Tag: William Hurt

Here we are, months after the release of Avengers: Endgame, and I am now ready to post a review. Why the delay? Several reasons!

One, my review when it came out would not mean a damn thing. Who cares? Everyone who wants to see it will go see it, and I wouldn’t convince any one on any side to change their mind. No one was on the fence.

Two, I wanted to wait for it to beat Avatar‘s record. I don’t think it has yet, but I’m tired of waiting. It will break it will silly re-releases, so pretty disappointing.

And three, if I waited a long time, I could do a review with spoilers! Something I have never really done before. A spoiler review can be more specific, and hey, people can agree or disagree. So let’s get on it.

Together Each Achieves More.

Endgame takes place almost immediately after the events of Infinity War. Half the population is gone, many heroes. Tony Stark (Robert Downey Jr.) is trapped in space. People are sad. But once Captain Marvel (Brie Larson) shows up, and they get their coordinates on, they all rush over to fuck over Thanos (Josh Brolin) and kill him. Hopefully also undo what he did. And it turns out they can’t. Infinity Stones are broken and gone, nothing can be done except sadness.

Five years later? Life is weird. Heroes are now fat (Chris Hemsworth). Hulks are now Professor Hulk (Mark Ruffalo). Captain America (Chris Evans) is just trying to help people. But once Ant-Man (Paul Rudd) is able to escape finally from the Quantum Realm, he is disgusted by what has occurred, and has ideas on how to fix what was undone. You know. With Time Travel.

Also starring…everybody. Scarlett Johansson, Jeremy Renner, Don Cheadle, Benedict Cumberbatch, Chadwick Boseman, Tom Holland, Karen Gillan, Zoe Saldana, Evangeline Lilly, Tessa Thompson, Rene Russo, Elizabeth Olsen, Anthony Mackie, Sebastian Stan, Tom Hiddleston, Danai Gurira, Benedict Wong, Pom Klementieff, Dave Bautista, Letitia Wright, John Slattery, Tilda Swinton, Jon Favreau, Hayley Atwell, Natalie Portman, Marisa Tomei, Taika Waititi, Angela Bassett, Michael Douglas, Michelle Pfeiffer, William Hurt, Cobie Smulders, Sean Gunn, Winston Duke, Linda Cardellini, Frank Grillo, Hiroyuki Sanada, Tom Vaughan-Lawlor, James D’Arcy, Jacob Batalon, Vin Diesel, Bradley Cooper, Gwyneth Paltrow, Ty Simpkins, Robert Redford, Chris Pratt, Samuel L. Jackson, Lexi Rabe, Ross Marquand, Kerry Condon, Yvette Nicole Brown, Ken Jeong, and Stan Lee. 

“Is that all you got?” Thanos, about the last paragraph, probably.

So sure, I gave Avengers: Endgame a 4 out of 4, despite being a non-perfect movie. Because it is an emotionally satisfying film. I cried, I cheered, I seized up with anticipation, I was serviced so much as a fan. It was a blast and the three hours flew by. The final battle had so many nice moments that were cool and can still be talked about today.

When Captain America was about to say Avengers Assemble, I remember bouncing in my seat for over 10 seconds, grabbing my wife’s arm and just ready to explode. That moment was necessary. It was beautiful.

And of course we lost characters, finally. Steve, despite feeling plot holey, got to live his regular life for once and die once his life was finally over. Tony sacrificed himself for the greater good, to finally fix all of his wrongs. Natasha had a fun suicide battle with Clint that we all knew were coming, and yet, the result was surprising given future movie’s coming out.

Most characters felt like they were given their proper moments to shine and showcase their power, especially the first big three of Captain America, Iron Man, and Thor. The throwbacks to previous films and their first fight in Avengers were nostalgic wet dreams.

And sure, a lot of might not be desired. Some newer, strong characters barely got screen time. Captain Marvel was mostly wasted (and despite the fun of the ladies of Marvel moment, it felt awkward because we know she needed zero help). Dr. Strange was left to be a defensive wizard. Of course a lot of this was done because these characters will have more time to shine in the future and are not mid swan song, but it technically also didn’t feel natural/necessary.

Honestly, a lot of the time stuff was silly. It probably could have been shortened a good amount, but again, it featured a ton of fun moments and also gave us the entrance for Loki’s future television show.

Torches were passed, heads were rolled, and franchises collided and will be changed in the future. I just hope this five year advance is handled with care and has a real significance to it. Spider-Man: Far From Home touched on it, but it didn’t go really in depth with it still. I am afraid they will mostly ignore these ramifications later in just a few movies.

Also I should note the forced disconnect of the TV shows and the movies is frustrating. All of the Netflix drama and Agents of Shield ruined us from having even more fun moments. I blame Ike.

