March in Review

My birthday month. Good month of movies.

                                            Oz The Great and Powerful

James Franco sucks. Over the top performances. Cheesy expressions. It was like he was still doing his hosting job at the Oscars. Compared to Franco, the rest of the cast were pretty decent. The creation of Oz was spectacular. I don't know if it was the fact that Sam Raimi directs or not, but this really feels reminiscent to Army of Darkness. Unlike the meaningful chemistry around Dorothy and her companions, Oz is surrounded by annoying, badly written sidekicks. DECENT FLICK BUT COULD HAVE BEEN BETTER IF ROBERT DOWNEY PLAYED OZ LIKE HE WAS SUPPOSE TO FROM THE START.

                                                         DEAD Man Down

Dead Man Down redefines the revenge, but not in a good way. This movie, although entertaining enough to bare, has the worst revenge story I've ever seen. If it wasn't for the cool opening of a gang of assassins led by Terence Howard, I don't think I would have stuck with film more than ten minutes. What's worse is that this movie doesn't just have one revenge story but two, and it's gets really dull, up until the money shot that involves a truck and house, which is the main reason for seeing this movie. After this movie, no one in film has any idea what to do with Colin Farrell. To be honest, after the one of the biggest bombs of last summer, Total Recall, which starred Farrell, I was really surprised to see this guy still getting work after his constant failures in the mainstream portion, especially when it comes to action films. He seems more fitting for the small screen. OKAY MOVIE, BUT FARRELL SHOULD QUIT WHILE HE'S BEHIND.

                                                         Olympus Has Fallen

Gerard Butler can kick some serious ass. Why isn't this guy a bigger action hero he should, instead of constantly trying to spread himself to romantic comedies, which are all terrible. 300, action, success. The Ugly Truth, rom-com garbage. Law Abiding Citizen,action, success. Playing for Keeps, rom-com, pure garbage. Can we stop with these action movies that try to relive the 90's with the pointless girlfriend component. Radha Mitchell plays Butler's wife, who's a nurse at a hospital only to have some connection to the plot. Why couldn't you just make a staff member of the President. Speaking of pointless, Ashley Judd plays the First Lady. Those enormously, goofy looking cheeks on the face of Judd was more appealing than her performance. Earlier, I would have thought this film would be the biggest misrepresentation of the Secret Service, but after recent current events, I find the absolute desolation of the Secret Service to be somewhat fitting. I didn't like the use of Aaron Eckhart, either the wrong role or just the wrong movie for him. And a couple of times I confused him for a secret service agent. ALONG WITH THE LOVE AFFAIRS OF CGI AND THE CONSTANT USE OF THE AMERICAN FLAG VERY FUN AND ENTERTAINING FLICK.

                                                                GI Joe 2

BEST OF THE MONTH OF MARCH. THE ROCK RULES. Now that I got that out of the way, Bruce Willis has done shit before, Hudson Hawk for example, but the more I think about the last Die Hard and it's ridiculousness of it's plot and title, the more I feel like I'm getting tired of ole' Bruce. Man, that's hard to admit. He just did that movie with such carelessness that it was a distraction for me to see him in this, especially being the person with thee worst written lines in this feature. If Red 2 fails, I don't know where to go from here.

FEBRUARY IN REVIEW

Welcome back, Walter Hill. It's great to see that he hasn't lost his cool, gritty style to action films. And much like Hill's work, Bullet to the Head suffers from a weak plot. Pretty Good Action flick.

Worst Die Hard since Die Hard 2. What were they thinking with slapped together work of garbage. It wasn't hard to tell this installment was just thrown together, with the February release, smaller budget, and being way shorter than all previous Die Hard flicks. The chemistry between Bruce and Jai existed but this movie was so fast moving with it's pointless action scenes, that it was over before they really had a chance to really show off the father and son relationship. So they tarnish this relationship with the typical father, admitting how he's never there for his son, and his son listening from a distance and all of a sudden they're the perfect team. So, they went from John Jr. pointing a gun at his own father, showing that these two had a really violent filled falling out, to being immediately family again without any real conversation going on. TRASH.

Typical haunted house movie, but instead of ghost and demons, it's aliens. About aliens. Are they or were they ever really scary? Maybe if I knew what they would do once your abducted. That whole probing theory is weak. This movie seemed like it was going into a new direction of alien conspiracies. Instead, it's just a that tries to build scares by  making wait and wait until near the end for the big payoff, which is worse. TRASH, FOR HAVING FOOLISH CHARACTERS MORE CONCERNED ABOUT FINANCES THAN A ALIEN INVASION.

