Rock of Ages Review

The art form known as the musical has been around for over two centuries, and is performed around the world for the amusement of all.  The musical was first brought to film in the mid 1920’s, and saw a huge boom between the 30’s and the 60’s.  Famous musicals such as West Side Story and Singin’ in the Rain revolutionized the musical industry.  In 2001, the musical Moulin Rouge caused the re-birth of the genre, and since then, great musicals such as Chicago, Hairspray and Sweeny Todd have been released.  My favorite style of music, 80’s rock had not yet truly been introduced into a musical film.  Until today.

Rock of Ages is based on a mid 2000’s play directed by Kristin Hanggi and focuses on the glory that is 1980’s rock and roll.  The movie, based on the play, follows the same basic story.  A young and ambitious girl named Sherrie Christian (played by Julianne Hough) moves from the suburbs to Hollywood, to follow her dream of becoming a famous rock star.  She meets a young guy, Drew Boley (played by Diego Boneta), and they immediately fall in love.  He gets her a job at a rock concert hall called the Bourbon club, where the rich rocker Stacee Jaxx (played by Tom Cruise), is about to play his final concert before going solo.  This is the most basic level of the plot, but the movie also involves many other characters and sub-plots.

The major problem in this movie is the two main characters, and the plot that the follow.  The two leads are so bland and forgettable that you groan every time they appear on screen.  The plot they follow is EXTREMELY generic too.  They fall in love, the guy gets famous but the girl doesn’t, there is a stupid misunderstanding that causes them to split, they both lose track of who they truly were, and then they get back together just as they realize all they ever needed was each other.  This becomes a serious problem when these two characters are the focus of the movie, instead of the much more entertaining storylines, like the one between Alec Baldwin and Russell Brand, and the one between Tom Cruise and Paul Giamatti.  You spend a large portion of the movie wishing it was about these other characters, and it detracts from the movie’s fun feel and atmosphere.  The lip-syncing in the movie is really bad too, and it’s easy to tell most of these actors really can’t sing at all. 

Now, I said before that the movie would have been much more interesting had it followed either Tom Cruise or Alec Baldwin or Russell Brand.  The way three of them act there parts is phenomenal.  Alec Baldwin and Russell Brand play off of each other very well, and it causes for some pretty comedic moments.  However, the real star of the movie is Tom Cruise.  He is so crazy and mean, and yet so likeable at the same time that you can’t make up your mind about whether or not you like or hate the guy.  Cruise plays the part like a man who has seen the best, and the worst, that the music industry has to offer.  It’s truly a great part that Cruise just gets lost in.  To my surprise, he is actually a pretty good singer too, and could honestly look toward a career in music.  Which brings me to the music.  What can I say?  The music in this movie is outstanding, but I guess that’s probably personal opinion.  It’s cheesy 80’s rock at its best.  And that’s really the best way to describe this movie, cheesy 80’s fun.  The movie is big, and always has something going on on-screen.  It’s always bright, colorful and bombastic, and loves how cheesy it is.  And that’s all I was looking for.

When I was walking into this movie, I wasn’t expecting anything Shakespearean, I was simply expecting some great music and a fun atmosphere.  When I left, I was happy that I got exactly what I wanted, plus a great performance from Tom Cruise.  So lip-syncing was bad.  So the main characters were bland.  So the plot focused on the wrong people.  When it comes down to it, this is a fun film, and that’s all it ever wanted to be.  I give it 3.5 stars out of 5.

Written by Alexander Martin

Cast:  Julianne Hough- Sherrie Christian   Diego Boneta- Drew Boley  

Alec Baldwin- Dennis Dupree   Russell Brand- Lonny   Catherine Zeta-Jones- Patricia Whitmore

 Malin Akerman: Constance Sack   Tom Cruise: Stacee Jaxx

Directed by Adam Shankman

Runtime: 123 min

The Avengers Review

The hype for The Avengers truly is something else, isn’t it?  I mean, think about it.  When another movie is advertized, you see billboards, commercials, trailers, advertizing on other products and so on.  But I’m finding it very difficult to remember a movie that has had multiple movies used to hype this it up.  Four or so movies (Iron Man’s 1 and 2, Thor, Captain America) have been used to hint at the fact that a movie with all of these heroes may actually happen.  I guess that’s a lot to gamble, putting all that money into four other movies, and this one, hoping you’ll come out successful.  Well, I’ve got to say, the gamble paid off.

