It's July already!

So it's July already. Hard to believe that the summer movie season is more or less half over already (especially considering there hasn't been much in the way of really great summer movies so far this year). It’s been a couple of weeks since my last entry, but I was out of town to see family for a weekend (and didn’t see any movies), and then I was out of town 4th of July weekend for a wedding. But that certainly wasn’t going to stop me from seeing that weekend's big release, Superman Returns! I didn’t see it Wednesday when it premiered because I was waiting until that Friday to attend a very special showing being put on by Muse Comics of Missoula, Montana (a wonderful store). The store actually booked an entire showing of the film, then gave a ticket to anyone who made a $10 donation to the Comic Book Legal Defense Fund through the store (which I thought was very cool, as this is a great organization that I fully support). And why would someone pay $10 to see a movie when the regular ticket price is only $7 you ask (especially when it’s not even a sneak preview of the movie)? Well, the answer to that is that Muse Comics managed the astounding feat of getting comic book legend Jim Lee to come to Missoula for a signing before attending the showing with everyone.

Now for those of you not into comic books, this probably doesn’t mean much. But Jim Lee is one of the current greats of the comic book world, having drawn Superman, X-Men, and a number of other significant comics, as well as starting his own comics publishing company, Wildstorm (which has a whole slew of kickass comics), which he eventually sold to DC Comics. Not being a fanboy type myself, I didn’t stand in line to get any comics signed (and I have to say there was quite the impressive line to get his autograph), but it was pretty cool to go to the movie and be able to say that Jim Lee sat right behind me. And because of the nature of the event, it very much felt like a big premiere, even if it happened after the movie had been playing a couple of days. Jim Lee said a few words to the crowd, and everyone was really excited (cheering and clapping when the movie started, and when the Spiderman 3 teaser played, for example), and it was just generally a really great time at the movies (which is why I love attending sneak previews or special showings like this of big movies).

At this point I’d like to digress from the movie for a moment to talk about premieres/sneak previews. Especially with the bigger movies, they tend to be a big hassle to attend (standing in line for hours to get tickets (although this is becoming less of an issue now that theaters are starting to sell tickets before the day of the show, sell tickets online, etc.), followed by standing in line hours before the movie starts so you’re near the front of the line in the hopes of getting good seats), but I’ve always felt it was worth it. I was always the guy who took a half day off from work to stand in line for tickets for everybody to the big premieres (which is never a lot of fun, especially when it’s for a holiday movie like the Lord of the Rings or Harry Potter films and it’s snowing and freezing cold), and I was more than happy to do it because I’m that big of a movie geek. Admittedly, I got lucky and never had to stand in line for the Star Wars prequels, because I’ve got a friend who’s a huge Star Wars geek who stood in line to get tickets for those (and to all those people who pitched tents and spent weeks/months in line to be the first to buy tickets, all I can say is – it’s just a damned movie! A few hours, maybe even half a day is one thing, but weeks?! Get a life!!). But back to the topic at hand. The reason I have no problems waiting in line for hours for these big premieres is because it is just such a fun experience to see the movie for the first time with a group of people who are just super psyched to see the movie. You won’t ever see me in costume or anything crazy like that (as I said, I’ve never really been a fanboy type of person), but it’s still fun to be around that crowd and to feel the energy and excitement that has people cheering and clapping when the movie starts and when the credits roll (and occasionally during really cool scenes in the movie). It just makes for a much more fun, memorable movie experience.

So back to Superman Returns (which I’ve actually seen twice now. I saw it Friday at the special showing, then again on Saturday with a couple of friends who had to work Friday night). I do have to say that I didn’t enjoy it as much as I did the first two X-Men or Spiderman movies (but that’s partly because while I’m a big fan of the X-Men comics and was a longtime reader of Spiderman, I’ve never really been a big fan of Superman). It was still a really cool movie, though, and I liked it a hell of a lot better than I did X-Men: The Last Stand. Which probably shouldn’t be too surprising since it’s directed by Bryan Singer, who directed the first two X-Men movies. Bryan Singer is just such a great director (he’s probably one of my top five, and absolutely one of my top 10 favorite directors). He focuses so much more on story and characters than he does on events and action and big effects scenes, which is why I like him better as a director than Brett Ratner (who directed X3). Of course, I think even Bryan Singer would have had a hard time with X3, since it’s biggest problem was that the script was crap. But we’ve covered that already in a previous entry, so moving on!

There were a handful of scenes in Superman Returns that were way over the top and just kind of make you shake your head because they push limits of suspending your disbelief a little too far, but it’s Superman, so sadly that’s to be expected. But overall the story was really well thought out and put together. I’ve heard a number of complaints from people about the lack of action in the movie, but I don’t necessarily think that’s a bad thing. And I have to shake my head at people who complain that Lex Luthor isn’t the bad, scary super-powered villain in the goofy costume like we’re used to from other superhero movies, because I say, “So what?” He is still a cool, fun to watch villain, especially when he’s played by Kevin Spacey. It so reminded me of another crazed megalomaniac character he played back in the 80s in a TV show called Wiseguy, where he played a wealthy arms dealer by the name of Mel Profitt. This is the show where I was first introduced to Kevin Spacey, and I’ve been a huge fan of his work ever since.

