Skyfall

2012 - 3/5

When it comes to the Bond movies, I’ve only seen 4 of the 23 before Skyfall (Goldeneye. The Living Daylights. Casino Royale. Quantam of Solace). So I can’t say that I know my Bond movies; so for what it’s worth [in your opinion], this is my review. I heard that this movie has a few throwbacks to previous Bond movies, but I’ll admit that I didn’t catch any of them.

Usually when I’m watching a movie, I write down things that stood out to me: the dialogue, certain scenes, something I thought, ect, but for this movie I didn’t write a whole lot down. I had written that I liked the fight that took place between Bond and the Assassin in the building (the one that was silhouetted), and I loved how part of the movie was set in Turkey and Shanghai (which made for great some shots). Aside from that, I really had nothing else written down, and I’m not sure what to make of it because the movie was almost 2.5 hours long. Don’t get me wrong, I did enjoy the movie, but for the sake of transparency, action flicks aren’t my cup of tea.

I felt as if this movie had a dark tone to it and it was present throughout the entire movie. I wasn’t expecting that, but it drew me into the plot a bit more. There really wasn’t much to the plot other than someone hacking into MI6 and taking information that threatened the safety of several agents and a bit more about the villain who did that (but I’m on the fence about whether or not that could be considered a spoiler, so I’ll leave it out). I found that there was a fair amount of fighting (which was well choreographed) and action, but the main aspect of this movie was its characters.

I had heard the song 'Skyfall' by Adele when the trailer came out and I can’t say I was a fan. When the song started playing during the movie, I immediately loved it. I mentioned earlier that the movie had a darker tone, and hearing this song at the beginning, defiantly helped set that tone. I can now say I’m a fan of the song.

I am going to have to talk about the acting, and there were a lot of relevant characters, so here’s my short blurb on each:

-Daniel Craig is great as James Bond. I really liked how this movie addressed that he was aging and he wasn’t necessarily at the top of his game, but lets face it, the guy will still get the job done. Craig’s appearance and demeanor make him so stealthy and cunning and such a great fit for this character.

-I had always liked Judi Dench as M, and I don’t think there could have been a better actress for this character. I really liked the relationship that M had with Bond. You could tell that each cared for the other, even with all their bickering.

-The only other movie I’ve seen with Javier Bardem in it was No Country For Old Men. There’s no question that the guy is a great villain. I do think that his character was slightly over the top in this movie: if ‘dark eccentricity’ existed, Silva would have been it.

-I really liked Eve and her relationship with Bond. It was nice seeing a woman in a Bond movie that was apart of the action too and not just a Bond girl. Naomie Harris didn’t have a huge role, but the scenes she was added into worked well in the movie.

-I liked Q; the character and the actor who portrayed him. I thought it was cool that a movie like this incorporated the characteristics of the younger generation nowadays. It was nice to see a tech-savvy character that had nothing to do with stupid gadgets.

-I liked how the Bond girl in this movie didn’t have a huge role and whatever scene she was in, wasn’t cheesy. At the same time, the ‘relationship’ between her and Bond was very forced.

Overall, it was an entertaining movie: it had a simple plot, it had great acting and good characters, but I'm not in any hurry to see it again any time soon.

***SPOILER ALERT***
-As I said earlier, the connection between Bond and the Bond girl was very forced and I bring this up again because I wanted to say that when she was killed, Bond seemed to get over it very quickly.
-Did anyone else find it a bit ironic that Bond slept with a chick that was caught in the sex-trafficking world?

-I liked that Silva’s motivation was revenge; it wasn’t something cheesy or unrelated to the other characters. His role wasn’t created just for the sake of fitting a villain into the plot.

Flight

2012 - 0.4/5

First things first: I am not a fan of Denzel Washington. Never really cared for any of the movies he was in as the lead. So why did I watch this? It seemed better than the other options at the time (Life of Pi, Red Dawn, Rise of the Guardians, Silver Linings Playbook and Twilight). In retrospect, I probably should have watched nothing, but I had a free ticket, so this was my choice.
(added 1/17/13: I probably should have watched Silver Linings Playbook).

