Movies Watched The Week of 3/15 - 3/21

Hi everybody.  Welcome back.  This week was almost a lot shorter than it is, due to work from the other website.  Mainly catching up on The Jinx and The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt.  But by the end of the week, I got shit done.  And it’s nice and varied for ya ass.  So sit back and let the good times roll. 

Blue Collar (March 15th, 2015)

Director: Paul Schrader

Starring: Richard Pryor, Harvey Keitel, and Yaphet Kotto

I woulda been interested in this movie if you just told me that Paul Schrader, the man who wrote Taxi Driver and Raging Bull, was the director/writer of this movie.  But when you have a crime dramedy with Harvey Keitel and, most interestingly, Richard Pryor, you have my attention.  The movie focuses on Pryor, Keitel, and Kotto.  They are working class men in an automobile factory.  Pryor and Keitel are family men who are very much in desperate need for money to provide for their families.  Kotto is just the friend they know who’s done time.  So they decide to rob their Union office, since the union is corrupt as fuck and isn’t helping them at all.  From there, they enter a world they didn’t want to.  What I like most about the movie is that you understand these guys.  They aren’t heroes, idolized versions of the working man.  They make mistakes and do stupid shit.  But there hearts are in the right place, they just don’t have the means to provide.  So they do what they can and suffer for it.  What’s also nice is the subtlety to the movie.  It isn’t a big, obnoxious movie that holds your hand.  We see everything from these three guys’ eyes, and things aren’t always clear.  The performances are solid all around, Keitel being the standout.  Pryor does his best and this is the best work he’s done.  The end scenes are his best work, but the he shows some rough edges for the most part.  It’s kinda obvious why he didn’t get used very well in Hollywood.  Keitel though manages to play this simple, naive guy very straight and lived in.  We all know a guy like him.  It’s very different from his other roles.  Schrader shows some roughness with his directorial debut, but that doesn’t detract too much.  And his writing is superb, par for the course back then.  The very last scene comes off a little too on the nose and isn’t a great fit.  Feels shoehorned in.  But the cumulative effect of the movie, about how the working class is pitted against each other and held down by those in power is great.  Good little 70’s gem.

Rating: 9/10

Phantom Of The Paradise (March 20th, 2015)
Director: Brian De Palma
Starring: William Finley, Paul Williams, Jessica Harper, and George Memmoli

Thank the lord the Brian De Palma made a musical, because this is such a unique and singular experience of bug fuckery and insanity that everyone needs to see it.  I seriously don’t know how exactly to sell this movie.  I can roughly describe it.  It is De Palmas mad scientist hybrid of Phantom of The Opera, Faust, and Dorian Gray all set in the glam rock 70s music scene starring Paul Williams with Paul Williams music.  And even from De Palma, this is a big and overblown experience.  Not a subtle bone in it’s body, this is ridiculous to such an extreme as to be endearing.  It knows exactly what it’s doing and it does it well.  Really, all I can say is to see it.  I know most people will dislike it because it is different than what they want.  But it’s weird enough for me. 

Rating: 9/10

Chicago (March 21st, 2015)
Director: Rob Marshall
Starring: Renee Zellweger, Richard Gere, Catherine Zeta Jones, and John C. Reilly

Well lookie here.  A movie I’m not giving an 8 rating.  What a shock, since apparently I’m an easy mark for movies.  So suck a dick.  So yeah, the movie really didn’t do it for me.  And what made it a miss in the end for me was the structure of the movie.  Not necessarily that it was a musical.  It’s the structure of making the musical numbers separate from the movie in a way. Instead of happening within the story like most musicals, it goes to a stage to do musical bits.  And it kills a lot of momentum the movie has.  The story is actually interesting and I wanted to like this more.  But cutting to musical numbers that just repeat information we already got or highlight a characters emotional frame of mind we can get from their reactions is a real drag, slowing this movie down to a crawl.  I’ll say the musical numbers got better integrated in the trial scene, but it was almost too little too late.  The cast is fine if unspectacular.  Gere is just playing his Primal Fear role pre character arc.  Zeta Jones plays the diva losing her fame well enough.  I don’t like Zellweger and she doesn’t win me over here.  I don’t think she really fits the role. That’s just me.  The movie is technically well put together and the music itself is good.  But as a whole, despite a story I coulda dug, this movie lost me.  And the story itself is kinda fucked up in the sense that it wants us to sympathize with a woman that is essentially Robert Durst. And the ending is all kinds of fucked up, with these horrible pieces of shit winning and getting what they want and being celebrated for it.  It’s so wrong headed a story that so tonally doesn’t realize how fucked up it is, I should love it for the insanity of the plot.  But I don’t, so fuck it.  An apparently rare lower than 8 rating from me. 

