We Own The Night - 6/10
This movie needed a lot more complexity. Some would call it predictable, but I wouldn't even assume that it ever tried to make you think it would happen any other way. The car chase scene is definitely awesome, but the Bourne Ultimatum scene tops it.

28 Weeks Later - 7.5 / 10. A nice follow up to the original. The way that they reintroduced the virus was quite believeable. There were some very creepy moments, but some of it was too much. There were a couple of things which just turned me off of it. Definitely not as good as the original, but still worth a watch.

1408 - 4 / 10. This movie was brutal. Not only was it not scary, it was downright lame. Extremely predictable, and it had some seriously SLOW stretches. Save yourself the 1.5 hours and watch something else...

Crank - 8/10

Nonstop action, no story, great effects. I had fun all the way through. Mindless flick to enjoy in surround sound.

Turistas - 2/10

I have no idea what prompted me to watch this crap, but I rented it last night. You know a movie a bad when you start checking your email and chatting online halfway through.

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Starship Troopers - 8/10

This is probably my 20th time watching it and it's still fun as hell. Two points off for some cheese, but overall it's a great flick to relax to.

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An American Haunting - 5/10

I'm actually not very familiar with the Bell Witch, so I popped in the DVD expecting absolutely nothing. Good thing, too, because had I expected something more, the score would have been lower. Cheap scares abound - I've actually just stop paying attention to them halfway through expecting something to pop out or a loud sound to bang. Acting is decent, so points for that.

Psycho (Original) - 6/10
I suppose at the time this was great. I mostly enjoyed the bad acting, it was great. The ending was especially hilarious.

The Thing - 8/10
IMO still one of the greatest horror movies ever.

Blade 2 - 6/10
I don't remember this movie being as cheesy as it was. It was okay I suppose, but I don't care to see it again. Very bad acting and terrible acting.

cq

hilarious, smart film. dumb, too. everything you'd want on a night during which you feel like crap thanks to a cold and are tired thanks to other activities that a smarter person would have foregone. we all have those nights. this is the film for them.

Perfume: A story of a murderer-9/10

An excellent story with an unusual character with an unusual talent, but the amazing part happens at the end of the film where 750 extras get naked and a massive orgy occurs. I was not expecting that to happen, so it gets an extra point from an 8 to a 9.

30 Days of Night - 8 / 10

Great set (reminded me of John Carpenter's The Thing in many ways) and solid characters. The bad guys were hyped up, wedged faced, cocaine-is-a-helluva-drug vampires that raided Marilyn Manson's closet and don't like to wash their faces. The arctic temperatures didn't phase them. The good guys were local-yokel cop (Harnett) and his fire marshal exwife (and other who remain mildly forgettable) who manage to take it to the hyper-suckers with a variety of armaments including some hot-hot bear trap action.

God view of town being eaten alive. Constantly neck snapping with Nosferatu kung-fu. Little girl gets decapitated. No tits, no ass. Minimal gun usage. No cheesy one-liners.

The finale fight ending was a bit too Dragonball Z for me, but it did the job.

Thanks for the review, and the heads up on it. Definitely wanna check it out :)

-Will

Lady in the Water - 6/10

It was alright. That's all I can really say about it.

28 Weeks Later 3/10

Weak. Hubby and I were both bored by the end of the movie. I'm not really a big fan of horror, but I thoroughly enjoyed the first one so I was pretty excited about this one after reading some good reviews. The premise of why the virus returns was actually decent (I was skeptical), but the story itself was lame and I didn't give a damn about the characters. I would have given it 2 stars but I love Robert Carlyle. I don't recommend this movie at all.

300. The story of Thermopylae, where 300 Spartans held off a million Persians by funnelling them through a narrow mountain pass. I thought this was ok in places, some nice gorey fight scenes but the dialogue/voiceover was annoying. They were trying to make it "deep" or something. The whole thing was done on blue-screen and its quite well done.
It takes a while to get going but it's not really worth it.
Not as good as I thought it would be. 4 out of 10.

