Ok, I’m not going to be able to contain myself…
CONTAINS SPOILERS!
This movie tells the story of two detectives. One of them is looking for no excitement in his job and after getting transferred from forensic accounting, wants nothing more than to sit at his desk and do his paperwork… and since he can’t seem to handle confrontation, everyone else’s paperwork as well. The other was a rising star in the NYPD, sure to go straight to the top if he kept his nose clean. Then one night (right before game 7 of the World Series) he was handling security at Yankee Stadium, making sure nobody tried to slip into the Yankees clubhouse when a dark figure started approaching him carrying a baseball bat. He warned the man to stop, drew his weapon and warned him again. Receiving no response, he fired, hitting the man in the leg… only to realize that it was Derek Jeter listening to his iPod (actual cameo by Jeter, very cool…).
Detective Gamble (Will Farrell) finds out that an entrepreneur has several building permits around the city and hasn’t applied for a single scaffolding permit. Detective Hoitz (Mark Wahlberg) is distraught at this development because everyone else is looking into high profile theft cases and Gamble wants to look into finable offenses.
True to policework (sometimes), the scaffolding permits get the detectives to look into this entrepreneur and they find a deep reaching conspiracy and then they proceed to bungle the investigation several times, incurring the wrath of their Captain, who works both at the precinct and at the local Bed, Bath, and Beyond… yes, it’s that kind of movie.
RATING
PG-13 for crude and sexual content, language, violence, and some drug material
Again, I have to say that the MPAA hit the nail on the head with this rating. It really says it all. Except one thing…
The “some drug material” line just made me think of the role drugs played in this movie and I had to mention it since I’ve already said that there are spoliers in this review. Detective Gamble (Farrell) drives his Prius to a crime scene as he and Hoitz are attempting to step into the void left by the death of the “top cops” (played by Dwayne Johnson and Samuel L. Jackson). In his zeal to get to the crime scene, Gamble loses track of what he’s doing, driving his car into the crime scene, running over a corpse and a large amount of cocaine… which settles nicely all over his car. For the next few minutes, several references are made to a red Prius covered in cocaine.
CHILDREN – 2
I wouldn’t recommend that children see this movie. There are several wisecracks that are hilarious to mature adults but are not appropriate for children.
YOUNG MALE/FEMALE – 7/3
This is very much a guy movie. Action, drugs, (some) explicit language, and (lots of) crude jokes make this an enjoyable film. I’m just not sure that the 13-18 year old Twilight crowd will enjoy them as much as I did.
ADULT MALE/FEMALE – 10/6
So if this is such a guy movie, how did it get rated at 6 for adult women? Well, it’s hilarious. There are many scenes and many jokes that are still funny even if they are a little bit vulgar, uncouth, or uncivilized.
Will Farrell plays such a “square” cop for most of the movie and Mark Wahlberg desperately wants a bit of glory and also thinks that Farrell is a fake cop. The back and forth between the two of them is very well written and had me laughing throughout most of the movie.
GORE – 7
For this movie, this category really should be renamed violence because there was a fair amount of violence but very little blood. Even the violence was funny. There was a scene where the two detectives were going to play “good cop bad cop” on the businessman and were going to get him to talk. After Walhberg strong-arms him, he looks at Farrell and says that he would like to deal with him because he “seems more reasonable”. What follows actually what might happen if a forensic accountant tried to play the bad cop.
Essentially, he went nuts. He started by yelling the face of the businessman with a strange look on his face and then he proceeded to smash up the office a bit and he topped it all off by running across the room and leveling the suspect with a flying tackle.
ROMANCE – 5
Like the violence, the romantic subplots only exist to further the humor of the film. A running joke throughout the movie is that Detective Gamble has a strange ability to attract incredibly beautiful women (as evidenced by his wife, played by Eva Mendes). The first time Hoitz meets Sheila Gamble (Mendes) he doesn’t believe that they are actually married, going so far as to slip up and say “why are you with him?” before catching himself.
Even more hilarity ensues when Hoitz chases after his “one that got away”, finding her in a ballet studio (as the instructor) and he flips out when he sees her dancing with another man. Hoitz goes so far as to call her a stripper (dancing for money) at which point she points out that all the poles in the studio are horizontal. A minute later, Hoitz says that the dancing that they do isn’t too hard and that anyone can do it. Sure that he’s going to fall flat on his face, Wahlberg does the only thing that would be funnier; he executes several ballet dance moves perfectly (albeit for someone in jeans and a leather jacket) finishing with a pose that will cause you to spew your drink out from laughter (just warning you…).
DIALOGUE – 10
Unfortunately, I can’t remember all the one-liners so you’ll just have to watch the movie to hear them. A recurring line, however, related to Hoitz’s burning desire to be the alpha cop of the precinct and whenever someone is holding him back (usually Detective Gamble) he gets a sad/angry expression on his face and says something to the effect of “I’m a peacock! You gotta let me fly!” right before storming off.
SPECIAL EFFECTS – 7
The only reason this is rated so high is because the makers of this movie wanted it to be ridiculous and they got their wish. The opening chase scene featuring Detectives Highsmith (Jackson) and Danson (Johnson) was quite possibly one of the more ridiculous scenes I’ve ever seen… and I laughed throughout it.
Imagine during a chase, the police car (which is actually a muscle car) jumps and gets stuck in a double decker bus. They take control of the bus and resume the chase when the bad guys decide not to run anymore and make their final stand. Detective Danson puts the bus into a skid and the rear end hits a parked car, vaulting the previously stuck police muscle car out of the bus like a projectile, right for the bad guys and their vehicle. (As if that wasn’t enough) the camera pans to the inside of the muscle car, where Detective Highsmith is still sitting, firing two handguns while Mirandizing the bad guys. The muscle car takes out the bad guy vehicle, goes into the building behind it, and explodes.
Ridiculous? Yes. Awesome? You bet.
STORY/ACTING – 9/7
I don’t think that Will Farrell is a particularly good actor and Mark Wahlberg is good (but not great). Together they feed off each other and get to a level that they probably wouldn’t have been able to achieve with another actor alongside them.
As for the story, it’s ridiculous comedy at its best, a Police Academy type movie for this generation.
INTANGIBLES – 10
I can’t list every little thing here so I’ll just highlight a few. After proving he’s not trustworthy with a real gun, Gamble is given a wooden one. During a peptalk to his employees at Bed, Bath, and Beyond, Captain Mauch accidentally starts talking about a serial rapist before realizing he’s in the wrong crowd. Two other detectives vying for the spot of alpha cop go to an elementary school for a presentation about policework. When a call comes in that they have to take, they ask for their guns back since they had passed them to the students to look at. After Captain Mauch gets sick of Gamble and Hoitz, he reassigns them to walking the beat and traffic duty, respectively. At first, Hoitz is upset about being on traffic duty but eventually he gets into it, including a wonderful scene where he dances his way through his job. And of course, how could we forget…
“I’m a peacock! You gotta let me fly!”
TOTAL POINTS – 83/120
ADJUSTED – 69
Pretty good movie overall, just leave the kids at home.
