21

Everything I learned about black jack I learned from a book called Bringing Down the House. It is the book on which this movie is based. My love for the book lead to an unusual excitement for this movie. I say unusual because nothing about the trailer made the movie look like something people needed to see. Add to that the fact that I am not a Vegas guy nor a gambling guy, it seems weird I wanted to see this movie so badly. Also, before I go any further, I try to not be one of those elitist jerks who says "well the book is better than the movie." I understand movies have to do in a little over 2hrs what a book can do in 500 pages. I do not judge a movie based on how the book was or what was in the book. This wills strictly be about the movie, 21.

Ben Campbell(Jim Sturgess) is an extremely bright college student with a rain man like quality when it comes to numbers. He is also from a fairly poor family and is trying to get into Harvard Medical School. If he does not get the full ride scholarship given to only 1 student, he will have to come up with $300,000.00. Ben is a total nerd who spends his nights with his two best friends trying to create a robot car, but he and his friends dream of having a life adventure and he dreams of scoring the hottest MIT girl ever, Jill Taylor(Kate Bosworth). One night as he is studying he is approached by Fisher(Jacob Pitts) who tells Ben he must him. When they reach their destination, Ben sees a room with his favorite Professor, Mikey Rosa(Kevin Spacey), Jill Taylor and two others. They are playing black jack. Well, they are counting cards. Ben is offered a spot on the MIT black jack team and is promised more money and more fun than he could possibly imagine. He is resistant at first, but Jill with her piercing blue eyes and big, sexy pouty lips is very persuasive. Ben is a pro at counting card and he is soon winning ungodly amounts of money, very quickly. Each team member changes persona's depending on the Casino and soon the reserved Ben is a full on big time player in the world of Vegas. It all seems perfect but the more popular and into Black jack he gets in Vegas, the worse things get for him at school and before to long everything he "worked" for is gone and his gambling addiction truly cost him everything.

As movies go, this is one of the most slick I have seen in a while. The clothes, performances, locations, camera shots and everything else are extremely slick and polished, much like everything in Las Vegas. Sturgess, whose dreamy earnest eyes caught my attention in Across the Universe, puts on a very believable American accent and is very good in transitioning between MIT nerd and Vegas hot shot. He looks good in all of the suits and he captures Ben's descent into addiction pretty well. Bosworth is mostly eye candy, and while she is a little too skinny for my taste, she looks damn good all dolled up in Las Vegas. She has a very nice sexual chemistry with Sturgess and actually gives a bit of depth to a stock character. Laurence Fishbourne who shows up as a Casino loss prevention officer on the heels of catching Ben, is a true thug, but a veteran thug who knows his livelihood is nearing its end. The true star though is Spacey. Spacey is in pure snarky, leader of the pack form here. He really gets to let loose as the Professor with a dark past of gambling. He plays the devil almost as he shows he doesn't really care about anyone, just the money. Every time he is on screen the movie gets a bit more exciting, but he never over steps his bounds and lets the young cast get theirs.

I was never bored, even if I felt they could have tightened the story up a bit and the shots of Black Jack actually make the game look a lot more exciting than it really is. The direction is fast and the editing is a little choppy but it actually works with the overall style of the film. Sure, it is probably a lot more style over substance, but that is not to say there is no substance to be found. 21 captures how devastating gambling addiction can be and how devastating losing yourself can be. However, it wraps things up in a pretty little Hollywood bow, which is my chief complaint about the movie. I did not think the mostly happy ending went with the themes, but I understand the American public demands the bad guys get theirs and the good guys find redemption.

Overall this is thoroughly entertaining movie that is not ruined by the typical ending. The performances are strong and the direction is interesting and the pace never gets bogged down. Here comes my little bit about the book- If you enjoyed 21, I highly suggest seeking out Bringing down the House by Ben Mezrich. The movie focuses solely on the Las Vegas exploits, but the book gets to delve even deeper into what happened each of the members of this real life team. While it is a non fiction book it reads as quickly as a fictional story. I really enjoyed the movie and it actually makes me want to read the book all over again.

