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really low budget improv mockumentary
blackballed isn't a bad film, it's just not a very good one. rob corddry and a bunch of other really funny people (the human giant guys, rob riggle, ed helms, etc.) made this mockumentary about bobby dukes (corddry), a paintball player who was the best, but due to cheating, was banned for 10 years. now 10 years later, he's back and wants to get back on top. so he assembles a team of ragtag paintballers and they go play in a tournament. there isn't much substance here, and most of the jokes are so slight and not really funny. it's humorous to be sure, and the absurdity of it all carries the film along... but the talent is wasted in this basically plotless improv fest. christopher guest films have done way better with the same kind of limited plot idea.
weird, disjointed, and not good
terry gilliam's latest film (and heath ledger's last) has a promising plot. doctor parnassus (christopher plummer) is a man with eternal life and plays various games with the devil (played by tom waits) throughout the years. in modern time the doctor is a travelling carnival man with a show that gives participants the chance to enter their imagination. his daughter is about to turn 16, and when she does her soul will belong to the devil, but he decides to play another game of chance with the doctor. whoever gets 5 souls first wins! seems simple enough, especially when the dr. meets heath ledger and he helps him recover souls in some weird choice the person makes inside the 'imaginarium'. the setup is interesting, and it's a typical terry gilliam weird-fest... but for some reason the emphasis is all on heath ledger's character, and not on dr. parnassus and his daughter (the hot lily cole). it's all weird and disjointed, probably because heath died during filming, but even if he lived to complete it, it'd be pretty crappy by gilliam's standards.
british black comedy...
'a film with me in it' is a black comedy that is quite similar to 'very bad things', but not quite as funny. the premise is funny, mark is an out of work actor who lives with his girlfriend and paralyzed brother in a shitty apartment with tons of problems. one day everything falls apart for mark... his girlfriend leaves him, the chandelier falls on his brother and kills him, the landlord whom he owes plenty of money to gets killed trying to fix a light, and so on. the apartment amasses many dead bodies, all by accident! mark's friend pierce, who also claims to be a film writer and director, comes over and the 2 try to come up with a plan. the idea is funny, and the story plays out like a thriller more than horror, but the payoff just isn't that great. mark isn't exactly a likeable guy, while the guy who plays pierce (dylan moran) is funny and entertaining.
fuck norman rockwell...
up is just like a fucking norman rockwell painting... utter bullshit. the story is about an old man whose wife of 50+ years has died, now he wants to go on an adventure he wanted to pursue with his beloved... i can't stand pixar films anymore... they're all the same. so much syruppy bullshit about friendship and what's really important and shit. fuck disney for making their films so manipulative. the film accomplishes what it sets out to... make us care about the characters. that's what they specialize in... they made us care about toys, fish, and cars for fucks sakes... why not an old man who never realized his dreams? i don't care how preposterous the plot is... i can get over that stuff, like the audience is supposed to... but the way they present life, it's so fucking phony. it's either a kids movie, or an adult movie... don't try to be both pixar!
another thing i hate about pixar... the shitty sense of humor. they're kid jokes, but they want adults to laugh at them. wtf? the funny stuff involves dug, the talking dog... but the jokes get old fast. this film is so similar to wall-e, finding nemo, monsters inc., etc. for some reason i keep seeing them too... just like the rest of the world. that's what i hate too! they have so much power over us! lol. the animation is amazing as usual, but i am just sick of their bullshit overall.
good and bad
judd apatow has good stories to tell in his films. like the 40 year old virgin and knocked up before it, funny people has a good premise, and i'm sure it's at least somewhat close to his heart because that's how the other films he directed were. adam sandler stars as george simmons, a comedian not that much unlike himself in real life. he's a comedian with tons of money. george however doesn't have a family or many friends, and he recently found out he's dying of a rare form of leukemia. he decides to get back into stand up comedy and befriends seth rogan's character, ira, a struggling stand up comic who has to work at a deli just to pay the bills. the 2 form a unique friendship... meanwhile george is still in love with his ex (leslie mann, apatow's real wife) who's now married to eric bana and they have 2 kids (apatow's real kids). well, guess what... george gets better, and his ex wants to get back together with him, but ira knows it'll fuck up a family... this film is more drama than funny, and extremely long. it's almost 2 and a half hours. the funny parts are funny, especially the scenes with seth rogan and his roommates jonah hill, and jason schwartzman. the important parts of the film are rushed through, while the funny but less important parts are dragged out quite a bit. the acting is good, premise is good, but it's execution is meh.
well made, but...