Also notable was the performance of Brandon Routh, the young unknown cast to play Superman. And having seen the movie, it’s obvious why he was chosen. As my buddy commented when we watched it, you’d swear he was channeling the spirit of Christopher Reeve. Their appearances are similar, and he just does such a great job with his mannerisms and the way he played the character to really, really make you think of Christopher Reeve's performance in the original films. It was outstanding. And finally I have to give kudos to Kate Bosworth (who I barely recognized without her usual blonde hair), who does a wonderful job as Lois Lane. She’s a very talented young actress that I look forward to seeing more of in the future.

So all in all a very enjoyable film, and hopefully the start of a renewal of the franchise (although I do have to say that as far as franchise restarts go, I was much more impressed with Batman Begins, but a lot of that is that it is both a darker film, and because I’m a much bigger Batman fan than I am a Superman fan). Certainly a movie worth going to see. Under normal circumstances it's probably not one I'd have seen at the theater twice, mind you (especially two days in a row), but that's how it goes sometimes. :-)

With 4th of July weekend being a long weekend, I made it to the theater that Monday to see the movie I'd missed the previous weekend when it first came out, Click. This was a pretty good movie, but certainly not a great movie. While Adam Sandler does a fantastic job, the biggest problem with the movie is that it is an Adam Sandler movie. Which is to say that there are numerous scenes of very juvenile humor that the movie would have been better off without. While this sort of humor works well in most of his movies, the nature of the story in this movie would have worked much better if they’d left a lot of that out. For example, there’s a running gag about the family dog constantly humping an over-sized stuffed duck that gets really old, really quickly.

The actors all did a great job. Kate Beckinsale is wonderful (and as beautiful and sexy as ever), and Christopher Walken steals pretty much every scene that he’s in (no surprise there at all). Sean Astin, David Hasselhoff, and Henry Winkler also give really solid performances. The story is pretty good, and very touching and heartfelt in spots, especially towards the end of the movie. I think with a little less emphasis on the humor (especially the more vulgar humor), this could have been a wonderful comedy-drama; instead we get an okay comedy with some dramatic elements to it. I’m glad I went and saw it, but I can probably only recommend it to Adam Sandler fans.

And so ends another entry. Next up we have my most-anticipated movie of the entire year that I had been absolutely dying to see – Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest. Stay tuned!

The Fast and The Furious (Oh Yeah!!)

So I just went and saw The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift, and I loved it!! Which, I’m sure, is not too big of a surprise to anyone who knows me. Fast cars, kick ass racing scenes, and very hot, scantily clad Asian women – how can you go wrong? So let’s start with the critics’ reviews of the movie (since that’s always fun) and go from there. Not surprisingly, pretty much all the critics out there made negative comments about the plot and the acting. And much as I hate to admit it, I can’t really disagree with them too much. As tends to be the case with these sorts of movies, the plot is pretty thin and really pushes the bounds of believability (the flimsy excuse to get the main character to Tokyo was especially weak). And none of the acting was exactly Oscar caliber (but I do have to give props to Sung Kang, who plays Han – I was pretty impressed with his performance). But as anyone who was excited about this movie coming out is likely to tell you, who really cares?!

And much to my surprise, a number of movie critics out there actually got this point. As a matter of fact, you could probably break the reviews down into two categories. First are those critics who made their justified criticisms about the plot and the acting, but then went on to comment that fans of the genre aren’t going to care about this, and that it has great racing scenes and is visually just great to watch (which is absolutely the case – the drifting scenes are unbelievable!). Then there’s the second group (who in my opinion shouldn’t be allowed to review anything other than independent, art-house films), who make all their focus on the weak plot and unbelievable storyline, some of whom go so far as to say that there’s too much emphasis put on the racing and not enough on the plot. Excuse me??? Are you kidding me here?! I’m sorry, but going to see this sort of movie and complaining that there’s too much emphasis on the racing and not enough on the plot is about as idiotic as going to see a porn movie and then complaining that there was way too much time spent focusing on the sex scenes!!! DUH!!!

Normally I try to avoid commenting on specific reviews; for one thing, I generally read the review on imdb, which gives quotes from various critics and an overall view of how critics felt about the movie, which means I don’t actually read any critic's complete review (which is intentional, since too many critics have a bad habit of giving away plot points I’d just as soon not have revealed until I see them in the movie). And I don’t like being too negative or critical about specific people (you never know – they may actually find out about my blog and sue me or something; stranger things have happened, I’m sure). But in this particular case, I have to make an exception, because imdb had a critic’s comment that was so idiotic I actually had to track down and read the entire review. And I’m here to tell you, if you want to see a page of pointless and inane drivel that completely misses the point of the entire flippin’ movie, then go check out the review for this movie on USA Today's website. Oh my God! She not only complains that the acting in the movie will put you to sleep (who the hell is paying attention to the acting), but she has the audacity to recommend that if you’re into automobiles that you check out Cars instead! Yeah, because an animated kiddie movie with talking cars is going to be some much more intense and exciting and adrenaline-filled than a movie with REAL cars in REAL races!! How silly of me! (I do have to admit that I haven't had a chance to see Cars yet (I spent most of last weekend when it opened at a soccer tournament), so I can't comment on what sort of racing is in that movie, but all things considered, it's pretty easy to guess that there's no comparison between the two films).