Final Grade: B+

Horton Hears a Who

Movies based on Dr Seuss books are generally considered to suck. I actually liked the live action Grinch based on my love for Jim Carrey, but I understood why people hated it. Well, Carrey is back in a Dr. Seuss movie but this time it is just his voice. Maybe I am a lone in this but I always think it weird in animated movies for people to voice characters that are vastly different in shape to the people voicing it. I just assume a big character should be played by a big guy, so I had that hurdle to leap over when I first saw the trailer for it. Also featuring the voices of Steve Carrell, Seth Rogen, Amy Poeller, Will Arnet, Jonah Hill, Isla Fisher, Dan Fogler and comedy legend Carol Burnett, you have kind of a who's who of comedy in America right now.

Like most of Seuss' stories, Horton is a fairly straight forward story with a message. Horton(Carrey) hears something on a tiny speck that is flying through the air and he believes he has to help whatever is on the speck. The Sour Kangaroo(Burnett), who kind of runs the jungle, doesn't like it one bit because she believes it will start giving kids ideas about imagination and it will ruin the order of the Jungle. She is determined to get the clover on which Horton has placed the speck. So much so that she sends a Vulture(Arnett in a hilarious cameo) after it and in the end sends an angry mob after it. Horton is affable, earnest and kind of dorky, but he is 100% on the mission of getting the speck to safety, especially after finally making contact with the Mayor(Carell) of the speck. The Mayor tells Horton that the speck is an entire town of people and in the town nothing bad has ever happened. The Mayor is a spastic, awkward, on the edge kind of guy and he doesn't really have the respect of the town or his only son JoJo who should be the next mayor when the time comes. it is a Dr. Seuss book so in the end it all gets worked out and children watching this movie or reading that book learn the valuable lessons of sticking to your word, believing in yourself, using your imagination is fun, and peer pressure kind of sucks.

Carrey still seems like kind of an odd choice for Horton, but I liked him in the role a lot. He really lends himself to animation but it almost always seemed within the realms of the story when he goes on a Carrey like tangent. Carell is pitch perfect as the awkward mayor which is not terribly shocking. As a fast moving mouse friend of Horton's, Rogen is limited but funny and actually all of the voice work is pretty exceptional. The animation is at times gorgeous, sweeping and magnificent and at times very cartoonish and awkward (The Monkeys especially). The movie moves quickly enough and while it doesn't seem like there is enough material for an 85 minute movie, I was not ever actually bored by any of it. It is a great story for children and the movie plays very well to children. There is enough humor for adults though to make it relatively interesting.

My biggest issue with the movie was the anime section, where Horton's fight fantasy is drawn and shot like a Pokemon cartoon. It was from way out in left field and did nothing to enhance my movie going experience. In fact, it was quite off putting and it took me a little while to get back into the story. Also, having kind of an affinity for the world of Horton though Seussical, I missed the songs. I missed the music big time, actually. I know Carrey and Carell can both sing and they threw in a random song at the end but, I really missed the world of Seussical. It is no fault of the movie, but it did hinder my enjoyment a bit.

Overall, while I enjoyed it at times and the voice work is excellent, there were too many random things and unnecessary animation tricks to make this a completely enjoyable experience. I know this movie is not aimed at me. I get that, I do, but if Pixar can continue to make great movie for both kids and adults, why is it too much to ask that other animated movies do the same?

Final Grade: C+

Be Kind Rewind

I always felt like one of the last people in America to convert over to the DVD player. In fact, I still have a box of VHS tapes of movies I have not found on DVD quite yet, and I bust one out and watch it every so often. Sure, they don't have the picture or video quality of DVD and VCRs have been known to chew through them fairly regularly, but I like the nostalgia of the VHS. Apparently, I was not the last one though, because in Michel Gondry's latest bizarre movie, Be Kind Rewind, there is essentially an entire town, Passaic, New Jersey, that is stuck in the nostalgia of the VHS.

