Cynical Evaluations of Cinema: Movie Reviews

[Reply #520 on:]

Rise of the Planet of the Apes
Apes have feelings too, and ambitions, and get more screentime than Frieda Pinto or John Lithgow put together (suckas!)
I liked the nods to the original, like the mounted police chasing the apes.
Also, David Hewlett and Tyler Labine, yay!
The CGI was inconsistent in places though, sometimes it looked great, other times just ok-ish.
B

[Reply #521 on:]

The Devils Double
Based on a supposedly true story (some reporters have thrown doubt on his claim) of Latif Yahia, body double (or fedai) to Uday Saddam Hussein.
Dominic Cooper plays both roles well, he's excellent as the psychotic rapist murderer Uday (you know it's bad when your dad Saddam Hussein throws you in prison for being a douche!), and the stony faced Latif, a good man thrown into a bad situation.
Ludivine Sagnier also stars as a love interest for Latif, just another girl belonging to Uday (however they somehow made her look kind of ugly in some scenes with weird make-up).
The story starts when Latif is asked to be his double, refuses and is then beaten and has his family threatened until he co-operates. He then has to learn Udays speech patterns and mannerisms, get surgery and appear in public as him and try not to get assassinated, all while trapped watching the real Udays psychophatic behaviour.
Regardless of the truth of the real life story, it's still a decent film.
B+

[Reply #522 on:]

Johnny English Reborn

I have only seen Johnny English once, and that was years and years ago when I was like 7, so I can't really compare the two.

Anyway, overall it was a good film, some moments were a little too corny and "as if", but overall funny and worth seeing if you want a laugh. As I said, I dunno how different it is to the first one, so dunno if there was any continuity or anything...

Best Scene:

Show spoiler

Johnny's sidekick, Tucker, confronts Agent 1 with Johnny in the bathroom because he knows that he's the thrid member in Vortex. (An assassin group who are the main enemies in the film) Holding him at gun point, 1 starts to tell them bluffs etc, and Tucker starts to lose his patience, then a guy walks into the bathroom and they have to act as if nothing is happening. It's just the awkwardness and the sudden-ness of it that made me laugh out loud. They're all looking at each other with evil eyes and stuff waiting for this guy to finish pissing.

B

[Reply #523 on:]

...but it wasn't funny. Like... at all.

[Reply #524 on:]

It was okay in places...

[Reply #525 on:]

They both have a running gag were Johnny confuses someone with someone else and the

Show spoiler

Bad guy was Johnnys partner in the last film

The last film ended with Johnny and his new girlfriend snogging in a car, and Johnny presses the eject button by mistake and his girlfriend shoots up into the air.. The End..

And in Reborn Nobody talks about her... What the fuck happened to her?

[Reply #526 on:]

Priest

Despite hearing that this was pretty much an epic fail at the box office, I kinda enjoyed it. Generally I worship almost anything that Paul Bettany touches, with a couple of exceptions, and his performance in this was no different for me.

It was a tad very, very clichéd for almost the entire film, and I called almost everything that happened right at the start of the film, but nevertheless, the vampires were pretty cool, the story was good - I like post-apocalyptic world type things - and the side characters weren't too annoying.

Overall, a nice little B- from me. Could have been way worse, but could have been done so much better at the same time.

[Reply #527 on:]

It was okay in places...

I liked the concept of the parkour chase scene, but that was it.

The last film ended with Johnny and his new girlfriend snogging in a car, and Johnny presses the eject button by mistake and his girlfriend shoots up into the air.. The End..

And in Reborn Nobody talks about her... What the fuck happened to her?

They were just doing the James Bond thing of having a different woman every film with no real explanation for what happens to them. It's a Bond spoof after-all.

[Reply #528 on:]

Well I've never seen a full Bond film so I wouldn't get that reference.

[Reply #529 on:]

You don't need to see a full Bond film, you just need to not live under a rock.

Everyone knows that his name is Bond... James Bond.

Everyone knows that Bond likes his martinis shaken, not stirred.

And everyone knows that Bond is a serial womaniser who practically rapes the girls in some of the films.

[Reply #530 on:]

Yes I knew the first two but I just didn't realize James had a new romance in each film

[Reply #531 on:]

And everyone knows that Bond is a serial womaniser who practically rapes the girls in some of the films.

* JoshTheater has On Her Majesty's Secret Service flashbacks.

[Reply #532 on:]

Puss in Boots

Not at all a film for the kiddies I don't think. Really adult-themed but who really is shocked by that knowledge? Puss is like an unofficial sex symbol of the Shrek franchise or something. Pretty meh plot IMO, sometimes a bit choppy and not really confusing per say but a bit muddled? Can't say I'd buy it on DVD nor pay to watch it again. Doubt I'll watch it again even on TV unless nothing else is on.

