Dead on arrival.

I think I have reached the evolutionary point in my movie reviewing career (yes I am starting to call it a career.  Suck it if you can’t let me enjoy a little fantasy) where I will no longer allow myself to excuse a crap movie just because I am a fan of the star of the film.  I am a Bruce Willis fan.  Pulp Fiction, the Sixth Sense, the Fifth Element (what’s with him and number movies?), and the original Die Hard are among my favorite films and to date have carried enough credibility to forgive the occasional Hudson Hawk or Cop Out.  Recent movies such as Moonrise Kingdom, Surrogates, and Looper continue to show his acting ability and general movie appeal.

However, as I watch more and more movies I have come to realize that each film is in and of itself a discrete particle that needs to be examined in isolation like lab rats to determine which one had the negative reaction to the massive overdose of hemorrhoid cream and which is just part of the control group.  Taken as such A Good Day to Die Hard is the most disease ridden lab animal in the cruelest testing facility in history.

To beat another analogy into this review if a movie franchise could be likened to an aircraft either soaring sedately through the stratosphere or crashing and burning horrible than the maneuver that the Die Hard franchise has been executing for the last four films would best be called a death spiral.  Each film in turn gets bigger, more elaborate, and stupider with more explosions and ridiculous plots.  The first film was arguably one of the top ten best action films of all time with Bruce Willis playing John McClane, an ordinary cop fighting against a villain bent on robbing millions of dollars and destroying a building in LA.  Die Hard 2: Die Harder decided the only way to make a better movie would be to have a bigger set and more evil plot so McClane is in a giant airport trying to stop some mercenaries from releasing a Latin American dictator.  In Die Hard With a Vengeance the villain opts to blow up parts of New York as part of some kind of nefarious plot to destroy the US economy (hey, I earn money in the US!  I should care about that!).  Then, like a drug addict needing more and more smack we are given Live Free or Die Hard and the ultimate evil plot: some kind of computer virus that will disrupt all power, traffic, computers, and possibly even your own home computer (OMG save us!)

Which leads us to the latest installment where the bad guys plan to do…something?  Honestly I’m not really clear on what the ultimate plan really was.  There was something about killing the rival of some Russian political guy, and later on it turned out to be something about weapons grade uranium but I’m not sure what the deal was.  I guess it was implied that they planned to build WMD’s but it’s not really clear (perhaps they left the nuke option out there in case they need an even bigger threat for Die Hard 6.  This does not bode well for Die Hard 7.  Once they have done nukes what is left?  Destruction of the entire world?  Perhaps by killing all the whales (which of you got that reference?)).

The vagueness of the dastardly plan is not what is bugging me about this film.  In fact, I kind of liked it if only because it felt a little ramped back from the lameness in three of the four previous plots.  No, what bugged me was the fact that the director really didn’t want to make a John McClane movie.  You see, one of the greatest things about McClane is the fact that he is an ordinary guy prevailing in the face of horrific odds.  In the first film every fight is a struggle and he has to use every resource he can to save his wife and her coworkers.  He turns his feet into hamburger by running barefoot through broken glass, gets shot, beat up, blown up, and falls off the building.  He starts off with his service gun and just improving his armament is a struggle.  However as the series progresses he looks less like the lovable punching bag we saw in the first one and more like a T-800, except that even the Terminator could get crushed in a hydraulic press and John McClane is pretty much immune to everything including what should be radioactive water (at least he doesn’t have to worry about hair loss).

This trend is taken to the next level in A Good Day by making John McClane (and his son.  More on that later) so indestructible that the combined military forces of the planet couldn’t take him out.  This is why Superman sucks and Batman rules.  There is no real struggle or bravery for a guy who is pretty much immune to everything on this planet except Krytonite (check out my article on how stupid the idea of Kryptonite on Earth really is) so we can’t care about his fight against 99.99999% of the villains out there.  Meanwhile, Batman (comic book Batman, not movie Batman.  Batman image courtesy of the Batman T Shirt category) is in constant danger from even the lowliest criminal.  All it takes is for one punk to get lucky with a gun and it is all over.  Thus is Batman the far superior hero (for other reasons too, but I don’t want to go too far off topic).  So when you make it pretty apparent that John McClane (and his son) are never going to really have anything bad happen to them you drain away all the tension in the film and the biggest helicopter explosions, car wrecks, and flying stunts in the universe will not motivate the audience to really give a damn.  Guns literally fall out of every cabinet and trunk they open, bad guys apparently trained at the Helen Keller School of Marksmenship and are all equipped with powerful bullet magnets, and injuries heal with nigh miraculous speed.

