Tag: Drama

Movies about male strippers aren’t very common in the world for whatever reason. Women strippers? Sure. But men? Nah. Which is shocking, given the large success of the last male stripping movie I’ve seen, The Full Monty. So why not Magic Mike? Only like a 14 year difference or so. That is incredibly small amount of male stripper movies.

But when you also decide to make this movie pseudo-biographical? Yes. Apparently it is inspired and slightly based off of Channing Tatum‘s early life, when he was a male exotic dancer. Well, that just makes it heartfelt. I guess.

We at Gorgview.com would like to note that we are not sexist, and as such we are fine with men being turned into objects, just like women.

In the heart of Tampa is a dangerous part of town. Sexydangerous. A male strip club, that is only open three nights of the week, where women go to flip a shit over men getting almost naked and dancing. Lead by Dallas (Matthew McConaughey), a now slightly older showman who never strips himself, he brings on energy and a good time to any lady who has the cash. Their biggest act is Mike (Tatum), now 30 years and still showing off his strong dance moves. Other dancers include Tito (Adam Rodriguez), Ken (Matt Bomer), Tarzan (Kevin Nash), and Big Dick Richie (Joe Manganiello).

While working on a construction gig, Mike runs into Adam (Alex Pettyfer), just a 19 year old kid, who is pretty down on his luck. After a few run ins, he has him stop by to help run props for the dancers, and due to an accident, he is thrown onto the stage to strip without any real training! Well it works out, kind of, so he joins full time. And he has a sister, non approving Brooke (Cody Horn). Mike would totally persue that, you know, if she wasn’t so stuck up, didn’t already have a boyfriend, and if he didn’t kind of have a weird thing going on with Joanna (Olivia Munn).

Either way, Adam is introduced to the living large lifestyle, and gets pretty deep pretty fast. Mike himself would rather stop stripping eventually, and work with his hands, building customer furniture. Once banks give him a damn loan (shitty credit dealing only with cash), and you know, if he didn’t have to pay off other miscellaneous purchases. Oh yeah, and Gabriel Iglesias is the club DJ, but as he is Hispanic, he is also a drug dealer.

To further clarify our non-sexism, here is some women potentially being objectified as well.

So, surprisingly I guess, the movie wasn’t completely terrible. Was there lots of eye candy for the females? Sure. But the dance moves / performances were generally mostly good, with some big exceptions. Even some funny moments. But the biggest problems really came from a technical stand point.

Generally, I found the transition between scenes to pretty bad in this movie. It opens to the McConaughey “do not touch” monologue from the trailer, but then goes to a black title screen with JUNE on it. Alright. I have no idea why though. I guess the first scene wasn’t June, and now it is? Or we are in a flash back? No, they just arbitrarily decided to tell you the current month that way, fine.

But besides that, scenes would end a little bit too long after the joke, or just at other awkward moments, never flowed too naturally. They also tried to do a lot of long shots for conversation scenes, which were hit and miss. Most of the time they were a miss if they involved Cody Horn, who was pretty bad in this movie. I guess her character was supposed to have a disapproving look 100% of the time on her face, but holy crap was it annoying.

Finally, Kevin Nash. What the fuck. He played the bigger male stripper, but whenever there was a group dance scene, I couldn’t pay attention to the sweet break dancing, because every time he was on camera he looked out of place. Dancing like a robot, not doing much at all. They could have easily gotten a big guy who can actually jump, no idea why they went to shit with him.

I’d say the plot wasn’t the best, but the (mostly) well choreographed dance scenes earn it a watch.

Oh shit, we got a potential bad ass over here. Biutiful, nominated for best foreign film…AND BEST ACTOR for 2011? Say Whaaa. That seems rare. Usually they put the foreign films into a category and then ignore the shit out of them. This puts a lot of pressure on the film to live up to hype.

A joint Mexican/Spain film, 100% spanish, by the guy who brought us Babel. Which I still haven’t seen so whatever.

“Oh jeeeez, I hate pressure.”

