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Matt sees this as his big chance and brings along his twin sister Wendy and best friend Barry as back-up. But both Wendy and Barry have their own drama. Matt, Wendy, and Barry head to the party looking to have a good time and end up having life-changing revelations through their night of revelry. I was bothered by one small scene in the beginning but the main character addresses it and apologizes for it later so I appreciated that. Matt gets to sleep with Tori but leaves her feeling shallow about it until he rebounds to save the day and build a romance in the end.
At first freaking out she eventually embraces the idea of driving to California, she agrees to pay him $1000 each day for 5 days, plus food and lodging expenses. Unfortunately she loses her purse and credit cards, they have to scramble to make it. Claire gets a phone message from her mom in Las Vegas, Claire's dad in California has taken sick and is in the hospital. At her wit's end she goes outside in the dark and rain, hails the first cab she sees, and says "Just drive" with no other instructions. This is a rather small independent movie brought to us by the husband and wife team of Jaeger and Jaeger.
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Matt confesses that he doesn't work at Goldman Sachs. Barry chastises Matt for not trying to have just one night of enjoyment and offers him a line of cocaine while driving. He tries to snort the cocaine, but ends up driving the convertible into a ditch. A police cruiser arrives, and it turns out to be Matt's dad. Already disappointed with his unwillingness to choose a career path, he further damages the convertible, coercing Matt to get a better job to pay off the damages.
The characters of Thom and Claire are made deliciously complex and we also see the other sides of their characters through close relatives and in Claire's case, her husband too. This helps to disrupt our ideas of where the story may go as the film reaches its conclusion. The instruction from Claire to Thom is to just "drive".
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The characters and the problems with which they dealt seemed real, could've been us or our family members. The filming showed off the country beautifully. The minor characters were well crafted, especially Clair's mother. As the action moves from the frenetic pace of the city through the numbing boredom of major highways to the serenity of nature's wide open spaces, the characters face their inner conflicts and fears. They grow separately, but in that way that others often see us more clearly than we can see ourselves, they also each contribute to the other.
It reminded me of movies like License to Drive, Fast Times at Ridgemont High, and Grosse Point Blank. I thought this was a better version of an homage to the 1980s than the movie, Hot Tub Time Machine. From the looks to the music, I loved hearing and seeing the 80s here.
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He apologizes for being such a failure, to which his dad replies that, as he's never tried, he has never reached failure. He wants Matt to take a shot at anything in life. Former Los Angeles Times film critic Betsy Sharkey is an award-winning entertainment journalist and bestselling author. In addition to her critical essays and reviews of about 200 films a year for The Times, Sharkey’s weekly movie reviews appeared in newspapers nationally and internationally. In “Take Me Home Tonight,” Topher Grace is completely out of place — and I mean in the actual movie, not just as the directionless MIT-grad working at a video store and living at home while he figures life out.
Seeking the lowest common denominator in every scene during the first and much of the second act, the movie rams its idea of madcap comedy at a viewer until numbness sets in. So when a tentative relationship between a guy at loose ends and the girl he carried a torch for during high school starts to surface, you barely notice. It wasn't funny enough to be a flat-out comedy, but it also didn't have much heart for a movie that wanted to occasionally take itself seriously.
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Thanks to the fine casting and the earnest devotion to the old, all-night-party genre, the movie works its warm, funny magic and casts a spell that's both nostalgic and naughty. It's so good-natured and sweet, in fact, that somehow the heavy language, sex, and drugs don't seem particularly shocking or offensive (but that doesn't mean that it's an age-appropriate pick for younger viewers). There are endless camera set-ups to define various groupings of characters who perform badly-written dialogue. Among these characters are Matt's twin sister Wendy and her boyfriend Kyle . Wendy is holding an envelope which will tell her if she has been accepted to "Cambridge University." Kyle thinks they should get married.
That scared me a bit but my wife and I watched it on Netflix streaming movies and found it nicely enjoyable. I don't review things often unless I feel really compelled to. The buildup of the relationship between these two was believable and I love how they handled themselves like adults would. This is a very sweet adventure road story romance. A lot of people will turn away because they will assume it's just another chic-flic love story. Now this is a very delicately woven romance, paced to coincide with the length of time it takes to cross the USA by taxi with some major interruptions along the way.
The Red One seems to have replaced the Panasonic DVX100 as the go-to camera for indie film-makers. Compared to many romantic films it stands out although I agree with comments that some guys may be bored. A very satisfying movie that deserves to be seen by more people then it will.
Rest of the cast fit their roles perfectly, with a huge cry to Chris Pratt and Dan Fogler. It's a romantic comedy plus a road trip with some family drama. And, sadly, that execution is only adequate, not great. The acting, the cinematography, even the story are fine. My husband and I saw this movie at the Savannah Film Fest, and we thought it was excellent.
For Claire, it's a marriage that is falling apart and a strained relationship with a father who just had a heart attack. For Thom, it's going broke pursuing a career he loves, and lying to his family about it out of shame and embarrassment. Indeed, it plays like an adult version of Hughes’ teen-movie SIXTEEN CANDLES, only with adults facing the dilemmas. The characters are entertaining, up to a point, with most of the main characters, except for the protagonist’s hedonistic sidekick, meant to be sweet rather than just lewd or immature.
Since high school Matt has been obsessed with Tori Fredreking , a beautiful and successful college graduate that he thinks is way out of his league. One day, Tori walks into Matt's video store and he decides that this is finally his moment. Matt pretends that he doesn't work in the store and re-introduces himself to Tori as a successful college graduate working in a financial firm. They make plans to meet up later at his twin sister Wendy's boyfriend's annual Labor Day party. Topher Grace was coming off That 70's Show in 2007 but really never had a truly strong role during the time period.
What could have made it better is a little more supportive comedy. I think "Take Me Home Tonight" relied too heavily on Dan Fogler's character for comedy purposes. All in all, was surprisingly funny, but very predictable in the same aspect. The film’s star, Topher Grace, has been a friend of fellow exec producer Gordon Kaywin since age 15. The two say they wanted to develop a comedy based on a longtime male friendship where high school and even college are very much in the rear-view mirror.
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