Month: July 2014

Behaving Badly is not a movie I was rushing out to see. Not really a movie I heard of ever, actually. But I grabbed it and a few others, purely as fillers when I needed something else for a week and wanted something random.

Literally, the only reason I grabbed these movies was to make sure my reviews weren’t just the well known new movies. I need those straight to DVD randoms. Especially if they have an interesting cast.

After all, those unheard of films that look terrible? If they end up good, that is the greatest feeling of all.

Yes, even greater than that.

Rick Stevens (Nat Wolff) is not your average teenager. His family is dysfunctional in many ways. His mother (Mary-Louise Parker) is on a lot of booze and pills. The dad (Cary Elwes) is never around, they hate each other, but he says he doesn’t want to divorce to lose money.

His sister (Ashley Rickards) is a stripper, getting money to go to college and his brother (Mitch Hewer) is very angry, stupid, and not coming out of the closet.

But they aren’t the cause of all of his problems. That is all because of Mrs. Bender (Elisabeth Shue), the mother of his best friend Billy (Lachlan Buchanan). For whatever reason, she likes Rick and sexual relationships happened. This changed his life greatly, leading to two weeks with some dead bodies, people in jail, mobsters, suicide attempts, and lots and lots of boobies. However, he just wants to impress a smart girl in his class Nina (Selena Gomez). Oh boy Rick, you done fucked up by fucking that lady.

It is also full of celebrity cameos. Gary Busey is a police chief, Heather Graham a lawyer, Patrick Warburton the principal, Jason Lee a priest, and Dylan McDermott as the strip club owner.

Generic Creepy Teenage Male Fantasy: The Movie!

Behaving Badly was a weird movie. It was definitely not made amazingly well, that is for sure. It has an incredibly low budget feel, a lot of it is half-assed. It definitely isn’t great.

But I still almost gave it a 3 out of 4 on originality alone. This movie felt like it was created for an ADHD generation, and since the story is the main character retelling most of the events, you can say that is why everything seems so hectic. It is all from the teenage boy perspective.

There were just so many awkward moments, that I had to give it some props. I loved seeing all of the celebrities making quick quips. It actually lived up to the teen sex comedy genre, although also not being of fantastic quality.

I am at a point where this film in most cases would deserve that 1, and definitely not deserve a 3 or higher, but there was a charm to it that just took me in. I didn’t know what I was getting in to, and well, it surprised me.

Alright, let’s pretend for an instant that I can give this movie any fair chance. You know it, I know it, I really can’t. I gave the Planes the most zero of zeroes I could give it. It was a strange review, in which I just went over all the scummy ways this movie was released, turned from straight to DVD bullshit to a cash cow thanks to advertisements.

But I digress. After I saw the movie, I realized it was still a 0 and deserved my scorn.

Now we have the sequel. Planes: Fire & Rescue. This should have less bullshit qualities, technically. The third film hasn’t been officially announced, but let’s assume next year too since they can churn these out pretty quickly.

Unfortunately, no other animated movies appear to be coming out soon, so this one will make decent box office as well. Hell, two weeks before it came out it probably already broke even with toys alone.

The sequel with mostly new characters instead of the old ones for obvious reasons.

Set sometime after the events of the first POS, Dusty Crophopper (Dane Cook) is now a big star. He is winning more races, people like him, and everything is going well. But during a routine manuver, something goes wrong! His gearbox is worn down, and he has to keep the vague torque dial below the red zone or else his engine will stop and he will die. [Note. I think they said his torque could go up to 140, but the dial showed 65. The “doctor” said 80% was his max, which was definitely not “112 Torque”.]

What does that mean? That means Dusty can’t race. His dreams that he spent forever getting in the last movie, literally changing out almost every plane part (including a gear box I bet), to do it, are now ruined. So he sulks off like a little bitch, and a fire happens due to his shitty gear box. This is almost a disaster, but it is solved. Too bad the fire inspector deems the fire truck as inept and old, so they shut down their run way. This is bad news when their corn fest (?) is in one week and expecting a big turn out thanks to Dusty.

