Set in some kind of fascist America in the year 2022, crime is lower than ever. Unemployement and poverty are almost gone, and once a year crime is legal for 12 hours. The way it's explained to people is that it's in our nature to be violent, and if we have one day a year to let it all out, then we will be better behaved the rest of the year.
This is an interesting concept, and I could see it being used for a fun, violent grindhouse type movie. Something like Death Race 2000, Running Man, or even Hunger Games. What would this kind of society be like? What would you do if anything was legal once a year?
The problem is instead of having fun with this concept and seeing what happens out in the streets, the entire movie takes place inside one house. Ethan Hawke and his family have the house sealed up and plan on staying inside all night until the purge is over. For reasons I won't say, people eventually get into the house and it becomes a simple home invasion story.
The movie spends too much time building up to the purge. After all this buildup, nothing happens for a good 20-30 minutes. It's only the last half hour or so that stuff starts to happen. It doesn't really make much sense for the best home security system around, built specifically to keep a family safe from intruders, would be so easy to get around. Once the bad guys show up and say they are going to get in, Ethan Hawke tells his wife that yes, it won't be very hard for them to break in.
Mild spoilers (which won't really hurt your enjoyment of the movie) - what was the daughter's boyfriend's plan? He hides inside the house, has a gun, and waits until the house is locked up before he goes to tell her dad that he loves her? Why did he bring the gun? I thought he was positioning himself inside the house so he would be able to terrorize the family once the purge began. Was his plan to kill Ethan Hawke? It wasn't clear what his intention was, since he confronts the dad at the same time the homeless guy gets in. There is a quick shootout, the homeless guy is loose somewhere, and the boyfriend is dead. It seems like that was really pointless. They could have removed the boyfriend character and it wouldn't have affected the movie at all.
Also, once the parents know that their home is about to be invaded, they do the dumbest things imaginable. They don't try to make any kind of plan. They don't go find a good place to fight from. They don't even stay together, to watch each other's backs. They could have started shooting the bad guys as soon as the door was open. But no, they let the invaders walk in, they split up, and walk around the darkened house with guns, hoping to shoot first.
I was bored and annoyed by this movie. Bored because it's mostly setup with very little payoff, and annoyed because they could have done so much more with this premise. Hopefully there will be a direct to DVD sequel that will have some balls, which this movie doesn't.
Thursday, June 13, 2013
Now You See Me - 3 stars
Four magicians (including Jesse Eisenberg and Woody Harrelson) are recruited by a mysterious benefactor to do ... something. We don't know what. A year after they are brought together, they perform a show in Las Vegas where a man is picked at random from the audience, teleported into a bank vault half way around the world, and the money from the vault rains down on the audience.
Did they really teleport him, or is it just an illusion? If it was, then how is it the bank was really robbed? The FBI figure they were responsible, they just don't know how they pulled it off. So after questioning and releasing them, an FBI agent (Mark Ruffalo) follows them to New Orleans to witness their next show.
Going in, I thought this would be a movie about magicians. But it's really a caper film. And the main character is the FBI agent. We spend a lot more time watching him track the magicians than we do with the magicians themselves.
My biggest problem with the movie is the magic acts themselves. As anyone who has ever been to a magic show knows, you know you're watching a trick. The fun is trying to figure out how it was done. Or you don't try, and you just enjoy the illusion. Movies can use editing and special effects to pull off any trick. That's ok, as long as the filmmakers don't make the trick look like CGI. The Prestige was a great example of this. I'm sure they used editing to make it look like Christian Bale and Hugh Jackman were pulling off those illusions, but they looked like tricks a human could perform in the real world (except for the teleportation stuff at the end, but that was part of the story).
In this movie, they do tricks that are impossible. For example, when they make the teleportation device appear on stage. Nothing wrong with taking an empty stage, pulling a black cloth in front of the audience, and then having the cloth drop to reveal a big machine. But in this movie, the black cloth has to appear out of thin air and fly around the stage. It's obviously CGI. Also the bit where the magicians blow big bubbles and fly out over the audience is rediculous.
So I would have liked the movie more if they had tried a bit harder to make the magic shows seem like real magic shows. I kept expecting them to reveal that these guys were wizards with real magic power. But in the end, it's all supposed to have been illusion.
Also, the ending kind of ruins it. I won't spoil who the mysterious benefactor is or what his/her motiviations are, but it feels like a letdown.
Anyway, I'm giving the movie 3 stars because I still enjoyed it. Ruffalo carried the story well and I was never bored. Not a bad heist movie.
Did they really teleport him, or is it just an illusion? If it was, then how is it the bank was really robbed? The FBI figure they were responsible, they just don't know how they pulled it off. So after questioning and releasing them, an FBI agent (Mark Ruffalo) follows them to New Orleans to witness their next show.
Going in, I thought this would be a movie about magicians. But it's really a caper film. And the main character is the FBI agent. We spend a lot more time watching him track the magicians than we do with the magicians themselves.
