Movies Watched The Week of 4/19 - 4/25

Hello everybody, we’re back and bringing the hotness.  Some real interesting movies here, some great pieces of work and a disappointing if interesting sequel.  All I know if you goofy bastards should watch them all (save the sequel, watch the prior entries first) and enrich your lives with good movies.  And with the last movie of the week here, I never wanna hear the critique that I only like gritty movies again.  So enjoy and thanks for visiting yet again.

Blackthorn (April 19th, 2015)

Director: Mateo Gil

Starring: Sam Shephard, Eduardo Noriega, Stephen Rea, and Nikolai Coster Waldeau 

Man, it’s always a pleasure to see a really good western, especially one made in recent times.  They always have the potential to be gorgeous looking movies and have worlds where shooting first badasses fit right in.  Good westerns are rare nowadays, with only a handful having come out since the new millennium dawned.  So it’s with great enjoyment to say that this is a great western, and a bit of a revisionist history western.  This is a movie that posits a world where Butch Cassidy didn’t die down in Bolivia and has reached old age.  Than in and of itself is interesting enough, so adding Sam Shephard playing Butch is a masterstroke.  Because to have reached old age in the west as a badass means you have to REALLY be a badass.  And Sam Shephard playing a crotchety old bastard is a great sight.  And the story itself is great, flashing back in time to show his friendship with Sundance and compare it to his burgeoning friendship with Noriega and how they are fundamentally different.  It’s kind of like The Godfather Part II to Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid.  I won’t ruin the surprises, even though it isn’t a twist kind of movie, but it’s a movie that is great to just experience fresh.  The portrayal of Butch in this is as an old man who has changed from the wild cad he was in the day.  He has land and is content with his existence.  But he can still bring out his old tricks of the trade when need be.  Aside from some little pacing issues, this is fantastic.  Shephard is brilliant, the visuals are gorgeous and the story is surprisingly poignant.  Highly recommended.

Rating: 9.5/10

 Life Of Crime (April 23rd, 2015)

Director: Daniel Schechter

Starring: John Hawkes, Yasiin Bey, Jennifer Aniston, and Tim Robbins

Elmore Leonard, for the most part, makes some pretty enjoyable movies.  Sure, there’s the occasional The Big Bounce.  Usually though, we can expect a good time at the very least from an adaptation of the mans work.  And that’s what we get here, a modest but enjoyable adaption of one of his books.  It’s a bit of an odd one too, since it focuses on two characters who appeared in Jackie Brown, Ordell Robie and Louis Garra, despite not being set in that same world.  Where Sam Jackson and Robert DeNiro played the two, respectively, in Jackie Brown, we got Yasiin Bey and John Hawkes this time out.  It’s set in the 70s and the two have a plan to kidnap Jennifer Anniston, who is married to thieving land dealer Tim Robbins, for a ransom.  But things, as usual in Leonard stories, don’t go to plan.  But unlike most other of his stories, this one doesn’t end in blood.  It’s low key and charming, with nothing really special to stand out.  Where properties like Jackie Brown and Justified manage to feel like his Leonard, they also elevate them for the form and give them some flair.  But this feels more like a straight, reverent adaptation.  Which is fine, but not classic status.  The direction is decent enough, but it’s the cast that makes this work.  Hawkes is the standout, really making Louis feel like a lovable doofus we all know.  Bey channels some Sam Jackson in the role and makes it work.  Anniston is decent enough in her role as the sad house wife.  It’s filled with Leonard characters which will always be more interesting than the vast majority than most crime flicks.  Fun enough, but nothing to beat the door down for.

