Not a review this time

Yeah. This is the first and probably only time that I'm writing something here that's not a review. Many of the three or so people that read this have been asking me when I'm putting up reviews for The Hunger Games or other films of that nature. I'm here to say that, for undisclosed reasons, I will not be reviewing any more. This proclamation is indefinite, as I have no clue when it shall end. I will still be hyper-opinionated about films, I just won't be reviewing them here. All my old reviews are up, so they can still be enjoyed for their vicious cynicism and crude 5th-grade-level writing ability. And to end it off on a film-loving note-see "The Cabin in the Woods" it's a brilliant deconstruction of the horror genre and I highly recommend it. I have to go now. Stay classy San Diego. -Davey Peppers

The Adventures of Tintin (2011)

I did the math. I used the Wikipedia page, I used the movies I’ve reviewed, the reviews I didn’t post, and the movies I watched but didn’t care enough about to review (don’t judge me. I had a lot on my plate when I saw Transformers: Dark of the Moon and Water for Elephants), and everything I saw that was released in 2011. Hitting the counter with one of my most anticipated films of the year, I have seen 100 movies that were released in 2011. And the 100th movie I saw that was a 2011 movie was The Adventures of Tintin: The Secret of the Unicorn, or just The Adventures of Tintin, if you prefer the North American title (which I don’t, but currently I am in North America, so I’m using that title for this review). And having that be my 100th 2011 film, all I have to say is: good decision-making, me.

Based off of the comics by Belgian artist Hergé (Georges Remi), The Adventures of Tintin takes its story from the comics The Crab with the Golden Claws, The Secret of the Unicorn, and Red Rackham’s Treasure. This mashed (but completely organic) story involves journalist Tintin (mo-cap and voice by Jamie Bell) and his trust dog Snowy who, when paired up with Captain Haddock (mo-cap/voice by Andy Serkis), has to find two more scrolls hidden inside models of the ship Unicorn, as they lead the way to finding the old treasure of the Haddock line, of which our Captain Haddock is the last. The competition for finding the treasure is Sakharine (mo-cap/voice by Daniel Craig), who is trying to restore order with his ancestors as well. And even though I probably said too much right there, I will say no more from that, because much like with many other great films, there are so many little great surprises that will either leave you in stitches or leave you amazed.

The Adventures of Tintin, despite how it was made, was sold as a silly kid’s film. THIS IS NOT A KID’S MOVIE. Just like Hugo this year, The Adventures of Tintin is just a movie that involves kiddy themes, but it is helmed in such an adult and brilliant way. There is a single roughly five-minute adventure scene in here, that is one singular shot. My heart was in my stomach the entire time because this is such a brilliant shot, and even though it is animated, you can see the talent and skill radiating from this scene, and from this entire film. At its heart, The Adventures of Tintin is a pure action adventure film, and very well could be the best adventure since Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom. It sure as heck is a better Indiana Jones film than Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.
9/10

My Week with Marilyn (2011)

As I said in my review for The Devil Wears Prada, which is actually a completely unrelated movie, Michelle Williams very much deserved the Oscar for Best Actress, which she lost in the 84th ceremony to Meryl Streep. Williams will win it one day, having been nominated for the award two years in a row, but that was not this past year, sadly. But despite the Academy being completely wrong once again (it’s gonna take a lot of right decisions to get me to bury the hatchet on Drive’s snubs and this isn’t helping), this film is still getting a decent amount of traction in the public eye due to its nomination and the public’s infatuation with Marilyn Monroe, which I think is a wonderful thing, because this is the type of movie that film junkies talk about and recommend to others that just sits on the shelf for months without being touched (and yes, this is a thinly veiled saying that those of you who are holding onto my DVD’s and Blu-rays: Watch them, or just give them back. Because I re-watch stuff, especially the stuff good enough to own and recommend, and ya’ll are not helping one bit), and instead, regular normal people are actually going out of their way to see an art house comedy, which is a beautiful thing.

Based off of the memoirs The Prince, The Showgirl, and Me, and My Week with Marilyn, both by Colin Clark, this movie tells the story of Clark’s (Eddie Redmayne, someone who is a perfectly fine actor, but is completely overshadowed in this film) time that he spent fulfilling his dream of working in film, here being the third assistant director for Laurence Oliver’s (Kenneth Branagh) production of Marilyn Monroe’s (Williams) The Prince and the Showgirl, and Clark’s relationship with Monroe, as she begins to open up as a person with Oliver’s cruel direction and the pressure of being Marilyn Monroe, the most important human being on the planet (when you ask someone to say who they thought was the biggest person of the 50s, they will say Marilyn Monroe. Heck, I don’t even know who was the President in the 50s without the help of Wikipedia), and her personal problems with her marriage and just a thousand different shades of pressure. And even though this is a very well-made film, with a great script, sharp direction, and a really good cast (Branagh’s also Oscar-nominated Supporting Actor role is something worth seeing this movie for as well), My Week with Marilyn is truly a film built around Michelle William’s performance as Marilyn Monroe. Granted, it’s a lot of talented people based around Michelle William’s performance as Marilyn Monroe, but it still is that (I’m saving everybody’s time by not typing that a third [and probably fourth or fifth] time around). She is perfect in this film, as she is balancing the tightrope that few actors can pull off of a real person in that it has to seem other than she’s doing an impression. And also with the fact that Williams does not look like Monroe, she has many barriers to cross with her performance, which could have sunken the entire ship. But she walks that tightrope like a champion, and pulls off what is truly the best performance of an American actor or actress this year.

In the end, while it really doesn’t boast the outside barriers it deserves, My Week with Marilyn is a charming, constantly funny, sweet, and honest movie that delves into a small piece of time in the life of an icon, and while it does have a very wonderful performance by Gilderoy Lockhart, the movie deserves to be seen just for William’s performance, which I don’t think I really can go into much more detail without just gushing for a few more paragraphs, but truly: she is perfect in this movie, and she did deserve every single award she was nominated for, and if there are any, any she did not.
8.5/10

ATM (2012)

ATM is actually released in theaters on April 6th, but it was available for a pre-release rental on iTunes, and I had a bus ride with nothing to do, so I decided to watch it. Just keep that in mind that most of my reviews are months or years after the DVD has been released, so this should balance it out a little bit.

Directed by newcomer David Brooks, ATM stars Alice Eve, Brian Geraghty, and Josh Peck (yeah, the other guy from Drake and Josh is in a horror movie now) as three friends who, at about 12 o’clock at night, is forced by Corey (Peck) stop at an ATM to get money for food, much to the chagrin of David (Geraghty), who is trying to have his last chance with Emily (Eve) before she leaves the city. While in the ATM (which in New York is apparently in a phone-booth-like box in the middle of a parking lot), a man in a parka appears outside, standing there ominously. They stay in the booth, just waiting out the creepy guy, but suddenly the entire situation turns fatal when the man kills a passer-by walking his dog. After that, it seems to be standard knowledge that they stay inside of the dang box. The rest of the movie is them conflicting with each other, trying to find ways of getting out alive, and the man trying to flush them out of the booth. Despite the obvious fact that this feels like a very thin premise, and it is, but it is still played out in such a way to where even though it isn’t really that scary, the movie sure as heck is entertaining. I enjoyed watching the dynamics of these people disintegrate, and watching them fight against a guy in a parka with a knife.

Even though the film does have its flaws (thankfully the characters only make one really stupid decision, but they still make it), and the acting can be a little better at times, ATM is a nice little thriller that will surprise you, but it by no means a great terrifying masterpiece, even though it does have a twist ending that would make even the masters like Hitchcock nod in approval.
8/10

Like Crazy (2011)

Writing this review right after writing my review of The Notebook, it feels like I’m working on two different sections of the romantic drama spectrum. Because where The Notebook feels like a story of how romance is supposed to work out, and it has a very sweet look at the perfect American love story. Like Crazy works a little bit differently as a film. Because where The Notebook is a story about love conquering all, Like Crazy is a story about how love actually works in the modern world. The Sundance Film Festival awarded this film the Grand Jury Prize the year it was in, and despite the fact that I’m pretty sure this was the year the fabulous Tucker and Dale Vs. Evil was at the Festival, I’m still very much behind this decision.

