This movie got made?

Robin Hood or Apple TV steels from the poor and gives to itself.

2011-02-01T18:14:00.000-08:00

Jason and I have been watching films together for a long time now. Since the 20th Centrury. We've seen a lot of home movie technologies come and go.

It started with VHS. The quality was shite, the films were Pan & Scanned and the TV's were small and the screens curved out. Then VHS tapes got wide screened. At some point I had a ridiculously expensive Laser Disc player that would flip the discs on it's own making crazy mechanical sounds as it did it. It broke before I watched maybe 20 films on it but since there weren't that many Laser Discs around it didn't matter. (Of Note: for years I refused to throw that hunk of metal out because I was always going to "fix it" like some kind of crazy hoarder. It only went into the trash in 2006) Then of course came DVD's which became the regular ritual as it is known today. We moved up to larger TV's 27", 32" tube TVs with flat screens and fancy things like Tipple Comb Noise Filter and Surround Sound. Finally came Blue Ray, 1080p, and massive TVs; Jason has a large LCD flat screen and I project my movies on to a Screen that is 10 feet wide. But due to downloading legal and illegal is Blue Ray like laser disc not long for this world? Maybe.

Jason got Apple TV for Christmas this year so last night we were going to sample the latest most convenient technology that is supposed to replace all these wacky wasteful discs. All you have to do is scroll to your favorite new movie select it and off you go. No driving to the video store in the cold, no aimless wandering in the aisles, no snotty Video Store staff reminding us of our younger selves making us long for an innocence and youth long lost and forgotten. Just easy scrolling and selecting. We even decided to make the food run for this viewing extra special and drove all the way across the Canada USA border to sample that latter nations greater selection of snack food wares. With the extra time we were going to save just simply choosing a film from a menu we could afford to drive farther for something more exotic, and what's more exotic than the Cost Cutter in Blaine, Washington. It was. An Unmitigated. Disaster.

After what turned out to be a quite lengthy trip to the USA, what with the border line ups, sheer real-estate size of the Cost Cutter, a slight detour due to an out of date GPS map, and general lethargy by us we returned tired and eager for some crappy movie fun. On goes the Apple TV. The selection sucked. It was like looking at a New Release wall from 2010, we had seen most of these movies. It seemed like Jason couldn't figure out the menus or they were hard to use but the same movies kept scrolling through again and again. (When did Edward Norton and Robert Deniro do a film where Edward Norton has corn rows? It looks retarded.) Finally after we scrolled confusingly past Russel Crowe's face brandishing a bow for like the tenth time we just gave up and decided to watch Riddley Scott's Robin Hood, staring said Aussie musician. This took I would say no less time than going to the video store and aimlessly walking around the aisles. At least then we would have been getting some exercise, here we were just sitting annoyed getting myopia looking at the endlessly scrolling cover boxes.

Then the real trouble started. I got up to pee and when I came back Jason was mumbling something about how he had selected the wrong version of the film and now we were going to have to watch the PG14 version not the Unrated Version because once you select something you can't go back. Then the thing reset itself. No explanation no download it just went back to the main screen. Jason had to go back through the menus but this time selected the Unrated. And of course now the thing told him he was going to have to pay for both. He started to get upset and in his fluster he chose the 14A version again and refused any mention of the Unrated because if he clicked on it "they" would know he had watched some of it and make him pay and he had to call "them" in the morning to cancel. I don't know who "they" are but I just want them to let me watch the right goddamn movie.

Finally it looked like we were going to watch the film. Not the version of the film we wanted to watch but at least a film. A scroll bar appeared on the bottom and that wheel thing like in YouTube videos appeared at the centre of the screen to tell us something was happening. And we waited, and waited, and waited, and waited. Finally a message appeared telling us we only had 5hours and 17minutes left of this download. At this point I started waving my arms and yelling like a Neanderthal but my yelps were cut short because the screen had changed and the movie in all its 14A glory had started. There were men dressed in scary costumes running through the woods setting fire to a village, then the lady from the opening of Lord of the Rings appeared looking super intense with a bow and arrow about to shoot it at the scary figures when....the image froze and the wheel in the middle of the screen reappeared.

Jason then proceeded to mumble something about ethenet cables and wireless and stomp around at the back of his TV pulling on rat nest of wires connectors looking like a giant moth larva trapped in some technological spider web. All that changed was that a new message appeared informing us that it would only take 3 hours for our download now. My Neanderthal yelps resumed and we were forced to give up. All this took a terribly long time and it was getting late and we're no longer those young innocent video store clerks that can afford to sleep in till the afternoon. We're adults that have to wake up early and take on the world.

Gripes

Apple TV sucks

What Worked

I got to see 3 minutes of Robin Hood and in that 3 minutes it looked like shite so I guess I was saved from watching it this time. Also not to let the whole night go to waste we watched Bourne Ultimatum on DVD and it worked and it Owned. And since we had both seen the movie a few times before we could talk through out it and share our feelings on prejudice: It's wrong.

Is It Better than Dungeons and Dragons
If Apple TV were a movie it would be Dungeons and Dragons starring a bored, tired, and defeated Jeremy Irons.

Mediocrity Scale

Bellow Mediocre. Apple TV just does not work. It didn't work at all. At all. It was a terrible mess. I hope it wasn't expensive although I'm sure it was. I'm sorry. I feel sorry for you. I wish I could help. I wish I could make it better. I can't. All I can do is write this long rambling scathing review that no one will read.

Food.

The snacks were actually quite good. Although Cost Cutter is huge the selection of snack foods was still underwhelming. It was basically the same stuff in Canada but more competitively priced and in larger and brighter packaging. The most exciting thing that isn't available up north was the Throwback Pepsi and Mountain Dew. These are limited editions of these pops that are made with real sugar not sucrose and the original 1900's formulations. The Mountain Dew was the best as it tasted quite refreshing and juicy, almost healthy vs it's modern day counter part. The Pepsi didn't taste much different I don't think. It was rather bland in my opinion. We also got Doritos, Toasted Corn flavour which apparently also is not sold in Canada and with good reason because it just tastes like regular corn Nachos; bland and boring. I want my Doritos to have some artificial flavor zest and burn my tongue by the sixth one. Next we had TGI Fridays brand Mozzarella Sticks and Jose Ole's Shredded Steak Taquitos. I think these items are available in Canada but their cost has always made them forbidden. Luckily Americans love greasy microwavable snack foods for cheap so we were able to get them. They were both delicious and tasty out of the oven; not too dry or greasy, though that might have something to do with Jason's super fantastic fancy oven. The sticks came with marinarra dipping sauce and it was delectable to dip into. Well done.

Sorcerereres Apprentice

2011-01-22T01:57:00.000-08:00

Ugh. Really we're watching this?