Rating: 8/10

Psycho III (April 25th, 2015)

Director: Anthony Perkins

Starring: Anthony Perkins, Diana Scarwid, Jeff Fahey, and Roberta Maxwell

Psycho II was a lot better than it had any right to be.  It could have been cheap cash crab to capitalize on the 80s slasher boom, but it really stood out as a real character study of Norman Bates trying to stay sane.  It felt like Hitch and a worthy follow up to the original.  Or in Tarantinos mind, better than the original.  And with the ending it had, it wasn’t a surprise to see a sequel.  But sadly, I have to report that it isn’t very good.  It’s not bad or a trainwreck or anything.  But it feels very repetitive and half assed. It has some low key, slasher movie charms to it but it doesn’t really work very well.  Perkins isn’t as good this time out as Bates, only really coming to play fully in fleeting moments.  And as a director, he leaves a little to be desired.  Some flat visuals and uninspired kill scenes don’t amp up the energy.  There’s some good stuff here, mainly in the reworking of some of the retconning from the last one.  And there’s some interesting stuff with Scarwid’s character, who reminds him of Marion Crane from the original.  And it has Jeff Fahey, who is always a pleasure to watch, even though his character doesn’t really work.  The ending is great though, a fitting end to the Bates legacy.  I’d say see it just to see Norman one last time, chronologically.  But don’t get your hopes up.

Rating: 5/10

Stardust (April 25th, 2015)

Director: Matthew Vaughn

Starring: Charlie Cox, Claire Danes, Michelle Pfeifer, and Robert DeNiro

Matthew Vaughn really hasn’t made a bad movie.  It’s really crazy to look at his career, a man who worked with Guy Ritchie for a while and then broke off on his own with a solid Ritchie esque movie in Layer Cake.  Since then, he’s been doing comic book movies, essentially origin stories, and has been getting better each time (with a minor slip with Kick-Ass).  And most people would kill to have this on the their filmography, because it would be their best flick.  But for him, this is his third best and that’s nuts.  This is a really great movie. It’s like his version of a more comic booky The Princess Bride.  Funny and thrilling and wholly original, this is a wild ride.  And being based off a Neil Gaiman book, that’s totally fitting.  He gets great stuff from his cast, discovering future Daredevil Charlie Cox, bringing Claire Danes back to the public with a charming performance, and a hilariously fey performance by DeNiro as a gay pirate.  The romance at play here is actually very effective and is due in most part to Danes and Cox.  Despite some rough CGI and effects work, on a whole it’s a gorgeous looking movie.  But most of all, it’s funny.  And while it’s laugh out loud the whole time, it does have stakes and is very effecting.  Great flick and another example of Vaughns work as a master popcorn filmmaker.

Rating: 9.5/10

Top Movies

1. Stardust

2. Blackthorn

3. Life Of Crime

4. Psycho III

- Tom Lorenzo

Movies Watched The Week of 4/12 - 4/18

Hello gang.  Welcome back to the newest and kinda light edition of my weekly jerk off sesh.  It's a smaller amount of choices this week because I have a life god dammit and works is bullshit and all that jazz.  But nothing bad here and some really great elements in each.  So sit back on this particularly lazy Sunday and enjoy my thrown together ramblings about these movies.

A Most Violent Year (April 13th, 2015)
Director: JC Chandor

Starring: Oscar Isaac, Jessica Chastain, Albert Brooks, and David Oyelowo

JC Chandor doesn’t make typical movies.  He’ll take a plot that could be a bit more entertaining in someone else’s hands, but slows them down and makes character pieces out of them.  Like his last flick All Is Lost.  That was a movie that was about Robert Redford getting stranded on a sinking boat in the ocean.  It’s very similar in plot to Gravity, but it is much slower and has virtually no dialogue and Redford is the only character we see.  And with this newest movie from him, we could have gotten a seedier and most violent tale than he gave us.  Especially with a title like A Most Violent Year, one wouldn’t begrudge him for going a bit bloodier.  But he holds off the baser elements of the story and rather shows the simpler moments and existential crisis’ of Oscar Isaacs Abel Morales.  Abel runs an oil company, and he is dealing with multiple crisis’ at the same time.  He is about to spend a ton of money and a bank loan on a new piece of land to expand his business.  But that is threatened with the news of a criminal investigation into his business, being chosen as the whipping boy for the widespread Oil company corruption of the day.  All the while, he is dealing with hijackings of his trucks, costing him money.  And the whole movie is essentially Abel trying to deal with all these problems without going dirty, especially when his mafia princess wife Anna (Jessica Chastain) is needling him to do so.  I really dug this movie, even if it is really slow.  Almost painfully slow, but Isaac and Chastain are magnetic enough to keep it watchable.  And the idea of a man trying his damnedest to get along on his talent without trying to cheat the game is cool enough.  I will say I think the movie kinda gets a bit muddled with the message at the end.  But that’s fine, it’s not crippling.  It works within the story.  But it is a movie with greater ambitions, bringing to mind in terms of visuals and tone The Godfather movies.  It doesn’t reach those immense heights, but it’s a good enough movie.  As a way to show off the talents of the two main actors it’s a good showcase. The story and hands is good if not totally fulfilling.

