Day: October 1, 2011

Hurray, deciding to rent movies that I have heard zero about. They are the best. Don’t you hate hearing others opinions about movies when all you want to do is watch it yourself? (My bad, by the way, posting all my movie opinions).

Gerard Butler gets to play an intelligent and super pissed off mad man killer, which he rarely gets to do. Normally he is just some bad ass guy, but usually good. The last time he got to play a psychotic and smart killer was Phantom of the Opera, but he also sang a bunch then. He also does that role OH SO WELL.

“Ohh, I wish I was an Oscar Meyer Weinerrrr”

Normally just the muscle, I found it incredibly believable his character could do everything he does in the movie. Sure, even a super smart person would have a hard time completing everything in the film but I guess its tiny possibility makes it interesting to watch. He has 10 years to plan it all, so the resources are there I guess.

Oh yeah, should probably note that at the beginning of the movie his wife is raped, and killed, and his child killed as well, right in front of him. He identifies the perpetrators and they are caught, but thanks to the justice system, one gets out way early. Gerard does not approve! His lawyer, Jamie Foxx, can’t help him either. So he, a normally Law Abiding Citizen, takes it into his own hands to punish both the wrong doers, and everyone in the justice system that screwed him over.

“Are you still using Flynn from Tangled after you mention rape scenes?” Yes. Yes I am.

The ending though, the ending was not what I was expecting (in the bad way). Overall I think the way they made it end left it kind of…eh. Like it was all pointless. Fuck it, this movie you can cheer on the bad guy and you only feel bad morally for a little bit.

This must be a good idea! Two of the biggest names in Hollywood (there is a fat joke there) in a buddy comedy about travelin’ and happy times to see a woman give birth (gross) by her Due Date. Because, just like in real life, if people have to rush anywhere, they will have hilarious hijinks and missteps along the way that makes their lives completely difficult, but yet when they are finished, they can look back on it and laugh. Just like real life.

“And then after all that he still wouldn’t give us back my teeth! Hil-ARIOUS!”

I wondered why I didn’t hear much about it when it was finally released. To me, it must be because it did not live up to his potential. I can see that a large inspiration to this movie was probably Planes, Trains, and Automobiles, but instead of just normal allusions or a quick reference, it seemed like some of the bigger plot points were just taken directly from PTA. But instead of done in a more clever way, they were just done in a more gross modern humor way.

One of the biggest moments of conflict between Robert Downey Jr. and Zach Galifianakis is taken straight from PTA, and it makes it just seem lazy. The biggest differences between the two movies is that John Candy‘s annoying character is actually likable, and just misunderstood, and it has a touching ending that makes everyone feel good inside. Zack Galifianakis’ character just is annoying and I hate him throughout the movie. Yes RDJ’s guy is an ass, but I think it is justified. Could be my ass-side talking though. Overall it could have been a lot better.

Oh yeah, the wife is played by Michelle Monaghan. What? She was just in Source Code (my last reviewed movie). She is everywhere, damn!

This movie was a lot better than expected, but technically I expected nothing. I first didn’t watch it, because the cover made me think of Eagle Eye. (yes, even though I read the words “Source Code“) Eagle Eye!? yuck! Don’t need any Shia LaBeouf in my room!

Or my website.

Doesn’t help that the main woman, Michelle Monaghan, is the main woman in Eagle Eye too.

Anyways, this is a sci-fi (esque) action movie, where if you can ignore some plot holes in how everything works, it becomes pretty good. What plot holes? It is hard to explain, here and in the movie. More or less, they said that after a “big event” in the realities aroun…no I still can’t explain it. More or less, they have a way to send people back into an event, inside a person whom shares qualities with their sendee back, and can do things before the event occurs. Not stop it of course, because it has already happened. But some cool things, like figure out who did it, figure out what they will be doing next, etc.

Why is this good? Because some dude bombed some trains in Chicago! And is planning on bombing more things! If they can find out who it is, maybe they can stop him!

Unfortunately when dealing with alternative realities, paradoxes tend to happen pretty easily. The ending was beautiful, and cannot be mucked up if they ever try to do a sequel. So that is good. I am tired of also liking 6/7 of a movie and hating the end. This time I liked pretty much all of it.

Also, for those Jake G haters, you can watch him die at least six times in this movie. No, that is not a spoiler. Unfortunately, as I said it was set in Chicago. We can’t all be perfect though.

I had already seen this movie in theaters, but never in Blu-Ray or Unrated. So, sorry for anyone hoping for a one time viewing review, you get at two time viewing review. Eat it! I must say also I didn’t really get the reason for the title until many weeks later. Your Highness? Alright. A stoner flick called a greeting to a king. Hey there is smoke on the cover. Oh wait. A stoner flick and…highness….wait for it…

OHHHHHHHHHHHhhhhhh. I got it now.

