Edward Norton’s actual reaction when learning the studio was not going to let him edit this movie.

I have yet to see Ang Lee’s 2003 Hulk, but do plan on watching that sometime this week. One can only help but wonder though why this series was rebooted after the first entry when the ‘re-quel’ is just your average summer blockbuster: lots of noise and some fun, but a little dumb. There is so much action stuffed into this story though it probably will be a box-office hit. What doesn’t help the Hulk is that Iron Man kicked off the summer season by rockin’ the house, and the anticipation for July’s The Dark Knight is so astronomically high. *In deep voice* Hulk blocked by big shadows.

Surprisingly, The Incredible Hulk does not really develop Bruce Banner’s character. We merely have to accept him for who he is and the world he lives in. Director Louis Leterrier and screenwriter Zak Penn only give us a 2 minute intro to Bruce Banner during the opening credits, which flash the results of some freak experiment gone wrong (Bruce was exposed to gamma rays). Bruce Banner (Edward Norton) is living in exile in Rio Di Janeiro as a workman in a soda factory. He wears a heart monitor on his wrist, and goes to yoga classes to gain a better understanding how to control his anger and heart rate. When Bruce gets too angry, the Hulk becomes pretty much an unstoppable killing force.

After a bit of Bruce’s blood accidentally lands in a bottle, which in turn lands in the fridge of someone in America, the U.S government sends a special operative team, led by Emil Blonsky (Tim Roth) to capture him. All this does is piss Bruce off, as he turns into the Hulk and pretty much kills everyone that gets in his way. While we do learn that Bruce is desperately searching for a cure for his ‘condition’ through a mystery person to be named later, the story gets extremely weak after thie first act.

Betty Ross (Liv Tyler) is thrown in the story as Bruce’s love interest. We see her as the scientist who is aiding Bruce in the experiment gone wrong from the opening credits. Her character is not developed at all, we get no sense of who she is other than being acted by Liv Tyler. Additionally, her and Norton lack chemistry to make us care about their relationship. On top of all that, their first embrace takes place in the rain and is so melodramatic and poorly acted, it reeks of a soap opera.

The story takes a back seat to the loads of action sequences. In a fun fight scene, the Hulk rips a car in half and uses the two parts as boxing gloves, which is bad ass. The action scenes though that take place at the University don’t seem as good as the could have been. General Ross (William Hurt) has to be the pansiest and dumbest military man since Corporal Timothy Upham from Saving Private Ryan. He comes off as a freakin’ idiot, lacking any common sense or basic military strategy. Why would he send jeep after jeep after jeep at Hulk when he knows Hulk will just destroy each and every one. It comes off as just an excuse to blow stuff up. Sure, it is fun to watch, but it is also mindless. This is especially true because Ross knows how strong Hulk is.

Blonsky becomes obsessed with the Hulk, sort of like a really lame man-crush. Like Barry Bonds, he wants to inject himself with as much crazy shit as possible, to give him ‘that edge’. And like Barry, he goes to the extreme, which gives him an enormous body, a huge head, and ridiculous strength. They call both Barry and Blonksy, the Abomination. But you know how the rest of this story goes, all the way down to their epic showdown.

This film is poorly advertised and has one of those trailers that pretty much gives away most of the movie, a HUGE problem that plagues Hollywood. I did not really give that much away in this review that you can’t take from the trailer. The Incredible Hulk is at its best during the action sequences, which is when you really don’t have to think that much.

The story however is quite weak. While the first act does a solid job at establishing Bruce’s desire to cure himself and live in peace, it is when he comes back to the U.S that the story becomes messy. The subplot with Betsy Ross accomplishes little emotionally. Betsy Ross’s relationship with her father General Ross accomplishes little emotionally. Banner’s path in the second half of the story when he isn’t green and mean just is not that interesting, and that is a problem that lies within the script.

The film has has a large amount of CGI, and for the most part it is well done. The Hulk looks good as do the environments when he rips them to shreds. When there are a ton of things though happening on screen, the CGI does take a dip in quality. Like when the Hulk throws random pieces of metal at the attacking helicopters as he is getting shot at by a massive amount of tropps, it looks pretty fake. They do a good job with the Abomination.

Edward Norton is solid in the role of Bruce Banner. The rest of the cast is under-developed and one dimensional. They just are not given enough screen time. Liv Tyler mostly whispers her lines in a wheezy sort of voice. Not sure what Letterier was thinking there. William Hurt as General Ross is played with a surprising amount of stupidity. Tim Roth plays Blonsky as the creepy steroid freak well enough.

There is a scene near the end that you know was supposed to be post credits, but because of the success of a certain film, they slapped it on the very end. The Incredible Hulk is fun at times, albeit a bit mindless. Maybe this is a reason why Edward Norton had such a hard time agreeing with the studio on the final cut of the movie.

High Points: Lots of fun action sequences, Norton is solid, the epic climactic showdown .

Low Points: Poor character development, lame love interest, uneven story.

FYI: Edward Norton is so upset with the final edited version of the film, he has boycotted all PR for it.

Bottom Line: Don’t expect anything other than a mindless action packed summer blockbuster.

Grade:

With the failure of his last film, “Lady in the Water”, I set the bar lower than normal for M. Night Shymalan’s new film The Happening. That is not to say I wasn’t excited to see it, because I was. The trailer intrigued me, and I really dug the premise. But The Village and Lady in the Water are both severe steps down from his first three films. M. Night will always be judged more harshly than other directors because his first film was just do damn good. Much like Sam Mendes’s debut with American Beauty and Quentin Tarantino’s \Resevoir Dogs, The Sixth Sense pretty much knocked everyone out. The ‘holy shit, that was insanely good’ reaction to it is pretty much the norm, especially since it was his first film. It also does not help that M. Night is cocky as hell, and I remember reading about how he thought The Village was ‘the greatest idea ever’. The falling out he had with Disney was a political nightmare, and one can only wonder if his public image gets in the head of some critics.