Rating: 8.5/10

The Babadook (April 17th, 2015)
Director: Jennifer Kent
Starring: Essie Davis and Noah Wiseman

A tough little movie to review as I liked it but it was very frustrating.  It’s almost obnoxiously slow paced.  Nothing happens for the more than half the movie.  And there’s only two real characters in the thing, the mother and the son.  The son is an obnoxious piece of human shit, an untethered little shit that goes to show that some kids need a beating every know and then.  And the mother is a push over, this woman completely unable to admit that there’s a problem with not just her son but herself.  And even when shit goes down, it goes down in such a low budget way that the movie can be really silly if you’re not into it.  But by the end of the movie, I kinda liked what it did.  Even though I liked it and was into it, it is a bit silly.  But the overarching idea of the movie being about a woman so racked with grief that she’s let her life fall apart having to literally fight her demons is interesting enough, what horror movies should do more of.  Use the monsters of your movies to reach higher than simple bloodshedding thrills.  And if you aren’t into the movie, the two characters can be obnoxiously unlikeable.  But if you tune into the movies wavelength, you can empathize with this woman and the hellion she has spawned.  But above all else, The Badadook himself is a visually cool monster.  The imagery is really good stuff.  It’s a good movie that could have used a little tightening and maybe a  some more thrills in it, but it’s a good little horror flick.  Much better than It Follows. 

Rating: 8/10

Batman vs Robin (April 18th, 2015)
Director: Jay Oliva
Starring: Jason O'Mara, Stuart Allan, Jeremy Sisto, and Sean Maher

Blah blah blah, another home run from DC.  If you read this, you know how I feel about DC’s animated offerings.  This isn’t the one to disappoint.  Being a direct sequel to Son of Batman, this is a step up.  May not reach Flashpoint or Throne of Atlantis, but it’s really fucking good.  Taking inspiration from Grant Morrisons Batman run and Scott Snyders New 52 run, this is a much more streamlined story with a better emotional core than Son of Batman.  Dealing with the relationship between Bruce and Damian in a much more interesting and emotionally resonant way than before, this actually has a nice little heart to it.  And the action is superb, and continuing the push towards completely unsuitable for children violence.  The voice acting is really solid as usual and the visuals are as well.  It’s just a great movie and a real treat for fans.

Rating: 9.5/10






Top Movies

1. Batman vs Robin
2. A Most Violent Year
3. The Babadook

- Tom Lorenzo

Movies Watched The Week of 4/5 - 4/11

Good morning Vietnam.  Or night I should say.  Yeah, life pushed this back a little bit for me, but not too far back that I didn’t get it done so shut up naysayers.  And for all the whiny shitbirds around, not as many 8s on the roster.  Good week on the dock, so enjoy it.  Or not.  Fucking ingrates.

