waynes world 2

i really loved the first movie, but this one is pretty bad.  i realize the first 'wayne's world' was pretty bad too, but my nostalgia for it blocks out all the detractors.  well, i never saw this one when it came out, only now catching up with it after recently rewatching the original.  unfortunately, this one doesn't hold up very well when compared to the original.  it makes sense, since this film is basically a rehash of the first one, not really adding anything new to the premise.  in this film wayne is trying to find some direction in his life and decides that he is going to create a music festival in downtown chicago.  along the way they hit the exact same beats as the first film, singing a song in the mirthmobile, stopping at the hockey donut shop, going to a concert, problems with wayne's girlfriend, etc.  which brings up a really frustrating this about this film: one of the driving forces is wayne's relationship with his girlfriend cassandra.  i know we are supposed to root for our hero wayne to keep the girl, but everything he does proves over and over again that he is a jerk and she would be better off without him!  he is constantly questioning her, he is a controlling boyfriend who wont let her be around any other guys or else his jealousy really kicks in, threatening to break up with her at the drop of a hat, and as soon as she starts to find success he becomes bitter and angry toward her.  also, he never does anything at all that should endear her to him, he never shows her any sort of affection other than objectifying her as 'hot'.  anyway,  back to the movie itself: the jokes are recycled and the plot is lifeless.  for some reason, as was the case in the first movie, garth has a completely unrelated story that never plays into the narrative of the movie.  this is definitely wayne's movie, with only a couple minutes here and there dedicated to his long suffering sidekick.  over all, these problems far outweigh any silly gags (which are just reinterpretations of gags from the first film anyway) or humor that may have been intended in the movie.  an unfortunate follow up to a pretty funny original movie.

relic

this movie is a rare anomaly: the movie is actually better than the book!  i remember reading this book when i was in high school, in anticipation for the movie.  the book, though, was filled with generic characters and a really really bad ending.  it was so bad it kind of ruined the fun tension of the rest of the book.  the movie, though, fixes that problem and gives an impressively explosive ending that corrected the major failure of the book.  the story is set in a museum and follows the workers there as they prepare for a big fundraising ball to show off their new exhibit.  a few crates recently arrived from the congo, but they were strangely empty.  well, they werent really empty, instead what was in them leads to a bunch of gruesome deaths.  as the mystery behind these deaths escalates, the ball is about to begin.  this is, in its simplest sense, a creature feature.  there is a really cool looking nasty creature who is causing all these terrible murders and one of the policemen and an important museum employee must try to get rid of the creature before it ruins the museum's biggest fundraiser of the year.  the creature itself, a stan winston creation, is pretty cool and very creepy.  i remember being blown away by it when i first watched this movie in the theater back in 1997.  the special effects hold up fairly well, especially when the creature is lurking in the dark.  when we finally get a good look at it, the effects are a bit dated, but the suspense and build up do a nice job of creating tension and setting up the action packed final act.

contact

i have mixed feelings about this movie.  on the one hand i really like it, its one of those rare big movies that has heart and really challenges the mind. but on the other hand, they so totally botch the ending that i walk away from it annoyed.  the film follows jodie foster's character, an astronomy scientist who has dedicated her life to finding life on other planets.  she spends her days listening to radio signals in outer space, hoping that she will hear a signal or response from somewhere else.  she is mocked and jeered by everyone else, about to get her funding taken away, when she finally hears something!  the signal she hears makes the news and everyone scrambles to try and make sense of it.  along the way she befriends a man of faith, played by matthew mcconaughey, who challenges her stance on scientific proof.  she blows off his beliefs because they cannot be proven.  as the extra terrestrial signal is decoded they discover that it is actually blueprints for a giant device.  the planet unites to try and build this device and the world prepares to find out what this device does.  the story itself is very interesting: uncovering the meanings, deciding what to do about it, dealing with the different opinions about how to proceed with the realization of intelligent life out there.  all of it is really cool!  the main theme of the movie is a weighty one: proof versus faith.  an interesting conversation and one that is dealt with seriously.  the frustration though, is that the last minute or two of the movie throws everything out and makes it a moot point by banging us over the head with an answer to the question of faith and proof.  all the wrestling over the struggle is thrown out the window in order to give a pat answer, and in so doing, destroy all the progress made in defending both points.  arg.  if this movie would have left off the last two minutes, it probably would have deserved a 5 star rating, but as is- only 3.

