Emily Blunt in a “look at my acting chops!” role. Josh Brolin as a smug jerk, or in other words, a typical Josh Brolin role. Benicio Del Toro as creepy as always.
BQB here with a a review of the latest Fall movie season Oscar contender.
I know, 3.5. I know. I’m stuck in the middle of a zombie apocalypse. I should be doing something more productive than watching movies. But what can I do? The zombies are out there, I’m stuck in Price Town. Might as well make the best of it, especially when my alien buddy has an intergalactic communications device (aka a space phone) that allows me to watch top notch Emily Blunt films.
Aliens love Emily Blunt. And to be blunt, so do I.
Wow, I bet Emily’s never heard that joke before.
OK. So let’s dive in. As the opening sequence of this film explains to us, a “sicario” was once the term used in Jerusalem to describe the super devout who chased Romans from their homeland, but today it has become the Mexican word for “hit man.”
By the way, just now, Apple spellchecker really wanted me to write “pit man” for some reason. I hate it when I have to argue with my computer just to get it to say what I want it to. I swear to Christ this is how Skynet begins. Up your butt, Apple.
SPOILERS AHEAD!
No more distractions. The film begins with Emily as FBI agent Kate Macer, an FBI anti-kidnapping specialist leading a mission to take a house that is alleged to be holding a drug cartel’s kidnapping victims.
Only thing is, it turns out the house is actually a house of horrors, with dead cartel victims lining the walls.
Emily is then recruited to assist a special task force with the apprehension of Manuel Diaz, the big time drug kingpin behind the death house.
Do you ever get confused when you watch a hardcore crime movie? I know when I watched True Detective, Season 2 I felt like I needed a flowchart and a slide rule just to keep up with what was going on.
Well, with this movie, you’re in luck, because you’re not the only one who’s confused. Emily/Kate is too.
Josh Brolin (aka Matt Graver) is some type of G-man in charge of the task force. Is he a spy? Does he work for the CIA? Is he military? Is he someone else entirely?
Meanwhile, the task force’s biggest asset is Alejandro aka Benicio. The same questions apply. Is he a CIA agent? Is he some kind of Mexican spy, a Juan Bond, if you will? (Oh come on, PC police, that was funny and you know it.) Is he military? Someone else?
The point is, Kate ends up working with these people and a) she has no idea who they are and b) they won’t tell her. In fact, Matt/Josh seems to relish holding back details of what’s going on vis a vis their mission, only eeking out just enough details to keep Kate from walking away, but otherwise she’s kept in the dark.
Finally! A protagonist in a serious crime drama who’s as confused as I am. I felt for Emily in this one. The whole film she’s like “What’s going on?” and I was replying, “I don’t know Emily, but I hope you find out. Don’t trust these dudes, girl.”
All in all, great acting, a gripping plot that draws you in. It gets you on a roll with questions and if you hang in there, they are answered.
On top of all that, it does offer a stunning indictment of the whole inter-border drug war. Nasty business. Don’t do drugs, kids.
I hate to give too much away but there was one quote that caught me. I’ll paraphrase. Basically, twenty-percent of the population are hardcore drug users and if we could get them to quit the cartels would be out of work.
So quit today, all you dope fiends. Only you can stop Mexican mafia murder houses.
One thing that made me happy was seeing Jeffrey Donovan in a supporting role. You might remember he was Michael Westen in Burn Notice. I loved that show. He’s a good actor. Hope to see him in more stuff. I hear he’s in the next season of Fargo.
That’s all I have, 3.5. To discuss it any further would be to spoil the whole thing. Go see it.
Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go ride out the zombie apocalypse.
“You do the math. You solve one problem. And then you solve another. And then another. Solve enough and you stay alive.”
– Mark Watney, The Martian
An astronaut trapped on Mars. A daring rescue mission. Matt Damon. Jeff Daniels. Jessica Chastain. Kate Mara. Sean Bean. Kristen Wiig. The list of top actors on this movie is too long to keep rattling names off but the biggest star of all?
SCIENCE!
Yes, in an age where people want more explosions, sex, and what the hell, explosive sex, Alien director Ridley Scott made a movie that not only entertains but educates.
Put on your spacesuit, 3.5 readers, and let’s talk about what this movie does not only for science, but for the world of self-publishing.
The Martian – Twentieth Century Fox
OK, first of all, let’s address the proverbial elephant on the sofa, the gorilla in the barcalounger, if you will.
But BQB! Aren’t you trapped in the middle of the East Randomtown Zombie Apocalypse?
I sure am, 3.5 readers. Luckily, I’ve got Alien Jones’ plutonium powered space phone and the Esteemed Brainy One managed to stream it for my group of survivors last night. It really lifted our spirits, because as you may have heard, we’re currently riding out the zompoc in Price Town, one of the last three stores still open at the nearly abandoned East Randomtown Mall.
HOW BIG WAS THIS MOVIE?
A “friend” of mine sent me an e-mail to let me know that this movie was so big that he’d never seen a line so long at the theater he usually goes to before. The poor chump ended up stuck in that damn front row spot. You know, the one where you have to keep your neck craned skywards for two hours and you have to look to the left when a character on the left is talking and a character on the right is talking.
What a jackass. Guy probably should have taken into account how popular the movie would be and gotten there earlier.
