Pitch Perfect 2 (2015)

I was planning to watch the first Pitch Perfect first, but my folks invited me to come to the theater with them. They adore a cappella and were already fans of at least one group who would appear briefly on screen. I like such singing almost as much, even when the singers cover a song I normally dislike.

My sister warned us that the writing was very stupid. Well, from what I hear of "Glee," that shouldn't stop anyone. In truth, I'd call it about par for intelligence among modern Hollywood comedies. And it is oh so much one of those.

Begin Again (2014)

Movies about fictitious musicians are a pretty big gamble for me. While biopics offer some true info if nothing else, the fiction pics don't even guarantee a single hit song. Their plots don't have a lot of variety, and some have little in the way of progression. As popular as Once was, I found it dull; as popular as Inside Llewyn Davis was, I found it numbing (and not in the Pink Floyd comfortable way).

BA, from the same director as Once, gets off to an unpromising start. Gretta's (Keira Knightley) opening song has a fine tune and lyrics but a lackluster presentation. Then we have a couple time jumps for background, which I failed to recognize as such until they made their way to the first scene. Gretta lags behind her partner-boyfriend in success and then breaks up with him in both senses. Meanwhile, drunk, divorced, deadbeat studio exec Dan (Mark Ruffalo in perhaps his least attractive role) gives teen Violet (Hailee Steinfeld) far more reason than usual to feel embarrassed by her father.

Fortunately, this is not a story about people going nowhere except maybe downward.