Whew! Okay, got that out of my system. I’ve been fuming about that and needing to vent about it from the minute I read the review, before I even saw the movie. But now I have seen it, and I can now say with absolute conviction that any critic who didn’t say the movie was worth seeing by anyone who loves car racing is a complete hack who needs to find another line of work. Just because it’s not your cup of tea doesn’t mean it’s a bad movie, and you can’t judge every movie by the same narrowly focused classifications. You need to look at what type of movie it is, what the priorities are for the people who are likely to want to see the movie, and whether or not the movie meets those priorities. Which means that not every movie has to be vying for Best Picture! If it’s a horror movie, it needs to be scary; if it’s a comedy, it needs to be funny; if it’s an action movie, it needs to be fast-paced and action-packed. And if you can’t keep that in mind when you’re writing your review of the movie, you’re not only wasting your readers’ time, but you’re doing a complete disservice to those people who are actually trying to use your review to help them decide if it’s a movie they’d enjoy or not (which is why I don't pay any attention whatsoever to critics when deciding what movies I'm going to see).

Damn, I just can’t get off the critic-bashing rant today (guess that tells you how emotional I get over bullshit reviews of movies I like). But anyways, let’s get back to the topic at hand – The Fast and The Furious: Tokyo Drift. Firstly, as you’ve probably guessed from the trailers, this one has a brand new set of characters with no ties to the previous movies at all. Which is fine, because as I commented on (repeatedly) above, that’s not what the movie is about. The movie is about racing. And specifically in this case, it’s about drifting, which I won't bother explaining to you because they do a pretty good job explaining it in the movie (and in the trailers for the movie, as far as that goes). All that needs to be said is that it is incredibly fun to watch.

So here's the plot in a nutshell: the main character goes to Japan to live with his estranged father (as mentioned above, the reasoning for this is pretty flimsy and falls completely within the realm of "only in Hollywood"), and once there gets involved in the world of drift racing. Not surprisingly, he knows nothing about drifting, and pretty much totals the car he borrows for his first race by slamming into walls, parked cars, etc., every time he tries to round a curve (the race takes place inside a parking garage of all places, with the racers racing to the top of the garage). But naturally he makes a few friends and slowly learns the ropes of drifting until he’s a top-notch racer. And at the same time, of course, he makes enemies with the best racer around by showing an interest in his girlfriend (who of course returns that interest). Kind of reminds me a lot of the original The Fast and The Furious, but that’s certainly not a bad thing. And things progress from there – I won’t bore you with the details; if you really want to know what happens, go see the movie!

In conclusion, all I can say is when you walk out of the theater completely pumped, and can practically feel the adrenaline racing through you, you know you’ve seen a good racing movie. And that’s exactly how I felt coming out of this movie. And there’s a little surprise at the end of the movie that is just really kickass that makes you feel just that much more pumped and excited and glad you saw the movie (at least it did for me). Hell, I’ll probably go see the movie a second time before it leaves the theaters. Take that, USA Today!!

The Break-Up

So I actually went and saw The Break-Up yesterday (despite it being an obvious chick/date movie). I went to the early matinee on Sunday, and there were a pair of older couples, a handful of women, and me at the theater (but I’m enough of a diehard movie buff that I didn’t even care that I was the only solo guy there). I went to see this movie for two reasons: one, I’ve always found Vince Vaughn to be incredibly funny, and two, the trailers for the movie made me realize just how hot (in a girl-next-door way, mind you, but still hot nonetheless) Jennifer Anniston really is (but I’d still take Angelina Jolie if I had to make a choice between the two – you go, Brad. And let me add – happy 31st birthday Angelina!! (June 4th – just happened to see that on imdb’s home page while I was writing this)).

The movie was both surprisingly good, and not nearly as funny as I expected it to be. Vince Vaughn isn’t so much funny as he is just obnoxious in this movie, but that’s not a bad thing, because that’s exactly what his character is supposed to be. Despite how you might feel from watching the trailers, once the movie starts you’re very quickly rooting for Jennifer Aniston’s character, because Vince Vaughn is really just a horribly inconsiderate boyfriend. And I noticed in the opening credits that he gets both producer and story writer credits for the movie, so it’s pretty obvious he had himself in mind when he wrote the role, which makes it really easy for him to inhabit the character and make you believe the character.

The movie starts out at a baseball game where Vince Vaughn first notices Jennifer Aniston, who’s actually there with another guy. He approaches her at the end of the game in the most obnoxiously charming way imaginable (pretty much acting just the way you’d expect a Vince Vaughn character to act), with Jennifer Aniston seeming less than impressed by him. But then the opening credits start with photo booth photos of the couple making goofy faces and poses (as most people seem to do when they’re in a photo booth), and then as the credits roll we’re treated to a very well thought out and presented series of photos showing the development of the couple’s relationship, from their early dating to shots of the couples’ bowling team that they’re on, holidays together, and of course them buying the condo that becomes the key focus during their breakup. When the credits finish and we see the couple again they’ve gone from having just met to having been dating for two years.