Like all of his films, The Happening has an exceptionally interesting premise. The story focuses on Elliot Moore (Mark Whalberg), and his girlfriend Alma Moore (Zooey Deschanel). A horrifying incident in New York City causes a nationwide scare that may or may not be terrorist related. People in New York are mysteriously dying. The first phase is confusion. The second is impaired motor skills. The third is death. So Elliot, Alma, his teaching buddy Julian (John Lequizamo) and his daughter hop on a train to Harrisburg in effort to get out of such a large city. Along the way, the train is forced to stop, and everyone on board is informed that Philadelphia as well as numerous other North Eastern cities have all been hit with the same strange epidemic.

Something in the air is causing all these people to die. The story gets increasingly strange from here, as these characters try to avoid a ‘happening’ when they aren’t sure what exactly it is or what is causing it. I will avoid giving away too much detail, and there are a few twists and turns along the way. One scene in particular will make your jaw drop.

What makes this so fascinating and frustrating to watch is how at times it is brilliantly executed while others present plot holes you can drive a Hummer through. However, M. Night has always been good at creating suspense, and keeping you on the edge of your seat. The Happening does this pretty well. Name another director that can make ‘air’ look so fu***** scary? He creates such a unique perspective on the villain of this film, it is hard not to admire his technique, even in spite of the film’s flaws. The mass hysteria that people are going through during this crisis has been centralized to a small group of people instead of rioting crowds. It gives the film a different feel, especially since these people don’t even know what they are running from. How do you run from something when not only do you not know what it actually is, nor what triggers it, but you don’t even know the what and where to keep you safe. That truly is f**** up. The film will keep your interest the whole way through, because you will not know or be able to predict the final act.

As brilliant as this premise is, The Happening is bogged down by some poor acting. It is a director’s responsibility to get the most out of every actor and many lines from Whalberg and Zooey aren’t very good. I don’t want to give it the total SAW SYNDROME (where a film has an intriguing plot, but the worst acting imaginable), but you have to wonder how M. Night was happy with these performances, especially in ‘key emotional scenes’. Whalberg might not be Robert De Niro, but he can act. Boogie Nights and Three Kings are great examples, and the blame for bad performances is on M. Night’s shoulders. This will most likely leave many people aggravated and annoyed.

The script is filled with a surprising amount of humor for a suspense flick. Some of the dialogue however, is just plain bad. Elliot actually asks during the movie “Is this happening?”. Yeah, that is cringe worthy. Also, the relationship between Elliot and his girlfriend/wife/whatever is poorly developed. They don’t really have any chemistry and as an audience member, we don’t really have a connection to their ‘bond’ like many film couples do. This has to do with the acting and the structure of the story. The Happening could have benefitted by expanding its exposition and toying around with
the third act.

Even with the problems the film had, there is a good story in here, If you can get past the bad acting, which many won’t be able to do, you could enjoy this movie. Who knows, maybe even with another draft or two of the script, this movie could have been awesome! One can only wonder though. The Happening isn’t great by any means, but it is a solid effort to the suspense genre.

High Points: Intriguing premise, excellent suspense with a jaw dropping scene.

Low Points: Poor acting and questionable dialogue.

FYI : Mark Whalberg loved the script so much he did this for free. Yep, I just made that up.

Bottom Line: If you can get past the poor acting and at times questionable dialogue, this is a decent suspense flick.

Grade:

You Don’t Mess with the Zohan is one of those comedies that will hit you over the head with a hammer of stupidity, and it will keep doing that over and over and and over to see if you relent. Even though this was not very good, I did not hate this movie. There was a few scenes where I could not stop laughing. The film tries so hard to be ridiculous that it most likely will repulse you in disgust because this is one stupid comedy. It reminds me of The Condemned, last year’s action flick starring Stone Cold. Both are movies you may laugh at, because they both are incredibly stupid. 

Zohan (Adam Sandler) is a Mossad agent with cartoon like powers. He can catch bullets with his nostrils, has speed of light fighting skills, and can catch up to speed boats by swimming like a dolphin. Oh, and his penis sticks out of his shorts like a softball. After a mission sends him to catch the Phantom (John Turturro), a bad terrorist guy who can walk on ceilings, he fakes his death and travels to America to style men’s hair and make them silky smooth. His dream is to meet Paul Mitchell. He befriends a stranger (Nick Swardson from Reno 911) who hooks him up with a place to say. Zohan thanks him by banging his mom, and walking around naked. Yes, this is a strange movie.

Zohan gets a gig at a Palestinian salon, which is a problem since he is an Israeli. He hides his ethnicity by pretending to be Haus-trailian. Zohan quickly becomes a sensation by having sex with any female customer, regardless of their looks or age. Oh, and he does give really good hair cuts. Immigrant taxi driver (Rob Schneider) accidentally sees Zohan while driving by the salon one day. Schneider and his middle eastern buddies try to figure out how to cash in on this top secret information.

They try calling the Hezbollah hotline for tips, try making a bomb out of neosporin, and other retarded acts of want to be violence. They end up threatening to expose the Phantom, who now is a celebrity in his country for killing the Zohan. Phantom agrees to give them free yogurt at a yogurt shop they are to work at for free as well as one pepe touch by one of Phantom’s wives. So like any good person who can walk on ceilings, he comes to American to find the Zohan.

You Don’t Mess with the Zohan keeps up a relentless pace of stupid humor until a little after the midway point, where Zohan starts to fall in love with a a co-worker, Dalia (Emanuelle Chriqui). This is where some of the story starts to get a bit more normal, which totally disrupts the pacing and feel the entire movie created up to that point. From here, this film tries to be to many things. A really stupid comedy, a normal comedy, and a romantic comedy.

