Article ITT I attempt to review every movie I've seen.

Only movie that I'm fixing to see in theaters in the near future is Sucker Punch. Oh, and this thread totally broke the 1500 post mark. Yay.
 
Hey Sexy, looking forward to your review of Suckerpunch. I showed my mom the Youtube trailer of it on my phone & she really liked it. Somehow I thought that there was some WWII-based ideas in the movie (possibly guy dressed in Nazi clothes, but not sure). Anyways, on Friday im gonna help ya review some movies. Any movies you plan on watching soon by chance sexy??
 
pillar said:
Hey Sexy, looking forward to your review of Suckerpunch. I showed my mom the Youtube trailer of it on my phone & she really liked it. Somehow I thought that there was some WWII-based ideas in the movie (possibly guy dressed in Nazi clothes, but not sure). Anyways, on Friday im gonna help ya review some movies. Any movies you plan on watching soon by chance sexy??
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Other than Sucker Punch...no. My life is consumed with work and papers at the moment. I took last weekend off, watched some movies and played the crap out of Dragon Age 2...and now I'm paying for it. Oh well c'est la vie.
 
hey sexy, lookin forward to your review of suckerpunch. i saw it earlier today & must say, i was rather impressed w/ it. all the guys should go see it. those ladies that are into action/drama flicks should go see it as well.
 
pillar said:
hey sexy, lookin forward to your review of suckerpunch. i saw it earlier today & must say, i was rather impressed w/ it. all the guys should go see it. those ladies that are into action/drama flicks should go see it as well.
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Seein it on Sunday.
 
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Title: Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time
Year: 2010
Country of Origin: US
Director: Mike Newell

Story: Is this the first halfway decent Video Game film?

Review: The answer to the above question is yes, PoP is the first halfway decent video game film. Which is saying a lot when comparing it to other video game movie of late...Max Payne, Hitman, Tomb Raider. This is all fine and good for a video game adaptation, but the film doesn't stand up all that well as a summer blockbuster. The film is woefully predictable, by the numbers, and awfully reminiscent of just about every other Jerry Bruckheimer production. While there is nothing terribly wrong with the film, it could've been better....That and when did British accents pass for Persian? I mean the highest grossing film of all time had subtitles, at least try some Persian.

[6.5/10]
 
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Title: Sucker Punch
Year: 2011
Country of Origin: US
Director: Zack Snyder

Story:Is Zack Snyder's (Dawn of the Dead (2004), 300, Watchmen) first original story an amazing tour de force or a crushing disappointment?

Review: I like Zach Snyder, the man knows what is awesome and since Dawn of the Dead he has been my go to guy for competently directed action films. So at the prospects of getting an original story from him is an exciting one. When I first saw the trailer for Sucker Punch I didn't know how to react, it seemed the Snyder threw everything but the kitchen sink of geek fodder in to one film. There was Steam Punk, D&D, and sci-fi...not to mention constant bombardment of '40 Pin-up imagery. It looked to be that Snyder was going for broke with this film and I was more than willing to pay to see the final product. The only thing that had me worried though was whether or not Snyder could create a narrative structure to fit all these elements into a single film?

It saddens me to report that Snyder could not come up with a good enough narrative structure and as such the film suffers. It's a film that is essentially about a group of girls attempting to escape an insane asylum before a doctor arrives to lobotomize our protagonist. The story then switches to a fantasy world where the girls are attempting to escape a brothel...and sometime to the story switches to an even further fantasy where they're fighting undead Germans or dragons. The actual plot is told through Lynchonian dream logic...meaning that what is happening in the fantasy worlds is a metaphor for what is happening in reality. So when I say they're escaping from the fantasy brothel what I mean is that they're escaping the asylum. Now in theory this narrative structure should be more than enough to all the various elements together, but it doesn't.

The "dream logic" plot mechanic actually works to disjoint the film which breaks it's pacing and narrative flow. This unfortunately pull the audience out of the experience. To make matters worse, the plot device that use to switch to the battle scenes is really clunky. In fact my friend leaned over to me during one of these transitions and said "this is really stupid". I actually tried to defend it, but I couldn't think of a single thing to say in the device's defense. It gets even worse when you get to the characters, which are unfortunately cardboard and shallow. All of the the protagonists, saved for a sage like old man, are are female...and all the antagonists are male. I mean Snyder set up what could have been his Kill Bill or even something greater and more subversive. But Snyder doesn't capitalize off this other than some T&A.