Rating: 7/10

Mystic River (March 21st, 2015)
Director: Clint Eastwood
Starring: Sean Penn, Tim Robbins, Kevin Bacon, and Marcia Gay Harden

I had already seen this movie and loved it unabashedly when I did.  But it had been quite a long time since and figured it was a good time as any to rewatch.  And the movie is still a fucking powerhouse, an emotional gut punch about the power of regret and past mistakes haunting us.  It’s really weird to see this movie after there being so many Clint movies since that all have the same visual look to them, but they all come off like weaker imitations of the look this one has.  He captures the drab and depressing atmosphere of working class Boston. The performances here are just superb.  Tim Robbins has never been better, really just perfectly portraying the broken man with the haunting past that may slowly be losing his mind.  Kevin Bacon has a thankless role of the straight edge cop who pushed his wife away because of his emotionally withholding ways, but he elevates it enough to not be eye rollingly cliched.  But the real MVP is Penn, a man I’ve no love for for the most part.  Only this role and Carlito’s Way are the performances of his that I like.  And this is the best by far, emotionally crushing and very threatening.  He’s never come off as one of the guys before, his smug sense of self worth keeping that a seemingly impossible task to portray.  But here he does it, making this blue collar guy with a darkness to him so real. The themes that run through this thing really speak to me.  The idea of one mistake, an innocent mistake as a child just reverberating through a lifetime and effecting those around you is great.  And guilt for that mistake and the various ways those deal with it, or don’t.   This really is a masterpiece.  I will say though, the very end is a bit confusing, almost like it was shoehorned in or not as clear due to stuff from the book that clears it up not being there.  But aside from the kinda ambiguous ending that still works for me, this is a masterpiece.  And if he didn’t have Unforgiven in his belt, this would be the tops in his directorial belt.  Although there is a part of me that wonders what Ben Affleck could have done with this.  But that’s just a hypothetical.  I’m glad we got this. 

Rating: 10/10







Top Movies

1. Mystic River
2. Blue Collar
3. Phantom Of The Paradise
4. Chicago

- Tom Lorenzo

Movies Watched The Week of 3/8 - 3/14

Hi everybody! We got a new post coming at ya.  And my oh my, we got a good week here.  This inadvertently turned into a week of looking at the past, specifically the 70s for the most part.  Three of them were made then, and it’s due in part to a specific figure I got a bit obsessed with this week.  He’s the subject of one, directed/wrote another, and rewrote a part of another.  So sit back and look at some movies you may likely have not heard about.

The Good Shepherd (March 8th, 2015)

Director: Robert DeNiro

Starring: Matt Damon, Angelina Jolie, John Turturro, and Eddie Redmayne

He’s only made two movies, but Robert DeNiro is a really good director.  He’s not one of the greats, he won’t make anyone rethink cinema nor will he change it significantly.  But in his years of working with some of the greats, he definitely picked some things up.  And while A Bronx Tale is one of those small scale, humble classics, The Good Shepherd got a bad rap on it’s release.  I can see why.  It had the stench of Awards baiting going on in the lead up to it, with the hype and promotional materials giving that feel off.  And I can understand that.  The movie does have a very self serious, polished period piece feel about it.  It may be a little too long, a little too cold, and a little too subtle with it’s narrative.  All that is fair criticism.  But I really dug this movie, about the early days of the CIA and the good ole Ivy Leaguers that formed the Agency.  Matt Damon is really good as the internal and very dedicated man tasked with helping forming the CIA, essentially the founder of counter intelligence.  Angelina Jolie has a thankless role, but does what she can to highlight what a cold and heartless bastard Damon is for the most part.  There’s other supporting players, like Michael Gambon as a mentor and Robert DeNiro as the General that rounds up the crew that became the CIA.  Also a short but nice turn from the retired Joe Pesci as a Mafia boss, essentially playing Sam Giancana.  The CIA has always been a interesting subject to me, so this may very well be a personal bias making me like this movie alot than most.  But I do honestly think that this is a solidly made, interesting movie about the morally fucked up world of counter intelligence.

Rating: 8.5/10

Milius (March 8th, 2015)
Directors: Joey Figueroa and Zak Knutson
Starring: John Milius, George Lucas, Steven Spielberg and Martin Scorsese

Even if you don’t know his name, you know his work and have felt his impact.  John Milius came up with the USC crew of filmmakers that changed cinema in the 70s. The like of Steven Spileberg, Francis Ford Coppola, and George Lucas came up with him and all looked up to him.  These masters, these house hold names all thought he was an otherworldly talent.  That his way with words made him one of the best writers around.  And the only one he didn’t work with was Lucas, having penned Apocalypse Now for Coppola and the Indianapolis scene from Jaws for Spielberg. But being a great writer isn’t the only reason he gets a documentary.  Milius was a character.  A big, loud man with a lot of right wing ideas and no compunction with telling people off.  A short cut version to describe Milius is to watch John Goodman in The Big Lebowski, Milius being the Coens' inspiration for Walter in that.  What’s great about this movie is the love that filmmakers have for the man and how he’s inspired everyone.  You see how his work has reverberated through time.  The biggest, or most obvious, being that he was the one who made Schwarzenneger a viable actor with Conan The Barbarian.  But what really makes the movie is the home stretch, where tragedy strikes.  The most touching scene being the absolute visible distress that Milius’ misfortune brings to Spielberg, his friends pain being that upsetting.  This is a great doc for all film fans, and for anyone who admires artists who forge their own path for better or worse.  I know he’s become a new filmmaking hero to me.