Meh, 50/100 golden eggs

[Reply #533 on:]

Our Idiot Brother
Not hugely funny, but reasonably charming and featuring a strong cast (Paul Rudd, Liz Banks and Steve Coogan), 'Our Idiot Brother' is easily watchable whilst being easily forgettable.

6/10


Village of the Damned (1960)
A solid horror film with a nice, compact and original concept behind it as well as being quite creepy for a film from 1960. It's not outstanding, but it's an enjoyable little gem and its influence upon films that have followed it undeniable. It certainly pisses all over the (awful) remake.

7/10


Hobo with a Shotgun
I respect it for its genuine ability to make me think "what the fuck am I watching?" at sereval points throughout and some of the jokes were, to be fair, very funny. But, like a new episode of 'The Simpsons', for every genuinely good joke, there were about 12 jokes so awful that they completely quaffed any notion of humour.
It would be fine if the film had something else going for it such as compelling characters or an interesting plot, but everything that needs to be known about the protagonist can be found in the film's title and he's, by far, the most complex character. And as for the plot, it's just 'Taxi Driver' with a hobo instead of a taxi driver and minus all of the artistry and depth.
And you know what, even all of that would be fine if the film was entertaining. Say, for instance, if it was just balls to the walls action-madness, but once you've seen a guy shoot somebody with a shotgun once, you've seen it a hundred times. There's no variety to the hobo's rampage. It's not like he ever shoots something explosive that a bad-guy is stood right next to, or shoots a chain holding up a precariously placed anvil above a bad-guy. It's all just shotgun blows to the chest and then, finally, one to the head. It's dull, quite frankly.

So that would leave a film with pretty much nothing going for it... but to be fair, the cinematography isn't bad. It's not great, either, but it's consistently interesting, which is something. It's hugely inspired by giallo films (although I suspect that it's more inspired by films that were inspired by those films, than being directly inspired by them) and so is full of shots with harsh colour-drenching in bold pastel colours.
And as I said, the film is genuinely bizarre at times. That's got to be worth something, right?
I feel like I should also be praising the score and musical choices in the film, but it all sounded like music from other films that were clearly inspirations to the over-all product. None of it sounded original, and none of it sounded particularly amazing - it just sounded like copyright-escaping rip-off music. So no points there.

'Machete' is essentially the same thing, being an homage to exploitation and revenge flicks of yore with extreme gore and extreme ridiculousness - but played for laughs given that it's now 2011. Also worth noting is that both films are feature-length adaptations of fake trailers for themselves that appeared in 'Grindhouse', although 'Hobo with a Shotgun' only appeared in special cuts of the film as it was the winner of a contest for best spoof trailer held by Rodriguez. But I digress, 'Machete' did the same thing, except for how 'Machete' is entertaining, funny and bad-ass. If you're interested in this film, just watch 'Machete' instead.

5/10


Arthur Christmas
A wasted opportunity in that for all its good ideas and the stuff that it gets right, parts of it are predictable, cliched or just mildly unlikable. It never reaches its full potential, but it has a strong concept to go on and its very much an Aardman production in that whilst it's not really hugely funny, it's incredibly charming.
The character designs are horrible and bland and the animation is boring and dull - it would look nicer if it was Aardman's usual stop-motion rather than CGI, but then I'd feel bad on them for putting so much effort into its look when it needed more effort putting into the script.
The cast is all great - but that doesn't stop the elves all being incredibly annoying due to their obvious character design and chipmunked vocals. But still, James McAvoy does his best to liven up a hideously generic character and Jim Broadbent, Hugh Laurie and especially Bill Nighy bring their usual extremely high quality work to the table.
And I should emphasise what I said before. It's very charming. So it has an interesting concept, a good cast and it's charming. It's far from being anything remarkable, but it's a decent enough effort and the best Christmas family film probably since 'The Nightmare Before Christmas'. And whilst it can't hold a candle to that film, it shits all over 'The Polar Express'.

Worth watching when it inevitably enters a cycle of being on the BBC every Christmas in 2 years time, but not worth making a trip to the cinema for.

7/10


Field of Dreams
A film that's just full to the brim with "what the fuck is this shit?" moments.

It's regarded as a classic, although it seems to be more of a "people's classic" than a film that critics hold in particularly high regard - despite its Oscar nomination for best picture. And given that, it's amazing just how bad this film is.

