And Soon The Darkness

** - I can’t imagine that the tourism board of Argentina is terribly happy with the way its native dwellers were portrayed in this 2010 film starring two skinny broads and the guy who played Éomer in the LOTR films. The basic plot is that a pair of scantily clad American girls (in their early twenties, I would guess; their prime “zoom the camera in on her ass” age) are bicycling through Argentina when they come upon a town inhabited solely by boorish rapists, sneaky murderers and snobby women who won’t even talk to you. That is the filmmaker’s portrayal of Argentina: corrupt cops, loutish brutes in bars, and servile women who just kind of stand around waiting to be ordered to do something by a man. In any event, the girls are unsurprisingly headed for trouble as one is kidnapped by an unknown assailant and the other one goes on what feels like a decade-long search for her, but was apparently actually only like 4 or 5 hours. It is quite obvious from the time they step foot in this cursed little town that things are going to end badly and it is also clear who the bad guys are (here’s a hint: it’s everybody). Anyway, the scenery is kind of nice, and if you enjoy staring at women in bikinis lying in the sun (which I must say, was probably the highlight of the movie) then you might get something out of this. Otherwise, I can’t recommend bothering with it.

The Ruins

** - This film is the absolute epitome of the cheesy clichéd modern horror flick. Start off with a scene of a scared woman in the dark screaming who is then dragged away by some unseen force. Then roll the credit sequence and immediately cut to a sunny beach in Mexico where four hot college-aged kids are frolicking and gamboling around with nary a care in the world. Enter a mysterious German stranger who cajoles them into going to a secluded Mayan ruin in the jungle to help him find his missing brother. The eventually find the ruin – which is a grandiose Mayan step pyramid – after encountering some weird little kids who just stare at them creepily. They notice a tent set up at the top and begin to scale the ruin only to notice a bizarre type of acidic vine covering it. Then a bunch of indigenous villagers run out of the woods and surround the group, forcing them to retreat to the top of the pyramid after shooting one of them in the face. I don’t want to give too much of the plot away here, but as you might imagine, while stuck at the top of the pyramid, all sorts of marginally spooky and not-too-terrifying stuff occurs that results in numerous deaths. I think one escaped, but then again maybe not, and then the film closes with another group of starry-eyed tourists wandering innocently toward the cursed pyramid. Nothing to see here; move along.

Furry Vengeance

* - I’ve tried very hard to come up with some sort of funny and catchy opening sentence for this review, but I think the movie itself so drained me of life and creativity that I continually am able to only think of one word: abomination. That is what 2010 Brendan Fraser vehicle “Furry Vengeance” is, an abomination to all that is good and decent in this universe. Perhaps, you say, I am being too harsh with this lighthearted film with apparently good intentions? I disagree. It is exactly that sort of thing – the deceptively evil – that worms its way into people’s consciousnesses and decays it from the inside out. This movie, which is ostensibly a comedy, is the broadest, lamest and most bereft of humor that I have seen in a long time. It’s like somebody got stoned, watched that one marginally entertaining scene from the John Candy movie “The Great Outdoors” that has the talking raccoons and decided that a feature length version of that would be hilarious. That person was very wrong. I’ve always felt that there is nothing worse than a bad comedy, as bad drama or action movies at least take on some unintentionally comedic elements. “Furry Vengeance” lends credence to that theory, as it is dangerously close to unwatchable.

The Town

**** - Say what you will about Ben Affleck’s acting ability (he seems to be somewhat polarizing in that respect) I think it is roundly agreed even by the most ardent of Affleck dislikers that his forays into directing and screenwriting have been of rather high quality regardless of what one thinks of his acting chops. This movie features Affleck in an acting, directing and screenwriting role and is of quite high quality on pretty much every level, which seems to indicate that anyone who feels he is a poor actor may have a bias against the movies in which he has acted. While this movie doesn’t present much that hasn’t been introduced in other films in one way or another, every facet of it is well above the standard action/drama lark, from story to cinematography to acting to characters. Those who know me would probably be surprised by my enjoyment of this, as it features a rather heavy romantic aspect quite prominently, and I tend to not be fond of those. That would be a very astute observation, but what made this part of the movie acceptable to me was that it wasn’t just thrown into the film to get a little T & A into it, but was rather a fully integrated part of the main plot. And I’m a sucker for movies that feature thick Boston accents, anyway.

