John's Movie Musings

When the trailers for Wall-E came out, Disney did a great job of not telling you anything about the story. You knew it was a about a robot on a planet that gets visited by a spaceship. And that's it. Well, you knew one other thing: this was a Pixar movie. And for everyone on the planet, that was enough.

I've been a little down on Pixar, however. Cars was a low point for me and Ratatouille didn't wow me as much as everyone hyped it up. But, Pixar has a solid track record, so I figured it was a safe bet to check this one out.

Wall-E is not only the best Pixar movie ever, it's one of the best Sci-Fi movies and one of the best love stories. Period. I worry about hyping it up too much, but it's about as perfect as you can hope for. This one's taking home an Oscar for sure.

But here's the thing. The movie starts out with two large heapings of guilt. I picture Wall-E pointing and laughing at Al Gore while calling him an amateur. Humans haven't been portrayed this badly since Bambi's mother got shot.

But it all works. Somehow, out of the little genius factory that is Pixar, that guilt gets turned into hope and love. There were women next to me wiping away tears at the end. As luck would have it, I got something stuck in my eye.

There are still a lot of big summer movies left, but I'd bet this one stands out as the best.

Grade: A+

I have a man-crush on Steve Carell. The dude cracks me up. My Thursday nights are reserved for The Office and he's mostly the reason why. Well, that and taking bets on when Jim and Pam are breaking up.

So when I heard that he was taking over for Don Adams in Get Smart, I thought, "Brilliant!" just like those Guinness guys. Who else could play the "funny man who's in a comedy but doesn't realize it" part?

I was also a bit nervous. Did you see the Pink Panther? Steve Martin is funny, and him speaking in a French accent is enough for me, but the movie wasn't all that great. It was ok, but certainly not worth $10 -- the exact amount I had riding on Get Smart. See where I'm going?

Fortunately, the movie is hilarious. I love going to comedies where the whole audience laughs with you. It's contagious. My viewing of Get Smart was like that. There wasn't a large crowd, but the people there all laughed for two hours. You can't help but enjoy that.

Anne Hathaway was also a big question mark for me going in. I'd never seen any of her movies, well, because she's only done like twenty princess flicks. Fortunately, my manhood is intact and I've never had to see one. But she's great and plays a great counter-balance to Carell.

The plot is kind of obvious, so don't go in expecting great drama. But the jokes are great and this one's worth checking out if you're in need of a laugh.

Grade: B+

By the time The Village and Lady in the Water came out, I think all the negative press started to get to him. The critic character in Lady in the Water is "Exhibit A." Also, Shyamalan's ego got worse with every movie. The time he spent on screen in his movies directly correlated to how badly they sucked.

With The Happening, the credits inform us that he wrote, directed, and produced it. I have no idea what a Producer does, so I just take that to mean he gave himself some donoughts every morning.

As for directing, the man is still a genius behind the camera. There are scenes that you will never forget. They're the kinds of things spoof movies make fun of. Unfortunately, M. Night has a long ways to go to make up for The Village, so it might be awhile before The Happening gets spoofed.

Now let's get to the writing. M. Night should immeditately burn every pen, pencil, quill, typewriter, and PC in his house. The man should never write again. The dialog in The Happening is so awful, I actually wished George Lucas would have helped out. Maybe it looked good on paper. Maybe he was on drugs. I'm not sure.

The Happening is certianly better than his last two movies, but still not worth catching in the theaters. It's worth a rental, though.


Grade: B-

Yes, here's another 80's series I didn't see as a kid. Too much Neverending Story and Short Circuit, obviously. I watched the original Rambo - excuse me, First Blood, a few months ago and I didn't particularly care for it. So why watch II and III? Well, Stallone made a new Rambo a few months ago and I wanted to see what he did with it. You may know that he did the same with Rocky Balboa, a movie I really enjoyed. To get the most out of the latest Rambo, I thought I better catch up on the series.

What can you say about the Rambo movies? I firmly believe that we will never see another character like this in our lifetimes. The action hero is dead. Think about it. What would today's studio execs say about a script where the hero escapes from prison, releases the prisoners, and steals his own rescue helicopter - without help from anyone. I imagine this stuffy guy in a suit scratching his chin after reading, only to ask the writer, "Can we make him gay?"

