The Secret Life of Pets

To escape the heat we saw The Secret Life of Pets. It gets good reviews and other people we know really enjoyed it, but the trailer never impressed me. It looked like another perfectly OK kids movie that would be on Netflix in a few months.
I wasn't wrong. It was perfectly OK and that is about it. The movie, which is a rarity these days, does have more going on than the trailer implies. That was a nice surprise.
The funniest part was the minions short before the movie.
Anyway, Bug gave it a thumbs up and thought the crazy bunny was her favorite character.

The Knights of Badassdom

I was looking to winnow down my Netflix queue a little and had the TV to myself for long enough to watch one movie. My allergies had my head clogged up and a river of liquid snot running down my face, so I wasn't up for anything that required a lot of thought. The Knights of Badassdom seemed like it would be perfect. I thought I had heard somewhere that it was a cult classic and it had Summer Glau in it. It had to be a decent, if mindless, horror comedy.....
Let's just say that it should be called the Knights of Bad. It wasn't the worst movie I have ever seen. It was even OK enough for me to semi-pay attention to for its entire running length, which was on the short side. It was just bad and uninspired and predictable and not funny. Mostly, it was just not funny. If there was a trace of successful humor, The Knights of Badassdom would have been cult classic material. Instead it is just blah.

The Interview

I am not a fan of Seth Rogan comedies; The sophmoric, stoner, potty humor isn’t my style. I am not a fan of James Franco either; I just don’t understand the hype.
It is unlikely I would have chosen to watch The Interview without the surounding hubbub or if it involved paying money. Since Netflix picked up The Interview and suggested it as a popular on Netflix thing, H and I decided we should probably see what all the fuss was about.
The Interview is not a terrible movie. I didn’t hate it. Largely it was what I expected: drug jokes, gay jokes, sex jokes, basic stupidity being passed off as humor. Towards the end some over the top violence is tossed into for shock value.
I’ve read that what sets The Interview apart is its meta-narrative. It pokes fun at American infotainment journalism and the CIA and propaganda in general. I think that critique gives the movie too much credit. Those elements can be dredged out of the film and its use of the lowest of low comedy to appeal to a mass audience can also be seen as a stroke of brilliance. I think that is a happy accident.
If you are going to see The Interview see it soon before the central joke gets stale. If you decide to skip it, you are not missing much. Better yet, go see *Team America: World Police* instead.

Lego Movie

Verizon is giving us a free three months of HBO and we took advantage of HBO on-demand to watch The Lego Movie.
I had high expectations for The Lego Movie. The good doctors of Wittertainment gave it stellar reviews. In fact the flappy handed one sang the song for weeks. The glowing reviews, and my undying love for legos, either made me predisposed to love the movie or set me up for crushing disappointment.
As the song says “everything is awesome”. I loved the movie. Visually it was incredible. The story was sweet and had its tounge far enough in its cheek to become schmaltzy. It is a rare gem that can be sweet and ironic at the same time. The Lego Movie pulled it off.
The ending was also perfectly balanced. It was sweet and poked fun at the franchise nature of big movies.
I am going to watch it again if a get a chance. I think I’m going to see if Bug will watch it with me. I think she’ll get a hoot out of it too.

Butter

Butter is one of the craziest movies I've seen in a long while. The plot is preposterous. The characters are over the top. The whole thing is whacked. Yet, it all works to make a bitting, dark, sweet social comedy.
The cast is littered with near-A list talent including Jennifer Gardner, Olivia Wild, Ty Burrell, and Alicia Silverstone. Many other cast members have familiar faces. They all do a great a job being overblown caricatures of stereotypes. Garner's ambitious house wife is crazed and in most hands would be completely unlikable. Instead she comes off as mildly sympathetic. Wild's stripper is deliciously depraved. Silverstone plays the liberal adoptive Mom with sensitivity without allowing the audience to forget why there is a stereotype.
The subplots twist and turn and at times I doubted that the movie would resolve things in a satisfactory manner. Then the movie ends and it all sort of makes sense.
I highly recommend Butter.

Despicable Me 2

H and I decided to go see this based solely on one joke that happens in the first twenty minutes of the movie. As far as I was concerned, the movie had little else to recommend it. I am not a fan of Steve Carell's work in general and reviews of the first film were pretty like warm.
It turns out that the sequel is better than the original. It must be because they ramped up the minion count. The adult characters are forgettable. The children are cute, but forgettable. The story is sweet, but predictable and forgettable.
What keeps things interesting is the comedy of the minions. I laughed enough to not feel like we wasted our money. I can imagine watching with wee child on Netflix and enjoying it.