The Day the Earth Stopped

* - This 90-minute low-budget quickie directed by and starring C. Thomas Howell is a blatant rip-off of the Keanu Reeves remake of “The Day the Earth Stood Still” minus the production value and star power. It features a pair of nude aliens landing in Los Angeles - along with a giant robot - with plans to annihilate the human race due to their violent and destructive nature. Luckily, despite having landed on Earth sans clothes (which, admittedly made for a fairly titillating opening bit) the female alien was able to apparently acquire copious amounts of lip gloss and eyeliner, because when one is destroying a civilization one certainly doesn’t want to look a mess. The poor quality of writing and production of this causes the viewer to continually ponder a series of questions that are raised, perhaps the most interesting being: why would the task force assigned to saving the planet from giant robots consist solely of a grumpy guy in a suit, two geeks in lab coats, a few military guys with rifles, and a 14 year old with cell phone? The studio that made this film is notorious for releasing direct-to-video garbage around the same time as similarly titled big-budget blockbusters, relying on confusion and trickery to make money. I have to question the efficacy of that business model. You’d think people would catch on at some point.

20 Years After

** - I don’t consider myself someone who has a bias against movies or TV series that have a less than average sized budget. I love the shows ‘Mystery Science Theater 3000’ and ‘Red Dwarf’ both of which are pretty low budget, and even movies like what one might see on SyFy aren’t necessarily considered bad by me, despite their lack of any sort of visual extravagance. However, I think what occasionally makes the above-mentioned media enjoyable to me is the quality of the dialogue and/or plot. Having those attributes is absolutely essential to making a less than stellar visual experience palatable. This movie – which I assume was made for TV or video, although I have no evidence of that – has the low budget look of a made-for-SyFy film but doesn’t counter that with an interesting story. It has the feel of the movie “Children of Men” without the interesting plot, characters and visuals. The biggest star in this is the guy who played the blond guy whose teeth end up in a piece of flannel shirt in “The Blair Witch Project” and it also lifts all of its plot elements from earlier and better films. In addition, this post-apocalyptic movie seems to have been filmed largely in an abandoned warehouse and a marginally scenic rocky forest, which certainly detracts from any potential gratification. I can’t imagine that there is anything here that would interest anyone but the hardcore sci-fi fan, and even that supposition is somewhat tenuous.

The Last Airbender

** - It is almost certainly a bad omen when the most enjoyable parts of a movie were the completely innocent and highly humorous spouting of lines such as “he’s a bender!” and “I knew you were a bender” by numerous characters to each other. You see, in the this M. Night Shyamalan sci-fi/fantasy film (which is apparently based on some weird-ass Japanese cartoon series) a “bender” is not a gay man, but actually is someone from one of the Four Nations (Earth, Air, Water and Fire) that has the ability to telekinetically control that nation’s element, sort of like using The Force. It sounds kind of neat in theory (although I would have certainly considered not using the term ‘bender’ had I been in charge), but in practice it is actually very lame, due largely to the fact that to, say, fling a ball of fire at someone, it requires a lengthy string of odd martial arts poses, during which time you are easy prey for arrows or swords or any other sort of ranged or melee attack. It is a very inefficient superpower, and comes off really lame in the fight sequences in this film. In addition to that, the acting (by a mostly child/teenage group) was extremely poor, the dialogue was dopey, the story was heavy on narration and the plot seemed to jump all over the place. On the bright side, the special effects were pretty good and the scenery was spectacular, but that’s not enough to pull this one off the scrap heap.

