The Lone Ranger

I had some friends who were lucky enough to work on this movie. Unfortunately, they didn't receive credits, but it must have been a hell of an experience. Also, unfortunately, this film has been receiving bad reviews. People are too cynical these days.

Starring Armie Hammer and Johnny Depp, "The Lone Ranger" is a retelling of the old TV show from the '50s. It is about an masked Texas Ranger who partners up with a Native American to fight justice. It's a pretty cut and dry plot, but Gore Verbinski makes it entertaining.

For some reason, this only has a 26% on Rotten Tomatoes. This brings me to my rant section of the blog.

I don't like Rotten Tomatoes system at all because the critics can only choose "Approve" or "don't Approve". Given them two choices will not necessarily define what they thought of the movie. Take for instance my opinion of "The Purge". Did I like it? No. Would I recommend it to a friend? No. Do I think it's better than the 38% that rotten tomatoes gives it? Yes. I think, if we're talking percentages like it's a grade, I would say it was a 52%. For a movie to be fairly critiqued and rated, you need at least a system of 1 to 5.

Anyway, I digress. This movie was quite enjoyable. That doesn't mean I thought it was good. There is a difference between enjoyabl-ity (shut up) and quality. There was a time when I would have said this movie was stupid because it wasn't deep or meaningful. But that's when I was in my movie hipster days. All hipsters and cynics are just immature people who haven't grown up enough to realize you can enjoy the stupid things from time to time. Not everything needs to be philosophical. Some things can just have action sequences that defy the laws of physics.

Now, brings me to my hypocritical point in the blog. Historical Inaccuracies! That is one thing that is unforgivable in my mind. In this movie, they sang "The Star Spangled Banner" as the national anthem in 1868. "The Star Spangled Banner" wasn't adopted as the National Anthem until 1931. It's earliest recognition as a national song was by the U.S. Navy in 1889, 21 years after this movie takes place!

Also, Johnny Depp isn't Native American... but who cares?

What does all my ranting and going off topic mean? It means people shouldn't be so critical. If you legitimately hated this movie, I understand. But to give it a low rating just because it wasn't "The Godfather" or "Gone With the Wind" is just silly. I hate how cynical this world has become.

My Grade: B

Fast & Furious 6

Before I get started, I have to tell you this is the first "Fast & Furious" movie I've seen. So if there is an answer to this, can someone please tell me when these people went from racing cars to performing military operations? I thought they were just a bunch of hooligans!

If you're going to see this movie, throw out all logic before the lights dim, or else you will be yelling at the screen like a psychopath. In "Fast & Furious 6", Dom Toretto and his crew are asked my Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson to help him catch an international criminal. In return, the crew demands full pardons.

This was the first stupid thing I heard in this movie. Dom says "You have the power to give us pardons and we know it" or something stupid like that. First off... NO! Just no! The only people who have the power to grant pardons are Governors and Presidents. No one else! Granted, most "Fast & Furious" fans probably don't know that (or, unlike me they're willing to overlook it).

I just don't have the heart to tell him he can't... or the balls.

This movie is more mindless than most mindless action movies. They completely throw logic and physics out the window. I'm going to skip the whole movie and all of its ridiculousness and just talk about the climactic scene on the runway. There may be spoilers from here on out...

You have been warned.

First off, the cargo plane the crew was trying to take down looked like a Boeing C-17... or possibly even bigger. A plane that size could easily lift 4 or 5 cars off of the ground. And don't give me any of that "Oh,  but the one car went really really fast and pulled the wing down". Just stop it. A car that is no more than 3,500 lbs. can not take down a 171,000 lb. plane. I don't care how fast it's going. This plane is made to carry people, cars and even tanks! It's can handle it! And how long is this runway?! It takes 15 minutes for a plane to take off when it hasn't even come to a complete stop from landing in the first place?

Oh, that explains it!

Those of you who read my review for "Now You See Me" know I hate twists in a movie that don't make any sense. Well, this is the second one I've seen in two days. It made even less sense than "Now You See Me". They literally had no lead up to this twist and it was painfully obvious that they did it just to make the movie 45 minutes longer than it was going to be.

I understand the ridiculousness is what makes it a good movie to some, but I'm not buying it. I'll stick with my Giant Robots Fighting Giant Monsters thank you very much! There is probably more realism in that than there is in this movie.

There were some positives in this movie. Vin Diesel, Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson and Ludacris.

This picture probably seems random to 99% of you.

Look it up!

My Grade: D+