Starring Anton Yelchin (someone who I am 100% sure is going to be an A-list actor in a few years’ time if he still is doing wonderful films) and Felicity Jones (whose acting ability is as wonderful in this film, but this is the first thing I’ve seen her in, so it’s still up for grabs), Like Crazy is the tale of Anna and Jacob, two people who meet in college. Anna is a British exchange student, and as she falls in love with Jacob, she decides to overstay her visa so she can spend the summer with him. But when she goes back to Britain for a family engagement, she is banned from re-entering the US for overstaying her previous visa. But with her being gone, their relationship is heavily strained, to the point where they both agree to take up separate romantic relationships, Anna’s with a fellow Britain (?) named Simon (Charlie Bewley) and Jacob’s with one of his co-workers named Sam (Jennifer Lawrence, who is wonderful in this film for five minutes. And also, with her being in two different movies in the same year where she is romantically paired up with Anton Yelchin here and the magnificent The Beaver, the two of them have to be pretty darn good friends at this point). But with later insane complications, involving them having to break it off with their respective significant others and them being forced into a marriage, the entire film just sees two people trying desperately to have their The Notebook and just keep failing.

In the end, even though it does have some script failings (which Jones said the entire thing was improvised…I call bull. This movie was too well-made to be improvised), the movie just feels so painfully real. And that is what I really love about this movie, is how real it feels. It doesn’t feel artificial (most of the time), it just feels real. The two leads work wonders together, and it’s movies like this that give hopeful one-day filmmakers like me the hope that we live on. So kudos, Like Crazy. Kudos.
8.5/10

The Notebook (2004)

The Notebook, based off of the novel of the same name by Nicolas Sparks, was released in 2004. As soon as I was old enough to truly understand movies, it immediately popped up on my radar. And I avoided it for eight years. I ran from this movie like it was the Black Plague. And now, due to the fact that with Drive and Crazy Stupid Love. my hero for 2011 has become Sir Ryan Gosling, I buckled down and watched the movie that made him and the wonderful Rachel McAdams unbearable famous.

Nicolas Sparks, the mastermind behind such evil plots as The Last Song, became famous with this little book, published eight years prior to the movie. He seems to be one of the more famous money-makers behind the relentless pulp novel section, that one very much has to weed through (consisting of romance, supernatural romance, and pointless thriller) to find a decent book (for me today it was A Game of Thrones-I’m very excited). But here, this story follows a modern day elderly man (James Garner) who is reading the story of a notebook to one of his fellow female patients (Gena Rowlands), who is suffering from dementia, to whom the story has a special meaning. The story goes back to the 1940s where a man named Noah (Ryan Gosling) meets and falls in love with a girl named Allie (Rachel McAdams), and the rest of the film chronicles their love, as they fight, recoup, live, love, and do all of this against the class system which is doing its best to pull the poor boy away from the rich girl. With a very classy supporting role by the wonderful James Marsden, the movie, even with its flaws (and God only knows there are many of them), becomes a very nice and enjoyable romance film, one that shows that love does actually conquer a good bit.

The film does have some very cheesy dialogue, there are a good bit of scenes that make you want to slam your head against a door, and that is my main complaint for the film, but the film is shot beautifully, the two leads have wonderful chemistry with one another, and the film retains an underlying sweetness that is essential to every single romantic movie’s success. And that lack of sweetness is something I see far too often in both romantic comedies and dramas, so it’s good to see a movie that just wants to tell a story about a boy and about a girl.
7/10

The Devil Wears Prada (2006)

Meryl Streep is a brilliant actress. I think that is something we’ve all figured out. I know that she is one of the best working actresses today. And keeping all of that in mind, I think she is still one of the most over-rated actresses working today. She is a wonderful actress, one with a legacy behind and in front of her, but she is put on a pedestal and is portrayed as a goddess. As I am reviewing this, I am watching the fantastic My Week with Marilyn, and personally, I think Michelle Williams completely deserved the Best Actress Oscar, even more than frontrunner Viola Davis for The Help, and yet, Meryl Streep won for The Iron Lady, a movie that barely even existed. But let’s get beyond the actress, we need to see the film that gave her the resurgence in popularity.

Based off of the novel of the same name by Lauren Weisberger, who wrote it based off of her experiences as assistant to Vogue editor-in-chief (and totally crazy) Anna Wintour, the film follows Andy Sachs (Anne Hathaway, in what is probably her breakout role) as she tries to break into journalism by being the second assistant to Miranda Priestly (Meryl Streep, in an Oscar-nominated role), a psychopathic editor-in-chief for Runway, a fictional magazine that apparently possesses all the power in the world. Also helping Andy in her endeavors are Miranda’s first assistant Emily (Emily Blunt) and the art director of the magazine Nigel (Stanley Tucci, who is a giant walking ball of awesome), as they all work together to try to possibly survive in a world where their boss can cost someone $300,000 just by pursing her lips.

While I don’t entirely agree with it, I found a lot of amusement in reading Roger Ebert’s review of this film. He compared the entire film to a series of books that were around when he was a kid, and it was completely fantastic. This film is a bit like that review. You really don’t expect how smart it is, but to the very core of it, there’s just something that withholds it from living to its full potential. There it’s my disagreement with it, here it’s something a little less definable. But still, while The Devil Wears Prada is lacking as a film, as a satire of the fashion industry, it’s a good bit of fun.
7.5/10

Anonymous (2011)

Something very important is to remember when reading my review for Anonymous-I hate Roland Emmerich. I think he’s a pointless filmmaker who makes pointless films for dummies. He has made one film that I have watched and enjoyed, and that film was Independence Day, a film I am scared of re-watching for finding I hate it and my Blu-ray is just taking up empty space now. He has made pointless disaster movie after pointless disaster movie, movies that I just see as big-budgeted script-less globs. The first Emmerich film I ever saw was 2012 when I was eleven. Even then I saw it as dumb, pointless, and stupid. And this is coming from a huge John Cusack fan.

Expanding on the idea that Shakespeare actually never wrote any of his plays, and that it was Edward de Vere, the 17th Earl of Oxford, the film stars Rhys Ifans (de Vere) and Vanessa Redgrave (Queen Elizabeth I), and was a film that suddenly, a few weeks before its release, was unexpectedly pushed down from 3000 or so screens to a measly 265 in the USA, Canada, and the UK, a number that is much smaller than it looks. The film was re-created with some very good CGI technology that re-created the entire atmosphere of old England. Honestly, the best thing about this film is the atmosphere, how it is created, how the costumes look, and how the performances are, this entire film just feels like old England from the first frame. But then you hear the first lines, and then the plot kicks in. It states that de Vere was the actual writer of the plays, because of the class system that everybody was so deathly afraid of back then (I am so happy I live in the 21st Century), and with the help of Ben Johnson (Sebastian Armesto, who performs as one of the few truly likable characters in the film), puts the plays on an often-drunken actor named William Shakespeare (Rafe Spall). I still really don’t know how Queen Elizabeth fits into the main plot of the story, she really seems to function as a side-plot, but that seems to not be terribly important here.

As both a Shakespeare fan and as a film fan, this movie is just nearly insulting. The film is extremely convoluted in its time-jumping script, and with that, the boring lines that go along with it. And putting aside my personal feelings on how the subject matter lives, what I’m concerned with is how it’s portrayed. Shakespeare is the foundation of how most films today are made, and I will appreciate him forever for that, and seeing him so ignorantly written here seems both ironic and offensive. But really, there’s nothing to be angry about here. There’s nothing to care about here. Anonymous just ends up being a lazy and convoluted drama that had a very good costume design, a very good set design, some good actors, and a script that seemed like someone threw words at a wall and picked out sentences.
3.5/10

Easy A (2010)

The one important thing that I learned from Easy A is that I could watch Emma Stone talk for hours and never get bored. I mean, in any movie she is in, she just bleeds charisma out of her ears. She is easily one of the single most charming people working in modern cinema today, and with The Help, Zombieland, Crazy Stupid Love, and a lot of projects on the horizon, it looks like (to my joy) that she won’t be going away anytime soon. But what is arguably one of the single best works of her acting is Easy A, the movie that got Stone a Golden Globe nod for Best Actress, something that she will win in the future when she finally starts to make movies that are truly the best of the year, and not just good movies where she is the best thing in that movie.

Based off of the novel that you may have read if you ever took a high school literature class, The Scarlet Letter, but doing so in an extremely self-referential way, Easy A is the high-school tale of Olive Penderghast (Stone) who after a fun night of listening to the song “Pocket Full of Sunshine” over and over again, is grilled about it by her friend (Aly Michalka), who was told by Olive that she was going on a date subconsciously. The rational (sometimes the only one in the movie) Olive tries to sway her friend’s interest by telling a little white lie that seems to make her happy-that Olive seemed to have lost a little something over the weekend. Of course, this goes completely out of proportion which sends Olive into a system of being a faked tramp for the losers, something that ends up involving Olive’s parents (Stanley Tucci and Patricia Clarkson, who will now go into the modern movie awesome parents hall of fame along with Juno’s), the marriage of her favorite teacher (Thomas Haden Church) to his unfaithful wife (Phoebe Buffet/Regina Phalange…I mean…Lisa Kudrow), and a psychopathic religious nut (hilariously played by Amanda Bynes striking every single note that I have with the crazy hyper-religious typed who try to force every single thing they believe on other people (they’re the same people who got Seven Days in Utopia and Courageous made), no matter what, to pure brilliance. These characters all come together in a gigantic wonderful film, one that I truly do love.

