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“I can’t wait for Parcheesi, the movie!” – - – Aceman

Swift shot:  Join the Navy, they said, kill some aliens, they said, and then get the girl.   This film is what sailors fantasize about when they are bored on watch.  This movie was basically ID4 meets Pearl Harbor, but while it was complete Unbelievable Bull Shit, or UBBS as a friend of mine likes to say, it was still a lot of fun to watch.  Launched by @Hasbro, Battleship plays out as a straight-forward naval action film, where they even manage a not entirely cheesy as expected nod to the board game inspiring the film’s title.  You’ll either love that part or your eyes will roll so hard they will pop out and end up stuck to the theater floor with some Milk Duds and God knows what else.

Stone Hopper (Alexander Skarsgård) is helping his punk brother, Alex (Taylor Kitsch) celebrate his birthday at a local dive in Hawaii, and takes the opportunity to get Alex to turn his life around and get some direction.  In the midst of his pep-talk, a stunning blonde walks into the bar and catches Alex’s, let’s say attention.  All she wants is a chicken burrito, but the “kitchen” is closed for the night.  In a move that is all brawn and no brains, Alex breaks into a convenience store across the street to get her the burrito.  If you are an avid viewer of those “America’s Dumbest Criminal” shows, you will see they took a frame by frame re-enactment of an actual break-in caught on tape.  It was a funny bit.  And, to his credit, Alex does deliver the burrito to said beauty, Samantha Shane (Brooklyn Decker), but winds up with shocking results for his trouble.

This is Stone’s breaking point, and he gives his wayward brother an ultimatum, either join the Navy, like him, or move the hell out and grow up.  Some time passes, not sure how much, but when we next see Alex, he is a Lieutenant on the John Paul Jones DDG-53, and is about to participate in RIMPAC 2012.  Essentially a Pacific Rim International Naval Exercise, which actually exists.  Lieutenant Hopper is a hot-head, and he lets his bravado still dictate his actions, only now he is responsible for more than just his own butt.  He reminded me a lot of Jim Tiberius Kirk in his early days, actually.  His reckless disregard for common-sense borders on retarded though (unlike Kirk), because he does something in the RIMPAC opening formation that could cause him to lose his naval career.  Not to mention he pisses off Admiral Shane (Liam Neeson) who is also Samantha’s dear old dad.

But, no worries, the alien invasion takes precedent over shipping him out of the Navy. As ultimately his destroyer is the only thing that can save . . . well, the whole planet.  And, here is where even the UBBS factor can’t be ignored.  When the aliens approach, first Hong Kong is devastated, and our gov’t is aware there are extra-terrestrial vessels that caused the destruction.  [Swift aside:  There is even a cameo by a certain famous Hawaiian that some cheered for and some jeered for.  If you follow me on twitter @rickswift, you'll know what noise I made]

And, oh yea, there is a total Godzilla under-tone, as the aliens are ultimately compared to lizards, and the fact that the Japanese Navy is working in tandem with the US to thwart the invasion, well, I kept thinking . . . Gohrzira, whenever the Japanese and aliens were on screen.

What sucked was that here the earth is, at the very least, accidentally hit by a large formation of objects from space, yet, the whole of Pearl Harbor is out doing stuipid crap like playing baseball, going about their normal routine etc.  The film-makers wanted it to seem like the attack was out-of-the-blue, but this was not the Imperial Naval surprise attack launched in 1941, at least a day has passed since first contact, and Marines at Kaneohe Bay looked like their only concern was wiping the wings on their aircraft, and the RIMPAC exercises were going on as scheduled, in other words, it was an SOP/BAU type of day, with no one even the slightest bit concerned by the fact that 25,000 people just got vaporized in Hong Kong . . . . hardly.   I can overlook special-effects and twisting science, but I can’t overlook that kind of storyline gaffe.

But, once you overlook the things like the fact that someone from the bridge would be sent out to investigate a giant monolith in the ocean . . . and NOT a SEAL team (just so they can consistently show Rihanna looking like a bad-ass), or the fact that a PT boat could just mosey on up to that same monolith and go unscathed when it decides to unleash hell, or the fact that . . . actually, let’s just throw facts right the hell out the porthole and enjoy the film.  Because if facts is what you are after, steer clear of this movie.  Let me say again, if facts are what you are after, steer clear . . . you may have a heart attack otherwise.

Now that those pesky facts are gone, here is what I did enjoy very much.  One of the standout heroes of the film, Colonel Canales was portrayed by an actual Wounded Warrior, Gregory D. Gadson, who is out hiking, you know, a day after the earth is invaded, with Alex’s girl, she is his physical therapist.  The film-makers did a nice job using him in a way that was credible, for the most part, but during his big face-off with one of the aliens, I heard the guy next to me say . . . “Oh, come on!”  But, it was already established, this movie was merely a sailor’s wet-dream, a fantasy in every sense of the word.  So, I just laughed, because by this point I was interested to see just how insanely creative Director Peter Berg and writers, the brothers Hoeber, could get.

