I think it’s safe to say that Jason Stratham has found the movie vehicle that works for him; a decrepit, hole filled weak story that only serves as the delivery system for a series of really good driving, shooting, and martial arts action.  It’s like taking a luxury passenger train and filling all the cars with fine food, quality entertainment, and the most interesting people on the planet and then hitching it to a three legged arthritic donkey instead of a locomotive.  If you are looking for a story that goes somewhere and does something that doesn’t damage your brain you should probably have taken the express.  On the other hand, if all you want to do is party in the back with all the explosions, car wrecks, and massive gun battles than look no further than this film.

I honestly don’t know where else to go with this review.  It looks like the producers set out to make a decent action film and more or less accomplished that goal.  As far as the story goes, it is pretty much Max Payne meets Terminator 2 with an 11 year old girl in place of young John Carter.  There is a smattering of Hard Boiled and Generic Russian Mafia Movie A as well.  Jason Stratham (Lock, Stock, and Two Smoking Barrels, Killer Elite, the Expendables) plays Luke Wright, an ex cage fighter who failed to go down in a fight correctly and is now hated by the Russian mafia.  His whole back story is explained to us in what I am going to call “flashback shotgun” style.  In other words a massive cluster of flashbacks are loaded into a gun and shot against the wall in hopes that some of them would hit the target.  For some inexplicable reason the gangsters opt to not kill him when they had the chance, leaving a dangerous man with awesome combat skills and nothing to lose.  No danger of that going badly.  Their plan is to somehow torture him by killing anyone he talks to for more than one sentence, starting with his wife.  Anyway, we get another blast in the face with the flashback shotgun as we are introduced to Mei (Catherine Chan-Aftershock) an 11 year old girl from China who speaks flawless English and can memorize any numbers.

For some other weird reason the Chinese gangsters Mei has been drafted into working for think the best way to do a deal for some money is to create a code for a safe combination and have Mei memorize it.  Did I mention that the story was stupid?  They never heard of a several pieces of paper, or maybe just calling the person they are doing the deal with and telling the the safe combination via telephone?  When you see the film you will see how amazingly needlessly complicated Mei’s involvement in the whole deal really is.  The really convoluted and poorly explained deal goes badly and Mei barely escapes with her life.

At that point Luke rescues her and the action really kicks off.  Naturally he has some kind of mysterious past and in spite of being a homeless bum is also some kind of unstoppable killing machine.  Turns out he could have killed the Russians any time he wanted to but was looking for an excuse more meaningful than the death of his wife and the ruination of his life.  He was also on the NYC police force but was kicked off for blowing the whistle on some corrupt cops.

So the girl is being chased by the Chinese mafia, the Russian mafia, and the corrupt police who all want her either alive or dead(?).  At that point I really started scratching my head.  It seems writer/director Boaz Yakin (Prince of Persia, Remember the Titans, Fresh) believes that cops in New York are corrupt enough to be party to the murder of an 11 year old girl.  The action gets hot as the plot gets more convoluted and stupid.  The cops are tricked into going on a raid of the Chinese casino (sans warrant) or something.  Is asking for some semblance of sense in a movie really that much?

So, the stars.  The action was in fact really good.  Jason kicks, punches, shoots, and runs down a massive legion of bad guys in very cool and exciting ways.  Three stars.  As formulaic as he is, I actually really like the standard Stratham character.  One star.  The character Mei was pretty cool too.  One star.  All the villains were extremely well cast and portrayed as bad men.  I especially enjoyed James Hong (Big Trouble in Little China, Hero, Kung Fu Panda.  Pork Chop Express image courtesy of the Movie T Shirts) as the leader of the Chinese mafia.  One star.  I’m actually torn on this next one as I think it could be either a star or a black hole, but the fact is the film did not crowbar in a hot girl to be the dumb romance sub plot.  I think I will give them a star for not insulting my intelligence.  One star.  Generally a fun movie.  One star.  Total: eight stars.

The black holes.  If flashbacks were fortified wine, this movie contains enough to kill all the homeless people on Haight Street.  One black hole.  Dumb, overly complicated plot that didn’t make much sense and was riddle with plot holes.  Two black holes.  I’ll give one to this film in support of the NYC Police and my belief that for the most part they are not corrupt.  One black hole.  The guy playing the ultimate bad guy must have been in rehab or something for most of the shooting as he more or less surfaces out of no where in the last 20 minutes of the film.  One black hole.  Total: five black holes.

A total of three stars.  Not bad, not great.  Like I said before, if you are looking for action and don’t want to engage your fore brain much this film will do you.  Date movie?  Not really.  A lot of rated R violence plus no romance will spoil it for the average girl.  Also, Jason Stratham manages to get his shirt off within the first five minutes and unless you have been hitting the gym lately you will suffer in comparison.  Bathroom break?  I’d say about the time Luke and Mei check into the hotel so Luke can shower and not shave.  Just a lot of reexplaining what just happened or being told stuff that becomes obvious later.  Don’t take your time however as things heat up pretty good shortly.

I’d also like it noted that my observation from Killer Elite that Jason Stratham must have a five o’clock shadow written into his film contracts holds true in this one.  He never shaves nor does he seem to grow any shaggier in spite of what looks like months of elapsed time.

Thanks for reading.  I’ll see something else tomorrow night I think.  My friend is showing 13 Assassins on Wednesday night so I might write something about that.  I know it’s late but I really want to see it.  Follow me on Twitter @Nerdkungfu or send me an email to david@nerdkungfu.com if you have specific questions or suggestions.  Feel free to comment here if you have thoughts on this movie or review.  Talk to you soon.

Dave

As good as I expected, but not a whole lot more than that.

The Avengers is not about surprising the audience with something truly exceptional or unexpected.  It does exactly what it sets out to do: deliver a fun, exciting comic book movie with all the elements fans are looking for.  The dialog is witty and funny, the action cool and exciting, the heroes all (for the most part) have their own motivation and angst, and the villain despicable yet sympathetic.  I will say it was a lot of fun and well worth your time to see in a theater.