This movie has some extremely funny people behind it, including Will Gluck, who went on to make Friends with Benefits a year later, and is rising onto the comedy scene. I have a funny story about Easy A. The first time that I ever saw it, I saw it with my mom and my best friend. After the movie, me and my friend agreed that it was a really good film. My mother was horrified. “I…I thought it was about school and grades!” Well mom, in a sense, it was.
8.5/10

Jack and Jill (2011)

[Before film] It’s been a long time since I did the review-while-watching, so I decided I would do it again with what is arguably my single most dreaded film of 2011 (probably after the day when I get old enough to succumb to Bucky Larson: Born to be a Star, but that’s neither here nor there), Jack and Jill. My iTunes download is coming in as I write this. It is 11:16 PM. Pray for me. [30 seconds in] Wow. Even the Happy Madison logo brings back painful memories of Happy Gilmore. And the entire logo of that “company” is just trashy. This is gonna be a long review. [2:58] Oh God protect me. We’ve gotten into the baby fart jokes and butts that were enhanced by CG. Why? [5:05] *Sigh* [5:32] There was actually a funny joke in this film, but it was so anti-Semitic I feel guilty. [6:34] Are you there God? It’s me, Davey. Could you do me a favor and wipe the image of Adam Sandler in drag from my memory, and while you’re at it, just hit him with a lightning bolt or something? [7:40] There is a bird. Named Poopsy. [8:17] Why is a little Amish girl doing karate? And why is this family so racially unbalanced? [9:50] They just knocked out two different product placements in one sentence. Awesome. [11:21] That’s it. I’m not gonna be typing more for a while. It just hurts too much. [16:14] This is one of the most painful experiences I’ve had this year. I quit for tonight. [1:16:05] Yep. Al Pacino is singing.

Well, I bailed on my attempt to speak while watching, because it was just too much. So now I have finished Jack and Jill, and I pray to you, as a decent human being, to wipe this movie from my memory. I actually counted the decent jokes or just good parts in the film. There were nine funny joke in the film (only in very small chuckles), and one mildly touching moment, so that makes ten moments I didn’t want to strangle myself. The movie is 90 minutes long, so once every nine minutes, something decent happens. That’s not a very good record. Now let’s try to get into the “story” of a film of this caliber. Adam Sandler stars as Jack, an advertising worker who every year, dreads the coming of his twin sister Jill (also…played by Adam Sandler), who is basically a giant obnoxious ball of annoyance. That Jill is an entirely unlikable and dreadful character seems to be the one thing Adam Sandler and I agree on, because there is nothing here to give me any sympathy for anybody here, especially Al Pacino, who somehow was blackmailed or something into this movie, and even though he has most of the few funny lines in this movie (after Jill breaks his Oscar-“Well, you probably have others, right?” “You would think, but, no.”). But Al Pacino is in an Adam Sandler film. The Mayans were right.

In the end, Jack and Jill is such a painfully unfunny film that begs you to hate it, because it has to be intentional in its terribleness, because this is the guy who made The Wedding Singer, a really funny comedy. Adam Sandler has to just be trolling all of us at this point.
1/10

Dream House (2011)

Okay. My computer keeps crashing (death to Windows 7) so this is the third time I’ve been reviewing Dream House, so this review will not be pleasant. What I hate the most about Dream House is that you can see the small little chunks of a good film seeping through the cracks of this studio hash of a film. When it first came out, one would hear stories of how Universal took this movie straight out of the hands of Jim Sheridan (the director) and went all Edward Scissorhands in the editing room, slicing what should have been a longer and better film and turning in…this. In short, I see Dream House like one of my closest friends (and my arch-nemesis) sees Contagion, a film that I praised extremely heavily against just about everybody-that it was a great three-hour movie that had a studio throwing scissors at it.

Starring Daniel Craig (who cannot pull off an American accent to save his life, and also, as a personal note, I can never buy him not only as not James Bond, but not as a family man especially, because he looks so angry, that I’m afraid he would just break into a fit and punch a hole in my face-actually, he might be a father-in-law, but not an actual parent or family man) as Will Atenton, a man who, when he quits his (seemingly pretty awesome) job to go and spend more time with his wife Libby (Rachel Weisz) and two kids (with apparently no financial aid what-so-ever), but they all begin to see strange things happening in their new house relating to a recently-released murderer from the house named Peter Ward. Helping Will try to keep his family safe is his neighbor Ann (Naomi Watts). And that is just about the most I can say without spoiling this film, because even when the TRAILER spoils it, I don’t.

Yes, the trailer for this film spoiled the big half-way mark in the middle of the film. When I saw that trailer, I was infuriated, because that was the big twist of the film, and now it’s just there to mock anybody who dared to go see it. And anyway, the film just gets into a completely ridiculous aspect after a while. Dream House is about eighteen different films that were spliced into one semi-coherent story, and most of its negative criticism stems from its terrible marketing and trailer (honestly, I might have liked this film a little bit more without that trailer. So, honestly, I don’t put the fault of how terrible this movie is on the director, the screenwriter, or the actors. I put the fault behind Dream House on the big rotating planet in the sky, on Universal Studios. Adios.
3/10

J. Edgar (2011)

I think J. Edgar is the worst-reviewed movie on my current ‘Best of 2011’ list. Granted, it’s at 20th place (out of 20), and will probably leave when all the movies I missed come out on DVD, but for now, it’s right up there. Directed by Clint Eastwood, this new biopic of FBI director (and possible closeted homosexual) J. Edgar Hoover divided critics extremely, with a meager 44% on Rotten Tomatoes, has been awarded with both rave reviews and horrific bashings. Personally, I love this movie, and I think that this is a truly great film. A characters study through and through, J. Edgar, at its core, becomes a Man Vs. Self story, as this character fights against everything he knows, almost like a condensed slightly watered-down version of The Aviator, which also stars Leonardo DiCaprio, who is amazing as Hoover in this film, and I strongly believe he is one of the best actors out there. Now that’s gone on long enough, let’s get into what you came here for-shall we?

Starring Leonardo DiCaprio in the title role, J. Edgar concerns the man who rebuilt the Federal Bureau of Investigation, J. Edgar Hoover. Telling Hoover’s story from the Palmer Raids onwards, the film chronicles the Lindbergh baby case, the arrest of John Dillinger, the deportation of anarchist Emma Goldman, and many other cases that made the man famous in his lifetime. Along with him, the film also chronicles his relationship with his secretary, Helen Gandy (Naomi Watts), and his relationship with his protégée Clyde Tolson (Armie Hammer), which was the subject of much speculation by others and Hoover himself during and after his lifetime. While that is one of the main subjects of this film, it never gets too deep or falls into rumors, something I really appreciate about this film. It chronicles Hoover’s life as a man under incredible pressure with a goal-eliminating radicals, and his inability to do that, along with all the other stress of life. Right now I’m probably doing this film too much justice, because as the film coasts, there are some very slow parts, and some parts where I almost fell asleep, but the film is never poorly-made. It’s not very well-lit, and there are some cheesy moments in the film, and it takes itself way too seriously, but this is a truly good film.

What I like best about J. Edgar is that it never feels like propaganda. J. Edgar, Clint Eastwood (who does a very good but un-noticeable job here), and Leonardo DiCaprio (who is amazing, because he is DiCaprio and can play anything) are not trying to make you have an opinion about J. Edgar Hoover. They just give you the facts and let you decide for yourself.
8.5/10

Tower Heist (2011)

The main problem that I have with Tower Heist goes back to the basic fundamentals of filmmaking-that all stories have a shorter exposition, a rising action that gets you pumped for the climax, and then the climax of the film, which is supposed to be the highlight of the film. But the highlight of the film never really seems to come. The actual robbery, which is about 20 minutes of the 100 minute film, while is fun to watch, just lacks the excitement or jokes it needs to float the film. The entire film is just being bogged down by the fact that it’s not that funny, which makes me sad. Because I love seeing a return to form for Eddie Murphy, making funny movies. And I also love Ben Stiller, and he is such a funny guy, but here he’s just not funny. And that is a bad thing.

