Zero Dark Thirty (2012)

I'm getting really sick and tired of all this crap. I'm getting so weary of never liking anything I'm supposed to think is amazing, that everyone tells me is amazing, that the consciousness says is amazing, and that the Academy Awards decides is amazing. I'm sick of it. I'm done, son. This was the last straw. From now on I don't care what the Tomatometer says - if it's rated at 90% or above, I'm just going to go ahead and assume it's not going to be very good.

What else am I supposed to think when a boring piece of clap-trap like "Zero Dark Thirty" gets a 93% while awesome movies like "The Last Stand" got a measly 59%,  "The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey" got 65%, and "Django Unchained," one of the best movies I've seen in years, is at an 88%?

Are you kidding me with this? Really, everyone? "Zero Dark Thirty" was rated better than "Django Unchained?" I'm not saying an 88% is something to be scoffed at, but was the fact that Quentin Tarantino makes enjoyable films such a turn-off to some of you? Or were you all so shaken in your ultra-PC, easily offended little bubbles by the dreaded "n-word" being used? Maybe you could explain why you called black dudes getting tortured in "Django" to be "in poor taste" whilst calling an Arab dude getting tortured in "Zero Dark Thirty" to be "provocative" and "powerful?"

Isn't it interesting where the line is drawn?

ZD30 is a plodding, self-fellatiating exercise in testing the limits of how far the audience is willing to blindly accept the notion that everything Kathryn Bigelow makes is fantastic, simply because that's what they've been told. All it has going for it is the fact that it's about terrorism, it shows waterboarding, and it attempts to paint both sides with multiple shades of grey. But the terrorism aspect is barely seen, the waterboarding lasts about a minute, and while it tries to be morally ambiguous it's clearly just as much American chest-thumping as any random Michael Bay movie is. Oh, and it's over two and a half hours. Because that was necessary.

Am I saying that "Zero Dark Thirty" is a bad film or that Kathryn Bigelow is a bad director? Well no, it's not techincally a "bad film," I am saying that it's boring and that she's severely overrated. Take that for what it's worth, and if you enjoyed this or "The Hurt Locker," then by all means don't allow me to detract from the entertainment you get from either film, since you're clearly in the camp that finds her work sublime. I just think you're all nuts because I found both films to be insufferable.

I could attempt to describe the plot of ZD30, but honestly I started blanking out pretty early on in the film in terms of what I was seeing and what anybody was talking about. I happen to be in luck, though, since the film is extraordinarily easy to sum up, because all that essentially happens is that:

1) Jessica Chastain works for the CIA. She wants to get Osama bin Laden.

2) They interrogate a metric crap-ton of Arab gentlemen in order to find bin Laden.

3) They find bin Laden. They shoot him in the face. Jessica Chastain has nothing to say. The End.

"Man, you guys. I sure am glad we're only in the last 20% of the movie, and that the previous 80% is talking. Otherwise that might have been exciting or something."

All that takes over two and a half hours. And despite its simplicity, throughout the entire affair I had little to no idea what was going on. The endless conversations which make up a vast amount of the run-time almost instantly devolve into a never-ending cycle of Arabic names that sound utterly alien to my ears, therefore making the connections impossible to follow. This of course is a problem since the whole point of the movie is to follow Jessica Chastain on her investigation, uncovering threads as they are revealed.

But how am I supposed to understand any of it when it's just a swirling cloud of names that all sound like "Abdul Al-Aldebwah," all connected to angry looking bearded men that all look identical to each other in their black and white surveillance camera mugshots, which is usually the only time we see their faces since we never actually meet any of them? I have no idea who any of these people are. And that's not limited to Arab people, either. I didn't even know who in the blue hell any of the Americans were. There were roughly 5 American characters in this movie who all looked alike, again, under their beards. These characters also acted nearly identically and liked to drift in and out of the film so often that I had no idea who I was looking at half the time.

 Ah yes. My three favorite characters: Beard, Beardy and um...Beard.

The film does such a poor job with clearly identifying characters that it dissolves into a mess of "Well that Arab dude wasn't helpful. Hey Random Bearded American #3, there's another Arab dude. Let's ask him. Oh good. That info might be useful. Make sure to tell Random Bearded American #2. Jessica, could you please stop being a bitch? We know you're upset we haven't caught bin Laden. We're working on it. You're adorable when you try to act tough, though."

That brings me to Jessica Chastain. You know, it's one thing to have to sit through a very long film you're not enjoying. It's quite another to sit through a very long film you're not enjoying with a main character you can't stand. I found Jessica Chastain's character Maya to be grating and one-dimensional, that one dimension being "obsessed with getting bin Laden." This is her one defining character trait, and the only thing we ever know about her.

And she's also kind of a bitch and swears at her boss, since that's professional. I guess that's supposed to make her a "strong female character," but seeing little Maya standing at the numerous briefings with her arms crossed, lips pursed, and eyes glaring out under furled brow came across more like a toddler holding its breath until it got to watch more cartoons. I'm not saying that for a women to be tough she has to be Briene of Tarth or anything, but with as instantly confrontational and puffed up in her bravado as Maya is while being a shallow as hell character, she comes across more like the demon fiance in any random romantic comedy who is holding back the male love interest from being with probably Katherine Heigl and will end up falling into a pool with a wedding dress on or get a cake dropped on her head or something by the end of it.

I don't care how cool her shades are. She's still boring as hell.

The only redeeming quality I found in ZD30 was the last 40 minutes or so, which shows the raid on bin Laden's compound. It's the only part of the film in which it feels like anything of substance is happening, which makes sense because it IS the only part where anything of substance happens. And to be fair, it is a very well shot and surprisingly tense scene, despite the fact that we know what's going happen. But it's less about any kind of surprise in the plot and more about watching the process with which the SEALs carry out the assault. Of course, I had no idea who any of these people were, so I felt nothing for them as characters, but hey, that's been par for the course for 2 hours leading up to it. Why start now?