Of course, it wouldn’t be one of my reviews if I didn’t find something to nit pick, and this film does have its issues.  The first one was the overuse of characters I don’t really give a damn about, specifically Hawkeye and Black Widow.  Had they had their own origin movie I might have cared more, but every minute spent on them was time taken away from Iron Man, Thor, Capt. American, or the Hulk.  It was like drinking a delicious milkshake from a straw that periodically switches over to unflavored yogurt.  Not necessarily bad, but just not really what you want to be drinking.  Kind of bland.  Also, they really felt lost and out of place without more back story.

Another issue I had was specifically with Black Widow.  If you read the post I did a few days ago about the problem of female heroes in comic movies you might have caught the point I made that either super heroines have to be so unstoppable that they never take a punch to the face, or the get beaten heavily, really disturbing most of the audience.  In this film the opted for the former, which would have made sense had she actually had some kind of super power.  However, she is just a human and the suspension of disbelief really gets strained when you see her killing super powered aliens with her bare hands.

I also had a problem with the super powered aliens invading the earth.  Never have I seen a less effective invasion.  At the beginning of the movie it was heavily implied that they would beat the combined armed forced of the planet in about a day, but once they arrived they more or less fell over if someone farted in their general direction.  I don’t see how aliens can hope to conquer the planet if a chick with a pistol and a guy with a bow and arrow can kill dozens of them.

All that being said, the movie was great and had a lot of really good points that made up for the negative issues.  Iron Man was great, as was Thor and Capt. America.  However, in the action scenes it was the Hulk who dominated and added the real excitement.  In addition to being amazingly strong and fast he had the added benefit of being really unpredictable, making his scenes that much more interesting.

I don’t want to get to much into the story as I expect every one of you readers to see this film.  I will say it falls back onto the traditional Marvel mashup premise: superheroes meet up, find an excuse to beat the hell out of each other, and then later find a reason to team up against the big bad.  I personally really appreciate this nod towards true comic book story telling and think it’s a wise move.  As for the story, Loki comes back with a device to summon an “unstoppable” alien army.  The Avengers are pulled in to stop him.  Mass chaos ensues.

The stars.  Really great action scenes.  Two stars.  Comic book movie.  One star.  The Hulk was freaking awesome.  Two stars.  Thor, Iron Man, and Capt. America were great too.  One star.  For the most part sticking to canon.  One star.  Loki was a really good villain.  One star.  While definitely riding the lame horse known as PG-13, they still managed to keep the action hot and at least talked about people being killed.  One star.  There were any number of really clever, laugh out loud lines and moments.  One star.  Camera work and CGI were flawless.  One star.  Pacing was great.  Even in the otherwise sluggish first 30 minutes I never felt bored or disengaged.  Exceptionally well done IMO.  One star.  The interaction between the differing personalities among the Avengers was really good and added a lot to the story.  One star.  Overall a great movie experience.  Two stars.  Total: fifteen stars.

The black holes.  Too much screen time burned on Black Widow and Hawkeye, both of whom felt kind of appendix-like.  One black hole.  The lack of a real back story on either character made me not care about them at all.  One black hole.  Worthless, worthless 3D.  How is it 3D is getting lamer, not better?  One black hole.  The alien invaders were kind of tissue paper.  One black hole.  The final battle scene was highly derivative of Transformers Dark of the Moon to the point even the aliens looked a lot like the Decepticons (grey technoblobs that blended in with the background and scenery).  One black hole.  SPOILER ALERT SPOILER ALERT SPOILER ALERT sorry but since this is a movie I expect you to see you might want to skip down the the next paragraph now.  The ending used the stupid, stupid “pulling the plug” tool first pioneered badly in Independence Day and the later used as a severe emetic in Star Wars the Phantom Menace when it came to defeating the alien army.  If you are borrowing plot tips from George Lucas you should know you are either being painfully lazy or just stupid.  Is it so bad to say “Well, we defeated the enemy but there are still several hundred alien soldiers running around we will have to hunt down over the next several months.”?  One black hole.  Total: six black holes.

A grand total nine stars.  An excellent score, and an excellent movie.  If you aren’t a bitter, shriveled soul such as myself the issues I had will be glossed over like a fresh coat of paint on graffiti, and you will enjoy the hell out of this movie.  Absolutely see it in a theater on the biggest screen you can find.  Well worth it.  The movie is interesting enough and the character interaction intriguing enough to even make this a decent date movie for the right girl.  Bathroom break?  I’d say about the time Black Widow starts talking one on one with Loki.  I know it was supposed to be a clever scene that added something to her character but at the end of it you kind of realize it was as worthless as the majority of the rest of her screen time.  Everything you learn from it she reiterates in the next scene.

Thanks for reading.  Sorry I kind of rushed this one and didn’t research the cast like I usually do but I am really slammed today (Warhammer weekend).  Follow me on Twitter @Nerdkungfu or send me an email if you have specific questions or suggestions at david@nerdkungfu.com.  If you want to comment on this review feel free to do so here.  I don’t know if I will have a chance to see anything this weekend, but if I do I’ll try to write it up Sunday night.  Have a good one.

Dave

A couple days ago Jason posted something about Scarlett Johansson wanting to do a stand alone Black Widow movie and why that is generally a bad idea.  His base statement is more or less correct: there has never been a female super hero movie that has done well, and in most cases they seem to spell career death for the actress involved.  Some of the notable failures include Catwoman and Electra, but if you dig deeper you find all kinds of other ones that did nothing but suck and die.  Red Sonya, Tank Girl, My Super Ex Girlfriend (actually I kind of like that one, but really it was less about the super hero and more about every ex girlfriend I have ever had), Sheena, and Barb Wire to name a few.  Duds all.  Some may argue that Hit Girl from Kick Ass was great (she was IMO), but she did not have her own movie.  There has yet to be a distaff Spider Man or Iron Man.