Saturday, August 7, 2010
SALT
This film was advertised in its run-up to release as a female Jason Bourne movie and while there are similarities, I don’t think that is a terribly good comparison.
This story starts by showing CIA agent Evelyn Salt being released from a North Korean prison, bailed out not by her Agency superiors, but rather by her husband, a German national that has nothing to do with the CIA.
After this we see shots of the boring everyday existence of Agent Salt as the world isn’t constantly going up in flames and needing the attention of every super-agent out there. For instance, a Russian man turns himself into the CIA and says he wishes to defect. Salt balks on taking the lead in the interrogation because she has anniversary plans with her husband. Her superior, Ted Winter (played by Liev Schreiber), also balks because he has a plane to catch and is tired at the end of a long day.
However, they both come back and help interrogate the potential defector and in the course of the interview/interrogation, he implicates Evelyn Salt as a Russian agent, not knowing that she was the one interviewing him.
The next hour and a half is almost pure action with a few breaks to take a breath as Salt tries to outrun (literally, then figuratively) the CIA agents trying to catch her and bring her in for questioning. Before I continue, isn’t it interesting that whenever a good guy agent is implicated in some huge conspiracy, they always run, citing the need to “clear their own name”? You never see implicated agents cooperating with the investigation and letting the proper due process clear their name for them. Well, the latter makes a terrible movie… maybe that’s the answer…
So, from this point on, I’m not sure I trust myself to keep everything under wraps so…
CONTAINS SPOILERS!!!
RATING
PG-13 for scenes of intense action and violence
This movie is intriguing to me because if I had to peg a movie franchise that it is closest to in terms of action, gore, and language, my first inclination would be James Bond. Some people might say the Bourne franchise but the action sequences ring totally differently to me.
There is a lot of violence in this movie (after all, it’s about spies and sleeper cells that are very well trained in the skill of killing people) but there’s not a whole lot of gore. In the Bourne trilogy, there is a fair amount of blood because no matter how well these agents are trained, they can’t teach them not to bleed. Bourne has a limp in one leg for most of the second and third movie and he comes out of nearly every fight scene with blood oozing from somewhere that is visible.
By contrast, James Bond (before Daniel Craig that is) just didn’t seem to bleed. He would get in fights, he would get the you-know-what beaten out of him, and he would have bumps and bruises to show for it. I understand that make-up and choreography are much more believable now than they were in 1962 when Dr. No came out but still…
To wrap it all up, in this movie Salt does bleed after several fight scenes. However, if they had made the amount of blood seen more realistic like the Bourne trilogy, I have no problem believing that this movie would have been rated R. Did they reduce the visible blood to get a PG-13 rating? It would hardly be the first time…
Lastly, I would put this in the category of the James Bond films where Bond is played by Daniel Craig. This movie is suitable for a wide range of audiences but before you take your small child to see it, make sure they can handle it.
AUDIENCE
CHILDREN – 2
Some kids are advanced for their age and can handle the mature concepts and themes of this movie. As a rule, I think the rating system devised by the MPAA is pretty good at pegging when the average person is mature enough to handle the concepts of a movie. Therefore, children under 13 years old may not handle this material as well as older people.
What do I know though? I saw my first R-rated movie when I was 9 so to each his own.
YOUNG MALE/FEMALE – 7/5
Honestly, if this movie was made several years ago, the “male” side of this rating would have been a bit higher. Truth be told, in my mind, Angelina Jolie isn’t quite the movie star that she was a few years ago. She is still a good actress and a good many guys out there still think she’s one of the most attractive women in Hollywood and I can’t disagree but she seemed to inspire a flock of younger, very attractive actresses that are realizing the way into men’s imaginations is to do action movies (I’m talking to you, Scarlett Johansson).
Still, an action movie with Angelina Jolie as the lead is still a big draw for adolescent males and I’ve said it many times and I’ll say it many more; any movie that can be spun as showing how tough women can be and how they can compete in any field with men is going to go over well with a lot of women, young and old.
ADULT MALE/FEMALE – 8/6
Angelina Jolie is not getting any younger and the crop of men that have watched her become a movie star over the past ten years are aging with her, hence, the male rating goes up slightly.
My reasoning for these ratings are virtually the same as they were for the young male/female classes but were slightly higher because of the overall maturity level and the content of this movie that caters to more mature audiences.
GORE – 7
As I said before, Salt contained very James Bond type levels of gore; there was just enough to make it look real but not enough that it would bump the rating up to R. All in all, job well done.
ROMANCE – 3
There was sort of a romantic subplot and it didn’t quite ring true to me and after avoiding the subject for so long, this is when I can’t hold back the spoilers.
The main premise of the film is that Salt actually is a Russian agent but she has a change of heart and she has to “complete” her missions to make sure someone else doesn’t do it for her when she goes rogue. In other words, the only way to protect the targets that she is supposed to kill is to eliminate any potential threats around the targets. This leads to utter mayhem in which the principal targets sustain minor injuries.
The part that doesn’t ring true is why she eventually turns her back on her parent Russian organization. It appears outwardly that she did it because they killed her husband. This seems odd in movie terms at least because secret agents don’t fall in love and if they do and something happens, they never get that personal again (see, Casino Royale – 2006).
For some reason, Salt going on this rampage of death and destruction and bringing down the entire sleeper network partially because of her husband’s murder doesn’t sit quite right with me.
DIALOGUE/SPECIAL EFFECTS – 5/6
This movie wasn’t heavy on one-liners or complex special effects but the movie did seem pretty plausible, which is one of the best things I can say about a movie based on reality. Neither of these categories went out of their way to enhance the experience and neither of them got in the way of the experience; hence, middle-range ratings.
STORY – 7
This was a very odd twist on the usual rogue spy story. Traditionally, there is no truth to the rumors of being an enemy spy and after all is said and done, the superspy receives a medal for their efforts to save the world while their own parent agency was looking for them.
In this movie, she actually IS a Russian spy but has a change of heart and now has to go out of her way to avoid the good guys, find and kill the bad guys, and not get shot herself. In the end, when some of her efforts come to the attention of a particular agent, instead of getting her name cleared, which he knows will take forever, he aids in her escape right under the noses of two agents that have no job but to watch their prisoner (Salt).
In my humble opinion, this story would have been better as a 24 type TV show instead of a movie. One of the best aspects of this movie was the knowledge that enemy agents could be anywhere and you start to wonder who the next one is going to be. You especially start to wonder how high the infiltration can go if the main character turns out to be a “bad guy”. I can’t help but think that if they had turned that into a TV show, it would have been better. Of course, it also would have been compared to 24 for its entire run on TV… maybe a movie was a better idea…
ACTING – 7
Angelina Jolie is good. Liev Schreiber is good. Chiwetel Ejiofor is one of my favorite “supporting role” actors. While the plot seemed a bit farfetched, these three actors went a long way to making it much more believable.
