The Shining (1980)

What makes a horror film truly scary? That's different for everyone, but for myself I feel that it's a matter of relatability. Don't get me wrong, I'm a fan of the outlandish horror tropes that are so outside reality that there's never any need to worry about them in real life, be it your yawning hellgate, Satan coming to steal your soul or monsters trying to kill you. For crying out loud, two of my favorite movies of all time are "Event Horizon" and John Carpenter's "The Thing." I'm okay with "off-the-wall."

But at the same time, there's only so much you, or at least I, can be scared of something like that. It can be intense or disturbing, and from that standpoint you might call it scary, but it's not very relatable is it? After all, nobody has a valid fear of being eaten by a dinosaur, and least nobody with a grasp on reality. But to dive into something that's tangible can elevate a film from being a collection of well-timed and executed shocks, and turn it into something that can crawl into your head, dig under your skin, and mess with you in a way that those outlandish monsters can't. That's where the real horror is, in my opinion. After all, everyone can relate to being angry at your family. And everyone can also imagine the fear of someone swinging an axe at your head.

And let's be honest. I think we all have an ingrained fear of Jack Nicholson. And plaid.

That brings me to what I consider to be one of the greatest horror films of all time, Stanley Kubrick's adaptation of Stephen King's "The Shining." Kubrick is a director whose works for me run the gambit from the sublime ("A Clockwork Orange") to the moderately decent ("Dr. Strangelove") to the wretchedly unwatchable ("2001: A Space Odyssey"). You can never quite tell what you're getting yourself into with him, which makes him an interesting director to discover. And even though I think that often his work is frankly overrated, I can't deny that he makes a damn good horror film. Too bad he only did one.

The reason "The Shining" works so well is because of three main factors. The first is the famous Kubrick slow burn, which sucked all life out of "2001" but made "The Shining" fantastic because a) It's not nearly as slow, b) It serves a purpose other than to simply take a long time and c) Things actually happen. From the opening helicopter shot where we see Jack's car while that horribly ominous, unearthly music plays, we can tell something is off. Something's not quite right. The hotel itself seems to be watching him, keeping something waiting around every corner, ready to strike.

 Man. This would have made the best Fruit Gushers commercial.

The cinematography helps with that, framing many shots like someone is watching without the character's knowledge. It's quite subtle, but it lends a lurking horror to what is honestly not that much happening. That is until the climax of the film where things go absolutely ballistic. And while it may take some time to get there, by the time we do get to the true madness the tension has been building up so much that the film stock seems like it's about to catch fire, aided along by some truly heart-stopping moments like the pantry door unlocking, the REDRUM scene, and my personal favorite moment - "All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy." That entire scene is unreal, and worthy of being placed up there with the greatest movie sequences of all time.

That brings us to the second reason, which is the acting. It probably would have been a better move to cast someone else besides Jack Nicholson, or at least cast someone who wasn't known for playing somewhat crazy people, but that being said Nicholson does an amazing job of taking us through a mad, twisting journey inside the mind of Jack Torrance. Having a more unassuming actor may have made that progression more surprising, but that's not really the fault of Nicholson. The man is just good at playing crazy people, and here he knocks it out of the park with one of the most terrifying performances I've ever seen.

And one of the most quotable.

I've heard a lot of people bash on Shelley Duvall as Wendy for being an annoying pushover. I disagree, but I understand where people are coming from. Duvall has moments of somewhat hammy dialogue where what she's saying doesn't sound like normal speech like she's doing an after-school special. But at the same time that comes across like a mask she's putting up around herself. When she does that she becomes the kind of "Good Wife Action Figure" with the pull-string voice box that'll spout stuff like "Sure thing, hon!" and "This is just dandy" and "Let's forget our troubles with a big bowl of strawberry ice cream!"

It's a front and a sham, and she wears it constantly to the point of passively accepting a rather severe amount of abuse from Jack, which could understandably make some people dislike her. But when the mask comes off, and her world crumbles around her as her own sanity is being stretched to its utmost limits, that's when we see her in her basest, most naked form. The scenes that some people say they find her at her most obnoxious as she weeps and sputters in gasping cries (roughly the entire last act of the film) are not the marks of a bad actress, but of someone who is portraying a human being who has been stripped of everything short of their body. That should be ugly and unpleasant. I frankly find her performance oddly stunning and hard to watch in a good way.

Pictured above - A master's course in acting afraid.

Danny Lloyd also was one of the best child actors, but like Carrie Henn six years later with "Aliens," he only did one film. That's a damn shame, but at least he went out by giving one of the best performances by a kid ever put on screen. He's got this amazing thousand yard stare that is really unnerving to watch him do, and he brings this oddly intelligent presence the film like he's the smartest one there, and this little kid totally sells that. I especially love the scene between him and Scatman Crothers where they talk about what "shining" is. Absolute gold.

Lastly, as I mentioned before, it's the believability of the story that makes "The Shining" so terrifying. And I'm not talking about a hotel being haunted. I'm talking about the fact that this could easily be seen as a movie about people going insane due to cabin fever and their own personal issues they brought with them. True there are supernatural elements to it what with Danny's psychic gifts and whatnot, but if you took that out it's completely plausible to believe that a guy could go nuts and attack his family with an axe. And that's the kind of story that'll get under your skin, even if you believe that the ghosts made him do it or that he's the reincarnation of the groundskeeper who's been there since at least 1921. Or whatever the heck that last shot is supposed to mean.

I still can't decide if this is one of the best or one of the worst trailers ever.

THE BOTTOM LINE - "The Shining" is one of my favorite movies. It's scary as hell (one of the scariest films ever, I think), it's superbly acted by everyone involved, and while Kubrick's directing may be a tad full of itself as usual, boy did he nail it this time around. I consider it the best movie he ever made, personally.

World War Z (2013)

I knew that I was asking for trouble when I said in my last entry that I was sensing a trend this month in me seeing a disturbing streak of big budget movies with no soul to them despite the spectacle. I mentioned that I needed a break from all of that, and what do I do? Almost immediately after writing that, I go out and see "World War Z," the most expensive zombie movie ever made with its price tag of around $200 million.

I am not a smart person sometimes.

I won't lie, I was never fully on board with this one from the get-go. I'm zombied out. I just can't bring myself to care about anything zombie related anymore. This culture really has seemingly hit an event horizon of zombie obsession, almost like zombies ourselves oddly enough. And this over-saturation and rabid following and praise of everything zombie related simply because it is zombie related has completely killed the genre for me. I'm sick of hearing about them, and by the way, I don't care how good "The Walking Dead" is supposed to be. The fact that all I hear fans of the show do is complain about how bad it is speaks otherwise.

And while we're at it, I don't care about "Doctor Who," either. Shut up about it. I would have maybe shown interest in it if half the people on my Facebook wall didn't post 57 "Doctor Who" related updates and pictures every day.

