Trance has an interesting premise and some great visuals, but it has a serious problem of telling instead of just showing; or shut the fuck up Rosario Dawson. [Read more...]
Review: X-Men: First Class
06/03/2011 by 1 Comment
X-Men: First Class is a great comic book film that is anchored by a fantastic cast and resets the X-Men universe in an era ripe for potential future films.
The film opens up right where the franchise did, with Erik Lehnsherr being separated from his family at a Nazi concentration camp and ripping a fence down in the process. Where we go from there is all new. After an introduction to Mystique and Charles Xavier who have become childhood/lifelong friends we catch back up with Erik who is hunting down the Nazi’s who tortured him and his family in the camp. Erik’s main target is Sebastian Shaw, a mutant himself who has collected a few others (mutants) around him, and Shaw is hatching something sinister between the U.S. and Russia.
The film is set right in the heart of the cold war, the Soviets and America on the verge of nuclear war, and Kennedy is in the White House trying to diffuse the situation. The unexpected help comes from these newly discovered mutants and this fresh new era really gives the series a fun playground to play in. The 60’s look is cool, sexy, and allows the characters to have a lot of fun, especially in these younger incarnations of these characters. The two leads, Erik and Xavier, are of course Magneto and Professor X from the films we are familiar with and getting to see them as young men is really quite fantastic. [Read more...]
Review: The Conspirator
04/22/2011 by Leave a Comment
Robert Redford’s latest is a fine looking and produced telling of a fairly unknown story in American history that fails to really excel to anything more than a straight forward court room drama that serves as a parallel to our modern day travails with prosecuting through Guantanamo Bay.
Now you might ask how a movie about Lincoln’s assassins translates to an obvious condemnation of the way the U.S. is handling the prosecuting of modern terrorists. Redford clearly has something to say and the film’s, and real life, drama surrounds defendants being prosecuted without a jury and instead by a military tribunal. The ethics of this is something to seriously question as the officers sitting on the judging tribunal are neither unbiased nor uninfluenced by their superiors which will obviously tend to lead to unfair trials. That is what critics of the way the government is handling the modern day situation will attest to, especially when regarding defendants that really have very little relevance to the enemies cause, and that is where Redford’s film draws its focus.
Review: Wanted
07/10/2008 by Leave a Comment
Timur Bekmambetov brings Mark Millar’s graphic novel to life in a visually stunning and entertaining film that comes off a bit rushed and short changed on material.
Wesley Gibson (James McAvoy) is going no where in life. His girlfriend is cheating on him with his best friend, he hates his job, and he hates his boss all while having no direction for the future at all. This is in contrast to a member of the Brotherhood, one of which is his father who we see killed after leaping out a window taking out a number of would be assassins as he jumps out one building to another (he makes the jump, it’s a bullet that gets him). Wesley is quickly finds a brash change in his life when he is approached by Fox (Angelina Jolie) who is both recruiting him to the brotherhood as well as protecting him from his fathers assassin Cross (Thomas Kretschmann). The two go on a whirlwind chase around Chicago as they are chased by Cross performing super unrealistic, but stylish, moves in Fox’s corvette all while Wesley is nearly shitting himself. Upon escape, Wesley is introduced to Sloan (Morgan Freeman), the leader of the Brotherhood, who says Wesley has inherited all of his father’s assets and is destined to be a hit man of the Brotherhood. Upon Wesley’s release he awakes as if from a dream but quickly realizes his reality and begins down a path to a life he never thought he had. [Read more...]
Review: Penelope
03/18/2008 by Leave a Comment
This modern day fairy tale follows the adventure of a cursed, pig nosed, girl searching for the man who can of blue blood decent that can break the curse and turn her to normal, and while it starts off strong it slowly fades into something pretty ridiculous and bad by the time it’s all over. [Read more...]
Review: Atonement
12/16/2007 by Leave a Comment
This period drama and Oscar hopeful delivers on multiple levels, at varying times, but meanders occasionally leaving us a bit unfocused at times. Now, I will say I do want to see it again as the theater environment I saw it in was anything but ideal, not to mention it is hard to focus when you feel like you are in an oven, but either way, back to the movie. [Read more...]