Sigh.  980 words in and I haven’t even started the story recap.  I’m going to be pretty generous with the spoilers in a minute but honestly if you are going to this film to be astounded by the story why don’t you just slam you head in your refrigerator door for 98 minutes?  (Incidentally, this film had a $92,000,000 budget and hired the guy who wrote the Wolverine movie.  Are a million monkey banging on a million typewriters really that hard to find?)  John McClane (Bruce Willis but if you didn’t know that what cave have you been living in?) has a grown son and daughter.  Like most families the son (Jai Courtney-Jack Reacher, Sparticus: War of the Damned, Boys Grammer) is a huge disappointment and has been arrested in Russia for something(?).  John flies to Russia to do something (really, what has that about?  Is John McClane some kind of expert on Russian law?  Was he going to go in guns blazing and bust his son out of the gulag?  Hypnotize the judge with the spot of light reflected off his head?  What?).  Meanwhile Russian billionaire Komorov (Sebastion Koch I think.  I might have these two guys reversed.  If you see the movie you see why-Unknown, the Lives of Others, Suspension of Disbelief (ironic)) is in the same prison waiting for trial for something (?).  He is the main rival of bigwig Anton (Roman Luknar-the Garden, Panelak, Lidice) who wants him killed because he has some file that will destroy him (again, very vague deals.  Everyone kept banging on about this file and then later it meant nothing).

Here come the spoilers.  I hope this doesn’t drain your excitement to the point you fall into a narcoleptic coma.  Anton sends a hit team to kill Komorov in the middle of the courtroom where he and Jack McClane are sitting in glass boxes.  Turns out Jack works for the CIA and is there to rescue Komorov.  They escape in a truck and nearly run down John, who was on his way to the courthouse.  Then we get the stupidest chase scene ever (I’m not kidding.  It made the escape scene from 2012 look like Bullitt.) with McClane literally driving over other cars.  They escape from the main henchman (Radivoje Bukvic-Taken, Three Worlds, Armed Hands).  Kamorov has to pick up his daughter and the file before leaving the country.

You know, twists in a movie plot are like nuclear power; they can be used for both good and evil.  In some films they greatly enhance the story and keep you really engaged, but in this one it seemed like they were throwing twists in whenever the writer got bored, which was like every 10 minutes.  The daughter betrays the father and gets him captured.  She then betrays the main evil dude and was secretly in league with her father all along, who instead of trying to atone for his sins and bring a bad man to justice had some secret plot to do something(?) with weapons grade uranium.  The story thread ends up looking like the biggest string of Xmas lights all piled up in a big incoherent mess.

So stuff gets blown up.  John and Jack kill about a million guys with each spray of their guns.  The end.

The stars.  I will give one for Bruce Willis doing his thing, but honestly since that is what I expected it’s like awarding a gold star to the best oxygen processor in 2nd grade.  One star nevertheless.  There was some attempt at character development between John and his son Jack, so I will award a star in the A for Effort category.  One star.  If you like guns, explosions, and pointless plot twists than you have found your Nirvana.  One star.  Total: three stars.

The black holes.  The plot could be considered a Crime Against Fiction.  Two black holes.  I think I have found a way to accurately describe the action in this film and that is it looked like Bruce and his buddy were playing a video game.  Even they looked bored and nothing seemed a challenge (easy mode video game).  Two black holes.  The story was needlessly labyrinthine and hard to follow.  If they had given me a reason to care I might not have resented the work it took to keep track of but they didn’t.  One black hole.  At no point did this film give me a real reason to give care other than it’s John McClane and my nostalgia should carry me through.  One black hole.  A chase scene that literally hurt my brain.  One black hole.  I’d say the explosions in this film rate 8/10 Micheal Beys.  One black hole.  I am going to hit them for drinking the “We must make things bigger in each film or else!” punch.  One black hole.  Crowbarring in a son and then have John show all the paternal instinct of Cronus (there’s a test of your education).  Is there any father in the world who is OK with sending his son into a fight against trained mercenaries and his plan literally is to go in guns blazing?  One black hole.  Finally one more for being so wrapped up in the name Die Hard that they created one of the stupidest movie titles ever.  One black hole.  Total: eleven black holes.