Breach

**** - This heavily dramatized telling of the story of Robert Hansson – one of recent American history’s most notorious traitors – is highly entertaining, most likely because so many liberties were taken with the events surrounding the actual case. The two main characters in this – Hansson, played by Chris Cooper and Eric O’Neill, played by Ryan Philippe – actually had a fairly mundane course of events in their lives, as opposed to the thrilling, dramatic series of happenings in the film. While that may annoy political history purists I actually found that it greatly enhanced my enjoyment of this movie. Although this may tacitly endorse the James Bond theory of intelligence and espionage (when in reality spy stuff tends to be far less intriguing than it is portrayed on film) it is also quite effective in conveying a great deal of humanity and personality to what could easily become very dull. The acting is surprisingly solid, the plot is extremely interesting and the ending – while somewhat rote and formulaic – is highly gratifying. There is nothing here that the experienced espionage/thriller fan has not seen or read at least a few times in the past, there is something to be said for this film’s earnestness and satisfying plot elements. Falling as it does somewhere between Bond and reality, this may not be authentic but it is definitely worth watching.

Don McKay

**1/2 – What is the deal with every movie that involves any sort of murder or intrigue being billed as a ‘thriller’? Does that term draw in so much more business that movie studios need to continually and blatantly lie about the content of their product? I can’t imagine that is the case. In this particular instance – 2009’s “Don McKay” – the term thriller is so out of place that I am tempted to knock some points off its rating. I would put this film more in the slow-paced mystery drama category, as the only thing even remotely resembling thrilling action would be when Elisabeth Shue clubs someone to death with a frozen roast. Does that put it in the same league as films like “Bullitt” and “Psycho”? I think not. Anyway, despite its bald-faced false billing, this movie wasn’t so bad. It starred the three-named sidekick guy from “Sideways” as a loser janitor who goes back to his hometown after he learns his high school sweetheart is dying. But things are not quite as they seem in idyllic Mount Raven (which I assume is in Massachusetts), as the lead character finds himself wrapped up in murder, blackmail and intrigue. The plot takes some interesting twists and turns, ends kind of oddly, but is fairly entertaining overall. It’s just not a thriller is all I’m saying.

Pineapple Express

**1/2 – Being comfortable with one’s own dorkiness can be an admirable trait. Being so comfortable with it that you then become a cocky loudmouthed douchebag makes it considerably less admirable. That’s my problem with this Seth Rogen guy. He seems like he is the kind of guy that if you were friends with him he would always monopolize the conversation with that deep, booming voice of his and never let you get a word in edgewise, while simultaneously being so in love with his own hilarity that he laughs inappropriately at all his own jokes. I also get the feeling that he has made some sort of pact with Hollywood big wigs that he must have a superhot girlfriend in all the movies that he is in so that it will make it seem to real life superhot women that they should be his girlfriend as well. It’s that kind of insidious ulterior motive that most bothers me. Anyway, this move stars Seth Rogen, and seeing as I am not much of a fan of his, that obviously detracts from my enjoyment of the film. This is pretty much a modern-day stoner film a la Cheech & Chong with a couple of guys toking the ganja throughout a bizarre, lame fight-filled adventure. It has some funny parts, but this sort of thing isn’t really my cup of tea.

Tropic Thunder

**** - I’ve always found Ben Stiller’s work to be kind of hit-or-miss. I love “The Cable Guy” and a number of his other films are kind of funny, but movies like “Zoolander” and “Dodgeball” which have no redeeming qualities whatsoever make me reconsider his worth. I’m also convinced that Robert Downey Jr. could take a dump on a film strip and receive extreme critical praise for it due to his ‘method acting’ habits, troubled past, and rebellious off-screen persona. I think he is highly overrated in general, although I do admit he was good in “Sherlock Holmes” and can pull off pretty much any accent. “Tropic Thunder” not only was co-written and directed by Stiller, and co-stars Stiller and Downey Jr., but also has the highly polarizing Jack Black as a major player, and features washed-up drunk Nick Nolte, unfunny comedian/actor Danny McBride, and frequent Judd Apatow collaborator Jay Baruchel. That’s all a recipe for potential disaster, but it actually turned out to be an extremely funny movie for the most part, due largely to its tendency to satirize all the clichés that are brought in as baggage by the various participants. Oh, and Tom Cruise also has role in this (which I barely recognized him in), and he is actually very funny and extraordinarily foul-mouthed. He may be the highlight of the film, despite his odd dance sequence that runs over the closing credits.

