watching movies one cup at a time

This movie follows in the tradition of Blair Witch as a “found footage” video camera film depicting something that supposedly really happened. In this case it’s a “demon” tormenting a young woman and her boyfriend. What I liked about it was the very original spin on a very cliche genre. I liked the natural dialogue, and I like the disbelief of the boyfriend who seems to be determined to push his girlfriend to extremes so he can get some kick-ass video footage, presumably to immediately post to youtube and high-five his other douchebag buddies. It’s a very contemporary reaction from a generation raised on youtube overexposure, counteless reality shows, and endless horror movies that retread the same old scares. I felt the final impact of the film wasn’t as powerful as Blair Witch, but it does succeed at creating a very creepy environment that makes you tense and uncomfortable.

Definitely worth checking out.

My favorite zombie movie is Shaun Of The Dead. It’s funny, scary, and extremely clever. Just a good movie that took the zombie apocalypse and did something entirely original and enjoyable. The makers of Zombieland said they wanted to make a movie on the level of Shaun. And I can see their intentions and how they wanted to make a more comedic, light-hearted but good zombie movie. The problem is that Zombieland is just not enough of anything to make any kind of real impression. It’s not enough of a zombie movie, it’s not enough of a comedy, it’s not enough of an awkward teen romance, it’s just not enough. It winds up being a rather well-done weak movie. The characters are good, the actors are great, but they just don’t have enough to do in this movie and I was honestly just plain bored. This is a zombieland where the zombies are just kind of afterthoughts. They aren’t any real threat, no one is really scared of them, and basically “it’s the end of the world as we know it but I feel fine.”

Overall it was a decent movie. Just not enough to make it great or even really good. And that’s a shame because you can really see the potential for something so much better.

To call this movie ridiculous is pretty much stating the obvious. So let’s just get the fact that it’s a ridiculous over-the-top two-dimensional movie out of the way. Now, as far as ridiculous movies go, it’s not that bad. It reminds me of the early ’80s/late ’70s Roger Moore James Bond movies like Moonraker where there were crazy, evil baddies with outrageously elaborate lairs, like what Austin Powers would parody. We get the crazed villain, the massively tricked-out headquarters, and crazy gadgets galore. It actually remains true to the original toys in that sense with each weapon is created to outdo the next.

The acting here is a very mixed bag. Christopher Eccleston and Joseph Gordon-Levitt are both brilliant actors who are basically given free reign to cook up the cartoonish villians required by the flm. But Channing Tatum is an absolutely horrible actor who shouldn’t ever be allowed anywhere near a movie that requires even the slightest amount of acting. Even for G.I. Joe he is just plain terrible. I guess in real life he is best friends Joseph Gordon-Levitt and that may be why they are in this movie together. But Joseph Gordon-Levitt has more talent in his eyebrow than Channing Tatum could ever dream to have. Marlon Wayans is of course just playing Marlon Wayans and makes all the required jokes I’m sure he was hired for. I don’t once believe him to be a highly-trained soldier though and his so-called comic relief is pretty cliche and slapstick. Dennis Quaid and Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje are just kind of in the background, under-utilized and mostly forgotten. Sienna Miller is passable but I didn’t like the back-and-forth of her loyalties. Baroness is evil, keep it that way.

This movie is a bit of fun, I will admit. And it’s still way better than that god awful Transformers sequel. But it’s pure fluff through and through. And I was a bit surprised by the amount of foul language in the movie. It’s PG-13 but I still would have expected it to be cleaner for a film that is based on a children’s toy and cartoon. Still, not a bad toy movie.

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 like one long Doctor Who episode. It really could have been a Doctor movie without much change to the story. Set in London, the film is essentially about “space vampires” that come to Earth to drain the lifeforce from humans and turn them into lifeforce-draining monsters themselves. It’s very campy and British in the exact same way that Doctor Who was, especially in the ’80s. But it is still enjoyable for a rather silly horror/sci-fi movie. The special effects are pretty ridiculous, again like Doctor Who back-in-the-day, but it doesn’t hurt that the main vampire villain is a hot girl who prefers to be naked all the time, just sayin’.

I give a lot of movies a 3 cup (out of 5) review because a lot of movies are just okay. Not great, not bad, just okay. Funny People follows in that tradition. It’s just okay. Judd Apatow is everywhere these days, mostly writing. And he has been known mostly for raunchy, “guy” humor. Funny People is his third turn at directing and he turns toward more dramatic territory than the more comedic 40 Year Old Virgin and Knocked Up. And the jokes are noticeably a lot less raunchy and “guy” oriented. There is still a lot of “guy” humor, just not as much. And while this movie has heart, it’s not really enough to make it a winner.