The Avengers follows six different superheroes; Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.), Thor (Chris Hemsworth), Captain America (Chris Evans), Hulk (Mark Ruffalo), Black Widow (Scarlett Johansson), and Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner).  They are assembled together by Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson), who runs the organization SHIELD, because Loki (Tom Hiddleston) stole the Tesseract, a cube of incredible power (see Captain America), which he is going to use to take over the world.  Loki is going to bring an army of aliens to Earth, and the newly formed Avengers need to stop him.

 This movie essentially gets the job done, but there are a few aspects that could have been done better.  First of all, the plot could have been done a little bit better.  The general bad-guy-stole-our-thing-got-to-get-it-back plot is a little cookie-cutter, but it works for the movie it’s in.  I just can’t help but wish for a little more depth and complexity in my superhero plots since The Dark Knight.  Anyway, another small issue is that of the plot holes.  I could pick out one in particular that perplexed me, about the Hulk character.  The entire movie, Hulk acts as if he has no control over the Hulk, and is trying his hardest to keep the creature inside.  Later in the movie, however, he says he CAN control the Hulk persona, and uses it to help save the day.  I just find it odd that all this time he somehow knew how to control the power, but we never had a scene of him having this revelation or figuring it out.

Most of the aspects of this film, however, are extremely fun and entertaining.  First, the action in this movie is phenomenal.  The final 45 minutes, which is the fight between the Avengers and Loki’s army, is worth the price of admission on its own.  Every action scene is inventive and exhilarating, jumping from one member of the team to the others, as they cleverly take down the alien army.  The camera work, during the action and the rest of the movie, does a good job keeping the audience on their toes, and showcases the large sets this movie has to offer.  The relationships between characters, and the way the actors portrayed them, really caught my attention early on.  Each Avenger has his/her own personality and style, which either clashes or works well with another person in the group.  This leads to a few fights and some bickering, but also makes the team stronger and more together toward the end.  These relationships also lead to some surprisingly funny scenes, most of which involve the Hulk.  Everything else, like the special effects, was good as well, creating a great overall experience.

As I said before, The Avengers gets the job is was trying to accomplish done.  It creates a situation in which multiple superheroes are forced to work together and stop a super-villain, though they don’t necessarily want to.  What will really catch your attention are the characters themselves, who are so different from one another that they blend well together.  If you’re looking for a great action movie to kick off the summer, or even a little bit more than that, this is your movie.  I give it 4 stars out of 5.

Written by Alexander Martin

Cast:  Robert Downey Jr.- Tony Stark/Iron Man   Chris Hemsworth- Thor   Chris Evans- Steve Rogers/ Captain America   Mark Ruffalo- Bruce Banner/ The Hulk   Scarlett Johansson- Natasha Romanoff/ Black Widow   Jeremy Renner-  Clint Barton/ Hawkeye  Samuel L. Jackson- Nick Fury   Tom Hiddleston- Loki

Directed by Joss Whedon

Rated: PG-13

Runtime: 143 min  

John Carter Review

John Carter is Disney’s latest sci-fi action movie.  It is based on a series of books from the early 20th century by Edgar Rice Burroughs (best known for creating the character Tarzan).  The film has been in development since 1931, going through many studios and directors.  In the end, Andrew Stanton (who has only previously directed Pixar movies) became the director.  The film is based on the first book of this series, A Princess of Mars.

The story begins with Edgar Rice Burroughs (Daryl Sabara) discovering that his uncle, John Carter (Taylor Kitsch) has died.  When he visits John’s home, he discovers John’s journal, which tells the events of the movie.  We then cut to the past, where John is a Civil War vet.  John eventually discovers a device that transports him to Mars, which the natives call Barsoom.  While on Mars, he can jump and throw extremely far due to his different bone density and gravity.  John soon finds himself in the middle of a war on Mars between the two cities of Helium and Zodanga.  The only way to end this war is for the princess of Helium, Dejah Thoris (Lynn Collins), to marry the Jeddak (king or general) of Zodanga, Sab Than.  However, Dejah does not want to marry him, so she runs away and eventually meets up with John.  Together they must end this and find a way for John to get home.