Either that or he could have skipped the popcorn and soda. God knows that fatty doesn’t need it.
Oh sorry, I shouldn’t speak ill of my friend on my blog. Good thing only 3.5 people read this.
THE PLOT
A storm causes a team of astronauts to abandon their mission on Mars. One of their teammates, Mark Watney, is impaled, presumed dead, and abandoned.
Whoops! He’s still alive, but the the Red Planet is so far away that NASA won’t be able to get help to him any soon.
THE SCIENCE
One of the biggest challenges for a writer is to a) explain to the reader how a character is going to extricate himself from a sticky situation with enough detail so as to not leave the reader feeling cheated and yet b) not go overboard to the point where the reader feels like dozing off.
Enter Andy Weir. The Martian is based off of Weir’s novel of the same name.
A computer programmer, Weir made all sorts of calculations, estimates, and scientific conclusions on how, in theory, an astronaut trapped on Mars could live long enough to find a way back home.
“I’m going to have to science the shit out of this,” Damon, as Watney, says.
And science the shit out of it, he does. Literally. He uses his own shit as fertilizer for potato plants. Potatoes then become Mark’s only form of sustenance and I’m willing to bet he reached a point where he never wanted to see another french fry ever again.
Aside from the potato plants, I don’t want to go into too much detail on the science angle. A) To do so would be to provide you with too many SPOILERS and b) some of it my brain was too feeble to understand and other parts I did understand but am not sure I could explain it correctly.
Suffice to say, there’s a lot of brainy people involved. NASA scientists on the ground work on a rescue plan while Watney on Mars works on his own survival.
For any kid out there interested in science, this film provides role models to look up to, not just in the form of the astronauts, but the people – technicians, engineers, specialists, scientists, etc. working to bring their colleague home.
Science, kids. It’s the way of the future.
WHAT DOES THIS MOVIE MEAN FOR SELF-PUBLISHING?
The Martian started out as a free serial on Andy’s blog. He as just a guy who really loved math, science, and space. So he took his passions and funneled them into a project to entertain his blog readers. (I bet he had more than 3.5 of them.)
As he explained in an interview with Johnny, Sean and Dave of the Self-Publishing Podcast, he put the novel on Amazon at the request of some of his readers who preferred an e-reader format over reading it on a blog. Not out to make any money and not thinking it would go anywhere, Weir put his novel on Amazon, priced it at 99-cents, and let his blog readers know it was available.
The novel took off and the rest was history.
By the way, I recommend listening to Andy’s SPP interview as it is an inspiration to anyone interested in self-publishing. Success doesn’t happen overnight and it certainly didn’t for Andy. He started blogging way back in 1999. A sixteen year journey to the big screen!
Keep plugging away, 3.5 readers/writers. Success might seem so far away as to be pointless, but then again, you’re already ahead of those who gave up.
I’ve sought out opinions as to what this movie means for self-publishers. Andy’s novel was originally self-published before he was approached by a literary agent and sold it to a big publisher.
Does this mean the general public will look at self-publishers in a whole new light? That if one man was able to take a project on his blog and turn it into a blockbuster film starring Matt Damon and other stars, might that not cause people to pay more attention to self-published works?
One person I spoke with answered no. His reasoning was the majority of the movie going public doesn’t really care who wrote a book or how the book was made. They just want to be entertained and thus this won’t do a lot to bring attention to self-publishing.
Technically, I think he’s right, but therein lies the rub.
As self-publishers, our WHOLE GOAL is to provide a piece of entertainment crafted so well that no one notices it wasn’t made by a team of big shots.
Because at the end of the day, when you turn on the TV, do you pay that much attention if a show is on NBC, CBS, or Showtime or do you just pick and watch shows because they grab your attention?
Have you ever said, “Well, I’ll never watch THAT film because it was made by Fox and Goddamn it, this is a Sony household!”
Have you ever walked into a bookstore, strolled over to the clerk, and said, “Excuse me, will you point me to the Random House books because I’m ONLY a Random House reader and I’ll never allow a Penguin book to sully my eyes!”
No. No one cares who was behind a piece of entertainment so long as it is entertaining.
And that, my 3.5 readers, is what I believe this movie does for self-publishers.
It gives their collective souls a boost. Andy Weir becomes another Hugh Howey to look up to. “If that guy did it, then I can do it too!”
After all, when Andy got his start, his readers weren’t saying, “Ugh! This book was not put out by a traditional publishing house? No thank you!”
They were saying, “An astronaut who gets trapped on Mars and has to figure out how to survive?! That sounds so cool! Sign me up!”
When you’re in the clothing store, do you check the label on that shirt that caught your eye? Nope. You’ll just buy it because you like it.
Write cool stories, 3.5 readers and if they’re entertaining enough, people won’t bother to check the label.
Thanks 3.5. I have to go fight the zombie apocalypse now.
All is forgiven for Mortdecai, Johnny. All is forgiven.
I’d announce SPOILERS though all this stuff actually happened! BQB here with a review of Black Mass.
“If nobody sees it, then it didn’t happen.”
So goes the advice of infamous Irish mobster James “Whitey” Bulger to his young son after he got in trouble for punching another kid at school. It’s a line delivered so eerily that it sets the whole tone of the movie.
