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.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.
in time
percy jackson & the olympians: the lightning thief
a muppet christmas carol
shrek the third
unknown
the wolfman
black swan
adjustment bureau
sunset limited
volunteers
fantastic mr. fox
chronicles of narnia: voyage of the dawn treader
not nearly as good as the first one, but i would argue that its better than the second, this movie follows the continuing adventures in the world of narnia. this one focuses on different characters, with aslan, the evil queen, and most of the kids amounting to little more than a cameo. if i remember correctly, this is one of the last stories in the series that includes very much of the kids. the rest of them deal mostly with other characters in narnia. tell you what, i'm ok with that. the kids from this series are a lot less interesting than some other children's fantasy series...how to train your dragon
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.
sorcerer's apprentice
i've never been a huge fan of nicolas cage. i give him a pass from time to time when the movie is really good, 'adaptation' for example. but those movies are few and far between. this one is a bit of fun in spite of him. we follow a young man as he is introduced to the world of sorcery, its strange and mysterious history, and how the bag guy is trying to reveal himself and take control over the rest of the world. it fell victim to the trap so many big movies that are trying to start a franchise do: it keeps promising the great things that will happen next time while delivering very little in the first movie. and like so many of those potential franchise starters, this one didn't start anything.harry and the hendersons
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!cop out
as a fan of kevin smith i expected more. but then i realized he didnt write it, he just directed it, so i guess i shouldnt have expected much. this is a buddy cop comedy that pairs up bruce willis with tracy morgan. that pairing alone and the goofiness that comes out of tracy morgan is the only decent part of the film. bruce willis seems to be slumming it here, not doing a bad job of acting, but plainly not trying either. all the cliches of a cop movie are here, slightly twisted. the twists on the old tropes arent enough to make this one worth seeing though.
jonah hex
bummer, this one had so much potential. the story follows jonah hex, a confederate soldier during the civil war who gets betrayed by an evil man played by john malcovich, and his family is killed. actually, hex is killed too, but it doesnt quite stick. when he comes back to life he's got a strange connection to the dead and can talk to them. this sets the stage for a bit o' the old revenge. a pretty good set-up, but this movie fails in almost every regard. josh brolin does well as the disfigured hex, but whats the deal with megan fox? it seems like her story was just added to the film when the realized they could afford her or something. most of her scenes are completely unconnected, not actually having any screen time with her costars until about the last ten minutes. strange. the story itself is choppy and seems like they just taped together what ever scenes they found on the cutting room floor after severely gutting the original movie. and and 80 minutes, its likely thats exactly what they did!
date night
the wife and i had been intending to see date night as a... well, date night. unfortunately we never quite got around to it, so instead we watched it as a stay at home date night! as a huge fan of the office and 30 rock (though not nearly as much) i was really excited to see carell and fey doing their thing together. the story follows a married couple with kids who never seem to have time for each other. with work and kids filling up their days and nights, they just cant find the time for just the two of them. well, they decide that they are going to make it a priority to have a night together. they get the babysitter and head out on the town. they try to go to a fancy restaurant but cant get in because the wait is too long. when the worker calls out a couple's name for the next table but they dont answer, well carell decides thats their opportunity. this, unfortunately for them, causes a pretty big case of mistaken identity. turns out the couple that made the reservations are involved in some not so legal affairs. from here things get pretty crazy and their quite date because anything but! the movie is pretty good, the two leads have a hilarious chemistry that results in some funny bits. the problems arise when the movie goes from a romantic comedy to an action film. its not that any of it is done poorly, its just that it is not exactly what i was hoping for. the gear switching of the film threw me for a loop and i never quite settled back in. its got a great first half though, i would have loved to see where these two actors would have taken the story if it had stayed just a movie about a married couple. it was still a bit of fun though!
