(Nothing...)
There is absolutely nothing in this movie I can possibly talk about. It lacks a story, it throws plot points out the window, there are no characters. It felt like I was watching somebody play Modern Warfare 2 with aliens. Yes, this is my review of this movie.
(Could use a few adjustments to the ending.)
After enduring one horrendous movie after another, I was starting to get worried that perhaps maybe this year was going to be as hopeless for the box office as last year was. Despite this fear I went to see The Adjustment Bureau and had relatively high hopes that I could find a decent movie that had a cast of A-list actors. Did The Adjustment Bureau deliver on all fronts?
David Norris (Matt Damon) is having a very successful run for democratic senator of New York when his campaign takes a turn for the worst because of frat boy behavior back in his college days, which tarnishes his image. By chance, after losing, Matt Damon meets Elise Sellas (Emily Blunt) in the men's room and turns his bitter defeat into an opportunity. By chance after meeting her again, David's world is turned upside down when he encounters one of his staff being investigated by a strange group of people. It's here that David learns of the Adjustment Bureau, a group of men in fancy fedoras who make a series of adjustments to make sure you are sticking to the plan, which is basically how your life should be played out. David's plan calls for him to stay away from Elise because it's simply not in either plan. Despite all this, David decides to continue to see Elise, which could potentially ruin both their lives.
What we have here is an interesting, but not entirely unique experience. The Adjustment Bureau has a really strong start and keeps that momentum going for the most part, but once it reaches the third act, it starts to fall apart eventually collapsing at the very end. It was almost like the story had been adjusted by men in fancy hats who were trying to convince me that we can't have a good movie yet! While the story falls apart, the one part of the writing where this movie stays strong is in its characters. Not only do these characters get some funny lines, the chemistry between Emily Blunt and Matt Damon is so strong with this movie, it feels real. While the performances aren't what I would call oscar worthy, I am not saying they are terrible, they're definitely above average A-list casting with an unknown director.
The movie's atmosphere is brought to life by some decent cinematography, but my favorite scenes are when David's meeting the guys in the adjustment bureau. These guys look like something out of a classic 30's era film, and a lot of their set design sort of reflects this. The one thing I found to be a little silly in this movie was that all the power comes from the hat. Seriously, the hat is the source of god-like abilities to make adjustments to a person's life? I think it should have been a combo of the hat and the clothes. The one awesome thing these guys can do with their hats is use doors to jump from one point to another, such as taking a door to a stadium can lead you to the statue of liberty. How awesome is that for fast travel?
Despite its flaws, The Adjustment Bureau is a pretty good movie. While its premise is a lot like The Matrix in that we're not supposed to be aware of these guys, it's a sci-fi movie more akin to Inception. The difference here is that while Inception requires you to pay attention, most of The Adjustment Bureau is given in a more straight forward manner that's easier to comprehend. I ended up liking this movie for its characters as opposed to its story telling, and that's a complement from me because a little flaw like a bad end can ruin a movie, but the characters save it.
(Those jobs will never be taken back at this rate...)
Times are tough for us all. We have to make a sacrifice every now and then, such as giving up a vacation, or maybe that fancy new car. The Company Men is one of those movies that was released at a perfect time, so you expect it to be a great movie, especially if you saw the trailer. Unfortunately this is a movie that with a great concept, can't get the execution quite right.
The Company Men is a movie about three different successful business men who become victims of corporate downsizing. Our lead victim, Bobby Walker (Ben Affleck), loses his job in the mess of this corporate downsizing. Upon losing his job, he immediately begins his search for another job, and is so sure he's going to get that new job so he can keep his nice house, and his Porsche, but he has no luck securing a job that pays the 120k per year salary he had. This, to me, is rather unrealistic because in this day and age, why should you look for a job when chances are you're going to have unemployment benefits for the rest of your life? The trailer seems to give off the idea that Bobby will spend a majority of the movie with his brother in-law Jack (Kevin Costner), but this character is only in the movie for maybe all of 20 minutes in a 2 hour environment. As for the other characters in Gene McCarly (Tommy Lee Jones) and Phil Woodward (Chris Cooper), we don't get to spend nearly enough time with these executives to understand what they're going through, and given that they're sort of the higher ups in the movie's company, it's rather hard for the average movie goer to relate to them.