You just sort of groan and shake your head when the movie tries to head towards a moral ending or for that matter, anything serious at all. I mean, there is a hacky-sack soccer like tournament, Zohan bangs customers loudly in the backroom and rattles the walls in which shit flies everywhere, and the Phantom tries to put out a fire by fighting it (that last bit is hilarious). With such a great amount of nonsense, you really can’t even go in a semi-serious direction without aborting the movie completely. This is funny to say, but Zohan just isn’t stupid enough the entire way through.

Nick Swardson is funny, but under utilized. There are tons of cameos, some of which are pretty good. They include Dave Mathews, Michael Buffer, Maria Carey, Kevin James, John McEnroe, and Chris Rock. Some of the humor is shocking, especially the dialogue. Rock plays a Jamaican cab driver and in one scene he tells Zohan his dreams of coming to America as a child and helping his family by sending money to them. When asked if he fullfilled his dream, the cab driver smiles and says ” No man, they were hacked to death”. I just short of shook my head in shock. Their are a few lines of dialogue like this that go for more shock value than anything else.

I shouldn’t say it is surprising that Adam Sandler is in a comedy like this, but this definitely is not one of his better ones. It is even more surprising that this is a Judd Apatow co-written script. You should have went through a few more drafts buddy. Am I happy I paid 10.50 to see this? No, it is not worth it. It is stupid enough though where you may be able to laugh at it instead of with it.

 High Points: Funny cameos, Michael Buffer plays a villain, repetitive stupid humor. 

Low Points: Repetitive stupid nonsense, 2 gallons of gas is better.

FYI: Sandler based his character on a real stylist.

Bottom Line: This is a really stupid comedy that could have been better if they kept at it the entire way through.

Grade:

Po: There is no charge for awesomeness… or attractiveness.

One of the very best lines from a movie this year! This was a pleasant surprise. I was not really looking forward to this, as I felt it was over-advertised and I must have seen 100 commercials and trailers for it. Usually when a movie is that saturated on TV as well as in the previews of every movie you see, you just get annoyed. I can safely say that Kung Fu Panda is really good.

The story follows Po (Jack Black) a fat panda who slaves away in the kitchen working for his father, Mr. Ping, and his noodle store. What is unusual is that Mr. Ping looks like an ostrich and Po is a panda bear. Anyways,  Po desperately wants to become a famous warrior. The opening sequence is done in an incredibly stylized 2-D animation, I wouldn’t have minded if the entire movie looked like that.

So after the legendary Kung Fu master Oogway, an old turtle, has a terrible vision, he decides to hold a town meeting to pick the next Dragon Warrior. The vision is that Tai Lung, an evil leopard ninja master, will escape his prison and make his way to the village to capture the dragon scroll which will grant him an unlimited amount of power. Po is unhappy with his current life and somehow stumbles into the meeting and somehow gets picked by Oogway.

This infuriates master Shifu (Dustin Hoffman), a furball of an animal,  who wanted it to be one of the furious 5: Mantis (Seth Rogen), Viper (Lucy Liu), Crane (David Cross), Tigress (Angelina Jolie, or Monkey (Jackie Chan). He then gets assigned the task to train Po on being the Dragon Warrior. The story is well paced and flows by rather quickly. Shifu must motivate Po before its to late, and the members of the furious 5 are not happy that Po is here. They even go to the lengths on trying to make him quit, led by master Shifu himself.

Jack Black is expertly casted as Po, and provides awesome doses of hilarity. Black is excellent at delivering his lines with the appropriate speed and pacing. Some of my favorites include: ” I see you like to chew. Perhaps you should chew… ON MY FIST! , ” Legend tells of a legendary warrior whose kung fu skills were the stuff of legend“, and  “He was so awesome that some people were BLINDED by his awesomeness! The script is wonderful, it is filled with funny dialogue and an uplifting story that you probably wouldn’t have guesses from the trailer. The voice acting is really well done, particularly Black as Po and Dustin Hoffman as Shifu.

I think this is the best looking animated Dreamworks film to date. Absolutely gorgeous animation, which make each action sequences that much better to watch. Vivid landscapes, epic fight scenes that take place in towns and rickety bridges (a la Temple of Doom), Kung Fu Panda is just a pleasure to look it. Kudos to the animators for creating such a colorful world. Not since Finding Nemo have I been this impressed with the quality of  animation. The action sequences are funny and well orchestrated. It was great when Tai Lung and Po were battling, and instead of shrieking in pain, Po is laughing as if being tickled. You definitely can see a few references to other films (like the Legend of Drunken Master when Po is being trained by Shifu), and I couldn’t help but think of the Gringott’s Escape with Harry, Ron, and Hermione in the Deathly Hallows during Tai Lung’s prison sequence. But maybe that is just because I am a big dork. 1000 guards for 1 man, that is great stuff!

My nit picks are small. I wish the film was longer, and at 90ish minutes, it is definitely geared for kids. They could have went into greater detail with the fierce-some 5 and their history. The film painted such a great picture on kung fu in such short time frame, I just wanted more. It seemed a bit simple, and bit of depth here and there would have rocked.

Kung Fu Panda has been the biggest surprise for me so far this summer and really is a film that everyone should enjoy. It is a joy to look it, is filled with witty dialogue and some strong voice acting performances, and features an uplifting story. Even if you don’t go to the movies that often, you better get check this one out. It is awesome!

High Points: Jack Black, really good story, hilarious.

Low Points: A bit short, could have gone more in-depth.

FYI: Jack Black starred in The Never Ending Story III.

Bottom Line: Kung Fu Panda is a pleasant surprise with an uplifting story that everyone should enjoy.