Rating: 10/10

The Hunt For Red October (March 10th, 2015)
Director: John McTiernan
Starring: Alec Baldwin, Sean Connery, Sam Neill, and Scott Glenn

John McTiernan went on a hell of a run in the mid 80s to the early 90s.  Predator, Die Hard, and Die Hard With A Vengeance all being big hits.  Die Hard especially, the apex of the action genre and begat its own subgenre in the action field.  And in that time he also made this Tom Clancy adaptation, about a potentially rogue Soviet submarine commander heading for America.  Connery is that rogue commander, and we don’t know what his intentions are for a bit.  But then we do, and it works.  Baldwin plays Jack Ryan, a CIA analyst who brings this info to his superiors and gets roped into the situation in the field.  The Generals and politicians think Connery is heading out to start a war.  Baldwin thinks he’s trying to defect from the Soviet Union.  The tension lies for a bit in what way he actually goes, but then the majority of the movie is if the rest of the world finds out in time to make a difference.  This is a tight, tense little movie.  It runs a little too long, dragging some scenes out and being a little too technical, which is the risk of a Clancy adaptation.  And some of the action scenes aren’t that great too look at, with it’s primitive effects not being all too good.  But the cast is great, the ambiguity is real sound and the movie sticks the landing.  It’s no Crimson Tide, but it’ll do.

Rating: 8/10

The Wind and The Lion (March 14th, 2015)
Director: John Milius
Starring: Sean Connery, Candice Bergen, Brian Keith, and Geoffrey Lewis

John Milius is quite the crazy son of a gun.  I mean, you’d have to be to cast Sean Connery as an Arab freedom fighter.  But despite having an accent of the Scots while delivering lines in Arabic, he does give a good performance.  He isn’t leaning on hid Bond persona, he gives a really good performance as a man with absolute belief in his cause.  A man with a code and with honor and bravery.  He is one of the main characters in this story.  The others are Bergen and Keith.  Bergen plays an American woman in Morocco who is kidnapped by Connery.  Connery does this as a means to embarrass the ruler of the land, and ideally cause a civil war.  The other main character, though slightly less focused on, is Keith as Teddy Roosevelt.  Roosevelt has to keep up the appearance of American strength and green lights some sort of rescue mission.  All this ends up in a big skirmish to save Bergen, and for the Moroccans to maybe capture Connery.  This is a movie of pretty decent scale, and it’s a gorgeous movie.  Milius definitely watched Lawrence of Arabia.  The cast is all great, my favorite being Keith because Teddy Roosevelt is just awesome and he does the guy service.  The story gets a little bit too cluttered, maybe being too hard to follow for some.  Lots of names and allegiances to keep track of.  I’ll admit I had to do a little work to keep track of everything.  But it was worth it.  There’s a real soul here, a beating heart of masculinity and honor.  Connery and Keith work as both sides of the same coin.  Connery wants to protect his land, where Keith wants to broaden and strengthen his.  Bergen is fine, if a little too shrewy for some of the hand wringers in the world.  The cumulative power of the movie makes all of the short comings (the few that there are) not too important.  Maybe a little streamlining could have helped, but this is a solid little movie.  Another gem from the 70s.

Rating: 8.5/10

The Taking Of Pelham One Two Three (March 14th, 2015)
Director: Joseph Sargent
Starring: Walther Matthau, Robert Shaw, Martin Balsam, and Jerry Stiller

If you ever wanted to see a gritty, tight and inventive 70s crime flick with Walter Matthau as the Cop in the situation, well have I got a movie for you.  Robert Shaw leads a group of men to hijack the Pelham 123 train for a $1 Million ransom.  And the movie really is just simply about trying to get the money to these men as quick as possible before they start shooting hostages.  Simple and to the point, with a nice heaping of a middle finger at the ineffectual government structure.  They straight up say that politicians are just mincing assholes looking for the easy way out and to look good to voters. While all this goes down, Matthau tries to talk to Shaw to maybe lengthen the deadline and maybe get some helpful info out of him on the sly.  It’s a quick, to the point little thriller.  Very minimal violence is here to keep us interested.  It’s mainly the characters and the simple but ingenious plot.  Sargent gives the movie a nice, gritty edge and captures a NYC long gone.  Dirty and gritty with a sense of danger, he also captures the old curmudgeons of the age with no compunction to let loose some sexist or racist sentiment.  It’s a nice little time capsule of an era gone by, like The French Connection or Taxi Driver or The Warriors.  Capturing a hard time pretty much lost to the ether.  You want a good, ole fashioned little thriller from the 70s, this is a damn good entry. 