It gives the viewer insight into just the kind of guy Whitey is. Most parents would tell their kid not to punch anyone. Whitey tells his to just make sure no one’s looking before he punches someone the next time.
Step aside Tony Soprano, as this true crime gangster flick shows Whitey as one cold, calculating sociopathic serial killer, leaving a trail of bodies in his wake during his tenure as the boss of an organized crime family known as the Winter Hill Gang in South Boston from the 1970s to the 1990’s.
I was a fan of The Sopranos and the ongoing theme of that show was that Tony often felt bad about his crimes. Of course, that didn’t stop him from being a murderer, but after the dirty deed, he’d feel bad, overeat, not sleep and walk around in his bathrobe and get so depressed that he’d need to go spill his guts to his confidant/ shrink Dr. Melfi.
Whitey, on the other hand – SPOILER – is able to strangle a hooker then take a nap and have dinner afterwards.
In one of the saddest turn of events in modern law enforcement history, FBI agent John Connolly struck a deal to use Bulger as an informant, but as we see in the movie, John becomes less concerned about justice and more about helping Whitey, his childhood friend, not to mention getting some extra gifts on the side.
Meanwhile, Whitey plays the FBI like a fiddle. He gives them info needed to take down a rival Italian crime family moving in on his turf, but after that, pretty much feeds them bupkis.
If this sounds familiar, you might recall 2006’s The Departed, which was somewhat based on Whitey’s reign of terror.
I’ve always felt The Departed was one of the best gangster flicks I’ve ever seen and this one does meet it.
Johnny Depp solidifies his reputation as an actor who can become anyone. He plays the ruthless yet somewhat quiet Whitey to a T and is barely recognizable on screen.
To complicate matters, Whitey’s brother was William Bulger, President of the Massachusetts Senate.
Benedict Cumberbatch plays the South Boston politician well, delivering a powerful speech about how he’ll drive crime out of South Boston just as St. Patrick drove the Romans and British out of Ireland.
Ironic, given who his brother was.
What did William know about his brother, when, and what was his involvement? Those are questions left on the table, though the film takes the standpoint that Billy basically suffered from being tied to a degenerate brother.
Can’t pick your family I guess.
Joel Edgerton turns in an excellent performance as Connolly, the fast talking Fed who always has a comeback ready to explain to his boss (played by Kevin Bacon) as to why Whitey’s being allowed to jerk the FBI around for his own personal gain.
Jesse Plemons (aka Creepy Todd from Breaking Bad) plays another creep, Whitey’s associate Kevin Weeks. Poor Jesse’s stuck playing creeps I guess.
Adam Scott (known for comedic roles such as his part as Leslie Knope’s husband, Ben Wyatt on Parks and Rec) makes his first notable foray into drama as a Fed who’s suspicious of Connolly.
Overall, it’s a solid cast. I could go into more detail, but I’d end up giving the rest of the story away.
Did Whitey win? If you’re a news watcher, you know he went on the lam in the 1990’s after being tipped off by Connolly to an impending arrest, only to be caught in Santa Monica in 2011.
You might say justice was finally found. Then again, Whitey was in his 80’s when he was nabbed so, he did get to live out his retirement years.
This is one of the first major Oscar contenders of the year and cements Depp as one of the greatest actors of our time.
If he takes home a gold statue for this, he will have earned it.
Not a single dude in tights with a cape to be seen!
Hollywood surprises us with a winner with No Escape.
Be warned: there’s “no escaping” these spoilers.
Ha. See what I did there? That guy gets it. Yes. You sir. Right there. Thanks for reading.
The setup? After his company goes belly up, Jack Dwyer (Owen Wilson) moves his wife, Annie (Lake Bell) and two young daughters to an unnamed Southeastern Asia country. It borders Vietnam and I could probably figure it out if I felt like looking for a map but I really don’t. Since it wasn’t named, I assume the movie producers weren’t looking to criticize any particular country anyway.
Before I go on, am I the only one who thought Annie was played by Idina Menzel of “Let it Go, Let it Go” fame?
The whole summer I’ve been seeing previews for this film and I’ve been like, “Huh. Elsa’s flexing her acting chops. Good for her.”
And throughout the whole movie, I was like, “Wow. That ‘Let it Go’ chick is really letting an ass whooping go on these bad guys.”
But it wasn’t Idina Menzel. It was Lake Bell. But I swear they look alike, so much so that Idina Menzel will probably get an award for being in this movie that she wasn’t even in.
Plus, I have to be honest, I’ve never heard of Lake Bell before, so now I’m wondering how many times I’ve seen her in other stuff and assumed it was Idina Menzel.
Mind=blown.
Anyway, the Dwyers aren’t settled into their new digs for more than a few hours when rebels storm the city, overrun the police and military, and start rounding up and shooting Americans/Brits/Aussies, various others they’ve identified as foreign devils.
It’s up to Jack to save his family as the Dwyers manage to stay just a few steps away from being slaughtered throughout the entire film.
People who are used to Owen Wilson being that happy go lucky, laid back mellow dude will be surprised to see him in this role. He still is that “dude” but this movie asks us to consider all the terrible things we might do to save our families, from taking a drastic chance that they’ll survive being thrown across a large gap between rooftops (note in real life they won’t) to beating a man to death who refuses to keep quiet.
It’s like Dupree but with killing.
