Greenville FanForce Movie Thread

Thought we could have movie discussions here. I saw Kill Bill Vol 1 tonight at my friends hosue. SO FREAKING AWESOME! It was a BLOODBATH!!

 

From Empire Online:

Flying Solo

Harrison Ford returns to space in Godspeed

26 May 2004


Harrison Ford will return to the big black next year, succumbing to the pull of zero-g as an astronaut in James Cameron's Godspeed. No, Cameron hasn't decided to break his hiatus (documentaries aside, he's been sitting on his directorial arse since Titanic back in 1997), but he will be producing the film. Why do we care, then? Well, Godspeed will mark Harrison Ford's triumphant return to the sci-fi genre, having not set foot in outer space since a little film back in 1983 called Return of the Jedi - you might have heard of it.

Given the decline in Ford's career in recent years (Hollywood Homicide and K19 alone could have brought lesser men to their knees), perhaps a return to the medium that brought us Han Solo is exactly what the actor needs to pull himself back up.

Godspeed seems to be set in the very near future aboard the successfully running international space station (see, we told you it was science fiction). In a more realistic turn of events, a fatal flaw is discovered and a life-threatening situation threatens to kill all aboard.

Of course this does put yet another project between Ford and Indy IV, but given how much work Spielberg has lined up at the moment, perhaps Ford has the right idea by keeping busy in the meantime.

*************************************************

I hope this one turns out well. I always look forward to Harrison Ford films, but I'm still getting over Hollywood Homicide. As for Indy IV, I'm just gonna tell myself not to even care until actual production begins, if it ever does.

 

Hmmmmm. Harrison Ford in space. Could be interesting. I liked the last film he did in space. Here's hoping it doesn't end up like his last two movies.

JMK

{[[[[<>]]_\=======================

 

I saw the Day After Tomorrow the other day. The effects were awesome but I thought the story overall needed some work and left you feeling that it wasn't believable enough. I had been looking forward to this movie for a very long time though.

This Friday I look forward to Harry Potter!

 

Well I don't think I have ever done this in my life but this has been the busiest movie weekend for me.

Thursday we got free passes to see The Terminal (sneak preview). It was awesome - I recommend it to all!!!! It was very funny in a very clever clean way.

Friday I saw Shrek 2 which kept me laughing quite a bit. Puss was cute and hilarious!

Saturday I saw Garfield. Which will be enjoyed by all Garfield and cat lovers.

Sunday I saw Harry Potter 3 for the second time. Just as good as the first .

Ok I'm movied out now.

 

I saw the Chronicles of Riddick the other night. I really enjoyed it. It kept moving and the action was great. I also liked Pitch Black too. I know there are a lot of people out there who would scorn this movie, like all the critics, etc...but to those I say this was an entertaining ride from start to finish.

I also think, we need more critics who enjoy a good SciFi movie. It seems to be all about drama nowadays. Don't forget we go to the movies to forget about our trouble for a short time. I don't want to go to movies all the time where it makes me ponder life. Sometimes, you just want to sit back and let the movie maker take you to a galaxy far, far away.

I'll stop rambling now.

Have a great weekend everyone.

Jedi Master Kel

 

Well since I rarely get to the movies anymore, I have to see everything after the fact. I saw School of Rock last night and enjoyed it fairly well. I think I'm gonna watch The Cooler tonight, then I have another coupon at Hollywood Video to burn before the end of the month. I'll probably get Bowling for Columbine, because I wanna get primed for Fahrenheit 9/11.

 

I watched The Cooler last night and really liked it. Alec Baldwin definitely shined in this movie. I'm a sucker for Vegas movies anyway, but it was interesting to watch how "old" Vegas and "new" Vegas are clashing. William H. Macy was also great - he definitely knows how to play the lovable loser.

I picked up three more for my viewing pleasure now - Bowling for Columbine, The Legend of Ron Jeremy, and Bubba Ho-Tep.

 

The weekend triple bill is over and here are some quick thoughts . . .

The Legend of Ron Jeremy - No it wasn't a porno, but it was legit documentary about the porno star and his attempts to get into mainstream film/TV. I was hoping for something a little better as it really seemed to be nothing more than a self-promotional piece for Jeremy's aspirations to move past porn. There was the obligatory history of how he got into porn, his standing as the "everyman hero" to all ugly guys who hope to get laid, and all the pertinent numbers dealing with quantity of women and size of other things. The rest of it seems to be a laundry list of his appearances in B-films and how ended up on the cutting room floor of many other films simply because he's a porn star. I think I was supposed to feel sorry for the guy, but when you see the women he has scored with, it's hard for me to feel bad for the guy just because he got cut out of Ronin.