macgruber
what a stupid movie! its based on the skits from saturday night live, you know, the ones that get old after the first 30 seconds, but then they continue for another five minutes? well, this is just like that, except that its 90 minutes long! the story, if you can call it that, follows macgruber as he tries to stop a bad guy from releasing some missiles. the team behind this one seems to have the comedy mindset that the more weiner and poop jokes they can throw in, the funnier it is. when, in fact, the opposite is true. the whole movie is just one gross out rude joke trying to push it further than the last one. a total waste of time. as if you couldn't have already figured that out from the lame snl sketches.ninja assassin
this one promises some major action that never actually comes. the storyline was so terrible that i promptly forgot all of it. something about the ninja helping out the police in new york, with flashbacks of his training as a child and having to hurt other kids. you know what, the story was so worthless that i actually fast forwarded through much of it because it was so lame. i would slow it down and watch when there were some action scenes, but those were pretty lame too. the whole movie is poorly lit so it was almost impossible to really make out what was going on anyway. a total waste of time.karate kid
i didnt really have much interest in seeing this one, but i am a sucker for anything with jackie chan in it. i remember the old karate kid movies from back in the day and found this one to be a very worthy update of those old movies. in fact, this one almost seemed better than the 80's movies! the story follows jaden smith who plays a boy who's mother gets a job that takes her to china. he must go along with her and tries hard to adapt to the different environment and culture around him. of course there is a love story, which is appropriately chaste considering both of them are only about 11 years old! smith keeps getting bullied by the chinese kids and seeks help to try and stand up to them. hopeless janitor jackie chan reluctantly agrees to train him. following the karate kid tradition of mr. miyagi, chan uses very a unconventional approach to his training which confuses smith to no end! the story ark of jackie chan and the developed friendship between he and smith are the real heart of this film. chan gives a moving performance as a man trying to come to terms with his past so that he can finally accept that he has a future worth living for. in a just world there would have been oscar talk last year for his amazingly raw performance- he really is a good actor! the final match between smith and the bully is fairly predictable, but the film leading up to it has been so unpredictably great that it is easy to over look such a small problem.
michael collins
now, i dont know much about the history of ireland so maybe this movie isnt for me. but i do love liam neeson, so i wanted to give it a try. the story follows michael collins (thats where the name of the movie comes from, in case you were wondering...) as he works with the people trying to get ireland's freedom from england. he first tries the violent approach, and gets englands attention, which is not always a good thing... he soon becomes a hero of the people of ireland and begins negotiating with the english leaders to find a peaceful solution. the people arent as excited about the peaceful option though, and he looses some support. the british leaders offer a deal, which collins accepts on behalf of the irish people, but then the british back out and are generally jerks about it all. the film itself is, i'm sure, an interesting study of great britain's political landscape during this time, but i must admit i wasnt drawn in by it. it was awfully talky, and the talking didnt always make sense. the people often times didnt act in very logical ways and the movie ends up with nothing to show for all the hard work, and julia roberts, mrs. collins, is left a widow. i know its historically accurate, but it just wasnt very compelling.croupier
this is one of the first movies to put clive owen on the map. its not a big movie, in fact its scale is very very small. it follows owen, a struggling writer, as he gets a job at a small casino in england as an operator of a roulette wheel. there are many rules for working in a casino, the film shows us, they must not fraternize with the customers or fellow workers, they must keep to themselves, they must be trustworthy. all of these things seem to fit the loner perfectly. or at least thats the way it seems at first. owen meets a customer who makes an impression and when he stumbles into her while out on a day off she strikes up a conversation which quickly leads to a relationship. this is not on accident. turns out she wants him to break his trustworthy code and play an important role in a planned casino heist. could this turn into a story for a book? his decision to find out takes him on a path he would have never thought that he would go on and leads him to make some bold choices in his life. the film is very interesting as it is narrated by owen and we get to hear his inner monologue. he shares with the audience the structure and rules of the casino and his own life, but then talks of wanting to be a character in his own book and making decisions that he wouldnt make, but that his character might.
