My first impression after having watched 'Get Him To The Greek?' I could have done with fewer scenes where Jonah Hill gets something shoved up his rectum. That said, this movie was a lot funnier than I was afraid it was going to be and a lot more sincere than I expected.
When I first heard they were going to do a spin off of 'Forgetting Sarah Marshall' based on Russell Brand's recently sober, incredibly bizarre rock star Aldous Snow, I was both psyched and dubious.
While 'FSM' (which I will call it from this point on) is one of my favorite comedies of the last few years, the idea that they could build a whole movie around such an eccentric character seemed unlikely.
Well, I take that back, I was absolutely positive they could build a movie around him. It was the probability of it totally sucking ass that I was worried about. It seemed very likely to me that I would end up sitting through 2 hours of broad caricatures making dick jokes.
But I didn't!
It helped that Jonah Hill doesn't play the obsessive-to-the-point-of-stalkerish fan he played in 'FSM.' That character, though one of my favorites, can only be funny in 5 minute installments.
This time around he's an underling at a major music label, working for P. Diddy. Or should I call him Sean Combs, since he's wearing his actor-shoes this time? Whatever, more on him later.
So Jonah Hill plays this very tame, sweet, kind of boring dude who ends up in charge of making sure... You know what, if you're reading my review you probably already know what the movie is about. Anyway, Hill is fine in the movie. He gets plenty of chuckles, but I prefer him as the blow-hard, asshole. Sweet just doesn't really work on him.
Russell Brand on the other hand gets to be as crazy as he wants to be and, as we all know, that's what he's best at. What surprised me the most was that when the movie got serious (and yes, it does get at least a little bit serious every once and a while) Brand was actually pretty good at playing it straight. Turns out, Aldous Snow is a real character with thoughts and feelings and motivations. Go figure.
As far as Puff Daddy goes, he's actually kind of hilarious. I didn't know he was going to have as large a role in the movie as he does and he totally pulls it off.
There are some pretty fun cameos thrown in here and there, including Ms. Marshall herself, Kristen Bell and the ladies, Rose Byrn and Elizabeth Moss, hold their own against the two leads.
Overall, I'd say that though I wouldn't say the movie truly lives up to it's source material, it is pretty damn funny.
And do not despair, there are still plenty of dick jokes.
Prince of Persia
The producers of this movie should really have just cut to the chase and called this movie 'Jake Gyllenhaal: Uber-hottie.'
I was going to try and review the film analytically and seriously, but come on, it's based on a video game and we all know it would not stand up well to scrutiny.
So I'll just say that I do not regret for a minute spending $8 to sit in a dark room and watch Mr. Gyllenhaal run around in leather pants and kill baddies for 2 hours. Totally worth it.
Oh, yeah, there are some other people in this movie too, but who gives a shit.
Robin Hood
After watching Ridley Scott's Robin Hood origin story today, I realized why no one else has ever done Robin Hood's origin story before. And that reason is that it's, well, kind of boring. And also a little muddled.
The heart of the appeal to Robin Hood is that he steals from the rich and gives to the poor, right? Well, he doesn't do that in this movie. Ok, he steals some grain at one point. That scene lasts about 2 minutes tops.
For the majority of the rest of the film he doesn't do that much. If one were to apply Joseph Campbell's Hero's Journey plot structure to this movie, it would pretty much only get us to the end of Act I, which is a little unsatisfying to say the least.
He kind of takes charge towards the end, but I couldn't really get that invested in the action because of the second problem I mentioned. When I say that the story was a little muddled, what I mean is, I couldn't really tell who I was supposed to be mad at for most of the movie. Who exactly is the villain here?
When we first meet Robin, he's fighting in King Richard's army. From what I remember from previous Robin Hoods, Richard is supposed to be the good one and Robin's supposed to be fighting in his name. But he doesn't seem so great here and Robin doesn't feel any kind of allegiance to him. He actually wants to get the hell out of the army as soon as he can.
Then we meet Richard's brother John, who we're obviously supposed to hate because he wants to tax the crap out of everyone. Also, he's arrogant and cheats on his wife. So he's totally evil. Right, of course, here's our problem: unfair taxation from an evil King.
But wait, then there's this guy Godfrey, some old friend of John's. But he's plotting with the King of France to overthrow him. How did France get into this?
It's like that too-many-villains syndrome I mentioned superhero movies have a problem with in my last review. If they really want us to get all riled up with righteous indignation and looking for Robin to kick some ass, we need to know who's ass we should want him to kick. Is it King John? Godfrey? The King of France? If you hate all of them, you spread the hate around too much and it loses its affect.
Gladiator was so awesome because Joaquin Phoenix was so perfectly evil that you wanted to reach into the screen and kill him yourself. I could never invest that much in this movie.
What really clinched this opinion for me was the fact that the most exciting part of the movie was the end. When you finally see Robin Longstride become Robin Hood, you think 'Oh, this looks like it's gonna be good!' And then it's over.
