The Good Lie

So I saw The Good Lie and I was pleasantly surprised by what it wasn’t. The movie is about a group of kids from Sudan, who make the thousand mile walk from their home to a refugee center, and eventually arrive in America, where they face new and unusual challenges. I was worried that the movie would be based around either The Gods Must Be Crazy style culture-clashes or that it would turn into some kind of Blind Side knock-off based around the three brothers’ (Arnold Oceng, Ger Duany, Emmanuel Jal) relationship with Carrie (Reese Witherspoon) who works for an employment agency finding them jobs.

Instead I was surprised to find that the movie mostly focused on the lives of the three men and their sister and their trek from Sudan to Ethiopia, and how they worked to actually build lives for themselves once they arrived in the United States. The African scenes were really affecting for me, they gave a sense of the both the beauty of the African landscape and the danger that seems to lurk around every corner. The kids starve and get dehydrated, they have to avoid both wild animals and soldiers that will either kill them or force them to fight on their side. In America they have to find work despite not having much education and being faced with a culture and environment that is totally alien. I think the movie did a pretty good job making the audience step back a bit and look at ourselves with an outsiders eye.

In all this is a decent movie, and could be an entrance to learning about the Lost Boys of Sudan in a way that’s based a bit more around hope and less around misery. It’s not a great movie, but I think it does what it sets out to do.

Nightcrawler

So I saw Nightcrawler and let me tell you, no one does crazy eyes like Jake Gyllenhaal. The movie is the story of Louis Bloom (Gyllenhaal) a down on his luck hustler who decides to get into the news business by filming grisly accident and crime scenes and selling the tape to local news. Eventually he teams up with Rick (Riz Ahmed), another guy down on his luck, and makes living selling tape to a local news producer Nina (Rene Russo). But the real focus of the movie is Gyllenhaal’s Lou. Besides just having extremely crazy eyes (his gaze makes both the audience and the other characters in the movie very uncomfortable) Lou is extremely hyper-verbal. Everything he says sounds like comes from a management or self-esteem textbook, full of buzzwords and jargon, the way he interacts with the world is incredibly unique and engrossing.

Because Lou is such an unstoppable force in the world of the movie, it’s really interesting seeing how all the other characters react to him. Rick and Nina seem to take opposite paths, Nina trying to block Lou’s endless ambition while for the most part Rick goes along for the ride. The interplay between the characters and their chemistry (or lack thereof) is really great.

I think the big thing that threw me with this movie is that it really feels like a period movie, but is set in the present day. I just might not be watching enough local news, but in my head the golden age of the kind of videos that this movie is based around is in the 1990s, not today. So when things happen that are clearly modern (a cellphone with GPS, Lou saving video in 4k fidelity, etc.) it seemed a little jarring to me. The other thing is that a HUGE amount of the movie’s plot is in the trailer. I was really surprised that parts of the penultimate scenes were prominently featured. It meant that I spent the whole movie waiting for certain things to happen, instead of letting the movie unfold normally.

I also want to point out that Bill Paxton has a part in this movie, and it’s like the third time this year that he’s been really great in a small role (the other were in the Agents of Shield TV show and Edge of Tomorrow). More bit parts for Bill Paxton please!

Anyhow, Nightcrawler is a good movie around a great performance, and I recommend it wholeheartedly. Check it out!

Before I Go To Sleep

So I saw Before I Go To Sleep, and it was basically 50 First Dates as a horror movie. Every morning Christine (Nicole Kidman wakes up with no memory, her husband-who she doesn't remember-gives her the rundown of her condition and what’s going on with everything. Actually it’s a lot like the end of 50 First Dates, but instead of romantic or something, it’s sort of grim and depressing. You feel bad for her husband (Colin Firth) until we learn about the mysterious doctor (Mark Strong) trying to help her condition, and we gets the sense that neither are telling the whole truth, and nothing is as it seems.

Amnesia seems like a cool device for a thriller, it guarantees that the audience knows things that the character doesn't, and has the potential to be totally mind-bending and fun. While there are some twists and turns in the plot, for the most part things just kind of go normally. Besides occasionally showing her waking up and not knowing exactly what's going on, for the most part Christine just keeps on adding to her memories and understanding at a steady pace. 

I was surprised more by what the movie DIDN'T do. For a movie about a character who's memory resets whenever they fall asleep, there wasn't really a scene where Christine stays up late trying desperately to stay awake to do something important. Similarly there were a couple places where the movie could have taken a very dark turn and didn't seemingly because the film makers didn't want to go for a true twilight zone style ending. For me these kinds of missed opportunities really keep the movie from being great.

One last thing. Everyone, if you find yourself in a thriller movie type situation: A strange house, pursued by a bad guy, definitely in trouble. If you have a working phone, please call 911 (or your local equivalent), most emergency services can trace your phone and have someone on their way to you right away! Don't get caught by the bad guy because you're trying to find a piece of mail or looking out the window for a street sign to figure out where you are! Also, like I said in the No Good Deed review, it's OK to hit your attacker with the same improvised weapon more than once. My motto: If you're going to stab them one time, you might as well stab them like a dozen times.