Starring Ben Stiller and Eddie Murphy, Tower Heist is almost an amateur-version of Soderbergh’s Ocean’s Eleven, about Josh Kovacs (Stiller), a building manager who manages The Tower, a fancy apartment complex owned by Arthur Shaw (Alan Alda), who ends up taking the money of everybody working in the Tower who let him invest with a Ponzi-style scheme. So, Josh, concierge Charlie (Casey Affleck), evicted tenant/bankrupt investor Mr. Fitzhugh (Matthew Broderick), bellhop Enrique (Michael Pena), maid Odessa (Gabourey Sidibe), and low-rent criminal Slide (Murphy), all team up to try to rob Shaw of the $20 million dollars he has hidden in his penthouse apartment. And watching the robbery is fun and kind of funny when it gets back down to it, but we’re treated to a full exposition that takes about an hour, and then just more filler for thirty minutes. And I wouldn’t really mind the filler if it was funny, but the big problem with this movie is that it’s just not that funny. The jokes needed to be much more clever, the characters more realistic and loose, and the direction needs to pull back a little bit. Brett Ratner, the guy who directed Rush Hour and its less-than-perfect sequels (not that Rush Hour is perfect), and got fired from producing the Academy Awards and subsequently had Eddie Murphy quit the awards because of his “loyalty” to the director.

In short, Tower Heist is a film that should be a whole lot better. It should be a lot of fun, it should be really funny, but it’s really just not. I’m just not having a lot of fun watching it. I love heist films, and I love comedies. So when you’ve made a heist comedy starring Ben Stiller and it feels like a chore, something went wrong here.
6/10

The Big Year (2011)

I really had a lot more fun watching this than I thought I would. Starring Steve Martin makes a hit, Owen Wilson is a hit-or-miss, and Jack Black is usually a miss, so I had no idea how to perceive the widely under-seen bird-watching comedy The Big Year. And especially with it getting as mixed reviews as it did, actually leaning towards the negative, I got scared that the sweet little comedy that I noticed when nobody else did was just going to be another anger-inducing studio rehash of a better comedy (because no matter what anybody says, the worst kind of bad movie is a bad comedy, because you can’t laugh at it, you just scream in agony. My fingers are trembling right now thinking of how much my voice hurt after watching Something Borrowed), and I was actually very close to being able to see this movie in theaters. Close but no cigar. I was unable to catch the comedy in theaters, so I had to watch it on my own poor little self on my 2.5-inch-wide iPhone. And when a movie makes me laugh and is engrossing on 2.5 inches, that is a funny movie.

Based off of the novel of the same name, The Big Year follows bird-enthusiasts Stu (Steve Martin), Brad (Jack Black), and Kenny (Owen Wilson), as they all try to (in Stu’s and Brad’s cases) see the most birds in North America in one year, or (in Kenny Bostick’s case) beat his own record or just hold onto it so that he can still be king. Stu is a happily married man on the edge of retirement, looking back at all the things he wanted to do, so he sets out to do a ‘big year’, which is the challenge where one person tries to see the most birds in North America in one year. Brad still lives with his parents, is divorced, and has no direction in his life than his birds, so he decides to do the same thing so he can prove to himself his worth. Kenny is the arrogant who-knows-how-many-times-married king of the birds, a wealthy and snobby individual who will never let go of his record, so, despite the objections of his wife (who has really good grounds for saying these things, by the way), he leaves to beat his own record, a record that trashed one of his marriages before. The thing about this film is that we are supposed to root for everybody but Kenny, and the film does a good job of it. We root for Stu, we root for Brad, we even root for the smaller characters, including Ellie (the always fabulous Rashida Jones), a potential romantic interest for Stu.

This is a rare thing-a film with good honest people that doesn’t beat you over the head with that fact. This entire movie just lives on the spirit of good spirit, and is such a wonderful film to watch. It is a very funny, well-written, well-acted piece of sweet filmmaking, and is a movie you could watch with your mom. There is some slight profanity (I usually don’t mention stuff like that because I don’t think the actual inappropriate content of a film is important to if someone should see it), but other than that, this is just a sweet family film that proves no harm to anybody who would see it, and if somebody does, they will be brought to a sweet, simple, and pretty clever movie, one that I recommend in the highest degree.
8.5/10

One Day (2011)

Even with my extremely recent change of making my reviews structured, paragraphed, and longer, I can tell you right now that One Day will not be a long review, because it doesn’t need to be. Because even though I did enjoy watching this past-present romance, it just is a film that doesn’t deserve a lot of attention. It just passed under people’s radars, which is just something that happens to lesser movies. I actually do remember seeing one poster inside of a bathroom at a theater, but that’s it. Nobody thought anything of it, nobody paid attention. One Day is the underdog story that doesn’t end in joy and happiness, and I’m not even talking about the events of the film. Now let’s look at the romance that time forgot.

Based off of the novel of the same name, published in 2009 and written by David Nicholls, One Day tells the story of Emma Morley (Anne Hathaway), a recently graduated student in 1988 where she meets Dexter (Jim Sturgess), a fellow graduate. After a bumbling and poorly-crafted attempt at a one-night-stand, they decide to become close friends, and over the years, every June 15th, the day they met, they always meet up. A good portion of this movie takes place on a June 15th anytime from 1988 to 2011, as we see their relationship alter and change and move on from its basic platonic nature, because, if you look at the poster for this film, let alone the trailer, it’s not a spoiler to say that this is a film about these two people who love each other, despite the fact that Dex is a self-centered snob and Emma is very much a pain in the neck, to put it lightly. But despite that, I still felt something for this film.

I don’t know why I don’t hate One Day, it seems to have all the elements of a bad film-bad direction, shaky acting, at times really unbelievable writing, and at those times I did not care for it. But there were moments in the film, where watching it, I did feel something. It all clicked and I enjoyed watching these two people realize their feelings for one-another. And watching the film, it has a major gut-punch ending. And even though I had it spoiled for me when it first was released in theaters (thanks, internet forums), I still felt something at that end. And the movie has Patricia Clarkson in it, who is amazing. So I highly suggest watching this movie for Patricia Clarkson being in it for ten minutes, and some chick named Anna Hathaway too, or something.
7/10

Twilight: Breaking Dawn-Part 1

I’m no stranger to the Twilight series, I’m ashamed to admit. I’m also ashamed to admit that these movies keep making more and more money every second of every day, and watching The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn-Part 1, I think I know why-teenage girls (and their creepy mothers) do not recognize how a romance actually works, so they have to flock to these rehashed studio trash. I honestly believe that anybody who enjoyed a Twilight film, specifically New Moon or Breaking Dawn-Part 1 (the first one isn’t terrible, and I hear the third one isn’t either), needs to be put to repeated viewings of (500) Days of Summer and the original Dracula over and over again until they recognize both romance and vampires for their true form (and it also helps if they stop watching The CW-The Vampire Diaries is just as much to blame). I know I sound hypocritical here, but I didn’t watch this movie to enjoy it, I watched it to prevent you from having to.

Based off of the final book in Stephanie Meyer’s quadrilogy, The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn-Part 1 again stars the emotionless Kristen Stewart as Bella Swan, a human, as she is in the process of marrying Edward Cullen (Robert Pattinson), a vampire, much to the disdain of Jacob Black (Taylor Lautner), a werewolf. Now, with a human, a vampire, and a werewolf, this movie should have been more interesting, right? NOPE! Even with these fantastical creatures, we’re stuck with a bogged down romance that lasts too long and is just to dang dull. Because no matter what angle you take on it (personally, I hate this abomination, but recently I’ve been trying to be more professional in my reviews), this movie is just boring. People walk around for hours, and do nothing.

All the events of this film could be condensed to a (still boring, mind you) twenty-minute period, and Breaking Dawn could just be one glob of terrible instead of two. Now, some people could have the argument “but Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows was two parts, and the first part was slow, so why bag on Twilight? (I’m doing this in a very annoying voice in my head)” Because, dumb little teenager (wow, we’re getting into real hypocrisy here), the seventh Harry Potter book was over 700 brilliant pages long, and from what little I know, Breaking Dawn has about 400 empty ones. Now, I could go into how lame the direction is, how bad the acting is, or how laughable the dialogue is, but instead of ranting on and on, but let me just say these few things-1. This is not the worst movie. Still, New Moon is, but this is definitely second. 2. Nobody learned a thing making these movies, everything is just as bad as before. 3. When the two lines Anna Kendrick say are the few moments of joy I have watching your movie, you’ve messed up. 4. But, because this is part 1 of the last book, that means ONLY ONE MORE TWILIGHT FILM! WOO! As Monty Python once said-“Always look on the bright side of life!”
2/10

Fast Five (2011)