Paranorman

I'm a sucker for a good misfit movie and Paranorman did not disapoint. It ticks all of the right boxes. Misfit kid with specail ability, a well meaning but clueless family, the mistfit freind, the gaurdian spirit, the mission to save the world, and zombies are all there. More importantly, the movie is smart, funny, and doesn't skimp on the scary to spare the kids. Saving the world requires Norman to work through some pretty rough stuff given that the target audience for the film is 12.

The the subversive humor is what makes the movie work and keeps it from drowning in its message. The creeepy uncle is creepy but is done humorously. The zombies are also creepy in a funny way. The only truly scary character is the witch.

I highly recommend Paranorman.

Iron Man 3

The Marvel Movie Machine keeps churning out the hits. Marvel has definitely found the right formula for cranking out summer block busters that don't require a lobotomy to watch. The Machine doesn't produce anything Nolanesque, but what it does make is art when put up against most summer block busters by people like McG and the Transformers guy.
Iron Man 3 sticks to its strengths: solid performances. Downey, Jr. is a near perfect Tony Stark. He has the right blend of arrogance and vulnerability. Cheadle plays Rhodes with a nice balance of seriousness and humility. He is totally believable as War Hammer/Iron Patriot. Paltrow's Pepper Pots is strong and plays off Downey perfectly.
The strong cast takes a plot that borders on pedestrian and could easily of fallen off a cliff and creates a hit.
The first third of the movie is a little slow, but it rebuilds the bond you have with the characters. By the time, the action kicks off you want them to pull through. While there is never a real sense of threat, the audience is invested enough to root for the heroes.
The middle of the film is the strongest part of the film. The thing I liked most about it was that it was strong without relying on big set pieces, CGI, or any super powers. It stands almost entirely on the strength of the characters.
The last third of the film is the expected CGI fueled super clash. It is a loud visual spectacular. It does not disappoint, In fact because the majority of the movie is special effects lite, it feels even better.
Is this a film that makes you think? Does it ask big questions? Not really. There is an interesting question about how to deal with terrorism. There is also an interesting reflection of the question of what makes Stark and Rhodes heroes. Does the suit make the hero?

Young Adult

I'm not really sure how I feel about this movie. I did like it, but I'm not sure I'd call it a good movie. It has moments of humor; the kind of humor that makes you ashamed to be human. It has moments of deep pathos. The actors all do excellent jobs with their parts. Charlize Theron is the only actor who could pull off the lead role without you completely despising her. The dialog and story are both smart and well paced. It is all eminently believable.
Yet, I found it hard to really get involved in the movie. Partially this has to do with the fact that for most of the movie you really think you have seen it before. Deeply flawed character finds redemption through the love of a person they would normally scorn. The fact that the roles are reversed should be a glaring sign that you are not in standard Hollywood tropes, but that is easy to misinterpret as just a nod towards modern gender equality. It isn't until the very end of the movie, that you realize how far from the tropes you have wandered. By then it is a little too late to reclaim a home audience that is easily distracted by e-mail, Twitter, and Facebook.
In final analysis, I applaud the darkness and subversiveness of the film. I just wish it had placed the hook a little more firmly from the get go. When the plot heads off into the woods, I wouldn't have been checking to see if my friends had tweeted anything over the interweb.

Iron Sky

A cheap movie about Moon Nazis is either going to be terrible or terribly fun. Iron Sky was terribly fun. It had better special effects than it had the right to. The performances were over the top. The plot was predictable. Even the moralizing was expected. Still it was exactly what you would expect from a low budget movie about Moon Nazis. It was way better than the normal ScyFy movie of the week.

Sleepwalk With Me

A movie based on a This American Life skit is an interesting idea in theory. The danger in executing it is that it will feel like a fifteen minute skit dragged out for ninety minutes. The other danger is that a character who seems interesting for a brief moment will become loathsome over the long hall.
Sadly Sleepwalk With Me fell into both traps. The sleepwalking skit is one of the great TAL episodes. Mike Birbiglia's other bits are also typically funny. The problem is that he doesn't do the work to tie them together into a story that holds up for the duration. In many ways, the sleepwalking bit feels tacked on to a dull story about the end of a relationship. It doesn't add anything to the story and the humor is fleeting. The love story bit is too mixed up with the bit about becoming an adult and it doesn't seem to really mesh in anyway that is believable. It all hangs together like a ball of wet noodles. A film is too long for Birbiglia's meandering style to hold up. It works best when the audience cannot stop paying attention halfway through because they don't have time.
The other problem is that for the movie to work you have to like the central character. As he says "remember you are on my side". I was never on his side. I wanted the girl to walkout on him after the first five minutes. I wanted her to sleep with the hunky guy at the bar. I wanted him to fall asleep at the wheel. I didn't believe that any girl could have more than a passing "self loathing" moment where she would consider him suitable for anything more than a tool. I didn't even believe it when he finally figured out how to be funny.
Was it a terrible movie? No. Do I feel like it was a waste of ninety minutes? Not really. Would I pay to watch it? No.