Life is raining down shit on Uxbal (Javier Bardem). He is a single father, living with two younger kids, who cannot see their mother (Maricel Alvarez) because she is an alcoholic and bipolar, and a danger to them. He himself is an orphan, only having a brother Tito (Eduard Fernandez). He works with illegal immigrants, namely a bunch of Chinese people who make stuff, and a bunch of African people who sell the stuff. Oh, then he gets a terminal cancer and only has a few months to live.

And fuck it, why not, he can talk to the dead, or at least recently deceased, and passes on messages at funerals.

So he is going to die, guess time to fix up relationship with wife. Nope, she is crazy, and he has to leave his children in better hands! A lot of the Africans get arrested, and he ends up taking in the wife (Diaryatou Daff) and child of one of his (now arrested) friends in order to give them shelter. Hopefully she doesn’t screw him over too.

Speaking of screwing over, he is also able to find all the Chinese immigrants jobs. There is no way that can backfire! (This is funny, if you know what happens. Also sad. Also what in the fuck).

Fine. You can have a picture of someone else who isn’t Javier.

Most of this movie is Javier Bardem with a solemn look on his face, and just being super depressed about his life. He obviously really wants to make sure his kids are safe before he goes, but shit, everyone is making that so damn hard. No one is trustworthy, and in the part of Spain he lives, everyone just sketches me out. There is a scene in this movie that I couldn’t get a picture for, of a strip club, where they wore weird masks to look like more boobs on their heads. And fake nipples on their butt cheeks to make them look like nipples too.

Wasn’t even a hallucination! That shit came out of no where, and he didn’t do coke until a bit later in the club!

Personally, I thought the movie dragged on really hard. It is about 145 minutes long, and only in subtitles. It was a long almost 2.5 hours of my life, having to read the subtitles and all, too afraid to try to multi task. I think it moved too slowly, and was clearly too long. Shit, I think it would have conveyed just as much emotion and heart that they wanted if they cut out like 45 minutes. But I just didn’t care about the story anymore.

Not to take anything away from Javier Bardem, because he clearly put his all into that character and trying to resonate its humanness (that sounds intelligent yeah?). But uhh, I don’t want to see it again.

Savages!

There is a bunch of them in this town, and they are barely even human.

That is all the pop culture I can pick up from that word. Two is a fair amount, hopefully this movie gives me another.

Look at those BRUTES, those SAVAGES, sitting in California and looking fantastic. Sickens me, every time.

O (Blake Lively), short for Ophelia, is the narrator of this tale, and born rich local of Laguna Beach, California. She meets Chon and Ben, working for their pot empire. POT EMPIRE? This movie is about drugs oh no!

Chon (Taylor Kitsch) is a former marine, serving in Iran and Afghanistan, and when asked by Ben, he assured him that Afghanistan had the world’s best pot. Ben (Aaron Johnson) is a free thinker, okay hippie, with big world visions involving giving water to Africa and stuff. But also hey drugs. He has a degree in Business and Botany, and he gets Chon to get some of those seeds back to the states. They are able to grow them with great attention, giving them ridiculously high THC percentages, and make an empire in California where they are rich and can donate a lot to the world charities. Chon is also the muscle, he has a few Iraq buddies to help them out in dire situations.

They’ve been giving cutbacks to a local DEA higher up (John Travolta) for years to keep their business sailing, but when a Mexican Cartel from Tijuana wants to hire them for three years, to use their pot, resources, and people, they get a little bit worried. Especally when the offer presented by one of their lawyers (Demian Bichir) turns out to be more of a demand, and them saying no can get them in a lot of shit.

More or less, it results in the kidnapping of O from both of them. Oh who is O? Their mutual girlfriend. She sexes up everyone. And she loves them both for different reasons, but it leads to nothing bad between the guys so it should be fine. So now Chon and Ben have to try and save her, not die, avoid their really bad ass hit man Lado (Benicio Del Toro) and convince Elena (Salma Hayek), the head of the organization to let them go freely with O, at any cost.

What a fucking great character. No jokes for you, just that fact bomb.

