Elise Haskell Reviews

Miracle on 34th Street

2011-12-15T22:39:00.000-05:00

Of course, I'm talking about the original. I have a lot of thoughts on the remake, but they are far too scathing and long-winded to put in here. So let's talk about the Christmas movie. Let's face it, it may not be everyone's favourite, but it is without a doubt the best one out there. It has influenced every single Christmas movie to come after, with its message about commercialism, faith, the magic of childhood. Hell, even Bad Santa took from here (the drunk Santa at the beginning, lol).

My favourite scene is when Kris starts speaking Dutch to the little girl.

Community: Regional Holiday Music

2011-12-14T20:07:00.000-05:00

This. Is. The. Best. Thing. Ever.

EVER.

Bad(der) Santa

2011-12-13T22:05:00.000-05:00

An instant classic in my books. When I saw this in theatres I knew I hadn't seen the last of it. In fact, this movie has worked its way into my family's vocabulary; it isn't uncommon for someone to get a present from Bad Santa come Christmas. It's a hard sell for a Christmas movie: alcoholic man poses as Santa in hopes of robbing a mall, and takes advantage of a child by moving into his house and allowing him to believe that he's the real Santa. He's just the worse kind of asshole and the best kind of anti-hero and the fact that it has one of the most heart-warming endings is a true sign of talented filmmakers.

The Simpsons: Holidays of Future Passed

2011-12-12T21:41:00.002-05:00

This years Simpsons' Christmas special was surprisingly good. I say this mostly because I haven't really watched this show in years and last time I did it wasn't that funny, but this particular episode reminded me of the good ol' days, when there was a lot of humour and heart mixed together. Also, I've always been fond of the future episodes. There's not a whole lot to say about this one, other than I ended up watching it twice and it got funnier the second time because there were a lot of jokes in this episode and you won't catch them the first time around, so there's a lot of re-watch value for future holidays.

Joyeux Noel

2011-12-11T16:35:00.001-05:00

This is not a feel-good holiday movie, this will probably do little more than depress the hell out of you, but I can't recommend it enough. It's such a moving story, and it's true. I mean, not completely true, but there was a cease-fire called during Christmas in WWI and I can imagine that what went down was probably pretty close to this movie's version. What I really love about this movie is that it's about humanity, it's about the bonds we chose to build and destroy between each other and why we do it and to what end. It's just fantastic. Also, it's pronounced "jwhy-uh no-elle." I never realized people couldn't pronounce this until I heard the Nostalgia Critic attempt to say it.

Rudolph the Red-Nose Reindeer

2011-12-10T09:39:00.000-05:00

This might be the one Christmas special that everyon is familiar with. It's based on the song, of course, which was based on a add-campaign (which you might not know). It's imagery has been co copied and parodied over the years that it's hard for me to know if I've ever actually seen this before. It doesn't really hold up all that well though. I mean, I can't really stand any of the songs, but I guess the charm of this is more the look of it, the silly puns, and the wacky characters - and of course it has a nice moral. It's a classic, but it's not my favourite.

Some of the parodies on the other hand though...

While You Were Sleeping

2011-12-09T19:35:00.001-05:00

I'm not that big on romantic comedies, but I unabashedly love this movie. I saw it a few times as a kid and it always stuck with me. It's just a really sweet movie that never feels forced, with Sandra Bullock at the height of her adorable awkwardness - and best of all it does NOT follow the romantic comedy plot (hating each other at first, predictably falling in love, only to have some sort of fight/misunderstanding and make up in the end). The focus isn't just on the boy and girl falling in love, but also on the family. I'd call this one more of a holiday film than a Christmas one though, because it starts at Christmas, has a New Years party and ends in January, but who really cares? To me that just makes it the kind of movie one can enjoy all year round. I absolutely recommend this film, especially if you're a silly girl like me.

Aw, someone made a music video for this movie <3 (Actually there are, surprisingly, a few fan videos for this film. I just happened to like this song the best.)

Scrooged

2011-12-08T20:27:00.001-05:00

This is a surprisingly good version of Dicken's A Christmas Carol - and anyone who celebrates Christmas knows there are more of these than any single person could watch in a lifetime. Oddly enough though, I didn't like it all that much the first time I saw it, even though I liked the effects and thought it was funny, it wasn't until watching it again today that I really appreciated it. Some things I quite like is how this film not only plays with setting, but the structure of the story, having the ghosts come at night, and giving the ghost such incredible characterizations (Christmas Present - or Krista as I like to call her - is my favourite). Also, this movie, just because when it was made, is an interesting time-capsule of yuppie life in the late 80s. American Psycho anyone? If you like A Christmas Carol, then check this out; BUT (and unlike Gremlins, this time I am really serious) this is not a kids movie.

It's sad not just because it's a good tear-jerker, but also because of how eerily well it still applies to today :(

White Christmas

2011-12-07T20:22:00.001-05:00

Of course I've heard Irving Berlin's song White Christmas, I had never seen the 1954 movie until today. That's right, there are Christmas movies even I haven't seen. For the most part it's your standard slapstick musical film from the 50s, except for the first 10 minutes that take place during WWII and cemented this song in my mind as one of the most depressing Christmas song I had ever heard.

The rest of the movie's pretty camp, and I'm not entirely sure why they think Vermont's economy depends on snow in early December, but it has some fairly decent songs and some pretty impressive performances. This is a good movie to play at a Christmas party when you just want something playing in the background.

The Santa Clause

2011-12-06T19:35:00.001-05:00

I don't think I'm wrong in saying this was "A Christmas Story" of our generation. It was the first really original Christmas movie I and many of my friends ever saw. It did a lot of interesting things, like it's techno-gadget North Pole. Though as cool as their depiction of the North Pole is, I can't help but be creeped out by the elf children. Even as a kid they rubbed me the wrong way. Also, I'm pretty sure their system is completely based on slavery. I was worried I wouldn't find it as funny or charming as I did when I was younger, but on the contrary. There was a whole new batch of jokes I never got as a child, like innuendos to drug use. It's just a really nice Christmas movie that anyone can enjoy. Also, I love how the main focus isn't on some weird villain wanting to take over Christmas, or whatever, but on the relationship between the father and son.

Gremlins

2011-12-05T12:41:00.001-05:00

This movie is just fucking weird, and I don't mean its plot is weird - although, Jesus Christ, did anyone proofread this??? I mean, the more I watch it, the more fault I find with it, and yet I still love it and continue to watch it (probably because it has a high nostalgia factor to it). Yet I don't mean it's so bad that it's good... it's just really fucking weird. It reminds me a bit about Die Hard, in that it's an incredibly violent film that just sort of happens to take place on Christmas. Christmas has nothing to do with the plot (other than the fact that Gizmo is a Christmas present, but that's a pretty weak excuse), it just makes for pretty set-pieces.

And then there's this fucking gem:

I don't think I can recommend this film in good conscious. Unless you saw this in your childhood, it's not going to have the same effect on you as it did on me and my friends. That being said, please don't let your children watch this.

A Very Harold and Kumar 3D Christmas

2011-12-04T21:52:00.001-05:00

A brand new Christmas film to watch! And it is already on my holiday playlist. This really is the perfect Christmas movie, taking every aspect of Christmas specials (musicals, claymation, magic) and combining it with that special kind of Harold & Kumar humour. Also, it might be the best 3D movie I've ever seen, because it actually takes advantage of the medium. They constantly had things coming out of the screen. Also, NPH was brilliant - as always! I worry some people might find the sub-plot with the toddler getting high to be a bit disturbing, but she was just so cute that it never got to me.

It's Christmastime Again, Charlie Brown

2011-12-03T12:00:00.000-05:00

The Charlie Brown DVD had two episodes on it, so I might as well review the second one as well!

I'm not sure if I've ever seen this one before, parts of it seemed similar, but if I saw it as a kid, then it certainly wasn't memorable as before. The plot of this Christmas special is the same as the last one, focusing on how Christmas has become commercial and its true meaning lost. Only this time it's Sally's existential crisis, which all culminates in her botching her Christmas pageant performance. It's not the best Christmas special I've ever seen :s

I'll stick to the original... err...

A Charlie Brown Christmas

2011-12-02T18:23:00.001-05:00

Although made for Children, even as an adult I find enjoyment is this. Not in the story or the characters really, but from the music. I mean, just listen to that opening, such a beautiful and haunting Christmas melody. The soft jazz soundtrack will be stuck in your mind come every December (though mostly because you will hear it being played in EVERY MALL EVER). Despite the fact that this movie really captures a part of my childhood (I can't even count how many Christmas plays I've been in), I still can't get over the fact that Charlie Brown is the blandest main character in the world. Also the religious aspect of Christmas actually plays a role in the plot, and I'm not so big on that - even if, again, it totally reminds me of my own childhood. Okay, maybe I'm just trying to distance myself from my childhood now...

Die Hard

2011-12-01T18:01:00.000-05:00

Die Hard is one of my favourite movies, so of course it's only natural that it's one of my favourite Christmas movies as well and always a great movie to start the Christmas season off with. It's one of those movies where the time of year has nothing to do with the plot (I mean, offices can have a multitude of excuses to have parties that Germans can break into), but the fact that they chose to set it during Christmas is genius. Remember how clever everyone thought when Tim Burton juxtaposed Christmas with something sinister in The Nightmare Before Christmas? Well Die Hard did it first! Then of course it's also just a great example of a near-perfect action movie (the amount you like this movie is directly proportional to how much you enjoy Alan Rickman's overacting).

Oh Alan, we <3 you. Anyway, this is a great Christmas movie and if you haven't seen it yet, 'tis the season (mother fucker!).

H2O: Just Add Water

2011-08-24T14:16:00.019-04:00

Time to change pace, so let's review an Australian TV series marketed to preteens. It's about mermaids.

See, I have this habit of getting high and just picking something at random on Netflix to watch. Sometimes I get a surprisingly good series (this is how I discovered Justified) and sometimes I get... mermaids. To be fair, I did sort of know what I was getting into. It was pretty clear this was meant for kids, and feeling a little nostalgic for my childhood when I watched shows like this all the time, I went for it; but I'm at such a loss as to what to make of this series, that I just have to sit down and work it out on paper (or on a screen anyway).

The setup.

Three girls, who I might as well call 1,2 and 3 (because I have such a hard time telling apart their personalities it's painful) manage to get the power to turn into a mermaid every time they touch water through the most improbably series of events I have ever seen. Observe:

A bully tricks 1 into going onto boat that won't work (because someone stole the spark plug from the engine) and then sets her adrift because she was there. No really, that's the reason he gives. Suddenly 2 jumps into the boat, spark plug in hand, they restart the boat and they steal it (this theft has no repercussions). For no good reason they pick up 3 who is walking by the water. Even though they don't like 3 and she doesn't want to step foot in the boat, she goes with them. Then, like utter morons they take the boat out to sea, because three teenagers taking a small one engine boat works so well in real life.

I have to stop right there because we're five minutes in and I'm so frustrated with these girls lack of personalities that I need to focus on that for a minute. It took me a surprisingly long time to realize that the reason they have no personalities is because they are Mary-Sues. It suddenly occurred to me that the writers are almost being clever, because this way any girl watching can easily put herself into the shoes (or fins) of any of the protagonists. However it's only clever from a marketing point of view. I mean, we're not just dealing with three girls who have no personalities beyond one of them being really organized, one of them not, and one of them being slightly dumber than the other three. Honestly they're all airheads. They're also almost identical too, except for one who is not blonde.

I know it seems silly to complain about characters in a children's show, but how can the producers justify creating such cardboard "role-models" for kids? Why even have three main characters if they're all the same person? And why does 3 bitch about being on the boat so much when NO ONE MADE HER GET ON THE BOAT???

Right, so of course they run out of gas, but luckily they don't have to discuss who they will eat first, because right away they see an island on the horizon (one which, of course, has a spooky legend surrounding it) and paddle over, where instead of staying on the wide open beach where they can easily be spotted, they wander into the jungle. Just because.

