Review the Last movie you have seen

[Wang Chung]

The Thing (2011)

I watched this again this weekend for the second time and it is pretty good. This movie actually takes place before the John Carpenter one of the 80's. If you were a fan of that movie I would suggest getting this one. A group of Antartica scientists stumble upon an Alien trapped in Ice. They get a tissue sample of it to see what it is. All hell breaks lose afterwards as the Alien breaks out of the Ice attacks a dog and the Scientists. Before long the scientist begin to realize that the blood cells mutate to take the shape of whatever is living but not before the Alien tries to kill them all and leave the area where there is not much life. The aliean gets toasted and roasted a few times. It tries to get to its ship to leave but in the end is foiled. As the credits roll you hear a helicopter and Lars starts hunting down the dog that is the Alien just like it happened in the original version. So this movie ends the way the original starts.

If you have seen the first and wander what happened in the encampment that Kurt Russell visits (and I must say that they did a wonderful job of recreating everything to detail that was shown in the first one) watch this.

 

[Postman Dave]

No Strings Attached

Congratulations Ivan Reitman, Ashton Kutcher and surprisingly Natalie Portman, you've somehow managed to take a film about sex and make it boring.

Seriously, one of the worst movies I've seen in a long time. Portman is hard to sympathize with due to being so narcotic, Kutcher is an idiot as always, what the fuck Kevin Kline is doing here is beyond me.

Two friends become sex buddies because Portman has commitment issues and Kutcher can't take a hint when he sees one and as a result I'm looking at the clock 30 minutes into this thing hoping it ends soon. It went on for another hour.

3/10 for raising the occasional chuckle, but don't bother. And if Friends With Benefits is anything like this it can fuck off too.

 

[TroyTheAverage]

The Sitter

The Sitter stars Jonah Hill as a reluctant babysitter. After agreeing to babysit 3 kids so his mom could go out on a date. Basically this movie is a more grown up movie of The Babysitter which starred Elisabeth Shue. To say that it didn't live up to the original is an understatement. Jonah Hill plays basically the same character he has played in all of his movies. There is a lot of comedy supposedly, although I don't remember laughing to much. It mixes in its share of feel good moments as well when Noah talks to the kids and gives them life advice.

This is a short and sweet review because basically, this movie tries to hard to be funny and my attention span wasn't good enough to keep me interested. The kids were great and really showed promise, but Jonah Hill kept bringing it down.

4/10 3 of those stars were for the kids and the other was for a nice set of boobs that popped onto the screen.

 

[Postman Dave]

Megamind

Evil villain actually manages to kill the superhero and finds himself bored now he's taken over the city. So he decides to create a superhero for him to fight, but his plan goes wrong when he falls for a local reporter.

The bad guy turned good theme is obviously going to draw comparisons with Despicable Me, but that's unfair as this is a great film in it's own right. Megamind is a bad guy you can get behind, and Minion is a fun sidekick. It's easily the most standable I've found Will Ferrell in years.

8/10 Just behind Despicable Me, but still a great movie in it's own right.

 

[Postman Dave]

Apologies for the double post.

Hanna

Crazy action film starring Saoirse Ronan as a 16 year old who has lived in the wilderness with her father (Eric Bana)all her life being taught to fight for when she steps out on her own. Once out, she is relentlessly hunted by Cate Blanchett as he discovers her real past, and the world around her as she travels across Europe.

A very striking presentation, with a great soundtrack by The Chemical Brothers and great visuals. Ronan really drives this film with a blend of deadly innocence, and the surrounding cast is fantastic too. The plot is a bit predictable but the action is fab and the characters are likeable.

8/10 Bold and striking, but not as original as it wants to be.

 

[TroyTheAverage]

GooN

Oh where do I begin? I was interested in seeing this just for two reasons. It stars Seann William Scott and it is about hockey. After watching the trailer quite a few times it looked like a great movie. It fell short in so many ways. First was the plot. They made hockey look like it was just a bunch of barbaric thugs beating the shit out of each other. It was less about hockey and more about fighting. That threw me off the movie almost instantly. Second, the comedy. It had some decent comedy in it, but if you want to save yourself the trouble, just watch the trailer. Those are all the funny parts.