Gripes
What if you took that one part in Empire Strikes Back where Luke goes to Degobah and learns the ways of the force from Yoda and turned it into a whole two hour movie and replaced Yoda with a haggard and sedated Nicolas Cage and Luke with an even worse actor than the guy that played Luke and the force with magic. Oh and Alfred Molina is doing something too but who cares. The movie opens with a long creepy sounding voice over sequence about Merlin and his apprentices and how they are fighting the Borg Queen or something because she wants to destroy the world. Really that's what she wants to do. She doesn't want to rule it or anything she just wants to destroy everything including I would assume herself. How lame. Anyway Merlin dies and Nic Cage traps the Borg Queen in a Russian Doll along with his girlfriend and Alfred Molina. Fast forward a thousand years and Nic has spent all this time looking for (are you bored yet, this is only the first five minutes of the movie) looking for the Prime Merlinian who will inherit all of Merlin's powers because he/she (I don't think in the montage Nic tries any girls but I'll be more gender neutral than the movie) has some of Merlin's blood in them. Whatever. Any way the kid from the Pizza Pop ads is the Prime Merlinian and he has to overcome being an awkward science geek so he can date this girl and save the world. Nic finds the kid then the movie fast-forwards another ten years and he finds him again then we have the looooooong boring empire sequence where the opening expository narration is now repeated over and over by Nic Cage to the kid and then finally Pizza Pop kid uses science and his Merlin powers to defeat the Borg Queen. Very Tidy by the numbers and totally lacking any personality. Everyone seems to be sleep walking through this, writers, director, Molina, Cage, random blonde love interest, the effects people. The only person not sleep walking is the Pizza Pop kid; he tires so hard but I don't know if it's the editing or the directing but he just ends up being one note and the timing of all the jokes is cut to shit.

What worked
At one point it looks like Cage and Pizza kid will have to fight all these magicians one by one using clever tricks. But that's not what happens. In fact Molina who's sorta the main baddy kills all the other magicians for them with a vulcan death pinch or something. It's awful and lazy. So I guess what worked is a momentary moment where it looked like the movie would be cool and there's a car chase that was maybe for a micro second cool when it wasn't poorly paced and cg'ed to indifference.

Mediocrity Scale
Telephoned. As in everyone phoned it in.

Is it Worse than Dungeons and Dragons
It does have a dragon in it at one point; one of those big screaming CG dragons that lets the heroes jump out of the way just in time from it's loud screechy digital jaws. I would have to say the movie is better; it's so uncreative that it's unoffensive, and there's a car chase that's boring but I could pretend that it could be better.

Food
Kellog Cinabon granola bars; 12 in a box so six each. The box claims that these are around "For a Limited Time Only" and I think the world will be a better place once that time runs out. These taste like crumbly uncooked batter slathered in the cheapest and worst sugary icing. I don't remember tasting any cinnamon but I'm sure there was some there. I don't recommend eating one of these things let alone six. The sugar content kept me up all night sweating icing. I can't remember but I think we had cheese Doritos as well or it could be that the Cinabon things made me hallucinate the Doritios whilst in some kind of Diabetic shock comma.

Jennifer's Body

2011-01-22T01:18:00.000-08:00

The French title for this film is Le Corpse de Jennifer. The use of the word corpse is quite appropriate here, cause this movie has all the life of one. Boom Zing.

Gripes
You know I bet if you wrote a quirky little screenplay about a clever teen preggo that was critically acclaimed and made it all the way to the Oscars you'd be pretty high on yourself. I bet you'd feel like you could effing do anything, hell I bet that you'd think you could write a killer teen horror flick and knock it out of the park. Well, you'd be wrong. I'm sure everyone involved in the making of Jennifer's Body probably felt pretty good about the project. I mean hell, it stars sex pot Meghan Fox of 2 hour GM robot advertisement fame, the screenplay is written by none other than the writer of last years indie-breakout film Juno, and it's about teens having sex and getting eaten by a monster. What could go wrong? Plenty.

This movie is boring. Just plain boring. The action is boring, the writing is boring, and the acting is boring. I think the reason that it is so boring is that no one cares, this is the ultimate hipster horror film in that everyone in it is too cool to care so there's no stakes because guess what; if you don't care, I don't care so why the hell are we all here, just turn off the movie and go home.

What Worked
The girl that plays the lead is a good actor and I could tell that she was trying to care which was probably discouraged on the set. But she tried.

Is It Better than Dungeons and Dragons
Yes.

Mediocrity Scale
Less than Just Mediocre. It tries to be subversive and good but ends up being boring and lame.

Food
I started writing this review over a year ago and have long forgotten what we ate; I'm sure it was bad for me.

Gamer

2010-04-10T00:42:00.001-07:00

Gerard Butler, the guys who made Crank, Dexter, and Keira Knightley, what could go wrong? Plenty.

Gripes
I liked Crank. It had great fun characters, decent action, and it used the conventions of video gaming to tell a cinematic story. Now Gamer takes the conventions of 1st person shooters and makes a big pile of crap on the screen. I had no idea what was happening, or at least I didn't care. Most of the movie is all shaky and jump cutty like your watching it through a bad internet connection or something. There's lots of shooting and blowing things up but none of it is linear or logical so it's just shooting and blowing things up for the sake of making loud noises and flashes on the screen. When there is any dialogue, following in the 1st person shooter vain, it's all poorly scripted exposition that you could give a crap about. Dexter wants to control the world with nanites blah blah blah. There's no logic, there's barely a story, and the action sucks.

What Worked
There's some nudity but it's so pointless and shot to make it look horrible and ugly that it didn't need to be there. There'slots bloody violence but it looks fake and not in a fun way so it's useless. There's one hand to hand fight scene near the end of the film that felt linear and real, that's about it. Dexter does his Dexter thing but I can see that in Dexter and it's much more interesting there. So not much worked for me.

Mediocrity Scale
Below Mediocre, barely trying.

Better than Dungeons & Dragons?
I really didn't enjoy this movie. It's just that it so doesn't make any sense as a cohesive film, it's just a bunch of loud crap vomited up on the screen for the sake of being 'cool'. I think it comes close to being at least as bad as Dungeons and Dragons but it did have that one good fistacuffs and there is shooting of guns and peoples heads getting blown up and bare breasts, so at least it tried a bit harder than D&D.

Food
Some kind of 'Real Dairy' ice cream; tasty and creamy. And Cplus; which made me extremely thirsty for anything else.

The International

2009-06-11T10:59:00.000-07:00

Decent, slow really really slow international thriller. Smart looking but dumb.

Gripes
This movie follows in the footsteps of international thrillers like Syrianna or Michael Clayton, but the biggest difference between those movies and this is that those movies were well written and always a step ahead of their audience, forcing the audience to pay attention and think. The International however is not clever enough to stay ahead of the audience. Early on there are long scenes with lots of expository dialogue that basically explain the whole thing and just in case you weren't paying attention the info is repeated through out. Basically this big bank is bad, so bad that they control everything ooooh. Okay we get it. There's also some convoluted plot about selling guidance systems for missiles to terrorists but it's really inconsequential. You don't have to pay attention to the International, infact I challenge any one just to watch the first 10 seconds of each DVD chapter, you will I'm sure have the exact same summary of the film as someone who watched the whole thing, but you will have saved lots of time.

What Worked
Clive Owen is always cool and that blonde actress was good. It all happens in Bahauss Europe and is spectacularly shot so as a travel video of cool buildings in Europe it works really well. VW AG also provided the cars so there's lots of cool shots of Audi's and VW driving around Europe so if you like that you'll be impressed. Finally Evil German Industrialist villains are always kind of cool. At one point the movie gets a pulse and there's a ridiculous oozie shootout at the Gugenheim (I told you it's all Bahaus), it's clearly how the movie got it's R rating but it's still somehow lacks real tension just like the rest of the film. It's shoehorned in and story wise the characters are in the exact same place before and after the shootout so it could have been like five seconds or not in the film at all. Clive Owen gets shot in the face though and that's cool, but later he doesn't seem to notice it.

Mediocrity Scale
Meciocre

Better than Dungeons and Dragons?
Yes. The R rating alone raises it above D&D, it's also shot with competency.

