Tag: Owen Wilson

I will admit, when I first saw the trailer for Free Birds, I chuckled at a few spots. The nameless government entities making a pun and laughing throughout the trailer was great. A movie about a dumb animal trying to save the world with other dumb animals might lead to a lot of just tongue in cheek situations or rampant fourth wall breaking or who knows what. The possibilities are limitless.

But they also are including time travel, a known killer of many movies, if they define a version that doesn’t make much sense. None of this “its a kids movie!” bullshit either. No, the story has to be somewhat coherent, or else shit is going down.

“Down like a Tom covered in poults.”
“Hey, that’s not a joke, witty, or remotely funny.”
“It would be if we were dealing with chickens, not turkeys!”

Reggie (Owen Wilson) is a freak. He is a smarter than your average turkey, which isn’t hard, because turkeys are dumb. But he is too smart, and refuses to eat and get fattened up for Thanksgiving, which causes the flock to throw him out. Luckily for him, he gets pardoned by the President, which apparently means he can sit around all day, not worry about getting eaten, and just watch TV and eat pizza.

Well, his new awesome reality comes crashing down when Jake (Woody Harrelson) takes him from his home! Oh no! Another Turkey, not some random dude named Jake.

He wants to infiltrate a secret base in Camp David where there is apparently a time machine. He wants to use that time machine to travel back in time to the first Thanksgiving, to take turkeys off the menu. Err okay. Well they do that. And the time machine named S.T.E.V.E. (George Takei), which was built for humans, can somehow understand the gobbles from turkeys.

Then they get there. The turkeys are just extremely obvious metaphors for American Indians, being hunted by the colonists, for this important feasts in a few days. Except these turkeys are all smart. That is right, they are saying turkeys became dumb due to domestication and Thanksgiving. So we have a bunch of smart turkeys and really only one dumb one, Jake. CAN THE TIME TRAVELING TURKEYS SAVE THEIR RACE FROM DESTRUCTION? Will he be able to score with Jenny (Amy Poehler), a smart enough turkey to not believe he is from the future? WILL HUMANS BE CAST AS THE BAD GUYS?

Or you know, will anything really cool happen? Eh.

Does this turkey look high to you?

Man, Owen Wilson I tend to hate at voice acting. Aka Cars and Cars 2. But he was able to show some emotion this time. Well done. Woody Harrelson sounded nothing like himself, so I want to assume that means he put effort into his lines. Having George Takei as navigator of sorts was a “I see what you did there” moment.

But enough about that, lets talk about the plot and other things I disliked. The beginning of the movie is very fast, so much that I’d be willing to bet that 85% or more of the movie takes place in the past, whereas the trailer had mostly set just getting to the time machine. A little misleading. Most of the best jokes were also in the trailer, including jokes that weren’t actually in the movie (due to splicing of the trailer into new jokes, not taking them out of the movie). Meh. I don’t think I would have liked it more if I didn’t see the trailer, however.

Making the turkeys in the past smart is lame. That leaves only one stupid character, and not the hordes of them that they implied in the trailer. That would allow it to have a lot more zany shenanigans! So, overall, the humor in this film isn’t really existent. The theater was practically silent for the most part.

The time travel itself is super sloppy. It was fine early on, but they went back to the present, and all sorts of stuff started to occur that don’t make sense based on how they defined time travel earlier in the film.

The ending is horrible. It just…it just isn’t good. The conflict doesn’t happen, despite a resolution. The resolution leaves a bad taste in the mouth.

So we got an unfunny movie, that breaks its own definitions of time travel, and has a shitty ending. Yawn. Let’s just wait for Frozen at the end of this month.

1 out of 4.

When you first heard about The Internship, you thought one of three things:

“Oh great, a movie where the jokes are only at the expense of nerds and old people trying to be hip!”

“Oh great, a giant advertisement movie for Google!”

“Oh great, an Owen Wilson and Vince Vaughn movie trying to recapture the magic that happened with Wedding Crashers in 2005!”

Well, to be fair, I think all of these ended up being true.

Because why the fuck not, they also play some quidditch.

Billy (Vaughn) and Nick (Wilson) are a great team and have been for decades. They sell watches and they have personality. Sales have been down this year, and they find out in the middle of a potential big sale that their company has folded. Great, what are two unskilled salesmen to do with the economy like it is?

Well, get a job at Google, of course! Or at least an interview, for an internship, that could lead to a job. While not being extremely qualified candidates, they are able to smooth talk their way into the intern process, because not every applicant should be a perfect nerd 20-something with no actual life experience.