You, Me and Dupree. God that movie sucked. Don’t even get me started on Drillbit Taylor. All is forgiven though, Owen, you’ve really redeemed yourself with this one.
Pierce Brosnan rounds out the cast as Hammond, a British badass adventurer type who comes to the Dwyer’s aid. He’s a bit mysterious but we’re alerted to his badassery early on when he informs Jack’s kids that he extracted the tiger tooth he’s wearing on a necklace from an actual tiger.
Reviewers have referred to this movie as “stressful” and it is. The stakes are high. We’ve seen a lot of super hero movies this summer with cartoonish violence. I’m not knocking them. I love them. But when a movie focuses around whether a family with two little kids is going to make it or not, it becomes a lot more real than, say, whether or not Iron Man’s suit gets a dent in it.
Love the comic book movies, but it’s good to see that Hollywood hasn’t completely forgotten that action can happen to the non-caped as well.
By: Video Game Rack Fighter, Official Bookshelf Battle Blog Video Game Reviewer/BQB’s Main Squeeze
What’s up, 3.5 readers?
Finally! BQB allows someone with an extra X chromosome to get a word in edgewise around here.
Between BQB, the Yeti, the Ghost of Uncle Hardass, and Dr. Hugo Von Science, it’s a total sausage fest up in this place.
I’ll exclude Alien Jones for obvious reasons.
Let’s talk about the latest attempt at a movie based on the long running video game franchise, Hitman.
FYI – this review is going to have some KILLER SPOILERS!
(Ha! See what I did there?)
Hitman: Agent 47 – Twentieth Century Fox
In the games, you play Agent 47, a cunning, coldblooded killing machine, completely devoid of feeling or remorse.
BQB EDITORIAL NOTE: Kind of like VGRF that time I ate her twizzlers.
Do you mind?
The games present a very chilling version of 47. He has an expressionless face and a deep, scary voice.
BQB EDITORIAL NOTE: Kind of like VGRF that time…
Shut up!
Anyway, the games are such a hit because there is so much strategy involved. As Agent 47, you work for, “The Agency” and you’re assigned a target to assassinate.
Don’t worry. The target is usually a bad guy who’s done something assassination worthy and often, the Agency will call on “The Hitman” to cross some line. He refuses and ends up taking on his bosses.
The player has a variety of choices. There are subtle ways to take out the mark, like poisoning his food, injection with a syringe, strangling with a garrote wire, setting up a trap (i.e. rigging a chandelier or something heavy to fall on his squash) or, if you aren’t up for any of that, you can just break out 47’s trademark dual pistols, the “Silver Ballers” and start racking up the body count.
BQB EDITORIAL NOTE: This is why I sleep with one eye open.
While this video game series is superb, Agent 47 is not a character that translates well to the big screen.
When I say that the video game 47 is completely devoid of personality, I mean he’s really devoid of personality. There’s just nothing there, and nothing that keeps him from feeling bad about the things that he does, and that’s why he’s such an eerie anti-hero to control.
Try as they might to avoid it, every actor has some personality, even if they try to stifle it for the role. Timothy Olyphant tried in a 2007 long forgotten version simply titled Hitman and while this latest effort brings more style and panache, it too I fear is destined for the 99 cent bin.
Rupert Friend, who you may know as Quinn, Carrie’s post-Brody love interest on Homeland, provides a more believable tour of duty as our favorite Hitman than Olyphant did. If you ask me, Olyphant is such a likable guy that it was a mistake to cast him for that role.
There was a more concerted effort to pay homage to video game fans with this one. Friend breaks out the silver ballers and the garrote wire.
BQB EDITORIAL NOTE: Hon, I just feel you’re too comfortable using the words “garrote wire.”
.And just like the VG version of 47, Friend grabs various uniforms to use to blend in and escape.
BQB EDITORIAL NOTE: Because that would totally work.
Do you just want to write this then? Huh? Sheesh.
Friend also attempts to mimic a stoic 47-esque voice. Sometimes he hits the mark, other times he misses it.
Gamers will also be pleased to see that 47’s handler, Diana, also drops in. She’s played by the actress, “Angelababy.”
Isn’t that just an adorable name? “Hi. I’m Angelababy.” Love it.
The plot? That’s the other reason why it’s hard to turn this franchise into a movie. The plot of the video games is to kill, kill, kill.
Here, the film follows a plot to capture Litvenko (aka Ciaran Hinds aka Mance Raider from Game of Thrones.
BQB EDITORIAL NOTE: OMG! I love Game of Thrones.
Tell us something we don’t know.
Litvenko was the man who began an assassin development program, conditioning people like 47 to kill in a brutally efficient manner.
After deciding he wanted nothing more to do with the program, he took off, but now the bad guys want him to produce more hitmen.
So, to get to him, they want to kidnap Litvenko’s daughter, Katia aka Hannah Ware.
There’s a face-off between 47 and Agent John Smith aka Zachary Quinto, who plays Mr. Spock in the JJ Abrams Star Trek reboot.
Both agents claim to have Hannah’s best interests at heart, but only one does. I’ll let you figure out who it is.
Oh, and I don’t want to give too much away, but it turns out Hannah doesn’t need that much protecting.
To wrap this up, it’s better than the first movie, but that’s not saying much. As a fan of the series, I appreciate the nods to gamers, but overall, this one fell flat.
