Something Disturbing at "The Factory"

A Buffalo NY serial killer is back in action...

The Story:

A bitter detective (John Cusack) has been doggedly pursuing a serial killer (Dallas Roberts) who has been targeting hookers in Buffalo every winter for the last 3 years.  His new partner (Jennifer Carpenter) shares his determination, but it gets personal when the killer takes the cop's daughter (Mae Whitman), mistaking her for a prostitute.

That's a reminder for today's teens to dress more responsibly.

Can the cops solve the puzzle in time to save the girl?

This drama/thriller is actually pretty interesting... almost until the very end.

And a much better overall effort than Cusack in The Raven.

The serial killer in question is actually more than that... and it's actually worse...thus providing the name for the movie.

The shocking end is indeed just that...

But...

The actual end leaves too big of plot holes and logic jumps to provide suitable closure.

More questions of "how on earth?" are raised than providing for a solid conclusion to an otherwise riveting tale.

Sorry, got to dock it for that...



Available for streaming instantly on Netflix as of this writing.

Final Grade: C+

Would I Own It: Nope, good one time viewing, nothing to be gained on subsequent replays.

What's the Best Kind of Gold? "Stolen"

There's gold in them there banks...

The Story:

4 criminals: Will (Nicolas Cage), Vincent (Josh Lucas), Riley (Malin Ackerman) and Hoyt (M.C. Gainey) are pulling off a $10 Million Dollar heist under the nose of the FBI.  As they attempt to getaway, Will and Vincent scuffle over killing a janitor, Will shoots Vince in the leg, throws him in the van and goes back to get the money...and his partners drive away.  Will is caught, sent to prison, and 8 years later he returns to New Orleans.  The FBI agents (Danny Huston and Mark Valley) are watching Will to see where he stashed the money.  Vince, presumed dead by the FBI returns to steal Will's daughter, and is holding her ransom for $10 million, and if he doesn't get it in 12 hours, the girl is dead.

What would you do?

This flick gets savaged by critics, opens in about a dozen theaters and disappears onto Netflix streaming, so it must suck, right?

Not so fast...

Apparently Nicolas Cage has moved to New Orleans and is going to do nothing but star in direct to DVD thrillers for the rest of his career.  That's okay if the output is like Seeking Justice or this one, which is even better.

If the worst complaint I can muster about this one is that it's like a 90s action movie... well that's actually pretty good praise, as the 90s cranked out some great popcorn movies.

Check your brain at the door, and just have fun.

Cage (and Gainey) re-team with Simon West who helmed one of the greatest (# 61 on my Top 100) 90s action flicks: Con Air.

Is this as good?

Nope, you don't have the cast and budget to pull off that spectacle here.

But they make the most with what they've got, and that actually works.

The story tightly weaves within New Orleans over the course of a day as Will frantically races throughout a Fat Tuesday New Orleans to find his daughter before resorting to return to a life of crime to save his little girl.

The ending climax is a bit over-the-top, but forgivable.

Available to stream instantly on Netflix as of this writing.

Final Grade: B-

Would I Own It: Yes, I could get this one and watch it again.

The Balcony is Closed...Forever. R.I.P. Roger Ebert

Well, that sucks.

I come home today and see that news that Roger Ebert has passed away after a lengthy battle with cancer.

Who knew that a film critic could garner such affection and sympathy from the American (dare I claim, world?) public?

Well, until the late 1970s, I doubt that was possible.

However, I was lucky enough to catch Roger Ebert and Gene Siskel when they started Sneak Previews on PBS in 1978.  My dad was a great fan of movies, and the apple didn't fall far from the tree.  We watched together or separately whenever it was on.  I probably enjoyed it more since they rarely reviewed Westerns. : )

Here were two movie critics that not only dissected whether movies were good or not in a manner of minutes, they often spent as much time (or more!) eviscerating each other over their opinions.

Yes, it was awesome.

In 1982 they left the confines of PBS and went syndicated with At the Movies.

I continued to watch as often as possible.

These two men were awesome.  Sometimes right, many times wrong, but always opinionated and I respected them for that.