He cries, he protects his family, he kicks ass. Best movie of February.

Trailers Trash

When I first got into movies, my main attractions was just going to see teasers and trailers. Watching a countdown clock go down to zero and Pierce Brosnan popping on screen announcing himself as James Bond for the Goldeneye teaser trailer, my cheeks raising so high that they touch my eyeballs and my face red as a strawberry with enjoyment. Most times I would just want to see a movie just because of the trailers of the future movies coming out. Now, it seems like those days are over.

   Movie Trailers, today, are nothing more than a mega commercial trying to sell you multiple products. You rarely hear original trailer music in previews. I've heard Kanye West's Power in so many trailers. I'm sick of Jay Z soundtracks. The worst is when the music isn't even a decent match for the trailer, such as the Clash of the Titans trailer using The Bird and the Worm. When I watch a sword and sandal genre flick, rock music doesn't come into mind. It's like the marketing team is selling the music of these artist more than the movie itself. Also, can we stop with these clips in almost every action movie trailer where someones jumping off a roof and time slows while they're in mid air, which was most likely made famous by The Bourne Ultimatum.

   I guess it could be worse. Like with the 70's, when you were shown full scenes that went on for almost 10 minutes, such as in the Halloween trailer, where almost a full chase scene was shown. The trailer for Godfather used flash clips, and some were spoilers. However, they did have complete focus on what they were trying to sell. A lot of trailers today just go all over the place and many of them follow the same dull ass formula. Please just focus and sell your movie and not music from popular artist or throwing in clips that are not meant for trailer view.

January in Review

                                                           


                                                      Texas Chainsaw Massacre
     What does Texas Chainsaw Massacre 3D have that the other Texas Chainsaw Massacre films don't have? Well, there are no deaths by chainsaw or even a scar by chainsaw in this film. Most of the deaths are brought about by meat cleavers and car crashes. Everything in this movie is just so tender, from Leatherface to every other piece of content in this film. Even the gore is pretty tame for a R rated horror flick, almost like they wanted a Pg-13 rating. First of all, I never found Leatherface appealing as an horror icon. The more they made the more they got away from the ideal chainsaw wielding retard and into a zombie, Jason-like character. This version, which is a so called direct sequel to the original, creates a more sympathizing character with Leatherface. Almost like what they did with Michael Myers in Rob Zombie's remake, with revealing his childhood back story. All the many faults in this movie none are worse than turning this icon into a sobbing creature. Pure Trash!!!

                                     

Wankster Squad

Josh Brolin still playing the stern, dry roles like he usually does. Maybe he felt that he was still trying to play Tommy Lee Jones younger self. Ryan Gosling added swagger to his tone but nothing towards the rest of his performance. Anthony Mackie becomes Blade. Robert Patrick turns into a western, quick drawer. Michael Pena playing the role of "I'm just here for the Mexican jokes". Nick Nolte  playing a drunk police chief. This film is anything but based off a true story. However, the way these actors played their roles and the wackiness of everything else kept this movie from being awful. Sean Penn's character or any other character had any depth at all to make them into at least 2 dimensional characters. So they gave the 50's era a very unrealistic, flashy style. If I could go back in time, I seriously doubt people in that era sounded, looked and dressed like they did in this movie. It's looking more and more like Ruben Fleischer was a one hit wonder with his Zombieland. Okay movie, makes you feel like you just stepped into January, known as the dumping ground for B movies and just play duds.

                                            
Russell Crowe kept this movie from breaking under it's attempt to bring back the film noir genre. Pretty good effort, but few issues kept it from hitting on all cylinders. There's a pointless girlfriend arc storyline with Wahlberg's character that goes nowhere and is the worst part of this movie. Russell Crowe and Jeffrey Wright keep this movie from being anything below decent. Okay.