10,000 B.C.

** - I learned a few things from this 2008 Roland Emmerich helmed historical (sort of) action film. First, I learned that Ancient Egypt was apparently run by an alien and his wise council consisting of about a dozen flaming gays with long weird fingernails and purple dresses. Second, I learned that the frigid Russian steppes and the deserts of northern Africa are only a few days walk away from each other, and were even that way at a time 12000 years ago when North Africa wasn’t yet actually a desert. Lastly, I learned if you save a vicious predatory cat from a trap that it is caught in, you can then reason with it in order to keep it from eating you (much like the old ‘lion with the thorn in its paw’ story). This movie – like most that this Emmerich idiot is responsible for – has the feel of facts being run through a Karl Pilkington filter and coming out all bizarre and making no sense. And that would be fine if this was talked about by Karl and Ricky and Steve in a podcast (which, by the way, would make a killer “Ricky Gervais Guide to…” audiobook), but when it takes the form of a completely seriously-themed, hugely-budgeted Hollywood film it isn’t all that entertaining. It has some nice scenery, though.

Evil Alien Conquerors

*1/2 – A pair of inept aliens come to Earth in order to annihilate human civilization in this extremely broad and largely unfunny sci-fi comedy. My’ik and Du’ug (yes, pronounced like Mike and Doug) come from the planet Kabijj (yes, pronounced like Cabbage) which is ruled by a fat giggly guy in a robe who never stands up, and his chief administrator Phil Lamarr who yells all of his lines for some reason. They task the idiotic title duo to destroy the Earth and kill all of its inhabitants in order to provide food for some giant wearing a diaper whose name I did not catch, despite it being repeated about 50 times. I think it began with a ‘k’. In any event, all this leads to the awkward pair wandering around the planet with swords the size of toothpicks threatening to behead people. They befriend a human, fall in love with women with unibrows, drink Smirnoff Ice, and wind up in all sorts of other situations that are supposed to provide humor. Pretty much none of them succeed. There are a couple of decent lines, but overall this movie seems like the kind that some stoner dude would find hilarious for about 20 minutes until he fell asleep on the couch with his hand inside a bag of Cheetos Paws.

Eden Log

** - This is a very damp movie, probably one of the dampest I’ve seen. I would guess it falls somewhere between “The Abyss” and “Waterworld” in terms of overall dampness. Not only is it damp, but it is also dank and dark and it takes place in a world where everything looks very muddy and filth-smeared. That is not to say that its level of moisture made it a bad movie, although it wasn’t in actuality particularly good. I chalk that up less to its soggy attributes (although they certainly didn’t help) than to its complete aimlessness and utter lack of characterization. It involves some guy who is covered in filth wandering around in tunnels and labs and such in search of nothing more than a way to get out. He runs across various characters including a woman in some weird space suit, a guy stuck to vines on a wall, a number of guards in full battle dress and an unending stream of weird zombie-mutant-freak creatures. To that end, it seemed a lot like playing a “Resident Evil” game, except you don’t have a weapon and it isn’t the least bit enjoyable. On the bright side, it has a kind of stylish quality and while I can’t claim that I understood what exactly was going on at all points in the film, I think I pretty much had it figured out by the end, and the story turned out being fairly neat. I highly recommend this for those who like dirt.