I really don’t have to spend a lot of information on this intro, do I?

Avengers: Infinity War (originally called Avengers: Infinity War Part 1, but people were nervous about half movies, and now the next one’s title is a secret because of spoilers or something.

I was an ecstatic little girl when the first Avengers film came out, waiting for it as soon as the first Iron Man film finished. Since then, things have been a bit more middling. My reviews have generally always been positive, none of them ever received under a 2 out of 4, and some of which are maybe too highly rated. Not everything I am extremely excited for, but most I definitely have a higher interest.

Last year, no superhero movies made my top of the year list (although one of them was about a super hero, sort of). This year, I already had Black Panther as a 4. And yet this film, this one right here, has me just as giddy as the first one for so many reasons.

So let’s just get into it.

Oh yeah, look at these folks. Maybe this is just Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3?

At the end of Thor: Ragnarok, we had a surprise for Thor and his crew. This film takes place right after that point. Bad news for the Asgardians, Thanos (Josh Brolin) is here. At this point he has one of the infinity stones, out of six total. His goal? To wipe out half of the life in the universe.

Now presumably this just means sentient life forms who walk around and have languages. I don’t think he has anything against puppies. Or plants. He isn’t doing it out of spite, he is calling it mercy. It is sort of his thing. He has been doing it manually with his own crew for a while, but he wants the stones to do it instantly, so that the survivors can flourish. You know, by having more resources, more space, less crime, whatever. He is a benevolent God.

It turns out some people have some issues with him wanting to do this though. And with two of the stones (that we know of) being on Earth, he is going to have to come crashing down, where a few people down there are decently strong and going to have to put up a little fight.

Starring every goddamn person ever. You know, Chris Evans, Robert Downey Jr., Chris Hemsworth, Mark Ruffalo, Scarlett Johansson, Don Cheadle, Karen Gillan, Danai Gurira, Bradley Cooper, Letitia Wright, Winston Duke, Benedict Wong, Benedict Cumberbatch, Tom Holland, Chadwick Boseman, Zoe Saldana, Tom Hiddleston, Paul Bettany, Elizabeth Olsen, Anthony Mackie, Sebastian Stan, Idris Elba, Pom Klementieff, Dave Bautista, Vin Diesel, Chris Pratt, and Benicio Del Toro.

Also featuring some newbies, like Peter Dinklage and Carrie Coon! Two whole people! Wow! And some technically regular people like Gwyneth Paltrow and William Hurt. Damn, did I get them all?

What is this a crossover episode?

What’s to say that isn’t already all over the internet?

Avengers: Infinity War is a fan pleasing romp across the universe, adding most of the cast we have come to love into a few surprising show downs, where the stakes have never been higher. It is certainly one of the darker and serious Marvel films at this point. People are going to get hurt, people are going to be sad, and people are going to cry. Well, maybe. I know I cried near the end, and almost another time before then.

Acting wise, a lot of the stars gave their A-game. Shout out to Cumberbatch who really felt like a leader of this group, despite being one of the most recent additions. Holland was brought in for his acting ability, and it really showed by the end. A lot of pain was on Evans’ face throughout the film. Hemsworth is so goddamn Thor-y, its fantastic, and I am glad we got so much of him in the last few movies. And finally, Saldana, who is normally a low point from the acting carried a lot.

Of course I also have to talk about Brolin as Thanos, a role we have been waiting for for years and it really paid off well. This is a goddamn villain right here. It is really great writing when you sympathize with someone who is trying to kill half of the universe.

I don´t entirely know where Marvel is going with its ending, but I do have a feeling I will be incredibly annoyed by it in the next film. I think they are going to take what they did great here and ruin it with the second part, but that is just a gut feeling.

Avengers: Infinity Wars has some of the best fight scenes and team ups yet, and is just pure fan service through and through while giving an incredible story as well. I wish this film was longer.

I don´t have to tell you to go see this one, I know you will, and I can´t see anyone who likes the series to be disappointed with this milestone achievement.

If there is anything to be disappointed in, it is Marvel´s poor decisions to not include their other people. I haven´t seen Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. in forever, but it seemed to react to the movies but never impact them, but someone from there might have been involved. And the Netflix shows? Come on, there was stuff happening in New York. If the Netflix shows ignore this event (which they didn´t ignore the first Avengers movie…) then they are just making poor decisions.

You’d think with three group shots I’d have gotten all the heroes. But nope.

Oh, it is the spring time. Is it time for an inspirational sports movie? Shit, I didn´t know. I wasn´t ready.

The more and more inspirational sports moments they decide to turn into films, they more obscure or recent they have to grab them. When we had Million Dollar Arm a few years ago, it was literally only a couple years after the event. We used to have to wait 10+ years to get a film about the sports event in question. Hell, we finally got a Tonya Harding movie just last year.

