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But seriously, this is just me babbling about the movies, some will be less coherent than others. That's why I changed the section title from "review" to "comments"
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Loki was the only reason to like Thor 2. The human characters were so bad this time around. I also didnt vibe the Elvish badbuy.
Oblivion on the other hand was very nice. I enjoyed it quite a bit. But I just happen to like anything Tom Cruise does that doesn't star Cameron Diaz.Comment
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The first and only movie I've ever walked out of
49. Oblivion
Tom Cruise, Andrea Riseborough, Olga Kurylenko, Morgan Freeman, Nikolaj Coster-Waldeau, Melissa Leo, Zoe Bell
Director(s): Joseph Kosinski
Writer(s): Karl Gajdusek, Michael Arndt
MPAA Rating: PG-13
Release Date: April 19th
RT Score: 54% (121 fresh, 105 rotten)
The Plot by Palooza: An extraterrestrial attack on the Earth has left the planet and its moon destroyed. Some of the aliens remain on Earth while two people (Tom Cruise, Andrea Riseborough) manage the equipment that is attempting to salvage the planets resources for their transfer to one of Saturn's moons.
Comments:
There are two things that this movie does exceptionally well - it's pretty as FUCK, absolutely gorgeous and was worth every penny from that perspective and the drones. The drones are absolutely incredible. They're horrifying, dangerous, relentless, and unpredictable. The plot is pretty strong, too, but it gets complicated and drops twists left and right. Some work and some don't. There's also an element of needing to turn your brain off because it's Tom Cruise. I love him as an action star, he does his own stunts and he is always doing some of the coolest, most unique shit for some reason. He may be a fudgepacker in real life, but I would happily see his action movies; I am a big fan of the Mission: Impossible franchise. But yeah, so Tom Cruise kind of takes any bit of realism (as much as there can be in a sci fi, post apocalyptic movie), factor in him running around with two fine ass bitches, both in love with him. It's little shit like this that is mostly unavoidable so I try not to give it too much shit for it, but it takes you out of the movie far too often.
I wish the trailers would have kept the Morgan Freeman element of the film a secret because his existence in the movie is already quite a plot twist, so it's obnoxious and unworthy when that comes to fruition. From there though, they win you back with some badass action, some Kingslayer action and some fantastic drone work. The ending is a strong talking point and I can see people not liking it, but it totally worked for me. It felt earned, if a little too perfect. What they bookend the film with is pretty whack though. This is a fun action movie that sometimes tries to be smarter than it needs to. Worth a late night HBO watch.
Spoiler Alert:
Grade: B-Comment
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Next 'review' is going to be a little different, I'm going to watch it and live-comment on the whole movie before posting. But first a nap.Comment
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Starting zee movie meow.... See ya in a little over 2 hours.Comment
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48. White House Down
Channing Tatum, Jamie Foxx, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Jason Clarke, Richard Jenkins, Joey King, James Woods, Nicholas Wright, Jimmi Simpson, Michael Murphy, Rachel Lefevre, Lance Reddick
Director(s): Roland Emmerich
Writer(s): James Vanderbilt
MPAA Rating: PG-13
Release Date: June 28th
RT Score: 51% (91 fresh, 89 rotten)
The Plot by Palooza: On the same day John Cale (Channing Tatum) is interviewing for a job in the Secret Service, a group of mercenaries take over the White House. Mayhem ensues.
Comments:
Seriously this movie sucks but it was made for me. This is how I like my action movies. Jokes, lack of seriousness, hammy acting, tolerable kids, Channing Tatum
, plus America, fuck ya! I'm watching this movie right now, so spoilers ahead...