Anyway, my expectations for "World War Z" were firmly in the ditch, seeing as it looked bad from the trailer, I don't care about zombies, the production history for the film was troubled to say the least, the whole "zombie swarm" thing looked dumb to me, and it's the only zombie movie I can think off the top of my head that is PG-13. Can't say as I was expecting much.

And what do you know? "Not much" is exactly what I got.

"World War Z" is basically the trailer. No, seriously. Everything you need to know about this movie can be ascertained by watching the trailer, in which nearly the entire film is laid out in near chronological order. And since it's a zombie film, it's basically on a plot railroad as it is. Zombie movies are nothing if not consistent, being that once you've seen a few, you've seen them all.

Look out, they're attacking you right in the CGI!

Brad Pitt is a guy who flees from the zombie apocalypse with his family, finding relative safety on a military ship, he has to go out and find a cure, which he (kind of) does, and the movie ends on the unforgivably overused note of "This is only the beginning." Because as we all know, closing your movie by saying those words is always a mark of a film that it totally not cliched and tired, and undoubtedly the ending will be satisfying. Except if you're in the real world, or in "World War Z," where that's actually really dumb.

The whole "cure" bit is really less of a cure and more of a band-aid which will allow people to get away from the infected zones. Brad Pitt discovers that if you are sick, the zombies won't go after you out of some bizarre plot contrivance that is either nature doing the "survival of the fittest" thing, or the zombies being picky eaters - Unless you're healthy, the zombies will leave you alone. Like, if you have some kind of really bad disease, they won't even touch you to kill you. This of course raises all kinds of issues, chief among them being the question of "What is the threshold of health that the zombies can instantly sense?" They won't go after Brad Pitt once he's injected himself with some terrible but curable disease, but what about people with heart conditions? What about people who just have colds?

The zombies are wiping out entire cities with gusto. In fact we see Philadelphia get annihilated. Everyone got eaten. We didn't hear reports of sick people walking out unscathed. You're telling me every person in Philly was the epitome of health? What about fat people? They aren't healthy. Why aren't fat people immune from zombie attacks with their high cholesterol and blood pressure and clogged arteries that will kill them? If that was the case America would be the last country standing. U.S.A! U.S.A!

The whole issue of "choosing a healthy host to propagate the virus" becomes even more stupid when you take into consideration that the zombie's bodies aren't even living, so the fact that they were healthy doesn't matter one damn bit. But hey, what do I know? I'm not a professional screen writer.

By the way, it's interesting that Brad Pitt's whole family, and in fact everyone in the world just kind of rolls with the situation. There's nobody freaking out, or even a question of "What's happening?" They just kind of all say "Well, looks like it's the zombie apocalypse. Let's do this thing." It's almost like they're zombie movie fanatics themselves.

All of this could have been slightly overlooked had the action of the film been at least halfway passable. But as it is, the action in "World War Z" is so absurdly shaky, undecipherable and dark that it is nearly impossible to tell what the hell just happened for about 90% of every action sequence. Now this movie is loaded with action, which is one of the only good things I can say about it, but what does it matter if you can't tell what's happening?

For as much plentiful action as there was, there were very few points during which I felt a solid understanding of what was happening or who I was even looking at half the time. The camera jolted and jostled around so much, and the editing cuts were so quick and frantic that I felt like my eyeballs were going to explode. And then I remembered it was directed by Marc Forster, the hack who brought us "Quantum of Solace," which had the worst filmed action scenes of any Bond movie ever, and it all made sense.

Huh. When you look at the zombie swarm in a still frame it just kind of looks silly doesn't it?

But the thing that kills, utterly KILLS "World War Z" before any of the lame plot devices, the uninspired paycheck collecting acting, the random useless might as well be nameless characters, and the terrible action was the absolutely unforgivable rating of PG-13. This is a movie that was clearly intended to be rated R, as was pretty much every single zombie movie ever made. But since we can't be having gore in a movie about PEOPLE GETTING EATEN, we need to have black blood (if any blood at all), confusing editing, and shaky camera so we never get a good look at the supposed carnage. If I had never seen a zombie movie in my life, I'd say the zombies just go around tackling people, because that's about all you ever see happen.

Listen to me very carefully. Are you sitting comfortably? Good. Because I'm about to once again, drop the science.

It's time for "LESSONS WITH PROFESSOR PAT!"

Pictured above - A credible movie critic.

LESSON #95 - "A few extra butts in seats is not worth a PG-13!"

Listen. It's a hard fact, but it's time to accept the truth. Zombie movies suck. Almost all of them do. It's just a fact of life. Embrace it, and know that no matter how bad it sucks, you will still have a built-in, hardcore audience that will see it no matter what.

And do you know the reason for that? It's because of the gore. Blood and guts. Carnage. People getting torn limb from limb while being eaten alive. That's literally the only thing your audience wants in a zombie flick. What, do you think they're going for the social commentary? That message was overdone and old in the 70's. Yes, consumerism. Loss of humanity. We get it. Even the masters of putting that message in their zombie movies have stopped giving a crap about that hackneyed moral.

We want blood. It's literally the only thing keeping most of us awake during this crap. Don't deny us that. Otherwise you look like a pansy.

 This is what happens in zombie movies. Accept it.

/science drop

 That's about all I have to say about "World War Z." I don't care about zombies, and this has done little to change my mind.

And I'm still not watching "The Walking Dead."

BWAAAAAAAAA...........BWAAAAAAAAAAA.........BWAAAAAAAAAAA.........

THE BOTTOM LINE - "World War Z" may look pretty, but like all that I have seen before it this month, being pretty does not excuse the fact that it's boring, dumb, and soulless. The fact that it's PG-13 just makes it insulting on top of being a waste of time.

The Hunter (2011)

I remember hearing about "The Hunter" back in 2011. I knew nothing about it at all, except for the fact that it starred Willem Dafoe and Sam Neill. And really, do you need more than that? I know I don't. Sam Neill has been a favorite of mine ever since "Jurassic Park," but once I saw him claw his eyes out of his skull in "Event Horizon" I was a die-hard fan. And Willem Dafoe is just a legend. I would watch a 90 minute film of him eating waffles. I have no idea what in the world you could do what that, but with Dafoe it'd be intense as hell.

So of course "The Hunter" never showed up in any theater that I was aware of, and it kind of just disappeared from my thoughts until recently when I saw it on the wall of my local Blockbuster. Score. That means my choice that night was easy.

After finally getting around to seeing this film, however, I find myself at a bit of a loss. Granted I went into this film without any preconceived notions besides the fact that two actors I really like are in it, but at the same time this wasn't at all what I was expecting. I went in expecting perhaps a thriller, maybe with Dafoe and Neill tracking and hunting each other, which would have been pretty awesome. Instead "The Hunter" is more one man's introspective journey as he rediscovers a bit of his humanity while working to destroy something that is pure, primal and rare - almost a reflection of himself.

