Tag: Megan Fox

Two years, Michael Bay released Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles as a nickelodeon presents film, after 4 or 5 years of delay. And now, just two years later, we have a sequel!

Damn it, in my last one, I mentioned how forgettable the movie was. That means I also wanted to forget about it. But how can I forget about a movie if they go and make a sequel?

This time it is called Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Out Of The Shadows. Or, TMNT: OOTS for short. Hmmm. Oots. That kind of, if you stretch it a little bit, sounds like OOZE. And ni the previous set of Turtle films, the sequel was called Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles II: The Secret of the Ooze. Is that a coincidence?

Based on that screen grab, then HELL NO IT ISN’T!

Set a year after the first film, our turtles are now heroes! Just kidding. Leonardo (Pete Ploszek), Michelangelo (Noel Fisher), Raphael (Alan Ritchson), and Donatello (Jeremy Howard) are still hiding in the shadows with Splinter (Peter Donald Badalamenti II, Tony Shalhoub, yes two people), training and existing.

They let Vernon Fenwick (Will Arnett) take all the glory, and people love him for it. But now…now The Shredder (Brian Tee) is about to break out of prison! In fact, his break out involves teleporting, portals, and a whole lot of foot soldiers. And of course, Baxter Stockman (Tyler Perry), smart scientist who wants to do evil to be famous.

And now they have Bebop (Gary Anthony Williams) and Rocksteady (Stephen Farrelly). And the turtles get Casey Jones (Stephen Amell). Basically a nice fair trade. OH AND KRANG (Brad Garrett) is here to tip the balance for the bad guys!

Eh, yeah, I guess Megan Fox returns as April O’Neal, Brittany Ishibashi is female Shredder assistant ninja, and Laura Linney is a police chief or something. It kind of fluctuates.

AW SHIT, KRANG HYPE FOR REAL.

While writing the plot outline, I couldn’t help but feel that this movie was just more of the same, with like, four more characters. And if it is more of the same, then it is still not too good, and making it crowded could add to the problems.

Like, for instance, Shredder not having any cool fight scenes whatsoever in this movie. And Splinter is in the film, but has maybe six lines and maybe a minute of screen time. Krang is only brought in for two scenes, his introduction early on (that goes too hectic and fast, like it was made for people with short attention spans), and then near the end. The ending scene was actually a bit more entertaining and longer, which is a plus.

But that brings us to all of the fight scenes. Basically every fight scene feels blurry and it requires you to fill in the blanks with what is going on. None of the fights are clear, every single one uses this lazy tactic. The first scenes of the movie involve the turtles running around buildings in NYC at night, and it set the bar for low quality action scenes. Hell, the final fight is actually in daylight, but it is still basically ruined with the CGI.

Yes, I both think Krang was cool in this film, while also disappointed in his big fight. The fight looked fun and creative, but again, they just blurred the whole thing together.

Bebop and Rocksteady were okay. They had more personality than the Secret of the Ooze versions and arguably took up all the screen time from Shredder/Splinter. Fox’s character wasn’t interesting, Casey Jones was only in the hockey mask once (early on, not even for the finale), Arnett was still annoying. Linney’s character was really badly done, but probably didn’t have a lot to work on with the scrip.

And honestly, this is the type of film where you might find yourself scratching your head, confused as to why the characters do certain actions. It seems like the dumb or extra complicated route is always chosen. Leonardo was acted far too strongly in the Asshole category, but the other turtles personalities felt right. Oh, and Perry as Baxter is one of the brighter spots as well. Go figure.

I can’t wait to be disappointed by another of these films in 2-3 years.

I have been waiting years to review this movie. Years! Because as you probably already know, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles has been in production hell for years.

It all goes to the time before time, 2010, when Nickelodeon had the rights for TMNT and announced that a Michael Bay company would be in charge, with Bay as a producer. This scared a lot of people.

But nothing was to prepare the fans for March 2012. That is when it was presented that the movie would actually be called just Ninja Turtles and was setting out to change at least half of their origin story. One major point was of course making them Aliens from some Turtle planet. Shredder was also a government agent / alien that could grow blades from his body and a lot of the turtle personality traits were switched around and changed, seemingly unnecessarily.