Big Hero 6

So I saw Big Hero 6 and I liked it, but was kind of let down when it turned out to be just another superhero origin story. The movie initially focuses on Hiro Hamada, a young super-genius in the city of San Fransokyo, a futuristic mash up of San Francisco and Tokyo. After his brother dies Hiro teams up with Baymax, health- care robot that’s more parade balloon than Terminator, and tries to unravel the mystery. Eventually when a bad guy is discovered Hiro enlists several of his super-genius buddies to form the titular super team (because there are six of them, get it?).

As a San Francisco resident I really loved seeing my city transformed into a futuristic wonderland. The animation is amazing throughout, basically what we've come to expect from this animation team. I enjoyed the interactions between Hiro and his family as well as Baymax, and even the other team members, a crew of multicultural geniuses, had interesting foibles and characterizations. To me it’s sort of a shame that all these fun characters and interesting settings are jammed into the cookie-cutter superhero origin story plot mold.

I watch a lot of superhero movies so at this point in history I’m kind of over origin stories, because they all have the exactly same beats: Power discovery montage, disastrous first mission, training montage, showdown with the bad guy where everything comes together for the team, everyone poses somewhere cool and gives a Tom Joad-esque speech (Wherever there’s trouble, I’ll be there). I've seen it like a thousand times. It's especially rough for a movie like this, clearly aimed at kids, at the end I almost felt like I’d just seen an hour long first episode of a new Saturday morning cartoon show, instead of a self-contained movie.

It’s frustrating because there is a lot to like about this movie that isn't just the same old stuff. I definitely want to  to say that on the familiar trappings of the origin story the filmmakers have managed to make a fun and charming movie that has some truly exhilarating and touching moments, it's just a sore spot for me. Plus this movie does have that family stuff that I like so much. Not a perfect movie, but absolutely worth checking out on the big screen if you can.

Horns

So I saw Horns, and it was basically the first third of Gone Girl + Liar, Liar with a little Stand By Me mixed in. It starts Daniel Radcliffe (who most people probably know as Harry Potter) as a slacker guy who’s girlfriend (Juno Temple)  is found raped and murdered and he’s the prime suspect. So far so normal (relatively), but then he wakes up one morning to find horns growing out of his forehead! Weirdly no one really notices the horns, and he soon realizes that they actually give him special powers. People now always tell him the truth, and often either do what he says or ask him permission to do something terrible. My favorite example was when he tells a group of local news teams that they have to fight each other and he’ll give an interview to the winners, which immediately leads to a full-on Anchorman style brawl. Anyhow, as time goes on his horns grow larger and larger and he slowly unravels the mystery of who killed his girlfriend. There are also extended flashbacks to when the characters were kids, showing how their relationships developed and stuff.

The thing about this movie is that it’s trying really hard to be edgy. While some of the reactions to the horns are funny or touching (at one point Radcliffe goes home and has a series of conversations with his family that are pretty gut-wrenching) but for the most part it’s pretty basic like “Oh man these cops turned out to be gay!” or “Woo! That dude pulled his junk out!” I wish they had done more with it. Also there are extended sequences that just seem to be about showing the dude who played Harry Potter doing drugs and having sex just for its own sake, which personally wasn't that titillating to me, but your mileage may vary.

There are some funny and interesting parts of this movie, but I wouldn't recommend rushing out to find it. It does have an important lesson to teach about not turning your back on crazy murderers though. Make sure they’re tied up and stuff before you start thinking you've won, honestly!

John Wick

So I saw John Wick, and it was pretty much one of the best action movies I’ve ever seen! The story is pretty basic: After his wife dies, retired hit man John Wick (Keanu Reeves) finds solace in the world’s cutest puppy that his departed wife gave him as a gift. This is spoiled when the son of a Russian mob boss (Alfie Allen, who you might know as Theon from Game of Thrones, and playing a similarly hateable guy) steals John’s car and kills the dog. Naturally revenge is required. This revenge takes John back into the hidden world of organized crime in New York and results in like a thousand dudes getting shot in the face. While that’s all pretty basic, there are two things that really make this movie great.

The first is the action. The gunplay in this movie is brutal and stylish and incredibly fun, certainly matching up to any other action movie I can think of, be Equilibrium, Heat, or one of John Woo’s magnum opuses.  Keanu Reeves really gives a master class in one guy shooting the hell out of a bunch of other guys, while bullets are flying everywhere. Several times he even does one of my favorite moves, where you grab one bad guy that close by, shoot a few other bad guys that are further away, then finish off the guy you shot earlier. He always double taps, and everyone gets shot in the face. It’s pretty awesome.

