facebook_twitter

Gavin Grades The Movies

Posts from March 2011

Source Code
by Gavin , posted Nov 2 2011 7:20PM
It's no secret that I'm vocal in my hatred of the spawn of celebrities getting into the film industry.  It just seems as if they don't earn the celebrity that they have.  But every once in a while there's one that comes along that is counter to my labels of "talentless and lucky" and an example of that is director Duncan Jones. Jones is the son of singer David Bowe and really impressed me with his last movie Moon.  It was a one-man show that featured Sam Rockwell putting in the last two weeks of a three year contract mining minerals by himself on the moon.  It was a sci-fi headtrip that was tense, sad and tragic.  What was amazing though was that it was science fiction for people who don't really like science fiction.  That's not an easy task to pull off, especially to do it well. For his follow-up film he chose to do exactly that again and surpassed it in scope and story.  This time, Jake Gyllenhaal is an Air Force pilot who wakes up to find himself in a secret military operation that involves reliving the same 8 minutes before a terrorist attack in Chicago in the body of someone else over and over again in an attempt to try and catch the killer.  Can you wrap your brain around that?! But what's most interesting to me is that he opens it up to be more than just a mindless action movie that, frankly, anyone from Bruce Willis to Jet Li could have pulled off.  By the end of the film Jones has shifted the thesis of the movie to one of morality, forgiveness and hope.  He also has the timeless theme of government overstepping their limit and stripping away rights for what they consider to be for the greater good.  Think of it kind of like Groundhog Day but with an exploding train.  Each time Gyllenhaal has to go back to solve a little more of the mystery, the story unfolds into more and more mystery. What's really cool because what you think would be the exciting parts of the film, such as finding the bomb and finding the terrorist, pale in comparison to the real mystery of how The Source Code works and how he got in it.  The only disappointment is that the scenes that do involve locating the bomb and confronting the terrorist are not executed as well as they should be.  They lack a pulse and seem almost rushed with cheesy dialogue and luke warm performances.  But when you make it to the end of the film and then look back on it, those scenes really aren't the point of the film.  It's not an action movie.  Source Code is science fiction drama that happens to have some cool explosions and jumps from a speeding train.  The originality of the script, written by Ben Ripley, is what drives this movie to the level of awesomeness it gets.  The twists and turns that shock and sadden are genuine and unpredictable, which seem to be the trend in Jones' movies.  Makes me look forward to his next film with heavy anticipation. The Source Code (Rated PG-13) Gavin Grade: A-
 (0) Comments
Tags :  
Social: , , , , , , , 

 
Jane Eyre
by Gavin , posted Nov 2 2011 7:20PM
Here's a quiz that has nothing to do with how good or bad Jane Eyre is, the film based on the classic novel most of us had to read in school by Charlotte Bronte.  What's a worse movie watching experience?  A: Theater full of teenagers.  B:  Theater full of ethnic stereotypes (you know what I mean).  C:  Theater full of old people.  After seeing Jane Eyre I can confidently say that the answer is C.  My theater was packed with the geriatric and if they weren't loudly snorting in through their nose every 15 seconds or trying to gnaw down their buttered popcorn, then they were loudly explaining the movie to each other.  But I will try not to allow that to ruin my opinion of the film...I just had to vent. Like all movies that are based on a book, you have to prepare yourself for a lean and trimmed representation of what the pages contained.  Unfortunately for director Cary Fukunaga (Sin Nombre), Jane Eyre is a really long book.  What they chose to chop was selective and calculated but it was also somewhat vital to character development.  If you never read the book and expect the movie to make you love Jane as much as the readers do, you will be disappointed.  But this should make English teachers happy who will easily be able to catch whether or not a student read the book or saw the movie...be warned! The film has a great dreary look to it and I know it's easy to chalk up the overcast sky and pall of gloom as...well...England, but it actually fits the mood of the story very well.  Of course after sitting through two hours of that kind of atmosphere, it doesn't make you feel romantic at all and instead makes you want to jump off a cliff. The performances from star Mia Wasikowska (Alice in Wonderland, The Kids Are Alright) and Michael Fassbender (Inglorious Basterds, 300) are very good, especially from her.  She displays the reserved joy and masked misery that Jane should, although the years of torment that leads to her stoic persona are cut from the film. The problem with this adaptation is where they decided to take it.  I never took Jane Eyre, the book, as a sweeping period romance but instead a gothic mystery that had romance in it.  Nevertheless, a sweeping period romance is, indeed, where it ended up.  I won't give anything away but scenes of spooky noises and terrifying night visions could have made the film much more entertaining to a broader audience, but instead they were cast aside to cater to middle-aged women seeking 19th century romance. This isn't me just hating on the movie because it's simply not the book.  I try to separate my feelings on the two.  If you never read the book you will probably enjoy the film at a "take-it-or-leave-it" level.  Dangerous though since if you did read the book, you will probably wish you did it again instead of see the film. Jane Eyre (Rated PG-13) Gavin Grade: B-
 (2) Comments
Tags :  
Social: , , , , , , 