Worth a rental, but don’t rush out to the theater.
The dog days of summer are here, and unfortunately, this is the first of many dog movies to come.
So a rubberman, a rock monster, a burning man and an invisible girl walk into a bar…
Bookshelf Q. Battler here with a review at the latest attempt at a Fantastic Four movie.
To paraphrase Ben “The Thing” Grimm: IT’S SPOILIN’ TIME!
Fantastic Four – Movieclips Trailers
This movie is getting the crap panned out of it by the critics and even director Josh Trank reportedly tweeted (and later deleted), “You’ll probably never get to see my good version,” assumedly in response to a collective thumbs down from the movie review community.
Rotten Tomatoes, a movie review site that ranks films on a scale of 1-100% gave it 9%. It barely registered. Holy crap, that’s like, Gigli territory.
To put it in perspective, if Disney ever puts out a Jar Jar Binks origin story film, it’d probably get at least 15% just for being a completed film.
(I don’t know that to be case exactly. What do I look like, a Rotten Tomato expert or something?)
Personally? I don’t get it.
Call me crazy, tell me why I’m wrong, but I didn’t think it was that bad.
It was better than the two mid-2000’s attempts, though that’s not saying much. This franchise’s big villain/draw has always been the metallic Dr. Doom, and those movies, for some odd reason, were pretty light on the Doom.
A Fab Four movie that’s light on Dr. Doom is the equivalent of making a movie about Superman, except there’s no heroics and it’s just a rom-com about how he wants to tell Lois his secret but is too afraid.
This version makes up for it, with some pretty sweet Doom scenes in which he, in almost a Darth Vaderian level of bad-ass-itude, started popping heads left and right with his mind. Toby Kebell plays the baddie in this version.
The franchise went with a younger crew this time around, and I don’t think that hurt it. In fact, Miles Teller plays Reed Richards and in a summer where every hero is buffer and has more muscles than the next, it was good to see a nerd as the hero for once.
For once? TRY FOR THE FIRST TIME EVER!
NERDS: Can a nerd be the hero for once?
SOCIETY: What?! You need glasses to see? Boo! No! No super heroics for you!
In this movie’s defense, this franchise isn’t Marvel’s easiest to put on film. You’ve got Reed aka Mr. Fantastic, who is a freaking rubber man. While being super stretchy is an interesting power, it does have the potential to backfire and look dumb. This film avoided that.
Then you’ve got a rock man, an invisible girl, and a man on fire, so all in all, they’re a haphazard collection of heroes with random powers.
(Oddly though, while this group usually gets goofed on by the critics, another comic book group featuring a Nordic god, a man in a robot suit, a green monster and a super patriot are box office gold so go figure.)
Kate Mara and Reg E. Cathey pull off a House of Cards mini-reunion. Frank Underwood fans know Kate as Zoe Barnes and Reg as Freddy aka the owner of Frank’s favorite barbecue joint. Here, Reg is the father of Sue (Kate) and Johnny Storm (Michael B. Jordan).
Sidenote: Jordan took a lot of heat (pun intended) for playing Johnny/the Human Torch. The character has usually been white in past films. But really, who cares? Spread the super hero roles throughout the races. If you’re worried about what color a character is in a super hero movie you probably have too much time on your hands.
Meanwhile, Jamie Bell plays Ben Grimm, the team member who has it the hardest (pun intended) because while the other characters can return to normal, he’s stuck being a rock monster.
And in this film, he’s a rock monster with no pants. He’s got nothing down there in case you were wondering. Maybe you weren’t. I don’t know.
This movie is all origin story with a face-off against Doom at the end. Perhaps it can be criticized on the fact that most of the first half is devoted to the experiment that leads to the team inadvertently catching their powers.
I’m not a fan of super hero origins stories, mostly because we know them front and back already. I don’t need to see Batman’s parents get shot for the hundredth time. I don’t need to see Superman’s escape pod land in the Kents’ corn field. I don’t need to see Peter Parker get bitten by a damn radioactive Spider again.
We all know what happened. There’s no need to re-tell the whole story again every time the cast changes. Just jump straight to the action.
However, I can’t begrudge the Fab Four an origin story because they’ve been denied a good one thus far.
I don’t know. Based on the reviews, I went into it thinking that it would be two hours of The Thing performing a poetry recital while Sue and Johnny use Reed as a jumprope, so I was pleasantly surprised.
If you hated it, I don’t want to start a nerd fight or anything, but what did I miss? Why is this movie considered so sucky?
It’s not like it was good enough to run out and watch again, but I didn’t feel like I didn’t get my money’s worth either.
Yup. I wasted valuable time and money to take in this movie.
OBLIGATORY SPOILER WARNING – though the trailer pretty much summarizes the best parts of the film:
Movieclips Trailers – Vacation
Oh Hollywood. Why must you continue to play it safe with reboots and sequels and so on?
Let me put it this way:
1) This movie doesn’t suck.
2) It only starts to suck when you start comparing it to the three original Vacation movies from the 1980’s that share this film’s name.
3) Though I can’t call it a guffaw-fest, there were a number of times where I did laugh.
The setup: Adult Rusty Griswold (Ed Helms), recognizing that his family is stuck in an unhappy rut, decides to pack up the clan and take them on a road trip to Walley World, just as his father Clark (Chevy Chase) did in the first film.
