Reviews

Movies like Atlas Shrugged and In Time exist on a plane of existence I like to call "allegory gone wrong." Branded belongs in that same ilk, never realizing how patently absurd the rabbit hole the writers have delved into it, contending that a direct allegory is all one needs to make a sci-fi film. That's just not the case.

In Branded, a young child is struck by lightning and becomes good at advertising when an adult. Meanwhile, the fast-food companies start an advertising push to make fat sexy because, well, you know, it's easier than making your food healthier. Our intrepid advertising exec is a whiz at this, starting a bizarre series of reality TV shows and billboards that don't even come close to making sense, until he has a dream that tells him to slaughter a cow and bathe in its ashes, and then he can see physical manifestations of advertising causing people to eat more and get fatter.

Yeah, this might just be the dumbest idea for a social speculative fiction movie ever. It's just bizarre, ill-conceived nonsense that tries oh-so hard to be some kind of Matrix-style mind-bender while simultaneously trying to educate us on 9th-grade economics through a strange robotic voice-over that halts the narrative focus of the film. Also, Max von Sydow stars as the aptly named "Marketing Guru" who spearheads the marketing campaigns and magically disappears in a flash of lightning once our hero decides to start a ridiculous smear campaign that everyone follows along with in spite of them making no sense.

The entire film makes no sense, blatantly ignoring any semblance of logic, interesting points, or even good visuals. It's trying so hard to say something but its so cartoonish and garish that nothing sticks. The acting from Ed Stoppard and LeeLee Sobiesky borders on SyFy channel bad. Avoid at all costs.

It's common knowledge that Quentin Tarantino, the mighty, fanboy-loving, ultra-violence king of Hollywood, "borrows" heavily from other films, especially "Grindhouse" films(aka films nobody saw in the first place), and then passes them off as homages, but nonetheless as his own work. He has a trademark style, the style of the aforementioned violence, the use of 100 plus racial epithets per film, completely random dialogue, and lots of shots of bare feet.

In "Death Proof", Tarantino gives us the ultimate in self-indulgence- an "homage" to the sub-genre Tarantino has himself created. He has somehow made a movie so bad it parodies everything that Tarantino has done in the past by taking his "style" so far to the extreme that the only possible person this movie could appeal to are Tarantino and his extremely adamant fanbase.

The film starts with four women- one of which is Jungle Julia, a radio DJ. The women go to a bar and literally talk about nothing for 30 minutes or more. They stumble across Stuntman Mike(played by Kurt Russell), who is a vicious killer in the guise of a near-elderly stuntman who worked on (gasp) old grindhouse movies! More self-indulgence! Queue the only good sequence in the film- the first kill scenes. During this scene we also get the only good line of dialogue in the entire film.

Then we find Mike on the hunt for more girls- four women who look very suspiciously similar to the first four girls. But there is a difference- these girls like old grindhouse car-related movies, and proceed to talk about them for another tedious, god-awful half an hour. Did I mention the black girl uses the n-word a lot? See, that makes it not racist.

The ending chase scene is decent, but the ending is so pathetic it makes me cry. The character of Stuntman Mike, for the one scene in the middle of the film, was so excellent, but Tarantino had to ruin him. Russell only has a couple actual scenes in the film, and it's a damn shame.

The dialogue is the true abomination here. it is so inane, so boring, so useless, and so utterly masturbatory in regards to Tarantino's trademark style, that it reaches the level of parodying it. Tarantino has finally reached a "pure" level. Gone are the days he made good movies, where the inane dialogue was entertaining and gave us insight into the characters on screen. Now, it is just a puerile string of nothingness that I could make up in my sleep. There is nothing fresh, nothing clever, nothing at all.

It's just a waste. It is so unfortunate that a gem like Planet Terror and all the fantastic fake trailers had to share screen time with this garbage.

Grindhouse is a movie that needs to be analyzed as two films, because well, that's what it is. In the tradition of the Grindhouse double features from the 60s and 70s, this film features "Planet Terror" by Robert Rodriguez, and "Death Proof" from Quentin Tarantino. The film also features four fake trailers.

First up is a fake trailer for "Machete", which is very fun. Then Planet Terror comes on. It's gory, it's hilarious, it's outrageous. It is pure grindhouse. It features Freddy Rodriguez, Rose McGowan, and Michael Bein, among others, fighting against a plague of biochemical zombies. If you want gore, you won't find many movies gorier than this(this is coming from a guy who's seen Ichi the Killer and Braindead). I give it a 10/10.

Then three more trailers play, with the highlight being Eli Roth's "Thanksgiving". Death Proof starts out with a bunch of girls talking about their evening and going to a bar. For about 30 minutes, we hear nothing but talking(some of it painful) about pointless things, but the films redeems itself when psychopath Stuntman Mike(played by Kurt Russel) crashes the evening. After a truly chilling and exhilarating encounter that sadly lasts only 10 minutes, the girls end up pushing up daisies. Then Stuntman targets more girls, and more talking occurs for 30 more minutes. The film however takes a gooey and cheesy turn after a chilling first half. it ends up falling short with a ridiculously stupid revenge scene. I give it a 6/10 Overall, as a whole i give grindhouse an 8/10. Death Proof could have been so much better though.