The second thing is the world-building. The filmmakers effectively create a whole criminal underworld that is as intriguing and mysterious as anything I’ve seen since the Matrix. It’s a world of secret clubs and backrooms, all powered by gold coins unspoken codes. One of the best parts of the movie is early on Theon tries to sell John Wick’s car to a chop shop and the owner (John Lequizamo) says no. Later, when the Mob boss calls him to see why he disrespected his son, he just says “because he stole John Wick’s car” and the mob boss just says “Oh.” It’s an intriguing setting I would love to see more of.

I really enjoyed the movie and heartily suggest it if you like a violent action movie. Everyone should check it out! I want John Wick sequels! I want John Wick PREQUELS!

Birdman or (The Unexpected Virtue of Ignorance)

So I saw Birdman, and I thought it was great-despite the fact that it kind of calls me dumb. Before I get to what's actually in the movie though, I'd like to quickly talk about what the movie is not.  Admittedly I don't do a ton of research for movies I watch beyond watching trailers and stuff, but Birdman the movie has completely different themes and concepts from Birdman the trailer.  From the trailer I got the sense that the movie was about Michael Keaton as a fading movie actor, far past his earlier success in superhero movies trying to gain legitimacy by doing a stage play, but as a twist action movie stuff happens around him all the time and he just might maybe actually have superpowers!

In fact, the first part of that is true, but most of the proof for the second part comes from one extended obvious dream sequence towards the end of the film. While Keaton does spend the film conversing with a "Birdman" voice in his head, to me at least it was pretty clearly just a voice pretty early in the movie. Anyhow enough about what it isn't and more about what it is.

Because what it is is an interestingly shot movie about fame, acting, and the nature of theater. The whole thing appears to be one long take, the camera following people from one scene to another, mostly throughout this theater on Broadway. I'm always a fan of these kinds of shots, and it gives the movie an incredible sense of momentum, as we follow one character until they have a conversation with another character, then follow that new person to a new conversation an so on. To me this gave the movie a very play-like feeling-like the whole thing was actually being performed by the actors in two hours without extra takes or extended periods of time on set-which was a great asset in a movie about the production of a play. Of course according to all the characters in the movie, I wouldn't know what a play is actually like, because I'm the kind of idiot who enjoys superhero movies.

The constant downing of superhero movies, and Hollywood movies in general, is a major theme in Birdman.  Early on while trying to fill the role that Edward Norton will eventually take Keaton lists a number of movie actors only for his agent to say that they're busy making one superhero movie or another. Keaton's character is haunted by the superhero movies he made twenty years ago (though apparently he was Birdman for three movies, instead of the two he did as Batman in reality.) Interestingly, while Edward Norton is basically playing himself-a brilliant actor that can be very difficult to work with-he's a version of Edward Norton that never left Broadway, that didn't star in the Incredible Hulk, and instead stayed "pure" as a stage actor only, both he and a theater critic played by Lindsay Duncan hold this over Keaton's head throughout the movie.

It's with Duncan that Birdman's anti-Hollywood agenda is at it's sharpest. She delivers an extended cutting monologue on the vapidness of movies and movie stars and what they've done to society, and to me Keaton's extremely lackluster response to her speech makes it pretty clear that the movie agrees with what she's said. As someone who really enjoys a superhero movie but is also not against more intellectual pursuits, it was hard not to take it a bit personally.

I don't want to say all that to make this seem like a bad movie, again I really enjoyed it.  I found the cinematography really engrossing and there are some very good performances, especially by Michael Keaton, who I've always enjoyed as an actor but seemed to disappear for me after he did that movie where he was a snowman. Basically, I think this movie is worth the time it takes to see it, it's doing a lot of interesting stuff, but I did want to forewarn you about what you're getting here. Recommended.

Whiplash

So I saw Whiplash and it was all right. Basically take the first half of Full Metal Jacket (where drill sergeant R. Lee Ermey yells at the young marines at boot camp for like an hour) but instead of about training to kill people it's about being in a high profile jazz orchestra.

Miles Teller plays a gifted young drummer at an elite art school and J.K. Simmons plays the drill sergeant/band conductor. I've been a pretty big fan of Simmons for a long time, since he played an evil skin-head in HBO's Oz. Both on that show and in this movie Simmons' intensity allows him to elevate the lines he reads to be full on menace and threat. He's definitely the best part of the movie for me.

The role Teller plays is a lot more complex than the one Simmons has, because it has to explain why he's willing to take Simmons's abuse. Unlike the cadets in Jacket, the students here are actively choosing their abuse. I could identify with Teller's drive and ambition, and how sometimes our ambitions can take us to dark places. Unfortunately, in a way that I find kind of hard to explain I didn't really like Teller's performance in this role. I think his character was too much of a cipher, I had trouble determining what he really wanted and where his drive came from. This really hurt the movie for me.

If you like really intense performances and some very fun jazz numbers, this movie is worth a look, but I can't endorse it whole-heatedly.