We start with the two people’s day jobs, and then when they get home that evening they pretty much go right into the big fight that leads to their break-up. Of course, Jennifer Anniston doesn’t really want to break up, she just wants her boyfriend to be more appreciative and more willing to do things for her and with her whether he personally wants to do them or not. And so the story of the movie is basically her various attempts to make him realize what he’s missing, make him jealous, etc., and his reactions to her attempts (one thing I do have to say – if Jennifer Anniston really wants to move past Friends and get fully into a movie career, she really needs to play characters that don’t immediately make you think of Rachel, which this character does in several instances).

One thing I found somewhat ironic, considering that the two actors involved supposedly are now dating after having made the movie together, is the fact that there are no lovemaking scenes, no kissing, no real intimacy of any sort between the two characters, since they’re basically fighting throughout the entire movie (the photos in the opening credits show numerous still shots of such moments, but that’s the only place). But hey, that’s Hollywood for you.

As I said before, this movie isn’t as funny as you’d think from the previews (something a number of critics complained about). There are certainly comic moments, and some really funny scenes, but mostly it’s more of a dramedy about two people who seem to really love each other, but who have very different personalities and backgrounds, and are at a crossroads in their relationship where they have to decide if they can overcome their differences in order to stay together as a couple. And they not only do a very good job with the story (regardless of what the critics think), but it also goes against the standard, cliched formulas you've seen done over and over again in romantic comedies (whether they do it right is something for each viewer to decide. I personally think they did). The ending is somewhat surprising, and VERY non-Hollywood, but it so perfectly fits the way the story and characters develop (and so plays out as more believable than the ending to the average romantic comedy) that I was really impressed, and just overall happy with the story as a whole when I left the theater.

I highly recommend this movie for couples, people who enjoy romantic films or relationship films, or for anyone who wants to see Jennifer Aniston’s bare butt (even if it’s not the best shot of it in the world, it’s still nice to watch). :-)

The Big X-Men Finale

So X-Men: The Last Stand premiered over Memorial Day weekend, breaking all kinds of records by the time the weekend was over. I’d hoped to get this review out a little sooner, but it was just been one of those weeks, and sadly by the time I’d gotten home from work every evening last week, I just didn't have the motivation to do much of anything, so I had a hell of a time getting focused on getting this done (but on the plus side, at least it didn’t take a month or more to do it!). With that said, I have to say that as far as the big finale to the X-Men trilogy goes, I was pretty disappointed. To be fair, I think Brett Ratner did a pretty good job taking over as director from Bryan Singer (which was of course my biggest concern before the movie came out, since I’m a very big fan of Bryan Singer’s, and he did such a fantastic job with the first two movies). And visually it was very exciting and enjoyable to watch (but that’s to be expected). The story, on the other hand, I have A LOT of complaints about. Now, before I continue any further with this review, I need to make two disclaimers:

Disclaimer #1: If you’ve never really read the comics and only know the X-Men characters/stories from the previous two movies, then you will probably very much enjoy the third movie just as much as you did the previous two. The vast majority of my criticisms of the movie are coming from someone who is a long-time reader of the comics. The screenwriters took a lot of liberties and did a lot of things with the characters especially that as a fan of the comics I was very unhappy with. So if you’re not a reader of the comics, don’t let my negative comments dissuade you from seeing the film – you’ll probably have little or no problems with it, and will wonder what the hell I’m so upset about.

Disclaimer #2: Some of the comments/criticisms in this review will be fairly vague and non-specific (which is going to be really difficult for me because there’s a lot that I’d really, really like to go into detail about). The reason for this is that any details I might give about the things I have a problem with would be MAJOR spoilers for anyone who hasn’t seen the movie. So on the off chance that one of my small handful of readers (assuming any of you are still out there after my long periods of no new entries) reads this review and hasn’t seen the movie yet, I don’t want to spoil it for you by revealing things that happen in the movie that are supposed to come as a surprise. So we’ll see how well I do venting my frustrations with the script without giving away too many surprises or key plot points.

Also, I’d just like to quickly say that I’m not going to make any comments about the critics’ reviews of the movie, because it is patently obvious that not only are they as clueless as always, but not a one of them has so much as looked at the cover of an actual X-Men comic, much less read one, so as far as I’m concerned, their opinions are completely meaningless here. And so with all that out of the way, on with the review. Let’s start with the positive (and there were certainly things about the movie I did like). For starters, the biggest thing I liked about the movie was that the various new characters (with one glaring exception, which I’ll get into later) were all great! It would have been nice if some of them would have gotten more screen time, but they were still great to see. Both Kitty Pryde and Colossus are both back (with Kitty, at least, played by a different actress than previously) with bigger roles than before, which I loved. The additions of Beast and Angel are both fantastic (Kelsey Grammer was unbelievably good as Beast), although it would have been nice to see Angel have a bigger role in the movie (he plays an important part to the story, but isn’t really IN the movie all that much). Another mutant addition that it was great to see (and something of a surprise as well) was Multiple Man, although his character was way under-used.

