, fun to be around, engaged in what is going on around them, taking care of their families. I wasn’t enamored of the amount of drinking they did. And there is a brief mention of a child born and left to be raised in Japan.
Alongside their stories (and two brief forays into romance for two of them) is the story of their grown niece, interwoven with the stories of the historical nature of where they live, as well as those who live in their neighborhood.
Also central to the story is the subject of organ donation (which was done against the will of well-beloved character.) It ultimates in finding those who received the donations (by computer hacking) — and ultimately redemption.
It is a story of love, affirmation and good will, with a tidy ending, perhaps tidier than real life would be, but evidencing forgiveness.
I think I enjoyed it as much for the older women and their relationship to each other as anything. In some ways they reminded me of a beloved grandmother. While there are difficult subjects tackled, they are tackled in a light way. Sort of like the substance of whipped cream. Not real satisfying, but an attempt to be deeper than the average romance novel.
This book is a delicious romp, with some serious issues handled through the story and the relationships, but in ways that you care about the characters and don’t look at them with a jaundiced eye. Most of us have known someone who might act this way, given half a chance. And most of us have felt the brunt of some of this, even if in lesser degree.
Again, I was struck by the cover (which was what made me choose it) — both the illustration and the clever title with its play on words to the English idiom, “Wolves in sheep’s clothing.” (It gave me the opportunity to define the idiom to my younger girls.) And because it said chic clothing, I hoped it would be as fashionably interesting as it turns out to be.
Oh my, this story is a lark! Filled with twenty-something abbreviations, it is Mean Girls grown up. I read nearly every word so as not to miss any of the humor or the abbreviations. The authors skewer anybody and everything. They even skewer themselves:
Lell: “My number-one priority is discretion…I don’t like to have people who are loose-lipped working close to me [she has security cameras trained on everyone]…I don’t gossip about my coworkers, and I expect — no, no demand the same from them. Besides the fact that we have no friends in common, you don’t seem the type to waste time on meretricious persiflage.”
Julia (thinking): Meretricious persiflage? What the hell was that? “Of course not. I am like a vault…” And God, what had she told Douglas so far? She’d need to put a filter on that.
Lell: I didn’t think so. Because gossip is really just tacky and harmful…In fact, there are two girls that I’m sort of friends with, and they have a book deal to write about twenty-something Park Avenue debutantes. I think it’s really shameful and tacky.” p 64
It has everything — a thoroughly likable main character, Julia; love; sex; morality; sexless marriage (and adultery and wished-for adultery); a pedophile married to one of the women; extreme wealth and those who have wealth, but can never keep up; four friends who are variably supportive of each other; gay men (friends with the heroine Julia) who later enter into marriage in Canada; foreign phrases used to separate the knowledgeable from the less knowledgeable…
All this is delivered with a camera’s eye, dished up with humor, while we laughingly wince at the character flaws, which are our own, but exaggerated enough to make them palatable.
Julia has naturally what the others need to develop — style with a capital “S.” She works at Pelham’s jewelry store, a mere peon in the system, until she is noticed by Lell, the store heiress, when she is asked to deliver a necklace on Lell’s wedding day. Julia is handcuffed to the briefcase containing the necklace and escorted by security. While there, she knows intuitively how the bridal attendants can successfully wear the normally staid and old-ladyish Pelham jewelry (which is delivered in a second delivery), by making some deceptively simple changes.
Suddenly Julia becomes the pawn in Lell’s and Polly’s makeovers. Both see her potential and feel it will reflect well on them if they are her mentor. Lell really has nothing to prove with the snobbery to bring it home, but Polly is playing catch up. Julia finds herself thrust into the world of trust funds (and lack of), loveless marriages, the milieu of high fashion, and more. She loses herself for a bit, but never completely loses her good sense, her kindness, her sense of seeing the good in everyone, even when they treat her crassly.
I rate it a 5. I chuckled out loud more than once, and I look forward to reading their first book on the off chance that it is similar to this one.
BTW, this would make a great movie!
Have you read it? If you like the relationship between the women in Sex and the City or the cattiness of The Devil Wears Prada, this is a book you will thoroughly enjoy.
Karin
If you are looking for interesting jewelry or bridal attendant gifts, look to Inky Productions. You can find more information at her blog. Her MySpace.
I know several people who are Fannie Flagg fans, but this is the first book I’ve read of hers. Two different people loaned it to me at two different times, and I finally got around to really getting into it vs. just looking through it. The second time it was loaned to me, I was told that she laughed all the way through and just loved it.
It took me a while to get into this book (obviously!) Every character has a narration voice — that takes a bit of getting used to, but makes the book more interesting. It truly was a funny book. I suspect we’d feel this way if we were cognizant of other people’s thought processes.
Flagg looks at her subjects with compassion. Their foibles are highlighted, but gently.
Imagine the consternation when a beloved older member of the community is pronounced dead, then several hours later abruptly sits up in the hospital and starts talking. The village hot line broadcasts her death immediately. Neighbors go in to straighten her house. They are all in mourning. We learn why she is so beloved, the many kindly things (and much more interesting than her daughter or son-in-law would expect) she has done over the years. We learn how she spends her time when she is dead. Throw in assorted characters: a would-be rapist; a murder; a hidden gun; a hidden body; a young man lifted out of his circumstances; the popular hair dresser; the obsessive daughter; the hospital attorney; the son-in-law who stops every day before going to work…
It’s really a lovely book, one that makes you think, one that makes you smile and laugh out loud, one with a bit of melancholy, but hope for a life well lived. I enjoyed her time between death and living again.