father of the bride part 2

i really loved the first movie, 'father of the bride', but this one falls pretty flat.  the first movie sets up the family, steve martin as the father who cant quite accept that his little girl has grown up and is going to marry.  well, this one plays that exact same note, only this time he cant believe his daughter is going to have a baby.  that would have been a fun set up, considering the well crafted characters from the first film, but then they have to take it one step further and have diane keaton, steve martin's wife, also become pregnant.  i had a really hard time believing that a 49 year old woman could get pregnant, so that alone ruined the movie for me.  also, the light hearted over-the-top qualities of the first film are pushed even farther this time around.  but this time it went too far over the top and landed somewhere absurd and unbelievable.  steve martin does a good job in this, as does the planner martin short, but the whole premise and follow through are just too much.  it takes everything that was sweet and believable in the first film and takes it too far out of the realm of realism.  a disappointing follow up to a wonderful family movie.

wayne's world

i'm pretty sure some major nostalgia is kicking in here, but this movie is actually really good!  i think this movie came out at just the right time for me to really love it, all the humor is pretty junior high level, and i was in junior high at the time- perfect!  this movie is based on a saturday night live skit that was created by mike meyers and dana carvey.  i remember seeing the skit on snl once or twice (not too often because my parents would rarely let me stay up that late, and when they did they certainly werent apt to let me watch snl!), and always thought they were really funny!  i think i was too young to really understand any of the sexual innuendo, so to me it was just a fun bit about two rock nerds in their basement.  how exactly they turned that little sketch into a full movie (and sequel!) is kind of impressive, really.  and to turn it into such a funny one at that!  the story follows two slackers who make a public access rock show in their basement as they are offered a chance to make it big.  the movie itself is more of a series of funny bits tied together as a makeshift movie, but those bits are so much fun!  i remember reenacting many of them with my friends, even.  watching it recently with my wife i began to realize that maybe this movie isnt as good as i seem to think it is...  she does not have the nostalgic memories of it and lost patience with it quickly, opting to read a book or play on her phone after about the first twenty minutes!  oh well, in my mind it still rocks, and even holds up to my memories all these years later.  party on, wayne!

tron: legacy

i dont think i have ever seen the original tron movie so i dont have any nastalgic recollection of the first one. i mostly just wanted to see this new one because it looked cool. well, it certainly did! the story starts 20 years after the original where jeff bridges character had created a world inside of a computer. it seems that he has been trapped in there ever since and his son has had to grow up without his father around. now incredibly wealthy (due to his father having invented some pretty amazing computery stuff), bridges' son has given up on doing anything worthwhile. one night he gets a message from his dad's old arcade. curious, he wanders in and discovers his dad's secret lab. he triggers the same mechanism as his father all those years ago and finds himself now a part of the computer program as well. over the past 20 years the program has been upgrading itself and trying to attain perfection so we see a vastly different version that the original movie. and boy is it an awesome version! the story of this film is not the draw here, the big draw is the amazing style and look of the computer world. the whole time i was watching it i knew that there was absolutely no substance to it, but the imagery was just so eye-poppingly amazing that i didnt even care! the hypnotic score by daft punk is the perfect combination to the slick visuals. this movie just drew me in big time! i know its not that good, but the look and sound of it just makes me want to go out and see it again as soon as possible!

