Movie review: The Lucky One

I had a free screening pass to The Lucky One, which is based on a Nicholas Sparks book and I would say it's a lot like one would expect for a Nicholas Sparks book... some romance, some tragedy, some destiny and a cute boy. I am quite the admirer of Zac Efron and he's fine in the role as an ex-Marine who is struggling to get back into society but can't seem to manage so he tracks down the girl in a picture he found in Afghanistan, a picture that saved his life. While it's a fine enough story and everyone did an okay acting job, I didn't really buy into the chemistry of the two main characters as much as I wanted to. There's a lot of satisfaction that comes from a nice girl getting away from a jerky man and into the arms of the sweet guy watching from the sidelines, which is the basic premise here. However, the actress (Taylor Schilling) just looks so much older than him and while there's nothing wrong with an age difference, it just seems extra noticeable here. I think she is supposed to be older because she has like a 8-year-old boy, but it was just distracting. Not to mention that Taylor Schilling bears a strong resemblance to Teri Polo, in my opinion. I kept wondering if they were related. On top of all that, her ex-husband (who's now a bad cop) is supposed to be like her high school boyfriend, yet HE looks like he's about 10 years older than her. Which, after checking IMDB, I'm not far off. So, the casting is questionable but it isn't a bad movie. My recommendation is to rent it.

Changing my Netflix account

I changed my Netflix account for the first time in a long time, getting rid of all mailed movies and sticking only with the streaming movies. You probably heard the big hullabaloo last summer when it was announced that the Netflix pricing structure would change, basically doubling the cost for me. No longer would streaming be included with the rental of DVDs. Well, I paid for both for a couple of months and then got a gift of three months free but now that the gift has run out, I've decided that I do not need both the DVDs and the streaming. I'm a big viewer of new releases and those are rarely available for streaming so I was leaning towards keeping the DVD and giving up the streaming but I can get DVDs at Redbox or the library so the plan is to pay for the streaming only for a few months and knock some movies off my queue and eventually if I find that I'm missing the DVDs, then I can switch to that. I know many people complain that the movies they want to see are never available for streaming but I do manage to have a streaming queue of over 100 movies so I think I can make do for a few months, at least. However, the way Netflix sets up their Web site for streaming only makes me mad. A movie ONLY shows up on the site now if it's streaming. So, if I watch a movie at the theater and want to rate it on Netflix so that it can be used to make suggestions for me, I can't do that. If I search for a movie or an actor, the only things that show up are those available for streaming. That's ridiculous. Primarily it's ridiculous for them in terms of sales because if I was searching for movie after movie and it was coming up on their site that I would have to get a DVD account in order to watch that movie, I might be swayed into getting a DVD account so I could watch some of the movies. They're stupid for not trying to plus-sell in this way. Overall, I am paying a lot less with the streaming only package and I'm glad about that. Time will only tell if I watch any more streaming movies now than I did before. It won't take much to use streaming more than I used to because I probably averaged like 1 steaming movie every two months. I also might write more movie reviews on this site since I can't rate a lot of the movies I'll be watching.

Movie review: Friends with Kids

I know I go to free movie screenings fairly regularly but the ticket I got to see Friends with Kids was kind of extra cool because the writer/director/star of the movie, Jennifer Westfeldt, graced us with her presence afterwards and answered questions from the audience.

Funnily enough, I was very late getting to the movie, which meant there were very few seats available at the screening when I got there so I ended up in the second row. But, since Jennifer was there, it ended up being a great seat because it meant I was two rows away from her!

Anyway, I enjoyed the movie. Jennifer and Adam Scott, from Parks and Recreation, star as two friends who are the last in their group to settle down, get married and have kids. However, after seeing their married friends kind of lose all fun in their life once the kids come, they think the best way around this is to remain friends and have kids that way, without the complications of romance. Of course, the just friends thing doesn't work out exactly the way they expect. Overall, it was a cute film with a lot of funny moments and despite the predictability of the premise (it's a romantic comedy, at its core), I felt the circumstances that took place between the main characters were very believable. And it surprised me how much I liked Adam Scott's performance, because quite frankly he's never done much for me before. I've seen him in several things and while he's fine, I would never have rated him any higher than fine. But he did a good job as the male lead here.

