The Spirit

Jamie and I saw “The Spirit” today. Here’s Jamie’s take at Chipotle:

Filed under: crap, thriller , movie review, the spirit, the spirit movie review, youtube

The Changeling & House

Friday I went to Mall of America and saw The Changeling, which was amazing…

More at MovieWeb

The synopsis from Movieweb:

Los Angeles, 1928: On a Saturday morning in a working-class suburb, Christine said goodbye to her son, Walter, and left for work. When she came home, she discovered he had vanished. A fruitless search ensues, and months later, a boy claiming to be the nine-year-old is returned. Dazed by the swirl of cops, reporters and her conflicted emotions, Christine allows him to stay overnight. But in her heart, she knows he is not Walter.

As she pushes authorities to keep looking, she learns that in Prohibition-era L.A., women don’t challenge the system and live to tell their story. Slandered as delusional and unfit, Christine finds an ally in activist Reverend Briegleb (Malkovich), who helps her fight the city to look for her missing boy. Based on the actual incident that rocked California’s legal system, “Changeling” tells the shocking tale of a mother’s quest to find her son, and those who won’t stop until they silence her.

A bit of a tear jerker…but compelling (to use a movie review cliché)… I also saw another movie this weekend: “House.” My advice? Skip House and go see The Changeling even if you love horror movies. Actually…the Changeling has a horror element in it…

More at MovieWeb

House has every horror movie cliché you can think of. Seriously. There’s the creepy haunted house (of course), the 1800’s style ghost family with creepy son, leaking faucets, storms, random creaks, gross food, insects, “mysterious pasts”, demon worship, random masked killer, odd editing, shrill-tense music, flooded basements, non-reflecting mirrors… oh, and devil worship…(you thought I was kidding)

After the first 20 minutes I realized that the director was cheating – if you have to resort to a distorted montage then, erm. Fail.

And (of course) we have the stock characters: The blond bombshell, who is a country singer…. and her husband, who looks like he missed the audition for Coldplay…

Via MovieWeb

 The temptress. The Meat-head… who looks like someone from that other industry…

Via MovieWeb

The shady police officer. And the creepy kid ala Ricci as Wendy…

via MovieWeb

Apparently this House contains plenty of plum eye shadow…maybe there’s a drag queen hiding in the basement?

Filed under: crap, horror, must see, thriller , angelina jolie, horror, house, movie review, the changeling

SAW V

Halloween is here, and yes, that means another installment of the SAW franchise. I watched SAW V today with a housemate at the Mall of America.

It was a typical SAW movie…you know, Hostel meets The Departed. And it’s not exactly scary… it’s basically a more gory, less-plot driven version of Thomas Harris story. It’s not a waste of money but not amazing either.

The best thing about the movie is that Meagan Good is in it.

If you want a scary movie then go see Quarantine.

Filed under: horror, thriller , horror, meagan good, movie review, saw v

Hell Ride

Fine, so I let this blog sink into decrepitude. I’ll update more – but don’t expect Daniel-level hilarity from me.

The key here is brevity.

The most recent movie I saw is Hell Ride. Yes, Quentin came back with a Grindhouse follow-up.

Hell Ride is a biker gang story in this new 70’s B-movie homage/parody genre that we first saw in Grindhouse and the Devil’s Rejects.

I loved it although I spent half the time thinking about which tattoos I wanted. It’s not as funny as The Devil’s Rejects and the plot is clunky, but it’s still que badass.

Now, it’s not like a lot happens here… Hell Ride follows this format: shittalk, partyhardy, ride on road, shoot someone, shittalk, more partyhardy/corny sex scene, more riding, more shooting, etc, etc. repeat. But this is probably part of the whole B-movie parody bit. What makes the movie que badass is the attitude. It has a lot of that. Har har.

One thing that really grilled my cheese though was that the dates didn’t make sense.

What do I mean? SPOILER: Well, we have a “missing child/father/if it were only so obvious on Maury” plot, but the kid was supposedly 10 (or so) years old in 1976.

Now let’s do some math.

Our story is set in 2008.

The kid was 10 in 1976.

2008-1976 = 32 + 10 = 42.

So best case scenario this missing kid is 42 and the dad is in his mid sixties. Right? Am I missing something?

So why is the actor who plays the “missing kid” 25 at best? You know the mysterious young gunner in the Biker Gang is going to be the missing boy…this is how these things work…but it’s sort of impossible because he’s supposed to be middle aged by now. 

“Hi I’m 42.”

Unless that booze/sex/constant desert sun exposure lifestyle does wonders in preservation. Hm. Maybe we should tell Miss Taylor about this…

Filed under: horror, thriller , hell ride, movie review

Deception, or well, not.

I saw the movie Deception last night. Here is a blurb from Movie-web.com:

An accountant (McGregor) is introduced to a mysterious sex club known as The List by his lawyer friend (Jackman). But in this new world, he soon becomes the prime suspect in a woman’s disappearance and a multi-million dollar heist.

I can see the underling pitching this to the movie executives: “Powerful men, hot and sexually valuable women, gratuitous strip club scene, money, money, money, and well, Deception!”

Deception

Deception

Deception

And how will this be done? Oh, you know, the usual way – the movie is thoroughly formulaic.

I sat in the theater like a chorus director: “Okay, and now this has to happen, and now this…”

Twenty minutes into the movie I thought, “Can I go now?” But no, I couldn’t go. I paid $9 for this crap.

Good thing I got the $1 student discount. $10 for crap would have pissed-me-the-fuck-off.

So I sat there for almost two hours waiting for the clunky plot devices to finish. And just in case anyone missed anything the movie dropped hints with the grace of a bitch-slap, “LOOK AT THIS. THIS IS IMPORTANT. HERE: ANOTHER SHOT. DO YOU REMEMBER THIS FROM 10 MINUTES AGO? CLUE! CLUEE! CLUEEEEE!”

Okay, we get it bubba, damn.

• A more mature and thorough version of the above can be found here.
• A 62-year-old Charlotte Rampling has about 5 minutes in the movie.

Filed under: crap, thriller , Charlotte Rampling, crappy movie, deception, deception movie, Ewan McGregor, guns, heist, Hugh Jackman, Maggie Q, Michelle Williams, movie review, plot