The Twilight Saga: Eclipse

*1/2 – The understanding of this movie seems to be fairly dependent upon seeing the first two films in the series. Luckily, anyone who sees this is probably a young girl who not only has seen but has actually memorized every line from the prior movies or is a curmudgeonly middle-aged man who watches shit movies in order to review them, both groups having likely seen the prior movies. Unsurprisingly, this film features scene after boring scene of banal melodramatic dialogue broken up occasionally by scenes featuring dull stares and cuddling in an open field. There are few things in this world that I find more irritating than people taking themselves and their interactions with others as being the most important thing currently occurring anywhere. The young people these days, however, seem to eat that crap up, due largely to the fact (in my opinion) that their idiot parents instill them with a sense of false over-importance. If you like watching people overestimating their self-worth (and guys wandering around shirtless) you may like this, but if you are like me and despise those sorts of things, I suggest avoiding this 3rd in the series of what is apparently going to be four. There were a couple of halfway decent action sequences featuring nifty albeit unexplained limb-lopping in this (clearly tossed into the film in order to placate the bored boyfriend who was dragged to see this), which I guess is worth a half of a star. Otherwise, it’s an unredeemable overly hormonal emotion-fest.

Fringe: The Complete 1st Season

***1/2 – After the first two or three episodes of this series I was on the verge of giving up on it. It seemed to heavily focus on relationships; that between the main protagonist - FBI agent Olivia Dunham - and her partner/lover, and that between Dr. Walter Bishop, a brilliant yet wacko scientist just released after 17 years in a mental ward, and his transient (yet almost equally brilliant) son Peter. It also threw plot points out seemingly at random and with no background given whatsoever, such as the mysterious series of events called “The Pattern” and a terrorist group called ZFT. However, by the time the season was halfway over, the tide had turned, and all the things that were dropped on the viewer unawares in the beginning began to make sense through elucidation and connection of plot strands. In addition, most of the relationship stuff completely fell by the wayside. By the time the season finale rolled around (featuring special guest star Leonard Nimoy!), I had become fully immersed in the world(s) created by the writers. While the characters remain somewhat aloof and - with the possible exception or Walter - largely unlikable, there is a modicum of humor tossed in and a story arc that is engrossing enough make me look forward to season 2.

Juno

**1/2 – This is one of those movies that tries way too hard too seem cool. There are few things sadder than that in my opinion. Perhaps there was a time when liking 70s slasher pics and The Stooges was thought of as being way outside the box and rebellious, but now it has become normal for the people who are slightly to the left of actual normal. Trying to pawn that off as being super weird and quirky – in the context of this movie anyway – is really rather off-putting. And I blame that on the writing, because I thought the performances were pretty darn good for the most part, especially that of the always reliable J.K. Simmons as the father. The gist of this movie is that a ‘weird’ girl gets pregnant and searches for a family to adopt the kid - ending up choosing Jason Bateman and Jennifer Garner – and then has all sorts of shenanigans in the meantime. I guess not so much shenanigans as goings-on. There is a fair amount of humor in it, mainly provided by peripheral characters like Simmons’ and a few others. The attempts at humor from the lead character generally annoyed more than anything as it smacked of 16-year-old-trying-to-sound-cool – which, in fairness, it actually was. In any event, this film was decent but not as good as most of the reviews of it seemed to indicate.

Troy

*** - Homer’s “Iliad” is one of the most popular, famous and iconic of the stories to have come down to us from the classical Greeks. This 2004 epic starring Brad Pitt, Eric Bana, Orlando Bloom and Brian Cox stays fairly faithful to the basic plotline of the Homeric original, but also falls into the same trap of modernization that many film adaptations of ancient works fall into. Taking place over 3000 years ago, this movie and the epic poem it’s based on take place in a Greece (actually, mainly in modern-day Turkey) that has morals, beliefs and sensibilities far different from those of today’s western cultures. Like most of its predecessors, “Troy” attempts to give the ancient ways modern spins, and I think that does a disservice to both the original work and the audience. Not only does it do that by giving the characters modern emotions and thought processes, but other than a few references, it completely cuts the Greek Gods out of the story, who play a major and active role in Homer’s poem. But comparing this to an earlier version is probably somewhat unfair in light of the fair amount of entertainment value it provides. It is along the lines of movies like “Braveheart” and “Gladiator” but probably a notch or two below in quality, and a bit longer. But if you enjoy those sorts of movies, you might like this one.