From there on, the film becomes a series of sketches, smaller vignettes that happen the family as they make various stops along the way.
Some jokes from the first movie are parodied or paid homage to (Rusty rents a Prancer, an Albanian car that far surpasses his father’s Family Truckster in suckage).
But to the movie’s credit, it pokes fun at itself, and an attempt is made to go off on its own rather than be simply a modernized carbon copy of the original.
Cameos aplenty, as I assume many of today’s actors have fond memories of laughing their butts off at a young Chevy Chase, as I do.
Chevy and Beverly D’Angelo make cameos as Grandpa Clark and Grandma Ellen. I feel like there might have been potential to do something funnier with them, but then again, had they been featured longer than they were, it’d of been a different movie altogether.
For fans of Community, it might be hard to not look at Chevy these days and think “Pierce Hawthorne.” Meanwhile, Beverly has definitely made some kind of supernatural anti-aging deal.
My favorite bit was the younger brother bullies the older brother routine. Every once in awhile, I’ll see that somewhere. It’s usually the older kid, who’s bigger, bullies the younger kid, but every so often you’ll see an older kid who’s polite and doesn’t want to hurt his miserable pipsqueak of a younger brother, even though he could totally knock him into next week for being a little jerk if he wanted to. That dynamic makes for some fun here.
As if there wasn’t enough in this film to make me feel old, Christina Applegate, who once played the uber hot Kelly Bundy in her youth (and who I oggled extensively in mine), now plays the uptight Mom trying to prove to everyone she’s still as fun as she used to be.
Oh time, please slow down.
Should you rush out to see it? Nah. Is it worth a rental when you have nothing better to do? Sure.
STATUS: Not shelf-worthy.
BUT – if you’re one of those younger people born with a cell phone in hand, you should check out:
Vacation
European Vacation
Christmas Vacation (I don’t know about you but I have to watch this at least once during the holiday season)
To Cruise’s credit, he’s a man who’s lived an extraordinary life, has nothing left to prove and yet, for our viewing pleasure, hooked himself up to the side of a flying plane.
Amazingly, there was all sorts of safety precautions taken, yet the final shot looks as though he was just holding on with nothing but his hands.
Would you strap yourself to a flying plane moving at 185 mph?
I would not. I would tell the writers they need to rewrite that shit. Those terrorists need to be foiled on the ground.
So kudos to Tom. You were married to Nicole Kidman, Katie Holmes, and now you’ve literally flown.
So, the setup. This go around it’s IMF vs. the Syndicate, an evil organization bent on bringing down the world.
To throw a monkey wrench into the works, Hunt has also cheesed off the CIA and MI6.
Fast cars, exotic locales, insane stunts…it’s an action movie that’s got it all.
I don’t know about you, 3.5 readers, but with these types of movies, I just go for the pretty colors and fancy special effects and don’t waste a lot of time getting bogged down by the plot. There’s so much explanation of how someone is going to break in to some place and blah blah blah, here’s how it’s going to happen and here’s what everyone is going to do.
Perhaps you sit there with your popcorn, trying to parse out all the details, but to me, it’s all just:
ETHAN: To break in, we’ll need the thing to do the thing and get past the thing.
BENJI: You’ll need a thing. But the thing has to be done with the exact thing or the thing will happen to the thing.
LUTHER: Nope. No way. You can’t do that thing with this thing. You’re going to need that other thing and when that thing happens, you’d better be ready to do that thing.
ETHAN: So it’s settled. We’re going to do the thing.
This is a big role for Rebecca Ferguson as Ilsa (not Elsa, no one sang, “Let it Go,”), the British agent who works with Hunt.
Sean Harris is exceptionally creepy as the film’s uber villian Solomon Lane while Jeremy Renner and Alec Baldwin get into a bureaucratic turf war over whether the CIA should absorb the IMF’s functions.
Last but not least, Simon Pegg, a nerd after my own heart, returns as Hunt’s tech savvy sidekick Benji.
It’s worth the price of admission with some awesomeness you have to see on the big screen.
I always look forward to these whenever they’re out. In this nerd’s opinion, when it comes to spy action movies, MI is second only to 007.
And by the way, there’s a great Spectretrailer before this one. Can’t wait for it.
Interesting side note: I noticed this movie was backed by the China Movie Channel and Alibaba Films. (Alibaba being the Chinese version of Amazon). Will the Chinese become major players in the American film industry? Eh, it seems new but then again Asia bridging the gap to Hollywood isn’t all that new. Japanese backed Sony has been around forever.
By: Jake Hatcher, Official Bookshelf Battle Blog Private Eye
BQB EDITORIAL NOTE: A special treat for you, 3.5 readers. If you’re following Pop Culture Mysteries, then you know that the Official Bookshelf Battle Blog Private Eye, Jake Hatcher, was once a formidable pugilist. His fists of fury brought down a number of vicious opponents, not to mention the Third Reich.
Thus, I decided to take a powder for this review and allow “The Jersey Jabber” to take over.
Jake Hatcher, Guest Movie Reviewer
Another Saturday night and no dame to while away the hours with. I was lonelier than an injured dog with one of those safety cones around its neck that renders it unable to lick itself.