Fans raged, internet was set on fire, former voice actors wrote nasty letters to Bay and needless to say, production was slowed and delayed. The release of this movie was kept getting pushed back, and that’s why it took almost six years after securing the rights for this movie to be released for the public.

A movie, for all intents and purposes, that should have been pretty easy to churn out.

Just like it should have been pretty easy to act out fainting, one would think.

Thankfully, the story takes place in modern NYC. There is a small gang war happening, where The Foot Clan is running amuck in the town, stealing shit, taking prisoners, being assholes. Basically a giant terrorist organization in NYC and for whatever reason just the local police force is doing something about it.

That and four mutated turtles in their teenage phase who have been trained as ninjas, that is. Leonardo (Pete Ploszek), the leader and Katana user, Donatello (Jeremy Howard), the smart one and Bo Staff wielder, Michelangelo (Noel Fisher), the joker/lover with the Dual Nunchaku, and of course Raphael (Alan Ritchson), the lone wolf and bad-ass with the Sai.

They are attempting to stop the Foot Clan in secret, after being trained by their Sensei Splinter (Danny Woodburn), an Adult Mutant Ninja Rat. And they would have been kept in secret too if it wasn’t for that troubling news reporter April O’Neal (Megan Fox) and her desire to get out of fluff news reporting. She discovers them and gets caught up much deeper into the war than she had wanted, especially since she knows no one will believe her. Not her boss (Whoopi Goldberg) or her camera man (Will Arnett, definitely not playing Casey Jones).

Also featuring non-science science, with a lab company lead by Eric Sachs (William Fichtner) who has a hand in the turtle creation without realizing it. Also featuring Johnny Knoxville and Tony Shalhoub as the voices of Leonardo and Splinter. What? Yes. For whatever reason, those two characters had different voice actors than the people playing them for real. Kind of odd.

Speaking of odd, The Shredder. I have no fucking clue who played him or who voiced him, if they are two different people. The internet seems to be void of that information despite being the big bad villain and all, and in the movie quite a fucking bit.

This face was made by Donatello when he couldn’t find out who was playing Shredder. Not knowing things hurts.

Again, thank goodness the internet rose up and demanded a better film. The turtles themselves are pretty loyal to the source material. Each turtle has his established personality traits and they all shine through nicely. As a team, they also seem to work really well together. Their chemistry was good and one of the better parts in the movie.

In fact, there are quite a few amusing/funny scenes scattered throughout. One “rap” scene in particular was well done (and no, not the Ninja Rap redone or whatever, that is just some bullshit credits thing). I also enjoyed a lot a mini-monologue by Raphael near the end. In terms of fight scenes, the most fleshed out fight scene is the going down the snow mountain one, which has a lot going on. All the fights before that are too dark and shadowy or feature too many quick changes. The final fight scene, with one cool moment, kind of just felt like how I play Soul Calibur. Since no one will get that joke, I ring out people like crazy.

Shredder was mostly in his ridiculous armor and never really showed off his actual skills, so that was annoying. I am mixed on whether or not I liked Splinter. Definitely unique.

A lot of fans are going to find the changes to the origin annoying, I predict. I am fine with the change, even though I like the original because then they can reference Dare Devil more. But it is fine.

Oh yeah. Fox? Not terrible, not great. Disappointed in Arnett’s role. He has a look for a guy that could be Casey Jones if he had longer hair, he just…is annoying in this one. I more or less hate how they look. Going for realism kind of make them just look gross. See the Donatello picture above.

Passable, okay, and maybe eventually forgettable.

Judd Apatow wants to make a realistic comedy movie about life. How do I know that? Because that is generally what he always does. This time, he is getting older, so he needs a movie about that as well. This Is 40 is the kind of sequel to Knocked Up, featuring the supporting characters from that movie as they both turn 40 in the same week. You know, because 40 is allegedly old age and time to start dying.

Strangely enough, I can’t tell if the mid life crisis mentality is a real life thing, or if it is just a movie creation. Shit, could movies be lying to me about what being older is like?

JUST WHAT IS 40 ANYWAYS!?

Apparently cake. Cake is 40.

Pete (Paul Rudd) and Debbie (Leslie Mann) are both turning 40 this week, so shit might be hitting the fan. They have two kids, one going through puberty (Maude Apatow) and the other in young annoying phase (Iris Apatow).