So there's not going to be any knife fights between these two, then?

Well, okay I guess. It's not what I was expecting but that doesn't make it bad. And looking at it from an overall impression, I'd say "The Hunter" is an interesting, well crafted film, if a bit light on some crucial character development which ends up hurting the narrative somewhat. But it's still engaging and absolutely well acted, in addition to being very pretty to look at.

Martin (Willem Dafoe) is a mercenary who is hired by a bio-tech company to go to Tasmania and track down and gather the genetic material of the Tasmanian tiger, an animal long thought extinct. However, rumors abound of a lone tiger, and Martin doesn't much care about the creature besides getting a paycheck out of killing it. He poses as a researcher from a university and stays at the house of woman named Lucy (Frances O'Connor) and her children, Sass (Morgana Davies) and Bike (Finn Woodlock).

Sam Neill is Jack, a local man who guides Martin up into the wilderness before leaving him to do his own thing, since Martin doesn't like company, especially when what he's doing would not only get him arrested, but probably lynched by the local environmentalists who are in the midst of protesting all kinds of things. He also looks after Lucy and her family a bit, since her husband went out hunting months ago and never returned.

Martin runs into difficulties pretty quickly including the tiger being a very elusive quarry, no electricity for his equipment back at the house, local jerks smearing his car with poo, and Lucy being hopped up on pills to the point where she can't take care of the kids. It's during the second act that the hunting takes a bit of a back seat and we instead delve deeper into Martin's relationship with Lucy and her family. While initially Martin is respectful but cold and distant, the kids instantly take a liking to him, and eventually the walls start to come down a bit and he starts to grow attached.

"Sass, why does it say "Surrogate Father" over my bedroom door?"

From that point on the main drama of "The Hunter" becomes whether or not Martin is still willing or able to go through with killing the tiger after finding a reason to care. And after some ominous connections are discovered between himself and the missing father, the tiger itself has become less of a creature and more of a symbol for the things in his life that are missing. How can a man be expected to kill that?

As one would expect from an adaptation of a novel into a film, which this is, there is a bunch of symbolism throughout "The Hunter" if you wanted to put your film school pants on and pour yourself a glass of moscato and get all snooty. But that also ends up being the film's biggest handicap - which is that Martin's character is never really fleshed out enough to drive home those pivotal moments of development.

The problem is that Martin doesn't do a whole lot of talking, which makes perfect sense. He's out in the woods by himself for a lot of the film, so he doesn't have anyone to talk to. And Dafoe plays the part incredibly well, but there's not a good gauge on where he is as a character at any particular moment. I'm sure there's plenty of interior monologue in the book which is revealing, but here it's more like a guessing game as to his state of mind.

 

He's thinking of all those bright flowering young men at Khe Sanh, Langdok, and Hill 364. It's going to be a travesty.

This is never more apparent than at the end of the film, when he's forced to make the ultimate choice that the whole story has been leading up to. And when the choice is made it was more confusing as opposed to cathartic as to why he did what he did. Although it makes (some) sense when you think about it, it's still not incredibly satisfying, particularly after the film had dropped a HUGE bomb a little ways into the third act which nearly made the whole affair seem pointless. It's seriously a soul crushing moment, and is a slap in the face for many reasons.

Distracting from all the missing bits of character is the absolutely stunning landscape of Tasmania. There are few places more interesting to look at than Australia, Tasmania, and New Zealand, and "The Hunter" looks on occasion like we've stepped onto some sets from "Lord of The Rings," only it's dark and brooding with far less excitement. But it's beautiful, none the less. And director Daniel Nettheim sure knows where to point the camera.

"Oolroyt then, Meesta Maht'n. This 'ere's the ployce. Beest speetin' cliff in Tasmoynia."

Lastly I'll call out the cast once again for some as usual excellent acting from Dafoe and Neill, although Neill is playing a far more relaxed character than I'm used to seeing him as. It was neat hearing him get to talk with his normal accent, though. Frances O'Connor was heartbreaking and loveable in addition to being really, really hot, and young Morgana Davies was one of the best kid actors I've seen in a while. I'll be on the lookout for her in the future, as I think she's got a solid career ahead of her.

So I didn't get any knife fights between Dafoe and Neill, but I still got something that was fairly competent and reasonably entertaining, if mostly because of the cast. I guess that's a fair use of my time. Is it overly harsh of me to really have wanted that knife fight, though?

The movie is nowhere near as intense as the trailer makes it out to be.

THE BOTTOM LINE - "The Hunter" is a deliberately paced drama that takes its time to build up tension and suspense, to varying degrees of success. It feels a bit abbreviated in terms of character development, and smacks of typical "The book was better" syndrome. A genuinely horrifying shock in the last act rescues it from being too plodding, at the cost of leaving the audience with something like a hollow feeling by the time the credits roll. But is it bad? No, despite that it's still worth a look.

John Dies At The End (2013)

You know, I've seen some weird stuff in movies. Some of them have been horrible. Some have been hilarious. And some have been just plain strange. Whenever I see something that leaves an impression on me, for good or bad, I'm usually glad I saw it. At the very least, I'll give a film credit for showing me something that I can say "Well, I've never seen that before" in regards to. Even if I didn't like the film, I still gives me something that I can pull out during a conversation in order for me to say something like "Oh yeah? I've seen a zombie eat its own intestines."

With "John Dies At The End," I find myself with a bit of a conundrum. On one hand, it was by far and away one of the most unique, surprising and unpredictable movies I've ever seen. For that reason alone I can say that I'm glad I saw it. This is hands down a movie going experience that's unlike anything else I've come across. And honestly, I would recommend anyone who likes interesting films to go and see it.

On the other hand, this movie is a train wreck. And the more I think back on it, the more and more I dislike "John Dies At The End." So much so that the entertainment I was admittedly getting out of the movie while watching it seems less and less important in retrospect. It's so frustrating to reflect on or dissect or make any kind of sense of it that it just makes me want to throw my hands up and decide it's not even worth it, because from a story telling standpoint this movie is an absolute catastrophe. And honestly, I can't recommend anyone seeing it.

It's all quite confusing.

The plot of "John Dies At The End" is so obfuscated and random that it gets to the point of being either just as pretentious and self-absorbed as any Terrence Malick wank-fest, or so unpretentious that it screams out at you "Of course this doesn't make sense. Why should it? Let's have fun." The ironic thing is that either way, the film reaches the same end-point. It still ends up collar-bone deep up its own rectum.

The concept of "John Dies At The End" is that there a drug (or alien life-form or something from another dimension or whatever it is) called 'Soy Sauce' that allows you to see through time. Or dimensions. Or be psychic. Or be able to exorcize ghosts. Or aliens. Or both. Or it allows you to travel to other dimensions. Or time. Or both. Or it kills you. Or it doesn't. Or it does both. Or all of the damn above.

Pretty much, yeah.