So if they decide to make a sequel, that movie will probably rock.
Sidenote: One other problem I had was that there wasn't enough of Robin's Merry Men. Little John, Will Scarlett and... the other one... were way more entertaining than Robin actually was.
Iron Man 2
Alright, what worked: everything. What didn't: nothing.
Too brief? Let me elaborate. 'Iron Man 2' was, in my BA in film studies holding opinion, totally freakin' awesome.
Robert Downey Jr. was once again amazing as Tony Stark. Somehow he manages to make Stark the most obnoxiously narcissistic superhero you've ever completely loved. He's self-righteous and vain but also self-hating and insecure. He's Batman minus humility and all the brooding plus a sense of humor and a drinking problem.
His relationship with Pepper is even more combative and adorable than in the first movie. Downey and Gweneth Paltrow have such fantastic chemistry that their scenes together could practically stand alone as a romantic comedy. And one that's better than any other rom-coms that have come out recently.
Also, I have to say that usually it would bother me that a major character was recast, but Don Cheadle is a better fit for the role of Lt. Rhodes than Terrance Howard was. He can hold his own against Downey comedically, whereas Howard just seemed to shake his head in exasperation and look disapproving for the entire first film.
Finally, this sequel managed to avoid the issue of the superfluous villains that a lot of superhero sequels seem to run into (I'm looking at you 'Spiderman 3'). I was leery about the fact that there were going to be two major villains in this one, especially after hearing that one of them would be Russian, since a thick Russian accent always seems to be a key ingredient in a recipe for 'over-the-top.'
However, Mickey Rourke managed to be incredibly menacing without any stereotypical supervillain grandstanding. All the grandstanding was left to Sam Rockwell, who did it beautifully as the lame Stark-wannabe Justin Hammer.
So there you have it. In my humble opinion, everything about 'Iron Man 2' was great. All pros, no cons.
Sidenote: Scarlett Johanson is also in this movie and while I don't think the character added all that much to the plot other than to stir up highly entertaining banter between Pepper and Tony, her fight scenes are totally bad-ass. So that was cool.
How To Train Your Dragon
Let me start by saying that I have a hard time reviewing movies I liked. It's much easier to tear apart a crappy movie than it is to explain why a movie was good. At least it is for me.
So this review might suck.
Anywho, I was pretty optimistic about this one going in since this movie has Jay Baruchel, Jonah Hill and Kristen Wiig, all of whom were in 'Knocked Up.'
(My new theory is that my enjoyment of a comedy is directly proportionate to the number of cast members from 'Knocked Up' said movie possesses.)
Also, it has Craig Ferguson. And McLovin'. Really, there is no bad here.
But back to the actual review...
The plot of this movie is your standard 'dorky-outcast-teaches-us-a-lesson' - but the lesson involves dragons that act like kitties!
The main character, Hiccup, is endearing and relatable and I suppose there's a nice message about understanding and team work and whatnot. Which is good, I suppose.
This might not be the best animated movie to come out in the last few years but it made me happy and I wouldn't mind paying to see it again.
So, to sum up:
Pros:
Funny people
Kitty dragons
Scottish accents
Good wholesome family fun and such
(so long as your children aren't bothered by the thought of people having their arms and legs bitten off by dragons)
Cons:
Inevitable theatre full of chatty 3-year-olds
Oh, and I hear it's really good in 3D, but I didn't bother with that.
Clash of the Titans
First of all I would like to state that I don't understand what the title of this movie has to do with anything seeing as there are no Titans in the movie, only a passing mention of them in the prologue.
Anyway, movies I see in the theatre (and yes I like to spell theatre the pretentious British way) generally fall into one of three categories for me:
A) 'That was awesome, I have to buy that DVD the day it comes out and watch it over and over again'
B) 'That was an acceptable way to pass some time,'
or
C) 'That was 2 hours of my life wasted, I want my money back,'
Sometimes movies leave such a strong impression on me that I have to amend the definitions of A and C to include:
'That was so amazing I want to go back and watch it again RIGHT NOW! I have to tell everyone I've ever met how fantastic that was!'
or
'Not only do I want my money back, but I want to track down everyone involved in that movie and stab them in the neck.'
'Clash of the Titans' would fall under category B. It was fine. I don't actually have much of an opinion on it one way or the other. So here's a neat little Pro/Con list to help you decide whether to see it:
Pros:
Greek Mythology is cool.
Sam Worthington is hot. (There are also a couple of hot chicks if that's more your thing)
Sword-fighting
Giant sea monster
Decent special effects
Cons:
Uninteresting characters
Not entirely faithful to actual Greek Mythology
Lame dialogue
Depending on your point of view:
Flying horses
Men in skirts and eyeliner
Gods in sparkly silver armor
So there you have it. The movie's not bad, but it's not very good either. Maybe you should just wait for Netflix.
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