But hey, Pete runs a record label kind of. They are poor, sure, and don’t sign any new big people, but they have regular small fan base. Chris O’Dowd and Lena Dunham work for him, but really, it is shit and they are losing lots of money. It doesn’t help that he is also letting his dad (Albert Brooks) borrow a lot of money, as he also has recently had more kids, whaaat.

Debbie isn’t flying high either. She has a small boutique, with two workers (Megan Fox, Charlyne Yi), but she is missing a lot of money from her inventory as well. She is also trying to stay in shape, change her life around, with the help of a life coach (Jason Segel).

Can the two get their life back on track, learn to trust each other again, and you know, not die alone and unhappy like the rest of people in movies?

When you Google This Is 40, half of the images will just be Megan Fox in a bra. Why aren’t there more of Rudd with the starfish, damn it?

Hey, do you tend to love Judd Apatow movies and its cast and Paul Rudd? Then go see the movie, simple as that, you will anyways. Rudd does play the same character, but he kind of had to, since its a sort of sequel. There are amusing moments in this movie, there are awkward ones, but there are also scenes that go on pretty long. Pretty sure this movie is over 2 hours, which means more time to make you feel bad or good about your own life.

But I think this film could have been a lot better. Maybe, just maybe, a small cameo with Rogen/Heigl from the first movie? But no, we get none of them. Really big miss there in my eyes.

Other than that, this movie is exactly as you think it would be. Apatow has made enough movies to have a certain style and humor in them, and I would say it definitely falls in line with the rest of them.

I instantly wanted to see Friends With Kids as soon as I saw the first trailer. Wait no, that’s not right. I wanted to see it as soon as I saw the cast list.

I was so excited to see all these people I liked in it, and then you know, one person I didn’t know. I also noticed that they didn’t really try to advertise this movie at all, outside the week before it came out. That sucks. Oh well, I am sure it isn’t entire cliche based.

Hey! I know these people. And none of them are the main people.

Alright, so we got a group of friends, two couples, and two single people. Adam Scott is a successful business man doing something, and Jennifer Westfeldt is also successful at something. They are just friends though. The couple friends at Maya Rudolph and Chris O’Dowd, who are about to have a kid, and Kristen Wiig and Jon Hamm who also are going to have a kid. Well that is weird.

Four years later, their friends are completely different, and also potentially having marital woes. But when you are married you cant just ask for a “break” without it being a big deal. With Jennifer’s biological clock going off and never finding a good guy, Adam thinks they should have a child together! BUt you know, no relationship, just have a baby, raise him separately and maintain their distance and friendship, and thus, no problems! Couldn’t go wrong.

A few years later, they even are seeing people. Well first Adam finds a girl walking a dog in the park, Megan Fox, despite her being way younger than him. This makes Jennifer upset (for some reason?) but she finds an older more experienced guy, Edward Burns, who has interesting stories and knows how to treat a woman and get shit done. As the kid gets older, I don’t expect him to find it weird about his parents situation. Sure their friends do, but come on, this is 2012. Babies probably have their shit together sooner now.

I was told it was good to acknowledge the main cast in the pictures too. Fineee.

You are probably wondering, “No really who the hell is that main actress? I know everyone else in the movie but her!?”. Well she is the writer and director damn it, and clearly the only woman she knows who can articulate the emotions she wants so she did it her self! That explains it. This is also supposed to be a bit more realistic than your standard RomComs, and I can say that it is. Parents having natural fights and getting through it, and some that don’t. Friends who are honest with each other, and some that drink too much.

But the dialogue between Adam and Jennifer is great and yet not the best part of the movie. Jon Hamm, as he tends to do, steals the show, and you find yourself paying attention to him more so whenever he is on screen, that sly dog.

Despite all this, and a decent plot, it just felt like it was both missing something and too long. The ending comes pretty abruptly, but I like that. Just the build up to it? I don’t like it. It takes a long time to get there (I guess that is a realistic approach?) and there is lots of filler that drags the film way down. More than one montage based scene as well. But it does do a nice job at getting to the point early on at least.

Ehh, its hard to describe. Should have been better than what was on screen.

