In all of my nearly 25 years, I had never cried in a movie. I had tried several times, when I felt I was close to crying in some sadder scenes, I tried to force tears, yet no tears rolled down my cheek. Until tonight.
Zach Braff's "Wish I Was Here" isn't particularly sad. In fact, it's quite funny. But the reality of being faced with the probability of abandoning your dreams hits close to home, so I found it particularly easy to connect with Braff's character.
Braff plays Aidan Bloom, a husband and a father of two whose family is struggling financially while he attempts to follow his dreams of becoming an actor, but has seen little more than one part in a commercial. All the while, his father stops paying for his grandchildren to go to a Jewish Private School due to financial and health complications in his own life. Aidan takes it upon himself to begin home schooling his children in an unconventional way, while also cleaning up his own life.
With the poor reviews this film has been getting, it makes me wonder. Perhaps I just saw this movie at the right time in my life, or perhaps most film critics are just so cynical, they hate movies that have the audacity to suggest that maybe instead of complaining and feeling sorry for ourselves, we should instead enjoy life as it happens.
"A film that tells us to enjoy life? This is one critic
who wishes he wasn't here." -Cynical Critic, because that's
the stupid shit they say.
This movie is probably not for everyone, and I won't be surprised if a lot of you don't like it or just think that it's OK. But in my non-professional opinion, it was pretty damn good…
A lot of people wanted to see this movie to see Jennifer Aniston strip. I wanted to see it to see the white kid rap! And some RON SWANSON!!!
You can gather what "We're the Millers" is about from the trailer. It is a raunchy comedy following a drug dealer, a stripper, a homeless girl and a super dooper white kid on a major drug smuggling mission. Hilarity inn sues. Especially when Ron F***ing Swanson shows up!
Honestly, I thought this would be one of those movies where all of the funny parts are in the trailer. And apart from Nick Offerman and Will Poulter (White kid, "Son of Ranbow"), I'm not a huge fan of anyone in this movie. But it exceeded my expectations.
I'm gonna take this moment to ask a question. Do I seem like a broken record. I feel like I say the same stuff for every movie. Perhaps I just have a smaller vocabulary than previously thought, but I just don't know how else to describe these movies. Oh, well.
Anyway, this movie had me laughing throughout and even pumping my fist in celebration at some moments. Not many movies can do that.
Go see it. Or else... Nothing will happen, but still, go see it.
I think it's safe to say that the reason the first "Despicable Me" was so popular was because of the minions. The hundreds of little yellow three stooges-esque guys had some of the funniest parts in the last one, and I think the studio got the message. They were a lot more prominent this time around.
In this hilarious sequel, Gru is hired by the Anti-Villain League to find out who has stolen a serum from a lab in Antarctica... actually the whole lab, not just the serum. The serum changes cute, little things into giant, coked out purple monsters! Kind of like if the Incredible Hulk and a crack-head had a child together. Gru sets up surveillance in the local mall and hunts down the villain all while trying to raise his newly adopted daughters, all the while, the minions start to disappear!
They did what to Kevin?!
As with the first one, the real selling points of this movie are the minions. Every scene they have is hilarious and even overshadows Agnes' adorableness. They sing songs on multiple occasions and there is even a cameo of Boyz 2 Minions.
It's been a while since I've seen the first one, but everything I remember about it had to do with the minions. But I can't be sure which one is better.
Honestly, they should drop the whole act with Gru and the girls and just make a movie about the minions. I'd pay to see that. And I don't have to pay.
Overall, this was a fun movie. Anyone who saw this, did you notice the "World War Z" nod towards the end? Or am I crazy?
Let's say for conversations sake, if the scenario in "The Purge" were to be true, and all crimes including murder were to be legal for 12 hours one night out of the year, answer the following questions.
What is one thing you would steal?
Where would you loiter?
What other law would you break?
For me? I would steal as much Barq's and/or IBC Root Beet and Frozen Pizza as I could fit in my car. I would loiter outside of a Taco Bell and being from Pennsylvania, I would sleep on a refrigerator outdoors. (Possibly an internet myth, but hell, why not?)
You don't choose the thug life, the thug life chooses you!
"The Purge" takes place in America in the near future. "The New Founding Fathers" have created a day in which for twelve hours, all crime is legal. This was created with the idea that "The Purge", as they call it, will help people release all of their hate, and the other 8,748 hours in the year will be relatively crime free.
