Rated R for two tiny scenes of sexual content…and enough blood to fill the Nile river in Egypt. Wow. I have to say that I absolutely loved this movie. It picks up right where the first one left off*, and takes everything we know and (maybe) love from the first film and continues the story. That’s what I loved about the first movie…it’s strict adherence to it’s own mythology. I just loved this movie so much…there’s humor, there’s violence and it tells an incredible vicarious story that I really enjoyed. Because this is a science-fiction/fantasy film✝, the highlight should not be the actors, the music or the directing…it’s the special effects and the story that matter the most to these films. And what was my personal favorite special effect? Actually there were two: the CGI transformations from human form to vampire or werewolf or hybrid (especially the vampire eyes…) and … Continue reading →

Jerry Bruckheimer plans on making a movie for every college sport that ever had race problems. Next up…RUGBY! Entitled Remember the Glory, it tells the true story of a college rugby team in Australia that is the first to integrate Aboriginals. After many trials and tribulations, they win the championship against all odds. Now all jabs aside, I really enjoyed this movie. I felt it was very powerful and wonderfully portrayed the historic first challenge to the NCAA’s white supremacy movement. Josh Lucas really delivers as girl’s basketball coach Don Haskins who moves to West Texas to coach a bottom-of-the-barrel college basketball team. Choosing to integrate the team with players that nobody wants (it’s the 60’s), he creates a power-house team based on fundamentals that comes out of nowhere to challenge “The Baron” (it looks like Jon Voight…it can’t be Jon Voight…he wouldn’t put on that much prosthesis just for … Continue reading →

Pierce Brosnan and Greg Kinnear in a buddy/black comedy. This was even funnier than After the Sunset (which was a fantastic movie though), and I think Brosnan and Kinnear have a slightly better chemistry than Brosnan had with Woody Harrelson. The only bad thing about the movie is some slight implausibility’s in the story (it’s surprisingly easy to kill people) and a joke without a punch line: Two Mexicans walk into a cantina. One of them is a midget and the other has a 15 inch penis. The midget says to the bartender, “They call my amigo here the Human Swizzle Stick. Want to know what they call me?” They never tell us the punch line! I hate them! Of course, this is the farthest thing from a good excuse to avoid this movie…it’s absolutely fantastic. Hilarious and touching, this off-beat comedy deals up heaps of post-007 Brosnan (everybody keeps … Continue reading →

See Dick See Dick Run Run Dick Run see dick work Dick Has A Nice Job See Jane SEE JANE WORK JANE WORKS HARD See Spot Spot Likes to Bark …ZAP… Liked to Bark With this storybook concept as the bookends of the movie (I think this is the first movie I’ve ever seen where black background and white scrolling text wasn’t used at all!), this update of the 1977 film with George Segal and Jane Fonda crackles with Judd Apatow’s wit (40 Year Old Virgin, Cable Guy) and scorches with the chemistry and comedy of would-be robbers Jim Carrey and Téa Leoni. The premise of the story is that Dick’s company, Globodyne, just got nailed for a scandal of Enron proportions and Dick’s out of a job. With money running tight and their lifestyle forced to change (DON’T TAKE MY TV! NOT MY TELEMUNDO!), they resort to knocking over … Continue reading →

The movie based on the musical based on the movie…all by Mel Brooks. Now, you might ask why Mel Brooks would do this. Well, in some article somewhere, he said it was to preserve on…well it isn’t really film in the traditional sense anymore, so preserve in 1s and 0s four performances that were absolutely incredible onstage: Nathan Lane, Matthew Broderick, Gary Beach and Roger Bart. But that wasn’t good enough for him. He had to add new players Will Ferrell and Uma Thurman to make the preservation even more spectacular. That man just doesn’t know when to quit. Or when to stop making Blazing Saddle references…the movie is jam-packed (what is it with me and jelly?) with them and makes this gut-busting adventure even more incredible. Susan Stroman directs the movie adaptation and apparently makes the transition very well…having directed the Broadway show, she’s very familiar with the material. … Continue reading →

What happens when you mix traditional conservative and liberal values? Fireworks. Now their may be a political message at the core of this not-quite family friendly flick (that liberal values are correct and conservative values are evil), but that doesn’t mean you have to boycott it if you lean to the red right down south. You’ve got to look past the politics and look at the real message about the real people (no this isn’t based on someone’s life as far as I know) which basically says: love heals all wounds…and there’s no holiday more lovingly charged than Christmas. With a star-studded cast (Diane Keaton, Craig T. Nelson, Sarah Jessica Parker, Rachel McAdams, Luke Wilson and Dermot Mulroney) that shares the screen well, the message really comes through. Parker is introduced to the family as Mulroney’s girlfriend. The problem is that she has crafted this business-like and professional persona that … Continue reading →

This film was phenomenal. It was everything I hoped it would be and more. There was very little doubt in my mind that Peter Jackson knew what he was doing with this adaptation because he is a fan boy. He took a beloved classic and gave it the glossy, shiny veneer of the 21st century. Character development was the biggest change Jackson introduced into his version, but looking at the original 1933 version (Dino De Laurentiis’ version doesn’t count…ever) it was a necessary shift…back then they were delivering a simplification of life to the audience…today’s audience’s are (on some level) able to handle the complications that come with life. That’s what makes this update a real success in my eyes: the improved focus on “beauty and the beast.” Watching the original, I didn’t quite get that focus…mostly because I knew that’s what it was about and kept trying to find … Continue reading →

This film was absolutely incredible. Evocative, heart-rending, moving, powerful and more, the story of four children destined to rule a kingdom and the lion that stood beside them is beautifully retold. I read the books back in middle school, but with a slightly refreshed memory (it’s hard to read any story about the film’s production or it’s ties to Christianity without remembering something about the story) it was like watching King Arthur: where your old friends start showing up in new and unexpected ways. What’s especially fantastic about the entire chronicle is that it’s an allegory for the Christian living. Not just the saving life of Jesus, which this movie deals with pretty exclusively, but the entire experience of being a Christian. Needless to say, I’m pretty darn excited to see Disney continue to adapt these books with the flair they did this one. About the only thing I walked … Continue reading →

  Ocean’s Eleven is a caper film with comedy (i.e. it is a film about thievery that you laugh at and enjoy). The “crew” gets along and doesn’t backstab or betray each other (i.e. no drama). This film by comparison is a caper film with dramody (i.e. it is a film about thievery that you laugh at and enjoy in which the crew betrays and backstabs one another since the caper in itself is an act of backstabbing and betrayal). Very interesting. I wouldn’t say the funniest things were in the trailer, but the majority of the funny moments from the movie were in the trailer. Oliver Platt was especially hilarious and plays the biggest comedic role in the movie (despite the reviews saying John Cusack and Billy Bob Thornton are the funniest thing since sliced bread). Cusack and Thornton are funny (practically everybody gets to crack a joke at … Continue reading →