A final total of eight black holes.  It has been a while since I rained unholy hell on a film like this, but I feel justified doing it here.  Die Hard was a masterpiece that should have been left to enjoy it’s success in the sun with a pina colada and a big umbrella.  Instead they keep trotting it out of retirement to help move the furniture around and then then everyone acts surprised when it defecates on the carpet and dies.  Who is to blame for this trend of exhuming corpses and using their bodies in puppet shows you ask?  I am going to blame you, the audience.  If you would only stop seeing this garbage then Hollywood would have no choice but to actually make something original and creative.  Each Die Hard movie has made more money than the previous one, so why should Hollywood stop?  Ugh.  Should you see it?  If you are a fan of John McClane or just want to kill 98 minutes than sure.  If you are easily distracted by explosions and bright objects you will not feel any remorse.  Date movie?  Hell no.  This film is an anti-date movie.  Bathroom break?  Since this film really only serves at an action delivery system (like the worlds stupidest t-shirt gun) then any of the non action scenes could be missed with ease.  You might even enjoy the film more if you made up your own plot to connect the action sequences.  If I had to be specific I’d say the scene where John starts off whining about how the whole opperation is blown before they head off to Chernobyl.

Thanks for reading.  More to see soon.  Follow me on Twitter @NerdKungFu.  Feel free to post comments on this film or my review here.  Off topic questions or suggestions can be emailed to david@nerdkungfu.com.  Thanks and I will talk to you soon.

Dave

I know, I know.  I’m supposed to write up my review for Cold Light of Day.  I’ll get to it after lunch.  I don’t expect many of you are on the fence about seeing it so I don’t feel a huge amount of pressure, but I have some funny thoughts to impart so I will get to it.

However, I wanted to take a moment to wish an icon of the nerd world, Mr. Adam West, a happy birthday.  As any nerd with his salt should I’m sure you are aware of the fact that Mr. West played Batman in the 70′s TV show.  This show was a big part of my childhood as it was in syndication on about 1,000 channels and you could find it anywhere.  That being said, it was awesome, mainly due to Adam’s super campy portrayel of both Bruce Wayne and Batman.  A huge number of modern cultural ideas and concepts were derived from this show, and as it started three months after my beloved Star Trek TOS it has that same niche appeal.

By the way, if you have never watched the series but want to absorb the culture of it in 105 glorious minutes rent the Batman movie.  It features all the best characters, including the very hot Lee Meriweather as Catwoman and Cesar Romero as a mustached Joker.  It also features the infamous worst shark attack scene ever (and by worst I don’t mean realistic or horrific, if you know what I mean) complete with Bat Shark Repellent.  It also has the Batcopter and the Batcycle (with side car).  Plus, the shark explodes.

The cars and money image I pulled from the Batman T Shirt category.  Review later today I promise.

Dave

So based on Dave’s review and my own love of Batman I went as saw this yesterday.  I enjoyed it a lot, but there was one point that bugged me during the film and has been bugging me ever since.

By the way, big spoiler coming in so if you have not yet watched the film better bail out.

Anyway, at one point Bruce Wayne is at the bottom of a prison pit.  The only way out is to climb up the pit wall and make some kind of jump or something.  They tie a rope around his waste so he won’t die when he falls.  He then has to attempt the climb over and over again.

Here’s the question.  If there is a rope that goes all the way up to the top of the pit wall why didn’t he just climb up the rope?  Or just use the rope to walk up the wall in relative safety.  They even did that in the 70′s Batman movie.  For that matter it looked like the rope was on some kind of pulley that a big dude held the end on.  Why didn’t they just pull him up to the top?  Dumb.

The image I got from Dave’s Batman t shirt collection.  He has a lot of them.

Jason

A film of many surprises.

This film did indeed surprise me in many ways, both positive and negative.  There were aspects I expected to suck that exceeded all my expectations.  Then there were aspects I thought were going to rule that ended up sucking.  There were also stealth surprises, in that aspects of the movie I had no opinion of one way or another jumped up and bit me on the ass.

The big positive surprise was Anne Hathaway as Catwoman.  I have said several times that I didn’t think she could really play either the Cat or Selina Kyle.  I didn’t think she had the role in her.  I could not have been more wrong.  She inhabits the role like she plans to raise six generations of Hathaways there and more or less dominates every scene she is in.  Her portrayal is superlative and I honestly will have a hard time seeing anyone else in the role.  Also, I have always had a thing for her (even when she was doing garbage like One Day I found her a real turn on) and no matter what she is doing in this movie she is dead sexy.