The beginning is kind of dumb. Jamie Foxx is a little too Johnny Do Good in the beginning, it gets to be a little corny. But then we switch over to Cale (C-Tates), a guard for the Speaker of the House (Richard Jenkins) and his daughter (Joey King) who is obsessed with the current President of the United States (Jamie Foxx). Cale takes he on a tour the same day he has an interview to be the part of the Secret Service, a dream job for both of his sake and his daughter's love of the prez. Meanwhile, James Woods plays somebody who seems very shady. Speaking of shady, random white mfers are running around the White House setting shit up for bad stuff. When Kale goes to pick up his daughter we get some of the bullshit deadbeat dad stuff we've become accustom to seeing with characters like this. Joey King as his daughter plays up the nerdy, smarter than her age role very well. She calls him John, a dynamic I hate. I'm mad at my dad, so I call him by his first name bullshit. Maggie Gyllenhaal plays somebody important/somebody close to the President (the titles are mostly irrelevant) who is a top, trustworthy somebody. Turns out Cale's interview is with Gyllenhaal and they know each other! They used to date! These types of convenient plot devices are dumb and sometimes distracting but I can look past them. They play it off really well here, seeing as how they flip the fact that they know each other on its head as it is the reason why he botches the interview rather than the reason why he gets the job. C-Tates is great in this scene, he is a fantastic comedic actor, he can deliver a well placed line and plays with his toughness and charisma very well.
He didn't get the job, but he doesn't wanna disappoint his daughter so he said he's hopeful he's gunna get it. Aw, poor Johnny boy. He definitely needs to do something to prove that he is worthy of protecting the President. :acid: More scenes of shadeball whiteys setting up some sort of attack, transition into James Woods hosting a meeting with the Secret Service Agents, I guess he's the head of them? And Maggie Gyllenhaal is one of them too? More on this developing story later. James Woods declares to the people in the meeting that this is his last week working at whatever his job is. Maggie calls him sir so his boss-hood is confirmed. Woods has separate moments with Maggie and a guy who seems to be his protege (the fake Tim Roth looking mfer from Dawn of the Dead). We jump between these scenes and ones with John and his daughter where they are about to make a clean getaway out of the White House when some derp named Ronny leads a tour and Joey King wants in on it. They jump onto the tour and behind them, Jason Clarke shadily walks through the scene dressed like a maintenance worker. Fishy things ahead. As the tour guy gives facts on the White House, we cut between these whiteys setting more shit up. And the President shows up during the tour and Joey King uses her political knowledge to impress the Prezzzzzz and the Prez gives some nonsense bullshit response. Mostly embarrassing scene. I'm cringing through this. AHHHH! And she just said her dad is going to be on his Secret Service detail! Poor fella. Prez whispers into his ear "stop lying to children." Can't get nothin past the Prez. Maggie goes home to get some sleep. Her leaving the White House is telling. Or is it? Impending doom comin', Emily Cale walks off to the bathroom. James Woods seems a little obsessed with the timing of how things are going. He's being very fishy. Keep your eyes on him. "We all have to make sacrifices for our country, sir."
The Speaker of the House is very much a peaceful man. He does not want to invade random Middle Eastern country. Shady white people walk through the halls. One of them crashes into Cale's partner (Matt Craven) and he ALMOST notices something is wrong. Almost. Creepy guy leaves his cart in the middle of a public area, cops follow him. Timer goes down and BOOM!!!!!! LET THE GAMES BEGIN! 31 minutes in an we have an explosion that destroys a fuck ton of the White Hizzy. Gyllenhaal watches nervously from outside the gates. The Speaker gets beat up from the explosion, but is able to evacuate. James Woods is acting a little too nonchalant as they go through evac protocols. Fake Tim Roth clears the Prez out. Cale and his daughter are separated. He's on lock down, she's in the bathroom. Jason Clarke and his cronies kill a guy with a staple gun in a theater +1. They all arm themselves with handguns with silencers. Jason Clarke kills some guards and then shoots a picture of George Washington in the head. Righteous. He means business. They go through the White House, perfectly taking out guards left and right. They seem to have an inside track. Hmmmm. They secure the armory and are now rocking automatic weapons. Emily is off on her own and watches Jason Clarke and the Boys bail to another floor. More mfers are killed including snipers and the bad guys start taking out people evacuating the White House with said snipers. Shit is starting to go down. Cale is panicking about his daughter, she stealthily walks in on Jason Clarke murdering some people. She uses her trusty cell phone to capture footage of Jason Clarke taking his mask off. Niiiiice. Devil from Justified pops up as a psycho mercenary bad guy with one of the McPoyles who was on House of Cards playing essentially the same character from HoC. Devil starts shooting shit up in that room and Cale gets away on the pursuit of his daughter. Some tension between Clarke and Devil as Devil is an obvious loose cannon. AF1 just got shot the fuck up by a turret. James Woods is being irrational and doing risque moves, but Prez Foxx trusts him, much to Fake Tim Roth's disappointment. The Vice President has safely escaped the White House. C-Tates just pulled some slick moves to kill a guy, pretending to be an innocent little bitch boy.