Suffice to say, when a mighty old friend from our past has to join the fray, I was amused, amazed and moved.  That is exactly how the film played out for me all night actually, it was just entertaining badassery salted with complete UBBS – but still a great film to just plug-in to some six year old’s imagination, as you realize Peter Berg essentially just turned the Pacific Ocean into his own personal bathtub, and we got to watch him play with some incredible bath toys. It was another one of these films that was bad-ass and shouldn’t be dissected by nit-wits like me.  Just enjoy it!  I hope Hasbro does get inspired to create some other titles in the future, I mean, wouldn’t Battle Beasts the movie be freakin’ sweet?!?  Also, stick around after the credits . . . I smell a sequel.

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Sacha Baron Cohen, back in the US and A…  Brace yourselves…

The H-Bomb:  Admiral General Aladeen (Sacha Baron Cohen) is the leader of Wadiya, a fictional country located somewhere in North Africa.  Sporting a signature beard that he was born with, and an immaculate white military uniform, he spends his days having his underlings killed for the slightest of reasons and his nights bedding Hollywood’s hottest celebrities.  Facing the threat of sanctions against his made-up nation over his nuclear program that he swears “is being developed for peaceful purposes,” Aladeen decides to travel to the United Nations in New York City to address the general assembly.

Soon after arriving in the Big Apple, Aladeen is kidnapped out of his hotel suite by John C. Reilly, who then proceeds to torture him in the most inhumane way imaginable…  by cutting off his signature sacred beard.  Aladeen manages to escape, and soon discovers that ranking members of his government have staged a coup, and that a double has taken his place at the U.N.  Aladeen attempts to tell the guards at the U.N. who he is, but to no avail.  He then listens in horror as his slow-witted double promises to reform and turn Wadiya into a democracy and will sign a treaty making it official in a few days time.

That gives our “beloved oppressor” a few days time to reclaim his identity and prevent his country from being stolen out from under him (that’s how he sees it, at least).  Eventually, he is aided by some new age hippie chick (Anna Faris) who owns a green, non-profit grocery store that will be catering the U.N. event, thus giving Aladeen a way to sneak into the building.  The only hiccup is, aside from this girl’s hairy armpits, is that she is an avid anti-Aladeen activist, and if she discovered his true identity, it could mean more trouble for our deposed tyrant on the lam.  Raunchy, audacious, gleefully politically incorrect hi-jinx, as well as cultural learnings of America for make benefit glorious nation of Wadiya ensue.

The Dictator is pretty much exactly what you would expect from Sacha Baron Cohen and Larry Charles, the actor and director who graced the world with Borat and Bruno.  It’s filled with that same kind of “wrong” humor that can make us wince just as much as it can make us laugh.  It is an equal opportunity offender that sticks it to just about every culture in existence; Middle Eastern, America, Asian, it don’t matter.  If there’s one thing to be learned from watching these films, it’s that nothing is taboo for Cohen and Charles.

Unlike Borat and Bruno, this is a feature film, with a script and actors in every single role, as opposed to the quasi-documentaries that those earlier movies were.  And because of that, The Dictator has, unfortunately, substantially less bite.  In Borat and Bruno, we saw this ridiculous character going up to real people in the real world, and it was their honest reactions to this nut that helped make those movies as funny (and uncomfortable) as they were.  Now, I understand why they dropped that approach, as Cohen has just become too damn famous to be able to trick people anymore, but still, it has lost a certain something-something because of that.

That is, however, not to say that The Dictator is not a funny movie, because it is.  It’s often hysterical, with Cohen’s Aladeen making the sexist, racist, anti-Semitic statements that we’ve come to expect from one of his characters.  Aladeen is basically Borat, if Borat were the leader of a country.  For people with a taste for this kind of thing, there is a lot to make them split a gut over.  For me, the highlights included a scene that involved a woman giving birth and a cell phone, another in which Aladeen discovers the sacred art of self-gratification, and my personal favorite, one that’s shown partially in the trailers, Aladeen and one of his followers terrorizing a couple of tourists on a helicopter.

There are times, however, when the humor goes from being provocatively subversive to downright tasteless, such as when Aladeen is playing a first-person-shooter videogame called “The Munich Olympics”, in which, as you may have guessed, he controls a terrorist running around a dorm gunning down Israeli athletes.  At the screening I attended, that gag was met with an uncomfortable murmur instead of laughter.  Another bit that doesn’t work is a running joke in which Aladeen was constantly making up aliases for himself by reading them off of nearby signs.