So Dusty does what he has to do, I guess. He goes to get certified as a fire fighter. This causes him to go to totally not Yellowstone park, to train under Blade Ranger (Ed Harris) and his crew. A girl plane Lil’ Dipper (Julie Bowen), who as the only real female character in the movie is a stalker to Dusty, an older helicopter Windlifter (Wes Studi), who is an incredibly racist caricature of a Naive American, and a bunch of tiny Honka looking bulldozers meant to sell toys.

Anyways, days of training and other bullshit happen. The “plot” comes from the fact that some luxury car (John Michael Higgins) opened up a new lodge in the area and is a dick. Nothing he does makes a lot of sense, but he is our cheap villain/not a villain character. After several days of bullshit training, like a week, CAN DUSTY SAVE THE DAY WHEN FIRE HAPPENS?

A few other voices I recognized included Curtis Armstrong, Hal Holbrook, Jerry Stiller, and Fred Willard.

Just. Just Fuck.

Just a kids movie. World building. Continuity. Bullshit.

I think that is the four ways I’d break down this analysis.

“But it’s just a kids movie!” I don’t know how much I have talked about that before, but that is one of the dummbest things anyone can say. Saying it is just a kids movie, or just a summer flick, is literally like being that kid on the playground who said his made up fighter character had a magical invisible cape that would reflect spells last minute. Bitch, everyone knows that is lie, and does not protect you. Just like a movie being geared towards kids. How can we even say that anymore when we have had dozens of nice “kids” movies that everyone can enjoy and get things out of over the last decade? It literally should have killed that excuse, yet somehow it goes on.

It is the reason we get low budget, cheap CGI, rushed crap, just to sell toys. If you forgot, Planes was last minute pulled from straight-to-DVD status and given a new guy to do the main voice and that was it. This was being made before that even happened. Cheap. Shit. Saying just a kids movies just lets them keep producing this filth.

This movie only creates more problems with the world building of this cars/planes universe crap that they are building. We already knew it was Earth. Sure. This is definitely set in America, with references to California and other states. It is very awkward. They, however, amplified the cars aspect of it all with all the animals being cars as well. In particular, John Deere equipment roamed the forests. What? The fuck?

But that isn’t it. I have talked before how it is all odd that 1) clearly they are made entities and cannot breed out more cars/planes, or 2) are made by other preexisting cars/planes in a factory or something. But the faulty gear box amps it up. The driving factor of the plot. Why not replace it like everything else? Because of course, that gear box is out of production and there is literally nothing they can do. The mechanics can’t fix it because it is complicated and needs factory precision.

So in their world, they have cars/planes making cars/planes parts somehow, and they can stop them knowing full well they are potentially killing hundreds/thousands who rely on that part? That is pretty damn fucked up.

Why do they even need a few people to put out forest fires? I can’t imagine forests having a huge need in a planet without humans. They should just let the mother burn.

Re: rushed project/CGI. There were many fire scenes. All of them were terribly ugly.

In terms of continuity, it is the simple basics they just didn’t care about. Early on we find out that the corn festival is in one week. He then spends almost a whole week in the fire training camp. Then? Then after events, he is knocked out for five days. After that? Yay time for the corn festival. How many fucking days are in a week again?

These minor things add up, showing that the people who wrote it were just pulling shit out of a hat and animating it. Coherence is for suckers. Didn’t Dusty have a girlfriend? She wasn’t in this movie at all.

Bullshit. So much bullshit. The film starts off saying it is dedicating the movie to all the firefighters out there. Aka the people who aren’t in the movie at all, and instead all of the emphasis is placed on their equipment not the men who drive the vehicles. At one point, Dusty worries about going into a cave because they might suffocate. Shit, planes need oxygen now?