Food
We had real Root Beer floats with real vanilla ice cream. Also Cakesters and double chocololate chip cookies to complete the Insulin shock.

Commando + Ransom = Taken

2009-05-21T16:06:00.000-07:00

I wasn't that impressed by the trailers for Taken. The idea of Qui-Gon Jinn going on a rampage Charles Bronson style on the men who kidnapped his daughter seemed pretty weak. I wondered how well Qui-Gon would be able to convey the proper emotional response when speaking with the kidnappers. However, given the choice between renting Taken and the latest Underworld abomination, I was happy to give way to my curiosity and find out if Qui-Gon was up to the challenge.

Like John Matrix before him, Qui-Gon is a retired special agent/army type who just wants to live a quiet life and be a good dad. How will Qui-Gon react when his daughter wants to go to Paris with her best friend for the summer? Not too well. Despite his reservations, his ex-wife (another thankless role for Famke Janssen) guilts him into agreeing to the scheme and away they go.

It doesn't take long for the girls to get into trouble. Like all good best friend characters in these kinds of movies, best friend has "loose morals" and announces that she's going to have sex with that guy from the airport who offered to share a cab. With the countdown to best friend's demise under way, a group of kidnappers arrive to abduct the girls. Now daddy's got just 96 hours to track down the bastards who kidnapped his daughter and get some revenge.

With the setup out of the way we get to the action. The good: innocent people get used as human shields, large body count, well choreographed (for the most part) fight scenes (think Jason Bourne style). The bad: the car chases are terrible. During one chase scene at some sort of factory/mining operation it is at times difficult to tell who exactly is chasing who.

The movie ends predictably enough, and I can't say I really have any complaints except that 1) the stupid ex-wife doesn't get any sort of comeuppance and 2) there is a lame subplot involving a Britney Spears type character whose life Qui-Gon saves near the beginning of the movie while on assignment. Said subplot is revisited at the tail end of the movie for no good reason. Maybe that was just in the extended cut?

Pain score: 1 of 10.

Special note on the snacks this week. I was recently in the states for a shopping trip and brought back a four pack of bottled A&W Rootbeer Floats. This is the kind of product I love. It's only available in the United States because a product like this could only exist in a place like the United States.

Think about this. This is a drink that contains (amongst a number of chemical ingredients) milk. That's right, milk. But unlike a carton of milk, you won't find this float in the dairy aisle. It's on the shelf, unrefrigerated. Disturbing.

If there is any doubt in your mind, the drink is foul. Possibly the worst snacktime beverage we have ever had.

Taken

2009-05-21T00:11:00.000-07:00

What happens when the foreigners of the world kidnap America's teenage daughters to use as sex slaves? America sends Liam Neeson to kick their fucking ass.

Gripes:

My biggest gripe has to be with the green screen shots of people driving. They look like something out of Sinefeild. 1990 called, they want their greenscreen back. Also the girl playing the daughter was like 40 and kind of annoying so it was hard to beleive she was so naive and it was kind of okay that she got kidnapped and turned into a sex slave. Poor casting.

Overall I don't have a lot gripes with this films. It does what it advertises; Liam Neeson's daughter gets kidnapped and so he goes and kicks the kidnappers ass. These are the worst anti-American kidnapers, they're based in France, they're Albanian, in cahoots with corrupt French spies, that sell virgin American daughters to Middle-Eastern sheiks via corrupt business men. American headline fears rolled up into one neat package, I'm surprised they weren't doing it to encourage Global Warming. Retired CIA special Operative Liam Neeson goes after them, tortures them, kills them, and finally delivers his daughter into the hands of an American teen pop star analogue to get career training. Ironically his daughter's kidnapping experiences have given her some of the training to be an American Teen pop star already, half naked dancing and all. So in a way Neason saves his daughter from being pimped out to Saudi Sheiks to be pimped out to the American public. USA USA USA.

What worked:
It feels good. Seeing foreign terrorists and their like get horribly killed by mild-mannered Neeson is strangely satisfying. Every man in that theatre could sympathise with Neason, if it was my daughter I would do the same. Of course I'm not a CIA operative so probably I would just roll up on the floor and cry and call the police or something.

Neason is a good action star. He creates a real three dimensional person here not just some mindless killing machine and it helped to get me involved in the story because the script certainly didn't.

Mediocrity Scale:
Just Above Mediocre

Better than D&D:
Yes, cohesive story and cathartic violence.

Food:
Awful Awful things. 5 Pogos which are disgusting in themselves but washed down with a horrible abomination that Jason brought from the USA; A&W rootbeer float in a bottle. All the goodness of a Root beer float, in a bottle. It was super sweet. Like cheap ice cream that melted in root beer syrup, then was left out in the sun until rotted. It made me want to barf. If someone asked "what is robot jizz like?" I would point them in the direction of A&W rootbeer float in a bottle.

The Spiri...zzzzzzzzzzzzzzz

2009-04-15T21:12:00.000-07:00

I fell asleep through this one so I can't really give a review because I didn't really see it.

Gripes:

All I can remember is it looks like Sin City, it's dumb, horrible horrible scenery chewing Samuel L. Jackson, everything is in slo mo - and sleepy time. This is one of those movies where every single thing they say and every image are really really really important and just so you don't forget they're gonna make it in slow motion. It's terrible and boring.

Get this mutherfuckin Samuel L. Jackson out of mutherfuckin movies.

What Worked:

The only thing that worked was the cut of Eva Medes' shirts.

Worse than Dungeons and Dragons?

Maybe but I slept through it.

Mediocrity Scale:

Trying too hard to be mediocre but failing miserably so, less than mediocre

Prince Caspian

2009-03-05T11:24:00.001-08:00

This movie was definitely better than the Wardrobe one but it still kinda sucked.

Gripes:

The biggest problem I had was the heavy duty emo acting by the teen leads. The guy who plays Peter should be shot in the face. Just quit whining you pussy. And the girl that plays his sister is always on the verge of crying; happy or sad she's always just about to cry and she looks like Octo-mom which = gross. I didn't care about them for one second and hoped they would die. Happily I'm told they don't return to the series and only the younger kids do, which is good because they weren't as annoying.

What Worked:

Okay I never actually thought this would happen but the CGI creatures in the film were pretty much photo real and perfect. The Badger especially looked totally real. I think this film sets a high mark for special effects CGI creatures and should have been nominated Oscar time. Aslan's mane looked totally real even though he's creepy and why didn't he help them when they were all getting killed. You suck Aslan. The effects here, which were a big problem in the last movie, were top notch.

Worse than Dungeons and Dragons?

No. Watchable.

Mediocrity Scale:

The effects were good, but this movie is looooong and not all that engaging. Mediocre.

Food:

Coke Zero and mystery flavour Doritos. Jason's wife Dianna came up with the name Firey Four Cheese Fiesta which I think is brilliant and describes the chips exactly. I won't be suprised if that's what they end up being called. We had yellow Cakesters as well. Sugary and gross but good.

That's Incredible

2008-10-30T14:03:00.000-07:00

I wish that after my long absence posting reviews that I could tell you they made a That's Incredible movie and that Cathy Lee Crosby was the best thing in it, but instead you'll have to settle for a few thoughts on the Incredible Hulk.

Like many of you unfortunate enough to have seen the 2003 Ang Lee Hulk picture, my hopes for this ~~sequel~~ re imagining were not very high. Sure, this time we get Ed Norton and Liv Tyler, but I don't hate Eric Bana and I'll take Jennifer Connelly over Tyler any day of the week.