The character I most enjoyed seeing in the movie was Leech, a young boy whose mutant power is that he cancels out other mutants’ powers. The movie uses his blood as the source for the mutant “cure” that’s at the crux of the plot. The one thing I was curious about going into the movie, however, was that in the comic book Leech’s power actually has a radius effect, and any mutant getting too close to him is affected by his power (it's not just his blood). I was impressed to see that they did bring this into the movie, and used it to good effect as well. I also like the young actor who portrays Leech – Cameron Bright, who I previously discussed in my review of Ultraviolet. I'll be interested to see how his career develops, and whether or not he disappears off the map once he gets older, as numerous other young child actors have done.

Another pleasant surprise in this movie was the addition of Dr. Moira MacTaggart, a non-mutant character who is a big part of the comics. Her name appears in a list of computer files at one point in X2 (you pretty much have to pause the DVD at a certain spot and look closely to see it, something I did just to see how many of the names listed I could identify from the comics), and she finally appears in person in the third movie. Interestingly enough, she’s not actually in the end credits, and shows up on imdb as uncredited (which is somewhat strange considering that she plays a fairly sizable part for a secondary character – but that’s Hollywood for you). Which brings up something else I’ve liked about all three of the X-Men movies. In all of them, I’ve found that if you watch the end credits closely (or check out the movies’ entries on imdb), you discover all kinds of characters that although they make little or no mention of their names in the movies, they are actual characters from the comics. For example, Jubilation Lee, a young Asian girl who actually was first created for the original X-Men cartoon, and then moved into the comics from there, has appeared in all three movies, and is listed in the credits for all three as Jubilee (her "superhero" name), but is only shown in group scenes of the students during the films – her name is never given in the movies, but if you're a fan of the comics you can fairly easily pick her out and know who she probably is. So even though she has a minimal role, and never even uses her mutant powers, they still made a point of identifying her character in the credits, which I thought was kind of cool (especially since I always liked her character). I kept hoping they’d eventually give her a bigger role (like they finally did with Kitty Pryde in the last movie), but at least she’s in all the movies.

There are numerous other characters that are in this same category, but I’m not going to take the time and effort to name all of them (I do have to say, though, that I've always felt the inclusion of these numerous additional characters actually taken from the comics, whether you caught who they were before you saw them listed in the credits or not, was a nice bonus for the fans of the comics that the filmmakers didn't have to do, but did anyways). If you’re a fan of the comics, check out the credit listings on imdb (if you haven't already); you’ll be surprised at just what characters they actually have listed in the credits (although there are a few that I STILL haven't actually been able to place in the movies when I re-watched them).

One more character I do need to talk about, though, before me move onto other things, is the one character who had no business whatsoever being in the final movie, and that is Cain Marko, AKA Juggernaut. Yes, he’s from the comic books, and is actually a fairly significant villain (also, for those who don't know, he's actually Professor Xavier’s step-brother, which is the main connection he has to the X-Men in the comics). There are two problems with including him in the movie, however. Number one, he was a fairly dumb and annoying character in the comics, and they make him an even dumber and more annoying character in the movie. Number two, despite how they might mislead you in the movie, Juggernaut is NOT, in any way, shape, or form, a mutant, which of course means he would have no place in Magneto’s Brotherhood of Mutants. All of Juggernaut’s powers came from a mystical crystal in his helmet (which is why he never took it off – without it he was powerless). So for the moviemakers to bring in not only an annoying character from the comics, but one who’s not even really a mutant, just really, really bugged me. This was an obvious weak spot in the film that could have been avoided (although there is one amusing scene with Juggernaut that I did like).

One last quick comment about the credits of the movie, and then we’ll move on. I love the fact that the movie featured R. Lee Ermey as the voice of an army sergeant. He is so perfect for that sort of role, and I just love it whenever I see him making a cameo appearance in a movie (he’s so the go-to guy whenever moviemakers need a great Army/Marine sergeant character, even if they’re just using his voice). And in looking at the imdb listing, I discovered that the movie not only featured the obligatory Stan Lee cameo, but there was also a cameo by Chris Claremont, a LONGTIME Uncanny X-Men writer and creator of numerous Marvel characters.

And now, onto some of the other things I liked about the movie. The actors all did a very good job, and even those who’s roles were way smaller than they should have been gave wonderful performances. And of course, as I mentioned earlier, visually the movie was indeed very exciting and top notch. And the action scenes were all very well done. But all of this was to be expected and so it's not exactly high praise for the movie (it would be a major criticism of the movie if these areas weren't well done, but it's not really a compliment to the movie that they were). The big problem is that the story has so many things wrong with it (in my opinion) that it really takes away from everything else. That being said, let’s get to what I found wrong with the movie.