Grade:

*Spoiler Alert*

To start off, I have to say I am a huge fan of the show. It has excellent writing, develops its characters extremely well, and makes solid observations on the battle of the sexes. Think of this show as Entourage for women. So being a fan, I was excited to see this movie.

When we last saw these 4, Carrie had her fairy tale ending with Big, Miranda was happily married to Steve, Charlotte was getting ready to adopt a child, and Samantha had finally settled down with Smith. While it really helps to have watched the show prior to this movie, Sex and the City: The Movie does work on its own. It quickly develops the four women, and the story proceeds from there.

Carrie makes plans to marry Big, Samantha is questioning her loyalty to Smith, Charlotte is Charlotte, and Miranda and Steve are thrown a curve ball that jeopardizes their future. So yes, more drama is a key ingredient in the story. And while this film does tackle some new territory, married life, it doesn’t go in the direction it could have. It focuses on the conflict amongst the 4 women, but this is very familiar territory. Miranda bitches about Steve, Samantha wants to have sex with everyone in the world, and Carrie fights with Big for the 3994932940 time. This works for the most part, but this series’ strong point has always been addressing new issues between men and women. They don’t entirely focus on problems that arise from married life, and relies to much on the problems of years past. It doesn’t feel as fresh as before. TV series aside, it does operate as a stand alone film, but probably could be viewed as a bit of a cookie cutter plot. I saw it with a group of girls, two of which had never seen the show. They all seemed to enjoy it, but the two newbies felt it was too predictable.

The film is funny though. Charlotte has the film’s best lines. She is the Seinfeld of the bunch, the sane one. Her reactions and ‘proper’ attitude have always been humorous. Veteran writer of the show Michael Patrick King does a solid job at soaking the film with sex, shoes, and fashion. One can only wonder though on why Darren Starr didn’t write/direct this since he created the show. I find that extremely weird.

The main problem with the film is that it feels like a season’s worth of events jammed into a 2 hour movie. The pacing is uneven, even though they try to force this into a three act story. So much happens, and so much time is passed in the world of the story, that some things just seem muddled. This is particularly true with the main character, Carrie. She goes through so much in just one film, it is almost enough to make Jack Bauer jealous. I understand this movie is supposed to be a ’spectacle’, but they should have cut some of the fat and concentrated on just the good stuff. Another thing is that it is a bit predictable, which was disappointing. You will more than likely guess how this one ends. This wasn’t always the case with the TV series, which did a pretty good job at keeping you honest. You will also hear some painful puns (like get Carried away) and some cheesy dialogue.

Sex and the City: The Movie is a pretty good flick, but is plagued by some uneven pacing and the pitfalls of this genre; easy to predict and cheesy. In some aspects, it seems to stray away from what made the show so popular, and that is a shame. This TV series is outstanding.  The film has some funny moments, it will pull at your heart strings, but in the end, it was a bit disappointing. But to each their own right? The entire row of 40-something women in front of me walked out saying “that was incredible”. Note to self: estrogen does cause cloudy judgement.

High Points: Lots of drama, Charlotte is hilarious, new theme song is great.

Low Points: Jennifer Hudson’s character: pointless. Predictable story.

Alternate Title: Sex and the Cliche

FYI : Why the fuck didn’t Darren Star write/direct this? That is like a Sopranos movie without David Chase. Boo!

Grade:

I love going to the movie theater. There is something special about seeing a movie on the big screen, in a packed house where the smell of buttery popcorn fills the air. Whether it be at the IMAX, AMC, or your small local theater chain, seeing a movie at the theater should be a pleasant experience. Unfortunately, this is not always the case. There are plenty of douchebags and annoying scenarios that can ruin anyones movie going experience. This is a list of if just that.

Annoying Cell Phone Guy

There are few people in in a movie theater that will piss you off like the idiot that talks on his cell phone and lets his phone ring during the movie. Even though this has been addressed by messages via slides in the movie theater before the previews start as well as commercials featuring famous directors (Martin Scorsese),it still is a problem. Letting your  #@!&$%crappy ring tone ring for an entire minute during a movie does not impress anyone. If you let this happen, you are probably beat up in school and no one likes you.  People like this should be beaten. Theaters should follow the rules of Los Angeles’s Arclight and just kick them out immediately. People that usually do this are a) single  b) illiterate and c) have some sort of criminal record.

Idiot Parent who brings baby into movie at night

If you can’t afford a baby sitter, you probably should not be in a movie theater. Seriously, you people can’t afford a measly 20 bucks or so to get someone to watch your kid for a few hours. Does your family hate you and want nothing to do with your kid? I just don’t get it.  Don’t get me wrong, babies are cute and all, but when they start crying just as the film starts, you will do what anyone else would do. Turn your head around to see where the hell that sound just came from and start to get really, really pissed off and annoyed. You probably will silently  curse the mother. I remember just as The Matrix Revolutions started, I heard a baby crying at an 11:30 pm showing. WTF people!!! You may not be angry at the baby, but instead your wrath will be focused on the idiot parent(s) who brought their child in the theater in the first place.

Stupid ass tall guy who sits right in front of you

This really isn’t that much of a problem anymore considering the fact that most theaters nowadays are stadium style seating on a bit of slant, but it still can happen. Sometimes even if you are early to the show, and sit down 20 minutes prior, some clueless Joe will stroll into the theater and plop right in front of you when the entire #@#@$# theater is empty. Maybe these people just need a hug because this type of behavior screams for attention. The only attention that this type of person shall receive is a brutal ass kicking, Jason Bourne style. People that are super tall should be forced to sit in the back of the theater. But again, this isn’t that much of an issue anymore with nice theaters.