Turns out this movie has a lot of unlikable characters in it. Pretty much no one is the type of person you’d want to root for. So it was hard to really watch the movie on that aspect, as it was a lot of gray area. Unfortunately, the character I liked the least, O, was also the narrator. The dialogue for the narration was bad, and the character was like a spoiled rich kid who has no problems, until the movie. And I don’t think really anyone would care about her, or her kidnapping and constant danger. It sucks, but its true. Let her die, I say. Solves most of the movies problems.

The other big issue I felt was the ending. It didn’t really seem to fit the rest of the movie, almost felt lame. It was different, for sure. But not what I would have wanted. If you see it, you will understand.

But other than that, great performance from Benicio Del Toro, who looked completely different in this movie. Also, Aaron Johnson? He looks ten years older at least than he did from Kick-Ass, and not at all the same. I was shocked when I realized it was the same guy.

I honestly don’t know what to say about $5 A Day based on what I guessed it would be about. Maybe prostitution. Very cheap prostitution.

But that is my go to thought for all films I’ve never heard of.

Oh well maybe its a ROAD TRIPPPP. With prostitutes?

Ritchie (Alessandro Nivola) is a health inspector and living the life with his girlfriend, Maggie (Amanda Peet). Nice. Good job, good pay, good living. Until he gets fired for lying on his resume about spending some years in jail earlier in his life. Maggie didn’t know this either, or that he lied about his dad being dead. Because he isn’t dead! Just dead to him. Something poetic. So Maggie leaves him too.

Apparently his dad, Nat (Christopher Walken) is dying from a tumor, and doesn’t have long to live. But he is apparently a bad guy, who has conned people his whole life. He even gets buy spending at most $5 a day, pretty nice. So Ritchie flies from LA to Atlantic City to be with his dad, who convinces him to go on a road trip to New Mexico for a potential cure. Oh fine.

Just along the way they have to drive in a sweet’n low car, and get free gas as long as they stop at Chevron stations. With hundreds of fake IDs giving him pretty much every birthday of the year, they are able to strategically eat at IHOPs for free! Crafty guy. Along the way they stay in abandoned houses, con some more people, run into their old baby sitter (Sharon Stone) and maybe even get lots of cash over a question of paternity.

What? Could Nat maybe not even be Ritchie’s real father, an exceptionally long con?

I bet when you saw Walken’s name, you knew he’d dance at some point in the movie.

TL;DR Version is this is a road trip movie about a dad and son, before the dad dies, rekindling their relationship, and also shenanigans.

But really I didn’t find it entertaining at all. Lots of cons happen, but to normal regular people who doesn’t deserve it (it feels like). So the main guy is just a jerk, and his son is a jerk too by helping. And that is about it. A 90 minute movie about jerks jerkin’. Yes, I do have a way with words.

This is just more of Christopher Walken playing the stereotype of himself, I think.

Personally, I had no idea what to expect from a movie like An Education. Zero. Possibly a love story. Based on the cast list, most certainly British. But yeah. Completely random watch, love those.

Unless you know, the movie sucks.

All great love stories begin with a ride in a stranger’s car.

Jenny Mellor (Carey Mulligan) is your typical 16 year old girl in London in the 1960s. Okay not really ‘typical’. She is forced by her dad (Alfred Molina) to study hard, play Cello, and be amazing, so she can get into Oxford. She also goes to an all girls school for the top tier education. Because nothing is more important than an Oxford education and degree.

But what about strange men in cars? After a concert, waiting in the rain with her cello, David Goldman (Peter Sarsgaard) drives up and offers her a lift. No, that’d be weird. He offers the cello a place in the car, and will drive by her as she walks home. Wouldn’t want to be creepy. He is just a music lover, and someone who doesn’t want the cello to be damaged!

Or maybe he just loves Jenny. That would explain the gifts, and the chance to go see a real concert with free. Not like he is some creeper, other people are their on his first date, Danny (Dominic Cooper) and Helen (Rosamund Pike). But why has he taken an interest in her? Where did all his money come from?

And why the heck is she suddenly willing to throw away her education if she has the potential to become a young bride? Her main teacher (Olivia Williams) sure seems against it, but why? AHH MOVIE SECRETS.

So much to ponder, but must remain elegant.