I honestly don´t know if The Miracle Season is a current event or something really old. I just know it is a volleyball film, which is not really common at all. So it is an inspirational volleyball film to get people excited about that sport, and winning and stuff.

Want to know the last inspirational volleyball film I remember watching? Phat Beach.

Holy shit, did they find a missing Mara sister for the lead role?

First of all, get ready, this film is set in Iowa. Now, everyone is not white in the movie, but they probably had to add some people of color because reality is too scary and they want to imagine it not so intense.

The main two white girls that this movie is about are Kelly (Erin Moriarty) and Line (Danika Yarosh). She was Caroline, but hated it, so she want by Line or Liner. They were BFFs since 3 years old, and their families have been close. And now they play volleyball together, going into their senior year of high school. Their team won the state championship in volleyball the previous year, and now they are ready to repeat!

Well, the coach (Helen Hunt) is. The rest seem to be cocky and goof off, even after losing their first game. Long story short, Line dies in a scooter accident, and now the team is even more fucked. She was the captain, the center, and the life force of their program. Her dad (William Hurt) is going through the most, because his wife died of cancer a week later, but her condition the knew about.

This is a true story again, so you know most likely how this story is going to end, or else, why would the movie exist?

Also starring Jason Gray-Stanford, Burkely Duffield, and Jillian Fargey. A few other girls on the team that stand out include Lillian Doucet-Roche as the freshman, who isn’t blonde, Tiera Skovbye as the most athletic one, who you can tell from the other blondes by her hair band, and Nesta Cooper, who is someone who isn’t even white like the rest of her team.

There we go. There’s that classic sports ending movie shot.

First of all, let me note that originally I was going to rate this lower, because I was annoyed at how they were “Hollywood-ing” up a real story, which happens very often. Creating a bit of extra drama in order to keep things going, instead of sticking to the truth. Well, then I watched a 14 minute special on the events, and every part I assume was extra was real. My bad.

Secondly, here are some coincidences. This film is about the death of Line of course, and the team coming together to repeat. It is also about Kelly, her best friend, coping with their loss and turning into a leader for the team to rally behind as well. Kelly after the events of the film went on to college at Iowa State from 2011-2015, where she probably played some volleyball too.

Well, I was at Iowa State from 2012-2014 for graduate school. I was a Geophysics graduate student, and she was a microbiology student, and those two sciences shared the same relatively small building on that campus, so there is a really good chance I have walked by or seen this real life person before. Heck, I had even bought things from the Microbiology club for their fundraisers. I find it a bit bizarre that this person who went through these crazy life experiences was near my own personal existance for so long without knowing, and now they have a movie about them.

Well, Kelly went on to graduate school to be a PA, and is currently in Houston, Texas trying to finish that. Hey. I am in in Houston, Texas.

Cough. Okay. Sorry. Moving on. To talk about the actual movie? Well, the acting is really average to below average. Yarosh was insufferable as Line. Way too much, and that may have been Line in real life, but it sort of just irritated me. I was ready for her to die. They loved spending time on their grief, so they didn’t spend as much time as I would have hoped on actual volleyball.

Outside of the occasional montage, the volleyball games were basically described by the first 1-2 serves and the last 1-2 serves, without much in between. Most of the characters don’t have any discernible personality. The freshman player has the next most personality after Kelly, and that is because of her fresh-ness only.

The Miracle Season is an okay film for its accuracy to the story and its ability to make you feel a bit compelled. It is not one where you will be blown away by the acting from any party involved. It has minor issues occasionally like one near the end where the server changes in between points at a time when that totally wouldn’t happen. But again, this is our only volleyball movie for the next 20+ years probably, so it will have to do.

Captain America: The Winter Soldier before 2016 was the best Marvel movie to date. It was solid all around, had the best action, the biggest stakes, and was nearly perfect. Before that, Captain America: The First Avenger was probably the second most solid solo film of Phase 1, behind Iron Man and also behind The Avengers.

Despite the resounding success of Captain America films and the Russo Brothers at directing, I was worried about Captain America: Civil War. Like, really really worried.

First of all, it is one of the only full plot lines I have actually read the comics for, so it holds a special place in my heart.

Second, I had seen a few trailers and I was worried about a lot of things. If the trailers gave too much away. That the plot felt forced (unnatural) and the big fight between the two groups would be cheesy. That the previous films didn’t set things up enough for the resentment to be believable.

A huge list of worries. I only need to state them out clear so I am not shown to be a fanboy. Especially after Batman vs Superman: Dawn of Justice, I was ready for disappointment.

And no matter what happened, I would be Team Cap all the way.

