Gorgon Reviews

Black Irish is one of those random DVDs I bought when the local Blockbuster went under. Why? I saw an actor I knew on the cover, huzzah!

Shit, it was 99 cents.

Either way, apparently Black Irish is a famous term that means something else. What is that something else? Well, it is…

Yep. Literally a black irish person. Moving on.

The McKays are a normal Irish-Catholic Boston family, accents and all. Desmond (Brendan Gleeson), the dad, is drowning himself with alcohol and pity, while keeping deep guarded secrets. The oldest brother, Terry (Tom Guiry), is turning to a life of crime and drugs. Kathleen (Emily VanCamp) got pregnant, but not married, and kicked out of her house. Cole (Michael Angarano) got Catholic schooling and is a great pitcher, but no real love and his parents are hitting low times, so he wants to transfer to a regular public school and get a job.

Margaret (Melissa Leo), is just standing back watching it all crumble beneath her.

But mostly, this is a story of Cole, trying to get his family to like him more by giving up the privileges that were given to him. Go to the same school as his brother. Get a girlfriend maybe. Get a job at an Italian restaurant with Joey (Michael Rispoli). But when you return to the streets, the streets sometimes doesn’t want you back. No matter how hard you (base)ball.

Also, check it, Francis Capra is a thug in here, just like he was in Veronica Mars.

Theory: They are using the term black in a negative term. Like bad Irish. Because that family is white.

My metaphorical hat for this movie would be tipped toward Mr. Gleeson. An actual Irishman, he had to speak the same accent with a more Boston drag, and did it well. His character gave the most feels for me.

Angarano was good too, sure, especially in the “shoe shining” scene. Great emotion. Not as good as other movies I have raved about in other reviews on this website though.

Unfortunately not all of the plot lines are good. The sister one? I was kind of confused by how little time they devoted to telling the story. Melissa Leo is nice, but I think she was completely underused. This was mostly the two brothers and the dad story.

Overall, it is an okay story. It could have been a lot better, if the plot was a bit better and more polished. After all, the main actors were good. Just. Needed. A Better. Story.

2 out of 4.

Jim Rash and Nat Faxon wrote The Descendants, and graced our screens with its presence in 2011. It was nominated for Best Picture and eventually won Best Adapted Screenplay. It basically made these writers pretty hot commodities.

That is why I was excited to see The Way, Way Back, their next film. No George Clooney this time, but they have plenty of other actors to fill his void.

Look, here are three now!

Summer can suck. Especially if you are Duncan (Liam James). Your parents are divorced, your dad just moved from NY to CA, and your mom (Toni Collette) is dating the biggest douche in the universe, Trent (Steve Carell). Unfortunately for Duncan, he has to head out to Trent’s summer beach house to pretend to give this new family idea a chance.

Did I mention Trent is a douche? He talks down to Duncan, constantly goes off with his friends (Rob Corddry, Amanda Peet) to get drunk or high or both. It is basically his personal summer vacation, where Duncan and his mom are afterthoughts.

But eventually, Duncan finds friendship in the local Water Park. Slacker manager Owen (Sam Rockwell) has decided to take pity on Duncan, give him a job and help him find a purpose in this long dreadful summer. With the help of Owen and the other workers (Maya Rudolph, Faxon, Rash), Duncan learns that there are non sucky things out there in life.

That is great, sure, but will this new found joy in life at all help him with his horrible home situation? Will it help him woo over the neighbor girl (AnnaSophia Robb), who has to deal with her constantly drunk mother (Allison Janney)?

Oh god. He is staring into my soul. What do I do!? Just act natural. Ho hum…AHHH!

Comedy/Drama movies are actually quite hard to pull off successfully. After all, even the strictest of dramas tend to have some minor elements in comedy, and vice versa. But most movies labeled in this category are clearly still one genre over the other, or even worse, weak in both areas to try and find a balance. One of the best examples I could list of a real comedy/drama would be 50/50, a film that made me both laugh and cry.

Nat Faxon and Jim Rash wrote a decent comedy/drama with The Descendants, very enjoyable, but it could have been more dramatic. For The Way, Way Back, they decided to amp up their game, and created a much better film. Not going to lie, I cried three times during it. I can’t say I relate specifically to the scenes in this film, but thanks to an excellent build up with terrific acting from everyone on the cast, the emotions quickly took over.