Anyway, our main character Dave (Chase Williamson) and the titular John (Rob Mayes) take this drug/alien/whatever and proceed to then freak out as all kinds of bizarre and unexplainable randomness starts happening to them. This includes a mustache prying itself off of someone's face to try and kill Dave, a freezer full of meat coming alive to form some kind of flesh golem, people exploding as alien spores burst out of them, John apparently dying only to come back for some unexplained reason, and Dave using a bratwurst as a phone. There's also this other world with an all-knowing, Lovecraftian monster that likes to eat people to gain their knowledge. I don't know. All of this is supposed to make sense. I think.

I know that all sounds amazing, but really, it's just weird for weird's sake.

Maybe I'm stupid, but that's seriously the best I can do to explain "John Dies At The End" because I am at a total loss to do more. The film suffers from the worst case of "Movie ADHD" I can recall seeing. But the odd thing is that in the moment you are watching it, each moment makes sense in of itself. "John Dies At The End" is less of a overarching cohesive narrative and more of a collection of ideas that twist and wind and blend into each other well enough to feel organic, but not enough to make anything close to a coherent story.

The problem is that due to the nature of Soy Sauce, chronology in "John Dies At The End" is pretty much a wash, as the film is somewhat tailored around the idea that time is essentially meaningless, and the film seems to go back and forth with no warning in regards to sequences of events. At least that's how it seemed to me. Add to the fact that most (?) of the film is told in flashbacks because Dave is telling someone a story, but it's near impossible to tell what's a flashback and what's in the future and what's happening right then and now, and there's never a clear sense of time or sequence of events. As a consequence the plot was also never clear. Again, I know that's fitting to the themes, but for me it's a little difficult to care about anything when I have no grasp on what's going on.

The best part of the film for me, and about the only thing that comes close to being a reasonably well-conveyed sequence is the interview that punctuates the film. Every once in a while we go back to Dave, who is telling his story to a journalist, Arnie (Paul Giamatti). Arnie is obviously skeptical of everything Dave is telling him, as it's nutter than a Payday bar, but as the story keeps going and Dave demonstrates his abilities, Arnie becomes a believer. All of this leads to an admittedly fantastic twist near the end of the movie, and if it had tied itself in to the plot of the film (had there actually been one) then it would have been doubly nice, especially since Giamatti tears it the hell up. But as it is his stuff ultimately ends up being pretty pointless.

Why can't Paul Giamatti be fantastic in a movie I like?

At least Giamatti got a lot of screen time. Two other actors I like were also in this, but end up being varying degrees of worthless. Doug Jones, also known as "That Guy in Full Body Makeup in Every Movie You've Ever Seen" got to actually show his face as this creepy looking dude who I think was supposed to be an alien. I'm not sure who/what he was, but he puts a giant slug type thing down Dave's shirt and says nonsensical stuff. I'm not sure why he's there. He's kind of like those aliens from "Galaxy Quest," only without a purpose for existing.

I'm also going to lay down a New Rule here and state for the record that if your movie has Clancy Brown in it, you use him, damn it. Clancy Brown is awesome, and he WILL be utilized to the best of his considerable talents! If a film isn't smart enough to give the guy who was The Freaking Kurgan more than 2 minutes of screen-time and a handful of throwaway lines that accomplishes nothing, than you need to have your film-making privileges suspended until you learn the value of a good cast.

I will say this in its defense, however. "John Dies At The End" is beautiful to look at. The colors are bright and vibrant, there's a great sense of style which makes the dreamlike states of mind of our characters both fascinating and somewhat horrifying to look at, and there is so much imagination and creativity going on in every frame that it's really something to behold. And despite my hangups it was never, ever boring. I was invested from beginning to end, which is a sizable accomplishment considering how aggravated I was at the narrative.

I cannot take away how pretty this movie is.

I'm sure that there's an audience for this movie. I can think of several of my good friends who would like it, and possibly love it. But I am not among them. And it's not that it's a bad film or even poorly made, because it's actually a gorgeous, brilliantly shot and put together film. After all it's by Don Coscarelli, the guy who directed "Bubba Ho-Tep." There's mad talent going on here, both in front of and behind the camera. But this is just too much crazy stuff at the expense of the plot, and that bugs me way too much. I appreciate the film's gusto and imagination and craftsmanship, but my limit for weird for weird's sake ends at "Aqua Teen Hunger Force." At least that's funny.

The trailer makes this look far too coherent.

THE BOTTOM LINE - "John Dies At The End" is a well-made, bizarre movie that is either going to blow you away with its imagination or infuriate you completely with its lunacy. For those of you who don't much care if anything makes sense. In the moment, it's mesmerizing. In hindsight, it's obnoxious. But hey, I've never seen anything quite like it. I just wish I knew what was going on.

Alex Cross (2012)

Oh snap. I'm about to cross Alex Cross. The trailer inferred ill effects should one attempt to do so, but what are my options? This is kind of what I do. Hopefully the towering manliness that is Tyler Perry isn't enough to cause my head to explode at the mere suggestion that I question his virility. I guess I'll take my chances and hope for the best.

"Alex Cross" was not a film that I was looking forward to by any stretch. I've never seen nor intended to see a single Tyler Perry movie despite him releasing roughly 47 of them every year, and my plans were happy and comfortable remaining exactly there. I don't think he's a good actor based on what I've seen of him, all his films looked asinine and boring, I hate the Eddie Murphy fat-suit schtick, he's kind of racist if you listen to him talk, and the fact that he is so transparently marketing a cut and paste product for his brainwashed fan-base consisting manly of white teenaged girls and has never been called on it is frankly irritating to me.

As you may know, this film is a reboot which follows the character of Alex Cross, who was played by Morgan Freeman in "Kiss The Girls" and "Along Came A Spider." Apparently those were such big hits that they felt a need to bring Cross back again. And they thought Tyler Perry was a good replacement for Morgen Freeman. I can't even make a joke about something that stupid. Anyway, Cross is a detective on the tail of a serial killer called "Picasso" (Matthew Fox) who seems to be targeting a business man, working his way up the chain to him, so to speak.

Cross will attempt to catch him using either the power of his massive intellect, or psychic ability. It's kind of hard to tell which one of those he possesses based on what I saw. I guess it's not that important, since by the end he doesn't really use his powers of deduction/magic to solve anything related to actually catching Picasso. He just kind of picks up a gun and goes Charles Bronson on him after the whole thing becomes overtly personal. So whatever. It doesn't really lead to anything anyone else couldn't have done with basic investigative competence.

Ah yes. "Perry's Untouchables," for sure.

"Alex Cross" is not going to break any new boundaries in terms of police dramas featuring psychos. It's all quite stock in a "Red Dragon" meets "In The Line of Fire" way. That's not to say it's bad, it's just recycled. And PG-13. It's a movie about a serial killer that's rated PG-13. That's always a good sign. But hey, it's got Edward Burns, Jean Reno and John C. McGinley. Those are some nice grabs for the supporting cast at least.

