Where the Wild Things Are

If you're looking for someone to wax nostalgic or talk about how many times I cried (spoiler alert: zero) during Where the Wild Things Are, then you've come to the wrong place. Yes, I read the book when I was younger, and I took the time to reread all 10 pages the other day in the bookstore. Maybe it was because I wasn't a dumb child or because I'm not a late 30's hipster now, but I have no affinity for the book, so I was watching the movie for what it was: a movie, not some love letter to a very overrated children's book, and as a movie, WtWTA is an absolute mess of a movie.

The first twenty minutes or so are actually pretty great, which makes the end product all the more disappointing. Max Records is pretty great as Max, the rambunctious, bipolar little pain in the ass who we follow on his journey. Through the opening, we see everything that we need to know about Max. His relationship with his older sister who is more concerned about her friends. His relationship with his mother and how he is affected by her relationship with Mark Ruffalo. There are some great character moments in opening, especially Max's reaction to something his sister does. It was beautifully heartbreaking and made me wish that we get could get a movie all about Max's life that doesn't involve massive puppet orgies.

Sadly, like most wishes I make, it fell on deaf ears and I was subjected to 90 minutes of wild things. I respect director Spike Jonze more than I could ever explain on this blog (more on that in a moment), and I respect all the work he did to get his passion project to the big screen, but the biggest problem is that WtWTA is a movie that never should have been made. There just isn't enough story and plot to drive the movie along in any sort of satisfying way. Maybe Jonze should have teamed up with Charlie Kaufman for a third time. I'm sure that would have brought about a satisfying script, though I doubt kids would have any interest. Nothing about the wild things was comelling in any way. Look, a giant dirt fight. A ball-shaped house. Really weird owls. I get that this was not an adventure film, but is more about emotion. And I get the allegory of the wild things, but that doesn't mean that I have to care. There are some good commentaries on childhood, but it is all just kind of left hanging in the end. There is really no satisfying resolution.

Back to Jonze, the guy has a great vision for movies. He's extremely modern, and likes weird, off-beat stuff, but his previous two films have been great. Technically speaking, his third film is great too. The cinematography is wonderful and the fact that the wild things were done using puppets really blew me away. The eyes were so amazingly expressive, that I almost cared about the monsters. Then I realized that they are all so one note and predictable that I didn't. The practical effects and action scenes were also visually impressive, but still emotionally hollow.

At the end of it all, I really don't know who this movie is for. It's all about kids and their issues, but it is in no way a kids movie. It's too boring and unconventional for mainstream audiences. It feels to me like an opportunity for older movie nerds to look back and go "That's right, I was a child. Thanks Spike!" Looks like the artsy kids and the bearded weirdos can have their day in the sun. As for me, let me know Where the Wild Things Are, so I can stay as far away from there as possible.

Zombieland

Aside from slasher flicks, zombie movies might be the most overused and unoriginal properties out there. Now, I'm not referring to Romero's classics or even Snyder's remake of one of those classics, but to whatever crap zombie movie Romero is making now or Resident Evil: Redundancy. Peruse the horror aisle at Blockbuster like I often do on Saturday night, and you'll see that there are even more bad zombie films out there than you could possibly imagine. There are so many bland takes on the genre, which is why it is so refreshing to see a movie that deals with zombies in a fun and original. Welcome to Zombieland.

While I doubt the lead role was actually written for Jesse Eisenberg, it fit him so perfectly that it might as well have been. As the meak, cowardly, extremely phobic Columbus, Eisenberg rattles off a continuous list of rules for how to survive in Zombieland. Not only is this list funny, it is presented in an even funnier way, making for one of the more enjoyable opening 10 minutes of a movie in recent memory. For my money, I'll take Eisenberg over Cera in a battle of who can be more nerdy and awkward. Cera may be funnier, but Eisenberg gives a heart and emotional depth to his characters that I have never seen from Cera. Equally as good as Eisenberg is Woody Harrelson, who is basically as far opposite of his counterpart as humanly possible. Yes, it's a simple buddy movie formula, but when it is surrounded by zombies and executed to flawlessly, it leads to the perfect framework of the movie. On the flipside, the best things I can say about Emma Stone and Abigail Breslin is that they don't make Eisenberg and Harrelson worse. The performances are very solid, especially since they aren't asked to do much, but the characters feel kinda flat and one note, and their actions throughout the film make absolutely no sense at times.

Though Zombieland is being advertised as a horror comedy, it is certainly more of the latter, and almost none of the former. I can think of maybe one scene that had an actual scare in it, and it wasn't anything special. While I'm saying the movie is not scary, I don't mean it as a bad thing. It is so funny and so well executed that it might be the best comedy of the year. Juxtaposed to that humor is some crazy violence and tons of gore. The kills and blood are certainly not for the squeamish. By the time the third act rolls around (more on that in just a second), we are witnesses to one of the better and more original movie shootouts.

At the risk of sounding like a Zombieland hater, there are problems with this movie, and most of them come in the third act. Since the tone of the movie is light and comedic throughout, when it tries to become darker and more intense later, it feels forced and unbelievable (although, there is an emotional scene earlier in the film that deals with who Harrelson was before the outbreak that is perfectly done). To be honest, the entire third act feels forced due to actions by some of the main characters that just don't make sense. It is as though the writers realized they'd wrapped up the story and then had to throw a plot device in there just because it could be cool (and it is, for the most part).

Regardless of the criticisms I have, I still love the movie. It is fun, original, comedic, gory, and violent. I really don't know if there's a better combination for a movie out there, and when it's executed as well as Zombieland is, it makes for a great time at the movies.

Surrogates

Ugh, it's times like this that I kinda hate my job. That job I'm referring to is of course that of a volunteer movie critic, which I've had officially since around January, and unofficially for as long as I remember (just ask anyone who's seen a movie with me about the rant I go on standing outside the theater). Since I've only been writing reviews since January, I haven't had to experience the post-summer September lull before. I was fully aware that movies in September are usually stinkers, but having to review movies that are the epitome of boring and average is really tough. Those two words perfectly describe Surrogates, but I'll do my best to describe why without turning my review into a boring, average mess.

Without Bruce Willis, Surrogates is a straight to DVD movie. With Bruce Willis, it's a straight to DVD quality movie that also features Willis wearing a bad hairpiece. The concept of the movie is interesting enough: people live vicariously through robots so they can be who they always wanted to be. When someone starts killing surrogates with some crazy new weapon that also kills the person operating the robot, shit gets real and they call in Willis, who is wearing what appears to be 5 layers of CG. That washed over, fake look might work, given that this is robo-Willis, but his partner is also a robot and she looks normal. It's not till later that you relize the look is given to Willis and some of the other surrogates because the actors playing them are older. If the actor is of the right age, they just act like a robot, which in this movie, pretty much entails not smiling. The consistency amongst how surrogates look and act is abysmal. Some show no emotion, others show tons of emotion. Some look plastic, others look normal. At first, I chalked the wooden acting up to them being robots, but then even the real people showed no emotion. I'm sure there's some jerk out there who will try to rationalize this but it's just lazy filmmaking.

I referred to this as straight to DVD quality earlier and that's mainly because of the script. While I've never read the graphic novel upon which this movie is based, I'm sure that all they took from it was the general concepts and the title, which are solid. Where Surrogates struggles is when it tries to make these great social commentaries about being alive or what it means to be human. The dialogue is so scripted and on the nose that whatever is trying to be said is undermined by stupidity. One has to look no further than Moon to see a movie that deals with weighty issues and does so in a subtle way, relying on character development and tones rather than lines of dialogue that tell the audience exactly what they should be thinking.