But overall, the funny does outweigh the unfunny in The Dictator.  After all, how many movies are there where you get to see Ben Kingsley kiss another man’s armpits?  Or have Megan Fox spoof her own image in such a candid way?  In fact, there are a surprising number of celebrity cameos, including Edward Norton in what has to be the most demeaning role of his career.  To sum it up, if you’re the kind of person who was offended by Borat and Bruno, then you do not want to see The Dictator, because it is very crude, very rude, and goes places that other comedies would never ever dare (making jokes about African child soldiers and molesting 14 year-old boys), and what else would you expect from a film that starts off with the dedication “In loving memory of Kim Jong-Il?”

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“If a man can become a monster, then a monster can become a man.”

Swift shot:  Freaky, weird, romantic, it’s all Burton and Depp.  A tragic love story set across time, where all magical and maniacal things are possible.  Where I found it lacking was in the ensemble concept, a lot of the characters got dashed away, like storylines hurled from the craggy rocks to the terrible tides below.  But because this two hour film is based on a series that ran for five years in the 60′s  and 70′s, I was expecting a bit of the characters to be lost.  A full running series rarely, if ever, translates into a brilliant film.

The series was a kind of campy, melodrama, soap-opera with dark creatures.  I saw it playing on Sci-Fi (back when it was still called that) about twenty years ago, but it never really got more than a few minutes of my time.  So, I am no authority on Dark Shadows, but I did hear that the original Barnabas Collins actor, Jonathon Frid passed away last month, Friday the 13th – which that in itself is creepy.  I’ll be kind and not draw on any comparisons to Depp here.

It’s 1750, Liverpool, a few hundred years before a little rock band would grace our delicate shores.  The Collins family, fish mongers, decide to set up a whole town in America.  Barnabas is only a boy when they leave England behind forever on a great ship heading to Maine.  He is a decent lad, and he has already caught the eye of a little girl who is of lower class and also sets sail on the great ship to America.  His life is charmed, to say the least, he is essentially royalty, as his family’s glorious Collinwood is constructed as he becomes a young man.  Now a young woman, his admirer, Angelique (Eva Green) has developed into a beauty, but she has some dark thoughts when Barnabas (Depp) falls in love with the stunning Josette (Bella Heathcote).  In fact she decides to punish him in the worst way possible, reminding us there are fates worse than death . . . when you are in love, life itself can be a tragedy.

Angelique has trapped him in his own body, never to know the release of death and to endure the pain of losing the one he loves . . . endlessly.  After he is shut in a coffin, fate intervenes and in 1972, he is released in his name’s sake Collinsport, Maine.  Collinwood, the majestic domicile to the Collins clan that he watched his parents construct has been reduced to a veritable ruins.  But, after he makes himself known to the lady of the manor, Elizabeth (Michelle Pfeiffer) and she discovers his secret, she decides to let him stay . . . provided he never harms anyone in the house, or in the family.

The family consists of Elizabeth’s half-witted brother, Roger Collins, played quite well by the full-witted Johnny Lee Miller.  Roger is a widower, and barely tolerates his son’s existence.  His son, David (Gulliver McGrath) keeps letting on that he sees his dead mother, and the family has hired (at this point) the live in psychiatrist Dr. Julia Hoffman (Helena Bonham Carter).  The wonderfully spoiled pup of the family, Carolyn (Chloe Grace Moretz) keeps us in a constant state of reminder that this is the 1970′s.  In her entrance, she even plays Season of the Witch, which is a prelude of dark things to come.  So, here is where I say everything gets lost, you also have the mysterious new addition, other than Barnabas, to the manor in Victoria Winters (Heathcote again).  On the music, it and Collinwood are characters of the film as well.

So, with all these characters running around, the story of each character gets underdone at best.  The focus, rightfully so, is on Barnabas and his adjusting to the modern world, and the hilarity ensues.  Sure, you will laugh at the antics and the odd choices Barnabas makes.  But, never forget, he is a monster, and Burton and screen-writer Seth Grahame-Smith make sure that isn’t lost on the audience several times.

Barnabas has hidden treasures that he uses to finance his fishing empire anew, and he employs some of his bag of tricks to ensure that the townsfolk are his willing staff.  This royally pisses off the rival fish tycoon, Angie who bears a striking resemblance to Angelique.  No spoiler here, it is her, she is a witch and she is still in love with Barnabas.  She allows him to play at fish monger again, but she always reminds him he is a monster and she really, really wants to get physical.  In one of the best scenes of the movie, there is a sure to be talked about “love” scene between the two.  Eventually the two fish figure out they can’t co-exist in the same pond, and the inevitable big showdown comes out.

If you loved 70′s music, like a little retro vampire action and are a huge fan of the quirky combo of Burton/Depp required staples, i.e. always wearing a ton of face makeup and with very deliberate physical acting, where Depp is really almost dancing in every scene . . . and of course steals every scene, this is your film.  It is part love story, part horror and all quirky fun.  I just wish I knew a lot more about the characters, other than Depp and Green, I very much felt like I wasn’t connecting to the other characters.  Gulliver, as David did have a few powerful scenes, but we learned so little about the boy that those parts felt tacked on ultimately.

