Missed Reviews to Nov 2010

I clearly have fallen behind on writing my movie reviews, compared to what I actually saw over the last few months. Let's at least churn out a few paragraphs.

Get Him To The Greek: * 3/4 (out of 4) (11 Jun 2010)

In a word: boring. I wanted to like this movie, but there was nothing there worth remembering, let alone writing about. This is what slowed me down on writing my reviews, really.

Sex and the City 2: ** 1/4 (out of 4) (16 Jun 2010)

I can't believe this wasn't garbage! Certainly, the rest of the world's reviews were apocalyptic; but I think this was a better movie than the first one, by a fair amount. That doesn't make it a good movie, or anything even nearly on par with the good parts of the show, but it was still fairly fun. At least it felt like the show occasionally, most like that Paris half-a-season.

Toy Story 3: *** 1/2 (out of 4) (19 Jun 2010)

It's still not my favorite Pixar movie; that would be The Incredibles, followed by Wall-E - but it's probably in third place. This movie was heart-warming, timely, and actively scary; I expected the first, but not so much the other two. Seeing it without 3D was kindof silly; seeing it with a whole pile of kids was a great idea.

Predators: ** 1/2 (out of 4) (14 Jul 2010)

I didn't expect to like this movie, but it turned out to be pretty fun. Yes, it's cheesy sci-fi action, with sketchy characters forced to interact and occasionally turning on each other for not-particularly-good reasons; but sometimes that's what you want out of a movie. It felt like a good successor to the original Predator, so I was happy.

Inception: *** 1/4 (out of 4) (23 Jul 2010)

The big non-sequel-but-still-an-"event" movie of the summer held up to its hype quite nicely. The plot was a bit convoluted, but easy to follow and didn't rely on cheats. If the characters were under-explored, they were at lest well-acted. The music did as much towards setting the tension of the movie as the plot itself did. And it was certainly an improvement over The Dark Knight.

Salt: ** (out of 4) (24 Jul 2010)

I'm not sure what I was expecting going into this movie, but I sure didn't find it. Angelina Jolie does a fairly convincing job playing a sleeper agent, but the storyline is convoluted in all of the wrong ways, and doesn't stand up to much scrutiny. I came out of the movie annoyed that I was eventually going to have to see sequels. Not terrible, but not worth the trouble.

The Kids Are All Right: *** 1/4 (out of 4) (22 Aug 2010)

This reminded me of why I like art movies. The acting was wonderful, the story was secondary to the characters and setting, and it did indeed warm my heart (even as it was kindof depressing). I really liked it; my girlfriend loved it; and I look forward to spending more time at the art theatre over the next few weeks, as the good movies start coming out in earnest.

Easy A: ** 3/4 (out of 4) (19 Sep 2010)

I didn't expect much of this movie going in, but it turned out to be a light-but-fun high school comedy that reminded me of Mean Girls more than anything. It also portrayed an overall more-reasonable high school experience than just about anything that's come out over the last few decades - a school with apathetic kids, cliques that are important but not all-powerful, and overall a less intense experience than most movies like to throw out. Also, Emma Stone was wonderful and her parents were better.

Red: ** 1/4 (out of 4) (17 Oct 2010)

And now we're back to a disappointment. It's not that it was a bad movie, overall; it was just kindof shallow, and the end didn't live up to either its opening or premise. Overall, I blame this on one thing: this was supposed to be a Warren Ellis movie, and it started out that way, but it was quickly watered down into something typical and low-key. The story worked well when it was fast-paced, over three issues; but the script would have been better-suited for a 6-8 issue series, and there just wasn't that much material. I'm glad it made money, but I wish it had also been good.