Mike( Mos Def) works in a run down, nothing-but-VHS video rental store and Elroy Fletcher(Danny Glover) is the owner of the store and they both seem to live upstairs. Business is not good with a new box rental store (Think Blockbuster or Hollywood) has come in with lots of titles and lots of DVDs. Elroy is not keen on the DVD player because he doesn't want his customers to have to purchase the upgrade. Jerry(Jack Black) is Mike's best friend and his job is to watch some sort of power plant at night, so his house is a trailer on the lot of the plant. Mike and Jerry do not know this, but Elroy has been told by the state that his store is not up to code and it will be knocked down to build new condos in a matter of months if he cannot afford the renovations. Elroy leaves the store in Mike's hands while he goes to spy on the big box store. One night Jerry tries to destroy the plant, something goes horribly wrong and he gets magnetized; he walks into Mike's shop and with his mere presence erases every tape in the store. At first everything seems doomed because the most regular customer, Miss Falowicz, wants to watch Ghostbusters. Then, Mike gets the brilliant idea to shoot Ghostbusters themselves, all low tech like. It turns out to be a hit with the youth in town and soon everyone wants Mike and Jerry's low tech movies that they say are "sweded." They enlist the goofy, cute, Alma (Melonie Diaz) to help them and soon their entire store is full of these sweded movies. They are charging $20.00 per movie and think they may make the money they need to save the store. Things don't always work the way you want them to and in the end the entire town comes together to create a fictional documentary about Fats Waller, a Jazz Musician who may or may not have been born inside the video store.

After I watch a movie I hit the IMDB message boards to gauge the general consensus view on a movie and I was shocked to find this movie being obliterated on the message boards. I am not sure these people saw the same movie I did because I fell in love with this movie from the very beginning. Jack Black is usually one of the most obnoxious actors on screen, but in this movie I found him to be funny and charming and his chemistry with Mos Def's somewhat slower Mike, totally worked for me. The Sweded movies are not only hilarious but creative in a way that makes me want to pick up a camera and start shooting movies. The Ghostbusters scene is the longest and funniest, but the remakes of Robocop, Driving Miss Daisy and Rush Hour 2 are also hilarious. They find a way to make low tech special effects and even animation in a way that shows real heart and passion for movies. Gondry also has fun with Black's character being magnetized in some funny physical comedy side gags. Danny Glover is also a very nice addition as he actually plays quirkiness quite well.

The final 25 minutes of this movie is where the real creativity lies though. When the entire town rallies to shoot this documentary, we see them finding ways to create all kinds of set pieces and props with just the stuff they have around them. Not to mention how having them shoot near fan gives the impression that it is old, from the sound. There is a lot of suspension of disbelief involved in enjoying this movie, but you can wrap your head around the silly premise and get to the heart of the picture I think it is very much worth it. Be Kind Rewind is a movie that believes in movie making magic. It is a movie that believes movies can bring people together in a time of crisis and can unite people in a bigger cause. It believes movies are made with heart and that movies can be good even if they are shot for basically no money. Be Kind Rewind believes in movies the way I believe in movies and the way my friends believes in movies. It is creatively shot, has some very good laugh out loud moments and underneath it all, it is heart warming.

Final Grade: A-

Drillbit Taylor

Judd Apatow and company are cash cows and Drillbit Taylor is the first movie out to really prove that they have the golden touch. See, the script and story for this movie have been floating around since the eighties. Eighties giant John Hughes started writing it back in the day and with studios trying to make as much money as possible off Apatow and his troupe, they gave the script to Seth Rogen to polish off, punch up, and turn it into a big winner. That was the hope anyway. Then they gave the script to a director who handles broad comedy fairly well having directed a few Sandler flicks in the past, put Apatow's name as a producer and sat back to wait for the money to roll in. Then Owen Wilson tried to kill himself. I do not mean to sound insensitive but his reluctance to get back in the swing of promotion kind of hurt the movie's chances, but did it really have a shot to begin with?