To be sure, every actor brought their best work, and Green did this really creepy thing with her voice that sent a chill up my spine.  She was the best witch I have seen on screen in a long time.  And, yes, I am over sparkling vampires and bare-chested werewolves, it was refreshing to see a completely horrific and believable daughter-of-Lucifer on the silver screen again.

(1 People gave this 5.00 out of 5)

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In “The Lucky One”, the latest film adaptation of a Nicholas Sparks book (which I have not read), Zac Efron plays a former Marine who, after three tours in Iraq, ends up in Louisiana to find the woman whose picture he thinks was his lucky charm which kept him safe during the war.

While in Iraq, Logan (Efron) picks up a photograph that is on the ground amidst some rubble.  The simple act of reaching for that picture saves his life, as a bomb goes off nearby which doesn’t kill him, because he wasn’t within the bomb’s radius.  Later, while still in Iraq, his vehicle is attacked and he is the only survivor.

Once he arrives home (Colorado I believe) he finds it hard to adjust to civilian life, and he is haunted by his memories of the war.  He becomes obsessed with finding the woman in the picture so he walks, yes walks, to Louisiana with his dog (he recognized where the photo was taken by a landmark in the background, a lighthouse which he compared to lighthouses on the internet to find the one he was looking for) and, after showing the picture and asking around, he finds Beth and her family’s business, a dog kennel.  Beth misunderstands Logan’s arrival and thinks he is applying for a job, which he accepts in order to get to know Beth better.

Beth and her son Ben (Riley Thomas Stewart) live with Beth’s grandmother Ellie (the always delightful Blythe Danner) in a big old house right next to the kennel.  Unfortunately, Beth’s ex-husband also Ben’s father Keith (Jay R. Ferguson) also lives in town.  They married right after high school, when Beth got pregnant (how often does that end up working out??) and they couldn’t make it work so they split up.  Keith is not very nice and he is always threatening to take Ben away from Beth.

While spending time with Beth, Logan finds it hard to keep his secret.  I kept wishing that he would have told her right at the beginning, because  keeping secrets is never a good idea!!  It turns out that the photograph belonged to someone close to Beth who did not make it out of Iraq alive (which is why her picture was in the rubble).

I pretty much always like Zac Efron in any role he plays, and I look forward to seeing more of him because he only gets better with age.  I haven’t seen Taylor Schilling in anything before so she was pretty much an unknown to me, but she was good in the role.  Riley Thomas Stewart and Blythe Danner also gave good performances.

Overall a decent film, women and teenage girls will likely enjoy it more than the men.  It had enough sappy romance to keep us entertained and some steamy love scenes as well!!

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Quoth the H-Man . . . who cares?

The H-Bomb:  In this fictionalized take on the “mysterious final days” of Edgar Allen Poe (John Cusack), which depicts the macabre writer as a penniless, boorish drunk who constantly belittles his piers and hasn’t written anything of worth in quite some time.  The only bright spot in his life, aside from his beloved pet raccoon, is his romance with the lovely Emily Hamilton (Alice Eve), whom he intends to marry, despite the very vocal objections of her powerful father (Brendan Gleason).

Then one day Poe is approached by the young and “infamous” Detective Fields (Luke Evans), who is investigating the double murder of a mother and daughter that was carried out in the exact same manner that was described in one of Poe’s stories.  Initially, Poe is the prime suspect, but as more and more murders take place, again lifted directly out of Poe’s writings, he is eventually cleared of the crimes and asked to assist in the investigation.  The expected cat and mouse game ensues as the killer leaves grim clues and Poe tries to anticipate his next move.

The stakes are raised when Poe’s fiancé is abducted by the madman and, naturally, the investigation becomes personal for him.  Now Poe is desperate and must use all of his wits to find Emily, who is buried alive somewhere, before her time runs out.  This all sounds pretty damn interesting, doesn’t it?

Well, what does seem like an interesting premise on paper, is rendered mediocre and plodding in The Raven, the latest from director James McTeigue (V for Vendetta, Ninja Assassin), a filmmaker I’m becoming less and less interested in with each passing project.  Here, he takes a genuinely cool sounding idea and, to a large extent, squanders it by turning it into a fairly pedestrian police procedural, set in the olden days, no less, with clunky exposition and sluggish pacing.

It’s not a total loss, however, as Cusack’s commanding performance as the legendary writer-turned-detective, whether drunkenly ranting or feverishly trying to piece together the puzzle, does hold our attention and keep the film from falling apart completely.  At first he seemed over-the-top, but his fiery, earnest turn gradually won me over, and he kept me invested even when the script itself did not.  Though he did ultimately nail his performance, a thing that kept nagging me as I watched Cusack, is that he looked way too healthy for a guy who was just a couple of whiskey shots away from drinking himself to death.

