Tag: Colin Farrell

Before this week, I had never seen Mary Poppins. Classic movie sure, and I of course knew songs and scenes from it, but I never watched it in its entirety. Blame the parents. While watching the movie as an adult, I did find it very odd. The message was clear: money is evil, family is great, but why they chose to enforce that message in the 1960s was beyond me.

That was my main goal for watching Saving Mr. Banks: to figure out what the money and banks ever did to the Mary Poppins author. Oh, and to figure out why she was behaving like a huge bitch.

I didn’t think anyone could be mean to a face like that.

Saving Mr. Banks is supposed to tell the true-ish story of Walt Disney (Tom Hanks) acquiring the rights to a film version of Mary Poppins, from the author P.L. Travers (Emma Thompson). Of course because it is a Disney movie about the creator of Disney, don’t expect that much actual truth in the movie.

The one thing that does appear to be truthful is that Travers was very very hard to work with. She was granted script rights, and she used the heck out of them. She didn’t want animation, didn’t want music, didn’t want Dick Van Dyke, didn’t want a lot of things. She was very peculiar over her character, and didn’t want Disney to mess it up.

Everything else that occurred in the film is whatever they wanted to say, presumably to rewrite history. For instance, Disney was a chronic smoker and he never hated it, despite it leading to his death. They made a few tiny references in the movie (a cough every once in awhile) but made sure they never showed him doing the deed. In fact, he had a line calling it a disgusting habit and one he was trying to quit. Riiiiight…

The movie is spliced with the tale of Travers’ early life, when she moved to the middle of no where with her family. She lived in a small house, but had a loving (yet alcoholic) father (Colin Farrell), and a quite annoyed mother (Ruth Wilson). Her stories were based on an actual nanny sent to clean up their home, after a few unfortunate events leaving it in disarray.

It should be obvious that most of her complaints with the original script, end up getting included in the final project. So something has to change by the end of the movie, but is it change that all parties actually agree on?

Also featuring Paul Giamatti as an optimistic driver (strange role for him), Bradley Whitford as the writer, and B.J. Novak and Jason Schwartzman as the song writers.

What? You didn’t want a farm story during a Mary Poppins movie movie? Too bad!

After watching the movie, I am unsure how much of it is true, and how much of it is just revisionist history. I mentioned a few discrepancies above, but I also don’t know if the back story on Travers’ early life is accurate. I loved the back story, loved it far more than the other part of the film. It was sweet and it was tragic. It made Mary Poppins make a heck of a lot more sense and give it a more powerful meaning. But given all the other changes, I can only doubt that the past problems are somewhat fabricated as well.

This film is also meant to be a pseudo-biopic for Walt Disney, but since it is such a small part of his wildly successful life, and full of inaccuracies, I wouldn’t be willing to label it as such.

My favorite actor from the movie is surprisingly Colin Farrell, playing the “real” Mr. Banks who needs saving. His performance was incredible, despite being a minor role. But hey, he has impressed me a lot over the last few years with a few of his role choices.

What this film taught me is that the real Travers was indeed really hard to work with, for potentially tragic yet inexcusable reasons. If our current pop culture network existed back then, there would have been tons of negative press thrown her way, with hardly any sympathizers.

Saving Mr. Banks itself will probably mostly just apeal to those who grew up with Mary Poppins in their lives and want to relive the magic in a completely different way.

Part of me was hoping at the end of the movie, when they did the premier of Mary Poppins, that they would show the entire film. You know, secretly turn it into a Double Feature. That would have been truly surprising. But Saving Mr. Banks on its own plays a relatively safe story: one that is very powerful, but also full of deceit.

2 out of 4.

I was very excited when I first saw the trailer for Epic. The music is perfect, not a lot is spoiled, it looks beautiful, and looks like a great new franchise.

You know what I don’t like? The title. You know how hard it is to look up things about Epic? Don’t just search the title, you will get dumb internet images. “Epic Movie” is out, because of a bad movie having that exact same name. I had to resort to searching for “Epic <character/actor name” to get anything close to finding suitable images or posts. Come on people, think about the ease of finding your movie before you name it. Unfortunately, it was also made by Blue Sky Productions, who haven’t really made anything I really loved, their last effort being Ice Age 4: Continental Drift.

Just look at how sexy those birds are. Mmmmhmm.