This movie will make more sense if you saw Avengers: Age of Ultron and Ant-Man. I assume you did, because come on, Marvel.

The film actually starts out, after some flashbacks, in Lagos, Nigeria! Some current avengers (Captain America (Chris Evans), Falcon (Anthony Mackie), Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson), and Scarlet Witch (Elizabeth Olsen)) are staking out important buildings, looking for Crossbones (Frank Grillo). Needless to say, not everything goes perfectly and some civilians get hurt. Namely, a group of missionaries!

Based on those events, the events in NYC, in Sokovia, and more, the world has decided to stand up in unity and demand action. Over 100 countries have signed the Sokovia Accords, which states that the Avengers will now only act if they have permission from a UN Panel, and of course, have to act if they deem it necessary. A few of the Avengers agree with these accords. Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.) is feeling guilty and War Machine (Don Cheadle) is on his side. Hell, even Vision (Paul Bettany) feels it is necessary to avoid problems in the future.

But not Captain. He has trust issues with these sorts of groups now, and doesn’t want to be forced to step aside if he sees wrong doing, or be forced to do something he sees as wrong. So he doesn’t sign the papers. The papers are led by the King of Wakanda, T’Chaka (John Kani), who is especially pissed that their primary export was used to make Ultron. And sure enough, more bad things happen. Apparently The Winter Soldier (Sebastian Stan) is at it again!

Fuck, so much shit. Captain believes Bucky is just brainwashed and wants to protect his old friend and not let the government kill him. So yeah, there is some conflict here. Captain and a few others agree to help him out, to get to the bottom of all of this, while the other guys have to stop them for negligently doing bad things to the UN and other officers. Fuck, who is right, I don’t know?!

Also featuring the return of Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner), Ant-Man (Paul Rudd), and Agent 13 (Emily VanCamp). And of course, introducing Chadwick Boseman as Black Panther, Tom Holland as Spider-Man, Marisa Tomei as Aunt May, and Daniel Brühl as Baron Zemo. William Hurt plays the Secretary of State and Martin Freeman as the head of the UN Avengers Council thing.

Shit Spider-Man, why do you gotta go and steal my boy’s shield like that?

Captain America: Civil War is two and a half hours long, but I found myself wanting more. I needed more. More of everything! I could spend the next 500 words just comparing it to BvS, but that wouldn’t be a review of this film, it’d just be a shitty comparison. So I will keep it short: Civil War did a lot of things right that BvS did not.

Civil War turns out to be a fanboy’s wet dream. The action is incredible throughout most of the film. For each and every spout of athleticism, you can understand the fight. There aren’t a thousand quick cuts or shaky cameras. You will not only see well choreographed fighting skill sets before your eyes, but each character fights true to their persona and powers, so no one ends up fighting the same. Of course, a lot of heroes end up fighting and battling with other heroes. We also get tons of team ups you haven’t seen before. All of this creates for some intense scenes with a whole lot of fan service.

Now now, I know what you are thinking. If basically everyone is a good guy with future films, the tension can’t be real. Well, for the most part you shouldn’t expect people to die. Because it is a comic book movie and all that reason. I am not saying people don’t die, but I am saying for sure a lot of people do get hurt, both physically and emotionally. This is not a movie that wraps up everything with a nice big bow, it changes the future landscape of the films…much like The Winter Soldier did.

On another note, Civil War doesn’t go the obvious route throughout the plot. It didn’t go the typical Marvel movie route. It didn’t just keep escalating the odds to ridiculous levels. It had emotional backing behind it, on every side and even on the villain side. Some can complain that the villain is too calculating, but when I compare his plan to someone like Lex Luther’s (fuck I did it again), his makes a lot more sense without ridiculous stretches.

Thank’s Black Panther. You are clearly just aggressively giving the shield back here.

Now here, allow me to hype things.

Black Panther HYPE! What a great introduction to this guy. He was shown to be strong, agile, moral with conflicting issues given his royal upbringing. His inclusion in this film was well written and explained, along with why he chose to fight. He is in this film a bunch, more than most of the other Avengers. I am so excited for this eventual film and future roles.

Spider-Man HYPE! Spider-Man was in this film a lot more than I expected as well. We got to see him as Peter Parker a bit as well for an introduction. His fighting was very spider like, along with his normal combat quips. They also showed his age really well, when compared to the old ass fuckers on the team, giving a clear and distinct gap in knowledge bases and general attitude.

Future films HYPE! I can’t wait for more. Like I said originally, I wasn’t looking forward to Civil War. After BvS, I certaintly wasn’t looking forward to Suicide Squad. All of my hopes were riding with X-Men: Apocalypse, which I don’t see as being good as the last two, and Doctor Strange, which I am pretty excited for. But now I have higher hopes for the future of Marvel films. Higher than I already anticipated.