I want to say that I knew what I was getting myself into with this movie; I knew it was a drama, and the only ‘action’ would be the plane crash itself. I was fine with that because the trailer made it seems as if it would be an intense movie in which Whip Whitaker (Denzel Washington) would have to defend himself.

I understand that when there is loss of life in something like a plane crash, people want answers as to why it happened and they especially want to hold someone accountable. And again, that’s what the direction I thought this movie was going in. Instead, what I got was a movie about a drunk that needed a line of coke to function (DW did play that part well).

For a movie that is supposed to be character driven, I really didn’t care what happened to Whip either way at the end (more on that in the spoiler section below). It’s easy to say that Whip wasn’t a character that I could relate to. What a good movie would have done, was to take an unrelatable character and make the audience care about him and his alcoholism. That did not happen in this movie.

It’s pretty sad that my favourite character in this movie was a character that only had 2 scenes that were about 5 minutes long. John Goodman had the best introduction of all characters and he was the highlight of this movie. I loved his character and I wish he was in the movie more.

A few points I just want to touch on:
-The nudity was unnecessary and it had no real purpose towards the plot at all:

1) Having a naked chick walk around a hotel room for 2 minutes does not imply any sort of relationship.

2) The guy that Nicole got heroin from was working on a porn movie and offered her a role (which was never brought up again, so why did it need to be in the movie in the first place?).

-The movie never touched on why Whip was an alcoholic (did it have something to do with his dad?).

-The movie was a lot longer than it needed to be; a lot of things could have been left out, and it wouldn’t have changed the movie in any way. 

Lets just say that the plane wasn’t the only thing that crashed in this movie.

***SPOILER ALERT***
Near the end, when Whip is asked the question if he thinks that (insert flight attendants name) drank the 2 bottles of vodka, I didn’t care whether or not he told the truth. If he said yes, he thinks she drank them, I wouldn’t have cared, and I also didn’t care that he actually owned up to it and said he drank them. I felt no attachment to that character whatsoever, and that sucks for the movie considering it had over 2 hours for it to convince me that I want to be on Whip’s side and care about his well-being.

The part in which the door to the adjacent room in Whip's hotel was somehow unlocked/open was never explained. And there would never be that much alcohol in a mini bar. I couldn't tell if it was a set-up or something totally random and by chance.

I think that the very last scene with Whip and his son was overkill. I think it should have ended after Whip’s spiel to other inmates at the AA meeting (which was pretty cheesy: “even though I’m behind bars, I feel free”).

Is it not a bit weird that a black man that is considered a ‘hero’ still ends up in prison?

Wreck It Ralph

2012 – 4.9/5

Before I get into my review I would like to say that I was blindsided by the short. I had no idea there would be a short for a Disney movie. – as in, not Disney Pixar. The short was super cute, and I’ll say that I had a smile on my face the entire time.

Yes, this review is on the long side, so if you don’t feel like reading the entire thing, here is my super short review: HIGH SCORE!

In all honesty, I thought that Fix It Felix Jr. was a game that existed back in the day – and that 2012 was its 30th year anniversary. I was very excited about that, but little did I know, Disney had created the game for this movie. Clearly, I’m not an expert gamer… or a gamer of any level or status.

When it came to video games, I had only played Nintendo, but usually just watched my older brother play arcade games. It wasn’t until the Nintendo 64 came out that I thought of video games to be a fun pastime. For the most part, I was never good (aside from N64’s Mario Kart and 007). As a kid that grew up in the 90’s I was quite excited that Disney created a movie that has to do with old school video games in today’s world. I was worried that I wouldn’t catch the majority of the references to the video game characters, but I found that I was able to pick out more than I thought!

For those of you who may not know what the movie is about, I’ll sum it up. This movie takes place in an arcade and Ralph is considered the ‘bad guy’ in one of the arcade games called Fix it Felix Jr. He wrecks a building and the ‘hero’ Felix jumps around fixing the windows. At the end of the day, all the buildings inhabitants praise Felix for his good work, while Ralph spends his nights alone and excluded. Ralph wants to prove to the characters in his game that he can be a good guy, so he “goes turbo” in order to earn a hero’s medal in a different game to gain some ‘wreck-ognition’ (I’m not that smart to come up with that, but I couldn’t not add it) ;).