Scum of the earth people who talk during the movie

This is my #1 pet peeve and really can ruin anyones movie going experience. People that #$#%## talk during a movie should be tortured, this is simply inexcusable. You are not in your living room, you are not at your friends house, so shut the hell up. Sometimes the elderly might be confused on what is going on and converse with one another. Not excusable! I don’t care what age you are, you shut your damn mouth in the theater. It is rude, it is inconsiderate, and if you partake in this type of behavior, you probably were raisedin a jungle or your parents kept you in a cage and you talk in the theater as a cry for help. At Los Angeles’s Arclight, you are kicked out for this type of animalistic behavior. I personally believe people should be fined hundreds of dollars for this type of idiotic behavior. I did not pay my hard earned money on a ticket and popcorn to listen to a stranger run his mouth. There are few things that can get me quite as angry as this.

Assclown who unwraps candy and eats loudly during movie

Buying goodies from the concession stand goes hand in hand with seeing a movie, but like anything, there is a certain etiquette  that needs to be followed. Most of the time people will behave, but there is always those few absent minded people who decide to open the most tightly wrapped candy or chomp away on popcorn with their mouth open halfway into the movie. Seriously, why do people wait to eat candy or whatever an hour into a movie? Isn’t the point to eat it after you sit or during the previews. You figure after an hour or people would be done eating whatever they bought. Seriously now, didn’t people stop chewing with their mouth open at age 7? It isn’t necessary to eat your food like a barbarian or a dog, it doesn’t make the food taste any better.

Dude who keeps leaving his seat during the movie

This especially sucks if you happened to sit near the very end of the row. You know this type of guy, someone who has the bladder of a 5 year old girl or that tub who needs to refill his popcorn and drink 3 times because they are ‘free’.  It probably isn’t a good idea to refill a large popcorn (the only type you can refill) when it is made with anti-heart oil and butter. But whatever the reason is, it is not ok to get up numerous times during a movie. You piss all the people off you have to say ‘excuse me’ to, especially if you are doing it repeatedly. I personally would trip a person if he kept getting up and sitting down. Those people who have to take ‘important calls’, just #$$&#*@@! leave already. What is the point on missing random 5 minute segments, why see the movie in the first place. I feel like throwing a brick at these people.

Douchebag who keeps kicking/bumping your chair during the movie

This is definitely up there with things that piss me off the most in a theater. For whatever reason, some people think its ok to bump or move their feet in a way where it nudges the seat in front of them. To all assclowns: people can feel you bump our chairs when you partake in this extremely aggravating behavior. It isn’t funny or nice to repeatedly bump the chair ahead of you. I don’t care if you have arthritis in your knees and have to stretch them out, either don’t do it at all and suck it up or do it in a way where you don’t touch my #**$#*$(#( chair. How would you like it if I poked you in the eye? You probably wouldn’t like it very much, so leave my chair alone. I don’t even care if it is a large person sitting in the chair and they are accidentally kicking my chair. Cut back on the buttered popcorn and watch the damn movie from home. Just don’t touch my chair.  I believe in karma, and I think if you kick peoples chairs you are in for an ass beatin’.

Parasites who save 17 seats in a really crowded movie theater.

Even the nicest of people can be pissed off when this happens. Your hands are full in a packed theater and you eye 4 seats sort of in the back of the theater and you are just about to walk down the row and some messy haired parasites say “we are holding these seats for our friends”. Theater seats should be first come first serve. It is one thing to save a seat or maybe two for people in the bathroom or someone running late, but it is not ok to save a bunch of seats during a crowded show. If you can’t get your butt in the theater at a reasonable time, you aren’t that interested in seeing it, plain and simple. If you were that interested, you wouldn’t have your friend save 8 seats by placing his stupid windbreaker over two seats and repeating “These seats are saved”. LAME.

I grew up on the Indiana Jones trilogy. I’ve watched them all a countless amount of times and have had endless debates on what the best one of the three are, Raiders of the Lost Ark or The Last Crusade. The films are a part of my childhood. I have fond memories of  watching them with my Dad. So these films are more than just movies to me, they are works of art wrapped with a bit of nostalgia. When they announced that they were doing another Indiana  Jones film about 5 years back, I never really thought it would get made. I wanted it to, but doubted Harrison Ford would be up to the task of putting the hat back on for one last adventure. Then when that became a reality, I became as super pumped as any other Indy fan around the world.

I saw the midnight showing and the theater was packed. There is something about watching a movie in a theater stuffed with people, it seems to add a certain element or X-factor to the movie going experience. As the opening credits rolled, it finally hit me. I was about to watch the next frickin’ Indiana Jones movie! So what did I think? Did this film live  up to the hype? Did it live up to my expectations?

That is a tough question to answer at point blank range because you almost don’t want to answer the question and admit that answer is no. I did enjoy this movie, quite a bit actually. But as thrilling as certain sequences may be, I had some serious issues with others. Everything I had a problem with is script related.

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- DO NOT READ PAST HERE - THERE ARE MAJOR SPOILERS IN THE REST OF THE REVIEW -

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The film starts out strong, with Indy battling a group of Russians in the same warehouse we saw from Raiders of the Lost Ark. They seek a mysterious relic with mysterious powers. Irina Spalko (Cate Blanchett) a pale faced ice queen, and this villain is their leader. The action sequences here are outstanding. So far so good.

The FBI becomes very interested at the events that took place at the warehouse and begin to follow Indy after forcing hid resignation at the university. But as the film plays out, you question on just where the heck its going. They keep addressing situations that took place outside the film, and it quickly becomes confusing and muddled. The plot isn’t as clear as previous films. Double agents, triple agents, mysterious drawings in prison cells, and the paranormal? Where is Mulder? Where is Special Agent Cooper?

Indy eventually meets up with Mutt Williams (Shia Lebouf), in an excellent scene at a soda shop. Mutt informs Indy that a man named Oxley was on to something big involving some sort of lost city of gold. That made me sit up straight in my chair. Lost city of gold, now that sounds like an adventure for Indiana Jones! Unfortunately, it isn’t as straightforward as that nor as exciting.