You know, I will give Tyler Perry the slightest bit of credit for trying to expand a bit and do something other than playing an old crazy lady, but right from the get go there's a problem with him being in this, which even from the trailer is clearly evident. The problem is that there is no way in this bizarre, messed up world that a guy like Tyler Perry is suited to be an action movie lead.

Maybe if he were cast as one of the IT guys, or the police chief, or a sidekick or something else where he didn't have to shoot a gun or look intimidating or anything involving punching someone else in the face I could have bought it. But as it is, we're supposed to not only believe that this doughy lump of smug is a competent police officer, but that he can run down and take out a guy like Picasso in hand to hand combat, which he does during the film's ludicrous climatic fight scene. I feel it necessary to inform you that earlier in the movie we saw Picasso utterly DESTROY an MMA fighter nearly twice his size. Like, nearly to the point of possibly killing him. With his bare hands. And this miniature, chocolate flavored version of the Stay Puft Marshmallow man is supposed to beat this guy? Please.

Oh honey no, put it down. You're going to hurt yourself.

There's actually something funny that happens every time we are meant to buy Tyler Perry being a badass. Every single time he's shown throwing a punch, or shooting a gun, or anything involving something other than talking, the camera goes into seizure mode like it's inside a dryer on spin cycle. One could easily chalk that up to it being yet another film trying to make the action "more intense" by making sure we can't see a thing, but I'm sure the real reason was so that we wouldn't notice Tyler Perry having a heart attack every time he was forced to raise his fist and swing.

And as you could probably guess, the end fight between Cross and Picasso is filmed so wildly shaky and cut so spastic that it's almost impossible to tell that Matthew Fox is basically standing still waiting to be hit. That's a good thing in the same way that if I had my face melted off, I wouldn't be able to see how hideous I was since my eyes would be gone. It is so pathetic watching the editing try to salvage the action scenes when it's clear the lead actor probably couldn't even put bread in a toaster without needing an oxygen tank. It's like I'm watching a Segal movie by accident.

Matthew Fox is the one shining light that breaks through the haze of cliched plot and Perry's paunch, however. Good gravy, this guy was awesome in "Alex Cross." I've never been huge on Matthew Fox, and I'm still convinced he's a C+ actor at best, since his only got two modes: dour and smirk. But he is in the wrong movie here. He and his character are far too awesome for the likes of "Alex Cross." He needed to be going up against Karl Urban in another "Dredd" movie or in the next "Mission: Impossible" or something. The shenanigans he's pulling off are nearly Bond Villain-esque in their over-the-top nature, and it's by far and away the most entertaining thing going on here.

I would have finished watching "Lost" if Jack had been this awesome as opposed to irritating.

Matthew Fox does provide the only shocking moments in "Alex Cross," one of which occurs in a scene that's all over the trailer but goes down in a much darker way than one would usually expect a scene like that to resolve. The film gets credit for that, but the PG-13 nature of the movie means that both scenes, particularly the one in the trailer, feel a bit neutered. The second scene, which could have been really gruesome, isn't even shown except for a blurry picture of the aftermath sent via text. Must have been a hell of a scene. Glad they didn't show it.

Oh yeah. This guy has no chance against the hulking powerhouse that is the guy who plays Medea.

And I don't mean that unless a movie is graphic that it's no good, but when a person gets a hole blasted through their chest with a large caliber bullet and there's literally not a single drop of blood to be seen or even a hole in their shirt, it tends to undermine what just happened because we can tell that "Alex Cross" is made for the kiddies, and we can't have them seeing scary blood in a movie about a serial killer.

There was another thing that really irked me as well. This was Tyler Perry's mother-in-law they call "Nana-Mama" (groan) who, when Cross goes commando and suits up to take out this crazy assassin, attempts to convey the "message" of the film. This "message" is basically that by taking revenge on this guy, he becomes just as bad as him, and that he won't be able to live with himself if he goes out and gets him. And sure enough the last shot of the movie conveys that he may not be able to move on, and that there's a big cloud hanging over him for what he's done. And you know, that may have been a valid point in another film, but there's one little problem that makes it kind of stupid: He's a goddamn cop. It's his job to stop people like Picasso.

I just wanted to punch Nana-Mama in the face. Her self-righteous judgement on Cross when he goes out to stop a guy MURDERING PEOPLE like his profession requires came across as extremely preachy and insulting. And while it was nice to see Cross basically tell her to piss off, it's clear that we as the audience should be siding with her. You know what? I don't want the people trying to stop serial killers to have second thoughts about turning the other cheek. I want them to stop the serial killers before I get tortured to death. How about that?

"Sorry, folks. I'd uphold the law and protect the innocent and everything but...well...Nana Mama loves her some Jesus so...you know. I'll be in car."

Of course, the end of this movie makes Alex Cross out to be a complete and utter scumbag who definitely and very illegally overreaches not only his professional jurisdiction but also his character's sense of morals, but it's not really having anything to do with Picasso. That happens at the end when Jean Reno's character turns out to be behind the whole Picasso thing (it was so obvious from the beginning), and Cross essentially sells him out to a drug cartel after setting him up. So the Cartel grabs Jean Reno to take him away and kill him. Most likely in a very horrible fashion. Nice, Cross. Very professional. And unnecessary.

I don't understand why that moral grey area was thrown in there at the last minute, like they needed to artificially create a dilemma. Cross didn't have to do that. He could have gone about getting Jean Reno's character in a more official capacity. He didn't have to go all thug-justice on him, and there wasn't really a good reason why he did it that way. In fact, it would have made far more sense for both the story and character to do it in an official capacity, because that's what Cross would probably have done based on the very trite characterization I was given with this film. He's mad, yes, but he's a good cop. At least he was for 95% of the film.

Did you know that Idris Elba was originally going to be Alex Cross? That I could have bought. And not that I need a reason to dislike Tyler Perry, but come on. I could have been watching a good actor here. That's not helping much. On top of that and the fact that he took out Matthew Fox, the only decent character in this whole debacle, it's a wonder I even watched it all the way through to the end after Fox buys it with 15 minutes left to go. Who cares after that point? Then it really is a Tyler Perry movie, and screw that.

If you want a good laugh, check out Tyler Perry trying to be hardcore. It's pretty funny.

THE BOTTOM LINE - "Alex Cross" is a movie whose biggest problem is bad casting for the lead. If the story had been R rated with someone other than Tyler Perry, the combination of that and Matthew Fox could have made for a halfway enjoyable thriller. But as it stands, it's just kind of there and gone with no real redeeming qualities. Tyler Perry should stick to his schtick so I don't feel any inclination to suffer through another one of his performances.

