Trying to play ketchup...I mean catch-up

Due to a big snow storm which left me trapped in parent’s home for 11 days, I got really log jammed on reviews. Since I am so behind I am doing brief summaries of most of the movies I watched in order to catch back up.

The Proposition: The best word to describe this film may be: gritty. It’s both realistic and unrealistic at the same time. The setting seems real, the characters feel real, but at the same time it seems a bit outlandish which somehow makes you think its some unbelievable that it works. There’s great acting, great writing, it’s eventful and odds are it’s like no movie you’ve ever seen before. As I have mentioned before, I have a strange love affair with Guy Pearce as an actor. I cannot really explain it, so I don’t expect anyone to understand it, but whether you like him or not, you’ll appreciate his performance, verdict: $$$$

Zombieland: This movie is funny. I had low expectations to begin with and the start of this movie did not help that. In fact, in a move I rarely make, I almost turned it off after the first few minutes. In some misguided attempt to make it up to myself for quitting my baseball team in eighth grade, I try to finish what I start which can be a real pain when reading a bad book more so than a bad movie. But I digress; the beginning of this movie is a little bit more graphic than what I anticipated. From that point on however, the movie establishes a fair balance between gory, zombie movie and comedy. The cameo in this movie is great, mostly because I didn’t see it coming. Since no one ruined it for me beforehand, I won’t ruin it for you either, as it was a legitimate highlight of this movie for some reason I don’t fully understand. Woody Harrelson will forever be my boy because of his stunn ing role in White Men Can’t Jump, so for that reason (and the fact that it’s really funny, as I may have mentioned already) I think you should look into Netflixing this one, verdict: $$$$

Surrogates: Movies should take some advice from the military and be all that they can be, however this also means knowing their limitations. I often criticize movies for trying to do too much. That is clearly the case here. One would think, that Bruce Willis (the man rode a Harrier jet in one movie for F’s sake) + robots = ass kicking, edge of your seat, head butt your girlfriend cuz you “can’t believe Bruce just F’ing did that,” type of action. Wrong. This movie had the potential to be a lesser version of I, Robot but they squandered that opportunity by trying to introduce this terribly awkward subplot where Bruce battles his inner demons and tries to reconnect with emotionally distant wife. Borrriiinnnggg. I like Bruce Willis when he: A.) kicks bad guy’s asses B.) kicks slightly less ass but is funny about it or C.) is the bad guy and then kicks ass (I got wayyyy too much enjoyment from him blowing off Jack Black’s arm with a rifle that can only be described as a cannon). This movie should not have had an delusions about being an action/sci-fi/drama hybrid. Next time, cut out the misplaced mushiness and stick to your story’s strengths, verdict: $$$

The Machinist

I may have mentioned once, or maybe like 6 times, that I like Christian Bale. Based on that sound reasoning, I decided to Netflix some of his older movies. Hard to believe I don’t own them all already, right? I have always been trying to Netflix a lot of what I call “crazy movies,” that leave you with your jaw hanging to the floor or you scratching your head, or some combination of those two things. A crazy movie can either “wow” you with its intense action, suspense, plot twists, or totally dialed-in acting performances. The Machinist is a crazy movie. Not because of anyone of these elements, but because of a combination of them all. The action is limited, but is intense when it occurs. Yes, I have a decent vocabulary, but no other word but “intense” would do justice to this movie. This movie is very suspenseful, although semi-predictable. The same can be said of the plot twists. I honestly do not think it is bias at work here, but Bale’s performance was Oscar worthy. This isn’t the greatest movie, but his performance makes it very worthwhile to watch. The best word for it is “dedicated.” The dude lost extreme amounts of weight, even when he probably didn’t have to, just in the interest of truly embracing the character he was portraying. If you can stomach watching a fairly solid, but not amazing movie (with some strange elements) just to appreciate good acting, then definitely rent this. If you aren’t up for that, well, your loss because it’s still worth watching regardless, verdict for Bale’s performance: $$$$$, verdict for the remaining elements of the film: $$$, overall verdict: $$$$