INTANGIBLE – 8
A lot of these points come from chase scenes and escape scenes, both of which seemed to me to be the most unrealistic parts of this movie. However, they were something I’ve never seen before and when it comes to the spy genre; I can say that I’ve seen most of it. Jumping from semi to semi on a network of highway overpasses was a very novel idea even if it would have ended in catastrophe in real life. Salt’s frequent escapes from unwinnable situations start to wear thin but when it really comes down to it, nobody in Hollywood knows what an honest to god sleeper is capable of so they have plenty of latitude when it comes to an on-screen portrayal. Overall though, I enjoy a good chase scene and while this one doesn’t measure up to Bourne (any of the three movies), it was still very enjoyable.
TOTAL SCORE – 71/120
ADJUSTED – 59
All in all, it’s an action movie. It doesn’t appeal to all people but the people that it does appeal to will thoroughly enjoy it.
This story starts by showing CIA agent Evelyn Salt being released from a North Korean prison, bailed out not by her Agency superiors, but rather by her husband, a German national that has nothing to do with the CIA.
After this we see shots of the boring everyday existence of Agent Salt as the world isn’t constantly going up in flames and needing the attention of every super-agent out there. For instance, a Russian man turns himself into the CIA and says he wishes to defect. Salt balks on taking the lead in the interrogation because she has anniversary plans with her husband. Her superior, Ted Winter (played by Liev Schreiber), also balks because he has a plane to catch and is tired at the end of a long day.
However, they both come back and help interrogate the potential defector and in the course of the interview/interrogation, he implicates Evelyn Salt as a Russian agent, not knowing that she was the one interviewing him.
The next hour and a half is almost pure action with a few breaks to take a breath as Salt tries to outrun (literally, then figuratively) the CIA agents trying to catch her and bring her in for questioning. Before I continue, isn’t it interesting that whenever a good guy agent is implicated in some huge conspiracy, they always run, citing the need to “clear their own name”? You never see implicated agents cooperating with the investigation and letting the proper due process clear their name for them. Well, the latter makes a terrible movie… maybe that’s the answer…
So, from this point on, I’m not sure I trust myself to keep everything under wraps so…
CONTAINS SPOILERS!!!
RATING
PG-13 for scenes of intense action and violence
This movie is intriguing to me because if I had to peg a movie franchise that it is closest to in terms of action, gore, and language, my first inclination would be James Bond. Some people might say the Bourne franchise but the action sequences ring totally differently to me.
There is a lot of violence in this movie (after all, it’s about spies and sleeper cells that are very well trained in the skill of killing people) but there’s not a whole lot of gore. In the Bourne trilogy, there is a fair amount of blood because no matter how well these agents are trained, they can’t teach them not to bleed. Bourne has a limp in one leg for most of the second and third movie and he comes out of nearly every fight scene with blood oozing from somewhere that is visible.
By contrast, James Bond (before Daniel Craig that is) just didn’t seem to bleed. He would get in fights, he would get the you-know-what beaten out of him, and he would have bumps and bruises to show for it. I understand that make-up and choreography are much more believable now than they were in 1962 when Dr. No came out but still…
To wrap it all up, in this movie Salt does bleed after several fight scenes. However, if they had made the amount of blood seen more realistic like the Bourne trilogy, I have no problem believing that this movie would have been rated R. Did they reduce the visible blood to get a PG-13 rating? It would hardly be the first time…
Lastly, I would put this in the category of the James Bond films where Bond is played by Daniel Craig. This movie is suitable for a wide range of audiences but before you take your small child to see it, make sure they can handle it.
AUDIENCE
CHILDREN – 2
Some kids are advanced for their age and can handle the mature concepts and themes of this movie. As a rule, I think the rating system devised by the MPAA is pretty good at pegging when the average person is mature enough to handle the concepts of a movie. Therefore, children under 13 years old may not handle this material as well as older people.
What do I know though? I saw my first R-rated movie when I was 9 so to each his own.
YOUNG MALE/FEMALE – 7/5
Honestly, if this movie was made several years ago, the “male” side of this rating would have been a bit higher. Truth be told, in my mind, Angelina Jolie isn’t quite the movie star that she was a few years ago. She is still a good actress and a good many guys out there still think she’s one of the most attractive women in Hollywood and I can’t disagree but she seemed to inspire a flock of younger, very attractive actresses that are realizing the way into men’s imaginations is to do action movies (I’m talking to you, Scarlett Johansson).
Still, an action movie with Angelina Jolie as the lead is still a big draw for adolescent males and I’ve said it many times and I’ll say it many more; any movie that can be spun as showing how tough women can be and how they can compete in any field with men is going to go over well with a lot of women, young and old.
ADULT MALE/FEMALE – 8/6
Angelina Jolie is not getting any younger and the crop of men that have watched her become a movie star over the past ten years are aging with her, hence, the male rating goes up slightly.
My reasoning for these ratings are virtually the same as they were for the young male/female classes but were slightly higher because of the overall maturity level and the content of this movie that caters to more mature audiences.
GORE – 7
As I said before, Salt contained very James Bond type levels of gore; there was just enough to make it look real but not enough that it would bump the rating up to R. All in all, job well done.
ROMANCE – 3
There was sort of a romantic subplot and it didn’t quite ring true to me and after avoiding the subject for so long, this is when I can’t hold back the spoilers.
The main premise of the film is that Salt actually is a Russian agent but she has a change of heart and she has to “complete” her missions to make sure someone else doesn’t do it for her when she goes rogue. In other words, the only way to protect the targets that she is supposed to kill is to eliminate any potential threats around the targets. This leads to utter mayhem in which the principal targets sustain minor injuries.
The part that doesn’t ring true is why she eventually turns her back on her parent Russian organization. It appears outwardly that she did it because they killed her husband. This seems odd in movie terms at least because secret agents don’t fall in love and if they do and something happens, they never get that personal again (see, Casino Royale – 2006).
For some reason, Salt going on this rampage of death and destruction and bringing down the entire sleeper network partially because of her husband’s murder doesn’t sit quite right with me.
DIALOGUE/SPECIAL EFFECTS – 5/6
This movie wasn’t heavy on one-liners or complex special effects but the movie did seem pretty plausible, which is one of the best things I can say about a movie based on reality. Neither of these categories went out of their way to enhance the experience and neither of them got in the way of the experience; hence, middle-range ratings.
STORY – 7
This was a very odd twist on the usual rogue spy story. Traditionally, there is no truth to the rumors of being an enemy spy and after all is said and done, the superspy receives a medal for their efforts to save the world while their own parent agency was looking for them.
In this movie, she actually IS a Russian spy but has a change of heart and now has to go out of her way to avoid the good guys, find and kill the bad guys, and not get shot herself. In the end, when some of her efforts come to the attention of a particular agent, instead of getting her name cleared, which he knows will take forever, he aids in her escape right under the noses of two agents that have no job but to watch their prisoner (Salt).