Needless to say, they are not popular amongst the other applicants. Only one team of interns will be guaranteed to receive jobs by the end of the summer and when it comes time to pick teams, they are stuck with the other nerds who weren’t picked (Tiya Sicar, Tobit Raphael, Dylan O’Brien) and the newest and most nervous group manager (Josh Brener, who you may remember last summer in this Samsung Galaxy S3 commercial before movies).

As expected, this turns into a group of ragtag individuals, trying to work together to overcome the odds and become the top team by summers end. Along the way, Nick has to try and woo a higher up Google employee (Rose Byrne), Billy has to overcome his inability succeed, and they all have to figure out ways to beat the supergroup made by Graham Hawtrey (Max Minghella), and also convince the head of the interns (Aasif Mandvi) that they aren’t complete losers.

A comedy like this of course has a lot of cameos, including Will Ferrell, Rob Riggle, and Josh Gad.

Heh…heh…heh…Noogle.I know the entire idea of this movie probably is a turn off to a lot of you. It looks formulaic, almost like a 1990s comedy (Another aspect of the film that I cannot defend). But it also has something else that is hard to value that really turns it into a decent movie. It has heart.

Wilson and Vaughn have amazing chemistry together, which is a fact we already knew. But it is amplified so well into this film! The dialogue is just so great, the two are able to make the entire thing still feel real and natural.

The Internship is not the funniest film of the year, no where close, but reports say that I giggled pretty consistently throughout it. The film accurately also showed the pressures that college graduates face today, where they can be perfect their entire life and still have trouble/stress once they hit the real world.

I did hate a few of the “speeches” by the end of the film, when they were announcing the winners. I think they cheapened the results by going about them that way, and could have easily been more clever about it. I’d say The Internship is worth checking out, but only if you are want a feel good story and if it is a matinee.

3 out of 4.

Apparently if I watched some of the trailers for The Big Year, you still wouldn’t really know what it is about. I will tell you right now. BIRDING. Or Bird Watching, if you want to be lame about it. Yes. The art of looking at birds and feeling good about yourself.

Mort importantly, A Big Year in the birding world is a competition to see who can see the most birds in a single calendar year. The competition can be state / province based, lower 48 states, or the biggest area of all states except Hawaii, and a bunch of other territories around the US. I didn’t learn these until I wiki’d that shit.

Can you tell who each of these three big actors are by just this picture alone?

So the story tells of three different “birders” who are attempting the big year. Owen Wilson plays an expert birder. In 2003 he reached a new record for A Big Year, reaching 723, putting him into instant celebrity status. Well, pseudo celebrity. Dude can find a bird like no other. He hasn’t attempted another big year since, but this year he is just going to do it for a few months, set the pace, make sure no one is getting close to his record. But will his dedication and drive break apart another marriage?

Steve Martin is a CEO who is retiring finally. Super rich, he wants to try a big year, full support with his wife, JoBeth Williams. But his job constantly is bugging him to return to the game, to fix problems, to even take another job. Joel McHale and Kevin Pollak are the corporate D-bags who continue to harass him throughout the year, warning him that after retirement, comes death.

Jack Black is the narrator and also attempting for the first time. He has trained to recognize any bird by a few notes only. He isn’t rich though, kind of poor, disapproving dad, and working a full time job to help pay for this during the year. But he is inspired to finally do something with his life. If he could also woo over Rashida Jones (who can do hundreds of bird noises on her own (I think in real life too?)), double win. Bird love. All that shit.

The movie shows the three men and their journey across America, just doing the things they love. They don’t travel together, but they run into each other enough to build a rivalry. Of course they don’t want others to know they are doing a big year, will make them no longer help them out. The movie probably sounds super boring. Bird watching. Wtf?

But look, there is some action!

Of course this whole thing is based on the honor system. Don’t have to take pictures, because hearing the bird counts as well. So it sounds like cheating may happen, and obviously it is dealt with in the movie. Not to mention Jim Parsons of Big Bang Theory slinks about in the movie as well.

But overall? The story was definitely done pretty nicely. By the end, you don’t hate Owen’s character like you’d expect. Everyone has their own appeal and their own “happy ending” so to speak. Had some chuckles, and hey, good for the whole family.

2 out of 4.

I was reluctant to watch Midnight in Paris because it had some things I am generally afraid of. One being Owen Wilson acting, the other being the possibility that I might not get it, because it is a Woody Allen movie. I think there is an unspoken rule that if you don’t like Woody Allen, you are bad at movies. Or something like that. So I have been putting his recent movies off. Even that one with Scarlet Johansson!

But now that I have seen a recent one, I am coming for you Vicky Christina Barcelona!

Film begins with Owen and Rachel McAdams, in Paris! They are married. He is a writer. But they have issues. Hopefully Paris with her parents and friends can help them. The dad is played by Kurt Fuller, who always makes me laugh. Not by what he does, just because of his looks and Wayne’s World.

