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(Reviews are arranged alphabetically by title)
Movies
Unlike Terminator, in which a super-computer uses robots to do its bidding, Eagle eye makes everything in society that can be classified as technology the enemy. Imagine a super-computer that decides humans are unreliable because they have feeling and can make bad decisions, parallels that decision with the observation that the American government is made up of humans running their nation poorly, and decides to do something about it.
Everything in technology is all connected! Cell phones, stoplights, the Internet, banks, businesses, air traffic, the military, trains and subways, even the ability to launch nuclear missiles is all distantly woven together. ARIIA, the super-computer has been set up to monitor technology world-wide, in the hopes that terrorist attacks can be detected early, missing people can be tracked, and technology errors can be avoided. She is directly tapped into all possible facets of technology.
In the process, however, ARIIA watches the continually fickle ways of mankind and decides to change things into a more efficient regime.
Every technology device world-wide she is using to track and control her pawns. People are moved into place as pawns to carry out her actions. Plans are changed, devices move without human control, and people are eliminated as she sees fit. Your cell phone is now her tool, satellites are now her eyes, technological devices are under her control and she uses them to threaten and kill people who disobey.
This movie is GOLD!!! Everything about it was amazing. My advice? RUN AND BUY IT!!!
The escapist is an ingenious film.
There is a fine line between too far and not far enough when it comes to films about revenge. The escapist hits that sweet spot right in the middle.
In the escapist, a sweet, devoted husband finds his life turned upside down when an escaped convict kills his pregnant wife. The villain receives a sentence that is too weak in proportion to his crime.
So how does he get back at the person who ruined his life? He commits a petty crime, does some time, and escapes. He gets some more time for escaping, and escapes again. He keeps escaping until finally, they send him where escape artists like his wife's murderer go, a prison on an island.
Let's just say, if you killed somebody's pregnant wife, you shouldn't put your fate into his hands.
This movie is definitely worth seeing, I enjoyed it a lot, and it kept me guessing right up until the end.
Link: The Escapist IMDb Page
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Despite the slightly terrifying menu screen which shows Adrian Broody and Keira Knightley with ghost-like appearances featuring blood-red eyes, I found this movie to be much better than I had expected. The plot was well-rounded and interesting all the way to the end, and the casting was perfect.
Sporting a time-travel sort of storyline, this movie depicted one man who accidentally found the key to change his fate and alter the future.
I can't say that I'm a fan of the non-english accent version of Keira, a factor that made her dialogue seem a tad unbelievable to me. However, Adrian Broody did a fantastic job in this role, and made the entire movie come alive.
Link: IMDB The Jacket Overview
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As soon as I saw this movie, I was fascinated by the storyline. However, I found it to be much less awesome than I had hoped. This movie narrates the story of one being named "Prot" who is visiting earth from his home planet "K-Pax". The insinuation is not to make Prot seem alien, but to depict him as futuristic, and advanced, having mastered space travel by use of highly advanced scientific knowledge gathered by an old and very intelligent race of K-Paxians instead of alien "magic". To begin with, the storyline supports this scientifically intelligent approach, depicting Prot dazzling astronomers with his knowledge of the universe, and showing him adding things about earth to the report he is making about his trip to earth.
However, somewhere midway, things start jumping into the plot that make it more and more ridiculous until finally, the viewer starts to question if Prot is really from a different planet, or he's just a really really damaged human, psychologically repressing memories of a traumatic murder/suicide out of self-protection. This viewpoint of Prot is much less attractive. The movie doesn't portray Prot as a fraud, but makes him seem like a genuine extra-terrestrial. So when the the idea is presented that Prot is not from K-Pax at all, it doesn't make sense and reduces the movie to speculation and doubt. Overall, the movie was disappointing and the ending doesn't help solidify the viewer's feeling about Prot one way or the other. Because of the oxymoron character portrayal of Prot, the movie was unpleasant. Honestly, the idea has merit, but the execution of the idea was weak.
Link: IMBD K-Pax Overview
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It's that moment when I get home, and think,
"What do I want to watch? hmm..."
Suddenly the movie I want to watch hits me. It's like an epiphany. I dig through my spoils and realize with a sinking feeling,
"I didn't buy it..." (As all true movie/show enthusiasts know, supporting the hobby with new material can get pricey. Fortunately, I am lucky enough to have sidestepped that bullet. For more information on where I always buy my movies, click this link, and scroll down the page to read my review about McKays.)
