Monday, June 27, 2011

Return of the Mini-Reviews

I am still on vacation untill the end of the week, but I've got a computer long enough to give my thoughts on 2 movies, starting with:

SHE'S OUT OF MY LEAGUE
If you were thinking of passing up this movie and filing it as just another lame romantic comedy, that you sir and/or madam, are a fool. She's Out of My League is a very funny comedy boosted by one of the most likable cast in a long time. The comedy works because the cast is funny and the film thankfully stays away from resting mainly on gross-out jokes. The romance is believeable as well because the lead actually feel like they would fall in love. Overall, an above-average romantic comedy with a great cast. 4.5 out of 6.

DATE NIGHT
If you were going to pass off this movie as just another cliched action-comedy, then you... are correct actually. Date Night plays through every action-comedy cliche in the book, and it doesn't do it particularlly well with them. The film is just not funny. The cast looks like they are actually trying, but the material they are given is subpar at best. The only funny scene is near the with a NYC cab driver. Overall, while the cast is trying, Date Night just is not funny. 2 out of 6.

I know 2 reviews aren't a lot, but when I return from my vacation, I will have new Cinema Wins and Cinema Sins, reviews of Super 8 and the Tron films and I will introduce an all-new series.

See You Later

Tuesday, June 21, 2011

It's Summer! (And I'm Sick)

Sorry I haven't updated in a while and because of a really bad cold and having to go out of town this week, I won't be able to post anything this week either. But when I return I should have some new reviews and 2 new Cinema Wins and Cinema Sins.

See you later.

Monday, June 13, 2011

Cinema Wins and Cinema Sins: Volume 4

CINEMA WINS
- My all time favorite movie monster has to be King Kong. All three of his movies (1933, 1976, 2005) are very good. And now it's been announced that Kong will return in a new animated movie. This new film will put a new twist on the series, though, as it will be told from Kong's perspective.

- Damon Lindelof, co-creator of Lost, has sign a deal with Disney to create an new film, titled 1952. It's been said that the new film has "multiple platform aspriartions" which could mean either video games, comic books or even a TV series based on this film might be possible. Like all Hollywood films now, the project is being kept a secret. All we know is the title, however it is believed that the movie will have ties to Lost or may pay tribute to the sci-fi films of the 50s. A win because it just sound cool and Lindelof is a proven writer.

- John C. Reilly, Jane Lynch, Sarah Silverman and Jack McBrayer are attached to the new animated children's movie Wreak It Ralph. Reilly stars as a villian from an old arcade game that accidently releases an arcade-destroying super-villian after he sneaks into a first-person shooter game to prove he's really a hero. McBrayer starts as Reilly's nemesis, Lynch will play a character from the FPS game and Silverman play a video game "glitch". A win, because, while the title is bad, the movie itself sounds fun.

- Also, quickly, today Indiana Jones turn 30. Happy Birthday, Indy. I got you a pet snake. That's not a problem, is it?

CINEMA SINS
- Hollywood got a little carried away with sequels/reboots/remakes this week. Among the new sequels are: Salt 2, Tron 3, Terminator 5 and G.I. Joe 2. Among the re-whatevers are: Adaptations of the games Risk and Asteroids, a movie based on a View-Master toy, a Daredevil reboot, a reboot of last year's The Wolfman titled Werewolf and a new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles movie. Now while I don't mind a new Tron or TMNT, all of the other ideas (mainly G.I. Joe 2, the View-Master movie and Terminator 5) sound lame or just unnessecary.

See you later!

Sunday, June 12, 2011

Cinema Wins and Cinema Sins: E3 2011 Edition

CINEMA WINS
- The Nintendo Wii unfortunately, failed as a console because Nintendo made it very hard for third-party companies to make games for the Wii due to it's having motion controls. It also failed because I didn't offer as good a hardcore gaming experience that it competators ,the PS3 and Xbox 360. So, Nintendo has announced their newest console (the Wii U? Seriously?) and how do I feel about it? Cautiously optamistic. The fact that it has third-party support (for now) and that the touch screen controller, while bulky, looks cool and is useful means that, ya, I'm like the Wii U (FOR NOW).

- Sly Cooper will make his triumphant return to the Playstaion when the new Sly Cooper: Theives in Time is released. Not much is known, but it's nice to have you back Sly.

CINEMA SINS
- Halo 4. A new Halo game. At this point does anyone care? Halo 3 was like the biggest video game ever and my friends would never stop talking about it. When Halo 4 was announced my friends acted like Halo was just any other guy on the street with green armor and a craving for alien meat flying everywhere. In other word, Halo just isn't relevant anymore. And this sequel feels more like a cash-grab than any other Halo before it. Yes, even more so than the RTS one.

- Minecraft will be coming  to consoles later this year. And by consoles I mean console. And by console I mean the Xbox 360. I want Minecraft. I have a PS3. Give me Minecraft. Xbox can have it once it gets rid of it's space marine fetish.

- Valve did not announce Half-Life 2: Episode 3. So, much of episodic games being quicker to make.

See you tomarrow with stuff that actually has to do with Cinema.

P.S. That game that come out on Tuesday. You know the one. It bounced around in development hell for 14 years. Ya, that one. Guess what. It is NOT good. Trust me. I'm on the internet.

Monday, June 6, 2011

Cinema Wins and Cinema Sins: Volume 3

CINEMA WINS
- First up, new trailers for the awfully-titled Rise of the Planet of the Apes and the well-titled The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo were both released this week and both showed that these films have a very good shot at being, well, good.

