<dl dt_class="field"> Jewel of the Nile (1985) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0089370/">5/10</a> The cast of <i>Romancing the Stone</i> returns for this sub-par sequel, made back when sequels did not necessarily have a number in their titles. Michael Douglas and Kathleen Turner play the lead couple and Danny DeVito reprises his role, but this time on their side rather than against them. The hijinks feel forced and the magic of the first film isn't really there. Snakes on a Plane (2006) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0417148/">4/10</a> It's fun to try to imagine why someone with Samuel L. Jackson's obvious reputation and assumed clout in Hollywood is nearly constantly driven to take such appalling roles in such appalling movies. Does he burn through money at such a prodigious rate? For personal reasons? Or is he especially charitable? Does he not read his contracts? Does his agent hate him? Did he make a bizarre deal with the devil? The movie's not as awful as expected and some of the scenes with snakes are well-filmed and quite visceral and convincing, but c'mon, Sam, you're above this, aren't you? Aren't you? Devil (2010) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1314655/">4/10</a> M. Night Shyamalan continues his descent from one-hit wonder to producer/writer/director with too much money and no idea how to spend it wisely. This movie couldn't have cost very much as it was essentially filmed almost entirely in an elevator. He only wrote and produced this one, letting someone else direct it, though that hardly makes a difference. The devil possesses someone in an elevator, which is filled with people, each of whom has a horrific backstory worthy of the devil's attention. There are a few moments of suspense, but overall it's not very good---and the ending is kind of a copout, I felt. Not recommended. Veep (2012/13) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1759761/">10/10</a> Julia Louis Dreyfus stars in this TV series as the Veep (Vice President of the United States of America). She is deeply funny and all-around excellent. The show is occasionally filthy, constantly ruthless and hopefully not accurate at all. Depressingly, it is probably indicative of the morass that is Washington D.C. The Veep and her crew---as well as the entirely unseen POTUS, of whom we only see his liaison to the Veep's office, Jonah, who is pond scum---barely pay attention to real issues and real politics, focusing instead laser-like on issues of re-electability, leverage and power. It's well-written and the cast surrounding Dreyfus is also quite good. We watched two seasons, mostly enjoyed them and will probably stick around for season 3. Freaks and Geeks (1999) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0193676/">9/10</a> A one-season TV show starring a lot of young actors who would go on to no small success: James Franco, Seth Rogen, Jason Siegel and Linda Cardellini. My hands-down favorite, though, is the character Bill, played by Martin Starr, who would end up playing only bit roles in subsequent Judd Apatow vehicles like <i>Superbad</i> and <i>Knocked Up</i> (Apatow directed three of the Freaks&Geeks episodes). Bill is really great in this, though. The show centers on the Weir family, which has two of the geeks (nerd Lindsay and her geeky, younger brother Sam). Sam's two friends, Bill and Neil round out the geeks. James Franco heads up the gang of Freaks as Daniel Desario, with Siegel, Rogen and the unfortunately named Busy Philipps rounding out his crew. The writing is spectacular even if some of the episodes drag ever so slightly. The appeal for me is increased because the kids are all in high school at about the same time I was in school in the 70s and 80s. Escape from New York (1981) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0082340/">7/10</a> Kurt Russell stars as Snake Plisskin, an eyepatched, crusty former soldier turned criminal/mercenary who's doing a long stretch in a maximum security prison. The story takes place in the near future (as envisioned in 1981), a future where crime is out of control and New York City has been mostly abandoned to various gangs and partially turned into a prison. Unfortunately, the President of the United States crash-lands in New York and Plisskin is plucked out of his cell and made an offer he can't refuse: he's to rescue the POTUS in 24 hours or he's dead. Plisskin accepts but quickly goes off the reservation, serving his own purposes as he seeks the President amid the rubble and mad denizens of New York. It wasn't as good as I remembered it from my youth, but it was so, so, so much better than the ill-fated sequel <i>Escape from L.A.</i>, released in 1996. Under the Dome (2013) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1553656/">6/10</a> This series is loosely based on the book of the same name by Stephen King. If you read the book, you'll recognize a lot of people's names and several plot points. However, everything has been stretched and adjusted to accommodate a more open-ended storyline that can play for months, if not years, instead of just a week, as in the book. Many of the characters are more insipid than those in the book---as expected for American network television---with some seemingly ridiculous behavior from some who should know better, particularly the police officers, who are wildly inconsistent, shockingly unprofessional, stupid and nearly constantly either explaining things that are blindingly obvious (most likely for the benefit of the slower viewers) or asking stunningly stupid questions (most likely so that another can answer the question that the slower viewers were asking themselves). It's entertaining enough, even with some of the more irritating characters dominating way too much airtime (I'm looking at you, Norrie), but much more shallow than King's novel. Junior Rennie comes the closest to exuding the more subtle menace of an under-the-surface psychotic typical of King's meanest characters. Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee (2012/2013) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2314952/">8/10</a> Jerry Seinfeld gets into a different, beautiful car in each show, calls a comedian friend and they go out for coffee and usually breakfast or lunch while they discuss comedy, business and anything else. The show is best when Jerry or his guest philosophizes. My favorite interviews so far have been Larry David, Alec Baldwin, Carl Reiner and Mel Brooks. Looking forward to seeing the second season. The International (2009) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0963178/">7/10</a> A slower, but ultimately interesting film about an Interpol officer, played by Clive Owen, who tries to take down "The International", a cabal of elite officers of a banking organization who pull the strings of the world behind the scenes. This time, they are trying to close a huge arms deal and thereby kill one of Owen's fellow officers. Naomi Watts stars as his partner. The plot is kind of convoluted with Italian financiers and a knot of other associates and interests, all trying to get their piece of the action. Recommended. Raging Bull (1980) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0081398/">7/10</a> Robert de Niro stars as boxer Jack LaMotta, a complete asshole of a man with a huge inferiority complex, no intelligence or savvy to speak of and a nearly uncontrollable temper. Oh, and he's an ephebophile who has no trouble robbing the cradle. Sound fun? It's totally not. Joe Pesci shines in his breakout role as LaMotta's brother, but otherwise it's not really a fun movie. DeNiro is good, but his character is just so relentlessly stupid and horrible that it's tough to enjoy. You can appreciate it for good acting, good direction and good writing, but you're not really going to enjoy it. I know I didn't. Red (2010) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1245526/">8/10</a> Bruce Willlis, John Malkovitch, Morgan Freeman, Helen Mirren and Brian Cox (awesome as Ivan) are all aging, aged and semi- or fully retired former agents and assassins. Of these, Willis's Frank Moses was---and still is---the best. He inadvertently shows up on another radar and gets embroiled in a new, modern-day plot that somehow involves the innocent young girl at his insurance company with whom he's fallen in love. They get the gang back together and infiltrate buildings guarded by the newer generations---and who prove utterly incapable of being able to handle the awesomeness that is an old guard trained and hardened during the cold war. Good times and good performances from several of the leads, with special kudos for Cox, Mirren and Malkovitch. Highly recommended if action comedies are your thing. The Mechanic (2011) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0472399/">8/10</a> A---nay, <i>the</i>---Jason Statham vehicle to end all Jason Statham vehicles. This is a remake of the 1972 original starring Charles Bronson. Statham plays an elite hit-man who learned at the feet of his master, Donald Sutherland. The business passes on to Statham and soon Sutherland's son---played by Ben Foster---shows up, wanting to be trained as Statham was. There is much precision shooting and ass-kicking, although not as much as I'd like in a Jason Statham film. Still, the plot is decent, the tension is good and the ending is very satisfying. Recommended. Apocalypse Now (1979) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0078788/">9/10</a> Martin Sheen and Marlon Brando star in this magnificent film about the vietnam war, directed by Francis Ford Coppola. Sheen narrates the film as a sailor on a PT boat headed deep, deep, deep into the Vietnamese---Laotian?---jungles. The war is shown in all its ugliness, in all its senselessness, in all its utter depravity. The entire second half of the nearly 4-hour--long "redux" version is highly surreal---this is the part where Brando appears as Kurtz, the renegade former US military commander who now heads a private army of naked savages. An utterly brilliant film well worth the time. Highly recommended. Natural Born Killers (1994) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0110632/">9/10</a> Oliver Stone's tour de force about a couple of homicidal killers named Mickey and Mallory Knox, played by Woody Harrelson and Juliette Lewis, respectively. Robert Downey Jr. also stars as Wayne Gale, a sleazy and exploitative tabloid-TV reporter, Tommy Lee Jones is an equally unctuous and greasy prison warden and Rodney Dangerfield plays Mallory's abusive and troglodyte father. The film is exquisitely cut together out of snippets of footage from other films, cartoons depicting fleeting acts of violence and faux-found footage from security cameras and shaky hand-cams. In Mickey's interview, there are shades of Charlie Manson, with a kind of lucidity shining forth from what society would call madness. But this is a society that is ostensibly mad already, especially in its approach to sex and violence, so who's the bigger problem? Mickey, who at least kills individuals, eye to eye? Or faceless bureaucrats, who with their actions wipe out