I might have found this movie interesting because I really didn’t know where everything was going. Would the guy end up being a creep, or just the perfect man? Would she be able to balance her new living large social life with school? What about Oxford? WHAT ABOUT OXFORD?

But that isn’t enough to actually like a movie, just makes it a one time fling. The acting I thought was pretty good in the movie as well, and the basic storyline. I can’t say that teenage girl lifestyles in England in the 1960s is something I have ready knowledge of, so it is interesting to learn about a completely different culture.

I’m just rambling. A pretty good movie, and you probably won’t be able to guess what is coming.

At first I thought The Ramen Girl was going to be one of Brittany Murphy‘s last movies, but she still had 5-6 come out after this one. Bah! Now I have to watch Something Wicked, that wasn’t released until this year.

Creepy.

Hey Brittany. That isn’t just inappropriate in Japan. It is inappropriate everywhere! Put some clothes on!

Abby (Murphy) is a girl who has recently moved to Tokyo! That is in Japan! She is super white and blonde and stands out a bit. But whatever. She has a job at some office, but they rarely use her, so her days are boring. But at least she has a boyfriend she loves and lives with! Who then has to go to Osaka for business and it might be awhile before he returns. She wants to go too! He says no. And a break up.

Awk. Now she is alone in Tokyo, doesn’t speak Japanese yet, and you know, crying. But she sees a Ramen shop nearby, and it looks enticing. AH FUCK ITS CLOSED. DAMN IT. NOTHING WILL GO RIGHT RARWRAWRWAR.

Because it is hard to ignore a crying white woman, the shop owner Maezumi (Toshiyuki Nishida) and wife Reiko (Kimiko Yo) open up and let her have some ramen. Probably the best thing she’s ever had in ever. She starts going their daily, being the highlight of her day. One day she realizes it is apparently a difficult craft to be the ultimate Ramen maker, and she wants to learn to do it. Damn it.

Especially since she hates her job, she convinces Maezumi to become her Sensei in the art of Ramen, willing to spend her whole day at the shop to learn the craft. Might even find a nice Japanese boy who can speak English, like Toshi Iwamoto (Sohee Park). Yeah, that’d be good.

But more importantly, can Abby become the ultimate Ramen chef supreme? Or you know, just start using those 10-20 cent ramen packs with flavoring. Those are pretty awesome too.

Wash Off, and Wash off some more. This is time to clean.

So if you couldn’t tell already, this is pretty much The Karate Kid, meets cooking noodles. Frankly, I think the entire point of the movie is to tell Americans that Ramen noodle cooking in Japan is a serious business, and takes awhile, and the shit we have here is shit.

But I still don’t buy it. Can’t fool me Japan. It’s just noodles in broth, with seasoning and stuff. Maybe plated sexy in a bowl. You can’t fool me, movies!

Overall it was an okay movie. If for whatever reason you like seeing Brittany Murphy cry, she does that a lot in the movie. Every once in awhile, while laughing, I could hear “Luanne” come out of her, and that was odd. But a mostly predictable story, where Murphy cries and gets hit in the head a lot. But never gives up, damn it.

People Like Us is a movie that actually went to theaters, but I never really heard of it. Heck, still in theaters. I only knew about it because I saw a preview for it in WTEWYE, and was like “Hey, I’ll watch that!” You know. Because I will watch anything.

The cast didn’t hurt the cause either.

Sam (Chris Pine) hates his dad. He also works a potentially sketch job where he buys overstocked goods and trades them to other countries, for profit. Bartering stuff. Currently living with girlfriend Hannah (Olivia Wilde), who is applying to law school, living the dream in NYC. But hey look, he gets in trouble with his job and then his dad dies. Awk. Despite his best attempts, he flies out to LA for the funeral to hang out with his mom (Michelle Pfeiffer). Their relationship is bit strange.

On the will, all he Sam gets is his dads old records, until the lawyer shows up and lets him know of another secret thing left behind. A shaving kit with 150 thousand dollars inside. Hooray! But a note? To give to some kid, Josh Davies (Michael Hall D’Addario). But why? Time to be a spy. He look, he has a mom, that makes since, Frankie (Elizabeth Banks). But she sees upset. Apparently her dad died too.