Valentine's Day movie reviews: The Vow and This Means War

I found this article very interesting about how Fox Pictures is delaying the release of its movie This Means War because it doesn't want to go up directly against The Vow. I've seen both movies over the last week or so thanks to advance screenings and I can say that it might be a smart move. The Vow is the much better movie.

The Vow is about a married woman who gets in a car accident and wakes up with amnesia, not remembering her husband or the last five years of her life at all. And in those last five years, so much had changed for her. The movie basically tells the story of the husband trying to get her to remember. It's part sad and part sweet and part funny, too. The film does a good job of getting you invested in the couple. And even though Channing Tatum isn't the world's best actor, I thought he did a fine job.

Meanwhile, This Means War is one of those that tries to attract both guys and girls by mixing action with romance. In this movie, two special agents both end up falling for the same girl (played by Reese Witherspoon) so they spend their time using their special agent skills to try to win the girl. In other words, they place microphones and secret cameras in her apartment; they put a GPS on her car; the one shoots the other with a tranquilizer dart to put him to sleep on a date... you can only imagine what else. While I have to say the film is a little original in seeing the spy gear being used against each other, somehow overall the plot of the film is crazy predictable. You can see every move before it happens. Ugh. And putting Chelsea Handler in the film as the best friend that helps Reese make decisions on what guy to choose was an awful decision. She's so grating. Finally, even when Reese finds out what's going on, she actually chooses to be with one of the guys, which I found utterly ridiculous. While it also has some funny and enjoyable scenes, you couldn't care less about either couple here. Thank God I didn't have to pay money for this one.

So, overall, just like Fox expects, if you're going to spend your movie dollars on just one of these films, I recommend you go see The Vow.

Movie Review: The Descendants

I saw a sneak preview of The Descendants a couple of days ago. I had also recently read the book on which it is based, as I am wont to do. Surprisingly, the movie very closely follows the book, although of course it can't fit in everything from a 200+ page book. I think the edits made for the big screen were smart ones, though, and, in fact, I can't think of anything they left out that should have been there. I feel like you got a good handle of the characters in both and there was really only one very small change they made to the plot towards the end that was something that didn't make much sense to me when it happened in the book so I'm actually glad that it was changed. Sorry for the vagueness but I don't want to spoil it.

That being said, I didn't enjoy the movie that much. It's getting Oscar buzz and, judging by the audience reaction when I saw it, many were enamored by the film. George Clooney is definitely an amazing actor, as if we didn't realize this before. And Shailene Woodley did pretty well, especially since all I've ever seen her do is star in that insipid ABC Family program, The Secret Life of the American Teenager. But, I just found the whole thing pretty boring. Maybe it was because I knew exactly what was coming since I'd read the book. Maybe it was the lack of comedy - I thought the film would be more of a dramedy since the book had some entertaining moments but the movie seemed too serious. Or, maybe it was just the plot.

The general plot of the film involves George Clooney as Matt, whose wife is dying in a coma thanks to a boating accident and who is forced to suddenly up his child-rearing involvement to his two daughters. To make things worse, he finds out his wife was having an affair pre-accident. And, finally, he is a descendant of a major landowner in Hawaii and has a huge land deal looming over his head while his wife is dying. I guess you would say it's about a middle-aged man finally waking up to the world around him and growing up. And that, I guess, is boring. My suggestion is to wait to rent it or skip it entirely.

Movie Review: Tower Heist

I went to an advanced screening of Tower Heist a few days ago and have to say I enjoyed it. It’s a good mix of action and comedy and stars Ben Stiller and Eddie Murphy as the leaders of a group that plan to pull off a $20 million heist in the apartment of a Bernie Madoff-type person played by Alan Alda. There’s a great supporting cast of thieves, including Casey Affleck, Matthew Broderick and Gabourey Sidibe. The movie has a lot of funny moments and is very well-paced. Sometimes with these types of films, they focus too much on the build-up to the heist. And, sometimes the heist takes forever. But this had a great mix of both. And of course there is some suspension of belief regarding the events of the heist but there’s enough to make you laugh that you are willing to overlook some of the ridiculousness. Overall, a pretty enjoyable movie.

