Category: review

Well, I saw the third (and likely final) installment in the “Bourne” series, following “The Bourne Identity” and “The Bourne Supremacy.” For those that remember, Matt Damon plays Jason Bourne, a CIA assassin that is still recovering from amnesia and trying to piece the remainder of his life together. For the previous two movies, the CIA was out to get him and take him out, as they a). weren’t sure what he remembered about how they screwed him over, or b). just wanted to close the door on a bad chapter of their operations overseas.

“The Bourne Ultimatum” picks up generally after “Supremacy” with Bourne inching closer and closer to the truth behind what he did for the CIA and why they were after him. Of the trilogy, I think this one is by far the strongest. The first one was very cerebral, and got kinda boring occasionally… I just watched “Supremacy” again yesterday and, as I remembered, it was a bit more fast-paced and more interesting to watch. “Ultimatum” really brings in the best of both the previous films, where it shows Bourne staying a few steps ahead of his predators, while also getting information he needs to really bring them down once and for all.

I won’t say much more about the story, as you probably shouldn’t know if you’ve seen the previous films. It’s almost required that you at least see “Supremacy” before seeing “Ultimatum,” but “Identity” is still worth watching. The action, on the other hand, I will comment on…and it’s rather awesome… The complaint I’ve always had about the “Bourne” films is that the fight scenes are very close-range, as in, you’ll be focused in on Matt Damon’s shoulder and fists during the scene, and you wish they’d just zoom out a bit to get a better feel for what’s going on. I think “Ultimatum,” while still not quite the way I’d like it, was better than the previous ones in that regard. Everything was well choreographed and a pleasure to watch, like they were dancing through all the dodges and punches.

So yeah, Rotten Tomatoes has “The Bourne Ultimatum” ranked at 93% (as of 8/12/07), and it’s pretty well-deserved. If you like spy movies and action, check it out. Matt Damon, again, proves what he’s capable of…

…now, if only Ben Affleck had some talent…

So for those who didn’t hear my story of woe, I tried seeing “Transformers” on the 4th of July at the Des Peres Wehrenberg Theater. There were a few “projector issues” at the beginning (of course, after sitting through commercials and previews…), but the movie got started about 10 min late. Then, about 2 hrs into the 2.5 hr movie, it died. And by “died,” I mean that screwdrivers and wrenches were coming out in the projection booth. Needless to say, we were not pleased with this development, but were given passes to see it again at another time…

…so we saw it again last night, but this time at the Wehrenberg Galaxy theater, where they have digital projection and a “Mega Screen” (not as big as IMAX, but noticeably bigger). Now, this is the way to watch a special-effects ridden movie, lemme tell ya… It’s like the jump from 25″ standard-def and TV speakers to 50″ high-def with THX-certified surround…

Oh yeah, so the movie itself was quite good, even with having to see the first 2 hours twice. The story (simplified) is about bad-guy robots that are after information a guy contains, and then good-guy robots (nearly all of which come from General Motors vehicles…) are protecting him. There’s plenty of comedy (you know, when your car starts chasing you and helping you get dates…things like that…) and plenty of action, whic is to be expected. The story itself makes a general amount of sense, and translates relatively well from the 1980s television show to the big screen.

The special effects have been described as “the best ever” for a movie, and while I’m not sure if they’re the absolute best, they come damn close… The acting, on the other hand, I’m unsure about. The main character, Shia LaBeouf, was really good and makes me excited for “Indiana Jones 4,” where he’ll play Indy’s son. A few other bit part actors were alright, but then there were others that seemed to either “call in” their performance, or were just given crappy lines…including Jon Voight, Anthony Anderson, and John Turturro. It’s not like they were acting badly, but something seemed a bit “off” about their performances…amongst others…

Anyway, it was a great action movie with damned incredible special effects…to the point that, frequently, the Autobots looked very realistic. It was only in that last climactic fight scene where I really started noticing the CGI effects, when you’re getting really close in with the actors and the robots… Still looked good, but wasn’t perfect…

If you plan on seeing the movie at all, you need to see it in the theater… Otherwise, you can borrow the DVD from me when I buy it in a few months… 😛

We saw the new Michael Moore flick, “Sicko,” last night at the Chase Plaza Theater. A guy played an organ before the movie started and I could buy a beer at the concession stand…and after the matinee movies started, they brought out the full bar for mixed drinks… I think we’ll be going back there… 😛

The movie itself is a documentary about the health care “system” here in the United States, about corporate profits and buyoffs of government officials, about how people in the middle class that had insurance were denied claims, and about how socialized health care (i.e. Canada, France, England) isn’t the evil that the right-wing wants us to believe.