This movie begins with death! Death before the film takes place (this is a PG movie). MK (Amanda Seyfried) is en route to her fathers house in the middle of the woods. She is almost 18, but her mother just died, and so she has to go live with her dad, who is basically a stranger to her. You see, Professor Bomba (Jason Sudeikis) believes there is a hidden ecosystem in these woods, hidden from human eyes. They react on a faster plane, like flies, so humans can’t really see them because they are always moving so…fast. Yeah, he went crazy and his wife left him. Happens all the time.

But holy tiny men, Bomba is right! In fact, it is a special day, the Summer Solstice on the same night as the Full Moon! Time for the Queen (Beyonce Knowles) to pick a new heir for the next 100 years. After all, only the queen can restore life to the forest if the evil Mandrake (Christoph Waltz) of the Boggarts (swamp/decay creatures) come to mess things up.

The leaf men won’t let that happen! Ronin (Colin Farrell) has sworn to protect her, but young Nod (Josh Hutcherson) is making things difficult by quitting. After some bad things happen, MK finds herself in the woods and magically gets shrunk down to their size. Now she is in the middle of a forest civil war, with the threat of 100 years of swamps on the horizon.

Of course, this could all be some sort of PTSD after her mom’s death for all we know. Chris O’Dowd and Aziz Ansari play a snail and slug, respectfully, Pitbull a frog, and Steven Tyler a glowworm.

“No shell over here baby, I’m a slug” – Aziz. Possibly my new favorite line ever, and I don’t know why.

Epic is loosely based on the children’s book (that no one has heard of), The Leaf Men and the Brave Good Bugs. Basically, it took the character ideas, and made an original story. The plot itself isn’t the most exciting or original, and was filled with certain plot holes that made me shutter.

But it’s pretty, though.

One of my biggest complaints is inconsistencies in a movie. In this case, what is the real difference between a tiny human, a plant/animal human hybrid, and an actual plant or animal.

It’d be simple if all animals and plants could talk and be human-like in this movie, but we have frogs and snails that can talk perfectly, living out their lives and jobs, right next to birds who are just 100% animal, no voice. We have flowers that are just flowers, right next to some flowers that run around, gossip, and have arms and legs. Where is the balance? How does this work?

With the leaf men, they aren’t leaves at all. They are basically tiny humans, with just leaf armor as clothing. Nothing else in the forest outside of the queen appears to be a tiny human, so I found it all confusing.

But it’s pretty, though.

Epic ended up being just an average film, not living up to its (poor) title. If you ignore how confusing the world ends up being, it is a cute tale that is outrageously incredible to look at.

“Hey, it’s a kids movie, stop thinking so deeply about the world!”. No, that is a bad excuse, and leads to movies like Cars 2.

2 out of 4

If you had to say anything about Dead Man Down, you would say that it had guts. It came out the same weekend as Oz The Great and Powerful, meaning it must not actually care about the money. It must be an artsy film! Just watch the trailer, I actually want you to for once. Yeah, little bit artsy, doesn’t really give anything major away. I think the trailer is fantastic, beautiful music, and no annoying narrator.

But the last time I saw a kick ass, artsy, action movie trailer, Killing Them Softly happened.

Shit, Killing Them Softly had a car in it too. The similarities are endless! From the trailer you would hear a few lines about deception, the loss of a family, and a traitor. This film definitely involves some of these keywords, but I just don’t want to fully describe it. Really, I went in knowing nothing, and felt like I probably enjoyed it more for that reason.

But here is some character information to not leave you completely in the dark. Beatrice (Noomi Rapace) used to be a beautician, but got into a car accident that severely messed up her face. It hurts to smile now, and its hard to make others feel pretty at that point, so her life is basically over. It sounds superficial, but you will get it. The man who hit her drunk driving only got three weeks in jail. She now lives with her going deaf mother (Isabelle Huppert) and is pretty mad.

Across the street lives, Victor (Colin Farrell), a secretive man. Secretive men have secretive pasts. He works for a local gang leader, Alphonse (Terrence Howard), who has been receiving death threats for over three months, and pictures of himself with his eyes crossed out. Kind of creepy. Victor joined about six months before this started, along with a fellow new recruit, Darcy (Dominic Cooper).

That sounds like a fine enough plot description for me, at least.

Oh, and the rats. Don’t forget to add the rats!Holy character development, Batman!