The question then is, does this Hulk deliver? Kind of. A little bit. Maybe. As I write these reviews I am reminded more and more just how cynical I am with regard to the movies I see these days. Perhaps it is that I'm getting older, but I rarely seem to feel the excitement for films that I did working at Blockbuster in the late '90s when I was in film school. The Incredible Hulk is a prime example of the kind of movie that I feel absolutely ho-hum about now, but wonder if I would have enjoyed more ten years ago.

Or perhaps The Incredible Hulk (and it's ilk) just isn't really that great. Too many meetings with marketing, too many producers wanting to be creative (and by creative I mean pander to the lowest common audience denominator so as to ensure that no one is offended) and ultimately a lackluster effort.

The Hulk has never been my favorite Marvel character, though I do profess a soft-spot for the grey-skinned hulk of the late '80s comics. Somehow the phrase "Hulk Smash!" never really did anything for me and the Hulk on display here both typifies the aspects of the character I find most boring and actually says the phrase.

In terms of the story, the Hulk himself is almost a non-character here, with the real story being about Bruce Banner trying to cure himself of his inner, green demon. If you've seen the Ang Lee version, the story is pretty much the same. Banner is on the run and the military is after him. They find him, he gets angry, smashes a bunch of stuff, repeat. Oh, there's a showdown with another "Hulk creature" (no Hulk dogs though) too. No sign of the She-Hulk though. Too bad.

Apparently there are plans to make a Thor movie, a Captain America movie and then an Avengers movie, with those two, Iron Man, Spiderman and the Hulk rounding out the cast of heroes. Given the Hulk character we've seen in the movies so far, I'm not sure how that's going to work - the Hulk, like my one year olds, doesn't know how to use his words yet.

Ultimately this movie left no real impression on me either way beyond almost total indifference. As a whole I neither liked it nor hated it, but felt both ways as it moved along.

Pain score: 4 of 10.

We had Michelina Snack rolls (both chicken and apple flavors) and Cakesters as snacks. Truly a delight.

The Incredible Hulk

2008-10-30T10:41:00.000-07:00

I miss Arnold Schwarzenegger. I don't necessarily miss the man but I miss the attitude. In his world there were good guys and there were bad guys and you killed the bad guys mercilessly and you protected the good guys and you didn't ask questions. The new crop of super heroes these days are all so emo. They side with the bad guys and feel bad about hurting them so it was no surprise when during the climactic battle between the Hulk and some other mutant Hulk, the green Hulk makes a sour emo-singer face and decides to spare the mutant Hulks life, even though the mutant hulk has killed a ton of people and has been trying to kill the Hulk for the whole movie. Look I'm not arguing that in real life we must have understanding and compassion for even the worst monsters of society, but that's real life, in the movies I want catharsis and for me that's seeing bad guys get shot in the face. The people agree; Iron Man was a huge hit, is it necessarily a better movie than The Incredible Hulk. They both pretty much follow the same superhero movie formula, they have big action set pieces, lots of CGI explosions, and skinny starlets but one tanked and one succeeded. The difference is attitude. The Hulk hates being the Hulk and spends the whole movie, the whole movie right up to the end brooding and whining about it. Iron Man is Iron man and he loves it so we love it too. And so what he blows up some terrorists that probably were lead into terrorism because the oppressive policies of the western world reduced their countries into impoverished third world states leaving them no choice but to be a terrorist blah blah save it for the UN. I don't want to think about that I want to see the hero smile while he blows their heads off and not cry and whine about it. I want Tyler Durden, instead I got the other guy.

Gripes

Is green hard to render in a computer? Because since the first Hulk movie flopped so long ago the hulk CGI still looks fake. The stuff getting smashed looked good but hulk and abominable hulk looked fake.
Stan Lee, Lou Ferrina, some other guy all made Hulk cameos. Annoying and pulled me out of the movie but I guess if you're a big fan of the comics you'd get a kick out of it.
At the end of the film Robert Downey Jr. makes an appearance as Tony Stark to set up some kind of sequel. It just encourages the comparison between the failure and non failure and is all gross in that "marketing up your ass" sort of way.
Liv Tyler is completely useless in this movie, her role could have been played by a blow up doll because all she does during the film is make the O face. It's not her fault it's the writing.
What's the conflict here? Jack doesn't want to be the Hulk, he's looking for the cure, crazed general and crazy soldier guy are looking for him, they fight a couple of times, Jack gets the cure, crazy soldier turns into crazy hulk, cure is ignored and jack hulks out, he beats up crazy hulk but doesn't kill him, end, nothing is really resolved and I feel cheated because the whole movie is set up for some distant sequel.

What Worked

Edward Norton while maybe not the most obvious choice for an action star is a great actor and compelling to watch. Sadly he's not given much to do here. He broods and broods some more. The scenes of him in Brazil hiding out and interacting with the locals were somehow the most compelling and interesting and made me care about the character. But then everything turned to turd.

Worse Than Dungeons and Dragons?

No. At no point does anyone yell unenthusiastically "now is your time to die"

Mediocrity Scale

Mediocre

Food

We had some kind of excellent snack size pastry filled with apple or buffalo chicken. It was reduced for quick sale at the store but was quite excellent. Oreo Cakesters to fill out the sugar quotient and Coke Zero to wash it all down.

Rush Hour 3

2008-09-15T20:25:00.001-07:00

This is easily one of the worst movies we've had the un-pleasure of watching. As you may or may not have noticed in my reviews I compare each movie to Dungeons and Dragons, the worst movie we have ever watched in our little weekly get together. DD was not enjoyable on any level, intentional or unintentional. There are lots of bad movies but often they're so bad that it's actually interesting or enjoyable to watch them, kind of like a car crash or snuff film, but DD was not pleasant in any way, it was just minutes and minutes of failure you aren't interested in seeing. The second worst movie we have ever seen was Stuck on You, horrible but not horrible enough to dethrone DD. Is Rush Hour 3 bad enough to take the top spot?

The original Rush Hour concept was simple; mix 1 part Chris Tucker comedy, with 1 part Jackie Chan high wire action and you've got a killer buddy-action-comedy flick. So what went wrong here?

Gripes:

1st the comedy; it's old, its tired, it ain't there. There are basically three gags in the whole movie and they are recycled ad nauseum. Gag #1 Chris Tucker Yells and Yells and Yells. I don't know what happened to Chris Tucker but the novelty of his yelling has worn off. I believe it wore off somewhere near the end of Rush Hour 1. Gag #2 Chris Tucker Sings Sooooouuuuuul Music and Dances All Kooky. The movie opens with this and it's not funny from the get go. He just looked bored here, like he wanted to leave and had something better to do. He probably did - heck going to take a dump would have been better than this. The guy needs new shtick bad. Note; apparently he got paid 20million for this movie so really he gets the last laugh on us. Gag #3 Jackie Chan talks in Ebonics. Not since Cousin Balky has mangling the english language been used to such ineffective comic effect. Basically this just isn't a funny movie, it's not even funny for not being funny. If you want comedy look elsewhere.

