It was a great year for films, here are some highlights from the writers of HST. [Sorry to blow you away with my expressive introduction, it's just my talent shining through] [Read more...]
HST’s Best of 2011: Movies
01/02/2012 by Leave a Comment
Now Playing Review – Bridesmaids
05/13/2011 by 5 Comments
If there is anything to take from Bridesmaids, it is that being the Maid of Honor sucks (which I hope my best friend will remember when I am most likely crying my eyes out over all I have to do for her when the day comes). More importantly, and more relavent, it’s the relief that the look for the best comedy of the year can stop right now. Basically it’s going to take pure perfection topped with bribery of free puppies, slushie machines, and Ryan Reynolds to beat this one.
To sum it up, the film structures itself around the well-worn path to the alter, taking a machete along to carve out its own path away from the formula best known for the sappiness of the romantic comedy versions of these stories. To clarify, this is not a romantic comedy, though both of those words apply to the film. More comparable to The Hangover and Due Date in comedy and ridiculous events transgressing within simple journeys (though I will purposely refrain from unfairly labeling it is a female version of The Hangover), Bridesmaids draws its humor from the relationships of the characters as they find themselves in a constant spiral of unraveling events that hopefully have never actually happened to one group of people in short succession. Hilarious to witness; no doubt unfathomably painful to experience. [Read more...]
Review: Despicable Me
07/09/2010 by Leave a Comment
Despicable Me is a bland effort around an interesting idea that barely salvages itself from travesty with a pretty decent finale.
The film follows Gru, a villain of the world who hasn’t had a note worthy diabolical scheme in some time. Added to this he has been recently upstaged by a young and upcoming villain, Vector, who has stolen one of the great pyramids and the two begin to battle it out over the next great heist using a top secret shrink ray that has just been produced. The two go back and forth over the ownership of the shrink ray and in the plot to take the ray from Vector; Gru adopts and forces his new young daughters into the mix of his dastardly plans.
Now Playing Review – Date Night
04/23/2010 by Leave a Comment
If Date Night were a blind date between you and another person (as opposed to what, I don’t know) then I would say that the date is going pretty well. Sure there are times when some traits are revealed that you aren’t really sure if you want to stick around for, and sometimes they make some nervously ill-conceived jokes that you laugh at to be nice, but overall you genuinely had a good time and were glad you didn’t need to get a friend to call with an “emergency” to allow you to bail out early.
The date that this story revolves around takes a different path than the hypothetical mentioned above. In Date Night, Phil and Claire Foster try to add a little spice to their marriage by going out to a fancy dinner in the city. Unfortunately they do this without making a reservation, but instead of leaving they decide to take on the identity of the Tripplehorns since they bailed on their table. Unfortunately for the Fosters, they don’t even get through their dinner before two men pull them from their meal and accuse them of doing something in a case of mistaken identity, starting off the most dangerously adventurous date of their relationship. [Read more...]
Now Playing Review – How To Train Your Dragon
03/29/2010 by Leave a Comment
DreamWorks’ How to Train Your Dragon is an entertaining and adorable (don’t worry boys, you will still be manly if you see it) film that is by far one of their best attempts at removing Pixar from the computer animation throne.
In the Viking community a name can say a lot about the person; so with a name like Hiccup people probably aren’t going to expect that much from that individual. Growing into his name, Hiccup is seen as the community screw-up, far from one with the battle prowess of the others in the village. Especially when it comes to killing dragons, the village pest problem. Though everyone has little faith in what Hiccup is capable of, he has not given up on becoming a great warrior against the dragons and actually brings an elusive Night Fury down with one of his inventions during a dragon food raid on the village. With this final straw, the village warriors (AKA the majority of the village) leave to find and eradicate the dragon nest, leaving Hiccup to his own devices. However, when he finds the downed dragon he realizes that maybe he just doesn’t have what it takes to do what is expected with him, starting an unheard of friendship with the enemy. [Read more...]