James Woods and the Prez are coming in hot to the vault and he continues to be eager to get him there in the most over the top I'm definitely the bad guy kind of way. Layers, though, bros. Layers. The VP is off on Air Force 2 or whatever. James Woods just shot and killed everyone in the room, "consider this my resignation." Even killing his protege, fake Tim Roth. Cale does some John McClaine shit and gets a radio, listening in on Woods calling Clarke over to him. Cale walks in on Woods/Foxx and a gunfight ensues! Just before Woods was about to explain his motivations. In the meantime, Clarke is on his way and this is reminding me of a Die Hard movie. C-Tates has the sarcastic fuck you mentality that works so well with these action movies. Tates and Foxx are now squading up. Hellllllsss yeah. Cale is saving the shit out of him right now. They get away from each other and we have a regrouping scene with a good deal of humor, mostly from the hacker McPoyle. I am patiently waiting for James Woods to chew up some scenery and then die. Foxx is dropping some much needed expositsh. Woods is the head of the Secret Service and his son was a Marine who was killed in the Generic Middle Eastern War. Woods has a bigger play as Foxx says, but they're unsure what. Woods kills some more important people and summons some other important people. Maggie G and Richard Jenks are out of the White House and together somehow, btw. Now they're with Daniels from the Wire and they're dropping some strategery.
Alright I had to change my laundry and forgot to pause. We are currently inside some tunnels and Maggie G is giving them directions. They’ve seeming gotten to a crossroads and C-Tates decides to go find his girl while Foxx goes to get some help. HoC McPoyle got a read on them and Clarke and crew on en route. “The exit tunnel is wired with explosives!” “...uhhhhh there is no other exit!” This has suuuuuch a low-rent Die Hard feel I love it. Yet another gun fight is going down! Obviously they couldn’t escape so they had to join back up together. And they’ve somehow wound up in the presidential garage, squading up on the Presidential limo. Jamie Foxx gets in the back hahahaha. Jason Clarke is yelling sooooo much. This is one of my favorite scenes, as C-Tates and Jamie Foxx are driving in circles on the White House lawn as they’re being chased. This is fucking hilarious and brilliant. The Presidential limo is indestructible and one of Clarke’s boys
God damnit there is so much going on, this movie is relentless; never a dull moment. We’re still chasing them around the WH lawn. Foxx orders a tank to bust open the gate so they can get out, but Clarke’s boys rock the thank with an RPG and that shit is now useless. Clarke continues to act insane. James Woods takes some pills and seems near death from some sort of medical problem, “I need him alive! That’s an order!” tension between Woods and Clarke, uh ooooh. Foxx has a rocket launcher now and he shot it at the gate, aiding in their escape. AT THE PERFECT MOMENT, Devil takes C-Tates daughter and he barely sees out the window as he holds a gun to her head. Tates is distracted enough and WHAP the Prez’s limo is nailed by a rocket launcher and they roll into a pool. Jimmy Woods shows up at the pool just as they are climbing out. Scheming some shit, Foxx forces Tates to hold a gun to his head since they won’t shoot the Pres. FOXX GOT A GRENADE DOE! So he tosses at them and they get separated. Asshole with a minigun starts blasting up the pool house where Tates and Foxx are. THERE IS A GIGANTIC PROPANE TANK! He nails it and it blows up. Somehow they survive but everybody assumes the two of them as dead.... for 5 seconds until Woods notices they had to have escaped down a basement shaft. The gubment doesn’t know tho so the VP is on AF1 and is getting sworn in. There’s a new Prez on the block. Here are your launch codes. FISHY!
Smoke break.
Clarke and Woods tension is getting even more evident. It's been revealed Woods has a "golfball sized tumor on his frontal lobe." And Maggie G suspects its a suicide mission. They bring in his wife to detail this information and they have a moment on the phone together. "I have to do this honey. They have to pay for what they did to Kevin. And when it's over... I promise. I promise you'll understand." AND THEN WIFEY IS ALL LIKE "you're doing this for Kevin?
