Mini Reviews (I'm Back)

In case anyone actually reads this, I apologize for my recent absence but things have been sort of crazy at work. Right now, I am going to write a few mini reviews to get caught up on the things I've seen recently (two movies in theaters you might want to check out and two on DVD that you will probably want to avoid), but then I am going to get back to updating this blog more frequently. I also have a few ideas for new funs things to do (i.e. a weekly Friday Top Five list related to new releases or actor birthdays and maybe a Best Director tournament!). But for now, here are quick thoughts on four 2013 releases (from best to worst):

The Internship
Starring: Vince Vaughn, Owen Wilson, Rose Byrne, Max Minghella
Plot: Two salesmen lose their jobs and decide that despite any skill whatsoever that they are going to get a job at Google. The movie follows a summer long internship program.
Thoughts: Despite being way too long and following all the rules of romantic comedy, The Internship manages to be cute, sweet and funny. The best part about it is, of course, Vaughn and Wilson and their perfect chemistry that also worked so well in Wedding Crashers. But the real star of the show is the Google campus which is fascinating and interesting in every sense of the word.
Grade: B-

Now You See Me
Starring: Jesse Eisenberg, Woody Harrelson, Mark Ruffalo, Isla Fisher, Morgan Freeman, Michael Caine, Dave Franco, Melanie Laurent
Plot: Four street magicians come together thanks to a mysterious but powerful benefactor to become the most successful magicians with a traveling show where they manage to do completely unbelievable tricks (such as stealing money from a Paris bank while in Vegas). The FBI is hot on their tail though.
Thoughts: Now You See Me benefits from having an almost unrelentless pace, which absolutely works in its favor because if you were given time to stop and think about the whole thing, you would realize how none of it (especially the far fetched, ridiculous ending) makes sense. Still, as far as fun, thoughtless entertainment goes, this is decent.
Grade: C+

Dark Skies
Starring: Keri Russell, J.K. Simmons
Plot: Aliens target a family and slowly drive them crazy.
Thoughts: Cliche, but also really terrible. Simmons is the only - THE ONLY - good thing about it and he's only in it for about 3 minutes.
Grade: D+

Stand Up Guys
Starring: Al Pacino, Christopher Walken, Alan Arkin
Plot: Val (Pacino) is newly released from prison but some powerful people are holding a 28 year grudge and send his bestie (Walken) to give him the night of his life and then kill him.
Thoughts: Remember when Pacino was one of the greatest actors of all time? That whole thing is pretty foggy to me. The more he makes crap like this, the easier it is to forget he was ever even in The Godfather. The end of this movie is actually pretty bad ass, but it's a shame you have to sit through an hour and a half of crap to get to 45 seconds of coolness. On the plus side? It's not as bad as Lords of Salem!
Grade: D-

Warm Bodies

My problem with Warm Bodies is sort of cyclical. I had little interest in the film, originally. Then I recently read the book. I thought the book was cute, funny and charming so it made me sort of excited to see the movie. Once I saw the movie, I felt like I might have enjoyed it more had I not read the book. If you've read the book, and liked the book, the main problem with the movie is that they change a lot of stuff, unnecessarily. A possible bigger problem is that they also dumbed it and watered it down quite a bit, but more on that later.

The zombie rom-com stars Nicholas Hoult as a zombie named R. He lives in an airport and, while he enjoys collecting records and listening to music, he mostly stands around and groans a lot. While on a hunting expedition in the city, he meets, falls for, and kidnaps Julie (Teresa Palmer). He brings the pretty blonde back to his airplane home and holds her hostage although she eventually sort of begins to like the quirky zombie. After a while, however, she decides she needs to head back to her home - a walled in stadium which is run by her militant dad (John Malkovich!). While R lets her go at first, he begins to realize that their love, or whatever, is changing not only himself but the other undead, so he decides to go win her heart.

Warm Bodies the book was a pleasant surprise - funny, charming, sweet and completely satisfying. Warm Bodies the movie has a lot of the same charm but, having recently finished the book, all the pointless changes were completely distracting. And it was things that didn't even need to be changed! In the book, R wears a red tie but in the movie they change it to a red hoodie. In the book, R goes searching for Julie because he loves her. In the movie, it's because he needs to warn her she is in danger. In the book, R has a zombie wife and kids. In the movie, they don't exist. The changes they make are totally silly and don't save any time, really. A big change I wasn't fond of was how R gets into the stadium to begin with. It's much more satisfying in the book. More than that though, Warm Bodies the movie seemed sort of dumbed down so it appealed to a more general audience. I'm not saying the book is particularly brilliant or mind bending or anything, but I definitely felt like the movie more aimed itself at pleasing a certain young teenage demographic. A lot of the jokes felt almost too jokey, if that makes sense.