Moonrise Kingdom

Last weekend H and I got a rare opportunity to see a movie! There wasn't much out that we could agree on seeing: other than the lingering Avengers and Dark Knight Rises it was mostly just the typical late summer Hollywood crap polluting the screens.
With some trepidation, and based on a good Kermode review and a 94% Rotten Tomatoes rating, we decided to give the latest Wes Anderson outing, Moonrise Kingdom, a shot.
Most Wes Anderson movies are infuriatingly kooky. It worked alright in The Royal Tannenbaums, but the rest of Anderson's catalog to date has been just too much. In fact, I found most of them to be kooky to the point of smugness. It is almost like he is saying if you don't find this funny, you are too crass to watch the movie. It is a little like Joyce's and Elliot's attitude towards the common reader, except Anderson doesn't have an iota of the talent to earn the attitude.
In Moonrise Kingdom, Anderson is able to temper the kook just enough to make a good movie. It helps that the story is centered around two endearing children and Anderson is smart enough to treat the characters with respect and tenderness. The strong center holds the kookiness of the rest of the movie in check.
The movie also benefits from an excellent performance from Bruce Willis as a downtrodden, good hearted police offer that becomes the surprising hero of the film.
Anderson favorite Bill Murray turns in a workman like performance. Murray's performance is paltry compared to Frances McDormand's portrayal of his wife. She makes you feel the conflicts of being a good mother, good wife, and lusting for more adventure in life. You can see from McDormand's character where Suzy gets her chutzpah.
This movie, like all Anderson movies, is full kookiness. In many ways it adds to the humor and tenderness of the film. It is always, however, threatening to overpower the whole endeavor. It wouldn't take much for the film to devolve into a version of The Life Aquatic with Steve Zissou where the kookiness destroys what could have been a smart commentary on family, fame, and obsession.
Ultimately, Anderson is able to restrain his tendencies and make a tender, funny, and smart movie. It is to his credit that he let the strong characters and endearing story dominate the story telling. It is the strong center that works the rest is just window dressing.

The Pirates!

After nearly two years, H and I finally got out to see a movie in a theater. Instead of jumping into something heavy, we decided for lighter fare: The Pirates! Band of Misfits (In the rest of the English speaking world, where they are not afraid of science, the subtitle is Adventures with Scientists.
It is an Ardman claymation film. Ardman are the people who created Wallace and Grommet, Chicken Run, and Sean the Sheep. As one would expect from Ardman, the film looks incredible. I am always amazed at how detailed and lush their films look. The characters are amazingly expressive. They have facial expressions, body postures, and movements that are, in some cases, even more expressive than what you can get from a human actor. The backgrounds were equally detailed. Some of them are digital, but they all flow together seamlessly. We saw it in 2D and I cannot see how 3D would do anything to improve the visuals. It would probably detract from the experience by being a distraction.
The story was OK. It had a good number of laughs and a wicked portrayal of Queen Elizabeth. Overall, it is a pretty standard issue story for a family movie. The writing will appeal to kids and adults alike. H felt like the first part of the movie dragged a bit, but I didn't mind the beginning at all.
The most impressive thing about the movie was the craftsmanship. It was clearly made by people who care about turning out high quality products. The movie was years in the making and it shows. It is a stark contrast to a lot of the poop that studios crank out simply for a buck. If you want to support quality, skip Transformers, John Carter, G. I. Joe and all of the cookie cutter romance movies spit out from the Sparks factory, and see Pirates!.

Your Highness

Given the awesome cast signed up to this film, I had high hopes. I should have remembered that the quality of a movie is often inversely proportional to the number of hot stars that are in it.
The performances are passable, but it is pretty obvious that Natalie Portman is not a comedic actor and neither is James Franco. While they have superb dramatic skills, they were unable to find the sweet spot for a satiric performance that was funny because it was supposed to be and not because it was so bad.
The humor also was a let down. The jokes relied too heavily on homo jokes and dick jokes. Sure one or two jokes about macho men being unknowingly gay is funny, but an hour and forty minutes of it is wearing. The rest of the dick jokes were just lame.
I certainly hope that Portman and Franco look back on this movie as a bad mistake. Maybe they will feel guilty enough to make up for the hours wasted by people watching this shlock. If I wasn't trapped on a plane for three hours I would have walked out of this just after seeing Portman semi-nude. That is the only good thing in the whole film.

