I haven’t seen this movie but I want to know if anyone has and what they thought. This has to have the biggest Rotten Tomatoes differential of all time!! 7% of critics liked it and 90% of people who went to see it liked it!
Pacific Rim
Bill C’s Review – 2.75 out of 5
This is another one of those movies where it doesn’t really matter what I thought. If you like movies like the Transformers movies or Japanese B movies from the 50s or 60s like Godzilla or action movies in general you’ll probably like this. If you don’t stay home or go see something else.
This is directed by Guillermo Del Toro and the movie is well made. The special effects and action are high quality but depending on your point of view with these movies will either be great or totally ridiculous. The same can be said for the plot and dialogue. Some of the dialogue can also be thought of as superfluous as some of the characters mind melded for the battles.
The movie definitely moves right along (either because you’re totally into it or you’re noticing all the reasons you don’t like it). If you like this type of movie definitely check it out.
The Kings of Summer
Bill C’s Review 3.5 out of 5
The Kings of Summer is is another likable coming of age story. This one is much quirkier than The Way, Way Back.
The film focuses on three teenagers who run away from home one summer and build a home in the forest. Two are best friends, one with a father who doesn’t know how to relate to his son after the death of his wife and the other whose parents are totally overbearing. The third boy is just a strange hanger on.
The first half of the movie focuses on the three running away and building a place in the woods and settling in which makes for some good laughs. In the second half conflicts ensue, lives are at risk, friendships + family ties are re-established.
The quirkiness, humor and upbeat/heart warming ending make this an enjoyable movie.
The Way Way Back
Bill C’s Review – 4 out of 5
Unintentionally the last three movies I’ve seen have all been about kids dealing with parenting issues. This is one of the two that have been teenage boy coming of age stories. The other was about a 6 year old girl. I’ve liked them all but this is my favorite.
The Way Way Back is a funny, touching movie about 14 year old Duncan. He has to spend the summer with his mom (Toni Collette), her boyfriend (Steve, Carell) and his daughter at his summer home by the beach. Duncan is quiet and sullen as he doesn’t get along with his mom’s boyfriend (or his daughter) and it looks like it will be a long summer.
Luckily he runs into Owen (Sam Rockwell) and a job at the local water park. Owen brings Duncan out of his shell and give him the opportunity to get comfortable in his own skin.
The acting is very good. Sam Rockwell is great in this movie and very funny at the water park. Allison Janney is also very funny as the next door neighbor. Collette is good as the stressed out mom trying to make the most of a not very good situation and Carrell is good in a rare non comedy role as the cruddy boyfriend/supposed father figure for Duncan.
Nat Faxon and Jim Rash wrote, directed and have small funny supporting roles as water park employees. They were also 2 of the writers of The Descendatnts.
This is definitely worth seeing
Bill I’s Review – 4 out of 5
I agree with my buddy on this, excellent film. One of the best portrayals of adolescent angst/coming of age/frustration I’ve seen. The young actor is seething with being forced to accompany his mom and her slimy new boyfriend (an unlikeable Steve Carrell, a first) to summer cottage by the beach in Cape Cod, where the adults are just drinking and partying and getting frisky while their kids are doing who knows what. Nothing really original in the plot, but the characters are memorable and it’s cool to see how a caring adult (Sam Rockwell is an adult in age but a goofy kid on the surface) can make a huge positive difference in a teenager’s life. Without being creepy! I particularly liked the last scene, which I won’t describe, but it was very nicely done, with zero dialogue. Check it out.
The Lone Ranger
Bill C’s Review – 1.5 out of 5
I took one for the team and went to see the Lone Ranger this afternoon even though the reviews were awful. The best thing I can say about it is that it got me out of the 100 degree heat for almost 3 hours (when you factor in 20 minutes of coming attractions).
At 2.5 hours this would have been too long if it was a good movie, which unfortunately it was not. I have included a link that Billy I. posted of someone else’s review. Unfortunately I hadn’t read the whole thing at the time as it told me I could have saved 5 minutes by not staying for the scene with Tonto during the closing credits that I thought might have a point. The linked review He provides a lot more detail on the movie than I do and it is an interesting read.
The plot is sort of crazy (as apparently is Tonto). the movie tells the story of naive (really naive) John Reid being transformed from pacifist lawyer, teaming up with Tonto and becoming the Lone Ranger. We also get Tonto’s backstory as a heavily made up, old Tonto recalls the entire story.
The movie tries to throw in some humor some of which is ok but much falls flat. As an action movie much of the action goes over the top and I am pretty sure that both Tonto and The Lone ranger would have been disabled or dead (although come to think of it (Spoiler Alert) according to Tonto The Lone Ranger can’t die (end spoiler alert)).
Bottom line is I wish I had gone to see Despicable Me II.