The Hurt Locker

The Hurt Locker hurts so good (or hurts so well according to grammar check…but that just doesn’t sound right, or near as corny). Instead of me writing a ton about a movie that has been reviewed to death, I’m gonna keep it short and to the point. It’s pretty damn good. Its not Best Picture good, but it’s a very solid movie. Again, all the major reviews will in fact review the finer points of this film, so allow me to touch on a few things that I didn’t like. I like Guy Pearce as an actor for some very, very odd reason (I know I can’t really figure it out either). Nothing bothers me more in movies than strange cameos by name actors that would have been just as easily played by some no-name guy. Spoiler Alert!!! Guy Pearce is in this movie. Guy Pearce is killed off after 1 minute of screen time in this movie. This strange cameo, although, not as strange as an earlier cameo of his I mentioned (see The Road review), started the movie off on a sour point for me. I totally forgot about this movie making mistake (that’s called alliteration if you were wondering) pretty quickly considering he gets totally blown to shit and the movie only picks upsteam from here. The casting is perfect, even the dude who I’m pretty sure played Tupac in Notorious. No huge name actors in this one (Ralph Fiennes does play a small part), which ends up being a really good thing. Watching Tom Cruise defuse bombs for two hours, in place of Jeremy Renner (who should get some Oscar consideration), would have made this movie unwatchable. It works because they are recognizable enough actors that you know they are pretty solid but not so recognizable that they don’t seem totally believable in their roles. Like I said, its really good. Almost everyone who watches will really like it, or at the very least appreciate why other people really, really liked it, verdict: $$$$ {Really, really close to $$$$$, seriously, Netflix it already).

Next

I recently watched the movie Next on TV. Hey, don’t trash my taste in movies because of it, I was sick, and there was nothing else on, and I was putting off doing my homework, and did I mention I was sick, deliriously sick? Pretty much the only nice things I have to say about this movie involve Jessica Biel, so in order to prevent me getting carried away, let’s just leave that one alone. This movie is enough to justify either intense loathing or envy toward Nicholas Cage. He makes out with the hottest women on the planet (see Jessica Biel mention earlier), gets paid tons of cash to look goofy, AND puts out a lot of movies that fall somewhere on the spectrum between mediocre and trash, all why needing a haircut. Badly. I just can’t seem to hate on the guy too much for this, its not his fault movie execs are suckers and people still pay to see his 90 minute life distractions, verdict: $$$

{Disclaimer: No, I did not think this was a good movie (AT ALL), as I mentioned. Nor, would I recommend anyone go out of there way to watch it. But, as far as shitty movies on FX at 6pm on a Tuesday, you could do a lot worse- well, maybe not a whole lot worse. But that’s my reasoning as to why this movie received $$$...that and Jessica Biel, of course.}

Gamer

When I first heard about the movie Gamer, I was quite excited. I enjoy action/ sci-fi movies starring big name actors (I, Robot is one $$$$ example) who are looking to get back on track after a string of disappointing movies. Gerard Butler gets back to his ass kicking roots that he became famous for in 300. The problem with this movie is that it was a bit too ambitious. Someone greatly overestimated the potential of this premise. The key ingredients for a good movie are there, but not for a great movie. If they had stuck to the basic elements here and just focused on: Man gets falsely imprisoned, Man kicks tons of ass to get back to his family, Man wins his freedom and either gets back to his family or he avenges them; then this would have been a really enjoyable movie. What I’m saying is that if they had taken the plot from Gladiator and made it science fiction, then this movie probably would have kicked ass. By throwing in Michael C. Hall’s “evil genius tries to take of world but is thwarted by the good guy who’s willing to do bad things to get his family back” angle, the movie just gets too convoluted. They really tried to do too much here, which normally you can’t fault someone for, but in this case I am because they disappointed me, verdict: $$$

The Book of Eli

I was so excited to see The Book of Eli (as you can probably tell from my earlier post about movies I couldn’t wait to see). While it wasn’t a life changing cinematic experience, it was by no means disappointing. There were several solid acting performances in this but Mila Kunis did not deliver one of them. I couldn’t help but think I was watching her character from That '70’s Show if there was ever a nuclear fallout in Point Place, Wisconsin. She came off as rather annoying (to me at least) but still wasn’t a major detractor from the film. If anything, her squawking lightened the atmosphere a bit at times. The most realistic acting job in this movie was probably by Gary Oldman, as he was incredibly believable as the deranged villain. However, this movie is all about Denzel Washington. The action sequences early on are fantastic (they are over the top, but I think that is what I liked about them) and he seems very authentic when speaking about the importance of faith, even if it does seem a tad bit preachy at points. While the surprise ending to this film, isn’t that much of a surprise, it is not because anything in Washington’s performance gives it away. I see no legitimate way for them to make a sequel, or even prequel, to this movie which is probably for the best, although I could watch him reprise this role several more times and not be sick of it, verdict: $$$$