Personally, I thought the movie was really, really well done. The main criticism of the film, however, is that it’s “one-sided” and that the health care industry as a whole doesn’t have the opportunity to rebutt. In my opinion however, after seeing what was presented in the movie, I find it hard to believe that an argument against these claims even exists. One is that socialized medicine will mean longer waits and less choice over doctors. Moore goes to Canada and shoots that one down quickly (20 min to 1 hr waits at any hospital). One is that, due to socialized medicine, you get higher taxes. He goes to France and shows a couple that makes the equivalent of $100,000, pays their taxes, and still travels all over the world (i.e. Sri Lanka, of all places…), has a new plasma TV, leather couches, etc. Another criticism is that doctors don’t make as much in Canada or England as they do here. Yeah…they still drive Audis that sell for $50,000 here…

Also, the movie isn’t all about health care. For much of the movie, he discusses other socialized systems in goverment. For example, in France, if you have a job, you get 5 weeks off a year minimum. That’s full-time or part-time. It’s required. If you’re sick, you get to take time off…paid… 65% from the government, 35% from the business. A guy had cancer, took three months off and went to the south of France…and was paid the whole time. It’s just a different mentality over there, and they’re all about preventative care.

So yeah, it was good, and I think the arguments were well thought-out and thoroughly established…let alone the fact that it was a highly entertaining and funny movie, too. It was also pretty depressing. Without explaining completely, let me just say that Moore takes some sick people to Cuba…and they get better treatment…and cheaper drugs… The examples of what people have to go through here, and that living somewhere else (and not necessarily in poverty) gets you better health coverage, is simply sad.

Thus, I ask you…see if you can find some rebuttals to this movie (whether you agree with them or not), ’cause I’m rather curious what could possibly shoot down what I saw. Sure, I bet Moore did some picking and choosing as to the examples he showed, but obviously we aren’t getting the whole story from our government (i.e. crazy right-wing Republicans) or the media (i.e. FOX News)…

Edit: CNN ran a little blurb about the film bringing up “fudged” facts… For those that care, Moore got to respond to it to Wolf Blitzer right after it aired, and then posted a full retort on his website later. Moore’s response to Blitzer is somewhat entertaining in the beginning, but his response on his website includes full citations for his claims about the report CNN ran just before his interview. If you have concerns about Moore’s statistics, it’s worth a read.

First of all, I’ve only seen the original “Die Hard” and neither of the other sequels, but I went and saw the fourth installment, “Live Free or Die Hard” anyway… (note: that title, by the way, seems to make very little sense given the plot of the movie…)

The movie centers on a group of hackers that are trying their best to bring down the entire U.S. infrastructure, and take advantage of the confusion to get rich. The only thing that stands in their way? Bruce Willis. And, for a guy that may be 80 years old by now, he still kicks crazy ass… Justin Long (whom you know from the “Mac and PC” commercials) is also quite entertaining as Willis’ plucky young side-kick, and Timothy Olyphant (he’s been in a few movies, including the up-coming “Hitman“…) is the crazy bad guy… The acting was perfectly fine, but I was really only there to see Bruce kill people and blow stuff up…and, by golly gee whiz, he sure did… (note: Kevin Smith also has a nice cameo…glad to see that genius is keeping busy…)

I was also rather impressed about the effects, in general. The only thing that was obviously CGI was the F-35 they sent after Willis…which he subsequently destroyed… All the rest looked like it involved old-fashioned pyrotechnics and guns, which is always welcome in today’s more “modern” action films…

Overall, the movie is a big explosion fest, with an ample amount of comedy interspersed, to boot. If you’re a fan of the series, I’m sure you’ll love it…and if you have never watched the others, this one will still be more than entertaining enough for you… Don’t expect anything Oscar-worthy, but then again, I’d imagine most fans of the “Die Hard” series (or action movies, in general…) couldn’t care any less…

Go buy some popcorn and see it… Then go see “Sicko“… 😉

So, if you’re read any reviews for “Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End,” you’ve seen that they’re somewhat mixed, and honestly, I think I agree.