Wild Card (April 5th, 2015)

Director: Simon West

Starring: Jason Statham, Milo Ventimiglia, Michael Angarano, and Stanley Tucci

Rating: 8.5/10

The Driver (April 8th, 2015)
Director: Walter Hill
Starring: Ryan O'Neal, Bruce Dern, Isabelle Adjani, and Ronee Blakely

Rating: 9.5/10

Top Five (April 9th, 2015)
Director: Chris Rock
Starring: Chris Rock, Rosario Dawson, JB Smoove, and Gabrielle Union

Someone needs to tell comedians to stop trying to be Louis CK.  He’s a good comedian and all, his show is unique and has it’s moments.  But only he can do that.  No one else can be Louis.  So Chris Rock trying to make a movie as if Louis did is really just annoying.  It feels simultaneously authentic and manufactured, a man trying to tell a personal story in such a copied way.  And it’s not even the original a story, basically having Chris Rock play an alcoholic version of Eddie Murphy, a once legendary stand up stuck in a rut of awful comedies.  One of the problems I have with the movie is it just tells us these things about Chris Rock, never really selling it as true.  Like his alcoholism.  They make it seem like he was as bad a drunk as Richard Pryor was, despite him saying his low point was watching Cedric The Entertainer have sex with two women he just had sex with.  It’s trying to be funny, but it undercuts what it wants to be a serious problem for the character.  It also tells us he was funny once, despite never really showing it.  He’s a bitter, sarcastic asshole the whole movie who has some nice little quips but never really comes off as funny.  They could have just shown us old clips of Rock standup to do some work there, but then he does a little bit at the end of the movie that just doesn’t land.  Maybe all of this would have worked if Rock didn’t star, since he isn’t a good actor.  He’s not bad, but he’s just unable to do anything but be Chris Rock on stage.  Trying to emote anything, he comes off as stiff. Especially when he’s paired with Rosario Dawson, an amazing performer who runs circles around him with a bit of a shit part of the woman with a secret who loves Rock for no other reason than they have to fall in love.  Despite the lack of a charismatic lead, the movie is ok.  The basic plot is a less interesting version of Funny People, but it’s fine enough.  And the message of balancing being yourself with doing what works is a solid enough idea. The satire of the industry has it’s moments but usually just falls into childish bitterness.  The supporting cast is great, picking out a bunch of really talented black comedic actors to fill the world out and make it feel more real than the entertainment side of the story.   I don’t know.  It’s not bad, just really flawed and a little too indebted to other mens work.  It has it’s moments and is better than Chris Rocks other movies, but it falls short of soaring like it could have. 

Rating: 7/10

Predestination (April 11th, 2015)
Directors: The Spierig Brothers
Starring: Ethan Hawke, Sarah Snook, and Noah Taylor

This is a total mindfuck of a movie.  For one, it is not what I expected at all.  The structure of the movie is so different than what you would assume a time travel kind of action movie would be.  I really don’t wanna say anything else about the movie, because going in cold is the best way to do it.  All one needs to know is that Ethan Hawke plays a time cop and he has a mission.  Things don’t play out the way you would expect at all, and it’s a ride.  Based off a Robert Heinlein story, that’s to be expected.  The only other movie like it would be 12 Monkeys.  And while it doesn’t hit the highs of 12 Monkeys, it comes damn close.  An original fucking movie that should shut up any jagoffs constantly complaining about the death of cinema and/or comic book movies.  Damn shame it didn’t get the coverage or discussion it deserved.  I think it’ll have legs and be discovered down the road.

Rating: 9/10













Top Movies

1. The Driver
2. Predestination
3. Wild Card
4. Top Five

- Tom Lorenzo

Movies Watched The Week of 3/29 - 4/4

Happy Easter gang.  Yes, I am back on schedule this week, having risen from the cavernous shit hole that is my work schedule to save you all from some shitty think pieces on why eating chocolate and not white chocolate on Easter is problematic.  I actually had a fucking busy week here with the cinema picks, and it was really good.  There’s one movie that is most definitely going to drop in rating as time moves on, but I gotta say that I’m glad to have seen all this flicks.  So give it a go on this holiday, celebrating it or not.  Peace. 