In my humble opinion, this story would have been better as a 24 type TV show instead of a movie. One of the best aspects of this movie was the knowledge that enemy agents could be anywhere and you start to wonder who the next one is going to be. You especially start to wonder how high the infiltration can go if the main character turns out to be a “bad guy”. I can’t help but think that if they had turned that into a TV show, it would have been better. Of course, it also would have been compared to 24 for its entire run on TV… maybe a movie was a better idea…
ACTING – 7
Angelina Jolie is good. Liev Schreiber is good. Chiwetel Ejiofor is one of my favorite “supporting role” actors. While the plot seemed a bit farfetched, these three actors went a long way to making it much more believable.
INTANGIBLE – 8
A lot of these points come from chase scenes and escape scenes, both of which seemed to me to be the most unrealistic parts of this movie. However, they were something I’ve never seen before and when it comes to the spy genre; I can say that I’ve seen most of it. Jumping from semi to semi on a network of highway overpasses was a very novel idea even if it would have ended in catastrophe in real life. Salt’s frequent escapes from unwinnable situations start to wear thin but when it really comes down to it, nobody in Hollywood knows what an honest to god sleeper is capable of so they have plenty of latitude when it comes to an on-screen portrayal. Overall though, I enjoy a good chase scene and while this one doesn’t measure up to Bourne (any of the three movies), it was still very enjoyable.
TOTAL SCORE – 71/120
ADJUSTED – 59
All in all, it’s an action movie. It doesn’t appeal to all people but the people that it does appeal to will thoroughly enjoy it.
Saturday, July 31, 2010
THE KIDS ARE ALRIGHT
Before delving into this movie, I just have to say that neither one of them is my favorite actress but every time I find myself doubting Annette Bening and Julianne Moore, they always remind me just how good they are.
This movie tells a very interesting story of a middle-aged lesbian couple with two teenaged children born with the help of a sperm donor. As their 18 year old daughter Joni is on the verge of going off to college, her 15 year old brother Laser (not kidding, that’s his name) asks her to contact the sperm bank for information about their biological father.
What follows is a well woven tale about an unconventional family coming to grips with choices made in the past and present and coming through a difficult time of everyone’s life with a positive outlook on life. Yes, indeed, you may not think so while watching the movie but in the end, it certainly lives up to its title.
I hate doing it but I have to just in case someone wants to yell at me for giving something away…
MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS!!!
RATING
R for strong sexual content, nudity, language, and some teen drug and alcohol use.
First of all, I have to say that it very much intrigues me that the word “teen” is in that sentence. I understand that we don’t want the youth of America to see teens in movies doing drugs and drinking and driving and to think it’s all ok but still, I object to the fact that it appears that when adults do drugs and drink (and sometimes drive) on screen, it’s somehow not as bad as when kids do it.
If you want to send a message, MPAA, send it.
I was watching Back to the Future recently and there is a classic scene where Biff totals George McFly’s car, saying that he had no idea that the car had a “blind spot”. He goes on to ask who is going to pay for the cleaning of his jacket because he spilled beer on it during the accident. I understand that this movie was made in 1985 but the MPAA rated Back to the Future PG.
All I’m saying is if you want to send a message about drug and alcohol use, it shouldn’t matter which character in the movie is doing it.
Anyways, back to the rating; yes, this movie has very adult content in it and comes very close on several occasions to having scenes that could be described as hardcore pornography. Is it overdone? I don’t think so. This movie is very sexually charged and I think it was tastefully done.
Still, not for kids…
AUDIENCE
CHILDREN – 0
Instead of blathering on here, just reread the above section on RATING and you should understand why I don’t recommend this movie for children.
YOUNG MALE/FEMALE – 2/7
This movie is about empowered women. First of all, the main characters fell in love and got married and have a (mostly) happy marriage and family unit in a country that is still coming to grips with people of the same sex doing that. A supporting character in this movie is an 18 year old girl who, while naïve, stretches her wings to see how far she can go. All of these are admirable things to look up to and aspire to for young women in this country. I guess what I’m trying to say is this movie is not about being straight or gay; it’s (partially) about taking control of your life, finding out what you want, grabbing hold of it and never letting it go.
ADULT MALE/FEMALE – 8/10
If you can get past the sex scenes and the innuendo and if you can get over the fact that two women kiss on screen several times, you can learn a lot from this movie (yes, if you haven’t figured it out, I’m just going to build on the point I just made). One of the things that I liked a lot about this movie is these people aren’t perfect and there aren’t too many arguments within the movie where someone is absolutely right and someone else is absolutely wrong.
This movie depicts a family, for better or worse, ‘til death do us part. I can fill volumes with times where I have gotten into an argument with a family member and despite being right (which happened a lot less than I like to admit) I still completely mishandle the situation. Nobody is perfect but I think the key point that this movie tries to get across is that you have to work at being a family and in the majority of cases, that work can pay enormous dividends.
GORE – 5
There was no gore or violence. If you’re hoping for violence out of this movie, you’ve obviously wandered into the wrong theater.
ROMANCE – 8
This is one of the more unconventional love stories within a movie that I have experienced. In most of the movies I watch (which admittedly, do not usually span a wide range of genres) if a married person had an affair, then there would almost certainly be a separation; usually of the married couple, sometimes of the unfaithful person from their head.
In this story, a lesbian has an affair with a man (which causes its own delicious awkwardness in and of itself). However, after shouting and arguing and hurt, Nic (Annette Bening) decides to stay with Jules (Julianne Moore) and make it work. Their marriage is far from a Romeo and Juliet fairy tale romance, but in some way, it’s actually better because they have to work at it and then they get to enjoy the fruits of that labor.
DIALOGUE – 10
This movie had some fantastic one-liners, most notably a wonderful scene where two lesbian parents have to “have the talk” with their 15 year old son whom they suspect might be gay. Hilarity ensues.
Another fantastic play on words was done by Mark Ruffalo’s character. Instead of saying “shut the %#&@ up” in a “no way, get outta here” sense, the writers gave Ruffalo the line “shut the front door”. It was said with the same inflection and was pulled off brilliantly by the actor. It was a very small thing and he said it perhaps two or three times but it was a nice little quirk of the character, much like the quirks that people have in real life that makes them so interesting…
SPECIAL EFFECTS – 5
There weren’t really any that I can think of…
STORY – 10
I think I’ve made my point about why this was a good movie and why the story is poignant to all people (of appropriate ages). I just hope that people who see it are able to look past the relative vulgarity and see the underlying message of the film because if you can’t, in my opinion, you have some issues.
ACTING/INTANGIBLES – 10/10
I’m lumping these together because the intangibles are the lead actresses, Annette Bening and Julianne Moore. Bening plays a doctor, a lifelong professional with a very well-paying job and enormous responsibility. Moore plays a hippie who is still searching for her professional calling and has gone through many jobs over the years.
Most importantly, these two actresses were able to convey (to me, at least) that they were a married couple first and a gay couple second. They bickered just like male-female married couples in other movies and they faced similar issues (their given sexual preferences did set up some good comic relief though).
TOTAL SCORE – 85/120
ADJUSTED – 71
This was a good movie and definitely worth a watch if you’re open-minded. The only reason it wasn’t rated higher is there is a lot of explicit content.
Until next time, enjoy the movies!