life as a house
the film follows chris kline, who plays an architect model builder, as he gets let go from his job and at the same time comes to find out that he has terminal cancer. now with his priorities back in line, he decides to finally build that house on the ocean that he has always put off. he forces his estranged teenage son to join him in building the house. as the movie progresses he begins to build his relationship with his son as the house is getting built. oh what a clever metaphor, huh? everything in this movie is about as heavy handed. kline does a great job and is very interesting as a man who has lost so much as he tries to rebuild himself with what time is left. here's the big problem with the movie though: the son is played by hayden christensen. he must have graduated from the ryan phillipie school of acting because he is about as natural an actor as a piece of plywood! what could have been a decent movie, if cliched, instead turns into a 'worlds worst actor' display of destruction that leaves every positive aspect of the movie destroyed because of christensen. i almost feel sorry now for george lucas who seemed to have gotten suckered into hiring this worthless actor to ruin star wars episodes 2 and 3!
modigliani
andy garcia plays the 1920's artist modigiani and his chaotic life and death. we join modigiani as he is a member of what seems to be an artistic community just jam packed with other famous artists. among them is pablo picasso, a man modigiani sees as a rival. as these artists try to out do each other, modigliani meets the girl of his dreams and starts a love affair with her. this go great at the beginning, but then alcohol gets the better of him. but by this time she is pregnant and he must make the right choices if he is to keep her. she also is facing the pressure from her family who hate him because he is jewish. the rivalry between the artists heats up as an art competition takes place pitting all of them against each other. who will win, picasso or modigliani? all of which leads to modigliani making some wrong decisions and a return to the bottle. the movie is pretty good, capturing the care free attitude of being an artist and the chaos of these men during this time period. garcia is perfect as modigliani, though he seems a bit old for the part. i did not care for the actor who played picasso, but that could be because i have always thought of picasso as being played by anthony hopkins. anyway, the movie brings an interesting view of the challenge of the artists' lifestyle compared to the responsibility of being a family man.
to walk with lions
this movie follows the real life story of george adamson, a man who went to live in africa and set up a lion reserve for lions that were to be set free from captivity. i guess there was already another movie about him called 'born free' and this is a sequel to that initial setting up of the reserve. in this film richard harris plays george and we join him as he has been living on the reserve taking care of dozens of different lions, trying to keep them safe from potential hunters and the like. at the beginning of the film we join a new recruit who has just arrived to be an assistant to adamson. as he begins to learn about the place adamson has set up, they begin to have a conflict with the local government who says they can no longer give him protection or grant him the land he has been using for all these years. the assistant tries to find an alternate place to keep the lions safe, but adamson is not interested. he has supported them here for this long and is not going to give up on this place now. the film, though it has admirable intentions, is not very good as a movie. the story of adamson is very compelling, but they obviously did not have much of a production budget. almost any time there is a lion on the screen it is stock footage cut to make it look like the lions are there with the actors. this becomes especially troublesome when they are supposed to be interacting in any way. also, we never really understand why adamson isnt willing to move the lions. it is apparent that the lions are in eminent danger by staying where they are, but adamson's bull headedness makes any other opportunities for their continued freedom impossible. its a great story, but the obvious budget problems along with the unexplained character motivations make this one a pass.
botched
yikes, what a crap fest. the story of this one is that a thief has been hired to go in to a wealthy man's penthouse loft and steal a valuable ancient cross. the heist goes as planned until they get to the elevator of the building. on the way down all hell breaks loose and the thiefs are stuck with a bunch of other people on one of the floors. i'm not entirely sure what happens next (and to be honest, i dont think the film makers do either...) because then there seems to be a seven foot tall vikking welding a broadsword that shows up and starts killing the different people on that floor of the building. there are traps set up and human sacrifices and arguing and heads being exploded by a mace. make sense? sure doesnt. and to top off all that unrelated nonsense, the whole thing looks like it costed about 40 bucks. with the music and opening credits, it looks like this is supposed to be a comedy, but i get the feeling that it wasnt originally, but due to such a crappy product, they changed it in the editing process from a bad movie to a bad movie thats trying to be funny. this one just looks like a poorly shot tv show from the 80's. avoid at all costs. robinson crusoe
when i read this book in junior high i thought it would make such a cool movie! it would, but this one isnt it. the story is a familiar one, robinson crusoe finds himself shipwrecked and the only survivor on a desolate island. he recovers as much as he can from the ship and tries to do his best to stay alive. as the years go by he finds a local inhabitant who he calls friday. this particular adaptation of the book glosses over many of the parts of crusoe's story that i always found the most interesting: how did he manage those first days and months? this moive skips past much of that first inner turmoil of realizing that he is alone and must fend for himself. instead this film focuses on the religious aspect of crusoe and friday as they try to come to terms with their differing beliefs. crusoe is adamant that catholicism is the only way, but friday sticks by his local indigenous faith. the whole thing falls apart into the 'white man savior' idea very quickly as the two of them are attacked by a bunch of natives. the movie never quite recovers and just kind of peters out at the end. i will give them respect for one thing in the movie: they dont shy away from showing brosnan's magnificent chest hair!
