Sunday, January 17, 2010

Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs

First off, I love Hot Rod so the voice of Bill Hader as Flint Lockwood was awesome to me. Second of all, this is a freaking fun and funny movie (FFFM). Watch it once and you probably won't catch everything the first time. Watch it again with subtitles and you should catch a lot more. It's funny from beginning to end and even captures a special moment for a son on his birthday. A perfect family movie, this one caught me by surprise just like Horton Hears a Who or Happy Feet. I want to watch it again! 8/10
PS>Line of the movie - "We have some Diem to Carpe!"
PSS>Tiego really liked it, too! He laughed the whole time! I love that kid's laugh!

Thursday, January 14, 2010

The Hurt Locker

I noticed this movie on a lot of "best movie of 2009" lists so I thought I would give it a try. I reminded me a lot of "Black Hawk Down" where it is constantly intense, but where Black Hawk Down is about one particular incident, The Hurt Locker successfully shows it during the whole course of the last two months of a OED's rotation. This is where the movie really touched me was where day in and day out, these men had do deal with a fear of dying that I personally could not deal with. It is touching, it is interesting, and it is real. It is done in the same shaky camera way as Fame, but where Fame (which I saw the night before) is Friday Night Lights, The Hurt Locker is more like United 93 (which I liked). There is a reason for it so be so real, because you are the fourth person on the team. The Best of 2009 lists were right to have these on their list. This was a powerful film. 7/10
PS>Guy Pearce and Ralph Fiennes make a big impact on this movie. I really liked what they did to the movie!

Fame

I have never seen the original Fame and I only watched this movie because some friends brought it over. I always like a good dance movie but this movie was about one thing. DRAMA. Young, growing, DRAMA. It actually reminded me a lot of "Friday Night Lights" where the whole point is to make a documnetary-like movie about growing up that just misses with its characters and interestingness. In Fame, the camera is shaky the whole time (for no reason), kids sing like a musical but it's still shaky camera style, and halfway through the movie I only knew one character's name. Very unengageing story about a few kids growing up at performing arts high school and defying their parents wishes for them to be a classical _______ (insert artistic career here). Waste of 2 hours. 4/10

Monday, January 11, 2010

Food, Inc

In the same "open your eyes" type documentary style as "Walmart: The High Cost of Low Prices", "The Corporation", and "An Inconvenient Truth", Food, Inc hits a little closer to home. It seems as revealing as if you were adopted because food is such a personal part of everyday life. This movie scared me, but I still ate during it. The only problem I had with the movie is it paints a dark picture of the food industry but does not really offer ways to avoid it, other than read labels and buy organic. Other than that, Food, Inc works on many levels. Better treatment for the animals. Better treatment for the farmers. Less subsidies to build big business, and the one that was biggest to me, healthier food for our kids. Food, Inc is a movie everyone should see although it doesn't "entertain" in the traditional sense. 7/10

Friday, January 8, 2010

District 9

Ever since I saw this trailer, I have wanted to watch this film. Done by first time director Neill Blomkamp, it is an alien movie set in South Africa and unlike anything I have ever seen. After Avatar, movies have tasted a little bland, but District 9 revived my belief in movies, and it was only made with $30 million! Now compare this movie with $27 million to make Twilight and you'll realize that Twilight was just wasting its money.

District 9 is gritty and real. The lead character is hilarious and dramatic. The story is interesting and action packed. This isn't a Hollywood movie at all. It combines the cultures of a movie like City of God/Slumdog Millionaire with science fiction. Deep down, District 9 could be considered too much of a video game movie, but it is just too real. It touches on real issues and is felt more than a video game ever could. 8/10.
PS>8 of 10 for too many exploding heads and F-bombs.

Avatar

Beautiful. Absolutely stunning. There are so many things I could say about Avatar that I want to keep it short and hopefully by the end of this review, if you haven't seen the movie, you will run out and see it in 3D.

This movie changes cinema in a few ways. The first is it brings back to life the EVENT of movies. Where movies on opening weekends can become events (Star Wars, The Dark Knight, etc), Avatar is an event on a weekday at any given time. It doesn't matter who you are with, but this movie takes you places you have never been. After about 45 minutes into the movie, I began forget about the 3D and felt completely immersed into a planet and culture that I did not know. It changes cinema the way surround sound changed it. I remember watching a movie at home for the first time in surround sound and being able to hear the bullets whiz by my head (Saving Private Ryan). I was so amazed that I didn't want to watch movies without surround sound. Avatar does that visually. You get to watch bullets whiz by your head and frankly, I want to watch EVERY movie in 3D like this.

There is so much to say about the film. I literally felt transported in this film. Unlike any movie I have ever seen, I felt it was my mission to tell everyone to see it. And I haven't met anyone that has been disappointed yet. Go see it now in 3D!
10/10