the frisco kid

this one is pretty strange. it stars gene wilder as a polish rabbi who has been called to be the leader of the synagogue in frontier town california. it follows him as he tries to make it from poland across america during the 1840's. along the way he meets up with a no-good cowboy played by harrison ford (huh?!?). ford starts off trying to take advantage of this shmuck who has no clue about the old west, but slowly takes a liking to him. wilder does a fantastic job of playing the clueless rabbi, he has an innocent gentleness to him that he brings to every roll. the rabbi doesnt understand that the train robbers are bad guys or that the angry men want to kill him, he just continues to show kindness to them, even when they are in the middle of beating him up! one of the funniest parts comes when he's saved by a group of christians and neither one of them know what to make of the other! harrison ford does his grumpy/annoyed thing here, which fits quite well, and the two of them make a surprisingly fun duo! the movie is a bit too long and awfully slow in parts, but its still a fun relic of wilder's comedic heyday.

the avengers

what a turd. i had no interest in watching this movie other than the fact that its got sean connery in it (clearly in it for the big paycheck) and the soundtrack has a song from one of my favorite bands the verve pipe. the movie is a remake of the british show from the 60's and is absolutely dreadful! the characters played by uma thurman and ralph fiennes are completely vapid and a waste of space. the characters dont ever talk to each other, they just reply to the worthless british snobbery with more 'witty' british snobbery. and connery, playing the evil bad guy (who for some reason at one point wears a giant teddy bear costume...) does the most generic thing any bad guy could possibly do: he creates a weather controlling machine! this stupid premise was a joke back when it was used in the 80's cartoon g.i. joe- do they really expect us to take it seriously?!? its too shallow to be a drama, its too generic to be a thriller, and its too lame to be a send up of the original. why exactly does this movie exist? no answer? didnt think so...

green lantern

i hate to say it, because i really love ryan reynolds, but this movie was kind of a dud. i grew up loving comic books, but green lantern never interested me. i guess that should have been an indication for me when i saw this one, huh? the story follows hal jordan, an ace pilot in the air force, as he is called to wear the ring and take up the helm of a green lantern. the movie, though epic in scale, feels really disjointed. we get to see the unhappy pilot who struggles with his father's death years earlier in an airplane related accident, but it never feels like a real motivation. we see the grand scope of the green lantern corps and all the strange creatures through out the galaxy that also have taken up the ring, but they never play any sort of real part of this story. we see the all encompassing evil that is the bad guy parallax, but its threat is never really conveyed. they even fail to truly explain what it is that the ring does. we know its the physical manifestation of will and hope, but what exactly does that mean? with out any explanation or attempt to justify its power, hal jordan can make a race track appear out of nowhere to save a helicopter. um, what does that have to do with hope? we never really see hal struggle with this new position except in the most shallow of ways: showing off to a roommate, trying to figure out the oath of the green lanterns, etc. there was much potential, but very little of it is realized with this film. sure, the effects looked pretty cool, but to what end? it felt like much of it was designed to distract the audience from the lack of storytelling. things just kind of happen with little rhyme or reason. how does hal suddenly have the strength to go from worthless hack to galaxy saving lantern in the course of one day? and that last scene! really? there was no reason behind it other then maybe everyone involved knew they didnt stand a chance of getting to do a second one so they wanted to go for it. what ever the case, this movie was a disappointment. a shiny disappointment, but that didnt help much.

buying the cow

you know, this one is a lot better than i thought it was going to be! it follows jerry o'connell's character as he is given an ultimatum from his girlfriend: get married or get out. she leaves him for a month to give him time to think. over the course of that time he talks with friends about the big decision, being told by his best friend, ryan reynolds, that its foolish to take the plunge. as that month passes we see a big (and rather unexpected) change in his friend as he finds his soul mate. the story was a lot stronger than the title would suggest, doing a pretty good job of exploring the situation, not just for laughs but also go allow o'connell to really struggle with the issues in his life. it doesnt end at all as i would have expected which is another nice surprise. just a warning: there is a lot of naked ryan reynolds! (i never thought i could get enough ryan reynolds, but this isnt what i meant...)

