Lockout

Actors:  Guy Pearce, Maggie Grace, Vincent Regan, Joseph Gilgun, Lennie James, Peter Stormare Rating:  9 out of 10, a really fun movie that totally snuck up on me when I saw it in the theater.  This kind of stuff is right in Luc Besson’s wheel house which he did so well with the 5^th Element.  Two actors completely dominate this movie.  Joseph Gilgun is mesmerizingly evil as the totally daft bad guy.  It’s impossible to look away when he is on screen and equally tough to understand what he is saying at times.  Pearce is even more effective as the wise cracking hero, channeling Bruce Willis.  He has too many great one–liners to recount but he takes serious moments and takes the air completely out of his superiors with incredibly funny jabs.  The action is almost non-stop as Pearce has to rescue the president’s daughter, Maggie Grace, from a prison located in space.  Grace holds her own with Pearce which is a challenge because he is so good.  The supporting cast is also superb although some of the American accents fray at times.  The dynamic between the two bad guy brothers was also well done and explains why Gilgun’s character survives his outlandish excesses.  The only thing that keeps this movie from achieving top ranking are the special effects which are not up to par.  Some of the early scenes look like they were done for a 1990’s Atari game.  That being said, this is a great movie for we lovers of popcorn escapism.
MVP:  Pearce as the witty, sarcastic but very effective CIA Operative Snow

American Reunion

Actors:  Jason Biggs, Seann William Scott, Alyson Hannigan, Tara Reid, Thomas Ian Nicholas, Mena Suvari, Chris Klein, Eddie Kaye Thomas, Eugene Levy and John Cho

Rating:  6 out of 10, I actually enjoyed this when it came out in theaters a couple of months ago but when I watched it at home it had lost a lot of its comedic punch.  It was clear that some of the leads are less than gifted actors and were merely reading their lines instead of trying to emote.  It was interesting to catch up with the characters from the original American Pie movie and see them wrestling with adulthood.  The best part of the movie was the relationship between Jason Biggs and his dad Eugene Levy, who’s still the funniest guy in the movie.  Stifler‘s act is a little lame now and they made no attempt to make the high schoolers look anything less than mid-twenties in age.  Jim and Michelle’s relationship was the sweetest thing about the other movies and it didn’t seem right to threaten it.  I loved the turn about between Finch and Stifler and their respective maternal quests.  Overall this was a nice, little movie where hopefully these characters are saying goodbye to us, one can hope.
MVP:  Levy as Jim’s Dad once again steals every scene he’s in and tries to show the younger actors what comedic acting is all about

Murder By Death

Actors:  Peter Falk, David Niven, Peter Sellers, Truman Capote, Maggie Smith, James Coco, Eileen Brennan, Alec Guiness, Elsa Lanchester
Rating:  8 out of 10, an extremely intelligent comedic parody of film noir  detectives that shows its age but is still laugh out loud funny.  The film was penned by Neil Simon and his sharp wit gives real traction to what would otherwise be extremely silly.  The story has five famous detectives based on Hercule Poiroit, Sam Spade, Miss Marple, Nick and Nora Charles, and Charlie Chan who are challenged to solve a murder by/of Truman Capote.  You can take a look at the cast and realize this was a lot of fun to watch.  As with most of Simon’s work the best part were the one liners and most of those fall to Falk in what I believe to be his best film role.  They even made a sequel featuring his character, called the Cheap Detective which was horrible.  I didn’t realize how hot Maggie Smith was at the time but she is also very good in a small part.  Alec Guiness is so funny as the blind butler James Sirbensonmum and shows a real flair for physical comedy, although I ddi keep flashing back to Obi Wan hearing his voice.  The only misses were Coco and Sellers who overdid their parts, maybe because they were surrounded by such talented actors.  I still love this movie and could not believe it was not in my collection until now. 
MVP:  Falk as the over the top tough detective Sam Diamond steals scenes even in the august company of this cast

21 Jump Street.

Actors:  Channing Tatum, Jonah Hill, Brie Larsen, Dave Franco, Rob Riggle, Ice Cube