Ladies! It probably took you half an hour to get there, this island will be the first one searched (and it is), just sit put! But no, they wander, get lost and one of them falls down a hole. Then another falls down the same hole. Then the last just jumps down the hole. The only way out of the hole? A pool of water which may or may not lead to the ocean. So of course one of them decides to swim into a submerged cave not knowing whether or not it's a dead end, but hey, it's a kid's show and she survives - but while the three are in the pool the full moon boils them or something and they become mermaids - but not right away, because... uh... Oh look a rescue boat!

The payoff.

Believe it or not, I actually think if this plot had been given to a completely different crew, one that didn't still think it was the 90s, this show would actually be rather clever. For starters, they can't control when they turn into mermaids, immediately turning every little girl's fantasy into a precarious situation. Also, one of the girls not only hates this change at first, she doesn't even know how to swim and refuses to go into the water for about three episodes. I also like all the moon business, which seems incredibly original for a mermaid story. It's poorly written and horribly acted, but I can't help but imagine at one point in production there was actually someone who gave a damn.

Unfortunately, nobody else gave a damn. This show had no foresight in its execution. Characters make ridiculous leaps in logic. Plots make little to no sense in the real world. For no reason whatsoever there's a bully character who instead of going to jail for attempted murder keeps coming back episode after episode (though he does have a story arc which, believe it or not, is also quite clever).

The morals being taught to any kids who watch this are particularly noteworthy. Such great tips like: never call the police, solve this shit for yourself; be sure to always wander into the unknown instead of waiting for help; don't tell your parents your secrets. This last one kills me. They don't want to tell anyone (except their buddy Lewis, who of course is a 16-year-old scientist/filmaker/genius/incredibly understanding sexually frustrated boy, even if all we really see him do is fish) because they're afraid of becoming a science experiment, but why not tell their parents? Their parents won't turn them in, and I assume would only help them. I just feel like in a kids' show, kids should be encouraged to share their deep dark secrets with their parents even if it's something they're ashamed of (and if you don't see why, then you are a fucking idiot).

Final thoughts.

It's horrid... but I can't stop watching it. Part of that is because I'm constantly shocked at just how much less the producers seem to care with every episode and it's akin to one's interest in watching a train get derailed... and then release a deadly gas... and then explode... and then burn down an entire forest... and then cause the extinction of several species... and... and I think you get the point. This show is so bad, I actually kind of... eh... enjoy it. Also, I think Angus McLaren (who plays Lewis) is genuinely funny... and kinda easy on the eyes (the character might be a kid, but the actor's only three years younger than me, so lay off). I don't think he has much to work with, but I can't help but feel that McLaren had a lot of fun working with three hot girls who were half-naked all the time. He certainly seems to constantly be hitting on all three of them even though his character is only supposed to like one of them. Of course, maybe he just can't tell them apart either.

P.S. Does anyone else find it strange that this show is essentially titled Water: Just Add Water?

American Psycho

2011-08-19T15:06:00.021-04:00

I'm going to be completely honest here. I have a fascination with serial killers. Ever since high school I've been an avid reader of true crime novels and whenever I have a chance I'll watch a documentary or (sometimes) a docudrama about a serial killer. So it really isn't surprising that American Psycho is one of my favourite movies. Strangely enough, I had never bothered to actually read the novel by Bret Easton Ellis, so while preparing to do this review I thought I'd give it a read and compare the two.

The film.

Suffice to say, there's enough violence and sex in this movie to make your head spin. You clue in almost immediately that it's all a commentary on consumerism and our inability to see people for what they are beyond the facade they present the world. This is done by introducing the main character, Patrick Bateman (Christian Bale), as a rich and classy business man who almost immediately begins to threaten young women. At around the five minute mark although we haven't seen anyone die, it's strongly insinuated that this guy is a serial killer. Oddly enough, Bateman is strangely likeable, though this might have more to do with Christian Bale than the writing or the character, because in the novel I can't say I like him at all.

Obviously not all the violence is suggested though and most people know this film based on its reputation of being extremely violent and full of sex. Actually, one of the things that always amused me about this film is that it got more criticism for having a three-way than all the gore. However the sex and violence is not just for the sake of sex and violence and if you actually pay attention to Christian Bale's performance (and not just stare dreamily into his eyes...) you realize this is a film about an entire society being raped and pillaged for the sake of the high class (the yuppies).

The ending probably throws people off the most. We are so conditioned to believe everything that happens on film that when that belief in reality is threatened we just... can't accept it. People get really frustrated by the ending and (yeah, I'm gonna spoil it, so go watch the movie and come back in two hours) whenever I show this movie to someone they'll say: "Oh, so it was just in his head." Well... was it just in his head? Or do we live in a society so concerned with appearance that we don't want to admit an attractive, rich and high society man can do something so monstrous? Not to mention the fact that a pile of dead bodies in an apartment tends to lower market value and that's never a good thing. American Psycho is really trying to get you to question society and appearances and the things we take for granted.

The book.

Something I never really got from the movie was what a slow boil this story is. It takes a long time (nearly 100 pages) for anything violent to happen and although Bateman will often tell someone he's a murderer or he'll inform the reader that he's done violent things, it's something you can almost ignore as an offhand joke. In fact, it's a huge plot point how little people care about what Bateman does behind closed doors. If you picked up this book not knowing Patrick Bateman was a serial killer, well, the first murder will shock the hell out of you. In fact, the first murder (a pathetic homeless man and his dog) really got to me, because the switch from the calm narration to him slitting the hobos eyes is so seamless and natural that it really makes you feel sick. After that the switch happens so often that you become disoriented and more and more desensitized to it. For that reason alone I think the book is more successful than the movie, but I don't want to dismiss the movie - obviously the book has more depth.

I was actually surprised by how faithful the movie was to the book. Most of the dialogue is lifted straight from it, and although a lot of the book is left out of the movie (really, I'm assuming, because of time), what scenes do appear are rarely changed. A few notable exceptions would be the scene where Bateman goes on a date with his secretary, this happens in the book, but the films amalgamates four separate chapters of the book to make this scenes (one of which is extremely violent chapter, strange when you consider that Jean survives unscathed - in fact, she ends up marrying him and bearing his son - though this is only hinted at in the novel). There are some stranger changes, like a lot of the names have been changed for no reason whatsoever. Paul Owen becomes Paul Allen, Timothy Price becomes Timothy Bryce. I mean, really - why??? You can almost accept it as a comment on how all the characters in this novel are essentially interchangeable and therefor their names don't matter, but you lose the pun with Tim Price's name ("Price, you're priceless" is probably the most repeated line in the whole novel). The story-line with Luis (the gay man Patrick goes to strangle in the bathroom and mistakes this as a come on) is much longer in the novel, that first encounter just being the beginning, and I feel it's a shame that it's dropped because the parallels of Luis and Bateman have trouble figuring out what is reality and what is a fantasy is interesting.

Moving on to the characters. Every time a character is described, we get incredibly detailed descriptions of what their wearing, but as far as physical descriptions go, the most we get is that a few of the women are blonde. This had a lot to do with the consumerism motif. Everyone has essentially become clones of each other, their personalities either having been erased or just turned into a shallow bastard only concerned with the price and look of something. The movie loses this, because the very nature of film we see what the characters look like and we can tell them apart but the book is incredibly disorienting and the repeated motif of no one being able to recognize anyone and names constantly being mixed up becomes a lot more powerful.

The debate over whether or not Bateman's violent acts were just in his head becomes a lot more complex in the novel. There are three occasions where Bateman says in the narration that he's dreaming (once he confirms he is, and once he says he thinks he is, and a final that the dream is falling apart). Also, the scene where he goes back to Paul Owen's apartment and finds all the dead bodies missing raises more questions, because his description of the building is completely different, leaving you to believe he might have just gone to the wrong building.

One thing that I could shake from my head while reading this was the character of Tim Price (played almost unnoticeable in the film by Justin Theroux). This character is so unforgettable in the film that I was having a really hard time figuring out why he was so prominent at the beginning of the novel. For the first 50 pages or so Price and Bateman are always together - then quite suddenly Price freaks out in a club, announces he's leaving, and runs down a dark tunnel into an abyss. I have never seen a character just mutiny from a novel before and I felt there had to be some deeper importance here. So, here's what I've come to: Timothy Price is Patrick Bateman. Or to be more specific, Tim Price is the ideal Bateman wants to be. Price is the only person Bateman ever honestly compliments (calling him the most interesting person he knows), embodies the Wall Street mentality, his very name means money, and Evelyn is having an affair with him. It isn't until Price disappears into the darkness of what I can only presume is Bateman's mind that his mask starts to fall and the novel gets increasingly more and more violent - and when Price returns at the end the violence ends. I feel as though Bateman being this empty thing must create an alter-ego to survive in this world, and of course this is what Evelyn is in love with. However, it isn't until the end of the novel when Batemen realizes he can co-exist in this world (married to his secretary) that he allows Price to come back. Also, to add to Bateman's split-personality disorder, during the big chase near the end the narration suddenly shifts from first to second person, as though Bateman is literally writing himself.

That or he's batman.

(Though seriously, there is a part in the novel where someone calls Bateman "Batman" and I can't tell if it's a typo - because there were some typos in the edition I read - or a joke. Either way it made me laugh out loud on the bus, and honestly it's never a good thing to be seen laughing out loud while reading American Psycho on the bus...)

Which is better?

First of all, reading this book has given me a greater appreciation of the film while also making realize just how tame this movie really is - and in fact for that reason alone I find myself leaning more towards the film. The problem here is that yes, the book is better, it's everything the movie couldn't be and a hundred times more, however I don't think I could in good conscious recommend this book to anyone. I said earlier I like reading about serial killers, so I've read my share of horrible descriptions of real murders, but my god everything in this novel is just so much worse.

Bret Easton Ellis is a sick, sick man. He's said in interviews that writing this novel was his way of working out his demons. Well thank god he worked them out on paper because this man must have been full of so much hatred it is shocking. He hated 80s society so much his brain created an alter-ego to literally ultra-violence it to death and it is really hard to read if you yourself do not have as much contempt as Mr. Ellis (and trust me, I got a lot of contempt and I'm still blown away).

Then there's also the matter of the book and movie's depictions of Bateman. They're very similar, but fuck me Christian Bale is incredible. In the book Bateman is just this disembodied pathetic empty evil creature, but Bale... well, I think you get what I mean here.

So yeah, the book is better, and if you have the stomach for it and really loved the movie... ugh... I still can't recommend it. Just... be wary. The first line of the novel is: "Abandon hope all ye who enter here" and the last is: "This is not an exit." This in itself should tell you this novel is something you can get into, but you cannot escape.

30 Minutes or Less

2011-08-17T08:49:00.007-04:00

As I mentioned in my Tron: Legacy review, I have a hard time thinking of anything to say about mediocre films - well the same goes for films when I can't find any flaws. I'm sure someone out in cyberspace will contradict me on this one, but 30 Minutes of Less was pretty much flawless. ANyway, I'm trying to commit myself to writing reviews on a regular basis, so I thought I'd jot down a little review for y'all (keep in mind I've been suffering from a delirium inducing cold, so my opinion of this film might be based on a hallucination).

What really struck me while watching this movie was how easily it could have been a sinister and dark action movie. When I saw the trailer I though it was a funny concept, but watching it I was surprised by how well it balanced that edge between comedy and OH MY FUCKING GOD THERE'S A BOMB STRAPPED TO THAT POOR KID!!! There are much darker elements at play as well, such as Dwayne (Danny McBride) hiring Chango (Michael Peña) to kill his father (Fred Ward) - or really just the character of Dwayne in general.

Now, I have a really dark sense of humour, so this movie really might not be for everyone, and judging by the low score it received on IMDB (6.8 as of this review), I don't think I'd be wrong is saying a lot of people disliked this film - but I laughed my fucking ass off. I really thought it was incredibly well writing and the casting and acting was perfect. I mean, Jesse Eisenberg just has to look at you with those puppy-dog eyes ad you feel sympathy for him.