To my surprise, I stepped into my office and found an envelope on my desk. Inside? A movie ticket for the film Southpaw and the following note:
See a movie on me, Hatcher. It’s the least I can do for the man who keeps my 3.5 readers entertained with tales of daring-do.
Sincerely,
Bookshelf Q. Battler
Blogger-in-Chief for the Bookshelf Battle Blog
Huh. Delilah must have dropped it off while I was at the liquor store.
Did I say liquor store? I meant to say while I was putting in a hard day of sleuthing.
Much appreciated, Mr. Battler. Though honestly, the least you could have done was pony up the dough for two tickets. Hell, you could have even talked that looker of a lawyer of yours into accompanying me.
Dim lights. Emotional flick. Perfect atmosphere to sneak in a little smooch-a-roo but oh well. Who am I kidding? I’ve got a better shot at stealing the Queen of England’s crown jewels than I do at stealing a kiss from the delicious dish Delilah K. Donnelly.
You know, 3.5 readers, in my day films were only shown for a limited time. If you missed it, it was tough titty said the kitty. Thus, if some turkey gobbled up the action that you missed, you’d allow him to give you an earful and you’d thank him for it, because by and large, word of mouth was the only way you’d find out about the story you missed.
Things are different today. Miss a film in the theater? Just watch it on your television. Or your phone. Or those damn i-Whatevers. Big phones basically. Watch a movie on your toaster, your toothbrush, your refrigerator, your cuisinart. If it’s a beep boop machine, then you can watch a damn movie on it.
And you can watch it whenever you want too. On the can, in line at the delicatessen, at the dentist’s office while your teeth are getting drilled, while you’re pretending to give two shits about whatever it is your dumb friend is saying, it doesn’t matter.
Bottomline – I’m supposed to warn you that this review has more SPOILERS than Ms. Donnelly has beauty, so if you haven’t taken it in yet, then take a walk, Jack.
Movieclips Trailers – Southpaw
Mr. Battler, all complaints about your cheapness aside, I do thank you for giving me the chance to watch this movie. It brought the good old days of my boxing career back to me faster than a Maserati with a brick on the accelerator.
So this fella, Jake Gyllenhaal. I take it he’s the cock of the walk in Tinsel Town these days. I’m not light in the loafers or nothin’ but I can tell a handsome man when I see one so I imagine the broads go gaga over this galoot. Guys like that have their choice of roles so it’s to his credit that he chose this one, since it’s not exactly a glamorous one.
Gyllenhaal plays Billy Hope, an ironic name to be sure because this cat becomes utterly hopeless.
At the start of the picture, Hope has it all. A mansion the Sultan of Brunei would be happy to call home. A swimming pool you could sail a battleship through. More friends than he can shake a stick at. An adorable daughter and a wife who’s hotter than a bowl full of jalapenos.
(I just have to say that to entertain the 3.5 readers, Ms. Donnelly. You know she’s got nothin’ on you.)
Have you folks taken a gander at this Rachel McAdams broad? All I can say is I’ll see your “Hubba Hubba” and raise you an “Awooga!”
That gal is easy on the eyes, let me tell you. For most of the first part of the movie, she runs around in a skimpy dress that really shows off her dynamic derriere.
Not that I want to pay attention to stuff like that, but I am a private detective. It’s my job to notice these things.
Anyway, you don’t need to listen to me flap my yapper all night, so let me give you the straight skinny.
Hope’s world comes crashing down when Miguel Escobar, a rival for the heavyweight belt, makes an inappropriate comment about Mrs. Hope. The champ gets madder than a box full of boll weevils, a fist fight ensues, and both fighters’ entourages join in the melee.
A gun is drawn and fired, Mrs. Hope takes a bullet and croaks like a frog on a log and yours truly is left to suffer without McAdams’ keister to gawk at for another hour and a half.
Again, I was just doing my job.
Luckily, there was plenty of other action to make up for the lack of McAdam’s marvelous mangoes. I won’t rat out the details but the whole mess causes Hope a whole heap of financial and legal problems, see? He loses his house, his money, his kid and hits rock bottom, a place this gumshoe knows only too well.
It’s up to down and out trainer Tick Wills (Forest Whitaker) to give Hope some hope and bring him back from the brink of self-destruction.
Curtis “50-Cent” Jackson plays Hope’s conniving manager Jordan, a real slick type who drops Hope like a bad penny when the going gets tough.
As if there wasn’t enough irony in this film, 50-Cent is the fella that springs the bad news to Hope that he’s got less cash than a check-out register at a discount dime store. Word on the street is that 50, or “Fiddy” as I hear folks call him, just filed for bankruptcy and his nickname has become more than apt.
Can anyone explain to me what a rapper is? I woke up a year ago after a 59-year nap and like a kangaroo with a sewn up pouch, I’m confused. All I can gather is they talk fast in rhyme to a beat. It’s like being a real smooth Lord Byron I suppose.
Whatever rapping is, the film is accompanied by a soundtrack that rap aficionados will want to check out. Fiddy is featured on the album, and another fella called Eminem offers up a diddy called, Phenomenal.
It’s catchy. You should listen to it. I hummed it for awhile after I got home until Ms. Tsang kicked me out of her kitchen because she couldn’t stand to listen to me anymore.
Can’t say as I blame her. Sometimes I’m not the best company. Just ask the three ex-Mrs. Hatchers.