Rating:  8 out of 10, this movie was so funny and Tatum is an absolute revelation in the film.  He demonstrates real comic timing which is not easy.  He is quickly establishing that he is much more than just a pretty face.  This is of course the homage film to the 80’s iconic TV show and they decided to make it a comedy which works on a number of levels.  It was funny to see the differences pointed out with today’s high school kids, mostly positive.  I won’t ruin the surprises but there are some very funny cameos in this as well.  Cube once again plays the angry black guy but also pokes fun at himself.  I think this was supposed to be a Hill vehicle also but he’s just not that funny as a lead and the movie slows way down when it focuses solely on his story line.  He is much more sympathetic and funny when he works as part of a duo.  This movie was just a whole lot of fun to watch. 

MVP:  Tatum as the clueless Jenko is a breakout comedy star in this  

Wrath of the Titans

Actors:  Sam Worthington, Liam Neeson, Ralph Fiennes, Edgar Ramirez, Toby Kebbell, Rosamund Pike

Rating:  7 out of 10, a surprise when a sequel is better than the original film but this film is clearly superior to the original, Clash of the Titans.  Worthington is an interesting actor but in this movie he spends almost the entire film getting his ass kicked repeatedly and thoroughly.  He’s supposed to be the hero but in each instance he wins (he is the hero after all) by some last minute gambit.  This prevents him from being truly heroic and steals some of his luster.  The special effects are truly special, especially the father of gods Chronos who looked like the LOTR’s Balrog on steroids.  The supporting cast was extremely talented if cursed with some truly unfortunate hair cuts.  Kebbell (as always) and Pike were both extremely credible in their roles as comic foil and romantic interest.  I liked this movie so much more than the Clash of the Titans which I don’t even remember very well other than mild contempt. 
MVP:  Worthington as Perseus shows he can take a punch and carry a movie

Project X

Actors:  Thomas Mann, Oliver Cooper, Jonathan Daniel Brown, Dax Flame, Kirby Bliss Blanding
Rating:  6 out of 10, I missed this when it was in theaters mainly because I couldn’t convince the wife to accompany and boy am I glad I couldn’t.  She would have hated this and I’m not sure I really liked it. It revolves around the story of three high school nobodies who change their lives by hosting a truly outrageous birthday party that escalates way out of control.  Apparently their high school has a bunch of twenty something playboy models going to school there which I guess is a good thing.  The leads are not sympathetic at all, especially Cooper who transcends to truly unlikable.  This was made by the same guys who made Hangover but in those movies you at least had someone to root for – not so here.  I wanted to see this because I used to have parties at my house when my parents were out and I thought it would be nostalgic but I never had angry dwarfs locked in the oven or a flame throwing drug dealer burning down the neighborhood so I guess I was pretty lame. 
MVP:  Blanding was memorable as Kirby, the love interest for one of the leads, because she seemed to be the only one who “got it” in the entire cast and she didn’t have to take her clothes off to be memorable

Camelot

Actors:  Richard Harris, Vanessa Redgrave, Franco Nero, Lionel Jeffries, David Hemmings Rating:  6 out of 10, a Father’s Day gift and a film I really cherished from my youth.  Camelot was the first play I ever saw, put on by my high school drama department while I was still in Junior High.  I’d always been a huge fan of knights in shining armor stuff and this had them in spades.  I always wondered about Redgrave whom I never found attractive in the role of Guinevere.  The movie has not aged well with the sound stages obviously fake which makes this seem more theater than movie and at times just silly.  The knights seem a lot more effeminate than I remembered and Arthur absolutely prances occasionally.  Nero was a huge mistake as Lancelot as he seems to be a spaghetti western actor dumped in the middle of a bunch of British thespians, which is of course exactly what happened.  He’s clearly out of his league and it hurts the movie.  Harris and Redgrave though carry the film and are so good that you wonder what the hell Guinevere was thinking.  One of my favorite scenes in movie history is the ending where Arthur sends off the young boy to remember the dream that was Camelot.  I’m glad I now have this cherished film of my younger years in my collection but it certainly has aged, but then, so have I.
MVP:  Harris was a much better actor that I ever gave him credit for, lot of nuance in his role as Arthur