Dear White People

So I saw Dear White People and I thought it was pretty good. It wasn't an uproarious laugh-out-loud comedy, but I don't think it was trying to be. Instead the movie is more like a series of conversations and monologues that characters deliver about race and the roles they see themselves in.

The movie centers around a campus radio show and it's firebrand host played by Tessa Thompson, and throughout the movie there are little asides from her show, usually in the form of statements starting with "Dear White People..." like "Dear White People, the official minimum number of black friends has been raised to two."  This show, combined with recent changes to housing policies at the school lead to increased racial tensions which culminate in the campus frat bros holding a black face themed Halloween party.  Along the way the movie points out and often has fun with a number of racial stereotypes and attitudes.  I think my two favorite examples were Tyler James Williams and Brandon P Bell bonding over being embarrassed for liking Star Trek: The Next Generation because it wasn't seen as "black enough" despite it's cast and pedigree, and the way it seemed like whenever Williams interacted with white people at least one person in the scene feels the need to fondle his Afro.

To me, having the big climax of the movie being a black face costume party seemed very apt, and something that might actually make this an important movie for future college students. I think sometimes we sensationalize the problems people face, and this makes it harder to relate to those problems. You end up with something like Higher Learning, which almost 20 years ago tried to discuss racism on college campuses with white students as Neo-Nazis and black students as Black Panthers with race war school shootings around every corner, this extreme view allows the viewer to distance themselves from what they're seeing "Sure, I don't hang out with anyone who looks different than me, but it's not like my dorm room is full of swastikas!"  Dear White People has lower stakes, but it also allows the viewer with less room to hide, it seems designed to spark discussion and to make the view examine how their actions effect people in ways they might not otherwise realize. Frankly if it keeps one college campus from hosting an incredibly racist costume party it's done more than its fair share.

Interstellar

So I saw Interstellar and I really liked it. I might be a little biased though because I really love movies about space and space exploration.  After I saw the movie I played Kerbal Space Program for like 10 hours because I was just in a very "TO THE STARS' kind of mood. Anyway, the movie! It stars Matthew McConaughey as Cooper, the pilot of a spaceship on a mission to find a new home for humanity as Earth dies beneath our feet. On their trip, Cooper and his crew (including Anne Hatheway and a few robots among others) face a number of challenges, from fist-fights on frozen worlds to overcoming time itself.

The cinematography for this movie is amazing. The sense of scale you get as our hero's tiny spaceship flies past Saturn or onto the surface of an alien world is both humbling and exhilarating.  On the other hand, when the camera isn't pulled all the way back, a lot of the space shots are done seemingly from cameras aboard the ship, so part of the ship's hull always takes up part of the screen. To me this was both reminiscent of the movies I've seen of the actual moon landings and helped to place the viewer within the action of the scene.

I enjoyed a lot of the science-y stuff in the movie. There's a lot in this movie about time, both how long it takes to actually travel through space conventionally and how time can dilate when you get too close to a black hole.  This concept-that an hour for you can be days, weeks, or even years to everyone else-has always fascinated me, even since I read Time for the Stars, a Juvenile Sci-Fi novel about that concept as it relates to travel near light speed.

The robots in the movie are amazing.  Instead of being the usual movie robot-a guy in a suit or wearing makeup-these robots are completely non-anthropomorphic. They're instead just boxes make up of a few planks, making them walk like a person using crutches, and run by turning into vaguely jack shaped wheel.  Combine that innovative design with extremely dry senses of humor and a bit of self awareness about how robots usually end up in these kinds of movies (i.e. destroyed or being the bad guy), and you get a winning combination.

I guess what I didn't like was that towards the end things get a little too cute for my taste. Like the whole movie is very hard science for most of its run-time and then gets mystic towards the end. I've heard some of my friends really appreciate this aspect, but it left me kind of cold. Also, this is a movie directed by Christopher Nolan, so that means that it's almost three hours long and may have some parts that you find confusing, be forewarned!

To sum up: A beautiful and smart sci-fi adventure, I wish there were more movies like this!

St. Vincent

So I saw St. Vincent, and here's the thing: I know when I'm being manipulated, OK? This is a pretty basic movie, Bill Murray is an old curmudgeon and Jaeden Lieberher is a precocious kid and the two of them learn from each other and all that. The kid gets a little tougher, the curmudgeon gets a little softer. In the end we learn a lesson about judging books by their covers and so on. It culminates in a big presentation the kid gives that shows us all the wonderful things the curmudgeon is hiding behind is tough exterior, and then the theater releases a crap load of dust into the air and you have to rub your eyes and stuff...don't look at me, it's dusty! Like I said, it's manipulative and the beats are pretty clear, and it's up to the talent to raise things to the next level.

