watching movies one cup at a time

A lot has been said about this movie’s use of CGI. It was made by the same people that created the Polar Express. It uses motion capture technology to digitally record an actor’s real, physical performance, and then interpret that into a computer to guide a computer generated character. So in that sense it greatly differs from films like Shrek and the Pixar films. It is much more direct attempt to mimic a “real life” depiction through computer generated animation. The people are meant to look like real people, etc. As opposed to the more “cartooney” CGI movies put out by other studios. Does it succeed? Do the digital characters look like real people? Well, it’s getting close. Read the rest of this entry »

This is Daniel Craig’s debut as James Bond and some had questioned the whole notion of a “blond Bond.” But Craig lives up the character and in fact kicks some major ass. In a sense this is a prequel. It depicts Bond’s first mission after becoming a 00. But in another sense I think this film is more how I envision the entire James Bond canon. I believe that “James Bond” is actually a title and not a real person in these stories. A man becomes “James Bond” after the previous one retires or is killed. Anyone with the 007 status adopts the identity. So Daniel Craig is not the original James Bond but he is the current one. And I’m talking about IN the movie, not the actor. That way James Bond is timeless and the several actors that have played him can be explained easily enough.

Having said that, Daniel Craig does a phenomenal job. He is a perfect cool, calm, and ruthless agent that is completely capable of all that’s required of the character. The film takes more inspiration from the recent Bourne movies than it does the campy, doomsday schemes of the 80s and 90s. This Bond will do a 15 minute fight sequence smashing through windows and jumping off of roofs before anything with lasers comes out. And all with the same cool and effortless expression on his face. Hardcore.

Great action, great characters, a great Bond film for a new generation.

I really enjoyed this movie. I had low expectations because I’m not a huge romantic-comedy fan (though I seem to have seen thousands somehow) but I was pleasantly surprised by an interesting story, real characters, and some great acting.

Jennifer Garner is lead here as a young woman about to be married only to have her fiance die in an accident right before the wedding. She deals with it with the help of her friends and a buddy of the fiance’s who is in town, played by Timothy Olyphant. Things get complicated when Juliette Lewis comes to town with a young child that she says was the fiance’s son whom Jennifer Garner never heard of before. But the pacing is kept light and airy, not too forced or hectic. All the characters deal with their friends death in different ways and it feels genuine and not some sappy made-for-TV movie cliche.

Jennifer Garner is great in this movie. She is perfect as the newly single character, Gray. Not extreme, not overthinking it, very natural. And her stunning beauty works well with the character.

Timothy Olyphant is also really, really good in this movie. Often he gets roles as the bad guy. And he can do bad guys exceptionally well. But he has been consistently great in everything I’ve seen him in. And in this film he does a great job of being at first the sort of rogue drifter but then really fleshing out the character as a good guy and a good person for Gray to start a romance with.

Kudos to Kevin Smith too. He rarely does movies that aren’t his own productions but this time he did a really good job in a purely supporting acting role. And his scene in the hospital was quite good. I know the character in the movie was pretty much just Kevin Smith by a different name, but he pulled it off and it flowed very naturally with the movie. I have seen far worse acting from people who don’t also have Director and Writer as their day job.

Bottom Line: If you’re looking for a good romantic-comedy-drama that isn’t wacky, gross, or over-the-top, give this a try.

This is an interesting little movie that kind of flew under the radar this year. It’s set in an underground city at some time in the future when the surface of the planet has presumably been made uninhabitable. The underground city has aged well past it’s expected use and is falling into disrepair. The ones who built the city have long passed away and so the current residents simply exist in a perpetual state of being fixed up with whatever temporary solutions are at hand. It’s a crumbling structure that is getting harder and harder to maintain. The leaders of the city are content with just keeping things as they are so they can horde the city’s limited resources for themselves. While a couple of kids figure out that there was a plan of action lost a long time ago that was intended to lead them out of the city and back to the surface.

The sets in this film are quite well done with a very rich level of detail. It reminds me very much of Terry Gilliam’s fantasy movies like Time Bandits and Baron Munchausen or Jeunet’s City of Lost Children. They do a great job of conveying the layers of layers of crumbling and quick fixes that have covered the city. Nothing is ever replaced with something new, it’s simply patched or tied together.

Overall the story was good but I felt it could have used a little more punch to it. It could have been a little more exciting and given a stronger edge of urgency. But it’s not bad and it’s a shame more people didn’t see it. Bill Murray as the corrupt and lazy mayor does an excellent job as do the two child leads, including Saoirse Ronan who was so brilliant in last year’s Atonement.

First I have to say I really liked the movie a lot. However that shaky camera thing really made me feel nauseous! WTF!? I definitely did not feel good by about halfway through the flick. That’s not something you want from a movie these days – call me crazy. And it appears I’m not alone. I read reports that some theaters posted signs saying the movie may cause motion sickness. Nice job, JJ Abrams!

Nevertheless, the film scores big for originality. The concept of seeing essentially a Godzilla movie in a reality show/documentary style really succeeded in connecting the terror of the moment to the audience. It was very effective and believable. We are so used to seeing reality show footage these days and this just blends right in. I got sucked into the realistically bewildering crisis. Read the rest of this entry »

This movie feels more like a gritty movie about South Africa than it does about aliens. It feels closer to movies like “City of God” and “Hotel Rwanda” than your typical sci-fi.