2nd the action: Jackie Chan ain't as spry as he used to be. He's getting old and he can't do all the stunts that he could before. Really he's geriatric at this point and I think the biggest stunt he managed here was jumping and hiding in a big flag. Other wise he just kicks people and jumps over small coffee tables. Not very good. Worse; I guess Tucker got tired of playing the incompetent that messes everything up and he wanted to do some kung fu too. There's even some ridiculous expository dialogue (that Tucker yells at top volume) that explains this. It's stupid and it fucks up the formula; Tucker mucks up in a humourous way, Chan saves him in creative action packed way. Instead they just clumsily hit stuff and chan jumps over a very small table. Whopee. I guess that's the biggest problem here, this movie feels old and tired like it's really been done before, but at the same time it tinkers enough with the tried and true formula to not even give you the pay off seeing something you're used to working. In the end we just tuned out of the movie and let it play out to it's predictable boring conclusion.

What Worked

Say what you will about Brett Ratner he can direct some good action sequences, or maybe that was his second unit. But there are good moments in a car chase scene. That's about it.

So Is it Worse than Dungeons and Dragons?

No. It's not even worse than Stuck on You. Don't get me wrong this is horrible, the worst most uninteresting thing we've seen in weeks. A movie that seeks out your hate gland and tickles it in full force but it has one thing going for it: Money. This movie had a big budget and you can see the dollars on the screen. From the car chases to the predictable scenes of our heroes hanging (and yelling constantly yelling) from the Eifle Tower it all looks so good and that was the most enjoyable thing. DD had nothing like that, it looked like it was made for a hundred bucks even though probably it cost millions, so therefore Rush Hour 3 was better.

Mediocrity Scale

Not Even Mediocre.

Food

We shirked the store bought processed food for delicious home made chocolate cake. Nuff said.

Street Kings? Kings of the Street?

2008-09-04T20:19:00.000-07:00

Shit I just watched it last night and I've already forgotten the title. Anyways Forrest Whittaker and Keanu Reeves are crooked cops in L.A. But then Keanu is crooked to do good and it turns out that Whittaker is just crooked and so is all of Keanu's unit. Also Johnny Flame or whatever is there too and he gets killed. And that doctor guy Bones? Mothers? whatever he walks with a limp and is really raspy he's there too and he appears every once in a while to be all raspy and shit. I'm telling you all of this but you already know this from the first frame of film because it's all really predictable and by the numbers and the big twist isn't really any kind of twist plus there's another twist that is so ridiculous that it's best left ignored. Still I liked it. There's people shooting at each other and murder and it's all rated R and it's kind of fun. I also liked Keanu as this older experienced kind of killer cop guy. I beleived it especially next to the Flalme On guy, I really saw the experienced successful sci-fi franchise veteran next to the new up and commer.

Gripes: Two Words: Forrest Whittaker. I just don't see what people like about this guy, I can't stand him. I don't know why but he just rubs me in a bad way. He always looks like he's about to cry or something. I just want to pinch his cheeks and tickle his belly and say "it's alright don't cry".

What Worked: A guy gets shot throught the back of the head and the front of his face gets blown off, another guy gets machined gunned repeatedly by two guys until he's just kind of jello. I love that kind of stuff, it takes me back to my fondest childhood memories of sneaking into Rated R movies at the local ciniplex.

Worse Thank Dungeons and Dragons? No. It did not incite any hate or desire to track down the movie makers, chain them to a wall, whip their backs, then pour lemon juice on the wounds like DD did.

Mediocrity Scale: A bit above Mediocre Violence.

Food: We started with a litre each of Sinful Cookie or something Ice Cream. Sweet, pretty creamy cheap Safeway Ice Cream that gave me bad farts and weird poo due to my mild lactose intolerance. Next we followed it up with some Pringles Restaurant Special Chips in Hamburger flavour. Yes that's right Hamburger. There were pictures of Hamburgers on the box to signify that it was indeed Hamburger flavour. Unfortunately it just tasted like a combo of ketchup, cheese, and smoke flavour and was quite disappointing. We didn't even finish it. To drink the always venerable Coke Zero.

10,000 BC

2008-08-25T19:46:00.001-07:00

We avoided renting this one for a long time. There it sat on the shelf at the video store, mocking us - daring us to rent it. Week after week we ignored it, pointing at it jokingly, asking ourselves when we would be desperate enough to rent this movie called "10,000 BC".

Well, we finally succumbed, as I knew we eventually would. If you haven't seen the movie and are wondering what it was like, the best description I could give you would be to imagine crossing Clan of the Cave Bear with Ice Age, with maybe a little Conan the Barbarian and 300 thrown in.

The story starts with the tale of a young hunter who has a crush on the most beautiful girl in his tribe - a girl with some sort of prophecy associated with her. The young man is not altogether that popular with his fellow tribe-mates after his father, the lead hunter of the tribe, abandons them when his son is a small boy. Since this boy is the lead, you know he's going to prove himself on his first hunt, proving his worth against a mammoth that looked about as realistic as an animal from the aforementioned Ice Age.

Having proven himself to the "haters" within the first 20 minutes of the film, the film gets going when the beautiful girl is kidnapped by a proto-islamic Thulsa Doom thug leading our hero and a few of his tribemates on a cross counry search worthy of Aragorn, Gimli and Legolas. Gathering the support of the united nations along the way, our hero finally finds himself in Egypt where he leads a slave rebellion against the King and some more bad CGI animals.

It's been awhile since we've seen a movie this bad. How hard would it have been to make the film a little bit more Dragonslayer or Beastmaster and a little bit less Apocalypto? This film didn't even throw us a bone like Apocalypto did with the Jaguar scene.

Pain score: 7.5 out of 10.

Fittingly, the snacks were bad as well. We had some kind of baked cracker snacks called Crispers. It was a real disgrace to eat something so healthy and we couldn't even finish a single bag of the cardboard "chips".

10,000 b.c.

2008-08-10T00:03:00.000-07:00

A bunch of tribesmen who speak in really short serious sentences (akin to Lothar of the Hill People) track down a bunch of pre-Muslim Muslims who stole some of their friends and a very special girl with blue eyes. Their journey leads them to befriend many noble humorously dressed African tribesmen and they and digital Mamoths, Sabertooths and Ostritches overthrow the evil pre-Egyptian Egyptian emperor and free all the slaves. Yay. This is a movie for everyone. So it sucks. It takes it self very seriously but is totally and completely ridiculous. At about the 45minute mark my brain completely shut down and I was actually able to enjoy the rest of the movie, so I recommend lowering you mental activity to basic brain stem function before starting the film and you'll have a great time.

Gripes: Bad CGI. Stilted terrible expository dialogue about lots of plot lines and ideas about long lost fathers, ancient tribes, old mothers, spirtis, and all of them go absolutely nowhere. PG rating takes all credibility away (that blue eyed girl would have been raped ten times before she even made it a mile) Terrible CGI. Racism? Maybe that's too harsh, how about extreme stereo types.

What worked: Any time the movie forgot that it had to be a big summer block buster with CGI and lots of plot and just settled into telling the story of a bunch of guys going to save a bunch of other guys I could actually pay attention and get interested.

Worse than Dungeons and Dragons?: No. But at the start I thought it might be close however it never reached the heights of pure outrage and hatred that DD did.

Mediocrity Scale: Pretty Mediocre

Food: Cream Soda Crush which was just syrupy and sweet. We also ate Crispers Ranch flavour, and Sour Cream and Onion flavor. If I had to break down the experience of eating them to its most basic I would have to say thin cardboard strips coated with salt. We did not finish either pack. Normally we fight to the end to finish whatever we have.

The Bank Job

2008-08-05T19:54:00.000-07:00

Jason Statham is awesome. One of my favorite action film actors working today.

The Bank job is the story of a group of small time crooks who, under the pretense of being presented with a score too big and easy to pass up, are actually being manipulated to steal the contents of a security deposit box containing some X-Rated photographs of a royal personnage.