On a final note, despite the large cast and significance of the plot, Civil War was worthy of being called a Captain America film. It wasn’t just Avengers 2.5. His characters was largely the focus of the film, but at the same time he wasn’t a simple protagonist. Chris Evans is GOAT, hooray movies.

Whoa whoa whoa, hold up. This movie Race is about a true story, inspirational sports figure, and it ISN’T made by Disney? They are dropping the ball!

Whoa whoa whoa, a second time. This is about Jesse Owens, famed Olympic runner, and he isn’t being played by Chadwick Boseman? I thought he had the monopoly on super famous Black historical figures now, what with Jackie Robinson, James Brown, and T’Challa, prince of Wakanda.

And hey, that title, Race. It is about a runner. But he was also black. Dare it…might it… be about his skin color as well?

A double entendre! And neither side is sex related! A movie miracle here, folks!

The only film that has made me care about the state of Ohio.

Early life be damned, let’s talk about Jesse Owens (Stephan James) in 193. This man was college bound. He is headed to The Ohio State University, land of the Buckeyes and people too ignorant to cheer on Michigan. He turned a few heads during a high school track meet in Chicago, breaking records left and right. So he was able to get a scholarship to attend. He isn’t a simple boy either. He has Ruth (Shanice Banton), who is working at a beauty salon, and a 3 year old girl he has to support. Sure he is going to college to run on the track team, but he also wants an education and a way to support his family, so he can marry Ruth and live a good long life with her.

Well, Larry Snyder (Jason Sudeikis) doesn’t have time for all of that. He doesn’t care about skin color, he just wants to win, like he did when he went to Ohio State. Almost went to the Olympics too!

And um. You know. Watch Jesse train, work, and make mistakes. He breaks many records, which the movie goes into, and qualifies for the Olympics! The Olympics that were being held in BERLIN, GERMANY, in 1936 before World War II (although they didn’t know it at the time).

So we also have the side plot of America maybe protesting and not going to the Olympics. Avery Brundage (Jeremy Irons) wants us to go, so he heads to Germany ahead of time to make sure there aren’t big human rights issues. Jeremiah Mahoney (William Hurt) leads the Olympic Committee and wants America to not compete.

Also starring Eli Goree and Shamier Anderson as fellow Black American racers. In Germany is Joseph Goebbels (Barnaby Metschurat), leader of the Olympic games, Leni Riefenstahl (Carice van Houten). director who wants to film the games, and Luz Long (David Kross), the best European racer.

That’s not him, he is Swedish, not German! But that is Jesse.

Race is 145 minutes long, telling the story of Jesse Owens, the fastest man in the world and winner of multiple Gold Medals. Kind of a lot of time for a guy who didn’t take a long time. It also tells the story of the movie Olympia, which depicted the games and was directed by a woman director. It also tells the story of Avery Brundage, a rich architect, who might have had bad dealings with the Nazis.

Race is crowded and too long. The other side stories are a little bit interesting, but they can get the fuck right out of here. It seems messed up for someone like Owens to finally get a biopic, and have to share it with a scumbag and a German director. Similarly, Owens had to face a lot of racial pressure. The NAACP didn’t want him to go, protesting Germany’s shitty human rights laws and compare them to the USA. So if he went, he could let down his race. If he didn’t go, he could let down his race. It was intense.

But this is also a true story. We know he went. We know he kicked back. The third or fourth time we had to see him threaten to stay home got ridiculous. Repetition only helps build the character so much.

It is a shame too. James acted great in this, and so did Sudeikis. I thought I had seen him as a coach before, but it was just a long commercial playing a Football coach. Check it out. They are the story here and you can tell they both care about the subject matter.

Race is just too bloated to tell the best possible story.

Movies in 2014 brought us some incredibly new and wonderful experiences. Boyhood took 12 years to film, doing a little bit each year to watch the actors grow old. Birdman was edited in a fine way to make it seem like just one long continuous shot. Both fantastic films, my 1 and 2 from the year.

But there was another movie that was unique last year that interested me. The Disappearance Of Eleanor Rigby. On its own, it doesn’t seem like that innovative of a film. However, it is collectively three films in one.

On the surface it is just about a relationship. Specifically, the three versions are called Him, Her, and Them. Him is the plot from mainly the guy’s point of view and Her is the girl’s point of view. Them is a more typically told story, telling bits and pieces of their sides and is a much more standard film.

And I wanted to see it all of 2014. I wanted to watch it as soon as it hit Blu-Ray. It has been on Netflix for months, all three parts! Welcome to Day 3 of my Fucking Finally week.