Luckily for me, right after seeing this I saw Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs and loved it, so I didn't have to think very long about surrogates. Sadly, I had to write this review (I put it off as long as possible) and relive my experience, but you can just go see Cloudy not have to deal with the very pedestrian Surrogates that can be described in one word: meh.

Jennifer's Body

WARNING: This review was written by a boy. Yes, a boy, and as Erudite Chick has pointed out, that means I have no soul, and therefore cannot enjoy this movie. Read on at your own risk.

All kidding aside, reactions to Jennifer's Body are almost entirely split down gender lines, with each side's reaction being quite extreme. I'm the first too admit that I find movies or TV shows with female protagonists to be less enjoyable than ones with males, but I like to think that I am a smart enough moviegoer that I can still watch a critique a movie where the two main characters are female. I believe that if the movie had been called John's Body and starred that messy haired, English asshole and the good looking Indian guy from Twilight, I would still feel the same way about it, and the girls (real girls, not dumb Twilighters) would dislike it as well. Maybe that's because the relationship between two girl best friends is so much different than that of two guy best friends, or maybe it's because this movie isn't actually good, but is just written in a way that girls will love it.

I've also made no secret that I am neither a Diablo Cody or Juno fan. There is a fine line between original and dumb, and I see both of Cody and her brainchild to be standing on the dumb side. It's kinda sad, because I think she could be a great writer. She has good characters and some really good dialogue, but she also takes it too far, and to the point that anyone with a brain gets kicked out of the movie. JB suffers from the same Cody-esque dialogue, though we only have to suffer through it during conversations between the two leads. People have tried to rationalize it by saying that it's supposed to be over the top and fun, to which I respond that it's neither over the top nor fun, just stupid. There are times when other characters in the movie poke fun at the dialogue, so the over the top argument might make sense, if not not for those same characters using even stupider dialogue five seconds later. Seeing this movie just proves that anything good that came out of Juno was from Jason Reitman's direction, and not Cody's Oscar winning screenplay (I just threw up a little).

While JB is being hailed as a horror comedy, it is only half of that. It is a comedy that riffs on horror tropes, without having any actual horror in it. Drag Me to Hell was a horror comedy and is ten thousand times better than this. JB is more of Scary Movie, but with no black people. There are only two moments that try to be horror, and the key word there is try. They are so set-up that you know exactly what's coming, and then it's not even well-executed. It's clear that the director has no idea how to handle the tone of these supposedly scary scenes. Then we don't even get to see the kills. They either occur off screen or are shown in shadow puppets and it's all just a giant tease with no payoff.

Where girls seem to be digging the movie and I seem to be panning it is on the relationship between the two best friends, Megan Fox and Amanda Seyfriend. I'm a fan of Fox despite what she says about Michael Bay and I think Seyfriend is one of the more underrated actresses in Hollywood. At least I can say that they both deliver good performances. Fox proves she isn't just the piece of eye-candy Bay has made her out to be, and that she can convincingly play a beautiful, slutty, bitch (who would have ever guessed?). She delivers most of the dialogue well, but there are times when she has to be menacing that are laughably bad. Seyfried delivers a better performance, but she also has more to work with. Where I have the problem is that I found their relationship to be entirely implausible. Aside from the fact that we're told they're best friends, nothing on screen shows that. So they sit next to each other in class and they make out in the bedroom, but there was connection between them that I could see, which is a problem because all of the emotion comes from buying into their friendship. The climax of the movie invokes this idea of them being best friends in a way that I found to be so unbelievably corny, but my female counterparts have said it was soul crushing in its magnitude.

To really prove that is a male oriented blog (I can't help how I think), I want to say that my two favorite performances were by Adam Brody and Kyle Gallner. Everyone knows Brody from The OC (well, not Zach, but he's just too much of contrarian), and he does a similar schtick here, but also does a lot more. He was also the most interesting character when he talks about his motivations and what he'll do to be famous. Brody is truly great and Gallner (a Veronica Mars and The Shield alum) is quite good as the goth student who becomes a focus of Jennifer's attention.

Sadly, Jennifer's Body has no horror, and it's comedy is overshadowed by pretentious garbage that is veiled as some sort of genius. To really sum up my thoughts, I'll give it to you the way Diablo Cody would write it: "I totally wanted Jennifer's Body to be super salty, but the double dash of green green jello just couldn't juice the kool-aid. Honest to blog. Something something dot org."

Editor's note: If you want to check out a less male perspective, check out Erudite Chick's review of Jennifer's Body over at All Thing Fangirl. It's basically the opposite of everything I said, but it's still good. Also, Scarlet Scribe has a great one you can read here. (We debated and she handed the king his ass.)

The Informant!

Despite the exclamation point next to the film's title, let me assure you I am far from enthusiastic about this movie. Not because of it was bad per say (I can't tip my hand this early in a review), but rather because there is no energy to the movie at all. That punctuation mark is probably the most invigorating thing the movie has going for it, which is disappointing because I thought the trailers showed a movie that would be a fun romp through corporate deceit. What I got instead was a light-hearted character study of a man who didn't deserve anything light hearted at all.

Someone turning informant on their company has never been a subject that I find particularly interesting (you guys really think The Insider is good?), and The Informant! really does nothing to change that. The movie just chugs along at a slow pace as we watch Matt Damon's Mark Whitacre get caught up in the whole process with the FBI. He goes on some trips, does some recording, and bumbles his way along, all the while failing to captivate the audience and convey why we should care about what we're watching. By the time we realize that it's not the plot, but the man we should be watching, half the movie has gone by and we're left wondering "What was the point?"

Where the movie does really succeed is Damon. After packing on the pounds to play the role, he needed to turn in a good performance, and he does. He is thoroughly convincing as Whitacre, pumping life into a movie that would otherwise have none. He shows Whitcare's ups and downs, and when the movie shifts into a complete character study, it is Damon's performance that keeps things going. The other performances in the movie are good as well, but none really stand out either way.

I consider myself to be a Steven Soderbergh fan, but it was his direction that brought the film down the most. There is a light-hearted, jovial tone over the whole movie, but the actual movie doesn't merit that. The music and screen-text harken back to an older time, as does the whole movie, and I wouldn't have had a problem with that if what was happening on screen felt the same. I'm not one of those people that thinks every movie needs to be dark, and I'm certainly not saying this about this one. It's just that what the movie was trying to make me feel just didn't line up with what it actually made me feel.

All in all, it certainly wasn't a bad trip to the movies, but it is nothing more than ok. If The Informant! shows us anything, it's that that great run of summer movies is now officially over.

Twitterized Review: Whiteout

Dumb. Dumb. Kate Beckinsale is gorgeous. Dumb. Dumb. Dumb. It’s really cold and there’s a killer. Dumb. Dumb. Dumb. Boring trash. Dumb. Dumb.

Twitterized Review: Sorority Row

Editor’s Note: I see pretty much every movie that’s released (I don’t consider what Tyler Perry makes to be movies), but I don’t always review them. Why? Well, some movies no one cares about, and others don’t deserve a full review. Recently, I got to thinking “Isn’t there some way I can give my thoughts on these movies without writing a full review?” A lazy idea, yes, but without further delay, I bring you the debut of Twitterized Reviews. Because sometimes all you need is 140 characters.