The characters are all stereotypes. Including the terrible Windlifter. The plot is taken from 80s action movies without any of the fear. The only issue is his gear box, of which he keeps a secret despite it clearly affecting him quite often. Once it does get brought up, he is told to just get over it. Then he gets over it. Moral? You might have a failing heart, but fuck it, just ignore it.

I watched this movie in a packed theater. The only times the audience laughed in a big unit was during the two fart jokes. Everything else? A few giggles, but mostly silence.

Just think. A third movie is definitely happening. Maybe in the third one, Dusty will get bored of racing and decide he wants to be a frog next?

Brendan Gleeson is one of those actors who took a really long time to get noticed. He had nice dramatic roles and a sweet Irish accent, but lets face it. His looks probably held him back. But now that he has a distinguished old guy look, his talents are more noticed and he is getting leading roles.

A few years ago, he got The Guard, and now he gets the movie Calvary. Both black comedies / dramas in a way too. I guess it is okay to have a genre niche.

I am surprised the “Movies With Scenes In A Meat Locker” genre hasn’t taken off more fully, either.

Let’s pretend you are Father James Lavelle (Brendan Gleeson). You are an old man, running a small Irish Catholic church in a tiny community. There are only a few other priests in the area, like Father Leary (David Wilmot). That means a lot of soul saving falls on one man.

During mass on a Sunday, in confessional time, a person says that they were abused by a Catholic priest when they were younger and goes into great detail. The priest has since died, but the man is still angry. He wants to get back at the Catholic Church, and to do that, he wants to kill a good priest to send a strong message. He wants to kill Father James Lavelle. In exactly one week he will come back to kill him, in order to get his affairs in order. Then he leaves.

Huh. That is terrifying. There are only a few people in the area, so it can only be a few people. But who?

Here is a vague list of actor names of characters, instead of talking about all of them individually. I even threw in a woman, too. (Chris O’ Dowd, Aidan Gillen, Dylan Moran, Isaach De Bankole, M. Emmet Walsh, Domhnall Gleeson, Marie-Josee Croze).

Oh yeah. Let’s not forget that he also has a daughter, Fiona Lavelle (Kelly Reilly), as part of his marriage before he became a priest.

As the story gets closer and closer to Sunday, more and more sinful activities seem to take place in his town, as if the whole world is going to Hell, and there is nothing the Father can do about it.

In true Irish fashion, his daughter of course is a ginger.

Despite the similar genres, The Guard and Calvary aren’t very similar. This film is much heavier on the drama and symbolism, while The Guard has more comedy, lewd behavior, and shooting of guns.

Gleeson puts on a heck of a show though, and even though I recognize his face in plenty of sinful characters from the past, I feel like it fits the best in a Catholic suit garb. Whatever those robes are called. He fit the character really well, including the few times in the movie where he broke down and did non Priesty things.

The supporting cast was especially up there for me, especially Dowd and Moran. Moran in general was just impressive with his character, and Dowd was impressive being in a more dramatic role which is rare for him. I have only seen Gillen in Game of Thrones, but his character is also pretty great. It is also nice to see Reilly in a controversial role after her last terrible role in Heaven Is For Real.

Overall, this is a really great and powerful movie. It might be pretty easy to get lost in some of the symbolism, or really figuring out where it is all going. I know I didn’t understand the whole thing without some additional research (and some of that research feels bullshit). Definitely a movie you might have to watch more than once to get the full impact of it.

Hoo, boy. Here I go. I am about to watch a movie called Nymphomaniac, VOL 1. That tells us that there are two volumes. Oh jeez, this is going to be something weird alright.

Directed by Lars von Trier, who gave us Melancholia, which I hated, and AntiChrist, which I don’t really want to see. This is supposed to be the end of some sort of some Depression Trilogy with the other two movies, so that doesn’t seem cheery.

I also know the original version of this movie was not split into two parts, but five and a half hours long in one go. That is a shit ton of movie. A movie about sex. For the two parts, about 90 extra minutes was cut overall, giving us the 2 two hour films.