First comes love…

Conor (James McAvoy) and Eleanor (Jessica Chastain) have had a long relationship. They even married! Serious stuff. But no one would describe their lives as remarkable. Eleanor came from an academic family, but left her PhD program in Anthropology, when she got pregnant. Conor is the son of a restaurant God in NYC, who also has bad relationships, and is now attempting to run his own restaurant without his dad’s help.

But then one of the worst things happen. They lost their baby boy, really young. Their grief came in different ways, driving a wedge between them. After a few months, Eleanor wants to take a brake from their relationship, frustrated where things are going, and that is really where our story begins.

In Him, we mostly get to see Conor flailing about trying to deal with his emotions by repressing them like a motherfucker. They still come out in bursts, like when he has attacked unruly customers. His best friend and chef (Bill Hader) is even getting sick of his shit.

Conor sort of starts to stalk Eleanor a little bit as well, following her around but never having the courage to talk to her until he resorts back to a kid in middle school and passes her a note, quite creepily. His story also features Ciaran Hinds as his father, and Nina Arianda as an employee who has feelings for him.

Then comes stalking after heartbreak and sadness…

In Her, we don’t even see Conor for the until the awkward scene above. James McAvoy is barely in this film and it is definitely all about Eleanor.

It starts with her injury and then her going on her own to the hospital. Eleanor decides to go home with her parents and sister. The mom (Isabelle Huppert) is French through and through, always seen with a glass of wine. Her dad (William Hurt) is still a psychologist at the local university, and her younger sister (Jess Weixler) has a little boy of her own, but no man or boyfriend in her life. She was already living with the parents still. Her family tries to get her help, but can’t seem to provide enough help on their own, the awkwardness of the whole situation. Some psychology degree, am I right?

So she does go to the local college to take a few classes. There she develops a nice bond with another psychology professor (Viola Davis), who is able to talk to her like a real person about normal things, since she knows nothing about Eleanor’s last few months. Her time alone allows Eleanor an attempt to find herself, and interact with Conor on her own terms in her own ways. Slowly, surely, and eventually full of hope.

In Them, it is the longest of the films at just over 2 hours. However, it is literally just everything you seen before. You still get the scenes between them, but this time you also get some of their individual scenes.

Them is packaged in a way so that it can be their complete story in a regular time frame for a regular movie. A movie about sadness and grief and how two different people cope. Technically, some of the scenes between them we see from a few different angles, but it is just a cram packed version with less individual detail on each character. Although, when watching it, it still felt like it featured a lot more of Her than Him.

Then comes alcohol to end all of the sadness!

Five hours, twelve minutes. That is how long watching these three movies took overall. That is if you want the full experience. The good news? You don’t have to see all three for the full experience!

In fact, you shouldn’t watch all three, and definitely not in the same week. You should only watch Him and Her, or Them, not all three. If you just watch the first two, you will get a very unique experience and you will get it in three hours, nine minutes. A much more reasonable amount of time. If you are feeling lazy or want a very regular saddish drama, then just go for Them. Its like a not very effective cliff notes.

Now, I watched them in Him, Her, and Them order because it just seemed to make sense. I knew the films were about the woman leaving, so it makes since to keep some mystery and watch Him before Her. Doing so allowed the film to answer questions are different times and felt like the best experience.

This only matters if you care about my recommendation of course. The best experience would just be Him and Her, no Them, because it is mostly repetitive. It sucks that I cannot wipe Him/Her from my memory before Them to give an unbiased review of it. But Them on its own didn’t feel like a great movie. Obviously I had the issues of it being full of scenes I had already seen (does that sound weird?), but it also cut out a lot of other scenes that I felt were necessary.

That’s right. Watching the condensed two hour version felt lacking. Shocking discovery, I know.

Them is Shit. Him and Her combined are a good experience. If you were going to watch just one of Him and Her, it won’t be good. It would just be odd and you don’t want to be odd.

Oh yeah, for whatever reason, the movies end differently. I have no idea why this happens, but Her has the best ending, in my ever so humble movie reviewer opinion.

Winter’s Tale has the honor of being the only movie released this week of four that is not a remake. No, but it is based on a book that came out from the 1980’s (The three remakes all come from 80’s movies too!).

This one also had the most advertising of the four, with a trailer that just…well, was just weird. It looked messy, or vague. It was either about magic, or religion, or coincidences. Really had no idea going in.

Yo, Colin, why is your hair so weird in this movie?

Winter’s Tale is definitely a hard movie to really describe. But let’s just say some of the basics.

Peter Lake (Colin Farrell) came to America from (German?) immigrants who weren’t allowed in. So they floated him in on a tiny boat.

He grew up on the streets, so he became a master thief, raised by Pearly Soames (Russell Crowe), who now wants to kill him. Apparently Peter isn’t evil enough.

