Review

One almost gets to feeling spoiled, as after Inception we have 2 weeks in a row of good movies opening. I am as grateful and shocked as you are, but still feeling the rope burns from Jonah’s Airbending Eclipse to think this anything but a hiccup of goodness amidst the mediocrity. I’m not sure what it means that The Expendables is the only thing left during the hot pocket months that genuinely generates fissions of excitement, even if it is just to see old 80’s stars groan, creak, and Ben Gay their way through exploding jeeps.

At least we have Salt to remind us what a fun summer flick should be for about 100 minutes. It’s an above average action movie that succeeds where last month’s A-Team worked only intermittently and a lot less ridiculous than Jolie’s last action attempt Wanted.

Now that I think about it, it may be my favorite Angelina Jolie movie of all time, as I’ve always thought that she was a decent actress (even if she did suffer from the Best Supporting Actress curse for a short spell), but I’ve never thought much if any of her movies. Except for Gia of course, but I only remember certain parts of those...mostly involving nudity and lesbians.

If you’ve seen the overly revealing trailer, you know exactly how the first act plays out, so bear with...

Salt opens with Evelyn Salt (Angelina Jolie) in North Korea getting the stuffing beaten out of her. We presume it’s because she wants to adopt North Korea’s entire population of indigent children, but it’s not. She’s accused of being a spy.  read more »

Good on you for staying at home this season as it seems to be the best bet to weather the worst movie summer, box-office and otherwise, in recent memory as its only true bright spots are a 15-year old Pixar franchise that’s the only valid reminder that Tim Allen actually still exists and an indie thriller named Winter’s Bone that’s opening on like, 7 screens across the country.

Watch Mad Men. Watch True Blood, as you’ll get more entertainment out of them than anything opening in your local megaplexes this weekend...other than Toy Story 3 of course. Just make sure your roommate returns your copy of The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo because if you’re unfortunate enough to see Jonah Hex (based on the comic book), you’ll need something to purge what you’ve seen and try to help you forget about the 10 dollars you just blew.

Should have seen it coming, as Hex is written by the guys that brought you those moronic Crank movies (as well as the Gerard Butler epic fail Gamer) and directed by a guy named Jimmy. As movie historians will tell you, no “Jimmy” has ever directed a good movie in the 35 trillion year history of cinema. But if you start calling yourself James, you may just have another Avatar on your hands.  read more »

The newest and completely unnecessary version of Robin Hood is nowhere near as terrible as you might have heard.

That stated, it’s also not something you’d actually want to pay to see and give up 2.5 hours of your life. Rent some Unrated version of it months from now and realize exactly why it’s going to clunk at the box-office. The ads trumpet its star Russell Crowe reteaming with Gladiator director Ridley Scott for the 5th time in 10 years but you’d STILL be better off watching Gladiator for the nth time. Or American Gangster. Or the uneven Body of Lies.

It’s almost unfair to be comparing Robin Hood 2010 with Gladiator simply because this version’s inexplicably neutered with the PG-13 rating. That’s right. You remember the blood by the bucketful seeing Gladiator for the first time back in 2000. You get maybe a thimbleful of the red stuff if you’re lucky and a lot of reverse cutaways when you should be seeing some nameless stuntperson in prop armor impaled by various sharp things.

I couldn’t remember any distinct emotional reaction either way from the audience at my screening. No applause upon leaving the theater, just silence. Not good from a movie that promises swashes, buckles, and the “untold story behind the legend”. In fact, the biggest emotional response was the laughter during the newest Eclipse trailer. Well, it was pretty funny...

The plot (and there is a lot of it) is a jumbled mess to be sure, as you get a lot of scenes of people talking about what’s happening, then people reacting to people talking about what’s happening...and a bloodless PG-13 arrow fight thrown in just to make sure you’re awake.  read more »

“I don't know. You have absolute power, remember?”
--Michael from E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial

"Leslie Burke is right. Mind like yours wide open, you could create a whole new world.”
--Ms. Edmunds from Bridge To Terabithia

“This is all yours. You're the owner of this world.”
--Carol from Where The Wild Things Are