Cosmopolis (2012)

It's a difficult thing to watch a director you like have a sudden moment of insanity. That's the only answer I have as to why David Cronenberg made "Cosmopolis." Clearly somewhere along the way, he lost his marbles. Or perhaps it's not as extreme as all that. Perhaps it was more that he was simply attempting something different and unique. In his defense that's what Cronenberg has been doing his whole career. In regards to that I suppose "Cosmopolis" would be a success. It is different. It is unique. And sometimes you fail miserably at trying something new. But that's how you learn. That's the process of creativity at work.

But man, the steaming pile of desiccated, reeking placenta left in the afterbirth of the creative process that is "Cosmopolis" is enough to make a person wish Cronenberg had left well enough alone. This movie is a big pile of pretentious excrement.

There is a rather severe disconnect going on in this film between what "Cosmopolis" thinks it is, and what it is in reality. What it thinks it is a scathing indictment of the rich, bundled up in their comfortable soundproof limos as they cruise over the backs of the peons beneath them in blissful, self-entitled ignorance. What it is in reality is the longest feeling 109 minutes of pretentious, incoherent babbling I've ever seen outside of a Terrence Malick film.

Although there is a merciful lack of wheat fields.

There is no real narrative. There are no real characters. There is no dialogue that makes any kind of sense. There are no performances that make us feel like we're looking at human beings. This is an absolute mess, and the only positive thing I can bring myself to say about it is that at least it has the decency to not be as long as an average Malick film. Sure feels like it, though.

"Cosmoplis" consists of billionaire Eric Packer (Robert Pattinson) sitting in a limo as he drives across town to get a haircut. According to the back of the DVD case, this qualifies as "an odyssey." I can already guarantee you this movie is giving itself far too much credit. As he is doing this, stuck in traffic the whole way, an assortment of characters pop in one after another to say weird things and then leave after 10 minutes of talking like a robot. Then Eric leaves the limo, does something random, meets someone else, usually has sex with them, another scene filled with rambling nonsense happens and then we go back to the limo to do it all over again. For nearly 2 hours. And then at one point Eric gets a pie in the face while a Frenchman will not shut up about it and camera flashes threaten to give me a seizure. All of this while SYMBOLISM with rats goes on in the background.

Could you please be a tad more overt? I don't think you've hit me over the head with it enough.

Now, I get what they're trying to do here. I'm not stupid. I understand symbolism. He's a rat who knows nothing of the plights of people not rich. Very original. But that stuff works best when it's subtle. Like Animal Mother's "Born to Kill/Peace Sign" helmet in "Full Metal Jacket" referencing "The Duality of Man" and all that crap. I get that. Although that could also just be something ironic that the character did. Sometimes it's hard to tell with symbolism, and I think a lot of times people inject far more into films than what was intended.

In the case of "Cosmopolis," it seems to have hit a symbolism singularity where it's so far over the top and obvious that it almost becomes subtle again, because your line of thinking reasons that no director in their right mind would do something do hackneyed. Especially a good one like Cronenberg. Add to that the fact that everything about "Cosmopolis" is so surreal that it comes across more like a fever dream to the strains of bad poetry, and you're not really sure if what you're seeing is actually supposed to mean anything anyway.

Oh I get it! They're separated like it's a confessional! That makes EVERYTHING make sense!

And you know, I could maybe handle some of that crap if the performances were decent. But the performances are across the board, the worst I've ever seen. Ever. I'm not even joking. Not one single person in this movie speaks like a human being. They deliver their lines like an alien or some other creature that learned the English language by reading E.E. Cummings poems, rambling off incomprehensible diatribes that seem more like a "flowery prowse" edition of Mad Libs.

Let me give you an example of this "deep" dialogue "Cosmopolis" seems to think is so insightful and powerful. Strap yourself in:

Eric Packer: There's a poem I read in which a rat becomes the unit of currency.
Michael Chin: Yes, that would be interesting.
Eric Packer: Yeah, that would impact the world economy.
Michael Chin: The name alone, better than the dong or the kwacha.
Eric Packer: The name says everything.
Michael Chin: Yes. The rat.
Eric Packer: Yes, the rat close lower today against the euro.
Michael Chin: Yes, there's going concern that the Russian rat will be devalued.
Eric Packer: White rats, think about that.
Michael Chin: Yes, pregnant rats.
Eric Packer: Major sell-offs of pregnant Russian rats.
Michael Chin: Britain converts the rat.
Eric Packer: Joins trend to universal currency.
Michael Chin: Yes, US is establishing the rat standard.
Eric Packer: Is every US dollar redeemable for rat?
Michael Chin: Dead rats!
Eric Packer: Yes, stockpiling of dead rats called global health menace. 

I'm sorry. Were you attempting to say anything in that vapid, rambling verbal diarrhea?

And while the terrible dialogue is all on the author of the book, Don DeLillo, the bizarre deliveries have got to be on Cronenberg's direction, because I've seen (some of) these actors do FAR better. Pattinson continues his streak of being simply not a very good actor. As per usual he's flat and uncharismatic, and I can't wait until the world is finally done with him. But having a Paul Giamatti performance is a good thing, and it's kind of wasted when you have no idea what he's talking about.
  

 Seriously. Go away. Take your eyebrows with you.

And it's absolutely insulting, at least to me, that a director with the pedigree of Cronenberg would subject us to this wretched, student film B.S. Is that really what it's come to? Does Cronenberg really think this crap that could be the final project of any random, pretentious, film school dropout would fly after giving us films like he's given us for 30 plus years? What in the blue hell is he thinking?

This is the guy who gave us "Eastern Promises." This is the guy who gave us "A History of Violence." This is the guy who gave us "The Fly." The is the guy who gave us "Videodrome," for crying out loud! Why, for the love of all that is Holy or Evil, is he giving us a piece of crap that is about as deep and meaningful as a sad clown flipping pancakes?!

I am not even kidding you. This is "Cosmopolis."

From the first frame of "Cosmopolis" to its sudden, utterly baffling ending, this is a film that screams out that it is smarter than you are. It screams out that it has something vital to say. It screams out to be taken seriously, and for critics and film snobs to heap praise upon it and shower it with awards because it's so utterly alienating and so gorged upon its own importance that the only possible explanation they can come up with is that it is a "thick and chewy" artistic masterpiece.

Well I, too, have an explanation for why it's "thick and chewy." It's because "Cosmopolis" is the most over-blown piece of garbage I've seen since "The Tree of Life," and it's a massive, greasy turd squeezed from the anus of the most amateur coffee-house beatnik failed poet which sustains itself on its own farts. How's that for an answer?

Hey, Cronenberg. Try making a f*#king movie next time.

THE BOTTOM LINE - This may very well be the worst film I've seen since "The Tree of Life." I wanted to stop it after 10 minutes, which felt like 30, but for some reason that I can't fathom, I muscled through it. I regret every second I wasted doing so. This film is punishment. This is something you'd use to win an easy $5 with by betting your buddy they can't sit through it.