Ah yes, the run time. It always seems to lead back to that, doesn't it? Here's the deal, and the last thing I'm going to say about "Zero Dark Thirty":

"The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey" is 2 hours and 49 minutes. Everyone bitched and moaned and griped and whined about it being far too long, which admittedly it was. But you know what? Stuff happened in "The Hobbit." They fought goblins. And trolls. And wargs. And orcs. They flew on eagles. A ring of ultimate power and unimaginable evil was found. We saw 13 dwarves and a wizard cut their way through an army of goblins. We saw a goddamn dragon burn down a fortress built into a mountain. But no, that's "padded and overblown."

"Zero Dark Thirty" is 2 hours and 37 minutes long. That's only twelve minutes shorter than "The Hobbit." And you know what happens in that essentially identical amount of time? They water-board a guy, some car bombs go off, Jessica Chastain scowls at her boss a lot, and a bunch of Arabs get shot. We have all learned a valuable lesson. What is that lesson? F@#k if I know, but it's very important and you should give this movie Oscars. Roll credits.

How hard do you think I can type SYMBOLISM on my keyboard before it breaks something?

And by the way, what in the hell does "Zero Dark Thirty" even mean? I'm just wondering because the film never mentions it. That would have been nice.

Come to think of it, I don't care. It's probably military code for "pretentious."

Here's the trailer to "Zero Dark Thirty." Enjoy Jessica Chastain being uppity and Metallica's music actually becoming worse.

THE BOTTOM LINE - An insanely overrated piece of plodding, confusing garbage that is banking on the hope that you'll consider it a masterpiece because of who is directing it. Kathryn Bigelow has once again made a dull, full of itself snooze-fest that managed to irritate me even more than "The Hurt Locker," something I didn't think was possible. I miss "Point Break" Kathryn Bigelow.

Olympus Has Fallen (2013)

Clearly the Movie Gods are reasonably appeased. In the time since the burst hemorrhoid that was "A Good Day to Die Hard" sloshed it's reeking mass through theaters a little more than a month ago, I may or may not have offered up a blood sacrifice. I'm not saying I did, but I could have. Had I done so, it would have been in exchange for their mercy and benevolence by giving us a film that could, at least in some small way, compensate for the death of one of the greatest action franchises of all time.

I'm not saying that "Olympus Has Fallen" was of the quality of the classic "Die Hard" films, but you can at least imagine in your mind that this would have been an alright one had it stared Bruce Willis. It's like the chintzy coffee mug your work may give you in exchange for cleaning the bathroom floors with your face for 15 hours on both Christmas Eve and Christmas Day. It's not really much of anything, and far too little too late after something nightmarishly horrible but hey, it's something.

So, to whatever dark deity accepted whatever sacrifice I may have hypothetically made, I offer my thanks. Be sure to leave your business card so I can properly worship you in the future. But next time do you think you could perhaps manage to do a little bit more than remake "Air Force One?" It's just going to make me want to watch "Air Force One" again. Not "Olympus Has Fallen." Hell, you even ripped off scenes like the "shooting the secretary" bit. I feel like I'm already watching "Air Force One," but without the awesomeness of Harrison Ford.

It is more subtle, though.

I realize that it may sound like I'm coming down too harshly on "Olympus Has Fallen." I don't want to make that impression, because this isn't a particularly bad movie by any means. As far as ridiculous, patriotic chest-thumping action movies go, it was fine. I've seen it done worse, although as one could infer from the previous paragraph, I've also seen it done better. At least I've seen it done with a far more memorable villain, which counts for a lot. But that's getting ahead of ourselves.

"Olympus Has Fallen" follows Mike (Gerard Butler), a former Secret Service agent who is forced to single-handedly save the President (Aaron Eckhart) and therefore the world after the White House comes under attack by North Korean insurgents. Of course there is hostage taking, executions, frantic conference calls as generals try to get some GODDAMN ANSWERS, torn American flags flapping in the wind, nuclear missiles, some one-liners, and all the other things we except from a movie like this involved. It's all pretty by the books, which doesn't make it bad, but as one could probably tell by looking at the poster, this most certainly is a movie that feels like it belongs in the late 90's.

"Happy birthday, Mr. President..."

And as much as that may sound like a slam, 90's action movies were awesome, so there's no issue there. By all means, remind me of something staring John Travolta or Christian Slater or Nicolas Cage. I will not complain. Hell, "Olympus Has Fallen" would actually make a decent double feature with something like "Under Siege" or maybe "Broken Arrow." Hell, even "Crimson Tide" would be a nice pairing.

Once the film gets going with the ridiculous plot, which gives "Red Dawn" a run for its money in terms of "That's dumb," bullets are flying and things are exploding with such rapidity that it almost overrides the fact that none of what we're seeing makes any sense or could feasibly happen. But really, in a movie like this when it's one man against an army of terrorists, there does come a certain point when logic does have to take a back seat to entertainment. After all, that's why we invented Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Just what part of "I'm going to shoot down this jet with a pistol" is problematic to you?

The action is acceptably frantic and reasonably well-shot, although it does suffer a bit from our old friend shakycam - The bane of the modern action film. And it may have just been the theater I saw it at (I'm looking at you, Emagine Canton) but the movie also seemed exceedingly dark, making it difficult to follow, particularly when about 3/4's of the movie takes place at dusk or night in a building with the power cut. So that was fun. But I can't deny that it was action packed, and I was never bored.

But for as much as the action counts, films like "Olympus Has Fallen" really depend on the charisma of their star, and while Gerard Butler isn't fantastic, he's not bad. He's just not that great. He certainly has the badass factor down pretty solidly, but for some reason the extra oomph to push him into full blown action movie star isn't there. Butler kind of falls in a weird place for me, being that he's like Jeremy Renner without the charm or Karl Urban without the acting chops. And though even a watered-down version of Renner or Urban is still good, after a while it does become a bit noticeable. And for me, I just start wishing that either one of those guys were in the movie instead.

I can't be the only one to be annoyed by his face, can I?

In a smart move, the film surrounds Butler with some heavyweights in the acting department, including not only Aaron Eckhart and Cole Hauser but also Morgen Freeman and even freaking Robert Forster. And while they barely (if ever) have any direct contact with Butler, he's talking to them for a good chunk of the film. Unfortunately we also have Angela Bassett sitting in the same room as Freeman and Forster sucking some of the talent out, but it still works as long as she's not talking. But one wonders what they're doing when they have not only a great actress like Ashley Judd in the film for just the first 15 minutes, but also Radha Mitchell, who has a do-nothing part we barely see her in. For shame.