As their journey continues, a certain element starts to overwhelm the story, and you sort of start thinking, ookkaay? Indiana Jones and Mutt eventually follow the trail of clues to the jungles of Peru. This is where it starts to get strange.

We find out that the relic that was stolen is a crystal skull with supernatural powers. It looks like a baby alien head. I am not familiar at all with these skulls, so all of this was new to me.  Now I bought the scene with Indy staring into the eyes of the skull, giving him the power to find out what Oxley was saying, but I still figured the climax of the film would involve some awesome treasure or city of gold. It doesn’t.

It became increasingly apparent as the film winded down that a science-fiction aspect could be part of the ending. The closing action scene involves a fucking space ship. They waited 19 years to make a sequel to Indiana Jones only to have the climactic scene have a space ship  fly away? George Lucas just made a million more enemies.

The first half of the film is far stronger than the second. Both are entertaining, but the second half is much tougher to swallow as far as believability. This all has to do with plot choices. The action sequences are wonderfully executed. There is a fun sword fight between Irina and Mutt that takes place on two speeding cars. There is a mano-o-mano fight with Indy and a tough Russian dude. I was just waiting for those chains to appear! Shootouts, chase scenes, they are all in the film,  as Spielberg does a superb job like only he can.

Everyone does a good job in the acting department. Shia Lebouf is a perfect sidekick to Indy, and while the greaser role was well played, it wasn’t utilized all that well.  I really did enjoy Cate Blanchett as Irina, although I would have liked to see more of her in the film. And it was a real joy to see Karen Allen back as Marion Ravenwood, easily the best female lead of this franchise. It is just too bad that didn’t do more with her character. I love the moment where they meet again, and she is pissed at him for not calling. And Harrison Ford IS Indiana Jones. He plays the character with the youthful spirit and vibrant energy like he always has. Ray Winstone was fine but his character was underdeveloped and confusing, and pretty much a total waste to the story.

What about the twist, as Indy finds out Mutt is his son? I sort of figured that out from the get go though, seeing how in the earlier films Indy’s name is made fun of as someone refers to it as a dogs name. Mutt and dog, do you see the connection? But it was a pleasure to find out that Indy has a son, which hopefully will lead to a much better sequel. The scene near the end of the film where the hat blows into the wedding as Mutt is about to pick it up, but Indy grabs it right before does suggest that there could be another Indy film. It also almost made me swallow my own throw up if they would have let him pick up the hat.

That was one of the few moments where the film winks at the audience and it works.  Some of the others that don’t work include a few cheesy one liners, particularly the one where Indy swings into a truck and says, “I thought that was a lot closer”. They also use a snake to help Indy out of a sandtrap. It is fucking retarded. The great aspects that carry this film are the action sequences,  some of the adventure and humor, and the fact it has Indiana Jones.

But I do have a lot of gripes. Although the film does do a really good job at looking like the previous three installments, there are more than a few times it looks too clean. I am not sure if that is from different film stock or a different cinematographer, but there are times where the difference in style is quite noticeable. Sets sometimes look to fake.

And what the hell is wrong with David Koepp and George Lucas? Lucas has to put his fat greasy hands on everything that  is sacred and fuck shit up. You could have called this Indiana Jones and the Truth is Out There or The Indiana Jones Files. Why implement such a sci-fi element to an archaeologist? Why the extravagant CGI? Years ago, Frank Darabont, director of little films like The Shawshank Redemption, The Green Mile, and The Mist, wrote a screenplay that Spielberg loved. But that was not good enough for greasy George Lucas, who had to put his stupid hand in this franchise to try to earn some credibility back for douching all over Star Wars. I can’t remember liking a movie this much, and having fun most of the time watching one, and at the same time have such issues with the plot. Near the end of the movie, it started to feel less and less like an Indiana Jones film.

And I understand we live in a modern age where CGI is a common thing in big blockbusters, but this is Indiana Jones not The Mummy. I can deal with a handful here and there (like when Indy  walks across the air in Last Crusade), but there was just too much CGI for my liking. Okay, so Indy survives a nuclear blast by hiding in a fridge that gets blown miles away? Was that really necessary to include in the movie? Sure that was fun to watch, but it should not be in an Indiana Jones adventure. Why did they write that in? They used way to much green screen.

What about the unnecessary CGI in the forest when Indy uses that RPG to blow up the vehicle in front of him? Or when Mutt is swinging through the trees like Tarzan, which looked incredibly cheesy, as well as him becoming monkey man? Serious amounts of CGI do not belong in this franchise.

I was also incredibly disappointed that they didn’t use real live bugs and instead resorted to CGI.  Every film prior had some type of creepy crawly that was designed to make your skin crawl, but they were real or at least appeared to be. Why did it have to be a billion angry ants that just swallowed people up? You’d think the David Koepp would have known this was done before in the movie The Mummy. I bet this was George Lucas’s idea. And why did Cate Blanchett have to die by CGI too? Fire from the eyes, that could have be done with special effects, come on now!

It is not like they are bad visual effects, because they aren’t. They are all extremely well done, particularly the massive bomb that goes off. But this isn’t Terminator 2. The old movies relied on stunts to drive the action, not CGI. It is a shame that this film did not go the same route. And don’t even get me started on the CGI near the end of the movie. A fucking flying saucer? 19 years later we get a sequel to Indiana Jones and one of the closing scenes involves a space ship? This isn’t bullshit nonsense like National Treasure. Sigh.

