Actors: Matt Damon, Frances McDormand, Rosemarie
DeWitt, John Krasinski, Hal Holbrook
Rating:
6 out of 10, I mean I get it, Damon hates big gas companies, but this was such
an uneven story it was hard to figure out what was going on at times. Damon starts out as a high priced “go to” guy
for the gas company but after one night shooting vodka shots with the locals he
seems to lose whatever ability he started the movie out with (well I guess that
can happen). A great cast, especially the
females, McDormand and DeWitt, although they’re criminally underused. Hal Holbrook looks to be about 180 yeas old but
ably plays the conscience for Damon’s charachter. There’s a twist at the end which is so obvious
and heavy handed that it loses its power.
A vanity piece with some great actors poorly used.
MVP: DeWitt
as the love interest Alice
Actors: Roddy McDowell, Natalie Trundy, Claude Akins,
Paul Williams, Severn Darden
Rating:
6 out of 10, The final movie in my foray into the early Apes movies
which points out eloquently why this series died out with this movie.
McDowell continues to shine but the plot and staging are exactly like an
hourly TV show not a movie. The battle
with the scarred human remnants was laughably bad as was Akins’ Aldo the gorilla
villain. They could have done a lot with
this, but chose to mail it in and it shows.
MVP: McDowell
as Caesar the only talking ape
Actors: Sylvester Stallone, Sarah Shahi, Jason Momoa,
Christian Slater, Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje
Rating: 7 out of 10, Rocky’s back, but that boy has
had some serious plastic surgery done.
He can barely move his facial muscles anymore. I think if he ever smiled (he doesn’t in this
movie) his toes would curl. He does get
into a Viking axe death match with Conan which gives you a clue about the
flick. This film also marked the return
of Walter Hill who directed some of the best action flicks of the 1980’s so his
teaming with Stallone was appropriate. I
always liked Hill’s gritty style and over the top action which is once again
present here. Stallone plays a betrayed
hit man who teams up with an Asian cop from Washington
DC to hunt down his betrayers in New Orleans. Somehow it all made sense and the action was
almost non-stop and enjoyable.
MVP: Stallone as Jimmy Bobo can still carry an
action flick
Actors: Min-sik Choi , Ji-tae Yu, Hye-jeong Kang,
Dae-han Ji
Rating: 7 out of 10, A truly fascinating movie that
will definitely take you out of your comfort zone. The possibility of me ever eating sushi was
definitely terminated after one scene in this movie. I heard a lot of buzz about this and it was
deserved. A poor slob gets plucked off
the street and then imprisoned for fifteen years for reasons only known to his
tormentor. Eventually released he goes
berserk trying to find out the reasons and generally wreaking havoc with a claw
hammer. Really well acted and staged
along with a convoluted plot – awesome movie but not for the squeamish.
MVP: Min-sik Choi as the tormented Oh Dae-su
Actors: Roddy McDowell, Natalie Trundy, Don Murray,
Ricardo Montalban, Hari Rhodes
Rating:
6 out of 10, The heavy handed writing for the sequels continue with a
sledgehammer approach to race relations.
The apes are now running around as menial servants abused in a
totalitarian regime of the 1990s (must have missed that). McDowell is excellent once again playing his
own son and leading the ape rebellion. Khan
learns he cannot fly and Murray
as the villain is completely over the top but hey, this is an apes movie.
MVP: McDowell
as Caesar the only talking ape
Actors: Kim Hunter, Roddy McDowell, Bradford Dillman,
Natalie Trundy, Eric Braedon, Ricardo Montalban
Rating:
7 out of 10, The 1970s surely will go down in cinema history as the
decade where sequels became commonplace.
Somehow Zira and Cornelius managed to find a rocket engineer and fix
Heston’s spacecraft from the bottom of the ocean and achieve interstellar/time
travel in the two days since we last saw them watching the gorilla army march
off to doom their world. All that being said, it’s fairly entertaining
to watch the apes arrive in 1970s Los
Angeles, mainly due to the acting of Hunter and
McDowell with remarkably expressive eyes, clearly superior to their CGI descendants. The plot goes over the top with attacking “the
system” but hey, this was the seventies where Hollywood was catching up to the social
unrest of the 60’s. Zira gets “stigmatized”
for dissecting live humans – how unfair.
I need to ask – how the hell did Hauptman Hans Dietrich from the Rat
Patrol get to be a presidential advisor! (you’ll really date yourself if you
understand that) and Khan running a circus!
MVP: Hunter
as the inappropriate but lovable Zira
Actors: Charlton Heston, Kim Hunter, Roddy McDowell,
Linda Harrison, Maurice Evans, James Franciscus
Rating:
6 out of 10, An obvious attempt to reap some sequel benefits from the
successful first movie and they did manage to get Harrison
back in her leather bikini, but…. This
movie played and was edited like a television show and really missed having Heston
in a lead role. The writer was obviously
traumatized by growing up during the cold war because the unintentional comedy
level skyrockets when we meet a bunch of deformed, telepathic humans praying to a nuclear
bomb as their god.