I only have four complaints about "Olympus Has Fallen" that really irked me enough to really stand out. Everything else was an acceptable action movie pâté which was enough to satisfy my post-"Die Hard 5" malaise. Does that sound like a good time? Then I say go for it. You could do far worse. But me being me, I gotta vent. Here goes.

The first one is an admittedly minor complaint, made even less so by the fact that I got a pretty good laugh out of it. I found Melissa Leo's character, the Secretary of Defense, to be borderline unwatchable. I think they were trying to go for a tough Hillery Clinton type (unsurprisingly) but Leo plays it with such teeth-clenched, steel-jawed machismo that it's a bit much. But it gets ridiculous after she gets the patriotic snot beat out of her by the villain, and gets dragged away to what she assumes will be her death. As this is happening she starts belting out the Pledge of Allegiance through her broken mouth at the top of her lungs. While this is obviously meant to be stirring and resolute, I couldn't help myself and had to laugh, since due to her slurred and half-conscious speaking she sounded less like a patriot bravely meeting their end and more like Calamity Jane from "Deadwood" on another one of her bourbon fueled rampages.

"AH PLESH AHLEEJANCE TO DA FWAGADA YOONITID STaate...ah HELL! I pished mahself 'gain!"

The second issue I took was that for as much as this is supposed to be an "America! Yeah!" movie, it sure does love to make our army, air force, police force, NORAD, secret service, and overall level of preparedness look really, really bad. I know the whole point of the film is that Gerard Butler is forced to save the day, but there is a serious lack of any kind of general competence going on with everyone else. During the initial attack the only thing the men guarding the White House seem willing to do is discourage the enemy by dying at them.

You know, I'm no military strategist. I'm not a genius when it comes to tactics. The best battleplan I usually manage to come up with in D&D is "The fighter hits it with his sword." I won every battle in StarCraft by building 12 of the biggest air units available and pounding the other side into the dirt from above. But were I put in a situation where I had a large, massed group of enemies advancing towards me over open ground, and I was standing outside a heavily fortified building with numerous places to hide and to take cover, I can tell you without equivocation that my first instinct would NOT be: "Stand out in the open so the enemy can clearly see and shoot you."

"Quickly men! Stop the bullets with your bodies! Forth, Eorlingas!"

I know it's a convention of the action movie, wherein the bad guys need to appear as a viable threat, but for the love of Crom, the secret service looses roughly 80% of their strength before they even think that perhaps, just maybe it might be a good idea to duck behind a pillar or something or simply GO INSIDE. It doesn't make the terrorists look scary so much as it makes the Americans look really dumb.

Speaking of dumb, there's a pretty hackneyed twist in "Olympus Has Fallen" involving Dylan McDermott's secret service agent revealing himself as a traitor who was helping the North Koreans the whole time. And like usual in these films, his reasons for doing so are never explained more than a silly little "America is bad!" speech. It's just like Xander Berkley in, again, "Air Force One." And it was stupid then, too. I've never liked the plot device of a traitor in the midst of a ridiculously selective group of elite soldiers. I can never figure out how nobody figured him out, and why he's secret service anyway when he was capable of turning heel to the point of blowing up the United States. Which is the place where he lives. It's where he keeps all his stuff.

Oh geez, look out everyone. Bobby Donnell is locked and loaded.

And lastly the villain Kang, played by Rick Yune, just wasn't up to par when it comes to baddies in movies like this. This kind of movie needs a Gary Oldman. A Christopher Walken. A Dennis Hopper. I'm not saying that Rick Yune is bad, but he's not up to the task of being an intimidating villain, at least as the character is written. He's not memorable, he doesn't actually do much, and he's not any fun to watch.
  

 "Nice suit. John Philips, London. I have two myself."

He doesn't say anything clever. He's not intimidating physically aside from some random kung-fu he pulls out of nowhere, and he doesn't really do anything besides beating up an older women and a dude who is cuffed at the wrists. And his big fallback plan is to hide after sacrificing the rest of his men. Norman Stansfield he is not. He's just a weaselly scumbag who isn't any fun. That's honestly the biggest problem, as I am of the firm belief that the quality of an action movie is directly proportional to how entertaining the villain is.

Don't believe me? Think back on "Die Hard" and "Die Hard With A Vengeance." Alan Rickman and Jeremy Irons were great, right? Now quick. Without checking IMDB, who was the villain in "Die Hard 2: Die Harder?" What about "Live Free or Die Hard?" How about "A Good Day to Die Hard?" What? You don't remember? Hmm. I do wonder how those movies stack up against the other two.

I rest my case.

Check out the trailer. What you see is pretty much exactly what you get.

THE BOTTOM LINE - "Olympus Has Fallen" is alright. Just alright. I've seen way worse action films, and for a hybrid of "Die Hard" meets "24" meets paranoid right-wing gun nut conspiracy theory 'MERICA! propaganda, it's serviceable. I'm just surprised it wasn't made 15 years ago. Well, it was. Several times, but you know what I mean. It's worth a rental at least, if you're feeling the urge for bloodshed.

Rise of The Guardians (2012)

On occasion, I hit a bit of a wall. I get to a place where I just can't do it. I can't lie to myself. I just can't get excited over a movie sometimes. Despite a fair amount of anticipation from everyone else and generally glowing feedback coming off of "Rise of The Guardians," I was unable to make myself care about it at any point. None. Zero. There was not a single moment in the stretch of time from when I first saw a trailer for this film and when I fired up my Blu-Ray player to reluctantly watch it that I could make myself give the slightest damn about it. Not a single damn was given.

Listen. I don't care if it looks pretty. I don't care if it looks cute. I don't care if it looks like a fun time for the whole family. I don't even care that it's by the makers of "How To Train Your Dragon," a film I legitimately love. It's about Santa, the Easter Bunny, the Toothfairy, Jack Frost, and the Sandman. Only now they're like the freaking Justice League.
 
That's...just stupid. And even if I wound up being surprised by a hidden wealth of mystical wonderment and glee by the whole affair, not a single molecule in my body will be able to accept that concept and roll with it.

This is a movie I was predestined to dislike.