It is in these moments that I put the movie on my MUST FIND list because, for whatever reason, it stuck out to me. Suddenly, the movie's value climbs in my mind.
Noise, was one such movie. I set it aside because it had a small crack on the disk. The crack was directly next to the hole in the center. Other than that small, half-an-inch crack, the disk was flawless. I opted not to risk it.
The next time I headed to McKays, however, I vowed to keep an eye out for that disk. If I found it again, I told myself, I would risk the possibility that it might not work.
Much to my surprise, I found the DVD in almost the same place it had been last time. This time, I bought it.
What a jewel! The risk was so worth it!!
The movie worked perfectly, and the movie was spectacular!
In Noise, David Owen, (played by Tim Robbins) becomes more and more bothered by the noise in New York City. He is indignant about the thousands of people who seem unconcerned by the amount of noise they are causing and allowing every day. In every facet of his life, the noise, particularly that made by car alarms, is driving him crazy.
Unlike the scores of other people who seem able to simply ignore the chaotic choruses, the sounds seem to drill into his mind. He can't sleep through it, and he can't enjoy the beautiful things in life.
All of this is not only because of the sensory effect of the noise, but also because of what he views as the despicable and inconsiderate actions of those who ignore the noise they are making everyone else endure. On behalf of everyone who has ever been annoyed by someone else's car alarm, he makes it his personal mission to silence New York City, one car alarm at a time.
Going on rampage after rampage, he starts breaking the windows in on the squawking cars so he can cut the battery line and shut the alarms off. After arrests and serving jail time, his work and marriage are suffering. Despite this, he continues, adamant that someone needs to do something about the problem.
Soon, he becomes smarter about his mission. Going by the code name, The Rectifier, he starts committing his acts of "public service" more subtly, sporting black clothing and sunglasses, and leaving a sticker on the car with the emblem "The Rectifier" on it.
The acts begin making a splash. People view The Rectifier as a public servant, they applaud him for doing what they all wish they had the courage to do.
David starts making a petition to add a change into the city charter banning car alarms from the city. The movement gains surprising momentum. He soon has tens-of-thousands of signatures supporting the change.
Without warning, the Mayor of New York, blocks the petition's hearing. The fight is over. They have lost before they even got to the city counsel.
David, however, chooses to take his petition to a more personal level. In a surprising move, he makes the biggest commotion since he first began as The Rectifier.
He is taken to court, and slapped with fees and threats of hard prison time.
Partway through the trial, however, David starts making strange decisions. It appears to everyone that David is providing the plaintiff with an even more solid case against him. In an electric moment of truth, David takes the whole case, and manages to turn it around to where it supports his battle against car alarms. Every piece falls into place in the most amazing way.
This movie was so amazing!
The plot had me hooked from beginning to end. At its core, Noise was an incredible demonstration of the power of persistence. This man's obsession seems purely psychological, which, in a way, it is. However, his obsession is not only for his own gratification. He sees a public menace, one that the citizens are ignoring, and shows them that they too deserve peace.
(Link: Noise IMBd page)
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Shutter Island is everything that I love in a movie. I've been putting off seeing it just because I hate horror movies, and for some reason I got the impression that it was scary. Anyway, I started watching it with a healthy sense of skepticism.
However, I soon was so engrossed by the story that I could hardly sit still. From the very beginning, I felt like something wasn't right. There's obviously going to be something odd when a mystery is set in a high level security mental hospital. But all of that aside, something was weird with Teddy, the main character.
He was constantly having nightmares, and people from his dreams would randomly appear in real life.
As the intrigue developed, it became more and more obvious that he was in danger. They would never let him leave the island.
Right at the end, the punch line hit me in the face. All of those loose ends tied themselves together into a bow. It was one of those movies that gives you a weird feeling, like maybe your entire life is a delusion.
Anyway, this is such a great movie, it made me think, and it was so well made. I strongly recommend this movie to those of you who liked, "Inception", "The Matrix", or "The Nines".
Link: Shutter Island IMBd overview
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Bravo!! This movie was fantastic! All the way from the concept of Stargate to the execution, this movie is solid. Although some sci-fi movies use the phrase sci-fi as an excuse for absurd and unbelievable movie elements, Stargate doesn't leave anything unexplained. The casting was fantastic, and Jaye Davidson is almost hypnotizing as the sun god Ra.
Overall, this movie made it into my "I will keep forever" box, and will be making its way back into my DVD player very soon.
