The Watchmen

It is 10:15am at The Easton Towne Center in Columbus, Ohio. My Watchmen experience is just about to begin. My bud Tony and I are racing up the corridor to the IMAX theatre when we hear the low grumble that can only be the beginning of a bad ass movie. We find our seats on the right middle side of the theatre, not middle but close enough. The thrill of knowing nothing about the movie that I am about to see is starting to take hold when I notice it. Not one person in the theatre is talking. I turn around, no cell phone lights, no texting. I sit there confused, what is this? This is the best theatre experience I have had for a long time……

The Watchmen

Alright, there are like three 35 year old virgins out there who went into this movie knowing all the characters names and they all had huge expectations for their favorite adult comic book film adaptation. The rest of us knew nothing, and we get laid often. But, we all had one thing in common by the time this 3 hour movie finished. We were all now fans of “The Watchmen”.

The movie opens up with the greatest “schooling” of characters I have ever scene. The credits are rolling as snapshots of our characters are shown across a period of time accompanied by some Bob Dylan which fit perfectly. The next 2 1/2 hour are filled with the grittiest, dirtiest, most violent content you could take from a comic book and put on screen. Beautiful.. I will however ask that if you are crazy about spoilers, TURN AWAY, the next few lines do contain some items that I can’t shake.

 

1)      Dr. Manhattan is hung like a Smurf Horse. I don’t understand why this “being”  only wore his thong half the time. One minute his giant blue….uh, you know….is all over the screen (remember this is IMAX, I am having nightmares now) and the next scene he is covered up. I guess if I controlled matter I might stroll naked with that weapon out too.

 

2)       Rorschach is the best character in this movie. I could have watched him kick ass for three hours and been happy. He does look a little like a pissed off David Caruso when his mask comes off, whatever, my favorite character.

 

3)      An actual sex scene in a comic movie? Not complaining, applauding.

 

 

4)      I love how this film really exposes how psychotic a super hero would have to be to do what they do. You see Batman and he grumbles and beats up bad guys, but he doesn’t ever cross that line between bad and good. We all cross that line sometimes which makes these characters so realistic, they are as fucked up as me! Well, I am not that fucked up.

 

5)      I didn’t think it could happen, but, this beats “The Dark Night” as best comic movie ever.

 

Grade: A+, no doubt about it.

Flash of Genius

Have you stolen any ideas lately?

 

Greg Kinnear takes on the role of an inventor who has an idea stolen by the Ford Motor Company, which ultimately drives him nuts and shatters his marriage. That’s why I am a Chevy guy. Ha! OK, his invention was the delay mode on windshield wipers. Oh yeah, this IS a true story. So, Ford steals his idea and the shear thought…..actually you know what? We all know what is going to happen; the happy times, the invention, the shock of loss, the struggle, the “5 years later” caption, more struggle and…and …..VICTORY!! So, there you go. Think Erin Brokovich, with much smaller boobs.
Grade – C

first it was cloverfield now it’s “Once”

I’m Irish, your Czecho-Somthinerother, hows it gonna work? It doesn’t.

 

Once
Once….my brother and I agreed on the quality of films.
OK, my brother loves music and that is a perfectly good explanation why he strongly recommended Once to me. What I don’t get is why he recommended a film with such a weak storyline to me. Does my brother love schmucks who are broken hearted? Married women who lead on sappy men only to crush their hopes of rebounding with someone cool? I don’t know.
Now for the review, Once is a low budget film (not a bad thing) that follows the brief relationship between a guitar playing, heart-broken man and a piano playing, flower selling Czech woman. After what seems to be days, they decide to cut an album together along with some random street musicians. The album is good and the Czech cuts him loose. Our broken hearted, guitar wielding, Czech loving, album seeking, Hoover fixing protagonist decides to move to London to reconnect with his whore ex-girlfriend and hopefully get a record deal. The end. This movie actually reminds me of August Rush, where the music totally distracts your ears enough that your eyes don’t notice the garbage that is passing by them.
Grade: C… Flat ( a music joke, I am witty!)

The Pineapple Express has arrived

Franco and Rogen

 

Pineapple Express is the 30th production from Team Apatow…really? Wow, as I scroll down IMDB’s list his productions hit me like a must see guide to funny. The man knows what is clicking in comedy and does not disappoint often. This latest chronicle follows the standard high as a kite buddy flick generic storyline, but keeps us entertained with great dialogue and decent action sequences. James Franco adds some new life to a tired storyline as his take of a burned up pot dealer. Rogen plays apparently himself ( does he have range? ) but that is what we pay to see him do. The cast does fill out with the usual suspects but none stand out nearly as much as Franco. If you have seen any one trailer for this movie you already know the plot but I won’t be the spoiler for you on this film, just know that if you know what it’s about – You will like it.  Over all – B+

The Lost boys: The Tribe (AKA: The Fat Haim Review)

Yeah, gettin back in shape. Got that whole celeb status to keep, ya know.