Not that I was expecting it to be bad, necessarily, but I honestly didn't want to waste an hour and a half of my time with it. There's literally hundreds of films sitting on my shelf that I've never seen that I would love to watch, but no. I have to go to Blockbuster and have "Rise of The Guardians" mock me from the shelf saying "What about me? You still haven't watched me! I'm a new release! You should watch it so people stop recommending it for you! And "Skyfall" is still all rented out! What? You'd rather watch that again? NOPE! Bwahahahaha!"

As a grown man, of course I'll watch a movie about the Easter Bunny over James Bond. It's just logical.

So I watched "Rise of The Guardians," against the instincts of every fiber of my being. And unsurprisingly, I didn't like it. It was exactly what I imagined it was going to be - a big steaming pile of cute. And, like I feared, I found it to be an immensely boring endeavor, not due to any kind of poor craftsmanship, but due to my not caring at any point about anything I was seeing. That's the trouble with the whole thing. It's not necessarily a bad movie, although it's no more than okay at best, but "Rise of The Guardians" is such a sizable chunk of nothing.

It's a strange place for me to be in where I don't care about something as opposed to outright dislike it. In fact it's almost worse. Michael Bay I loathe, but I'm more likely to watch a new movie of his as opposed to "Rise of The Guardians," since I know at the very least it will elicit an emotion from me. True it will most likely be anger, but at least I'll get a good rant out of it. The prospect of seeing a Terrence Malick movie may encourage me to drill out my eyes with an auger, but at least it's driving me to do something. I'll be active in some way. Not just sitting on the couch willing time to go by faster so my wasted 90 minutes are over and done with like I'm in a freaking time-out.

At some point I suppose I should talk about this thing. The idea is that...ah hell, I don't know. Not much about "Rise of The Guardians" made that much sense to me. Apparently The Man in The Moon, who we never hear speak but apparently is totally talking to our heroes, is running the whole shebang when it comes to...I guess the happiness of children?  Making sure kids are happy are the Guardians, being Santa and the Easter Bunny and whatnot. The Guardians keep the spirit of happiness alive in children, but they have power only so long as kids believe in them.

It's kind of like Queen Mab in that movie "Merlin" with Sam Neill. And for some reason the happiness of children, which is directly proportional to their belief in occasionally arguably mythical characters, is directly proportional to the fate of the world or something.

Whatever. That works I guess. It's dumb but as far as a movie concept goes it's serviceable. But why in the hell does Santa Claus, oh sorry, his name is North now, have swords?

Seriously with this?

What kind of sense does that make? It's true that's it been a number of years since I believed in Santa, but I can't recall at any point imagining him being a stern, tattooed, Russian version of Conan. Wouldn't the concept of Santa having swords be kind of terrifying to a little kid? I thought the whole concept of Santa was that he was supposed to be a kind, jolly, fat man. And the thought of someone like that visiting your house in the middle of the night was acceptable. But if he's all hardcore and is this hulking brute who duel-wields like a freaking ranger in D&D, that's a little bit more intimidating than I want Santa Claus to come across as!

He has "Naughty" and "Nice" tattooed on his arms. Is...is he going to punch naughty kids?

I would also question the logic of getting Alec Baldwin to voice Santa Claus when he's going to do it in a heavy Russian accent, making it so you can barely tell that it's him. Not that Alec Baldwin is a bad choice for the part or a bad actor, because he's neither one of those, but that's like getting Cindy Crawford to do a photo shoot while wearing a Christie Brinkley mask. What's the damn point?

The scary thing is that Santa isn't the most ridiculous one of the group. What they do to the Easter Bunny is downright laughable. Being the logically least physically imposing member of the group, I guess it's logical that the Easter Bunny was made into this 6-foot tall, steely eyed, Australian Snake Plissken type, but that doesn't mean that him being the tough guy of the group wasn't ridiculous. Although to the film's credit, that is made into the subject of more than a few jokes. So in that sense I guess there's some cheeky self-awareness, but that couldn't help me figure out what in the blue hell this movie was trying to accomplish.

Okay. Fine. You're a badass. That's not what one would usually expect. You know you have eggs in your bandolier, right?

Am I supposed to laugh simply because he's tough when, being the Easter Bunny, you'd imagine him to be otherwise? That's such an obnoxiously lazy form of humor. That's like all the MLP fan-art of Fluttershy being a serial killer. Because she's the quiet and overly-polite one, you see? And it's the juxtaposition of those two extremes that makes it funny. Or boring and way too easy. Take your pick.

At least Hugh Jackman got to speak in his normal voice for a change. But not being used to his normal voice, like Alec Baldwin, I could barely tell it was him. As is probably obvious, that was a pretty consistent problem I had with "Rise of The Guardians," being that the admittedly upper-echelon cast seemed really wasted. Baldwin and Jackman were both okay but were fairly unrecognizable, while Isla Fisher as the Tooth Fairy and Chris Pine as Jack Frost both have such indistinct voices that it really could have been anyone. Again, they didn't do a bad job, but I fail to see the point in getting actors without distinct voices to do voice work for movies.

It also didn't help that the majority of Chris Pine's dialogue is "Whoa!" "Ha Ha!" "Woo!" and "Yeah!"

That's true, by the way. I can only assume that in a cost-cutting measure, to get about 40 pages worth of dialogue out of him, they simply put Chris Pine in a recording booth for 5 minutes and gave him a script which was a single direction written in the middle of the page that read:

JACK FROST

(sounds of boyish laughter and excitement)

And that was probably it. Boom. We've got a movie, you guys. Quick, get the conceptual art team to conjure up some whimsical sequences where we can make the camera go all over the place and follow Jack Frost as he's flying around and causing snow and ice to happen. In fact, have them make a crap ton of that. That can be like 30% of the film. Don't worry about it. The whimsy will make up for the lack of anything significant happening.

The only, I repeat, ONLY character that I gave two craps about was the villain, Pitch. I will admit to really liking this character, who is essentially The Boogie Man. I actually felt more sympathy towards the villain than I did any of the heroes, since he has a far more interesting story which is full of tragic self-fulfilling loneliness, and as a result he feels like a far more fleshed out character than ANY of the Guardians by quite a wide margin. On top of that, Jude Law was the only cast member who stood out with his voice work, and easily turns in the best performance of the cast. And what do you know, I could actually tell it was him.