Steve Carell had to play the biggest jerk in the world, and he pulled it off well. It was quite surprising. Sam Rockwell and Allison Janney carried the comedy for me, while at the same time their characters felt real. Everyone felt real. I love real, even though real characters lead to uncomfortable moments.

Major props as well to Liam James. I can’t say I recognized him in anything before, however he pulled off the awkward/lonely teenager role really well. But hey, apparently he was Young Shawn in the Psych flashbacks, so that is kind of cool.

 

4 out of 4.

Two James McAvoy movies in two days.

That is what I did with Trance and Welcome To The Punch, both which released on DVD/BR the same day. Pretty much a McAvoy festapalooza.

Alright, I have nothing to say as an introduction. I am just stalling. Let’s just say I got to go into this movie blind, knowing it had a silly title and James McAvoy.

And a really fucking weird blue hue throughout the film. Is that a halo?

Max Lewinsky (McAvoy) is a detective in London, and he is a bit of a hot shot. He is chasing after famed criminal, Jacob Sternwood (Mark Strong), but things start to go awry. Jacob gets away, but not without first putting a bullet through Max’s leg. Shit.

Three years later, Max is now retired, and all sorts of pissed off. It is like his leg has never felt the same again. The good news is, Jacob’s son is now in the hospital! Okay, that is terrible news. But that news means that Jacob is most likely going to return from his Iceland hideout, in order to see his son. That is when Max can take him out. That is where he can get his revenge. So he gets all un-retired, a new partner in Sarah Hawks (Andrea Riseborough), and this time he will take him in for good.

Unless, things aren’t as clear as they appear to be. Maybe Jacob is secretly a good guy? Maybe. Just maybe.

Oh god, it is so fucking blue. I bet he has a blue house too, with a blue little window. Maybe even a blue corvette…

Welcome To The Punch reminds me of Deadfall. Only in that it went from a great opening to “who gives a fuck” real real quick into it. The twist and secrets were seen miles ahead, without even trying to be remotely clever. Maybe the problem is that they told us that not everything was on the uppity up in the description. Why couldn’t it have been described as just a revenge cop story, because that on its own is relatively unique. A man driven to obsession over getting that one last criminal. Those movies tend to be fantastic.

Throw in corrupt cop angles? Well, I have seen that shit in every movie. It is boring now. Except when I rewatch The Shield. The Shield makes it sexy.

What, I spoiled the corrupt cop nature of it? That is a lie, you already guessed that was the secret. You were right.

The acting wasn’t bad or anything, McAvoy played the obsession angle really well I thought, and it wasn’t really something I’ve seen him do before.

The problem is the movie quickly becomes dull and never really picks itself up from that, so we are just left waiting for it to end. Oh yeah, the ending. That was bad too.

1 out of 4.

I went in to see The Wolverine with one thing on my mind. It couldn’t be worse than X-Men Origins: Wolverine. What a terrible movie. Maybe the worst big comic movie since Superman Returns.

Basically, the bar is set pretty low. So as long as the plot makes sense and there are some decent action scenes, I will probably find it okay

There are gratuitous amounts of shirtless scenes as well. Dem veins.

This story takes place after the events of X-Men: The Last Stand, with some flashbacks before half of the events in X-Men Origins: Wolverine. Jean Grey (Famke Janssen) is still dead, she just happens to be haunting the dreams of Logan / Wolverine (Hugh Jackman). Logan has now escaped to the Canadian wilderness to be left alone.

Enter Yukio (Rila Fukushima), a spunky young Asian woman who can see how people will die (not a mutant) and will not leave Logan alone. In Nagasaki, right before we dropped that big bomb, Logan saved a young general’s life from the blast and radiation. Mr. Yashida (Hal Yamanouchi) became one of the richest people in Japan after that incident! Now, he is about to die, and he wants Logan to come to Japan to say goodbye to the man who saved his life.