McTeigue’s vision of 1800’s Baltimore as a dark, shadowy, foreboding place was effective in setting up the appropriate gloomy atmosphere, and some of the set pieces, including an ambush at a masquerade ball, and a chase through the backstage of a theatre, were both well executed and exciting.  But most everything else is just a slog to sit through.  Poe’s big sit down confrontation with the killer, whose reveal is a big “so what,” is overblown and just plain silly. It’s one of those obligatory scenes where the bad guy takes ten minutes to explain to the hero what he did and why he did it, just so the audience will get it.  Lame.

Add on to that a final scene that feels tacked on and less than necessary, and what we end up with is a film that isn’t exactly bad (again, Cusack carries this motherfucker a long way), but given the inherent intrigue of its premise, it’s underwhelming at best.  For me, The Raven was particularly disappointing, as I truly did want to like it, and it feels like forever since I’ve reviewed a decent film (does this stream of mediocrity have no end???).  It’s definitely not one that needs to be seen on the big screen, but it could make an okay Net watch someday.  Or, come to think of it, your time would probably be better spent actually reading some Edgar Allen Poe, instead.

(1 People gave this 5.00 out of 5)

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“Freedom is life’s great lie.” — Loki of Asgard.

Swift shot:  This was the best film I have reviewed since claiming the Rick Swift title!  When you were a little kid dreaming of making a film, The Avengers is the film you were dreaming about making.  Joss Whedon has again done the incredible on film, bringing together some of the strongest, or remarkable people in Hollywood to create a film that will stand the test of time and will be measured as the finest action film ever put on screen!  I am calling it the Gone With the Wind of comic-book movies.

The trickster, demi-god, Loki (Tom Hiddleston) is in a void in the darkest regions of space, and to capture the throne of humanity, he has made a deal with a dark force of aliens to obtain the mysterious tesseract cube.  It is this mysterious cube that ties in the other Marvel films, Captain America and Thor specifically.  But, if you missed either film, you won’t be lost much, as they manage to bring everyone up to speed as the Avengers . . . assemble.

Loki teleports to Earth using the tesseract cube and quickly “recruits” S.H.I.E.L.D. agents into his devious fold.  One of the Avengers is “un-made” and then “re-made” to serve Loki.  Remember, he is a god, so he has all manner of tricks up his sleeve for dealing with puny human minds.  Even the strongest of hearts are susceptible to his mind-control.  Loki wants to essentially free humans from their one true fault, free-will.  See, he figures that only a strong leader can unite humanity under his rule, only then will they find peace.  But, really, he just wants to subjugate humanity, or Earth, because his ‘brother’ Thor (Chris Hemsworth) is sworn to protect it and us.  It was interesting, at one point you saw brother fighting brother to determine if slavery was acceptable . . . like our U.S. Civil War.  Not sure if that was intentional, but it was a nice touch for history nerds like me to appreciate either way.

After Loki makes his grand appearance, Nick Fury (Samuel Jackson) realizes that the planet is very much at war with a force they are embarrassingly under-prepared to deal with.  As the leader of S.H.I.E.L.D., with his plucky, ALWAYS polite, Agent Phil Coulson (Clark Gregg) and his lethally sexy, lady in leather, Agent Hill (Cobie Smulders), Fury determines it is time to count on heroes . . . what he calls the Avengers initiative.  Left with little options, he tries to bring them all together under the S.H.I.E.L.D. banner.  As I mentioned, one of the heroes was brain-washed to serve Loki, so he is out of the picture.  Fury recruits Natasha Romanoff (Scarlett Johansson) also known as The Widow, or more specifically, Black Widow to gather up a gamma radiation specialist, Dr. Bruce Banner (Mark Ruffalo), who has some slight anger issues but immediately understands the capacity for power the tesseract holds.  But, as the team soon learns, maybe clean energy isn’t the only thing holding S.H.I.E.L.D.’s interest with the cube.

Reluctantly, Captain Steve Rogers (Chris Evans) who has just been sleeping for 70 years, also gets pulled into another war.  The one real stand-out would have been Tony Stark, Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.) but even he has to pull away from the gorgeously jean-shorted Pepper (Gwneyth Paltrow) to assist S.H.I.E.L.D. when he sees how high the stakes are, from his recently created Stark Tower, using an arc-reactor to run on pure, clean energy.  [Swift aside, Pepper and her shorts may be the only reason I would give to see this one in 3D, as I did.  3D is just not a big draw for me, I can live with it or without it, either way - so don't ask me about that]

How each member is recruited is right out of the comic panels, lots of character nods to the classic books are in there, with some new funny twists to tie into the recent Marvel films mentioned above.  There are so many quick one-liners and so much attention to detail that you will miss things on the first screening, so you have to see this film at least twice.  And, really, this is one of the few films I would pay money to see in theaters more than once.  The recruitment sequences lead up to the required hero vs. hero battles that I am not overly fond of in comic books, but watching them via Whedon-vision ala ILM, well, even I had to appreciate the green on green combat.  By my take, you had Thor vs. Iron Man, Thor vs. Hulk, Captain America vs. Iron Man/Thor, Black Widow vs. Hulk, and well, pretty much they are the worst team ever assembled and I am sure I missed one or two battles there.  But it isn’t until one of the heroes falls that they finally stand up to become THE AVENGERS!