What a deliciously crappy movie. Hot girls (and Rumer Willis), solid kills, solid scares, and Carrie Fisher with a shotgun. I had a blast.

9

In an age where 3-D animation has almost entirely replaced 2-D animation, and where the recent purchase of Marvel by Disney has led to rumblings of a Pixar animated Avengers film, we’ve come to wonder if a good animated movie can be made that’s not for kids. Now, some of the more hyperbolic critics out there will claim that Wall-E or Up fit this mold, but they’re wrong. As good as those films may be, they’re kids’ movies that adults can also enjoy. 9 is the first major 3-D animated release to be PG-13, and therefore the first non-kid one in my book.

9 tells the story of 9 little rag doll things that are the last remnant of life on the planet after machines have destroyed everything else. In the flashback sequences, we see giant armies of machines going around killing folks (something this movie did better than Terminator Salvation), and yet there’s only a few robots moving around during the actual course of the movie. Where they all went, I have no idea, which you’ll see is a big theme for me. The plot of the movie is a good mix of simplistically straight forward and head scratchingly stupid, or as I like to call it, Quantum of Solace syndrome. The entire movie, you’re never really sure exactly what’s happening, and then we’ve got a pretty good grip on the situation, you realize that it’s just dumb.

The biggest problem 9 has is that it really doesn’t know what it wants to be. It is stuck in a tonal limbo, unsure of whether it wants to appeal to kids or be a balls-out, dark, adult film. The solution was to have some dark images, with lighter music behind it, so you don’t really know what to feel. It’s really too dark and not funny to appeal to the really young ones, and it’s certainly not adult enough to appeal to general audiences. I will be though that tweens think it’s awesome.

One of the things also boasted by the crack marketing team was a big cast of voice actors. I should have realized this probably wasn’t a good thing since the great animated films don’t have big Hollywood casts, and movies like Ice Agedo. It’s much better to have great voice actors than people who are good screen actors. There was such a disconnect between the voices and the movie it was unbelievable. There was no flow or connection with the dialogue. Pretty much every line was said in a vacuum. At no point did I ever feel like these characters were actually interacting. It was rather that it was a group of actors getting an easy paycheck sitting in a sound booth doing two takes of their lines and leaving.

One thing that the movie did get right was the visual style. I’d certainly go see another Shane Acker directed film based off the way the movie looked. As the film progresses, we see more and more different creature designs, and they get better each time. The cobra-baby doll thing was kinda awesome and the brain robot was expertly designed and animated. The thing is though, I’m not some 12 year old kid who thinks he’s cool because I’m hanging at the theater without a parent there. I need more than just cool (okay, very cool) visuals to make the movie good.

At the end of the day, I’m really not sure if we can say that 9 is the first animated movie to cross that line between adult and kids’ film. That was certainly the intention, but the result is not that. While they certainly didn’t make a kids film, they didn’t make an adult one either. All I know is that if this is the future of PG-13 3-D animation, I’ll say thanks, but no thanks. I’ll be over in the next theater over surrounded by little kids and parents.

Gamer

Man, it’s been two weeks since I’ve written a review, so bear with me I’m not on top of my game. To those wondering why I didn’t review anything last week, the answer is the choice to not review anything was my actual review (did I just blow your mind?). Now that I’m back doing real reviews, I’m given the task of reviewing Gamer, the latest from crazy s.o.b.’s Neveldine/Taylor, a movie that really doesn’t lend itself to reviews.

Gamer is basically a remake of Death Race or The Running Man or any other movie with the overused plot of death row inmates involved in some crazy killing game that allows them to eventually earn their freedom. This game is called Slayers, and in it, people have the ability to control the death row inmates (through mind control technology, of course) in a free-for all shootout. Is it a great plot? No, but I loved what N/T did with the first two Crank movies, and this plot seemed like the perfect vehicle for them to blow everything up on a large scale.

What I got instead was a slow, boring, poorly shot film that at times took itself way too seriously, which is a shame, because one of my favorite things about N/T is that they don’t take themselves seriously at all (or so I thought). Gamerfollows Kable (Gerard Butler) who you know is a bad-ass because he spells his name with a K. Butler delivers another very solid performance. The guy deserves to be an action star who does Clive Owen like roles, not Jason Statham roles. Michael C. Hall’s performance has not been received well and I really disagree with that. If you just his performance as compared to performances in real movies, then it’s not good. But if you judge it for being in a N/T movie, it was exactly what I wanted. It was deliciously over the top, with Hall just hamming up his southern accent the entire time. There’s a slew of other actors who were in the movie for about two seconds, which was really strange, but to me, the best of them was Milo Ventimiglia as Rick Rape. With a name like that, I really don’t have to explain the character.

I still maintain that the framework to an awesome action movie was there. There are three slayer sequences, which should have ranked in the most ridiculous things I’ve ever seen, but instead rank in the most boring action set pieces I’ve ever seen. They’re not shot well, and there is never any sense of tension or conflict, which I wouldn’t mind, if they had been out of control, which they weren’t. This may sound strange, but the violence just wasn’t gratuitous enough for me. Whenever there was violence, especially in the beginning, it was connected to slayers, and therefore part of the plot. Never did we get a scene where I thought, “that action doesn’t need to be here” or “that violence is too much” and the problem is I wanted to think that.

My biggest gripe with the movie was that it tries for serious themes and emotions, and that’s just not something that N/T can do, or something that people want from a N/T movie. There were aspects of the movie that were super weird (namely an entire section of the movie known as “society”) and they were awesome. It was exactly what I wanted out of the movie. The aforementioned Rick Rape could have been classic if the movie around him wasn’t so mundane. I even bought into the song and dance sequence that proceeds the climax (a climax which really sucked, I might add), and no one else in the world seemed to have liked that.

As much as I went to the theater wanting to love this movie, I can’t even go as far as to recommend anyone see it. Gamer promises us action and uber-weirdness but delivers us boring set pieces and just basic weirdness. The morale of the story is, don’t ever see anything Ludacris is in (Luda!). That rule never fails.

Inglorious Basterds

It’s been a little over two years since the Grindhouse debacle. Now, I hear what you’re saying. Yes, a lot of that movie works. Plannet Terror is great, gory, escapist fun and some of those fake trailers are fantastic. I’m calling it a failure because the movie performed poorly at the box office and Quentin Tarantino fans left the theater saying he had lost it (well, this fan did at least). Death Proof has all the elements that define Tarantino movies (extended dialogue scenes, brutal violence, and feet), but it lacked that undefinable something that makes his movies so special. Death Proof comes off feeling like it’s made by some newbie trying to immitate Tarantino’s style, rather than Tarantino himself. The movie was so off-putting that people began to wonder if the man behind such masterpieces as Pulp Fiction and Reservior Dogs had become nothing more than a charicature of himself. With Inglorious Basterds, Tarantino proves that he still has one of the most unique visions in Hollywood, and that his best may be yet to come.

IB is exactly what it promises to be: WWII as interpreted through the eyes of Quentin Tarantino. If you want history or realism, this is not for you. If you want to see a war movie that I promise is unlike anything you’ve seen, then you’ve come to the right place. To call IB a war film is proably inaccurate. It’s a spaghetti western that’s set in Nazi-occupied France. As you’d expect, the movie is told in segments, and not always in the right order. Still, this could be Tarantino’s best screenplay to date. On one side, you have Shoshana, a 22 year old Jewish girl hiding out in France. On the other side, Aldo Raine and his “basterds,” a Jewish-American group of soldiers whose one job is to kill as many Nazis as they can in the most brutal ways possible. These two stories are woven together by Nazi Colonel Hans Landa and the screening of the new film Nation’s Pride. To tell you any more about the story would be depriving you of something special.