Rental Review: Extract
01/01/2010 by 1 Comment
For a movie about flavored extract, Extract sure is bland.
For the most part, Joel lives a pretty mediocre life. He lives comfortably in his nice house with a nice car in the driveway, but its hard to be content with this with an annoyingly outspoken neighbor and a wife that uses sweat pants as if to say “you’re not getting any tonight.” What’s more is that his only escape from it all is the extract plant he built and now owns, but now it too is becoming more trouble than it’s worth for Joel. Seeing his escape thanks to an offer from General Mills to take the company off his hands, he finally sees a way to put his life back together. Too bad the factory has other plans for him. After a freak accident at work, Joel must now find other ways to bring about a happy return to normalcy before he loses his mind.
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Review: Whip It
10/02/2009 by Leave a Comment
Drew Barrymore’s directorial debut is a fun, humorous, and uplifting tale that appeals to all audiences with its themes about being yourself and not bashing anyone along the way and it is about as fun as a movie can get when it is firing on all cylinders.
Bliss Cavendar is a seventeen year old girl living under the tutelage of her mother in the world of beauty pageants and is quickly growing disinterested with the whole thing. Growing more and more into her own, Bliss is looking for something more up her ally. Not full of her self and never trying to set a trend, she is a quiet and gentle outsider when it comes to school but while visiting Austin she sees a group of roller derby girls promoting an event and quickly takes an interest to the sport. With her best friend Pash, the two head out for the big city to catch the event and Bliss becomes an enthralled by the event that unfolds. Upon discovering there are open tryouts for the league in a few weeks time, Bliss decides to bust out her old skates and start training to hopefully make a team. After a rough try out, her speed finds her a spot on the The Hurl Scouts with teammate like Maggie Mayhem, Smashley Simpson, Rosa Sparks, and Bloody Holly. Having to keep this world secret from her mom she leads a second life as a roller derby girl and even finds romance in a fan of the sport that helps her further discover herself. [Read more...]
Review: Adventureland
04/15/2009 by Leave a Comment
Greg Mottola’s follow up to Superbad shares little in common with that previous film, which isn’t a bad thing as this is an honest and sometimes sweet coming of age tale for a fresh college grad.
James has a plan. As his graduation present his parents are supposed to help fund his trip to Europe with friends, where he can finally lose his virginity, and then he will move to New York to attend an Ivy League school for graduate degree and everything will be peachy. Well upon graduation he discovers that his dad has been demoted and his parents can no longer float him along any more and that he must get a summer job. The only place that will hire him is the local dead end amusement park, Adventureland. James is stuck working the game booths for the course of the summer in which he meets a number of interesting individual, the most interesting being a cute fellow twenty something named Em. James and Em click and they begin hanging out quite a bit and eventually fall into a sort of pseudo relationship of sorts. Meanwhile, James bonds with Joel, a dorky fellow games worker and Connell the parks repair man who is also a fairly successful musician on the side, or so they say. As the summer goes on, we get to see the ups and downs of James and Em, James struggles with his affinity to fall in love, the comings and goings of the park, and the challenge of fighting his urge to get laid over his faithfulness to a relationship. [Read more...]
Review: Ghost Town
07/31/2008 by Leave a Comment
Ricky Gervais teams with David Koepp to make a great debut as a film lead for American audiences in a film that is a bit familiar but fresh and funny enough to keep you entertained.
Frank (Greg Kinnear) is walking along the streets of New York having a cell phone conversation with his wife, followed by his real estate agent, and over the course of these conversations we discover he isn’t the most faithful of husbands’ right before he dies. We are then introduced to Bertram Pincus (Gervais), a dentist who isn’t a fan of people, keeps to himself, and has to prepare himself for a routine colonoscopy. After the procedure he begins to see and be able communicate with dead people and is harassed by them to help them solve their problems so they can move on. Upon returning to the hospital Bertram discovers that he died for nearly 7 minutes and that might explain is current situation. [Read more...]