While the acting and effects were just as good as either of the previous iterations, the story was all over the place, to the point that I really didn’t know what was going on for half the movie…and when a movie is nearly 3 hours long, that “half the movie” quickly becomes 1.5 hrs. I don’t like being that confused for so long… As other reviewers have stated, much of this confusion comes from the fact that you don’t really know who’s on whose side until the very end of the movie…and even then, it isn’t completely clear… Then again, the double/triple-agents amongst each side are to be expected, as we are dealing with a movie about pirates…

But then again, there were plenty of laugh-out-loud moments and at least some of the charm of the original made it through the second movie and into the third. I think the trouble for me comes in deciding whether this movie was better than the second one or not. Many were disappointed by the ending in the second movie, especially after following a mostly stand-alone first movie (and in my review of “Dead Man’s Chest,” I correctly compared this series to what was done with “The Matrix”…), and I can’t say that this third movie leaves me feeling all that much better. In all honesty, I still wasn’t completely satisfied with the ending of this one – but if you want some peace in your life, wait until after the credits for one additional, and useful, scene…

So, did I generally enjoy the movie? Yeah, I guess… Will I buy it when it comes out on DVD to complete my collection? Absolutely… But was it better than “Spider-Man 3?” Nope…

So, if you’re read any reviews for “Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End,” you’ve seen that they’re somewhat mixed, and honestly, I think I agree.

While the acting and effects were just as good as either of the previous iterations, the story was all over the place, to the point that I really didn’t know what was going on for half the movie…and when a movie is nearly 3 hours long, that “half the movie” quickly becomes 1.5 hrs. I don’t like being that confused for so long… As other reviewers have stated, much of this confusion comes from the fact that you don’t really know who’s on whose side until the very end of the movie…and even then, it isn’t completely clear… Then again, the double/triple-agents amongst each side are to be expected, as we are dealing with a movie about pirates…

But then again, there were plenty of laugh-out-loud moments and at least some of the charm of the original made it through the second movie and into the third. I think the trouble for me comes in deciding whether this movie was better than the second one or not. Many were disappointed by the ending in the second movie, especially after following a mostly stand-alone first movie (and in my review of “Dead Man’s Chest,” I correctly compared this series to what was done with “The Matrix”…), and I can’t say that this third movie leaves me feeling all that much better. In all honesty, I still wasn’t completely satisfied with the ending of this one – but if you want some peace in your life, wait until after the credits for one additional, and useful, scene…

So, did I generally enjoy the movie? Yeah, I guess… Will I buy it when it comes out on DVD to complete my collection? Absolutely… But was it better than “Spider-Man 3?” Nope…

So, as of right now, “Spider-Man 3” is ranking something like 62% at Rotten Tomatoes, indicating that the feelings of critics are somewhat mixed…largely, they’re comparing the third iteration of the franchise to “Spider-Man 2,” a movie that garners 93% at the same site.

After seeing the movie myself, I can understand some of the criticisms. Yes, there are a lot of characters and a lot of villains, and these don’t have the depth that the characters did in the previous two films. Yes, it is a little long, clocking in at around 2.5 hrs. And yes, the overall moral and point of the story can get somewhat muddled (but really isn’t that hard to discern)…

But to these, and others, I confidently reply: so what? Personally, after waiting 3 years for another “Spider-Man” movie, I wasn’t disappointed. I didn’t look at my watch until 2 hrs into the film, which is pretty good. I was able to follow the storyline(s) pretty easily, and didn’t feel like much more was needed for each…except for Venom, of course… The action sequences were still top notch, and the acting was just as good as the previous movies. There were even more comedic breaks throughout that had the entire theater laughing. For those of us wanting to see Spider-Man swing across the big screen again, you won’t be disappointed.

Now, don’t get me wrong…the movie wasn’t perfect… Sam Raimi (the director) said recently that the entire “Venom” story line should have been broken up into two films: get with the black, alien, costume…get rid of it after you find out it’s evil…give it to Eddie Brock…then have another movie where you deal with the new enemy (i.e. Venom). Raimi was “strongly encouraged” to include Venom in this film by the movie studio, and it shows – more could have been done with Venom as a character, with lots more development. He’s really only in there in that final fight sequence as an afterthought, but at least the sequence was relatively bad-ass… The entire Sand Man character was set up and he did his thing, but he wasn’t terribly necessary… And the New Goblin was a necessary evil, I think, to tie up that thread that started way back in the first movie. Really, I would have just done away with Sand Man and stuck completely with Venom…yet then again, it may have been best to have Sand Man in this one and develop Venom, but not actually fight him until the fourth movie… Either way, something different probably should have been done between those two villains, yet they were still fun to see…