Yeah, this is the sequel to the 1987 hit ‘The Lost Boys’ with the two Corey’s and kiefer Sutherland. Well, the two Corey’s made it for the sequel but I guess Kiefer was to busy so they subbed him with another Sutherland….Angus Sutherland. I think he is Donald’s bastard son from a fling on the set of Backdraft. OK, back to the critique. Same premise as the first, vampires are bad/people are good. Older sibling has to almost become a vampire in order to save younger sibling. Now that we have the clone plot line taken care of let’s get to the real topic of interest: Corey Feldmen’s voice. Did he get a tracheotomy recently?  Was Greg Oden doing his voice over? He sounded like he really needed a drink of water throughout the entire film! I guess it did distract me from his horrific acting which totally peaked when a really fat Corey Haim vampire showed up. That was the money shot by the way. If you do subject yourself to this “made for Showtime at 3:00am” movie, at least let the credits roll so you get a glimpse at what 20 years of eating has done to Corey Haim. There was a cover of Sister’s of Mercy – Cry Little Sister in the film, but it sucked as well so it was a total loss. Overall: D….+. Yeah D+ because a fat Corey Haim is funny.

P.S. Looking for the above photo I found this nugget http://coreyhaim.wordpress.com/

Hellboy 2: the golden army

I love you, You love me…….

My expectations for this sequel were low, due to the little to no hype Dark Horse Entertainment put out for it’s release. Those expectations were just due to the stories meritocracy and serious lack of action sequences, which is why you go see a movie called “Hellboy”. Sure, there were some action scenes and there was some good one liners…but that alone does not make a good movie.

Where this sequel went wrong starts with the introduction of a new team leader, a German made of smoke(?), that unless you were an avid reader of Hellboy you were lost in his background. Next was the crazy amount of attempts at romance. My brother gives more detail to who loves who, but trust me, everybody loves everybody in this movie. It was like a big hug orgy between superheroes and mythical woodland fairy creatures. Odd. Lastly, the antagonist was weak, very weak. In the first you had Rasputin and the dark side, this sequel gives you the prince of trolls. I don’t know who he was the prince of, but trolls were definitely involved. Point being, they just weren’t very intimidating. Also, the ending was pretty predictable if you paid any attention to the first half an hour.

Final tally: Would rather have seen the Dark Knight again and waited until this came out on DVD. This does continue a pretty lame movie streak my brother and I have seen together, really no luck since we saw Superbad last year. Oh, well there is always next time.  C+

Shoot Em’ Up

Editor’s Note: Oh yeah…and Monica Bellucci is in it…and she’s HOT!

Now THIS is an action flick! Clive Owen plays what seems to be an unstoppable force against evil in this one. His character (Smith…easy to remember) is guarding a baby that some gangsters want to kill for political reasons. Well, once the shooting begins it doesn’t cease till the credits roll. This is a good thing because the action sequences were terrific throughout. Paul Giamatti (as the bad guy) handles his role well with his normal growl and gruff. Not at all the piece of garbage I was expecting. B+

Oceans 13

I think I’ve seen these mannequins at Macy’s

Mission accomplished. We made them all richer because Oceans 11 was cool and we long for that magic again. They are going to keep spewing this crap at us until we stop going. The only twist on this one is that Andy Garcia is now in on a plot, but the plot is still on him…Blah. Good news! Julia Roberts did not play herself in this one, oh, and Bruce Willis is nowhere to be found. That’s all I care to write about this one. I hear they are making 14. I hope it’s better……….and the cycle begins again. C-

30 days of night…huh, days of night. Funny.

Just look at that neck! Yummy!

Josh Hartnett leads a nobody cast in a lame attempt at a vampire thriller. Recap: Vampires attack a city way up north…and there won’t be sunlight for 30 whole days. Thus, 30 days of night. Vampires kill everybody but a select group of hiders, one gets cocky and tries to escape and gets eaten, Josh sacrifices himself for the greater good. The end. There is more but you have seen it before under better titles with worse actors. I only recommend this movie if you are a Josh Hartnett stalker and you have already seen the rest of his catalog, and you are really bored. C-