Movie Review: Like Crazy

Like Crazy is the story of a young couple – she’s from England; he’s from California – who fall in love while in college and then when she is due to go back home for the summer, decides that she will just skip out on her visa and stay with the man she loves. Well, when she finally does go home for a wedding at the end of the summer, they won’t let her back in the country for violating the terms of her visa. So then the story follows their attempts at a long-distance relationship. It’s a very well-acted film and I read, after seeing it, that a lot of it is improvised, so that makes it even more impressive. However, I had difficulty getting over the premise and that distracted me greatly. If they are so in love – crazy in love so much that she can’t bear to leave for a few weeks - then a little bit of distance shouldn’t affect them as much as it did. Also, the impetuousness of just disregarding what your visa says to stay with your boyfriend is really something that I couldn’t get over and, therefore, had difficulty sympathizing with her. At least there are consequences for this behavior... This film won awards at the Sundance Film Festival so I guess it could be nominated for an Oscar or two and, like I said, the acting was good, so I'm glad to have seen it. But I'm also glad I saw it for free.

Movie review: Larry Crowne

I had another sneak peek screening this week; this time, it was Larry Crowne, the Tom Hanks/Julia Roberts movie that came out yesterday. I would call it cute. It was a relatively enjoyable movie with a lot of fun, quirky characters and Tom Hanks as charming as always playing a guy (Larry) who loses his job for not having a college degree and decides to change that by enrolling in community college. He learns a lot, inside and outside the classroom. I kind of feel like there were too many fun, quirky characters, more than necessary. You had Larry's neighbors, Larry's coworkers, Larry's classmates, Larry's scooter gang friends... it's a lot of people to share screen time. Besides the story of Larry kind of hitting rock bottom and then growing into a better version of himself, there is the romance with Julia Roberts' character, which I feel is played up in most of the previews but is really the worst part of the movie. It's a very rushed and forced romance. Julia's character is married but I guess we are supposed to forget that because he's kind of a jerk. She's also very disillusioned and cranky, so much so that it's very hard for me to believe that she puts that all aside due to the ten minutes of alone time she spends with Larry. I do think the movie was cute overall and I definitely didn't leave the theater thinking it was a waste of my time but I kind of wish they had left out the romance and just showed how someone can turn lemons into lemonade.

"All-You-Can-Watch MoviePass Brings Netflix Model to Theaters"

This article talks about MoviePass, a new service that is currently being tested in San Francisco, with plans to expand nationally by the fall. It's a service like NetFlix, where you pay one flat rate fee and can get an unlimited amount of movies each month. In this case, though, instead of DVDs shipped to your home it's movies at the theater that you get for $50.

It's an interesting concept but I don't know many people who go to that many movies each month to make it worthwhile. Of course, the benefit for most companies like this is that people buy something and don't use it enough to make it worth their while but keep the subscription anyway. It's not a bad idea and I'm honestly surprised it's taken so long for something like this to be developed.

The article mentions a cheaper service that is under consideration that costs $30/month for access to four movies and I have to say that might be something I would consider, especially if you can start and stop the service as easily as you can with Netflix. There are definitely months (like in the summer or around the Academy Awards) when there are four movies I would want to see. But not all months. Plus, movies cost over $10 here so really as long as you went at least three times you would be saving some money.

Movie review: Bad Teacher

Bad Teacher opens this weekend and I had the chance to watch it on Wednesday at a free advanced screening. I have to say, I laughed really hard. It seems to be getting only average reviews but it's not often that I laugh so consistently throughout a movie so I recommend it. It's crude and Cameron Diaz plays a really despicable person but she's remarkably good at it and does get her comeuppance a few times. She has a rival teacher that you kind of root for, plus Jason Segel, from How I Met Your Mother, is awesome in that his character sees right through Cameron's character.

Movie review: Super 8

I saw an advanced screening of Super 8 over the weekend and I enjoyed it. It's sort of a mix of E.T., Stand by Me and the premiere of Lost. Perhaps Goonies-esque, although I've honestly never seen that. It has a lot of funny moments, plus some thriller, mystery and sci-fi. And it stars Kyle Chandler, who I've had a crush on for years thanks to Friday Night Lights. Well, who am I kidding? It's probably more like since Early Edition. Anyway, I recommend it.

