I was sort of dreading THE TERMINAL, because I’d heard only bad things, and because I was pretty sure it wouldn’t stand up to SCHINDLER, AMISTAD and PRIVATE RYAN all in a row. Well, it’s not something a consider a good movie. It’s a hacky comedy script that squeezes cute bullshit out of a great real life premise. (read the rest of this shit…)
Archive for the ‘Reviews’ Category
The Terminal
Wednesday, February 1st, 2012Saving Private Ryan
Tuesday, January 31st, 2012
No joke, I never saw SAVING PRIVATE RYAN before. I’ve never been big on war movies and I think back when it was a recent movie I was real cynical and suspicious of any type of flagwaving. I thought movies like this were just brainwashing kids to join up in case they needed to blow up Iraq again.
But that’s stupid. This one’s about “the good war” and still makes it look like something to avoid at all costs. The famous Omaha Beach invasion sequence near the beginning is a total bloodbath, soldiers pouring off the boats into waves of machine gun bullets. They might as well just be jumping from a diving board directly into a giant fan, it seems like. (read the rest of this shit…)
Amistad
Thursday, January 26th, 2012
With AMISTAD Spielberg brings his historical dramas closer to home, dealing with slavery in America through the story of an unusual court case. The case deals with a group of Africans captured as slaves and transported on a schooner called La Amistad. Cinque (Djimon Hounsou) leads an uprising and takes control of the ship, but they end up taken into custody along American shores. (read the rest of this shit…)
Schindler’s List
Tuesday, January 24th, 2012
You know what movie’s good? SCHINDLER’S LIST! Why did nobody tell me this before?
Would you believe this was my first time seeing SCHINDLER’S LIST? It’s getting toward 20 years old and I remembered I hadn’t gotten around to seeing it yet. It’s kind of a heavy decision to make one day: hey, I got 3 hours before I gotta leave for work, maybe I should watch SCHINDLER’S LIST? Never had the urge I guess. (read the rest of this shit…)
The Grey
Sunday, January 22nd, 2012
Okay, the first thing you’re gonna have to do is completely forget the trailer for THE GREY. It deliberately tricks you into believing something cool is gonna happen in the movie that is not gonna happen in the movie, and it gives away most of the major events, including the very end. It’s a mean trailer. (read the rest of this shit…)
Haywire
Sunday, January 22nd, 2012
Steven Soderbergh’s take on an action/spy thriller – built around “The Face of Women’s MMA” Gina Carano after he saw her on Strikeforce while flipping channels around – lives up to my high expectations. It’s written by Lem Dobbs and it’s like the kid sister of THE LIMEY, mixing the style of that Soderbergh classic with kind of a more upbeat ex-Marine-badass-operative-betrayed-and-on-the-run type of story. It has THE LIMEY’s sense of quiet, deliberate pace and dread and also its dry you-just-fucked-with-the-wrong-person type of humor. Of course, professional fighter Carano has different strengths as a performer than Terence Stamp does, so her movie has less emotion and more punching, kicking, choking, armbars, heads broken through furniture, foot chases, etc. Gina’s not gonna mourn the loss of the daughter she never knew, and Terence isn’t gonna climb up onto a roof. In my opinion. And it’s great to have both of them. (read the rest of this shit…)
Hook
Thursday, January 19th, 2012
HOOK, man. What went wrong? Let’s try to figure it out.
One thing I noticed about HOOK: it’s not called PAN. The title HOOK implies a new perspective on the PETER PAN tale, like we’re gonna see it from the pirate’s perspective, or even like it’s gonna be a Captain Hook biopic. Maybe we would learn about his struggles growing up, how he wrote his first hits, rose to the top of the charts, substance abuse, falling in love, the thing with the crocodile, etc. (read the rest of this shit…)
Always
Tuesday, January 17th, 2012
ALWAYS is very cutesy and sentimental, it’s got some pretty weak comedic bits and it’s definitely the weakest full-length Spielberg I’ve watched in this marathon so far. But it’s still pretty good, and with some things nobody could’ve done as well as Spielberg.
This one’s about the pilots who dump the red stuff on forest fires, and the Tom Cruise of red-stuff-dumpers is former shark expert and Close Encounterer Richard Dreyfus. The Anthony Edwards is John Goodman and the Kelly McGillis is Holly Hunter. Actually, Dreyfus looks kinda like Paul Newman in this one, strutting around in aviators, leather jacket, baseball cap and grey mustache. The point is he thinks he’s awesome, and everybody else agrees. His girl seems to have when are we gonna settle down? type issues, but he makes her happy by buying her a nice dress, something you don’t see around the base much because she’s the only woman there. (read the rest of this shit…)
Empire of the Sun
Monday, January 16th, 2012
“Excuse me everyone – I surrender!”
Wow – for some reason I never had any interest in EMPIRE OF THE SUN before. Turns out it’s great and sort of a beginning for alot of things. It’s Spielberg’s first WWII drama. One of Christian Bale’s first movies. The one that gave Ben Stiller the idea for TROPIC THUNDER. etc. (read the rest of this shit…)
The Artist
Saturday, January 14th, 2012
THE ARTIST is an enjoyable, cleverly made tribute movie by the French director (Michel Hazanavicius) and star (Jean Dujardin) of those O.S.S. 117 movies, which from what I have heard are also enjoyable, cleverly made tribute movies. In this one the guy plays George Valentin, beloved silent film star, on top of the world right before the dawn of the sound era. And then he’s in trouble.
(read the rest of this shit…)
1. Patreon
Toss me a couple bucks a month, support the good shit, also get access to a bunch of exclusive writing. This is my primary source of writing money that has allowed me to cut down to part time at the day job. Thank you!
2. Buy my books from your local bookseller or somebody
click here for my Amazon author page (NOTE: My ten year contract has passed on the Titan books, so I don't get residuals on them like I do WORM ON A HOOK and NIKETOWN, but I would love for you to read them because I'm proud of them)
EXTRA CREDIT: Review them on Amazon! That would really help me out. Unless you didn't like them, in which case forget I said anything.
4. My exciting line of fashion and leisure products
(I get a couple bucks per item, you get a cool t-shirt, mug or lifestyle item)
-