This movie tells a very interesting story of a middle-aged lesbian couple with two teenaged children born with the help of a sperm donor. As their 18 year old daughter Joni is on the verge of going off to college, her 15 year old brother Laser (not kidding, that’s his name) asks her to contact the sperm bank for information about their biological father.
What follows is a well woven tale about an unconventional family coming to grips with choices made in the past and present and coming through a difficult time of everyone’s life with a positive outlook on life. Yes, indeed, you may not think so while watching the movie but in the end, it certainly lives up to its title.
I hate doing it but I have to just in case someone wants to yell at me for giving something away…
MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS!!!
RATING
R for strong sexual content, nudity, language, and some teen drug and alcohol use.
First of all, I have to say that it very much intrigues me that the word “teen” is in that sentence. I understand that we don’t want the youth of America to see teens in movies doing drugs and drinking and driving and to think it’s all ok but still, I object to the fact that it appears that when adults do drugs and drink (and sometimes drive) on screen, it’s somehow not as bad as when kids do it.
If you want to send a message, MPAA, send it.
I was watching Back to the Future recently and there is a classic scene where Biff totals George McFly’s car, saying that he had no idea that the car had a “blind spot”. He goes on to ask who is going to pay for the cleaning of his jacket because he spilled beer on it during the accident. I understand that this movie was made in 1985 but the MPAA rated Back to the Future PG.
All I’m saying is if you want to send a message about drug and alcohol use, it shouldn’t matter which character in the movie is doing it.
Anyways, back to the rating; yes, this movie has very adult content in it and comes very close on several occasions to having scenes that could be described as hardcore pornography. Is it overdone? I don’t think so. This movie is very sexually charged and I think it was tastefully done.
Still, not for kids…
AUDIENCE
CHILDREN – 0
Instead of blathering on here, just reread the above section on RATING and you should understand why I don’t recommend this movie for children.
YOUNG MALE/FEMALE – 2/7
This movie is about empowered women. First of all, the main characters fell in love and got married and have a (mostly) happy marriage and family unit in a country that is still coming to grips with people of the same sex doing that. A supporting character in this movie is an 18 year old girl who, while naïve, stretches her wings to see how far she can go. All of these are admirable things to look up to and aspire to for young women in this country. I guess what I’m trying to say is this movie is not about being straight or gay; it’s (partially) about taking control of your life, finding out what you want, grabbing hold of it and never letting it go.
ADULT MALE/FEMALE – 8/10
If you can get past the sex scenes and the innuendo and if you can get over the fact that two women kiss on screen several times, you can learn a lot from this movie (yes, if you haven’t figured it out, I’m just going to build on the point I just made). One of the things that I liked a lot about this movie is these people aren’t perfect and there aren’t too many arguments within the movie where someone is absolutely right and someone else is absolutely wrong.
This movie depicts a family, for better or worse, ‘til death do us part. I can fill volumes with times where I have gotten into an argument with a family member and despite being right (which happened a lot less than I like to admit) I still completely mishandle the situation. Nobody is perfect but I think the key point that this movie tries to get across is that you have to work at being a family and in the majority of cases, that work can pay enormous dividends.
GORE – 5
There was no gore or violence. If you’re hoping for violence out of this movie, you’ve obviously wandered into the wrong theater.
ROMANCE – 8
This is one of the more unconventional love stories within a movie that I have experienced. In most of the movies I watch (which admittedly, do not usually span a wide range of genres) if a married person had an affair, then there would almost certainly be a separation; usually of the married couple, sometimes of the unfaithful person from their head.
In this story, a lesbian has an affair with a man (which causes its own delicious awkwardness in and of itself). However, after shouting and arguing and hurt, Nic (Annette Bening) decides to stay with Jules (Julianne Moore) and make it work. Their marriage is far from a Romeo and Juliet fairy tale romance, but in some way, it’s actually better because they have to work at it and then they get to enjoy the fruits of that labor.
DIALOGUE – 10
This movie had some fantastic one-liners, most notably a wonderful scene where two lesbian parents have to “have the talk” with their 15 year old son whom they suspect might be gay. Hilarity ensues.
Another fantastic play on words was done by Mark Ruffalo’s character. Instead of saying “shut the %#&@ up” in a “no way, get outta here” sense, the writers gave Ruffalo the line “shut the front door”. It was said with the same inflection and was pulled off brilliantly by the actor. It was a very small thing and he said it perhaps two or three times but it was a nice little quirk of the character, much like the quirks that people have in real life that makes them so interesting…
SPECIAL EFFECTS – 5
There weren’t really any that I can think of…
STORY – 10
I think I’ve made my point about why this was a good movie and why the story is poignant to all people (of appropriate ages). I just hope that people who see it are able to look past the relative vulgarity and see the underlying message of the film because if you can’t, in my opinion, you have some issues.
ACTING/INTANGIBLES – 10/10
I’m lumping these together because the intangibles are the lead actresses, Annette Bening and Julianne Moore. Bening plays a doctor, a lifelong professional with a very well-paying job and enormous responsibility. Moore plays a hippie who is still searching for her professional calling and has gone through many jobs over the years.
Most importantly, these two actresses were able to convey (to me, at least) that they were a married couple first and a gay couple second. They bickered just like male-female married couples in other movies and they faced similar issues (their given sexual preferences did set up some good comic relief though).
TOTAL SCORE – 85/120
ADJUSTED – 71
This was a good movie and definitely worth a watch if you’re open-minded. The only reason it wasn’t rated higher is there is a lot of explicit content.
Until next time, enjoy the movies!
Saturday, July 3, 2010
TOY STORY 3
There is only so much I can say about the franchise that has been Pixar’s best. Toy Story was great in 1995, Toy Story 2 was somehow better in 1999 and after 11 years off, this one picks up right where the sequel left off, introducing enough new characters while bringing back all those that you fell in love with long ago.
In essence, when longtime playmate Andy is set to go to college, he has to decide what to do with all the toys that have stood by him for all those years. A misunderstanding places them in the back of a garbage truck where Woody manages to get them out of the frying pan to a daycare center, not knowing that he unwittingly put the rest of the toys straight into the fire under the thumb of a dictatorial purple teddy bear. Hilarity ensues as Woody does everything he can to rescue his friends while at the same time getting back to his owner. In the end, difficult decisions are made about what is best for everyone involved; the toys as well as Andy.
Ok, I’ll say it again; THERE MIGHT BE SPOILERS AHEAD.
RATING – G
There is one scene which children might have some difficulty with. In essence, all of our protagonists end up at a junkyard on a conveyer belt heading to a giant incinerator. The main antagonist, Lotso, has a chance to save them by shutting down the conveyer and doesn’t, making a snide comment with an evil laugh.
However, this scene is short and I am of the opinion that any child would be able to weather this brief storm either in the lap of their parent or perhaps simply by holding a hand. It is entirely possible though that after watching this movie, children may not look at teddy bears the same way again…
CHILDREN – 10
The intended audience; children. Pixar has had repeated success at making movies that are very good for children and this is no exception. It is yet another extension of the common childhood fantasy that when you are gone, your toys play with each other rather than sitting around in some box waiting to be played with.