The Running Man (1987)

At the time of this entry, there are only two days remaining. Two days until the triumphant return of one of the greatest Action Movie Gods of all time. He is the giant who cannot be hit by bullets. He is the man who can make something explode just by pointing something else at it. He is the man who can look badass in both a loincloth and a spandex bodysuit. He's the King of The One Liner. He's also one of my favorite actors. I can be speaking of none other than Arnold Schwarzenegger. And this week, he returns.

I can't accurately describe my excitement for "The Last Stand." I'm so excited, in fact, that I couldn't help myself and needed to pre-game before seeing it. I decided to pop in one of the less popular Arnold vehicles, "The Running Man."

Right off the bat, I can see two reasons why "The Running Man" is usually not one of the films mentioned often in conversations about Arnold movies, unless the people discussing are big fans. The first is that frankly it's not one of his better movies. That's not to say it's bad, but it's a little too tame on the violence and a little too cheesy for its own good to hold up next to some other classic Schwarzenegger films. Which brings us to the second reason: 1987 saw the release of two Arnold movies. "The Running Man" was one. The other movie was "Predator."

Yeah, "Predator" wins.

How in the world any movie is supposed to hold up next to what is one of the best action films of all time I have no idea. It seems unnecessarily cruel to compare the two, since the source material at a base level is better in one over the other, but especially so since "Predator" director John McTiernan went on to do "Die Hard," and "The Running Man" director Paul Michael Glaser went on to do "Kazaam." Did "The Running Man" ever have much of a shot at being the more memorable film?

"The Running Man" is set in what is now considered a pretty cliched setting: In the not-too-distant future, television and The Media will be the most powerful thing on the planet, and there will be a distopian landscape where human life is held with the same amount of reverence as used toilet paper. In this future, the most successful and popular show is "The Running Man," where criminals (as determined by the corrupt government) fight to the death in embarrassing bodysuits against gladiators in even more embarrassing outfits known as "stalkers" in order to win their freedom. Of course, it's all a hoax and even if you win, they kill you in secret.

Hey, it may be cliched now, but I'm sure back in 1987 it was a bit less plausible and frighteningly less close to home.

Bee tee dubs, he's the author of the book it's based on. #themoreyouknow

Schwarzenegger plays Ben Richards (yeah right), a former cop who gets thrown in the slammer after not killing a bunch of starving people, whom he's then framed for killing anyway. After breaking out of the most ineptly run prison in the world after only a year and a half, Ben ends up in the custody of the government after being a bit of a prick and trying to abscond to Hawaii with this random girl who he finds now living in his brother's apartment. They make it as far as the airport before she predictably betrays him to the authorities at the first possible opportunity.

Ben is then forced into participating in "The Running Man" by the guy who runs away with both the literal and proverbial show, the movie's villain Damon Killian, played by Richard Dawson. Dawson was on a lot of TV shows, most notably "Hogan's Heroes," but everyone remembers him as "That host of Family Feud that tried to make out with all the female contestants." Richard Dawson was awesome, and he was actually a very good actor as well. There's no contest when I say that out of everyone in "The Running Man," Dawson throws down the best performance as the slimy bizarro-version of himself as the host of the eponymous show. And to be honest once again, were it not for him I really wouldn't consider "The Running Man" to be watchable. Even with Arnold in it.

Arnold's bulge was up for a Golden Globe. It lost to David Bowie's. True story.

There's just too little payoff to be found, in my opinion. There are really only four big fights in the entire film that Arnold has, and none of them last very long or are satisfying in terms of the carnage we'd expect from the premise. The first fight between Ben and Subzero (played by not-Harold Sakata professional wrestler Professor Toru Tanaka) starts off reasonably promising, but it's over pretty quick as Arnold takes him down with a single maneuver. The next stalker, Buzzsaw, has the longest fight and goriest kill, but most of it consists of Buzzsaw dragging Ben around behind his motorcycle and the violence isn't shown. Not very thrilling. The walking Lite-Brite Dynamo just crashes his car with Ben never touching him. Lastly, the stalker with the best weapon, Fireball (played by NFL legend Jim Brown) doesn't seem to realize how easily he could kill him with a flamethrower and gets taken out like a punk with barely any fight at all.

There's also a decent fight between Jessie Ventura and Arnold, but it's not actually the character of Ben Richards. It's only a guy with Ben's face mapped over his own in post. Although we never do find out who they had just sitting around the place who just happened to be a competent but expendable fighter the exact size of Arnold Schwarzenegger. I don't know. It's an 80's action flick. I'm not going to lose sleep over something like that. But it still doesn't change the fact that for an R-rated action movie about futuristic gladiators staring Schwarzenegger, this is a pretty tame outing.

"And if you survive, the grand prize will be...having your story be repackaged as a teen fiction phenomenon which will serve as a better alternative to a lousy teen fiction phenomenon!"

Also, if you have Arnold promise the villain with the horribly cheesy but strangely badass line, "I'll live to see you eat that contract, but I hope you leave enough room for my fist because I'm going to ram it into your stomach and break your goddamn spine" and you don't have him follow through with that promise...reconsider how you are going about making your film. Seriously you guys, that one was a freebee.

This. I want to see Arnold do this.

Lastly, "The Running Man" is just a little too corny for its own good. Don't get me wrong, my favorite thing about Arnie is the one-liners, but here they just aren't up to par. There's a couple groan inducing ones including "What a hot head" after he roasts someone and "What a pain in the neck" after he garrotes someone else to death, but as you can probably already tell, they weren't very creative. Some also required some pretty forced lead-ins. Even the most memorable one-liner "Here is Subzero! Now plain zero!" is honestly just confusing to me. "Plain zero" implies simply nothing, while "Subzero" implies less than that. Is he saying that he's improved Subzero by killing him? Has he made him at least break even now?

Hell, the best one-liner in "The Running Man" came from Richard Dawson when, after Arnold says "I'll be back," he quips "Only in a re-run." Taking away my hatred for whenever they have Arnie recycle a line, when compared with any of the numerous phenomenal quotes from that same year's "Predator" it's not even close. That can't compete with stuff like "Stick around." That can't even compete with "Knock, knock." This movie wishes that it could have that same badassery, and it tries, but when you kill your main villain by firing him into a wall in a rocket-car and the line after is "Well that hit the spot," it's just sad.

What spot? Was the rocket-car's name "Spot?" What the hell are you talking about?

THE BOTTOM LINE - While "The Running Man" should be required watching for anyone who's a fan of Arnold, it's probably the weakest of his 80's films, if only because back then his peaks were so high. It's alright, but this is one of the weakest. The only ones worse are probably "Conan The Destroyer." Or "Red Sonja." Or "Twins." Okay, so maybe "The Running Man" ain't all that bad. At least see it for Richard Dawson being awesome.

Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter (2012)

You know, I'm tired of this. I really am.