What I didn’t like was that way too much information about this world and its characters was thrown at the audience way too fast.  As a result, the story can get really confusing if you don’t pay attention closely.  Also, Taylor Kitsch was just ok in the role of John, since this character deserves someone who is more charismatic than Taylor.  Lastly, the romance between John and Dejah seemed forced for the sake of advancing the plot.  Not to mention, the actors portraying them have very little chemistry.

Some positives were that the special effects were fantastic. Also, the action sequences were very entertaining and well choreographed (with the exception of one fight scene).  Despite the average acting, most of these characters and creatures are very interesting.  One notable example is a large dog- and frog-like creature (or as I’ve dubbed it, “Squishy Dog”) that can run at super fast speeds that John finds.  The creature stole every scene that it was in and added great comic relief.

Overall, if you’re looking for a fun sci-fi movie, you should see this movie.  But if you want a movie with more substance, then you should probably skip this.  In the end, the movie was just OK to me.  Final Rating: 3.5/5

Written by Daniel Baker

Cast: Taylor Kitsch: John Carter   Lynn Collins: Dejah Thoris   Willem Dafoe: Tars Tarkas  

Dominic West: Sab Than   Mark Strong: Matai Shang   Daryl Sabara: Edgar Rice Burroughs

Directed by Andrew Stanton

Rated PG-13

Runtime: 132 min   

The Three Stooges Review

The Three Stooges was a comedy act from the early to mid-20^th century.  The most famous line-up consisted of Moe Howard, Larry Fine, and Curly Howard.  Together they starred in many films and shorts.  Before I review this 2012 update, I just want to say that I am a big Three Stooges fan.  So naturally I was angry with the very idea of this movie (a Stooges movie that takes place in modern-times without the original trio, no thanks).  So against my better judgment I went on opening day to see it and was very surprised.

                The movie is split into three shorts all held together with one plot.  The Stooges, Moe (Chris Diamantopoulos), Larry (Sean Hayes), and Curly (Will Sasso), find out that their childhood orphanage is closing down due to a large debt.  The only way to save it is to collect $830,000 within 30 days.  From there the Stooges go to the city and find themselves involved in many misadventures including a plot to kill a rich housewife’s (Sofia Vergara) husband, and Moe becoming a member on a famous reality show that you may have heard of.

                When I went into this movie I expected the worst, but was pleasantly surprised.  The biggest complaint that I have is that the ending seems very disconnected from the rest of the movie, making it seem like the Farrelly Brothers (the directors and writers) didn’t know how to end it.  Also, the subplot involving a sick orphan was extremely cliché and was only there to show why it was important to save the orphanage.  Lastly, most of the modern references (with a few exceptions) weren’t funny.

                Besides that I really enjoyed this film. My biggest praise goes to the actors portraying the Stooges.  While you can never replace the originals, they did a fantastic job of emulating them and I even found myself forgetting that they weren’t the real Stooges.  Even their child counterparts that were used in flashbacks did a fantastic job.  Most importantly, this movie was hilarious, with great slapstick and one-liners, I was almost laughing non-stop along with the rest of the audience.  Some critics have complained that the jokes are stupid (which is true), but The Three Stooges have never been about sophisticated humor, rather slapstick and quick jokes.

                Don’t believe the negative reviews, this movie is great for Stooges fans young and old and is a great family comedy.  Final Rating: 4/5.

Written by Daniel Baker

Cast:  Sean Hayes- Larry   Will Sasso- Curly   Chris Diamantopoulos- Moe   Jane Lynch- Mother Superior   Sofia Vergara- Lydia   Jennifer Hudson- Sister Rosemary 

Directed by Bobby and Peter Farrelly

Rated PG

Runtime: 92 min

  

The Hunger Games Review

So, here comes another incredibly hyped up movie based on a young-adult book.  What is this, the third book series to be adapted based on the highly exploitable teen market?  Not to say I didn’t like this book, or this movie.  I enjoyed the book, written by Suzanne Collins, for its enthralling characters, post-apocalyptic environment, and violent action.  The movie did a fairly good job of adapting two of these three aspects.  Which one was the bad seed?  Was it bad enough to ruin this movie?