YOUNG MEN – 7
YOUNG WOMEN – 9
This movie has less to offer to the adolescent male than the adolescent female. After all, this is a movie about toys and in my experience adolescent males don’t do the best work for their credibility by doing anything associated with toys. Still, this movie has good action sequences, just like the first two, and wonderfully written dialogue that appeals to all age groups.
ADULT MEN – 9
ADULT WOMEN – 10
Like it or not, women are more sentimental than men and this movie (along with more or less every Pixar product) plays right into it. Having said that, it is still a wonderfully enjoyable movie for anyone with a heart; I do not recommend this movie for serial killers.
GORE – 8
As with the first two, there is a fair amount of “violence” that you would expect from toys fighting. Limbs get contorted into unnatural positions (not a big deal for a toy, just for a human), Mr. and Mrs. Potato Head lose parts regularly, and at one point Buzz Lightyear is reprogrammed from his lucid self into the Space Ranger that we first met 15 years ago with amusing consequences.
There is enough violence to make you believe that this is real and it’s not all that different from what people would do if they were thrust into similar situations but it’s also done in a tasteful way that accents the movie and doesn’t detract from it.
ACTING – 6
ROMANCE – 5
With all due respect to Tom Hanks, Tim Allen, and all the others that provided voices for this movie, there’s only so much you can add to an animated movie by providing the voice. Yes, some people are better than others at doing voice work but in this movie it added a small amount. In my opinion, the voice actors did the single best thing that they can do in an animated film; they didn’t distract you from the movie.
This movie didn’t have much of a romantic subplot with the exception of the Buzz Lightyear/Jessie relationship continued (and slightly furthered) from Toy Story 2. Didn’t add much, didn’t detract much, although it did give us one of the best scenes from all three movies (more on that later).
DIALOGUE – 8
Like every other Pixar movie I’ve seen, the writing is witty and good for all age groups. The vocabulary level is low enough that small children can follow what’s going on and occasionally there are snide references to more adult themes that small kids won’t understand and adults find hilarious.
SPECIAL EFFECTS/STORY – 10
The best thing I can say about the story is the writers somehow took the same characters, wrote three separate stories that have very little to do with each other. I know this is a drastic example but in the original Star Wars trilogy, the plot of the second and third movies built upon their predecessors. In the Toy Story franchise, these three stories are completely unrelated with the exception of the common characters.
Again, all I can say about the special effects is the highest praise I can say for an animated film; the effects were amazing but they still didn’t look too real. This isn’t a video game where the better the resolution the better and this isn’t an IMAX film where we have to see every single pixel in excruciating detail. As Nintendo found out with some of their titles for the Wii, sometimes slightly lower resolution with a great plot is better than the other way around.
INTANGIBLES – 10
Tom Hanks plus good animation plus good story equals great movie. Most importantly, they added one of the greatest sequences in all three movies with Buzz Lightyear. Part of the way through the movie, Buzz is reprogrammed by the evil toys and he reverts back to the Space Ranger from the original movie who thinks that he is still battling Zurg’s evil forces. When the good toys recapture him and attempt to reverse the process, they accidentally switch him to his “Spanish Mode”. In the ensuing few minutes, a salsa remix of “You’ve Got a Friend in Me” comes on and Buzz and Jessie go bonkers for each other and have a spicy dancing scene. The scene was absolutely hilarious and provided just one more example of the writer’s brilliance.
TOTAL SCORE – 102
ADJUSTED SCORE – 85/100
All in all, this is another home run by Pixar and I highly recommend it for all ages and occasions.
In essence, when longtime playmate Andy is set to go to college, he has to decide what to do with all the toys that have stood by him for all those years. A misunderstanding places them in the back of a garbage truck where Woody manages to get them out of the frying pan to a daycare center, not knowing that he unwittingly put the rest of the toys straight into the fire under the thumb of a dictatorial purple teddy bear. Hilarity ensues as Woody does everything he can to rescue his friends while at the same time getting back to his owner. In the end, difficult decisions are made about what is best for everyone involved; the toys as well as Andy.
Ok, I’ll say it again; THERE MIGHT BE SPOILERS AHEAD.
RATING – G
There is one scene which children might have some difficulty with. In essence, all of our protagonists end up at a junkyard on a conveyer belt heading to a giant incinerator. The main antagonist, Lotso, has a chance to save them by shutting down the conveyer and doesn’t, making a snide comment with an evil laugh.
However, this scene is short and I am of the opinion that any child would be able to weather this brief storm either in the lap of their parent or perhaps simply by holding a hand. It is entirely possible though that after watching this movie, children may not look at teddy bears the same way again…
CHILDREN – 10
The intended audience; children. Pixar has had repeated success at making movies that are very good for children and this is no exception. It is yet another extension of the common childhood fantasy that when you are gone, your toys play with each other rather than sitting around in some box waiting to be played with.
YOUNG MEN – 7
YOUNG WOMEN – 9
This movie has less to offer to the adolescent male than the adolescent female. After all, this is a movie about toys and in my experience adolescent males don’t do the best work for their credibility by doing anything associated with toys. Still, this movie has good action sequences, just like the first two, and wonderfully written dialogue that appeals to all age groups.
ADULT MEN – 9
ADULT WOMEN – 10
Like it or not, women are more sentimental than men and this movie (along with more or less every Pixar product) plays right into it. Having said that, it is still a wonderfully enjoyable movie for anyone with a heart; I do not recommend this movie for serial killers.
GORE – 8
As with the first two, there is a fair amount of “violence” that you would expect from toys fighting. Limbs get contorted into unnatural positions (not a big deal for a toy, just for a human), Mr. and Mrs. Potato Head lose parts regularly, and at one point Buzz Lightyear is reprogrammed from his lucid self into the Space Ranger that we first met 15 years ago with amusing consequences.
There is enough violence to make you believe that this is real and it’s not all that different from what people would do if they were thrust into similar situations but it’s also done in a tasteful way that accents the movie and doesn’t detract from it.
ACTING – 6
ROMANCE – 5
With all due respect to Tom Hanks, Tim Allen, and all the others that provided voices for this movie, there’s only so much you can add to an animated movie by providing the voice. Yes, some people are better than others at doing voice work but in this movie it added a small amount. In my opinion, the voice actors did the single best thing that they can do in an animated film; they didn’t distract you from the movie.
This movie didn’t have much of a romantic subplot with the exception of the Buzz Lightyear/Jessie relationship continued (and slightly furthered) from Toy Story 2. Didn’t add much, didn’t detract much, although it did give us one of the best scenes from all three movies (more on that later).
DIALOGUE – 8
Like every other Pixar movie I’ve seen, the writing is witty and good for all age groups. The vocabulary level is low enough that small children can follow what’s going on and occasionally there are snide references to more adult themes that small kids won’t understand and adults find hilarious.
SPECIAL EFFECTS/STORY – 10
The best thing I can say about the story is the writers somehow took the same characters, wrote three separate stories that have very little to do with each other. I know this is a drastic example but in the original Star Wars trilogy, the plot of the second and third movies built upon their predecessors. In the Toy Story franchise, these three stories are completely unrelated with the exception of the common characters.