 
JK Simmons Interview
by Gavin , posted Nov 2 2011 7:20PM

Gavin sat down for a great interview with one of the best character actors working. Click below to hear the full interview JK Simmons
 (0) Comments
Tags :  
Social: , , , , , , , , , , 

 
Sucker Punch
by Gavin , posted Nov 2 2011 7:20PM
For a solid year now movie nerds and fanboys have been drooling over the prospect of director Zach Snyder getting back in the business of kicking ass!  For some reason the man that brought us 300, Dawn of the Dead and Watchmen most recently gave us the children's film Legends of the Guardian.  What?!  So it was a relief to most of us to see the trailer for Sucker Punch.  Hot girls dressed in sexy outfits shooting guns and kicking ass in a fantasy film about escaping reality while escaping an insane asylum.  I was hook-line-and-sinkered!  Sadly though, Sucker Punch was a giant, disjointed mess. The film stars Emily Browning (The Uninvited, Lemony Snickets) as a wrongfully imprisoned girl who sinks into a fantasy world with her friends played by (the long time Gavin crush...call me, Jena) Jena Malone (Contact, Into the Wild), Abbie Cornish (Limitless, Bright Star) and Vanessa Hudgens who you either know from Disney's High School Musical films or her naked pictures that leaked online. Snyder's trademark "look" to the film exists through the entire thing and it dazzles like it always does.  It's colorful, exciting and dramatic.  The problem is that the story is a mixture of fanboy dribble and poor storytelling.  That could be that this is the first Zach Snyder movie that isn't based on anything.  All his other films were either a remake, adapted from graphic novels or a children's book.  He came up with Sucker Punch all by himself and it shows that he's not ready to pen an original script. It's hard to keep track of what the hell is even going on in the film.  Reality gets blurred very quickly and I'm fine with that but you have to let us know what's happening in the actual reality or we don't care what happens to the characters in the non-reality.  There are fantasies within fantasies here and it's not done cleverly like in Inception.  Not only do you quickly get lost but you find yourself rolling your eyes at how repetitive the damn thing gets. Sucker Punch turns into a roulette wheel of nerdy action sequences that start, unfold and end exactly the same way each time and none of it is cool or exciting to anyone over the age of 14.  Zombie Nazis, fire-breathing dragons, faceless robots and enormous devil samurais are all in this movie in brainless and confusing fantasies that exist in the main characters head.  But if she's a teenage girl why the hell is she thinking like a 14-year-old comic book nerd? The best part of the film, besides the general look of it, is the performance that the villainous Oscar Isaac (Robin Hood, Body of Lies) gives.  He was fantastic in the film and makes me think that given enough time for his career to develop and put in the right movie, he could have Oscar-caliber chops...and I don't mean his name.  But even his tour de force performance and my love for Jena Malone couldn't hold my interest for this film.  Sorry Zach, but Sucker Punch was far from a knock out and just plain sucked. Sucker Punch (Rated PG-13) Gavin Grade: D+
 (0) Comments
Tags :  
Social: , , , , , , , , 