Before I go any further with this review I want to clear up a few things:

1) To “go turbo” means to jump from your game to another. This is bad because if you die in game that is not your own, you actually die. While I’m on the subject of going turbo, I would like to mention that I read a few reviews that said that people didn’t understand what that meant and the movie should have explained it earlier. I’m not sure why, but I actually knew that ‘going turbo’ had a similar meaning to ‘going rouge’, so that wasn’t an issue for me.

2) Because Ralph is considered the villain in his game, he will never have the opportunity to get a medal, hence why he has to leave his game to obtain a medal from a different game.

3) When Ralph goes turbo, he goes to Game Central Station, which is a train station that is actually a multiple electrical outlet (picture below) in the arcade; and that is how the characters can go from one game to another. I LOVED that. I thought that that was one of the most clever things in this movie. I will never look at one of those things the same. :)
I also really liked the airport-like security while trying to go to a different game and how you can’t bring certain things (cherries) back. I absolutely love it when a movie integrates everyday things with a twist that fits into the movie and isn’t forced. This aspect of this movie had to be one of my favourite things and there was a lot of them: Nesquick sand as quicksand, the Nintendo controller as the safe lock and the Nintendo password (up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right, B, A, start) as the safe combination (what a great throwback).

When Ralph goes turbo, he really only goes to 2 different games (Hero’s Duty and Sugar Rush) with the majority in the latter. Going into this movie, I was hoping that Ralph would interact with more characters and go to different games, but now having seen the movie, I wouldn’t change a thing. Although I loved Street Fighters, I don’t think Ryu or any other video game character would have fit into this movie any better than they already were.

It is an animated movie, but that doesn’t mean it can’t have a great screenplay ("I'm not a glitch. I'm just pixelated" - Vanellope). I liked how Ralph commented on how violent video games are nowadays and how Felix comments on the quality of the animation. Although I forget who said ‘your Candyness’ (as in ‘your highness’) to King Candy, I thought that was pretty witty too.

As for the voiceover actors, I thought they were superbly casted. I don’t think I’ve loved a voiceover for another [animated] movie since Finding Nemo. John C Reilly as Ralph was the best of them all. He has a knack for voiceovers; it also helps that I see a resemblance between Ralph and JCR. I remember that a long time ago I heard Sarah Silverman’s voice and did not like it. But Silverman as Vanellope von Schweetz was perfect! I had no idea who was doing the voice for Felix, but once I found out who it was (Jack McBrayer), again, I thought perfect. Jane Lynch as Sgt. Calhoun was great; it’s a voice you hear and immediately, you know she means business. I don’t know what else to say about the voiceover actors in this movie… I’m actually at a loss for words. Everyone was excellent.

It’s not easy to make the viewer care about more than one character, and it’s probably harder to do so in an animated movie. But this movie does it so well. You really feel for Ralph and his desire to be seen in a good light. And even though Vanellope was annoying at the start, she grew on you too. Ralph and Vanellope made a great pair because they were both outcasts and they both were trying to gain the acceptance of others – and I for one, felt a connection to both of them. I was very interested in Felix and Sgt Calhoun’s stories. As secondary characters, there was enough time spent on each so the viewer didn’t feel as if they were added for the sake of being filler characters.

Random’s:
-I loved the music during Hero’s Duty (and the music during the rest of the movie – very fitting).
-I liked how Sour Bill had a sour personality.

This movie never dragged at any point; everything added was relevant and the story moved forward at a good pace. This has to be one of the most entertaining movies I’ve seen in a while. I cannot wait to buy this and watch it again. I’m sure I’ll love it just as much and I’ll probably pick up on more of the little details and other video game references. It’s a great movie for viewers of all ages.

The Sitter

2011 – 1/5

Before I wrote this review, I went onto IMDB and read some reviews to get an idea of what other people thought of this movie. When I read reviews on IMDB I have a tendency to sort them by the “Love/Hate” option. I like to read the reviews of people who gave this movie a really good rating then read the reviews of people who gave it a really bad rating.

So why am I mentioning this in MY review? Well, its mainly because I wanted to point out that I agreed with more of the negative ratings. Yes, I know this movie wasn’t meant to be nominated for an Oscar, but when you break it down to the basics, there really isn’t much in terms of entertainment value either.