The Squid and the Whale

**1/2 – This is the 2nd of Wes Anderson protégé Noah Baumbach’s films that I have seen (the first being the more recent “Greenberg”), and I am starting to notice a pattern. His movies are sort of offbeat and quirky like Anderson’s, but are filled with characters that are extremely unlikeable and contain a lot more graphic sexual content. In this film, Jeff Daniels plays an asshole writer who is married to (then separated from) a cheating slut, who have two kids that are equally horrifying. The older son is a mirror image of his smug father, who apparently has no self-esteem and poses as an artsy type of person while in actuality being a complete sham that plagiarizes Pink Floyd and hasn’t read any of the literature he claims to have. The younger son is even weirder, as he drinks beer, masturbates constantly (and smears his ejaculate in various locations around school), swears like a longshoreman, and wanders around shirtless. If ever there was a family of four that is the poster family for complete dysfunctionality, it is the one in this film. Disliking all the characters (including one of the Baldwin brothers playing a strange tennis club pro who is bopping the wife and refers to everyone as ‘brother’) certainly makes this film hard to watch. All that saves it from being as bad as “Greenberg” are a few more laughs.

Grimm

** - I am nowhere near being an expert on fairy tales, but this 2003 Dutch film that is supposedly based on one or more of them has very little similarity to any fairy tales that I am familiar with, Brothers Grimm authored or otherwise. The beginning has a bit of a “Hansel and Gretel” feel to it, and I suppose someone with a very open mind could interpret other parts as being similarly parallel, but that is about as far as I could go with any sort of comparison. This is advertised (on the front of the NetFlix sleeve, anyway) as a “darkly comedic, absurdist take” on traditional fairy tales. I definitely see the absurdist aspect, but I found about as much dark comedy in this as I did in “Schindler’s List” (i.e. none). Perhaps it has something to with the Dutch-to-English translation, or the somewhat similar yet very clearly demarcated nuances between what Americans find funny and what Europeans do (eg. Jerry Lewis), but the long and the short of it is that I just didn’t laugh at all while watching this. I didn’t really enjoy it all that much either, although I must admit that I found the direction and cinematography to be pretty good, and I couldn’t really find any fault with the acting either. Still, I can’t really recommend watching this movie.

The Expendables

** - A bloated and largely incoherent Sylvester Stallone stars along with an all-star action film cast in this 2010 attempt to create a sort of ‘perfect action movie.’ I am assuming that was the intention, and if it truly was, then I’d have to say it failed miserably for a number of reasons. Firstly, I have to debate the quality of the cast here. The youngest of the stars featured is the nearly 40-year old Jason Statham, Dolph Lundgren and Mickey Rourke are tossed in for some reason, and there are at least a few ex-wrestlers in there somewhere, including ‘Stone Cold’ Steve Austin (who is thankfully burned to death toward the end). Add to that bizarre and very out of place cameos from Arnold Schwarzenegger and Bruce Willis and a supporting role for Eric Roberts, and I highly doubt anyone would get too excited by the overall cast. Whether or not one agrees with me on that aspect, it is almost certain that the lack of character background, random introduction of plot points, and the meandering and unfocused story is likely to turn off even the most ardent of action fans. The action sequences – especially those featuring Stallone and the badly aging Jet Li – aren’t even very entertaining. There are loads of explosions and gunfire and extremely graphic shots of bodies being blown to pieces and being cruelly slaughtered, though, if you like that sort of thing.