The recollection of childhood is the infinite atlas of our dreams. Our childhood memories are a form of storytelling within themselves. The flood of emotions that washed over me while watching Spike Jonze’s breathtaking adaptation of Maurice Sendak’s timeless Where The Wild Things Are is a testament to the true power of visual storytelling. The power of Sendak’s 1963 vision radiates with startling precision in 2009. The power of this kind of story comes from tradition-- the tradition of parents reading to their young children. My older brothers and I begged my Mom to read us Where The Wild Things Are every night for several years. Not only did I beg my Mom to read me that book, but also Goodnight Moon, The Fantastic Mr. Fox and countless Babar books. My childhood memories are seen through a suburban Seventies hazy filter with images from books and countless Black and White films. Cinematically, my memories look as though they were shot by Edward Lachman and Tim Orr. Classic storybooks with their rich illustrations serve as templates of not only my dreams, but also the prism through which I view my past. The images from Sendak’s masterpiece are still as wild and inviting as they were nearly thirty-six years ago when my Mom read it to me every night. The power of Spike Jonze’s film comes through within the first several minutes as we are introduced to the iconic, mischief maker himself, Max, beautifully played by Max Records. In these scenes, the chaos, allure and recollection of childhood is presented perfectly. The first twenty minutes of the film are a powerful expression of what it means to be a young boy through the eyes of Spike Jonze, screenwriter, Dave Eggers and most importantly, Maurice Sendak. Where The Wild Things Are is not a childhood flashback, but a reflection of what it means to be a child. This is not a children’s film, this is a film for all ages. Everyone can relate to the themes in this work; that is part of the film’s magnetism.  read more »

Remember kids, Inglourious Basterds is playing on a screen very near the one you might be considering seeing the, um, second Halloween II in. You’ll want to keep that in mind during the half dozen times you want to walk out of this tedious look-at-your-watch sequel of an original, um, remake that I actually liked.

While Brad Pitt and Co. were clobbering Nazis to the squeal of audience delight somewhere in a much happier section of the multiplex, myself and the 7 other people in the theater...made not a word. Complete silence. No kids making smartass comments or even wolf-whistles at the handful of topless women. No genius giving a running teleplay or unwanted commentary as the movie’s going on like he’s in his living room. No ewws or ohhs at the various shots of gore. Maybe the electronic beep of a watch changing hours was the closest thing that resembled an audience reaction.

At least no one walked out of the theater, but that could have been because they were either asleep or too drained from ennui to exert all that effort. During the movie, you hope that someone turns on their phone simply because the light blue glow emanating is showing something more interesting than what is on the screen. When the familiar Halloween theme blares over the end credits, you can be sure that remaining coherent audience members will look at each other blank-faced, probably wondering “What the fuck did we just watch?” Or maybe they’ll have no expression at all, they’ve just listened to a scintillating lecture on photosynthesis...which on the other hand might be more interesting that anything that happens during the movie.  read more »

Ever since making an ear-cutting splash in ’92 with Reservoir Dogs and spawning a flannel-wearing generation of film geeks with the iconic Pulp Fiction writer/director Quentin Tarantino remains the most vital filmmaker of his generation. Whether you love or hate his films, one has to admit that they rarely induce an indifferent reaction. With Inglourious Basterds Tarantino has made a Holocaust film that doesn’t feel like School on Saturday or make you think you have homework after the movie. If you thought Death Proof was too talky or that Jackie Brown wasn’t worth the 2.5 hour investment, then odds are you’re not going to enjoy Basterds and you’d be better off watching your District 9 download again or seeing massive drug buys, prostitution, car antenna abortions, and arms deals occur during screenings of Post Grad because of the 7 people in the theater, none of them are actually watching the movie. Call it the Keaton factor.

In Inglourious Basterds, Tarantino has fashioned revenge porn we can all relate to. We may not be able to identify with the oversized seafood being oppressed in J-Berg because they look a little different or give a flying fillet o’ fuck about whether some narcissistic New York shrew completes and blogs about all the Julia Child recipes, but I think we’ve all thought to ourselves not only about how Hitler was a monster, but in choosing to both shoot himself in the head and bite into a cyanide capsule rather than getting taken out of Berlin...turned out to be a huge pussy as well taking the easy way out.  read more »

Kyle XY

Grade: B+

“Kyle XY” is probably the best show ABC Family has ever had. It’s far more interesting than most of their shows and has compelling characters that are continually developed and become easier to care for as the series goes on. “Kyle XY” is an intriguing mix of mystery of a corrupted conspiracy and teen/family drama. This mix works really well alongside the comedy in the innocence of experiencing everything for the first time.