There is a subplot involving the UK version of Malcolm X who supposedly is using the photos to blackmail the british government in such a way that the powers that be feel that hiring some crooks to steal the photos is a better plan than to send in some secret agents to do the job.

But like any good Hitchockian thriller, the whys and wherefores are less important than the journey and the predicament our hero finds himself in.

The movie which takes place in the '70s feels quite a bit like a Guy Ritchie movie, or a low-rent version of Ocean's 11 (the remake (which is fabulous), not the original (which sucks)). The actors all acquit themselves well and the script keeps the action moving along with the requisite suspense and "will they get caught" moments.

Of course like any movie we sit down to watch together, The Bank Job is not without it's share of problems, most notably a few slow periods where the film drags a bit between the good parts. Overall I don't have a lot to complain about, but I'm happy I didn't pay full movie theatre fare.

Pain Score: 3 out of 10.

Redacted

2008-08-05T19:31:00.001-07:00

Once again I am behind in my review posting, so please forgive me if my memory of the movie is cloudy.

Over the last couple of months I've slowly been making my way through the "Iraq war" movie glut of last year having seen In The Valley of Elah, The Kingdom, Lions for Lambs and now finally Redacted.

I was curious to know why Redacted lives on the "Restricted" shelf of the local video store, beside the soft core porn films and was disappointed that the rating was earned for a particularly gruesome rape sequence rather than for violent or profane content. But I'm getting ahead of myself. The movie, which stars no one, is directed by Brian DePalma and pretends to be assembled from video footage collected by several groups - an army grunt, a french news channel, and some security video footage.

If this sounds a lot like the recently reviewed here Vantage Point, it's because it is, though this time we are at least spared having to see the same sequence over and over again.

The story revolves around a group of army grunts whose tour has just been extended as they deal with the high stress environment of operating an army checkpoint. Looking to burn off some steam after an incident involving the shooting of a pregnant woman during a "routine" checkpoint stop, a couple of the boys decide to go and have some "fun" - raping a young Iraqi woman and killing her family while two of their comrades look on in horror - unable to do anything to stop them.

Unfortunately the movie is far more interested in scoring points against war in general and the "war on terror" in particular to delve into the true motivations and emotions of the characters involved. The villains are cookie-cutter and the speech given by the "hero" who presented evidence against his former friends at the end of the movie is forced and contrived.

Pain scale: 6 out of 10.

Pointless

2008-07-10T20:23:00.000-07:00

Raph insisted on seeing the Dennis Quaid/Forrest Whittaker epic Vantage Point this time out and I have to admit that I was somewhat curious. Was this going to be a movie that would rise above it's gimic (viewing the same story from the "vantage point" of several different characters (get it?)) or was the gimic all the movie had going for it?

The answer was clear within the first five minutes. Vantage Point is a thriller decidely lacking in thrills. Instead of using the fact that the audience knows what is going to happen (from both the trailer of the film and the opening sequence) to build suspense, the filmmakers thought it would be more interesting to use each character's vantage point to hammer us over the head with the details any reasonable person would have noticed previously.

The conceit completely falls apart in the last third or so of the movie when the film begins cutting between multiple vantage points to tell the meat of the story. The climax, which brings everyone together was laughably implausible, like an M. Night Shyamalan movie without a twist ending.

Pain score: 6 out of 10.

We had "cheese" to eat, but we made the mistake of buying Roasted Red Pepper and Lime flavored tortilla chips which were awful. We had Ice Blue Kool-Aid instead of our usual carbonated beverage selection which was a refreshing change and surprisingly delicious. It was surprised that it wasn't sweeter tasting than it was given the cup of sugar required to make it.

Vantage Point

2008-07-10T11:00:00.000-07:00

J has already said pretty much what there is to say. This movie is a stinker. Still, here's my 2 cents.

Dennis Quaid, Sigourney Weaver, Forrest Whitaker, and a bunch of terrorist looking actors come to cash their checks. This movie is really bad and has so many things wrong with it it's hard to figure out where to begin. Let's do a quick recap; The US president (Jimmie's borther from History of Violence but giving a much more boring and sedate performance) is in Spain to give a speech, a terrorist threat is intercepted, so instead of the real president giving the speech it's his double. Guarding the double is Dennis Quaid, an experienced secret service agent who last year got shot protecting the pres but is now back on the job and is understandably nervous. The double gets shot, the real pres gets kidnapped and the whole thing is foiled by an annoying little girl that likes to play in traffic. Now the kicker is we get to see these events unfold from seven different points of view, seven 'vantage points' if you will. We see it from the POV of the terrorists, innocent bystander I look like I'm going to cry all the time Forrest Whitaker, Dennis Quaid, the president guy, Sigourney Weaver in a Television control room, some random Spanish cop, and so on. Which kind of sounds cool, but it's not cool, not cool at all, it's just lame. To begin with if you remove the different points of view concept and just lay out the plot of the thing it's totally ridiculous and unbeleviable. Double agents, super duper prescient terrorists, super duper secret ops trained terrorists, Dennis Quaid is always at the exact right place at the right time, it's dumb and cliche at every turn. But it gets worse, you have to watch the dumb cliches over and over. Each point of view reveals a bit more of the story but after it's played out the movie rewinds and you have to sit through stuff you already saw again. Because Dennis Quaid is the focus (star? is Dennis Quaid a star?) of the film each 'vantage point' has to feature him, so unfortunately we get to see him make the same phone call more than once. Why? That's boring. Stupidly he's one of the first vantage points presented, so we basically know the whole story from the central characters POV right from the beginning. I could care less what the periphery characters saw, just get on with it. It's like watching Star Wars up to the moment in the cantina scene where pig face gets his arm chopped off, then the movie rewinds and we watch pigfaced man's day until he gets to the cantina and we watch him again interact with the leads and gets his arm chopped off again. Who cares; get on with Star Wars.

What Worked:

There's people getting shot and explosions and that's always neat. There's a car chase and cars get smashed up pretty good.

Gipes :

This thing is such a fiasco it's hard to list them all. The boring sequence right from the top in the televesion control room (one of the 'vantage points') which features a tired and confused Sigourney Weaver.

How about the fact that there's a huge bomb explosion in a public place but no one seems to really get hurt. It's so sanitary it's offensive to every person that has lost a limb or had their face blown off by a bomb.

Forest Whittaker, all of Forest Whittaker, every single frame of Forest Whittaker.

Was it better than Dungeons and Dragons?

Yes. There is no part in DD worth watching, in this at least the car chase scene is something and I must admit I wanted to see how the thing was going to end and play out (I was sorely disappointed with how it did mind you) I couldn't care less how DD was going to end.

Mediocroty Scale:

A less than mediocre effort all around

Food.

We had some kind of blue Kool-Aid and thankfully it didn't kill us and tasted great and refreshing. Some kind of lime tortilla chips; look that lime powder shit doesn't belong on anything so stop putting it on stuff it makes it taste gross. And of course melted Nacho Cheese is an old favorite and it was good minus the lime flavour.

Resident Evil: Extinction

2008-07-08T19:59:00.001-07:00

As we started watching the latest entry in the Resident Evil franchise, I realized that despite having seen the previous films, I had virtually no memory of them.

It is appropriate then, that a little over a week after watching, I have little memory of the latest entry. Milla Jovovich is once again pitted against the remnants of the evil corporation that genetically engineered her (or did they only clone her?) and in the process she runs into the kids from Mad Max Beyond Thunderdome, who, now grown up are travelling across America in a convoy, searching out gas and food from each broken town.