Overall, it seemed like a movie that was put together by Jonah Hill having a few ideas in his head and wanting to put them into a movie (for example, an adopted kid that likes to blow things up, a car chase in a mini van, and him gaining ‘street cred’ with some black folks). It just seems as if he gave a list of things he wanted in the film to the director and expected a story out of it. Basically this movie was a bunch of situations and characters thrown in with a story created around that.

On a good note, I did like Jonah Hill. I think he has great comedic timing and his dialogue wasn’t that bad. Also, a thumbs up for Sam Rockwell. The movie also had good music, but most of the scenes it was added in didn’t really need to be there.

The Adventures of Tintin

2011 – 4/5

I was in the mood to see a movie that didn’t have a complicated plot. Something simple and light, but something that would be good. I settled for The Adventures of Tintin. I did watch the cartoon as a child; can’t say it was my favourite, but it was entertaining. Now that I’ve seen the movie, I can say that yes, this was a simple, good movie. I really enjoyed it.

Aside from the cute animated intro, the first thing I want to mention is that before the first minute of the movie was up, I was already in love with the motion capture/CGI animation; it was stellar. When it comes to animated flicks, Disney Pixar is usually way ahead of the game – but, boy did Columbia and Paramount step it up. At times it felt as if I was seeing real people on screen and not something that was created by a computer. That blew me away.

It had a great plot in which Tintin goes on an adventure to find treasure. It wasn’t complicated so if you tuned out, you are able to figure out what’s going on in a matter of second – not that you’d want to tune out because it was a great movie. I liked how the movie moved forward. The plot had a good way of going forward with each situation moving into the next so smoothly. There were some transitions between scenes that were nothing short of amazing and very well done.

I have been a fan of Jamie Bell since I saw him in Billy Elliot and I had no idea he was doing the voice of Tintin, but I loved it. I think his voice suited the character. I also really liked the Capitan Haddick too. I thought he added a lot of comedy into the movie that was relevant to what was happening; it wasn’t comedy thrown in for the sake of it, it tied into the plot. I also liked Simon Pegg’s voice over as one of the Thompson twins; those characters were funny too. I thought Daniel Craig’s voice suited Sakharine/Red Rackham, but it wasn’t one that stood out among the other characters.

This has to be one of my favourite Steven Spielberg films. I typically do not like watching any movie in 3D, but this is a movie I regret not seeing in theatres, in 3D. Considering the end of of this movie suggested that there will be a sequel, I will for sure see it in 3D in theatres. Although I have access to see this movie at any time on Netflix, I plan on buying this movie.

Seven Pshychopaths

2012 – 2.4/5

Before I saw the neon green movie poster for this movie, I did not know it existed. The title sounded interesting enough for me to look into a bit further, and once I found out that Christopher Walken was in it, I was sold! (I have what my friend calls “CWB” – Christopher Walken Bias).

I wanted to go into this movie blind, so I decided I wouldn’t watch the trailer. I don’t even think I read the synopsis, but I remember seeing that it was listed as a comedy, which I wasn’t expecting. I had heard from a few people that it was good, so that made me what to see it even more. What was even more intriguing were the pictures I saw while trying to find an image to add to this review.

I had really hoped that I wasn’t hyping myself up for this movie, but I don’t think I did. I went in with no expectations and came out not knowing how I felt about it. At times, it felt as if the movie didn’t know where it was going and it just kept trucking on because it had to (especially with certain characters and situations that needed some sort of closure). The first half of the movie was really good and I was enjoying it. At the half way mark, the movie hit its peak and became very dry and slow.

I’m not to sure what I thought about the movie; more so, I’m not sure how to convey what I feel about the movie. I guess the first thing I’ll bring is up that I don’t agree with it’s genre listing. I don’t think it’s a comedy. There were funny bits here and there, but it wasn’t a comedy – at least not the typical type of comedy. There were tidbits of dark comedy, but that’s about it.

I can’t say that this movie had a great script, but there were a few parts of the dialogue that stood out: I really liked the conversation about Ghandi’s saying: “an eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind”. It was just funny and original. I really liked Hans and the little things he’d say like “It’s their blood. It’s his puke”. The very last conversation between Marty and Zachariah was pretty good too.