Again, all I can say about the special effects is the highest praise I can say for an animated film; the effects were amazing but they still didn’t look too real. This isn’t a video game where the better the resolution the better and this isn’t an IMAX film where we have to see every single pixel in excruciating detail. As Nintendo found out with some of their titles for the Wii, sometimes slightly lower resolution with a great plot is better than the other way around.
INTANGIBLES – 10
Tom Hanks plus good animation plus good story equals great movie. Most importantly, they added one of the greatest sequences in all three movies with Buzz Lightyear. Part of the way through the movie, Buzz is reprogrammed by the evil toys and he reverts back to the Space Ranger from the original movie who thinks that he is still battling Zurg’s evil forces. When the good toys recapture him and attempt to reverse the process, they accidentally switch him to his “Spanish Mode”. In the ensuing few minutes, a salsa remix of “You’ve Got a Friend in Me” comes on and Buzz and Jessie go bonkers for each other and have a spicy dancing scene. The scene was absolutely hilarious and provided just one more example of the writer’s brilliance.
TOTAL SCORE – 102
ADJUSTED SCORE – 85/100
All in all, this is another home run by Pixar and I highly recommend it for all ages and occasions.
Friday, July 2, 2010
TWILIGHT SAGA: ECLIPSE
I’m sure those of you who know me would wonder why I would review this movie because the natural assumption is that I watched it. Well, I did. I’ve now seen all three movies in the Twilight Saga. I don’t know if that’s a good thing or a bad thing; just a thing.
At this point, I’m going to insert the disclaimer and I’m not going to say it ever again… THIS REVIEW MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS. Ah, got that out of the way.
Anyways, without further adieu…
RATING – PG-13
Intense sequences of action and violence, and some sensuality
CHILDREN – 0
No, I do not recommend this movie for children. First of all, the subject matter is fairly dark. Secondly, the Motion Picture Association of America decided that for children under the age of 13, they should be accompanied. That should say a lot. Honestly, the rating description says it all as to why this movie isn’t the best choice for small children.
YOUNG WOMEN – 10
Ah, the target audience. This movie has it all for the teenage girl age bracket. As a friend of a friend said on Facebook, Harry Potter was a story about a kid defying the odds and coming into his own when the whole world was against him while the Twilight Saga is mostly about how important it is to have a boyfriend. I believe this is a fairly good assessment of the average American teenage girl. It’s not a bad thing or a good thing; just a thing.
For the young women this movie has everything; the heartthrob vampire that they think is hot (no idea why), the werewolf who compensates for his unusual condition by having no body hair, and a young girl with lots of free time on her hands stuck in the middle. To be the center (or very near to it) of a four-book, five movie universe is a perfect fantasy for this age group.
YOUNG MEN – 1
Take everything I said in the Young Women category and take the exact opposite. The only reason I gave this movie a 1 and not a 0 is a guy who has the intestinal fortitude to see this movie might be able to score some points with the Young Women group.
ADULT WOMEN – 7
The adult categories are quite similar to the younger categories but both are closer to the middle. This movie still appeals to women because it’s the story about a girl being chased (sometimes literally) by everyone but most especially two attractive suitors, one of whom presents the potential for eternal life.
I marked it down a bit because I think that when we reach adulthood, our dreams and fantasies take a bit of a back seat to reality and the lives that we actually lead.
ADULT MEN – 2
Adult men who go to see the Twilight movies will probably have a very good reason to and for a great many of them, it probably has to do with a daughter that fits into the “Young Women” grouping. Having a daughter that wants to see this movie and begs and pleads for you to take them to it is a much better reason to be there than a significant other. So, the daughter aspect is good for another point. Still, not a movie aimed at guys.
GORE – 7
There wasn’t too much gore in this movie which is relatively unusual for a film that centers on vampires and werewolves. There are scenes where a vampire is basically creating a vampire army and according to the story, people who were recently changed have an insatiable appetite for human blood. However, in the scenes where this is evident, the camera is either angled away from where gore would be or is far enough away that you can’t see much (if any) blood.
In the climactic battle of this movie, where the previously mentioned army of vampires attacks a family of vampires (who have the backing of a pack of werewolves), there is actually no blood. According to the mythology of the series (as well as the mythology of vampires), the vampires have no heartbeat and also, no blood.
In my opinion, the amount of violence/gore was quite tastefully done. There was enough to convince the viewer that these fights and battles were going on but little enough explicitly shown for this movie to be appropriate for younger viewers.
ROMANCE – 8
This movie is full of romantic plots and subplots. The protagonist, Isabella Swan, accepts the marriage proposal of vampire Edward Cullen and then shortly after, she professes her love for werewolf Jacob… but she loves Edward more and is prepared to spend eternity with him (literally).
If that doesn’t spell romance, I don’t know what does.
DIALOGUE – 4
The script writing doesn’t add too much to this movie and at times detracts. Some lines seem forced and don’t seem to fit well with the rest of the storyline. Also, I didn’t notice until it was pointed out by Riff Trax (absolutely hilarious if you get a chance) but there are sometimes large pauses in the middle of sentences. This isn’t exactly dialogue (more direction than writing) but it can get really distracting.
SPECIAL EFFECTS – 5
The Special Effects are terribly done but sometimes when the werewolves are running, they don’t look natural, especially when they are bounding over objects on the ground in the forest. It just looks weird and unnatural at times.
STORY – 5
I’m sure that this value would be higher if I had read the books but I haven’t yet so in this vampire-saturated entertainment market, I can’t get overly excited about another series of books and movies about vampires. Yes, the mythology is interesting but we as a country are a bit too obsessed with vampirism for my taste right now.
ACTING – 2
Ah, the one I’ve been waiting for. The stories center around characters played by Robert Pattinson (Edward), Kristen Stewart (Bella), and Taylor Lautner (Jacob). Unfortunately, none of these three are particularly adept at delivering lines or portraying a given emotion. In my opinion, they were picked much more for their looks than their acting ability.
INTANGIBLES – 0
There really wasn’t anything, other than what I’ve discussed, that called to me and said that this movie deserved anymore points towards its total score.
TOTAL SCORE – 52 POINTS
FINAL RATING – 43
WOULD I RECOMMEND THIS MOVIE?
For some people, yes, for most people no.
At this point, I’m going to insert the disclaimer and I’m not going to say it ever again… THIS REVIEW MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS. Ah, got that out of the way.
Anyways, without further adieu…
RATING – PG-13
Intense sequences of action and violence, and some sensuality
CHILDREN – 0
No, I do not recommend this movie for children. First of all, the subject matter is fairly dark. Secondly, the Motion Picture Association of America decided that for children under the age of 13, they should be accompanied. That should say a lot. Honestly, the rating description says it all as to why this movie isn’t the best choice for small children.
