"KEEP BUSTIN'."

Posts Tagged ‘Doug Liman’

Road House (2024)

Monday, March 25th, 2024

ROAD HOUSE (1989) is one of my all time favorite movies. It is simultaneously extremely of its time and absolutely of all times. There’s nothing like it, nothing as good as it, it’s a lightning bolt and they stopped making the type of bottle you would need to even try to catch it again. But it is possible to make a fun remake of it, and I know this because after many years of threatening somebody finally went through with it. ROAD HOUSE (2024) skipped theaters because it was made for the Amazon Prime Free Product Shipping and Digital Television Network, but I liked it more than any non-JOHN WICK or M:I theatrically released Hollywood action movie of recent years I can think of. It’s funny and badass and different enough from the original to stand on its own. (read the rest of this shit…)

Edge of Tomorrow

Monday, June 9th, 2014

tn_edgeoftomorrowGROUNDHOG DAY is an American classic in my opinion. It has this crazy Twilight Zone type of premise (what if you had to live the same day over and over again indefinitely?) that seems too out there for a 1993 studio comedy, and yet there it is. It’s funny and clever and last time I watched it I realized it was also beautiful and profound. It’s a complete original, so it’s weird to think that after two sci-fi spins on the premise, SOURCE CODE and EDGE OF TOMORROW, we could be headed toward a world where young people see it and don’t think there’s anything unique about it. I’ve seen this before, but with action scenes. I’m bored.

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Summer Movie Flashback: Mr. & Mrs. Smith

Tuesday, August 27th, 2013

tn_mrandmrssmith

2005
2005

MR. & MRS. SMITH is an action comedy from Doug Liman, the director of THE BOURNE IDENTITY and JUMPER.  It has had a bigger imprint on pop culture than JUMPER because it caused Brad Pitt to ditch the lady he was with at the time and stick with his wife in the movie, LARA CROFT TOMB RAIDER THE CRADLE OF LIFE star Angelina Jolie. The two play John and Jane Smith (of course), who have been married for “5 or 6 years” without knowing that each other are highly skilled assassins for rival secret organizations. It’s kind of like TRUE LIES I guess but less hateful, more equal (though also the action, like the movie in general, is not as huge).

John works out of a cluttered headquarters like a construction office, his partner a misogynist loser who lives in his Mom’s basement (Vince Vaughn, his shtick already pretty worn out by that point). John keeps his weapons in a secret bunker under the tool shed. Jane’s firm is a high tech MISSION: IMPOSSIBLE type joint in a high rise. She seems to be the boss, pampered by an all female, all model staff including Kerry Washington. At one point she tells two of them to make her coffee. Her weapons, of course, are in a secret compartment under the oven.
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