Kicking off my 2012 list: 1. Edge of Darkness: A 2. Star Trek: The Motion Picture: B+ Got a great deal at Amazon over the Holidays on the BluRay set. This one and probably only Final Frontier will make this list as my personal standard for my list is a NEW NEVER before seen film or not seen in about 10 years. The film looks great on BluRay. It seems quite remastered. The colors are vivid and bold. The sense of awe and grander is still in the movie but those sequences, and there are a few, where we look at the Enterprise for 3 minutes in wonder as we circle. As we travel through V'Ger's outer clouds are big drawbacks on the film. The core story is good and it's interesting to note how he encourages Decker to remind him of some protocols. Something he of course does with Savaik as well.
Updates in Bold: Bad Boys (8) Legend of the Millennium Dragon (7) Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy (5) Could not follow this much at all, and I'm no slouch when it comes to paying attention to films either.
1. Marie Antoinette (2006) - 2.5/5. 2. Sherlock Holmes - A Game Of Shadows (2011) - 4/5 3. The Muppets (2011) - 4.5/5 4. 2012 (2009) - 2.25/5 The whole idea is silly. I don't think the world will end. Anyways, with the film, it was rather predictable. But the special effects were rather cool, but looked like several setups of what could happen, and throw in the main characters in scene.
10. Ninja Scroll 11. Fearless 12. The Promise (wuji) 13. Seven Swords 14. The Tale of Zatoichi Continues
Kicking off my 2012 list: 1. Edge of Darkness: A 2. Star Trek: The Motion Picture: B+ 3. Repo Men: B- This Jude Law, Forest Whitaker, Liv Schrieber and Alice Braga film about a future world where health care, specifically organ replacement, is a high impact art. Jude and Forest play two buddies who's history together goes back to primary school. They were together in the War that upturned civilization. As Remy and Jake they work for The Union, a company that offers high tech organ replacement for an extreme price with outrageous interest rates. If you can't pay they send their Repo Men out to reclaim the property much the same way if you don't pay on your car. It is therefore a modestly bloody film. Remy's(Law) wife wants him to move into Sales so he can be home with her and their kid. Jake(Whitaker) doesn't want his best buddy and right hand man to get out of Repo'ing. There is your dynamic. It's one of those films though where Spoiler: last act of the movie the ending loops back to a point in the film and you realize the last 20 min you watched didn't really happen. and that type thing irks me most times and it did here. Although it is a window for a sequel I suppose but I don't think that's going to happen.
Spoiler: Rest of List 1. Holy Rollers (B-) 2. The Kids Are All Right (B) 3. History of the World, Part 1 (C-) 4. Blazing Saddles (A+) 5. Scarface [1932] (B-) 6. The Purple Rose of Cairo (A) 7. Rampart (B+) 8. We Need To Talk About Kevin (A+) We Need To Talk About Kevin: Sometimes, a film comes along that is so powerful, so gripping, and so utterly devastating that you can't help but love it...and also, can't imagine ever wanting to see it again. This is one of those movies. Made for a paltry $3 million by co-writer/director Lynne Ramsay, the film is an elliptical and elegiac portrait of a family that goes, for no particular reason that I can discern, terribly wrong. It's also, despite the budget (and the intimate subject matter) a movie that is almost epic in proportions. It features some of the best performances from young actors that you'll ever see, too, although Tilda Swinton and John C. Reilly are excellent as well. It's definitely in my top ten from 2011, which means I'll have to adjust that list again... Theatres: 2 (+1) Home Video: 5 Computer: 1
1. The Devil Wears Prada (2006) C+ (Anne Hathaway, Meryl Streep, Stanley Tucci, Emily Blunt). Finally watched the entirety of this film for the first time last night and found myself actually really liking it. I didn't give it a higher grade because it does have a few flaws...mostly the predictable ending. I saw the ending happening about half way through the film. The acting was great for the most part. Anne Hathaway is fantastic (obviously this was meant as a vehicle to launch her post Princess Diaries career which it did) and charming as the lead character. Meryl Streep whom I'm not crazy about but respect does a fine job as the overbearing fashion publisher. Stanley Tucci is just fantastic as well in this film. Emily Blunt is noteworthy as well. I'd say this is a guilty pleasure film of mine now lol. 2. Sweet Home Alabama (2002) C + (Reese Witherspoon, Josh Lucas, Patrick Demspey, Candice Bergen, Ethan Emry, Jean Smart). Speaking of guilty pleasures...this rom com happens to be one of my favourite gulity pleasures. I don't know what is about this sappy rom com but I enjoy it. Probably Reese Witherspoon's performance in this movie.
I don't understand why people take that film so seriously. All it is, is another action movie made by the guys who made INDEPENDANCE DAY and THE DAY AFTER TOMMORROW. Oh, and OT: the last movie I watched was GREEN LANTERN.
4. Manhattan Murder Mystery A very funny film by Woody Allen, I liked it a lot. Spoiler: ending I did not like the revelation of how the crime was commited, but that could be my fault. I missed the first few minutes of the film so for me the sister came out of nowhere, but maybe they mentioned her in the beginning.