In the meantime there are a few battles with zombie crows and zombie humans, and Ashanti dies (the film isn't all bad) until the final confrontation with the corporations lead scientist who decides to try his latest experiment out on himself, turning himself into a super zombie.

Neither Milla nor we the audience ever make it to Tomorrow-morrow land, but things are set up nicely for another sequel that I'm sure I'll see but not remember.

Overall pain score: 5 out of 10.

Resident Evil: Extinction

2008-07-02T18:57:00.000-07:00

It's Mila Jojovich and a bunch of pretty kids running around the desert fighting zombies. Thankfully a lot of the pretty kids get eaten by the zombies.

After some virus has turned most of the population of the world into mindless zombies bent on killing people and turned the earth into a barren wasteland a few pockets of humanity survive. One of these pockets is a convoy of people that drive around in big SUV's (H2's no less) collecting gas and survivors. The poeple are mostly made up of young Lindsay Lohan wanna be girls. Actually seeing them driving around in an H2 is quite appropriate since it's probably what they do on a daily basis in their regular lives, but they simply were not an ounce beleivable as rough and tough survivors of an apokalypse. I think Alyiah was one of them but what do I know. Anyway they hook up with Mila and kick zombie ass, except that a lot of those starlets get eaten on the way. Which is fun. Actually having these girls in the film made Mila Jojovich seem that much more credible. She had a real sense of having done it all before sadness about her I really liked.

There was lots of convoluded plot about super domesticated zombies, Mila having special powers, unafected areas in Canada, on and on as is usually the case in these video game movies. Since I haven't played the game and didn't care I didn't really pay attention to the plot. I just sat back and enjoyed Mila killing zombies with knives and machetes, zombies getting machine gunned, and young startlets getting eaten.

What worked:

It's rated R and the violence was there. I like zombies that eat people so that was fun. The action set pieces were on the low budget side, but this is a low budget zombie thing so.

Gripes:

The acting was really bad. I could see the acting coaches lurking in the shadows. These kids just don't have talent and shouldn't act. The killer birds sequence was stupid too but it did thankfully kill Alyiah.

Was it Better than Dungeons and Dragons:
Oh yeah. R rating alone makes it better, throw in zombies and some bloody kills and you're in a different league from D&D.

Mediocrity Scale:

Pretty Mediocre.

Food:

I think we had albino Oreo Cakesters. They're discounted at the supermarket and rightfully so. It's kind of like a twinky burger type thing. I could feel the sugar grains in the filling; not high quality stuff. We also had another flavour of Fanta, I think it was grape, I just remember it was gross.

Fantastic!

2008-06-18T20:38:00.000-07:00

The key thing to understand about our decision to watch Fantastic Four 2 - The Rise of the Silver Surfer is that it was entirely motivated by my desire to try out the iTunes movie rental service. For those of you not familiar with the service, it works by allowing you to download a movie through the iTunes store and watch it at your leisure (as long as your leisure starts within 30 days of your downloading the film and you have the time to watch the film within 48 hours of starting it).

There aren't a whole lot of rental choices on the iTunes store, or rather not many that fall within our typical movie watching parameters, so we ended up with Fantastic Four 2 despite having seen the original and having full knowledge of what we were likely getting ourselves into.

As expected there is not a lot to like about this pointless sequel. I find it difficult to understand how so many (probably) smart people can feel happy or even satisfied by uninspired, cartoonish effects. When I think about the sheer number of meetings, discussions, whiteboard brainstorming and man hours that go into creating elaborate effects sequences that can't stand up to work being done 30 years ago I have to shake my head and wonder who is asleep at the wheel.

Without good effects work to fall back on, Fantastic Four 2 doesn't even have the one thing going for it that one might have hoped for - exciting action sequences. Jessica Alba is terrible in the movie and the rest of the cast isn't much better. Maybe it's not really the actors that are so bad - maybe it's the writing, or maybe it's the directing or maybe it's all three. It's hard to say for sure, so maybe best to consider each aspect of the film as a complete failure on it's own.

The story starts with a lame setup about Mr. Fantastic and Invisible Girl getting married (she wants a normal life and for the two of them to focus on their personal life while he is distracted by work and fighting evil). When an alien force which threatens the entire planet (as well as the "Fantastic Wedding" and any further attempt at character development) arrives in the form of the Silver Surfer the team is forced to save the world once again.

In addition to saving the planet from the silver menace, the team is faced with some teamwork issues, an uncooperative military commander and Dr. Doom who only seems to be in the film so that they can fight him for about 5 minutes after he predictably betrays them.

Pain score: 6 of 10. I really disliked this movie.

We had Michelina Buffalo-style chicken snacks and EXTREME Screamin' Dill Pringles chips to eat and both were somewhat enjoyable. The chicken snacks in particular were far better than I expected.

Fantastic 4: Rise of the Silver Surfer

2008-06-18T17:02:00.000-07:00

I think it's actually been two weeks since I saw this film and I've been avoiding writing about it. Maybe I've been too busy, maybe I haven't felt like writing or maybe I'm a little embarrassed because I actually liked this movie. Maybe all of the above.

This is a dead simple movie that seeks only to entertain. There's really not too much to say. The acting is wooden the effects are pretty good the story is decent and a good time is had by all. You just have to know going in this is by the numbers entertainment, not much more. It's what I would call a good mediocre movie.

Gripes:

I'm really struggling to find something to gripe about. There's a lot that's half assed, and badly executed but the movie definitely is greater than the sum of it's parts, so therefore everything kinda works. It's also been two weeks since I saw this and it's fading away...

What works:

I'm not a comic book fan so I don't know the story of the silver surfer. I didn't know anything about the planet eating or his surfboard or any of it so it was fun to figure out the mystery.
The movie has a good pace. The time between set pieces is brief and seems to serve the overall story so I wasn't really ever bored.
Most importantly the movie seems totally unpretentious about itself. It knows we're watching a pulp movie and it's having fun and so am I.

Was it Better than Dungeons and Dragons:

Yes it was. Better pace, doesn't take itself too seriously, no shitty dragons, doesn't take away the will to live.

Mediocrity Scale:

It's mediocre, but good mediocre.

Food Review:

We ate some kind of chicken balls or something coated in pastry. It tasted exactly like what I would imagine chicken tastes like after going through the teleportation device in David Cronenbergs the Fly before all the bugs are worked out. (pun not intended)

We also ate Pringles EXTREME FLAVOUR DILL PICKLE CHIPS!!. If by extreme they mean really really salty, then they were extreme indeed. Also the picture of the pickles on the box looks like green turds. Not good.

Mr. Brooks

2008-05-30T20:10:00.000-07:00

I was disappointed to learn that this movie did not continue the adventures of Brooks from the Shawshank Redemption, in prequel fashion. I wanted to experience him seeing that car once, when he was a kid.

But I digress.

Mr. Brooks is a successful business man - he makes boxes. And he's a schizophrenic sociopath too. So there's that. But he's trying to do the right thing Ringo, despite the constant whining from his hallucinary friend who is constantly goading him to treat himself to another murder - he's been such a good boy after all.

Why are serial killers in movies always either successful business men or shady drifters? I want to see a middle manager snap and go and a killing spree. That would be a great movie.