The biggest issue I have with this movie though is it really wasted an opportunity to show that perhaps maybe we need an appreciation for the simpler things and that perhaps maybe success isn't always about your membership to the country club, or that nice exotic car of yours. Bobby is obviously meant to be the sympathetic character, the one we relate to the most. Ben Affleck does a decent job in this movie, given that his character is in Boston yet again, but it's far from his performance in The Town. Tommy Lee Jones gives a rather notable performance as well, but I barely felt anything out of Chris Cooper's performance, and found him to be the most difficult to sympathize with.
Sporting some nice cinematography by Roger Deakins, it's one of the movie's finer aspects. The weakest coming from John Wells' writing. Mostly because Bobby does eventually get his job back, but the ending actually sort of left me asking "have I learned anything from this?" All I learned was how unrealistic Bobby's character is in trying to find a job right away. it's that eventually. The whole movie almost feels like Bobby is just having a bad dream. Also, if you're going to do a story about the lives of three people, you can't just go and make one part of the story interesting and push the other two aside, Hereafter had this problem as well.
This is one of those movies that seems to be screaming "oscar bait." From its cinematography, to its acting, it's trying hard for an oscar. The one aspect this movie misses the most though is the story telling aspect. It's a good effort on John Wells' part since he wanted something that could be a sign of the times, and while perfectly timed, it misses the mark multiple times.
It's that time of year again! Time for all the big toy manufacturers to show off their goods to potential buyers for what will no doubt be the big toy for the holiday season. As expected, Hasbro is showing off a few additions to its newest generation of My Little Pony, and given that my life was sabotaged by ponies, I might as well give my thoughts on the matter.So, let's take a look at what we have.
Looks like we've got another carriage to go along with Rarity, which gave Hasbro an excuse to re-release Applejack in a new pose. The carriage itself is rather cute, but would it have been too much trouble to maybe give Applejack a hat of some sort since it's one of her trademark personality quirks in the show?
These Riding Along toys look like recycled toys from 3.5, which sort of has no right being in place with the toy line given the show's mythos. Still, there are some cute quirks with these, especially Twilight's helmet having a tiny hole in it for her horn. It's just out of character is all I'm saying.
I don't think I'd ever trust Pinkie Pie in a car. Haven't you seen her behavior in the show? I'd steer as clear of the road as possible!
How fitting Rarity gets what is possibly one of the more expensive toys in the line. If I had to guess, Hasbro wants to push this one as the hot item everypony will want for Christmas. They even give you two ponies, and it apparently plays music. If I had to guess, the music is probably a few bars of the My Little Pony theme, similar to Twilight Sparkle's Twinkling Balloon. The decor is nice, and it appears that Rarity either has a sparkly mane, or the photo is playing a trick on me.
It would appear that the Newborn Cuties line from previous generations was successful enough for Hasbro to try and carry it over to the new generation. Me? There's no way I'd buy any of the NBC line, but then again it's not meant for people my age. As for this toy itself, looks like the legs kick, but maybe it knows when it's trying to walk.
To sum it up, this seemed to be an underwhelming showing for ponies simply because a lot of it seems out of character when you watch the show. On top of that, Hasbro also had a lot of their already available toys in the line to possibly attract even more potential buyers. Still, there may be a few surprises we have yet to see and this doesn't reveal everything that's coming out in the year.
(Can you survive the goriest scene in a good long while?)
Aron Ralston's story is well known. He spent five days trapped in a canyon and managed to survive through any means necessary. So... why exactly would you make a movie out of this? No idea, but director Danny Boyle felt it was a good idea to make a movie out of it, and he manages to succeed at telling Aron's story, making a movie that is worthy of a best picture nomination.