My biggest problem with the movie is the magic acts themselves. As anyone who has ever been to a magic show knows, you know you're watching a trick. The fun is trying to figure out how it was done. Or you don't try, and you just enjoy the illusion. Movies can use editing and special effects to pull off any trick. That's ok, as long as the filmmakers don't make the trick look like CGI. The Prestige was a great example of this. I'm sure they used editing to make it look like Christian Bale and Hugh Jackman were pulling off those illusions, but they looked like tricks a human could perform in the real world (except for the teleportation stuff at the end, but that was part of the story).
In this movie, they do tricks that are impossible. For example, when they make the teleportation device appear on stage. Nothing wrong with taking an empty stage, pulling a black cloth in front of the audience, and then having the cloth drop to reveal a big machine. But in this movie, the black cloth has to appear out of thin air and fly around the stage. It's obviously CGI. Also the bit where the magicians blow big bubbles and fly out over the audience is rediculous.
So I would have liked the movie more if they had tried a bit harder to make the magic shows seem like real magic shows. I kept expecting them to reveal that these guys were wizards with real magic power. But in the end, it's all supposed to have been illusion.
Also, the ending kind of ruins it. I won't spoil who the mysterious benefactor is or what his/her motiviations are, but it feels like a letdown.
Anyway, I'm giving the movie 3 stars because I still enjoyed it. Ruffalo carried the story well and I was never bored. Not a bad heist movie.
Friday, May 31, 2013
After Earth - 3 stars
Even though this movie is set in the future, it's basically a simple survival story. Will Smith supposedly got the idea from watching a news story about a man and his son surviving after a plane crash.
It's 1,000 years in the future. Since we polluted the heck out of it, humans have left Earth and settled a new planet, Nova Prime. Will Smith plays Cypher Raige, a respected colonel in the ranger corps, and his son is Kitai (Jaden Smith), a cadet who just failed to advance to the rangers. The two are on a ship traveling through space when they hit an asteroid field. They crash land on Earth, the rest of the crew is killed, the emergency beacon is damaged, and they have to go find the other emergency beacon. The problem is it's in the tail, which is 100 kilometers away. Oh, and the father's legs are broken, so the son will have to go do it by himself.
Kitai's space suit is equipped with cameras, so Cypher can stay on the ship and see everything his son sees. This way he can warn him before any beasts attack. He can also guide him to where he needs to go, and advise him when he runs into trouble.
Ok, problems with this movie. First of all, the opening 20 minutes is badly written. Every line of dialogue does nothing but further the plot. No one has a conversation, and we don't learn anything about the characters except Cypher is a hard ass and Kitai wants to be a ranger. The movie takes itself so seriously. It's too on-the-nose and earnest, with overly dramatic music. We have just met these characters, and the movie expects us to feel the drama. Sorry, but I don't care about these characters until I get to know them a little.
Also, for some reason everyone speaks with this vague southern accent that's sometimes really hard to understand. The movie opens with voiceover narration, and I thought Jaden Smith hadn't learned that actors are supposed to enunciate. The accent kind of comes and goes, depending on the urgency of the scene.
It's also very predictable. You will see every threat coming a mile away, especially the showdown with the ursa, a dangerous creature that can smell fear.
Despite all of that, I enjoyed the movie for what it was. Once they crash and Kitai has to leave his father and the safety of the ship, I felt his fear. Besides a survival story, it's also a coming of age story. Kitai has to learn to be a man and not depend on his father to save him.
There are some cool sci-fi ideas in this movie. Their home planet's gravity is different than Earth, so Kitai says his body feels heavy. Of course, the movie abandons this idea 30 seconds later, as Kitai is able to run and run without getting tired. If gravity was that different, wouldn't walking exhaust him? Oh well. Also, oxygen is different than on their home planet, so he has to ingest some kind of liquid oxygen that coats his lungs. They only last about 24 hours and he has just enough to make it to the tail section.
Just for fun, I have to point out a few things that bugged me. Besides the video screens, Cypher also has a radar that shows Kitai as a green dot, and any other creatures as red dots. He sees when a monkey is approaching his son. He warns him that there is a life form 50 meters away and he has plenty of time to prepare. But a minute later when 30 more monkeys show up, Cypher has no warning. And why the hell does the eagle save Kitai? That was just dumb.
Also, Cypher tells Kitai that every creature is dangerous. He says everything on this planet has evolved to kill humans. So if there were a shorter route, wouldn't it make sense to suggest that route? No, he has him set out on foot. Then when his supply of oxygen packs run low, Kitai suddenly has the option of doing a sky jump. He can jump off a cliff and his suit opens and becomes a glider. This will cut a day or two off his trip. Why not plan to go that way from the start? Because it's too scary? Isn't it more dangerous and frightening to walk through the dangerous forest days than to base jump?
Even worse, when faced with the choice of jumping or returning to the ship, Cypher says to return to the ship. He has already told Kitai that if he doesn't make it to the tail, then they will both die. So rather than have his son do a sky jump, he is prepared to give up and let them both die. That doesn't make sense.
Ok, enough about this movie. I think I'm being generous giving it 3 stars, but I enjoyed it for what it was.
It's 1,000 years in the future. Since we polluted the heck out of it, humans have left Earth and settled a new planet, Nova Prime. Will Smith plays Cypher Raige, a respected colonel in the ranger corps, and his son is Kitai (Jaden Smith), a cadet who just failed to advance to the rangers. The two are on a ship traveling through space when they hit an asteroid field. They crash land on Earth, the rest of the crew is killed, the emergency beacon is damaged, and they have to go find the other emergency beacon. The problem is it's in the tail, which is 100 kilometers away. Oh, and the father's legs are broken, so the son will have to go do it by himself.