I am more than happy to say that Fast Five is my first introduction to the Fast and Furious films. A couple years back, me and my friends rented the original The Fast and the Furious. I remember the DVD cover and getting some of the best sleep a 9-year-old me ever got. So, fully rested, and ready to watch trash, I sat down to watch Fast Five, and I actually had a good time. I knew that this was the first film in the series with positive reviews, but I was still cynical. If there are ever to extremely overrated genres in popcorn cinema, it would be car films and dance films. Despite a filmmaking value, I just do not understand the appeal of those films. It may be because I’m someone who hides behind a computer, a television, and gallons of root beer (usually at the same time) instead of going out and illegally dancing/racing cars. But anyway, what’s great about Fast Five is that it ISN’T a car movie, it’s a heist film. And God knows I love heist films. Because I am fascinated by organized crime. Now let’s get into Fast Five. The fifth film in the Fast and Furious series of films, this one once again stars Vin Diesel as Dominic Toretto, who now is in Rio with his pal Brian O’Conner (annoying surfer and inventor of the term ‘bra’ as in a friend, Paul Walker) and sister Mia Toretto (Jordana Brewster), who are at odds with crime boss Hernan Reyes, as they decide to steal millions of dollars from him in vengeance, which in turn forces them to pair up with cop Luke Hobbs (Dwayne Johnson), in an awesome heist which involves whole bunches of awesome. As for the movie itself, it is actually filled with some really snappy dialogue, some really wonderful direction, and acting that actually isn’t that bad, because Fast Five is actually a well-made film, and I had a blast watching it. It’s by no means a perfect film, and is one that only warrants maybe one more viewing, but I had a lot of fun watching it.
7.5/10

Seven Days in Utopia (2011)

It’s movies like this that make me want to punch a hole in a wall and also burn a couple hundred feet of used film to get rid of all the filth that is Seven Days in Utopia. Based off of the novel God’s Sacred Journey: Seven Days at the Links of Utopia, Seven Days in Utopia is a movie with surprisingly little to do with God, little to do with golf, and little to do with anything. It’s movies like this that make me perfectly angry, because it stars Robert Duvall and Melissa Leo, both Oscar-winning actors. Robert Duvall made movies like The Godfather, To Kill a Mockingbird, and Apocalypse Now. Now he makes movies like Seven Days in Utopia. Starring Lucas Black and Robert Duvall (and Melissa Leo is in the movie doing nothing for 5 minutes-God, why?), this “movie” is the tale of a punk golfer named Luke Chisolm (Black), who, after snapping one of his golf clubs, becomes the most hated person in golf, and his father basically disowns him, and the clip of him “freaking out” is played repeatedly on the golf channel. The movie-makers wouldn’t have anything actually bad play out, because we want a truly likable character apparently, because all these characters are so peachy-clean and perfect. Nobody says a single “choice word” (I have a story behind that saying, I have to tell it to you sometime), nobody does anything bad, even as kind of terrible things happen. Lots of bad things happen to these characters (not bad enough, but still), and they’re all still pitch-perfect. The thing that I hate so much about this movie is that they are all perfect people. This movie exists in a world where everything is fine, and everything is perfect, and nothing at all goes wrong. This movie is all a big lie. And I don’t say that as a cynic, I say that as a rational human being. This movie is all a big lie. Wait! I have to finish the story synopsis. Pretend we’re back a couple sentences-And after he gets in a car accident as he tries to dodge a cow in the middle of the road (what?), he ends up stuck in Utopia for seven days as he gets his car fixed (why that much? I don’t think the hillbillies of this town even have cars, so what would the wait be for them to fix something up that a talented human being can do with three hours? I mean-5-year-old Tony Stark did it, why couldn’t someone else do it? But never mind. So, after that, a man (Robert Duvall) tries to help Luke get better at golf and also bring God into his game. Now back to my rant. This movie exists in a perfect world where all the bad people do are freak out on a golf tournament and have their kids play golf on one Sunday instead of go to church. This movie is a lie on top of a lie on top of a lie, and anybody who thinks that people, situations, life, or anything is this pitch-perfect is either really ignorant or really stupid. And I say this here. I’m not talking to anyone in general, just saying as a rule-if you like this movie, you’re an idiot. Or too young to know any better.
0/10

Take Shelter (2011)

The best thing about Take Shelter, for me, is that nobody knows about it. Very few people heard about the Michael Shannon thriller when its release date was upcoming, and as soon as it was released, the few critics that saw it loved it, but still, nobody knew this little thriller/drama existed. And now, with the release of almost every critic’s ‘Best of 2011’ list, Take Shelter is dominating. And now, with the Oscar snubs being sent out, Drive and Take Shelter are becoming the most popular of those snubbed films. The sophomore film of director Jeff Nichols, Take Shelter stars the absolutely wonderful Michael Shannon as Curtis LaForche, a blue-collar worker who, while struggling to keep his family afloat financially, begins to have haunting dreams and visions of terrible things happening, all relating to a storm with motor oil rain and terrible lightning and thunder. These dreams begin to force him to make extremely irrational decisions, which begin to put a strain on his marriage with his wife Samantha (the wonderful and constantly-appearing Jessica Chastain), his case for his daughter, the deaf Hannah (the actually deaf and wonderfully small Tova Stewart), his job, and his relationship with the community, which, with his family and Curtis himself, begin to suspect his insanity, due to his family’s previous relationship with schizophrenia, and the nature of the dreams. For the most part of this slow, taught, and dreary thriller, the question is whether this is schizophrenia or prophecy. As soon as the answer becomes clear, the movie doesn’t turn into a fast-paced monster, it doesn’t gain speed. It stays as calm, as quiet, as demonic. But-if you watch this movie, you have to watch it to the last thirty or so seconds. Because when you see a single shot in this film, your blood will run cold. Because this isn’t an Insidious-level horror film meant to make your girlfriends fall into your lap, this is a quiet, brilliant, and haunting drama/thriller, with an absolutely perfect performance by Michael Shannon, who, in a just world, would be at least nominated for, if not winning, the Oscar for Best Actor.
9.5/10

Lady in the Water

(NOTE: I do get to spoiling the fate of a few characters in this review, so please proceed with caution or the notion that this review is more entertaining than the actual movie, and I say this in all modesty, something I never do) There are two types of M. Night Shyamalan films-wonderful and terrible. As a director, he has made two great films that I have seen, and a lot of terrible trash. Now, a lot of people don’t hate his third major film, Signs, but I have not seen it yet. The two good films are The Sixth Sense and Unbreakable, and the two terrible films I’ve seen are Lady in the Water and The Last Airbender, one of the worst movies of ever. And now, after I have completely summed up the only four M. Night films I have seen, let’s talk about the most recent one. Lady in the Water, based off of a fairy tale M. Night used to tell his kids. Seriously? Even hearing about that the film is based off of an unofficial fairy tale gets my Spider-sense tingling, and that isn’t even the half of it. Starring Paul Giamatti and Bryce Dallas Howard, Lady in the Water is the tale of a handyman at an apartment complex named Cleveland (Giamatti) who encounters a water Narf named Story (Howard) as she tries to get back to her water world, but she is being hindered by a wolf-like creature who is on a mission to stop her from this mission. There is a lot more complicated stuff to this story, which was actually published as a children’s book that I might read, because the principle and moral of the story aren’t bad, the filmmaking is. The problem with Lady in the Water is that is contains long, tedious, melodic tracking shots, which is something Shyamalan does a lot, something I noticed heavily in Unbreakable, but I am afraid I never got to comment on it during my review for that film. But where in Unbreakable the tracking shots showed the fragile, delicate monotony the characters are in risk of losing, but in Lazy in the Water, the tracking shots are just to show monotony. And monotony is boring! The film’s first live-action shot is that of Paul Giammate cleaning a drain. Who wants to see that? I know I don’t. But besides the fact that this movie shows a man who is completely incompetent in filmmaking, there is a character in here that is a film critic, and, much like in the work of fellow incompetent filmmaker Roland Emmerich, he is portrayed as the most arrogant, pretentious snob since...me! The character shows a pretentious unsociable nut, who, in a scene where he is facing certain death, begins to count the reasons he will live in the story. He is then mauled to death. Now, I don’t know if Shyamalan is trying to be cute or funny with self-referential humor (leave it to the pros like Community, Shyamalan), or if he is being arrogant himself and saying that all film critics are pretentious monsters, and he is giving me the finger, then I give that finger back and say-Shyamalan, you know why we hate you? Because you make crap movies, and then call US stupid. The most redeemable quality about Michael Bay is that he APOLOGIZED for Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen. Spielberg APOLOGIZED for ruining the DVD print of ET: The Extra Terrestrial. You know why we hate George Lucas? Because he doesn’t learn from his mistakes, he just makes them worse, and then he calls us stupid. Be careful Shyamalan, you’re already treading on thin ice as of 2006, so in 2012, I have to say-be careful, you could be the next George Lucas.
3/10

Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace (1999)