The big negative surprise was Bane.  I really expected to like him as a villain but honestly found him to be really kind of boring.  He  suffers in comparison to the Joker in the Dark Knight of course, but even without that bar to hold up I would have found him boring and two dimensional.  His plan seems vague and a little pointless, and he just doesn’t have the dialog and compelling nature of even Two Face or Scarecrow from the other movies.  He more or less translates as slightly better than a muscle bound thug.  (Bane image courtesy of the Batman T Shirts)

One of the surprises that really caught me off guard was Bane’s voice in the movie.  Somehow they made him sound suspiciously like Alfred Pennyworth with a mouth full of loose gravel  and spoken through 100 yards of steel pipe.  It was really, really disconcerting.  Honestly the whole time I felt like his voice had been dubbed over, really robbing his dialog of any import or strength.  Plus I spent about half the time trying to understand what the hell he had just said.  I’d like to not say “I’m not saying the voice doesn’t work but…” but honestly, that’s exactly what I am saying (without the but).

I have seen other critics call the story and plot ludicrous and to be fair to them, it pretty much is.  The story borrows but from but does not really tell the stories from Knightfall, Breaking the Bat, No Man’s Land, and a half dozen other Batman comic story lines and as a result fails to tell one complete story.  It definitely feel fragmented, convoluted, and lacking in continuity.  Months of movie time are covered in the space of a few minutes and very little motivation is given for any of the supporting characters to do pretty much anything.  Excellent supporting characters such as Catwoman or Alfred disappear for huge swaths of time only to reappear when the plot needs them.  However, I saw the Batman Marathon at the local Regal and saw this movie after watching Batman Begins and the Dark Knight and I can say that while TDK is a brilliant story with amazing character interaction Batman Begins is ludicrous with a capital L.  Ra’s al Ghul’s plan, if you recall, was to spend months injecting a fear causing hallucinogenic into the water supply and then microwave it into steam to cause the city to self destruct and teach the world a lesson or something.  It doesn’t get much hokier than that.

That being said, the story does seem to lack focus and drifts from story to story, even reprising Ra’s al Ghul in order to give Bane something to do.  This is a mistake in my opinion.  Bane was always much cooler and more interesting in the comics when he just had a personal axe to grind with Batman.  If you read my (brilliant, IMO) post on why The Wrath of Khan is the best of the Star Trek movies you might see what I mean.  When the bad guy’s plan is to blow up a city (or the world) Hollywood seems to think we are going to somehow be personally connected to the story and feel some kind of kinship for all the people threatened.  Nothing could be further from the truth.  The fact is we connect with a specific character in the movie and feel more involved when there is some kind of personal vendetta going on.  This is one of the many reasons the Dark Knight was so cool.  Joker wanted nothing more than to screw with Batman.  The threats to the city were incidental.  When I watch a movie I want to feel like I’m Batman fighting to save my life, not one of the squirming millions of unwashed masses he is trying to protect.

All that being said, this movie is definitely worth watching.  It drags at places, and you will feel every one of the self indulgent 164 minutes (mostly in your numb butt and full bladder), but visually stunning and the action is pretty damned good.

I’m not going to get into the story too deep as I expect pretty much everyone reading this to watch it and don’t want to hand out any spoilers.  Sufficed to say Batman has been in hiding for eight years since taking the blame for the death of Harvey Dent.  Bruce Wayne has been a recluse until Catwoman pulls him back to reality by robbing his safe.  There is a lot of complicated, convoluted non-action in the first 45 minutes until Bane finally takes over the city No Man’s Land style.  All hell breaks loose, and Batman is more or less broken.  Stuff blows up.  There is a massive riot.  More stuff blows up.  The end.

The stars.  Batman movie.  Two stars.  Comic book movie.  One star.  Catwoman was pretty damned impressive, not to mention uber hot.  One star.  Almost all the supporting characters delivered at least a good performance, if not great.  One star.  Visually stunning.  Expect to see some technical Oscars for this one.  Two stars.  While the pretty much used canon as a doormat, they tried to keep all the characters except Bane true to themselves.  One star.  I thought Joseph Gordon-Levitt was a really good choice to introduce as a new character, and his role added a lot to the story.  One star.  The action was pretty impressive all around (not to mention brutal), especially any fight between Bane and Batman.  One star.  Overall entertaining as hell.  Two stars.  Total: twelve stars.