Drillbit Taylor(Wilson) is a homeless Army Vet looking for $380.00 so he can leave California and go to Canada. Wade(Nate Hartley), Ryan(Troy Gentile) and Jim(Ian Roberts) are three high school freshmen with a serious bully problem. The bully, Filkins(Alex Frost) is an emancipated senior with serious issues. In a montage of bullying the 3 losers are thrown, hit, flushed, crammed into small spaces, made to piss each other etc. They get fed up and decide to hire a bodyguard; enter Drillbit. At first Drillbit is just trying to to sucker the kids out of $380.00 but soon he realizes they are worth more to he sticks around to swindle them out of more money. As part of his protection plan he pretends to be a substitute teacher and meets Lisa(Leslie Mann) a very horny English teacher. In various montages, Drillbit pretends to teach the kids how to fight and how to look and feel tough. But, in the end the kids do have to fend for themselves as the usual trappings of such a comedy expose Drillbit as a fraud and the kids to fight Filkins on their own. There is also a sweet side romance between Wade and a Little Asian girl.

Typically with comedies I loathe or love them; there is no middle ground. Well, Drillbit Taylor finds that middle ground. It is funny enough to make me like it, but too broad and absurd for me to love it. The three kids, especially the pudgy Troy Gentile, are all quite endearing and funny. Rogen punched up the script with some nice one-liners including 1 or 2 that seem for a more adult movie. Owen Wilson is his usual charming self and he finds a way to deliver lines to make them funnier than they ought to be. He works very well with the 3 kids, but it is something Wilson plays often and it would be nice to see him try something new. Unfortunately most of the jokes come in the first 35-40 minutes and the fun action comedy comes in the final 20 minutes which leaves the middle 35 minutes in which the film flounders. Neither the script nor the director seem too sure where they want the focus to be. Drillbit is essentially a supporting role that over stays its welcome because the kids are at the real heart of the movie. The romance between Mann and Wilson is fun and nice but seems out of place and only succeeds in dragging the movie along instead of having it be quicker.

The movie is also very sitcomy with the treatment of parents and teachers. No one question Filkins fake pleasantries even after it is found out the kids went so far as to hire a bodyguard for protection. Also, how not a single teacher suspected Taylor might be a fraud is too convenient to be taken seriously. But it all ends up worth it for the big climatic fight. yes, the fight does happen and for anyone who was bullied (like I was) there is a twisted joy out of watching 3 losers try and pummel a bully. The fight is choreographed very well with pauses for cheers and laughs and the kids all handle it very well. Also, there is never a moment of "violence doesn't solve anything" nonsense, so the movie is never hypocritical as many movies are. In this movie violence is not only necessary but it can help freshmen grow up and learn to have self esteem.

In the end, I laughed full on big laughs for the first section and I was entertainingly cheering on the kids in the end, so I think the movie accomplished its goal. I am sure it will be compared to Superbad because of the look of the 3 kids, but this is obviously not Superbad and anyone expecting that will be disappointed. However, if you just want to kind of laugh at some goofy kids in goofy situations, I recommend this movie. It has heart; it has laughs and it has a fat white kid rapping 8 mile style. What is not to like about that?

Final Grade: B-

Sleuth (2007)

Pop quiz hot shot, when is a remake not a remake? The answer is when both are based on a play and when the remake has the advantage of having Harold Pinter as the writer of the screenplay. Such is the case with Sleuth, a remake of a 1972 film which was an adaptation of a stage play. In the 1972 version Michael Caine played the young lothario and in this version he is the older of the two men. It is very easy to see how this started as a screenplay as it features only 2 characters, one stationary, if massive, set and very distinguishable scene breaks. However, the scene breaks may have been accented for effect by Kenneth Branagh, the director.

Andrew Wyke(Caine) and Milo Tindle are two men engaged in a battle of wits or one up manship. Tindle is sleeping with Wyke's wife and has come to Wyke's house to coax Wyke into giving his wife the divorce she wants. Whther or not any of that is actually true or not is beyond me and seems to be beyond the scope of the movie and appears just to be a set up to get the two men in a room together. What follows is a very complex game of cat and mouse. In act 1 Wyke wants Tindle to break into his house and steal a necklace so he can claim the insurance on it and Tindle and Wyke's wife can sell it and live off of it. It turns around on Tindle because Wyke was controlling the whole thing. In act 2, Tindle semi-cleverly disguises himself as a detective coming to arrest Wyke for the murder of Tindle. Act 3 takes a bizarre twist and derails the entire movie because in act 3 it is never clear who is who and what is what. We have no basis to believe the homosexuality when it is hastily thrown in our faces and we are not sure what to believe in anymore. In acts 1 and 2 we kind of understood what was going on and there was a clear cut game or trick at play, but in act 3 it seems that maybe Wyke is being sincere, but it isn't fully flushed out.