 
Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules
by Gavin , posted Nov 2 2011 7:20PM
In an effort not to come across creepy, I try to bring friend's kids along when I go to screenings of movies intended for them since I have don't have any of my own.  It also helps me get an idea how they enjoyed it.  I did not do this for the first Diary of a Wimpy Kid which came out last year.  I really enjoyed the first one and thought that, besides being very funny, it worked on multiple levels.  The first being that it appealed to the 11 and Under crowd that was preparing to go into middle school; a time period of a kid's life that seems to get overlooked by Hollywood.  The second being that it appealed to adults in that it truly conveyed what it was like to be a scared poopless kid going into the dreaded 6th grade.  But because I didn't have a kid with me at the time, I didn't know if children would find the movie as entertaining as I did.  This time around I brought Katie, my co-host's, 7-year-old daughter.  She and I sat in a packed theater and laughed our asses off from beginning to end; good to know it's not just me. Although we have a new director in David Bowers (Astro Boy), the same cast is all back.  Such a relief too because beside the comedic brilliance of the parents who are played by Rachel Harris (The Hangover, Best in Show) and Steve Zahn (Sunshine Cleaning, Strange Wilderness), all the same kids are back too. This time around the film doesn't focus on main character Greg, played by Zachary Gordon (National Treasure, Diary of a Wimpy Kid) and his obsession to be popular in school.  Now we have a more mature and timeless story about brothers getting along.  His older high school brother Rodrick is played even better than the first one by Devon Bostick (Saw VI, Land of the Dead).  These two are fantastic together in scenes that had the whole theater in a steady, rolling chuckle.  Not to mention that the supporting child actors that fill out the rest of the film are all equally hilarious. A common complaint I hear is that there aren't films for families to enjoy together anymore.  I don't really agree with that considering the quality films that Pixar puts out.  But when it comes to live action, nothing could be more true.  But now we have the Diary of a Wimpy Kid series to enjoy together.  The quirky tone of a family dealing with odd and familiar situations reminds me a lot of TV shows like Malcom in the Middle or The Adventures of Pete & Pete.  It's even more impressive that the series is trending in a way that makes me think the films will get better and better.  In a quagmire of rotten, over-the-top Disney Channel garbage, it's refreshing to see a live action children's film that this adult doesn't feel wimpy saying he loved it and looks forward to seeing it again. Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules (Rated PG) Gavin Grade: A
 (0) Comments
Tags :  
Social: , , , , , , , , 

 
Paul
by Gavin , posted Nov 2 2011 7:20PM
What would happen if you got together with a bunch of your closest movie nerd friends to play the board game Scene It but turned it into a feature length film?  The answer is you'd have the movie Paul. This sci-fi comedy starring Simon Pegg (Shaun of the Dead, Star Trek) and Nick Frost (Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz) and the voice of Seth Rogen is made for fanboys, by fanboys.  That's because the plot of two nerds who find a real alien while touring America's alien attractions and helping him find his way home is full of references to classic (mostly) sci-fi movies.  That might have been one of the best things about the movie.  Sitting in a theater and playing along with Paul, trying to guess every quote that comes up is almost worth the price of admission itself.  Not every single one is eased in there seamlessly, but all of them are funny as hell and worthy of a big belly laugh if you're a movie nerd like me. But how is the actual movie, you say?  Well, it's pretty good but not great.  Sad since I was expecting so much more.  When Pegg and Frost get together for a film, the results are usually golden.  Now add in a cast like Kristen Wiig (SNL, Walk Hard), Jason Bateman (Juno, Dodgeball), Sigourney Weaver (Alien, Galaxy Quest) and many other cameos.  That sets the bar pretty high and perhaps that was my fault for doing that. My enjoyment of this film might have been dampened by my own ideals of its potential.  I expected it to be just as good as Shaun of the Dead and Hot Fuzz.  It's not.  Not even close.  That might be because the director of those two films, Edgar Wright (Scott Pilgrim vs. The World) didn't do Paul.  Instead they got Greg Mottola (Superbad, Adventureland) to stand at the wheel.  He did a fine job, but even he didn't raise to the level that Suberbad did.  I think that's simply because this script lacks a constant personality.  There are times when it's slapstick and dick jokes.  Other times it's very heady and cerebral comedy.  But there are times when it ventures into preachy material about religion (and I'm on the side of the point they're making) that comes across way out of place and shoehorned in. Paul is a very funny movie and will satiate the avid movie lover with comedic quotes and references, but as far as your average audience member...the humor will seem a bit alien. Paul (Rated R) Gavin Grade: B