Kitai's space suit is equipped with cameras, so Cypher can stay on the ship and see everything his son sees. This way he can warn him before any beasts attack. He can also guide him to where he needs to go, and advise him when he runs into trouble.
Ok, problems with this movie. First of all, the opening 20 minutes is badly written. Every line of dialogue does nothing but further the plot. No one has a conversation, and we don't learn anything about the characters except Cypher is a hard ass and Kitai wants to be a ranger. The movie takes itself so seriously. It's too on-the-nose and earnest, with overly dramatic music. We have just met these characters, and the movie expects us to feel the drama. Sorry, but I don't care about these characters until I get to know them a little.
Also, for some reason everyone speaks with this vague southern accent that's sometimes really hard to understand. The movie opens with voiceover narration, and I thought Jaden Smith hadn't learned that actors are supposed to enunciate. The accent kind of comes and goes, depending on the urgency of the scene.
It's also very predictable. You will see every threat coming a mile away, especially the showdown with the ursa, a dangerous creature that can smell fear.
Despite all of that, I enjoyed the movie for what it was. Once they crash and Kitai has to leave his father and the safety of the ship, I felt his fear. Besides a survival story, it's also a coming of age story. Kitai has to learn to be a man and not depend on his father to save him.
There are some cool sci-fi ideas in this movie. Their home planet's gravity is different than Earth, so Kitai says his body feels heavy. Of course, the movie abandons this idea 30 seconds later, as Kitai is able to run and run without getting tired. If gravity was that different, wouldn't walking exhaust him? Oh well. Also, oxygen is different than on their home planet, so he has to ingest some kind of liquid oxygen that coats his lungs. They only last about 24 hours and he has just enough to make it to the tail section.
Just for fun, I have to point out a few things that bugged me. Besides the video screens, Cypher also has a radar that shows Kitai as a green dot, and any other creatures as red dots. He sees when a monkey is approaching his son. He warns him that there is a life form 50 meters away and he has plenty of time to prepare. But a minute later when 30 more monkeys show up, Cypher has no warning. And why the hell does the eagle save Kitai? That was just dumb.
Also, Cypher tells Kitai that every creature is dangerous. He says everything on this planet has evolved to kill humans. So if there were a shorter route, wouldn't it make sense to suggest that route? No, he has him set out on foot. Then when his supply of oxygen packs run low, Kitai suddenly has the option of doing a sky jump. He can jump off a cliff and his suit opens and becomes a glider. This will cut a day or two off his trip. Why not plan to go that way from the start? Because it's too scary? Isn't it more dangerous and frightening to walk through the dangerous forest days than to base jump?
Even worse, when faced with the choice of jumping or returning to the ship, Cypher says to return to the ship. He has already told Kitai that if he doesn't make it to the tail, then they will both die. So rather than have his son do a sky jump, he is prepared to give up and let them both die. That doesn't make sense.
Ok, enough about this movie. I think I'm being generous giving it 3 stars, but I enjoyed it for what it was.
Friday, May 17, 2013
Star Trek Into Darkness - 3 stars
This is going to be a tough review to write. There is a lot I can say about the new Star Trek movie, but I don't want to spoil the surprises. The less you know about it going in, the more fun you will have. Sometime next week I will post another review where I will get into more detail about what I liked and what I didn't like about it. Despite my 3 star review, I had quite a few problems with the script.
In 2009's Star Trek, we were introduced to the new crew. J. J. Abrams rebooted the franchise, but using time travel he was able to say this story takes place in the same universe as the original Star Trek, just in a different timeline. This gives him license to write his own stories without worrying about official Star Trek cannon. He can have characters do whatever he wants and tell whatever stories he wants. So why did he have to go and ... no, not going to get into that now.
The movie begins with Kirk and McCoy running from some kind of tribal natives. Kirk stole something from their temple, and the natives are throwing spears at them (very reminiscent of Raiders of the Lost Ark). Why did Kirk steal their sacred artifact? We aren't told, and he ends up leaving it behind to distract the natives. Kirk and McCoy end up jumping off a cliff into the ocean, which works fine because the laws of physics don't apply when the script demands it. Sorry, but I'm getting tired of movies that have the hero jump off a cliff or a bridge (Skyfall) and just because they land in water, they survive. No, if you fall from that high, landing in water is like landing on concrete.
Anyway, I digress. The reason they are on that planet is to stop a volcano from erupting, which would kill the entire civilization (as in all Star Trek, the entire population of a planet lives withing a 50 mile radius). The people are primitive and have no knowledge of space travel or other worlds, so it would violate the prime directive to let them see the ship. But Spock is stuck in the volcano and they need to beam him out, so Kirk violates the prime directive and saves Spock. No problem with that, it's typical for Kirk to do something like that. And it nicely sets up some conflict between the characters. Rather than thank Kirk for saving his life, Spock is upset that Kirk violated the prime directive.