George Lucas should not be involved with any Star Wars or Indiana Jones property at all. What made the original Star wars movies so great? The fact that Lucas only wrote or directed one of them, that’s what. Look what he did with the ‘new’ trilogy. He pissed off fans and was trashed by critics. Jar Jar Binks? Are you kidding me? Then he later says he made the trilogy for himself. Yeah, I would say that too if I realized what I just created was a total joke. Yet, he had to be hands on with this project and be involved creatively. If it were up to Spielberg, this would have been made years ago. But no, Lucas had to okay the script. And to top all that off, a few weeks back Lucas makes a statement to the press that fans have unrealistic expectations on how good this movie will be. Lucas do us all a favor and sell the rights to anything you’ve ever made to Spielberg. If he was looking to alter the mindset of fans still angry at him for the new Star Wars films, he has failed. In fact I’d say he angered a new legion of fans. Lucas has done irreparable damage to his career and he still can’t let go of a franchise he made over 30  years ago. The Clone Wars animated? How sad.  Hopefully he pulls a Howard Hughes and isn’t heard from for 20 years.  It is the best gift he can give to the world of cinema.

I am a very passionate Indy fan, and when you are a huge fan of something, your expectations may be slightly different than the average movie goer. I did enjoy watching Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull. It was a fun movie at times, even though it has some serious issues with where the plot goes as well as the use of CGI. It seemed to stray from the ingredients that made the franchise so great.

Leave it to the master that is Steven Spielberg to execute a bad script and make it for the most part fun to watch. There isn’t a director around that can do it quite like he can. Whenever they played the theme song, you just can’t help but smile. I probably will be seeing this again in theaters at some point, even though I was a disappointed with the outcome. The film is a fun adventure filled with wonderfully executed action scenes, but fails to live up to its predecessors. But I still want another sequel, because the franchise should not end on a bad note!

My enthusiasm for this flick was not very high because I didn’t really like or hate the first  installment, it was just decent. Also, this trailer didn’t really do much for me. And you know what they say, your instinct is usually right. It was in this case.

The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian can be a fun film at times, but mainly is an  empty and uneven movie-going experience. Much the like the first installment, some of these kids just are not very strong actors.  William Mosesely as Peter Pevensie is easily the weakest of the four, and fails at generating any emotion with the audience. The slow motion shots of him yelling “charge” are laughable. That is cutting room floor material folks.  Ben Barnes as Prince Caspian seems to be the poor man’s Orlando Bloom, and just comes off as totally out of place. I found the accent to be annoying.

The story begins as the Jean Reno looking King Miraz wants to be the King of Narnia, and on the day of his son’s birth, he sends his henchmen to kill Prince Caspian. Caspian flees to the forrest, and is given shelter by some Narnians. The four kids are then plunged back into Narnia and discover hundreds of  years have passed since their last visit. They quickly change into Narnian like clothes and engauge in combat right away. The film’s lackadaisical approach on how prepubescent kids can be experts with swords and bows and fight grown men gives the film a real cheese flavor, which I am sure they were not going for.

When the children meet up with Prince Caspian is when the film starts to flip flop from interesting to “okay, what time is it?”. Sadly, this is happens pretty quickly. The story seems to jump from one subplot to the next, and never hammers home any real development besides making King Miraz an uberly evil villain. He really does look like Jean Reno’s brother. Some of the plot jumping feels awkward. After the film the group of friends who I saw it with informed me that this was a poor adaptation and that certain sequences were just made up and had no relation to the book at all. Maybe this is why I had so many questions about the story afterward. This also is probably the reason be why the story feels so uneven. The movie does build up steam as you watch it, but it has to many hiccups that prevent it from connecting with you on an emotional level. 

The CGI ranges from absolutely terrible to passable. We all know Jurassic Park still looks better than most of the CGI out today, but for an epic franchise such as this one, it is a shame they didn’t hire the folks at Industrial Light and Magic. Some of the effects look Ghost Rider bad.  The only two really well done effects were of the Lion and the water battle near the end.

The epic wanna-be Gladiator battle at the end is poorly executed and keeps cutting away from the fight to show other stuff going on in the story, which totally destroys any excitement or momentum. A very poor editing choice. The entire fight, I just kept thinking, “wow, that is straight out of Gladiator”.

One can only wonder just how great this franchise might have been if put in the hands of  someone else. The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian is too poorly executed and uninspired to be considered anything above average. The film is handled with kid gloves, evident of the PG rating, and has too many cheesy one liners, and sappy emotional scenes. This series should have been handled with the same maturity as The Lord of the Rings. Instead, it is relegated to your average movie going experience, which is sure to disappoint the Narnia fan base. I don’t think I will be seeing the third film of this series. Instead, I will read the books, something I should have done in the first place. 

Grade:

To me, The Wachowski Brothers are as synonymous to the word ‘genius’ as they are to the phrase ‘epic failure’. After the collosal disappointment that everyone shared after watching The Matrix Revolutions, they turned around and created the masterpiece that is V for Vendetta, one of the greatest comic book films of all time. So my expectations were pretty high riding into this one based solely on the fact that the Wachowski’s were involved. I never really watched Speed Racer prior to the film, so going in, I really didn’t know what to expect. Based off what I thought was an excellent first trailer and  a bunch of my friends saying it was going to suck, was I disappointed?

Imagine melting down a bag of skittles, then injecting them into your veins. The result is the world created in Speed Racer, an acid trip where the everything is painted with watercolors. I’ve never seen anything like it. The Wachowski’s are masters at telling a story through visuals, their style is arguably one of the best in all of cinema. With Speed Racer, they have truly created a spectacle. Every scene is filled with such vibrant colors, you almost need sunglasses to watch it.

But like all movies, visuals can carry you only so far. That is where Speed Racer has a handful of problems. Unless you are a fan of the original anime TV show, you probably will be confused more than once throughout the movie. The plot starts out simple enough, with Speed Racer (Emile Hirsch) trying to beat the ghost time of his brother via hologram around a popular race track. The event is televised and Speed does so well, he catches the eye of Royalton (Roger Allam), a greedy and evil racing tycoon who seems to own everything that deals with racing. Speed must then decide on whether to join such a huge brand name, or stick with his family’s company, created by his Dad. The story becomes cloudy from here, and involves mafioso type figures, a  strange racer appropriately titled Racer X (Matthew Fox), a bunch of flashbacks, and some subpolot about an investigation into Royalton.