This movie centers around a sixteen girl named Katniss Everdeen (played by Jennifer Lawrence), who lives in the post-apocalyptic world of Panem, which is broken up into 12 different districts and a Capitol.  The all controlling Capitol, as punishment for a war the districts attempted to wage on it, has forced the districts to, each year, send one girl and one boy as tribute (between the ages of 12 and 18) to fight to the death until only one survives.  This completion has become known as the Hunger Games, and it has become a widely televised phenomenon in Panem.  When Katniss’s sister is chosen as tribute, Katniss volunteers to go instead, along with a boy named Peeta Mellark (played by Josh Hutcherson) to compete in the games.

Though I did enjoy this movie as a good representation of the book, I mentioned above that I had a serious problem with this movie.  The grand majority of the action scenes in this movie were AWFUL.  This is all due to the insane overuse of the shaky-cam.  For those of you who don’t know, what I mean by the shaky cam is that, to imply violence rather than actually show it, you sporadically move the camera around.  All this does is, what I said, imply violence and obscure the audience from the action.  It makes us more confused than awed, and we wonder what we just saw.  Now, I can fully understand why they had to do this.  I understand that this movie was rated PG-13, so the action had to be more implied to keep that MPAA rating.  I just wish that we could have actually SEEN the action.

Other than that, everything else in this movie was solid.  The camera work, other than that on the action, was good at showing the excellent cinematography this movie had to offer.  The depiction of the future world of Panem was very good, especially that of the technologically advanced Capitol.  The plot was well adapted from the book, passing over the needlessly descriptive sections of the novel and skipping to the scenes where important events occurred.  The acting was also very good, especially from Woody Harrelson (who played the leads’ instructor Haymitch) and Lenny Kravitz (who played the stylist Cinna).  They, along with Lawrence and Hutcherson, depicted the characters from the book very well; the calculating Katniss, strong Peeta, drunken Haymitch, and smart Cinna.  The special effects were nice when we saw them, including a swarm of crazy bees and a certain surprise toward the end that I will not spoil.

The main purpose of a movie based on a book, other than to make money (greedy Hollywood), is to make a faithful interpretation of the book, while keeping a crowd who hasn’t read the book interested and invested.  As I sat through this movie, I saw the characters that I had read about coming to life on screen, and the setting I had pictured being born.  A friend who set next to me at the film had never read the book, and he also enjoyed the movie for its characters and setting.  If not for the terribly shot action, I would have loved this movie.  Well, at least I have something to hope for in Hunger Games 2.  I give it 4 stars out of 5. 

    

Written by Alexander Martin

Cast: Jennifer Lawrence- Katniss Everdeen   Josh Hutcherson- Peeta Mellark   Woody Harrelson- Haymitch Abernathy   Lenny Kravitz- Cinna   Liam Hemsworth- Gale Hawthorne   Wes Bentley- Seneca Crane

Directed by Gary Ross

Rated PG-13

Runtime: 142 min    

Act of Valor Review

Going into this movie, I was joking about it being like Saving Private Ryan, and in a sense, it is, but also completely different. However, the two are completely separate movies, so I’ll just focus on Act of Valor. It’s about the actual events of the U.S Navy Special Warfare Combatant Crewmen. What are the actual events, well the first half of the movie consists of the team venturing to save an abducted CIA Agent by the name of Morales. While she is being tortured, trying to get information out of her, the team arrives to save her, recovering her and a cell phone that reveals important information about what a terrorist is trying to do to sneak his suicide bombers into America and cause a huge economic collapse. The second half of the movie revolves around the team uniting with the Mexican Special Forces to stop the terrorist before he 

sneaks himself and his bombers into America.

The team itself was played by active-duty Navy Seals (whose full names are not released), all portraying Navy Seals. Many criticisms I’ve read have criticized them for being “unemotional” and just plain bad actors. This blew my mind on so many levels. My approach is this, they’re Navy Seals portraying Navy Seals; you cannot get more authentic than that; so saying that they’re bad actors just seems like your over-analyzing the movie. These men are not actors acting in a movie, they are Navy Seals being Navy Seals in an accurate representation of real life events, and how the hell can you criticize that? I, personally, found them to be just fine in the movie. You feel for them and their dilemmas during the mission. They show accurate human emotion and you can see the respect they have for each other, its not like we’re talking about Vin Diesel from The Pacifier. Widgett Walls from “NeedCoffee.com” really summed it up well. He said:

   

    “If you expect them to act and banter like the marines from Aliens, you're gonna be disappointed. But that's not what the film promised, nor what I showed up for.”