I could go on for a thousand words about the performances in the film. The one who you’ll be hearing the most about and who deserves the most attention is Christoph Waltz as the aforementioned Landa. He is pure evil in every way, yet Waltz is able to show the complexities of the character and actually make him funny at times (remember, this is a Tarantino; evil can be funny). Waltz is not the driving force of the movie, but he is involved in every aspect. He weaves in and out of both stories. This guy deserves every mention he gets in the Oscar conversation. Brad Pitt is also great as Raine. He manages to be both humorous and menacing at the same time. Despite being a “good guy”, his actions are far from good. He scalps Nazi’s and carves Swatstikas into their foreheads. You root for him, but he is not the driving force, which leads us to Shoshana. Melanie Laurent gives us the character whose arc we care about the most. It is her quest for revenge that drives the story forward. Without her, the movie would lack that human touch and I would argue this is every bit her movie as it is Pitt’s.

Every other cast member is great as well. Diane Kruger shows acting talents she never got a chance to show opposite the CAGEbot in National Treasure. Michael Fassbender is great as Lt. Archie Hicox. Fassbender is an intricate part in my favorite scene, a scene that could have fallen completely flat without him. I don’t know the names of the actors who played Hitler and Goebbels, but they are quite good. Keep in mind, these are not historical representations, but rather humorous ones. Both men are played for laughs (you laugh at how disgusting they are). The only actor who didn’t work for me was Eli Roth as “The Bear Jew”. Maybe it was the Boston accent, or maybe it’s the fact that the man is a director and not an actor, but I wanted more out of the character. The part was originally offered to Adam Sandler, and had that happened, we would be dealing with an all-time classic character.

Directorally, Tarantino is really at the top of his game. There is a lot of great cinematography in the movie, especially in scenes that you wouldn’t expect it. The score is also classic Tarantino, with a combination of classical music and more modern songs. What really stands out though, is the dialogue. There are numerous scenes of extended dialogue, that aren’t adding anything to the characters or the narrative, and yet you don’t want it to stop because it is so good. Even though nothing is progressing, all of the conversations seem deliberate and create a wonderful mood to the film. There is also the violence that also culminates these scenes. As usual, it’s brutal. I’ve mentioned the scalpings and the carvings, but there is also death by baseball ball and some graphic shootouts. Like I said earlier though, despite being graphic and brutal, it all has a very speghetti feel to it, so it lessens the effect.

With the faith of his fans hanging in the balance, Quentin Tarantino has returned to form and delivered one of the best, albeit most outlandish, films of the year. Inglorious Basterds is fun, emotional, comical, brutal, and weird. Or in other words, everything I want out of a trip to the movies.

Paper Heart

A Sundance darling? A documentary that interweves fictional and non-fictional elements? Michael Cera in love? Sounds great, right? Sadly, Paper Heartworks much better conceptually than it does on the big screen.

PH is a simple set-up. Charlyne Yi doesn’t believe in love and sets off on a quest across America to discover what it is. Don’t know who Yi is? She’s that annoying Asian girl from Knocked Up, but you’ll know her now as the annyoing Asian girl from PH. That’s probably PH’s biggest problem. Yi is more annoying than cute, and more strange than relatable. She’s a comedian, and not an actress, and it shows. During the actual documentary parts of the movie, she is a funny narrator. It is during the non-doc parts that Yi (as well as everyone else in the movie) struggles.

That leads into the other huge problem with the movie. That interview parts of the movie feel like an actual documentary, from their content to the way they are shot. They feel real, and even if they aren’t, it is presented in a believable and convicing way. The other parts of the movie, the section where Yi begins a relationship with Michael Cera, feel very staged. Not only do Yi and Cera both fail to play themselves convincingly, the movie takes on way too much production value for us to believe we are still watching a documentary. Too many camera angles tip the hand to the fact that the scene has been run multiple times. The “director” of the movie isn’t even the director, but rather an actor running a staged scene. I really wouldn’t have had a problem with this blend if it had been done successfully. District 9 is shot feux-doc for the first act and feels real (more real, actuallly, than anything in PH). Because it feels false, it loses whatever it was trying to accomplish in this style.

I did enjoy the interviews, especially the one with the children on the playground, and would have much prefered if the movie was a straight documentary. As is, Paper Heart doesn’t know what it wants to be and becomes a hodgepodge of boring and weird, that fails to compel the audience in any way or elicit any sort of emotion, in a movie all about find one.

The Goods

The world “terrible” is thrown around a lot these days, especially by me, but most of the time it is more “comparatively terrible”, meaning it is bad by my standards. Then there are movies that are truly terrible, that literally are not watchable. Say hello to The Goods.

This is a movie that is just painfully unfunny. It is just poorly written and even if there is something potentially humorous, it is poorly executed. There’s some good talent in this movie but they are hampered by a horrible script and direction. Everything is just so stupid and weird. James Brolin walking around with an erection? I’m sure that does a lot for his legacy. There is just absolutely no flow or timing at all. It’s just people making over the top weird comments that aren’t funny but acting like they are.

Every man has his limits, and The Goods pushed me beyond mine. I have sat through many, many terrible movies this year alone, and I’ve done it so I can get you (you know who you are) a review. I’m willing to give even the worst movie 30 minutes before I walk out, and even that was painful in this movie. Let me just say “The Goods? More like The Bads.” The sad part is, that horrible joke is better than everything in the movie.

District 9

Who says originality is dead in Hollywood? After being bombarded all summer by sequels, prequels, reboots, remakes, comic book adaptations, and movies based on toys, salvation has come in the guise of a South African sci-fi mockumentary. Neill Blomkamp shows us that sci-fi can be mainstream, that an action movie doesn’t have to be dumb, and that you don’t need $200 million to make a great and visually stunning movie.

The premise to District 9 is simple. Twenty eight years ago, an alien space craft appears over Johannesburg. Unlike every other movie with this plot, these aliens (called “prawns”) are not here to start shit, but rather they need our help. From there, they are hoarded into slums and discriminated against by the native South Africans. Blomkamp grew up in South Africa during apartheid and has admitted that as an influence on D9; the parallels between the treatment of prawns and the treatment of blacks are very apparent. Aside from racism, the film also comments on conglomeration, capitalism, and the military, but can be viewed entirely seperate from these ideals. It is not a message movie, but rather a great movie that also has messages.

Where D9 really becomes special is the faux-documentary style that the first 30-45 minutes are shot in. Using a combination of talking heads, old news footage, and footage of MNU’s current plan for evicting the prawns, Blomkamp creates a believable and realistic world for the prawns to live. The news footage and interviews feel exactly how things would be if there were aliens running around in Joburg. I’ve talked before about how documentaries create a connection with the audience because it feels real and intimate. Blomkamp uses doc style through the first act of the movie to create this connection between characters and audience and makes the audience feel as though they are watching something “real”, even though the movie is far from reality. The doc style interviews reveal information about the prawn back story, but also plot points about the movie’s ending, which is a very interesting technique.