The Departed was a movie that I had wanted to see for quite a long time due to the hype. I've heard it being described as better than Goodfellas. I've heard it being described as Scorcese's best. It is neither.

Don't get me wrong, the film is good. But it's not without it's flaws. The film's strong suit is the characters and the dialog. You feel for the characters, and the banter between them is wonderful.The film does an excellent job of blurring the lines of cop and crook, but herein lies a problem. The lines are blurred so much that the film is unbelievably hard to follow, and the plot certainly has holes. There is a lot to catch, even in two hours and thirty-one minutes.

And of course the shocking ending. The last 5 minutes of the movie confused the hell out of me, and I can't help but think that if they gave the movie more time and tweaked the plot and the ending, it could have been what people were hyping it to be. It's got great action, great dialog, great characters, and great acting. What it is lacking is continuity.

Overall, it's good enough for an 8/10, but it is certainly not the best film of the year, IMO.

Smokin' Aces delivers exactly what the previews showed. It's a fast paced, frenetic, guns a blazin' action/thriller.

Aces Israel is a famous Vegas entertainer who gets caught up in the mob. The FBI wants him to testify against the mob in exchange for immunity against his crimes. A hit is put out on Aces, and a plethora of colorful hit men race to get to him before the FBI does.Two gangsta sniper girls, three inbred neo-nazi brothers, a torture master, and a man of a thousand faces are all after poor Israel, as is a group of ex-cops led by a bail-bondsman.

Needless to say, the fast pace leads to some "what?" moments, and lead me to wish for a rewind button in the theater. But if you can keep up, the plot and rich characters make for an insanely fun time. The whole film is basically lead up to a final showdown, which culminates in a surprisingly melodramatic ending. Probably the biggest knock for me is the last 15 minutes. It's a good ending, but it doesn't feel like it belongs with the rest of the film.

Overall, it's a good action film with an amazing cast and some great shootouts.

8/10.

Warning: if you can't stand an unpopular opinion, don't read this.

I really dislike this movie. Not to the point of hate, but close. Here's why.

Spiderman 2 is the worst comic adaptation i have seen. it is no where near what Spiderman was like in the comics. i shall use three points to explain the faults.

1. The "humor". This movie tries desperately to be funny, but all it does is ooze cheesy lines like "would you like some chocolate cake" and "this is heavy", both followed by awkward pauses. Let's not forget the horribly stupid "Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head" sequence! 2. The Romance. Sure, there is a romance story in the comics, but it's not so soap-operatic, and Peter Parker is no where near as love struck, love-lorn, or just plain awkward. He's not as whiny, either.

3. The storyline/action. First off, Doc Oc is supposed to be a bad guy, not a mind controlled good guy. second, where were Spidey's famous in-fight sarcastic quips? Not there. Spiderman losing his powers because he somehow isn't sure he want's to be a hero. NEWS FLASH! He ain't an empath: he can't control whether or not he has powers! Also, the children's reaction in the train was pathetic. "We won't tell." YOU ARE A 10 YEAR OLD WHO KNOWS SPIDERMANS SECRET IDENTITY, OF COURSE YOU'RE GONNA BRAG! The drastic overplay of the drama and the corniness of the humor just detract so much from the film.

Kirsten Dunce(yes, misspelled on purpose) has yet another horrid acting performance. Sure, the FX were great, for the 12 minutes of action that were in this daytime soap. I guess I should have just forgotten about the source material and enjoy this as a stand alone...p-UH-lease!Skip this and go watch Sin City or Hellboy, please!

"eXistenZ" is a peculiar sci-fi "thriller" from David Cronenberg, the man behind the classic "Scanners" and "The Fly". I put thriller in quotes because this movie is not very thrilling at all.

The film focuses on Alegra Gellar, an ace game designer, and Ted Pikul, her nerd-turned-bodyguard due to recent attempts on her life. The film deals with a subject that was also dealt with in another film that came out in the same year, "The Matrix"-namely, alternate/virtual reality vs real life. Alegra and Ted decide to port into her new video game(whose pod looks like a stomach with five nipples) to see if it has been damaged. What follows is a journey that is as confusing as it is useless.

The theme is prevalent throughout the film. The characters, especially Pikul, are nervous about integrating themselves into the game. The game is essentially a glorified version of "The Sims", only with adaptation capabilities. The game is so realistic, however, that it's hard to distinguish real life from the game. There is little semblance of plot throughout the film, however, because the plot of the game is a non-plot. As Allegra says it, "You have to play the game to realize what your playing for", or something like that. The two just meander around doing what they suppose the game is directing them to do.

I suppose this is an idea film. All the film does is state an idea, and add some sci-fi gloss, and try to pass it off as cinema. It's boring and tedious, with little action or thrilling moments. Essentially, the film is one of those pictures that is a picture of a picture. Then that picture also has a picture, and so on and so on. The whole film is the equivalent of some guy sitting in his room wondering if life is real.

Cronenberg could have had a gem here, only if he had gone past the idea stage and put more effort into a larger scale plot and character development. Much like Shyamalan's "The Village", all this movie is wasted potential.