The Sandins, a wealthy family who are one of the few who are able to afford a state of the art security system that protects them from the annual Purge, find themselves in a pickle when their young son opens their home to a man running from a gang of purgers. These Purgers demand that the Sandins return their victim or they will break in and kill everyone.
This gentleman right here is too late. He already killed me with his smile and charm.
This is your typical, wacky-scenario horror movie in which no one thinks logically or unselfishly. The kind of movie that "The Cabin in the Woods" is poking fun at. Lets start from the beginning, shall we?
SPOILER ALERT: The rest of this post may be filled with spoilers, but I assure you, you can see everything coming from a mile away regardless.
The ridiculousness starts when Zoey Sandin, the teenage daughter's boyfriend breaks into their house before the security system is down. Zoey's Father doesn't like her boyfriend. So to fix this, her boyfriend gets the great idea to kill her Father as soon as the Purge begins, with the idea that she will still love him afterwards. I mean, we've all been there, am I right fellas?
Then, when the Father is trying to save his family by tying the man who his son saved to take him outside, people start acting like he's the bad guy. I mean, I understand it's messed up, sending a guy out to die in order to save your family, but ANY Father would do that. It doesn't mean he likes the fact that he's doing it, it just mean he doesn't want you to die, you ungrateful little bastards!
Ugh, why are you trying to save us, Dad? You're such a loser!
Becky's Dad would never try to save her!
And the way the gang breaks into the house? The chain the GIANT STEEL DOORS up to A PICK-UP TRUCK and RIP THEM OUT.... are they serious? How bad is this security system where it can't handle a pick up driving in reverse?
This movie was so predictable, I felt like I was just making it up as I was watching it. All except for Ethan Hawke and Rhys Wakefield (The Gang Leader) the acting was sub par. It wasn't particularly scary and it wasn't well written. But the people who made it are marketing geniuses. They made it for $3 Million, and it made just over $34 Million it's first weekend. I guess if you light any movie darkly and put scary music to it, you can walk away rich!
I'm gonna be honest with you guys. I thought this movie was gonna be terrible. I thought this was gonna be the worst animated film of the decade. I thought this was gonna make me want to gouge my eyes out. I know, a bit extreme, but I need to stress to you how little my hope was for this movie before I tell you this...
Never have I been so wrong.
"The Croods" is an animated film about a family of cave dwellers before the Ice Age. They are lead by a Father, voiced by Nicholas Cage, who is so afraid of their world that he only lets them out of the cave to find food. Of course this goes over well for everyone but the angst ridden teen that he is raising, voiced by Emma Stone.
Again, I failed you guys and I am writing this three months after watching it. I know I suck, and I'm sorry. Anyway, Something that I can't remember causes them to leave their cave and they go on quite possibly, the worlds first road trip. On this road trip you may or may not laugh, cry smile depending on if you have a heart or not.
For those of you who know him, doesn't this look like a
Cave Man version of Mike Egan?
This movie surprisingly has a lot of heart and good messages in it for how ridiculously goofy it is at times. It is a great example of how a family must keep together through everything, but at the same time should never keep them from achieving their dreams. With great lessons like that, it amazes me that there are people out there who don't let their kids watch TV or movies. You can learn so much from them.
Like how Sloths used to be used as belts... I'm sure that's a real thing.
I won't lie to you. Unless it is the old 2D animation, or Pixar is involved, I am skeptical about all animated Disney movies. I don't have any reason to be. the only movie of theirs I though was terrible was Bolt. The rest have been decent. But even with the highly anticipated Wreck-It Ralph, I wasn't anxious to see it. I had little expectations for it.
But there is no greater feeling than when you are proven wrong about a movie you expect to be bad. Arguably, it's even better than a movie you're excited for meeting your expectations.
Essentially telling the fictional untold story of Donkey Kong, Wreck-It Ralph tells the story of Ralph, voiced ever so fittingly by John C. Reilly, an arcade game villain who has been the bad guy for 30 years and ignored by his peers. He is tired of living in the shadows of his "nemesis" Fix-It Felix, voiced Jack McBrayer and wants to be accepted by the other characters in his game. To do so, he "game jumps" in an attempt to win a metal. But this puts his game in jeopardy of being unplugged. So Felix must find Ralph, or Ralph must get his metal before it's to late.
I'm not a huge gamer, but this movie had a bunch of references to games that you don't have to play video games to understand. It is an interesting take on the old adage "the villain is the hero in his own story".