Even once the film transitions from faux-doc into a regular movie, it is still shot in doc style (shaky cam). This allows for the movie to transition between its styles without the switch being to jarring and while still keeping that up-close and gritty feel throughout. This style works especially well when the film cranks up the action around the middle of the second act. After spending the first half creating a world and advancing the plot, Blomkamp shows off his action chops and delivers some of the most satisfying and original action sequences I can remember. I can’t remember the last time my jaw dropped so many times during a set piece.

Blomkamp made his living prior to this as an SFX supervisor and it shows. The special effects in the movie are fantastic. There have been some great instances of CGI in this past year (Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen andStar Trek) but D9 one ups the work of ILM with the creation of the prawns. CGI has never looked as good when it is making something fleshy and organic. The Hulk never looks as real as Optimus Prime does. The prawns inD9 look real and interact with their environment as though normal aliens would. I was most impressed with how expressive the prawn faces were. You can read the emotion on their faces; you can tell when they are happy or sad or scared or angry. This becomes pivotal because it makes you care for the prawns rather than have them be a group of wild animals.

The cast is made up of unknown South African actors who all do a fantastic job. Sharlto Copley stands out above the rest because he plays the films protagonist, Wikus van de Werve, but also because he has no prior acting experience. Copley is conveys a very scared and flawed character perfectly and gives a better performance than most Hollywood actors could. The fact that he is an unknown adds to the characters persona as an unassuming every-man who is thrown into an extraordinary situation.

I really can’t put into words how lucky we are to get a movie like this. It is a sci-fi movie that addresses important issues, doesn’t feel the need to spell everything out to you, and has amazing action. Last week, I said (500) Days of Summer was the best film of the year so far. I hope it enjoyed its run, because there is a new best movie atop the list. District 9 is not only the best movie of the year, it is an instant classic that belongs in the conversation when mentioning great science-fiction.

(500) Days of Summer

Movies are magical. They allow us to feel a myriad of emotions. They are funny and scary and action packed and depressing. They heart warming and heart breaking, sometimes at the same time. They make us think and let us escape. We can sometimes forget just how wonderful movies can be, especially after seeing GI Joe or Righteous Kill, but then there comes along a movie so great, that it reminds you of why you love cinema. (500) Days of Summer is one of these movies.

(500) takes a story that is relatable to everyone, the age old tale of boy meets girl and tells it in a fun, realistic, and original way. The story itself is by no means original or special, which makes how great the movie is all the more impressive. Had this movie been done differently, or been in the hands of another director, I suspect we would have nothing more than a run of the mill romantic comedy. Lucky for us, Marc Webb is the man behind the camera and he gives us a film that is anything but a fluff Hollywood rom-com.

In a movie all about the relationship between two characters, you need good performances. If that relationship doesn’t feel real, the whole movie falls apart (look at The Ugly Truth, The Proposal, or any other generic rom-com). Joseph Gordon-Levitt and Zooey Deschanel both deliver perfect performances. Gordon-Levitt is a great actor, one who could become the best actor of his generation (especially with Heath Ledger gone and Casey Affleck busy making rapper documentaries), and he shows his entire range in (500). We see him at his happiest and his saddest and everything in between. Not once does it ever feel like Gordo-Levitt is acting; he is always just living. Because he is so good and realistic, his emotional journey hits the audience that much harder as we feel like we are watching a real person.

Deschanel is also great. I’ve often mused as to why she is so famous, because her filmography does not denote that fame. The answer I get is that she’s cute, and she certainly is that, but she is also a very talented actress (although she hasn’t really played anyone other than herself). Like I said, her cuteness lends to her appeal, but she gives Summer life and personality. Had she just been looks, the movie would have failed. Instead, we get an equally full and believable character to stand opposite Gordon-Levitt’s Tom.

The rest cast is also superb, making up one of the best ensemble supporting casts in recent memory. Geoffrey Arend and Matthew Gary Gubler are both over the top hilarious and realistic as Gordon-Levitt’s best friends, but Chloe Moretz is the best non-couple character as Tom’s sister. It’s impressive that she is able to hold her own against Gordon-Levitt seeing as she is 11 years old (that being said, Gordon-Levitt isn’t an overbearing presence), but she also provides a perspective that is outside of the couple. They all float in and out but make the most with the screen time they are given and really make the movie feel whole.

The movie would have been enjoyable and very good just with the characters and their arcs, but it is more than that. Telling the movie is a non-linear fashion really adds to the overall enjoyment. By showing the movie mostly in order and then choosing when to weave in the flash-fowards, certain scenes are accented and given a much stronger emotional punch. Most of the movie is shot in a non-destinct manner, but Webb thows in some very beautiful and potent shots throughout the movie.

The overall tone of the movie is just fun. The voice over narration harkens back to an older time and helps add humor and insight to the movie when it is used. The humor in the movie is bountiful and organic. The jokes don’t always make you laugh, but it will make you smile. There wasn’t a line that was meant to be humorous that falls flat, which is a rarity. On the subject of fun, there is a 3 minute sequence involving dancing that could be my favorite scene of the year. I had a gigantic smile on my face the entire time.

There are also the emotional moments, which actually work better due to their extreme contrast to the humor and other light-hearted aspect of the movie. This is one of the most real representations of relationships to captured on film. You fully believe they are a couple the entire time. What really makes the movie great is how it uses this one relationship to make commentaries on relationships in general, but does so in a way that doesn’t feel forced. These commentaries arise from the characters and their actions and yet everyone in the audience connects to what is happening.

I had to think long and hard about what I’m about to say, because Star Trekwas a great movie, and I don’t want to see like I’m copying everyone else, but I can’t help it. (500) Days of Summer is the best movie of the year so far. I really don’t think it could have been better. It is superbly acted, written, and directed. It is everything I want out of a trip to the movies. It is funny, sad, fun, heartwarming, and makes great points on love and relationships. I love this movie so much that I will go as far to say that if you don’t love this movie, you must not have a heart.

GI Joe: The Rise of Cobra

I’m all for going to movies, kicking back, turning off your brain, and just hoping to have some fun. That’s really the only reason that I went to GI Joe: The Rise of Cobra. Despite the warning alarms my brain kept setting off after every spot or bit of footage I saw, I held out hope that the movie would be pure, escapist fun. Instead, I got the exact of opposite of fun. TRoCrepeatedly bashes you over the head with a stupid stick and is so blatantly horrible that you can’t turn your brain off.

Pretty much everything to do with the movie is poorly done. It all starts with Stephen Sommers’ direction. The feel of the entire movie is just wrong. There is not one of moment of genuine tension or character or emotion. I know, I’m talking about a GI Joe movie, so I shouldn’t care, but I like a little bit of substance in between my explosions. Besides, the action sucks. It doesn’t look cool (the futuristic weaponary was dumb) and it always feels completely staged. The action scenes look like what you would get out of a cartoon, and not in a good way. Due to poor CGI, it looks people riding in animated vehicles, or wearing animated suits. Say what you will about Bay and theTransformers movies, but the CGI is amazing. It looks like there is a giant robot running around blowing things up, where as the CGI in TRoC never interacts with the environment. During that horrible chase scene involving the accelerator suits, not once did it look like they were actually there.

