Guest Review: Unknown in under a paragraph

Unknown

Guy wakes up and doesn't know who he is, stabs a guy in the neck, and everyone gets corn. The End.


This review brought to you by Lady Elara

Science fiction Love Story where the love comes first - a review of Never Let Me Go

Ah Childhood love. It was a growing trend last year in 2010. Okay, so two films really don't count as a trend but whatever. Now a man whose opinion I generally always agree with(DAMN YOU ABOUT SUCKER PUNCH), and who even when we disagree I still respect the opinion he establishes, called this his favorite movie of last year. And thus I HAD to buy it and watch it. Was it worth it? Absolutely. Is it the best movie of the year? That's arguable because I was and as I learned tuesday night, still am, in love with Scott Pilgrim vs The world. So let us start with what works because it far out weighs the little problems this movie had. The first and foremost is the fact that this is a science fiction movie about clones bred for the sole purpose of organ harvesting to keep people from dying who are raised to adulthood. They are done this so that they can still live a full life. It is this really fantastic premise. And I'm labeling this spoilers but I don't think it needs the spoiler tag because it's part of the synopsis. But here's the real kicked to the story, they don't dwell to much on this fact. It really is a coming of age story that happens to be about clones. Yes we get some fantastic story work done involving morality and humanity but that isn't what is at the core of this story. The core is the acting. Oh wow, is it ever amazing here. Andrew Garfield should have won an Oscar for his work here. He shows such a dynamic range of acting that I knew as soon as I watched it that this kid could not only pull off Peter Parker in the upcoming Amazing Spider-Man, but that he is going to go on to be a star. Keira Knightly delivers in her non-POTC skills where she is fantastic. But the heart, the soul, and really the real gem of this movie is Carey Mulligan. Your heart will break for some of the absolute real emotion she brings to the table. Fully dynamic, and an absolute delight to watch, she will defy your expectations. So the only real downfalls in this film is that the score doesn't do a whole lot and the plot is a little simplistic, never rising above the basic premise. But when you see this twisted three dimensional love story, you'll be swept away. I can completely and whole heartily say that this is an amazing movie that you owe it to yourself to see. This is an A.

Soulless War Movies Seek Characters inquire inside - a review of Battle Los Angeles

Straight up, I’m very meh about this movie. It didn’t grab me, didn’t distract me, and had me looking at my phone on a regular basis for what time it was and how long it’d take to get to a good action scene. The flaws in this movie are fairly glaring, not the least of which were the script. This script sucks, the dialogue is stilted and only made passable by some decent actors. But even good, some great, actors can’t save these characters. The main character played by Aaron Eckheart of The Dark Knight, gives a rather uninspired performance here. His character’s arc literally is at the beginning of the movie he is the stereotypical one week (or in this case, one day) from retirement cop(Marine) who gets pulled into one last case(war). And at the end he is gung ho to keep fighting. Which as far as bad clichés go, it’s not the worst, but it is never earned. And that is ultimately the problem here. None of these characters earn the end result of their stories and I never once cared that anyone died. In fact, I only cared when by the end a character DIDN’T die. And it made me cranky. The characters are all bland, two dimensional caricatures that belong in a Roland Emerich movie. And that isn’t a bad way to compare this. All you have here is big sequences that look cool but don’t amount to much. There are clearly some cool ideas going on with these aliens, but the story is so vague and unspecific about them that they come down to the role of Invaders! And we never get to know what they really want or why they are here or who any of them are. In a post District 9 world where we clearly can be told the motivations and desires of alien forces, we shouldn’t be forced to live with faceless enemies especially in a movie that clocks in at under two hours. In many ways this is the movie form of a game called Resistance: Fall of Man. Which takes a similar aesthetic to an alien invasion, but in that you get better characters and story, so I’d say go check that one out. There even is a fantastic moment of product placement for Resistance 2 on one of the billboards, so I’d say the creators knew it too. I can’t in good conscience recommend this movie, but I also can’t claim it to be good. It’ll likely go down in my mind as one of those films that failed spectacularly to live up its potential. So is this movie Black Hawk Down with Aliens? Yeah if you want to boil it down to that, but you have to foot note that there is not character here. None. So this is without a doubt, a D movie. Not worth your time, not a complete failure, but ultimately just a footnote towards some better set pieces to come.

Some of Them want to be used - A review of Sucker Punch

“If you don’t stand for something, you’ll fall for anything.”
Okay so before I get into spoilers, here’s the thing. SEE THIS MOVIE. I can’t sing it enough praise, but if you do yourself one favor, see this movie. It is this year’s Scott Pilgrim and Kick Ass.
So
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So the plot of this movie is some bad, traumatic events happen to this young girl. She is then wrongfully placed into an asylum and has five days to figure out how to get out or be lobotomized because her stepfather paid the right guy off. So what does she do? She supplants a fantasy world into her view and begins a cunning plan by some old man in her imagination.
Sounds weird right? Gets weirder. See in this fantasy world, whenever she dances she creates a new fantasy world where she(Baby Doll) and her allies form a team of ass kicking women and fight in various fantasy realities including an alternate World War II, a horde of Orcs sieging a castle with a dragon in its heart, and feudal Japan fused with modern day guns. It’s an amalgamation of everything awesome and as such it creates a wildly visual movie. Now there isn’t a whole lot to say plot wise going on here. There aren’t too many deep levels to it, frankly, and it’s ambiguous when it comes to the stuff you can analyze. It is in many ways the girl equivalent of 300 in that it is a group of five young women fighting for survival.
The acting ranges from fantastically emotive to kind of dull and predictable. The “villains” are fairly one note and don’t have a lot to offer to the plate. Only four of the characters have any development, and two of them are entwined by being Sisters. Baby Doll gets the most story out of this and her backstory visual montage is quite the spectacle. And yet, I can’t call this movie shallow. Yes, it is a bunch of girls in skimpy outfits being bad ass and gun toting and at time there is homoerotic subtext going on between them. But it is in every way about empowerment and improving the esteem of these young women.
The best parts are absolutely the visuals, but even more so is those visuals combind with an amazing soundtrack. Zach Snyder has a habit of releasing movies with killer soundtracks and this is no different. But what is different is that in a large handful of action scenes or scenes without dialogue you have music and their lyrics telling the story for you. So much so that I would call this a new genre of musical. It is in every way an action movie, but it follows so many tropes of a musical that it blows my mind away.
My biggest complaint is A) the third act isn’t as strong as the first two and feels kind of rushed. Sure, it is exactly what the film told us and telegraphed to us via the five items she has to collect in her fantasy world. And B) it wasn’t in 3D. I know, that sounds stupid but when you see this movie, it was clearly a film that could have gained from being in 3D rather than in simple 2D.
So in all, no the film isn’t perfect, but it is absolutely an A-. I might amend this on further viewings to be an A, but this is such a fun adventure that everyone really needs to see it. So get out there and do it now!