What is the problem here?  It’s not like we don’t have great female comic book characters to draw from.  Every year someone talks about doing a Wonder Woman movie, but honestly I predict even that will fail to meet expectations.  Jason’s theory was that most comic book movie fans are male and want to pretend to be the hero.  A female hero is just harder to identify with and pretend to be.  I think there may be some validity to this theory, but don’t see it as the overriding issue.  For the most part fans identify with the super powers, not the super hero.  I could easily see someone imagining having the telekinetic powers of Phoenix or the weather control of Storm.  Also, I think in this day and age the line of gender identification is a little blurrier that it has ever been in the past.  (Wonder Woman image courtesy of the DC Comic T Shirt category).

I think the issue is much more primal.  The problem is that in order for a super hero movie to be great, the hero has to get his or her ass handed to him (or her).  If you look at the first Spider Man movie, Peter Parker gets completely trounced by the Green Goblin (blown up, really).  In the last Superman the managed to find a way to have the normally invulnerable Superman on deaths doorstep.  In order for a super hero to be super he or she has to overcome serious mortal danger and pain.  We root for the hero who comes to the brink of destruction but still triumphs.  Without that it just sucks.  The reason this doesn’t work for super heroines is the fact that the vast majority of men are hard wired on a genetic level to not like to see a woman getting beaten.

Seriously, this is an issue.  In my movie reviews if I see a woman getting punched in the face it usually earns the movie a black hole.  I find it incredibly disturbing.  There is nothing more upsetting to a man (a real man) than seeing a woman’s face with a black eye or bruises.  I know, I am supposed to be more open minded and equality and all that feminist stuff, but even guys who say that it seeing men beaten bothers them equally with women are lying.  There is a genetic imperative in men to protect women from harm (kids too, but you don’t see a lot of that in movies).  There is nothing that will get me to intervene in a situation faster than seeing a man hit a woman, yet I would be OK watching two guys beat the hell out of each other.

This, unfortunately, leaves Hollywood with a bad choice to make.  Either they go with letting the heroine get her ass kicked, making the movie really disturbing to the bulk of the viewing audience, or they make her invulnerable and impervious to harm, making the movie really boring and unreal.  The thing that comic movie fans demand these days is some level of realism (ironic, given that we are talking about people with super powers) and seeing a 105lb girl get punched in the face and kick the crap out of a 200lb thug just isn’t realistic (one of the many reasons Catwoman  really sucked).

What is the answer?  I don’t know.  Maybe more movies of women who don’t necessarily have to duke it out with guys.  Angelina Jolie was great in Wanted and for the most part shot people.  This might actually make for a decent film for Black Widow, but I predict they will feel the need to get her to go toe to toe with someone, ironically lessening the action.

That’s pretty much it on the matter.  I’d like to thank my best friend Dave for first suggesting this theory and helping me flesh out out.  If you want to comment or suggest a different theory free to post something here.  Follow me on Twitter @Nerdkungfu.  If you have specific questions or suggestions feel free to email me at david@nerdkungfu.com.

By the way, before I get going I wanted to mention something interesting I found on the Intertube.  I was looking for info on the upcoming Men in Black 3 and came across this kid Bugeyes126 doing some kind of investigation video series trying to prove that the Men in Black are real.  I can’t tell if this is for real, for fun, or just a really creative marketing campaign.  It’s like some kind of reality TV show scavenger hunt.  I’ll link Bugeyes126 most recent video as it flashes me back to my childhood days of dumpster diving.  However, I can tell him from painful personal experience jumping straight into a dumpster like he does is a good recipe for getting a rusty length of jagged metal jammed six inches into your calf.  I’d also like to add that tetanus shots in 1982 were a whole lot less fun than they are now.

No movie tonight as I have to paint new models for the tournament this weekend.  However, I have tickets for a midnight screening of the Avengers at the fabulous Kabuki Cinema in San Francisco Thursday so look for that review Friday morning.  Thanks as always for reading.  Talk to you soon.

Dave

When was this movie supposed to get interesting?  Nevermore.

I’m not saying this movie was particularly bad or annoying.  It’s just really generic.  If you took Seven, mixed in equal parts of Sherlock Holmes and Scooby Doo, added a dash Batman’s the Riddler, and let it simmer for 111 minutes this is the film you would get.

The problems with this film is it just fails to meet expectations.  The plot isn’t bad.  However, given the source material and claims of being a mystery movie you would expect some kind of plot twist or horrific reveal.  Instead we get a led by the nose mystery wherein the villain supplies handwritten clues for Poe to decode and a denouement that ends up being almost random.  There is no satisfaction in a mystery solved when the killer just steps out and reveals himself.  In spite of the fact that Edgar Allen Poe wrote of some of the most horrifically grisly murders imaginable and this movie has an R rating, with the exception of the pendulum scene all the murders are neutered of all gore and grimness.  I saw a more graphic murder last night on the British Being Human.  John Cusack acquits himself well but the character he has been given just doesn’t really feel like I would imagine Poe being; a tortured, melancholy, dark alcoholic who revels in gallows humor.  Instead we basically get Sherlock Holmes without the deductive ability or English accent.

I think a big part of the disappointment for me is the fact that I am a John Cusack fan.  He has been in several of my favorite movies, including Better Off Dead, Hi Fidelity, Gross Pointe Blank, and even Hot Tub Time Machine (Cherobly image courtesy of the Movie T Shirt category).  I think he is a talented actor and I enjoy his performances, even in this one.  He brings real to the screen.

The story is of course about the last days of Edgar Allen Poe, American literary hero and father of modern horror.  He is a destitute alcoholic who is struggling to make money from his past writing and fame.  He is also in love with daughter of a rich Baltimore socialite, Emily (Alice Eve-Big Nothing, She’s Out of My League, Sex and the City 2).  Her father (Brendan Gleeson-Troy, Gangs of New York, Braveheart) wisely thinks he is bad news and hates him.  Meanwhile across town two women are murdered in a scene lifted from one of Poe’s stories.  The detective (Like Evans-the Immortals, Clash of the Titans, the Three Musketeers) investigating regonizes the scene and hauls Poe in for questioning.  Meanwhile a fat man suffer the Pit and the Pendulum death in the only murder scene worth anything.  Turns out he was a literary rival of Poe and suspicion falls on him again.  However, he (somehow?) convinces Detective Fields of his innocence and agrees to help in the investigation.  Emily gets kidnapped out of a party and at that point the killer starts sending notes to Poe instructing him to follow the clues and keep investigating the murders or she dies.