The entire movie just has a silly and kiddy vibe to it. Bash Revenge of the Fallen’s plot all you want; TRoC makes it look like Memento. It is really just incredibly stupid. I said that Bay’s movies are like a kid playing with his toys, and it was awesome. This is the same principal, except this kid is stupid and has ADD. Every performance in this movie is just terrible, and not funny terrible like CAGEbot or Chris Klein. Channing Tatum was the complete wrong direction for Duke. Aside from the fact that he looks like bi-curious trailer trash, he is too young for the role and is never able to portray the perfect soldier. Marlon Wayans couldn’t have been less funny. All he does it spout one liners and make loud noises to make sure that the audience knows he’s black. If I ever see him, I will punch him square in the face (That’s not a threat; it’s a promise). Even Joseph Gordon-Levitt as Cobra Commander was bad and that really hurts me to say. He must have signed a deal with the devil that was something along the lines of “You will be blessed with great acting talent, and could even grow up to be the best actor of your generation, but you will have to be in a Stephen Sommers directed GI Joe movie.”

There are two good things about this movie: Snake Eyes and Sienna Miller. Ray Park continues to be the best thing in the movies he’s in (for those who don’t know, he was Darth Maul in Epsisode I). Snake Eyes gets all the cool scenes, doing sword moves and crazy flips, but I have to ask, why give his suit lips? Also, Sommers might be a bad director, but he does know how to make his leading ladies look good. From Rachel Weisz to Kate Beckinsale, Sommers consistently makes the women in his movies look awesome and Sienna Miller as The Baroness is no exception. She spends the entire movie in form fitting leather body suits and low cut dresses.

Look at me, talking about GI Joe: The Rise of Cobra likes it’s a real movie. It’s not. It’s a 100-minute, $175 million cartoon that is painful to watch for anyone over the age of 12. This movie is exactly like Cobra Commander says “This will hurt at first, and then more so.”

The Hurt Locker

Since the Iraq war (am I supposed to be calling it a “war”?) started, there have been a number of films made about it. Strangely, not all of these Iraq war movies actually take place in Iraq (ie The Kingdom), but it is the underlying themes of a post 9/11 world, of a world where it is us against the brown people. The setting isn’t fooling anyone. They’re all about Iraq and we know it. From action movies to dramas, and a good amount of documentaries, plenty of directors have tried their hand at making a successful and enjoyable (read: good) Iraq war movie, and so far all of them failed. The best piece of media made about the war has been HBO’s Generation Kill, which aptly captured the monotony of war and the people who fight in it. Of course, this is a mini-series and it was also done by The Wire alum’s Simmons/Burns, so it doesn’t count.

Imagine my suprise when we finally get a great movie about the Iraq war, and it’s directed by a woman. Yes, you read that right. Women are directing movies now. And not just movies about cooking or stoned girls who fall in love with shiny lesbian vampires, but war movies. All sexist jokes aside, The Hurt Locker is a great movie because of Kathryn Bigelow’s direction. The script, while good, is not anything special, while the movie itself is.

The film is shot in “doc style”, or “shaky cam” for general audiences, a style that I have bashed on this site multiple times. Those times I was lamenting how the style was not being used properly, whileit works perfectly for THL. It creates a realistic and gritty tone for the film and ratchets up the intensity during the action scenes, which feel unbelievably real due to the way they are shot and choreographed. This style can be off-putting to some, but the movie would not be what it is without the shaky cam. Bigelow also does a great job of balancing moods throughout the film. It will change from joking to danger, from calm to chaos, in seconds. This could be jarring in another setting, but since this is a war film, these rapid changes keep the audience on edge the same way that the characters are.

Bigelow’s direction of the actors is also great, but it helps that she has some (underrated) talent to work with. Jeremy Renner has been number one on my “Deserves to be a Bigger Star” list since 2003 when he was the bad guy inSWAT, and he will be again if there isn’t some big casting news before the list is released. Just one look at the guy and I saw “action star” written all over him. He proved it again in 28 Weeks Later, where he actually got to play the good guy was awesome. Now he gets to play a soldier again, but this time he also gets to show off his dramatic range (he’s done that in other things, but never as a leading man). Renner’s William James is an EOD (Expolosive Ordinance Division) bomb technician sent to Bravo company with 39 days left in the rotation. James is a cowboy adrenaline junky and there is no one better suited to play this part then Renner. With a perfect combination of bravado and vulnerability, Renner delivers a one of the most satisfying character arcs I’ve seen in a long time. There isn’t enough praise that can be given to Renner for this performance, and he deserves to be on screen with Sam Rockwell at this year’s Oscars. Although the majority of screen time is allotted to Renner, Anthony Mackie delivers an equally impressive supporting role. I did not understand what the hype was surronding Mackie’s performance until he has his “Oscar moment” later in the film.

The main reason that the movie works so well is because it doesn’t have an agenda or an overwrought plot. Iraq is just the backdrop, not a topic. This is not a sweeping epic about the war. Don’t get me wrong, there are a lot of commentaries about war and soldiers, but every war movie has that. There is no bias in this movie, no message. This is just the story of Bravo company’s EOD and how they handle their last 39 days.

While this movie will definitely be categorized as a war film, it is also a character study that happens to take place during a war, similar to Apocalypse Now. The war is there, but it does not define the movie. The characters and the action define the movie, leading to a satisfying and poignant ending. The Hurt Locker is a brutally realistic, action packed, character driven film that instantly earns a spot amongst the all-time great war films.

Funny People

Have I told you recently that I love great character arcs or that I thinkForgetting Sarah Marshall and Knocked Up are two of the best comedies of the decade because of their characters? You say that I have? That I actually bring it up way too often, usually in a situation where I don’t need to bring it up? Interesting; I hadn’t noticed. Well, since you know how much I love character development, you must know how much I was looking forward toFunny People, the third film directed by Judd Apatow, because he was crossing the line from comedy into dramedy. While the result is an extremely well-made and very good all around movie, it is also hugely flawed.

Let me first say that I this is not a comedy, nor is it a dramedy in my opinion. I think FP crosses both of those lines and is a straight up drama. The reason that there is a lot of humor in the movie is because all of the characters are “funny people”. The movie being a drama is going to disappoint a lot of people, but not me. I loved it as a drama, especially a funny drama. The reason it is a (very) good movie rather than a great movie is the structure of the movie and as a result of that structure, a weak narrative. Ever wonder why there are all those “Extended Edition” DVD’s with tons of deleted scenes? Most of those scenes are really funny, especially when you’re talking Apatow movies. The reason those scenes are cut is because they slow down the movie too much for general audiences to handle. I’d be shocked if there is one deleted scene on the FP DVD. At two and a half hours, it feels as though Apatow used every thing he shot.

Structurally, the big problem is that there is no discernible plot to speak of until at least an hour in. That first hour is almost entirely stand-up. Don’t get me wrong, the stand-up is funny and will gain a lot of laughs, but it neither advances the plot nor the characters. The comedy from the stand-up is also a problem because it is completely forced and not organic at all (I mean, that’s what stand-up is, right?). There are a lot of comedic moments that are natural, but they are mainly in the second half. My funniest moment in the film was one that isn’t even a joke, but rather a character moment, but it was so funny and natural. Maybe that’s just me, because it didn’t get more than a chuckle from anyone else in the theater. By the time the real plot starts to develop, you’ve already taken in so much that you’re mentally full and it is harder to appreciate the second half of the movie.

FP also seems confused about whose movie it wants to be. By that I mean, who is the main focus of the movie: Adam Sandler or Seth Rogen? Before I answer that, let me say that both of them are great. Sandler shows that he has dramatic chops in a movie other than Punch Drunk Love and Rogen turns in his most complete performance to date. Back to the question, the movie is mainly about Sandler and his growth as a character, but there is still enough about Rogen that you’re not sure. Rather than play the roommates in the same light as the Knocked Up roomates, Apatow tries to make them bigger characters. Because it is still Sandler’s movie, you don’t get enough of these characters to make them feel complete, but there is still a lot of them. The roles of Jonah Hill and Jason Schwartzman could be cut down drastically and the movie would be much better for it.