Is it good for the action hero to be dead? I don't think so. Afterall, we've got Die Hard 4 and Rambo 4 coming into these modern times. There's even another Terminator coming out. So Stallone, Willis, and Schwarzenegger all agree with me.

Maybe it's just the lack of action stars today. Let's go hypothetical... Hollywood is big into "revisioning" old series. Pretend the last Rambo didn't get made and now a new director wants to remake First Blood. Who would star? The only guy I can think might possibly pull it off is Gerard Butler of 300. Got anyone better?

Anyway, I'll spout off more about this after I watch Rambo (the last one). As for Rambo: First Blood, Part II and Rambo III, they're classics. Go find yourself some Pop Rocks and Coke and watch both in the same night.

Grades: B

All too often, I go into Indie films hoping to discover the next Juno or Once. That's not a bad hope to have, but it's "hope" and not "expectation" because most Indie films are crapfests.

Take Wristcutters: A Love Story, for instance. Following the Independent Film bylaws, it tackles a subject Hollywood won't touch - suicide. OK, I'm cool with that. It's good to explore some darker themes in the safety of film to help make sense of it. But only an Independent filmmaker would look at suicide and say, "Hey, this would make a great love story." Idiots.

Yes, I know Romeo & Juliet did it. Shut up. That was a well told tragedy. Wristcutters is a tragedy. See the difference?

The movies opens with the titular suicide and the hero's death. However, he wakes up somewhere between Heaven and Hell. Think more New Jersey than Purgatory. Wherever it is, only suicide victims live there. He soon hears that his girlfriend killed herself shortly after his funeral, and so begins his quest to reuinite with his true love.

"But John," you say. "What about all the emotional strife that caused him to kill himself?" Yeah, that's why this movie sucks. You basically have this quirky love story set in New Jergatory that completely ignores the fact that every character killed themselves. Actually, I take that back. Every character explains how they killed themselves, but no one explains why. Maybe it's just me, but when Mr Big Emotional Elephant is in the room, I think a story should deal with him.

Bah. Whatever. You've probably never heard of this movie. My apologies for ruining that.

Grade: D

Over and over, I'm convinced Johnny Depp is the greatest actor of our time. Every time I see him, he's playing a character that's different than all the rest. I daresay, here's a star who acts. Gasp.

In Sweeney Todd, Mr Depp does something he's never done before. He sings. And he sings well. Seriously. I went in fully expecting the wailings of a tortured soul trained by Yoko Ono. I expected cats to fall dead in the street. I even expected the TV to say, "Oh hell no" and mute itself.

But none of that happened. The man can sing and Sweeney Todd is worth a watching just for that.

So how's the movie? Well, have you ever watched Phantom of the Opera and wished for fountains of blood? The kind that shows up in Tarantino movies or SNL skits. Sweeney Todd has all that and even gets the color wrong to emphasize the ridiculousness of it all.

At its core, the movie is a Revenge flick. If you've read my other reviews on Revenge flicks, you know how essential I hold the ending. Fortunately, Sweeney Todd gets it right. You know when you order a Guinness and the server brings it to you while it's still cascading? That's the kind of satisfaction I'm talking about. Nothing life-changing. Just contentment.

If you're ever in the mood for a Slasher-Revenge tale set to song, rent it. I enjoyed this one.


Grade: A-

Remember that Hulk movie a few years ago? Ang Lee did it right before Brokeback Mountain. I don't remember too many of the details, but I think Hulk was trying to avoid the Army for violating the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" policy. I may have that wrong, but whatever, the movie was horrible.

Fast forward five years and Marvel gets their own studio. First, they come out with Iron Man (supposed to be awesome) and this weekend, they release a new Hulk movie. I think it's called The Incredible Forget About That Last Hulk.

I'm not a big Hulk fan, but it's one of the few superheroes I know anything about. And that's only because I watched the TV show as a kid. Because of that knowledge, I was dreading another origin story. I hate origin stories. Especially those that get told over and over again. But in The Incredible Hulk, they treat the it perfectly during the opening credits. Brilliant. It's like they knew I'd be bored during the credits anyway, so why not squeeze some gamma radiation in there. Whoever made that call deserves a bonus.

Edward Norton is the last person in the world I pictured as Bruce Banner. The man can act, but as the Hulk? Come on. Fortunately, he proved me wrong. He's awesome and paints a very human side to the biggest green monster outside of Boston.

