I... well, I kinda liked it. And I kinda didn't. Maryanne had the same type of thought.
I'd suggest waiting for a rental if your interested at all. It was entertaining, but not a new idea for a movie.
The long and short: Cowboy gets abducted. Cowboy escapes, but has lost a good chunk of his memory. Cowboy was a bad guy, so the good guys are after him.
Cowboy ends up being the only one who can lead the fight against the aliens.
Cowboy ends up being a good guy in the end.
I think I've seen that formula somewhere before, or at least one very much like it. Either way, it was all too easy, too familiar (like it's be done before) and just too... boring. Kinda. I wanted to like it, really. But it's just so BLAH.
Tuesday, October 04, 2011
Issues between Google and Blogger
Seems there are some issues upgrading accounts, and a number of authors have lost access. We're working to figure out what Google broke and getting our people back in.
Stick around....
Stick around....
Wednesday, September 28, 2011
Contagion
Ehhh...
Wait for a Rental.
If you've seen the movie Virus, or read the book 'The Hot Zone', then you'll be very familiar with this movie.
Done in the Docu-Drama style, it's not remotely an Action-Thriller movie as it's being marketed; no real action, and not a big thrill either. It was very predicitable if you've read the Hot Zone book or know anything about how the CDC and the Gov respond to viral epidemics, and the whole story revolved around one family and then a bunch of doctors and researchers trying to figure it out. The problem is that the focus kept shifting so often you weren't sure just who things were supposed to be centered on, who to root for, and in some cases exactly why some of the stuff that was happening was really happening. There were a couple characters and subplots in the movie that made no sense and didn't seem to fit in the slightest. At points it almost felt like there were two seperate and distinct movies that somebody decided to merge together to create one product.
In our opinion it just didn't work well. Even the 'twist' at the end was no surprise to either of us. When we left the theater, we wondered how this could've been a better movie. We kinda concluded that removing one subplot and the 6 or 8 recognizable actors from the movie that were part of that subplot, and focusing much more on how people were coping with the disease and finding the cure and such, basically adding an element of urgency that (strangely) was missing throughout the whole thing would've made this a more enjoyable flick.
If you're at all interested, wait for a rental and watch it at home with a few friends. Between the movie and teh conversation of the friends trying to understand what's going on during the movie, you'll have a more enjoyable experience.
Wait for a Rental.
If you've seen the movie Virus, or read the book 'The Hot Zone', then you'll be very familiar with this movie.
Done in the Docu-Drama style, it's not remotely an Action-Thriller movie as it's being marketed; no real action, and not a big thrill either. It was very predicitable if you've read the Hot Zone book or know anything about how the CDC and the Gov respond to viral epidemics, and the whole story revolved around one family and then a bunch of doctors and researchers trying to figure it out. The problem is that the focus kept shifting so often you weren't sure just who things were supposed to be centered on, who to root for, and in some cases exactly why some of the stuff that was happening was really happening. There were a couple characters and subplots in the movie that made no sense and didn't seem to fit in the slightest. At points it almost felt like there were two seperate and distinct movies that somebody decided to merge together to create one product.
In our opinion it just didn't work well. Even the 'twist' at the end was no surprise to either of us. When we left the theater, we wondered how this could've been a better movie. We kinda concluded that removing one subplot and the 6 or 8 recognizable actors from the movie that were part of that subplot, and focusing much more on how people were coping with the disease and finding the cure and such, basically adding an element of urgency that (strangely) was missing throughout the whole thing would've made this a more enjoyable flick.
If you're at all interested, wait for a rental and watch it at home with a few friends. Between the movie and teh conversation of the friends trying to understand what's going on during the movie, you'll have a more enjoyable experience.
Wednesday, July 27, 2011
Moving Day coming!
William and Maryanne are moving. New home, new town, new stuff... lots of packing to do. That's partly why our reviews have been slightly sporadic for the last couple months.
We apologize for that (all of us), and Maryanne and I at least have both promised to each other that we'll start getting reviews up at least within a few days of seeing a movie or dining out, and we're prodding everyone else into getting things to us as well. Although we aren't doing much dining out lately (unless you count Dairy Queen) as we're packing, cleaning, recycling, and hauling stuff around a lot lately. Many of the friends are helping, and few of them are currently in a financial crunch.
There are a few movies coming up that some or all of us are looking forward to though. Here's the list:
Cowboys and Aliens - July 29
Conan - August 19 (not sure I'll like that one)
Sherlock Holmes & Mission Impossible - December 16
The Avengers - May 2012
Men In Black III - May 2012
Spiderman - July 2012 (this is supposed to be a reboot of the whole movie series)
The Dark Knight (Batman) - July 2012
Superman - December 2012 (another attempt to reboot the franchise)
The Hobbit, Part 1 - sometime in 2013
There may well be some other movies coming up that I'm not aware of yet, and that's fine. This is my list, not a collaboration or anything (though Conan still gives me second thoughts after seeing previews recently) and this is stuff I'd like to see.