Kyle (Dallas), woke up one day with no memory of anything. He was labeled as an amnesia victim and handed over to psychiatrist, Nicole Tragger (MacIntyre). Since he has no other place to go, she brought him to her home. She felt for him deeply and wanted to help him. The rest of the Traggers end up embracing Kyle and making him part of their family. They always suspected there was something very different about him. He’s a genius with a photographic memory and unconceivable hearing abilities. There are many simple things about the world around him that he doesn’t know; he is taking new things in every day. Oh, and he doesn’t have a belly button. Josh, (Bilodeau), keeps a notebook of all of the abnormal things Kyle does and has a theory that Kyle is an alien. Kyle searches for answers about his past. He finally finds them when two people come to see him, claiming to be his parents. A blood test even proves this. Kyle goes with them only to find his real parent: Adam Baylin (Peck).  read more »

The Meryl Streep/Amy Adams dramedy Julie & Julia is the perfect piece of summer counterprogramming against the PG-13 tempered testosterone of G. I. Joe and a rising Cobra. That it’s a pretty decent movie can only help the running time go by faster. Guys, if having to watch this is part of your quid pro blow for watching Sienna Miller, Rachel Nichols and some really huge weaponry in Joe this weekend, you could do a lot worse than J & J as you could have been rendered sterile by The Time Traveler’s Wife next week. Consider the bullet swiftly dodged...

I did feel a well-earned sigh of relief when the closing credits began to roll and everyone began to file out of the theater. Before the movie started I realized that we (me, my wife, and a homeless person we treated to the movies) were the ONLY people under the age of 50 at the screening, and I was hoping, hoping, hoping that no one would die before the lights went up, and if they did at least be quiet about it but that rarely happens as someone unavoidably screams. Inconsiderate.
There’s nothing that breaks story continuity like sirens and gurneys and the inevitable almost-hour delay that occurs when someone dies while you’re watching something in the theater. It happened during a Screening of My Sister’s Keeper last June, but I realized that after seeing that awful maudlin ending and the grating soundtrack of the worst movie of the summer, (to paraphrase from The Hills Have Eyes) those that died were the lucky ones...  read more »

As the final big-budget release of Summer 2009, GI Joe: Rise of Cobra opens this weekend, one can be glad that Summer of ’09 wasn’t...Summer of ’08, ‘cause Dark Knight/Iron Man/Tropic Pineapple Thunder Express notwithstanding, why would you want to relive THAT again?

And, as far as unofficial Summer blockbuster finales go, Rise of Cobra is a very good one. Summer junk food at its inconsequential mindless best. It’s a more entertaining diversion than that half-baked Terminator, despite having Channing Tatum as one of its leads. That alone is praiseworthy as I hope appearing in Joe and its subsequent sequels will wash the reek of those Step Up movies off Tatum’s career. He seems like a nice enough...joe so he deserves a second shot. Now if he could only learn to act.

Along with Tatum, another beneficiary of the probable box-office success of G. I. Joe is Mummy and Joe director Stephen Sommers, whose last movie was the wearisome 2004 dud Van Helsing. ‘Nuff said, as Hugh Jackman can thank his back-to-back titan failures of Deception and Australia to knock Helsing off his personal worst of all time list.  read more »

6 movies down. 2 more to go. We can then move on with our lives...

After drawing the ire of millions of pointy-hatted, robe-wearing, wand-waving Potterphiles by pulling the antepenultimate Harry Potter movie from its original Thanksgiving release date (if you remember, Twilight and Australia opened during that weekend leaving a great majority of moviegoers over 12 and without training bras less than thankful), Harry Potter and Half-Blood Prince finally makes its way into theaters and judging by the trip-digit melanoma marinated lines around multiplexes, not a moment too soon.

I don’t consider myself a Potter expert, but like the majority of the free world I’ve helped line JK Rowling’s silky British pockets by reading the books (only finished the novels sometime last summer) and seeing the movies. I’m of the bent that the darker the series got, the better it became.

My least favorite of the movies are the first 2 Chris Columbus “kids” movies as they’re haltingly uneven and it doesn’t take very long for them to wear out their 2.5 hours + running time. Apparently the OD (Original Dumbledore) Richard Harris didn’t like them much either since he, you know, died and left the more than capable Michael Gambon holding the hat.  read more »