The problem is the plot is just to big for its own good. It is like if you try to eat 12 pieces of pizza when you can only eat 7, things won’t work out very well and will eventually get messy. The flashbacks are utilized to strengthen Speed’s character as well as his family and girlfriend Trixie (Christina Ricci), but the rest of the many characters go undeveloped. Too much is going on and the story stretches out so poorly that you will want certain scenes just to end. More than once during the film I felt like I needed to see the source material before watching this. Racer X is poorly developed and sort of just pops in the story, along with all of his subplot.

Another thing I was not prepared for is that the film is essentially a kids movie. The rating (PG) is something I didn’t really think about heading in. Much of the humor is geared towards children. Half of it works, half of it doesn’t. On a few occasions I winced because of the heavy cheese and sappy dialogue.  The acting is par for a film like this, but Matthew Fox as Racer X seems to be a hit or miss, depending on the scene. His monotone delivery of lines seemed beyond puzzling to me. Some of it reminded me of Michael Madsen’s non-acting in Sin City, except it was not nearly as bad as that. I am not sure if the  original Racer X was an inspiration or not, but his voice pattern just seemed weird.

The racing scenes were also hit or miss, but they seemed to get stronger as the film went on. While the opening race seemed to lack excitement or suspense, the last one made up for it in spades. For all the story problems that this film has, the climax is excellent. The final 15 minutes is worth seeing, and it is just a shame that the rest of the film couldn’t get on track until the last lap (I know, horrible pun). The visual effects are incredible and the action  sequences are somewhat solid. The musical score definitely seems to be a step down from their previous two films, which is surprising considering the music they had in the first trailer was perfect.

In all, I was definitely let down by Speed Racer. There were scenes that were well executed, and while it was pretty to look at, and had a surprisingly effective climax, the film was just bogged down by a seriously muddled plot line. Add in the cheese factor and so-so action scenes, and you have a film that really only appeals to the die-hards, the Speed Racer fanboys. The problems can mainly be found in the script. Speed Racer is like the gorgeous  blonde trying to push open a door that says pull. Both are visually stunning. And.. Yep, thats it.

Grade:

You know that feeling you get when you are walking around your house and you stub your toe, and the pain triggers an unbelievable amount of anger and blind rage where you just want to scream obscenities and get hurt something or someone? That is exactly how I feel when I see a new trailer for a spoof movie.

From Scary Movie 1, 2, 3 and 4, Date Movie, Epic Movie, Meet the Spartans, to the recently released Superhero Movie, the spoof genre is absolute garbage. I’ve said this once and I will say it again, the last time this genre was funny, Nirvana was still a band. Think about this for a second. This trend of shit films not only is a testament to Hollywood’s lack of integrity that fecal matter like this can be released into theaters, but maybe they are truly running out of ideas.

Jason Friedberg and Aaron Seltzer are responsible for Spy Hard, Scary Movie 2,3,4, Meet the Spartans, Date Movie and Epic Movie. If I were them I would jump into a pit of spikes, a la Mortal Kombat. As kids, did they know they would grow up to be complete douchebags of monumental proportions? Jason and Aaron, how can you honestly be happy with yourselves with a body of work comparable to Paris Hilton? Are your parents even proud of what you do? If I had a child and he grew up and created something like Epic Movie, I’d want someone like Dexter Morgan to deal with him.

These two complete pieces of shit lack any creativity, artistic integrity, or the intelligence to create something remotely original. They are as useful and fun as a computer virus. They are film terrorists. And their debacles of careers do not stop here. Their next comedy, Goodie Two Shows, spoofs films like Superbad and the yet to be released Hancock, Sex and the City, and The Love Guru. Yep, the have started making fun of movies that are not even out yet. Hey guys, I think Dr. Kevorkian can provide you with a much needed service, why don’t you give him a call.

What about David Zucker, who has been holding on to the spoof genre for almost 30 years? You beat both the Naked Gun and scary Movie series to death. We all know Airplane! and The Naked Gun were funny films, but like the mullet, you have to let it go. In fact, the mullet and the spoof genre share some key similarities. Both are as funny as Schindler’s List, both only have one or two ‘cool’ examples (MacGyver, Solid Snake), and both need to be buried where no one can ever find them.

If you aren’t going to get triple A talent in all areas to rescue a genre that needs to stay as dead as Michael Myers, then just STOP. Tom Brady (a lame director, not the QB) showed us just that with The Comebacks, a diarrhea of the mouth factory of a movie, that tried to take a stab at spoofing the sports genre. The film was as dumb as Teen Ms. South Carolina 2007 trying to answer this question . Brady is the same man responsible for turds like The Animal, The Hot Chick, and his upcoming comedy Welcome Back, Kotter starring none other than Ice Cube. Brady, did your mom feed you bleach as a child?

What type of people go to movies like these anyways? The only way for these atrocities to stop is for people to stop fucking going to shitty movies like this. Do they not care about cinema? Do they even like to laugh? Are they merely going just to torment the other 99.8% of the population? I will close with an except from my review of Epic Movie.

There is nothing funny about nobody’s imitating funny scenes in a movie you’ve seen 3 months ago. It’s almost as bad as those lame ass NOW Volume 3994939! CD’S. Who wants a music compilation of radio songs 6 months old for 20 bucks? You’d think nobody, but they still fucking sell. The only people that buy them are the same that probably see films like this. Fans of spoof movies can take their NOW CD and shove it up their fuc**** ass.