Where to start, where to start. Well, I guess the first place to start is with Hollywood’s love of the trilogy. Three so seems to be the magic number. Yes, you do have a number of franchises that make many, many more movies than that, but by and large it’s all about the trilogy, and so as soon as the studio greenlights a sequel to a movie, it’s generally assumed that a third movie will be done, and then barring huge success, they’ll stop there (I also think that any more whenever there’s franchise potential, they’ll get actors to sign a three picture deal so that they know they’ll have them at a set salary for at least three pictures – which means that if there is a fourth movie, they have the problem that the actors can either opt out of further films, or ask for quite a bit larger salaries if the first three movies have been very successful). That seems to be the attitude that the screenwriters took on X-Men: The Last Stand – this is the last movie in the trilogy, so we can do whatever the hell we want to with the story and the characters. Which is exactly what they did. I won’t go into details because I don’t want to put in any spoilers, but they do some things to some of the major characters that really pissed me off, because it so goes against what’s in the comics. I think any fan of the comics would be upset with what they did.

Now, having said the above, I will concede that they do leave hints at the end of the movie that point to a possible fourth film (but let’s face it, that’s pretty much standard for ANY movie with franchise potential or that’s part of a franchise, whether there’s any plans whatsoever to do another movie or not, so that really means absolutely nothing these days). Oh, on that subject, if you do go to see the movie, make sure you stay all the way until the very end of the end credits.

Another aspect of the story that annoyed me, but wasn’t nearly as big a deal as what they did to the characters, is the state the country is in when the movie starts. Admittedly it has been three years between movies, but the student characters don’t really seemed to have aged that much (as far as how they’re portrayed in the film) and things at the school just don’t feel like that much time has passed (but maybe that’s just me). But the world at large in the movie shows enough changes to make it feel like even more than three years have passed. There’s a new president, and we have a brand new government department, The Department of Mutant Affairs, and mutants are a common, everybody knows about them minority in the country. It just feels like too many things have changed between the second and third films. And then there’s Hank McCoy, AKA Beast, the Secretary of Mutant Affairs. He shows up out of the blue (no pun intended), and when he arrives at Xavier’s school, he’s greeted like an old friend by Storm and Professor X, but Wolverine acts as if he’s never met him before. And we are given the impression that Beast was once an X-Man, but no details into his history or connection to the group or the school are mentioned; you’re just expected to assume that there is one, which just bothered me as being a weak point in the story that they just decided not to bother going into.

Another thing that bugged me was a group of mutants the movie shows getting together to protest the new “mutant cure”. My guess is they’re meant to represent, or are inspired by, the Morlocks, a society of mutants in the comics who live in tunnels underneath Manhatten because unlike the X-Men they don’t have cool superpowers, they’re just freaks of nature whose physical mutations are blatant and extreme enough to make them outcasts of society. Part of my reason for linking the group of mutants in the movie to the Morlocks is that one of the characters there who joins Magneto (the woman who can sense other mutants) is listed in the credits as Callisto, who in the comics rises to become leader of the Morlocks. But instead of showing us a group of obvious mutants (which would be REALLY easy considering the F/X make-up and CGI abilities that movie studios have these days), what we get is basically just a group of vagabond homeless people, some of whom are fairly obviously mutants. This, in my opinion, was just laziness on the part of the filmmakers.

Well this thing has gotten long enough that I think I’ll stop there. That should give you an overall view of my feelings about this movie. Again, if you’re not a big reader of the comics, most of my complaints will mean little to you, and if you liked the previous films, you should enjoy this one just as well. But as for me, I’m unhappy enough about some of the story decisions of the movie (among other things) that I won’t be bothering to see it a second time at the theaters (something I felt sure I’d do from watching the trailers and from how much I liked the previous movies), and it’ll be up in the air as to whether or not I pick it up on DVD. But that’s just me.

And so we conclude our latest entry. I actually have my review of this weekend’s movie, The Break-Up, completed as well, but it’s still sitting in Word (and it's way past my bedtime and I've got work tomorrow, so it's going to have to wait). So as soon as I get it copied into blogger and all the imdb links put in, it will be published as well; barring unforeseen delays, it should be up on Monday. Until then! :-)

Spring 2006

So we’ve finally made it to March and April. If I can hurry up and get this entry done, I’ll only be one month behind! And if I do a separate entry for X-Men: The Last Stand shortly after I watch it like I did with The Da Vinci Code, then I’ll only have two movies to review for May, and then I’ll be caught up! Can you imagine it, dear readers? It’s almost frightening, I know, but it really could happen. But not if I don’t get a move on! So on we go with movies from March.

The first movie of March (at least that I saw) was the Richard Donner action thriller 16 Blocks, which starred Bruce Willis and Mos Def. I didn’t realize that this was a Richard Donner movie until the end credits, at which point I realized the reason why I enjoyed the movie so much (how can you not enjoy a movie brought to you by the man who brought us all four Lethal Weapon movies, among others?). This movie was action-packed, exciting, and generally just fun to watch – a perfect Saturday matinee popcorn movie. Bruce Willis does a solid job as always, and Mos Def does a very good job (after seeing him in this, following on his great performances in The Italian Job and The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, I have to say I look forward to seeing what he does next). I'd also like to compliment David Morse, a great character actor whom I've always liked, who does a great job as the corrupt cop chasing after them. It’s your pretty standard action/thriller fare, so I don’t know that there’s anything specific I really want to touch on about the movie, other than to say I really enjoyed it and will probably pick it up on DVD.