Seriously, wow. It is almost like every character in the movie was treated like a real individual, and not a complete stereotype. Okay, sure, there were some stereotypical henchmen or bad guys, but even a few of them had their moments as well. Color me surprised.

Despite not being an action packed movie on its own, I would say it has enough to keep me interested. The acting for everyone involved was also great. Colin Farrell is getting a rep at being a box office bomb, but that’s just because Total Recall remake was bad, and for this movie, they went out against a juggernaut.

I fully recommend Dead Man Down, as I feel it is a complete movie experience. It is able to tell a realistic enough story, is not special effects driven, and has a great performance by everyone in the cast. There is a little bit of “supermanning” at the end of the film, but by then it is pretty worth it.

4 out of 4

When I first heard about the film Seven Psychopaths, I was definitely excited. This movie is directed by Martin McDonagh, the guy who brought us In Bruges four years ago.

If you haven’t seen In Bruges, you definitely should. It is a dark comedy, and a pretty unique movie experience. But no pressure on McDonagh to recreate the magic of his last movie or anything.

Pictured above: Unique experience.

Marty (Colin Farrell) is a struggling screen writer and now alcoholic. He had some success, but he cant find the motivation for his next film, which is way past its deadline! Plus, his girlfriend is a bitch, maybe. His best friend, Billy (Sam Rockwell), an out of work actor really wants to help him on his new movie called Seven Psychopaths, so he puts an ad in the local paper calling all psychopaths to contact Marty and tell him their story. Ah jeez, thanks.

At the same time, Billy is working with an old friend of his, Hans (Christopher Walken) on a small time dog kidnapping business. Kidnap dogs from rich looking people, wait for them to post a reward, and boom, profit! Hans is working on money to pay for his wife’s cancer treatment (Linda Bright Clay). Unfortunately, they end up kidnapping the wrong man’s dog. Charlie (Woody Harrelson), a high ranking member of the local Italian mob loves his dog more than anything, and will kill anyone in his way to get him back!

Right. While all of that is going on, Marty is getting caught up in these shenanigans while also hearing stories from other psychopaths, such as Zachariah (Tom Waits), a Dexter sort of psychopath, and a pretty pissed off former member of the Vietcong(Long Nguyen). Not only does Marty have to survive the full wrath of the local mob, thanks to his friends attempts to help inspire the screenplay any way possible, but also stop drinking so gosh darn much!

You know where alcohol gets you? In the hospital. That’s the real moral of this whole movie.

If I am going to compare here, I can say that Seven Psychopaths is a bit more crazier than In Bruges, and you’d expect that with a film that had psychopath in the title. Unfortunately for myself, I had the displeasure of sitting behind a woman who cackled at every small amusing thing, ruining a bit of the humor for myself, but I still found it pretty damn funny. This film had large amounts of normal comedy and “dark comedy”, easily willing to make both groups happy (and potentially uncomfortable if you just want comedy). Basically, if you hate death, stay away.

But the person who really made this movie I think was Sam Rockwell, out of all the actors. His character just felt leagues above the rest of the cast, not that they were bad, just no where as near as awesome and crazy as his. He forces you to watch him every time he is on screen.

I think the only thing I didn’t really enjoy was the “movie in a movie” aspect of it. The movie, Seven Psychopaths, is about a guy trying to write a movie called Psychopaths, and very strange movie like circumstances occurring to his life as a result. Don’t get me wrong, the things that occurred were pretty fantastic, I just almost wanted a 100% real movie instead for a higher shenanigan potential. Definitely a great movie to watch with the friends however, with a fun time guaranteed.

3 out of 4.

Total Recall, for people who like movies based off books that also already had another movie based off of said book.

Do you love the old Total Recall? Yes? Then why the heck are you going to watch this film? You know it wont be anything like it, and will just make you mad because you compare the two. I say ignore it. See how this one goes. Then don’t get too pissed off when you realize this one has no trip to Marsin it.

But if we’re lucky, we are in for a mind fuck. Kind of like the recall business.

Douglas Quaid (Colin Farrell) is a factory worker, helping build police drones, in the Britain Empire. After chemical war, there are only really two livable places left, Britain (Which is a lot of Northern Europe), and Australia, now called The Colony. Guess which one is in charge? GUESS. Lead by President Cohaagen (Bryan Cranston) of Britain, times are rough. Hell, Douglas lives in the Colony, but has to tramsute to Britain each day for work with his pal Harry (Bokeem Woodbine).