millions? Stone intersperses images of Waco, Texas to make his point that State violence makes a killing spree like Mickey and Mallory's seem like an absolute drop in the bucket. Oz the Great and Powerful (2013) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1623205/">3/10</a> This is an incredibly uneven sequel to the <i>Wizard of Oz</i> starring James Franco in the title role with Michelle Williams, Rachel Weisz and Mila Kunis as the three witches. The cast of witches was quite promising but would prove to ultimately be a disappointment. Zach Braff plays Franco's assistant and then voices his horrible little monkey sidekick. The CGI is over-the-top and candy-coated, clearly having been designed for the attention span of an eight-year--old and for the 3D theater. All actors are wasted by this awful script with its hideous dialogue. James Franco is charming and, having just finished watching <i>Freaks and Geeks</i>, it was hard not to see Daniel Disario shining through his toothy grin. Sunshine (2007) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0448134/">8/10</a> This is a science-fiction horror film about a near-future where the sun is dying, failing to warm the Earth. It follows a crew of scientists who are the last-ditch hope of humanity, sent to dump a highly powerful generator/bomb into the sun in an effort to super-charge it back to life---like a giant defibrillator. They are the second mission and are plagued by thoughts of what happened to the first mission. Did they go mad? Did they succeed? Did they fail? An uncommon cast---Michelle Yeoh, Benedict Wong, Hiroyuki Sanada; in other words, not the usual lily-white male astronaut studs, though those are also present (e.g. Chris Pine, who is also good)---gives the film more flavor than it would otherwise have had. Mark Strong is good, as usual. Recommended as a decent science-fiction movie. Cloud Atlas (2012) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1371111/">9/10</a> How do you even begin to describe this movie? I can't pretend that I understood everything---I can't even pretend that I knew all the characters and the actors who played them. I can say that I found the movie absolutely riveting, beautifully made and well-paced. Hugo Weaving as Uncle Georgie was a standout role. All of the actors are very good, even Halle Berry. This is a big-budget concept film that beats out Terence Malick's Tree of Life, which, while it took an entirely different tack, felt similar at times. Ben Whishaw, Keith David, Hugh Grant, Susan Sarandon, Hugo Weaving, Jim Broadbent and Tom Hanks lend a tremendous amount of gravitas. Year of the Dragon (1985) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0090350/">4/10</a> A plodding plot that really shows its age in its execution. The main cop played by Mickey Rourke is an utter turd. But he's the lead role, so he unbelievably is also the primary love interest of the leading lady. Lots of violence and stupid racist stereotypes made this film utterly forgettable. Not recommended. Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy (2011) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1340800/">8/10</a> An all-star cast play out this melancholy, very slow-paced film about cold-war espionage. Some of the exposition is too long for my taste, but some, like when Gary Oldman's George Smiley starts chewing (ever so lightly) the scenery, are spellbinding. Likewise, Peter's theft of a journal from MI6 headquarters (Peter is played by Benedict Cumberbatch) is a marvel for how much tension and subsequent relief it produces, all without any of the quick-cuts, shaky cams and explosions other spy movies have brought to the genre. Recommended for those looking for a movie that engages the mind instead of the adrenal glands. The Magnificent Seven (1960) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0054047/">6/10</a> It's amazing how much screen-time the comparatively unknown Horst Buchholz gets in this movie. He acts well, but the movie was clearly a vehicle dreamt up to bring together Yul Brenner, Steve McQueen, Charles Bronson, Robert Vaughn and James Coburn. It was kind of <i>The Expendables</i> of its day, actually. It, too, suffers somewhat from long, expositional scenes that don't seem to add to the basic plot. It's likely that some of this was taken from the Japanese original, shot just a few years before. If you're a fan of westerns, you've got to see this one. The Change-Up (2011) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1488555/">5/10</a> Ryan Reynolds, Jason Bateman, Leslie Mann, Olivia Wilde and Alan Arkin form a promising cast for what ends up being a more disappointing movie. It's not awful, but not as good as it could have been, devolving into some pretty stupid "typical-guy" tropes that should be beneath everyone involved. Olivia Wilde was less wooden and horrible than usual (it's weird, she interviews very well) and Reynolds was funny, at times. Not really recommended. War (2007) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0499556/">6/10</a> Despite starring both Jason Statham and Jet Li, the film was oddly disappointing. The title refers to two wars, actually: the war between the Triads and Yakuza and the war between Statham (federal agent) and Li (mysterious and seemingly unstoppable hired killer), who Statham is hunting for having killed his partner years before. It takes a long time before Statham's first really decent fight scene arrives---always a bad sign---and, likewise, a Jet Li movie with minimal martial arts and maximal car chases and sniper scenes just