true romance
this movie seems to hold a high place in cinema because it is written by quinten tarentino. that may be, but it is written poorly! the story starts with christian slater's character working at a comic book store. a woman comes in and hits it off with him and they have a whirlwind romance. we soon find out that the woman is actually a prostitute paid for by slater's boss because he thinks slater needs to get out more. the two of them are in love none the less, and now they need to find a way to get her away from her pimp. poor decisions are made by everyone in the movie, and theres a huge gunfight that ends with slater and his girl on the run. by the end of the film there are a bunch of different sides, the mob, the police, the pimp, and slater who have a grand showdown. since its tarentino, it must of course end in a blood bath. yes, tarentino does a great job with the interesting conversations his characters have along the way. but the big problem for me is that no one acts in a way that would be even remotely interpreted as rational. everyone in this thing does the exact opposite of what a logical human would do. because of that i did not care at all what happened to these people and when so many were left dead it was of no consequence.
chances are
this one is definitely from the 80's back when everyone was trying to make robert downey jr. 'happen'. it didnt quite work until about 25 years later, but you can see in this movie why he was given so many second chances. the film is pretty ridiculous, its about a happily married guy who dies and in heaven is sent back to earth (that whole reincarnation thing was big in movies back then i guess...) but they forgot to wipe his memories. twenty years later the reborn guy goes to meet the family of a girl he likes and just met. it turns out that the girl's mom is his wife from his last life! (kinda creepy that he made out with his own daughter, huh?) the wife, played by sybil shepherd has never moved on from her husband's death and now this kid is claiming to be him! she has a really hard time with it, as one would expect, and the family tries to deal with where to go from there. downey is good as the boy torn between what he knows and what he seems to remember, and they do a pretty good job of showing that conflict in both he and shepherd. there are a few funny bits to it and at times its even a little touching as we see the hope of a woman who never let go of the love she had that was taken away so suddenly.
iris
this film is a moving portrait of a woman who has spent her whole life as a writer crafting words and teaching about their importance as she begins to loose that very thing she loves so much. judi dench plays iris who is a famous author and professor known for her verbose vocabulary and love of the english language. she is now growing old and loosing her memory, most specifically she is forgetting words, the language of her soul. by her side is her long suffering husband, played to hapless perfection by jim broadbent, who must try to help her stave off the effects of dementia. through out the film we see flashbacks of the relationship between the two of them as they meet and fall in love. she was always the leader, the strong one, but as we see now she has to accept the role of follower and is struggling with that position. she knows she is loosing her memory but cant do anything about it. the film is a heartbreaking study of the love between these two people as they come to terms with what was and now what is to come.
parenthood
my wife and i have been enjoying the nbc show 'parenthood' and so were interested to go back and check out the source material! this movie follows the life of different members of one family: grandpa and grandma, the married couple with kids, the divorced sister with a teen, and the reckless wanderer brother who only shows up to ask for money. the stories of each of these family groups were funny at times and everyone is rather likable, but the movie hasnt aged very well. steve martin does his wholesome exasperated thing very well here, but its not quite enough to make this one work. the current tv show does a much better job (but then again it has 20 hours a season to really create the characters instead of two hours).