 Well that’s my little rant on that, what else is there in the movie? The story... well since its true events, I can’t really criticize that, but the story was fine; A Navy Seal operation to protect America would be a simplification of the plot. The action scenes were superb; the Seals didn’t just run in an armed area and shot everything that moves Schwarzenegger style, they used real military tactics and procedures which, in the movie, are executed great and while watching, you feel like you’re there with them (to a point). The camera work stunned me; it showed the standard third-person action scene but also switched to some first-person views, which was a nice touch and executed very well, especially during the peak of the action scenes. The special effects were great and added to the huge intensity of the movie, which is the right word to sum it up: intense. There are a few sequences (about 75% in the beginning exposition) weren’t top notch. Some lingered too long, some weren’t explained enough, there were a few that were over explained; it was a mess. However, there are a lot of edits that were actually really good. I especially like how they introduced us to the team and the edits between place to place on the globe was done really well. The dialogue was fairly well, but the high points were the military codes and sequences which used a lot of actual military dialogue. If you’re like me, you understood it all and knew exactly what was happening. If you were like the woman sitting next to me, you were constantly being told by whomever was with you what would happen, so I can see how this may be a problem to some people who aren’t caught up on military lingo. With me, once the ending came along, I could feel the lump in my throat and I felt my eyes water. I became emotional, which is very rare for me and is also a sign of a good movie that I was really invested in. I also thought it was clever to put the title at the very end of the movie and end on a solid quote with the scrolling of names of soldiers who protected and served for our country. But for me, this was an intense movie that makes me appreciate the military even more for their constant protection of America. I extend a big-thank you to all those people who continue protect and serve our country and preserve our freedom.

Final Rating: 4.5/5 Except for the few editing and a few points of dialogue, this was an amazing movie that made me leave the theater thanking that we have the freedom we do due to the men and women of the military. I recommend you see it; Act of Valor was well worth the cost.

Written by Edan Mejias

Cast: Roselyn Sanchez- Lisa Morales   Nestor Serrano- Walter Ross   Emilio Rivera- Sanchez   U.S Navy Seals and U.S Navy Special Warfare Combatant Crew- Everybody Else

Directed by Mike McCoy and Scott Waugh

Rated R

Runtime: 110 min

Chronicle Review

The found footage technique of telling a movie’s story has become an overdone and cheesy way of movie making.  As a result, I wasn’t sure of what to expect from Chronicle, since it is also told like that.  But, I reluctantly went and what I saw really surprised me.

The movie begins with a socially awkward teenager named Andrew (Dane DeHaan).  He decides to document his hard life of abuse from his alcoholic father and his struggle to keep his dying mother alive with a video camera.  One night, Andrew, his cousin, Matt (Alex Russell), and best friend Steve (Michael B. Jordan) come across a mysterious rock, that when touched, gives them telekinesis.  However, Andrew begins using his powers for darker purposes.  There is more to the story but it would be better if I didn’t spoil it.

My only problem with this film is that Matt’s love interest (Ashley Hinshaw) was a pointless character.  What I mean is that her only purpose is to serve as an extra camera for scenes that Andrew wasn’t in.  As a result, her character isn’t developed at all and you don’t care about the character.

Other than that, this film is amazing.  The editing was fantastic, especially in the final act of the movie.  Also, the film uses really interesting camera angles whenever Andrew is using his telekinesis to direct the camera.  Another thing I liked was the length of the film.  While this movie is a bit shorter than most (84 minutes), I thought it was the perfect runtime as the pace wasn’t slow.  Lastly, I appreciate that the filmmakers didn’t shake the camera like crazy, like in other found footage movies.

Overall, this film is a great way to start the 2012 season of movies.  If you are looking for a fun, but dark action or superhero film, you can’t go wrong with Chronicle.  Final Rating: 4.5/5

Written by Daniel Baker

Cast: Dane DeHaan- Andrew Detmer   Alex Russell- Matt Garetty   Michael B. Jordan- Steve Montgomery   Michael Kelly- Richard Detmer   Ashley Hinshaw- Casey Letter

Directed by Josh Trank

Rated PG-13

Runtime: 84 min