It Follows (March 29th, 2015)

Director: David Robert Mitchell

Starring: Maika Monroe, Keir Gilchrist, Daniel Zovatto, and Lili Sepe

I always have hope that a horror movie I’m about to watch will at least be entertaining.  It’s a little naive to think that you can get smart horror a good deal of the time, mainly because horror is cheap and doesn’t attract as much intellect anymore.  But then there’s times when one with something on the brain and it’s a nice breathe of fresh air.  Then theres the even rarer times when a movie like that doesn’t really hit the mark completely, leaving a disappointing flavor in your mouth.  And It Follows is a movie like that, a well made movie on the technical aspect but leaves a good deal to be desired in the meat of the movie, story and character and such.  The plot of the movie is simple yet convoluted and not really delved into all that deeply.  There’s this supernatural killing machine ghost type thing that only haunts someone, trying to kill them.  The way that person gets haunted by It is sex.  Simple enough and an obvious metaphor for STDs.  But the movie really doesn’t get too deep into the actual reality of the situation, just lounging about a bit with a few “scare” scenes thrown in.  The movie really feels like an overlong 1st act, really just dragging everything along at a snails pace.  It doesn’t help at all that only one other person gets tagged in the movie after the main girl (Monroe).  So it’s all just a slog of watching this girl try to not be electro fucked by It.  And It is a lame element too, as it just shows up as a person in white attire usually and slowly walks at you.  It has the same basic plan of attack as Michael and Jason, without any change despite being inherently supernatural and stealth.  The fact that it doesn’t strike when sleep is being had, is really fucking stupid.  And the end is a little too silly, going into this ridiculous climax in a pool that’s very anticlimactic, leaving a lot too be desire within. None of this would be a problem if you cared about anybody, but everyone is just a blank slate, typical cardboard cutouts of typical horror characters.  And the main girl is just an absolute blank, someone whose fate we’re supposed to care about despite being as empty a vessel as a Terminator.  I know it sounds like I’m being real hard on the movie, but it has to be said.  The movie is aiming for higher standards than simple entertainment.  It has themes on the brain, though it’s a bit scatterbrained.  It wants to be a more progressive version of a horror movie, but it still has the old school vibe of having sex you deserve to die.  And it gets even weirder, since Monroe gets It in a scene that kinda devolves into a scene shot like a rape scene.  It’s muddled and all the problems really coalesce into a crippling outcome.  But there is plenty of good within the movie.  But it’s all really technical stuff.  The movie is gorgeous to look at, shot with utmost precision.  The score is great, a real 80s throwback to the synth days of movie music.  And there are some really good scenes of tension being built, with It wandering in the background without being noticed, giving a slow building sense of dread.  Mitchell must be a fan of Carpenter, since this feels so much like it wants to be Carpenter, down to the shots and the score to even the story.  If I had to make a comparison to what this movie feels like, I would have to say it’s as if Terrence Malick was given a script that was a bastard mix of Halloween and A Nightmare On Elm Street but was told to shoot it like Carpenter.  While watching the movie I was enjoying it, even when it ended I was ok.  But it’s a movie that started to lose its luster as time has gone on.  It hasn’t stuck and many of the scenes are gone from my memory.  I’m gonna be real generous here with my rating, but I’m gonna straight up say that this is more likely than not drop in the future and is solely based on my feelings right when it ended.  

Rating: 8/10

Vertigo (March 30th, 2015)
Director: Alfred Hitchcock
Starring: James Stewart, Kim Novak, Barbara Bel Geddes, and Tom Helmore

Yeah, this is a good movie.  People weren’t wrong.  Shocking, I know.  It’s another in a long line of really well made movies by Hitch, and this one may be the pinnacle of his powers.  What seems like a typical mystery from back in the day becomes something more, a little darker and more unsettling than the norm.  I like that the movie does not fly by the playbook of the usual movies of the genre.  It has a real weird structure, not typical and I like that.  Jimmy Stewart is great as usual, playing a lot darker than normal.  The rest of the cast is great too, many of whom playing depths not seen at the beginning.  And I like that the movie is not a feel good movie, going for the truthful ending of a story like this.  It’s about obsession and grief and fear, all rolled into one ball that crashes together at the end.  Not some of the stuff that goes down towards the end of the movie is a tad bit silly, stuff that requires a little more suspension of disbelief than normal in a movie.  But since it all thematically works, I can give it a pass.  Now the very end, the last scene, is great until what I feel is a bit of a twist for twist sakes punch line.  But it does contain a really great, haunting image in the scene so I can dig it.  It doesn’t kill the movie for me, just made me cock my head to the side a bit in wonder.  I don’t wanna say much more about the movie because I really don’t have much to add to it at this point that hasn’t been said already, and even though its damn near 60 years old I want it to be fresh in peoples minds if they decide to see it.  It’s a great flick, one for all to see.  Do it up. 