And for some reason, and I don't know if it was just my imagination here, the animation on Pitch's face was so much better than anyone else. Maybe it was because I knew who I was listening to speak, which made it easier to imagine their face, but I got so much more emotion out of Pitch than the Guardians. I don't want to come out and say that it's because Jude Law is a better voice actor, which while unlikely is honestly a reasonable possibility, but the animation certainly helped him blow everyone else out of the water here.

Wow. A character with complexity. Too bad he's the villain.

But it's a movie. You know the bad guy is going to lose. The bad guy always loses. I knew the character I liked most was going down in the end, which didn't help with my enjoyment of the whole affair. I knew these people I couldn't care less about were going to stop the only character with an interesting story simply on the basis that he was the villain, and I just wanted them to beat him and get it done so the movie could be over, kind of like ripping off a band-aid. Such was my experience with "Rise of The Guardians." I wanted the option of ripping out some of my hair in a quick moment of pain in exchange for it just being done.

But, and this is just a quick question of logic here, but when the fate of the world depends on children believing in the Guardians, why don't they just do this:

Behold. Problem solved.

I don't mean to be overly nitpicky, but that's a legitimate complaint here. The Guardians go around trying to covertly fix things when it's clear that all they would have to do is show themselves, proving they exist without question, and Pitch is instantly defeated. I'm sure an answer may have been given at one point, but I don't recall ever hearing it. Perhaps it was because I was bored.

Can I just watch "Wreck-It Ralph" again?

Here's the trailer for "Rise of The Guardians." Just imagine me rolling my eyes and picking at a hole in the arm of my chair and you've got my general reaction to the entire film.

THE BOTTOM LINE - My negative reaction to "Rise of The Guardians" is directly proportional to my apathy towards it. It's not that it's bad. I just never gave a damn about it. Did you think it looked good? Then you'll like it. I guess it's decent family entertainment, although the message of blind faith in something demonstrably untrue is unsettling to me. But it's supposed to be a fantasy, not an allegory. I hope. Otherwise the message to the target audience is "Hey kids! The Easter Bunny is totally real! And you better believe in him or the world is doomed!" Because that's healthy.

The Boondock Saints (1999)

One day when I was attending Central Michigan University, way back circa 2002, a friend of mine from down the hall came to my dorm room. In his hand was a burned DVD. He holds it up and asks me, "Dude, Pat, I have this movie called "The Boondock Saints." Ever seen it?" I told him I had not even heard of it. I see a small sparkle appear in his eyes as a smile creeps across his face. He then tells me, "You have got to see it. We're watching it right now." So we did.

I think that's the experience most people had with "The Boondock Saints." After essentially going straight-to-DVD, as the only initial theatrical release it got was on 5 screens for one week, the film garnered a pretty big fan following based entirely on word of mouth. Eventually being a part of that fandom would lead to a somewhat embarrassing predicament as 14 year-olds and Hot Topic kind of ruined it for everyone else by going the "Scarface" route and putting the Saints on everything because it makes whoever is wearing it totally hardcore and gangster. But if we step away from that there's still a pretty good movie to be found underneath all that marketing, teen wangst, black trenchcoats, and people flaunting their 7% Irish heritage by getting Celtic tattoos and wearing a "Boondock Saints" hoodie.

"The Boondock Saints" is about Connor (Sean Patrick Flanery) and Murphy (Norman Reedus) MacManus, two deeply religious Irish brothers who, after running afoul of the Russian mob after an innocent bar fight, decide it is their duty to destroy the evil in Boston by shooting it in the head. Of course they decide it's ordained by God that they do so, which makes it all okay. Using their mob errand boy friend, Rocco (David Della Rocco) as a walking Rolodex of people to kill, they start cleaning up the streets of every high and low level mobster they can get their hands on, all while the Boston police and FBI agent Paul Smecker (Willam Dafoe) play catch up and try to figure out just who in the hell is killing all these criminals.

The hits carried out by the MacManus brothers are always told in flashbacks as Smecker and the cops investigate the crime scenes, attempting to piece together the events that went on. These get more elaborate as the film goes on, leading to the final one which finds the film at its most artsy, showing Smecker actually walking through the shootings, narrating as the scene plays out around him in slow motion like he's not even there. And it really highlights how smart Smecker is, but also how easily he can make mistakes - like 1 guy with 6 guns turning into 6 guys with guns. While it may be a touch too much on occasion, overall I found it to be an interesting narrative device.

Umm...symbolism? Because he was in "Platoon?"

That's not what people remember about "The Boondock Saints," though. What they remember, and rightly so, is how funny it is. While it's true that at its core this is a pretty dark film which explores the nature of killing under the guise of religious righteousness, and does so without giving any clear-cut answers as to whether or not what our heroes are doing is right (although I think the way it's written implies the movie thinks it is), nobody is going to be thinking too much about all that deep stuff when the cast is so damn funny and likeable.

Flanery and Reedus are absolutely charming as the brothers, and have an amazing chemistry with each other. Their boyish jubilance over their new job would be disturbing if they weren't so funny. And as Smecker points out, their action-movie inspired tactics are so ridiculous and unprofessional that the only reason they succeed is because it IS so far out there that it's got a chance. And whether or not you count their survival on luck or divine intervention, you can't help but like these guys. Even if they are crazy.

It's okay. The voices in our heads told us we should do this. (Our heroes!)

I could just go down the cast list and say "They were awesome" to be honest. David Della Rocco is the only person more likable than the MacManus', and is most people's favorite character for a good reason, as he's hysterical. Rocco is one of the best loveable schmuck characters I can remember from recent film history, and he's played with such passion and gusto that whenever he's on screen the film gets this energy that's undeniable.

But to be perfectly honest, I really think it's Willem Dafoe who runs away with this movie. Even from a story standpoint it's just as much Smecker's story as the brother's. We are following him for a good chunk of the movie, sometimes more often than the MacManus', and by the end he's really functioning as the soul of the film. He's smart enough to figure these guys out, and he's probably good enough to stop them if he wanted to, but he has to ask himself if that's what he really wants to do. And being arguably the best actor in the cast, his performance is fiery, humorous, and tortured all at the same time.

Did I mention you get to see Willem Dafoe in drag? It is amazing.