I think Bill Murray does a great job at this. To me his character Vincent seems like a classic smart-ass Bill Murray character (like from Stripes or Meatballs) who as grown old to the point that being a smart-ass is not longer cute or charming, but just kind of makes you a jerk. It makes Vincent likable but prickly, and ultimately makes his redemption at the hands of the kid Oliver believable.

Jaeden Lieberher is pretty good as the kid, Oliver. He delivers his lines well and manages to be wise-beyond-his-years without being grating. There's a thin line kids in movies have to walk to avoid being annoying or painful to watch, and he does a decent job, especially when he's acting as the straight man for both Murray and Melissa McCarthy.

While it's basically just a comedy, the level of the cast, its time of release, and some high-quality stroke acting makes me wonder if this movie is actually some sort of stealth Oscar bait, we'll see I guess. If you're looking for a fun movie with some decent warm fuzzies at the end, this could be right up your alley. Worth a shot.

The Book of Life

So I saw The Book of Life and it was OK I guess. Your basic kid's movie with lessons about finding your own destiny and the importance of family.

I really liked the art style of the movie, both in the slightly more realistic town of San Angel and especially in the Land of the Remembered, where everything is a spectacular Day of the Dead float. I also appreciated the art style of the movie, and it's slightly different focus. When a museum tour guide introduces the story she says it takes place in the "center of the universe: Mexico" which made me raise an eyebrow. Still, it's a interesting change from kid's movies that take place in generic parts of the United States and Olde Timey Europe.

I didn't find a lot to be really bad about the movie, but there were some parts that were kind of off. For example while Channing Tatum seems to be really having fun as the swashbuckling Joaquin, he stands out in a movie where almost everyone else speaks with an accent, and it stands out. I also thought the song selections were kind of odd. The Book of Life isn't quite a musical, but there are musical interludes, and they're generally of older pop songs done fairly straight. I mean, I imagine it would be weird if they dude a super Mariachi version of Radiohead's Creep, but just having the main character play an acoustic version of it is out of place also. It seems to me that if you're going to make a movie about Mexican culture and folklore, why not go the whole hog? Anyhow, it's a fine kids movie, but there probably isn't enough here for grownups, so take that into advisement as well.

Fury

So I saw Fury, and man for a bunch of stone-cold killers, these dudes sure do cry a lot! Seriously though I enjoyed a lot of this movie. The battle scenes are really spectacular, with bodies and tracer bullets flying everywhere. The final battle, where the tank is damaged and the crew fights off a Nazi company in increasingly desperate terms was thrilling, especially as it becomes clear that not everyone is going to make it out.

I enjoyed the acting as well. The writer/director David Ayer is really good at telling stories featuring guys you normally wouldn't like much but are extremely charismatic (as exemplified in both End of Watch and Training Day, the two big movies he's known for). Brad Pitt's character in this movie is not a good guy, he bullies both his tank crew and the civilians in a town they liberate, but you can also see why his men follow him, in an excellent kind of balancing act. Shia LaBeouf was really good in this movie as well, which isn't something I expect to say ordinarily (BURN).

What keeps this movie from being great is a long section in the middle, where instead of fighting or tank driving the movie turns into an unexpected passive-aggressive dinner party. Like when a couple is about to break up and they're sitting at the table with everyone else and they just start suddenly making random comments designed to hurt the other person and they get angrier and angrier and everyone else gets increasingly uncomfortable. It's a very weird turn that doesn't seem to accomplish much in the overall movie. Besides that though, generally this movie has good action, good acting, and at one point the main gun of a Sherman tank hits a Nazi trench and a dude is blasted like 30 feet in the air and it's pretty sweet. Worth a look, go to the bathroom when Gordo and Coon-ass show up at the apartment.

Kill the Messenger

So I saw Kill the Messenger, and it was all right.  It's a movie about Gary Webb, a reporter for the San Jose Mercury News played by Jeremy Renner. Back in the mid-90s Webb wrote a series of articles about the CIA overseeing the importation so cocaine into the U.S. to fund the Contras in Nicaragua. The movie follows Webb through learning about and researching the story, followed by his fall and eventual disgrace at the hands of the media and government (Sorry, I usually don't do a ton of synopses in these reviews but I wasn't that familiar with the movie or the story it's about when I went to see it so I thought I'd share).

The movie plays out along the usual "fall from grace" story line. In the first half of the movie we see what a dogged and determined reporter Webb is as he hunts down leads and writes the story. Once the story is published and to universal acclaim it's basically a countdown until the other shoe drops and everything goes bad.

I was a little surprised by the lack real action in this movie. While there are often parts where Webb is threatened or things are implied by members of the government, For the most part it seems content to just let Webb get really paranoid and rely on the fact that whenever someone starts saying things about the CIA being out to get them they sound extremely crazy.  In the end the key to this movie is Jeremy Renner's performance, because there isn't a ton going on beyond how he reacts to any given situation. While I think he did a good job of conveying the emotional journey his character goes through, there isn't enough going on besides that. An interesting little movie that might be worth your time if you're interested in the subject matter, but not much else.