So yeah, in the end, I thought it was pretty good. As good as the previous two? Probably not…but certainly not as bad as some reviewers make it out to be. If you liked the previous ones, or you’re a fan of the comics, you’ll enjoy seeing Peter’s turn to the “dark side” with the black costume, as many of us have waited for since the beginning… And in the end, the movie isn’t left hanging for a fourth, yet there are enough “open doors” available to make it worth doing. Then again, if Raimi will just get messed with again, do we really want another one done?

Just look at the Batman franchise (pre-“Batman Begins“)…

In short: 300 was bad-ass…

The movie is based on a graphic novel by Frank Miller (of Sin City fame…), which was based on the Battle of Thermopylae where King Leonidas of Sparta led 300 warriors into a hopeless battle against hordes of Persians led by King Xerxes, eventually paving the way for a more united Greece to defeat Persia in the Battle of Plataea.

Much like Sin City, 300 was styled like a comic book, but to a lesser degree. This story had a coherent plot that flowed through the duration of the film (unlike City). The effects effortlessly transitioned between all-digital and all-real, yet relied heavily on a green screen for the majority of the movie. The acting was rather good, despite having very, very few “big name actors”…actually, there were people you’d recognize, but certainly no one I knew by name… Either way, the fight scenes were very cool, using the obligatory “slow motion” fights frequently, but not that often… It was certainly a violent movie, but that wasn’t unexpected.

The thing that grabbed me the most was the sense of “legend” that the movie evoked. To many Greeks who heard of the battle later, they were inspired to fight for their freedom and democracy as they never had before. Hence, you could imagine that some “details” were exaggerated to a certain degree. For example, Xerxes was noticeably taller than Leonidas. As in…giant-sized… The elephants and rhinos were ten times the size of real ones. You get the idea that, in describing the battle to later generations, the details got a bit more glorious and heroic…and the movie is based more on the exaggerations rather than what actually may or may not have happened. This is how legends are born, after all.

My one complaint was that the Queen seemed like she was used a bit more heavily than she should have been. She was close to Leonidas and stayed behind to try and rally support amongst the Spartan elders, to get more soldiers sent to help Leonidas. I guess her character was being used to try and connect Sparta with the battle, allowing for breaks between the fight scenes…but in the end, her efforts just seemed to be kinda useless… I’m not really sure what her purpose was in the whole deal, besides making some connection between the politics in Sparta and the battle at hand.

So yeah, it was pretty awesome, methinks…well-deserving the $70 million (est.) it took in on opening weekend. If you like action movies, this’ll fit the bill quiite nicely.

So, I haven’t gotten to see any movies, since Casino Royale…and that was many months ago… Anyway, I’d been looking forward to a good escapist story at the theaters…yet I’m not sure I can say Ghost Rider is what I was looking for…

The story is based on the relatively popular Ghost Rider stories from Marvel Comics where a man, Johnny Blaze (Nicholas Cage), sells his soul to the devil to save his father’s life… The devil betrays him (surprise, surprise…) and Blaze gets rather pissed… Anyway, in selling his soul, he now has to do the devil’s bidding to get his soul back. In the movie, there are some power hungry fallen angels who want souls on Earth, so the Ghost Rider is called upon to take them out.

…predictably…

As in, there are four baddies, each of which has a different elemental power, of sorts. So do all four attack the Rider at once? Nope. He fights one while the others get away. He fights another one, while the others get away. The final two find out that Blaze has a girlfriend, kidnaps her, then lures the Rider to the climactic battle at the end of the movie.

So yeah, the movie wasn’t surprising in the least, which wasn’t really unexpected, but at the same time, I would have liked to see a bit more creativity in the story. The effects were relatively decent, but the CGI flaming skull that replaced Nic Cage’s head just looked fake the whole time. Perhaps lighting his head on fire for real would have been better? 😛

Anyway, the movie wasn’t terrible, and was alright to see in theaters, but I certainly won’t be buying it. It was a formulaic story with halfway decent acting and effects. Nothing to write home about…

…guess I’ll just have to wait for TMNT and Spider-Man 3… w00t!