The other movie that came out this same weekend was one I was much more excited to see, but which turned out to be something of a disappointment. The movie I’m talking about is Ultraviolet, starring the very sexy Milla Jovovich. This is basically a sci-fi vampire movie, but sadly I think it tries to be too many things, and doesn’t do justice to any of them. The background of the film isn't developed very well, and the characters are really not that believable. Visually the movie is pretty stunning, and the special effects are top notch, but sadly that’s not exactly something special or unique these days. Any movie with any sort of budget can have incredible visuals, but if you don’t have a decent story to go with it (which Ultraviolet very much doesn’t), you end up with a weak movie. I’d say it’s worth seeing if you can rent it on the cheap (if for no other reason than the visuals are interesting to watch), but that’s about it. I do have to make note of the performance by young Cameron Bright, though, who plays the boy that Milla Jovovich is trying to save. He does a really good job not only in this movie, but in the several other roles I've seen him in (including a great guest role on Stargate: SG1). I'm looking forward to seeing him playing Leech in X-Men: The Last Stand.

The second two movies of March that I saw were both top notch, kick ass movies that left the month's early movies completely in the dust, starting with the first Top 10 contender of 2006, the stellar V for Vendetta. I loved this movie!! Natalie Portman was fantastic. Her British accent was very well done (and very sexy), and even with her head shaved, she is as beautiful as ever. She is certainly one of my very favorite actresses, and her performance in this movie is an excellent example of why. Also great in this movie is Hugo Weaving, whose voice is perfect for the enigmatic and very verbose V. And certainly worth mentioning as well is Stephen Rea, who does a wonderful job as the police inspector who’s trying to track V down.

I’ve read the original graphic novel that this is based on, and I have to say I was very impressed with how they developed the story for the screen. To my surprise, they didn’t dumb it down for movie audiences like I expected, and much of V’s dialogue is in the movie (much of it very Shakespearean sounding and a little hard for even me to follow at times), which I was thrilled to see. The story is very engaging and really keeps your attention throughout the movie. The actors all did a wonderful job, and the cinematography was great. The critics generally gave it good reviews (surprise, surprise), although I do think that too many of them made too big a deal out of the political aspects of the movie, trying to compare it to current real world events (it's just a movie, people – the original story was written long before George W. Bush ever got into office). This was definitely the first big movie of 2006 as far as I'm concerned, and I can’t wait for it to show up on DVD. With any luck, the success of such movies as this and Sin City will lead to more non-superhero comics being developed for the movies, which I think is a wonderful thing (how many people realize that the incredible Tom Hanks gangster picture Road to Perdition is actually based on a comic book graphic novel, for example). Being a huge comic book fan, I love the idea of people being exposed to the many wonderful, complex, amazing stories that comic books can tell, that have nothing to do with super-powered guys and gals running around wearing spandex (not that I don't enjoy those comics and their movies as well).

The final movie of March was also a great film (although not quite on par with V for Vendetta). It was Inside Man, from director Spike Lee. While I’m not generally a big Spike Lee fan, I am big heist movie fan, and this is just a damned good heist movie. Even better, it’s part heist movie, part suspense thriller, so there are some great twists and turns to the plot that aren’t generally part of a heist movie that made it even better. And with the all-star cast they put together, how can you go wrong? Denzel Washington and Clive Owen do a great job as always, and Jody Foster’s manipulative, amoral character is just fun to watch. She really does a good job with the role. And I loved the bhangra song that was used in the opening credits (especially since this is a genre of music that I’m just starting to get into). I highly recommend this movie.

And now we head into the month of April, which only brought us two new movies that I managed to see at the theater. As I believe I mentioned earlier, I caught both of these on a Sunday afternoon as a sort of double feature (the theater wasn’t playing them as a double feature, I just saw one, then turned right around and saw the other). And of course I did this just as I was developing a really nasty flu, and so I ended up deathly ill by the time the second movie was over, and the week following was one of the most miserable of my life, but we won’t go into that.

The first of these two movies was the video game horror movie Silent Hill. This was a very creepy movie, and the director did a great job with the atmosphere for the movie. The story wasn’t too bad, but it was pretty confusing at times, and there were a few inconsistencies that just didn’t make sense at all that muddled the story a bit. I do have to say I liked the twisted, messed up ending to the movie (which was very much in line with this sort of spooky horror film). The cast does a really good job, and I liked the little girl (because what’s a creepy, spooky horror movie these days without a creepy little girl with long, dark hair, right?). But all in all I’d have to say this movie is just okay. Part of that, however, I think comes from the fact that I tend to set the bar pretty high these days for horror movies, because of the fantastic horror movies that have been coming out in the last couple of years, especially those coming out of Asia. So if you’re a big fan of this genre of movie, I’d say go ahead and check it out (if for no other reason than just to say you’ve seen it); otherwise it’s probably not worth your time.