MVP: Harrison and her bikini
Actors: Charlton Heston, Kim Hunter, Roddy McDowell,
Linda Harrison, Maurice Evans
Rating:
7 out of 10, The first and definitely the best of the old Apes movies
with the twist ending explaining why everyone, including the apes, spoke
English. It’s interesting to watch now
for the sledgehammer type criticism leveled against 1960s society. Harrison doesn’t
say a word but wears the hell out of her buckskin bikini. Every time you see Heston in a movie, you’re reminded
of what screen presence is all about.
MVP: Heston
as Taylor the preachy, but compelling hero
Actors: Naomi Watts, Ewan McGregor, Tom Holland,
Sonke Mohring
Rating:
8 out of 10, I’m not a huge Watts fan
but she really surprised me in this, as did the whole movie. The first twenty minutes are as visceral an
experience one can imagine as the 2004 tsunami devastates Thailand. The film doesn’t go for cheap, Hollywood
tricks but reduces the view to that of the victims which is heartbreaking. Tom Holland as the eldest son holds his own with
the veteran actors and McGregor is his typical awesome as the desperate father searching
for his family. I also liked the depiction of the quiet courage of the Thais
faced with unimaginable horror and doing their simple, human best to help.
MVP: McGregor
as the focused father
Actors: James Franco, Selena Gomez, Vanessa Hudgens,
Ashlety Benson, Rachel Korine
Rating:
7 out of 10, I thought this would only be a T&A spring break
exploitation flick until my daughter (feminist extraordinaire) recommended
it. The gals in this movie totally
dominate even if their life choices are somewhat screwy. James Franco continues
his streak of totally unlikable characters but at least in this one I he was
supposed to be. He plays one of those white guys (we all see them) trying to
mimic black gangsta style and only manage absurd “loser” status. I liked the
bond of the gals in this but the director goes for so many “style” shots that
the pace comes to a screeching halt. The last few minutes descend into complete
fantasy with the girls packing 800 round magazines on pistols and becoming
deadly marksmen, with no training, but hey, it’s the movies. In the end this
really is a chick flick that tries to intrude on male action themes and does a
pretty good job of it.
MVP: Hudgens
definitely leaves Disney well behind her and is the best actor on the screen
for this
Actors: Jodie Whitaker, John Boyega, Alex Esmail,
Leeon Jones, Nick Frost
Rating:
7 out of 10, An extremely interesting take on the old alien invasion
motif. A gang of young toughs start out
mugging a helpless girl and then team up with her to deal with an invasion of
shaggy aliens in an inner city tenement.
Some of the dialogue was tough for a Yank to follow because of the thick
accents. Interesting to see a side of modern
Britain
not well explored in cinema that reaches our shore – this was definitely not
Jane Austen territory. Not a D’Arcy in
sight (thank God) but some pretty well done action scenes and a very
interesting young cast; especially Boyega who has some real screen
presence. Nick Frost shows up for some
reason that’s never really explained – kind of wasted in this. A fun movie but the “heroes” were awful hard
to root for.
MVP: Boyega
as Moses the natural leader of the gang
Actors: Jason Momoa, Stephen Lang, Rachel Nichols,
Ron Perlman, Rose McGowan
Rating:
8 out of 10, I initially really didn’t like this remake of one of my
favorite movie characters. I thought Milius
captured the true spirit of Conan in his 1980’s version, mainly by limiting Arnold to about seventeen
words in the entire movie. The stark,
lone, invincible warrior I read about growing up was there. I didn’t give this one a chance when it first
came out because of that bias but my son encouraged me to see it again and he
was right. It’s a well done action movie
and Momoa can actually speak which is probably what threw me off. Nichols is no Sandahl Bergman (whatever
happened to her) as the heroine but Lang and an especially creepy McGowan make
great villains.
MVP: Perlman
as Conan’s father is his usual, epic, understated awesome.
Actors: Ingrid Pitt, Madeline Smith, Peter Cushing,
Ferdy Cole, Jon Finch
Rating:
6 out of 10, A return to one of the later Hammer Studio horror movies
where they tried to up viewership by finally letting those signature low cut blouses
fail. Pitt was a little beyond her prime
but still extremely “watchable” in this seriously silly vampire tale where she
seduces and then kills a series of well endowed young British actresses. Cushing is barely in this until he’s called
on to “Van Helsing” the poor Ms Pitt. I’m
still trying to figure out what the male vampire running around the woods was
supposed to be doing.
MVP: Ms Smith with her large tracts of land as
the clueless Emma