I will try my best to be a grown up about all of this.

It was also pretty hard to find some PG pictures. Gotta have some standards.

Joe (Charlotte Gainsbourg) has done a lot in her life. Sometimes, multiple people at the same time. That’s right, Joe, a woman, liked sex. Get over it prudes.

But now she has found herself lying homeless in the streets. Thankfully, Seligman (Stellan Skarsgard), a local, has taken her off the streets to get her some food and help, in exchange for her life story.

So that is exactly what we get, or at least half of it in this first volume. We learn about her family, in particular her father (Christian Slater). He was a nice guy, and stop it, stop where your mind is going. A movie about sex doesn’t mean everything is about sex, he could just be nice.

We found about her experiencing sexuality as a kid, losing her virginity to Jerome (Shia LaBeouf), as a teen (Stacy Martin) entering public sex competitions with her friend (Sophie Kennedy Clark), breaking up marriages making irate wives (Uma Thurman) and even being a prostitute for awhile.

All of it being told, while Seligman relates his own stories and tales he has heard to her experiences.

Although his experiences don’t involve too many train gang bangs.

Hey, this movie has a lot of intense subject matter, so I will try to break it down.

At least in volume 1, they are not making an argument that her life is horrible due to her addiction to sex. Or at least, not from what I can tell. She doesn’t get shunned for being promiscuous, she is just able to more or less live out her life. Sure, she gets upset and sad over events and some are related to sex, but it isn’t the cause of all of her problems.

It also isn’t a porno. Sure, there is sex in the movie. And some of it graphic in nature. You might watch it and go “Holy shit, that is real sex. In a movie! I saw penetration!” Well, apparently all of the sex scenes were done through CGI stuff. So all of the sex scenes were set up very specifically, needing certain angles and shots for what was planned. And then it looked really real, making it a bit uncomfortable, but it wasn’t.

So how about the movie? Well, as a stand alone volume, I think it had some strong moments and some weak ones. There are five to six stories that are told, so of course not all of them will be hit or miss. But yeah, about 50-50 for me.

Kind of interesting film, didn’t go super hard in the first volume, so wondering where the rest of her story is going. By itself? It’s okay.

Like most people who still are alive, I sometimes find myself worrying about money. I don’t have any evidence to support this, but I also think a few dead people also might still worry.

Although I don’t think I was directly affected by the 2008 financial disaster, as in, I didn’t lose my 401k or anything (which is a thing I have now!). But it affected where I went to college thanks to increased enrollment in graduate school due to less jobs. It affected the job market that I went into 6 years later. And it affected the classes I took because all of the sudden they wanted to relate things to current events. Boo current events.

Inequality For All is a documentary that wants to help explain the direct cause before the effect, but how that first cause was able to happen in the place. This is all of course according to Robert Reich and a few other people. Reich has worked under several presidents and served as Secretary of Labor under Clinton. He also has about a shit ton of books, and now lectures about the economy and appears on some political shows.

So if anything, we can say the guys point of views have some amount of validity to them and he isn’t just a celebrity talking about someone else’s research.

He also looks a bit like a cult leader in this image.

Reich himself is a pretty charismatic guy. He had some condition causing him to be pretty short for and adult male, and if you didn’t notice right away, you will notice after his 30th short joke in the documentary. Some footage is him literally talking to a documentary camera telling information, some of it through his narration, and some of it through footage of his talks. But don’t worry, it isn’t just a guy babbling for 100 minutes. It does still feel like a standard documentary. We get animations of charts and graphs, we get figures, we get footage from elsewhere.

From what I can see, a lot of what he said seemed to be correct. I can’t say that finance is my subject background, so nothing appeared to be incorrect.

I however think that the way it was presented felt a bit boring. Sure, early on I was in to it. But as it went on, I kind of just wanted it to make its points quicker. Hurry the fuck up. Tell me what I need to know and stop trying to convince me.

