Movie Review: Cowboys and Alines

I think I am now officially more scared of aliens than I was before. There is some serious creepy shit in this movie. And in the mean time there is a western going on. And it rocks. I loved pretty much every minute of this movie. It has a classic feel and frankly the aliens don't make it corny, they make it creepy as all get out. Olivia Wilde's character is a wee bit odd and out of place. Its sorta like they wanted a girl because every movie needs at least one woman. Also I really liked Harrison Ford in this movie, he had the prefect combination of gruff and concern for his character. If you have yet to see this go see it now.

Quote of the day

"Saying that this movie is less of and eye F*** than the last one does not equal a good review." - Movie Bob Chipman about Transformers Dark of the Moon

Thor Review, Go See it.

Movie Review: Hanna

This ladies and gentelmen is how its done. This is what a movie is supposed to look like, feel like smell like. These are the angles its should be shot from, these are the actors that can do the job. This is what the movies were supposed to be about, not the mass produced Micheal Bay shlop we are force feed on a regular basis. Yes there are guns and fighting but if you are not paying attention and using your brain than you miss half the movie. This is what a script should look like, this is what tone should feel like.

Hana is the story of a girl that is raised by her father in the woods with the sole purpose of eventually leaving to kill a CIA operative. It sounds like a basic kind of plot and few people have said that it has the bits and pieces of the Bourne series to it. But it is so much more. This is the most perfect modern version of a fairy tale, because true fairy tales had nothing to do with princes and everything to do with two women fighting to the death.

This movie is about a sheltered girl who is going to have to fight to the death with a much older more experienced woman. Along the way she encounters seven people that effect her choices, a family and three hired hands that are hunting her. There is symbolism and references to the Grimm fairy tales throughout. The visuals are stunning and the choice of music might be some of the best selections ever. This movie is a true marriage of thought and style with action.

If you don't see this movie I will hunt you down and strap you to a chair and force you to watch it, and if you philistine to appreciate it I will put your name in my book and then put a black line through it. (If anyone gets the book and strike reference I will get them a prize for naming the movie it is from.)

Movie Review: The Last Airbender

Back in 2005 I was still in high school and was watching way more anime than I do today. Nickelodean released a show that year called Avatar: The Last Air Bender. It was an American made show that had taken heavy influences from Asian cultures.

The show took place in a made up world where people had the ability to bend Air, Water, Fire and Earth. Each style of bending was based on a real life style of fighting. Water bending is almost complete comprised of Tai Chi. About a hundred years ago in this world the fire nation decided to conquer the other nations. At about this time the Avatar, a mystical person who is a reincarnation that can bend all four powers, disappeared. The show opens with two teens in the Southern Water Kingdom finding the Avatar who has been in suspended animation for a hundred years in a block of ice.

The show on its surface was for kids, but had themes and issues for teens. The prince of the fire nation, Zuko,  was an extremely complex character who was kicked out of his kingdom for showing compassion and struggles with his need for acceptance and doing the right thing. Aang, the Avatar was forced to confront the fact that an accident meant his entire people were wiped out and that the entire world was counting on him to kill a man he had never meet. Katara struggled to be a water bender and a woman in a society that thought she should be relegated to a healer position. Sokka, Katara's brother, dealt with the fact that his entire tribe basically left him in charge and his lack of bending making him a less useful member of the group.

The show was fantastic and funny. I thought they could have switched a romance or two to make the story have a greater depth but that was me nitpicking. The show was fantastic and I re-watched it on several occasions. I watched the first season with my boyfriend and he then on his own watched the rest of the show.

The movie on the other hand was perhaps on of the greatest failures in cinema for this generation and perhaps the next three. The opening voice over was carried on into the entire movie. The characters had the acting depth of an elementary school play. The movie attempted to cram in the side story locations when it should have simply focused on the over arching story. Details of the show were thrown in at random. Most of the first season was an extended road trip as the three main characters traveled from the south pole to the north pole. Most episodes existed to show the depth of the world. Including parts of these episodes in the movie was completely idiotic.

The biggest offense was simple change of lines and actions. In the show Aang ran away from him home because the elders wanted to take him away from his adoptive father. He knew he was the
Avatar but it wasn't that big of a deal, the issue was his adoptive father was still protecting him from a more grueling training. He ran away in a fit of anger and got trapped. In the movie he ran away when he found out he was the Avatar, because he knew that the Avatar wasn't allowed to have a family. I about shot Shamalamdingdong for that. In the movie version is is completely is fault that all the Air Benders were slaughtered, in the show he had no idea. In the movie they tell him they need his help to stop this threat. So Aang from the movie sucks ass.