Honestly if you took a massive bathroom break after the kidnap and came back about two minutes before the murderer is revealed you wouldn’t miss much (and as an aside, my recommendation for a bathroom break is any time after Emily gets kidnapped).  Stuff happens.  A couple more people die.  A string of Scooby Doo-esque clues are followed.  Other stuff happens.  There is a fire in a random building that turns out to be Poe’s home so he moves in with Fields (did I mention there were elements of the Odd Couple in this?).

The stars.  John Cusack did a good job with the acting.  One star.  I like the source material.  One star.  I am a fan of that period of American History, and they kept it in tone.  One star.  The pendulum scene was as grisly and horrible as the rest of the movie was not, in a good way.  One star.  Overall executed competently, with good pacing, dialog, and camera work with no obvious continuity issues or plot holes.  One star.  Total: five stars.

The black holes.  A real failing to live up to it’s potential, but in plot and rated R material.  I’m not asking for nudity here (although a little would have been appreciated) but if you are getting an R anyway why not make this fit in with the world in Edgar Allen Poe’s head?  One black hole.  With the exception of Fields and Poe, most of the characters were at best expository noise holes.  Very two dimensional, even the killer.  One black hole.  I’m going to hit them for being derivative of a bunch of other movies without really taking a very singular character and making an original film around him.  Basically a generic, boilerplate serial murder film sans horror.  One black hole.  Total: three black holes.

A grand total of two stars.  At least it stays positive.  I won’t say I regret the time or money I spent on it, because really I didn’t.  It’s not a bad, and there are parts you can really appreciate.  I just don’t know if it really holds up to a lot of the other movies coming out right now.  I think this movie will do great as a late night let’s just watch something kind of film.  Date movie?  Not really, unless she is a huge John Cusack fan.

Thanks for reading.  I will see Safe and Pirates this week, so keep checking back.  Also, something Jason wrote the other day about female superhero movies got me thinking about it and discussing it with my friend, so I think I will write something about that tomorrow.  Follow me on Twitter @Nerdkungfu or email me at david@nerdkungfu.com if you have any specific questions or suggestions (or if you work for a studio and want to hook me up with some kind of advanced screening).  If you have comments about this review feel free to post here.  Talk to you soon.

Dave

Another depressingly competent rom com.

I have hit another one of those Twilight Zone-esque episodes in my movie reviewing career wherein everything I see is at least decent.  This may not sound like a bad thing, but the fact is my funniest and best reviews are all for the worst, most disappointing movies and I can’t seem to find one.  I mean really, where is Nicholas Cage when you really need him?

So this movie was well done.  I have become more of a Jason Segel fan since watching How I Met Your Mother and Emily Blunt is really hot in my mind (plus a good actress).  In this film they exhibit some really good chemistry and accurately portray the agony of a modern relationship (a more cynical and bitter reviewer might say they accurately portray how a woman can destroy a man in a relationship.  Good thing I am so well adjusted).  The film itself is well done and has some really funny moments.  It does seem to drag on at times, and there are some scenes that are either completely unnecessary or extend well past their freshness date.  At first I was prepared to lambast the film for the slow pacing, but as things progressed I suddenly realized that the film was accurately giving me the feeling of what a five year engagement must feel like.  This makes Judd Apatow one of the smartest or luckiest movie makers in the industry.

That’s not to say there weren’t moments when I was hoping to find a fast forward button in my box of Whoppers, but overall I really like the idea of a filmmaker creating a feeling and theme without having to slap us in the face with it.  There was another less subtle but still well delivered theme having to do with stale donuts as well (although I question the validity of the psychology involved) that also made for a decent subtext.

The story is, of course, of a five year engagement.  Jason Segel (The Muppets, Despicable Me, Forgetting Sarah Marshal) and Emily Blunt (the Devil Wears Prada, the Adjustment Bureau, the Young Victoria) play Tom and Violet, a young successful San Francisco couple the likes of which I meet all the time out here (and occasionally want to run over with my car).  He is a sous chef at a high end restaurant and she is a graduate student in psychology.  They get engaged but when she fails to get into Berkeley and instead gets into Michigan he has to quit his job so they can both move to Ann Arbor.  She excels in her program while he descends into a frozen hell and has to get a job in a sandwich shop.  The relationship starts to really crumble and to be perfectly honest I am going to put the blame on this one directly on Violet.  She is completely disconnected from her partner’s pain (sometimes literally) and even when he brings up his issues more or less sits around hoping he gets used to it or something.  I actually found this refreshing as a study in relationships and it was nice to see someone other than the guy painted as the the insensitive one.  Of course this role reversal kind of robbed Jason Segel of whatever machismo he might have had, and no offense Jason but you never seems to play a role overburdened with testosterone.

Left to his own devices Tom has a funny episode where he devolves into a Michigan hunting woodsman (complete with Swamp People beard) which is probably some of the funniest stuff.  The relationship continues to degenerate, abetted by Violets professor Winton Childs (Rhys Ifans-Notting Hill, Anonymous, Little Nicky) untoward interest in her.  The comedy kind of takes a back seat to the drama as things go from bad to worse.  Relationship chaos ensues.  Stuff happens.

The stars.  I was laughing out loud at multiple points.  One star.  Well acted from pretty much everyone.  One star.  The chemistry between Segal and Blunt was palpable.  One star.  The supporting actors, especially best friend Alex (Chris Pratt-Wanted, Parks & Rec, Everwood.  Parks & Rec image courtesy of the TV Show T Shirts) added a lot to the film.  One star.  An honest (and successful) effort to add subtext.  One star.  A realistic look at a dysfunctional relationship.  One star.  The movie managed to make San Francisco look like the greatest city in the world (which, in my opinion, it may well be.  If not it is only second to New York).  One star.  The Tom as a hunter scenes were especially entertaining.  One star.  A bonus star for overall keeping me entertained in a film that should have had me snoozing.  Total: nine stars.