I would like to say that I agreed with Medusa about 28 Weeks Later. Loved the first one though.

interkosmos
jim finn

brilliant fake documentary about the east german space colonization/interplantery archive programme of the middle 1970s. you eventually find out what is going on, but it's goofy to say more than that.

i have a real thing for soviet/east european 60s kitsch, particularly the hip sci-fi stuff--you know, the mosfilms look--solaris being an example that attains a level of genius rarely seen by us mortals--the musicals collected in "east side story" being the kitschy hip side. the look of this film is perfect. PERFECT.

closest thing i've seen to it is viktor pelevin's novel "omon ra" which is also brilliant.

o yeah--there are footnotes at the end of the film.
and the music and sound are excellent throughout.

track this film down.
see it.
that is all.

Across the Universe: 5/10. It's too a literal interpretation of The Beatles music and way over the top in places. I mean they've got the Merry Pranksters bus, with quite obviously Neal Cassidy at the wheel, but instead of Ken Kesey, you've got Bono playing "Doctor Robert" and they stop at the house of "Dr. Cleary." I mean, give me a break, if you are going to go literal about some aspects, then go literal about the whole thing. Personally, I think it would have been a better movie with the plot intact and a beatles soundtrack rather than some kind of 'Beatles Musical'.

Boy, it's been a long time since I wrote any movie reviews...let's see...I have watched:

(2) Costa-Gavras films - I had been meaning to see these staples of our modern-era liberalism for a long time, and I can't say I was very moved by either of them.

Missing - 7/10
The story of an American ex-pat who disappears while living in an unidentified S American country in the midst of a brutal military coup - a coup which turns out to have been instigated in part by the US government. Starring Sissy Spacek (his wife) and, thankfully, Jack Lemmon (his father). If it weren't for Jack Lemmon's heart-wrenching performance in this film I would have rated it lower. I love him. :hearts: Lemmon plays a naive American conservative who, in the process of trying to find out what happened to his son, is enlightened to the brutality and oppression his country is willing to overlook in its fight against communism.
As for the film itself, I found its message to be a little heavy-handed for our age. Plus, the idea of being shocked by US support of murderous governments in South America is kind of quaint these days.

and

Z 8/10
This one was much better, even though it was weighed down with some pretty clunky self-righteousness, too, but hey the concept of being a liberal was experiencing a new age, lol! I always love watching Yves Montand sashay around and looking cool, but his time in the movie was entirely too brief. The fight scenes are laughably bad, but the chase scenes are monumental for their day. All in all, it was a good watch, but would have been so much more so in 1969. When I was 4, lol. I bet my parents enjoyed it!

MST3K: Touch of Satan 7/10
Not nearly as good as Prince of Space, but it definitely has its moments of uncanned hilarity. My daughter, the 8-year-old, most enjoyed the scene where the old 100-year-old devil grandma is sitting and looking into a mirror and one of the commentators goes 'who's got it going on? me, that's who!' :lol:
guess you had to be there....

The Original Kings of Comedy 10/10
:lol:
I have a whole new appreciation for Bernie Mac. :hearts:
:lol:

About A Boy 9/10
The only Hugh Grant film that I know of that would earn a 9/10. I found this movie to be charming and it made me feel happy. Both Grant and the kid gave excellent performances.

The Last King of Scotland 8/10
This movie was a little odd. The story of a Scotsman who became Idi Amin's personal doctor after seizing power in Uganda in the early 70's. Forest Whitaker earned every bit of acclaim he earned - it's easy to dismiss as being over the top, but there was a lot of psychological subtlety in his performance. The style of the movie was a little unsettling, though, kind of like a cross between Boogie Nights and Hotel Rwanda. Gawd...that's awful. :p But I enjoyed it for the most part, and, if the information in the film is accurate, I learned a lot, too. More ugly, horrible, devastating meddling by the West in other people's countries. Which I guess brings these reviews full circle.

See No Evil - 4/10.

It was decent. Could be more gorey given the concept. Horror film my ass.