Rating: 9/10






Top Movies

1. Milius
2. The Taking Of Pelham One Two Three
3. The Good Shepherd
4. The Wind and The Lion
5. The Hunt For Red October

- Tom Lorenzo

Movies Watched The Week of 3/1 - 3/7

Hello everybody.  We got a new post for y’all, the first post Oscar update.  And we got some good stuff lined up for ya.  If you don’t know, I got a concussion recently so excuse any rough(er than usual) writing from me as I’m still dealing with that.  I tried to keep it short, but the bottom movie this week got a lot from me, as it is a frustrating movie all around.  But, hey.  Good vibes.  Take a look at what we got here.  Should be fun. 

Chef (March 1st, 2015)

Director: Jon Favreau

Starring: Jon Favreau, John Leguizamo, Sofia Vergara, and Scarlett Johansson

Jon Favreau is an interesting director.  He's gone from little indies all the way up to the biggest of movies.  Hell, he's in part responsible for the cinematic takeover that Marvel has achieved, thanks to his work on Iron Man and Iron Man 2.  He's gone from those, to little flicks like Made, to family films like Elf and Zathura, to big bombs like Cowboys and Aliens (a movie I like, shut up).  He's had amazing success, but he's basically had no real voice coming through in the big budget stuff.  He's had a deft hand with the visuals and making it light/fun.  But unlike Nolan or Shane Black or James Gunn, they didn't feel like him or something he's too into.  And watching Chef, you can see what his feelings are on the subject.  Favreau stars as Carl, a big hot shot chef with all the talent in the world.  He’s got a cushy job at a high end restaurant, where the owner (a nice appearance by Dustin Hoffman) claims to let him do what he wants, but pulls on the leash whenever Carl shows signs of wanting to do new things.  This comes through when a hot shot food critic gives Carl a bad review, saying he once had promise but is now a lazy cook going through the motions for the money.  Carl doesn’t take it too well and is fired.  So he has to make a way for himself, going to a low rent food truck and making what he wants.  So essentially, Favreau made a little biopic about his career in film, but changed it to a cook.  It’s really hard to argue that this is not what he’s doing.  And it gives the movie that little edge, the personal touch with some real emotion going into it that’s been missing.  It doesn’t help that the movie has a low key charm, with a great cast having fun and Favreaus absolute joy in showing the art of cooking.  He just absolutely gives us a cinematic exercise in food pornography, just daring people to watch this on an empty stomach.  It’s not a world changer of a movie, but it is fun.  Now, it’s a little easy when it comes to the climax.  Everything works out in the end (literally everything).  But for fluff like this, that’s fine.  And it has a nice little relationship between Carl and his son, a reconciliation working through the narrative.  That in and of itself feels like Favreau saying he feels like he wasn’t there enough for his kids.  Again, this feels like a personal film and it helps make it work.  Fun, funny and enticing, this is a good time at the movies.  

Rating: 9/10

The Lone Ranger (March 2nd, 2015)
Director: Gore Verbinski
Starring: Armie Hammer, Johnny Depp, Tom Wilkinson, and William Fitchner