The black holes.  In spite of believing the movie makers did this on purpose to add the feeling of being engaged for five years, you really feel every one of the 124 minutes.  One black hole.  There were a few scenes in particular that stretched on for an eon.  One black hole.  I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again.  If you are going to eat an R rating anyway throw in some nudity please.  There was a perfect opportunity towards the end.  One black hole.  SPOILER ALERT.  The ending seemed a little trite and actually did not really resolve any of the main issues.  One black hole.  Total: four black holes.

A grand total of five stars.  A good score for a rom com, and perfect for a five year engagement (I swear that wasn’t on purpose).  Worth seeing?  Sort of, but only as a date.  Good date movie?  Yes and no.  Yes in that it has everything a woman would want to see in a film about romance (and also you will probably compare favorably to pasty white boy Jason Segel.  He’s like a young Raymond Burr).  However, I am actually more concerned about what this film could potentially do to you as the male viewer.  If you are of a dark or paranoid mindset the destruction of Tom’s life in the interest of Violet’s career will probably have you leaving your date at the theater in order to pursue a life as a Buddhist monk (they are cool with internet porn, right?  I had better check on that soon).  However, if you can stomach that this will probably make for a decent date.

Thanks for reading.  More films to see this weekend, including the Raven, Pirates, and Safe.  Hopefully one of them will suck (my money is on Safe).  Follow me on Twitter @Nerdkungfu.  If you have a comment about this review feel free to post it here, and if you have suggestions or specific questions feel free to email me at david@nerdkungfu.com.  Talk to you soon.

Dave

I honestly liked it, and for the life of me can’t figure out why.

This film was a huge surprise to me.  According the the trailers (which I watched over and over again) it looked like every movie I should hate on every level: good looking late 20-somethings dating and screwing each other while living in the lap of luxury and enjoying the finer things in life while I struggle to buy something more than Top Ramen.  It also had the appearance of following in the pattern set in Valentine’s Day and my fourth worst film of 2011, New Years Eve in that it is an assemblage cast with multiple interweaving multiple story lines crossing into each other.  However, while New Years Eve enjoyed all the success of a barbed wire jock strap, somehow this movie does it right and manages to keep the audience engaged and into the story.

I think a big part of it is in this film the talented cast of actors all put their heart into the roles, ending up with a great and believable performance from all of them (with one exception, maybe).  That, combined with excellent dialog and very strong chemistry, both romantic and platonic, made up for some of the weaknesses around the script.

I do have two major issues with this film and like most of my problems, they are personal.  First of all seeing as I have been riding a dating rejection streak is approaching presidential term length (two term, that is) seeing all these hot young people date and for the most part succeed in finding love was like multiple daggers made of frozen nitrogen stuck into my chest.  The fact that there wasn’t a woman in this film I couldn’t fall in love with was the twist on the handle.

The other issue was the portrayal of Los Angeles as the most romantic city in the world or something.  I have tried dating in LA and from a romance perspective you will not find a more wretched wasteland of shallowness, ego, and self image destruction short of the fourth level of hell.  If any of you readers are women living in LA I apologize if this offends you (I’m sure you are the exception to this generization) but the girls of Los Angeles are the most horrid humans to date in the known universe.  I would literally rather kiss a wookie.  (I’d Rather Kiss a Wookie image courtesy of the Star Wars T Shirts.  Also, cute but hirsute women don’t be afraid to contact me).

Anyway, the movie.  It is the story of 4 men and the women who have to date them.  They are all friends and all take on aspects of the worst stereotypes of bad male partners: the non-committer, the player, the mammas boy, and the unemployed loser.  For the record they are played by Michael Ealy (Seven Pounds, Underworld Awakenings), Jerry Ferrara (Entourage, Brooklyn Rules) Terrence Jenkins (Burlesque), and Romany Malco (Weeds, the 40 Year Old Virgin, Blades of Glory).  They are joined by comic relief and recently divorced Kevin Hart (Soul Plane, Fool’s Gold, Along Came Polly).  They are either involved with or meet and start dating four women who are each respectively sick of these types of guys.  They are Meagan Good (Brick, Stomp the Yard, Eve’s Bayoo), Regina Hall (Scary Movie 4, Scary Movie, Law Abiding Citizen), Taraji P. Henson (the Curious Case of Benjamin Button, the Karate Kid, Date Night), and Gabrielle Union (Bad Boys II, 10 Things I Hate About You. Bring it On) and are to a woman very easy on the eyes.

The four women seem destined to keep on moving in the same direction they always have in their relationships until they come across a date advice book by Steve Harvey.  I don’t know what he did to become a dating expert but since I first started this blog by giving out dating advice who am I to judge? (if you want to laugh here is the link to Part 1 of 19 posts on Online Dating I did.  Kind of bitter, but some of the funniest stuff I have written IMHO)  The four women buy his book and learn how to deal with men.  Steve’s advice seems to be summed up as “lower your standards and then browbeat the hell out of your man until he morphs into something you can stomach”.  I’m not saying I disagree with him.

Of course, the men find out about the book and start using the info back at the women.  Things go to hell all around.  Plans go astray.  Dating chaos ensues.

The stars.  I was really impressed by the cast and their performances for the most part.  Two stars.  Great dialog.  One star.  The characters all had really good, solid chemistry that worked.  One star.  All the women were pretty.  One star.  The multiple story lines not only managed to avoid tripping each other up, but actually enhanced each other.  One star.  I enjoyed it a lot more than I expected to.  One star.  Total: seven stars.

The black holes.  The Kevin Hart character, while useful as a comic relief, was the one character that felt fake.  I don’t think this is on Kevin so much as it is on the writer.  One black hole.  Sappy, predictable endings. One black hole.  I don’t know if was my own feelings about dating, Los Angeles, or what but something about the film kind of infuriated me.  Also we ended up looking at a lot of bare man chest.  One black hole.  Total: three black holes.