Of course, Mr. Yashida wants more than a goodbye. He still wants to live and he believes he can offer Logan a way to finally die by transferring his healing powers. Interesting proposition. Logan also stepped deep into a company power struggle. Yashida’s son Shingen (Hiroyuki Sanada) thinks he is gaining control of the company, but it is actually going to the granddaughter, Mariko (Tao Okamoto). To make matters worse, the Yakuza and a ninja clan (including Will Yun Lee) are also involved!

At the same time, Wolverine gets poisoned by Viper (Svetlana Khodchenkova), the only other mutant in the movie, causing him to lose most of his healing ability. Oh no! He has to fix all the kidnappings, act as a bodyguard, figure out who is the biggest asshole in the room, and try to not die. Typical Tuesday.

Adamantium on Adamantium porn. To reiterate, I had only two criteria that I needed met: a plot that makes sense, and interesting action scenes.

First let’s look at the plot. This film was far too long. They focused a lot on plot and character development, but it wasn’t good plot or character development. Especially in the middle, it dragged on a lot, made more relevant by the lack of action.

The plot is actually a bit confusing. Apparently everyone is a bad guy! The ending attempts to wrap up the multiple plot lines with a big reveal, but instead a few of the plot lines no longer make any sense. Those plot lines remain unanswered the rest of the movie, swept under the rug, hoping no one would notice.

Alright, so the plot is a mess. (Nerd Quandary: In X2 we found out that Logan’s memories after his Adamantium surgery had been wiped. It was explained in X-Men Origins: Wolverine that those memories were lost thanks to adamantium bullets to the head. He only regains a few memories thanks to Xavier’s help, yet he is supposed to remember World War II? Hmm…)

The next thing I have to look at is the action. There is a really interesting train scene that is visually pleasing. The arrow/ninja scene had a great take down. But outside of those two moments, everything was lackluster. The final scene felt really cheap, and a lot of that has to do with Viper as a villain. She is a mutant and has powers, but they are never really explained. She just does more and more snake like things throughout the film, but it all just feels fake. She is also incredibly pointless in the long run.

Crap, I didn’t know what my rating would be until I got to this part of my review. Turns out I disliked it more than I thought. STILL better than X-Men Origins: Wolverine. Far better. The story at least tries to be interesting, and gives some entertainment value. Unfortunately, relooking over the experience, it was overall less than stellar.

We can all feel good at the fact that X-Men: Days Of Future Past comes out next year. It happens to be one of the most ambitious film ideas I’ve ever heard of, and the subject of the scene in the credits.

1 out of 4.

Trance came out in theaters in late March, but apparently never came close to my area, so I had to wait until the DVD Release.

You’d think a college town would be able to justify more indie and lesser known releases. But then again, you’d think a college town would also have trivia nights at their bars.

More importantly, Trance was directed by Danny Boyle. Surely the man who did 28 Days Later…, 127 Hours, and Slumdog Millionaire has earned post-indie status by now.

When he rubs his temple that way, my mind feels raped. According to this movie, stealing art used to be easy. You kind of just pranced into a museum, took it and ran, then went home and hid. Shit gets stolen, and a museum gets fucked. Nowadays, it is way high tech and almost impossible without a huge plan to do it. Okay, that isn’t true. Just read the beginning of this Cracked article which states basically the opposite with facts.

But let’s say for this movie art is hard to steal. Simon (James McAvoy) works as a dude who protects art in case someone tries to steam them when they are getting stolen. Guess what. Some people try to steal a famous painting, Witches In The Air, valued at over $25 million.

Franck (Vincent Cassel) and his crew (including Danny Sapani) steal the shit out of that painting, while also knocking out Simon for trying to be a hero. But when they look at their new score, they find that the painting is gone. Shit. What did Simon do!?

Too bad Simon doesn’t remember what he did with the painting. The men who tried to steal it are pretty pissed off, and have tortured him and tore up all of his things. But still, he just does not remember.

So they get a hypnotist, Elizabeth (Rosario Dawson). However, when she begins to work her mind magic, she discovers secrets that none of the individuals thought possible.

Rosario Dawson shows a lot of her…acting talents in this movie. First things first, for you fucking perverts out there. Rosario Dawson for the first time is completely nude in this movie. Like full frontal, lower and upper, multiple times, no body double nude. She is also shaved. Which is relevant to the plot of the movie. I feel dirty saying all of that, but not really.