I also love Bob Marley as the resident dunder-head Detective Greenly, and even freaking Ron Jeremy was incredibly memorable. They, along with the rest of the cast turn what could have been a very average crime thriller and turn it into a very, very funny movie. Oddly enough the one guy who isn't funny at all, and in fact is the only character played completely dead serious, is the the most prolific comedic actor of the bunch, Billy Connolly.

Speaking of humor, "The Boondock Saints" is one of the most endlessly quotable films I've ever seen. Unfortunately, much like "The Big Lewbowski," the film is laced with so much profanity that it's difficult to do so in public. But whether it's Greenly assuring his fellow cops that he will do no f@#kin' bagel fetching, or Rocco asking "Is it dead?" there are so many golden lines throughout that the whole film becomes something like a sing-along.

Alright, all together now: "Well, name ONE THING you're gonna need the rope for!" Now stop. That's annoying.

I've heard this film criticized often by people who label it as an immature, unfunny, over-stylized rehash of every vigilante justice movie ever made, and as such is a terrible film. I've never understood the seething hatred this movie brings out of some people. while I understand the argument as to it being unoriginal and low-brow at times. It's just as stylized as any other modern action movie that uses slow-motion on occasion, which doesn't make it bad since the slow-motion is well done, and humor is subjective. I find "The Boondock Saints" to be hilarious, personally, but I can understand someone thinking otherwise. I have a hunch that it's more that they can't stand the fanbase that worships it, which I totally get because I'm not a huge fan of them either. But it's not fair to take it out on the movie.

Some complain about the slow-motion, and there may admittedly be an abuse of it going on, but seeing as it stays consistent in its use it never really bothered me, and it started to become almost another character. Besides, had the fights not been in slow motion they would have taken 7 seconds and been so confusing and hectic it'd be indecipherable. And I'll take clear, easily comprehended slow-motion over confusing shaky-cam any damn day of the week. And that's a fact. Bitch about it all you want, but at least you know what just happened.

Like I said earlier, I really don't understand why this movie has so many detractors unless they're just out to tear apart a cult movie for no other reason other than not liking the audience for it. I guess you could get yourself in a tizzy over the message of vigilantism, but I don't think the movie is taking itself seriously enough to really look at it that closely. It's supposed to be a really fun time. Which it is.

Just looking at Rocco's face makes me smile.

Now as to the long delayed sequel, that's a conversation for another day...

Check out the trailer for "The Boondock Saints." It's awesomely cheesy and belongs in the early 90's!

THE BOTTOM LINE - I love "The Boondock Saints," even though the hip thing for me to do, as a self-stylized amateur critic is to write it off. Everyone else did. But I like what I like, and this movie puts a smile on my face, and if you've never seen it and aren't turned off by prodigious amounts of profanity and some rather dark humor, I'd highly recommend you give it a shot.

The Terminator (1984)

What am I supposed to say about "The Terminator" that hasn't been said a thousand times before? Not only is it one of the defining action movies of the 80's, but it also made legitimate stars of Arnold Schwarzenegger and James Cameron. And it's one of my favorite movies. Ever. In fact, I'm in the rare position of being a bigger fan of "The Terminator" than I am of "Terminator 2: Judgement Day." That's not something you hear often.

I think that for me, the reason I like "The Terminator" more than any of the sequels is because it's the only one that makes sense by itself. In fact it works best when viewed as a stand-alone film, due to the sequels having annoying time paradoxes that rear their ugly heads because of the mere fact that sequels exist.

This franchise got so convoluted and out of control with the mind-bending plot holes that it's really best to not even think about it, lest your head implode. But with the first film, it's a nice little package that ties itself up nice and pretty. And you don't have to ask questions like "How did Skynet create itself by sending technology back in time from the future if it couldn't exist in the future it sent technology back from because it didn't exist in past?"

Shut up and eat your popcorn.

What strikes me about the look and feel of "The Terminator" is that it is one of the most bleak action films I think I've ever seen. There's this barely subdued nightmarish quality about it, almost like you're floating in a bad dream. The color palette is all greys and blacks, almost the entire movie takes place at night, and the soundtrack during the action scenes is all electronic madness going nuts like a 'nipped-up cat rolling around on a Casio keyboard while their owner is in the garage pummeling an anvil with a sledgehammer. Even the main theme, incidentally one of the greatest ever, promises only darkness and oppression.

And being that the movie has only two settings, which are "Waiting" and "OH SWEET JESUS RUN FOR YOUR LIVES" that nightmarish quality is only enhanced by the unrelenting tension, which never really lets up. I am reminded a bit of "Jaws," being that even when you don't see the shark, you know it's out there somewhere. For that reason, anytime someone gets in the water, they're fair game even if you don't see anything. And like the shark popping up to scare the bajesus out of Roy Scheider,  the Terminator could easily bust through a wall at any moment. Most likely to shoot someone in the face.

Although James Cameron was right when he said that Arnold playing the Terminator shouldn't have worked, since the whole concept of the Terminator was to blend in and look very unassuming, there's two very good reasons why it did. The first is that Arnold Schwarzenegger is a scary looking man. There's no way around it. If you have Arnold as a villain, he's going to be scary. Well, unless Joel Schumacher is involved, but that's a whole other conversation.

"Oh man. I willingly choose to forget what I did last night..."

The second reason is that Schwarzenegger turns in what is honestly a brilliant performance here. He had been only Hercules and Conan before becoming the Terminator, but after this film he became someone to really take notice of. And although it's easy to make fun of the guy and crack wise about how playing an emotionless robot is the best role for him, Arnold plays the Terminator spectacularly well, and it's honestly one of the best, most subtle villainous performances in film. The only other guy I can think of that's ever come close to being as chilling in his silence would have to be Dolph Lundgren in "Rocky IV." And Ivan Drago actually had fewer lines than the Terminator did in this movie.

There is an art to playing someone with no emotions. It's not enough to not move any facial muscles and deadpan everything. There still has to be something behind it. When you look at both Schwarzenegger's face in "The Terminator" and Lungren's face in "Rocky IV," there's this cold, calculating intensity behind the eyes that you just can't fake. When Arnold first appears and slowly takes in his surroundings the processors in the Terminator's head can almost be heard whirling. And when Ivan stares down Rocky or Apollo, it's very similar. You don't know what this guy is thinking, but you know it's no good, and you know he's very, very dangerous. Especially to street punks who like to pick on naked people.