Then you do whatever it takes. You make them pay for what they did to our boy." awwww spiittt the plan backfired. "You have 19 minutes." Maggie G has just been relieved of her duties by Daniels. Matt Craven and Maggie G going rogue, Craven stays on the inside giving her tips and she's going to use her contacts to find out the truth! We find out that the President has a piece of glass in his side and he's bleeding a lot. They continue to bond as C-Tates patches him up. C-Tates tellin stories to develop his character. I believe the backstory kind of, it's good enough, I am sympathizing even though Tates don't need it. I appreciate that rather than trying to act and coming off like being out of place or trying too hard, they just don't really try to act during the sappy moments.
The VP has decided to attack the White House in order to eliminate the threat, regardless of the hostages. Foxx being sappy. "Nah, I don't wanna make history... I wanna make a difference. Your daughter says I'm her hero, well, I gotta earn that." Holy shit, I just realized this is like an early Michael Bay flick. This feels like Roland Emmerich made a 90's Michael Bay movie.
This has such a The Rock feel it's unbelievable. I fucking love the Rock, btw. Unfortunately, this doesn't have all the perfect elements like The Rock does. C-Tates and Foxx are no Cage and Sean Connery. C-Tates finds out about the attack and now he is a man on a mission, literally sprinting back to the White House in order to save his daughter. Let the 3rd act commence. The dumbass military went straight at the White House and got blew the fuck up. What the hell did they think was gunna happen? Did they miss the part where that tank got blowed up from the same angle with the same rocket launcher. Devil starts taunting the military with hostages, but the military gets reckless and shoots a bunch of bad guys. Devil shoots back and causes the pilot to panic and he drives into another fighter jet and crashes into a fountain. C-Tates appears out of fucking nowhere and is getting shot at by the military, kicking some ass, attacking a rocket launcher carrying Jason Clarke. They rumble and tumble but Clarke is able to get a shot off from the ground, blowing up a jet that lands directly on the White House, landing in the middle of the room with the hostages, a propeller landing inches from the tour guide's face. I've definitely seen this in a movie before but I'm not sure which. C-Tates and Jason Clarke get into a well choreographed hand to hand battle, but then some dumbass comes up on him a gun and he jumps out of a window, as seen on the banner image. In the struggle, Jason Clarke someone winds up with a piece of his pocket, the tickets for the tour in there. This is when Jason Clarke finally finds out that Emily is his daughter. This is another Die Hard moment that is about to turn into a True Lies moment. Fuck ya. McPoyle got into the US weaponry system and sends a missile to AF1 where the new President is. The plane crashes, he dies. "Mr Speaker of the House .... we're going to have to swear you in now."
Clarke goes to get Emily and a Bill O'Reilly esque pundit puts himself in between Clarke and Emily, showing some courage but he gets shot. This is an odd, unnecessary moment. After the Speaker becomes the President, he somehow rationally convinces everyone that an air strike on the White House is the best idea, even though he's been about peace the whole movie. This is where I should have seen it coming. I should have known. Clarke delivers Emily to Woods. He gets on the PA system and taunts John about his daughter. More Die Hard. Pres Foxx gives himself up to save Emily. Maggie G to C-Tates - "You only have 8 minutes left to get them out." LET THE MOTHAFUCKIN GAMES BEGIN!
Schemin Tates giving intelligent look-sees at some stuff, obviously planning some shit. McPoyle seems to have set some shit up and bailed from his nerd station. Woods - "Whatever happened to the pen is the mightier than the sword?" Pres Foxx - "Fuck you" Woods wants the launch codes for the nuke football. Clarke's right hand man isn't pleased with this deal, but Clarke seems indifferent. Foxx explains his codes won't work and Woods says "let me take care of that" ... more evidence for the 'twist'. Woods is going all wipe all the Iranians out pyscho mode. "This will be our last war." Foxx refuses. Woods threatens Emily. "Emily, I can't open this for him. If I do, millions of people will die." Emily - "I understand."