Four stars total, a great score for a romance film.  Should you see it?  Not really if you are a single man.  Date movie?  Hell yes.  Interesting enough to keep you engaged while fulfilling ever dream your date has ever had.  However, I think this will work even better on a TV in front of a couch in a couple months, if you know what I mean.

I’ve kind of hit a streak of either decent or good movies.  While that is a plus for me personally I know that this translates into kind of boring reviews.  I can only hope something coming out soon sucks the proverbial teat, but honestly it looks like a good lineup.  The best two cantidated for suckage are probably the Five-Year Engagement and Safe, but we’ll see.  This weekend I should see both of those as well as Pirates and the Raven.  Busy weekend.  Follow me on Twitter @Nerdkungfu or email me with questions or suggestions to david@nerdkungfu.com.  Feel free to post any comments on this movie here.  Thanks for reading.  Have a good weekend.

Dave

I am slammed with this whole business move and don’t have a lot of time to blog right now.  Sunday night I was supposed to see Think Like a Man and in a surprising twist of fate it was sold out.  I really didn’t expect to see that happen, but according to the interlink the movie is doing shockingly well.  I will try to see it tonight and let you know if it looks at all better than the trailers (who all make it look like it is only slightly more appealing than a case of whooping cough).

However, there seems to be a bumper crop of movies I am into coming out, so I thought I would do a quick rundown on what we can see in the next month or so.  Here we go:

The Pirates!  Band of Misfits-I am a fan of Wallace and Gromit (I plan to name my first son Gromit (or Gromitina, if it’s a girl.  Sometimes I wonder why I’m still single…) and am really looking forward to this one.  Definitely kiddy, but the thing about this style of cartoon is it generally makes for entertaining adult fare as well.

The Pirates!  Band of Misfits-I am a fan of Wallace and Gromit (I plan to name my first son Gromit (or Gromitina, if it’s a gir).  Sometimes I wonder why I’m still single…) and am really looking forward to this one.  Definitely kiddy, but the thing about this style of cartoon is it generally makes for entertaining adult fare as well.

The Five-Year Engagement-it rarely bodes well for a movie that I plan to review when I can think of a funny one liner for the subtitle before even seeing it.  In this case if the movie sucks or is slow the subtitle would most likely be something like “The Five-Year Movie”.  However, watching How I Met Your Mother has recently given me an appreciation for Jason Segel and I will give this rom com its day in court.

The Raven-of all the movies coming out in the next few weeks this one excites me third most.  I am a huge John Kusak fan and the story of Edgar Allen Poe fascinates me.  A movie based around his life done should be amazing.  There is a chance of suck, but for the most part this should be good.

Safe-what can be said about this other than it’s a Jason Stratham action film?  I predict decent action, intensity, and an aversion to razor blades.

The Avengers-this is my second most anticipated movie of the early summer.  It looks like it could really rule.  Unfortunately, the crowbarring in of a couple of the lesser Avengers (Hawkeye?) has all the hallmarks of “design by committee”, so the potential to run off the rails into the abyss of too much/too little remains.  I have faith in Joss Whedon as a director.  The problem is he is operating with a 300 pound anchor tied to his neck known as “PG-13″.  I predict I will enjoy the hell out of it, but the movie will feel short and have too much human not enough action.  Also I think the action will be very sanitized.

Looper-I’m really intrigued by the concept of this one.  Also, in spite of all his efforts to make me hate him I still love Bruce Willis, and have of late also become a fan of Joseph Gordan-Ellis.  We’ll see.

Dark Shadows-I am really enjoying the trailers for this one, which is usually a bad sign for the movie.  However, Johnny Depp and Tim Burton is inevitably a winning combination, like chocolate and peanut butter.  I expect to love it.

Abe Lincoln, Vampire Hunter-I am actually getting really annoyed at movie audiences laughing at the trailers for this one.  If they don’t understand how freaking cool this movie is going to be they should all shut their lame, ignorant noises holes and stuff Reeces Pieces into their nostrils until they pass out, thus sparing us their stupidity.  I think this movie is going to rock.  Also, I think America needs to be reminded of the fact that vampires are not romantic dreamboats who sparkle in daylight but rather are evil monster who only want the blood in your veins.  (Buffy Staked Edward image courtesy of the Funny T-Shirts category)

God Bless America-this one looks like two of my other favorite movies, Heathers and Natural Born Killers.  Check out the trailer.

That’s all I’m really interested in right now.  There will no doubt be a number of dross films that I either don’t care about or don’t want to see but have to, so you can look forward to those.  However, with this lineup I am actually excited about the upcoming movie season, which is saying a lot as the last two year of seeing everything that comes out has more or less burned out my excitement gland and replaced it with a backup bitterness gland.

Thanks for reading.  Look for that dating movie review tomorrow morning.  Follow me on Twitter @NerdKungFu or email me at david@nerdkungfu.com.  Feel free to post a comment here if you are curious about an upcoming movie and I can look into it and express my poorly informed opinion.  Talk to you soon.

Dave

Last week at the recommendation of my best friend Dave I started watching How I Met Your Mother.  I had avoided it prior to that for a number of reasons.  First of all the title alone makes it sound like the brainless “family friendly” pap that gave us shows like Full House.  The base concept-a guy telling his kids about meeting their mother-sounds annoying to say the least.  Furthermore, I figured I had had my fill of young singles living and loving in New York after years of watching Friends, a show that alternated between brilliant and painfully annoying.

However, Dave has yet to steer me wrong so I started watching it.  The first few episodes started off slow but after a while I realized that the show is awesome for exactly one reason: Barney.  You see, Neil Patrick Harris plays a character named Barney who is a self centered, womanizing egomaniac and like most sociopaths you don’t have to deal with in your life is endlessly entertaining.  He is very well written and of course Neil plays him brilliantly.  I think he is great.

The rest of the cast is a lot more bland, although that just might be in comparison.  The main guy I’d like to see get punched in the face more for being kind of a Ross style putz, and his love interest drives me crazy whenever she’s on screen.  Jason Segal found a role that doesn’t suck, and his girlfriend is super cute.