The black holes.  Long, long movie with non-action portions that seemed to really mire the plot down.  Pacing could have been tightened up a lot.  One black hole.  The main villain was pretty damned boring, which I am going to ascribe to breaking too far away from canon.  One black hole.  Bane’s voice.  One black hole.  The story was very much overly convoluted, with myriad sub plots that seemed to go no where.  Too much source material in my opinion.  One black hole.  Some off putting continuity issues, and characters that disappeared for a while.  One black hole.  Total: five black holes.

A grand total of seven stars.  Decently good, and well worth watching.  I will put this one on par with Batman Returns but well below The Dark Knight.  It is a good ending to the trilogy, but I honestly did not walk away with the sense of satisfaction I had hoped to have.  Should you see it?  Absolutely.  Spend a few extra bucks on IMAX.  This is a must see for any Batman fan and a should see for everyone else.  Just don’t expect to be riveted to the seat by a Heath Ledger like performance.  Date movie?  Only in the sense that even women should see this film.  There is nothing going on here that will encourage her to take off her clothes with you, and having you geek out next to her might actually hurt your chances.  See it with your friends IMO.  I think you will enjoy it more.  Bathroom break?  Pretty much anywhere in the first 45 minutes would be fine, but if you are looking for a time later in the film I would say any of the the first two climbing out of the pit attempts.  You will know what I mean.  Not only is Nolan joining the “excitement through repetition” crowd but that whole sub plot adds absolutely nothing to the story except for more continuity issues.

Thanks for reading, and sorry I couldn’t gush more about this film.  It was good but not gush-worthy.  Worth seeing for sure, but honestly I don’t think I am motivated to see in in a theater a second time.  I’d actually rather go see the Avengers again.  Follow me on Twitter @NerdKungFu.  Feel free to post comments about this movie or review here.  Any off topic comments or suggestions can go to david@nerdkungfu.com.  Talk to you soon.

Dave

These questions Dave used to post as part of bigger review, but the fact is most of them came from arguments we would have on the whole who would win thing so I thought I would throw up my own.

This question seems pretty obvious to anyone who did not play Max Payne all the way through.  Batman has taken down hundreds of gun toting thugs who look a lot like Max.  However, as a fan of Max Payne I can say it wouldn’t be as clear cut as all that.  Max, like Batman, is haunted by the deaths of his family.  However, his deaths happened recently while he was an adult and included his child.  This gives him a much more nothing to lose attitude that is almost a death wish.  He, like Batman, has the ability to push through any level of pain and suffering to deliver more pain to his enemies.  If you don’t believe me just replay the Baseball Bat chapter.

I do think Batman would triumph in this fight, but it wouldn’t be a easy or clean as most fights against normal civilians would be.  Max has untested reserves and an unholy resourcefulness that might surprise the Bat.  Plus he has bullet time.

This image I pulled from Dave’s Batman t shirt collection, another one where he has hundreds of shirts.

Jason

So I heard that they are doing a tour with the Tumbler Batmobile and got really excited.  I think the Tumbler is the best Batmobile they have ever come up with, even better than the original.  However, I have discovered that they are completely ignoring the Bay Area on their 26 city tour.  Here is the list in case you want to see it:

So last week Jason was giving me crap for being scared of clowns when he was talking about the new Twisted Metal movie.  Personally I don’t really see this as a weird phobia or mental condition at all.  For any rational, thinking person clowns are freaking evil!  Although not as evil as their horrible cousins, mimes, they cause mayhem and despair wherever their tiny little cars and giant shoes go (by the way, if you happen to agree with me join the I Hate Clowns movement).

Fear of clowns is scientifically called coulrophobia, but I call it having a brain and survival instinct.  I thought I would try to prove my point to Jason and all the other people who think I am weird for this and list my 10 Scariest Clowns of All Time.

10.  Ronald McDonald-I think the first time I realized how evil clowns were was when I was a kid and visited a McDonald’s.  Out front they had a park bench with a statue of Ronald with his arm out so you could sit down and take a picture like a moron or something.  My friend sat there and all of a sudden I got the creepiest feeling ever.  In looking back as an adult I realized that the pose and look was straight up child molester.  However, if you want to count the evilness of clowns based on how much damage and despair they have brought upon the world, from a dietary point of view Ronald McDonald is the Hitler of clowns.  How much garbage has he helped shovel into the waiting maws of future obese diabetics?