While on the run, Peter decides to rob one last house. There he finds Beverly Penn (Jessica Brown Findlay), a sick girl who is literally too hot. Her sickness is killing her, because she is so hot, she can literally melt the cold winter snow around her. She is so hot, she has to sleep on the roof of her house in a tent, or the whole thing might burn down and kill her. She is so hot, she is a virgin, because sex would be her hotness squared.

Anyways, she is sick, Peter is in love, Pearly wants to kill him or her (he is kind of unsure), people are agents for angels and demons, miracles and chaos, the universe loves everyone, and eventually Peter goes 100 years into the future.

Kevin Corrigan (and later, Kevin Durand, but much shorter time frame) plays a lackey, William Hurt plays Beverly’s dad, Jennifer Connelly is the future adult female, and Will Smith is the man in the very very black shorts, Lucifer!

See? She is wearing white. That’s how you know she is innocent.

A-ha! This movie is slightly religious and magic based! A-ha!

That means nothing to me though. Because to me, this movie was a lot of confusing. Unfortunately anything that might be considered a plot hole or vague area can be wiped away with “magic” which plays a huge deus ex machina element. So I won’t complain about the inconsistencies that I saw.

The acting itself was okay mostly. I thought Connelly was terrible in it though. Thankfully her role was much smaller.

I think the movie wanted to go for this huge, philosophical and magical plot line, but just never reached its extremely lofty goals. I can’t tell if it was meant to be a comedy, but moments had me laughing out loud with how “bad” it all was, including the drawing of the red haired girl that was floating around. The vaguest, most nondescript image ever, leading to such big conclusions.

To me, this just goes to show my point. Colin Farrell is still a 50/50 hit or miss good movie actor. No middle ground, just good or bad.

The Host is the first book turned movie story from Stephenie Meyer that does not feature vampires in it! Hooray! But how different will that story actually be?

I mean, this one is about aliens. And romance. I guess that fits the supernatural teen romance genre still, which is good for her audience. But this book was made in 2008 with no other novels behind it. It can’t turn into the next big romance teen drama for people to hate on (which is why I am not doing this for a milestone review). Hell, who knows if it even has romance in it?

Shit. But more importantly, why is the year added to the hashtag?

In this world/future, there was a secret war. An alien race had invaded, a race of parasites, that enter into the human body and then live out their lives. They act just like humans, just have that weird ass eye thing happening. Either way, they are non violent aliens, they have many planets. They just want to take over their hosts lives, improve on them, then move on to a new planet, that is all. How neat.

Sure, the Host’s spirit kind of dies. But whatever. Fuck those guys.

Well, there is only a few humans left in hidden communities and they want to fight back. Like Melanie (Saoirse Ronan) who is looking after her brother, Jamie (Chandler Canterbury) and falling in love with a new guy, Jared (Max Irons). But on their way to the new hide out (let by her Uncle Jeb (William Hurt)), she totally gets captured and made a host. Sucks to suck.

Well, her spirit doesn’t get back! She fights back, convinces the alien to not give up the location of the survivors to The Seeker (Diane Kruger), and go on the run! Yeah!

Well, when she gets to the compound, no one trusts her, obviously, but hey, eventually she finds love. Love that is different than Jared, a different guy, who loves the alien version of Melanie. Well thats nice.

Boyd Holbrook is Kyle, the new lover, and Jake Abel is Ian, and he hates all of this shit.

Just wait for it. If this turns into a big deal, girls will start getting contacts like this.

The best place to start is with the most famous actor here. William Hurt? Strange. Well, Jeb was cool. Southern big guy with a beard and gun. Can’t go wrong. Also a bit crazy.

Saoirse Ronan is kind of famous. I have only seen her before in Hanna, and well, Hanna actually sucked. Don’t believe the hype. Well, her acting was only “decent” in this film I guess. But when half of the movie is your facial expressions as you talk to the voice in your brain, you need to be more than decent.

Fuck all that noise though. There is VERY little that happens in this movie. There is about 2 action scenes, because the alien race is non violent. The Seeker just happens to be a bit crazy. It is almost entirely the love triangle created by two personalities in one body.

The alien wanted to make a big sacrifice at the end, but her plan didn’t make any sense. A surprise to no one, things work out well for everyone, and there is hope for the future.

Just like there is hope for a sequel. Which is being planned despite no book. You know what that means?

Well, I don’t. Can’t really have more love triangles. Wait, a sequel might be the human kind taking back their planet. Maybe…war? Maybe action? Maybe excitement. I don’t care, lets get the sequel rolling.

Recently I asked my two labs what their favorite movies were. I asked everyone, about 37 students in all, and I was happy to say I had seen every single one of them already.