The ending was a little weird. We never find out what happened to the Major and the fates of Dwayne and Chango are a little... questionable. Also, this movie barely overtook the 80 minute mark and being that this film isn't raunchy (scenes with Juicy aside) I can only imagine the stuff that got cut out was probably too violent. Well, I'm sure we'll be seeing the unrated version soon and I'll find out what we missed in the theatres.

Battle Los Angeles

2011-06-22T19:31:00.014-04:00

Or World Invasion: Battle Los Angeles, but certainly NOT Battle of Los Angeles.

When the trailer for this film was released, I was really keen to see it, because the trailer was just so good; however I still had some apprehension and didn't actually see this until someone bought me a ticket. Then... well my opinion on this film was so confused that I didn't really know how to explain it.

Someone would ask me what I thought about it and I would say: "It's great and it sucks." Finally I said that one too many times and now I have to try and explain myself, the only way I know how - through a timely review!

The Genre
The essential problem facing this movie is that it decided to mix two extremely different genres, which at first don't seem all that different to begin with - which might be why the filmmakers thought it would work really well. I'm going to get back to this topic later, but what I want to say here is that in my mind, this is two movies. One is an alien invasion movie, and the other is a hyper-realistic war film.

The alien invasion movie is really good.

The hyper-realistic war film? It fucking sucks.

You guys have had military training... right?

To begin, I am not in the military, and I don't consider my five odd years in cadets as any form of military training; but I have been around the military my entire life and watch quite a lot of war movies. It was actually driving me insane how stupid these people were acting. I don't want to go on a long rant of everything they fucked up (that and I saw this movie months ago, so my list is a little incomplete), but the thing that really killed me was the lack of radio silence.

So, you're a soldier and are thrown into an urban battlefield against an enemy whose biology and technology are completely (and literally) alien to you... and you aren't maintaining radio silence? Hello! They could have any number of surveillance equipment we know nothing about. Correct me if I'm wrong, but wouldn't the military play it safe on this one? The first scene I saw these idiots pull out their radios I wanted to start screaming at the screen, and when it became a plot point I just wanted the soldiers to get their just desserts for being so STUPID.

Arg! Who are these people!?!

One of the most painful things about this movie is the lack of character development. The movie suffers from what can only be called Army Boy Syndrome (ABS?). When you put a bunch of young men in IDENTICAL uniforms it gets really hard really fast to tell them apart. I knew which one was Aaron Eckhart, but the rest of the boys were just soldiers in my head. When the audience can't tell the characters apart - they stop caring about them.

There are ways to introduce military characters properly. For starters, focus on less of them. Three or four are really all the side characters you need in an action movie anyway. Then, spend more time introducing the characters. This movie really, really, really wanted to get to the aliens, which makes me think the characters were really a last-minute addition to this movie. As though Christopher Bertolini wrote a great script about Aaron Eckhart and Michelle Rodriguez fighting aliens, only to be told afterwards to add fodder for the aliens to kill. And there we have it, I can't think of these other people as characters, only fodder to die.

Hiveminds... or Whatever

The big "twist" at the end of this film is that all the robots/spaceships that the aliens used are controlled by one super computer/mother-ship/thing, and if you take that out you've essentially destroyed the alien army.

You know. I'm not really complaining about this point. I sort of groaned inwardly when it happened, but it wasn't a complete cop-out. Unlike in Independence Day, for example, destroying the mother-ship didn't destroy the ENTIRE alien army, just the one in Los Angeles.

What does annoy me is just what a tired and silly cliche this is. I refuse to believe any civilization would base their technology around relying one thing to control everything.

Suffer the Children

I never thought children in a war movie where it would be illogical if they weren't present would feel so damn out of place, but my god I wanted them to lose these kids. I think part of this has to do with them having no character, so like all the other soldiers, I could have cared less about them. The worst moment really comes when Eckhart gives the little boy the inspirational speech at the end. Oh gag me. That was so out of place it was painful. I bet you any amount of money that scene was also added as an afterthought, possibly because the studio wanted more emotion in what, frankly, is a film lacking all emotion.

Why This Works

By this point you're probably wondering why I think any part of this film is good, but hear me out. As alien invasion movies go, it's the most original one I've seen since... fuck, I can't even think of an alien invasion movie that isn't a War of the Worlds clone. This is the first time I've thought: "Yes, this is what would happen if aliens invaded us."

The reactions are genuine and completely logical (radio silence aside). I not only believe this is what it would (essentially) look like, I also completely buy it being the U.S. military who figures out how to defeat the aliens. Because, let's be honest, they do have the best military in the world. Their serious misstep was hiring a horror film director instead of getting down on their knees and begging Ridley Scott to direct what could, in some twisted world, be renamed Black Hawk Down 2.

The concept for this film is so good that I honestly have a hard time hating it. I really want there to be sequels, where hopefully they can fix up some of the stuff they clearly rushed through this first time. Or at the very least, alien invasion movies should take a cue. Ground combat in an urban environment is exactly what alien invasion movies NEED.

Heavy Rain

2011-03-13T13:54:00.012-04:00

I've never reviewed video game before, but I thought it was worth a shot.If you haven't played Heavy Rain before, be aware that I'm going to be pretty liberal with spoilers here.

The Controls

Now, I actually played the demo before buying this game - officially the only demo that ever sold me on a game. I couldn't believe the sheer trivialness of some of the tasks presented to the player and the ridiculous button mashing games to achieve such tasks as "walk around the dumpster" or "walk up the ridge," but my god when it came to the fight scene it all paid off. The fight scenes are fast-paced and in real time, so if you fuck up you seriously fuck up and will either spend the rest of the game with horrible scars - or fucking *die*. Unfortunately the fight/action scenes and few and far in between and most of the time I'm doing button mashing to "draw a picture," "make an omelette," "juggle" or my personal favourite: "use the toilet."

In conclusion, I hated what I had to use the controls for a lot more than I hate the controls - although that fucking electric wire scene should DIE.

The Plot-Holes

This is pretty much the reason I wanted to write this. I couldn't believe how inconsistent this game was, or how much they just never bothered to explain. After spending about five minutes on the Internet I read a lot of these problems stemmed from the fact that many scenes were cut, as well as any connection to supernatural - but this means huge plot points in this game go unexplained. Where was the editor on this?

For example: why the fuck would Ethan black out and wake up with origami figurines in his hands? The first time it happened I thought he'd been drugged - but no, apparently not. Apparently he was just having a mental breakdown and would dream about children drowning because... well... uh... ??????????????

Or how about: Shaun's mom tells the police about Ethan's blackouts, directly connects it to the origami killer and then thinks they're not related. Well if you thought that then why the fuck are you telling the police you essentially think your husband is a serial killer???

Ugh, I could go on, but there's more to bitch about.

Jason

Is this kid retarded? No, really, I'm sorry I'm not being PC, but does this child have an underdeveloped brain? Or possibly have some sort of brain damage? Is there a history of schizophrenia in the Mars family (actually, that would explain Ethan a little better)? Why the fuck does this kid wander off like that in the mall? Then look all confused that he's wandered across a street and then get all giddy at the sight of his father and RUN INTO ONCOMING TRAFFIC!!!!!!!!!!!! I was kind of happy this kid got taken out. Darwin at his best!

Also, not to hark on the plot holes, but ETHAN GOT HIT NOT JASON!!! How does the person who took the full impact of the blow walk away without so much as a spine injury while his son kicks the bucket?

Madison

Meet, quite possibly, the most useless and superfluous character in the history of video games - which is unfortunate, because she wasn't a bad character. She was strong, smart (well...), cool and could kick ass pretty nicely, but what is her point? Madison suffered the most from the cuts made to this game. Her entire back story was red-conned, making her character more of a question mark than anything. Why does she dream of people attacking her? Why is she an insomniac? Why does she instantly go gaga over a guy who, frankly, looks like a bit of a drug addict? Why can't her hips stop swaying? Why does she have the be nude when you introduce her? Why does she keep helping Ethan escape from the police? *Plot-hole* How does she get her motorcycle back after doing this? Wouldn't the police have confiscated it, maybe looked up the license and registration? When she knows the police are after Ethan, why doesn't she suggest he move to a room that isn't under his own name? How come all her chapters involve date-rape, dancing or trying to get it on with Ethan? WHY ARE YOU IN THIS GAME!?!!?!?!?!?!

OMFG I JUST KILLED A CHARACTER!!!

Apparently there's an entire smorgasbord of ways to fuck up and kill characters, which is something I was not aware of until I let poor Agent Jayden get... well, sliced and diced. It was a strange moment of realization and horror that there were consequences to failing the button mashing. I had been operating under the assumption that the game had a logical conclusion to reach and therefor you could not fail. I did not realize how much time and effort was put into multiple endings. So when I got to the end, and for about a minute couldn't revive Shaun, I was almost on the brink of a meltdown that I had gone through that only to fail at the ending (he came around, go happy endings!). The point is, the twists and turns this game has to offer not only allows you multiple play-throughs, but it gives the game a tension I've never actually felt in a video game before. I was invested in all these characters - yes, even Madison - and I didn't want bad things to happen to them.

That being said, I cannot believe I only let one character get killed. This is unheard of success for me and video games.

Heavy Rain, the Movie Game: The Movie!

As I started playing this game I almost instantly started thinking about what a movie adaptation would be like, and almost as quickly decided there should never be a movie adaptation, so of course when I saw it listed on IMDB.Com a part of me died. Here's the thing, this video game is a movie - only it's about ten times better than a movie because it's interactive and your actions decide the outcome. Talk about defeating the purpose, if this movie is ever made it will flop horrendously at the box office. No matter how good they make this movie, it would still only be a movie, all the outcomes predetermined and completely cut off from audience interaction. Besides, this story isn't all that great, and the director would have a hell of a time trying to gloss over all the plot holes that might bypass some players who pick this game up at random.

My point is, film adaptations of popular video games are inevitable. But to all you who would rather wait for the movie than spend the 10 odd hours it takes to play: play the game, you'll get way more out of it that way... that and you can kind of play your own serial killer game... "I have decided Scott Shelby shall drown. I will not try to save him."

In Defense of Dragonball Evolution

2011-03-07T15:49:00.005-05:00

(Originally posted in my LiveJournal on 2010-01-28)

Uh... that's not a sentence I ever wanted to say. It sort of turns my stomach and makes me feel sick. I just can't help it, when people bitch and moan about a movie and then get the facts wrong it drives me nuts.

First things first. This:

Is a terrible movie. It's not even in the category of being so good it's bad, it's just bad. It's illogical, annoying and just poorly executed... Anyway.

Reasons not to hate this movie over:

Bulma's hair isn't blue/green/turquoise/purple: Yeah, okay, let me stop you right there. Just the very fact that I just listed four colours should be some indication that the anime never had much reverence for her hair colour. Akira Toriyama always gave her purple hair. So yeah, who gives a shit what colour her hair is, it's hardly important.

Goku should be Asian!: Why? While the planet Dragon Ball takes place on is Earth (I don't wanna be a total geek and start naming chapter and episodes, but Bulma and Popo do visit Jupiter at one point, and of course the moon is present), but Goku doesn't come from Earth. He's from another race on another planet and the only genetic trait Saiyans seem to share with Asians is black hair.

That stupid pot: I don't think they did a very good job explaining it... well they didn't do a very good job explaining ANY of this movie, but the 'plot-pot' does come straight out of Dragon Ball. The big difference is in Dragon Ball it's a huge plot-point that actually makes sense and is also... a rice cooker. Yum.

How can Goku become Oozaru without a tail?: I'm pretty sure I've heard it from the horses mouth that they decided against giving Goku a tail (which is so retarded because the tail echoes the entire basis for this manga exist - ie. Journey to the West).