There are only three main characters in this movie, but Danny Boyle makes sure you have to work to earn the story. There are twists, there are turns, there are mind fucks. If you stop paying attention, you might not be able to keep up, so it really rewards those people who don’t have short attention spans. It assumes the watcher is intelligent, and will take you on an (often really loud) journey.

I think by the end the story might have gotten a bit too ahead of itself, making too many leaps and bounds. Despite that, it was still a great story, another fantastic movie from Danny Boyle, and another reason why I hate the local theaters.

3 out of 4.

Alright, look, I am sorry it took this long to review District 9.

Most have you have already seen it by now, I bet. Which is great. It was fantastic when I watched in theaters in 2009. Shit, that is like, four years ago. FOUR YEARS AGO PEOPLE. Fuck. It seems so new, even now. Still, I am reviewing it now for two reasons. One, Neill Blomkamp. District 9 was his first directed movie, and it is an indie one at that. Insane. More importantly, he has another movie coming out in a couple of weeks, Elysium, you might have heard of it.

Reason number two? I said I would review this movie once I finally rewatched it again. Needless to say, that shit took awhile.

Yeah. Aliens AND politics. My kind of entertainment! You already know this is a positive review, look how highly I talked about it before.

This takes place in modern day time, 2010 or so, but in an alternative history. South Africa has always been known for its rambunctious nature and high levels of racism. But did you know in 1982 an Alien Spaceship landed above Johannesburg? Of course not, it is a movie, ffs.

Well, they checked out the ship that wasn’t attacking them and found hundreds of malnourished aliens on board that they now call Prawns, a racial slur against them. They were put into a government campsite outside of Johannesburg, named District 9 and given tiny shacks and junk yards to live in. There is constant pressure from those in Johannesburg, who hate the shit out of them, and internal struggles in their poor neighborhoods, so eventually the government wants them to be moved.

These aliens have rights though. They have to be evicted first, before they can be put in a new location much farther away (And a lot more shittier).

Wikus Van De Merwe (Sharlto Copley), a random bureaucrat, has been assigned to give the notices. There is a lot of eyes watching the process, to make sure they don’t harass the prawns, so many news organizations have sent representatives. They also have a small armed force, lead by Koobus Venter (David James). But what happens when they find more than just a few homes smuggling alien weaponry, and discover something even bigger is forming?

Even more quizzical, what happens when they discover the black goop?

The feels. The feels. Oh my goodness, the feels.

One thing I certainly forgot in the four years since I saw this movie in theaters? It is kind of gross. The attention to detail is high, and that leads to some cringe worthy scenarios in my stomach area. Lot of violence. People die. Aliens die. People die in weird ways. Other things happen that are gross that I can’t really describe without spoilers. But seriously, gross gross gross.

However, at the same time, it is just so fucking well done. The plot, the intrigue, and the acting. Only one actor really matters in this movie, good ole Sharlto, who had basically his first role with this film. He carries it on his back, despite being a big unknown. Especially when a lot of the movie deals with him interacting with aliens and Nigerians, he really stands out (racist?).

However, there is one thing that keeps me from giving it a 4. Part of the reason I would give a 4 comes from rewatchability. I can watch a great movie, and love its acting, but if I don’t think I would want to watch it again in a few years, it can’t be a 4 for me. Now, this one took me about three years to finally watch after buying it, which is a huge amount of time. I didn’t finally watch it because I wanted to, just had to before Elysium.

So, with that, that explains the 3. Very good, watch it at least once and be happy.

3 out of 4.

Coriolanus gets the disctinction for being another movie that took me a long ass time to watch. It came out roughly the summer of 2012, and I got it then too. Just. Never. Watched it. Shit, my parents watched it right away, and somehow I just forgot about it. Well, the opportunity came up for me to watch it on Blu-Ray instead, so I rented it, despite owning it. Why? Because then I had a time limit to watch it! If I didn’t watch it before today, I would have wasted money.

I can’t be wasting money. Unless you call renting a movie you own anyways wasting money. Remember when I said I forgot about it? I mean literally forgot that it existed. Whoops. Fuck.

Never forget about Voldemort and The Phantom. They don’t take kindly to that.