Still, Warm Bodies isn't without it's good points, the main one being the great cast. Nicholas Hoult is absolutely perfectly cast as the droll, intellectual, funny, sweet zombie R. He is great in the role and I think he's about to have a huge year. Teresa Palmer is great as well, although he role seems more interchangeable. Anyone could have played Julie, although I think Hoult is perfectly cast as R. Analeigh Tipton (who I think would make a perfect Andie if they and when they make the Gone Girl movie... someone better take note of this because it's gold, casting wise!) is a great scene stealer in the small role of Julie's best friend Nora. Dave Franco brings the adorable Franco brother charm to the role of Julie's recently departed boyfriend. But it's John Malkovich, of course, who all but steals the show. It's sometimes hard to tell if he's being campy or not but that sort of Malkovich blend of acting works perfectly in this movie.

Overall, Warm Bodies isn't going to change the world, and come summer time, most people will probably have forgotten about it altogether. Still, it's a cute and fun way to pass a few hours on a cold winter's day.

Grade: C

Silent House & 21 Jump Street

Silent House - There are good things and bad things about Silent House. First, the good news. It's ridiculously creative. Filmed in one continuous take, the 88 minute long film was filmed in real time and features creative direction and camera tricks. Also, Elizabeth Olsen is INCREDIBLE. Her performance is so terrifyingly real and sincere that it's hard to not become involved in the story. The story, of course, is about Sarah (Olsen) who goes to her family's old lake house with her dad and her uncle in order to fix it up to sell it. It's been mostly abandoned for the last year and there are squatters who keep breaking in and destroying the house. Or maybe the squatters are still in the house. Because Sarah soon finds herself locked in the house. Then she finds her dad's unconscious body and so begins a game of cat and mouse with Sarah trying to stay alive and make it out of the house. Now for the bad news. The movie just isn't scary at all. Plus, it gets a little too weird at one point. Also, it's full of all the same old horror movie cliches. Then there's that ending. SPOILER ALERT. I'm not going to totally ruin the ending. I did like the IDEA of the ending. The problem is I don't think it was executed properly. An ending similar to that has been done so much better before in films like High Tension and Triangle. All in all, Silent House was merely mediocre. The creativity and Olsen's incredible performance definitely make it watchable. If it wasn't for those things, Silent House would just be another run of the mill, trite, boring wanna be scary movie.
Grade: C


21 Jump Street - A few days ago when I reviewed last year's remake of Footloose, I talked about how the best way to remake a classic film (or, in this case, TV show) was to make it your own while still paying homage to the original. Well, 21 Jump Street totally succeeds at both of these things. The film is based on the TV show that made Johnny Depp a mega star and is about a group of young looking cops who go undercover at local high schools. In the movie, Jonah Hill and Channing Tatum star as ex-high school enemies (Tatum was uber popular, Hill was a loser) who become besties and then find themselves going back into their old school to infiltrate a drug ring. This time around, Hill finds himself in with the cool kids (including James Franco's equally strange and talented younger brother Dave) while Tatum is a nerd who is mistakenly signed up for AP-Chemistry. So, the plot is pretty commonplace, but here's the thing - the movie is actually really, really funny. In fact, at certain points, I kept thinking about how this movie really has no right to be this good. In fact, after the barrage of trailers that took over for a while, I was convinced this movie was going to be terrible. But it's not. We all know Jonah Hill is funny but here, again, he's proving that he's a pretty damn good actor as well. Tatum is known as being a pretty face but after seeing A Guide to Recognizing Your Saints, I always suspected there was a good actor in there somewhere. Here, he's funny and charming and absolutely great. The supporting cast (from Franco to Ice Cube to Ellie Kempler to a small scene stealing part from Johnny Simmons) is all fantastic as well. Plus, there are cameos by a bunch of the original cast members of the show (including Johnny Depp - whose cameo is absolutely great). All in all, 21 Jump Street is a GOOD movie. The only thing keeping it from being a great movie is the too long run time. Other than that, it's totally recommendable.
Grade: B