In a summer where people started to turn against blockbusters, this movie was the poster child of the big budget whipping boy.  In a year with Star Trek Into Darkness, World War Z, and Man of Steel, The Lone Ranger managed to come out on top of movie that everyone just fucking hated.  And it seemed like right out of the gate too.  Before it even came out in that hateful summer.  From a super serious trailer that promised all the grim dark origin explorations that people were growing less and less fond of, to a overblown scale and another seemingly irritating makeup performance by Johnny Depp, things looked grim.  It had a big hill to climb with those, in addition to being made by the guy who made 2 abysmal Pirates Of The Caribbean movies.  But in spite of all the vitriol and anti hype this movie had garnered, it isn’t the abysmal train wreck everyone claimed.  It’s not a good movie, by any stretch.  The middle is where this movie lies, a movie of absolute mediocrity.  Of all the problems the movie has, none is more harming than the awful framing device.  Having a ludicrously old Tonto telling the story to a young boy is just ridiculous, killing any potential momentum that the story could hope to maintain.  The rest of the movie could have been great, but this intercutting between this and the story is so misguided to be crippling from the get go.  But the rest of the movie doesn’t help.  For one, it is an origin story that feels like it’s embarrassed by it’s characters.  John Reid (a game Armie Hammer) is more of a bumbling ninny than a hero in training until he just becomes a hero.  Tonto is a blank void of annoying ticks in place of characteristics, not surprising due to being played by Johnny Depp.  In all fairness to him, this is the best of his bad performances.  Instead of being obviously and obnoxiously bad, he’s subtly bad.  He’s a blank for the most part, with brief moments of mugging for the camera.  Tonto is a typical crazy person in the movie way.  He’s not interesting, just there. There’s a lot of humor stemming from how goofy and campy the entire property is, making it kind of smug and making us feel like jerk offs for even watching it.   And the relationship between John and Tonto is really just so antagonistic to be ham fisted that they become friends at the end.  It’s such an ugly relationship at first.  Then there’s the plot, which the movie takes it’s damn time actually getting to.  It’s typical action western fare, with double crosses and greed the play of the day.  William Fichtner gives a good performance, but one that is completely not of this movie.  He belongs in something else entirely.  Which is another problem this movie has.  It is such a tonal nightmare, whiplashing from goofy comedy to super gritty/violent action flick to over the top cartoonish action to longing love story, it’s a headache.  And for an action movie of this size and budget, it has surprisingly little action aside from the beginning and end.  I will say that even though the beginning is a miserable slog with a bland action sequence, the movie picks up a bit at the halfway point and gets some momentum going (despite adding a new villain for no damn reason with no real character).  It picks up until a very enjoyable train sequence set to the old Lone Ranger theme, basically becoming an actual Lone Ranger story at the very end for 20 minutes.  There’s two apt comparisons I could make here.  John Carter and Ridley Scott’s Robin Hood.  John Carter in the big budget failure with too much cartoony CGI and no heart, and Robin Hood in the super serious reboot that isn’t interesting and isn’t really a story that fits with the property until the very end (literally the last minute for Robin Hood).  This is better than both of them, but only a little bit more than John Carter (a fuck ton better than Robin Hood).  What kills this to me is the lack of passion, an overwhelming feeling of antipathy.  Verbinski doesn’t really bring a spark to the movie for the most part, wasting Armie Hammer and allowing Depp to make another wacky character.  It’s a shame, but it’s what we got.  So while it is still the worst of those big budget blockbusters that summer, it isn’t cinematic cancer equivalent to Tusk.  

Rating: 6/10

Foxcatcher (March 3rd, 2015)
Director: Bennett Miller
Starring: Channing Tatum, Steve Carrell, Mark Ruffalo, and Anthony Michael Hall

Bennett Miller has a very specific tone.  He is a very deliberate film maker, making slow pace character pieces with an icy detachment to them.  It worked fine for Capote and hindered the ok Moneyball.  But it seems like filmmaker has met the perfect story to apply his icy sensibilities.  Based on the true story of the De Pont murder story in the 90s, Miller really bites into the story in his way.  I’ll just get the negatives out of the way quick.  The makeup appliances are pretty terrible.  It looks fake and doesn’t do the suspension of belief any favors.  Channing Tatum, ostensibly the main character, is sidelined a bit in the final stretch of the movie.  And while it doesn’t bother me, the very slow and deliberate pace doesn’t bother me, I can absolutely understand why people would be bothered by it.  It’s very trying, but that’s the point.  Now, onto the good.  The cast is superb.  The obvious highlight is Steve Carrell, completely as far away from a comedic performance as could be, bringing the creeping insanity out in Du Pont.  But he steals the thunder from Tatum and Ruffalo.  Tatum as Mark Schultz has never been better, a seething wound of a man who bristles at living in anyones shadow.  Desperate to prove he can be his own man, he fails at every turn, proving he needs others.  And Ruffalo proves yet again what a talent he is, making Dave Schultz a really good guy.  There’s not a bad bone in his body.  He’s honorable, filled with love for his family and an intelligence that pores out.  He truly is a good man.  A weaker movie could have made Dave a bit of a dick, excusing Marks shit heel behavior.  But it doesn’t, making Mark come off even worse for inadvertently putting Dave in De Ponts cross hairs.   The Miller pacing/tone work great here, because it brings out the creeping rot in the story, and in Mark and Du Pont.  The relationship between the two is very creepy, in an unobviously/subtextually homoerotic way.  The movie doesn’t spell it out, but the homosexual underpinings are there under the surface.  So much so that at a certain point, Mark starts acting like a rape victim.  A pretty good movie all around that elevates what could have been a run of the mill crime thriller.  Miller really did earn his Oscar Nomination.  It’ll be interesting to see what he does next.