Rating: 9/10

Green Zone (March 31st, 2015)
Director: Paul Greengrass
Starring: Matt Damon, Greg Kinnear, Brendan Gleeson, and Amy Ryan

Paul Greengrass is a hell of a filmmaker and is responsible for the worst god damn trend in action movies in the 2000’s.  The shaky cam he brought to the table in The Bourne Supremacy worked fine for him, but brought along a shit ton of imitators that couldn’t do it well at all and it killed a lot of action movies.  He’s got the docu style in his work, and it’s fine, it works.  So when he was reuniting with Damon for an action movie set in Iraq during the search for WMD’s, it sounded like a clone of Bourne but real world.  But Green Zone isn’t that at all.  Damon isn’t playing a super soldier, kicking ass without a worry.  He gets his ass kicked plenty of times.  He isn’t a wimp, but he is out of his depth.  And the movie is a movie-fied version of the search for WMD’s and the truth coming out.  The movie isn’t really an action movie.  It’s a procedural essentially, with Damon trying to find out the truth of what he’s doing.  There’s action within, but not wall to wall and not over the top.  It’s a war flick, with people getting hurt bad.  It’s definitely an R movie.  The movie doesn’t get much love in Greengrass’s career, and that’s a shame.  It’s a solid little movie, playing things really murky about how it all went down.  It’s a morally confused world and I like that.  The action is well done and exciting enough.  Narratively it may get a little too convoluted, but it works itself out in the end.  The only thing negative to say is that it lacks the spark of The Bourne movies or Captain Phillips.  It seems manly like he’s going through the motions, which again is fine.  It’s like Fincher on The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo or Scorsese on Casino.  That and a lack of any other character to really get to know.  Supporting roles aren’t really up to snuff, but it’s about Damon so we can deal.  It’s a fine little movie, and one that works a little better now that the situation in Iraq has gotten as bad as was predicted in a way in this movie.

Rating: 8/10

Psycho II (April 4th, 2015)
Director: Richard Franklin
Starring: Anthony Perkins, Vera Miles, Meg Tilly, and Robert Loggia

There comes a time when a movie is announced and you just kinda know that it isn’t gonna be good.  Shouldn’t be good.  It’s usually a sequel to a movie that told a complete story and doesn’t need any further expanding upon.  And the original Psycho is one of those movies.  How do you sequelize that movie? Well, the 80s came a knocking with a bloodlust for any slasher movie sequel they could find.  And somewhere, young upstart Tom Holland (future creator of Fright Night and Childs Play) had an idea for it, and they made it.  Somefuckinghow, they managed to make a pretty good damn movie that works as a good sequel.  Set 22 years after the original, Norman Bates (a returning Perkins) is deemed sane by the courts and released back into the public.  There is some outcry that he’s too dangerous, but for the most part no one remembers anymore.  Time has marched on and Norman really does wanna be better, tries to escape the past.  The movie than starts to throw some obstacles in his way, testing his mind and really asking can Norman be normal.  The biggest shock in here is that the movie manages to be of a piece with the original, feeling in tone and visuals the same.  Obviously being made in the 80s when the industry was completely changed, there are some differences.  The violence is more graphic, but for the most part not 80s over the top violent (except for one really crazy graphic kill).  And there’s a tad bit of nudity.  But for the most part, fits right in. And despite being an 80s sequel, it’s pretty slow paced and not a gore fest.  There is blood, oh yes.  But it’s saved for the climax for the most part.  Perkins is great in his return to the iconic role, bringing real pathos to a man trying so hard to escape his demons.  Tilly is alright, the one true weak link in the cast, just not up to snuff with the rest of the cast.  And a complaint I have with most movies is that there isn’t enough Dennis Franz.  Honestly, I’m still kinda shocked at how good the movie really was and how natural it all felt. There are some genuine surprises and some good character writing in it, fitting in with the kinda funny and slightly over the top original.  My only issue is it may get a little too busy and twist happy at the end.  But for the most part, it’s really god damn good.  And it has a really great and haunting final image.  I gotta say, if you like the original and/or Bates Motel, you’d really dig this.  And hey, Tarantino likes it more than the original. And we know that mad man has to see something in it. 