Gavin talked to British actor Simon Pegg (Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz, Star Trek) about his new movie Paul.

Listen to the full interview here: Simon Pegg Interview
 (0) Comments
Tags :  
Social: , , , , , , , , , , , 

 
Battle: Los Angeles
by Gavin , posted Nov 2 2011 7:20PM
Imagine a perfect movie hybrid where every cliche you ever saw in a war film and every cliche you ever saw in a disaster film were combined into one super movie that contained them all.  That movie would be called Battle: Los Angeles. I wondered when the awesome trailer came out for this movie, why they were releasing in the winter wasteland, where studios dump their bad movies and not in the summer when these types of big budget blockbusters are seen.  The answer is because the winter wasteland is where it belongs. Battle: Los Angeles is essentially what Black Hawk Down or Saving Private Ryan would be like if they were moderately entertaining alien movies.  Los Angeles is just one of the many cities these aliens have invaded in an attempt to take over the world.  Aaron Eckhart (The Dark Knight, Rabbit Hole) is the leader of a platoon of marines sent into Santa Monica to find civilians and get them out.  He's joined by pop star Ne-Yo and Michelle Rodriguez (Avatar, Machete) , and they shoot and blast their way through the city to safety. It's as simple as a story can be and I mean that in the strictest sense of the word.  It's written with such military precision because screenwriter Christopher Bertolini (The General's Daughter) used to be a marine.  However his experiences and attention to detail on accurate military jargon has made him overlook what makes a movie compelling...feeling.  You feel nothing for these characters.  And the scenes that do make an attempt to tug at your heartstrings are so melodramatic and silly that day time soap operas wouldn't air them. However, director Jonathan Liebesman (Texas Chainsaw Massacre: The Beginning, Darkness Falls) does his best to give the movie a feeling of integrity despite the silly script.  Practically the entire film is shot with handheld cameras and gives it a very "on-the-ground" feel.  At first the sets seem really fake and a total Universal Studio's Backlot Tour but they do get more incredible as the film builds to the climax. But, for me, the choice of aliens was a huge mistake.  They are more mechanical than organic and that doesn't make me feel like they're as much of a threat or real for that matter.  Last year's District 9 proved that even the silliest looking aliens could still show menace and emotion by being more organic.  Battle: Los Angeles made me feel like they were fighting robots or terminators or something and never once did I buy into the fiction. Battle: Los Angeles is shot in a way that makes it seem a lot more exciting than it really is.  There are no thrills in it because the story didn't have any.  But the cinematography makes it appear suspenseful and dangerous.  Just make sure you avoid this film if  you get motion sickness...or if you don't want to waste your money. Battle: Los Angeles (Rated PG-13) Gavin Grade: C-
 (8) Comments
Tags :  
Social: , , , , , , , , , 