When this movie first came out in 1999, I was a year old. I have no recollection of any theater experience of a Star Wars film before seeing my first PG-13 movie, Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith. But, despite that, I am a huge Star Wars nerd. I have seen all six movies (except for Star Wars Episode II: Attack of the Clones, which I think I have only seen once, because it’s really not a good movie at all, the only truly bad Star Wars film) many times, and love most of them very much. Star Wars, re-titled Star Wars Episode IV: A New Hope, and Star Wars Episode V: The Empire Strikes Back are the two best, then Star Wars Episode VI: Return of the Jedi and Star Wars Episode III: Revenge of the Sith are both very wonderful and fun films, and then there were two. Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace, easily my second-least-favorite of the Star Wars films, can be argued to be the single most hated film of all time. Released in May 1999 to waiting crowds of desperate nerds, they all were disappointed with the fact that most of this movie is really, really, boring. Nothing really happens in this film, and when you have a film that even Liam Neeson can’t save, you have a bad film. Starting off the story to tell how the chosen one, Anakin Skywalker, got to where he is in the original trilogy. While on a mission to establish peace to the universe, Jedis Qui-Gon Jinn (Liam Neeson) and Obi-Wan Kenobi (Ewan McGregor) come across Queen Amidala (Natalie Portman) and a young Anakin (the terrible, emotionless, and hated Jake Lloyd) as they try to stop the Sith, or the enemy of the Jedi. While the film does sound intresting in concept, a space opera with light saber battles and intergalactic war, the movie is increasingly boring. I nearly found myself going through $7.50 in drinks at the movie theater, getting up to keep from sleep and when I could no longer stand it. The most horrible thing about Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace. If any of you hate me ranting (and I know you’re out there), I suggest you run now. Shut your computer and run. It’s ranting time. Jar Jar Binks. Jar Jar Binks. The most evil creature on the planet is Jar Jar Binks, the worst creation on the planet. I just figured it’d be easier to have the caps lock button on my computer at this point. GEORGE LUCAS I HOPE YOU ARE HIT BY A BUS! THIS MOVIE WASN’T FOR KIDS, IT’S FOR PEOPLE WHO WERE KIDS WHEN THEY SAW YOUR GOOD MOVIES! THIS EXCUSE FOR CRAP COMIC RELIEF SICKENS ME AND EVERY OTHER SENSIBLE CREATURE ON THE PLANET! THE ONLY PEOPLE WHO EVEN LIKE JAR JAR ARE THE STUPID, THE VERY STUPID, THE NAUSEATINGLY NAÏVE, OR THE VERY VERY YOUNG! YOU SUCK AS A PERSON, AND THIS IS THE WORST THING ANYONE HAS EVER DONE! YOU ARE A DISGRACE TO FILMMAKING, A DISGRACE TO HUMANITY, AND A DISGRACE TO HUMAN CONCIOUSNESS! YOU MADE ONE OF THE WORST THINGS EVER, AND THEN BLAME US FOR OVERREACTING? AND THEN YOU QUIT BLOCKBUSTERS? You. Quit. Blockbusters? NO! YOU’RE STUCK WITH THESE HATED FILMS THAT EVERYBODY WILL HATE YOU FOR GEORGE, AND DON’T TRY TO CHICKEN OUT OR BLAME IT ON US. FACE YOUR CREATIONS, AND THEN…I’m gonna be calm now. –then either make good movies or no movies at all. You used to make good movies George. What the heck happened? Seriously. What the heck happened here? Now, the movie does have some good scenes in it. But it’s hyper-long length, it’s boring storyline, it’s lack of respect to the Star Wars universe and fanbase, and Jar Jar, this movie just fails(also, seeing this in theaters for the 3-D version, I have to say-the 3-D in this movie is terrible. It adds nothing, so don’t go for the extra trip even if just for 3-D.It’s not worth it).
5/10

Clueless (1995)

I have said it many times before that I am not akin to watching ‘chick-flicks’, in fact, if they’re well done, I like them a lot. Movies that are made for girls that I love insanely are (500) Days of Summer, Juno, Annie Hall, Crazy Stupid Love, Easy A, Hairspray, and a bunch of other wonderful films, and they are all great films about relationships and love. And another great film to add to that list is Clueless, a 1995 film that does not feel like a movie made in the 90s. I actually had to recheck every single source I had (Wikipedia, IMDb, and the DVD box) to confirm that this movie wasn’t made in the 80s, because it feels so much like an 80s film. And to mention-from what I’ve seen, my version of Woody Allen’s Midnight in Paris would be me time-traveling back to 1980’s Hollywood. But enough about gushing on a time period, I need to gush about this movie. And since I just got done with watching Lady in the Water, I need something to remind me that good movies can still be made. Based off of the 1815 Jane Austen novel Emma, Clueless is the tale of Cher (Alicia Silverstone), a shallow, superficial, but extremely good-natured teen who acts as the unofficial match-maker for the school she attends, as she manipulates and matches people to get her way, and despite everything I say, she is a completely lovable protagonist, mostly because everything works out, and she is so good-natured in what she is doing. But she and her fellow super-rich and super-popular friends Donnie (Stacey Dash) and Tai (the late Brittany Murphy) set out to basically try to find their happy endings. The best thing about Clueless is that while there are some scenes where I was completely laughing out loud, it strives as a sweet film, it’s a film that makes cynics turn to lovers, a film that makes haters turn to kings. When someone like me, who constantly repeats the phrase “there are two types of people in this world-idiots, and the lonely” looks at a film with pure happiness and love, that is a wonderful thing. This movie is just a wonderful fun teen romance, one that is completely highly recommended.
8.5/10

Unbreakable (2000)

“They call me Mr. Glass…” M. Night Shyamalan’s (this was before the name Shyamalamadingdong became worthy) second major film, Unbreakable, is a movie that divides a lot of people. But, much like the 2011 film The Tree of Life, not a soul will ever agree on it. I (and neither will any fellow movie-lovers) refuse to admit fault in The Tree of Life, at least any faults that are hate-worthy. And I say the same thing with Unbreakable. While I think The Tree of Life is a better film than Unbreakable, it does not dilute the love I have for this film in any way. Despite having a lot of people hate this movie for either its unconventional tone, lack of a brand name superhero, or the wicked twist ending that many people hate, this movie is an absolutely wonderful film, and is easily Shyamalan’s best film, and yes, it is a better film than The Sixth Sense. Easily deserving its place as one of Time’s “Top 10 Superhero Movies” list, Unbreakable stars Bruce Willis as David Dunn, a man who finds out, with the help of odd comic book fan named Elijah Price (the perfect Samuel L. Jackson, whose comic book fan basically to the extent of ‘him with comics/me with movies’) with osteogenesis imperfecta, a rare disease where those affected have extremely brittle bones, those that break unnaturally. What may be a simple scratch to one of us would be a good number of bone fractures, something that actually does happen in the movie. But Elijah’s logic is that if there is someone like him, there must be someone else on the other side of the spectrum, someone who is truly unbreakable, a superhero, and that man, David, is found by Elijah after he is the sole survivor of a freak train accident. I know I’m not explaining this well. Quentin Tarantino explains it best-“What if Superman was here on Earth, and didn’t know he was Superman?” That quote really does explain this movie best. It is an origin story to a new superhero, a new hero for a new generation. But, don’t get me wrong, this movie isn’t perfect. The first thirty minutes or so of this film are very slow, as is the entire film, but it takes about thirty minutes for the film to completely set in, at least for me. But despite that, the movie is a tense film, a wonderful one, and one that shall be recommended for ages passed on. And-the twist ending at the end of this movie is a wonderful one. Just saying. “It’s how I knew. It was the kids! They called me Mr. Glass.”
8.5/10

Hairspray (2007)