Cale starts burning the mothafuckin house down and as far as I can tell it's felt like way more than 8 minutes. Sprinkles got everybody soaked. McPoyle can't figure out how to turn them off even though he's a hacker, "Who makes this shit?!" which made me LOL. Tates and Devil just played hackey sack with a grenade and Devil is about to kill Cale when the tour guide (the most Michael Bay character ever) comes outta nowhere and kills Devil with some artifact. He grabs a shotgun and leads everyone out of the White House. One of the booby traps McPoyle set up blows up in his face. In the most hilariously cheesy portion of the movie, Foxx jumps in on a call back from earlier and says "I CHOOSE THE PEN!" and stabs Woods in the neck. Woods eats that pen up and tosses Foxx off of him and I guess typing this had me miss how Woods winds up with the codes. The airstrike is super fucking close, btw.
Clarke vs C-Tates. Round 2. FIGHT! Woods vs. Foxx. Round 2. FIGHT! SIMULTANEOUS FIGHTS! Woods has a gun and points it at Foxx, cocking it for the 10th time in the past 20 minutes. I really wonder what the clock's at right now, it feels like it's been an hour. Woods shoots Foxx. Emily freaks out and attacks Woods. He grabs her with one hand and carries her away. Back to Tates and Clark - Tates stabs Clarke in the foot and wraps Clarke's grenade belt around his neck, pulling the pin on every one. That show blows the fuck up, bits of his body flying everywhere. C-Tates wins! The airstrike still has no happened. C-Tates sees Emily and Woods in a window as he continues putting the codes. For some reason Emily's mom (the shite actress from Under the Dome) runs toward the White House. Meanwhile, C-Tates finds a Suburban and drives that shit into the room Woods is in, pinning him against the wall. All he needs to do is push the red button and BOOOOOOOM MIDDLE EAST GO BYE BYE! He's. so. close. But Tates hops up, grabs onto the mounted gun on top of the whip and blows James Woods the fuck away, tearing his body to bits.
C-Tates sends Emily out so she can save herself, but she grabs the Presidential flag and waves it on the lawn, appealing to the pilots sympathies and they abort the mission! Emily is a hero! C-Tates is a hero! Bad guys are dad! Maggie G's stealth mode investigation report comes back from the guy she tasked with doing it.... The bad guys aren't all dead are they? Who else could there be!
Foxx comes outta nowhere, having been saved by some Abe Lincoln pocketwatch that the bullet hit. "This isn't over yet" says Maggie G on the phone. There's another bad guy. There's someone else. "He was a dinosaur, he still used a pager." Maggie G says. Who else uses a pager? C-Tates knows. C-Tates used to be on his detail. Richard Jenkins you son of a bitch. Why! whyyyyy!!!???? Before C-Tates confronts Jenkins, he reconciles officially with Emily. They love another. C-Tates schemes Jenkins, telling him the Prez died and Jenkins is like aw spit we gotta move troops into the middle east to avoid further conflict! Tates gets him into a corner and Jenkins is like f u who will believe you, I'm President! And Foxx comes out from the crowd and is like nah brah, the President is right here, it's me! The President! I kinda stopped paying attention, but Jenkins is arrested and everyone is besties now. The end.
Overall the movie is a little too long and has a hell of a lot going on at all times. The action is relentless and the humor is simply corny one liners. The entire movie plays out like a video game, which is always fun when it involves pew pews and bang bangs. I’m not particularly a fan of Jamie Foxx, but outside of his corny MURICA shit in the beginning, he is just fine here. The end kind of crushed my soul because I love Richard Jenkins and his character seemed like the genuinely only good politician who was firm in his beliefs. He even has a great speech after he becomes President. Maybe it's because for an otherwise dumb movie I couldn't notice a blatantly telegraphed "twist"? For lack of a better phrase, these guys just seem to be having fun out there. If I was 14 this would be my favorite movie of the year without a doubt.
This live-review is probably longer than the script.