The plan seems very poorly thought out. They really didn't know that the shuttle and the cable wouldn't be able to handle the heat from the volcano? It's surprising that Spock couldn't think of a better plan. And there is a lot of talk about how they aren't supposed to interfere with the planet's destiny, yet no one mentions that stopping the volcano is exactly what they were doing.
Soon we will meet the villain of the movie, the terrorist John Harrison (Benedict Cumberbatch). Harrison is angry about something, and he wants to punish the federation. First he destroys a Starfleet building in London, then he shows up in San Francisco and opens fire on a room full of high ranking officers (reminded me of Godfather 3).
From there, the plot is basically about Kirk and company going to capture Harrison and bring him to justice. I enjoyed the setup and the conflict between the characters. The funniest bit was about Spock and Uhura having a fight. You will remember from the first movie that the two were dating. Seeing a Vulcan try to understand an angry woman is hilarious.
Chris Pine is good as Kirk (even though he is a little too young for the part), and Zachary Quinto makes a very good Spock. Karl Urban makes a good Bones, but I got a little tired of him in this movie. He's kind of a one note character, and his crankyness gets old if it's used too much. Simon Pegg is a very different Scotty, but he's great comic relief. The character I really don't like is Anton Yelchin's Chekov. His accent bugged me.
The best character in the movie was John Harrison. If you haven't seen the BBC series Sherlock starring Benedict Cumberbatch as Sherlock Holmes and Martin Freeman as Dr. Watson, check it out. Cumberbatch is a very exciting actor, and he is a joy to watch. Harrison is a mystery in this movie. At first, he's plotting these attacks without doing or saying much. Then he's captured, and you get the feeling he wanted to be captured. Standing in his cell, he is reminiscent of Hannibal Lector. You get the impression he has Kirk and crew exactly where he wants them at all times.
One of my complaints is that Cumberbatch is not on screen enough. He is built up to be this terrifying villain, and the movie builds to this point where it feels like the real fight is about to begin, and then it's over after 5 minutes. It felt a bit anticlimactic.
The movie throws in a lot of references to the original TV series and movies. I think they relied on that too much. A few references here and there are fun, and only the most hard core Trek fans will catch them all. But at some point Abrams and company need to have confidence to tell their own original story, without trying to rehash previous Star Trek plots. By the end I felt like I had seen all this before. There were also a lot of plot holes that could have been fixed if they had spent a little more time with the script.
That being said, I still enjoyed the movie. It was a lot of fun, and you don't have to be a Trekkie to enjoy it. And Peter Weller plays an admiral. It's nice to see Robocop in a movie again.
In 2009's Star Trek, we were introduced to the new crew. J. J. Abrams rebooted the franchise, but using time travel he was able to say this story takes place in the same universe as the original Star Trek, just in a different timeline. This gives him license to write his own stories without worrying about official Star Trek cannon. He can have characters do whatever he wants and tell whatever stories he wants. So why did he have to go and ... no, not going to get into that now.
The movie begins with Kirk and McCoy running from some kind of tribal natives. Kirk stole something from their temple, and the natives are throwing spears at them (very reminiscent of Raiders of the Lost Ark). Why did Kirk steal their sacred artifact? We aren't told, and he ends up leaving it behind to distract the natives. Kirk and McCoy end up jumping off a cliff into the ocean, which works fine because the laws of physics don't apply when the script demands it. Sorry, but I'm getting tired of movies that have the hero jump off a cliff or a bridge (Skyfall) and just because they land in water, they survive. No, if you fall from that high, landing in water is like landing on concrete.
Anyway, I digress. The reason they are on that planet is to stop a volcano from erupting, which would kill the entire civilization (as in all Star Trek, the entire population of a planet lives withing a 50 mile radius). The people are primitive and have no knowledge of space travel or other worlds, so it would violate the prime directive to let them see the ship. But Spock is stuck in the volcano and they need to beam him out, so Kirk violates the prime directive and saves Spock. No problem with that, it's typical for Kirk to do something like that. And it nicely sets up some conflict between the characters. Rather than thank Kirk for saving his life, Spock is upset that Kirk violated the prime directive.
The plan seems very poorly thought out. They really didn't know that the shuttle and the cable wouldn't be able to handle the heat from the volcano? It's surprising that Spock couldn't think of a better plan. And there is a lot of talk about how they aren't supposed to interfere with the planet's destiny, yet no one mentions that stopping the volcano is exactly what they were doing.
Soon we will meet the villain of the movie, the terrorist John Harrison (Benedict Cumberbatch). Harrison is angry about something, and he wants to punish the federation. First he destroys a Starfleet building in London, then he shows up in San Francisco and opens fire on a room full of high ranking officers (reminded me of Godfather 3).
From there, the plot is basically about Kirk and company going to capture Harrison and bring him to justice. I enjoyed the setup and the conflict between the characters. The funniest bit was about Spock and Uhura having a fight. You will remember from the first movie that the two were dating. Seeing a Vulcan try to understand an angry woman is hilarious.
Chris Pine is good as Kirk (even though he is a little too young for the part), and Zachary Quinto makes a very good Spock. Karl Urban makes a good Bones, but I got a little tired of him in this movie. He's kind of a one note character, and his crankyness gets old if it's used too much. Simon Pegg is a very different Scotty, but he's great comic relief. The character I really don't like is Anton Yelchin's Chekov. His accent bugged me.