What’s that, secret family?! Oh shit. Now Sam has a half sister and half-nephew (?) that he never knew about, and has to give him all this money when he himself is having financial trouble? Well clearly the only thing left to do is enter their lives on a false pretense, and learn more about his secret family, before telling them the truth and the money he holds.

Also, Mark Duplass plays a neighbor and very small role.

“So I am just going to be sketch and in your life, and drive your kid around. Is that cool?”

This movie got pretty intense at times, and man did Chris Pine get smacked a lot. Too much. Come on people, women beating on men shouldn’t be seen as okay either.

Also, this movie got super weird at times. Keeping the fact that you are a half brother a secret to your half sister? Super sketch, especially if both people are attractive and you are way overly nice.

Overall I found most of the acting to be pretty good for the film, that was also touching at the same time. It is one of those call your parents right after and fix your problems, movies. Or else you know, regret. Death and shit.

But at the same time it was far too slow at parts, and the whole plotline involving him avoiding the law and getting jail time was super weird. They definitely didn’t flesh that out, just swept it under the rug, and ignored it. That bugged me a lot, finish your storyline.

But still, the ending? Dawwwwwww.

I saw probably two trailers for Moonrise Kingdom, with neither of them answering really anything at all. I did know that it was a Wes Anderson movie, of which I have only liked one. But to be fair, I have only seen two…

I am sure someone is reading this review because they heard I disliked Bill Murray and heard I only like him in cameos. Well. I won’t let any perceived actor hatred from giving this movie its full attention and chance to wow me. No fear good sirs.

Uh oh, famous people alert.

Honestly, I have a hard time trying to explain just what this movie is about. The easiest way is to just explain some of the characters and location.

The setting is in 1965 at a fictional New England island of New Penzance. Pretty small. Nearby is a few other islands too. But small, has a ferry system, and no paved roads.

The first family introduced is the Bishops, Walt (Murray) and Laura (Frances McDormand). They have three young boys, and an older daughter at twelve named Suzy (Kara Hayward). She may be dysfunctional, and likes binoculars.

There is only one police officer for the whole island, Captain Sharp (Bruce Willis) and not the smartest man out there. There is a local camp set up for some Khaki Scouts, lead by Scout Master Ward (Edward Norton), who is a math teacher normally. He runs his camp with authority, and makes sure not too many shenanigans occur. But when it is found out that Sam (Jared Gilman), an orphan kid who no one likes has retired from the Scouts, run away and stolen a canoe, it drives the Island into panic!

Mostly indifference, but still, he can’t have gone that far.

This leads to a grand adventure of love, and longing. Where adults act childish, and children act like adults. Where books are read, and where coves are named. Jason Schwartzman also appears as “Cousin Ben” and Harvey Keitel as Commander Pierce, head of the Khaki Scouts and working on the local Hullabaloo.

Still don’t know what this movie is about? Bitch, she’s a raven!

Fucking Wes Anderson! How dare he do an amazing movie like this.

Everything felt top notch about this movie. Everything was so weird and I love weird. The music? It was both in your face, and felt appropriate. But the real level of amazing would be the camera work here. Lot of longer scenes where the camera would just move from left to right as people walked, and things happened in the background, and the movie carried on. The color schemes between the scenes, they were noticeable and overpowering, but yet it also added so much to the island of New Penzance.

I can’t even tell if the acting was that good? The main kid performances was full of “awwww”, and I love movies that give me stuff like that. You know, like Flipped.

The movie is really hard to explain, but I really loved it. Was on the edge of my seat for a while. I did find it odd that I was pretty much the only one laughing in my theater of 12-15~ people for most of the jokes. But those guys are just jerks I guess.

Darwin Darwin Darwin.

Who would have thought a movie called Creation was a biographical-ish movie about Mr. Charles? Seems pretty silly. But I guess it is about his struggles with discerning natural selection, and his “battle” against Creation.

Alright why not, his life is probably riveting.

Oh, I see what they did there.