Let me begin this review like I begin most of my best ones-by being mean. If you don’t like this movie-heck, if you don’t love this movie, you are a Terminator, and your mission in life is to suck the fun out of it. Because this little gem right here, based off of the Broadway musical based off of the John Waters film of the same name, is nothing but pure unleaded fun for 2 hours. Telling an alternate tale of the Civil Rights movement (yes, your history teachers lied to you. It wasn’t Martin Luther King Jr. or Malcolm X; it was a singing chubby white girl. AMERICA!) through song and dance, Hairspray is the tale of Tracy Turnblad (newcomer Nikki Blonsky), a girl in the 60s who, with her best friend Penny (the always wonderful Amanda Bynes), dreams of nothing more than being a dancer on The Corny Collins Show, a local dance show run by Corny Collins (James Marsden), the fun and awesome super-amazing guy, and Velma Von Tussle (Michelle Pfeiffer), who is the exact opposite, and is super racist. On the show are Velma’s daughter Amber (Brittany Snow), and Link (Zac Efron…in a good movie…where he isn’t terrible? GASP!), among other people. Now, even that would only be a packed enough film, but the film also deals with the relationship with Tracy’s mother and father (carrying the tradition of the John Waters film and the musical, Tracy’s mother is played by a man in drag, this time John Travolta, and his/her husband, played by Christopher Walken. There seriously is a scene where John Travolta and Christopher Walken sing a love song to each other. There is a God.), and the fact that people were still super racist in the 60s, as Tracy encounters a group of African-American dancers including Seaweed (Elijah Kelley) and his mother Maybelle (Queen Latifah). Despite the fact that the plot can be sort of silly and convoluted, it doesn’t matter. This movie is nothing but pure unleaded fun for two full hours. This is truly one of those movies that I watch when I am having a terrible day, and watch it and love it. The songs are hyper-energetic, the jokes are hilarious, and the movie is so dang bright, you have to smile during it. Now, this isn’t a feel-good movie like (500) Days of Summer, which does so in an odd way (at least for me), it’s just so much fun that it’s purely contagious. This movie is contagious with fun, and everybody needs to see it. You. You need to see it. And if you don’t like it, you’re a Terminator.
9/10

Chronicle (2012)

I promised some of my friends that I would put this up a few hours after seeing this movie. That was about fourteen hours ago. So, Ginny and Hannah, I am sorry. Now let’s begin! Chronicle is the first movie that I’ve seen that was a 2012 film. I designed it this way (not seeing Man on a Ledge with my not-as-awesome friends), so that I could gush over this movie. And gush I shall. Written by the son of John Landis, Max, and directed by first-time director Josh Trank, Chronicle should have been terrible from the beginning. A found-footage superhero movie with angry angst-filled teens who fight should have been terrible. But then the trailer came out a couple months ago, and the concept intrigued me enough to check it out. Since then, Chronicle was at the very top of my ‘must-see’ list, which is well deserved. Truly so much more than a superhero movie, Chronicle is probably one of the most fantastic and purely haunting films since Drive (and I know I saw Drive last week, but I’m talking in the sense of release date). Starring absolutely wonderful teen TV actor Dane DeHaan (seriously. At some legitimate award ceremony, please give this kid a nomination for Best Actor) as Andrew, this movie follows him as he begins to film his terrible life, beaten by his father, his mother dying, him having no friends, just slowly becoming a wave of destruction. But when he is helped out by his cousin Matt (Alex Russell) and Matt’s friend Steve (Michael B. Jordan), he begins to have some friends and social life, which is greatly emphasized when the three of them find a hole in the middle of a ditch. They go in the hole. They walk out with superpowers. For wisely unexplained reasons, they now have telekinetic powers, and use those powers the way teens would-pulling pranks on people. That’s what’s great with this movie. It actually shows what would happen instead of what their parents would want to happen. They don’t go around swinging building-to-building with pizza boxes in hand, they actually make some decent havoc in the grocery store world. They find out they can fly as their powers get stronger. Soon, they can do anything, but despite his newfound popularity, Andrew, because of the terrible way his father treats him, goes rouge. He starts to steal money (for his mother’s treatment, but still), and beats up people and probably kills a lot of them. So, despite pleas from the others, the end of this movie turns into a terrifying superhero war in the middle of the city, but even though he’s killing thousands of lives, you never give up on Andrew. He’s such a sympathetic character, and his life was going so well, it’s more of a tragic teen drama than it is a superhero movie. And with the people being able to move the camera with their mind and get some great cinematic shots, and switching from camera-to-camera made the film lose the ‘found footage touch’ that even Cloverfield had to bear. This movie is a wonderful superhero movie, a wonderful found footage movie, and heck, just a wonderful movie. It truly is as near perfect as you can get in 2012. Please go see this movie. And if you’re anything like me, you’ll pretend that you have superpowers at the end and freak out all your friends (sorry guys). But seriously, please go see this movie. It deserves it.
9.5/10

Courageous (2011)

And let the rant begin. As I have said many times, I am not a fan of inspirational films. And also as I have said twice, thrice, quadrice (?) times, I really am not a fan of religious films. Don’t get me wrong, I am a Christian, but nearly all religious films are messages and not movies. And the biggest culprit of this is Sherwood Pictures, a terrible religious film company who churns out another heap of cat excrement every few years (by using the fancy word ‘excrement’, I have already written stuff better in this review than in this entire movie, in all modesty). My school makes me sit through clips of Facing the Giants a couple times every year, and people cheer. THEY CHEER! I have never been more disappointed in my classmates, especially when they’re the same classmates who have bashed The Tree of Life like it was Something Borrowed. But, the fourth film by these terrible people is Courageous, a movie about cops who are also fathers. They get sad when they can’t be the same fathers on TV, because they have to be normal people and can’t spend every day with their bratty kids. I have the same problem with this like I do with I Don’t Know How She Does It-they treat these people who aren’t the perfect family like they are hindered and basically unable to do this and poor them-but they’re just people, so you all need to suck it up, and take your terrible movies with you when you do. Now, I could end the review here, but I need to go into more detail of how much I hate this. The direction is terrible, the editing is atrocious, the writing is absolutely horrid, the acting is on par with Jake Lloyd in The Phantom Menace, and that’s saying something. Now Haylee-this last part is for you. There are two things done right in this movie-there is one funny scene and one mildly interesting cop shooting. But the movie drags on, it’s terrible made, and it is a movie made by people who don’t watch movies, don’t like movies, and quite frankly, don’t make movies, because this isn’t a movie. You want a good religious movie-watch The Last Temptation of Christ. But you can’t, because it portrays Jesus as impure, so you couldn’t watch that, you have to take this force-fed message that is built on no principle of filmmaking what-so-ever. Let the hate begin.
2.5/10

Drive (2011)

Drive. Drive, Driver, Driven, Drove, Drive. To put into perspective how powerful this movie is-I think I pulled a muscle (stretching, not actually doing athletic work) halfway through it, and I stayed to watch it. I stayed to watch this movie, because not a nuclear explosion could take me away from this movie. Not to be blasphemous, but in Heaven, I’m pretty sure there’s a Blu-ray of Drive somewhere in there. I actually had to wait about 15 minutes before writing this review, out of the sheer notion of horror coming from that movie. The movie leaves you absolutely breathless, I stood up to clap at my computer screen. No review of mine could give this movie the justice it deserves, but I can try. For starters, the only reason this isn’t #1 on my 2011 list is because of Midnight in Paris, which I think is as wonderful of a film, but I can watch that with my mom, so…I do not recommend watching this movie with your mom. For starters, there is a scene where Ryan Gosling barges in on a strip club changing room and takes a hammer to a mobster’s head. That is only a second, however, in the fascinating life of The Driver, a man who has two day jobs, a stunt driver for movies, and a mechanic, while moonlighting as a getaway driver for criminals at night. He is about cars like I am about movies. He loves cars, he is one with his car, he is one of the best drivers out there. And then he meets Irene. Played by Carey Mulligan, Irene is the next-door neighbor to the quiet nameless Driver, she has a son and a husband who is in the process of getting out of prison for doing a job. But after he is released, he calls on the Driver to help him with a final job that would put Irene and her son off of the mobster’s watch-list, a job that-to say the least-doesn’t end up very well. Blood is spilled, shots are fired, and if I can mildly spoil something that happens about an hour in-a character’s entire face is blown off with one pull of the trigger. Seriously-it explodes like one of the Resident Evil zombies. But also added into the mix when the heist goes wrong are two mobsters (Albert Brooks and Ron Perlman), who clash with the Driver and his mentor, Shannon (the great Walter White, Bryan Cranston) when they accidentally grab one of the mobster’s money instead of the $20,000 they were supposed to. That is about all I caught of the plot, because I was spending too much time with a delayed heart rate and absolutely terrified. Because, aside from about 15 minutes spread throughout the 100 minutes the film takes place, it is extremely tense, because you’re just waiting for the tensions to break. For example, one of the most notable scenes in the film is when the Driver and Irene are in an elevator with a hitman. They all just stare at each other, and you just wait. And wait. And wait. Then the Driver squashes the hitman’s head in with his foot. The director of this film, Nicholas Winding Refn, won the award for Best Director at the Cannes Film Festival, an award well-deserved. I think even more than Best Picture (which this did deserve at least a nomination for), this movie deserved Best Director for Refn, because he directs this neo-noir with such a wonderful style, with crazy harsh colors, insane moments, and absolute beauty. One of the hardest things to do here is to make beauty out of violence, and Refn does this. This is the first film of his I have seen, but judging from this movie, if he steps up his film count, and picks the right script, he could be the next Scorsese. Yes. I actually did just say that. But still-this movie is a masterpiece of modern cinema, a movie that truly needs to be seen by everybody. You will do yourself nothing but a favor by watching Drive, the biggest snub the Oscars have done since The Dark Knight got the same treatment in 2008.
9.5/10