Well, one night when he just wants to walk around and not go out dancing, he gets invited into an old timey car right at midnight. Reluctantly, he goes with them out to a bar, and eventually realizes he is in the 1920s Paris, much like what his novel is about. He meets the F. Scott Fitzgerald! And other people. Like Corey Stoll as Ernest Hemingway, and Kathy Bates as Gertrude Stein. Famous artists throughout the earl 1900s who inhabited Paris show up, from writers, to song writers, to painters, and more. Night after night he goes to the same place to be picked up by the car, alone after he realizes his wife wouldn’t understand.

Yeah. And he meets a girl. “Adriana” or Marion Cotillard. Not sure if she is actually someone famous or not. But he likes her way more. Afterall, she lives in the “Golden Ages!”

Allegedly.

Despite it being a “RomCom” it definitely takes it in a weirder direction. My whole time watching, despite it being obvious that they weren’t good together, I was thinking that if these trips through time were real, just being with Adriana in them was him cheating. Bugged me.

I thought the dialogue was really good though. Made me interested in what was going on, and during a time I usually don’t care about. The overall theme of grass being greener was a good one to follow, but maybe a bit too forced at the end.

So yeah. Decent.

2 out of 4.

Hooray! The long awaited sequel to Cars is Cars 2! And by long awaited, I mean both never expected in 2006 and also, since a couple days ago, when I reviewed Cars.

I say this in an exaggerated way obviously, but Cars 2 is nothing like Cars. Sure, both of them are still in some creepy ass world with only cars (and other transportation vehicles) being their own entities that are alive, but Cars is better than Cars 2. Cars is about slowing down, appreciating the finer things in life, and finding true happiness.

Cars 2 is just some big James Bond Spoof.

But unfortunately, when I think Cars + James Bond, I think KITT from Knight Rider. This was KITT-less.

Owen Wilson and his bad voicing habits are barely in this movie. This movie is all about Mater, the Tow Truck, voiced by Larry The Cable Guy. Yes. They changed leads and put the comic relief in the first film as the main character. Yes. This is as bad as it sounds.

The actual beginning of the movie I assumed was a “movie” in this car land. It was just nothing like the first film, with Michael Caine playing the James Bond like car, spying on an oil rig? Or something? But this film is “deeper” than that. It involves Lightning going on a world grand prix, and racing against a french car (voiced excellently by John Tuturro) sponsored by an alternative fuel source dude, voiced by Eddie Izzard. This is of course the only way Izzard can play someone who isn’t evil. Because if he had to show his face in a movie, you know he always is the evil dude. Yay voicing!

But yeah. There is some big conspiracy happening. This takes up most of the movie, and of course Mater ends up being mistaken for an American spy. Thanks to Bruce Campbell, who’s few minutes is the best in the movie, because he is Bruce Campbell.

“Voice a car? Boom boom boom. Sorry, I’m fighting deadites here. Can the car just be backfiring? Boom boom boomstick.”

It is stupid that this movie got a G rating, with all of its “violence”. But who knows what goes on in those rating meetings. The reason for all the bad cars is laughable too. They are a bunch of “lemons”, or cars that break down a bunch. Yes. I’d hope you read my first review, but in this world, cars are created and forced to live certain rules. You’d be pissed off too if you were made with defections and forced to just, live that life out while other cars never break down. You can only handle being stuck on the side of the road so many times before you’d snap too.

So, likers of the first Cars movie would probably call this one worse. I am going to actually find a shark and throw it over the shark, to represent my point more. This movie is just a cash-grab for merchandise. But at least they called Bruce Campbell.

1 out 4.

Hey now. Cars is pretty old. 2006? Yes, it goes way outside of my range of movies I normally review. But because Cars 2 comes out soon and I am reviewing it, I figure I might as well throw up the first one as well (since I just saw it). Also because it is old, I can do a more satirical review of it. Boom boom.

To start, this movie is about cars. The main character, voiced by Owen Wilson, is a race car. Yes, in this car-world, there are no humans. All the cars are alive. If they crash, they can get repaired. But that is about it. No where in this movie is there a dead car. They also have lots of roads and towns where they sell car things.
The movie goes back and forth with gas. It seems to both me something to drink when they are thirsty, and like actual gas, they just need it to run. Hmmm.

What is also weird about this world is that cars on their own pretty much make a NASCAR like event. Which, if you compare everything they do to humans (which I will), is kind of weird. It’d be like having 3 hour races for humans, where they’d just keep running, and taking food/drink beaks. Massages probably in the pit stop.

Owen Wilson is terrrrrrribad in this movie. So bad.

But he is so hot right now.