feels wrong. It wasn't terrible, but it could have been much better. Making Jet Li smugly smile whenever he thwarts Statham is a pretty transparent and ultimately ineffective way of making the audience hate him. I guess you could also hate him because he gets to cruise around in a Spyker C8 Spyder, which is a very sweet-looking car. In the last third, when Jet Li finally starts fighting---and starts rebelling against the utterly unprincipled Yakuza for whom he works---things get much better. Many more fights scenes---including the long-awaited one between Statham and Li---and a cool surprise ending. Hot Shots! (1991) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0102059/">7/10</a> Charlie Sheen doing what he does best---making fun of hit movies (in this case, mostly <i>Top Gun</i>). Cary Elwes, Jon Cryer, Lloyd Bridges and the adorable Valeria Golino round out the cast. This is a pretty good Airplane-style movie, beaten out only by <i>Top Secret</i>, in my humble opinion. Ghosts of Girlfriends Past (2009) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0821640/">6/10</a> Matthew McConaughey stars as a Lothario fashion photographer who trails a ridiculously long train of sexual conquests behind him going into his brother's wedding. The wedding takes place at his Uncle Wayne's (played by Michael Douglas) mansion. The story follows---more or less---Dickens's Christmas Carol, with ghostly visitations. Jennifer Garner stars as a skeleton, Emma Stone makes an appearance as the teenage ghost of the past and Anne Archer plays the cougar-ish mother of the bride. It's not a great movie, but the actors aren't bad, especially McConaughey and Douglas, who deliver their utterly horrific lines with gusto and who seemingly cannot be phased. Somewhat recommended, depending on audience, mood and/or available libations. Hot Shots! Part Deux (1993) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0107144/">6/10</a> Lloyd Bridges, Charlie Sheen and Valeria Golino reprise their roles in this second installment of Hot Shots, this time taking the piss out of Rambo instead of Top Gun. Ryan Stiles and Miguel Ferrer round out the crew that accompanies Topper (Sheen) into the jungles. Conan the Barbarian (2011) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0816462/">4/10</a> This is a reboot (aren't those popular these days) of the popular 1980s movies starring Arnold Schwarzenegger. If you think the guy playing Conan---Jason Momoa---looks familier, it's because he plays almost exactly the same character in <i>Game of Thrones</i>, as Khal Drogo. The plot is pretty predictable, with the only semi-interesting part showing Conan's origin story, featuring Ron Perlman as his father. Not really recommended; if you want something like this, watch either the original or <i>John Carter</i> instead. Employee of the Month (2006) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0424993/">3/10</a> I only caught the second half of this, but I think that <iq>starring <i>Dane Cook</i> and <i>Jessica Simpson</i></iq> should serve as enough of a warning. <i>Harland Williams</i>, <i>Andy Dick</i> and <i>Brian George</i> were also recognizable and had a couple of decent lines. The plot was execrable and the acting was barely better. Not recommended. Airplane II: The Sequel (1982) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0083530/">6/10</a> I only saw the second half, but still kind of enjoyed it. It's kind of a stupid movie, but it's my kind of stupid. William Shatner is pretty good. Your mileage may vary. Constantine (2005) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0360486/">10/10</a> Keanu Reeves stars as Constantine, a warrior in the battle of good vs. evil. He's not exactly neutral but he fights for the balance. The demons, however, are sick of the balance---and so are some angels. This movie just kicks ass for all sorts of reasons, not least of which is probably Reeves's best role ever. Highly recommended. Air America (1990) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0099005/">6/10</a> An exceedingly boyish Robert Downey Jr. playes a hotshot news-copter pilot recruited by the CIA. Mel Gibson plays an only slightly older-looking old CIA hand flying for the eponymous "Air America", which was the CIA's fleet of aircraft serving the whole of Southeast Asia and was based in Laos. The giant airbase did not officially exist. There is much drinking and much manly talk and much flying and crashing of highly unlikely and non-airworthy aircraft. The plot eventually winds up with a feel-good story about how Downey's basic goodness and forthrightness influences Gibson to change his mercenary and gun-running ways. Not bad, but not great either. The Internship (2013) --- <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2234155/">5/10</a> Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson as recently out-of-work salesmen in their late 30s who sign up for the Google internship program---which is led by Aasif Mandvi. It sounds good, in principle. In execution, it feels much more like a 90-minute advertisement for Google. Vaughn and Owen play the exact same roles they always play, which means there are a few good Vaughn speeches in there, but there's not much else to sustain you through the film. Their team of interns aren't half-bad and are far less insufferable than expected; their main opponent is typically, cartoonishly evil. Mandvi is OK, but I can't believe he let himself be convinced that he should do the whole movie in an Indian accent that he doesn't, in real life, have. Not really recommended. </dl>