A wild Bill Paxton appears!

While Arnold is the actor everybody thinks of when talking about these films, I must admit that one of the main reasons I love the first film so much is because of Michael Biehn. I've never understood why Michael isn't a household name when he's appeared in some huge movies throughout the years. And it's not like he had small roles, either. He was Cpl. Hicks in "Aliens," he was the bad guy in "The Abyss," he was the most memorable villain out of many in "Tombstone," and he was in the only good Michael Bay movie, "The Rock." And here he's Kyle Reese, the guy who is John Connor's father. He's kind of a big deal.

And he's also a really good actor, too. He is one of my all time favorites, having the badassery of Kurt Russell and the intensity of Nicolas Cage but without the goofiness. His portrayal of Kyle Reese is really heartfelt and full of pain, and he knows that the best case scenario is that he's almost certainly going to die. But his love for Sarah Connor, a women he's never met and has traveled through time for, keeps him going enough to make sure she's safe no matter the cost. Dramatically it's probably up there among the best roles he's portrayed.

Too bad he dresses like a flasher, though. Ah well. The 80's.

Linda Hamilton deserves a lot of credit as Sarah Connor, as she's probably one of the best female protagonists of action movie history. Her character arc is very compelling and at the same is quite subtle, since the movie doesn't bash us over the head with the fact that she's going to become this hardass survivalist later in life. A lesser movie would have her pick up something heavy and pointy and beat the Terminator to death with it in a scene that has her "realize her destiny" and crap.
 
But since that would be stupid and would make no sense, she survives by using her wits, courage and a bit of good luck. She's not a solider yet, after all. But she will be, to which the movie drops hints by her being a natural at applying a field bandage and having a really good "ON YOUR FEET, SOLIDER!" voice when she needs it. Again, subtle.

Why James Cameron went insane and lost all sense of subtly by the time "Avatar" came around I have no idea. I blame constant success and deep sea diving.

"Now I'm off to actually invent time travel! That way I can go to the future when technology has finally caught up to my vision!!! Then I can wait another decade for it to catch up to me again! I AM THE FUTURE."

It's a lot of fun to watch "The Terminator" and spot all the actors in it that you know you've seen in something else but you just can't place it. Naturally seeing Bill Paxton with pointy blue hair is a sight to behold and elicits a mighty squee from me every time, but Lance Henriksen is also always a lot of fun to watch. Although I'm not quite sure if his character's schtick, that being that he always has a lame story to tell that gets cut off before it goes anywhere ever really materialized the way it was probably intended. I don't think enough time was spent with the cops to really have that pay off. But in any case, the repartee between Henriksen and the late great Paul Winfield is awesome.

Especially when you imagine that it's Bishop talking to Lucius Sweet

There's also that guy with the really big mouth. You know, from "The X-Files" and "Mortal Kombat: Annihilation." Yeah, that guy. His name is Brian Thompson, and he's the punk who gets his heart ripped out of his chest by Schwarzenegger. So that's cool. Oh and by the way, Rick Rossovich is Ginger's boyfriend in this. You all know Rick Rossovich, right? Nothing? Oh, come on! He was Slider in "Top Gun!" He stinks!

Ugh. Why do I even try?

Without question "The Terminator" is up there with the best movies Schwarzenegger has ever been involved in, and it's one of my favorite action flicks. And I know I've said before that I prefer it over "T2," but I have to be honest when I say it's probably my second favorite James Cameron movie, second only to "Aliens." What can I say? I liked Cameron before he went nuts.

Check out the AWESOMELY cheesy trailer. I love how the dude says the name of the movie like 12 times.

THE BOTTOM LINE - If you've never seen "The Terminator" I really don't know what you're doing, because there are few action movies that are as intelligent and intense as this one. Seriously, drop what you're doing and find a way to watch it. It's readily available. Go. NOW! And if you've already seen it, well hell. Watch it again. We'll make a night of it. I've got the brewskis. Let's do this. Come with me if you want to live!

Red Dawn (2012)

I love action movie cheese, whether it's "Top Gun" or "Point Break" or anything starring Dolph Lundgren. But there do exist a few films deemed classics in the "badly awesome" category that I am not a fan of. One of those is the original "Red Dawn." I know it occupies a special place in many hearts, but for some reason I could never get behind it.

There's a lot of reasons to like it to be sure, be it the amazing cast or the stunningly absurd plot that screams out for high-octane action movie shenanigans, but I honestly slept through most of "Red Dawn." I have a hard time pointing to exactly the reason why, but there's something about that movie that just makes me drift off into a stupor worthy of post-Thanksgiving dinner. Considering that there's a calculated 2.23 acts of violence every minute of the film (seriously, at the time it made the Guinness Book of World Records), it's quite an accomplishment to make something that action-packed boring, but hey there it is.

I always found "Red Dawn" inexplicably dull, and because of that I didn't like it. Well, that and it was really creepy watching it knowing that there are people in America who look at it like it's a precognitive documentary. Honestly it made me feel a little queasy because it was like looking at the world through the lenses of their paranoid, gun-nut, conspiracy theory laden crazy goggles. It's an unsettling feeling.

That's a thing I want to watch: Alex Jones' spank material.

So sure. Remake it. Whatever. At this point I'm not even going to rant about them remaking everything. At least it's a remake of a movie I don't care about. It could be much worse. And when a movie has been sitting on the shelf for 3 years after being completed (true story, it was shot in 2009), you know you're dealing with some quality material, am I right?

This is going to suck, isn't it?

Well, the answer is unfortunately "Yes, it did suck." This is not a good movie. Not even by the standards of unnecessary remakes is it a decent film. It's barely coherent in its narrative, the plot does the impossible and is even dumber than the original, all but one of the characters are essentially walking cardboard cutouts spouting dialogue equivalent to a dog gnawing on a squeaky toy, and the admittedly plentiful action is squandered by the watered-down PG-13 rating. I would ask how something this easy is messed up so much, but honestly there wasn't much to work with to begin with, so I can't even be that mad about it. It's not like I'm surprised it sucked. I'm just tired.