The Judge

So I saw The Judge and it was OK I guess. To me it seemed like the movie wasn't quite sure what it wanted to be, or at least it was trying to be a lot of different things at once. There are tropes and story lines from at least three different kinds of movies in here and none of them really reach their full potential for me.

The main one you see in the commercials for the movie is the big city lawyer comes to the small town and tries a court case, like My Cousin Vinny. But with so much of the movie focused on other stuff we don't really see a ton of court action. We get one scene from jury selection and and maybe one cross examination before the big dramatic courtroom scene with Roberts Duvall and Downey Jr. and then the case is largely over.

Its also another of these "tragedy brings estranged family members back together" movies like Skeleton Twins or This Is Where I Leave You. I think this part of the movie is probably the strongest, mostly because of the excellent cast. Robert Downey Jr. does his usual Ton Stark thing while Robert Duvall is a cranky curmudgeon. I think this is probably the strongest part of the movie, though as stated before I am a sucker for family stuff in movies, and I feel like some of the story lines presented are pretty underdeveloped, especially Vincent D'Onfrio and Jeremy Strong as the other brothers in the family. There are the starts of stories here but they don't seem super developed.

The third movie is a fish out of water learns to love the small town story like Doc Hollywood. For me this is the weakest plot line just because of the way the movie is shot. All the scenes in Indiana are beautifully lit and shot, the small town where most of the action takes place is bright, sunny, and full of smiling people who seem pretty care-free and everyone's business is thriving. It makes Robert Downey Jr. just seem like he's being an over-dramatic when he's annoyed to be coming back home, instead of empathizing with him.

I wish I liked this movie more, because I am a fan of the actors here, but in the end there wasn't enough of any one thing to really lift this movie to the next level.

Dracula Untold

So I saw Dracula Untold, and it was pretty meh. I'm always willing to watch a movie based on an old-school movie monster-I'm one of the only people to have seen I, Frankenstein earlier this year for instance-and from the trailer I was pretty excited for a big special effects movie with giant bat fists and so on. So it's kind of a disappointment when all the big effects are the ones that are in trailer, and the "untold" story of Dracula is your run-of-the-mill superhero origin story.

It's disappointing because there's some promise at the start of the movie. There's some Game of Thrones elements dealing with internal politics of the Ottoman Empire and a whole cast of Prince Vlad's advisers and lieutenants, but it's all quickly over once he gains his vampire powers. Then it's the standard "learning to use your powers" and "hiding your powers from others" montages. After that every other character sort of fades to the background as we focus on the inevitable showdown with the big bad guy.

I love superhero movies, but at this point in history the origin story is the weakest superhero story you can tell.  This is the monster movie version of The Legend of Hercules, and that is a sad thing indeed.

Left Behind

So I saw Left Behind and boy howdy, it is not a fine movie. I've read at least on review that describes it as a drinking game, and I thought I'd try my hand at making one:

Drink When:

• The movie's sound track is either wildly inappropriate (like upbeat elevator music over the opening credits) or ridiculously dated (like smooth jazz saxophone when the sultry temptress appears)
• You notice that Chad Michael Murray's beard is weirdly trimmed and you can't look away from the weird notch in his chin
• When the only purpose Chad Michael Murray serves in a scene is to hit redial on his cell phone
• People refer to religious people (especially Lea Thompson) as crazy
• When characters say that those "crazy" religious people were RIGHT!
• You see a pile of empty clothes after the Rapture strikes
• Someone in first class says something and everyone in first class starts standing up and having a big discussion like they're doing a one act play or something.
• The little person first class passenger is incredibly angry for no reason.
• Over the top examples of societal breakdowns post-Rapture, including scooter-based purse snatching duos
• When despite this craze societal breakdown, when it's needed an undamaged, still running motorcycle is readily available just lying on the street
• Glass is broken (drink twice when the bible is used to break glass!)
• Something happens that is really really dumb

You might want to watch this movie to make fun of it, but that is the only reason to do so. For the love of God (before he raptures everyone I guess) avoid this!

Gone Girl

So I saw Gone Girl and it was fantastic! I'm a huge fan of movies about conspiracies and con artists, where everything is part of a larger scheme and nothing is as it seems, and that is what this movie is all about.

I honestly don't want to say to much because so much of what made this movie good were all the little twists and turns that turn the course of the movie on a dime. I will say that while Ben Affleck gets top billing the real star of this movie is Rosamund Pike, who does a fantastic job both as her character and who her character pretends to be.

An amazing thriller that will keep you guessing, and surprisingly funny. You should definitely go see it!

The Skeleton Twins

So I saw The Skeleton Twins and I thought it was pretty good. If might be because I just watched it recently but it really seemed cut from the same cloth as This Is Where I Leave You. Both movies feature estranged adult siblings reuniting in the wake of a tragedy, though Skeleton Twins is more of a sad movie with funny parts, instead of Leave You which was a comedy with some sad parts.