There are good and bad episodes, as with any show, but overall I would say check it out if you haven’t.  This Awesomed shirt from the TV Show T Shirt category makes a lot more sense once you have watched the show a little.

Sorry about the short post, but I have been working my butt off getting our new warehouse set up.  Movie tonight, review tomorrow.  Talk to you soon.

Dave

Count yourself lucky if your girlfriend doesn’t drag you to see this uber chick flick.

Somehow I feel weirder going to see movies like this by myself than I do seeing obvious kids movies such as Winnie the Pooh.  It is a bit of a puzzlement for me.  I think the reason really has to do with the fact that I can almost feel my testicles shriveling up during the course of the film, whereas with kids films I can feel some level of nostalgia easing me through.

So this is a chick flick in the truest sense of the term.  Don’t be fooled by the Iraq war action that goes on at the beginning.  It is brief and non graphic as possible.  You know how action films will crowbar in some romance to make it at least somewhat palatable to the girls in the audience?  The “action” here feels like a reversal of that concept in an attempt to get guys to not pass out during the film.

But is it a good chick flick or a bad one?  Kind of?  It is as cliche and formulaic as possible, with the only deviation from the typical bad story happening at the end when they opted to go for an even more cheesy and pat denouement.  I think the best descriptive for this movie is grinding.  It grinds it’s way through the plot and each cliche in turn like one of those industrial rock crushing conveyer belt machines, turning each large, weighty cliche into smaller and much more functional cliches in turn.  Long, romantic interludes drag on until you want to watch a more interesting movie on your iPhone while watching this one, and the pacing consistently is reminiscent of waiting at the DMV to get your license renewed.

The other thing that is glaringly missing from this film is chemistry.  Zac Efron is a pretty boy, and probably is the heart throb of any number of women out there, but to my perception if he was supposed to be delivering smouldering looks he should have checked to make sure someone had lit his pilot light first.  In fact, none of the characters actually read like real people.  They all seemed like caricatures of other, better developed characters: the sexy ex Marine who is in all ways is perfect (as described by women); the cartoonish small town sheriff/abusive ex husband; the single mom trying struggling to make it in the world; the precocious kid; the fat Southern politician (Dukes of Hazard style.  Dukes of Hazard image courtesy of the TV Show T Shirts); the worldly wise grandmother.  Each of them comes across so locked into their role that in spite of this movie being like 80% character development none of them seem to go anywhere.

Anyway, the movie.  Zac Efron (all the High School Musicals plus epicly bad film New Years Eve) plays Logan, a Marine who while on a mission in Iraq finds a picture of a hot girl right before all his friends get blown up.  This picture apparently keeps him safe (or something) and when he gets back he decides to try to find the girl.  After dealing with some PTSD issues (that are never mentioned again) he decides to find her.  She is in Louisiana and the best way for him to get there is to walk from Colorado (seriously, to any women readers out there are you not in the least offended by the blatant pandering that this movie is doing for you?) with his dog Zues (Zues and Logan?  Come on.  These names put my old friend Studly McSuperpenis to shame).  The girl Beth (Taylor Schilling-Dark Matter, Atlas Shrugged Part I (ha ha ha ha ha), Mercy) lives there with her mother and son.  Her brother died in Iraq.  He arrives at her family owned dog hotel where he opts to not tell her about the picture because…actually there is no reason other than the need to later create plot drama.  Seriously, I really doubt she would have had an issue with him returning a lost heirloom of her brother (that’s who’s picture it was) and it might have actually endeared him to her more.

Instead, he makes the stalker move of taking a job at the dog hotel.  She runs it with the her mother (Blythe Danner-Meet the Parents, Meet the Fockers, Howl’s Moving Castle) and her eight year old son Ben (Riley Thomas Steward-the Beaver, Straight A’s, A Christmas Wedding Tail) who is some kind of chess prodigy.  At first she is standoffish because…well I guess the movie directors must have needed more conflict than the whole “not tell about the picture” thing.  In time she naturally does what all women most do around Zac Effron looking guys (God I hate them all) and falls in love.  Meanwhile her ex husband Keith (Jay R. Ferguson-Mad Men, the Killer Inside Me, Campfire Tales) rips off every bad Southern small town sheriff stereotype as an experiment to see if people would love Roscoe P Coltrane if instead of being a bumbling goof he were an abusive jerk (with his father the town judge being Boss Hogg).

I’d like to say stuff ensues, but really not a lot does and what does happen progresses about as predictable as the tides.  I won’t ruin the ending completely but will say that true love triumphs as always (at least when you look like Zac Effon.  Rot in Hell).

The stars.  I will give credit for this film doing what it set out to do.  It was built to be a chick flick, and if you are a chick who doesn’t want to think too hard while feeling good this film we succeed in all regards.  Two stars.  There are a lot of really cool dogs in the movie, especially Logan’s German Sheppard.  One star.  Taylor Schilling is not super hot, but manages to come across as kind of a natural beauty that worked for me.  Also, of all the characters hers was the least unbelievable.  One star.  Total: four stars.

The black holes.  Most of the characters were so over the top that they felt like those giant inflatable balloons they make for Snoopy and Spider Man at the Macy’s Day Parade.  Two black holes.  Hamhanded attempts at creating conflict out of nothing in order to keep the audience from falling asleep.  One black hole.  Sluggish pacing.  One black hole.  An ending at complete odds with the entire rest of the film as well as coming from deep within the writers ass.  One black hole.  Blatant use of the weather to deliver an emotional point.  Happy times?  Sunny.  Conflict and bad times?  Rainy.  One black hole.  The situation Beth was in with her ex husband felt really fake and archaic.  Was this film supposed to be set in the 50′s?  One black hole.  Total: seven black holes.

A grand total of three black holes.  Should you go see this one?  If you have any testosterone and self respect at all than hell no.  Date movie?  Hell yes.  This film was created to be the perfect date movie.  If she isn’t in the mood to sleep with you (or Zac Effron) by the end of this show you should find a way to discretely check to see that she wasn’t born a man, or perhaps some kind of doppelganger alien.  If she has a brain and any kind of film knowledge or taste than she will be offended by the rampant use of romance cliches, but they are cliches because they work.