One day, Aron Ralston goes canyoneering, but as usual, he doesn't tell anybody where he's going. His trip seems to be going well enough until he finds himself trapped between a rock and a hard place. Ralston spends the next five days examining his own life and trying to survive. Just about everybody should be familiar with his story and the extremes he went through to survive. How do you make a 95 minute movie out of a story like this? The drama of the movie comes from Aron taking a long, hard look at his life as he is trapped, and his struggle to survive on no food and very little water.
There are other actors in this movie I'm told, but this movie focuses on Aron Ralston, played by James Franco. Franco is one of those guys who is difficult to cast, because he really doesn't fit the mold of playing this character, but dammit, he did so well in this role, he earned that nomination for best actor. It's one of those moments where you feel like you're watching a documentary, and forget this is an actor playing a role.
127 Hours features some fantastic cinematography that not only captures the scenery well, but helps to capture the feeling of claustrophobia. For those of you with claustrophobia, it is recommended you not see this movie. During the times Ralston uses the camera to record his dillema, this is supposedly as close as we're going to get to seeing the real tapes. I'd love to see these tapes to see if that talk show with himself actually happened. I will also point this out, if you're squeamish, then the climax is almost completely unwatchable. I've seen my fair share of horror movies so I'm used to gore, but I've never seen it in this excruciating detail. Definitely one of the more cringe-worthy moments of the year.
127 Hours goes by really fast. For a movie that seems to sort of sit in one place for the whole 95 minutes, it wasn't dull by any means. From beginning to end, this is one fantastic movie about survival.
(Weeeee! I'm flying in my Porsche!)
After the success of Need for Speed Most Wanted, EA and Black Box figured they had a formula they could go with for 2006 and the PS3 launch. Need for Speed Carbon is an NFS game that gets a lot of things right, but still comes up a bit short of reaching the top 5 finish it wants.
Yeah, because it's Black Box, it requires a story to follow for some reason. Unfortunately for NFS Carbon, they went with a story that's a little too confusing to follow, even if it seems rather simple. The simple part is after the events of Most Wanted, you return to Palmont City and are the most hated guy ever because of some shady event that took place. So you clean up your reputation by racing in Palmont and taking control of territories to fix your reputation. The complicated parts actually involve trying to piece together what happened, as there is something about red bags being switched, you somehow being allowed to escape. Look Black Box, stop trying to put in complex story ideas in a racing game.
Well, NFS Carbon is open world, because it's black box, and while Palmont City, a city that never sees daytime in Carbon, is rather modest in scale, the free roam is rendered useless. Yes, you can use the free roam to launch events, and they're not too far apart, but when the game includes an option to launch events directly from a world map in the menu, it almost seems pointless. It's made even more pointless when you realize that pursuits do not happen as often as you would like if you're racing. Palmont City must not be as active at night because the traffic just isn't there, but there's cross traffic in the races, which looks funny because it crosses barriers you can't cross. I want to go there in the race! As far as the driving model goes, this is where a lot of Carbon's problems show up. For a good chunk of the game, it really feels like there's no sense of speed in the game. Kind of ironic considering it's a Need for Speed game. You really don't start experiencing a sense of speed until you unlock the tier 3 cars, but given the game's screwed up unlock system, it will be a while before you start getting those cars, or the parts to create a sense of speed.There's also the issue of hovercar physics, and this is mostly seen from jumps because you will be airborne for about a whole 20 seconds.
In all honesty, Carbon's not offering a whole lot of innovative things to the table. Aside from the usual game modes, canyon duels are a new feature that aren't quite as fun. These often result in races that have you the most concerned because you can end them by falling off the track. Yes, the first time around, you will probably fall off the track a few times before you get used to the hovercar physics. The wingman system is a welcome addition in that it does work well, but the game doesn't give you enough variety among the wingmen. In fact, two of them offer the same rewards and benifits, but perform a different action. I'd prefer to race without them because they just won't shut up for half the race, and they're just plain annoying. YEAH, YOU'RE LEADING THE PACK, ON YOUR LEFT, THAT'S HOW IT'S DONE, WHAT ARE THEY RACING, GO KARTS?!?! You'll hear the same thing over and over until you're sick of it.
