Greatly Overdue Movie Reviews

I've got six movies to review.  It's been a while, but I have some good ones in here, so keep reading.

"Battleship":  This movie is the surprise of the bunch.  I had super low expectations, and found that I really, really enjoyed the 2 hours and 11 minutes I spent watching "Battleship".

Taylor Kitsch stars as Alex Hopper, a Navy Lieutenant who never quite manages to realize his full potential.  While participating in Naval exercises, Hopper receives some bad news.  Before he can realize the full implications of that news, the earth is attacked by aliens.  His ship is at the center of the initial wave, and after his captain and first officer dies, Hopper finds himself in command of the only ship left with a chance to stop the aliens before they establish communications and send for reinforcements.

Is the premise a bit far fetched?  Sure is...but it's a fun movie that is decently acted and packed with cool Naval battles.  Liam Neeson plays an Admiral, and as he generally does, Neeson raises the class of the movie just by his sheer presence.  Kitsch is better in "Battleship" than he was in "John Carter" and I think he has a bright future ahead of him.

This is a 4, almost 4.5, star movie.  "Battleship" is a great popcorn eating movie.

"Men in Black 3":  Yes, Agents J (Will Smith) and K (Tommy Lee Jones) are back again, and as good as ever.  I watched this one on my recent trip to Brazil, and was not disappointed.

"Men in Black 3" finds us 14 years after the original "Men in Black".  A ruthless alien that Agent K put away in 1969 has escaped from his prison on the moon, and is looking for revenge.  When the Agents face off against this menace, Agent K suddenly becomes very secretive and protective.  The next day, Agent J wakes up to find that he's the only one at MIB that remembers Agent K.  Deducing that the timeline has been changed, Agent J, with the help of one of the many crazies living in New York, goes back in time to 1969 to find a younger and happier version of Agent K (Josh Brolin).  The two of them have to work together to save the world once again.

I have always liked the "Men in Black" movies.  I find them entertaining first and foremost.  Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones are always a great pair.  The majority of this movie is Will Smith and Josh Brolin, but that's ok.  Brolin does a great job playing a young Tommy Lee Jones. 

"Men in Black 3" kept me laughing and entertained for 2 hours of a 10 hour flight.  For that alone, it gets 4 stars.

"The Muppets":  David became a big fan of The Muppets earlier this year, and he begged me to get "The Muppets" from Netflix.  For those of you who are Muppets fans from way back, this movie will bring back a lot of nostalgia.

The premise is pretty simple.  The Muppets have fallen on hard times.  They aren't relevant any more, and the implication is that kids today have moved beyond the relatively tame comedy that the Muppets bring to the stage.  But, when Walter (a muppet), his brother (Jason Segal) and his girlfriend (Amy Adams) visit The Muppet Studios, hi jinx ensues to bring the Muppets back.

I really enjoyed this movie.  It took me back to when I was a kid...from the opening theme to Rainbow Connection, it was great stuff.  Although Jason Segal is not a great actor, he sings one of the best songs in the movie, asking the eternal question, "Am I a Man or a Muppet"?

This is a 4 star movie...really good stuff!

"The Hunger Games":  I read all the books in "The Hunger Games" trilogy, and while I was disappointed with the 3rd book, this was still a good book series.  I wasn't sure how the series would translate to a movie, so I skipped the theater and waited for the DVD.

In case you aren't familiar with the premise, "The Hunger Games" is set some time in the future.  The United States has fallen, and is divided into 12 districts, controlled by The Capital.  People in the Capital live high on the hog, so to speak, but as you get out into the districts, life gets harder and poorer.  In response to a rebel uprising, each district is required to send two tributes, age 12-18, to compete in The Hunger Games, a "Survivor" type show with only 1 survivor.  Our hero, Katniss Everdeen, finds herself competing along with her fellow district 12 competitor Peeta.

"The Hunger Games" made a very compelling movie, and stayed relatively true to the book.  I thought Jennifer Lawrence was a great choice for Katniss, and I liked Donald Sutherland as President Snow.  I had heard the camera work was shaky and hard to follow, but I didn't seem to have trouble with it at all.

"The Hunger Games" is a 4 star movie.  Lets see how Hollywood handles the next 2 movies.

"Man On A Ledge":  I was intrigued enough by the trailers to put this movie in my DVD queue.  This movie was on it's way to being really good, but somewhere along the line it took a detour and ended up at mediocre.

"Man on a Ledge" stars Sam Worthington as Nick Cassidy, a former cop, who is sent to prison for committing robbery.  When Cassidy escapes prison, he ends up on the ledge of a building.  This is where a suicide specialist (Elizabeth Banks) is brought in.  However, it quickly becomes obvious that Cassidy is not on the ledge for suicidal reasons...he definitely has something else in the works.

The parts of this movie where Cassidy is actually on the ledge are really well done, other than the fact that Sam Worthington keeps slipping in and out of his natural Australian accent.  However, when his plot is discovered, "Man On A Ledge" turns into just another action movie, and not a great one at that.

I'll go with 3 stars for "Man On A Ledge".

"Snow White and the Huntsman":  I'm not gonna spend a lot of time on this movie.  This was another airplane movie.  I knew it had gotten rotten reviews, and my friend Nick said it was terrible, but there wasn't much selection on the plane, so I decided to give it a whirl...what a waste of time.

This movie is a new telling of the traditional Snow White story.  Kristen Stewart plays Snow White, Charlize Theron is the wicked queen, and Chris Hemsworth is The Huntsmen. 

Here are the problems I had with this movie:
1)  The story is horribly weak.  Snow White never appears heroic or particularly inspiring, but at the end of the movie, all of the sudden she is supposed to be heroic and inspiring.  It just doesn't work.
2)  Kristen Stewart is terrible.  She spends most of the movie looking stoned.
3)  Charlize Theron way overacts...I mean almost Shatner overacting, but not in a good way.
4)  Chris Hemsworth is wasted.  He was so good in "Thor" and "The Avengers" and could have been good in this, but the movie was so bad, he never got a chance to be good.

I rate this one 2 stars, only because Ian McShane has a cameo appearance, and I still think Chris Hemsworth is pretty good, despite being set up for failure with this terrible script.