Eventually Mr. Brooks' imaginary friend gets the upper hand and they're at it again, killing a couple who like having sex in front of a wide open window. We're treated to an extended sequence showing how careful Mr. Brooks is to make sure he doesn't get caught. Everything is all planned out so that no one will be the wiser. Except for the window thing. How did he overlook that?

You can probably guess what happens next. Despite Mr. Brooks' special care he is photographed by Dane Cook who proceeds to blackmail him. The "twist" is that Dane Cook isn't after money, he wants Mr. Brooks to mentor him in the art of murder. Where do they come up with these original ideas?

Meanwhile the cops are on the case, looking for clues into this new murder by the serial killer who hasn't struck in two years. The main cop is played by Demi Moore who doesn't bring much to the part. Worse, it appears that in order to land such a major star, the studio had to agree to add a lot more "story" for her character to make her part bigger.

Suddenly the movie changes course and we have to sit through learning about Demi's backstory (she's being divorced by her boy-toy ex. who wants a piece of her huge fortune). The new movie within a movie drags on long enough that for you to lose interest in the Mr. Brooks storyline before finally getting back to business.

Except now the story has changed again and Mr. Brooks is dealing with his daughter who shows up home from college, saying she has dropped out. To make matters worse the cops show up shortly after asking questions about the murder of her boyfriend.

This just isn't Mr. Brooks' week. Nor mine. I've got a sociopath, a rich cop and the story of a young woman trying to follow in her father's footsteps with limited success. Too bad I don't have a tight plot, suspense or action. And three endings. Why not four? I'm holding out for the scooby-doo ending.

Pain scale score: 4 out of 10

Snack time was Raph's choice and he picked chicken pot pies which were pretty standard as such things go. The Fanta Grape was surprisingly tasty, considering our recent experience with the abysmal Red Tangerine flavor. After such an ordinary snack outing we'll have to be sure to find something truly disturbing for next time.

Mr. Brooks

2008-05-28T21:06:00.000-07:00

Okay, let me try to get all this straight: There's Mr. Brooks (Dances with Wolves guy), who kills people because he's addicted and is also a successful business man with a wife and family and is trying to quit, there's his imaginary friend (William Hurt?) who goads him into killing people and acts like a guardian angel of sorts for serial killers, there's Dane Cook, the guy that catches Mr. Brooks killing a couple that likes to dance and screw with the blinds open, and blackmails Mr. Brooks with photos of him killing set couple into teaching him how to be a serial killer, there's Demi Moore playing the hard nosed tough woman cop who's going through a tough divorce and is a millionaire because she inherited a lot of money from her dad who wanted a boy so to prove to him she's good enough she works as a cop even though she doesn't have to and is trying to solve Mr. Brooks' murders, there's her partner (token black guy), there's Mr. Brook's daughter (some young starlet) who's back from college because she killed somebody with a hatchet and is preggos, there's Mr. Brooks' wife (the old former stripper lady in CSI Las Vegas) who doesn't know anything, and there's Demi Moore's ex-husband and his lawyer lady who have a sexy affair.

Whew. That's a lot of characters and a lot of plot. Mr. Brooks' feels bookish and I bet if I looked it up I would find that it was based on a novel. You have to pay attention to Mr. Brooks because it jams in a lot in it's fairly lengthy running time and that is a problem because it's kind of slow. However I enjoyed it. The writing is good, Dances With Wolves guy is understated as always but compelling, William Hurt is fun, and even Dane Cook doesn't annoy too much, plus *SPOILER* he gets killed in a neat gory fashion. What I liked most is it's an unusual serial killer movie; a killer who wants to quit has all these problems getting out and the problems pile on and he has to get out of it in a creative serial killer fashion, it's kind of fun and it's kind of smart too. You also see a lot of the twists coming but it's handled well and you don't really know. Plus that's part of the fun.

Gripes:

Too much Demi. Demi Moore is fine, she looks good (surgically), there's nothing wrong with her acting, but her character isn't a big enough player in the story to warrant so much development. The movie could have been a lot shorter if they chose to keep a lot of her background on the down low. It felt a bit like they put all that in because of who Demi Moore is and she probably demanded it.

False ending: The movie ends three times, the first twist is good, the second; not so much. It feels like a last minute addition and the Mr. Brooks character is totally inconsistent in the final ending with everything he'd done up until then. Probably some kind of studio bandoogle.

What Worked:

A lot like I said before. The writing is what really works for me here. There's a lot here and it didn't feel like I was being fed a lot of exposition which is always good. My feeling could be a matter of reference though as the movie I watched prior to this was the crap storm that is Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull: a study in poor exposition thick writing so maybe by comparison Mr. Brooks had less clunky exposition. I don't know. Don't see Indiana Jones is all I can say about that.

Is it better than Dungeons and Dragons:

Yes, a lot better. Real actors, no bad CGI, no Shakespeareans picking up pay cheque.

Mediocrity scale:

Above Mediocre

Food Review:

We had Meat Shoppe brand chicken pot pies. They tasted kind of good going down but later in the night I couldn't sleep because of stomach pains and nausea. Stay away. Oh and we had Purple Fanta; gross, tastes like some kind of mixture of medicine and cleaning chemicals.

The Golden Compass (Aborted Franchise)

2008-05-22T17:30:00.000-07:00

A big problem with this movie is that for source material that clearly required a great deal of imagination to create, the movie makers were totally devoid of any. This is a movie by numbers. The casting is uninspired (Come on Gandalf? You couldn't find any other Shakespearean actor?) as is the whole movie. The worst culprit is the writing here; all exposition. As a result the lead girl isn't given much to do except to react to tons and tons of expository dialogue and green screen effects, so we end up not liking her. Smart creative writers are able to hide the exposition in action and story. Here they just say it. This is this and this is this and this is called this and this is the most magical important thing blah blah blah blah. They might as well have done the movie as a Power Point presentation, it would have been equally as enjoyable and I would have been involved about as much. It's like they were so worried about setting up the two sequels that they forgot to make an entertaining movie. Sucks to be them because this movie pretty much bombed so the sequels have been cancelled.

My other gripes:

I couldn't hear what Nicole Kidman was saying. She kept talking in this low scratchy voice that was hard to make out. It wasn't sexy at all. So did the James Bond girl whatever her name is. Is this some kind of new trend; Frog throat acting? It needs to end.

After LOTR and the movie about Spartans, your climactic epic battle between good and evil better be good. It wasn't here, move on.

What Worked:

There's one or two shots where the little girl meets the Polar Bear Gandalf where the digital effects looked really good and the Bear looked real. For the rest of the movie it didn't.

The guy from the Big Lebowski didn't look stupid for about a second.

Was it Better than Dungeons and Dragons:

Yes but it shares some commonalities; Weak lead, lame climactic battle, Shakespearean actor picking up paycheck.

Recommend:

I think kids might like it. Their own imaginations will fill in the voids left in this movie. But they'll probably be looking forward to sequels that will most likely never happen.

Mediocroty Scale:

Just Mediocre

The Golden Compass

2008-05-22T15:31:00.000-07:00

It's hard to say what was worse about this movie, the very digital effects or the constant stream of expositional dialogue. I kept wondering as we watched whether the cityscapes and backgrounds were original or borrowed from the models of Naboo created for Star Wars Episode I.

Pain scale score: 4 out of 10

Thankfully the snacks were better than the film. In addition to the always delicious Salt and Pepper flavored Kettle Chips we also sampled the new (to me) flavor of Oreo cookies, Strawberry Milkshake. To my surprise and delight the cookies were actually pretty good - the strawberry flavor worked well with the chocolate cookie.