Rating: 8/10

Syriana (April 4th, 2015)
Director: Stephen Gaghan
Starring: George Clooney, Matt Damon, Jeffrey Wright, and Chris Cooper

Well the writer of Traffic was given a chance to direct a movie, and he took that chance to make Traffic but with oil instead of drugs.  Which is cool and all, but it gives things a little too much of a convoluted business.  Traffic was busy and had a lot of characters, but it was simple enough in that you knew what everyone was doing and why.  Syriana has the issue of Oil businesses being such a dense and complicated issue that it becomes a bit of a confusing watch.  That and there’s too many side plots that deal with the oil industry, showing way too many sides of the problem.  If it mainly dealt with Clooney, Damon, and Wrights storyline it would be fine.  But there’s a whole terrorist in training subplot that is fine in theory but really drags the movie down since it’s really not that fleshed out.  Kinda just done in broad strokes.  And even the stuff that should have been the focus is a little too mechanical. It wants us to care for some of these guys, by giving Clooney a kid, Damon a dead kid, and Wright an alcoholic father.  But it’s so hackneyed and mechanical and not given enough time to really connect, it’s not as affecting seeing there stories.  The movie is interesting in spite of those things as it shows the ways in which shit goes wrong and how fucking murky and corrupt the world really is.  And for the almost clinical way it shows it this world, I can dig that, even though it dumps us into the deep end of the pool.  It’s a good flick with some damn good performances, but it’s really just a bit too confusing.  It’s fine, but I don’t think most would like it.  It lacks a certain touch of humanity that Traffic had. 

Rating: 8/10






Top Movies

1. Vertigo
2. Psycho II
3. Green Zone
4. Syriana
5. It Follows

- Tom Lorenzo

Movies Watched The Week of 3/22 - 3/28

Well this is a bit embarrassing.  This column is hella fucking late, mainly due to a shit ton of work coming at me.  More work than I could do with writing, so the writing had to take a backseat for a bit.  It’s a short week though, mainly cause I saw a movie that will be on the other websites column in addition to more work than usual.  But it’s a real solid week and should be a good read, even if it isn’t timely.  So enjoy it and I’ll be posting the newest one on time this time. 

The Spectacular Now (March 22nd, 2015)

Director: James Ponsoldt

Starring: Miles Teller, Shailene Woodley, Brie Larson, and Kyle Chandler

Look at that, Miles Teller and Shailene Woodley are actually good performers.  You wouldn’t be too mistaken to actually wonder if they are, thanks to their work in the Divergent fucking movies.  But there was a time before those bland shit pieces were they were up and coming actors making names for themselves.  Not that they’re bad now, Whiplash for Teller being a good showcase and The Fault In Our Stars for Woodley.  Back in the day (2013), they had this coming of age, young love story.  And while that sounds a little too hackey and eye rollingly easy a movie, this isn’t a typical love story.  No, what sets this apart is that it’s kind of a tragedy.  Miles Teller plays Sutter, a free spirited drunk who is always positive but has no anchor in life.  He’s the guy you can see being the pathetic drunk at the bar in the morning, unable to hold down a job and has a kid or two he doesn’t see anymore.  Woodley plays Aimee, a wallflower of sorts who doesn’t have any real agency in her life and lets others decide her choices.  She’s sweet but essentially spineless.  So when these two meet and start a relationship, it’s like watching a slow moving train wreck start to form.  And these two totally sell the roles, making them feel like real kids. They feel like people we all know, and the sadness that runs through them.  It’s a real heartbreaker of a movie, especially for Tellers character. He has the main arc of the flick, seeing exactly what his bullshit does to people and where he may end up.  What he goes through is relatable and painful and not cleaned up at all.  By the time we get to the end, it isn’t exactly a happy ending.  It’s left ambiguous, but a sad future seems to be in store for them.  It’s a really solid movie that overcomes the indie romance tropes it could have easily fallen into.  A nice showcase for these two. 