All that being said, I still liked it better than the original. At least I stayed awake this time.

You know what the deal is at this point with the story, and little has changed from the original in that respect. Very early on, a foreign army invades America, and with a pillaging that would make the beginning of any fantasy movie proud, the townsfolk of Spokane, Washington are promptly slaughtered and interned. Escaping from the invader's clutches is a group of high schoolers who decide to flee into the woods and fight the good fight, calling themselves The Wolverines and eventually throwing a big enough wrench into the enemy's plan as to suggest eventual victory in the near future. Since "Red Dawn" doesn't feel the need to have an actual ending.

Cower in fear, North Korea. She's going to make duck-lips at you.

In the original film the invaders were the Russians. And in 1984, I'm sure that made some sense. In the remake, it's North Korea. It was supposed to be China, but when MGM decided they didn't want to make them mad, since it might eat into the box office sales in...well, China I guess, they changed it to North Korea, a place where barely anyone has electricity let alone a movie theater to go to. It's not even worth it to mention how stupid the idea that they could successfully invade us is. But I'll still say it. That's stupid.

The whole invasion is explained to be possible because of "a new weapon" that destroys all communication or something, kind of like an EMP, except North Korea's stuff is immune due to a MacGuffin they needed for a third act plot device. Of course, the film never explains how all the radios and TVs and communication that was not protected is still working after the invasion, but there I go nitpicking "stuff that doesn't matter" like the buzz-kill I am.

Our main heroes de jour are played by Chris Hemsworth (pre-"Thor"), Josh Hutcherson (pre-"Hunger Games"), and Josh Peck (post-proving he's a terrible actor). There's also Jeffery Dean Morgan and Brett Cullen who show up to throw some acting chutzpah at us, but they are extremely underused. So overall the cast is alright, but then again, among The Wolverines we've also got Adrianne Palicki, who played Wonder Woman on the failed TV reboot, and Isabel Lucas, who was the Decepticon in "Transformers: Revenge of The Fallen" who could turn into a human (since Decepticons can do that now), so I guess we've got to pick our battles here.

"I'm the only reason you're watching this, aren't I?"

When the cast is good, it's pretty darn good. Morgan and Cullen are of course great, but Hemsworth is carrying the movie nearly the entire time, being the best actor of the main cast by as far as Thor could chuck Mjolnir. It also helps that he is given the most interesting character, being a soldier recently back from the war who has some issues, but obviously becomes indispensable when North Korea attacks. Hutcherson is okay, but he has the same problem most of the cast has, being that his character is so anonymous that he kind of fades into the background, and it's a struggle to even remember his name. Even Will Yun Lee, playing the essentially nameless Big Bad doesn't really do much besides get killed via impossible convenience, although he is fairly intimidating.

But when the cast is bad, it becomes borderline unwatchable. The worst offender of this is Josh Peck as Hemsworth's younger brother. I knew I was going to hate this character the instant he showed up as a hotdogging quarterback who ends up costing his team the game because he felt he could win it single-handedly. He was mistaken. And true to that character trait of selfish impulsiveness (which is about the only one he has), he ends up getting one of his friends killed at a later point in the film. I thought that perhaps that may have proven to be a learning experience for him, but nope. Not happening. He doesn't learn anything and ends the movie the same character he started as despite suffering horrendous loss. What a character arc.

And Josh Peck is such an unlikable actor that it really is nails on a chalkboard for me to even look at the damn guy. And it took me the longest time to place where I'd seen him before. At first I thought he was that mattress selling prick from "Devil," but then I finally realized where I'd seen him before.

IT'S THAT LITTLE TURD SMUGGLER FROM "ATM."

Of course it is. Why wouldn't that be the actor they got for "Red Dawn?" He's only the most soul-punchingly obnoxious and irritating actor I've seen since Ryan Reynolds or Dane Cook. Sounds like a great time. Make him one of the heroes. In fact, make him essentially the main character, as he's one of the few who survives till the end. Fantastic. I'm glad I'm watching him in this movie.

Aside from the shortfalls of the cast, the rest of the movie does tend to make itself not boring by having a good amount of bombs, bullets and guys screaming "AAAAAARRGH!" as they shoot the enemy troops, all of whom seem to have the survival instinct of a duck with a sexual attraction to spinning helicopter blades. The problem with all of that is that pretty soon scenes start feeling less like a cohesive narrative and more like a slideshow of explosions that happened in no particular order. "Red Dawn" will jump from scene to scene with no lead-in or establishment of when or even where we are in relation to the thing we just saw, making the story quite hard to follow. And it's not too long before it starts getting really hard to care one way or another.

 It's the amazing Wolverine Brothers, Douche, Square-face and Talent!

By the way, isn't it nice when we don't have to see blood during our sequences of horrific violence? Much like "Alex Cross," there's a shocking moment in "Red Dawn" featuring a sniper rifle. But in this movie, instead of the chest, the person gets shot in the head. But don't worry! Just because the dude would have gotten his head half removed with that large-caliber bullet doesn't mean we have to see blood. Because just like real life, that's a very tidy affair. They wouldn't have even had to wash the carpet he fell on. Man, why can't every violent action movie be PG-13? It makes it so much better!

"Red Dawn" feels to me like a 5 hour long TV mini-series that was trimmed down to an hour and a half and released in theaters. And that compression does make it go by at a very brisk clip, but at the cost of knowing what in the world is happening. I'd prefer it as a mini-series. And maybe if it had been a series we could have actually gotten to know the characters instead of just knowing them as "The annoying one," "The one with the weird face," "The black one," "The one Josh Peck got killed," and Chris Hemsworth. 

I don't know what else to say, honestly. "Red Dawn" isn't the worst remake I've ever seen, but some of that probably has to due with the fact that I never liked the original. So even if it did suck, hey it's no skin off my back. I just don't care.

Check out the trailer for "Red Dawn." BTW Chris Hemsworth is not nearly as prominent in the actual film. Of course.

THE BOTTOM LINE - "Red Dawn" is relatively harmless, and the action is admittedly plentiful, but it's ultimately not worth the time or effort it takes to get the disc, put it in the player, go back to the couch, hit play, chapter skip through the previews and commercials, play the movie, and then sit there for an hour and a half. There are better things you could be doing.