But I want to give the movie the benefit of the doubt. We never see Goku naked (thank Kami!) and for all we know it's his deep and dark shame he just doesn't talk about.

There are no high school dramas in Dragon Ball: Yeah, putting Goku into any form of formal education - or just plain education for that matter - is ridiculous, but doesn't anyone else remember Gohan's high-school adventures?

Reasons to hate this movie:

No Vegeta:

Okay, that might just be me. Obviously Vegeta had nothing to do with the King Piccolo Saga, but if they're gonna just skip through volumes and volumes of graphic novels (about 14 to be exact - 36 if you wanna count the alien/high school stuff) and take whatever story bits they want, why not just skip to Dragon Ball Z? You're hardly gonna leave anyone in the dark here, most people who like Dragon Ball are only familiar with Dragon Ball Z, so just do the Saiyan Saga and be done with it!

No Krillin:

You wanna know why the King Piccolo Saga was so tense in Dragon Ball? Because Krillin got murdered! He was the first main character to die (heh, and come back) in the series, and they completely erased him from the canon.

Plot Rape: There's just too much... far too much... to go over...
-LS

[Edit: I also included my psychotic ranting from the comments!]

They might not have thought they were filming Inglourious Basterds, but they thought they were doing something good. All the actors were signed up for three movies, for crying out loud, and James Masters... my god that man must be on drugs. I can't even count the number of times I heard him go on about how Shakespearean the role was and blah, blah, blah... there's no way he ever read the manga.

I'm pretty sure that the first draft of this movie incorporated a lot more from the manga, you can sort of see these things gleaming through, but either the director or one of the producers (I'm gonna say Rick Thorne, because he was behind Elektra and several other comic-based movies I hated) changed as much as they physically could in order to make this appeal to a wider audience... despite the fact that I think Dragon Ball is the most universally loved anime spanning over every possible category of 'audience'...

The whole thing felt like a hack job. It's barely over an hour long. How many scenes do you think they had to cut out for that to happen? What would the movie have been like if it had been released as written? Worse? Better? I have no idea, this whole things frustrates me.

Ugh, and what's even more frustrating is that Stephen Chow was offered the directors seat... STEPHEN FUCKING CHOW!!! He could have saved that fucking movie. I guess he had better shit to do, like going to the horse's mouth and making 'The Journey to the West'.

Ugh, I don't even know what point I'm trying to make, you've got me ranting. All I know is that everyone involved with this showed up thinking they were gonna make a great TRILOGY of movies, realized they were all being ass-raped, and stuck around to collect their pay-checks.

Fantasia 2000

2011-02-05T14:27:00.014-05:00

I’ve never reviewed an older film before, but I felt I had something to say about this movie and damn it, I’m gonna say it.

Let me turn back the clock. It’s the mid-90s, and I own a VHS copy of Fantsia, one that I watch ad infinitum. It is my favourite movie as a kid and when I found out there was going to be a sequel I was ecstatic. I saw it at the iMax downtown… and the disappointed still shakes me to this day.

So let’s break this down to the segments and the presenters and why this movie blows mouse balls.

Symphony no. 5

Ah, Beethoven. Would Fantasia be complete without it? Of course not, he’s the one composer to make it into both films, and rightfully so. However this intro to the movie sums up nicely what is wrong with the entire movie. To begin with, it’s three minutes long. This entire film cripples itself by keeping all its sequences to about three (or less) minutes. There are only two exceptions to this, I’ll get to those later. One can argue that our attention span has decreased over the years, but I’m gonna stop you there and disagree.

Let me reiterate. Fantasy was my favourite movie as a kid. I watched it over and over and over again. The sequences in that film were about 10 minutes or more each and they never had any trouble keeping my attention. Even the opening of Fantasia, my least favourite part, was far more griping than this shlock. With the first movie the opening actually has music being transformed into image, here we just see… I dunno, butterflies. Are those supposed to be notes? This is so hack it’s painful.

Pines of Rome

This sequence would have and should have been incredible… if it weren’t for the fact that it’s mostly CGI. I remember this sequence being in the trailer and being really excited to see it in IMAX, and let me try to explain why. Even as a kid I could tell that the animation in Fantasia was better than any other animation I had ever seen. I thought I would witness CGI getting pushed beyond anything I had ever seen before… and who knows, maybe on a technical level it was, however to my eye all I could see was lazy animators using CGI instead of showing off the traditional hand-drawn animation it hints at but doesn’t exploit.

CGI truly is the bane of this film, especially after you learn just how innovative the original Fantasia was.

Rhapsody in Blue

This one is actually brilliant and wonderful and by far the best thing about Fantasia 2000. So of course they shove it 15 minutes into the movie, thus making it forgettable and somewhat obsolete in the eyes of the producers. I just don’t understand why they’ve buried this one, this is the only sequence that manages to truly translate music into image and dares to run longer than 10 minutes. It’s funny and full of heart and I could watch it as many times as I watched the original Fantasia without getting bored.

I actually get angry by how good this sequence is compared to the rest of the film because it makes me realize that the filmmakers were fully capable of recreating the magic of Fantasia and yet for some reason they just didn’t.

Bette Midler

… Really???

The Tin Soldier

Here we have another sequence butchered by CGI. I just can’t tell you how much I dislike mixing CGI with traditional hand-drawn animation. I think both are valid forms of art, don’t get me wrong, but I firmly believe that using CGI in a traditionally animated film is nothing but a crutch – especially when you have films like Fantasia and Pinocchio and Snow White to look at and see the amazing things you can do without CGI and photocopiers and all that bullshit.

Also, this story just kind of bores me. Our hero, the Tin Solider, doesn’t do anything. He just goes along for the ride and ends up back and home. Where’s the conflict? Where’s the tension? This sequence has more McGuffins than that Due South episode that actually labels all the McGuffins!

Mind you, I did like the rats.

James Earl Jones

My favourite intro of the film, firstly because James Early Jones is made of rainbows and awesome and secondly because he asks what everyone watching had been thinking for about 40 minutes: “Who wrote this?”

Carnival of the Animals

I would like this a lot more if it didn’t last less than three minutes. The animation here is incredible. This is the CGI-less animation I crave from Fantasia and it’s great… but again the producers think we’re cats and cut to Penn and Teller as fast as they can.

The Sorcerer’s Apprentice

I was pissed off when I realized what was happening 11 years ago and I’m pissed off now. They reused The Sorcerer’s Apprentice… THEY REUSED THE SORCERER’S APPRENTICE. It’s bad enough that this film is half the runtime of the original, but when you realize that it’s not even all-new footage you come to the startling realization that this film is barely 60 minutes long, about 50 minutes of which is actual animation.

This is the only other sequence that dares to hit that 10 minutes mark. We are essentially watching an hour-long TV animation. And this is the point of the film where you realize just what an uninspired money-grab Fantasia 2000 is. It also doesn’t help that this is one of the sequences from the original I never really liked (probably because there are no women present). Listening to the commentary you come to realize that the producers couldn’t picture Fantasia without this sequence, and I have a hard time figuring out why. Fantasia is supposed to be about visualizing music, watch half an hour of the original Fantasia and you’ll understand that tenfold, and yet the people who made this film thought Fantasia was about a cutesy story involving a mouse.

Now, let’s step back a moment, Walt Disney actually envisioned Fantasia as being a movie constantly being rereleased with a mixture of old and new sequences, so it was essentially a quilt of animation and music… but c’mon guys, that idea clearly got thrown out the wayside around 1940, so don’t try to give that as an explanation. The Disney studios called in this film, and reusing this sequence is ample evidence of that.

Pomp and Circumstance (Noah’s Ark)

I thought I would hate this sequence, this mostly stems from the fact that it’s a bible story and the original Fantasia is so wonderfully secular, but honestly it’s my second favourite sequence. This captures more of the spirit of the classic Disney short than any other part of this damn film. The humour and slapstick here is so subtle and it’s damn near perfect. It still feels a little rushed, like all of this film does, but I feel that mostly because I enjoyed this segment so much I wish it had been longer.

The bad part about this segment is that this is the point where I finally get into the movie and think: “You know what, maybe the rest won’t be so bad.” Then I am immediately told that there’s only one segment left.

So much rage!

Firebird (A.K.A. Ferngully)

This is supposed to be their ode to the final sequence of Fantasia… and you can tell, because it kinda rips it off, utterly and completely. At least this piece has character and, despite the blatant CGI, has incredibly beautiful animation. Here we have CGI used properly in animation, where it helps but does not completely overtake the hand-drawn animation.

The Elk is probably my favourite character in this whole film. Whoever animated that Elk should have won an academy award. Bambi, step aside, this Elk’s eyes show more emotion than you ever did while you were calling for your dead mother.

In Conclusion

Walt Disney set out to make the greatest animated film of all time when he made Fantasia, and he did. Roy Disney set out to make the greatest money grab of all time, and he failed.

Is Fantasia 2000 is completely waste of celluloid? No, Rhapsody in Blue is incredible and Noah’s Ark is cute and Firebird is quite beautiful and worthy of ending the film, but it bothers me how hack this film is and how little the creators cared about what they were creating. They had a chance to continue the greatest animated film of all time… and they called it in.

What makes this movie worse is watching the documentary that comes on the DVD about Musicana, a sequel to Fantasia that nearly began production in the 80s. Just seeing the concept from that film was more riveting than watching Fantasia 2000.

TRON: Legacy

2010-12-19T02:55:00.006-05:00

I literally have nothing to say about this movie, but there is something I'd like to say about movies in general. See, the main reason why I stopped updating here is that so many of the movies I saw were in that uncomfortable realm of mediocre and I just couldn't motivate myself to write about them. They weren't bad, they weren't good, they just were.

So, fast forward to 2010, I consider starting this blog up again and saw TRON: Legacy... and it wasn't good, it wasn't bad, it just was. This bums me out more than if it had been a terrible movie.

I just wish producers actually cared about their finished product as a whole, and not just what it looked like.

Background Image

2010-12-15T23:04:00.003-05:00

Robin Hood

2010-12-15T14:56:00.008-05:00

Yes, there are spoilers, read at your own discretion.

I'm not entirely sure why this movie has prompted me to write a review out of all the movies I've seen over the years since last posting here, but I felt like I needed to say something about this movie. I had really low expectations going in and only watched it because I could get it for free from the library and was sort of on a Robin Hood kick from the adorable BBC Robin Hood series.

Aw, he's so adorably anachronistic! That being said, all Robin Hood movies are anachronistic (more on that later).

Really all this movie had to be was not Kevin Costner's version and I was going to love it. Anyway, the version I saw was the Director's Cut, so I'm not entirely sure what was added back into the movie, but it starts with written narration, telling us briefly about King Richard is returning home after fighting in the crusades and how there is an archer in his army named Robin Longstride. Already something feels wrong about this version of Robin Hood. Let's break it down.

1. This film takes place during 1199, but traditionally the story of Robin Hood takes place about a decade earlier while Richard is away and his brother John is abusing his regency, leaving Robin Hood to uphold the name of justice until Richard returns. Now, it doesn't really matter what time frame you put Robin in because he's just a fictional characters and all the story elements are just traditions passed down through the generations. That being said, when all a story is is a series of traditions that you change just to be different, you're telling a different story.

2. This is not our familiar Robin of Locksley, this is a peasant who ends up taking the place of the dead nobleman, Robert of Locksley. This doesn't really bug me, because Robin being a nobleman is one of the elements added to later renditions of the story, but it's yet another familiar element Ripley Scott is striping away from his version of Robin Hood.

So we meet Robin, the oldest soldier in the army, who despite being an archer uses his bow maybe four times in the whole movie. And his outfit is... ridiculous.

I can't really dislike the movie for this, because it's being both accurate to what they actually wore at the time and it is literally the only familiar Robin Hood thing they've kept in the movie. But it's just so... stereotypical... and silly. I'll take Errol Flynn's costume over this any day.