9.  Violator from Spawn.  The fat clown that turns into a horrid demon was bad enough in the movie, but trust me when I say he was way worse in the comic book.

8.  the Joker-I am of course a Batman fan and the Joker is my second favorite villain (Two Face is my first).  However, part of the reason he is such a good villain is he is horrible!  I don’t care which one; Jack Nicholson, the cartoon, the comic, Heath Ledger, even Cesar Romero from the TV show.  They are all scary as hell.  (Joker image courtesy of the Batman T-Shirt category)

7.  the clown doll from Poltergeist-ugh.  Thank god I never saw this movie as a kid.  I never would have slept again.  This clown was scary as hell, kept showing up in unexpected places, and never spoke.  Plus, it was a clown.

6.  Sergio from the Last Circus-I don’t think any of you saw this Spanish film, but if you do and don’t suffer from coulrophobia, you will.  In my mind clowns are scary sociopaths anyway, and to see one that actually is a sociopath is god awful.

5.  the zombie clown from Zombieland-this is a nice convergence for my best friend and I.  You see, I fear clowns and he fears zombies.  Works out nicely.  I think part of the reason I loved this movie is the main character shows the rational sense to have a healthy fear of the “c” word.

4.  Captain Spaulding from the Devil’s Rejects and House of 1,000 Corpses-Rob Zombie learned early on how well clowns work in horror films with Halloween and put that experience to good use when he created this character.  Talk about messed up.

3.  the clowns from Killer Klowns from Outer Space-not only are they clowns, but they are from outer space, have huge freaking clown heads, and are here to capture humans in order to encase them in cotton candy and drink their fluids with a crazy straw!  I saw this movie at a friends house and I think my hand print is still impressed on the armrest of his couch.

2.  Sweet Tooth from Twisted Metal-yes, Jason used to make me play this game and always force me to watch the intro showing how Sweet Tooth came to be.  Can you imagine anything scarier than a clown with glowing red eyes and flames for hair driving an ice cream truck armed with enough guns to sink a battleship?  Well, actually I can since Sweet Tooth is only number 2 on my list.

1.  Pennywise from Stephen King’s It-no, not the band.  Only the scariest clown in the history of the universe, who spends his times killing children and not with laughter.  Seeing this guy on screen might have been what pushed me over the top from being kind of creeped out by clowns to full blown terror.

Sorry, but Patch Adams didn’t quite make the list, although it was close.  That’s pretty much it.  I think I am going to see an indy film tonight, so look for a good review tomorrow.  I need to go have a couple drinks and punch Jason in the head for making me relive all this.  Post comments here or follow me on Twitter @NerdKungFu.  You can also email me at david@nerdkungfu.com.  Thanks for reading.  Talk to you soon.

Dave

My name is Jason, and I’m coming on board with Dave as his loyal sidekick, kind of like Robin only not so wimpy (Robin shirt from the Batman T Shirt category).  I am going to be posting here reasonably often about nerd stuff I see in order to have this blog do what it is supposed to do and give Dave more time to work on his actual job.

Dave is going to keep on doing all the movie reviews and long nerd rants, and odds are won’t slow down on them.  I really don’t have that kind of free time, since I actually have a life, and will be keeping my posts short and sweet.  Mostly I will be keeping an eye out for interesting nerd facts about upcoming movies, comic books, and so on.  One that I heard the other day has to do with the fact that they are likely to make the Expendables 2 PG-13 instead of R.  Big mistake in my opinion, as PG-13 is a recipe for suck.  Word on the street (or internet) is that this was a requirement put forth by tough guy Chuck Norris, as he feels the need for kids to see him in all his middle aged glory.  Guess what, Chuck?  No one young enough to be affected by an R rating gives a rats ass about you.  Get over yourself.

Jason

Pretty damned good.

It is always nice to see something decent after being subjected to the film equivalent of a flesh eating virus.  Thursday night I dragged myself to New Years Eve, and truly regretted it.  Last night I went to see Sherlock Holmes and was reminded that there is still some good in the world (of movies).  This movie is in all ways entertaining and exciting, with great writing, dialog, acting, and action.

It is, of course, a grandiose story of Sherlock Holmes, the greatest fictional detective ever (actually, I would claim Batman as the greatest fictional detective ever, but that’s just a personal preference.  Batman image courtesy of the Batman T Shirt category) and his friend Dr. Watson.  They are attempting to prevent the infamous Moriarty from literally destroying Western Civilization.