Adam Sandler does a good job basically playing himself as a burnt-out comedian, but he never warms up and becomes anyone you’re sympathetic for. Seth Rogen is good as his assistant but I didn’t think the connection between the two characters was very natural. it felt rather forced. The stand up routines were basically good but nothing outrageous. A much better film along similar lines is the Tom Hanks movie Punchline with Sally Field. And a much better Apatow film is still 40 Year Old Virgin.

This is the 6th Harry Potter movie and the last installment before the big finale. In a lot of ways this movie is just setting up the events of the last movie. So there just isn’t a whole lot of actual story here. The other movies felt more independent, like they had a central story to them on their own. But this one just races along to ultimately lead to the big battles of the next chapter. Sure things happen but it all feels like small steps. And the whole love potion/couples thing just gets a bit silly. We’re just killing time basically.

Harry is just kind of goofy and awkward. Hermoine is annoying and all weepy. Ron is a dumbass. Malfoy just walks around scowling constantly. Dumbledore gets a bit goofy. Helena Bonham Carter is completely copying her character from Sweeney Todd. Snape is harmless. And we never even see Voldemort except in flashback. I was completely bored.

Of course see the movie if you are in to the series, but don’t expect any excitement or energy.

I was looking forward to this movie since all the buzz in front of it said that it was an original and well-done sci-fi movie. I am always on the lookout for an something interesting on the sci-fi front and there are very few original ideas left out there. However this seemed promising. Ultimately thought the movie falls rather flat and it just doesn’t do a good enough job of holding my interest. It gets rather long and boring, and the plot device of clones isn’t done with any dramatic new take or twist. First-time director Duncan Jones, son of David Bowie btw, puts a fair amount of style into the movie. And Sam Rockwell does an excellent job playing against himself and making each version of his character different. It’s not really a bad movie, but it’s not as good as I had hoped or had been led to believe. Most of the time I was quite bored waiting for something interesting to happen, and it just didn’t deliver.

I feel like this movie got kind of brushed off. It was delayed for quite awhile before it came out and so by the time it hit theaters at the end of 2008 it was kind of an afterthought. And it didn’t help that Tom Cruise has been riding a negative publicity wave surrounding his controversial Scientology religion and tabloid fare. But despite how people may feel about Tom Cruise and Scientology, he consistently delivers a great performance in all of his movies and it would be a mistake to dismiss a quality movie like this just because of the actor’s personal life.

Directed by the extremely talented Bryan Singer, Valkyrie delivers a compelling story about a part of history we never hear about in the United States. We never hear about the German citizens who chose to rebel against Hitler in the face of tremendous pressure and risk during WWII. A friend of mine who had lived in Germany said that some felt that Germans didn’t need a “Hollywood” movie about their past. But the truth is millions more will hear about this from this movie than a small independent or a documentary. And despite being a so-called “Hollywood” movie, this film has a stellar ensemble cast doing top-notch work. And no one does a better job than Tom Cruise.

The story follows Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg who becomes involved in a plan to take down Hitler and launch a political coup to topple the Third Reich before they lead Germany and the rest of Europe into further destruction and chaos. Many join the cause in the face of oppressive and mandatory loyalty that is enforced through constant threats and coercion. It’s dangerous and risky but we all know the outcome. No spoiler alert necessary. But I never knew about this before and I think it’s important to know that not all German’s citizens, even members of Hitler’s “inner circle,” went along with Hitler.

It’s a quality movie definitely worth watching.

I wasn’t expecting a whole lot from this movie but I was pleasantly surprised. It’s good movie with a genuine feel for the Star Wars fan community. The story is centered around a group of 5 hardcare Star Wars fans in 1998 who go on a cross-country road trip to break into Skywalker Ranch to watch the rough cut of Episode 1 because their friend Linus has cancer and is not expected to live long enough to see it in the theaters.

As expected, the movie is filled with Star Wars-related humor and jokes aimed at the hardcore fan. But it never panders or makes fun of the fans. It’s done with respect, and the cast pulls it off flawlessly. Plus the film has a ton of really great cameos from Billy D. Williams, Carrie Fisher, William Shatner, Kevin Smith and several brilliant characters played by Seth Rogen. You get the sense that everyone just wanted to make something fun about a subject they love and grew up with.

One interesting point is that the film is set before the prequel series came out. Many of the hardcore fans were very disappointed by those films and some argue they diminished the whole Star Wars genre, especially the first one in all of it’s Jar-Jar, little kid Darth Vader goodness. And the movie ends with the question, “Dude, what if the movie sucks?” So in a sense, 1998 may have been the last time hardcore faithful could revel in “classic” Star Wars without the stigma of Episodes 1-3.

You don’t have to be a Star Wars fan to enjoy this movie but it would definitely help. Overall it’s a good flick!