YOUNG WOMEN – 10
Ah, the target audience. This movie has it all for the teenage girl age bracket. As a friend of a friend said on Facebook, Harry Potter was a story about a kid defying the odds and coming into his own when the whole world was against him while the Twilight Saga is mostly about how important it is to have a boyfriend. I believe this is a fairly good assessment of the average American teenage girl. It’s not a bad thing or a good thing; just a thing.
For the young women this movie has everything; the heartthrob vampire that they think is hot (no idea why), the werewolf who compensates for his unusual condition by having no body hair, and a young girl with lots of free time on her hands stuck in the middle. To be the center (or very near to it) of a four-book, five movie universe is a perfect fantasy for this age group.
YOUNG MEN – 1
Take everything I said in the Young Women category and take the exact opposite. The only reason I gave this movie a 1 and not a 0 is a guy who has the intestinal fortitude to see this movie might be able to score some points with the Young Women group.
ADULT WOMEN – 7
The adult categories are quite similar to the younger categories but both are closer to the middle. This movie still appeals to women because it’s the story about a girl being chased (sometimes literally) by everyone but most especially two attractive suitors, one of whom presents the potential for eternal life.
I marked it down a bit because I think that when we reach adulthood, our dreams and fantasies take a bit of a back seat to reality and the lives that we actually lead.
ADULT MEN – 2
Adult men who go to see the Twilight movies will probably have a very good reason to and for a great many of them, it probably has to do with a daughter that fits into the “Young Women” grouping. Having a daughter that wants to see this movie and begs and pleads for you to take them to it is a much better reason to be there than a significant other. So, the daughter aspect is good for another point. Still, not a movie aimed at guys.
GORE – 7
There wasn’t too much gore in this movie which is relatively unusual for a film that centers on vampires and werewolves. There are scenes where a vampire is basically creating a vampire army and according to the story, people who were recently changed have an insatiable appetite for human blood. However, in the scenes where this is evident, the camera is either angled away from where gore would be or is far enough away that you can’t see much (if any) blood.
In the climactic battle of this movie, where the previously mentioned army of vampires attacks a family of vampires (who have the backing of a pack of werewolves), there is actually no blood. According to the mythology of the series (as well as the mythology of vampires), the vampires have no heartbeat and also, no blood.
In my opinion, the amount of violence/gore was quite tastefully done. There was enough to convince the viewer that these fights and battles were going on but little enough explicitly shown for this movie to be appropriate for younger viewers.
ROMANCE – 8
This movie is full of romantic plots and subplots. The protagonist, Isabella Swan, accepts the marriage proposal of vampire Edward Cullen and then shortly after, she professes her love for werewolf Jacob… but she loves Edward more and is prepared to spend eternity with him (literally).
If that doesn’t spell romance, I don’t know what does.
DIALOGUE – 4
The script writing doesn’t add too much to this movie and at times detracts. Some lines seem forced and don’t seem to fit well with the rest of the storyline. Also, I didn’t notice until it was pointed out by Riff Trax (absolutely hilarious if you get a chance) but there are sometimes large pauses in the middle of sentences. This isn’t exactly dialogue (more direction than writing) but it can get really distracting.
SPECIAL EFFECTS – 5
The Special Effects are terribly done but sometimes when the werewolves are running, they don’t look natural, especially when they are bounding over objects on the ground in the forest. It just looks weird and unnatural at times.
STORY – 5
I’m sure that this value would be higher if I had read the books but I haven’t yet so in this vampire-saturated entertainment market, I can’t get overly excited about another series of books and movies about vampires. Yes, the mythology is interesting but we as a country are a bit too obsessed with vampirism for my taste right now.
ACTING – 2
Ah, the one I’ve been waiting for. The stories center around characters played by Robert Pattinson (Edward), Kristen Stewart (Bella), and Taylor Lautner (Jacob). Unfortunately, none of these three are particularly adept at delivering lines or portraying a given emotion. In my opinion, they were picked much more for their looks than their acting ability.
INTANGIBLES – 0
There really wasn’t anything, other than what I’ve discussed, that called to me and said that this movie deserved anymore points towards its total score.
TOTAL SCORE – 52 POINTS
FINAL RATING – 43
WOULD I RECOMMEND THIS MOVIE?
For some people, yes, for most people no.
Circle Change Movie Reviews
I have thought about expanding my blogging portfolio for a while and have decided to go into the realm of the silver screen. I’ve always enjoyed movies and have a personal collection of about 400 DVD’s and have a Netflix account and watch movies with regularity.
I don’t consider myself an expert on the film industry or a critic in whom you should put all of your faith and trust when it comes to evaluating a movie. I’m a pretty typical guy in terms of my movie tastes and I just figured that if I threw my opinion out there, it might help somebody somewhere decide whether or not they want to see a particular flick.
I devised a rating system because I’ve always thought that the old tried and true turkey through five star rating system lacked the detail that I wanted. Therefore, I came up with twelve parameters and will give the movies a value for each from 0 to 10. At the end, I add them all up, divide by the total possible (120), and then multiply by 100, giving us a final rating between 0 and 100 (0 bad and 100 good).
Five of the parameters are how appropriate this movie is for the following particular audiences; children, young women, young men, adult women, and adult men. When I say appropriate, I’m not necessarily thinking of content, I’m thinking of how well that particular demographic will enjoy the movie. The other parameters I’m going to use to judge movies are Gore, Romance, Dialogue, Special Effects, Story, Acting, and Intangibles.
For example, if I were to give a movie a ranking of 10 for Gore, I’m not saying that the movie has a ton of gore or no gore at all; I’m saying that the amount of gore added content to the movie.
For the time being, I’m going to try to review movies as I watch them in the theaters but eventually I am going to go through my collection of DVD’s and find out what the best movie that I’ve ever seen actually is…
In the meantime, reach for the popcorn and enjoy the movies!
I don’t consider myself an expert on the film industry or a critic in whom you should put all of your faith and trust when it comes to evaluating a movie. I’m a pretty typical guy in terms of my movie tastes and I just figured that if I threw my opinion out there, it might help somebody somewhere decide whether or not they want to see a particular flick.
I devised a rating system because I’ve always thought that the old tried and true turkey through five star rating system lacked the detail that I wanted. Therefore, I came up with twelve parameters and will give the movies a value for each from 0 to 10. At the end, I add them all up, divide by the total possible (120), and then multiply by 100, giving us a final rating between 0 and 100 (0 bad and 100 good).
Five of the parameters are how appropriate this movie is for the following particular audiences; children, young women, young men, adult women, and adult men. When I say appropriate, I’m not necessarily thinking of content, I’m thinking of how well that particular demographic will enjoy the movie. The other parameters I’m going to use to judge movies are Gore, Romance, Dialogue, Special Effects, Story, Acting, and Intangibles.
For example, if I were to give a movie a ranking of 10 for Gore, I’m not saying that the movie has a ton of gore or no gore at all; I’m saying that the amount of gore added content to the movie.
For the time being, I’m going to try to review movies as I watch them in the theaters but eventually I am going to go through my collection of DVD’s and find out what the best movie that I’ve ever seen actually is…
In the meantime, reach for the popcorn and enjoy the movies!
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