Tangled

Tangled is not a movie I'm proud to say I've watched, particularly when I didn't watch it with a child. H and I watched it on Netflix when there was nothing else on the tube.
I expected Tangled to be pretty mediocre and was modestly surprised. It definitely isn't a classic, but it is more fun than it could have been.
The plot is pretty much what one would expect. The characters are all standard fare. The heroine is plucky and resourceful. The hero is a rouge with a heart of gold. Together they fall in love, defeat the forces aligned against them, and live happily ever after. There is betrayal, sacrifice, and help from a rouge's gallery of misfits. Oh there is plenty of singing.
The beautiful animation is one of the Tangled strengths. While the story is cookie cutter, it is a good story and it is well assembled. Everyone does a good job. Mandy Moore's singing is excellent. Zac Levy's rouge is dashing when needed and believable when he gets soft. The jokes are well done and well timed.
So, Tangled won't win any awards, nor will it become a classic. That said, it is a decent way to kill an hour and a half.

Chuck Anticipation

I'm psyched that Chuck is getting one more, albeit shortened, season. It is a fun, action comedy and the central characters—Chuck, Sara, and Casey—are interesting. You want them to succeed and be happy. The rest of the cast makes a nice back drop, as long as they don't get too much air time.
I thought the season finally was, although predictable, excellent. It showed Chuck's growth in terms of self-confidence and skills, it resolved the Volkoff storyline, and tied up the family issues. I also liked that it set up the next season for big changes.
The one concern I have, and it was one of the things that bothered me all season, was the expansion of Morgan's role. As the slacker friend in the first few seasons he was a nice comic side-kick. This season his position as "team member" put him on screen too much, and his role is set up to be even bigger next season.
It many ways Morgan is just a delayed version of Chuck. Adding a second Chuck into the mix cannot be a good idea. It will either distract from the main arc of Chuck's development or be just an easy way to keep fall back on previously trodden territory.
I hope the writers can find a way to keep the story focused on the central trio. I imagine there is a way Morgan can be integrated into the story and his status elevated such that he enhances the central narrative. I just hope the writers pull it off.

Easy A

The highly rated teen drama staring the highly regarded Emma Stone makes Hester Prynn a web caster - sort of. It is a neat idea to update the classic in a respectful manner without a naked Demi Moore. Sadly, Easy A is not the film to do it.
Emma Stone's performance is strong and the supporting performances by her character's family member are perfect. The film does deal with the issue of character assassination and false piety, but it gets lost along the way. There is the whole rumors running wild conceit, the whole being infamous has a dark side conceit, and the whole be true to yourself conceit. They all have a place, but in this case I found that they detracted from the main thrust of the story.
The writing and humor was well delivered, so it is a watchable movie. It was definitely an OK Saturday Netfilx film.

Better Off Ted

Better Off Ted is a short lived, witty take on Dilbert. (I lo e the fact that Netflix let's me watch things like this!) It is so much more than Dilbert though.
The show is centered around Ted who looks like a generic successful white male executive at a large generically evil mega-corporation. He has two whacky scientists that work for him and a nice, honest tester who plays his sort of love interest. Ted also has an affectless maniacal boss. It takes this cliche cast and spins gold.
The dialog is fast paced and spot on. The plots are original but laced with enough convention that you don't miss the satire. The cast plays things perfectly. They oscillate between subdued and over the top deftly. It is like Arrested Development meets The Office. Except that it is way better than The Office. I think it makes The Office look like a cheap community production.

Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs

This is the craziest movie I've seen in a long time. Yet it some how worked amazingly well. The animation popped and made the effects seem huge - even on my iPads screen. I wish I had seen it in IMAX! Mr. T's performance was perfect. I cannot think of a bad thing to say about this movie.

Dinoshark

I have a fetish for knowingly terrible horror movies. Dinoshark, a Scyfy production, ranks near the top.
The special effects are obvious, the dialog is terrible, the plot is predictable, and the acting is criminal. It is chuck full of the archetyps: hot, but discredited, scientist, mysterious, and troubled, man of action, expendable sidekicks, skeptical authority figures, creature unleashed by man's relentless assault on nature.....
To me, however, the sheer scope of the terribleness is the beauty of a movie like Dinoshark. Nobody involved in making the movie thought it would be anything more than a B-movie. It has all the references, it has all the required tropes, and it has the low budget feel. It even managed to have a few jumptastic moments.
How can you not like a movie that combines Godzilla and Jaws into one perfect cheese ball? It is a great way to waste a rainy Sunday afternoon.