All of this griping aside, the battle sequences in this film are incredible. The storming of the castle at the beginning is slightly underwhelming, but maybe that's because Robin spends most of it in the stocks and it's a chef that takes out King Richard. Lame.

Robin and his merry men (yeah, he's already collected them) break out and go AWOL, in an attempt to reach the coast before the rest of the army. I guess because it will be harder to get a passage across the channel if a few thousand men are hiring ships. This army, by the way, will never be mentioned again. When King John is freaking out about not having an army to fight the French invasion with, I gotta wonder why he doesn't just use this army. And how exactly are the French able to attack England when there's an English army plundering their soil? I guess the English army got drunk and slept in for the rest of the movie.

Instead of reaching the coast though, Robin instead stumbles across one of the most overly complicated Robin Hood plots I have ever seen.

I'm not even going to try to explain it, because I know I'll get something wrong. Needless to say Mark Strong is a villain, real surprise there, who is working with the French while pretending to be Prince John's loyal subject. He ambushes a bunch of nobles who are also leaving the battle to reach the coast in the hopes of killing the already dead King Richard. This is where Robin meets Locksley and the two switch places. Confused yet?

They end up using the King's crown and disguises as lords to make their way across the channel and once all this overly long exposition is over John is King, going to marry a French noble named Isabella, whom his mother objects to and Robin is off to Nottingham with his merry men to return Locksley's sword to his father - though not before Mark Strong recognizes him and decides to pursue him. To keep his cover, I guess, but William Hurt ends up blowing his cover about a half hour later anyway.

But the plot's not important, so let's stop there to talk about why all Robin Hood movies are anachronistic, and why this one really stand out for being so. Thanks to my wonderful Medieval Literature course I've been learning about the evolution of the English language and, well, they didn't speak it back then. They hadn't even gotten to Middle English (think Geoffrey Chaucer) by this point. The peasants spoke Old English, or Anglo-Saxon (think Beowulf) and the nobles spoke Old French. So all the scenes where Isabella is seen to be indignant because she will only speak French to the English just don't make sense to me. They all spoke French!

I do understand the need to have the characters speaking English instead of Anglo-Saxon, and artistically you can get away with it, but when you decide to have a lot of the characters speaking French anyway, why not go that extra mile and actually have all the French speakers speak French? Are you just trying to create more animosity between the French and English? Because frankly it's lazy to rely on a language barrier to show that.

Also, in real life Isabella was 11 when this movie took place (she married John at the ripe and legal age of 12). So... that's gross.

Finally Robin reaches Nottingham where he meets Maid Marion... who isn't a maiden at all, as she's Robert of Locksley's widow. Robert's blind father asks Robin to take his son's place and pretend to be Marion's husband so she doesn't lose the land when he dies. The amount of trust suddenly placed into this perfect stranger is astonishing to me. What's to stop Robin from taking the land and throwing Marion off when Old Man Locksley dies? What's to stop him from raping Marion when she invites him into her chamber to continue the ruse? You don't know this person! Or does he? That gets a little foggy later.

The other astonishing change in this movie is their characterization of the Sherif of Nottingham. He is a complete pussy in this movie, a pussy that does *nothing*. He barely has screen time. He has been replaced as Robin's nemesis by Mark Strong and that's just fucking ridiculous to me. I feel like like they forgot about his character in the first few drafts and only added him as an afterthought. That's like having a Batman movie where the Joker is just a petty thief Batman takes care of in one scene, leaving all the big fights to some evil character the filmmakers made up. You can't do that! You can't strip away every iconic thing about Robin Hood and then still call it Robin Hood!

This is my biggest gripe with this movie. Change all the character names and you will not be able to recognize it as a Robin Hood story. I'm not even entirely sure Ridley Scott likes Robin Hood from the way this story is told. I think he just wanted to make a period piece and the only way he could sell it was by calling it Robin Hood.

To convolute the story even more, it turns out Robin is himself from Locksley, and his father was some... politician? Drafter of legal documents? Stone mason? I have no idea, but about halfway through the movie Old Man Locksley and William Hurt start telling Robin about his father and what a great man he was, so I guess they always knew Robin? I AM SO FUCKING CONFUSED.

So why do I like this movie? This movie that has a confusing and forgettable plot. This movie with underdeveloped characters I don't give a damn about. This movie with no resolution that has an ending tacked onto it just to fool us into thinking it's a prequel to Robin Hood's adventures.

Because the battles are fucking amazing. The sets are detailed and feel real. The weapons look dangerous. Visually it's absolutely stunning and being that I'm on such a medieval kick at the moment I just ate it up. The final battle, at what looked to be the Cliffs of Dover but are apparently some other white cliffs in England, is quite possibly the best battle I've seen in a long while. It didn't look like any battle I've seen in a movie before, and the archer's lined up on the cliffs like that reminded me of the fact that at one time England was known to have the greatest archers in all the world. It's an absolutely terrifying sight to be met with as you land on a beach.

Of course, Robin doesn't stay with the archers, instead he gets on a horse and starts beating people with a hammer. Because when I think Robin Hood, I think of a 45-year-old man on horseback with a giant hammer. And then Marion storms the battle with a dozen children... wait, what? Yeah, that part was weird.

People coming to this movie and wanting to see a story about Robing Hood, or any kind of comprehendible story of any sort, will be sorely disappointed, but those who want to emerge themselves in the medieval world couldn't pick a better movie to watch. You'll be confused, but you'll never be bored.

And remember, if you don't watch it Russell Crowe will find you... and take your head off.

-LS

The Boondock Saints II: All Saints Day

2010-09-16T20:02:00.005-04:00

Well, I haven't used this journal in a while, but I see no reason for it to go to waste, so I thought I'd make it my home for any video reviews I do for movies, after all a review is a review. Here's something I did a couple months ago. I want to make more video reviews, but I might not use the same format. It took forever to film everything I needed to make this, and I really felt awkward being in front of the camera.

Either way, enjoy!

Smokin' Aces

2007-01-30T14:11:00.002-05:00

(This one's going to be in the Feb. 6 issue of The Chronicle)

One million dollars, seven contract killers, one target. The plot of Smokin’ Aces seems simple enough when you watch the preview, and when you pay for your ticket and sit down to watch the movie, there’s going to be a certain expectation for action and violence. And this movie has action and violence in, well, aces.

The movie starts out quietly enough, with FBI agents Carruthers (Ray Liotta) and Messner (Ryan Reynolds) having a friendly chat about the benefits of urine for you skin while on a stakeout. Suddenly they pick up a call about a $1 million hit on Buddy “Aces” Israel (Jeremy Piven).

Suddenly the movie shifts gears and for the next 10 minutes so much information is being shoved down your throat that your head spins. It’s practically impossible to keep up with what’s going on, who’s being introduced and what you need to know.

The fact is, all that information is pointless and didn’t need to be told. All the audience needs to know is that Israel is a rat with seven contract killers coming after him. Why they needed to muddle it up with a complicated back-story and confusing history is a mystery. If you want to catch all the facts, you’re going to have to see it twice – though, who knows, maybe that’s the studio’s marketing plan.

After the mind-numbing exposition comes a section in the movie of these people just trying to get to the hotel where Israel is staying. On the way the violence and unexpected turns begin and it really does become an enjoyable movie.

The characters were all interesting to watch. Some are likeable with their bravado and humour (Ryan Reynolds), others are pitiable with their world spinning out of control around them (Jeremy Piven) and some were so unnervingly creepy that they’ll give children nightmares.

Jeremy Piven was incredible to watch on screen, and if anything, it’s worth seeing this movie just to see him act. That character probably has the most character development (which, to be perfectly honest, isn’t saying a whole lot as most characters weren't in it long enough to deserve character development) and he timed and delivered his lines perfectly.

When all the killers are in place and the real fighting gets underway, the audience is led to expect a climax that never really comes. While the trailers say ‘all hell breaks loose’, it really doesn’t.

Chaos, yes, but certainly not hell.

In fact, the fighting ends quite abruptly. It is as if director Joe Carnahan forgot about the climax.

However, he didn’t forget the climax, he just tried to make it a “thinking man’s” climax. The final 10 minutes of the film provides far too much explanation at once, and frankly, seems rushed and unnecessary. And the plot gaps remain wide and impossible to jump over.

Maybe scenes were missing that explained these impossible things, but the ‘shocking’ twist near the end was stupid. If it hadn’t been there the movie would have been much better.

Still the way the story is finally resolved was pretty well done in itself, despite the unnecessary plot twist.

So, was it a good movie? Yes. But Joe Carnahan tried way too hard to make it into a smart movie, and it’s really not a smart movie by any stretch on the imagination.
-LS

Happy Feet

2006-11-18T03:23:00.003-05:00

This is one of the few movies I've seen that have really left me speechless, but I'm not sure that's such a good thing.

At first there's a whole lot of cuteness and singing and I couldn't help but think: "This is 'Penguins: The Musical'!"

But then about half way through the movie it took a very drastic and strange turn. All the sudden it became this big allergory for American politics and I wasn't even sure of half the messages they were trying to dish out; though I did know they involved religious fanaticism.

If you feel like being cheered up, go see this movie. Nothing makes you smile more than a dancing penguin... but I really did feel overwhelmed with all the political messages they tried to incorperrate in this movie.

It was too much and I wish one of them had been left on the cutting room floor. The only political message I thought fit well was about fishing conservation because that's a big problem for both penguins and humans.

But seriously? Did it need so much more? Why not just have singing and dancing penguins!?! Why is that so wrong!?!
-LS

Borat

2006-11-18T03:19:00.002-05:00

(I wrote this review the weekend the movie came out, but wrote it for my newspaper and didn't bother to post it. This will be printed in the November 21st issue of The Chronicle)

Borat is the tale of one man’s journey across American in order to meet Pamela Anderson. Along with his trustee producer Azamat (played by Ken Davitian) and a camera, Borat embarks on an unforgettable adventure all captured in one 84-minute documentary.

Only, it’s not technically a real documentary, because Borat isn’t real. He’s a character, originated on Da Ali G Show by Sacha Baron Cohen, whose sole purpose seems to be to find and offend anyone he possibly can.

That’s what the entire movie is, one long line of offensive jokes, and it’s worth every minute.

Cohen is really quite ingenious. By saying terrible things in interviews such as suggesting homosexuals should be killed, he gets others to admit they actually agree with this.

The whole point of Borat, and indeed this movie, is not that he’s offensive and terrible, but that there are people – real people – who are that offensive and terrible.

Of course, some people are still taken aback by Borat, being too closed-minded to take a joke. And then there’s the Kazakhstan government which actually threatened to sue Cohen.

Borat’s very similar to Stephen Colbert in one sense, putting on a façade just to bring attention to how ridiculous some of the things he’ll say in character are.

The movie starts off in a small Kazakhstan village, where the movie audience is introduced to life there, which includes fun activities such as bathing in a rather unique thong and The Running of the Jews (Cohen is Jewish).

Then Borat and Azamat head to New York where Borat watches Baywatch and decides he must travel to California in order to marry the woman of his dreams.

From start to finish this movie will have audiences laughing, even when something truly offensive does happen, such as a group of drunken frat boys admitting they thought slavery should be brought back.

But the movie wasn’t just jokes from start to finish, there were quite a few really sweet moments, dare I say heartbreaking?

When Borat is sitting in the back of the ice cream truck and talking to the camera all by himself, trying to keep a smile on his face even though his documentary is crashing down around him, you can’t help but sympathize with the racist, sexist, anti-Semitic shell of a man.

That being said, the naked man fight is perhaps the funniest thing ever seen on film. Cohen and Davitian are brave, brave men.

And the last scene in the movie will completely blow minds. It’s hard to believe what they did, and most people are theorizing that it was staged.

But, audiences will be the judge.

Go and see this movie, you won’t be disappointed, though you may be traumatized for life.
-LS

The Grudge 2

2006-10-18T11:07:00.002-04:00

I'm a pretty big fan of The Grudge and the Ju-On movies, so I went into the theatre with some fairly high expectations.