Bowling for Columbine - Just getting ready for Fahrenheit 9/11, until I realized it wasn't gonna be in Greenville. Why am I not surprised in this podunk town? This is typical Moore fare. He does have a broad ranging point, but he's so intent on getting every single argument in there, he tends to gloss over a lot of stuff. His arguments for why the Columbine shootings happened range from fear of blacks to a Lockheed-Martin plant in Littleton. He really hits his stride when he addresses the culture of fear reinforced by the news media and how they'd rather report every shooting, rape, murder, etc. instead of a wider range of news. He also shows why Charlton Heston is a great figurehead for the NRA due to his name, but when faced with tough questions, he is not equipped to handle them. I was about to get bored during the first third of the film, but then it really picked up and the last two-thirds were really interesting.

Bubba Ho-tep - By far, one of the most surprisingly enjoyable movies I've seen in a while. If you read the synopsis of this film (basically Elvis versus the Mummy), you'd expect perhaps a dark comedy, some camp, some horror, who knows? Bubba Ho-tep contains small elements of all of this, but ultimately I think it's a touching drama dealing with getting older, looking back on how you lived your life, and if you can be proud of it. I cannot express how surprised I was by this movie and I'll probably go buy a copy now as I want to watch it again paying a little more attention to themes and symbolism. I've read several reviews of this film and they're pretty much you'll hate it or love it. There's not much middle ground. I loved it. Where else will you find an elderly Elvis, a black JFK, a redneck mummy who sucks souls out of a**holes, and a poignant story of living your life in the face of death?

 

The weekend double features concludes with . . .

Barbershop 2 - If you saw Barbershop, you've seen Barbershop 2. It's essentially the same movie, except this time the bad guys are crooked politicians and greedy land developers. It's all really just a small reason to allow Cedric the Entertainer to rant and rave about all things controversial, including mixed-race people, women's roles in life, and the DC sniper (the Jackie Robinson of crime). For some reason, the writers felt the need to limit Cedric's work in this film and attempt to move along a dull, predictable plot to its natural conclusion. Queen Latifah is introduced in this film, but only enough to promote the next film in this series, "Beauty Shop," which appears to be "Barbershop" with women. Anyway, it's good for a few laughs, but not as many as the first.

Once Upon a Time in Mexico - What a disappointment. I am a huge fan of "El Mariachi" and "Desperado." I read "Rebel without a Film Crew" half a dozen times, and now I'm rewarded with this crap. The first two films in this trilogy were easy to figure out, a mistaken-identity shoot 'em up and a revenge shoot 'em up. This film is a convoluted mess with at least five or six pointless subplots all leading to poop. It appears at this point, Robert Rodriguez ran out of new clever ways for "El" to dish out his brand of justice. Now he's relegated to simply standing in the middle of rooms or streets and blowing people away while never being shot. All the creativity seems to have dried up. Next, Salma Hayek is promoted heavily for this film, but she easily has less than ten minutes of screen time - relegated to flashbacks that are completely erratic and to a point, annoying. The only positive in this film is Johnny Depp as an over-the-top rogue CIA agent (who wears a CIA agent T-shirt to a bull fight). He is laughably smug and ruthless, but even when he meets a pretty nasty fate late in the film, he is still the same smug guy. There's some others in here including Willem Dafoe (spelled William on the DVD case), Mickey Rourke, Ruben Blades, Enrique Iglesias (what?!), and several others who are all doublecrossing each other and otherwise making the film even less comprehensible. If you've seen the first two films in the this trilogy, you may want to check it out, but really, it's hardly necessary and doesn't have much to do with the other films. On the DVD, there is of course the Rodriguez staple "The 10 Minute Flick School" which is the most interesting thing on the disc. There is also a "10 Minute Cooking School" which was kind of cool, and then a tour of his home studio which will make any fan film geek's mouth water. Drool.

 

Apparently we have this thing in Greenville called a movie theater, where you can actually go see movies on a big screen with other people. Having a child, I did not realize you could actually leave your house to do such fun things . . .

Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy: Will Ferrell is at the top of the comedy heap right now. There just isn't much this guy can do now that I don't laugh at hysterically. Anchorman is no different. The premise is cheesy, the setting and time are the same, and the movie sometimes goes to extreme absurds (such as a gangland streetfight between competing news teams). Yet I laughed 'til I cried, repeatedly. The last time I laughed this hard at a movie was . . . Will Ferrell's Elf. Steve Carell (now apparently forever typecasted as a news team member of some kind) steals much of the film as nerdy weather guy, Brick Tamblin and Vince Vaughn is hilarious as the anchor of the #2 team in the market, Wes Mantooth. The plot is pretty straightforward - Christina Applegate comes to San Diego to become a female news anchor in the 70's, and of course that shouldn't be happening in a world run by men. There are several great cameos in the film that were really funny (if you didn't know about them coming in), but Ferrell once again rules.

 

I've heard about this movie theater thing the other week. My wife and I got to enjoy ourselves there this past weekend and saw Spidey 2. What a great ride!

JMK

 

Yes. We took advantage of the grandparents last weekend and saw Anchorman on Friday and Spidey 2 on Saturday.

Spider-Man 2: If other superhero films took the time to explore the burden of being a superhero as well as Spidey 2 does, it would be a great gift to the genre. Superman and Superman 2 did it. First exploring Clark Kent's difficulties of hiding his powers as a child, then later in the second movie, they become such a burden that he actually gives up his powers for love. Being a superhero isn't all cool tights and great powers. The Batman and X-Men series glossed over these burdens at best, and the Hulk barely even qualified as a superhero film anyway. I think the Spidey series may have moved up to my favorite superhero film series now (but it's really not fair to Superman because Superman 3 & 4 sucked so badly, Spidey 3 will easily be better). The action in Spidey 2 does not seem as prevalent as in the first Spidey. But if you watch the first Spidey again, you'll realize there's not as much action as you'd think as a lot of that film revolves around Peter's discovery of his powers and how to use them. In Spidey 2, you see a lot of how Peter deals with being Spider-Man, how it costs him his job, his grades, his girl, and his own life. But when the action comes, it comes fast and furious. The train fight sequence is amazing and the resolution with the train's passengers is really moving. Doc Ock is a great creation and his robotic arms seemed to be characters unto themselves. A lot of detail went into making those arms very animal-like and it really shows. The end seems a tad long and tad over-the-top, but if ROTK can get away with it, so can Spidey. I am really looking forward to catching this movie again.

My .99 cent coupon triple bill DVD rentals of the week: Seabiscuit, The Rundown, EuroTrip. Reviews forthcoming . . .

 

EuroTrip: A review quote on the box called it "American Pie in Europe!" Bah. At least with AP, there's some familiarity with the hassles about sex when you're in high school, but it's hard for me to relate to a guy that simply tells his parents he's camping, and then heads to Europe to find the girl of his dreams. I guess as I've gotten older, movies like this or AP do not the hold the appeal they had when I was a kid when it was movies like Porky's and Revenge of the Nerds. Of course when I was a kid, seeing these movies was a big deal since I was under 17 and boobs seemed like the best thing since sliced bread. Today, boobs are still the best thing since sliced bread, but I can see both whenever I want, so a teen flick with gratuitous nudity, while nice, needs a little more to interest me. In a nutshell, this was an OK .99 cents rental, but would've sucked at regular price. The movie uses the known stereotypes about Europe from the sex-filled Amsterdam to snooty French waiters to English soccer hooligans and so on. It has its funny spots and there is a recurring joke about a particular song that goes through the whole movie which continuously cracked me up. Go find a coupon or maybe find the Unrated version. A few more boobies might make it more worth the extra money.

The Rundown: Good or bad, it's pretty much what I expected. It's kind of a buddy flick, but not really, more in the vein of Midnight Run, but with a lot more stuff blowing up. The Rock does a nice job and is pretty funny with the material he's given. Sean William Scott is Stiffler in the jungle. When he tries to act tough near the end, it's still not believable. Christoper Walken is in typical form which usually means he's stealing the show which is the case here. The slightly annoying thing about the movie is how the Rock's character goes from a bad-@ss dude to a borderline superhero by the end of the movie - not necessarily in his character, so much as in abilities. In the beginning of the film, he's just a bad dude than can handle himself in a fight against bigger competition, but by the end of the film, he's knocking down buildings and brick pillars with his shoulders. It's a little over the top for my taste, but the rest of the film is entertaining enough that I can live with it.

