Monday, June 13, 2011

In The Year 3000...





Good Afternoon Ladies & Gentlemen,

It has been a very busy week at work… and I’ve also been going to the gym almost every day… so yeah, that kind of explains why you haven’t heard from me in a while. Oh… and my mom came to town this weekend… so there’ll certainly be pictures of that later. In the meantime, I just thought that I’d share a few movies that I saw in the late hours while recovering from the gym.

First up is a movie that I’ve been waiting for quite some time. Why? Well, of course it stars the lovely Megan Fox… whose work I’ve been following… let’s say passionately for a few years. Mickey Rourke is in it too… and he’s usually entertaining. The other big thing though… was when I heard that Bill Murray was going to be in it… as a ruthless gangster. Oh no, it’s not a comedy. It’s an independent flick. Yup. Anyway, without further ado, I give you “Passion Play” finally. It’s the story of a down-and-out musician (Rourke) who’s on the run from a ruthless gangster named Happy (Murray, as mentioned). He stumbles upon a carnival… where he meets a beautiful woman named Lily (Fox) who… sigh… who has wings. Yes, she’s not an angel… she’s just a young woman with wings. Please stop rolling your eyes. Well, they run away together from the manipulative carnie leader (Rhys Ifans) because the musician thinks that if he cuts a deal with Happy to make a lot of money showing off his newfound love… then Happy won’t kill him & take her anyway. Well, I think you can guess where it goes from there… but it’s actually an okay flick… as long as you can get past the wings thing… and it’s just great eye candy with Miss Fox anyway. I recommend it if you’re looking for an interesting indie flick. I will give you a cheese warning though. There is some cheesiness. Then again, you get to see Bill Murray play a gangster too. Well worth it…

Saturday, I basically spent the afternoon hanging with my roommate Nurse and we watched a few movies. Oddly enough, both of us are young beautiful individuals… who just had nothing better to do on a Saturday night. Weird, right? Anyway, first up was “The King’s Speech” starring Colin Firth, Helena Bonham Carter & Geoffrey Rush. You’ve probably heard about it since it won Best Picture… but it’s about in the early 1930’s when the King of England died, the eldest son (Guy Pearce) decided that instead of being king he would marry a woman from Baltimore, Hitler was taking over the European continent, and then the man who would be king (Firth) had a pretty bad stammer. Well, as usual, behind every great man in history, his wife (Carter) helped him by pairing him with a controversial Australian speech therapist (Rush) and the rest… is history. Pretty great flick, I highly recommend it. There’s a lot about family, duty, perseverance, courage, confidence, & all that other junk.

Next up was “Buried” starring Ryan Reynolds and… well, spoiler alert… it’s just Ryan Reynolds… in a box… up until they roll credits. A private contractor in Iraq awakes to find himself buried alive in a coffin somewhere. He doesn’t know where. He’s in a coffin. All he has is the clothes on him, a lighter, and a bag filled with various items like glow sticks, a knife, etc. He gets a call… he’s being held hostage… and he’s trying to call around to talk to his family, the consulate, anybody who can help him. It’s actually pretty gripping… though there’s a LOT of political undertones as you might expect from the location… which kind of takes away from the horror theme of being buried alive… but then again, he’s still buried alive. Ain’t no punching your way up through the ground thanks to your training like he’s in “Kill Bill” This is real. Happens every day. Anyway, give it a gander if you’d like…

After that though… we kind of needed something a little more cheery than a war horror movie… so I pulled out the desperate measure. “Have you seen… Hot Tub Time Machine?” “No?” “I know what our next movie will be then…” and we laughed hysterically for about 102 minutes. Great white buffalo…

The next day… I finally did it. I know I’ve mentioned that I’ve been thinking about it for a long time… but just didn’t have the sudden urge to just… get out there and do it. It was a long time coming. I was curious. People had told me that it would change my life… but I didn’t believe them. So I sucked it up… and went for it… and finally watched “Battlefield Earth” starring John Travolta… which is highly regarded as one of the worst movies of the modern era… and it really didn’t disappoint. Quick summation of the story: Scientology’s Book of Genesis. Not quite so quick: In the year 3000, human are endangered… and hide amongst the mountains from evil alien overlords called Psychlos, who mine gold & other metals out of the ground. One man has balls, knowledge machine, humans revolt, blah blah blah… let’s get to how bad the movie was. Now, I don’t know why… but there was a LOT of slow motion & echoing throughout this movie. Like… if it were played in regular speed, it might’ve been a twenty minute movie total… and not as much life would’ve been wasted. Also, the director or editor must have really liked center-out transition wipes… because there was a few dozen thrown in too. Use sparingly, future filmmakers. John Travolta… who played the evil alien leader Terl… truly deserved the Worst Actor Razzie & Worst On-Screen Duo with anybody on screen with him. It was REALLY bad… like… REALLY… BAD. Very campy. His only competition… was Arnie in “Batman & Robin” but without the bad puns, just piss poor dialogue. Academy Award nominee Forest Whitaker was in the movie too… or so I’m told. His part was pretty small… covered in costume… and even when you could understand what he was saying… it was pretty bad acting & dialogue anyway. Just overall… really bad. Period. I could go on and on… but yeah, waste of time… and even typing. Done with it… but not sorry to see it first-hand. It needed to be done. Now I know.

Next up was the Coen Brothers remake of “True Grit” starring Jeff Bridges, Matt Damon, Josh Brolin & newcomer Hailee Steinfeld. For those of you who haven’t seen the original starring John Wayne, go do so… and then watch this one. Both are pretty good. It’s a good old fashioned story of revenge & redemption in the Old West. Mattie Ross (Steinfeld) is a 14 year old girl out to settle her murdered father’s affairs… but to hunt down his murderer (Brolin), she needs the help of a Texas ranger (Damon) and an old gunslinging sheriff named Rooster Cogburn (Bridges) to help her follow his trail. What really stood out about this movie… was Steinfeld’s performance from such a young lady surrounded by Hollywood’s finest. Also, the dialogue is not what you’re used to… as with most Coen Brothers’ films… but very good & appropriate to the environment of the film. I really liked it… and it made me want to watch the original again (it’s been a few years).

Anyway, that should do it for me this time. Next time, pictures of my weekend with my beautiful mother & aunt in this incredible Bay Area. Have a great day everybody!!!

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