For me the best parts of the movie were the non-dramatic scenes where Bill Hader and Kristen Wiig just riffed and made each other laugh with little jokes. Their interactions are full of both biting sarcasm and genuine emotion that I really enjoyed. These happy moments made the inevitable falling outs and arguments all the more dramatic, because you could tell that the characters cared for each other but each had their own issues which got in the way.

This is a melancholy movie about life and growing up, and not quite the "you can't go home again" type comedy that it's advertised as. I suppose any movie with multiple suicide attempts can only be so funny (except for Groundhog Day, but that's a special case.) I found this movie to be very engrossing and very real, it's worth a look.

Men, Women & Children

So I saw Men, Women & Children (and a movie by that name!) and I think I'm still sort of processing it. So far I've had three different thoughts about it, so I'll just review it through here:

First: It's one of those ensemble teen movies like Fast Times at Ridgemont High or American Pie, but updated for modern times with smartphones and so on. Oh and also with a bit more focus on the parents of the kids as well.

Second: It's a remake of all those classic scare movies like Reefer Madness or Perversion for Profit, but improbably about the internet. The internet allows married couples to cheat, makes a teenage girl anorexic AND pregnant, and (most shocking of all) makes a star running back quit the high school football team!

Third: It's actually kind of a mix of the two, because the problems in this movie are the problems that teens and parents always have in these movies. Parents are cheating on each other, A kid gets disillusioned with high school football. A young woman as sex with a young man who turns out to be a huge douche. A girl and boy fall in love despite the girl's mother being really controlling and intrusive. These are pretty universal themes in these kinds of movies, and I can't quite tell if the point of the movie is that the internet makes these problems different, or if it's the same stuff in a different way.

Generally though, I liked:
-Emma Thompson as a snarky omniscient narrator,
-The relationship between Ansel Elgort and Kaitlyn Dever which was sweet in the "let's be sad loners together" way
-Adam Sandler giving one of those great quiet and subdued performances he does once every five years or so

This is an OK movie, but if you're interested you might want to wait until it comes to video or something.

P.S. As a fan of the show Alias back in the day I'm increasingly bummed out that all the roles I see Jennifer Garner in these days is as the Mom. But that's a personal agenda, never mind!

P.P.S. There's a key plot point that is completely nonsensical about how a certain video game works in this movie. As a video gamer this offends me greatly (not actually).

This Is Where I Leave You

So I saw This Is Where I Leave You and I enjoyed it, but I probably can't be trusted. I have a soft spot for movies about family bonding and stuff, so I have trouble being fully objective. Still, I shall endeavor to give a reasonable assessment with what I liked, what I didn't, and what I'm undecided on.

What I liked: I really enjoyed how all the characters interacted with each other. They had a kind of easy familiarity that seemed pretty realistic, especially Jason Bateman and Tina Fey. There were some parts that had me laughing in spite of myself, especially a running gag where everyone keeps calling a rabbi by his childhood nickname, much to his chagrin (his nickname is "Boner," it's pretty funny).

What I didn't like: It's probably just the presence of Jason Bateman here, but I kept thinking that maybe they should have just gotten the rest of the cast of Arrested Development to handle many of these roles. Especially Jane Fonda, who seems like she's doing a version of Jessica Walter's boozy over-sharing shtick.

I'm undecided on this feeling of back story that the movie had. If I found out that This Is Where I Leave you was a sequel or cast reunion to some other movie or TV show that was popular 10 years ago I wouldn't be surprised. There are so many things here that are mentioned and undeveloped or just glossed over. Like how apparently at one point the mother of the family wrote a famous Ordinary People type book about her kids going through adolescence which was really weird and embarrassing for them, but after that's mentioned it's just kind of dropped. In the end a lot of things are really resolved and things still seem up in the air. If you wanted to be charitable you might think that this is intentional, because after all in real life we rarely have smooth beginnings or endings, but a more realistic view may be that the script is a bit under cooked, and could have been tightened up a bit more. Either way, I found this movie to be fun and enjoyable, and if you like movies about family stuff, it can be worth your time.

The Boxtrolls

So I saw The Boxtrolls and I thought it was an OK kids movie, but it was missing something for me. I really liked the boxtrolls themselves, and enjoyed the look we got into their world but the rest of the movie left me kind of cold.

I was really thrown off by the design of most of the adult characters in the movie. I mean it's clearly a conscious decision on the filmmakers' part but the adults were all unrelentingly ugly and off-putting to me, to the point that it was just really distracting.

On the upside the dialog is generally pretty funny. There's a running gag where Richard Ayoade and Nick Frost as two of the villain's evil henchmen have a series of existential conversations about whether they actually are evil henchmen or not, like an extended version of the Mitchell and Webb "Are we the baddies?" sketch. Also Ben Kingsley is pretty good voicing the main villain, though I found his character hard to look at.