Little Miss Sunshine - 6/10

Okay, some parts of these movies were mildly amusing, but the whole way through I just kept wondering what people saw in this film to proclaim it one of the best of 2006. I just don't get it. Way overhyped.

Fracture 5/10
I've seen better acting, plot development, and suspense on Law and Order. Anthony Hopkins obviously needed the paycheck.

Borat - 6.5/10

Stupid, humorous, not very many laugh out loud moments. However, I was entertained.

Battle Royal
I've seen this like 5 or 6 times and it's still fucking awesome every time! so many characters to keep you entertained it's awesome! the story is simple yet with every character doing it's own thing, it's very enjoyable! for a foreign movie, this is one of the best. highly recommended for almost everyone who likes a little action.

I give this movie a score of 9/10

Good Will Hunting - 9/10
[Buy - Rent- Download - Avoid]

I know, I know... I shouldn't have just seen this movie. I should have seen it years ago. If you haven't seen this movie, and don't like Ben Affleck, you might find a new appreciation for him in this movie.

Robin Williams is incredible, as always, and Matt Damon's performance shows us what we already know: he's fucking great. This movie gets top marks (I've practically never given out a 10/10) for the full plot, rich characters, and wonderful story. Of course, I may be a little biased because the movie's set in the Boston area and I grew up a bit south of Boston, so the accents immediately make me happy. Speaking of making me happy, Minnie Driver is quite nice as well, and really delivers (in her natural English accent, which is also a soft spot for me).

All in all, it's very well written and played out by everyone involved. If you haven't seen it, go out and get it now.

American Gangster - 9/10 (coming next week to theaters)
[Buy - Rent- Download - Avoid]

It's a story about violence in high, but appropriate (not "just because"), amounts. It's a story about drugs. It's a story with raw language, and some nudity (where it belongs, and not where it doesn't).

Denzel Washington is both hardcore and a gentleman. Russell Crowe is intense and . You can get a story synopsis anywhere, so I'll just give you a snapshot of the experience. This movie is extremely well done. Cinematography, attention to detail for the time period, characters... all very good. It's not a "shoot everything that moves because hollywood loves gun play" movie. It's got a powerful storyline (based on the true story of the main character, Frank Lucas), and shows you the "gangster" world in gritty detail. Crowe is great as the no-bullshit honest cop working against illegal drugs and those who would allow (and even profit from) their presence.

Go out and see it. Don't wait to rent it, or catch it some time on a movie channel- go out and catch it in theaters when it comes out.

david lynch: inland empire

to my mind, this is the best film lynch has made (since eraserhead) by quite a distance, and this despite the ending, which i'll just complain about in the abstract. visually and sonically spectacular (at some points the music gets so to be so Big and "THIS IS SCARY" that you have to laugh. which is fun too.) in a deeply disturbing psychological space (until you are let off the hook).

the film is 3 hours long, so we broke it into 2 evenings and saw it with a couple friends who are lynch fans. i am not particularly a lynch fan. but we agreed on this one.

find it, watch it: it'll mess you up for a few hours.

lars von trier: boss of it all

very funny little film from von trier. strangely parallel to lynch in the use of camera and editing, but bent to a quite different purpose.
basically, an actor gets hired to impersonate kinda the non-existant boss of a company. he ends up in all kinds of trouble. it's great.

but then again, i am a hopeless fanboy when it comes to lars von trier.
to my mind, though, his finest thing so far is "five obstructions."
if you havent seen that, drop what you are doing and get thee to a rental joint.
then see this film. to cool you off. like a shower.

Saw III.

Not as good as I, better than II

Lars von Trier wrote the script for the movie Dear, Wendy I reviewed a month or so ago, rb. I loved that film.

Night Watch 6/10.
Not a bad movie, but very difficult to follow, probably cause it was filmed in Russia. Very Matrix-y in the cinematography. Had a good premise, eon's old battle between the forces of good and evil and a truce was declared that the good would police the evil during the night (nightwatch) and the evil would police the good during the day (daywatch). Of course, not all goes according to plan. It was dubbed into English, but that still didn't help the gutteral russian accents and I still needed subtitles to make heads or tails out of it.