pandorum
the whole time i was watching this movie i just kept thinking 'im pretty sure i've seen this before'. turns out, i had, except last time i saw it it was called 'event horizon'. this movie seems to be a pretty bad rip off of the sci fi film from a dozen years ago that stared laurence fishburne and sam neil. this sci fi horror movie starts off with a man waking up too early from his deep space sleeper tank. when he gets out, he is on a huge space ship thats headed for some far off destination. as another guy wakes up as well, and they discover that they are still far away from their destination. it seems that the ship has malfunctioned and they are just now getting out of hibernation. they try to get to the bridge of the ship but find it locked off. as they make their way around the ship to find out what the problem is, they come across some creatures that are trying to kill them. are they going crazy? do they have 'pandorum', or is there something really really wrong? the pretty lame set up is made worse by the campy creatures and stupid characters they come across as they try to save the ship and themselves. the ending is pretty interesting and almost makes up for the pathetic middle section that reminded me of all those terrible post-apocalyptic movies where the characters wear car parts for armor. over all though, i felt like i had already seen it, and any of the new twists were not worth seeing in the first place.
i'll do anything
i had never heard of this sweet little movie before, but was rather charmed by it. the story follows nick nolte as a divorced father who is an out of work actor. never able to pull much of a career together, his wife has left him in hopes of greener pastures. unfortunately, she never found those greener pastures, and now must drop off their daughter for him to take care of by himself. as luck would have it, nolte comes across the right people with the right audition at just the right time. he doesnt end up getting the part, but he makes some friends at the casting office and finds a part time job to support himself and his daughter. he attempts to juggle a new relationship at the same time, which doesnt always work out the best for him. as these new changes happen, nolte's character must juggle everything around him in order to do whats best for his daughter. its a pretty good little movie that reminded me why nick nolte became a star in the first place- he's really good! in this movie, he elevates the film from a bland rom-com to something much better and sweeter.
gigli
honestly, its not as bad as everyone seems to think it is. sure, its pretty stupid, but most romantic comedies are. ben affleck plays a low level mob guy who is trying to make a name for himself. in order to make his boss happy he has to watch the little brother of someone they are trying to get money from. since the boss doesnt have much faith in him, jennifer lopez plays the extra help thats hired to make sure affleck does his job. so far so good. here's where it goes off the rails: the little brother is mentally retarded. yeah, that wasnt exactly necessary... if you can get past all the terribly offensive jokes, you have a traditional romantic comedy. he likes her, she doesnt like him, eventually he wins her over. of course there has to be a misunderstanding, but by the last reel they figure it out and all is well. lame, but not as 'worst car wreck of a movie ever!' as they kept telling us.
ladyhawke
i had no idea what to expect with this one, i just knew michele phiffer was in it, and usually thats enough for me... this medieval fantasy movie follows a young man, played by matthew broderick, as he escapes from the local guards and runs away. as he is trying to loose them he runs into a strange traveling swordsman, rutger hauer, who has a pet hawk. later that night he finds a beautiful woman wandering around in the forest and they are attacked by a ferocious wolf. as the story unfolds we begin to understand the strong connection these seemingly random people and animals really have. its a love story at its heart, and the unfolding of the romance is really fascinating. the fantasy elements are not too over the top and the quest to fix what has happened is worth the viewing. my one gripe with the film is that it felt like matthew broderick was kind of wedged in there. he doesnt really seem to fit. he is meant to be someone living in medieval times, but he just comes off as farris beuler in a robe, he even talks into the camera at times. his character doesnt fit at all, but the strangeness of his modern day quality gets played down as the movie progresses. not bad at all for an 80's flick!
the adventures of johnny tao
i was hoping to like this one. the description of it sounded like a cool asian meets rockabilly style fun, but in reality its just an expensive home movie that wouldnt even make the cut as a saturday night movie on syfy. the whole thing just reeks of amateurishness. the acting is high school play level, and the effects are something that can be bested by anyone with an editing program on their home computer. it actually looks like they spent more making this poster (which by the way, looks infinitely better than anything on the screen during the actual film) than they did on the entire film! the story (if you can call it that) follows a boy who's country singing father died in a crash a decade earlier. well, it just so happens that his guitar was fashioned out of a magical spear needed to kill an evil chinese spirit who has recently returned to arizona (really? why would the spear be found in arizona when the last battle that put the spirit away for 600 years took place in china?!?). poor acting, if you can even call it acting, poor writing, if you can call it writing, make this little movie, if you can even call it a movie, absolutely terrible.
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