Review from someone else that Billy I posted
World War Z
Bill I’s Review – 3.5 out of 5
I don’t normally go for zombie movies, or world war movies, much less a world war movie with zombies like this, but it’s a lot of (I was going to say “fun” but definitely not that) cool action and fantastic zombies. I always wondered why zombies would always move so slow, which they certainly do not here. These undead are super fast (but only when they are agitated!), crazy obsessed about attacking and biting humans, and seemingly super strong. There’s some incredible scenes, which I won’t give away here. Brad Pitt is excellent as the hero, and everyone else is a minor character (most of them turn into zombies, no surprise). This movie is not for the young teen age set, as it will likely cause nightmares. I saw a tweet from a Palestinian who saw this as Israeli propoganda, which I don’t agree with, although I could see how some might interpret racist undertones (e.g. during the initial attack Brad takes his family to Newark and everyone’s looting the stores, while a wino sits in the alley and pays no attention, then an African American cop shows up and…starts grabbing stuff off the shelves himself). But at least the zombies are multi-cultural.
We Steal Secrets – The Story of Wikileaks
Bill I’s Review – 3 out of 5
Bill C would probably rate this higher than I did ’cause he loves documentaries. I just “like” them, and this is an excellent one, but maybe a little long at 130 minutes. It’s very timely (I sat through a panel discussion beforehand) given the Snowden situation going on now, with many parallels to Bradley Manning releasing tons of US government classified documents to Wikileaks, who then partnered with some major new organizations (including the NY Times) to publish the information. I thought this would be a very liberal take on it, lionizing Julian Assange, but it certainly is not that. It’s a very even handed take on all parties, and by the end reinforces my suspicion about Assange’s character, which is that he’s not so honorable (“all information should be free”), and ended up turning into what he was supposedly fighting, namely someone who is not transparent about information that he considers private (sexual assault charges against him). Even his former founders speak against him. Alex Gibney is the talented director/writer and he is a master at telling this story. Most interesting to me is Bradley Manning, whom I knew very little about. You will be shocked when you hear from him. He’s the real hero or villain, and you will wonder how different Assange is from the NY Times. The Times scrutinized and redacted information it deemed dangerous to people’s lives, while Assange did nothing of the sort, although he claimed to have a process – he lied.
A Band Called Death
A Band Called Death – 4 out of 5
I originally reviewed this movie back in March during SXSW but it is opening this coming weekend. I think it’s also already available on Amazon and DVD as well. The Alamo Drafthouse has a screening on 6/26 with the band in attendance and doing a Q and A. The band also played last night at the Parish and put on a great show so if they tour they are worth checking out.
This documentary is the year’s ‘Searching for SugarMan‘! Three brothers from Detroit weren’t into the Motown scene and recorded some punk music in the mid-seventies. 35 years later they become overnight sensations! They were probably a little ahead of their time with pre-Ramones punk and they weren’t helped by their name. Their journey is an emotional one and luckily they were rediscovered a couple of years ago after detouring unsuccessfully into reggae music.
This is the End
Bill I’s Review – Nutty out of 5
For some reason I really like to hear and see Seth Rogan, in any film (including Funny People) and in any role (seemingly playing himself in many cases). Same with Jonah Hill and more and more the same with James Franco, Craig Robinson and Danny McBride. Well, with all these guys in this film, including others of that vein such as Aziz Ansari and Michael Cera, I was predisposed to find this movie hilarious…which I DID!!!
I loved it, not expecting much of a meaningful plot, but I was smiling throughout. Emma Watson is a great surprise, along with Channing Tatum and some well hung devils. Don’t read about any of the scenes, just go and enjoy the wackiness.
Oh, I almost forget about Rihanna, playing a version of herself who does not let herself get slapped around.
Bill C’s Review – 4 out of 5
I also loved this movie! All the actors are playing fictionalized versions of themselves during the rapture. Luckily they don’t take their persona’s very seriously and they have a great time making fun of their perceived selves. So much is going on in this movie that I might go back to see it again just to see some of the stuff I missed.
My only criticism is it probably could have been a little shorter and like Pineapple Express got a little too involved with the action instead of just focusing on the comedy at the end. This is definitely my favorite movie of the summer so far.
Fans of Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg (writes of the movie should check out this great interview on the WTF podcast.
The Internship
Bill C’s Review 2.5 out of 5
The Internship is a re-teaming of Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson from the very funny 2005 movie Wedding Crasher’s. Vaughn and Wilson still have undeniable chemistry and this film has a lot of funny moments but I was hoping for something that approached Wedding Crashers in quality. They try, but fail to reach the comedic level or the emotive relationships between. the key characters of their earlier collaboration. This movie is also a lot tamer than Wedding Crashers.
This movie stretched for a premise in having their characters be two middle aged, recently unemployed that convince the powers that be at Google to give them a shot in their intern program. Google gets a lot of free publicity and I guess the idea was to make Google look good. Having interns compete in teams for jobs (only members of the winning team get jobs) by tasks such as a game of Qidditch seemed stupid (and then Vaughn and Wilson becoming computer whizzes able to compete with the best and the brightest seemed stupider).
I think if I didn’t have such high expectations due to Wedding Crashers I might have liked this more. If you’re a real fan of theirs you should still consider this. It’s not bad, just not really good and overall I was disappointed.