The best character in the movie was John Harrison. If you haven't seen the BBC series Sherlock starring Benedict Cumberbatch as Sherlock Holmes and Martin Freeman as Dr. Watson, check it out. Cumberbatch is a very exciting actor, and he is a joy to watch. Harrison is a mystery in this movie. At first, he's plotting these attacks without doing or saying much. Then he's captured, and you get the feeling he wanted to be captured. Standing in his cell, he is reminiscent of Hannibal Lector. You get the impression he has Kirk and crew exactly where he wants them at all times.
One of my complaints is that Cumberbatch is not on screen enough. He is built up to be this terrifying villain, and the movie builds to this point where it feels like the real fight is about to begin, and then it's over after 5 minutes. It felt a bit anticlimactic.
The movie throws in a lot of references to the original TV series and movies. I think they relied on that too much. A few references here and there are fun, and only the most hard core Trek fans will catch them all. But at some point Abrams and company need to have confidence to tell their own original story, without trying to rehash previous Star Trek plots. By the end I felt like I had seen all this before. There were also a lot of plot holes that could have been fixed if they had spent a little more time with the script.
That being said, I still enjoyed the movie. It was a lot of fun, and you don't have to be a Trekkie to enjoy it. And Peter Weller plays an admiral. It's nice to see Robocop in a movie again.
Iron Man 3 - 3 stars
Better than Iron Man 2, possibly better than Iron Man 1 but not as much fun.
After 2 Iron Man movies and The Avengers, seeing Tony Stark flying around in the Iron Man suit just isn't that exciting anymore. I'm much more interested in seeing the character Tony Stark and watching him develop. Robert Downey Jr. delivers snarky remarks better than just about anyone, and that's what I'm looking for. That's exactly what this movie delivers.
Tony Stark is having anxiety attacks after the events of The Avengers. Flying a nuke into a wormhole and fighting a bunch of aliens will do that to anyone. When a terrorist known as The Mandarin starts setting off bombs around the country, Tony decides to stay out of it. Iron Man can't solve every problem. But when one of The Mandarin's attacks hurts someone close to Stark, he vows revenge.
After his home is destroyed, Stark crash lands in rural Tennessee. His suit is damaged and the world thinks he's dead, so he stays in hiding for a while. He finds a barn which he can use as a workshop to repair his suit, and he befriends a kid who could use a father figure. Just when you think the movie is going to turn sappy and sentimental, Stark tells the kid to buzz off and stop being a yutz. Funny stuff.
Shane Black takes over writing and directing duties for this 3rd installment, and it's exactly what the franchise needed. Black's last movie Kiss Kiss Bang Bang was one of the best movies of the last 10 years, and he really should work more. He knows how to write for Downey Jr. better than anyone. And the finale, with Stark and Rhodes going into the villains lair with guns drawn, is reminicent of Lethal Weapon (also written by Black). Ben Kingsley plays a great villain with a secret, and Guy Pearce also has some fun moments. I really enjoyed Iron Man 3, and I hope Shane Black comes back for Iron Man 4.
After 2 Iron Man movies and The Avengers, seeing Tony Stark flying around in the Iron Man suit just isn't that exciting anymore. I'm much more interested in seeing the character Tony Stark and watching him develop. Robert Downey Jr. delivers snarky remarks better than just about anyone, and that's what I'm looking for. That's exactly what this movie delivers.
Tony Stark is having anxiety attacks after the events of The Avengers. Flying a nuke into a wormhole and fighting a bunch of aliens will do that to anyone. When a terrorist known as The Mandarin starts setting off bombs around the country, Tony decides to stay out of it. Iron Man can't solve every problem. But when one of The Mandarin's attacks hurts someone close to Stark, he vows revenge.
After his home is destroyed, Stark crash lands in rural Tennessee. His suit is damaged and the world thinks he's dead, so he stays in hiding for a while. He finds a barn which he can use as a workshop to repair his suit, and he befriends a kid who could use a father figure. Just when you think the movie is going to turn sappy and sentimental, Stark tells the kid to buzz off and stop being a yutz. Funny stuff.
Shane Black takes over writing and directing duties for this 3rd installment, and it's exactly what the franchise needed. Black's last movie Kiss Kiss Bang Bang was one of the best movies of the last 10 years, and he really should work more. He knows how to write for Downey Jr. better than anyone. And the finale, with Stark and Rhodes going into the villains lair with guns drawn, is reminicent of Lethal Weapon (also written by Black). Ben Kingsley plays a great villain with a secret, and Guy Pearce also has some fun moments. I really enjoyed Iron Man 3, and I hope Shane Black comes back for Iron Man 4.
Thursday, April 25, 2013
Pain & Gain - 2 1/2 stars
After 3 Transformers movies, Michael Bay is taking a break from huge, epic movies where cities are destroyed and giving us a small caper movie. Small meaning a $25 million budget rather than $200 million. And no giant robots or asteriods threatening the Earth.