the baader meinhof complex is based on the true story of anarchist rebels andreas baader and ulrike meinhof, and their rise to power in 70's germany, and their international following. the film is very well made, and good. the subject matter however is aggrevating. the filmmakers however seem to idolize these people, and i found them to be completely reprehensible. sure the world was full of shit at the time (still is by the way), and these people stood up against it in their own fucked up way... but what did they actually change? nothing. they were terrorists with giant egos and no true sense of reality. i noticed that several terrorists (RFA fighters) shot at cops, but the instant that they were wrestled to the ground we heard them moan in agony from the pain! wtf? dude just killed a bunch of guys, but we're supposed to feel sorry for them when they're taken down and handcuffed? i think the filmmakers failed to make a strong enough case for these people. they all came off as ignorant idealistic college kids who we should love and respect. i didn't buy it. we were supposed to feel sorry for them when they were jailed in solitary confinement. the people fucking used pipe bombs and stole cars!
like i said though, the film was very well made, especially the special effects. there are some great bullet wounds that are incredibly realistic. the movie also goes very long, around 2.5 hours!
jan svankmajer in wonderland
i have always enjoyed stop motion animation, especially when i was young. now i still like and appreciate it, but it isn't as magical and amazing as when i was a kid. alice is a live action/stop motion animation film by jan svankmajer. i'll admit that the only other films of his i've seen was little otik and faust. i've always heard how dark and disturbing his films were, but i didn't get that from them at all, and that disappointed me. alice isn't much different in my opinion. it's mostly just repetative stop motion action set in the small world of alice in wonderland. the film seems so small, like we're stuck in a little house with a few tiny rooms, and hardly anything happens. the film follows the basic story of alice in wonderland and through the looking glass (i believe), and offers little new to the many many versions out there. the stop motion animation is good as usual, but it's almost just a gimmick. like i said, there is a lot of repetition, and little adventure to be had.
disjointed romantic comedy/drama
steve zahn stars as mike, a lonely motel manager in a small arizona town. he meets sue (jennifer aniston), and falls in love with her immediately. mike is socially awkward and tries way too hard, but somehow sue sees something in him and the 2 hookup. once she goes home mike follows (more like stalks) her for the next few months. the 2 have chemistry, but both need to change in order for the relationship to work. eventually sue ends up with her ex-boyfriend jango, an ex-punk played by woody harrelson who provides stability. anyways, the film has some hilarious moments, especially when zahn meets his new friend al, who is especially funny. the film has some decent drama, but a lot of the plot elements seem tacked on especially when steve zahn becomes a buddhist monk. it's a good idea, but seemed to be added at the last minute, because it was almost pointless to the plot. also the characters seem to not act the way people would in the same situations, and that was kinda annoying. overall i enjoyed this film despite the flaws.
also, management features one of the worst uses of product placement i've ever seen was when sue and mike hand out burger king coupons and powerade to the homeless. that's so dispicable. 'omg burger king is saving the homeless! and we get to advertise to the world in a really cute way!' that really pissed me off too.
if not for the singing, i woulda loved it
repo! is a musical from Darren Smith and Terrance Zdunich. it's obvious that they put lots of effort into the screenplay, songs, and music for this highly ambitious film. the story is great, visuals are stunning, and a lot of the music is good too. it's just too campy, in a rocky horror picture show way. this can be good, but with a plot as good as this i just don't think it works that well.
in the future people get organ transplants often, and one company supplies them: GeneCo. if people can't make payments on time for these organs, geneco sends in the repo men to remove them. rotti the geneco owner is dying and must leave his company to one of his 3 rotten children (one of which is paris hilton ffs), so he tries to find a new heir, shilo. she's the daughter of rotti's true love who died years ago. he was responsible for killing her but pinned it on her husband and shilo's father, nathan. nathan is forced to be a repo man which he keeps a secret from shilo. this all sounds complicated, but gets explained pretty well through comic book flashback sequences. i liked the whole idea of the repo men, all the other stuff doesn't do it for me, but i appreciate how ambitious the entire plot is. i mostly just don't like musicals all that much, and the singing in this gets rather annoying quickly. some dialogue is spoken, then sung and back again. i didn't like that whole aspect of the film, which is a huge important part.
another stylish con movie
the brothers bloom is similar to any other con artist movie ever made. plenty of cons, people conning eachother, hard to tell who's really conning and who they're conning, etc. to me it gets old fast. this film is rather enjoyable, but overall it's a tired story and i felt like i've seen it many times before. adrian brody (bloom) is in love with rachel weisz (penelope), the woman they're scamming. the story gets repetetive fast, as brody wants the same thing from his brother mark ruffalo (stephen), the mastermind. there are some funny parts, lots of enjoyable moments, but as i said it's been done before. see matchstick men, house of cards, dirty rotten scoundrels, etc.
robert rodriguez's latest spoof of grindhouse