Link: IMBD Stargate Overview
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Stranger than Fiction manages to make me happy every time I watch it, despite whatever mood I was in when I started watching. The ending leaves the viewer feeling happy and inspired.
This classic movie poses the fascinating scenario of a man who finds his life being narrated by a strange woman's voice. Everything that she says is accurate, and after a day or two, he hears her mention that he is going to die very soon. Flabbergasted and frightened, Harold learns that he is the main character in a book that is being written. A book that will eventually end...in his death.
Heartfelt and poignant, this movie is a must see for every movie lover. Not only is the author of the fateful book eccentric, but she seems empty, an emptiness that is translated over into her writing. Harold brings meaning into her reality, and transforms the lives of each of the characters in a way that is unexpected. This movie ends in a non-stereotypical feel-good way. All I can say is, see it!
Link: IMBD Stranger Than Fiction Overview
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WARNING: This review contains SPOILERS!
It's been a long time since I've seen a movie that was this engaging. I was on pins and needles through the entire film, and every time I thought I knew what was going to happen, a new twist came in and changed the scene! It combined the everyday horrors of war, and dropped in hints of the 21st century. One of the things I liked the most about this movie was the fascinating enlightenment it shed on the war in Iraq. I felt the oppressive hopelessness seen in the eyes of the natives, who were only safe from the Iraqi army when Americans were around. The straggling band of American soldiers knew that as soon as they drove away, the innocent civilians would be slaughtered, but despite the strength of the American army, they were powerless. This movie had so much heart! A ragtag band of soldier sent out initially to make themselves wealthy, but soon, they were forced to take another direction. Their compassion won out over their greed, and with their last shred of strength, they gave away their fortune to save the lives of civilians. I was so captivated by their story that I cried tears of joy as the refugees fled across the border while the Iraqi soldiers stood silently.
AMAZING movie! Well written, well cast, well done!
Link: Three Kings IMDb movie overview
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There was so much comedy in this movie it was hard to keep up with what I was laughing at exactly.
In the tooth fairy, the tough hockey player in the minor leagues is living at half his potential. He had a minor injury and he lost his mojo. Over the last few years he went from the king of the rink to the bulldog of the minor leagues. He just stays in the game because he's good at knocking opponents onto their backs.
He's a dream crusher, he tells kids to lower their expectations, that they'll probably never be the best.
Because of this, the tooth-fairy godmother sentences him to two weeks hard labor as a tooth fairy. Armed to the teeth with shrinking gel, amnesia dust, a pair of fluffy wings, dog bark mints to scare away cats, and a bad attitude, he sets record after record as the worst tooth-fairy ever.
This movie had me laughing the entire time, and yes, it is very cheesy, but it's so good! I definitely recommend it!
Link: Tooth Fairy IMBd overview
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The Weather Man wasn't a complete wash, (no pun intended) but it wasn't an eye-catcher either. This movie essentially shows what it's like for an average man to achieve all of his goals in life and realize that his life still sucks. Expensive cars? Six-figure salary? Sounds awesome, but when you add in a messy divorce, an obese daughter with no ambitions, a son who's in and out of the courthouse, and a celebrity father with no time for appreciation, affection, or even his family, the perks of success start to fade. It is at this point in life where David Spritz (Nicolas Cage) steps back and wonders what success really is.
Aside from the discovery of Nicolas Cage's fabulous hair, this movie isn't one that I would choose for the family movie night. The plot was tiresome and stretched on without wax or wane. Also, although the purpose of the movie seemed to be a self-searching, thoughtful look on life, it left in its wake hopelessness and the conclusion did nothing to paste it together. Overall, I give this a movie a 2 out of 5 stars and say "Next!" with enthusiasm.
Link: IMDB The Weatherman Overview
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However, despite the movie's advertising, which says that 50/50 is a comedy, I found this movie to be anything but funny.
The storyline has merit, I will admit. It was heartfelt, and filled with poignant scenes that peer into the life of a young man whose life is being threatened by a dangerous illness.
Had the movie been advertise as a drama, or something other than a comedy, it might have been more successful. As it is, throughout the entire movie, all I could think about was how the movie I was watching was not funny.
Overall, I enjoyed the acting of the main characters, and the irony of the situation, but i did not enjoy the movie very much. The description and the actual movie were contradictions, and this too distracting.
To the director of 50/50 I ask, do you even know what a comedy is?
Link: 50/50 IMDb overview
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