I wanted to see some creepy ass shit and be scared out of my mind and I was. For the past few nights I keep thinking that Kyako is going to crawl out of the crack of the door on my sliding closet.

But there was something to be desired throughout the whole film. The two different story lines didn't bother me, but all this was going on and there were so many characters to see that you felt cut off from them. I never once really cared about what would happen to them (except for Jake. I always feel bad for children in horror movies) and couldn't even tell you half their names.

The last five minutes of the movie totally rocked my world. There was this great sense of: "Oh man, I GET it." I mean, the movie wasn't confusing or anything, but the ending just tied up everything so well that it made up for some of the less appealing scenes (c'mon, the phonebooth? Not scary OR creepy).

All in all, good movie, go see it if you want a really good scare and don't forget to check out the other movies, because I still strongly believe that they're much better.
-LS

Jackass Number Two

2006-09-23T02:44:00.001-04:00

(The following review will be published in Issue II of The Chronicle)

I took great pride in the fact that I’d never seen the Jackass TV show. When all my friends in high school would go on and on about it, I always felt a slight sense of superiority.

Well, I felt it was time to get over myself and go see Jackass Number Two (justifying it by publishing this review). I went out and bought the first movie to prepare myself for the sequel but mostly because it came with a free movie pass.

After all that though, I was still not prepared for what I witnessed. In fact, I strongly believe that having now seen this movie I’m still not sure I’m prepared to see it.

I don’t think I’ve ever been so continuously horrified, offended and sickened. There were two specific scenes (though I’m not going to tell you which in order to keep this spoiler-free) where I did gag and almost threw up.

There was a scene at the beginning where my 250-pound male friend was so terrified at what he was witnessing that he grabbed onto my arm, screaming, until my hand went numb.

But I could not stop laughing.

Even while I was gagging I was laughing – which certainly made matters worse. I can’t even tell you how funny this movie was without saying something extremely cliché such as: “This was the funniest movie I’ve seen all year.” Which, I’m sorry to say, it was.

Comparing this movie to the first one, I have to say the second is faster paced. The stunts/pranks don’t go on for as long, so you never get bored and in between everything are small vignettes of the Jackass boys (Johnny Knoxville, Bam Margera, Ryan Dunn, Chris Pontius, Steve-O, Dave England, Ehren McGhehey, Brandon DiCamillo, Preston Lacy, and Jason "Wee-Man" Acuña) doing something even dumber and funnier than what you just saw.

It never lets up and once we got to the ending I felt a great sense of disappointment that I wouldn’t be able to see any more of the stupidity.

I mean, what else would you call piercing your own cheek with a fishhook and then jumping into water teeming with man-eating sharks (oops, was that a spoiler?) if not sheer, absolute and unbelievable stupidity?

And I loved it! Oh forgive me mom, I loved every terrible second.

One thing I can’t wrap my head around though, is how the Jackass boys actually remain friends. Their favourite pastime seems to be hitting each other in the balls when it’s least expected. I am positive that whenever they sleep in close quarters they lay awake terrified by what their ‘friends’ might be planning.

There were two scenes where their friendship really came into question. Two pranks on Margera and McGhehey were so terrible that they actually started crying.

And may god have mercy on my soul, I was still laughing.

Strangely enough, I still felt my sense of superiority. I couldn’t help but think that not only had I not paid money to watch this, but I was a better human being than these boys in almost every way. From the way they treated each other, to the stupid things they did to themselves and the fact that they let people film it.

I do have to give them kudos though, for the simple fact that although they might be doing this for money, they’re also doing it for the enjoyment of bored people such as me. There are not a lot of people out there risking life and limb (and friendship) just to get people to laugh.

Maybe that isn’t actually something they can be proud of, but I’m still thankful and I’m sure everyone else (not including the humourless) who sees this will be too.
-LS

SNAKES ON A MOTHERFUCKIN' PLANE

2006-08-18T01:54:00.002-04:00

Since about March I have been heralding the arrival on Snakes on a Plane. I couldn't wait until August 18th to see this movie, so I got myself some advance tickets to the preview on the 17th. I just got home 40 minutes ago, and I am still psyched.

I was expecting Snakes on a Plane to be awesome, but I am in actually disbelief about how good this movie actually was. I honestly believe that people who weren't all excited about this movie will love it nonetheless.

Is the plot somewhat farfetched and ridiculous? Of course. But they still did it well. The fact that they managed to keep the movie going for almost two hours (with some well-placed cuts back to the mainland and the reactions there) and still have it be exciting and interest was a feat in itself.

Samuel L. Jackson was incredible. Especially at the end with the reaction shots he was giving to Keenan Thompson.

The crowd I saw this movie with was just great. There was hissing and excited screams and applause and rubber snakes being thrown in the air. It kind of had the feel of one of those midnight films that people have seen so many times and enjoy and cherish every moment of it. Hell, maybe this will become a midnight film. There's no doubt that it's already a cult classic and will be a blockbuster.

The theatre was packed and everyone loved it.

You must see this movie. MUST. You will actually keel over and die if you do not go see this movie in the theatre. So go now, to the motherfuckin' theatre and go see Motherfuckin' Snakes on a Motherfuckin' Plane!
-LS

P.S. Check out the article I published: Falling in love with Snakes on a Plane. Scroll down to the bottom of the page.

Superman Returns

2006-07-09T16:31:00.002-04:00

I told myself I’d write a review for Superman Returns, and over a week later here I finally am,

Let me explain something first. I hate Superman. I think he’s a dick and far too perfect. But this movie was awesome!

I love how it started after the second Superman film, because I think I would have gone absolutely insane trying to sit through his origin again. We get it, kid from Krypton, planet blew up, kryptonite bad.

I have no idea who this Brandon Routh character is, but he’s incredibly hot and incredibly talented and hey! he’s a Libra! That’s all I need to know. He’s gonna become very famous very soon.

Kate Bosworth was cool, especially in the scene where she got slammed in the head with a steel door – in 3D!!!

Oh yeah, go see the 3D if you can. It really is worth the slight annoyance of having little green lights flash to tell you to put on glasses. My only regret is that the entire movie is not is 3D. Would that really have been so bad?

Kevin Spacey? OMG KEVIN SPACEY!!!

Parkey Posey was brilliant and Kal Penn’s role should have been bigger and the effects were super (no pun intended).

Alas, if only Bryan Singer and his writer crew could have come back for X3. I weep, oh how I weep.
-LS

Banlieue 13 (District 13)

2006-06-10T21:52:00.002-04:00

Lovers of kung-fu, sci-fi, France, hot men and/or incredible action sequences, rejoice!

I thought that this movie would be good because it was made by the same people as Ong-Bak, one of my favourite movies. However, two things took me by surprise. 1) This movie was absolutely incredible. I loved every second of it. There really was nothing that I didn't like about it. 2) It was French.

Yeah, like most good kung-fu (ok, so there's no actual kung-fu in this movie, but that's just the best way to describe the fighting in this movie. Because honestly, the fighting in this movie in indescribable) movies you have to sit through sub-titles. 'Course being that I speak French, this really didn't bug me. Though it did amuse me just how much the French say 'merde' and how little Americans are willing to translate it.

Now, onto the actors.

I'm pretty sure that I want to marry and bear the children of David Belle (Leito - the main character). I really don't know what better way to put it. He's completely replaced my love-lust for Tony Jaa (Ong-Bak), though some of that may have to do with the fact that I could actually communicate with David Belle. Good actor, good looking, good hair, good god...

Cyril Raffaelli (Damien) looked like the French love-child of Jason Statham and Vin Diesel, which is amusing because I just found out that Raffaelli was Statham's stunt double in The Transporter. Anyway, he was incredible in the fights and not so bad on the acting plane.

Though really, this isn't an 'acting' kind of movie.

Dany Verissimo (Lola) was great for the 10 minutes she was actually in the movie. She was also the only woman in the ENTIRE movie. I didn't actually notice this until after seeing the movie, which I guess just goes to prove that the movie was so good one doesn't even notice such a grand imbalance in the sexes.

I could probably go on praising this movie for another thousand words, but really one thing needs to be said: GO SEE THIS MOVIE NOW!!!
-LS

The Omen

2006-06-06T16:16:00.002-04:00

My first impression was something along the lines of: "Oh man, this is sooooo much better than I thought it would be!"

I never really liked the original. I bought it some time ago and was kinda bored with it, but I recognized the potential and understood why people would like it so much. This remake (and I'm sure people will disagree), took everything that was wrong with the original and made it far, far better.

The story and all the plot-points are the same, but things seem to fit better this time around. The look is better, the effects are better, the acting the same (as in very good in both versions) and those dreams were wicked!

I especially loved Liev Schreiber. I've never really cared about him before, but he was just awesome in this. I really felt for him (and he was really hot... but this is not important!). Julia Stiles was good, but I had a hard time buying her being old enough to have a child. That's not her fault though, that's mostly because I just re-watched 10 Things I Hate About You the other week. Pete Postlethwaite played a priest... again. He was incredible and all, but nothing special or different. Mia Farrow freaked the hell outta me, good work Mia.

David Thewlis is my god, 'nuff said.

Seamus Davey-Fitzpatrick (Damien) was nothing special. He just kinda looked confused for the whole movie, but one can't except too much from a five-year-old.

Not to give too much away, but the ending of this movie really touched me. It was the same as the original, but Liev Schreiber was absolutely heart-wrenching to watch.

Go see this movie, now, NOW I SAY!!!
-LS

X-Men: The Last Stand

2006-05-27T13:13:00.002-04:00

Mmm... Hugh Jackman... mm... Hugh Jackman as Wolverine... mmm... Hugh Jackman as Wolverine with no shirt on...

...

...

... Uh, right, but in all seriousness folks. *Clears throat*

First and foremost, I hate the title. 'The Last Stand'? That's so fucking corny. But a title does not make a movie. Now there is lot to like about this movie. The acting was superb, the CGI was astonishing, the fights were SO FUCKING AWESOME!!! So those three things made this movie incredibly enjoyable, but there were a few hiccups.

The first 20 minutes or so of the movie were extremely jarring. They were trying to introduce about 30 new characters and five plot lines and it felt very rushed and annoying. For people who haven't read the comics, I think they'll hate the first bit, because they're really not going to know who's who.

Phoenix was awesome. Phoenix's explanation was bullshit. I can understand them not wanting to go down the road of the aliens, but a split personality? Ugh. It just came out of nowhere and felt really - sorry to be repeating myself - jarring.

I hated the music. John Powell should never work again. I hate you John Powell, you ruined almost every dramatic moment!

So, to recap, there's a lot to love, but a lot to hate, which makes this movie the worst out of the three X-Men movie. However I did like this movie. I just don't think many non-comic book people will like it very much.

Now where was I?

Oh right... mmm... Hugh Jackman...
-LS

The Rocket

2006-05-12T23:51:00.002-04:00

Before going to see this movie I read a review and it was less than flattering, but I still went to see it because I was in a hockey mood (play-offs and all). I have to say that reviewer had his head up his ass. I really liked this movie. Now I'll admit that it wasn't the best movie I've ever seen, but it certainly was enjoyable and worth checking out (though I suppose it's something that can wait until DVD).

Roy Dupuis was just frakking amazing. There's really little more I can say on that. I thought he was absolutely fantastic, and my father (who's a big Maurice Richard fan) leaned over half-way through the movie to tell me that he'd been cast perfectly. Good on you Roy, I hope you get an award (though, who are we kidding, it'll probably just be a Genie).

I also really liked the fact that they kept the French French and the English English (though being that I speak French I may be slightly biased. I hear some people were rather annoyed at having to read subtitles half of the time).

There were three things that kind of annoyed me about this movie. The simplest one was that I wish there had been more hockey, though I'm glad they didn't sacrifice the other aspect of Maurice Richard's life to show the hockey.