Sleuth is mostly better heard than seen. Pinter's script is quick and smart and Caine and Law handle it with ease and they both sound pleasant enough. The story moves from point A to point B swiftly without ever losing the wit or charm in Pinter's words. The violin heavy score adds an element of suspense without ever becoming annoying as a lot of violin heavy scores get. On the other hand we have Branagh's decision to film giant sections of the movie through surveillance cameras or giving bizarre close ups at weird moments. He also likes over head shots and quite a lot of shots where people are only half in the picture which can be a nifty trick with great effect, but here is just seems like someone bumped the camera man and no one fixed it. Branagh appears unsure how to handle anything that is going on from the action to the massive house that is almost a character in its own right. The script has obviously gotten the best of the director here and it hurts immensely.

The acting, though, is fabulous. Law, a very strong actor, really lets it rip as Tindle the possible psychopathic actor. He is adept at the disguise that is employed in act 2 (this is not a spoiler because only 2 actors appear in the opening credits)and he reaches crazy heights in the end of act 2. He is menacing, funny, charming, intelligent and down right evil and none of them seem to be too challenging. Caine, the consummate actor, plays Wyke as a very clever yet ferocious possible homosexual. The two men do the best they can in the third act when the script and the direction fail them and between the two of them they almost salvage the movie. They have a very nice chemistry even in times of deep hatred on screen. It is clear Law was not scared to tackle the role first played on screen by his acting partner and with Caine to play off of, Law appears to be in the driver's seat of Sleuth.

Final Grade: C-

Doomsday

Doomsday is another movie in the virus-is-ending-the-world genre. It borrows liberally from I am Legend, Escape from New York, Clockwork Orange, Resident Evil, 28 days later, Mad Max, Gladiator and yes, Pulp Fiction even. It is from the director of The Descent and while it is a very different film he manages to incorporate the same style of blood and guts as that film. Also, this movie features more human beheadings than The Descent. I will leave that up to you whether that is good or bad.

In 2008 a virus is mysteriously unleashed on Scotland and the country is essentially boarded up and forgotten about. The movie in time to about 25 years in the future where we are introduced to a sexy, snarling, one-line spouting bad ass chick, Eden Sinclair (Rhona Mitra) with a detachable eye that gives her vision around corners and what not. She belongs to some sort of national police team (think about V for Vendetta) and when there is a small outbreak of the virus again, shit hits the fan. It turns out that there have been survivors in Scotland as shown by satellite footage and Sinclair will be leading a team into the seemingly abandoned country in hopes of discovering maybe an antidote for the virus. The team is comprised of 4 soldiers, 2 scientists and 2 drivers. As they reach the hospital inside Scotland, they are met with a whole crazy troop of 1980's punk rejects with make shift weapons and Molotov cocktails. The death toll really gets off to a nice start with bloody limbs flying every where and even our group of 8 heroes is very quickly whittled down. This is not the kind of movie where the small group slowly gets smaller, no sir, we lose half of the team right away, and they do not get heroic deaths- throats are cut, brains bashed in and one is just brutally beaten to death. Sinclair is captured by these ruffians who are led by a Clockwork wannabe named Sol. We figure out quickly that they survived by eating dead people. They cook and eat one of the hero squad in a pretty vile scene. Sinclair escapes and helps someone else escape who can help Sinclair find the Scientist who may have the antidote.

Here is where the movie really gets absurd. After traveling through a secret tunnel, Sinclair, the girl she saved, that girl's boyfriend and the last 2 remaining hero squad members somehow go from this weird post apocalyptic city to 1800 Scotland and in doing so are met by archers, a crazy big villain on a horse and yes, a giant Castle! Sinclair must fight the giant villain guy Gladiator style in a very stylized cool fight with pretty gruesome results and Sinclair finds out there is no antidote, just immunities to the virus. The Scientist played by Malcolm McDowell, gives a very Darwinian speech about survival of the fittest and how the virus was God's work to show the people what was truly important, which is apparently dressing like 18th century people and living in a castle that has a gift shop.

