Jennifer's Body

I had a lot of trouble figuring out Jennifer’s Body.  At first I thought I was laughing at the movie because everything was so ridiculous, but I talked to people and remembered to take in who wrote the movie.  Diablo Cody (Juno) wrote a very unique movie.  It’s a satirical spoof of horror films as well as a social commentary.

Needy (Amanda Seyfried) is best friends with Jennifer (Megan Fox) who is the hottest, most popular girl in school.  Everything is fine in their small town until an Indy band passes through.  They take an interest in Jennifer.  They need to sacrifice a virgin for a ritual that will make the band rich and famous, and Jennifer is their choice, but little did they know that Jennifer isn’t even a “backdoor virgin.”  The band gets what they want, but what they leave is a demon in the form of Jennifer.  Now she must feast on the flesh of humans to stay strong and beautiful.

The dialogue is great because it is so ridiculous and extremely quotable.  I laughed through the whole thing.  There were moments of suspense and even some spots that make you jump.  Megan Fox did a great representation of a high-strung high school girl.  It’s hard to believe that she says she was never actually popular in high school.  The photography was excellent.  There were a lot of unique camera angles and wide variety of shots.  The whole film was very visually interesting.  There was one make out scene in the middle of the movie was quite random, but guys will love it.

Rating: 3.0★ stars (out of 5)

Recommendation: This is a fun movie for those who don’t like scary movies.  There is a little something for everyone, but it’s more directed towards young adults.  I don’t think older generations will get a lot of the jokes.  It would make an good rental choice.

Twilight Saga New Moon

O Twilight, how tweens and twi-moms love the.  New Moon was a definite step up from it's predecessor Twilight, and audiences around the country agree.  In it's first night it racked up $140.7 million making it the 3rd most attended midnight showing in the history of movies behind The Dark Knight and Spider-Man 3, and just in front of Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End (that's ridiculous, and twice as much as Twilight).  What is more surprising is that that movie only took $50 million to make.  They made a profit in it's premiere hours.  So far the movie has sold close to $220 million in tickets.

Now I bought my ticket about 2 months in advance on fandango and was right there for the midnight showing.  I loved the movie, but that's because I love the story.  So saying that, I will try my best to give an objective review.  Here we go...

New Moon is the sequel to Twilight, and the movie opens in one of Bella's (Kristen Stewart) dreams on the dawn of her birthday.  She doesn't want to get older since her vampire love, Edward (Robert Pattinson) can't age.  The Cullens throw Bella a birthday party, and all hell breaks loose when she gets surprisingly bloody paper cut that sends Jasper on the attack.  Edward decides it's in Bella's best interest to leave and let her live a normal life.  This sends Bella into a depression where she can only find peace in her friend Jacob (Taylor Lautner).  But Jacob starts acting weird and disappears for a while.  It turns out that Jacob has a special Quillette gene that turns him into a Werewolf who hunts vampires.  Bella is still hung up on Edward and sees visions of him whenever she does something dangerous.  Edward learns of one of her daredevil attempts, thinks she's died and decides that he no longer wants to live.  Now it's up to Bella: stay with Jacob or rescue Edward.

New Moon had a new director, Chris Weitz, who also directed films like The Compass.  Depending on what review you read, he either did a horrible or a terrific job.  I'm following the latter.  He did a much better job of portraying vampires running, and he was good for all the animation that they used.  The acting was better too, but only slightly.  I'm not sure if any director can get Kristen Stewart and Rob Pattinson to jell on screen.  If they do have a relationship, why don't they translate that to the screen.  On the other hand, Kristen and Taylor Launter had tons of chemistry.  The feel of the movie was much warmer, but the pacing was off for most of it.  Drama was drawn out where it didn't necessarily need to be.  I didn't notice this the first time cause I was so amped to see it, but the second time it was pretty clear.  Lautner was topless for half the movie which will have young girls (and cougar moms) squealing everywhere.