The horrendously simplistic, Dan Brown-esque dialogue aside, it's just full of things that are too much to take with a grain of salt and enjoy. It's about Kevin Costner as a farmer, and one day he hears voices in his field telling him that "If you build it, they will come". He doesn't seem TOO disturbed by this voice-in-his-head thing, and his wife is supportive of it, so he makes the bizarre jump of logic that he needs to rebuild and old baseball pitch because obviously BASEBALL IS IMPORTANT.
Then he does it and ghosts start to appear. And people who 'believe' can see the ghosts, but cynics like myself can't because fuck us guys who don't live in a sugary world like the one this film is set in where everything is scored like a stock "feel good" film-trailer.
And then a load of boring stuff happens to do with Kevin needing money and going in search of old baseball players and blah blah blah. Then he just goes back in time. For no reason. With no explanation. And he tries to get this guy who became a doctor to follow his dream of being a baseball player instead. So he becomes one of the baseball players in the present.
Then at the end, his daughter falls from a meter or so and everyone is worried that she's dead so the new baseball ghost steps outside of the pitch area - breaking some sort of rule - and turns into a doctor again. He does nothing to the girl, but just says she's fine because she only fell a metre and then walks off smiling - as does basically everyone.
Then Costner's astranged father shows up as a ghost and they play catch in the attempted emotional raping's climax where supposedly everybody cries but not everybody cries because I was too happy that the film was about to end to cry. Not to mention that I wasn't invested in the cardboard characters of the preposterous and nonsensical events surrounding them, anyway.

So yeah. This film is a celebration of the sappy and overly sweet without a shred of irony. That wouldn't bother me if it didn't want me to take baseball ghosts and impromptu time-travel 100% seriously. And don't even get me started on the mildly disturbing over-importance based on the idol-worship of baseball. This film sucks.

4/10

[Reply #534 on:]

I can't believe it, but I actually went to see Twilight: Breaking Dawn Part 1.

If I'm honest, I went to see it because 1. I've read the books and therefore will see the movies on principle - that's just how I roll, and 2. It was a night out with my friends, and who doesn't love seeing their friends?

The movie was bad. Not as bad as it could have been, and nowhere near as bad as the first or second, maybe slightly better than the third.

My main criticism is the acting and the dialogue. For many, many parts in the movie it is so clear that they're reading a scripted movie... there's little passion in a lot of the lines, many of them are delivered with a tone that seems to come out of nowhere, and there's just so much blandness in the characters that I felt awkward watching it. The acting from a few of the cast wasn't bad - Robert Pattinson is a good actor when he's doing any other part but this, and it shone through a few times, Michael Sheen got about 4 lines - right at the end, and they were fabulous in a way that only he can make things, and there's quite a few of the men that play Quileute Wolves that I think are pretty decent and keep to their character well.

Kristen Stewart was as bland and uninteresting as ever, the girl cannot emote to save herself and her dialogue was horrendous at times, not to mention the point
where Bella actually cries and begs Edward for sex. Whatever the hell possessed them to put this in a movie that young girls will see is beyond me, well beyond in another fucking dimension.

There was a pretty decent fight scene at the end that had a little bit of tension to keep me watching with wide eyes, and a fair few funny bits delivered by the supporting cast who really, really need a bigger role in those movies.

All in all, it was bland, a little boring, with a few good bits that cannot compensate for the utter shite that litters the entire movie. Although I was quite fond of Bella's wedding dress, and there are a few members of the cast that I would totally do.

I'm not going to grade it, because it doesn't deserve me having to think of one that I could give it.

[Reply #535 on:]

Bella actually cries and begs Edward for sex.

That's just awful. Wow.
I've heard lots of bad things about Twilight, but I haven't heard anything about that.

[Reply #536 on:]

Nutty: I hope you had this shirt on:

[Reply #537 on:]

30 Minutes or Less
Meh it was ok for a few laughs, robotic-jew-fro (Jesse Eisenbergenheimer) and annoying-intern-from-Scrubs (Aziz Anansi) run around and there's a bomb and they rob the bank and try to foil the bad guys.
Danny McBride plays the same character we've seen already, the hick douchebag.
Michael Pena was pretty good though.

C-

[Reply #538 on:]

Aziz Anansi is on Parks & Rec now.

[Reply #539 on:]

I can't believe it, but I actually went to see Twilight: Breaking Dawn Part 1.

You and I are enemies now.

[Reply #540 on:]

Could be worse, you could have threatened to come to my house and set me on fire. Really, I deserve a fate worse than that for sitting through that shit, but as I said, I went along for the banter.

And sitting making snide comments about the film with my friend whilst we were watching it turned out to be a laugh.

[Reply #541 on:]

The Twilight films are some of the easiest to riff on ever. They're so self-important, serious, and angsty, they're goldmines of comedy.

[Reply #542 on:]

I know for a fact I couldn't riff on a twilight movie, purely because apart from the odd comments that have my friends laughing for ages, I spend most of the movies repeating "What the fuck am I watching?"