I'm so sick and tired of watching all these mediocre, unmemorable movies that are so insanely hard to talk about. Why are they hard to talk about? Well, what are you supposed to say about something that is completely and unashamedly bland? Well, besides the fact that it is completely and unashamedly bland, I mean.

The "Mona Lisa" I could talk about. "Guernica" I could talk about. Even Andy Warhol's freaking soup can could warrant discussion. What the hell am I supposed to say about a 2x4 someone dunked in beige paint? That's not even artsy in the most snooty, elitist fashion, although get enough moscato in a Fine Arts major and I'm sure they'll do their damnedest to try.

But that's what "Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter" is. It's a 2x4 dunked in beige paint. There wasn't even a brush involved to import some form of base artistry. There was only dunking. In and out, let dry, print a couple thousand copies, send to the theaters, next on the list.

"Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter" is for me, a perfect example of a movie with no soul. There is no passion behind any of it. It's just an overly flashy checklist of action movie beats which plays out more like watching a collection of videogame cutscenes. Cutscenes with really bad CGI. The kind of cutscenes you would skip upon playing the game a second time. And the worst thing about it is that even though it goes down the list of action movie beats like clockwork, at the same time it's absurdly boring.

THRILL AS HE TWIRLS HIS AXE!!! (Seriously, thrill at it. "Axe-twirling" makes up 58% of this film.)

I think the reason it's boring is because it never gets beyond the gimmick of "Wouldn't it be silly to see Abraham Lincoln fighting the undead?" I can appreciate the concept to a point, I suppose. It's taking something that normally isn't badass and making it badass because something that isn't badass becoming badass equals a form of "awesome," as decreed by Teh Intarnets. And while there may be something to that, it's really not enough to fuel an entire movie. At least if it's actually suicidal enough to take itself seriously, which this film unfortunately does.

This movie actually takes itself WAY too seriously, in fact. As opposed to embracing the ridiculous nature, which might have made it interesting or even amusing, "Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter" is about as somber and brow-furled as "300" or "Priest," two movies of similar tone and style, which fully believe that what they're talking about is no laughing matter - even though all of them are stupid. At least "300" had the decency to be filled with so much blood and gore it would take quantum mathematics to calculate. "Priest" was PG-13 and "Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter" has vampires with black blood.

Make sure that blood is sufficiently not-scary! We can't have red blood in our R. RATED. MOVIE.

What is the point of "Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter?" It attempts to weave Lincoln's life around the idea that he was actually a stalker of the undead, hunting for vengeance after his mother was killed by a vampire when he was a child. After meeting a vampire hunter, played by Dominic Cooper, he becomes a skilled and inexplicably super-powered warrior thanks to the power of the training montage.

There were a couple puzzling things to me concerning the whole process of the training to become a vampire hunter. The first was that (spoiler alert) Dominic Cooper is actually a vampire. You see, in this movie, vampires literally are physically unable to kill another vampire. So Dominic Cooper trains Lincoln to do it for him. This is actually presented as a plot twist near the back half of the film, but it seems an odd oversight that Lincoln could train for evidently 10 years to spot and destroy vampires and never suspected one single time that his teacher was one of them. You know, since he's trained to detect them. Lincoln must suck at being a vampire hunter.

Like that one time Lincoln spotted a vampire due to them not showing up in a mirror, which should have also given Dominic Cooper away since he clearly could have been spotted in the mirror as well since he was standing right next to Lincoln, and shouldn't have made a reflection, but he either did, or Lincoln never noticed it or...yeah, oops.

"My god, he's bad at this. I've been dropping hints for a decade. Oh well. It's either him or Ulysses S. Grant, and that guy's a prick."

The second thing that puzzled me was the revelation that normal, everyday people are capable of acts of super human speed and strength, as long as they are sufficiently angry/enlightened. When first told to chop a tree in half with a single blow, Lincoln is understandably unable to. That is until Dominic Cooper drops some simple Dr. Phil psychoanalysis on him. Then Lincoln is officially a superhero. Seriously, he is. One tree. One swing. Just because Lincoln realized that his mother's murder made him upset. What a revelation.

You know, this kind of reminds me of another soul-reapingly stupid plot element involving normal, everyday people suddenly being able to do physically impossible things due to having some arbitrary mental block removed akin to asking them "Well, how do you know you can't do superhuman things if you've never tried?" What was it, again?

GAH! Damn it, that WAS you wasn't it, Timur?!

That's right. Director Timur Bekmambetov also did the insufferable "Wanted," another movie that insults us with sprinkling some magical mental pixie dust on the hero and saying that *boom* now they're a badass capable of things that are impossible. I nearly put a fist through my TV when I was subjected to the concept of "bullet curving," and it still makes me mad to this day just thinking about it. Some people rage over Ewoks. I have Morgan Freeman telling me that if no one had told me that bullets fly straight, I could curve them by stupidly flailing my arms like that robot from "Lost In Space."

It's just such a lazy way to make a hero awesome. It's boring. It's stupid. It's insulting. I don't like when a movie just says "Here, accept this" for no reason other than it "looks cool." At least give me a reason that is something better than "Consider the following: Do it."

I can't tell you how mad I was when "Mythbusters" wasted half an episode on "Bullet Curving."

By the way, that whole "not physically possible" thing isn't just relegated to chopping down trees with a single swing. There's also that whole thing with "collecting all the silver in Washington D.C., melting it all down, casting bayonets and cannonballs from it, transporting it all by foot 80 miles, and distribute it to an army of 90,000 men...all in around 12 hours" thing. That's fun.

I can't really think of much more to say about it than nitpicking the things that struck me as dumb or weird. Like I said earlier, it was so bland and standard vanilla that I can really just sum it up by saying that I'm guessing there will probably only be one or two scenes or moments from the movie that you remember. And it will probably involving running across horses.

LOADING VAMPIRE.ACTION.MOVE.374b.EXE...PLEASE WAIT...

I'm going to end this entry by saying what I figured I'd be saying before I even watched "Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter" - which is that I got far more enjoyment from "Abraham Lincoln vs. Zombies." I'm dead serious. The Asylum's mockbuster was a far more heartfelt, fun, and enjoyable movie than "Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter." By far.

It was funnier, it was honestly more clever with history despite being somehow more ridiculous, it was absurdly more grounded in reality, but at the same time didn't take itself seriously which paradoxically made it far more believable. And there is also the issue of actor Benjamin Walker not being able to hold a candle to Bill Oberst Jr. in terms of playing Abraham Lincoln.

Bill Oberst Jr. didn't need vaguely defined superpowers to rock hardcore.

I'm serious when I say this, guys. The Asylum one upped Hollywood on this one. Given the director involved, I can't say I'm surprised.

THE BOTTOM LINE - "Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter" is stupid. It's stupid because it's not trying. It has no soul, no purpose, and no sense of fun nor humor. Honestly, the best thing being said about it that I can possibly imagine is "It was what I was expecting." But that's the problem: It's exactly what you expected because it came from a cookie cutter.