Rating: 2.7 ★ stars (out of 5)

Recommendation: Boys, take your girls to this movie (unless you are insecure about your body). This is the yet another perfect tween movie, but if your not a fan already, I'm not convinced that the films will do it for you.

Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen

Ah, Transformers...what can I say? It brings out the little boy in all of us. Just the name, Optimus Prime, makes boys everywhere giggle like school girls.

Ah, Michael Bay...what can I say? He can make anything explode. Just the sound of his name sends crashes and bangs to my ears. He makes audiences everywhere “Ooooooh” and “Aaaaaaaah” with his high intensity actions sequences.

Here’s the deal with Transformers, you have to judge it on two scales: 1) compared to other feature films 2) compared to Michael Bay films. I have included 2 star ratings to justify the film for both scales. Most women will judge by the first, and from my experience, most men judge by the second.

The movie was essentially a 2 1/2 hour action sequence. I saw it at midnight, and frankly, I wanted to fall asleep because I got so action bored. In order for action to be awesome and exciting, there needs to be breaks, to allow the audience to catch up. I became numb to the action after the first hour and a half.

For all you drooling men out there waiting to hear about Megan Fox, here you go...

I was a little bit upset by how much she was objectified in this movie. In the first half hour, there wasn’t a single scene with her in it that didn’t include a full body tilt. I get it, she’s hot, whatever. Her acting was acceptable.

Shia LaBeouf sported a hand injury for a car accident in real life that had to be worked into the film. It worked out. His acting was by far the best in the film. He didn't have much to work with dialogue wise, but he worked it nonetheless.

Don’t get me started on the dialogue. If negative dialogue is the equation dialogue - explosions = total dialogue then this movie would be so far negative that it would reach the bowels of hell. Sure it was cute and funny in the beginning, but it had nothing to offer the story. (Ha, STORY!)

Rating: 2.0 ★ stars (out of 5)

Michael Bay Rating: 6.0 ★ stars (out of 5)

Recommendation: If you're not seeing it at midnight, at the IMAX, or are a man reliving his youth, then there's no need to see it. Renting it when it comes to the RedBox will be just fine, just make sure you have a big TV and preferably HD.

Yes Man!

How many opportunities are missed simply because we say “No” to a simple suggestion?  Yes Man is a not so serious movie with a thought-provoking undertone that would have been better suited as a serious film as apposed to a comedy.

Yes Man star Jim Carrey plays Carl Allen, a recently divorced man whose life has been stuck in a rut for several months.  He says no to everything, which has lead to the neglect of his friends, work and personal wellbeing.  It takes an old acquaintance to get him to question, whether or not this “No” life is what he wants.  As a result Carl attends a “YES!” conference where he makes a covenant with himself to say “Yes” to everything.

At first his “yes” ventures seem to lead him only to trouble, but as Carl begins to embrace the concept, more positive results start pouring in, like a new girlfriend, and a promotion at work.  But nothing good lasts forever.  Carl must learn that the classic rule of “everything in moderation” the hard way.  You shouldn’t say yes because you have to, you should say it because you want to.

Zooey Deschanel plays Allison, Carl’s love interest.  Allison is a classic Deschanel character, quirky and against the grain.  I love this character.  Maybe its because I feel I can relate to it, but whatever it is, Deschanel plays it perfectly.

Carrey did everything that he possibly could with his role, but still the film felt lacking.  The laughs were cheap and not well thought out.  I feel as though so much more could have been done with this movie, but instead it decided to skate by

Rating: 2.0 ★ stars (out of 5)

Recommendation:  Wait until this comes to TNT or USA.  I wouldn’t see it in a theatre or at least not for full price.  It’s a good movie to watch with the family.

Role Models

What do you get when you cross an ultra depressed man and an extremely chipper sex-crazed co-worker?  You get a classic comedy duo and two very unlikely role models.  Paul Rudd plays Danny, a seriously depressing man, who despises his job as a representative of the energy drink company set to keep kids off drugs, Minotaur.  Scott plays Danny’s co-worker Wheeler, a frat boy who never grew up.