I also saw 30 Days of Night.

I agree mostly with Crompsin except I didn't find the characters solid. It wasn't bad for a horror movie. It had some funny moments. I'm growing tired of the quick jerky camera work this genre is using.

All in all good movie...except the ending...won't ruin it, but I think they could have done better.

I'll give it a 7/10. Great potential, but didn't have the follow through.

Kill Bill Vol. 1

I've seen it before, of course, but it's great every time.

9.5/10

28 Weeks Later

It has been quite a while since I saw the first installment, 28 Days Later, but the plot/premise of zombie movies isn't too hard to remember. I was impressed at just how much plot and backstory there was in this movie, while still having plenty of gore and chaos.

8 braaaaaaaaains out of 10 braaaaaaaaains

Saw IV - ???

I don't know how to describe it other than... well... it was so appalling to the senses that it was hard to recognize that it was a good movie. I thought it was good at least. I'm personally still shaking it off.

whisper 6-10
war 3-10
smoking aces 7-10

Nightmare Before Christmas in 3-D

AWESOME! One of my favorite movies and then in 3-D. It was a good night of entertainment.

10/10

Is this a thumbs up or thumbs down? Or a thumb with vomit on it? :)

The Black Book. A Paul Verhoeven film about one woman's experience in the Dutch Resistance during WWII. Supposedly based on a true story---okay it was really depressing but incredibly well acted and of course the plot was riveting.

9/10

House of the Flying Daggers
7/10
pretty, good kung fu, nice effects, interesting story.

Click 8/10

An awesome film, made me laugh so much it hurt, then almost cry. Wouldn't watch it again for a while, so it doesn't get a 9/10. Definatly recommend.

Lost Boys 7/10

Pretty entertaining for a vampire movie made in the 80s. I've watched it several times. It's then ending that cracks me up. The Grandpa is my favorite character.

Clerks 2 - 7.5/10

Not my favorite Kevin Smith movies, but one of his better ones for sure.

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The Fountain - 7/10

Somewhat confusing narrative combined with fantastic visuals.

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Thr3e - 8/10

It was entertaining for sure, but didn't blow me away.

The Big Lebowski - 5/5

One of my favorite movies of all time and I just got to watch it on the big screen for the first time at a local art house theatre. The Dude Abides.

The Condemned - 3/10

What a terrible movie. I stole it off the internet and I still feel like I was robbed. Some of the worst filming I have ever seen in my entire life. Its like they paid a 2 year old child who doesn't know how to hold its arms up properly to hold the camera.

Oldboy - 8.5/10
Spurred by the reviews I read in this thread, I had to see it. I was quite impressed. I enjoyed it a lot. There were some parts that didn't click with me though, but I think that's the culture gap speaking.

Naked Weapon - 2/10
I rented this movie because after seeing Maggie Q in Balls of Fury, I HAD to see her naked. I got what I asked for, but the rest of the movie was so corny. There were only 2 sets of nipples in the entire film. TWO!! Hence.. 2 out of 10.

the condemned was pretty terrible, yes. i rented it expecting very little -- i just wanted to see a movie starring a professional wrestler who cant act beating up on extras for freedom -- but no, it had to try and be socially meaningful and pack its movie full of horrible, violent rape and torture and then blame you for enjoying watching it. well, take heart, you socially conscious filmmakers -- i did NOT enjoy watching the violence in your film. because you guys suck so bad at making movies!

i just watched “mr. wrong” last night. i think i’d give it 4 out of 10. (that’s really low for me, i like everything.) it starts off promisingly, and i like both bill pullman and ellen degeneres and it has what you would think is the most inassailably reliable premise of any movie comedy ever -- you know, the crazy lover who drives you up the wall has been the stuff of hilarity since “it happened one night” and “bringing up baby.” but after about the first half hour it goes to seed and just pretty much persists in sucking till the end.