I’m not going to get too deep into the story, as I spent literally hours yesterday writing up that dumb New Years movie and have a lot to do today, but it starts off with Holmes (Robert Downey Jr.-Iron Man, of course) dealing with the impending marriage of his long time companion Dr. Watson (Jude Law-actually, some good movies here that no one but me likes.  The Road to Perdition, Cold Mountain, and Enemy at the Gates to name a few).  Meanwhile, he rescues a hot Gypsy fortune teller (Naomi Rapace-the Girl with the Dragon Tattoo et al) who’s brother is involved in a secret plan cooked up by Moriarty (Jared Harris-Natural Born Killers, Resident Evil Apocalypse).  They are aided by Holmes’ brother Mycroft (Stephen Fry-V for Vendetta, a bunch of other roles calling for a smarmy over-educated pasty white guy).  I expect you all to see this film, so I don’t want to throw too much into this.  Stuff blows up, Holmes deduces stuff, and a lot of fairly cool action occurs.

The stars.  I know I’m a sucker for English accents, but the dialog couldn’t be more perfect.  The language and diction was perfectly in period of the late 19th century England.  Two stars.  Well written story.  Two stories.  Excellent performances by literally everyone.  Two stars.  They did this really cool quick cut sequences thing to show how Sherlock Holmes’s deductive brain worked.  One star.  There were some shooting and running slow motion action scenes that were really cool.  One star.  A couple of really cool plot twists.  One star.  There was a ton of really funny humor seamlessly mixed into the dialog.  One star.  The onscreen relationship between Watson and Holmes felt really real and genuine.  I know this is just a reflection of the excellent acting talents of Robert and Jude, but still it was refreshing to see.  One star.  Mycroft was outstanding in every scene he was in.  One star.  So was Moriarty.  One star.  And two bonus stars for a good movie experience.  Total: fourteen stars.

The black holes.  This is just a reflection of my own stupidity, but the combination of Robert Downey Jr. fast deliver plus the English accent meant I kept missing what I felt were either funny or plot critical points.  One black hole, although that’s really for my slow brain.  I felt the whole Dr. Watson marriage and his wife’s character were kind of unnecessary.  I don’t think they added much to the story, especially once the wife more or less fell off the screen.  One black hole.  That’s it.  Two black holes.

In the vexing but not black hole worthy, I really only have one and it galls me like a burning coal in my gut to say this, but I honestly think this movie would have been better in 3D.  Gah, I can’t believe I just wrote that!  I hate 3D.  However, there were a number of scenes involving artillery shells, knives, and bullets that would have looked cool in 3D.  OK, I said it.  I’m going to go flagellate myself after finishing this review in punishment.

So a grand total of twelve stars and my recommendation that you see it in the theater.  Some of the epic scenes will lose impact on a smaller screen.  Good date movie, as your date will probably be entertained by the clever English dialog.  Also she could possibly fill you in on any of the dialog you missed (going to the movies by yourself sucks.  Trust me, I know).

Sorry about the short review, but when I like a movie I don’t usually find a lot to write about.  I am happy to report that the movie I unleashed all the bile in my life upon yesterday, New Years Eve, tanked horribly and is being counted as a film failure in spite of the celebrity lineup.  Well, done, America.  You reaffirm my faith in humanity.  Follow me on Twitter @NerdKungFu.  Thanks for reading.  Talk to you soon.

Dave

Better than the trailer makes it out to be.

I’ll admit, I enjoy cartoons and will see a movie that catches my eye, even if it’s made for kids.  I do feel kind of creepy being in a theater with a bunch of children and bored parents, but this was nothing like the last Winnie the Pooh experience.  As a rule, when I go to a kids film I sit by myself and don’t talk to or look at anyone in hopes no one notices me.

Actually, now that I think about it, that is my policy for pretty much all the movies I see.  My life sucks.

Anyway, I was not really gung ho to see this movie, mainly because the trailers managed to unsell it for me.  Another example of failure in marketing.  The trailers really made it looks at the same time both sappy sweet and over the top silly.  In truth it was neither of those.  It was fun, clever, entertaining, and above all well executed.  As a rule I suspend my usual star/black hole rating system for kids movies, as dropping black holes on a film designed to entertain seven year olds is a move that would give the Grinch pause.  That being said, I honestly wouldn’t have found a lot of black holes to give it.  Maybe it’s just a little too polished.  Other than that it’s pretty good.  It’s no Kiss Saves Christmas, but still fun to watch.