Charles Darwin (Paul Bettany) loves him some biology. And family! Especially his daughter, Annie (Martha West). She loves to hear stories, and thankfully he has a whole bunch. Because fifteen years prior, he went on this fantastic voyage to the Galapagos Islands. So since then he has been home, working on his discoveries, and trying to figure out this dang evolution thing.

His wife Emma? She hates this shit. Emma (Jennifer Connelly) is more religious than a Chinese fruit basket, so she doesn’t like the potential implications of the findings of his research. She thinks she will be in heaven and he won’t make it if he publishes the book, and they will be separated throughout eternity.

Turns out also that daughter he loved died awhile ago, weak genes or something, and he is just moping. Doesn’t want to kill god, doesn’t want to make wife mad, but can’t just ignore this stuff. So most of the movie is him trying to properly grieve over the death of his daughter and rekindle his marriage, with some Galapagos island stories, a monkey, and other science.

WILL HE DECIDE TO PUBLISH HIS BOOK THOUGH? I do not know.

Like I said, it is his favorite kid. >.>

Kind of a short plot summary eh? Well I mean, it is pseudo biographical. I think they cut out a lot of his children, and probably just exaggerated how much it affected him. I mean, Charles Darwin, he is a scientist, probably not seeing a ghost of his daughter.

Unfortunately for me, I found this tale to be quite boring. If I wanted a full biography of him, I’d like some stuff as he grew up as well, before his wife, actual life story, not just the important 15 years. I’d also want post book publishing implications.

However much of this is true, I can’t say, but over half of it is just awkward guilt and grieving, so not really what I expected.

“Uh oh, it is a John Malkovich movie. Better not try to multi-task this movie.”

That is an exact quote from me before watching Disgrace. Disgrace being a novel about post-Apartheid South Africa (or the Best South Africa in my book!). I mean, the author actually received a Nobel Prize in Literature a few years after writing this. I didn’t even know they had one of those, because hey, I barely know what books are.

Who would have thought so much love would be given to a professor who had a relationship with one of his students?

This is the walk of a man who is giving zero fucks about his situation.

Shit, I might have given away most of the plot I can tell already.

Professor David Lurie (Malkovich) is a Professor (shut up) in South Africa (said that already). But what you didn’t know is that he teaches English! Romantic poems and stuff. Through flirtatious glances and the such, he develops a relationship with Soraya (Natalie Becker) even though she has a boyfriend and is in his class. Oh well, she’s hot, sex hooray! No way he could be taking advantage of her in this situation, right?

Well, word gets out and the university doesn’t like it. He is brought before a board, admits to everything, and is promptly dismissed. He doesn’t care though. He just wants to live his life, now that he is in his 50s and divorced and miserable. So he leaves his South African city and goes to a different South African place, to live with his daughter Lucy (Jessica Haines) who is a simple farmer, living in a small community, and a lesbian.

David volunteers at a local pet clinic, but the job is a pretty sad one. Mostly getting rid of unwanted dogs. He starts a relationship with the clinic owner. Lucy is in a business relationship with Petrus (Eriq Ebouaney), a black farmer who shares the land. But while he goes away on a business trip, a horrible event happens. Three younger gentlemen go to their farm, rob them, assault them, and Lucy is raped.

Not the most ideal situation, but David is even more shocked when Lucy refuses to persecute the criminals (post-Apartheid is a weird time in South Africa. Race relations unstable) and not be a bother to the community. She also becomes pregnant.

Will David realize the power others can actually hold over others based on their position? Will he change at all? What the hell South Africa?

“Hey now, this time it wasn’t me. I’m white!”

I know, I know this is going to sound weird. But this plot didn’t interest me at all. It had lots of things a good drama needed, but I never could get attached to the main characters and it all bounced right off of me. The rubber effect. Too bad I couldn’t have been an emotional glue.

This is an example of a film where I could recognize the good acting and work to make the film, but still not give a damn either way. The worst reviews for me to write, because I can never really give a good reasoning behind it. I mean, maybe it was just too slow? I don’t know. But some how a wall was put up, and I guess I won’t watch it again.