This is all just how I felt watching it. Some good information. On its own, won’t change anything, but the ideas are correct and delightful. Since it is on netflix, it can be a nice watch to waste time, but this documentary won’t blow your mind.

Rise of the Planet of the Apes did something miraculously a few years ago. It was able to bring back a cherished series, put its own stamp on it, and not suck completely.

You know, like what Planet of the Apes couldn’t do a decade and a half ago.

But still! Well done Rise. It relaunched a series and gave us a good story. Outside of a really terrible forced romance, it was an exciting movie that I have watched many times.

So, no pressure Dawn of the Planet Of The Apes.

Pressure is Caesar’s middle name. Wait. No. That was Julius.

Dawn is set ten years after the events of the first film. The virus spread throughout the human race, killing most of them. Sure, there were people immune to the virus who are now survivors. But their numbers are few in small cities across the globe, running low on resources and technologies that once were plentiful.

Caesar (Andy Serkis) and his band of merryapes are living peacefully in the red wood forests outside of San Francisco. They haven’t seen humans in years. They hunt deer, protect their own, have rules, are teaching the youth. But then? Humans.

A group of them, including Malcolm (Jason Clarke), Ellie (Keri Russell), Alexander (Kodi Sit-McPhee), and Carver (Kirk Acevedo). They are to go to the nearby dam to try and turn it on. Supplies are low.

However Ape/Human relationships are quite tense. Caesar is willing to trust them and forgive, but other apes in the vicinity, like his general Kobo (Toby Kebbell) might not be as trusting. Add that with the human fear of the apes, lead by the San Fransisco ex-military leader Dreyfus (Gary Oldman) and you got the potential for quite a boondoggle.

Also, Nick Thurston plays Blue Eyes, the son of Caesar (because Augustus would be silly).

I know what you’re thinking, human. You’re thinking “did he fire six shots or only five?” and “Does that Ape know how many shells are even in a shot gun” and “Does he think that gun is candy?”

I will definitely give this movie one thing. It did a great job at world building after the events of the first film. Of course, we only get to see a small area, San Francisco + forest. It would have been cool to see more of the world. For instance, just how many humans are there? I assume that will be answered in future parts.

Caesar / Serkis was also really cool. Everything about him was awesome. Speech, movements, plot line. What a baller guy/ape.

But other than that? This movie disappointed in some ways too. At times the CGI was really jarring, standing out, and even looking kind of shitty. Some of the characters looked awful and I was taken out of the experience. When the Apes and Men clashed for the first big fight? That looked terrible. The other fire scene? Didn’t really work for me either.

The film also dragged on at different times. All of it part of the world building and getting used to this new civilization. And I kind of just wished it would get to the point closer. The ending itself felt a bit predictable too, offering not a lot new minus the fact that it involved apes.

The movie had a lot of good, and a lot of average going on for it. So although parts were awesome and the movie had a good vibe, I couldn’t help leave feeling a bit disappointed. Also for those who hate reading, 1) thank you for still reading my reviews, and 2) there is a bunch of subtitles.

Finally, the moment everyone has been waiting for. A comedy biopic about the life of Paul Potts!

What? You don’t know who Paul Potts is? I mean, come on, he is… uhh. Shit. I never heard of him either. This is a real story? I just thought it was a comedy about a guy wanting to sing Opera and people getting in his way.

So this guy got famous for winning Britain’s Got Talent, which is the first iteration of that show, and thus the first ever winner. I guess that makes him special? Sure.

One Chance is a reference to the show being his only opportunity to make it big and stop selling cell phones, and I guess the name of his first album.

And who can really hate a sad clown?

Before Britain’s Got Talent, Paul was just a fat kid in a choir. He sang like an angel, typical of kids, and got beat up for it, also typical for kids. Yet somehow into his early adult life, Paul (James Corden) was still getting beat up by local yokels every once in awhile. Bunch of savages…

Well, things are about to change. A girl he was talking to on the internet is coming over to visit! Julz (Alexandria Roach), and she was a real woman! Internet success! His job as a cell phone salesman is okay, but the manager (Mackenzie Crook) is inept. Either way, they like each other, and he just recently won a talent competition for cash. This will let him travel to Venice and take a real Opera class and maybe meet the Pavarotti.