This movie is supposedly based on a true story. Three bodybuilders (Mark Wahlberg, Anthony Mackie, and Dwayne Johnson) kidnap a rich guy (Tony Shalhoub) and force him to sign all his assets over to him. Then they try to kill him, but they're so incompetent that he survives. While he's in the hospital, the police talk to him but they don't believe his story. Once the kidnappers hear about this, they figure they're home free. They have his house and his money, and they start living it up.
It may not sound like it, but this is actually a comedy. Dwayne Johnson plays a born again Christian who's trying to stay out of trouble, besides the whole kidnapping thing. He also happens to have a cocaine habit. He's actually a pretty sweet guy, and he's incredibly gullible. I don't usually like Dwayne Johnson in movies, but I enjoyed his character.
I got tired of Michael Bay's style a long time ago. The camera never stops moving, and he puts in clever and unique camera angles and movements anywhere he possible can. The editing is aslo very hectic, especially at the beginning of the movie. The first 20 minutes felt like a long teaser the way it was cut together, and it was exhausting. If the movie had stayed like that, I would have been very unhappy.
Luckily the movie slows down a little once the plot kicks in. It was very over the top and unbelievable, and it should have been at least 20 minutes shorter. But I admit I was entertained at times. There were some funny moments that made me laugh out loud. This is one of those movies where I have some complaints, and I can't call it a very good movie, but I can almost recommend it. Almost.
This movie is supposedly based on a true story. Three bodybuilders (Mark Wahlberg, Anthony Mackie, and Dwayne Johnson) kidnap a rich guy (Tony Shalhoub) and force him to sign all his assets over to him. Then they try to kill him, but they're so incompetent that he survives. While he's in the hospital, the police talk to him but they don't believe his story. Once the kidnappers hear about this, they figure they're home free. They have his house and his money, and they start living it up.
It may not sound like it, but this is actually a comedy. Dwayne Johnson plays a born again Christian who's trying to stay out of trouble, besides the whole kidnapping thing. He also happens to have a cocaine habit. He's actually a pretty sweet guy, and he's incredibly gullible. I don't usually like Dwayne Johnson in movies, but I enjoyed his character.
I got tired of Michael Bay's style a long time ago. The camera never stops moving, and he puts in clever and unique camera angles and movements anywhere he possible can. The editing is aslo very hectic, especially at the beginning of the movie. The first 20 minutes felt like a long teaser the way it was cut together, and it was exhausting. If the movie had stayed like that, I would have been very unhappy.
Luckily the movie slows down a little once the plot kicks in. It was very over the top and unbelievable, and it should have been at least 20 minutes shorter. But I admit I was entertained at times. There were some funny moments that made me laugh out loud. This is one of those movies where I have some complaints, and I can't call it a very good movie, but I can almost recommend it. Almost.
Thursday, April 18, 2013
April reviews
OBLIVION - 3 stars
An enjoyable if somewhat derivative science fiction action movie. It looks incredible. The movie takes place on a future Earth that's been decimated by war with an alien race. After they destroyed the moon, earthquakes and tsunamis killed most of the population and the survivors fled to a moon of Saturn. Tom Cruise plays Jack, one of the guys working on Earth as the clean up crew. Just like after World War II when there were pockets of Japanese soldiers hiding in caves keeping the fight going, even though we won the war, there are still alien 'Scavs' who need to be hunted down. Jack's job is to fix the drones that fly around looking for Scavs. The drones also protect the gigantic devices that are collecting the water from Earth's oceans.
I saw this in IMAX and I really enjoyed the visuals. The sound design and music is also really good. The score reminded me of Inception. But one problem is the movie seemed to drag in the beginning. Right off the bat we're told the setup by voiceover narration, and we see Jack get into a really cool ship and fly down to the surface. But then nothing much happens for 20 minutes or so. I don't mind a slow, thoughtful sci-fi movie, but the trailers seemed to promise more action.
You probably won't be surprised by some of the twists, and they're easy to see coming (if it's all true, why was his memory erased?), but that doesn't make it a bad movie. Just familiar. Worth seeing but not a game changer.
STARBUCK - 2 stars
Starbuck is a French Canadian movie about David, a deadbeat who owes money all over town. As a young man he went to a sperm bank hundreds of times, and now 20 years or so later, a lawyer shows up to inform him that he fathered 533 children. Of those, 142 have joined a class action lawsuit to force the clinic to reveal his identity. These kids just want to know who their biological dad was.
The movie is played for laughs, but the movie is very uneven. I didn't laugh much, partly because I couldn't buy the premise. Once the lawsuit gets into the papers, none of the kids realizes what they are doing. They want to know who the donor was, but do they want to ruin his life? The media is running stories on this 'pervert', and he becomes a locally hated (but anonymous) celebrity. We never meet any of these kids' parents. It's not like David slept around and left their mothers when they were young. All these kids were born because a woman or a couple couldn't conceive and went to a sperm bank. Also, one of the kids finds out who he is and blackmails him into hanging out for a while. But after 15 - 20 minutes of this kid being in the story, he disappears with no explanation.
Another complaint is that there are far too many montages. In fact, the moment I was most looking forward to was played as a montage. The trial begins and we don't get to hear anything the lawyers or kids say. It's all played to music.
I didn't enjoy this movie much. There are a few funny moments, especially in the prologue when he's getting to work at the sperm bank and takes a break to read the articles.