I was really enjoying this one up until the final act. I swear you can pinpoint exactly when the Writer's Strike happened. The CG is pretty and you best enoy it, 'cause that's all you get.

Wait and rent this one.

Grade: B-

Why do I even try any more? I've said for years that Will Ferrell cannot carry a movie. Exhibit A is Anchorman. Exhibit B is Blades of Glory. But for some reason, I still long for the funny that was broughten in Old School will show up again. It feels like I'm at the end of a turd assembly line hoping for chocolate.

Semi-Pro is no different. In fact, it's because it's not different that it's so bad. Sure, it's got the same kind of humor as all of his other movies, just less funny this time. I hoped for a "that just happened" joke, but was denied. This surprised me as everything else had been done before.

Maybe my problem is that I'm not a big basketball fan. If I was, I may have gotten a few more of the jokes, or at least appreciated them more. But I'm not a NASCAR fan and I enjoyed Talladega Nights (a chocolate piece).

Anyway, I'm not gonna spend any more time on this. If you like Will Ferrel, you may like it. But surely you have a list of ten or more movies you need to see that are better. Go with those.

Grade: C-

I've been reviewing way too many popular movies, so I needed something obscure. I can't remember where I first heard about Paper Clips. It's been in my queue for awhile now and I was finally in the mood to watch it this weekend (Netflix users, it's a "Watch it Now" movie).

Paper Clips is a documentary about a small school in SE Tennessee who started a small project on the Holocaust. As they were talking about the six million Jews who were killed, one of the students asked what six million looked like. After some discussion and research, the students decided to collect paper clips. It turns out that was a very interesting choice because of its strange Norwegian origins and symbolism in Nazi Germany.

This multi-year story is simply amazing. Obviously, when a movie deals with the Holocaust, it'll bring up all kinds of emotions. Paper Clips is no exception and covers territories I wasn't expecting it to. The Weinsteins produced it, so the production quality and storytelling are above your average documentary. Expect scenes specifically designed to crack that cold, dead heart of yours. For those of you blessed with a soft heart, keep the tissues close....lots of 'em.

Obviously, I'm rating this pretty high, but should you see it? Absolutely, but I'd recommend that you wait until you're in the mood. Like if you're ever thinking to yourself, "What movie could I do a double feature with Schindler's List?" I would recommend you lay off the black eyeliner and nail polish. For the rest of you, put this in your "See before the end of the year" list.


Grade: A

You remember that short story you had to read in High School? The one about 10 homeless guys taken to an island to be hunted. They made a few different movies about it over the years and going into The Condemned, I thought it would fall within the quality range of those movies. Instead of hunting the homeless, The Condemned are all death row convicts and have to kill each other. Last man standing walks free. And it's all televised on the internets.

Warning: If you know anything about how the internet works, this movie will cause you bodily harm.

For the most part, it actually met my expectations. It stars Stone Cold Steve Austin for cryin out loud. The man went to the Steven Segal School of Acting. You also know who is going to last to the end because they're the only two people you recognize as having an ounce of fame.

But at around the 30 minute mark, something shifted. It became a great movie. No, Bruce Campbell did not make a cameo. Instead, the director portrayed the violence in such a way that I actually felt uncomfortable watching it. It wasn't any more graphic than other movies. In fact, they cut out parts that other movies have gladly shown. But the way the murder and rape was presented fit perfectly into the message the director was aiming at.

And that's where things fell completely apart. Instead of sticking with a great premise, (and I hope I'm not spoiling anything here), the director goes on to point out that violence in media only exists because people watch it. That's a valid point. However, this is a violent movie (intended to make money) starring Stone Cold Steve Austin (of WWE fame) telling you that you're to blame for violent movies. That's like some guy at McDonald's telling you it's unhealthy as he slams a fistful of fries down his throat. Or it's like Stone Cold Steve Austin kicking your ass because you're to blame for Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson.

...

OK, that's a valid point. But I swear I did my part to avoid smellin what that guy was cookin.

Anyway, if you set aside the pretentiousness and hyprocisy of the movie, it's not that bad. I mean it's a mindless action flick with an out of place message, starring a pro-wrestler who can't act (Stone Cold Steve Austin... Seriously. His name is like Beatlejuice). But if you're bored on a Friday night with a few beers in the fridge, there are worse ways to spend an evening.

Grade: B-