I have been told this Pavarotti is a real big Opera name.

Either way, he does good there too. Performing with Alessandra (Valeria Bilello), he is able to earn a chance to perform for Pavarotti. But the theme of this movie and his life is that something goes wrong.

Paul is hit with injury after injury, with some freak accidents, to always take his career steps back before he gets his next “One Chance.”

Then you know, eventually Britain’s Got Talent does something.

His parents are played by Julie Walters and Colm Meaney.

Oh shit, he wins! Surprise!

Once he auditions for BGT, the movie quickly recaps that he wins and becomes famous, tours, sings for the queen, and then end.

Huh? What? But how did fame change him? We don’t get much of that story. I guess being a success isn’t as interesting?

One Chance is an incomplete biography that is comical in nature, in that bad things keep happening to him. Unfortunately, while watching it I could help but wonder who the hell care? Knowing how he got famous, and knowing that it was produced by the same people who did BGT, it just feels like an awkward advertisement to make their show seem relevant.

“See? We are awesome. We saved him!”

Yeah. Who cares?

A guy who is unlucky does not on its own an interesting movie make. I don’t know if James Corden was actually singing, but it didn’t seem like it, and felt pretty awkward.

I feel like this film could have been a lot better, but after viewing, the trailer makes for a much more enjoyable and time saving option than the film itself.

It took a few years, but today I finally get to finish a trilogy of reviews on this site. I don’t know why it took me so long to see The Way Back, as I got it probably two years ago. Just needed the right moment.

Although un-officially, The Way Back is the second movie of a trilogy. The other two are of course The Way and then The Way, Way Back. I know I watched them out of order, my bad. But those two movies made me really excited about this one, mostly for the fact that I gave them both 4 out of 4.

I don’t necessarily enjoy watching bad movies (despite the number that I do see), so anything to give me hope that a movie might be amazing is fine in my book. Even if the logic is absurd.

If I remember correctly, no other movie in the “Trilogy” uses the word Gulag.

Life during WW2 was probably hard. Not too much Freedom in Europe, people dying, and if you were really unlucky, you might have been sent to the middle of nowhere Siberia to live in a Gulag. A Gulag was a nice labor camp where people had to work and eventually die. You may have saw one in Muppets Most Wanted. They aren’t too hard to get out of either, because there is generally no way someone could survive the harsh weather and get anywhere safe. There are many animals who would kill you, and communities all around know they will get a bounty if they return any escaped criminals.

But that’s not to say that people didn’t try anyways.

Like Janusz Wieszczek (Jim Sturgess), a Polish POW who was sent to the gulag and definitely doesn’t want to be there. After some cruel conditions, lack of food, and harsh weather, he finally gets a group of people to escape with.

We have an English engineer Mr. Smith (Ed Harris), an actor Khabarov (Mark Strong), Zoran (Dragos Bucur) a Yugoslavian accountant, Voss (Gustaf Skarsgard), a Latvian Priest, Tomasz (Alexandru Potocean), a Polish artist, and Kazik (Sebastian Urzendowsky) a Polish man with night blindness. Hmm. Who else who else. Oh of course, Valka (Colin Farrell), a Russian criminal.

I would like to thank Wikipedia for giving me their ethnicity and work information because there is damn no way I would remember most of that.

Unfortunately, after traveling through the winter storm areas, with some men dying along the way, they find that Mongolia seems to be under Communist command. That is just escaping into more enemy territory. No, it looks like they might have to walk even further from Siberia. They may have to walk to India, through the Himalayas and Tibet, through a grueling desert and treacherous mountains. Oh boy. That is a long way back.