Initially, the plot description confused me. “A banished hero of Rome allies with a sworn enemy to take his revenge on the city.” Alright, a period piece in Ancient Rome, sweet! But when I saw the pictures, I saw modern looking stuff. I forgot that Rome was still a city in Italy, so I guess that is what is going on with it?

Nope, Coriolanus is a Shakespeare play. Should have guessed it. Directed by Ralph Fiennes (his first ever director role), this is one of those modern Shakespeare plays, which I guess will get me prepped for when I finally see the new Much Ado About Nothing.

Caius Martius (Fiennes) is a great Roman warlord, who kind of hates the Romans themselves. He finds the plebians to be silly. But he kicks so much ass, and wins so many fights he eventually wins them over. Heck, he also almost takes out the nearby Volscian army, lead by Tullus Aufidius (Gerard Butler). They both survive, but it is clear Rome won the bout overall.

Eventually he wins the public over and decides to run for Consul, the leader of Rome. The senate fears his power though, so they begin a smear campaign against him, attempting to turn the public against him as well. Caius has quite a temper, so he eventually gets pissed off, curses everyone and quickly gets branded a traitor and exiled out of Rome. Surely they won’t regret sending out one of their greatest generals, super pissed off, out of city gates? I hope he doesn’t get the urge to come back…with force.

Jessica Chastain plays his wife, and Vanessa Redgrave his mother.

Oh shit, he is really really mad. Rome is totally going down.

Shakespeare. Are you familiar with his words? Well, for the untrained, it is easy to get lost in the words and get confused, which is why I watched the movie with subtitles.

Coriolanus presumably follows the script to a letter, which means the movie feels overly dramatic. There is a lot of monologue-ing and yelling by the various characters. Lots of yelling, because that means passion, and everyone is passionate in a Shakespeare play.

Which felt really annoying. Overall, Coriolanus is good in that it is trying something new. There are other modern Shakespeare things, but they usually never work for me. This one was different enough that it seemed to be okay they were speaking in such strange ways but with guns.

But the story itself is a let down. I guess I could blame that one on Shakespeare. It wasn’t one that kept me interested. Way more talking and not enough doing. Interesting movie to see once, but ehh…

Also, the Blu-Ray isn’t Blu-Ray quality, those bastards.

2 out of 4.

12 Rounds is a film that is now a bit older. Okay, 2009, so not too old. But I definitely remember seeing the trailer multiple times in theaters and dozens of TV Shots. You know what I thought of it back then? “Huh, that looks pretty good!”

Yeah, four years ago me was weird. Still, I never heard about it after the fact, but I did see that there was a direct to DVD sequel, 12 Rounds: Reloaded. Huh, so it was good…enough…right? To make a direct to DVD sequel? Something in the back of my mind made me want to watch it though. It could be really entertaining, if not just a bit silly.

YEAH. EXPLOSIONS! Miles Jackson (Aidan Gillen) is a big fancy arms dealer, a big bad guy, who they want to take down. Namely Danny Fisher (John Cena). Well, shit goes wrong. He almost gets away with his girlfriend, but then she gets hit with a car and dies. Shit, who saw that coming. Miles gets caught and he is pissed off.

A year later, Danny gets a phone call…FROM MILES! OH MAN! He has escaped from prison! And he has his girlfriend Molly (Ashley Scott) captive! Ahh! Miles tells him they are going to play a game, a game called 12 Rounds. He just passed Round 1 by surviving an explosion, and if he passes all 12 tasks, he will get the girl back. Sure. Right.

So Miles has Danny running around the city, with the help of the force (Steve Harris, Brian White, more) to get his girl back and also recapture and dangerous man. Also, explosions and death and shit. Lots of that.

Miles looks like a cross of Edward Norton and Josh Groban to me. Let’s just say this movie wasn’t as entertaining as advertised. Wasn’t even silly. It was a very serious faced film. Everyone took it very seriously, and I didn’t care one bit.

Shit, it took TWENTY minutes for the intro to finish so we could get to modern day and start the games. That is a long chase for the arms dealer dude. Who gives a fuck.

This movie literally gave me a headache with its badness. So I had to give it this rating, because I hate headaches. No entertainment value for me. Can’t wait for the sequel.

0 out of 4.