As far as the action goes, it's alright. Snyder once again over utilizes his patented "stop & go" high kinetic slow-mo. I mean I like Snyder's use of slow-mo and all, but it's over used just like in his earlier films. The action is fun but outlandish and removed from the story making it seemed tacked on for no real reason. Of course that's the biggest issue with the whole film, everything feels unnecessary. The characters, the plot, the action, the settings, the cinematography, the sound track...it just feels tacked on with no real connection to one another. I wanted to like this film, I really did. I saw the critical consensus on Rottentomatoes and thought "screw the critics, I'm going to see this film and I'm going to like it." But alas, I cannot recommend this film to anyone.

[4/10]
 
I expected as much when it came to Suckerpunch's story, I will only really be seeing it for the action. Should at least look cool in Imax.
 
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Title: The Assassination of Jesse James by the Coward Robert Ford
Year: 2007
Country of Origin: US
Director: Andrew Dominik

Story: Spoiler alert, Robert Ford kills Jesse James.

Review: The tale of Jesse James' death is one that is well worn. Including this film, there have been 25 films on the subject of Jesse James and countless books books written on him too. So to say that this film tells an interesting, compelling and somewhat original story would be a little hard to believe. The film actually focuses on Robert Ford, a man who worshiped the ground that Jesse James walked on and was driven out of fear to kill him. It's an interesting take on the subject and deals with some interesting themes.

Both Pitt and Affleck do a spectacular job in their roles, the supporting cast also does a stupendous job. The film's direction is in the same vein of Terrence Malick's work. Meaning that it is gorgeously shot with brilliant cinematography, but it also means that the film slow. There were even time where I found myself struggling through the film's 2 hour and 40 min run time. Despite this, the film is a rewarding one to sit through.

[9/10]
 
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Title: Rango
Year: 2011
Country of Origin: US
Director: Gore Verbinski

Story: An animated fish out of water story that closely resembles the plot of Chinatown. No seriously, Chinatown.

Review: Rango is a film that is all over the place and this is a good thing. First, I have to get this out of my system, Rango references a ton of movies during it's run time...all of which the film intended audience would not catch. There are references to Once Upon a Time West, Chinatown, Fear and Loathing Las Vegas, Raising Arizona, Apocalypse Now, The Dollar Trilogy, and The Three Amigos just to name a few. The film does these references well and it's entertaining to see them pop up every now and then.

Even without the references, the film is entertaining and a load of a fun to watch. The some of characters are a little bland, especially the protagonist, but the antagonistic characters are actually really well written and are great fun. The story, as I said above, is pretty reminiscent to Chinatown, which I can't really say is a good thing nor can I say it's a bad thing. It's just, you know, Chinatown...in a kids movie, there is just something funny about it. Anyway the real star of the film is Industrial Light & Magic, who managed to make what is quite possibly the most beautiful CGI ever. Seriously, no one has hit this level of awesome yet in CGI. Oh, and this is ILM's first animated feature, so double kudos to them. Overall I have to say this is easily the most enjoyable film I've seen in theaters this year. So if you haven't seen it yet, I do recommend you do so...especially in theaters just because the film is so damn beautiful.

[7.5/10]
 
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I've been going over my old Kurt Russel collection recently and i was wondering what you thought of Escape from New York and LA (for the cheese) as well as Big Trouble in Little China (for a little more delicious cheese).

Oh and Garden State which is completely unrelated to the previous films mentioned.

Thanks Sexy.
 
