At Middleton (2014)

That was an excellent one.

Sorry, this movie sucks

Highly Overrated But Still Good

Good movie but grossly overrated

I do not want to spoil the plot in any way, so I'm just going to tell you my thoughts of the performances. Andy Garcia... gave an amazing performance. Vera Farmiga... I can only say WOW. These two really are amazing together in this film. I know this film isn't flashy in any way, and the story may bother some people, but the acting is simply brilliant. Taissa Farmiga and Spencer Lofranco also put in very good performances. I also thought the work of Danielle Garcia and Stephen Borello were performed very well.What I have noticed is that a movie such as this, isn't just the acting though. The writing and directing of this film are also done very well. It was a complete joy to for me to watch.Bottom Line: If you enjoy well Written Dialog; A film that is very well Acted and Directed, with some Romance. You'll love this movie.

"At Middleton" is a mid-life romance that suffers from a terminal case of the cutes. Edith (Vera Farmiga) and George (Andy Garcia) meet while taking their respective children, Audrey (Taissa Farmiga) and Conrad (Spencer Lofranco), on a tour of a fictional college (their respective spouses are conveniently unable to attend the event). While the kids are going through the official orientation, the two parents break off and conduct a tour of their own, exploring the campus as well as each other.Despite the best of intentions, "At Middleton" feels phony from the get-go. We get the sense that Edith and George are unreasonably antagonistic towards one another at the beginning just so they can become an item by the end. And things don't get any better from there, as the parents proceed to make fun of the tour guide, steal bikes from some unsuspecting students on campus, horn in on an acting class, smooch in a projection booth, get stoned in a dorm room, and in general act superior to everyone they meet, with corn, affectation and heavy-handed life lessons the order of the day.Though the movie tries very hard to achieve moments of "little people" sentimental uplift, virtually every scene in "At Middleton" emerges as hopelessly contrived and calculated, a reflection more on the screenwriters Glenn German and Adam Rogers (who also directed the movie) than on the actors, who do their best under the circumstances. Farigna, so impressive in TV's "Bates Motel," comes across as unnecessarily grating at times, the result of a grown woman behaving in a less mature fashion than her teenaged daughter perhaps, her joie de vivre and truth-telling assertiveness, which might have seemed refreshing in small doses, ultimately falling over the edge into obnoxiousness (though she does well playing opposite her real life daughter). As the buttoned-down heart surgeon who really needs to loosen up and learn how to enjoy life, Garcia is constrained by having to embody a character with no truly interesting or compelling personal traits (the fact that he's supposed to be that way doesn't exactly make him any more interesting).I know we're supposed to be moved and inspired by what's happening between Edith and George, but all I could think about while watching their story unfold is how some parents just can't help making what is supposed to be a special day for their kids really all about themselves.

Review: I didn't really find this movie realistic or even that funny, but it is quite a sweet love story between the 2 main characters. The whole film is set around a visiting day at a school which is were Garcia and Farmiga meet for the first time, and they end up wandering off, doing there own thing. It wasn't exactly what I as expecting from the movie, but it's light hearted fun which does tickle the heart strings. It ends pretty abruptly which was a dramatic change of tempo from the rest of the movie, which I think the director was trying to accomplish. In the end of the day, it's fun for the whole family, especially parents that have kids that are living them for further education. Watchable!Round-Up: I was really expecting a lot from Andy Garcia, but his latter years haven't been good to him in the movie world. From his earlier movies like the Godfather III and the Untouchables, he was the talk of the town at one point, but know he's lucky to be in a big Blockbuster. After playing those serious roles, it's hard to watch him make a fool of himself in this movie, but I'm sure that it won't hurt his portfolio. Vera Farmiga seems to act the same in all of her movies, so she was a great choice for this role. The movie wasn't really what I was hoping for, but it's good to see Garcia back on the big screen.Budget: $2.5million Worldwide Gross: $50,000 (Terrible!)I recommend this movie to people who are into there movies about a dad and mother who take there kids on a open day at college. 4/10

This "little film" is surprisingly ambitious — and effective. It subverts the college student rom-com by focusing on the parents at their nest emptying. For both generations this new liberation can be terrifying. As Edith tells another parent, the kids' departure leaves the parents realizing how little they know or are connected to their 18-year partners. The theatrical scene Edith plays with George reveals how a marriage can hide lives of quiet desperation. In the crowning irony, the two college roommates coolly watch the two adults getting stoned and acting wacky, under their knowing eye. The film also replays the old Benedict/Beatrice device of characters who initially snipe at each other gradually discovering themselves simpatico. George and Edith begin and end as opposites, but they switch poles. At first he's the rod-ass and she's the bohemian free spirit. She cures his fear of heights, he her temptation to be totally carefree. By the end he's loosened up enough to want to have an affair with her and she retreats to the safer ground of self-denial.Their respective kids replay that shift. Conrad leaves the security of his studly "million dollar smile" to pursue his disembodied, faceless role on campus radio. Wilder and more precocious Audrey takes to heart her idol's distinction between healthy ambition and unhealthy obsession.In both those relationships — and in the respective parents' scenes with their kids — there is ample demonstration of what Audrey reads from her idol's book: linguistics must deal with what is not said as much as with what is. Heard sentences are meaty but those unheard are meatier. Hence the really delicate work in facial expression and body language throughout, especially as the leads increasingly open up and connect. Hence the confessional Truth behind the two parents stage "performance."The campus name, Middleton, puts all its characters in some middle. The two teens are pivoting into adulthood. The two parents are turning from the stability of their unfulfilling marriages into self-realization — or not. Both turn passive at the moment of decision, as imaged in their letting their kids drive. When George prefers the long way home he's taking more time to face the life he dreads, to put behind the happier alternative he has just encountered. Informed by the reflections on French films, we don't get the usual American film's happy ending. But the chance remains. We're hoping this one-shot might lead to a Richard Linklater trilogy where we can follow these so very touching and appealing lovers into a happier afterlife. Finally the film is about what a college education should be. The two parents get a college education in one day when they meet new people, try out each other's alien perspectives and experience, act out exploratory expressions of themselves, learn to breathe more freely and deeply, get new insight into themselves and each other, test experimental things they never would in their outside (aka "real") lives, and end up significantly altered, illuminated, broadened in understanding and emotion, whichever road they pursue. It's an idyllic university, a slice of heaven, so the disciplines represented are literature, language, horticulture, the arts, and the pulse is in the library. The linguistics (!) professor's office is a jaw-dropper. The salutary absence of Business, High Tech, a football team, make the setting as Edenic as the two leads' romantic discovery. For more see www.yacowar.blogspot.com