Day: October 2, 2011

I bought this movie because the cover made me laugh. Mattttt Damonnn just looks ridiculous.

Look at it, in all its glory.

And it seems hilarious. Didn’t read the back, no idea on what it was about, just his ridiculous ridiculous face. I think not knowing anything about it a much more enjoyable experience.

The movie tells of Matttt Damonnn, working for a company, which happens to be doing some illegal shenanigans. Nothing that important, just that his company has been involved with price fixing. He decides to tell the FBI. He didn’t think it would turn out to be such a big deal. He thought he could let them know, and be done with it. Nope. They needed proof. This causes him to become one of the most cooperative informants they have ever had. He is SUPER awkward though throughout it. And it is great.

Unfortunately some of the details he gives them are not adding up. Bunch this up with the fact that he is a weird guy, sometimes forgetting meetings, and avoiding people. Is there more shit going on? Maybe. His wife is played by Melanie Lynskey and the FBI agents are Scott Bakula and Joel McHale.

Mattttttttt Damonnnnnnnn

You keep asking yourself “WHY are you doing that???” Without trying to spoil anything, the movie gets pretty deep with its subject material. You just can’t stop watching the train wreck, thinking it can’t be real. You also never really know exactly what is going on.

It was good to be on that ride. What made it even more funny was Damon’s random thoughts throughout the movie, said through voice over. Generally these thoughts had nothing to do with the current scene, and it could make you miss important information. But the only thing you could do was nod along and think, “Huh. Why IS that?” It is also based on a true story (or at least the books about the true story), which I didn’t know until the end. Shocked I tell ya.

I should say ridiculous again.

Holy shit (hah!) is this movie short! I mean, my bar said 87 minutes, but the credits began at the 80 minute mark. The opening credits was a good chunk as well (even though there was story during that, but more on that later).

What is this, Land Before Time VI? (No. That is 77 minutes long). A friend of mine said that he thought they left a lot of the movie on the cutting room floor, which I have to agree. The plot confused me at times, and its not like this is hard hitting thinking material. But everything was either rushed. Or just not much happened. It is hard to tell.

Above: Either hard hitting thinking material, rushed material, or nothing at all.

Did I find things interesting? Yes. I enjoyed a majority of the fight scenes, visually they were great. Speaking of visually great, the opening of movie was good too. I believe it was done by the Priest artist of the comic, Hyung Min-woo. Probably why it was overall my favorite part.

I liked that the vampire eggs apparently hatched the same way a whelp hatchling would (Yah, I went WoW). I understand why the vampires lacked eyes and were very bug like. That is just science! I also like how it was a pseudo-western with kind of science fictiony angle.

Now I don’t understand why the Church would lie. I don’t understand why he went corny at the end with “No the war is just beginning!” nor do I like Maggie Q. Go away Maggie Q. Get a real name. I still want to read the source material, which I bet is fantastic.

I have been waiting to see both Tron and Tron: Legacy for awhile. When Legacy came out on Blu-Ray, a local target had a sale for both movies on Blu-Ray for $30, but didn’t have the original there. It was sold out. So I said, “Screw you Target!” and didn’t get either. I felt like I was missing a part of life by not seeing the original Tron. I knew all the pop culture references, just not the movie. I was horribly disappointed with Tron though. Think it is popular more so because of its groundbreaking effects of the time, than actual movie quality, and that is the opinion that has stuck in our conscious. The Avatar effect, if you will.

“Dude, quit dissing us on your site.”

This is a review of the second though, which could easily be watched without the first, which I guess was part of my problem. Despite being a twenty some year later sequel, you really don’t have to see the first at all to understand the second. So, why make it a sequel? Just because it has a similar world. Not worth it in my eyes. Yes. I also found that the music was good (as reported), and the visuals were fantasticles on Blu-Ray, it is just everything besides those two I found to be lacking.

Why are all the programs either goth, or just audience noises? Where is my fat people programs (the first Tron had that one guy). Maybe they just want to be far away from Tron Guy. It makes me wonder, what if Jeff Bridges didn’t become a big name actor? They really lucked out on having him, cause he was great in it. If they had a lame person in Tron, then they’d get a new person for that roll in this, and you know, not have as real of a feel. I hated the CGI young Flynn too. Olivia Wilde didn’t interest me either. Anyways, the plot was either weak or just confusing. So the movie might be best to just be on the background, especially if on drugs. It was more about effects than entertainment.

Sometimes the quality of a disk can really determine how much you enjoy a movie. This would be my case for Cedar Rapids. About 50 minutes into it (out of 86) it was fine, but I might have missed about 5 minutes of material in the last half hour, which is a lot. Lot of skipping, so stuff gets all jumbled. This isn’t really the fault of Ed Helms or John C. Reilly, just my own disk. Onwards!

And sally faawwwr…sally farrtas….grr. sallyforth.

Anyways, Cedar Rapids isn’t a stoner comedy, doesn’t use “offensive” jokes to make laughs, or much slapstick, but just goes a more natural route. I liked that. It was definitely a great change of comedy. I heard someone refer to it as a “midwest people” comedy, a stereotype we don’t get to explore at all enough. We pretty much have Fargo, as a northern midwest comedy, and that is about it. So a lot less funny accents here, and a lot more, “break out of your shell, you square!” comedy. The name also comes from the insurance convention in the region, which takes place in Cedar Rapids, Iowa.

I also really didn’t hate any character in the movie, which was good (except you know, the “evil people”). Also, Maebe from Arrested Development as Bree the Prostitute was enjoyable. What?