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i must say sexy, im rather disappointed w/ your review. i actually enjoyed the movie. i took my mom to go watch it w/ me & she enjoyed it as well. btw, when you said bout the review from rottentomatoes "screw it, im gonna watch it & enjoy it", dont say something along those lines. its always best to say, "ill go check out the movie & see what they like or dont like bout the movie & give my own 2 pennies bout what i liked &/or didnt like".

for me, the only disappointment was that the robot scene wasnt in 3d. i believe that scene would have been awesome in 3d. however, i dont believe its possible just to put that technology in the movie just for 1 scene, not to mention that i believe that it wouldnt even be thought of, esp when i believe their mindset is "its all or nothing". i really hope that whenever the blu-ray version comes out, they re-do that scene in 3d as apart of a 2nd disc special feature or something.
 
pillar said:
i must say sexy, im rather disappointed w/ your review. i actually enjoyed the movie. i took my mom to go watch it w/ me & she enjoyed it as well. btw, when you said bout the review from rottentomatoes "screw it, im gonna watch it & enjoy it", dont say something along those lines. its always best to say, "ill go check out the movie & see what they like or dont like bout the movie & give my own 2 pennies bout what i liked &/or didnt like".
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See here's the thing, I understand that I should stay academic about watching films. If I read other reviews I should weigh in the pros and cons of what they liked and didn't like about the film. Then after that discuss how I felt about the film in a way to add to the on going discussion of the subject. Though when it comes to a film like Sucker Punch all I want to be is entertained. If I can be entertained, then all of the faults of the film no longer matter, because the film did what it set out to do. But I wasn't drawn in or entertained by Sucker Punch, it could be because of all that beer I drank before hand, but there were thing that I found fundamentally wrong with the film.

I'm certain that people enjoyed the film and I'm happy for them, their $9.50 was well spent. I, unfortunately, didn't enjoy the film nor did my friend that I saw the movie with. A double negative from two people that are roughly in the demographic that this film was shooting for is not a good thing. Especially two people who generally liked Snyder's previous work. Though we did disagree on where the film went wrong, my friend said that issue lies with the direction. I still think that the main problem was with the story mechanics and Snyder's attempt shove too many divergent ideas into one film. But that's neither here nor there, we still agree that the film failed on basic levels.

Still I try to avoid being snobbish in my reviews and my opinion in films. I hate coming off as elitist or pretentious and I try to give every film I see a fair shake...anyway I'm starting to ramble a bit. For Snyder's sake though, I hope he can handle the new Superman adaptation. He still seems like the best man for the job.
 
SB, you've had me since giving Lawrence of Arabia a 10/10.

How about 'The Wild Bunch'?
 
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Title: The Wild Bunch
Year: 1969
Country of Origin: US
Director: Sam Peckinpah

Story: A film about the death of the Wild West.

Review: The "Wild West" is a period in American history that lasted roughly 80 or 90 years. This period has had more fiction written about it then pretty much any other period in history. Seriously, more westerns have been written than I care to think about. Personally, my favorite sub-genre of the Western is when the west is ending. For me I always found it interesting how an entire culture got shoved aside in the name of civilization and order. It's a well explored sub-genre and there are plenty of notable entries; from Once Upon a Time in the West to the more recent Red Dead Redemption, heck even Firefly/Serenity touched on this subject. The death of the west is a well worn subject. But none better tell the death of the west than The Wild Bunch.

Easily Sam Peckinpah's best film, The Wild Bunch takes place in 1913 a time where the civilization had already subdued the frontier. It follows a group of outlaws from a by gone era as they try to survive in this new inhospitable world. Chasing this group of is a man who used to ride with them and is now in the employment of the railroad company. It's a basic set up for a film, but it works to great effect here. All around the acting is spot on, with stand out performances from William Holden and Robert Ryan. Though the real star here is Peckinpah direction, particularly his use of violence. To give a clearer understanding of how violent this film is, when Warner Bros. resubmitted the film to the MPAA in 1993 to get a rating for a video release it was rated [NC-17]. Which is funny considering it had an [R] rating back when it was released in '69. Anyway, back to why Peckinpah's use of violence is impressive. He shot all the gun play in slow motion, which for '69 was almost unheard of. While not omnipresent, the slow motion helps to create an operatic feeling for the action sequences and allows for an almost cathartic experience. It is simply something that needs to be seen.

[10/10]
 
Well I see that you have seen some new movies... Lets try this again!
Have you seen Hobo With A Shotgun?

Has one of my favorite actors in it. It was not half bad for what it was shooting for tho.

Wish movies were like this and not CGI out the wazoo
Here is a trailer but it's really really gory...
[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ASomc2O6eqY[/ame]
 
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