TRANCE - 3 1/2 stars
There's something satisfying about being in the hands of a good director, and Danny Boyle (Trainspotting, 127 Hours) is definitely a good director. In this movie, Simon (James McAvoy) works at an art auction house which is robbed during the opening credits. Simon's job in the event of a robbery is to take the most expensive painting, put it in a bag, and drop it in the chute which leads to some time lock safe. Before he can do that, he is intercepted by the leader of the thieves, Franck (Vincent Cassel). Franck hits Simon on the head with his shotgun and takes the painting.
Once in the getaway car, Franck opens the bag to find the painting is gone. Simon hid it before he was intercepted. So Franck and the gang kidnap Simon to find out where the painting is. The problem is Simon has amnesia and can't remember that day, so he has no idea where the paiting is. They take Simon to a hypnotherapist (Rosario Dawson) to get him to remember.
This is one of those thrillers that makes you think you are missing something because there seems to be some plot holes. But as the movie goes along, we get some backstory that fills in those gaps. That's partly what I meant about being in the hands of a good director. Even when I was confused by the characters' behavior, I knew that soon we would be told why they were behaving that way. It isn't a spoiler to reveal that Simon was in on the robbery, or that the hypnotherapist was not chosen at random. I'm not sure the story really holds together in the end, and I wish there had been at least one plot twist fewer, but I had a great time watching this movie.
EVIL DEAD - 3 stars
I'm a big fan of the original trilogy, and I was apprehensive when I heard about this remake. For years fans have been asking Sam Raimi and Bruce Campbell whether they would ever make Evil Dead 4. I don't know how I would like seeing a 50 year old Ash running around fighting Deadites, so I guess if we were going to get another Evil Dead, this was the way to go.
I'm not sure if it's a remake, a reboot, or a sequel. There is no reason this movie couldn't take place 20 or 30 years after the previous movies in the same cabin, so that's how I look at it.
One problem is the cast is very bland. There is only one Bruce Campbell and any actor who tries to imitate him would probably not come across very well, but the actors in this movie are so forgettable. We have the standard teenagers going to a cabin in the woods, reading from the book of the dead, summoning evil spirits, and mayhem ensues. The tree rape scene is in there, and it's more gruesome and hard to watch than I remember it in the first movie. There are buckets and buckets of blood, and people cutting limbs off with carving knives, and a nail gun ...
The movie works as a horror movie. It doesn't have the same comedic tone the previous movies had, and some times I laughed when I was supposed to be scared. But it was an enjoyable night at the movies.
THE HOST - 1 star
The Host is the worst movie I have seen this year. It takes a traditional body snatchers story idea and completely screws it up. Just like Stephanie Meyer did with the Twilight saga, she turns a good premise into another excuse for a teenage girl to pine for a boy who won't sleep with her.
Most body snatcher movies take place before anything is wrong. One day, a character starts behaving strangely. Then another, then another, until the main character figures out that aliens are taking over, and those people are not themselves anymore. This movie takes place after this has already happened. 99% of the planet's population have already been taken over by aliens, and they are looking for the remaining humans who are trying to fight back.
To save her brother by distracting the aliens, a girl named Melanie jumps out a window and falls to her death. But she doesn't die. Why not? She has a strong will to live. They put an alien inside her - the aliens look like these glowing jellyfish that they insert at the back of the neck - and the alien, named Wanderer posesses her body. But since she isn't dead, Melanie is able to communicate with the Wanderer. This gives the author an easy way to get all Melanie's inner monologue in the movie.
Melanie convinces Wanderer to escape and leads her to a hideout where the human resistance, including her family and boyfriend, are hiding out. Of course they immediately want to kill her because they assume it's the alien, and Melanie decides not to tell them she's still alive in there. And in another nod to Twilight, Wanderer starts to fall for another boy. So instead of Melanie wanting two different boys, she likes one and Wanderer likes the other.
This movie was just really dumb. I was bored and irritated almost the entire time. Stay away from The Host.
An enjoyable if somewhat derivative science fiction action movie. It looks incredible. The movie takes place on a future Earth that's been decimated by war with an alien race. After they destroyed the moon, earthquakes and tsunamis killed most of the population and the survivors fled to a moon of Saturn. Tom Cruise plays Jack, one of the guys working on Earth as the clean up crew. Just like after World War II when there were pockets of Japanese soldiers hiding in caves keeping the fight going, even though we won the war, there are still alien 'Scavs' who need to be hunted down. Jack's job is to fix the drones that fly around looking for Scavs. The drones also protect the gigantic devices that are collecting the water from Earth's oceans.
I saw this in IMAX and I really enjoyed the visuals. The sound design and music is also really good. The score reminded me of Inception. But one problem is the movie seemed to drag in the beginning. Right off the bat we're told the setup by voiceover narration, and we see Jack get into a really cool ship and fly down to the surface. But then nothing much happens for 20 minutes or so. I don't mind a slow, thoughtful sci-fi movie, but the trailers seemed to promise more action.
You probably won't be surprised by some of the twists, and they're easy to see coming (if it's all true, why was his memory erased?), but that doesn't make it a bad movie. Just familiar. Worth seeing but not a game changer.