Except for one.

Into The Wild. I had heard of it mentioned before, but never seen it. Well, I couldn’t let my record stay at only one away, so I set off to see it immediately. Didn’t hurt that it fell in my 2007+ range of reviewable movies!

Hey uhh, that’s some nice geology you, uhh, got going on there.

Chris McCandless (Emile Hirsch) is not like normal boys. No, he is a free spirit, a guy who just hates the grind towards success in life, and he only just graduated college. Well, after he is finally living alone, he says fuck it. I don’t want to do this shit. I want to go out and live on the land, enjoy life for what it is and become one with nature. Damn it.

And that begins his two year journey, with the goal of moving up to the Alaskan wilderness to live on his own. But that isn’t his only goal. He also kayaks down the Colorado River all the way to Mexico, works a few odd jobs, and gets in trouble with the law. His parents (Marcia Gay Harden and William Hurt) are distraught, as their boy seemingly fell off the face of the earth. He has no intention of being found either. His sister (Jena Malone) seems to understand why he did it all, but doesn’t mean she is fine with it either.

Oh, but he isn’t alone on this journey. He meets many people along the way, with different stories, theories and stations in life, and many free spirits. (These people include Brian H. Dierker, Catherine Keener, Vince Vaughn, Hal Holbrook, Kristen Stewart, and Zach Galifianakis).

No. You will ONLY get artsy looking pictures in this review, damn it.

Oh here is another fun fact. This movie was directed by Sean Penn. That fact wasn’t fun for you? My bad. But maybe mildly interesting.

This is the only movie I have seen directed by Mr. Penn, and let me a tell ya. It was pretty intense. I am kind of disappointed no one told me to watch this movie earlier, because it is such a great (and true-ish) story!

I am not the kind of guy who will ever give up things to go and discover myself. I like things, I like that they are a part of myself. Hooray capitalism and what not. If I didn’t like things, I wouldn’t have so many movies. But even I felt attached to Chris during his story. Full of ups and downs he discovered the truth about his life and did what he loved most in the world.

The movie is over 2 hours long and I didn’t notice it at all. I don’t think I have seen Emile Hirsch in any other movies, but I think his acting was just so tremendous in this movie, I am going to have to see more. The next will probably be Speed Racer, where he is the titular role, that way I can have a lesser opinion of him. Or something.

Into the Wild is definitely an overlooked movie from about 5-6 years ago, and should be a must watch for some time to come.

Ooh, Noise. That would be either some vague horror movie, or another remake of The Grinch.

Obviously it is neither, but man, wouldn’t some gritty remake of The Grinch be cool? Something rated R, yet also still not a horror movie.

I’d watch it.

Quick googling says there is no such thing as a Gritty Grinch. Yet.

Instead of my bizarre idea, this movie goes one step bizarrier (Level 2 spell?). It stars mild mannered Tim Robbins. He lives and works in New York city, with his wife, Bridget Moynahan, and their young daughter. But every night the same thing happens. The noise never stops. More specifically, the car alarms, but all the excess noises are a big problem in his eyes.

It makes the baby wake up, and makes it so no one can sleep well, and also makes him limp. Err. Well because the cops never seem to do something about it, he decides to do his own punishment. First he starts slow, deflating a tire or whatever. But eventually he is full on rage mode, smashing the window open to pop the trunk, to cut the line to the battery, just to shut it off. 3 minutes is too long for an alarm to go, given that most people ignore alarms anyways and probably do more harm than good.

He becomes known as The Rectifier, a sort of vigilante punishing those who don’t turn off their alarms. He does try to use the courts to his advantage, but each time his case is thrown out. After his wife makes him leave for his obsession, he meets a Russian student, Margarita Levieva, who helps him start a simple petition to change some car alarm laws and make it fine-able which gets huge support. But the Mayor (William Hurt) and his assistant (William Baldwin) don’t like it just because it seems to support vigilantism, so they put a stop to it.

So it becomes up to Tim Robbins to find a way to get his law passed, any means possible.

Look at all that rage. Yeah, he clearly mad.

I will keep this short and sweet. This movie was weird, yes, which I like. The beginning felt pretty good but died down after about twenty or so minutes. The ending was also strong, I liked what he decided to do in order to finally get his ordinance passed. But a whole lot of the middle was kind of boring. I didn’t even like their quick country plantation visit, where he found that the noise problems still exist outside of the city.

It is a bad problem, no one likes it but everyone accepts it and his character cannot fathom why they should accept it any longer. So he decides to spend a long time trying to combat it, and it is kind of awesome in an “unexpected hero” sort of way. I was surprised this wasn’t based on some real life story of a guy who hated the alarms that much.

But man, if it was a bit better in the middle, this movie would be a lot better.