We apologize for that (all of us), and Maryanne and I at least have both promised to each other that we'll start getting reviews up at least within a few days of seeing a movie or dining out, and we're prodding everyone else into getting things to us as well. Although we aren't doing much dining out lately (unless you count Dairy Queen) as we're packing, cleaning, recycling, and hauling stuff around a lot lately. Many of the friends are helping, and few of them are currently in a financial crunch.
There are a few movies coming up that some or all of us are looking forward to though. Here's the list:
Cowboys and Aliens - July 29
Conan - August 19 (not sure I'll like that one)
Sherlock Holmes & Mission Impossible - December 16
The Avengers - May 2012
Men In Black III - May 2012
Spiderman - July 2012 (this is supposed to be a reboot of the whole movie series)
The Dark Knight (Batman) - July 2012
Superman - December 2012 (another attempt to reboot the franchise)
The Hobbit, Part 1 - sometime in 2013
There may well be some other movies coming up that I'm not aware of yet, and that's fine. This is my list, not a collaboration or anything (though Conan still gives me second thoughts after seeing previews recently) and this is stuff I'd like to see.
Transformers: Dark of the Moon
Ehh.
That's about all I can say on this one.
Definitely more action, but the overall entertainment value is still a bit low. Lots of good chuckles throughout the movie, and couple minor plot twists caught my attention, but overall I see it as another failure to live up to expectations. I very much wanted to like and enjoy this movie as I like the Transformers franchise and all, but this again just felt like an average-effort film like the first one was.
The long and the short:
The Autobots get pissed off when they discover that they're USA friends haven't been sharing everything they know, namely that an Autobot ship was discovered crashed on the moon, and that's why we went to the moon... Not to beat the Russians, but to beat the Russians to the crashed alien ship.
Turns out that ship carried one of the Autobots greatest inventors/scientists (familiar voice on this guy too for you Star Trek fans out there) who was transporting a weapon, the greatest and best hope that Autobots had of winning the war.
Turns out to be not true. This weapon was being handed over to the Decepticons. Apparently a deal was struck, and the idea was that this so-called weapon (it's not) would be used to enslave all the humans on Earth, and put them to work at rebuilding Cybertron.
Well now that Autobots have to destroy the devices instead of try to recover them in order to save humanity again (which they do).
New characters are introduced on both sides of the fence, only for us to see some of them get killed off later on.
No real change to the underlying plot (good vs. evil on the giant-robot-scale), and in my mind at least they failed to actually move the overall story along. The first hour was more than boring but not by much, and they spent way, WAY too much time on the Sam kid again. I'm here to see giant alien robots do crap, not some whiny college grad complain about not being able to get a good job.
I'd almost rate this as not worth seeing, but I already hear rumors of a fourth movie, and I'll bet (at least I hope) that the fourth will build on the third and actually produce a story worth seeing.
I was not overjoyed with this movie, and my friends weren't all that impressed either as I recall. I'd advise waiting on a rental with this one. Really. Seriously. Unless you have kids that wanna see it, then of course you're at the whim of your kids.
That's about all I can say on this one.
Definitely more action, but the overall entertainment value is still a bit low. Lots of good chuckles throughout the movie, and couple minor plot twists caught my attention, but overall I see it as another failure to live up to expectations. I very much wanted to like and enjoy this movie as I like the Transformers franchise and all, but this again just felt like an average-effort film like the first one was.
The long and the short:
The Autobots get pissed off when they discover that they're USA friends haven't been sharing everything they know, namely that an Autobot ship was discovered crashed on the moon, and that's why we went to the moon... Not to beat the Russians, but to beat the Russians to the crashed alien ship.
Turns out that ship carried one of the Autobots greatest inventors/scientists (familiar voice on this guy too for you Star Trek fans out there) who was transporting a weapon, the greatest and best hope that Autobots had of winning the war.
Turns out to be not true. This weapon was being handed over to the Decepticons. Apparently a deal was struck, and the idea was that this so-called weapon (it's not) would be used to enslave all the humans on Earth, and put them to work at rebuilding Cybertron.
Well now that Autobots have to destroy the devices instead of try to recover them in order to save humanity again (which they do).
New characters are introduced on both sides of the fence, only for us to see some of them get killed off later on.
No real change to the underlying plot (good vs. evil on the giant-robot-scale), and in my mind at least they failed to actually move the overall story along. The first hour was more than boring but not by much, and they spent way, WAY too much time on the Sam kid again. I'm here to see giant alien robots do crap, not some whiny college grad complain about not being able to get a good job.
I'd almost rate this as not worth seeing, but I already hear rumors of a fourth movie, and I'll bet (at least I hope) that the fourth will build on the third and actually produce a story worth seeing.
I was not overjoyed with this movie, and my friends weren't all that impressed either as I recall. I'd advise waiting on a rental with this one. Really. Seriously. Unless you have kids that wanna see it, then of course you're at the whim of your kids.
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