- Britain has thankfully banned the Human Centipede 2: Full Sequence, with The Film Stage stating the film “presents graphic images of sexual violence, forced defecation, and mutilation,” with the perspective being that of the main character. Relating to that, while the original showed the centipede as a medical experiment, the sequel presents it as the “depraved sexual fantasy” of our lead" http://thefilmstage.com/2011/06/06/the-human-centipede-ii-full-sequence-banned-in-uk-plot-details-emerge/. A win because, weather you are anti-censorship or not (And I certainly am anti-censorship), the less people see of the Human Centipede, the better.

CINEMA SINS
- It should comes as no surprise that after grossing $205 Million dollars worldwide in five days, The Hangover: Part III is in the works. A sin because, The Hangover never needed a sequel in the first place. I can even guess what this one will be about. The "Wolf Pack" travels to Canada where Doug tries to renew his vows, only to be force to join the other three after his wife's prized ant farm goes missing. They head to Jupiter where they meet a group of French tourists, Mike Tyson wearing an unicorn jacket and Mel Gibson complaining he wasn't in the sequel to a half-man, half-alligator Charlie Sheen. Wow, I got really carried away there, didn't I?

- Hawkman is getting his own movie. A sin because, well, he's Hawkman. It's like giving Aquaman his own video ga...aw, wait.

- The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn: Part 1 of 2: The Ending of The Beginning's Ending's Beginning on The Sixth of July got a trailer this week. Now I know it's easy to make fun of Twilight, but this trailer seriously sets epic action music to PEOPLE GETTING WEDDING INVITATIONS! I only expect epic action music when somebody gets invited to a birthday party that has a clown coming.

See you later.

P.S. Psych is still the best show currently on TV.

Sunday, June 5, 2011

X-Men: First Class Review

PREJUDICE IS BAD. SO ARE SPOILERS. THIS IS A SPOILER WARNING.


    It's time we talked about the F-word: Franchises. Franchises aren't bad. They are just exploited. Films that beg not to have a sequel are given a franchises if they make enough money. X-Men was one of those films. Honestly I think the first X-Men was just okay and it was the sequel X2 that was the star of the series. However, by the time The Last Stand rolled around, while not awful, it was clear the series had lost much of this steam and should die out as a flawed yet great trilogy. And then they made Wolverine. Oops. Suddently Fox was stuck with a major dilemma. They had to make a new movie or Marvel Studios was going to sweep the series back home. However after the disaster that was X-Men Origins: Wolverine, they needed to do something drastic to get the fans to return for a new film.
    So, they hired Matthew Vaughn who directed a highly underrated film back in 2010 called Kick-Ass. When fans saw a skilled director take the reins, things were starting to look up. The trailers looked good. The cast looked good. The story sounded good. So, the big question is, is X-Men: First Class good? Let's take a look.
    The film stars James McAvoy and Michael Fassbender as Professor X and Magneto, respectively. Oscar-nomminee Jennifer Lawrence plays Mystique. January Jones plays villian Emma Frost and Kevin Bacon steals the show as big baddie Sebastian Shaw. Rose Byrne, Nicholas Holt, Caleb Landry Jones and Lucas Till also star. The film follows Professor X and Magneto as they try to stop Shaw from starting
World War III by making a team of their own. Now, the film does one thing right, right from the start. It completely forgets Wolverine, thank god. But, does that mean it's good? Well, for that and other reasons, yes, it is good. Really damn good.
    There is a lot to love here. The cast is the best X-Men cast ever. The action and effects are very well done. And the writing is fan-freaking-tastic. I'm still not quite sure it's as good as X2, but if it isn't, it's a really close second. My one problem is that like the other X-Men films, I'm not quite sure it will be all that memorable, with me at least. Like the Harry Potter series none of the films have had a lasting effect on me. So, will X-Men: First Class be the one that changes that? Only time will tell. But untill then, it's really damn good. 5 out of 6.
    See you later.

P.S. All of you wondering if HE shows up in this film, HE does and it is hilarious.

Thursday, June 2, 2011

Mini-Review Madness

Over the holiday weekend I saw a good amount of movies. And because I'm lazy instead of reviewing each one sepreately I decided to group them all together, starting with...

KUNG FU PANDA 2
With what I knew of this sequel, going into theaters I wasn't very excited. The trailers looked like the film didn't have much going on and what it did have was a rehash of the first one. However I was happily proven wrong as the sequel did everything a sequel should do. It was bigger, riskier and, above all, better than the first. Overall, one of the must see films of the summer. 6 out of 6.

PRINCE OF PERSIA: THE SANDS OF TIME
Finally. We have a good video game movie. The action is great. The cast is great The effects are great. The problem is the rest of the movie is very generic. It's all been done better by something else. Even the action gets boring toward the end. This is always going to be a problem with video game movies. Games "borrow" so much from movies and other games that when they make a movie about it it just ends up "borrowing" from other movies. 3.5 out of 6

SWEENEY TODD: THE DEMON BARBER OF FLEET STREET
Sweeney Todd is an odd movie. That's probably because Director Tim Burton likes to make odd movies. How much you like the movie is entirely going to depend on how much you like Tim Burton. I myself have alway been on the fence, but I think if I were to fall somewhere it would be "Not a Fan". I've never really thought any of his movies were worth more than a "meh" and Sweeney Todd is no exception. The music and scenery are nice, but everything else is just not that interesting save one of the best musical moment I've ever seen with Epiphany. 3.5 out of 6

That's all for now. See you later.