What? How can they do that daily? Oh haven’t you heard? The Fall is a giant gravity elevator that goes through the earth’s crust and mantle, around the core, to the other side. Don’t ask questions.

So times are rough. There are ways to get over it though, through Rekall. They will implant false memories into your brain to make it all better. People don’t trust it though. Since Douglas has been having strange dreams about a girl, he finally decides to go. Despite the calming voice of John Cho, shit hits the fan when he tries to have secret agent memories. What’s that? Apparently he already has those memories? How can that be?

Either way, shit is weird. Even his wife Lori (Kate Beckinsale) seems to have turn on him! She is a spy for the government? Oh nos! But at least he finally met the mysterious girl, Melina (Jessica Biel) who claims he was kidnapped and had his memories replaced, and he is actually an agent for Matthias (Bill Nighy), a resistance leader wanting the Colony to break out of Britain control.

Oh, or is all this actually just the memory that was implanted in him? That could be true as well.

For “whatever reason”, when you google Total Recall you mostly get these images.

Wooo science and action! And that is about it.

I mean shit. Okay, I know they don’t get to go to Mars. That sucks. Mars is awesome. Curiosity agrees. But you know, all this felt like was a bunch of confusion, with action, and eventually a crazy ending. I have talked before about how too many plot twists can ruin a movie. Once you reach a certain point, you lose interest, and don’t trust the film anymore. I think this movie passes that threshold. Also, if you thought the lens flares were bad in Star Trek, you are going to be pissed off watching this movie.

I mean shit. Besides the obvious, I feel like the science presented in the movie didn’t even stay too consistent. I’m looking at you magnet cars.

Fuck, I can’t even think of more to say. I just thought it was kind of boring and dumb.

1 out of 4.

In Bruges is one of those movies I heard about before (on the internet! and) from friends, but never really knew how to pronounce.

Oh what a scary film. How could I talk about it with others in real life. Just mumble the title? That second word is way too damn intimidating. Thankfully, that phrase “In Bruges” is uttered in the film on multiple occasions. Whew, problem solved, game over man, game over.

Nothing to do In Bruges. Just gotta look at buildings.

Ray (Colin Farrell) and Ken (Brendan Gleeson) are in Bruges. Yep, movie over.

Ray really really doesn’t want to be in Bruges. I mean, fuck, Belgium? Nothing to do here. Ken seems more optimistic though, loves sight seeing. They are staying at a local small hotel, near christmas, run by a pregnant Marie (Thekla Reuten) and her husband. All we know is they have to stay there for up to two weeks, waiting for a call from some Harry (Ralph Fiennes).

While waiting, they come upon a set for a movie, probably the only movie ever made in Bruges. With a dwarf, Jimmy (Jordan Prentice), some local lady extra (Crackwhore? thief?) Natalie (Elizabeth Berrington) who has a boyfriend, Eirik (Jeremie Renier). Jeez, it’s like you can’t trust anyone In Bruges.

So why are they hanging out in Bruges? What is their secret job? Hopefully it doesn’t involving killing people, that’d make this film about Bruges pretty dark.

Aw fuck.

I have a good bad problem. All the movies I’ve been watching lately I’ve been liking. No variation for the website! Shit!

This film is definitely a different experience. I found it really enjoyable and “funny”, but just a different kind of funny. Colin Ferrel and Brendan Gleeson were pretty great in their performances, despite not knowing for half the movie what they did or what the problem was, just knowing that Ray really really hated Bruges made me giggle. Everything was wrong with that city.

It’s hard to really explain for me what is great about this movie. But it does intensify as the movie progresses, and even after a few shocking scenes, there is still time for some humor in the hotel stand off.

Colin Ferrel in one scene, on drugs? Brilliant. Just brilliant.

3 out of 4.

Man, the cover for Crazy Heart is pretty epic, in my opinion.

Maybe that guitar turns into a gun? Yeah!

Jeff Bridges is the lead, and he is an old, alcoholic, former country star. He used to be big shit, but you know, isn’t anymore. Making ends meat by traveling in the south, playing smaller shows, and getting more beer! Well, eventually he meets Maggie Gyllenhaal, who is a journalist looking for a good story. She is divorced with a son, and they kind of hit it off, in a creepy way.