It probably sounds like I’m being really hard on this movie and that I don’t like it, but that’s not the case. I’m pointing out some major flaws in the movie, because it think this was 30-45 minutes away from being a masterpiece. The movie is extremely personal and self-referential for Apatow and Sandler, so which is the main reason they didn’t want to cut anything from it. This is evidenced by the actual home movie of Sandler making prank calls. They were too close to it to see what might not work for general audiences.

From a technical standpoint, this is clearly Apatow’s most polished movie. With three films now under his belt, he understands the art of movie making much more. The cinematography is great, which is not something you really expect out of a movie like this, and Apatow continues to use great music for his movies.

I already mentioned some of the cast members, but two of the best were Leslie Mann and Eric Bana. Probably the best thing about the Apatow craze is that we get more Mann. She’s been great in the previous two Apatow films, especially KU, but here she is given the opportunity to play the female lead and she thrives. The first scene her and Sandler share on screen together is amazing. Bana, a casting choice I was very skeptical of, is perfect whenever he’s on screen. Like Russell Brand in FSM, Bana has the job of taking a character that the audience shouldn’t like and making him full and likeable (and in Bana’s case, sympathetic at times). The only person who felt totally out of place was Aubrey Plaza as Rogan’s love interest. Through a combination of being underdeveloped and Plaza’s wooden acting, the character feels completely flat and fake.

I also can’t talk about the cast without mentioning the cameos, because the movie is loaded with them. They range from amusing to very funny, but they are always good to have because they create a very real world for the movie to exist in. The two best ones are Eminem and Ray Romano, who supriringly appear in the same scene. The scene starts off dramatic and makes some good points on fame, but develops into one of the movies funnier set pieces. (SIDE NOTE: Eminem is a suprisingly good actor. I know he only places himself, but he’s always believable)

I still feel like I’m coming off negatively, so let me try again. This really is a very good movie, but it is just so much to digest. I prepared a very apt food metaphor, but then I remembered that I’m not an asshole, so I’m not going to use it. When the humor is on, it is really funny. I laughed a great deal and never did the humor feel stupid. The main characters are well-written and feel like real people, which you all know is a real thing of mine. They act as real people would and there aren’t any moments where I felt myself saying “that would never happen”. FP also has some of the best character moments we’ve seen in a movie this funny. If you don’t feel for these characters, there is something wrong with you.

I don’t think I can really speak to how good Apatow’s direction has become. There are times when it feels like absolute genius. I just wish that there had been someone there to check him. That’s a result from having two mega-hits, there wasn’t any regulation on this one. Funny People has a lot of great humor and character moments, but too many structural problems to be a great movie.

The Collector

Rarely does a movie come along that both exemplifies everything about its genre, but also transcends that genre to become something more: a masterpiece. Examples of this are Terminator 2, Aliens, The Shining, Unforgiven, The Departed, and The Dark Knight. Now joining such illustrious company is The Collector, the new horror film from the writers of Saw IV and V. Not only is this a near perfect horror film, from its tone and scares, but it also makes a strong commentary on redemption and the bond of family. Arkin, our ex-con protagonist, needs money to help his wife pay off a loan shark. The only way he can do this is to break into a diamond broker’s house and steal a large stone. Once inside, he is horrified to find that the family has fallen victim to a sadistic serial killer who has rigged the house with various death traps. As Arkin tries to save the family he planned to rob, he learns about the hero that lives inside us all.

Ok, I really can’t keep up a straight face anymore. That first paragraph is a lie. This movie is terrible. Not “horror movie” terrible but “all-around, god awful” terrible. And it’s not even scary. The entire movie can be described as follows: “Good guy goes upstairs. Bad guy goes upstairs. Good guy sneaks downstairs. Almost get caught in a trap, but doesn’t. Bad guy comes back downstairs. Good guy sneaks upstairs. Almost gets caught in a trap, but doesn’t.” You get the idea.

I’ll admit that I do not handle horror movies very well. I jump easily (not always visibly, but on the inside) and the tension before a jump just kills me. As calm as I may appear, deep down, I’m still that little boy digging my fingers into my dad’s arm when Mischa Barton is puking on Haley Joel Osment. So, it doesn’t take much to scare me and this movie couldn’t even accomplish that. I’m sure if I was five, it would be petrifying, but I’m not, so it wasn’t.

Let’s examine why it wasn’t scary. First, the killer isn’t scary. His mask appears to be made out of an old basketball that he’s painted black. We’re told that he’s a normal guy behind the mask, but from what we can see, he looks inbred. So, now we have our villain, an inbred ninja, who fills the house with traps that are too complicated to have been set up in the timeframe given to him, and too simple to be cool. The reason the Saw traps are cool is because they’re so complicated and elaborate. We know it’s stupid and unrealistic and that’s what makes them fun. These are traps that look like Jigsaw would have come up with if he’d had a lobotomy. There are a few traps that are elaborate, but those scenes are shot so close and cut so quickly that I have no idea what actually happened. I’m pretty sure someone died, but I can’t be positive.

Another reason why it’s not scary is just the way the film is made. The shots are all framed way too tight so that you can’t see what is going on. There’s also way too much slow motion. Slow-mo can work, which Zach Snyder has proven, but not in a horror movie. Also, who chose the music? It’s a lot of heavy metal screaming that just ruins any tone the movie was trying to have.

The Collector is another example of what is wrong with horror movies today. Aside from having low budgets and being poorly put together, horror has become more about gore than scares. For that, I say screw you Eli Roth. A good horror movie isn’t about showing that most graphic kills you can possibly have and as much gore as the MPAA will allow. A good horror movie is about tone and tension. You want to be so scared that you constantly want the movie to end, but when it does, you wish the movie was longer. Let’s hope more people take a queue from Sam Raimi and make horror fun again, because The Collector is anything but that.

The Ugly Truth

nyone who came to the site this week looking to read about (500) Days of Summer is about to be subjected to some disappointing news. I got the date of the screening wrong, and I missed it. So, instead of seeing the Sundance darling, the film that many people are calling one of the year’s best, I got to see what people are calling one of the year’s worst. Lucky me, right?

For people who know and care a great deal about movies, The Ugly Truth is absolute trash and is painful to watch. It really is deserving of all the garbage being heaped upon it because it brings absolutely nothing original or impressive to the table. For general audiences (and I don’t mean this in a condescending way), this will likely be an enjoyable movie going experience. Now, we all know that I’m burdened with a massive knowledge and appreciation of movies, so it’s tough for me to do this, but when I look at this movie through “general” eyes, I can see why people would be entertained. That extremely condescending joke aside, the main reason I say this is based on audience reaction and the opinion of the person I saw this with, who described it as “cute”. The main distinction between people like me and general audiences isn’t a knowledge thing, or an intelligence thing (well, sometimes it is), but rather how we view movies. If you’re one of the people who goes to the movie looking for a fun, relaxing two hours or so where you can turn off your brain, then this is a movie for you. It’s complete superficial fluff. We go to movies to turn our brain on, to think, to watch characters and feel their emotion. I’m not saying there’s a right or wrong way, just giving you my perspective and how it compares to this movie.