Rating: 9/10

Dressed To Kill (March 4th, 2015)
Director: Brian DePalma
Starring: Angie Dickenson, Michael Caine, Nancy Allen, and Keith Gordon

Brian DePalma has an obvious love for Hitchcock.  And it’s obvious because he had been unofficially remaking the man and cribbing his style all throughout the 70’s/80s.  And this movie may be the most obvious Hitchcock influenced, and by influenced I mean straight up based on.  This is basically Psycho, but with all the weird sexual stuff the center of the movie and dialed up to 11.  From structure and plot to motivation, this is all his riff on Psycho.  And it’s a pretty solid flick, with the weird DePalma-isms making it a worthwhile watch.  It’s got his technical acumen, really great looking compositions and production design.  It’s a big movie, not subtle at all.  It opens with Angie Dickinson pretty much jerking it in the shower in a dream sequence.  It’s DePalma, one couldn’t expect any less.  But it all works as a heightened reworking of Psycho.  Now, it isn’t exactly perfect.  Some of the acting doesn’t gel to the DePalma style.  Dickenson mainly makes it a bit harder to connect, but when you got Caine, Allen, Arnie from Christine (Gordon), and Dennis Franz it’s fine.  The plot is a little jittery and 80s style chopped.  It goes from a slow burn to rushing immensely to the end.  But even that is ok, not great, until an ending scene where you have some of the surviving people in a circle explaining the plot to us because it goes by so quickly.  Now, if you can handle the DePalma style and want to see a new take on Psycho, this is a good little flick.  It’s no Blow Out or Scarface, but it’s a worthwhile little flick.

Rating: 8/10

Justice League: The New Frontier (March 7th, 2015)
Director: Dave Bullock
Starring: David Boreanz, Miguel Ferrer, Neil Patrick Harris, and Jeremy Sisto

This was a nice little change of pace within the DC Animated slate.  For one, the animation style is significantly different than the rest of the movie, taking the look from Darwyn Cooke’s graphic novel this is based on.  Another, being set in the 50s gives the movie a fresh look at everything.  There’s a sort of innocence to everything that has a creeping rot seeping in.  Some bad shit is on the edges, everything on the cusp of change.  But the heroes (aside from Batman of course) are all nice guys just trying to do the right thing.  And unlike the last one I watched (Crisis On Two Earths), the voice casting is really on point here.  The standouts for me of this great cast is Ferrer of the Martian Manhunter, my most underrated super hero.  But the surprise is Sisto, giving the best Batman performance outside of Kevin Conroy.  Now the plot is typical end of the world alien shit.  It’s a bit convoluted and big.  But the movie works on the micro level, the little moments between characters and what they’re going through.  It’s a much smaller scale movie for the most part compared to other Justice League movies, taking its time to get to the big finale.  It’s a gorgeous movie with a great style and a great tone, giving us a unique take on the world.  Gotta give it to them for shaking it up a bit.  It’s still an adult take, with some really hardcore violence showing up.  But for the most part, this is not like the newer crop of stuff.  Great stuff.

Rating: 9/10





Top Movies

1. Chef
2. Justice League: The New Frontier
3. Foxcatcher
4. Dressed To Kill
5. The Lone Ranger

- Tom Lorenzo

2014s Cinematical Movie Review

Welcome everybody.  Oscar Season has come and gone, so it is time to discuss the best movies of the prior year.  2014 is the topic of discussion in this particular case.  Before I decided to make this list, I thought it was an ok year.  Some good stuff came out, but not too much great.  But as I started to go through the year, I realized something. This was an immense fucking year.  So much great stuff came out, it’s almost absurd.  From foreign crime flicks, to American made blockbusters, all the way down to small scale indies, we had some massive works.  Now, obviously, this is all gonna be based on my opinion.  Cause I couldn’t give too much of a fuck less about anyone else’s opinion.  Otherwise I’d have to love Birdman, and that shit just ain’t happening.  So coming up we will have all the movies I’ve seen ranked from worst to best.  Only the top ten will be written about, cause I just don’t have the time to do more.  But I also have some awards to give out, cause I’m that kind of guy.  And at the very end, I will be looking forward to the year ahead briefly.  So take a breather and dive in to the list of Cinema ranked to my standards.  And be sure to take a look at the 2014 roundups of fellow film freaks Josh and Mike.  See you on the other sides gents.

Movies Watched The Week of 2/22 - 2/28

Hello everybody.  We got a nice selection for this weeks update for you guys.  That's a bit of the silver lining of getting a concussion at work and being home for a few days.  Movies galore.  And all for you guys.  Well, it's all for me but you guys can enjoy it too.  So enjoy the whiplash like variety of things I've watched.  There's only one garbage heap in here, so YAY! I'm done now.  Read it or not.  I got either shit to write.  Bye.