Now, it may seem as if I hated this movie and perhaps I should have hated it, but I really didn't. I was thoroughly entertained. From the cannibalism, the be-headings, the bad one-liners, even the fully rubber dressed gimp, I was laughing and cheering up a storm. Sure it is not a very good movie, but it entertained and the sheer audacity of it to rub our faces in how absurd it was really earned it points in my mind. Yes, it is pure B-movie schlock, but it is incredibly entertaining B-movie schlock. There is a very amusing car chase that features some very innovative stunts, funny moments, crashes, burning bodies and a sick ass Bentley and with all of that how bad can a movie really be?

I will not be recommending this movie to anyone really because it is ridiculous. However, if you can check your brain at the door and just go along for the very impossible ride, I think you will find yourself laughing and enjoying the movie immensely. I am sure maybe the director was hoping for a little more out of and maybe he was trying to have some social commentary about Government. cover ups, fearing God and all that stuff, but when you show a bunny being ripped apart by an automated machine gun you kind of lose the right to make a deeply serious point. As a throwback or homage to those 80s post-apocalyptic movies this really hits the nail on the head and I think John Carpenter and George Miller would approve.

Final Grade: B-

The Bank Job

Heist films will always be popular because deep down every guy wishes he could rob a bank or rob casinos. It is just the way of the world. However, heist films have always been getting so high tech, us normal guys cannot conceive being able to do that anymore. We do not have access to the kinds of toys George Clooney and Brad Pitt got in the Ocean's movies and we don't think it is practical to drive an Audi down the halls of a rich person like The Italian Job. Luckily, when people set movies in the 70s we don't have these high tech problems, such is the case with this movie.

Based on somewhat true events, The Bank job is the story of a group of 6 people who decide to take everything they can out of the safe deposit boxes in a bank. The catalyst to the whole event is a former model named Martine Love (Saffron Burrows). After being arrested for a pretty serious drug charge she calls a Government agent she knows to help out of the jam. He agrees to it if she can find a group of people to rob a bank. The Government needs the contents of a specific box but cannot be linked to the robbery. Love drops in on childhood friend Terry Leather (Jason Statham), who is a very small time criminal and he and his boys agree to the job and so it begins. There are also side plots involving high up Government people who go to a brothel and are secretly photographed and a porn king who has a ledger with his police pay offs. All of those things are in the boxes robbed by Terry and his crew. After the robbery the movie kind of tail spins a bit into a kind of predictable double cross, he-who-has-the-money-has-the-power, type of movie with the big climax in public involving all of the stories coming together.

However, before it kind of spins out of control The Bank Job is a fun, easy going movie that feels very much like the time period shown in the movie. The gang of robbers all have fun distinct personalities and the bickering from them is a lot of fun and watching them all work to make the heist happens is not only fun, but it also is a throw back and made me feel like I could actually rob a bank with just a jack hammer and a shovel. AWESOME! The script is tight and none of the scenes feel unnecessary. At times you wonder when they are going to wrap it up, but that is all in the post robbery stuff. The fun is the pre-robbery and the robbery itself. The guys are all guys we identify with and that really adds to the fun. There are some politically charged things in the side plots that can be a bit distracting, but when the focus shifts back to our shifty robbers, the fun quotient revs back up.

Jason Statham is a real man's actor. He is laconic, stoic and full of badassery, but here he actually proves he can act a little bit. He is not going to win any awards or anything, but he does have a nice moment of vulnerability with his wife and it certainly ads to the heightened sense of danger in the post robbery third of the film. He also gets to kick a little of ass towards the end and it reminds me how awesome he is when he is fighting. There isn't a lot of camera trickery here as the director understands to just let the movie fend for itself and his minimalist approach really adds to the seventies quality to the film. He Never loses us when the movie starts playing games with who is good and who is bad and who works for what Government agency which is nice because so often things like that get confusing and can ruin the mood of a movie.