So he is like, “Hey! I wanna get my life on track!” So he goes to Colin Farrell, a past “student” of his who is big now, and gets to open up for him. Despite thinking he shouldn’t have to, because he used to be better. He wants to do an album with him to get on track better, but Colin has to do a few more solo albums. So he enlists Jeff to write some songs, because he is apparently good at that shit too. Well. He relapses, has relationships problem, drinks, gets hurt, and you know, crazy shit.

Crazy Heart shit. He also has an old friend who helps him through his problems in Robert Duvall, playing helpful bartender. (Or at least the most helpful a Bartender can be to an alcoholic.)

But that is the movie in a nutshell.

There are literally no better pictures of this movie on the internet.

Although it had pretty good acting, I thought it was…too long drawn out. I lost interest. Well done everyone, but just, the story wasn’t interesting enough for me. So I wouldn’t want to see it again.

2 out of 4.

Fright Night! Rawr vampires! This is of course a remake of a movie with the same name. I don’t know anything about the older movie though. Besides it also had a “comedic” element to the horror trope and was self aware of that fact. I am sure it is a fine movie, and I have probably seen a few parts of it before on TV. So I think I would rather just assume that this new version and the original are only similar, and not actually alike.

After all, this movie had to come up with a reason why cell phones do not work.

“WHAT DID I TELL YOU ABOUT ROAMING FEES?!?

The movie begins with a death! After that, yay school. Anton Yelchin is the main character, who used to be a big nerd but now is trying to be all “Cool” and shit. His old friend, Christopher Mintz-Plasse, thinks that their third friend not showing up to school is a bad sign. He thinks a vampire got him! But Yelchin is too cool for vampires. He doesn’t listen to him. You know. Until Chris also disappears.

So he starts to get all paranoid. Could his neighbor Colin Farrell actually be a vampire? (Yes). I know I know, its crazy. He is way too charming to be a vampire.

Unfortunately, of course, no one believes him either. Not even Peter Vincent (played by everyone’s favorite new doctor, David Tennant), the bad ass vampire hunter on TV and in Vegas shows.

It isn’t until Colin openly attacks his home, with his mother, Toni Collette, and girlfriend, Imogen Poots (can we all laugh at her name for a second?), inside does he finally get any help.

Now, I am not one for normally watching “Scary” movies. But the new releases this week were not plentiful, so I gave it a chance. This movie is definitely not scary, but more kind of bad ass. It was very very entertaining. No one is going to win any best actor/actress awards from it, but you will definitely have a good time.

Here is a scene of people not having a good time.

Honestly, all the vampire tropes you want will be in this movie. They didn’t invite a new vampire or anything silly. I was surprised at how much was actually packed in the movie. Halfway through, I thought the film was climaxing, but it got more and more intense instead. Which definitely was a good feeling.

I don’t think you will leave feeling screwed at the ending either. The worst part of some movies is the buildup of how powerful the bad guy is, but in the final fight something easy takes him down due to cockiness or love or something. But in this movie, the vampire proves he is a badass, and the final fight is actually worth it.

Probably would have been better if I watched this at night, instead of noon time though.

3 out of 4.

I shouldn’t have to describe this plot to you but I will anyways.

Charlie Day, Jason Bateman, and Jason Sudeikis are all friends. They all hate their bosses, but for different reasons. But more or less they are all Horrible….Bosses. Jennifer Aniston is sexual abusing Charlie at work, and he is engaged! Kevin Spacey is a crazy psycho and won’t give Jason Bateman his due promotion. Colin Farrell is an incompetent cokehead boss, who got the job over Jason Sueikis.

Also Jamie Foxx is a black man, and thus a murder consultant.

Sorry. I don’t make the rules of the movie.

Wait, murder consultant?

Oh yeah. Because they want to kill their bosses, fixing their lives completely. As long as they don’t do it stupidly enough to get caught, and get help.

The comedy in this I really enjoyed. The plot line, although ridiculous, somehow works out at the end. Do any of the bosses actually die? That would be a spoiler. But it is R rated, if you know what I fucking mean. Jason Bateman plays the role he always seems to play. Charlie Day freaks out and does his fast talk like normal. I am confused by how funny I find Jason Sudeikis, as he is generally a side character. But his characters have been funnier in other recent movies too. Farrell doesn’t add much to the film, but Kevin Spacey easily adds enough to make up for the both of them. Most of you would probably just want to watch this to see Jennifer Aniston in a new light.

As a brunette!

Some flaws, but very decent nonetheless.

3 out of 4.