With a mix of low humor and your standard "don't judge misfits and outsiders just because they're different" storyline this seems like it'd be a great movie for kids, but I don't know if there's enough there for grownups. At least there wasn't for this one.

The Equalizer

So I saw The Equalizer and it was a lot of fun! The director, Antoine Fuqua is very skilled at creating violent action movies with enough characterization to keep you interested during the slow bits, and this is no different. Here’s the deal: In the first fight of the movie Denzel Washington stabs a dude to death with a corkscrew, and if that sounds awesome to you then you’ll probably enjoy this movie. If it sounds unnecessarily gory then you should probably see something else.

Personally, I’m a big fan of corkscrew murder. One of my favorite kind of action movie characters is the guy who enters a situation without any guns or anything of their and instead fights with weapons and random objects that they acquire during the fight. This movie is all about that kind of crazy environmental based fighting, especially the final battle, which takes place in a giant Home Depot-type hardware store.

One thing I thought was interesting about this movie is that it has kind of an episodic structure. Sort of like what I assume the TV show the movie is based on,  Denzel Washington’s character is confronted by a number of situation that require his abilities to be solved, and are sort of disconnected from the main plot of the movie. I could see how some could see this as making the movie disjointed, but it worked really well for me.

Some of the supporting players in the movie do really good jobs, especially Marton Csokas as the bad guy, a psychopathic Russian mob enforcer.  Chlöe Grace Moretz is a decent ingénue, though I was surprised by how little she’s in it given her prominent spot in the trailer and other advertising. But really this movie is 100% about Denzel Washington doing his dangerous calm persona, which I always find to be very entertaining. In all this is an extremely entertaining movie with great action and suspense. Definitely worth your time.

A Walk Among The Tombstones

So I saw A Walk Among the Tombstones and it was OK but didn't blow me away. It's one of these "dark, gritty" thrillers where the good guys aren't that good and the bad guys are really really bad. Sort of like The Drop, the filmmakers do a good job of establishing a bleak rainy New York City at the end of 1999. Why they did that specific era is sort of lost on me, all we really get out of it is some random Y2K references and a semi-plausible explanation for why Liam Neeson can't use the internet, which leads him to befriend his punk kid sidekick.

Brian Bradely (or is it just "Astro"? KIDS THESE DAYS) is interesting as the sidekick just because unlike most movie he's way more belligerent than he is cute or funny. Meanwhile, Liam Neeson doesn't go full Taken in this movie, but he does do a bit of the menacing phone conversations that we've come to expect.

In general the movie relies way too much on "mysterious figures appearing behind you" type scares and implications of greater violence. There are parts of the movie that are clearly attempts to make a point or be artistic, but for me really falls flat. There's an extended section around the big finale that involve action occurring while the 12 steps from Alcoholics Anonymous are read, but only one or two of the steps seem to actually match up with the action on the screen, so it just seems random. Worth a look if you're in desperate need of a cops and robbers movie, or are a fan of late period Liam Neeson, otherwise pass.

The Maze Runner

So I saw The Maze Runner and it was just a wasted opportunity. I haven’t read the books or anything, but from the commercials I had seen for this movie I was really hoping for a Lord of the Flies + Cube, with a little bit of Bourne Identity fun with amnesia mixed in. Instead it’s just another “here’s a weird situation, but it all changes when the special kid who changes everything shows up” YA Lit movie. It seems like the movie I wanted to see happened before this one even started, with a bunch of boys creating a society and mapping a giant labyrinth, learning the rules of their world and establishing order. That seems more interesting to me than the story of how that’s all broken because this one kid shows up.

As for the actual movie I saw, the actual kid actors do a decent job with what they’re given. I have a few problems with the writing and direction of the movie though. Everyone in this is so damn cryptic, no one will ever give a straight answer. Early in the movie it seems to me like it would have been easy to say “beyond the wall there’s a big maze, but it’s dangerous in there. The doors close at nightfall and no one has ever survived the night.” That’s two sentences, but it takes like fifteen minutes of screen time to relay this information through a bunch of “Don’t go in there” “Why not?” “Because.”

The problem with the direction is that several of the key action sequences happen in the middle of the night with almost no extra light to illuminate things. To me this made the action hard to follow, and made it hard to make out just what things looked like and how they worked. Why you’d want to make a movie based around special effects monsters and then take pains to not let us see the monsters all that much is beyond me.

Finally, I want to say that I really hate cliff hangers, especially in the first installments of movies. This movie ends with a ton of questions unanswered and reasoning unexplained, with only a “see the next movie as an answer, and that, like this movie overall, is lame.

P.S. Current YA Lit Movie Power Rankings:

1. Harry Potter

2. Hunger Games

3. TBD

4. TBD

5. Maze Runner

6. Divergent & The Giver (tie)

8. Twilight