STARBUCK - 2 stars
Starbuck is a French Canadian movie about David, a deadbeat who owes money all over town. As a young man he went to a sperm bank hundreds of times, and now 20 years or so later, a lawyer shows up to inform him that he fathered 533 children. Of those, 142 have joined a class action lawsuit to force the clinic to reveal his identity. These kids just want to know who their biological dad was.
The movie is played for laughs, but the movie is very uneven. I didn't laugh much, partly because I couldn't buy the premise. Once the lawsuit gets into the papers, none of the kids realizes what they are doing. They want to know who the donor was, but do they want to ruin his life? The media is running stories on this 'pervert', and he becomes a locally hated (but anonymous) celebrity. We never meet any of these kids' parents. It's not like David slept around and left their mothers when they were young. All these kids were born because a woman or a couple couldn't conceive and went to a sperm bank. Also, one of the kids finds out who he is and blackmails him into hanging out for a while. But after 15 - 20 minutes of this kid being in the story, he disappears with no explanation.
Another complaint is that there are far too many montages. In fact, the moment I was most looking forward to was played as a montage. The trial begins and we don't get to hear anything the lawyers or kids say. It's all played to music.
I didn't enjoy this movie much. There are a few funny moments, especially in the prologue when he's getting to work at the sperm bank and takes a break to read the articles.
TRANCE - 3 1/2 stars
There's something satisfying about being in the hands of a good director, and Danny Boyle (Trainspotting, 127 Hours) is definitely a good director. In this movie, Simon (James McAvoy) works at an art auction house which is robbed during the opening credits. Simon's job in the event of a robbery is to take the most expensive painting, put it in a bag, and drop it in the chute which leads to some time lock safe. Before he can do that, he is intercepted by the leader of the thieves, Franck (Vincent Cassel). Franck hits Simon on the head with his shotgun and takes the painting.
Once in the getaway car, Franck opens the bag to find the painting is gone. Simon hid it before he was intercepted. So Franck and the gang kidnap Simon to find out where the painting is. The problem is Simon has amnesia and can't remember that day, so he has no idea where the paiting is. They take Simon to a hypnotherapist (Rosario Dawson) to get him to remember.
This is one of those thrillers that makes you think you are missing something because there seems to be some plot holes. But as the movie goes along, we get some backstory that fills in those gaps. That's partly what I meant about being in the hands of a good director. Even when I was confused by the characters' behavior, I knew that soon we would be told why they were behaving that way. It isn't a spoiler to reveal that Simon was in on the robbery, or that the hypnotherapist was not chosen at random. I'm not sure the story really holds together in the end, and I wish there had been at least one plot twist fewer, but I had a great time watching this movie.
EVIL DEAD - 3 stars
I'm a big fan of the original trilogy, and I was apprehensive when I heard about this remake. For years fans have been asking Sam Raimi and Bruce Campbell whether they would ever make Evil Dead 4. I don't know how I would like seeing a 50 year old Ash running around fighting Deadites, so I guess if we were going to get another Evil Dead, this was the way to go.
I'm not sure if it's a remake, a reboot, or a sequel. There is no reason this movie couldn't take place 20 or 30 years after the previous movies in the same cabin, so that's how I look at it.
One problem is the cast is very bland. There is only one Bruce Campbell and any actor who tries to imitate him would probably not come across very well, but the actors in this movie are so forgettable. We have the standard teenagers going to a cabin in the woods, reading from the book of the dead, summoning evil spirits, and mayhem ensues. The tree rape scene is in there, and it's more gruesome and hard to watch than I remember it in the first movie. There are buckets and buckets of blood, and people cutting limbs off with carving knives, and a nail gun ...
The movie works as a horror movie. It doesn't have the same comedic tone the previous movies had, and some times I laughed when I was supposed to be scared. But it was an enjoyable night at the movies.
THE HOST - 1 star
The Host is the worst movie I have seen this year. It takes a traditional body snatchers story idea and completely screws it up. Just like Stephanie Meyer did with the Twilight saga, she turns a good premise into another excuse for a teenage girl to pine for a boy who won't sleep with her.
Most body snatcher movies take place before anything is wrong. One day, a character starts behaving strangely. Then another, then another, until the main character figures out that aliens are taking over, and those people are not themselves anymore. This movie takes place after this has already happened. 99% of the planet's population have already been taken over by aliens, and they are looking for the remaining humans who are trying to fight back.
To save her brother by distracting the aliens, a girl named Melanie jumps out a window and falls to her death. But she doesn't die. Why not? She has a strong will to live. They put an alien inside her - the aliens look like these glowing jellyfish that they insert at the back of the neck - and the alien, named Wanderer posesses her body. But since she isn't dead, Melanie is able to communicate with the Wanderer. This gives the author an easy way to get all Melanie's inner monologue in the movie.
Melanie convinces Wanderer to escape and leads her to a hideout where the human resistance, including her family and boyfriend, are hiding out. Of course they immediately want to kill her because they assume it's the alien, and Melanie decides not to tell them she's still alive in there. And in another nod to Twilight, Wanderer starts to fall for another boy. So instead of Melanie wanting two different boys, she likes one and Wanderer likes the other.
This movie was just really dumb. I was bored and irritated almost the entire time. Stay away from The Host.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