The plot is simple, aliens are invading the Earth, led by a twisted misguided god, but even he isn’t the ultimate puppet-master.  There is one revealed during the film, but another sinister influence is behind the real test of humanity, and that doesn’t get revealed til AFTER the end credits, so, yes, stick around.  And, if you took the time to read my whole review, right here is where I tell you to stick around til the FINAL credits for one little amusing scene for the die-hards who do stick around.  I just hope Marvel and all these great team-members assemble again to give us another Avengers film in the near future, featuring some new faces, new enemies, and the same old awesomeness that we have come to expect from this glorious franchise!

I could literally write a book about why I loved this film so much, so let me attempt some brevity for your sake.  From the minute you see the Paramount scroll, there is a tingle in your spine, it is finally here, that moment almost five years in the making . . . The Avengers.  The opening sequence starts right out with the action, as Loki introduces himself to S.H.I.E.L.D. and pretty much destroys everything in the process.  The explosions and implosions are seamlessly painted onto the silver canvass as only Industrial Light & Magic (ILM) can pull off.  From that moment on, you are, pardon the cliche, blown away by the special effects.  The action is almost non-stop, with just enough spacing in between to let you catch your breath and take in all the lightning paced one-liners from Stark or others.  The colors and sounds and miracle of movie making are used to such an incredible balance that is like watching a living work of violent art play out seemingly just for you.  The only time you even become aware of the fact you are in a theater is when the crowd busts out in applause, which happened seven times at my screening.  You know a film is good when people are very interactive yet shutting the hell up because they don’t want to miss anything on screen.

Where other action films failed, The Avengers fills in the gap for a team story, which is hard to balance, because all of the characters could (and obviously some did) have their own films.  Much like any great franchise, Marvel’s Avengers is the gift that keeps giving to expand our imaginations and push the limits of what a film can deliver.  We are all very lucky to be able to see this one in theaters, again it is the Gone With the Wind of comic-book films.  It was bad-ass!  Yes that’s it . . . remember being a kid and saying that about some great action film?  That is how I felt walking out . . . MAN THAT WAS BAD-ASS!!!!  If you don’t see this one in theaters . . . dude (or dudette), just, what the hell is your excuse!?!  Assemble your team and see it today!!

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Sometimes you just gotta take a bite.

Swift shot: Predictably silly, romantic comedy, heavier on the romance than the comedy – but still worth a halfhearted bite or two.  Jason Segel co-wrote the screenplay with his The Muppets friend Nicholas Stoller.  Starring his favorite actor, himself, Segel works opposite the incredibly sophisticated, classy yet charmingly goofy Emily Blunt.

Tom (Segel) is a very successful sous-chef at a swank restaurant in San Francisco, and he is madly in love with Violet (Blunt) whom he met at a create your own super-hero costume party.  He was the giant “Super Bunny” she was Princess Diana.  And, yes, the film explains why that counted at a create your own super-hero party.  He is all set to propose to Violet, life is good, things are about to settle where they need to, it’s New Year’s Eve, he has an elaborate proposal dinner planned.  And, of course, no spoiler here, Violet accepts.

Violet is a true-blue Brit, and she has her family from London come to the Drunken Pig for a comical engagement dinner with some toasts that should pull a few laughs . . . I laughed anyway.  Violet’s sister, Suzie (Alison Brie) is a complete wreck, yet one of my favorite characters in the film.  Again, no spoiler here, she hooks up with Tom’s friend, Alex (Chris Pratt) at the engagement party.

All is just wonderful, as Violet hopes she will get picked up by Berkley [Ptooey] to begin her psychology graduate work.  Ah, life, she is a cruel, heartless bitch, and much to everyone’s chagrin, Violet gets accepted to . . . Slime University, oh, I mean Michigan.  It is only for two years, tops, so Tom “happily” moves to Michigan with his fiancee.  Suzie is soon under the odd tutelage of Professor Winton Childs (Rhys Ifans) the wacky Welshman who is eager to test the patience of adults, using a test similar to one where children are told they can have one marshmallow now or wait 20 minutes and get two marshmallows.  Suzie devises an interesting experiment using stale doughnuts.  Soon the movie becomes an analogy for the experiment.