I tip my fedora to Gyllenhaal. The key to great acting is to transform into someone the audience doesn’t recognize, and Jake does that here.
(Try not to get confused, 3.5 readers. The star’s name is Jake, but my name is also Jake. Two Jakes, no waiting.)
Hope is a mumbling, bumbling fella, a punch drunk palooka who’s taken one too many smashes to the cranium. He’s a powder keg full of rage and ready to see the slightest provocation as the match needed to set him off. Gyllenhaal plays him to a tee.
Acting isn’t an easy gig. When I first arrived in LaLaLand, I gave the old thespian routine a go and was laughed at by the entertainment industry power brokers like I was a clown in a pair of polka dot pants.
I try not to think about that though. Sometimes when you fail, all that really happens is you come that much closer to figuring out what you’re good at.
Me? I have two skills:
1) Sleuthing.
2) Punching dangerous desperados in the face.
Word has it Mr. Battler will even help me regale you 3.5 readers with the tale of how I became so good at the latter. All I’ll say for now is I wish I’d never allowed that scumbag Mugsy McGillicuddy to force me to take a dive. It cost me my chance at fame and fortune but even worse, my sweet, sweet Peaches.
If you want my recommendation, this film is worth your time. It’s a gut wrenching story of loss and redemption. The moral of the tale? Appreciate what you’ve got and don’t stoop to the bad guy’s level or else you’ll lose it in an instant. Sometimes the bigger man is the one who walks away.
Mr. Gyllenhaal, keep at it. I think this acting thing of yours is going to work out for you. And again, just because I pointed out that you’re a man of dapper visage doesn’t make me some kind of switch hitter for the Oakland Athletics.
Finally, I’d just like to say if my courtship of Ms. Donnelly doesn’t work out, you’re welcome to stop by Tsang’s Hong Kong Palace and eat my special egg roll, Ms. McAdams.
That’s not some kind of inappropriate innuendo. Ms. Tsang shared her recipe with me and I make a mean plate of those delicious appetizers. We could share a meal and shoot the bull was all I was trying to say.
Is it hot in here or is it just me? Must be this damn trench coat I’m wearing in July.
Jake Hatcher is a hardboiled film noir style detective who fell asleep in 1955, woke up in 2014, and was recruited in June of this year by Bookshelf Battle Blog Lead Counsel Delilah K. Donnelly to solve 100 Pop Culture Mysteries.
If you have a question about movies, music, TV, books, or other forms of entertainment, drop a dime to Bookshelf Q. Battler by tweeting @bookshelfbattle and he’ll put Hatcher on the case.
Hey parents! Remember all those video games you loved as a kid?
Well, they’re so old that they’ve become quaint!
Bookshelf Q. Battler here with a review of Adam Sandler’s action movie for kids, Pixels.
Even Pac-Man couldn’t gobble up the oncoming SPOILERS fast enough.
Movie Trailer – Pixels – Sony
Sometimes it’s hard to be Adam Sandler.
He wowed people in the 90’s with hits like Happy Gilmore and Billy Madison. Those are two films that are still quotable today.
(You’ve never told someone something they just said made no sense and everyone is now dumber for having heard it?)
But then he made a slew of lesser films that fell flat and now he’s the point where everyone expects his movies will suck.
To his credit, this one didn’t.
If you’re looking for highbrow entertainment, then you’ll probably think it does.
If you’re a parent looking for a movie to bring your kids to that won’t bore you to tears, then you’ll enjoy it.
As kids, Sandler (Brenner), Kevin James (Cooper), Josh Gad (Ludlow), and Peter Dinklage (Eddie) once competed in a 1980’s video game tournament.
Back in those days, the lads thought the world would one day be their oyster. Alas, they find life pretty disappointing as adults.
Brenner, who once dreamed of becoming a tech genius works at a Best Buy-esque home TV installation company. Ludlow has become a wacky conspiracy theorist who still lives with his grandma and Eddie? I won’t spoil it for you.
The only one who had life go his way was Cooper, but I won’t spoil that for you either.
Needless to say, the buddies who once believed their video game skills were useless in the real world become the world’s only hope when aliens attack using video game warfare.
Turns out, aliens aren’t that bright. (Don’t tell Alien Jones).
Footage of the video game tournament was sent to outer space as an example of Earth culture in the hopes that friendly aliens would discover it. Alas, the aliens take it as a challenge and develop real life versions of 1980’s video games to attack Earth.
Completely silly I know, but you’ll enjoy the special effects as Brenner and friends take on Centipede, Pac-Man, Donkey Kong and so on.
There’s plenty of celebrity appearances. Brian Cox plays a cranky American general and Sean Bean plays his British counterpart. Michelle Monaghan plays Brenner’s love interest/Army inventor of anti-alien video game technology.
Josh Gad steals the show with his antics until Dinklage steals it from him with his obnoxious, egotistical character.
Q-Bert becomes the Jar Jar Binks of the film but that’s besides the point.
Will you, as once said to Happy Madison, be dumber for watching this movie? Maybe. But if you suspend disbelief and silence your inner critic, you’ll be entertained.
But if you can remember a time when arcades were fun and popular, then you might want to skip it because you’ll be left feeling old…unless you’re feeling nostalgic.
Bookshelf Battle 