Another thing that annoyed me was Julie LeBreton. I'm not saying she was a bad actress, she was good, though all her role entailed was to look worried once in a while. My problem with her is that she looks 33 (maybe she is 33, I don't know) and the first time you see her in the movie she's supposed to be 17. Fuck! They should have hired someone who was 20 or something, then they could just age them through good ol' fashioned movie magic, because it really takes you out of the moment trying to pretend this woman is 16 years younger. For the record, I also know Roy Dupuis is far older than his role, but his acting was so amazing that I barely noticed it (and even then, only for the first five minutes).

The third, and final, thing was that I felt things weren't explained very well. For someone who doesn't know a whole lot about Maurice Richard, I found myself lost at a few scenes and it would take me a few minutes to figure out when it was and what was going on. Though this shouldn't be a problem for most hockey fans.
-LS

Silent Hill

2006-04-25T10:59:00.002-04:00

The simple review to Silent Hill is that I didn’t like it, but what kind of a review is that? After all, I didn’t think that it was a terrible movie; it just fell below my expectations.

This movie was exactly like the game. It looked like the game, sounded like the game, felt like the game, but it wasn’t the game, it was a movie and it seemed like someone forgot that. The dialogue was like chewing cardboard and the acting was… well, it just seemed like the actors were only there for a paycheck.

I’ll give them bonus marks on the makeup and special effects; Pyramid Head was incredible to see.

The plot was acceptable, but it seemed rather small and unimportant. The movie seemed to be putting a lot of it’s stock into being seen as a very pretty movie. They didn’t try very hard with the plot.

Sean Bean rocked, he should have been in more of the movie… and he should have died. It’s unnatural to not have Sean Bean die in a movie.
-LS

V for Vendetta

2006-03-19T23:13:00.001-05:00

This is probably the most powerful movie I have ever seen and definitely one of the best movies I have seen in the past year (this is counting 2005). From the previews I thought it would be awesome and being a comic book geek I've been eagerly awaiting it for almost a year. Now normally when something gets hyped up like that there is no way it can live up to your expectations, but this simply went above and beyond them.

The movie's theme is not original, in fact it's basically the sequel of 1984 (both movies cast John Hurt as well, though in completely different roles), but that's not important. I love movies that are all about governments going too far and the people finally standing up to them. It inspires me to believe that we can really make a difference in our world, but I've never seen a movie with this theme that has moved me so much. Yes, it's moved me so much that I have begun to use cliches in order to explain my feelings towards it.

"I laughed, I cried, it moved me Bob."

There were a few things that rubbed me the wrong way, like Natalie Portman's accent. Now, I have nothing against Natalie Portman, I love her in fact. I think she is a great actor and I think she did an incredible job in this movie, but her accent just sounded really fake. I suppose we can't win 'em all... I also wasn't entirely sure if I liked some of the director's (James McTeigue) choices in the fight scenes. In the last action scene with V vs. Creedy and his goons they made it look like a comic book which in turn made it look a little too Matrixy for my taste, but I still think it was a cool scene.

I recommend that you go and watch this movie in the theatres, because it is most certainly worth the money and if you are reading this too late to do that, go and buy the DVD. You will not regret it.
-LS

Hostel

2006-01-31T08:53:00.002-05:00

Well, in a word: interesting. In a sentence: Not entirely good and not entirely bad.

It was nothing like I expected it to be, mostly because the preview didn't show anything other than scenes of people being tortured. Basically I expected to sit through a movie entirely composed of disturbing events. The first scene of the movie however was in Amsterdam and involved lots of drugs and sex. I was puzzled, but found it all amusing so I didn't care. That's how the movie continued for about 45 minutes. Lots of drugs and as many tits as one sees in a porn.

Still, I found the movie funny so I didn't mind. Then of course people FINALLY start getting tortured. You don't see a lot of it though, and the only thing that really disturbed me I've actually seen in other movies before. So nothing new, nothing special. I didn't really care about any of the characters until Pax (Jay Hernandez) put a suit on. Suddenly I was invested! It's strange how a nice black suit can make the most boring of people suddenly attractive and bad-ass.

The movie was also really short! I couldn't believe how fast it went by, but being that there were only three main characters and a plot that really only belongs in a short story, I can forgive that. The movie would have really reeked something awful if they'd tried to carry it any longer.

All in all, good movie, but I won't be seeing it in the theatres again.
-LS

Underworld: Evolution

2006-01-22T16:45:00.001-05:00

Yay, first review of the year!

Go see this movie. I thought it was going to suck, I didn't even want to see it, by Kat showed some interest, and I think Scott Speedman (we'll talk more about him later) is hot. So we went, and I was pleasantly surprised.

It takes off right where the last movie ends, Selene (Kate Beckinsdale) and her newly acquired puppy Michael (Scott Speedman) trying to find a safe place, Korvin headin' off to kill Marcus, Marcus waking up, etc. And it jumps right into the action. It really feels like a continuation of the first movie, like they are one, like Kill Bill. So if you haven't seen the first one, DO NOT see this one. You will have no idea what's going on.

So, right, Scott Speedman. I am almost 100% positive that it is in his contract to be shirtless for half the movie (both movies, actually). He is absolutely adorable though! I've only seen the man in three movies (Underworld 1, Underworld 2, and The 24th Day), but he always plays the most adorable person. I adore him and his little lost puppy ways ("Love me Selene!").

Also, I always loved how they (Michael & Selene) never had sex or had a mad passionate kiss in the first movie, but was absolutely ecstatic that they had both in the sequel. *Squee*

Now, there were a few things that confused us. The biggest one being: WHERE ARE THEY!?! So I spent all day trying to figure this out. We couldn't figure out how they seemed to be in America in one movie, and then seem to be in Hungary and France in the sequel. Well, in the first movie she looks up Michael's address, it says he lives in Budapest, Budapest is in Hungary. It makes sense!!! But why are they speaking English?

I believe I’ve rambled sufficiently. Movie: good. Scott Speedman: Adorable. Kate Beckinsdale: HOT!!! Plot Holes: There, but easily dismissed.
-LS

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

2005-11-19T14:54:00.001-05:00

I haven't read the book in four-ish years, so what they cut out is a little fuzzy, but everything I remember happening in the book, happened in the movie, so I was well content.

All the stuff with the ball was absolutely great. When they're first told and all the girls get excited and all the boys start grumbling and looking around in annoyance. It's perfect! The actually ball was absolutely lovely to watch, all the pretty reds and such. And oh my god! Jarvis Cocker was in it! Why did no one tell me of this!?!

It just all really felt real. This is how teenagers act!

All those kids really know how to act, except in the one scene where Dan Radcliffe has to show actual emotions. I just didn't believe his crying at all, and that just really took me out of the moment. That part was awfully annoying. But then Jeff Rawle started screaming and crying, and that part broke my heart.

No one broke my heart like Neville (Matthew Lewis). He was just so adorable! Everything Neville does makes me happy, and I really like how they gave him a slightly bigger role in this movie than in the book. He's starting to look... well, nice.

Tom Felton is also starting to look a little dashing, especially in a suit. But I probably shouldn't be talking about kids who are younger than me. So, uh, how about that Alan Rickman? He was hilarious. He had about three scenes, but he was brilliant in every single one of them. It's incredible how he can just express so much with just a tilt of the head.

Well, I could go on and on (especially about the dragon scene, that was awesome!), but in the end all you need to know is that this movie is worth seeing, so go see it!
-LS

A History of Violence

2005-11-18T12:59:00.002-05:00

It's probably wrong that I was turned on by this movie, but so I was.

Hottest angry sex I have EVER seen.

Viggo Mortensen was beyond hot, and yeah, acting good too. And oh my god could he kick some ass! AND we get to see his bum. *Dissolves into puddle of goo*

Ok, this is starting to sound less and less like a review.

The movie was great. Never a dull moment, though a few where I had to wince. When they put the word 'violence' in a movie title, one should expect violence.

Ashton Holmes was pretty good in the movie, awfully cute, though a bit of a pussy (except for that one scene at the school... that was hot). William Hurt was incredible! His reactions to everything were TOO funny. "How could you fuck that up!?!" But he was only in the movie for, like, half an hour. That made me sad. Same thing with Ed Harris, absolutely incredible, but not a whole lot of him.

I could have lived without the daughter. Her cuteness made me want to vomit, and she looked nothing like her parents. How do two (beautiful) people with high cheek bones produce a bleach blonde child with pudgy cheeks? Does not make sense people! Unless Maria Bello was sleeping around... But who sleep around on Viggo Mortensen!?!

Ok, this review has no substance at all. I should stop writing.
-LS

P.S. Go see this movie.

Zathura

2005-11-16T10:08:00.002-05:00

Despite the fact that I still can't seem to pronounce this movie ("Thasura?"), I absolutely adored it.

Yes, yes, it's a kid movie, but it was still great! The story was fun, the effects very cool, and Dax Shepard DOES have gorgeous eyes! I think I liked it better than Jumanji, but that's just because I'm a bit of a space nut.

One thing I did not like (as much) was the ending. The best word I can use to describe it was 'smoke'. I could see it, I could even smell it, but I just didn't feel it. And it kinda came out of nowhere, but I suppose it was a neat little twist... if not slightly disturbing.

The other thing was that I couldn't quite connect with the theme. Brotherhood and all that, I have a lot of sisters, we work a lot differently. So that was a little lost on me (not that I didn't get it, it just didn't speak to me).

If I had a rating system, I'd probably give it a perfect score... or perhaps I'd take half a mark for the ending... but honestly, I loved this movie. Made me feel like a kid again.
-LS

Saw II

2005-11-01T10:17:00.002-05:00

I figured my Hollowe'en wouldn't be complete without a scary movie, so I wrangled together some friends and we went to see Saw II. Not exactly the scariest movie out there, but it certainly did make me squeamish. The tagline ("Oh yes... there will be blood.") certainly did a good job of summing it up.

The movie took a little while to get off the ground, and I was getting a little impatient. I really liked how in Saw the story just jump-started and you discovered all the little things through flashbacks. This one had flashbacks from scenes that had happened not five minutes previously and portrayed them in a seizure-inducing flash of lights and sounds. They were unnecessary, except for the extremely stupid I suppose.

The story itself was rather interesting, and although a few things were blatantly obvious (their connection, etc) nothing important was obvious, though there was a slight nagging in the back of your mind: "Hey, what is going on here?" I also liked the link back to Saw (ever wonder just what did happen to Adam?)

It lacked character development on a whole. A few characters you got glimpses of understanding from, but people like Obi were never really explained, and seemed to hinder the movie more than anything. "Oh no he's evil! But... uh... what?"

Yeah, I liked it. I just really wished it hadn't been geared towards stupid people so much. That was massively annoying...
-LS

Serenity

2005-10-01T16:02:00.002-04:00

One word describes this movie quite well: 'Shiny'

This movie was absolutely wonderful, and far more incredible and indepth than the show ever was - and the show was absolutely fantastic, so that's saying something quite profound. After seeing this as a movie, I don't think I could go back to watching it on a small screen. Firefly belongs in a theatre.

Everyone should go see this movie, even if you haven't seen the show and especially if you have. The writing was absolutely incredible (I laughed and cried all in the same scene) and the acting just as good. Nathan Fillion especially was completely believable as Mal - dark, brooding Captain of Serenity (who could kick Han Solo's ass in a bar fight any day). Summer Glau was equally good, almost too good... creepy even.

The movie was far creepier than I thought it would be. When I heard we'd be able to see Reavers (cannibals who live on the outskirts of the solar system) I was beyond excited - and then I did see them and just wanted them to leave because they're just so CREEPY! And when they're flying by and all they can hear is screams on the radio *shudder*. Too fucking creepy man. I'm with Jayne on this one, Reavers just ain't right.

Now, there was something about this movie that really pissed me off, not that it made the movie bad or anything... but grr, did it make me mad. I don't wanna give anything away, so all I'll say is: Why Joss!?! WHY!?!
-LS

P.S. Han Solo didn't shoot Greedo, Mal Reynolds did!