For some reason, I enjoyed it more the second time around. In theaters I was disappointed, thought they just half-assed the whole movie. Technically, yes it actually was half-assed though, as there may not have ever been a script (/if there was a script, they never used it). I am told that most of the movie was filmed as pretty much improvised.

Maybe I was hoping Franco was as ridiculous as McBride in this movie? I just felt like it could have done a lot better. I think this was the first big release from Natalie Portman after Black Swan, so that probably angered some people too. You know, the ones demanding she pick a genre and stick to it. Zooey Deschanel was in this movie too, and super hot. Even when she went all sex demon.

For the unrated version, I couldn’t even tell what scenes were added, except maybe a conversation between Franco/Zooey before the wedding. Maybe all that was really added in was more blood in death scenes. So, the difference between theatrical and unrated is negligible.

Alright, a good thing to realize right off the back when watching this is it is NOT a prequel to the 2001 Burton one. Instead it is yes, another reboot, and a retelling that is more try to the original film series. This confused me a bit, as they threw in references and clues talking about space travel and stuff in this version of Rise, but they didn’t match with the ’01 version, making me go “Whaaaa?”. Saying “Whaaaa?” in theaters is also very distracting.

Anyways. This movie did a good job of making me care about the apes more than humans. Because seriously, the biggest problem with Avatar? Fuck the Na’vi.

Fuck you too, buddy!

More specifically, if you give me a conflict between Humans and not humans, overall, I want the humans to win. Every time. Species over other species. I may not agree with all the actions (as we are supposed to feel uneasy in Starship Troopers) but I don’t want them to lose because of it. So if this movie brought up a big war with the apes and humans, I would be pissed if the apes won.

Thankfully, what it does better than ’01, is make the apes not the bad guy. ’01 made them clearly the bad guys (humans enslaved! War hungry apes!), but in this movie none of the apes are bad/evil, just a few people and that is all. It also does a good job of explaining at the end how the Apes will take over, so if they choose to continue the franchise the eggs are all in place. The only people who were really hurt were the bad humans too, and no all out war, just an escape for the apes to live in peace.

Not really a spoiler, but yeah its Franco‘s fault. He develops a drug to cure Alzheimer’s, but the testing on apes made them wicked smart. He just wanted to cure his dad, is all. Also, how good is John Lithgow in this movie? This plus Dexter season 4 shows this guy has got that acting thing down.

All in all, this is just a movie about the love between a monkey and John Lithgow.

The plot moves along at a good pace. If I had any complaint it is that the “Ape Escape” in the last half hour may have taken a bit too long.

In terms of randoms, I found his love interest a pointless add in. She didn’t seem to take away or add anything to the film, so that whole buildup was annoying. Also, the company owner in the beginning in the movie, in his first two scenes, removed and put on his glasses a total of five times. My friends didn’t notice it though. Seriously. I wrote them down for my second viewing. At 4:00, 4:10, and 4:35, and then 7:24 and 7:45 minute marks, this happens. Way too much dude.

This is the worst movie I have watched so far with these reviews. This just has to be a bad movie. Not a good kids movie and a bad movie, but a bad kids movie too. Besides its horrible title (Mars Needs Moms? What does that even mean?), the reason it failed box office wise has to be because it would only appeal to boys aged 9-12. No adults, and definitely no women would come out after watching this and feel more inspired, better, or different at all. Well, maybe they will be angry at that drivel. Unless they are cool with their roles being reduced solely to being housewives later on, whose value is determined by ability to get others to do chores.

By that logic, Freddy Mercury would make a good housewife.

What also bugged me was how creepy the humans looked. The voices seemed to not match at all the mouths how they were coming out, making them seem even more creepy. Especially with their dead eyes staring at me. Way too much uncanny valley.

Yes. THOSE dead eyes.

It is billed as starring Seth Green, and as I watched it I thought there is NO WAY that Seth Green is doing that voice. Thanks to quick research, it is determined that the creators didn’t like his voice either, so they changed it to an actual eleven year old kid. The movements/face are still based off of Seth Green, but not the important part, the voice. Guess what didn’t get changed? The credits. That just feels like false advertising. Thats some crap.

The sidekick character was annoying, and the plot horrible. Don’t watch this. Seriously. There is a reason it is one of the worst box office disasters ever. Don’t let them make any money back through DVD/Blu-Ray sales in order to not call it a compete flop.

Oh man this movie was sooooo saddd. AGGHHHH. And depressing. I cried. I did. Very good. Here are some jokes to take my mind off of it.