Spoiler Alert: n/a
Grade: B-Last edited by Palooza; 04-26-2014, 07:42 PM.Comment
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Live-watch reviews - Lots of nonsensical babble/10Comment
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I can not imagine a man liking White House Down over Olympus Has Fallen.Comment
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47. Monsters University
Billy Crystal, John Goodman, Steve Buscemi, Joel Murray, Helen Mirren, Sean Hayes, Dave Foley, Peter Sohn, Charlie Day, Alfred Molina, Nathan Fillion, Aubrey Plaza, Tyler Labine, John Krasinski, Bonnie Hunt, Bill Hader, Bobby Moynihan, Julia Sweeney, Beth Behrs, Bob Peterson, John Ratzenberger
Director(s): Dan Scanlon
Writer(s): Dan Scanlon, Daniel Gerson, Robert L. Baird
MPAA Rating: G
Release Date: June 21st
RT Score: 78% (143 fresh, 40 rotten)
The Plot by Palooza: In the prequel to Monsters Inc, Sully and Mike meet for the first time in college and get involved in a Greek-life competition.
Comments:
Monsters University mixes both old characters from the original film and new characters to create the only post-merge Pixar movie that is worthwhile. Adding Helen Mirren, Charlie Day, Dave Foley, etc with the known characters of Billy Crystal, John Goodman, Steve Buscemi feels genuine and works really well. It's not as good as the first, mostly because it doesn't have the exact same Pixar feel. There's just something off. It feels more generic than Pixar has been known for; it's good, but definitely not great. It was really entertaining and mostly funny. It's a pretty good stand-alone film (minus a few moments where they assume you know the mythos involved) and you don't necessarily need to have seen Monsters Inc, but having seen it will enhance the experience for sure. It has this Animal House/Revenge of the Nerds feel which is pretty fucking fantastic, they pull it off so well, but that's not really Pixar's style. Pixar is originality through and through, this seems to be lacking in originality (I can see how people find the Scare Games a little derivative). It's not OG Pixar, but if we are looking at this new generation of Pixar movie represented by Brave and Cars, this is a turn in the right direction, but I don't think we'll ever get to where we were. It's not easy to make a prequel, but this movie really pulls it off. There are problems, sure, but it's good. It expands a very interesting world and it mostly does as good as it could have.
Spoiler Alert:
Grade: B-Last edited by Palooza; 04-27-2014, 03:56 PM.Comment
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WHD is definitely more entertaining, and even makes more sense than OHF.
Rather enjoyed You're Next and I'd even have Monsters U higher than 47. I think. Have to start ranking them myself, soon.Comment
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46. Man of Steel
Henry Cavill, Amy Adams, Michael Shannon, Diane Lane, Kevin Costner, Russell Crowe, Laurence Fishburne, Antje Zurer, Harry Lennix, Christopher Meloni, Richard Schiff, Mackenzie Gray, Michael Kelly
Director(s): Zack Snyder
Writer(s): David S. Goyer
MPAA Rating: PG-13
Release Date: June 14th
RT Score: 56% (159 fresh, 126 rotten)
The Plot by Palooza: The origins of Superman aka "The Man of Steel"
Comments:
Have you ever seen a movie directed by Zack Snyder? This movie is exactly like all of those - sloppy, poorly written (thanks David S. Goyer, ya bum), overlong, among other things. Zack Snyder does know how to make a pretty movie with some badass action, though. Snyder's movies can be good, but usually they're just not bad (except Sucker Punch that was terrible). This one falls into the not bad category thanks to the pretty dope first act with Russell Crowe as Jor-El in the final minutes of Supes' home planet of Krypton. After Crowe's death, he shows up a few more times, playing the dues ex Crowina, getting Supes and Lois Lane out of some near-impossible situations. So yeah, the beginning is pretty dope as it offers something new, but from there we get the derivative superhero origin nonsense. On Earf, we get Kevin Costner as Papa Kent who teaches his 'son' to hide his powers because the world would never accept him. Clark reluctantly using his powers for good is actually pretty great, but it's always ruined by perpetual Debbie Downer Kevin Costner. Once Costner steps into a tornado, Clark goes off on his own to find himself and from there he becomes the man we know him as today. Then we get to the third act as his father's murderer, General Zod (Michael Shannon) somehow gets out of his life sentence and comes back to Earth looking for Supes. Then for the next 45 minutes we get complete and utter destruction of the city of Metropolis. The movie almost completely falls apart, but you'll never see me complain about balls to the wall action and destruction. Superman will probably never be involved in a good movie, the upcoming ones included. Amy Adams is a babe, btw.
Spoiler Alert: Good guys win.
Grade: B-Comment
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