         
The Last Stand, the title of Arnold Schwarzenegger's new film, which should be his last stand in the movie business. This guy's done. You can see it in his big cracked face. His chunky, out of breadth, slow looking physique, and he's run out of one liners, so he says anything to try to make it sound cool. The failed attempt at a comeback does not mean Arnold no longer has a big fan base anymore. This guy lost his thunder way before he became governor. His last successful film, critically and financially, was True Lies; Eraser was also a big success, financially wise. Then came the slumps: Jingle All the way, Batman and Robin, End of Days, The 6th Day, Collateral Damage and Terminator 3, which I still believe is the weakest installment in the Terminator franchise. Could it be that his appeal was washed away already? And he actually believes that he could go somewhere with this low rate, direct to video garbage. There's hardly any Arnold moments til the near end. If this movie has any saving grace at all, it would every car chasing scene, fantastic. Pure Crap, Kim Ji-Woon, the director chosen for this movie mainly because of his great work on movies like I Saw the Devil, hopefully returns to filming in his country and doesn't become another John Woo.

I enjoy jump scares. Killing all sound and suddenly blasting all sound to create a reaction. If there's a reaction, that's all that matters.Wasn't expecting a fantasy horror, but should have known with Guillermo Del Toro attached to it. Okay movie, hopefully has an unrated dvd release.

Hansel & Gretel would have to be my favorite movie for the month of January. Just entertaining, fun, all I would expect from a movie with a poster like this. Cool flick.

One Question? Where is the action? This is Jason Statham. The most boring Jason Statham movie I've ever seen. Stop hiring Nick Nolte, unless the character is a drunk. Parker is absolutely the wrong movie for Statham. Not saying that without Statham this movie would have been better. Just a small miscast. Jennifer Lopez is terrible and adds nothing to the film. She comes in like 30 minutes into the movie, which you usually do with characters that have meaning. Her intro was just pointless and could have been left out of this whole movie. Michael Chikilis was fun to watch and I wish he had gotten more screen time. Trash.

TOP 10 WORST MOVIES OF 2012

1.

                         
Real does not equal Good. Acting is meant for actors.This is not a movie meant to glorify Navy Seals. It's a film that's riding off the success of the Call of Duty franchise. Terrible dialogue. Did the Navy Seals write the script. Horrible film

2.

 
The only good thing about this movie is that Act of Valour came out the same year, to take the number one spot. When will this guy be finished in the film making industry. Alex Cross is the most unoriginal character in the world of fiction. Being directed by the guy who made the Bruce Lee story says it all.

3.

First movie of 2012. And one of the worst.

4.

Discovery of a lousy way to make good profit from a cheap looking film.

5.

When did Steven Soderbergh become such a dull directed, more focused with style over substance.

6.

What's in the box? Not a good movie.

7.

Can this franchise get any worse?
8.

Can't wait til Disney get's a hold of this.

9.

Poor attempt at trying to make Denzel into Jason Bourne.

10.

Wrath of Sam Worthington's mediocrity.

The Best of 2012

Top 10 of 2012

Why?

10. The Collection

A horror flick with a cool killer but a bad ass hero. I've seen many horror films with heroic characters, Laurie Strode, Sidney Prescott. However, in those two franchises, it's the antagonists who gets all the glory in the end. With the The Collection and it's predecessor, it's more about Arkin and less about the killer.

9. Dredd

The Law has returned. Probably the most overlooked movie of 2012.

8. Jack Reacher

Jack Reacher > Vincent the hitman

7. 21 Jump Street

 

Best Comedy of 2012

6. The Dark Knight Rises

                     

Great Conclusion. Still, though. Burton's Batman's the best.

5. The Avengers

Of Course.

4.Django Unchained

Bloodiest western since The Dirty Dozen. When it comes to spaghetti westerns, Sergio Leone is the only director I'd deal with, until now.

3.Looper

 Best way to explain time Travel? Don't Explain Time Travel. 

2.The Grey

He's now acquired a new set of skill.

1. Skyfall

 

The Apparition

Once you believe, you die? How bout once you don't use common sense, you die, since absolutely no one in this movie and everyone who anything with creating this picture was simply void of. I've seen so many supernatural movies where the characters do the most illogical things to come off as so unrealistic, but in some strange way, when they do it right it can still be entertaining.The Apparition took characters that should have been written in Tom Arnold's The Stupids and made them the most unbelievable roles ever. Supernatural films before this one, at least, put the characters in situations where they would be exposed to events that could be rationalized. In this movie, there's so many wild things happening in the beginning that you would expect to happen during the 2nd or final act of the film. What's worse is the fact that there is no rationalizing done by any of the characters. They just see something and pop they're mouths open for a couple of minutes, go to bed and tomorrow, it's a fresh brand new day.

Surprisingly, I was never bored by this movie, but thought it lacked every typical standard in every formulaic ghost story.