Also, at some point they meet Irena (Saoirse Ronan), a young Polish girl with questionable back story.

My theory is that she used to be that stick.

The Way Back is not run of the mill action escape movie. It also isn’t necessarily about the initial escape either, so there isn’t an hour of lead up before they break out. The movie is about the journey after they escape and their long walk to freedom.

It could be considered an Epic of sort, because it is literally a hard drama about people trying to survive in harsh conditions. Everything felt so realistic with their journey as well, from blisters and swelling, to dry caked lips. It was hard to watch at times, knowing that if I was in a similar situation I probably wouldn’t have made it out of Siberia.

I see it was nominated for an Oscar for Best Makeup and it was extraordinary. That, coupled with the excellent cinematography and scenic views really draw you into the film and make it a memorable experience.

At the same time? Eh, it lulled a few times in the movie. I can’t tell really if this is supposed to be a true story, but it is inspired by a book. I think the film suffered from too many characters early on. They might have needed them just to kill some people off and showcase more the harsh conditions, but it became a bit harder to tell who was who (when they were all bundled up and frost bitten) and who would just be movie fodder.

Overall a really well done film though.

There was not a lot of build up to Tammy compared to other recent McCarthy based films such as The Heat and Identity Thief. Those films got their trailers played over and over again, to increasingly annoying levels. Tammy? Nah. It had a strange teaser trailer a few months ago, decently funny, and then a regular trailer like, a month ago and that was it.

Good. It really sucks hating a movie before it comes out due to bad trailers or overplaying those trailers.

In fact, the teaser trailer of Tammy robbing the store? Pretty amusing. So there were definite hopes for this film. Especially when I found out that Melissa McCarthy co-wrote the movie with her husband / director Ben Falcone. So presumably they will flesh stuff out and not just give us the same roles she has now been type casted to.

See? She looks calm in this picture. She is never calm in any other movie.

This is a movie about a lady named Tammy (McCarthy). Tammy just lost her job for being late constantly, even if she had a good reason this time. Her car breaks down while going back home. Because she still gets back home early, she is able to see her husband (Nat Faxon) and neighbor (Toni Collette) having a fancy dinner and surprised to see her. Wooo.

So Tammy decides to leave. She wants to run away but her car is dead. Her mom (Allison Janney) says no, but her grandmother (Susan Sarandon) says yes! Pearl has over $6,000 in cash and a car, just needs someone to drive her, so why not run away with her grand daughter for awhile?

Which is also I guess your basic plot. They go on a mini adventure, where things go badly and problems occur. They get to see Pearl’s cousin, Lenore (Kathy Bates), the founder of a big pet store chain and her lesbian lover (Sandra Oh). They also meet a gentlemen interested in Pearl (Gary Cole) and his son (Mark Duplass) who Tammy awkwardly flirts with.

Outside of mentioning that her dad is played by Dan Aykroyd, I don’t think I could describe the movie anymore than I already have.

Talking about this scene is unnecessary thanks to the trailer!

When I said that was the basic plot, I guess I tried to sound sarcastic, but that is really hard to do through words on a screen. It is hard to really say how much of a plot this movie had outside of a girl and her grandmother having problems and driving. Those tiny plot points could be turned into a good film, sure, but this film might not have been in the best hands.

For the most part, McCarthy does play the exact same role. She has some nicer character moments that a lot of her other roles lack, which is nice. But as the main lead, her character doesn’t have enough for me to care. Was I supposed to feel sorry about her getting fired? No way. Even if this time it was okay, it still implied she was late a lot and probably deserved it. Same with most of the other things that happened to her.

Let’s go back to the awesome teaser trailer. You know how I didn’t bring it up? That is because that scene doesn’t happen until about two thirds of the way in the movie. Seriously. And not much is different about it from the teaser. All the lines are the same, barely any longer. A funny part so much later ruined for that reason. Looking at the trailers, this scene seems to be something early on which would make it okay. Hey, the problems start because she robs a store. Cool. Nah. That late in the movie, I kind of wonder what the point was.