The Bank Job (February 22nd, 2015)

Director: Roger Donaldson

Starring: Jason Statham, Saffron Burrows, David Suchet, and Peter De Jersey

Statham is one of the most unique action stars of all time.  He may not be the best actor of them all (Stallone), the most iconic (Schwarzenegger), or the most ironically enjoyable (Van Damme).  But he is the one who takes the most chances and does movies that aren't typical shoot em ups.  The best one is probably Redemption, but this movie here is one of them.  Marketed as a Guy Ritchie esque action flick, this is much more in line with 70s Brit crime flicks. Based on a true story, Statham plays a low level criminal who is roped into a plot to rob a bank by an old flame (Burrows).  But the plot is much more complex than a simple bank robbery, and all hell breaks loose after.  While this isn't a grim dark flick, it's a serious affair.  There are consequences.  It's also a surprisingly political movie, being based off a true story, it has a real cynical look at the game.  It's a breezy fun, with maybe a little too short a run time.  It woulda been nice to spend more time with the crew before some of the consequences land, but it still works.  Statham is great and the plotting is like a well oiled machine.  This is a good little flick and one of the underseen gems in the Statham filmography.  

Rating: 8.5/10

Kick-Ass 2 (February 23rd, 2015)
Director: Jeff Wadlow
Starring: Aaron Taylor Johnson, Chloe Moretz, Chris Mintz Plasse, and Jim Carrey


Having now seen all of the movies based of Mark Millar books, it's safe to say that only Matthew Vaughn should spearhead the adaptations.  Because of the 4 made, he did 2.  And the other 2 are just absolute garbage.  Those are Wanted and now this, a sequel to the Matthew Vaughn directed adaptation.  Now, the funny thing about all the books is that they are garbage.  The first Kick-Ass book is the closest to good, but it suffers from Millars current trend of being over the top, nihilistic and immature with no point.  But Vaughn and writing partner Jane Goldman manage to see the strengths in the books, wring out the crap and make something special. But here, you got a director who couldn't make the god awful sequel book work, so we got a pretty bad movie.  Like the book, it's a half assed and over the top look at escalation from a "realistic" standpoint.  And by realistic, it just means really fucking ugly with no point or weight.  This was just a slog to get through.  Johnson is still and will probably always be a blank slate, a nothing of a performer.  Moretz does what she can, but is given a lot of nothing to do.  And Carrey makes the most of what he's given, giving a solid performance. There really isn't much to say.  This is a pretty garbage movie and is an affront to the pretty solid original.

Rating: 4/10

Big Hero 6 (February 26th, 2015)
Directors: Chris Williams and Don Hall
Starring: Ryan Potter, Genesis Rodriguez, TJ Miller, and Scott Adsit

Getting it out of the way, this didn't deserve to win Best Animated Feature at the Oscars.  And no, it shouldn't have gone to The Lego Movie for all you wonderfully hip adults out there.  That honor should have gone to How To Train Your Dragon 2.  But the movie is really good, so I'm not upset that it won.  It isn't the Birdman for animation.  Its a really good, old school movie that fits right into the Disney mold.  Young kid suffers a loss in the family and goes on an adventure to learn how to deal with the loss, while gaining a new family that accepts him.  Add in a funny inhuman creature, this time being the medic robot named Baymax that becomes the surrogate to the lost relative.  The movie is visually fun, set in a San Francisco that was merged with Japan stylings (minus any of the weird sexual depravities, thankfully).  The directors stage the movie with a real panache.  The flying stuff is great. Not as great as Dragon 2's flying scenes, but great nonetheless.  And while not featuring any of the well known Marvel characters, it's use of the ideas and characters gives it a nice world to separate it from other cartoons.  The characters are all well written and charmingly performed.  It's also nice to see a cartoon (and movie in general) that values intelligence and craftiness over good looks and brawn.  It's a thrilling and funny movie that works well for kids and won't bore any adults.  It's a nice little superhero movie that isn't too dark for the kiddies.

Rating: 9/10

Munich (February 26th, 2015)
Director: Steven Spielberg
Starring: Eric Bana, Daniel Craig, Ciaran Hinds, and Geoffrey Rush

This is one of Spielbergs lesser known movies, mainly due to the lack of box office success.  There was also a bit of a controversy surrounding the movie, with some claiming it to be anti semitic.  Which is gold, because it’s from the guy who made Schindler’s List.  But hey, fuck that because it doesn’t make Israel seem like the cleanest and most noble place.  But despite it’s almost forgotten reputation and lack of adventurous moments, this is one of the best things he’s ever made.  By far, it’s the most morally ambiguous movie he’s ever made.  When 11 Israeli Olympic team members are killed in a hostage situation by a Palestinian group, Israel puts together a black ops sqaud to kill 11 men involved in the attack.  But by putting us in the shoes of the team leader (Bana), we don’t get all the information.  We are in his shoes, so nothing is clear.  Are these names actually involved? What’s the proof?  Will killing them even make a difference? What does killing men in cold blood do to a soul, despite a righteous belief? Can you kill an enemy easily after having a real conversation with them?  This is a powerful film that doesn’t pull punches.  It’s brutal and unflinching, managing to damn nor praise either side.  It takes a swipe at the very idea of war and the circuitous nature of revenge.  The whole thing is about ambiguity, never answering a good deal of questions.  It’s a movie that’s another answer from Spielberg that he’s too sentimental and childish a director.  It’s a god damn minor miracle it even got made and is as good as it is.  Another masterpiece by the beard, this one should be seen by all.