[Reply #543 on:]

How is the birth scene? From what I hear it sounds like it is the most interesting thing to ever happen in the Twilight movies. (I like birth scenes if they're scary, don't know why, ever since I watched the birth scene in the Fly I like to see how freaky it can get).

[Reply #544 on:]

It's handled surprisingly well. Lots of blood and shrieking, though you don't actually see what's happening it's pretty damn obvious. I'd say it's about the only time she actually manages to emote properly for the situation that's being depicted.

[Reply #545 on:]

I can't believe it, but I actually went to see Twilight: Breaking Dawn Part 1.

You and I are enemies now.

Awww... are you upset because she didn't wait and go to watch it with you?

[Reply #546 on:]

How is the birth scene? From what I hear it sounds like it is the most interesting thing to ever happen in the Twilight movies. (I like birth scenes if they're scary, don't know why, ever since I watched the birth scene in the Fly I like to see how freaky it can get).

I said it before, David Cronenberg should have directed Breaking Dawn.

[Reply #547 on:]

The Guard
Finally saw this and loved it, Brendan Gleason is fantastic as well as the supporting cast, Don Cheadle as the smooth FBI drugs agent is a good counterpoint to his hilarious Galway bogger cop shenanigans.
Mark Strong, Liam Cunningham and David Wilmot are great together as the three drug smugglers.
Excellent stuff.
A

Limitless
Dang, Bradley Cooper is too handsome to be a loser writer, so he gets a superdrug that makes him smart and stuff, mostly good at stock market and picking up chicks, awesome.
I found it interesting enough, there's kind of an anti-drug message in parts of it (when he's in withdrawal), but then they get confused and he gets back on them and he's awesome again! Cover your kids eyes!
B-

[Reply #548 on:]

How is the birth scene? From what I hear it sounds like it is the most interesting thing to ever happen in the Twilight movies. (I like birth scenes if they're scary, don't know why, ever since I watched the birth scene in the Fly I like to see how freaky it can get).

I said it before, David Cronenberg should have directed Breaking Dawn.

That's too scary of a concept even for David Cronenberg.

[Reply #549 on:]

*BUMP*

The Muppets

Oh my god that was an amazingly awesome movie. So many cameos (Jim Parsons!), so many self-referencing moments, and hilarious jokes (maniacal laugh!), I seriously loved the hell out of this movie. And it is a rare feet for a movie to make me laugh so loud and so hard at a joke, I think I was the only one laughing for a while. Go see this movie!

A+

[Reply #550 on:]

Hell, I'm gonna have to see that. I didn't even know there WAS a new muppets movie.

[Reply #551 on:]

It's been getting ridiculously good reviews (right now it's the best-reviewed Muppets movie on Rotten Tomatoes). I'm going to see it with my sister tomorrow.

[Reply #552 on:]

It doesn't come out until January here apparently. Which sucks because that means we may not be able to see it without cinema-loads of kids. I hope it stays on over Feb when kids are back at school..

[Reply #553 on:]

Jason Siegel definitely did right by The Muppets.

Muppet Barbershop Quartet singing Smells Like Teen Spirit is amazing.

[Reply #554 on:]

Muppet Barbershop Quartet singing Smells Like Teen Spirit is amazing.

That was the part where when I realized what it was I started laughing so loud and so hard, because that was the funniest goddamn thing I had heard in ages. My boyfriend didn't even understand what had happened because I was laughing so loudly. Our theater was filled with little kids so a lot of the jokes flew over their heads but I thought it was just great.

[Reply #555 on:]

The Muppets

If you're very familiar with The Muppets, most of the characters and the little jokes that go along with them, you'll have a blast watching this (as I did).

It's a mostly kid-aimed movie (as would be expected) and while there are a fair amount of okay adult-aimed jokes, most of the delight adults will get is mostly from nostalgia and familiarity with the Muppets in general.

So if you've heard of The Muppets but never really seen anything with them and have almost no knowledge about them other than the fact that they are puppets, this movie is not going to win you over...you'll mostly just be confused and irritated. Seek entertainment elsewhere.

Otherwise, besides a few minor missteps (and one particularly cringe-worthy rap by the main villain), this movie is just plain good fun.

B+

[Reply #556 on:]

Chris Cooper is an AWESOME rapper

[Reply #557 on:]

If it's anything like the rap in the recent Simpsons episode, no thanks.

[Reply #558 on:]

Chris Cooper is an AWESOME rapper

Oh, I would agree he pulls it off like a boss, but it doesn't make it any less of an awkward WTF moment in the movie that seems to come out of nowhere. Although it is really that sort of movie, so I can't fault it too much, and luckily it wasn't very long.

[Reply #559 on:]

Oh, it's terrible, but it's awesome terrible.