 
Red Riding Hood
by Gavin , posted Nov 2 2011 7:20PM
Warner Brothers needs to find another franchise they can squeeze money out of since Harry Potter is ending and they were too stupid to nab the Twilight series.  So what's the next best thing?  Turn a childhood fairy tale into a 100 minute long feature film and add in sexy teenage love with horror for children and base it off a book that I sure hope was better than this awful script.  Then you nab the crappy director of the first Twilight movie, Catherine Hardwicke, to direct it in hopes of giving the Hot Topic crowd more gothic romance t-shirts to buy.  The fact that any studio would even trust Hardwicke with another movie after Twilight is beyond me.  The good news for her though is the Red Riding Hood is at least a little better than Twilight, but just barely.  She has a profound way of not being able to direct actors to produce a good performance.  Casting actors who can't act is only a problem in some of them like new hunky dufuses that play the love interests of Red Riding Hood aka Valerie, Shiloh Fernandez (Dead Girl) and Max Irons (Dorian Gray).  But she gets her hands on well accomplished actors like Gary Oldman (JFK, Dracula) and Julie Christie (Hamlet, Finding Neverland) and still gets stale, vapid, empty performances from them.  Red  Riding Hood is embarrassing to watch.  There's nothing good in the film at all.  That's not to say that the whole thing is a mess though.  The imagery is pretty decent.  Sure the sets look like something out of a made-for-TV movie but the shots of Valerie, played by Amanda Seyfried (Jennifer's Body, Mama Mia), walking through the snowy woods on her way to Grandmother's house with her long red riding cloak flowing behind her are pretty neat to see.  Plus I enjoyed the Whodunit? approach to who the wolf is.  That held my interest through the entire movie but that was the only thing that did.  The zombie-like performances and cheesy dialogue was enough to make wish the wolf would pick off some of the key characters earlier in the movie.  The romance in Red Riding Hood is as thin as the paper it was printed on.  Never once do you find yourself caring about anyone in the movie, especially the young love triangle that feels as warm and authentic as an arraigned marriage.  I'm not even sure who could really look at this movie and say it was a success.  I would imagine that if you're a fan of the book, you'd be pissed it was ruined.  If you never read the book , you'd just be bored out of your mind.  And if you're a Twilight fan, a teenage girl, or both, you'd only feel like this was a cheap ripoff.  And a cheap ripoff of Twilight is the stuff that crap is made of. Red Riding Hood (Rated PG-13) Gavin Grade: C-
 (0) Comments
Tags :  
Social: , , , , , , , , 

 
Take Me Home Tonight
by Gavin , posted Nov 2 2011 7:20PM
Damn you, Take Me Home Tonight!  This movie cost me $46!  Not for the price of the movie or concessions (I get those for free...he he).  But because this movie, that is set in 1987, inspired me to go home and start an '80s playlist on my iPod.  I can't believe I didn't have one!  That's because there is only about 40 minutes of this movie that doesn't have an awesome '80s song playing overtop or underneath it.  That helps add to the emotion of the movie but it also made it feel rather forced and fraudulent too.  You know that '80s party you get invited too and you show up and they have all the hits playing and everyone is popping their polos or spraying their bangs up?  The movie feels like that.  Not sure if that's a bad thing necessarily but it doesn't feel like a period piece, more like a fake college '80s party.  Topher Grace (Spiderman 3) stars in this movie about a guy going to an epic post-college party to finally hook up with his high school crush, played by Teresa Palmer (I Am Number Four, The Sorcerer's Apprentice).  He's joined by his best friend played by Dan Fogler (Balls of Fury) and the lovely and talented Anna Faris (Observe and Report).  Take Me Home Tonight is basically 1998's Can't Hardly Wait for a different generation.  However, where Can't Hardly Wait had stereotypes and cliches, at least it was authentic in the respect that it was filmed in the decade it was about.  Take Me Home Tonight is not a bad film though.  It's pretty funny but also does an adequate job of capturing what it feels like to be in your early 20s; out of college, lost in the world and not have a single friggin' idea of what you want to do with your life.  That is an age and life struggle that seems to get overlooked by Hollywood a lot.  I suppose that's because it's pretty depressing.  But Take Me Home Tonight doesn't get bogged down in that due to a supporting cast like Chris Pratt (NBC's Parks and Recreation), Demitri Martin (Comedy Central's Important Things) and Michael Ian Black (Wet Hot American Summer).  Demitri Martin really shines though!  He's only in two scenes but is the winner of both.  You'll recognize other faces in the film too in small cameos that go underutilized and end up being confusing as to why they're in it at all.  Although the song Take Me Home Tonight is not actually used in the film, the soundtrack is great.  The film is very self-aware of the music and featured it fairly well.  Much like how the soundtrack to Forest Gump was a great musical encapsulation of the '60s and '70s, this film will do the same for the '80s.  The soundtrack features 19 tracks and it looks like they have Volume 2 coming out soon.  It also features dialogue from the movie, much like a Quentin Tarantino soundtrack might. Take Me Home Tonight is actually a lot more like the '80s than it realizes; just like the decade itself, it's fun, colorful and amusing but at its core is fake, empty and not very original. Take Me Home Tonight (Rated R) Gavin Grade: C+
 (0) Comments
Tags :  
Social: , , , , , , , , , 
People: Chris Pratt