Rating: 10/10

Close Encounters Of The Third Kind (February 27th, 2015)
Director: Steven Spielberg
Starring: Richard Dreyfuss, Melinda Dillon, Teri Garr, and Francois Truffaut


For the longest time, I just couldn't get into this movie.  I tried and it was painfully boring to me.  But after delving into the Spielberg filmography, I had to finish the movie to be a completist.  And this time, I actually was able to appreciate what he was doing.  It still isn't a perfect movie by any stretch of the imagination.  The pacing is way too slow.  Deliberate and slow I can handle.  But this was, at points, way too much so.  But upon this rewatch, I can also see how this is him trying to bring the tone and style of Jaws to an alien movie.  A slower paced character piece with a bigger element involved.  Where Jaws was about an outside nuisance (the shark) making Brody overcome his fears to protect his family and people he oversees as Police Chief, this is about an outside nuisance shaking Roy Neary free from his stasis and realizing he wants more.  Which is all fine and dandy, but the end with Neary going off with aliens and abandoning his family.  Leaves a sour taste, despite being fitting and making sense to the story being told.  But whats also nice, and almost unfathomable, was Spielberg making the aliens not world conquerors.  Back then it was unheard of, especially the same year Alien came out.  Even today that's not always the case.  And by making a movie about alien contact and not making the Government a shady bunch of scumbags.  They're just concerned about what could happen, but are just as ecstatic about it as Neary.  And as one of the few movies written by Spielberg, it is a very telling movie.  For one, it's like the origin story of the Spielberg father, a man who grows unattached to his children.  And it also gives a glimpse into Spielbergs feelings of living in middle America, feeling like an outsider from the rest of the world.  And the ending works as his way of taking a world changing leap.  It has it's tense moments, as it works like Jaws, but it's almost like a sucker punch.  Overall, it's a positive movie with an idealistic view of life outside the planet.  While it could have used some tightening in the editing bay, it's an overall good damn flick.  It'll always have a lower place in the Spierberg canon to me, but it's a nice follow up to a game changing masterpiece.

Rating: 8/10

Justice League: Crisis On Two Earths (February 28th, 2015)
Directors: Lauren Montgomery and Sam Liu
Starring: Mark Harmon, William Baldwin, Chris Noth, and James Woods

It took a while, but I’ve found the new low in the DC animated canon.  But being a DC animated film, it’s still a good time.  This time out, we have a movie dealing the multiverse and the Crime Syndicate.  The Syndicate is the evil versions of the JL, occupying another dimensions Earth.  We see in the beginning that that worlds Lex Luthor is a good guy, battling the Syndicate.  But in a last ditch effort, Lex sends himself to the Earth of the JL.  After convincing them to help, they all go off to fight.  Except Batman that is.  What follows is a movie very heavy on action.  Which is all well and good, but doesn’t really get into the characters heads.  Martian Manhunter gets a half assed attempt at an arc, but it’s not well executed.  But the worst thing is that the voice cast isn’t that good.  It’s the worst cast wrangled up in DC lore so far.  The only one who works out is James Woods, actually trying to play a character.  But the rest seem out of place.  But despite a quick runtime and a lack of story with a slightly miscast crew, it has it’s entertainment.  Mainly of the explosive variety.  But there’s some good character interactions here, making it a fun and quick run.

Rating: 8/10

Snake Eyes (February 28th, 2015)
Director: Brian DePalma
Starring: Nic Cage, Gary Sinise, Carla Cugino, and John Heard

It’s a damn shame that DePalma has fallen apart in recent years, because this guy really knew how to put a god damn scene together man.  The visual flair he showed for decades was stunning.  It almost seemed like he was showing off most of the time.  And while this movie may not be the best thing he ever did, but this is a solid entry from a guy late in his career.  Starring Nic Cage managing to act and make the moments of Cage-ness work within the character.  What we got here story wise is a fairly typical convoluted conspiracy plot with backstabbings galore.  But with the panache that DePalma brings elevates this completely.  It’s fun and gorgeous to watch.  There isn’t much depth to the flick here.  But it is a very morally grey movie.  Cage isn’t a straight up hero.  He’s a corrupt cop wrapped up in this plot and decides to do the right thing.  But what’s really refreshing is that it blows up in his face.  His corruption is his downfall.  It’s nice to see the anti hero get his comeuppance even though he does the right thing.  So while it is no Blow Out, Scarface or Carlito’s Way, this is some damn fine pulp entertainment.

Rating: 9/10





Top Movies

1. Munich
2. Big Hero 6
3. Snake Eyes
4. The Bank Job
5. Close Encounters Of The Third King
6. Justice League: Crisis On Two Earths
7. Kick-Ass 2

- Tom Lorenzo