Palmont City never sees daytime in this game, which may be an excuse to hide an average looking game. The way paint looks on these cars comes off as looking unrealistic to the point where it looks like a toy car. Aside from that though, Carbon does at times look above average, but it's still nothing to write home about. Especially when the damage model is nothing but scratched paint and broken windshields. The audio at least tries to do something interesting where if you drive muscle, you get hard rock, exotics get you hip hop, and tuners get you electronic music. Unfortunately... this is all rendered pointless when you actually race, because you just get the game's original music which consists of maybe two songs. It gets annoying after a while, and you just want it to stop. For an NFS game, I barely noticed the engine sounds over the loud blaring music and incessant chattering of the wingman.
Carbon isn't a total loss though, as despite its flaws, can still be fun. It's just the game doesn't deliver anything new to the table. It didn't quite live up to Most Wanted, but it's certainly better than Pro Street and Undercover. My one complaint about the PC version is no support for widescreen. I mean, really. Porsche Unleashed, for one reason or another since that game came out in 2000, supports widescreen resolutions. Carbon was a 2006 game and there's no widescreen for THAT? That's too minor of a quibble to prevent me from enjoying this.
(Why??? WHY??? WHYYYYYYYYYYYYY??????)
I've seen a lot of bad movies. I've paid to see a lot of bad movies. I saw The Last Airbender in theaters. That should be qualification enough to say this movie is by far the worst of 2011 so far, and may possibly be worse than Nicolas Cage's other movie Deadfall. Oh yes, it's that bad. It makes movies like Grown Ups, Nightmare on Elm Street (2010), and The Last Airbender look like oscar worthy movies.
Set in the era of the Crusades, Nicolas Cage and Ron Perlmen are supposed to be knights in the middle of the Crusades. It's difficult to take this whole thing seriously because of Cage's totally convincing english accent and his damn mullet. I have an easier time taking Ron Perlmen's ugly mug seriously, and he too has an english accent that's totally convincing. Yes, I'm being sarcastic when I say their accents are convincing, because I really mean they don't exist considering they're surrounded by people with english accents. Anyway, these two knights have to escort a woman accused of being a witch to a remote location so she may be put away for good. Apparently they need some relic called The Book of Solomon to perform the ritual.
Most of the movie consists of them escorting the girl to this remote location, all the while learning the secrets behind this witch. Because of it's 95 minute running time, you'd think this movie would go fast, but it doesn't. It's actually quite boring in the second act. I found myself almost falling asleep, but I needed to stay awake because I had to see all 95 minutes of this movie. During their travels through the Wormwood Forest, I kept thinking back to my house in New York where my backyard was basically the woods. I should have shot movies there when I had the chance, I could have been making millions! Eventually when action takes place it mostly consists of our heroes fighting CG creations, and even then the CG creations look about as cheap as Cage's armor. Yes, it's that unconvincing, and I am left with the idea that this was originally intended to be a 3D movie.
When the movie's all over, you want to tell yourself "thank god," but how can you after that final battle which reveals that this movie has no witches at all. Seriously, your movie is called Season of the Witch, and there aren't any witches in it. Oh, and that final battle itself is pretty silly because while Mullet Man and Tall Head fight off zombies the priest keeps reading from the Book of Solomon to try and eradicate the demon. When it was all over, I was left with a nasty feeling in my stomach.
Season of the Witch is by far the worst movie of 2011. It may also be worse than Deadfall. Yes, Deadfall is a terrible movie, but truth be told, I love watching Nicolas Cage's performance in Deadfall because it's hilariously bad. This is not hilariously bad. This is just god awful. I can't find one redeeming factor other than thank god it wasn't in 3D.
(The real fight is for the oscars)
So many boxing movies. Yet so many of them are actually good movies. The two most common examples of boxing movies are Raging Bull and Rocky. What happens when you take ideas from both movies, and put them together? You get David O. Russell's The Fighter. A movie that has its heart in the right place, but lacks the emotional punch of most boxing movies.