It started off on a bad note, however, by subjecting me and the soft brained impressionable youth of America to a “music” video by girly man/boy Justin Bieber singing a “rock” version of some Christmas carol.  Is there anything remotely masculine about that guy?  I know he’s like 17 or something but by the time was that age I had been in fights with more guys than I had friends, played football, wrestled, set fire to a shockingly large amount of private property, spent seven months in a Bolivian prison, and had facial hair.  The ironic part is he is adored by girls his age while I was the dating equivalent of athletes foot.  The other part that drove me nuts was during the video, when they were not performing their “dance” routine, they were treating us to clips from the MOVIE WE WERE ABOUT TO WATCH!  Really?  Is a blank screen and a cone of silence that much to ask for?  Seriously, whoever was in charge of marketing for this film should be taken behind the woodshed and shot.

Anyway, once I got over the suck part and into the movie proper, it warmed up nicely.  It is Christmas Eve and Santa is making his run around the world, delivering presents with the help of about 1,000,000,000 elves and a high tech super sleigh that looks like an Apple store threw up all over it.  We are treated to high tech Mission Impossible cut scenes as the elves zip line down from the S1 and B&E their way through the world, delivering gifts to good children.  Santa is really more of a figurehead, as the entire high tech operation is being run by his oldest son, Steve, a macho guy who runs things with military efficiency and all the warmth and holiday spirit of a roadkill.  Meanwhile, his younger brother Arthur, a bumbling klutz, stumbles around messing things up while trying to read all the childrens letters and relate the relevant contents to Santa and Steve.

Steve dreams of being the next Santa (apparently, rather than being an immortal “jolly old elf” Santa is an inherited position, passed from father to son.  Incidentally, the current Santas real name is Malcolm.  Meanwhile, during a particularly intricate operation, a gift for a young girl named Gwen gets lost.  No one realizes that until after everything is shut down.  At that point both Santa and Steve kind of blow it off and it’s up to Arthur to deliver the gift.  He recruits his grandfather, a former Santa and curmudgeonly old bastard, to help him.  They find the old sleigh and reindeer, and head off.  They are joined by Bryony, an elf who specializes in gift wrapping.  She is actually my favorite character.

Anyway, Xmas chaos ensues.  The world is convinced that aliens are invading.  Certain characters are reminded of the true meaning of Christmas.  You end up feeling good at the end.

Like I said, I won’t do the whole stars and black holes for a kid movie.  I will say that 3D, while normally horrible for the average film, works really well for CGI cartoons.  The best way to judge a kids movie, IMO, is by how the kids in the theater are reacting to it and in this case they were laughing their asses off.  Great movie for kids.  It’s clever enough to keep the parents engaged, although I don’t think it has enough meat on it to be worth seeing without kids (unless you plan to review it).

Thanks for reading.  I’m off to watch the Last Starfighter at Bad Movie Night.  Follow me on Twitter @NerdKungFu.

By the way, I’m hearing some seriously scary things out of the new Batman movie.  As much as I am attracted to Anne Hathaway (and really, I am) I have said from the start I don’t think she could ever pull off Catwoman.  Word is she is kind of butchering it, and wears a utility belt with an iPhone carrier.  Also, Christopher Nolan is apparently channeling the spirit of Joel Schumacher from Batman and Robin by taking the highly intelligent  South American super villain Bane and turning him into a muscle bound thug.  Really, if you want a thug just do Killer Croc.  It’s not rocket science.  My best friend keeps telling me to keep the faith in that Christopher Nolan has yet to fail us, but this whole deal is really starting to smell of suck.  Maybe he wants to ruin the Batman franchise for the next director, like Sam Raime did with Spiderman 3.  I swear if Bruce Wayne goes emo and does a moody swing dance number while Catwoman sings I will beat the first person to tell me they liked the movie to a pulp.

I’m kidding about that, of course.  I am a pretty non violent guy.  Besides, why take my anger out on some hapless moron when I can use this blog to burn the director to my hearts content.  I don’t know.  It could be good.  I’m just worried.  I’ll try to keep up to date on what is going on, and talk about what I hear on future posts.  Also, if the movie does both suck and blow, you can count on me to explain why and how in excruciating detail right here.  Thanks again.  Talk to you soon.  Catwoman image, by the way, courtesy of the Batman T Shirt category.

Dave