It is sad that movies like this get lost in the shuffle underneath those big mammoth movies because these small quality independent movies deserve an audience. I am sure there will people who are turned off by the nudity and the amount of time spent in a strip club, but again it really makes it feel like the fast, loose and free seventies. The Bank Job has laughs, sex, punch outs, stabbings, shooting, and a freaking bank robbery and if that isn't good old fashion entertainment, I don't know what is.

Final Grade: B+

10,000 B.C. (spoilers)

I know that admitting what I am about to admit could essentially ruin any credibility I have as someone who reviews movies, but I dug The Day After Tomorrow. Roland Emmerich, the guy who directed 10,000 B.C. also directed The Day After Tomorrow as well as the awesome Independence Day, the terrible Godzilla and the alright The Patriot. He makes big spectacle pictures that are often high on fun but low on everything else. I readily admit that The Day After Tomorrow is not a good movie, but I enjoyed the hell out of it. A year after the epic 300 we get 10,000 B.C., the 2008 version of 300. What I mean by that is that we get a big budget movie in the middle of March feature something pre-historic almost. Yet, with Emmerich's spotty record would this turn out like Independence Day , Godzilla or somewhere in between?

I will now attempt to tell you the plot of this movie, but I have to be honest, I am not quite sure I ever really understood what was going on. Some of it was because of bad storytelling and some of it is because during the exposition voice over opening, there was a child crying in the theater. What I understood was this- a little girl with startling blue eyes, Evolet(Camilla Belle is found by this tribe of cavemen (when I say cavemen, don't think of cromagnen people, no these are gorgeous people who speak perfect English)and the spirit mother of the tribe believes this blue eyed girl is the key to survival for the tribe and the guy who gets her will lead the tribe. Our hero D'elh (held backwards because "held" is the German word for Hero, brilliant I know). He is a Mammoth hunter but his father deserted the tribe and he is kind of a weakling, at first. These creepy big guys come into the tribe destroy it and kidnap all the males and of course Evolet. D'elh was not amongst the captured and he sets off to find Evolet. Along the way he manages to meet a ton of tribes of people who all seem to speak different languages, but luckily one guy seems to know them all. These separate tribes of people all join forces to fight the big bad gods. The Gods are kidnapping people to turn them into slaves to build the pyramids, so maybe the Gods are supposed to be Egyptian? If that means they are near Egypt where did the tribe learn English? Who knows?!?!

10,000 B.C. is such a bad movie I very nearly walked out of it. "How could a movie that had access to Saber Tooth tigers be so awful?", you ask. Easy, the Saber Tooth tiger spends 3 minutes on screen and doesn't do anything bad-ass. In fact the Saber Tooth tiger is as harmless as an every day house cat in the movie. The only fierce creatures appear to be some sort of hybrid between a Raptor and a dodo bird. What the hell? The Mammoth's look gorgeous, the tiger looks gorgeous, but they are merely window dressing to try and disguise the fact that nothing in the movie makes sense. The one remaining God fears the one with the mark, which some what turns out to be Evolet, but she doesn't do the killing at all, so the whole mark nonsense turns out to be useless and just a way to add time to the movie. The story makes no sense and every time the movie switches back to the old mother woman I was just lost in the stupidity. The acting is god awful, but at least Evolet is gorgeous. The dialog is useless, as Emmerich seems only interested in creating a faux epic with wide circular motioned shots of sprawling snow capped mountains, but it all amounts to nothing.

This movie lacks the sheer audacity of The Day After Tomorrow, it even lacks the goofy stupidity of Godzilla and the over the top nonsense of The Patriot; in short, the movie has no fun with itself. Emmerich was really trying to make a big drama set in a pre-historic time period and it blew up in his face miserably. The battle sequences are dull, the chases lack a sense of urgency. I mentioned 300 earlier and I think some of the comparisons they are drawing are fair. Both are movies that take a liberal use of history to tell a crazy story, but 300 has fun while telling the story. 300 had amazing visuals, a fun story, incredible action sequences, and a strong presence in the lead actor to mask the awful dialog, whereas 10,000 B.C. doesn't have enough to make up for the obvious shortcomings. The worst thing a movie can be, in my opinion, is boring. Boring is the kiss of death for a movie and I was checking my watch about 30 minutes in because I kind of wanted it to just be over.