The Fighter follows "Irish" Mickey Ward (Mark Wahlberg) and his fight to the welterweight title. It's also about his older brother Dickie Eklund (Christian Bale) fighting his crack addiction. So really, the title can go two ways since it's about two different fights. The story is told with a fantastic script, but as stated earlier it lacks the emotional punch of a good chunk of boxing movies simply because you can already tell what's going to happen. To its credit though, the rest of the script is fantastic.
Where this movie shines though, are the performances. For the longest time, I've felt Mark Wahlberg hasn't had a good role since Dirk Diggler in Boogie Nights, which I feel he should have won an oscar for. After starring in such wonderful hits like Max Payne, Mark Wahlberg proves he is indeed worthy of an oscar by delivering a top notch performance as Mickey Ward. Christian Bale himself does a great job, and I had a hard time recognizing him as Christian Bale. He really did slim down to play the crack addict role so perfectly. Definite oscar nomination for Bale as a supporting actor.
Funny enough, there isn't that much in the way of boxing in this movie. Sure, it shows a couple of fights, and has a few short Rocky style montages, but this movie is about its fighters. When it came to the fights though, they stick a video filter over them to create this idea that they were the HBO broadcasted fights. While it's a great effect, it's lost when they use the same filter to show the more cinematic angles. This is only a minor issue though, as the fights themselves are, like Raging Bull's, the last few moments of the fight. It works, yet at the same time, it doesn't.
The Fighter is Mark Wahlberg's best movie in a damn long while. It's also another great addition into the sports movie genre. While we have to put up with a rather predictable ending, the script, Wahlberg and Bale's performances really make up for it. There's a lot of heart in this movie that it deserves its oscar nominations. I can only hope Wahlberg will have a streak, because this movie has given him a bright future.
(We need more movies like this.)
So I'm entering 2011 with a movie from 2010, simply because I had been meaning to see The King's Speech for a long time. After sitting through so many poor quality movies last year, it's a miracle movies like The King's Speech still exist. This is a movie that gives 3D and visual effects the finger, and tells a story about hope in dire times.
The King's Speech is both a literal and metaphorical title in the sense. The Duke of York, better known in this movie as Bertie (Colin Firth), has been given the honor of being crowned King George VI. Trouble is, Bertie is not so good at delivering speeches thanks to a speech impediment he's had since he was five years old. His wife, Elizabeth (Helena Bonham Carter) recommends him to Lionel Logue (Geoffery Rush), who will help him overcome his stammering to deliver a speech during the dark times of Hitler and Nazism to give London the hope it needs. Yes, it's pretty much inspirational oscar bait, but I can't fault them for that. I was desperate for a movie with such beautiful storytelling, and I finally got one after waiting for so damn long.
Both Colin Firth and Geoffery Rush play off each other so well. At times I forgot I was watching a movie and thought I was in the same room with these two. Lionel's unorthodox therapy methods are some of the funniest things I've seen in a while. There's just something about a speech therapist who finds dropping F-bombs theraputic quite hilarious. From what we see of Helena Bonham Carter's performance, I am very impressed with her screen presence in this movie. Another minor performance I was impressed with was Timothy Spall's performance as Winston Churchill. I want to see him get nominated for best supporting actor for this movie, simply because he nails his character so well.
I can safely say that there are two departments this movie will win an oscar in is its costume and set design. 1930's London is recreated beautifully in this movie, with plenty of colorful, fancy decor all over the place. Lionel's office, on the other hand, is very cozy, house warming, and welcoming with an elevator that barely fits two people. Helena Bonham Carter wears the most beautiful, elegantly designed outfits along with pearls, which seemed to be typical of English royalty. I'm going to get a lot of heat for that, so I apologize if I insulted anyone reading this that's British. When Bertie is crowned King George VI he wears a fine suit full of medals and awards, fit for royalty. I really hope it wins oscars for these two areas.
The King's Speech is a refreshing movie in this day and age. We've had to put up with the 3D gimmick being shoved down our throats, movies that use dazzling visual effects, and explosions everywhere to mask poor movie making and storytelling. The King's Speech is one of those movies that entertains you with a wonderful oscar-bait story that is very powerful and inspiring, and dazzles you with pretty set design and costumes.
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