I followed up Silent Hill by turning around and seeing The Sentinel. It’s hard to compare the two movies because they’re two completely different genres, but all in all I’d have to rate them the same – not bad, but not great, either. A number of critics compared it with 24 (and generally not favorably), since both star Kiefer Sutherland and have the same general concept. I do have to say there are similarities, but I can’t really compare quality since I stopped watching 24 mid-way through season 3 (since in my mind the show had really gone downhill since the first season and the plot was way too all over the place. A buddy of mine tells me the storyline tightened up and got a lot better several episodes after I stopped watching, so I’m now watching the series over in syndication – we’ll see if he was right or not). But back to The Sentinel. The story is okay, but it gets a little far fetched at times, even for this sort of political action thriller. Nothing about the movie really stands out that I can think of (well, other than the fact that Eva Longoria is really hot), so that’s about all I can think to say about it.

Okay, turns out I lied. There were actually three movies from April that I saw at the theaters (but in my defense, this third one I just caught last weekend or the weekend before; I forget). This last movie, that I’m guessing I caught just before it left theatres, was the Robin Williams comedy RV. Now I don’t care what the critics say – I thought this movie was funny as hell! Okay, yes it was over-the-top and dumb at spots, and it started going downhill towards the end, it was still really a joy to watch. Robin Williams is just such a nut, and since his last several movies have been much more serious, dramatic films, it’s nice to see him getting back to his comic roots. So if you’re looking for a good, funny, family-friendly movie, and can accept the fact that yes, it gets really dumb at times, I’d say this movie is worth checking out.

Well look at that! March and April all done! Not exactly long, detailed reviews of the movies in question, but hey, better than nothing, right? Well since I’m on such a roll, I think I’ll continue right on into May. This is the month that officially kicks off the summer movie season (which used to start on Memorial Day weekend, but as movies started being released a week or two before this in order to try and get the jump on their bigger, more highly anticipated competition, the beginning of the summer blockbuster season has slowly crept backwards until nowadays it seems to pretty much start the first weekend in May). The nice thing about the start of summer movie season from my perspective (especially as far as my blog entries go) is that for the next several months I will generally only have one new movie per weekend coming out that I really want to see, which makes it a lot easier to keep up on my movie reviews.

So I’ve got just two movies to cover for May, and then I’ll be all caught up (since I already reviewed The Da Vinci Code, and I won’t be seeing X-Men: The Last Stand until tomorrow). How unbelievable is that?! So neither of the movies I caught in early May were all the great, but they were both worth seeing at the theater. The first of these was Mission: Impossible III. Now I loved the original movie, and I really enjoyed the second one (more so than the critics, or most of the people I know who’ve seen it – but then again, I’m a HUGE John Woo fan, so what can I say). The third one, however, didn’t really do a whole lot for me. For starters, I’ve never really been a big fan of Tom Cruise, and like a lot of people, I’m really getting tired of hearing about his escapades in this news. The other thing with this movie, that a few critics commented on that I have to agree with, is that unlike some of the other action/spy/thriller franchises out there, this one never really developed characters that you’re involved with. Cruise’s Ethan Hunt just isn’t that likable a character, and it’s really hard to care one way or the other what happens to him. And the rest of the cast (with the exception of Ving Rhames, whose just great in everything he does, and is one of the few endearing things about this franchise) seems to change every movie. Which means that as opposed to being a franchise that builds on itself from movie to movie, like that Bourne films or the James Bond series, for example, the Mission: Impossible movies pretty much are forced to stand alone as individual films. And while I’m a big fan of J. J. Abrams, this movie doesn’t really impress all that much. It’s not that bad; I’m glad I went and saw it at the theater (although I do wish my dumb ass would have remembered I had a free movie ticket in my Mission Impossible DVD so that I could have saved myself $5 – oh well), but at the same time, I doubt that I’ll pick it up on DVD until it’s on sale and I can get it for $10 or something. I do have to give props, though, to Philip Seymour Hoffman, who plays an incredible, very sinister villain, and to Maggie Q, who is a very sexy and fun to watch (I absolutely love her line when Tom Cruise tells her to blow up the Ferrari (or whatever type of high end sports car it was), and she says, “It’s such a nice car . . . .” The delivery is just superb).

My final movie to review for the month of May is the disaster movie remake Poseidon. Now normally I’m a really big fan of Wolfgang Petersen’s movies, especially when he’s doing any sort of sea picture, but I have to say that Poseidon was a bit of a disappointment, especially when compared to the 1972 original The Poseidon Adventure. As disaster epics go, Poseidon isn’t too bad, and I must admit it does a pretty good job of showing just how horrific this sort of tragedy would likely be (although I’m still not sure if that’s a good thing or a bad thing, as it is something of a downer when you really think about it). The visual effects are pretty good, but you just don’t really get as involved with the characters as you do in the original movie, and so it’s hard to care as much when they get killed. I am glad I saw this on the big screen (as it is certainly a big screen sort of movie), and as a disaster movie fan, I did enjoy it, but unless you’re a big fan of this genre, I’d say it’s probably one you can skip.

And so, shock of shocks, I am actually all caught up!! And as I said, I’ll be seeing X-Men: The Last Stand tomorrow, so I'll try and get a review up for it early next week. And then it’s onward and upward from there! And since I’m actually caught up on movie reviews, I can actually start doing some entries that aren't specifically movie reviews, and branch out into other movie-related articles. That should be fun. Well, until then, see you at the movies!!