As a general rule of thumb, I say hooray to all movies based off of graphic novels. As a rule of my pinky, I usually say “Oh damn it, a movie with Megan Fox.”
Thus the overall rule of my hand is that I had no emotion towards Jonah Hex, except one telling me to continue to put it off until I get bored enough to watch it.

She is why we can’t have nice things.

Josh Brolin plays Jonah Hex, also known as the guy who can’t really die. They tried to kill him, but apparently some nice Indian folk brought him back to life. So he also, having spent time being dead, can now talk to the dead. That’s nice. With his touch, the dead come back until he lets go, and its good for interrogating. For some reason its easier to bring back people who have been dead for a longer time.

He was killed for turning his back on former Confederate leader Quentin Turnbull (John Malkovich), so Turnbull and his assistant, Michael Fassbender, killed his family, scarred his face and killed him. Or so he thought! Then Hex killed him back, or so he thought!

Later he is a bounty hunter, living on the DL. Sometimes screwing Megan Fox. But the US government wants to hire him, because Turnbull is assembling a great weapon designed by Eli Whitney, that can destroy a nation on the 100th anniversary of America. Aidan Quinn plays President Grant and Will Arnett a high ranking officer (hah!).

Trick is to not look him in the mouth.

So this movie has a lot of negative stigma behind it. I guess bad acting mostly being why. And it is true, casting choices didn’t make sense. Why is Will Arnett in a “serious” action movie? Or Malkovich. He was the oddest casting for me, as main bad guy. I don’t think it worked at all. The only decent role would be Brolin as Hex. I’d say Quinn as President, but he really didn’t have many scenes.

But interestingly enough I actually found a lot of the action early on great. It didn’t bog me down with a lot of back story at the beginning, but gradually showed it throughout the movie. Was great to get you right into the story. Unfortunately the action by the end was a lot less interesting than the beginning. So poor ending, poor acting. That is a poor movie.

Jennifer’s Body is listed in the Comedy section at Blockbuster. I think that statement is enough to show how the general public perceives this “supposed to be horror but also kinda not ish” movie.

But this movie is brought to us by the same girl who wrote Juno! It must be good! But if the same level of writing was used in both movies, it is clear what made Juno work was the actors and actresses involved, not the script.

Both movies cater to a different fetish group though.

In Jennifer’s Body, we have two friends, Megan Fox as Jennifer, and Amanda Seyfried as ‘Needy’. Dumb nick name, probably alludes to something. They used to be best friends, from the “sandboxes” of yore, and in high school, they still get along great. You know, despite the huge slutty cheerleader-ness of Jennifer, and the dorky whatever-ness of Needy. Needy has a steady boyfriend though, in Johnny Simmons, and is taking it slow.

But they go to the only bar in town to see some indie band play a gig, named Low Shoulder, with the frontman being played by Adam Brody. I have been told he was trying to imitate the lead singer of The Killers with his performance, but I really couldn’t say! Anyways, a FIRE happens, and a person dies in it at the bar! Next thing Needy knows, Jennifer has disappeared with the band, and has no idea whats going on. Then later she appears at her door, all being creepy and covered in blood!

Egads!

Then some people die in the school, namely boys. Who is doing it? Well, Jennifer is. Because she is some demon now, and only Needy seems to realize it. It is like the girl she used to know, is no longer there, but what has remained is Jennifer’s…body. Oh yeah, if you want to see both JK Simmons in his ugliest and worst role ever, this would be a great thing to pick up.

In a movie that has gore, death, Megan Fox acting, this is still the grossest thing.

So, somehow, according to the writer, this is a movie about women empowerment. But I get absolutely nothing like that. All I see is a movie trying to use T&A to sell tickets/dvds, with a pretty dumb and badly acted plot. Oddly enough, one of the reasons Megan Fox didn’t like working in Transformers is because she thought she was being exploited for her looks. Huh. Then she did this movie? Glad you have your priorities straight.

I need Amanda Seyfried to get out of these dumb teen movies right away. She was funny in Mean Girls, and was one of the stars in Mamma Mia!, but then she did this and Red Riding Hood? Stop it right now Amanda.

I have also heard this referred to as “Twilight for Boys” in the good way. What?? That would be assuming that guys only care about “hot” looking womens in their movies, nothing more. Clearly this is just offensive to guys (which may be pro women empowerment? Who knows.