father of the bride

i remember loving this movie as a kid, i'm not entirely sure why though. usually i was in to big action movies or comedies, but for some reason this little chick flick was on my list of movies i loved. after rewatching it recently with my wife (which, by the way, was the first time she had ever seen it! shocking!), i realize that my love for it was not so strange after all. this wholesome family comedy actually is pretty funny! the movie starts with steve martin and diane keaton having the perfect middle (ok, upper) class family. the daughter just arrived back from a semester abroad and returns home with the man she fell in love with while there. and the two of them announce that they are getting married! martin does not exactly take this well. the film plays up his hopelessness about affording the wedding of his daughter's dreams, but the real challenge for him is coming to terms with the fact that his little girl is all grown up. its touching, its playful, and whenever martin short is on screen, its way over the top! its pretty saccharin sweet, but i really enjoyed it! i'm sure the nostalgia factors into it pretty heavily too, but i'm ok with that...

a christmas carol

ugh. everyone knows this story, so why did they feel the need to remake it without changing anything or adding anything new? what a waste of time! not only does this movie follow every single version of 'a christmas carol' that came before it, it also looks terrible! the motion capture computer graphics are unbelievably fake! the faces either look really fake, or frightening- and not the kind of on-purpose frightening. its the same old story of scrooge with absolutely nothing new to add or to say, on top of that the animation looks horrible and sloppy- they certainly havent fixed the 'dead eye' problem, in fact it seems like they have taken a step back, this thing looks much worse than 'polar express', and that was five years earlier. i know that this thing originally came out in 3D, and every scene of the film makes sure you know that its supposed to be seen in 3D. it uses every 3D cheap trick in the book, but unfortunately i didnt watch it in 3D, so it just looks cheap. i watched it with my wife, and about 35 minutes in i had to stop the movie because it was just so bad! the story was lifeless, the scenes felt like exact recreations shot for shot of the george c. scott version from 25 years ago, which we have already seen. and that animation! i couldnt get over just how terrible everything looked! when they showed the ghost of christmas past (which is a candle with a face- again, really terrible looking) and it brought them to scrooge as a young child, the child version of scrooge was so embarrassingly detestable looking that i shut if off immediately. just for the sake of giving it a second chance, i did finish watching the movie, hoping for something new or interesting. turns out i shouldnt have wasted my time. and please, dont waste your time either- this thing is terrible!!!

the other guys

dumb, but fun! ferrell and wahlberg play two cops who work in the police station pushing paper for the crazy free wheeling cops who act like bruce willis in die hard- destroying everything to get the bad guys (samuel l. jackson and dwayne johnson, perfectly cast!). when something happens to the two crazy cops, ferrell and wahlberg decide that they are going to try and fill that void. as you might expect, things dont work out so well for them...
the two of them do a good job with their roles, ferrell is in classic form, always saying the wrong thing to hilarious results. wahlberg is pretty good here, he is more than capable but sometimes plays the straight guy a little too straight. over all though there were some pretty good laugh out loud moments. i'm sure the outtakes and bloopers from the movie were fantastic!

armored

the film follows a bunch of guys who were for an armored truck company. the get the great idea to try and steal the money that they are hauling, trying to make it look like they were robbed. of course things have to go wrong and everyone is at odds with each other as the whole plan falls apart. pretty generic film all around. well except one scene: where we see the hero running past a bunch of foot wide pipes as the camera is on the opposite end of the pipes, it moves past them at the same speed as the runner, creating a sort of animated cinescope, saves the movie from being a total crapfest. other than that creative shot, its not really worth your time.

addams family values

i must have been in some kind of mood when i saw this movie because i really enjoyed it! this is the sequel to the addams family movie, and its actually pretty good. i had seen the original back when it first came out, but had never bothered with this one, and i was pleasantly surprised! as you know, nine tenths of these addams family movies are all about lame puns about being dead, but for some reason i was really enjoying them this time! perhaps its the wonderful acting by the cast, made up of raul julia, angelica houston, christina ricci, and christopher lloyd, but something about it clicked just right! the story follows the family as they welcome the arrival a new baby into the family. also, uncle fester finds a new lady (who's just in it for the money) and pugsly and wednesday are sent to summer camp. i dont know how, but everything just worked in this one! i dont have very fond memories of the first film, but this one was a lot of campy fun!