Rating: 9/10

Run All Night (March 24th, 2015)
Director: Jaume Collet-Serra
Starring: Liam Neeson, Joel Kinnaman, Ed Harris, and Vincent D'Onofrio

With the recent news from Liam that he will be retiring from action movies soon, it’s only fair to go into his newest with some expectations in your mind.  Can this live up to the hype his name brings to a flick that Taken brought, or will it fall to the wayside like the Taken sequels? And what we got is kind of the former, because this isn’t really an action movie.  It’s more of a crime drama.  An apt comparison would be to call it the B movie Road To Perdition.  And it’s carried by Liam and Ed Harris.  Liam plays washed up hitman Jimmy Conlon, racked by the weight and guilt of all the evil he’s done in his life.  The only reason he’s still around and taken care of is because he is essentially brothers with big Irish mob boss Shawn Maguire (Harris).  The relationship between the two feel very lived in and genuine.  You believe these two as brothers and that they’ve live through some shit.  They both have sons that have fallen far from their respective trees.  Jimmys son Mike hates Jimmy for the evil he’s done, so he lives a blue collar life as a limo driver.  Shawns son Danny is a junkie loose cannon with a lot of self worth but no brains.  So when Mike witnesses Danny execute someone, Mike has to run for his life.  Danny gets the drop on him, but Jimmy shows up and kills Danny.  Right then, Jimmy knows his life is over in one way.  He did the one thing that could break his relationship with Shawn and he knows it.  So he’s either gonna die or go to jail.  But he’s gonna save his son before he does.  The movie isn’t a big bag of originality, but it has a really good feel, a nice Irish sadness running through it all.  Guilt hangs heavy over this movie and the past is almost a character in and of itself.  Sollet brings a little flash to the movie and handles the directing duties well enough.  This is no masterpiece, but it stands a lot taller than most of Neesons movies.  Only The Grey and A Walk Among The Tombstones stands taller.  But this is a solid crime flick with great work by Neeson and Harris.

Rating: 8/10

Rope (March 25th, 2015)
Director: Alfred Hitchcock
Starring: James Stewart, John Dall, Farley Granger, and Joan Chandler

Oh Hitch.  He’s one of the biggest directors of all time and he’s iconic, making movies that has lived on for ages.  To be honest, not all of them are great.  He’s made so many movies that he’s gotta have some stinkers.  Off the top of my head, The Birds sucks.  Plenty of good is in there though.  And this is one of them, a nice little experimental film from the man.  Not experimental in the way of being obnoxious or pretentious.  It’s a nice little suspense flick with the experiment of making it look like all one take, basically Birdman but less obnoxious.  It’s simple enough.  Two rich assholes kill one of their friends, just to see if they can do it/get away with it.  They have it in their minds that the higher ups and elite folks in the world should be allowed to kill those lesser than them, so they kill and invite people over to their place to almost rub it in.  The body is still there, yet they wanna get as close to being caught as possible with about being caught.  So the whole movie is a tense little ride of when is the shoe gonna drop, or will it?  The camera trick works pretty well, not too obvious that there are hidden cuts.  It helps heighten the tension as we go along, and it gives the movie a nice low key visual flair.  The cast is good and sells the material well, giving everyone a high falutin sense of entitlement.  Running through the movie is a nice little piece of classism that gives it some weight outside the simple thrills of murder.  This is a solid little flick, a low key one that shows Hitchcock was one of the best technical directors in film. 

Rating: 9/10







Top Movies

1. Rope
2. The Spectacular Now
3. Run All Night

- Tom Lorenzo