You get your requisite fish-out-of-water tomfoolery, as Tom tries to get hired at several restaurants, to no avail.  But, fans of some adult-swim shows will be treated to a few cameos.  I guess I shouldn’t ruin it, but you may miss it, so pay attention during the job-hunting scenes.  Anyway, Tim, I mean, Tom never lands anything prestigious like he had in San Francisco, and soon he embraces all that, must be, Michigan life.  He becomes a living Sasquatch, which were some of the scenes I found the funniest.

Ultimately, Suzie’s stint in Michigan is prolonged, again, no spoiler there, I did mention it was a predictable story.  Tom and Suzie finally have a falling out and maybe this whole engagement idea was just a dream.  Maybe love isn’t enough to be with someone, maybe geography and careers, and all the other bullshit in life gets in the way.  Or, maybe, somehow Tom and Suzie manage to somehow make it despite all the obstacles.  I won’t give that away either, but in the end, will Tom, or Suzie, choose the stale doughnut or wait til something better, something perfect comes along?

If you like quirky, romantic comedies I would say this one definitely had me laughing, or at least grinning, throughout most of its run time, but it plays heavy on character comedy.  With a ton of NBC cast-members, the whole thing should feel funny and familiar.  There are some pretty shocking adult themes in this film, so leave the kids at home.  While Segel remained clothed throughout The Muppets, not so much in this film.  And, it is HEAVY on the raunchy and deliberately gross many times.

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A collage of “Indie” clichés.

The H-Bomb:  Enoch (Henry Hopper) is your basic indie film protagonist; a sensitive young man with a tragic family history who’s lost and directionless and full of angst, yada, yada, yada.   He’s in between schools for reasons we’re told late in the film (not that it really matters) and his favorite past times include crashing the funerals of complete strangers and playing Battleship with his best friend, Hiroshi (Ryo Kase), who just happens to be the ghost of a WWII Japanese Kamikaze pilot… just take a moment and let that last bit sink in.  Ready to move on?  Okay.

One day, while crashing a funeral, Enoch meets a girl named Annabel (Mia Wasikowska).  Now much in the way that Enoch is our typical indie film leading man, Annabel is our typical indie film leading lady; she’s sweet, free spirited, into nature (including bugs and birds), is not necessarily drop dead gorgeous, but attractive enough to make us smitten with her, and, of course, she is the only person on the planet who can relate to our spastic weirdo of a protagonist. (This is the exact kind of character Zooey Deschanel would’ve played had the movie been made some 4-5 years ago)

Enoch and Annabel have a few meetings before they really hit it off, but eventually they bond over their conversations about funeral crashing, funeral attire, musical instruments, and I forget what else.  Then, right before this predictably quirky relationship can really hit its stride, Annabel drops an A-Bomb…  she’s got cancer and she only has three months to live.  Enoch takes this news remarkably well and continues the relationship in which they converse with Hiroshi the ghost, throw rocks at passing trains, go trick or treating, memorize facts from bird books, along with other such activities that I would most definitely engage in if I knew I was going to keel over in three months time.

Restless, which came out quietly last Fall, is Un Film du Gus Van Sant, a director most people will know from Good Will Hunting, but who I like more for My Own Private Idaho and Elephant.  I won’t do a full run down of his career, I’ll just say he’s had his share of solid films (Milk) and not-so-solid (Psycho remake), and that he’s one of those directors whose films I will go out of my way to see.  And now that I have gone way out of my way to see Restless, I can say that it is a movie that rightly went in and out of theaters with little notice, as the movie going public missed absolutely nothing when it flew underneath their radars.

Independent films over the last few years, particularly independent romantic dramedies, have developed their own aesthetic, become basically their own genre, with their own set of clichés; and aside from the ones already laid out, we are also treated to such staples as the typical indie soundtrack.  It’s hard to describe, really… it’s the kind of music that has a lot of bouncy, boinging noises in it, the kind that’s spunky, playful, grating, and just weird.  It also features cinematography that is nice but self-consciously artsy, chock full of pretty, perfectly composed pictures of our heroes drawing chalk lines around themselves, and overall, a whimsical vibe that’s meant to be endearing but just comes off as smug.

What I have just described is more or less the whole of Gus Van Sant’s Restless, a stereotypical check list of modern “independent” movie clichés, and in describing it, hopefully, I have taken away any and all interest you might have had in actually seeing this irritatingly self-satisfied wank-fest.  It is basically, weird boy meets weird girl, they have weird relationship, in which they have one boring, pretentious conversation after another, and then she, and I’m not spoiling a thing, dies of her cancer.  And it’s no biggie when Annabel does die, because she’s made peace with that and goes out with a smile, and we should all just party when she kicks the bucket, because that’s what she would want.