Spoiler: the rest of my list. 1. Daddy Day Care (✩✩✩½) 2. Wild Child (✩✩) 3. Fling (✩✩✩½) 4. Arthur 2: On the Rocks (✩✩✩✩) 5. Havoc (✩✩✩✩) 6. Contagion (✩✩✩✩½) 7. The Blind Side (✩✩✩½) 8. Batman: Under the Red Hood (✩✩✩✩½) 9. The Andromeda Strain (✩✩✩½) 10. The Last Man on Earth (✩✩✩✩) 11. Network (✩✩½) 12. Normal Adolescent Behavior: Havoc 2: (✩) This one stars Amber Tamblyn. I got it thinking it would be a low-budget sequel to Anne Hathaway's Havoc, but there was no connection. I later found out that the studio put in "Havoc 2" against the wishes of the director. Anyway, it was about a girl in a polyamourous relationship with 5 others who began struggling with sexual norms after meeting someone. The movie was pretty bad and hard to follow. I gave half a star for Amber Tamblyn being spanked in her underwear and another half-star for Kelly Lynch who's still pretty hot. 13. Starsky & Hutch: (✩✩½) A comedic remake of that 70s show I know nothing about. Owen Wilson and Ben Stiller were alright, but the movie is nothing to write home about. 14. The Rundown: (✩✩✩½) The Rock stars as a retrieval expert who doesn't want to be a retrieval expert anymore, but agrees to do one more job for his boss... Find his son in the jungles of Brazil. There, he gets more than he bargained for and has to put up with the son (played by Seann William Scott) who has plans of his own. Christopher Walken plays the bad guy, the Rock was pretty good, and I found it to be a decent action movie in general. 15. Mallrats: (✩✩✩✩) Saw the extended version of this which has an additional 30 minutes. Ah, the 90s... No internet and less cool technology, but simpler times. The extended run made it drag a bit at the beginning, but it was still fun seeing all those old faces. At the Theatre: 0 On DVD/Blu-Ray: 5 On Demand: 1 On TV: 9 Off the Internet: 0
Spoiler: rest of list 1. Chasing Amy - C+ 2. Where The Wild Things Are - C 3. The Tree of Life - C+ 4. Source Code - B. "That's no Moon" (couldn't resist). Duncan Jones turns out another solid science-fiction brain teaser which shares some similar themes to his previous movie. In this case the technology involved is just a little bit too murky to be believable and it hurts the film a bit in my opinion. 5. Kung Fu Panda - B. Pretty funny. About what you'd expect from a Jack Black movie about an animated Panda. 6. Ponyo - B+. Usual Studio Ghibli escapist magic. Some really beautiful animation particularly of the underwater scenes.
15. Spider-man 2.1 16. Taxi 3 17. A Chinese Ghost Story 18. Ryan's Daughter 19. Confucius 1940 The last one I had to sign papers to see.
Kicking off my 2012 list: 1. Edge of Darkness: A 2. Star Trek: The Motion Picture: B+ 3. Repo Men: B- 4. Star Trek V: The Final Frontier: B- Still going through my TOS Movie Blu-Ray set and this film is one I've not seen in nearly a decade. It's one of those films I actually like better. I feel it, or I, have aged into it. My prior ratings of the film were much worse. One of things that may influence my opinion of the film are the commentaries and interviews about what they wanted to do, especially with the ending. How Kirk was, in the final shooting script, going to have to battle a sequence of Rockmen to escape. The test footage was fun to watch with the one Rockman suit. The camaraderie of Kirk/Spock/McCoy really about parallels a type of triumvirate friendship I myself now have. The story still has it's weak points with specifics about the plot but the overall family feel between the crew and their dedication to each other shines through.
5. Defiance The film is about jewish resistance fighters in Berlarus during the Second World War. It was interesting, because its a topic I hadn't known anything about before (and films like this also make me look up the stuff they are about), but other than that it was a fairly standard war film. Definitely worth watching once.
1. War Horse (B-) 2. The Woman in the Window (A-) 3. The Last Exorcism (B) 4. The Guard (A) A very funny Irish fish-out-of-water cop-buddy movie that breathes new life into the old Beverly Hills Cop formula by inverting it. Brendan Gleeson plays a hard-bitten, irreverent sergeant in the Garda Siochana, the Republic of Ireland's police force. Don Cheadle plays a straight-laced FBI agent who comes to the west coast of Ireland to investigate an international drug-smuggling ring. As the saying goes, hilarity ensues, along with culture clashes and gunfights. In addition to the very funny scenes with Gleeson and Cheadle, the film features a number of memorable minor characters. Highly recommended. Theatres: 1 Home Video: 3 (+1) Computer: 0
Spoiler: Rest of List 1. Holy Rollers (B-) 2. The Kids Are All Right (B) 3. History of the World, Part 1 (C-) 4. Blazing Saddles (A+) 5. Scarface [1932] (B-) 6. The Purple Rose of Cairo (A) 7. Rampart (B+) 8. We Need To Talk About Kevin (A+) 9. Tucker and Dale vs Evil (B+) Tucker and Dale vs Evil: I was very pleasantly surprised by this horror/comedy film, which is sort of like Deliverance, but from the perspective of the hillbillies (played hilariously by Tyler Labine and Alan Tudyk!). Of course, the hillbillies aren't killers at all, just the victims of one misunderstanding after another (not to mention a healthy does of fatal -- and darkly funny -- accidents on the part of a group of college kids in the woods. The film loses a bit of its comedic edge in the end, but it still works fairly well. It's definitely recommended viewing if you don't mind your comedy coming with a bit (okay, a lot) of blood. Theatres: 2 Home Video: 6 +1 Computer: 1
My roommate found this one, actually. He heard about it from a friend. Unless one or both of them are closet Trek-fans, I'd say it was just a happy coincidence.