I often find that when all you do is talk about movies, people tend to suggest them. Of course I will watch a movie if someone suggests it to me, but with Ruby Sparks something even stranger happened. TWO people recommended this movie to me, potentially within a few weeks apart. Well, of course I have to see it now.

I also realized why I didn’t watch it right away. Sparks? That title is too close to the title Sparkle. I hated that movie.

I could write a better movie than Sparkle for sure. It would be about some sort of mythical creature that Sparkled under strange circumstances. I am sure that’s an original concept.

Calvin (Paul Dano) is a genius. Alright, he doesn’t like that word. But he dropped out of high school once he wrote what many consider to be the next great American novel, and he quickly rose to fame and success. But now, almost ten years later, he is in his late 20s and he still has one novel under his belt. He has released a few short stories and novellas, but nothing of any real length or magnitude.

Some genius indeed. It must all be getting to his head. In fact, he has to see a psychiatrist now just to sort through his feelings of loneliness.

But then one magical night, he has a dream. A dream of a girl, with red hair, and a quirky attitude. She is perfect to him. So he writes about his dreams and turns it into its own new story. Yes, this is the one, his next great novel! Who cares if his brother (Chris Messina) thinks the story is dumb.

Calvin really is a genius. His brain is so powerful, that one morning he woke up and found the literal girl of his dreams in his kitchen. Ruby Sparks (Zoe Kazan). In the flesh. Based on everything he wrote about. How can that be? People can’t just be created! Or can they? Truly only a genius (or geniuses, in some cases) could create a person without even trying. It gets weirder when he realizes it is not in his head. It gets creepier when he realizes that whatever he types comes true. Yeah, you know what I’m talking about.

Annette Bening and Antonio Banderas play his mom and step-dad, while Steve Coogan has a small role as “other older writer dude.”

Anyone else find it funny how Ruby is always wearing red? And how she and Superman are never in the same room?

Yeah, so I really fucking love strange quirky movies like this. Pretty easy to learn that given my rating record. Watching this movie made me want to watch Stranger Than Fiction right after it. Another well acted quirky movie about the truth being determined by what someone rights. Who knew there was a whole drama about this!?

I found myself flailing while I watched this movie. My mind raced ahead of itself, so once I was given new information, I always assumed the worse. Having complete and utter power over someone? That can lead to many dark dark places, and I assumed each one would be touched upon. Thankfully, each one wasn’t touched upon, because I didn’t feel like crying that night. But the scene where the power finally got to the head? Shit scared me, and it did it in away without having to go the hard R rating that most of us are probably imagining. Which is great, when I rewatch this movie, I can not flip out as much and STILL enjoy the process they go through.

Besides, this type of stuff is every (male?) fantasy. Since Frankenstein, the idea of creating a person has always been intriguing. So why not?

I think this film is excellent on all cylinders, and exactly the type of thing I’d watch again and again.

4 out of 4.

I was given an advanced screening of the short “I Had A Heart Once“, directed by fellow movie reviewer Josh Lewis.

The short itself is only a little bit over five minutes. Our main and only character, John, is apparently ready to finally tell us what is on his mind after a night of heavy drinking and epiphanies.

Interlaced between the dialogue are clips of John wandering aimlessly around the city, looking sad, confused, and depressed, so it is not just simply one man talking on his couch.

One man and a couch? Could be a porno really.

The thing I liked most about the movie was the soundtrack and the last 20 or so seconds. The soundtrack carries the emotions splendidly throughout the short piece and enhances the feelings that the actor is trying to convey. The ending gives us context for his late night rant by finally answering the few questions you have during his talk: Who are you talking to and why?

Unfortunately for me this piece was not as powerful as I could have hoped, and I have been able to single it down to one reason. I didn’t understand almost half of the words spoken by our actor, Rohan Mead. Presumably his goal was to get the message across while also appearing wasted in some capacity. Therefore most of the lines are said quickly and go from whisper to regular voice quite often. His dialogue is very realistic in that regard, a man trying to get something off of his chest (and about his chest, hah) that he has kept deep for some time. But if I don’t know what words he uses, I can’t get lost in the powerful imagery it creates.

Should it have come with subtitles or at least had clearer dialogue, the review would have been higher.

2 out of 4.