Another massive offense was the casting. The fire nation was Japan. Lets be honest. It looked like Japan, the people dressed in traditional Japanese clothes and eat sushi. The earth nation was a combination of China, Korea, and Thailand. The water nation was supposed to be eskimos. In fact every actor for the water nation except for the main characters did have that native American look. So what gives with casting two Russian looking kids for the leads? Then Shamalamdingdong had to go and make the fire nation Indian. Because god forbid he doesn't get to put himself in the movie some place.

The changes to the story and actors were surface level. The writing suffered greatly. The show had been well written, the movie was something that I think was written by a pre-schooler attempting to recreated the show. I hate voice overs on principle and this movie proves that using them is never really a good idea.

I can't even being to point out all the things that were wrong with this movie without re-watching, because I tried to scrub it from my memory, but I will never watch it again. The point that made me laugh is that when the creators of the original show were asked about the movie they made it a point to say that they were not involved in the project at all. They said they were not consulted at all and then politely tried not to say they thought the movie was an abomination.

The one saving grace was that my favorite character Toph, a blind girl with the strongest ability to earth bend in this generation, was spared and not in the movie. She doesn't show up until the second season so she is save where she belongs, throwing insults and kicking rocks. Hell she was the first person to bend metal, something that was thought impossible.

For those interested the creators of the original show have announced a sequel of sorts. This will follow the life of the next Avatar, who will be a girl from the water tribe. The story is going to focus on the fact that science in the world is quickly pushing benders out of the picture. They promise there will be steampunk and rebellions. The show is entitled Avatar: The Legend of Korra.

WTF Sam Neil, Movie Review: Under the Mountain

Don't ask me how I found this movie, but it was odd. So um there are aliens and they are in New Zeland, which is a change for aliens. There are trying to take over our world. Sam Neil is another alien that wants to help but is afraid to help because the last group of twins failed.

Oh yeah twins are needed to fight the evil aliens, and they have the have "twinness" which is a special bond. Which makes me think about escape to witch mountain. But yeah. I watched the whole movie and I can't really tell you who this was made for, or why it was made. There is some low budget stuff happening but then a big budget scene sneaks in. There were crazy tempo problems as well. The first twenty five, perhaps thirty minutes of the movie was two redhead kids looking depressed and then freaked out at random times. Their mom had died and then they were sent to the aunt and uncles. They can speak in each others heads but the boy hates it.

And then pretty much out of no where come Sam Neil making fire. My exact reaction upon seeing him in this movie was "WTF Sam Neil?" Not to mention that his character has little to no personality, so there is no reason for Sam Neil to be the one to play Mr. Jones.

Why are bad aliens always slimy and good ones look like us or have fire? I mean really. Bad aliens can't be fire based and we can't have slimy good aliens? Yes I understand that the reason these things happen are our connotations of these ideas, but I like it when things get mixed up a little bit.

The end of the movie came down to the kids throwing some rocks in a dormant volcano. I would say that it was a horrible movie and there was nothing great, but it was better than Last Air Bender. I shit you not. Last Air Bender was a great series and M. Night Shamalamdingdong f-ed it up big time in perhaps the biggest let down of my life. So yes this movie is greater than Last Air Bender. But it does have that 'this was a kids book we turned into a movie' feel. And of course now that I go look up a picture I see that it is. That makes way more sense.

Sucker Punch Movie Review

Movie Review: Paul

This might come as a shock but I am a bit of a nerd. I know, you were so surprised. Anyway I remember back when news of this movie was coming out but no pictures because they really wanted to keep the movie secretive. Which at the time threw me because this was Simon Pegg we are talking about, I didn't thin he did secretive.

Another thing we are currently in the middle of the dead period for movies. This is when the odd movies come out. The big one come out in the summer or a month or two before. Paul is right before that point. But it was light out today until almost seven so maybe is in the cut off.

I really liked this movie. The alien jokes were great and I love the cast. This was literally a who's who of the funny people that are in movies these days. Kristen Wigg as the overly religious woman pretty much made my day. This movie is funny, and a bit funnier if you know anything about science fiction. The only down side is there are several references to science fiction pop culture that was before my time. I can tell that is probably for the 30 something crowd a bit more.

If you like science fiction or silly movies this is for you. If you are overly religious or don't know a single thing about aliens or science fiction pop culture then don't go see this.

Now if you don't mind I have to go climb a mountain the look for some ashes that my cure my love interest's uncle. I am so close to getting to the really hard parts in Dragon Age. Also I got Alistair to sleep with me, so go team! I am currently working on making everyone in my party love me as much as possible. I play that game with the wiki page open next to me. I would use the guide but sadly it is in another state in a storage unit because my mom doesn't understand that I might have needed that.