Loving Redbox

I just started using Redbox to rent movies pretty frequently in the last month or two, thanks to free rental coupons and a Groupon I bought that gave me three rentals for $1.00. And it's so easy and cool that I can't believe it took me so long and I highly recommend it to anyone who hasn't tried it and wants to rent movies! I won't be giving up Netflix anytime soon but since I downgraded to one movie out at a time, there are definitely times when I want a certain movie NOW and Redbox comes in very handy for that. It probably helps that there is a grocery store 2 blocks away that has two Redbox machines and is open 24 hours a day, so it really can't get much more convenient. But it's nice that you can check the inventory of all boxes easily online so before I head out to the grocery store, I can see if they even have the movie I'm looking for. Or, maybe go somewhere else. And you can reserve online. And, you can return a movie anywhere - it doesn't have to be returned to the box where you got it. I've used all these features.

Oscar documentaries

The last few years, I'd managed to watch one of the Oscar-nominated documentaries before the telecast and it turned out to be the winner. This year, I watched three of them so I won't be surprised if one of the other two is the one that wins. Ha ha. Actually, I've heard Inside Job is the favorite and that isn't one I watched.

The three I watched were: Exit Through the Gift Shop, GasLand, and Restrepo. Of those three, I would award the first. It told an interesting story, plus the director is a secret figure so I am curious to see what would happen if it wins - who would accept the award?

By the way, I came across this article that details what will happen at the Oscars, segment by segment, so when it starts to run over, you can see how far over it is.

Movie review: Just Go With It

I got a chance to see an advance screening of the Adam Sandler-Jennifer Aniston comedy Just Go With It on Thursday and I enjoyed it. It had a lot of funny moments, more than what you see in the previews. Jennifer's character is really likable and her two kids in the movie are real finds. Sure, there's a lot of over-the-topness because the whole premise of the movie is built on Adam's character lying about being married and of course, one lie piles on another and so on... But as long as you don't analyze it too much (my friend & I started to) and just go with it (ha ha), I think it's pretty good. Predictable, yes, but still pretty good. My only complaint is that Adam seems to be talking to the women's breasts the entire movie and I found that pretty annoying. Maybe he isn't, maybe he's just not making eye contact but it certainly looks like that's what he's doing. And I guess that would be in character for him to do that but then again, it would also be in Jennifer's character to call him out for that and she didn't.

Movie Review: Black Swan

This isn't a Christmas Movie review, just a regular movie review (although the Christmas movies are piling up on my Tivo)... I got the chance to see Black Swan about a week ago and it's sort of taken me that long to decide whether or not I liked it. I think I did. It's a psychological thriller so it tries to mess with your head and spook you and it certainly did do that. But, wow, it's really stuck with me this last week. I've heard Oscar buzz for Natalie Portman and she really did do an amazing job but I'll be honest that it doesn't really strike me as an Oscar-type movie. The plot is that Natalie's character is a star ballerina who is obsessed with perfection and gets the lead role in Swan Lake. She is asked to be both the perfect white swan character and the evil, manipulative black swan. She really struggles capturing the black swan part of the job because she is so focused on perfection. Meanwhile, she is convinced that another dancer is trying to steal her role. Her mom is a scary stage mom type. And the ballet's director is constantly pushing her. The whole thing is really over-the-top, yet also enjoyable.

Movie Review: 127 Hours

I went to a free advance screening of 127 Hours this past week and it was followed by a Q&A session with its director Danny Boyle, who is probably most well-known as the Academy Award-winning director of Slumdog Millionaire. The whole experience was amazing.

The movie tells the true story of Aron Ralston, who made news in 2003 when he got trapped while hiking in Utah and ultimately had to cut off his own hand in order to free himself. He was trapped for 127 hours, so over 5 days. I realize that's nothing compared to the Chilean miners' 69 days but it's an equally fascinating story.

Because Aron was trapped all alone in such a remote area, the filmmaker decided to film it as it happened and not intersperse it with any sort of outside story. So, basically after about 15-20 minutes, the movie depicts Aron's entrapment and that's all. It's pretty intense and James Franco is so fantastic in it. The movie and James' performance has really stuck with me ever since I saw it. I'd be shocked if he's not nominated for an Oscar.

The Q&A with the author was pretty cool but unfortunately they took questions from the audience and most people had really stupid questions. It would have been nice if they had done some pre-screening. "Why did you decide to use humor when Aron was trapped?" (Gee, I don't know, to break up the seriousness!!) "It seems like you spend a lot of time picking out music in your movies. Do you?" (Yes, don't all filmmakers?) I watched the Q&A session videos for a similar screening in Boston and Boyle said a lot of the same things, so if you're interested, I'd watch...