The Road, obviously, is loosely based off of Jack Kerouac‘s life (and his most famous work, On The Road). Viggo Mortensen plays for the second time a brilliant role as a man slowly turning into a zombie.

I am pretty sure that is what is going on in this scene.

I heard they were going to make a book based off of this movie, but I hope it doesn’t blow like the last book they made after the other successful Viggo movie. That one with the hobbits. History of Violence I believe was based off of real life events though as well, because, you know, it was history.

But seriously. This movie was great, despite the depressing state of everything. Bring tissues. Check it out. It is a post apocalyptic movie, where despite knowing stuff is about to go down, Viggo and his wife still have a child. Viggo believes it to be his duty to still have a child to help the world through these times, while his wife doesn’t agree, thinking it will just hurt them in the end. Parts of the story is told through flashback, before the child, and his early days when they lived in a house, and the rest is between Viggo and his son as they attempt to travel and survive in this world gone mad. You get to see what people will do in order to survive and protect the ones they love, passing many many moral boundaries.

What is with all these one word simple movie titles. Paul? Someone will look at the URLs for these pages and just think very sexual and inappropriate thoughts about what the site is actually about.

Well I guess you could think of sexual things and inappropriate things, without them being the same “thing”. But why?

I forgot that this was technically another British comedy, so it gave me a more refreshing take on a foul mouthed alien story we have all grown accustomed too (that last one being Machete (see what I did there?)).

Pegg/Frost, despite being the main two, were not as exciting as the rest of the supporting cast in my opinion, which definitely made the movie. (Oh. So all the Americans. Whoops.)

It was cool seeing Jason Bateman as a “bad guy” too, and Sigourney Weaver was a nice joke there. Also, for more patriotism, U-S-A! U-S-A! U-S-A! I don’t know why I haven’t mentioned Seth Rogen yet. Dude is great at voice acting. Must explain his horrible face? He was obviously one of the better parts of this movie, just like he was the best part of Monsters vs Aliens (which was lame). So yeah. Aliens are funny. Nerds are fun. British people trying to not be considered gay in America is interesting. So overall pretty good movie.

Oh. Bonus movies on the Blu-Ray too. For a limited time, you can watch for free with this movie….Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas, or Tremors 2: Aftershocks. They are pretty much all the same movie. (WHAT!?)

I think this movie didn’t know what it wanted to be. First part was amusing in a violent sort of way, and then it almost tried to be some sort of a cheesy 80’s cop show (based off the soundtrack). But then when it tried to get serious, it never really got there.

This movie is about a Tactical Force unit that just doesn’t do things by the book! Effective? Sure. But no one seemed to pay attention in SWAT class.
Including a hilarious lesson on how to properly stop someone with hostages. That is internet sarcasm.

Shut your dirty mouth, ORLY Owl

While going to a warehouse to run test missions with fake bullets and what not, they accidentally encounter a real gorup of bad guys. Oh no! With no bullets, versus a ton of people with bullets? However will they stop them? Oh yeah. TACTICAL FORCE!

So more things happen. More kinda violence. Steve Austin, the leader, ends up wrestling with someone else. Weird for a SWAT guy, but I guess they were going for that. I thought Michael Jai White (Black Dynomiteeee) was pretty good at his role. There was a “Twist” ending as well, that really didn’t mean anything or need to exist. I understand it. But it didn’t add anything to the movie or trick you in any way. Just kinda blah.

Alright, I have a confession to make. I am definitely biased with this review. I know part of the crew who put this movie together.

If you go to the cast and crew page of Super, you can find one Justin Beckham. He was actually the head camp director person for a Boy Scout Summer Camp I worked at in high school. Now a lawyer, he decided to help make a movie. Some people know how to live better lives than others I guess!

Anyways, this was a low budget dark comedy that was also independently release. Coming out within a year of Kick-Ass didn’t help either. Studio movie based off a graphic novel vs something someone just decided to do. Despite the low budget and “already done” theme, it was amazing. While focusing less on amazing action scenes (yet somewhat upping the gore/violence) and more on the human emotion side you get a different picture. The hero is of course Rainn Wilson. Kevin Bacon and Nathan Fillion are both in it as well, as a villain and tv character respecftfully. Ellen Page‘s character was crazy awesome. Like a less deadly, more psychotic (and strangely hot) Hit-Girl. What else was unexpected? Anime tentacles, a rape scene (not related to tentacles, oddly enough), and realistic (ish) deaths.

“Did you say rape scene?”
Damn it, Flynn!

In other news, this movie is pretty cheap on Amazon. I saw it for preorder as $13 on Blu-Ray, but now it is still just $14. Pretty cheap for Blu-Ray.

I personally think the ending of this film is debatable, but no one else who saw it did. They actually ignored my theories, but if you watch it, I will argue it with you to!