TUT is a romantic comedy, cut from the same mold as every Hollywood rom-com of the last ten years, but with an attempt to throw some Apatowian flair on it. Instead of getting a rom-com that feels new and fun, we get something completely generic and unrealistic, and I mean super unrealistic. Unrealistic to the point that it is offensive that the movie expects me to believe something so dumb. I said in my review of The Proposal that it was “one of the most unrealistic representations of human beings I have ever seen”. Good thing I qualified it by saying “one of”, because TUT clearly takes that title, and I do not want to have to apologize to a movie as bad as The Proposal. This is entirely the fault of the director, Robert Luketic. He creates a world with characters so two-dimensional and cartoonish that nothing is able to thrive. I’ve seen more character development in a Sunday morning cartoon strip.

The entire plot is comprised of recycled elements from other rom-coms. As for the crudeness, the movie certainly has that. The difference between a movie like this and an Apatow movie is that the crudeness in those movies feels organic and natural, where here it seems completely forced. Apatow sets out to make a funny movie and the crudeness is just a part of that. TUT is simply crude for the sake of being crude, and despite leading to some humor, it hinders the movie in the long run.

With the leads, the casting director got it half right. Gerard Butler, who has proven his action chops, is the only part of the movie that consistently garnered laughs out of me. He is charismatic and funny, if only he was in a better movie. His worse half, Katherine Heigl, spends the entire movie over acting. It is never a good idea to cast an unlikeable actress to play an unlikeable character when that character is the crux of your story. In a fluff movie like this, you’re supposed to want the two characters to end up together, but with Heigl being so unlikable, you want Butler to end up with someone else. Is anyone else upset by the fact that Heigl bitched about Knocked Up being derogatory towards women (after it made her a star I might add), only to turn around and do a movie that is far more derogatory? Someone should kick her in the face.

I can’t write any more about this movie because I’ve already given it more of my time than it deserves. Long story short, there’s some laughs, some gags, some crudeness, no characters, and Katherine Heigl sucks.

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

Since I can already tell that this review is going to become a love letter about the Harry Potter series (both the books and the movies), this is as good a time as any to tell you how it all started. My grandma gave the first book in 4th grade, months before anyone else had even heard the name “Harry Potter”, but I put it on my book shelf because I thought the cover looked silly. One day later, I saw a few of my class members carrying books with that same “silly” cover. I asked them about it, only to be told how absolutely awesome it was and how stupid I was for not reading it. I’m always one to give into peer pressure, so I immediately started reading it, and I could not put it down. By that time, the second and third books had already been published, and I read them both in a few days. As the years went by and the new books trickled out, I read each one as quickly as I could, and loved every page. I can say without hesitation that the Harry Potter books are my favorite literary series, even overLord of the Rings. The moral of the story, cliched as it may sound, is don’t judge a book by its cover and listen to your grandma when she recommends a book.

But what about the movies you say? That’s another story entirely. The first two films, which I’ll admit I haven’t seen in years, were complete disappointments. Chris Columbus was in way over his head with the franchise and just couldn’t capture what made the books so fantastic. I remember watching scenes that I loved from the book and being so confused as to why I wasn’t enjoying them. Enter Alfonso Cuaron. With possibly the best of the books as his source material, Cuaron gave the movie the feel that it needed and gave the franchise a much needed breath of fresh air. His vision was darker and less colorful without sacrificing the fun tone of the books. The fourth film was good, but not great. It captured the massive visuals very well, and gave us Ralph Fiennes as the horrifying Lord Voldemort, but the movie just did not have the same impact that the book did. To the fifth film, where the series finally found the man who could create the perfect adaptation of Harry Potter in David Yates. Taking cues from his predecessors while giving the movie its own unique flair, Yates’ Potter-world is amazing. Order of the Phoenix was one of that year’s best, and with those expectations, Yates led us in to Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince.

I’ve done enough meandering so I’ll just cut to the chase: this movie is great. It’s excellent. It’s fantastic. I really can’t think of enough praising words. This is really everything that a movie should be. Rarely do series get better after the second film, and any series that goes as far as 6 movies usually becomes a parody of itself, but HBP has gone the opposite way, and is the best of the series so far. Everything about this movie is fantastic.

I’m getting so overwhelmed just thinking about it that I don’t even know where to begin. The performances, from the main characters to the supporting characters, are just perfect. One of the advantages to doing a series this long with all the same actors is that they develop a great chemistry with one another, especially with the big three. The banter between the three friends is so perfectly timed and natural feeling and that’s because they’ve been doing it for eight years. At no point does it ever feel like they’re playing friends; they’re real friends. Daniel Radcliffe is completely comfortable in the role and has made Potter his own. Emma Watson continues to be perfect, balancing fun and friendly with obsessive and neurotic. The actor who really stood out, the one who made the biggest jump between movies, is Rupert Grint as Ron. The character gets more screen time and growth in this film and Grint is fantastic. I could go on and on about every performance, but I’ll just say that Michael Gambon (Dumbledore), Alan Rickman (Snape), Jim Broadbent (Slughorn), and Helena Bonham Carter (Bellatrix) were all great. Although Gambon has never had to do much as Dumbledore, he has to show quite a range in this film and it’s perfect.

The most suprising thing (it’s a pleasant surprise) was the tone of the movie. Coming off the ending of OotP, and knowing where this film had to end up, coupled with the marketing of the film, I was expecting an extremely dark movie. The movie is quite the opposite. From the get go, it is all about having fun. There were a lot of great comedic moments, and most of these laughs are generated by the characters. It’s not a series of set pieces, but facial expressions, or body language, that are so hilarious. Most of the movie is fun and comedic in tone, but there are dark moments, and they are equally as great as the fun ones. The shift between tones does not feel forced, but rather a natural progression of events. It’s as though even with all of the light-heartedness, there is always that darkness lingering, just below the surface, so when it comes through, it’s not unexpected because it was never too far away.

This movie is really all about character development, and that’s what makes it work so well. That’s the same thing that makes the books work so well, especially for those of us who read them as they were written. I was about the same age when the first book came about, so as I got older, so did the characters, and I felt so much closer to them because of this. The same thing can be said for the movies. We’ve seen these actors since they were little kids and now we’re watching them grow and mature and become real people, and this leads to some truly great character moments. We are given a great look at the bond between Harry and Hermione, and bond that is pivotal for the final films. Like I said, it’s all about the character growth in this film, even to the point that there is no real plot. It’s essentially two and half hours and showing you the lives of these characters. The only real “plot” elements concern learning how Voldemort went from a young boy to the greatest dark wizard of all time, and that’s the definition of character development right there.

I’ve probably glossed over or forgotten someone or something on the character and story side, but you can assume it was great. From a technical side, this movie is just as great. Even non-Potter fans will have to say that the film looks great, and the cinematography is absolutley amazing. Yates takes a cue from his predecessor Cuaron and uses a number of beautiful continuous shots. They are obviously stitched together using CGI, which makes them less impressive than Cuaron Children of Men shots, but they are still brilliantly done. The movie is just filled with little shots and angles that are unconventional and give the film a very original look. Also, the establishing shots of the country side and train route are absolutely breath-taking.

To everyone saying that they don’t see these movies or read the books because they are for kids is wrong. Like I said before, don’t put the book on the shelf just because it has a silly cover (see, there was a point to that story). If you haven’t given the movies a chance, do it. If you walked away after the disappointing first two, come back. Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince is a triumph of filmmaking, a near perfect movie. Bring on The Deathly Hallows.