I left with an overwhelming sense of disappointment because I was pretty excited about this movie. Not because it is historically accurate or even because I thought it would be this amazing movie, but because deep down, I love to be entertained by over the top messes and this looked like it would at least be that. Instead it was just a mess. It was timid, small scale and I never felt the stakes were high enough for me to care about anything that was going on. I was not alone in my disappointment either. I heard the disgust in the voices of the other people leaving the theater.

Final Grade: F

In Bruges

If you still need proof that the first two movies directed by Quinten Tarantino are the most influential movies to be released since 1990, In Bruges is another movie that is heavily influenced by Reservoir Dogs and Pulp Fiction. Those two movies were released in the early nineties and here we are in 2008 and we still get movies that probably would not exist without them. A playwright who made a short film two years ago that won the Oscar for short film, Director Martin McDonagh starts off his feature film career with a bang. Part Tarantino and part Mamet, McDonagh looks to have a long established career if his ego doesn't get the best of him (See Troy Duffy).

Ray (Colin Farrell) and Ken (Brendan Gleeson) are hit men who have been told to go to Bruges (which is in Belgium and doesn't have a bowling alley but has a Pizza Hut) after a hit to await further instructions. Ken is interested in the ancient architecture of Bruges and likes the calm peacefulness that surrounds the quaint little town. Ray on the other hand feels that " If I'd grown up on a farm and was retarded, Bruges might impress me, but I didn't, so it doesn't." Ray is a high strung, sarcastic, politically incorrect, handsome guy, but he is haunted by a secret. Ken is a slow moving, affable, bigger, older and wiser of the two men, and he is a mentor or father figure to Ray. While in Bruges, they spot a movie being made and Ray spots a very pretty girl, Chloe and a dwarf named Jimmy. Chloe and Ray go on a date that ends in two violent acts. However, he still likes the girl, but he steals some of the drugs she sells and ends up in a room with the dwarf and two hookers doing blow and discussing a future where a race war happens and all of the blacks fight all of the whites, including all the black dwarfs fighting all of the white dwarfs. It is all fun and games until we actually learn Ray's deep dark secret. It changes the mood of the movie, some what and it all culminates in a somewhat bloody, and very dark climax.

In Bruges is the perfect blend of silly humor, very dark humor and interesting story telling. Ken and Ray are very complex real characters and Farrell is exceptional as the younger hit man. I have always believed in him and am glad to see him get back to doing good work. He is incredibly hilarious in his line delivery, but his reactionary expressions are what help make this a flat out hilarious movie. Gleeson is the great mix of quiet and intense and really balances Farrell's high wire act. Ralph Fiennes shows up in person in the last 25 minutes and sets the screen on fire with his brutal big boss hit man. He doesn't have worlds of screen time but he really makes the most of it. Clemence Poesy as Chloe is a beautiful minx and while she doesn't have too much to do she is the character we seem to most identify with.

However, the real star of this movie is McDonagh. His dialog pops off the screen with hilarious and biting lines and his directing is top notch as his location shots really make Bruges a motionless character in the movie. He gets great performances and seems to always get the best shot. There is also an interesting morality tale at play here, but to say too much about it would give away the secret held within the story. Listening to hit men go on about morals is always interesting and with McDonagh's hyper literate hit men we really gain an understanding of what McDonagh was going for here. He never drowns us in lecturing because he is always ready with a joke to lighten any tense moment and he captures a brilliant climax that begins as an intense chase, shifts into absurdly hilarious, then transforms into something very dark and bloody before hitting another hilarious moment for the falling action. McDonagh also manages to be mostly politically incorrect without being terribly offensive to anyone, except fat people, but that scene is so incredibly funny that it is hardly mean spirited.

I am not going to lie, if I see 10 movies better than this later this year I might be a bit surprised. From the opening moment of dialog until the very last line, I was immensely entertained and laughing harder than I do in many movies that are just comedies. In mixing the intelligent humor with some great thrills, McDonagh has really proven himself as someone to watch in the future. It is almost a shame this movie has been buried in February, but I am highly recommending this movie to everyone who enjoys very smart, fast moving crime movies.

Final Grade: A