If not, I'd definitely recommend the movie!

Movie Review: Going the Distance

The other day I got to attend a free sneak preview of Going the Distance, which stars Drew Barrymore and Justin Long as a couple trying out a long-distance relationship. It opens next Friday. I guess it is in the romantic comedy genre, although it's not in the girl-trying-to-get-guy style because they are in the relationship basically from the beginning.

I enjoyed it and would recommend it! It had a lot of funny moments, thanks to great casting of not only Drew & Justin, but also Christina Applegate, Jim Gaffigan, Jason Sudeikis and Charlie Day, who basically plays his character from It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia so the fact that he's funny goes without saying. Not that I'm an expert, but the movie seems to be pretty honest in the way it depicts long-distance relationships, too. Drew & Justin are both adorable and you are rooting for them as a couple.

Movie Review: Hot Tub Time Machine

I watched Hot Tub Time Machine a couple of weeks back and while I mostly thought it sucked, I was slightly amused that a very small subplot had to do with the Browns vs. Broncos playoff game that resulted in "The Drive". The guys go back in time to the day of that game and once they realize that they know exactly what's going to happen, one of the guys bets on the outcome of that game. You know, the standard M.O. in time travel movies, the trying to make money off of the past. No one can believe that the Broncos come back to win so they take that bet. And.... "The Drive" doesn't happen. The Browns keep their lead and move on to the Super Bowl. Ha ha, only in the movies.

Beyond that, it was a very predictable and not especially funny movie. I was disappointed.

Movie Review: The Kids are All Right

Last night I saw a free advance screening of the movie The Kids are All Right, which I think opens today, at least in select markets. I had heard rave reviews about the film and I agree that it was pretty good. It tells the story of a family - two lesbian moms, an 18-year-old daughter about to leave for college, and a 15-year-old son - who deal with the changes in their family after the children get in touch with their sperm donor "father." The acting is amazing but that goes without saying when you have Julianne Moore, Annette Bening & Mark Ruffalo in the leading roles. It was interesting to see the dynamics of the two mom household and Mark Ruffalo has never been more appealing. He was so friggin' hot in the movie, totally sexy. I thought a lot of the dialogue was realistic and really funny in a lot of places but overall, I did have a few issues with the storyline so while I liked it, I wouldn't quite say it lived up to the reputation of the reviews I read.

Strangely, the worst part of the movie was that the boom mic was evident in nearly every scene shot inside the family's home. You could see it creeping into the screen from above to the point where it was completely distracting and where you would look and wait for it during any indoor scene. My friend was totally annoyed with it and went so far as to say that the movie was ruined. Every time it happened, she made a loud comment (which ironically kind of ruined the movie for me). I suggested to her afterwards that perhaps that is not the fault of the director or the director of photography but rather the fault of the projectionist. See, in the beginning, when the opening credits were rolling, the bottom parts of the names were hidden. Therefore, my theory is that if the projectionist had adjusted the picture up a little that not only would we have seen all the names but so too would we not have seen all the boom mics. My friend (as she always does) told me I was incorrect. And, yes, perhaps that sort of obvious error shouldn't show up at all on the tape, but I definitely think it was exacerbated by the crappy job of the projectionist. I'm curious to see how it would look at another theater. I just cannot believe, I don't care how low budget or independent the film is, that they would intentionally okay all those appearances of the boom mic. Crazy.

Movie Review: Get Him to the Greek

I went to a free advance screening of Get Him to the Greek about a month ago and never wrote a review of it but since it opens in theaters to a paying audience today, I thought I'd write a quick review. I'd skip it, if I were you, or at least wait for it to come out on DVD. There are definitely some funny moments - P.Diddy has some funny moments as a record exec, for instance - but it drags on way too long and is totally predictable to recommend it as a whole. The Russell Brand character is the same person from Forgetting Sarah Marshall (the rock star Sarah started dating) and while he was great in a small role, no way is he enough to carry a whole movie. He is grating. And I'd really say the same about Jonah Hill. He's great as the sidekick friend but not so much as the main character. And the plot, watching the rock star ruin the nice guy by way of drugs, alcohol, groupies and just general bad behavior, gets old real quick.