 
Rango
by Gavin , posted Nov 2 2011 7:20PM
When the first Pirates of the Caribbean came out I read an interview with Johnny Depp and he said that he "wanted to do a movie his kids could watch for once."  Seems like they've had quite the grip on him because he hasn't done many "adult" films since.  Rango is by far his most childish, but since he put his trust in the hands of director Gore Verbinski (the Pirates films, The Ring) it still comes across very enjoyable for adults.  Rango is a classic Western story that's been done and done again.  The outsider comes to a new town, is mistaken for being braver than he is, pretends until real danger shows up, but in the end is actually as brave as he portrayed.  Think of The Three Amigos but with only one Amigo and everyone is an animal.  The cliche, uonoringal story is something that can be overlooked due to how original everything else is.  This is a children's movie about talking animals that would only look more realistic if you used actual talking animals.  I consider Verbinski a very talented director and was worried when I saw him doing an animated film fearing that his vision and signature look would get lost.  Nope.  Not one bit.  Rango is every much a Gore Verbinski film as anything else he's done.  Part of that is due to the animation being captured from the actual actors movements filming the scenes, just like the did for Avatar.  Plus the decision to make the creatures dirty, wounded and jarringly realistic was risky and brilliant.  That may prove to be too unnerving for some small kids - be warned.  They are as far removed from the traditional Disney talking animals as I've ever seen.  But that nod to realism works incredibly well for the film.  The other aspect that makes the film so good is the choice of casting.  The voice work of Isla Fisher (Wedding Crashers), Abigail Bresslin (Zombieland), Ned Beatty (Toy Story 3), Bill Nighy (Pirates of the Caribbean 2) and Ray Winstone (The Departed) is superb!  Everyone in the film committed to their part and treated it like they were performing for adults.  You don't get the impression from any of the performances that they're pandering to kids.  On a side note, they did pander to people like me as there is a reference to Hunter S. Thompson and his characters from Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas...but me and one other guy were the only ones laughing our asses off at that.  You won't hear me say this too often but Rango would have been better in 3D.  I think animation is the only genre that really impresses in 3D and this world is so rich with color and action that it seemed like a waste to not offer an extra dimension.  I hope that Johnny Depp considers Rango as much of a success as I do and will go back to making movies for grown-ups again.  We miss him in R-rated craziness. Rango (Rated PG) Gavin Grade: B+
 (0) Comments
Tags :  
Social: , , , , , , , , , , 

 


advertise with us
Recent Blog Posts
Anthem Butchered at Hockey Game
The Wake Up Call
May 21
Oklahoma Tornados
The Wake Up Call
May 21
Star Trek: Into Darkness
Gavin
May 17
Another Kanye Rant
The Wake Up Call
May 17
Seeing Something Shocking
The Wake Up Call
May 15
Congratulating Cancelled Show
The Wake Up Call
May 14
The Great Gatsby
Gavin
May 11
Ariel Castro's Daughter
The Wake Up Call
May 10
Categories
Archives