He has about two emotions, which I am realizing is true with his real movies. He always seems to speak in a calm relaxed way. Even his anxious or afraid voice he just seems to not be aware of the severity of the situation, just coasting by everything. And that is how the car talked. Despite being lost in California or somewhere, and in jail, and working hard labor in a town, he just never seems to really be too upset. In the ending of the movie, when he makes his race, and all of his new friends show up to be his pit crew, he says something like “Hey, you guys came.”

Now read that in the most laid back way possible. That is how it was said. Like, he seemed almost indifferent. He was just stating a fact, wasn’t happy or excited. Just eh.

But let us get to the most important point of the movie. This movie teaches kids something very very bad.

What you will do for the rest of your life is determined when you are born. (I would also like to note that they never go into cars being born. There is no car factory that they speak of, where, I assume, either machines or cars make more cars. Can you imagine a baby making factory for humans? Kind of creepy. Kind of Matrix-y). Now at these car factories, if they make you a tank, guess what, you will be fighting in wars I assume. If they make you into a cop car, you are sure as heck going to be a cop when you are older.

If you are a race car, you are probably going to do races. You can even gain money and get more upgrades and be a better race car (one with lights. He doesn’t have any in the movie, because, race cars don’t do things beside race and there are lights in the arena). But wait! The girl car gave up her life to help the town! Yes. A more well off car can decide to not live up to its potential and do what you wan’t, but just like real life, someone who was born (or CREATED) as a lesser or specific vehicle can only do that. All the pit crews are fork lifts. Fork lifts can only do pit crew like things. It becomes even more fucked up if you remember they were created. Someone decided to give life to an individual, specifically with specialized abilities to limit their life and force them down a specific path.

What the fuck.

Outside of the car factories there may as well be this guy just standing there.

“You’re all doooomed. Doomed I say. Doooomed. You’re allll doooomed.”

Its an okay movie, with bad messages for the youth. I’d rather live in a world (well, one with Humans) where I can make my own destiny thank you very much.

1 out of 4.

Whoa. The director of How Do You Know is the director of As Good As It Gets. Holy shit. That movie was awesome. Maybe this one is too?

Nope. The only real constant between the movies is Jack Nicholson.

But less crazy dog love.

Unfortunately even Jack Nicholson’s character is particularly weak in this movie. The synopsis was a bit confusing, both in trailer and reading, so here we go. Reese Witherspoon is an olympic soft ball player who had just got cut from the roster (getting old there, Reese). Owen Wilson is a pitcher for the Nationals. Paul Rudd is executive who is suddenly being indicted because of, well, he doesn’t know why, and Jack is his dad/boss.

So through a serious of awkward dates, no one knows really who likes who. Well, Paul Rudd and Owen Wilson are sure they don’t like each other. So the title is asking the question, How Do You Know if you are in love?

But blahhh. Does it fall short. Neither Reese nor Owen are particularly good characters. While watching this movie, you won’t care for them, you will only care for Paul Rudd. You hope he is happy by the end, and gets out of the mess, but unfortunately (thanks to a nice list shown in the movie) even with his happy ending, it still has negative consequences on his life. He also is still jobless! That has to suck.

One of the better parts was played by the pregnant secretary. Her acting was crazy good, yet still for some reason I don’t provide a link to her imdb. That is just the way the world works.

Spoilers. In this scene, Rudd kills Witherspoon.

Part of the problem too is it just takes too long for the outcome. Doesn’t even give me the normal cheap joys a regualr romcom would. Barely any conflict. Just people being unsure about who is a true love or not. Borrring.

1 out of 4.

What? This movie has nothing to do with school time shenanigans? Oh well.

I was hoping for a hilarious romp of avoiding the hall monitor and cutting class with all the cool kids!

Interesting concept. The wives of Jason Sudeikis and Owen Wilson (played by Christina Applegate and Jenna Fischer) give their husbands a week long “Hall Pass” from Marriage. They both go away for 7 days, to let their husbands live alone and do whatever they want. Stay our partying, hit on (or sleep) with other women. Whatever. They were no unfaithful before, but classified as way too horny/cocky whatever, because they think they can still hit the hot stuff if they were still single. So giving them the break allows them to find out they cannot, and hopefully be way more faithful.

I can see how the idea of a hall pass, if not a silly name, could help a relationship. But also could see how it could easily hurt one. The idea that it would always help would just mean that certain people are meant to be together, probably. But I review movies, not provide marriage advice.

That would be Dr. Phil.

Most of the humor comes from the fact that these dudes are middle aged and have no game. No one wants to hit that. They will swing and miss a lot. Fun stuff! I did enjoy the first half of the movie. However the ending seemed to be kinda meh for me. Just died down and didn’t really know how to end (which would explain why they went for the ending that they did).

So remember married guys, there is no way your life could have turned out better, especially now that you are old and married.

2 out of 4.