Paranormal Activity 3 (2011)

I have odd feelings of the entire Paranormal Activity series. The first movie is absolutely terrible. I hate it, it’s got the most absolutely annoying characters, and I just wanted to punch both of them. Also, there were about two good scares in the film, and with the ratio of 2 good scares per 90 minutes, that is bad. With the usual good horror film, at 90 minutes, you have probably from 15-20 really good scares. Now, that doesn’t sound like a lot, but when you think about it, getting absolutely terrified roughly 17 times is a very good thing, and especially when the really good scares take about 2-3 minutes for exposition. And about that scare count is what makes Paranormal Activity 2 and Paranormal Activity 3 both really good horror movies (not great. You have to be special to be a great horror movie), and much better films than the first film that made the series so dang popular. But, while this movie is not as scary as the second one is, this is still a very scary movie, and I think it a very scary movie. Directed by the two who directed the “docu-drama” Catfish, which I was not a fan of, this movie takes place in 1988, featuring the sisters Katie and Kristi from movies 1 and 2 at a very young age, where they are being filmed by their mother’s new husband who films weddings, so he is filming everything that happens in their house when they find strange happenings revolving around Kristi talking to her “imaginary” friend Toby (the name given to the ghost-I will never see this ghost as anything else, like when I named the demon from Insidious Frank). The thing that works in the first hour or so of the film is when there are 3-minute stretches of complete silence freaking you out until something pops out, and then the movie goes completely insane. For about the last 15-20 minutes, it goes completely insane. It is so insane (but still scary) that it almost goes against what the first hour did so greatly. There is a lot of it that raises a lot of questions, and a lot of them are really making not a single clue what-so-ever, and you have to wonder-“why don’t they remember ANY of this?” I don’t want to go into spoilers here, because I don’t want there to even be tempted for someone to know the end on my behalf, because you just have to see it. You have to see it for the scares, and if you’ve seen any of the other movies in the series, you will want answers to some of the more unexplained questions, because by the time they’re done terrorizing this family, with every found-footage excuse possible, we are going to have a really good universe, one that is scary, fascinating, and if they keep it up, forgiving of the first movie.
8/10

Abduction (2011)

Abduction’s biggest problem is that it’s just incompetently made, not that it’s terrible. A lot of people have been bashing this movie, it even has a 4% on Rotten Tomatoes. Everyone says that this is the worst movie, that it is terrible, and that it needs to be burned at the stake (I’m sort of paraphrasing), but it’s really not. It’s just an incompetent “action” “film” that doesn’t deserve any more attention than a really small indie film would get. Actually, there are some great indie films this year (Another Earth in particular) that need to trade places with Abduction on America’s attention-meter, but that’s for another day. Starring teen heartthrob and brick-wall actor Taylor Lautner, this movie really deserved nothing more than a direct to video release. Nathan Harper (Lautner) has the perfect life. He’s a scumbag, he lives a super rich scumbag life, and he has a bunch of scumbag friends. I hate to say it-he’s living the American dream. But while he is doing a school project with fellow schoolmate Karen Murphy (Lily Collins, who was only cast in this movie because she is one of the five actors on the planet worse than Lautner) about missing children, he sees a young picture of him on it, and before he can get any answers, two men come by and assassinate who he finds out are not his real parents. And there are along with it, a bunch of really confusing and annoying plotlines that make not a single lick of sense. The action plot that is basing this movie along is one that is so tedious and annoying I wanted to scream. Because also along for the ride are Alfred Molina (what happened?), Michael Nyqvist (What seriously happened?) and Sigourney Weaver (No. Ripley is better than this. Not Dr. Octopus or Michael Blomkvist, but Ripley is better than this.), who really serve no purpose other than them trying to give weight to this super-convoluted storyline, to where I had no idea what was going on-it is probably the single most boring and dull movie to make no sense when too much stuff is happening, but it’s all too much boring for one movie! This movie is just hit in the uncanny valley of mediocre, between convoluted and confusing and completely dull. I really don’t know how to describe this film, and I know that right now I’m not doing a great job of it. I would say for you to watch it to believe it, but it’s just a time-eater. This movie has no purpose other than to eat two hours from every sad sap who watches it. I really do not recommend Abduction, because it really didn’t need to have the light of day in the first place.
3/10

The Artist (2011)

I didn’t even know anybody had the guts to do a movie like this. Well, if somebody did, it would be the French. Now, don’t get me wrong, I love the French. They give us great cinema (sometimes), croissants, Paris, the Statue of Liberty, and epic accents, and probably some stuff that matters too (I don’t keep up with politics). But I make fun of the French the same way I make fun of Sam Raimi and his colleagues-they will try everything. And only the French can try to make a modern-day silent movie. Yes, there are two scenes with sound, and they’re both handled perfectly, but about 90% or so of this film is silent, with nothing but a score running in the background. There are some cards which say what the characters are saying, but this is only used when there are things that needed to be known. I say this because it’s frustrating the first ten minutes of the film going “What are they saying? I don’t know!” and then it sinks in that it doesn’t matter. The biggest accomplishment this film has is that it makes you forget you’re watching a silent film. Starring Oscar-nominated actor (maybe a winner?) Jean Dujardin as George Valentin, this movie chronicles his life as a silent film star that is slowly brought down to nothing, and all the time his life works in sync with that of rising starlet Peppy Miller (another Oscar-contender and wife of the director Bérénice Bejo), who is coming into replacing George’s role as the king/queen of Hollywood when the transition to sound is made. Along with this relatively simple story is a wonderful film, with wonderful moments, and wonderful scenes, and wonderful energy, and OH MY GOD a wonderful score (another Oscar nominee/could-be winner). I mean, in all honesty, this movie is made like a Woody Allen film-simple, sweet, and magical. And the direction by director and husband of Bérénice Bejo (nice job buddy) Michael Hazanavicius (never ask me to pronounce that) is wonderful and also a possible Oscar winner (this movie and Hugo are topping the nominations), and possibly a deserved one. This entire movie is overflowing with talent, wonderful songs, music, direction, acting, and just a purely wonderful film. I absolutely adore this film, and when I publish my top 20 best/worst of 2011 list, I will have this pretty dang close to the top (I will post the list on my www.spill.com page, and link to it when I see and review the film A Separation, which is my last ‘must-see’ movie of the year before I make my list, and then that’ll be there. What a formal way to end a review).
9.5/10

Shark Night (2011)

I don’t know which title for this movie to use-Shark Night or Shark Night 3D, because when you buy the movie, it says Shark Night, but the filmmakers were too lazy to change the opening titles from Shark Night 3D, even though I think there isn’t a single 3D DVD available. But, yeah. This entire movie if filled with little things like that, where you just stare at the screen going-“Wait, what? How is that-never mind.” (those were my actual words). I treat Shark Night like Tim (Simon Pegg) from the TV show Spaced thinks of Daisy-“She’s either sweet and stupid, or an evil genius.” This movie is either just stupid and innocent, or an evil trick to show us how shark movies work, because there is no way on earth that anybody can make a movie this incompetent (maybe Jasob Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer, but they don’t count as real people) without trying to pull something on us. The plot of the movie concerns a bunch of college kids who are going on an island, when they find that a bunch of sharks have been released into the lake and are eating them, which they find is a part of a plan that is either completely stupid or absolutely genius. To reveal any more would spoil the amazing fun you would have while watching Shark Night, a movie that while I recognize that it is terrible and stupid, is just so much ridiculous fun. I have a great example why this movie is a great movie to watch with buddies to laugh at it. There is a shot close to the end where the main guy Nick (Dustin Milligan) shoots a spear gun through a shark, one that’s trying to eat the main girl Sara (Sara Paxton), and we see shark guts and blood fly everywhere (the most gore in the film, since they wanted a toned-down PG13 rating, which should not have happened). The very next shot, the shark is gone, the guts have disappeared, and the water is as clear as it could be, which is absolutely insane. This entire movie is absolutely insane, and completely terrible. I highly recommend watching it, but with a group of friends, and if your age allows it, a couple of cold ones (with Korey, Leon, and Carlyle! Sorry-nerdy Spill reference, excuse my unknown references for this review). I highly recommend Shark Night, just not as a good movie. I don’t know what rating to give this movie, because I love it and hate it at the same time, so I’ll give it my lowest positive review. Also-my reviews now are getting pictures! Under all reviews there will be a poster for the film. Hopefully by the end of the week I’ll have covered them all. Just my site getting a little bit better. Adios, readers!
6.5/10