These are the guys that lived my dream.

It's no small coincidence that I enjoy writing reviews.  While I could never hope to be a Siskel or Ebert, being a movie reviewer would be one of my dream gigs.

So I do it here in my own little corner of the internet to a few people who read my reviews, and I thank you for that.

Gene Siskel passed away in 1999, and the world was never quite the same, at least when it came to movie reviews.

Two Thumbs Up was forever embedded in the cultural vocabulary of the world.  One of those thumbs belonged to Gene, and could never be replaced.

Today we lost the other thumb, as Roger Ebert has passed on.

The great thing about the internet, Roger's reviews will live forever, as long as his website stays active at least.  Like the movies they reviewed, Siskel and Ebert became as much a part of popular culture as the films they praised and skewered.

There will never be another reviewer like either of them, and there most definitely will never be another duo that recreates the magic that they shared.

I thank them both for their careers.  They touched a lot of people over the years, and from my corner of the internet, I owe them both a great deal of gratitude for helping me enjoy movies, both as a fan, and as a critic.

As they used to sign off their show, until then, the balcony is closed.

R.I.P. Gentlemen.

You are both missed, and I'm hoping that the two of you are enjoying a heavenly reunion right about now...

I'm sure Siskel's got a lot of opinions to share with Roger!

Pixar Stumbles for the First Time..."Brave"

Pixar attempts to outdo what Disney does best: the Princess Movie

The Story:

Scottish princess Merida (Kelly MacDonald) is at odds with her family.  It seems that her mother and father (Emma Thompson and Billy Connolly) are doing what all good Scottish clan leaders did back in the day: attempting to marry off their daughter to another prince to solidify their empires.  Unfortunately, Merida wants nothing to do with the idea.  She's a tomboy who prefers shooting a bow to dancing with guys.  Merida stumbles upon a witch in the woods and begs for a spell that will change her destiny.  The witch obliges, and turns her mother into a bear.

Congratulations, your destiny has been changed.  Good luck saving your mom from your father and everyone else who now wants her dead...

This is the latest Pixar release that I really wasn't sure about watching.  Having been pleasantly surprised by Ratatouille, Up and Wall*E, you would think that I wouldn't question Pixar's abilities.

And yet...

Something about Brave just struck me wrong from the opening trailers.

I don't want to see another Disney Princess film.  If I did, I'd watch Tangled again.

That is Disney territory, let it be.

However, Pixar once again decided to fool me, this wasn't a Disney Princess tale.

No!

It was a different version of Brother Bear!

 

: /

Again...already done by Disney, and done better.

So, while this was a typically great Pixar production: Great voice casting, beautiful to look at...

I can no longer say, and I quote myself : " The worst Pixar movie is still better than the best movie from any other animated studio ."

That this film won the Academy Award tells me that voters simply see the word "Pixar" and punch the ballot.

That is a shame, because of the list of animated movies I've seen since the beginning of the year, this ranks only above Frankenweenie, which I simply despised, but below everything else.

Final Grade: B-

Would I Own It: Only if the kids really want it, and so far, they were left unimpressed.

Sometimes the Oscar Goes to the Right Film... "Argo"

 

 

It's 1979, and things in Iran just got real...

The Story:

Based on the true story of the upheaval in Iran in 1979 when the Shaw left, the Ayatollah took over, and Americans were glued to their sets watching the Hostage Crisis unfold on national television.  However, 6 of the Americans left the embassy and were hidden at the house of the Canadian Ambassador.  The CIA puzzled with how to get them home, and every idea was awful.  So they took the best of the worst options:  Go into Iran posing as a Canadian film crew, and get the hostages out.  The chance for failure, about 99%.  That is not going to stop Agent Tony Mendez (Ben Affleck) from trying.  The movie's name?  Argo.

Okay, is everyone done bashing Ben Affleck's career?  If not, this should silence the critics.

From the opening Warner Brothers logo, you are in 1979, there is no denying it.

I have yet to see the rest of the Best Picture nominees from the year, but I see no reason to think the Academy got it wrong on this one.

I would say the snub for Best Director comes from the fact that, it's Ben Affleck.