Corpse Bride

2005-09-22T13:10:00.001-04:00

The most important thing I can say about Corpse Bride is that it isn't The Nightmare Before Christmas. That being said, don't expect it to be because you will be sadly disappointed, not to say that the movie isn't good, it just isn't The Nightmare Before Christmas.

Back to that point about it being a good movie, it was. However, it was not perfect. For starters the movies ran about 70 minutes, which left little time for character development or real story. The movie seemed to sweep by in the flash of the eye and by the time it ended you had no idea why anyone had done anything that they had done... Make sense?

The other unfortunate thing about the movie was the fact that it was a musical. I love musicals, so don't get me wrong when I say this. The problem with this musical was that the music sucked. I mean really, I didn't like a single song (except the piano pieces, but that just doesn't count). Not only did I dislike the music, but half the time the songs sounded like the Oompa Loompa songs (which is understandible seeing he was probably scoring both movies at the same time).

However, like I said, the movie was really good, so when it comes to a theater near you, go see it.
-LS

Sky High

2005-08-02T16:15:00.002-04:00

For the most part people are passing this movie of as just another kids movie, and for the most part people will be correct - however, this movie was also made for comic book fans of all ages. There were a dozen jokes me and my friends were the only ones laughing.

Was this the most predictable movie in the world? Well... yes; and it was in fact X-Men meets Harry Potter. In fact, it was basically just your average high school movie, only all the teenagers had super powers. Still, I really liked this movie, because it was really funny. I'm sure most people would like it even if they weren't a kid or liked comic books.

On a more personal note: Steven Strait is very hot - albeit a tad too young for me, but just by a few months really! *Looks around nervously and laughs*
-LS

The Island

2005-07-27T17:34:00.002-04:00

I was soooo determined to hate this movie, I mean you have no idea. I saw all the previews for this movie, and putting all three of those previews together, everything that happened in this movie was absolutely ruined for me. So in that aspect, yeah, I really hated this movie, but then Sonya yelled and me and made me think things over a bit, and I've come to the conclusion that it actually was a pretty good movie - especially when you don't know what happens. (Don't you just hate spoilers? Doesn't it just make you wanna rip a certain someone's jugular out?)

There were still a few things about the movie that bothered me, like the complete un-originality of it. It was Logan's Run meets 1984, meets Bad Boys, coupled with a direct rip-off of the bike scene from Return of the Jedi. The direction was... okay at best. The lighting was very pretty, but Michael Bay has a certain fondness for moving the camera around - A LOT - so half the time I felt like I was having a seizure. Some scenes were impossible to watch. For example, the only two things the previews didn't ruin were how they escaped, and how they survived falling off the building, and after seeing the film I still have no idea how they pulled that one off!

So yeah, go see it, because it was a lot of fun, and the second Ewan McGregor starts smiling and speaking in an Scottish accent... well... *trails off into gibberish*
-LS

Wedding Crashers

2005-07-27T17:28:00.001-04:00

I really didn't think this movie was going to be very good, and the only real reason I wanted to see it in the first place was because Vince Vaughn was in it, but I couldn't believe how funny it actually was. For a good half-hour straight the theatre was just non-stop laughing.

Now, of course all movies can't be great. The last half-hour of this movie was rather... slow, boring even. In fact, the movie could have done better to have simply cut to the last five minutes, which were also very funny (I really doubt anyone would have noticed the missing plot, being that the movie was just a runaway idea about sleeping with chicks at weddings).

So, if you want a good laugh, go see this movie, especially if you wanna see a lot of tits in the first few minutes.
-LS

Charlie and the Chocolate Factory

2005-07-17T13:18:00.002-04:00

I've been having a hard time putting what I thought about this movie into words. The two words that seem to come to mind the most are: "Overly Trippy"

Yes, I liked this movie, but by the end of it I wasn't sure if I was still sane. It was like having one of the worst trips of your life, and all the time dealing with the fact that you are sober. When the Oompa Loompas came out, I thought I would have a heart attack.

All-in-all the movie was good, and very funny, and I was quite impressed with the sceneries and effects (though very disappointed that Willy Wonka's rant got cut out - you know there one: "There's no earthly way of knowing / Which direction we are going / There's no knowing where we're rowing / Or which way the river's flowing / Is it raining? / Is it snowing? / Is a hurricane a-blowing? / Not a speck of light is showing / So the danger must be growing / Are the fires of hell a-glowing? / Is the grisly reaper mowing? / Yes, the danger must be growing / 'Cause the rowers keep on rowing / And they're certainly not showing / Any signs that they are slowing.").

Now, I didn't think Johnny Depp would do a better job than Gene Wilder, and I was absolutely right. There just wasn't the same heart in the character... or any heart really. He was in fact a completely different character and I wasn't all that sure if I liked it. Freddie Highmore was adorable, I had nothing against him.

The ending seemed to run on a bit, and I much preferred the way the original ended, because there was a lot more heartbreak when Willy Wonka started screaming at him... Anyway, I suggest you go see this movie. Just DO NOT, I repeat, DO NOT see this movie stoned. YOU WILL DIE.
-LS

Fantastic Four

2005-07-11T23:27:00.001-04:00

Well... it started off well enough.

At the beginning I was still feeling the exitment of watching this movie, but the more Jessica Alba was on screen, the more I wondered why anyone thought she could act, and why they made Ioan Gruffud act like such a pussy when he was such a bad-ass in King Arthur. I had no problems with Michael Chiklis or Chris Evans, in fact, they're the only reasons I liked that movie at all.

Doom started off alright, but then he just got weird, and was nothing like he is in the comics. The more the movie kept running, the more corny it got, and the more I was just counting the seconds until Chris Evans came back on.

I'd say it was worth it to see the effects on the big screen... only there weren't really any effects worth seeing on the big screen. All-in-all, this is a movie you should wait to rent.
-LS

Howl's Moving Castle

2005-07-11T23:18:00.002-04:00

It's my personal opinion (shared by many) that Hayao Miyazaki can do no evil. That, and adding the fact that they cast the lovely Christian Bale in this movie, I am of the opinion that this movie rocked! (Especially being that I saw it after such an attrocious movie like War of the Worlds)

I've never read the book (by Diana Wynne Jones), but the movie was great. It was very imaginative, and dare I say it, romantic. From the very beginning I was sucked into this world they created, and the characters (one voiced by Billy Crystal) kept me wanting to watch more.

Really there's nothing bad to say about this movie. You might not like it if you don't like anime all that much, though I think anyone could enjoy this for what it is.

And hey, Jean Simmons was in the english version (no, not the singer from Kiss, but the chick who played Ophelia opposite Lawrence Olivier)!
-LS

War of the Worlds

2005-07-11T21:28:00.002-04:00

DO NOT GO SEE THIS MOVIE!!!

There are many bad things I can say about this, and sadly very few good things I can say. I loved the book. The book still remains one of my all-time favourites... but the movie was terrible.

Firstly, I was terribly bored. I wanted to see lots of explossions and battles, and got none. I wanted to see aliens, and all I got was tri-pod rip-offs of Independence Day.

Steven Spielberg simply reharshed Close Encounters of the Third Kind and Jurassic Park and figured he'd get away with it by using a famous book and a couple famous actors. This did not work. You felt nothing for Tom Cruise (possibly because the man's barking mad!), Dakota Fanning would not stop screaming, and I wanted to punch Justin Chatwin very, very badly. It was meant to be a family film, but I hated the family!

The book was absolutely butchered, the movie held onto very little from it. There was Ogilvy, and a shadow of the boat scene... and nothing that would entice anyone to want to see this movie again.

DO NOT GO SEE THIS MOVIE!!!!
-LS

Cinderella Man

2005-06-19T20:58:00.002-04:00

This was another movie where I was expecting it to suck, or at least expecting it to not live up to all the reviews, and this was another movie where I was proved wrong and came face to face with a really incredible movie. Ron Howard and Russell Crowe have made up for ‘A Beautiful Mind’ (FINALLY!!!)

I don’t really know how long I can go on spewing praise for this film – even Renée Zellweger who I think is far better in comedies than dramas was really good. Russell Crowe probably deserves another Oscar, and hey, why not give another to Ron while they’re at it?

One thing in particular that I need to rave about is the fighting in this film. I’ve mentioned before how all these movies are using the camera seizure technique. Well this movie did not. It allowed for wide shots and steady cameras, and man, that really makes a difference. I was actually getting into the fight scenes for once.
-LS

Batman Begins

2005-06-19T20:50:00.002-04:00

I went into this movie not expecting a whole lot. In fact, I figured it would suck – especially after that terrible Joel Schumacher film (we dare not speak it’s name). My basic thoughts were: “How bad can it be? I’m in love with half of the cast!”

It exceeded all expectations - by far. The effects were great (and not overused like in some movies *caugh*StarWars*caugh*), the acting was great, the script was great, the scenery was great, and the music was phenomenal (and of course it is when one of my favourite composers – James Newton Howard – is involved. That, and there were four composers in all).

Now the fight scenes were a little… well the best word to describe them would be ‘shaky’. Lately I’ve been noticing that all new films have this camera ‘technique’ where during a fight the camera has a fucking seizure. My theory behind this is that people don’t want to choreograph fifty fights and to get away with using the same shit over and over again they shake the camera around so that all you see is shades of black and blue. The only fight where this worked was when Batman was fighting with the guys on the docks when he first starts up. The only fight where they didn’t use this (obscenely) is the sword fight on the ice, and so that fight is my favourite.

The last fight was boring as all fuck. I couldn’t see shit and was just waiting for them to get back to Gary Oldman driving the Batmobile – that right! Gary Oldman kicks ass! He could have played Batman (and definitely would have done a better job than Val Kilmer).

There was of course the obligatory car chase, but it was a car chase with the BATMOBILE! (Which, is by far the coolest Batmobile to date)

All in all a great fucking movie, go see it – GO SEE IT!!! And to Warner Brothers, make a sequel with this cast! You must make a sequel using this cast!!! DO IT NOW!!!
-LS

Mr. & Mrs. Smith

2005-06-13T15:35:00.002-04:00

I wanted to wait until I went and saw some life changing award winning movie to make my first review, but most movies out nowadays suck and I ended up seeing 'Mr. & Mrs. Smith' which I rather liked, so I figured I'd start there.

Like I said before, I liked this movie. It was pretty much exactly what I had expected it to be, though I hadn't really expected it to be good.

It started off quietly enough, a few jokes here and there, of course the audience is just waiting for the explosions to start so after everything was set up it jumped right to Angelina Jolie in a dominatrix outfit.

Once they figured out they were both assasins the movie picked up quite a bit more, but it also tried to add drama in the movie which really didn't fit. It's a comedy, people want to laugh, trying to make them cry at the same time just confusses the masses. So the couple fights, and in a strange life imitates the arts, you have the two of them denying their loves for each other - but of course we all know it's there.

Then came the obligatory car chase, which you must come to expect in an action movie but they always bore me to tears. This one was different though, I'm not quite sure why, maybe it was because of the dialogue, and the humour, or the fact that Angelina Jolie was still not wearing pants, but I really enjoyed this particular car chase.

The ending of the movie seemed a little rushed, and the scene from the preview with Brad Pitt riding a tricycle shooting people has vanished. There was one visual that absolutely killed me, Brad Pitt interogating a teenager who's wearing a 'Fight Club' T-Shirt (if you don't get that, then you don't deserve to live).

All in all, good movie, go see it, or DIE!!! Or something...
-LS

Welcome

2005-06-02T17:44:00.001-04:00

I wanted to create a new blog because my real Blog (and LiveJournal) were becoming rather cluttered with movie reviews and I figured being that most of the time I just wanted to write movie reviews anyway, maybe I should make a site where I could do that and not have to also go into what was happening in my life - making for long posts.

So nothing at the moment, but I'm going to try to write a review for every movie I see - I work on my writing whever I can.

Thanks for reading!
-LS