Now you may be asking yourself; Troy, what did you like about the movie? Well for starters Seann William Scott was phenomenal and it was hard to dislike his character no matter how bad everything else was. He was far removed from Stifler or any other comedy movie he played in. Liev Schreiber, Allison Pill, Jay Baruchel and Kim Coates round out the stellar cast. It was hard to hate the cast for what transpired in the movie with a terrible script. They did what they could in the movie. That was pretty much all I liked about the movie.

Final conclusion. It isn't so bad that it is not watchable, but you need to go into it with low expectations and you may come out liking the movie.

5/10

 

[Wang Chung]

Secret World of Arriety

Not going to do a huge review like Fuji.

Basically a family of little people known as borrowers life in houses with normal humans. The borrowers take little things that the humans would not notice is gone like a cube of sugar, a tissue, and tiny little cups for dolls and such. This is a touching film as a young teenage borrower Arriety is coming to age and life lessons learned.

Arriety gets to go on her first borrowing journey in which she is spotted by a human. The human ends up being sickly and dying. He tries to befriend the borrowers, but that makes Arriety's father decide to move the family to another location. The housemaid hunts them down int he house and captures the mother while the father is out making arrangements to move the family and find the safest path there. Arriety seeks the help of the human boy to find her mother. They succeed in finding her mother and making the housemaid look foolish in the process. Arriety and her family make the journey to a new home while the human boy hunts them down to say goodbye.

I really liked the movie along with the visualizations. I thought the story was done well and brought the characters to life. Not so sure why most of the Studio Gibli movies are not doing well here in America except for Ponyo which was the worst of all the Gibli films (IMO). I would watch it again and again.

I give this a 8/10 and if you haven't seen it and are tired of sequels and reboots sit down and be amazed.

 

[Postman Dave]

Love & Other Drugs

Yay, another romantic film for Dave!

Jake Gyllenhaal is a aspiring drugs rep who falls for Anne Hathaway. The catch? Hathaway has stage one parkinson's disease.

The film gets an immediate 5/10 for the gratuitous Hathaway booby shots, so it's watchable in that respect.

It's still a good film, I felt at times it struggled to figure out what it was going for, either romance or comedy. It's like the first third is setting the scene, second is romance, third is comedy and forth is the melodramatic bit. It never settles on one genre, and this hurts the film as you're never quite sure where you sit with it.

That being said, everyone is great in it, Gyllenhaal continues to affirm his status as my favourite actor, Hathaway is wonderful having to balance her character's love of life with her crippling illness, and Josh Gad is hilarious as Jake's brother.

7/10 at least it's not "No String's Attached".

 

[Postman Dave]

Fast Five

My god how long I've wanted to see this. The Rock vs. Vin Diesel? Are you shitting me?

That's one of two big hooks for this film. The other being that they've brought back a ton of guys from the previous 4 films. Plot is simple, Jordana Brewster is pregnant, so Paul Walker and Vin realise they need to escape and stop running from the law. Their plan? Get together a team to rob the guy who effectively runs Rio de Janeiro and steal $100 million. Simple? Not quite, as FBI Agent Dwayne Johnson is hot on their tail.

So, you want the good news? This film is wicked awesome. Like any action film, you have to suspend your disbelief at times but what you get in return is one hell of a ride. Bringing back the old cast really helps too, as they add more dimension, charisma (what do you mean they didn't bring back Lucas Black? :shifty and humour to the proceedings. It really comes across as a great way to end the series, but the scene post credits (featuring the return of another TWO characters) and the fuckton of money this made at the box office means expect a sixth.

I'm not complaining though. Best installment since the first. 9/10

Oh, and next Saturday's film? I little movie called Scream 4.....

 

[Postman Dave]

Scream 4

I must saying going into this that my only prior film in this series is the last 20 minutes of 1. So don't expect me to get any continuity stuff or anything.

I must also say that 30 minutes in and the folks had had enough and were ready to condone this to Saturday movie history. Luckily for you lot, I got them to stick it out.

Thankfully, the film did get better in their eyes, and I was entertained throughout. The tongue in cheek stuff got a bit tiresome towards the end, and any film that kills Hayden Panettiere does not sit well with me. But it's a good popcorn flick that will kill a few hours with others.

7/10