Thankfully, it would seem that every other voting entity got over themselves and any disdain they had for Gigli... and got it right.

Kudos also to Alan Arkin and John Goodman as the Hollywood producer and special effects guy who went out on a limb to provide the most elaborate back story ever for a covert operation.  Their dialogue is hilarious, and they provide some much needed smiles in an otherwise harrowing ordeal.

If you haven't seen it, I highly recommend it.

Final Grade: A

Would I Own It: That's a tricky one. Dramas only have so much replay value, as I have to psych myself up for a movie like this.  Rewatchable? Yes.

 

 

 

The Real Review... "Rise of the Guardians"

 

Okay, now that I had my April Fool's Joke yesterday, let's bring you the REAL review today...

 

 

The only thing that can stop the Boogeyman...

The Story:

The Guardians watch over the children of the world.  North (Alec Baldwin) is the guardian of wonder.  E. Aster Bunnymund (Hugh Jackman) is the guardian of hope.  The Sandman is the guardian of dreams.  And the Tooth Fairy (Isla Fisher) is the guardian of memories.  When all of this is threatened by Pitch (Jude Law) who is attempting to destroy all of childhood's hopes, dreams and wonders.... can the addition of perpetual mischief-maker Jack Frost (Chris Pine) tip the scales in favor of good, or is humanity doomed?

After months of tears and begging, I finally gave in and watched the movie.

It was everything that my kids swore to me, and more.

Much darker than Wreck-It Ralph, that doesn't mean there isn't a sweet side to this story.

It's fun, but not "funny", so the two films are on entirely different spectrums of animated entertainment.

You want fast visuals and fart jokes? Wreck-It Ralph is for you.

You want something deeper for yourself as a parent and for your kids to gather, then this is that film.

The animation from Dreamworks is superb, as always.  The voice acting is stellar, again you never lose sight of the character onscreen due to the voice of the actor in a stunt-casting role.

In fact, Alec Baldwin is all but unrecognizable as North enlisting a jovial Russian/German hybrid for his Santa.

I can see why many people could be turned off by the darkness of this film, but you're wrong.

It was a well-made film, and a shame that we have a generation of kids (and adults) that may not be able to appreciate that.

My only complaint with the film?

Whoever decided to end the film with THAT musical interlude...  I don't care what your intentions were, and from what I read, the idea behind it was sweet....

But that was just plain awful.

Maybe that's where DreamWorks went wrong?  You walk out of the theater, and the song over the credits is your last feeling, and if you walk out to that, you're not feeling it.

Final Grade: A.  You missed out on the + due to the musical choice.

Would I Own It: Already done!  The kids were suitably impressed.

 

 

Worst...Movie...Ever... "Rise of the Guardians"

They are there to protect the children...

Someone should have protected us from them.

The Story:

The Guardians (Santa, the Easter Bunny, the Tooth Fairy and the Sandman) gather together to welcome their newest guardian, Jack Frost to the fold.  What doe the Guardians do?  They protect the children of the world from dangerous things...

like Pitch... the Boogeyman has returned!

Based on a series of children's books, I have to hope that those books are more coherent and responsible than this film.

Ugh.

First, the animation is subpar, typical work from the hack Dreamwork Studios.  They will strive to beat Pixar, but will fail, time and time again.  Disney does better work than this with their eyes closed.  In fact, I'm thinking Fox has a better animation studio at this point.

The voices?  Zzzz... Alec Baldwin is over the top as Santa Claus and Hugh Jackman plays the Easter Bunny as Wolverine.

Jack Frost is a joke of a hero... he wants to be fun and lovable, but he's really just a menace to the children and the Guardians themselves.

The only good that comes from this film, there should be no room for a sequel.

I hope!

Final Grade: F-  Easily the worst animated movie I've ever seen.  Possibly the single worst movie I've ever watched.  I wish I had stabbed my eyes out and saved myself from this one.

Would I Own It: Not if I can help it, but some of my kids thought it was great, so I'm sure I'll be buying it.

Bah.

Let's hope that I can find a better movie to review after April 1st this month!