Thanks for reading.  Looks like all chick flicks this weekend.  I guess I will suck it up and go see Think Like a Man tomorrow, although I like to believe I already know how (maybe I’m fooling myself).  Follow me on Twitter @NerdKungFu.  Post any comments about this movie or my review here.  If you have a specific question or suggestion feel free to email me at david@nerdkungfu.com.  Talk to you soon.

Dave

In space, no one can hear a mediocre movie.

Lockout is the latest Luc Besson’s latest shlock epic.  It combines elements of watchability-good action, decent production values, an appealing main character, a camera-with elements that make you wish you were still seeing previews-a simplistic, derivative story (Die Hard in space), paper cut out characters with no development, a soundtrack that seems lifted from a mid 90′s FPS video game, a complete lack of understanding (or disregard) of how zero gravity physics work, and a flicker style editing process used to bandage up the holes in the story progression.  In a nutshell dumb but fun.

I know this paints me as a complete nerd, but let me talk a little about science.  The concepts I am about to go into are not really hard to understand and I would think one of the 36 member (thank you IMDB) primary cast and crew would know them.  First of all, if you are on a station in free fall and you and your hot love interest jump off, you do not immediately start falling faster down towards Earth.  The best you could hope for would be to accelerate horizontally away from the station.  I don’t want to get into the whole “artificial gravity” thing (another impossibility) but this is not hard to understand.  Also, if you do jump out in an EVA suit there is no way you are going to survive the re-entry burn.  (Pigs Fly image courtesy of the Cheap T Shirt category)

Another thing that drove me nuts is the realities of zero gravity combat.  Even today in the air combats are resolved from kilometers away.  In space, with nothing to slow down bullets or missiles, combat would be resolved at a distance of thousands of kilometers.  There is no way a bunch of “fighter” spacecraft would have to weave in and out of the spars of a space station (don’t get me started on the impossible physics of that actually happening,  Inertia is a bitch) in order to plant a magnetic nuclear mine to it.  Furthermore, what the hell is the deal with a magnetic nuclear mine?  Has no one on this team ever heard of a missile with a nuclear warhead?  Watch the scene and you will see how stupid it is.

Oh, also take a minute and wonder how many bullets and explosions can fly around a space station before there is a breach.  According to this movie it’s something like 1,000,000,000.

On the other hand the action is pretty good.  Decently done, although they did a lot of quick cuts to make up for the actors inability to perform physically (I think I am going to coin a term for that type of fight sequence editing.  From now on let’s call it “granular editing”).  Guy Pearce makes the character of Snow work by being sarcastically charming the entire time.  All the characters were horrifically one dimensional (Scooby Doo has more depth) but for the most part that one dimension was entertaining, especially the two bad guys.  The one thing they did that annoyed was they seemed to have cut out a lot of little 5-10 seconds scenes that kind of explain what is happening.  Maybe to keep within budget?  It’s like they took the granular editing system (see?  The term works) so many action movies are employing these days and extended it to the entire film.  Either that or the directors were easily bored with shooting the non-exciting stuff and blew it all off.

The story is simplistic and predictable. Guy Pearce (Momento, Hurt Locker, L.A. Confidential) is Snow, a renegade ex CIA operative who gets framed for the murder of another agent.  There is a briefcase with some ill defined evidence that might get him off, but for some reason he feels he needs to have his buddy Mace (what’s with the names in this film) hide the stuff while he goes off the space prison for 30 years.  Meanwhile, the President’s daughter (Maggie Grace-Taken, Lost, Night and Day) is working for her daddy inspecting the worlds first prison in space, which was apparently built with all the safeguards of a closet with a sticky door.  The prisoners all break out with the help of main baddy Hydell (Joseph Gilgun-Harry Brown, This is England, Emmerdale) and his brother Alex (Vincent Regan-300, Clash of the Titans, Troy).  There seems to be some kind of attempt at a police negotiation that goes no where.  Snow is sent on board to rescue the girl and has his own agenda as well (his buddy Mace is on board and opted to rot in suspended animation forever rather than give up the location of the suitcase with something(?) inside it).  Guns get shot.  Bad guys act bad.  Good guys act good.  Maggie Grace manages to avoid showing any skin above her neck or below her long sleeve arm holes.

The stars.  Guy Pearce was entertaining.  One star.  So was Joseph Gilgun.  One star.  Action was entertaining in a brainless sort of way.  One star.  While the story was dumb on a genetic level the dialog was decent.  One star.  Decent special effects given the budget limitations.  One star.  Total: five stars.

The black holes.  Complete and utter disregard of fairly simple scientific concepts.  One black hole.  The space dog fight, and the freaking nuclear limpet mine (with 30 second digital counter on the outside).  One black hole.  A space prison with absolutely no prison safety features.  Have you ever considered some kind of remote control in case the prisoners do something unprecedented like take it over?  Or putting a “lock” on the control room door?  One black hole.  Not even an attempt at character development, with most of them so flat you could get a paper cut picking them up.  One black hole.  The editiing out of some key items that might have made things a little easier.  One black hole.  Total: five black holes.

A straight zero, which is about what I expected.  This movie is both better and worse than the trailers make out out to be.  If you are looking for dumb, dumb entertainment then look no further.  Shut down your higher brain functions and enjoy.  If you have an issue with pre Newtonian physics and want characters to be more than mannequins from which to hang bullets off of, maybe you should give it a pass.  It’s not Taken or the Professional.  Date movie?  Probably not.  Big screen?  Meh.  Maybe, but most of it was shot inside corridors so I think a home viewing experience would be OK.

Nothing to see tonight, I think.  Also I am moving into a new office and have a lot of work to do.  I’ll think of something for tomorrow.  Follow me on Twitter or email me with questions and suggestions at david@nerdkungfu.com.  Feel free to post comments here on this review or movie.  Have a good day.

Dave