Seabiscuit: I like horses and I think they're beautiful animals, but I'd hardly call myself a horseracing fan, which is why I'm glad Seabiscuit tells the story of the horse's fame in relation to the troubles the country was facing. I'm a sucker for a sports film, but this one goes beyond the sporting aspect and explores the cultural significance of the animal and how the country came to love it, much in the same way they rallied around the US Olympic hockey team in the 80's. The story of how the horse, owner, trainer, and jockey all come together after suffering various losses only to overcome everything is pretty inspiring. Not knowing much about Seabiscuit at all made most of the story really entertaining. I knew enough about the US hockey team that the end of "Miracle," while satisfying, loses just a bit of excitement. But with Seabiscuit, I guess I was spoiler-free, so it made for a great conclusion to a great film. Chris Cooper definitely rules the screen in this one, but Jeff Bridges and Tobey McGuire are in great form too.

And now the next coupon-driven triple-bill includes Welcome to Mooseport, Mystic River, and Freddy vs. Jason.

 

Freddy vs Jason rules! I have that on dvd. I finally got Star Wars Episode 1 in a pawn shop for 8 bucks. I hope they get in ep 2 for that cheap. I got Spiderman Ultimate Edition the other day too as well as TMNT Season one last night. (the original toon). I really hope that Metallica: Some Kind of Monster (documentary of the bands history--getting good reviews from what I've heard--but then theres the occasional morons) gets into our theaters. If not I'll just haveta get to Raleigh somehow and see it there if they have it..

 

I'm kind of looking forward to Freddy vs. Jason. As you can tell from the stuff I've been watching, I'm horribly behind on movies. I think the original Nightmare on Elm Street is probably my favorite horror film. But as they made Freddy more comical, I thought the movies got a little worse, though most of them had a bright spot or two. My wife would never watch a horror movie with me, so I'll likely be watching this one by myself up in the bonus room.

 

I'm sure you've all heard that "Alien Vs. Predator" is coming to theaters soon.

What's next? Chucky Vs. Michael Myers?

 

at least freddy vs jason has been in the works for 16 years and was somewhat serious. Same thing with alien vs predator. been in talks for a looong time and will be serious and not comical like mike vs chuckster

 

saw The Incredibles on Tuesday. Really cool movie, hate that episode 3 trailor wasn't with it! What have you guys seen lately?

 

Saw The Incredibles a couple of weeks ago, and like you, no trailer.

Last Saturday, we went and saw the Polar Express. Great movie. Wonderfully done. Masterful, can you tell I liked the movie?

JMK

 

I haven't seen anything lately. Haven't even really rented anything. I am really looking forward to Ocean's 12 though, and I wouldn't mind checking out National Treasure.

 

apparently some extra ROTS trailors were sent out, and one is supposed to with National Tresure. So Dalton, there's your're reason to go see National Tresure..lol

 

So what brought about the new ID? Is BFo9 retired permanently?

 

Well I actually got to see a new movie, so I reckon I'll chat about it a moment -

Ocean's 12 - Simply put, I enjoyed it, but not as much as the first one. Really they're two different types of movie. Where Ocean's 11 was really a "heist movie," Ocean's 12 puts the heist in the background for a half dozen smaller subplots that range from entertaining to contrived. The banter between the "12" is a little more crispy and funny in this one, but there are several places where it slows down which I didn't care for. I guess I just prefer the "heist movie" like Ocean's 11 or the Italian Job. I also must admit that I am not particularly enamored with Catherine Zeta-Jones like most of the world seems to be. There's no doubt she can be hot at times, but I find her personality on-screen to be as entertaining as a piece of plywood.

 

Finally got to see Rungu...the Japanese film that they remade into The Ring. Actually from what I've read the US film makers combined Ringu and Rungu 2 and made it into The Ring. Now The Ring 2 is a whole new story not based on a Japanese film. Ringu was very very suspensful. As a guy who always watches hack and slash movies, it was a welcome change as this movie screwed with your mind, not showing blood and guts. Its a little different than I remember of The Ring, and man...it was just so awesome. I'd definatly going to get Ringu, Ringu 2, the prequal Ringu 0 and I think theres another one Japan made. Plus, since next year along side my majoring in history at State, I'm also minoring in Japanese so it'll give me practice having some Japanese audio films. Now I cant wait for The Ring 2 in theaters and I'll definatly be buying The Ring as well. i know that was confusing as hell but ahh well.