Plus, you know what’s really nice about her cancer, it’s that special kind of movie cancer, the kind that allows her to look all cute and pixie-like right up until the bitter end.  Ya know, unlike real cancer, where people are usually bald from chemo, deathly thin, and look like they’re being eaten away from the inside out, which, by they way, Mr. Van Sant, is what happens to real people with real cancer, fuck you very much!

But I don’t mean to get so hot under the collar, because Restless, which is inexplicably co-produced by Ron and Bryce Dallas Howard, is not a completely awful movie, it’s just an awfully annoying one with its overly familiar, oh-so-hip art house vibe.  Usually, at least the actors would help make things a little bearable, but here, we get Hopper (son of Dennis), who displays absolutely none of his late father’s charismatic intensity, and instead just mopes through this flick like a drippy little emo punk you just want to beat the shit out of on general principle.  In other words, I didn’t like him.

Then there’s Wasikowska (good thing this is a written review, so I wouldn’t have to try and butcher that), who does manage to be appealing in a way, but again, her character is the stock indie chick in a film that is made up entirely of stock indie film ingredients.  I wouldn’t be harping on this so much if it wasn’t so damn true!  Add onto that it’s never charming, never moving, nor does it ever ring emotionally true even once in it’s ninety-something minutes (and even that slim running time feels too long).  With all that, Restless adds up to nothing more than one a big, fat, obnoxious cliché of independent cinema that absolutely is not worth anyone’s time of day.

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Click here for our exclusive sit-down with the Dancing Damsel herself, Greta Gerwig!

Damsels in Distress makes the long waited, and somewhat anticipated return of Whit Stillman to writing/directing. The last time he made a film was 1998’s The Last Days of Disco. Stillman has always been known for his, pardon the pun, witty writing style and character development; and Damsels in Distress harkens that same feel once again. Don’t let the title fool you, there is nothing distressing about this movie; unless you walk in to see a movie and a musical breaks out.

Damsels in Distress starts off at what can only be considered an East Coast University that until recently had been an all male institution. The notion of a school only recently becoming coed is a different take, especially since we don’t get an exact time frame of when the movie takes place. The movie follows mainly three girls who are close friends; Violet (Greta Gerwig) who is the undeclared leader of the trio, Rose (Megalyn Echikunwoke), and Heather (Carrie MacLemore). These girls are out to change the way the school is and make it more accepting to women like themselves. They come upon a transfer student, Lily (Analeigh Tipton) and take her under their wing. The girls decide that the mood of the university is much too bleak, and the best way to change things around is to start a suicide prevention center; the method of choice is of course . . . tap dancing.

Violet, Rose, and Heather show Lily the way they believe life and love should manifest in society. This is a rather interesting take due to the dialogue and how everything plays out throughout the movie. Violet seemingly has her way mapped out, but deep down inside she is really quite lost. The way she speaks is quite elegant, and almost seems as if she takes the Shakespeare phrase “All the world is a stage” entirely literally.

Violet believes that most women date men who will appear to make them look better and increase their stature; she doesn’t agree with this theory and believes that women should improve a man’s stature in life and appearance by merely teaching them, and also being seen with them. This is an interesting take for me, because it seems that this is the way society actually looks at relationships from both genders. The way the dialogue was written and performed adds something that is missing from most movies recently.

Lily slowly takes what she is learning and believes she has gained the greater understanding of everything, that is until she meets a man unlike any other she has ever met, Charlie (Adam Brody). As Lily comes into her own, Violet admits that she’s not really depressed, but in a tailspin of her life. This comes with the realization that her boyfriend, whom she is trying to change, Frank (Ryan Metcalf) seduces another girl.

Throughout the movie we meet an interesting collection of characters that all seem to fit in their own way. Rose and Heather seem to have difficulties of their own as well. Taking Violet’s advice doesn’t seem to help either of them due to the fact that most of the men at the university have dating skills not seen since Cro-Magnon man. This is where the title comes into play.

The girls all seem to have their heads firmly on their shoulders, but when they attempt to put into play what they believe in, all that comes out is putting their own lives in distress. This adds depth to the movie in a way that is intriguing. Most viewers might see this as a stretch to keep the comedy alive, but the way the script is written and the way the actors portray their roles really adds humor and depth. While some might consider it silly humor or going in for cheap laughs, it really gives off the sense of meaning in the way everything is structured.

This movie certainly isn’t for everybody. There will always be a certain sect of the audience that will shun a movie such as Damsels in Distress. I found myself caught in the middle. Some of things felt a little over-the-top and contrived, but the humor and portrayal really added something that some might miss out on. There is also the plot line which comes across as a conceivably “what the hell” type of a storyline. Also, leaving out when the movie takes place adds some distraction, but you do get a vague sense.  It was enjoyable and is just a fun film to watch when you want a few good laughs, or just want to get away from the normal doldrums of some of the current films of the day.

Overall, I say if you have the chance to see it, take it; you might walk away with a spring in your step or at least with some memorable lines and a few unforgettable characters.