In the film, a derelict alien ship drifts into the skies above Johannesburg. A community of aliens are found inside, not plotting a siege or looking to make friends, just sort of stuck there and abandoned. They are moved to the ghettos of the city and essentially treated as annoying refugees that need to be isolated and ignored. Meanwhile their weapons and technology are irresistible to those who want to exploit it even though humans are unable to use any of it.

We are constantly shown the ugly side of humanity and it is easy to believe that these visitors would wind up experiencing the worst we have to offer. As they say in the beginning, there was no grand first contact, no exchange of goodwill, no dramatic meeting of the worlds. Just ugliness and cruelty. It was refreshing to see a movie that did not just present another “aliens are out to take over” or “aliens are here to show us how to love” kind of sci-fi nonsense. But at the same time it presented a very hopeless and all-too-real vision of man’s capacity for horrible behavior. At the end of the film I felt almost exhausted from the tension and misery.

Still it was a very well-done film and presented an interesting story. I appreciate that the aliens and their world was treated so normally and fluid with the rest of the actors and scenery.

This movie is basically an updated, teen version of Hitchcock’s classic “Rear Window.” A person confined to their home spies on the neighbors and suspects one of them is a killer. Disturbia is not a classic but it is an entertaining film that is well done. Kind of like “Rear Window” mixed with Tom Hank’s “The ‘burbs” and “Fright Night.”

One of the ways it ups the thrill level from “Rear Window” is by making the suspected neighbor much more of a Hannibal Lecter type serial killer. This guy has gone to great lengths to do his dirty work and to make sure it’s covered up. David Morse is sufficiently creepy to play the killer, and he’s played villians many times before, but he is not really a terrifying presence by himself.

Shia LaBeouf plays the main character, Kale, and he does a great job. However, I don’t think Shia is a great actor. He falls into the category of a John Cusack or Julia Roberts where he is good at playing characters like himself, but that’s about it. He’s great at what he does, but it’s the same guy in each movie – Transformers, Disturbia, Indiana Jones, etc. Fortunately that guy is entertaining and very natural. I enjoy him in this movie and that’s good enough.

Bottom Line: The movie is rather light entertainment, but it is entertaining and fairly clever. Definitely give it a shot if you’re looking for a light thriller.

This was actually better than I expected. Shia Lebouf left a bad taste in my mouth after Indiana Jones this summer. But when he’s in something more his speed, he does pretty good. This is directed by the same guy as Disturbia, another unexpectedly good Lebouf movie.

In this movie a rogue government intelligence computer starts it’s own coup attempt using a vast amount of resources to manipulate people into doing it’s bidding. It’s very fast-paced and the action is very believeable. Essentially it’s a chase movie and it is pretty fun to watch. The supporting cast all does an excellent job of keeping things from bring too flat. And it’s nice to see Michael Chiklis get to play an intelligent good-guy character for a change.

Nothing earth-shaking here, but it’s enjoyable.

I really liked this one. It was smartly done and Amy Adams steals the show as Giselle. She’s absolutely perfect. She makes you laugh at her without her looking stupid, and she has the convincing air of innocence the character needs without seeming too naive or helpless. The story is an interesting one, having fictional cartoon characters cross over into the real world and become real themselves. It was all kind of a stretch but it worked fine enough.

Timothy Spall is great as Nathaniel, making him both rather buffoonish and tenderly sympathetic. James Marsden is a great Prince Edward, really fleshing out the archetype but not over doing it. Susan Sarandon had some fun doing this one. Her evil Queen is just the right balance of scary and absurd.

Another great family movie. Disney is really jumping on this whole “princess” thing so they can sell kids more crap. But it really didn’t feel like a Disney fairy tale movie. It stands on it’s own and it was a good time. It’s the same director as the really well done Eloise movies from a few years ago. He has a knack for this kind of story.

This movie is a sort of sci-fi horror film, like a cross between H.P. Lovecraft and Alien. It stars Laurence Fishburne and Sam Neil and is set out in space as Laurence Fishburne’s character captains a ship sent to rescue another ship called the Event Horizon. Sam Neil’s character built it and an experimental engine that creates black holes for the purposes of advanced space travel. But the ship had disappeared and then reappeared but without any of it’s crew. Turns out the experimental engine took the ship to some “evil dimension” and when it came back, the ship was essentially haunted and homicidal.

There are some pretty horrific scenes in here as we find out what happened to the crew. But I found the concept to be really interesting. And I’ve always liked the idea of horror in a sci-fi setting, as long as it’s done right. This movie is believable and the actors play the characters well. There aren’t a ton of effects but there are enough to make the point without going overboard.

Besides being very H.P. Lovecraft, this movie also has a very Hellraiser feel too it. In fact when Sam Neil’s character becomes totally “evil”, he is physically transformed and looks just like a Cenobite (the so-called demon figures) from the Hellraiser movies. The Hellraiser series actually attempted a sci-fi plot device in the Hellraiser: Bloodlines film with much less success.

Event Horizon was directed by Paul W.S. Anderson who also directed the Resident Evil films and Alien vs. Predator. This movie is close to that kind of genre so if you want an interesting movie without getting too serious, this one would be a good choice.