The drama begins when Danny’s girlfriend breaks up with him.  His day continually gets worse resulting in a nervous breakdown that leads both Danny and Wheeler into trouble.  What kind of trouble?  The kind you get when you mount a Minotaur truck on a high school’s Trojan statue.

The two men are sentenced to 60 hours of community service at the mentor program Sturdy Wings.  The men are matched with two troubled kids whose back-stories are as unique as they come.  A dark undertone sets the stage but the laughs mask any unfriendly feelings.

Role Models is one of the most quotable movies that I have ever seen.  Stupid humor and sarcasm litter the dialogue.

Rating: 3.5 ★ stars (out of 5)

Recommendation:  The film is definitely aimed at the college and young professional demographic.  Males everywhere will love the film, and I would recommend it as a date movie. 

Twilight

The only place to begin is the book.  Twilight is about a teenage girl, Bella Swan, who exiles herself to a small town of Forks, Washington, and the rainiest place in the continental United States.  There she falls in love with a vampire, Edward Cullen, in unique tale of forbidden romance.

When pressed to describe the series I say it’s about “vampires and awesomeness.”  I am a tween at heart.  The books are amazing, so it’s hard to believe that any film could come close.  If you have read the books you must go into the movie with an open mind.

I saw Twilight at the midnight showing in my town.  That was a very interesting experience.  All the little tweens screamed every time a new young male actor appeared on the screen.  It was annoying and fun at the same time.  My theatre was full.  Arriving a half hour early left me in the suck seats two rows before the scream.  Not the best way to see any film.  So it wasn’t surprising to me that Twilight grossed around $77 mil in it’s first three days.  That was the highest opening for a female director, and thought that makes me happy to see a successful female, I was upset that it had to be Catherine Hardwick.

Catherine Hardwick directed and young, up-and-coming group of actors.  Kirsten Stewart plays Bella Swan and Robert Pattinson plays Edward Cullen.  The acting was so-so, but I blame that on the direction.  Kristen Stewart really only had one look the entire film and that was a very blank one.  Establishing shots were amazing but most of the film was conducted in close-up and these actors just aren’t ready for that yet or were poorly directed on.

The filmed moved very quickly and the action was a little off.  Never once did the book say that Edward was spider-man and yet he’s scaling trees in the film.

Rating: 2.5 ★ stars (out of 5)

Recommendation:  This is the perfect tween film.  It represents teenagers almost spot on and is quite humorous.  Throw in some good-looking actors and you have Twilight.  Don’t get me wrong, I loved the film, but I loved it more for what I could bring to it than what was presented in front of me.  If you are, have or are a tween at heart then this is a good film for you.

Rachel Getting Married

Sorry that this post is long overdue.  I have several movies that I want to write about including Twilight and Role Models.  Since my finals have ended I will update more my reviews more often.

            Rachel Getting Married is tale of a recovering drug addict, Kym (Anne Hathaway), who gets out of rehab just in time to make it to her big sister, Rachel’s (Rosemarie Dewitt) wedding.  With Kym comes a trouble past and loads of tension.

            Kym struggles with her past and Rachel struggles to keep Kym and herself happy on what should be the happiest day of her life.  Although it is Rachel’s day, Kym finds herself in the spotlight, not unknowingly, a few times.  The sisters’ loves, hug, battle and at times loathe each other.  Their father tries to keep the peace but always seems to side with the youngest, Kym.

            Rachel Getting Married is a very emotional film taking you from tears, to shock, to chuckles.  Family fights reveal secrets and strangers lend new insight.  Every emotional thread will be pulled.

            As a low budget indie film you can expect elements of the movie to be outside mainstream Hollywood.  The beginning of the movie is occupied with long following shots that have made me a little dizzy at first, but I eventually got used to.  The score of the film is also all in real time.  The wedding band is on site for the backyard wedding at all times rehearsing.  I found that to be a very unique feature of the film.

Rating: 4.5 ★ stars (out of 5)

Recommendation:  It’s an excellent film with great casting a real homey feel.  It’s not a must see but for anyone who is wondering if it’s any good, it is!