Overall, the movie did have some amusing scenes, but they were few and far between for me. Pretty forgettable soon after watching it.

Happy Freedom Day everybody! Unless you are reading this from Not-America, in which case, you know, the Fourth of July or whatever you want to call it.

I needed to review some sort of patriotic like movie for this special and awesome holiday, much like last year how I showed God Bless America. So when I found out some strange documentary was coming out this week with America in the title, I was thrilled.

America: Imagine The World Without Her. Alright, umm. Kind of a weird title. In fact, just reading it gives me negative thoughts about how this “Documentary” will go.

In middle and elementary school, every February for many years I would end up seeing a play put on for Black History Month. Usually it was about the achievements and inventions of Black Americans, and how life would be so different without them. It was an awkward play then and it is now, because they make the claim that if they weren’t there, then it would never be made. Which is bullshit of course, if they didn’t do it, someone else would have most likely. So I was scared that this documentary would be a lot like that play, but on a bigger screen scale with more kung fu fighting bald eagles or something.

But I was wrong. Somehow, it was far worse than I could have ever imagined.

And it was made by a man who looks like the Indian version of my second to last roommate.

Rage. That was my first emotion during this piece. After the intro of course. The documentary is full of historical reenactments, such as speeches by Lincoln or Frederick Douglas. It asks a hypothetical, how the world would be if Washington died in the Revolution. If the South won their independence. Some cool questions, of which, none of them were explored.

Instead, they ignored basically the title of the documentary and those questions and talked about why America was bad and their country was founded on thievery. What thievery? America stole the land from the American Indians, stole half of Mexico, stole people from Africa, stole resources from the world, and stole money from their own citizens.

What? This is what made me rage as it went through this list, detailed explanations from interviewed people as to why America was dick. I remember yelling retorts in my head. Like, “Fuck Christopher Columbus! He wasn’t American, he was Spanish, I don’t care what he did. Didn’t even land in modern USA!”

And then you know what? The documentary did it for me. Here came my confusion phase.

It started to use the same arguments in my head to clear up some of the issues. But it also used incorrect facts coupled with correct facts to make its point. I should have knew something was up when it grouped those five things together.

Not only did it mold the incorrect with the factual, blurring the lines with its biases, but a lot of what it started to say seemed pointless. Like, using these pointless “facts” as an argument against the earlier brought up points, where these stories didn’t actually relate to the points the argument made.

It’d be a lot easier to just dismiss if it was biased in one way. All falses, or something. But this documentary is sneaky.

So sneaky, that the true intentions of this documentary aren’t all made clear until near the last third.

And it all involves this woman reenactment video.

Turns out this documentary has a completely different agenda. It has turned suddenly into an anti-Obama documentary, almost completely out of left field. The director also did 2016, a documentary that I now have no reason to ever watch, because I can’t trust a thing he said. Should have known that, I guess.

So yeah, it went super hard against Obama out of nowhere. A lot of it was strange in that it was angry at him and his policies, despite it specifically being things started in the Bush years?

Then it went and talked about socialism, talkign about Saul Alinsky, and how Obama was someone who liked some of his ideals. This makes everyone bad by the way. Not only does it bring in Obama, but it then attacks Hillary Clinton, who wrote a thesis on him in college.

So there you have it. The whole point of this doc. It is entirely right wing propaganda, even had pro Tea Party information which no one should like. It made them seem like the little guy who was being walked all over, so the documentary wanted them to stand up and fight back against these evil changes to America.

They didn’t answer the questions brought up in the documentary. It was misleading. And it literally was just made quickly to affect the 2016 elections, which haven’t even had primaries for either side to see who is in the running.

What in the actual fuck.

Politically, I am an independent, so if a Democratic type documentary like this came out I would bash it equally as well.

America is an ass kicking country, and this documentary is part of the problem, not part of the solution. Political division is fucking stupid.