The actors were a big reason as to why I wanted to see this movie. Again, I have the CWB, so I’ll keep it short and say that Walken was so believable as Hans. Sam Rockwell did a great job too, and I liked the mysterious vibe that surrounded him. I liked Colin Farrell a lot more than I thought I would. The roles I’ve seen him in are usually the-manly-man, but with this movie, his character was somewhat helpless, and I loved it. he did a great job with the role. Last person I want to mention is Woody Harrelson. The role of Charlie was probably created with him in mind (Actually it wasn’t. It was supposed to go to Mickey Rourke). But wow, even with my CWB, I cannot deny that Woody Harrelson stole the show.

Yes, I realize that I have given this movie an overall positive review, but when it comes to numbers, 2.4 is the highest I can go.

A Thousand Words

2012 - 0/5

-The situations he got into were really forced.
-The only thing I liked about this movie was the relationship Jack had with his mom.
-Overall, it was stupid.

The Dead Zone

1983 – 0.9/5

I want to begin this review by saying that I had no interest in watching this movie until a friend said that it was worth watching. She didn’t really need to sell me on it because I’m a big fan of Christopher Walken and that alone made me decide to watch it. So I’ll cut to the chase: Was it a good movie? Ya, it was okay. Would I watch it again? I highly doubt it.

The highlight of this movie wasn’t the plot or the script – it was Christopher Walken as Johnny Smith. He played the part very well. He was the only thing in this movie that drew me in a little, which resulted in me watching the entire thing. When he flinched, I felt as if it was real. Nobody else really had a big role that’s worth mentioning.

One other thing I did like about this movie was that it had good transitions between Johnny Smith and what he was seeing when he touched someone. It wasn’t jumpy or choppy; the editing was smooth between scenes.

I wouldn’t really consider this a thriller. It wasn’t the type of movie that you had to pay attention to every minute of it to get what’s going on. It lacked any ability to enthrall you and hold you attention the entire time. It was good for a movie that came out in the early 80s, but as someone who is watching it in 2012, I can say that I’ve seen much better.

The Way

2010 - 2.5/5

I really don’t know what to say about this movie other than: I liked it.

Kudos to Emilio Estevez’s directing and Martin Sheen’s acting. Both underrated people in the world of Hollywood film.

Watching this movie makes me want to go to Spain even more… and possibly go on the pilgrimage route of Santiago de Compostela/ El Camino.

Favourite quote:
Daniel: You don't choose a life, dad. You live one.

Dinner for Schmucks

2010 - 1.2/5

-The mouse intro was cool. I thought the “Mouse’ter-Pieces” were cute.

-Steve Carell’s character, Barry was pretty much if Murphy’s Law was a person. Everything that could go wrong, went wrong. And this made the movie a little bit more unique and different from others.

-Paul Rudd has such natural talent with this type of character, but it seemed a bit wasted in this movie. He was the perfect actor for this role, but it wasn’t his best.

-I didn’t know that Zack Galifianakis was in this movie. I think he complimented Steve Carell’s character a lot.

-I enjoyed it a lot more than I thought, but that doesn’t mean that it was good.

-I, in all honesty thought that this would be a terrible movie, but like I said, I enjoyed it. I got a few laughs out of it and I didn’t think it was a waste of time.

Jeff, Who Lives At Home

2011 - 0.5/5

I really don’t know what to make of this movie. It wasn’t bad or anything, but it wasn’t good either. I am going to make the assumption that this was an independent flick, and for what it was, it was fine, but I don’t think it added anything to what already exists.

I had no idea this movie existed until I saw it on Netflix. The only reason I decided to watch this movie was because Jason Segel was in it, and I like Ed Helms too – had no idea Susan Sarandon was in it (the actors/actresses were the only reason I gave this movie a 0.5 instead of a 0). The relationship between JS and EH did seem genuine so I bought that they were brothers. I think everyone did a good job as the characters they were supposed to be, but like the plot, there wasn’t much to it.

The one thing that made it lose a couple points in my books was the odd camera work. It could have gone without the random close-ups. I don’t think I’d recommend people watch this movie unless they’re in the mood for a melodramatic film, and even then, it really wasn’t something mention-worthy.