Avengers Assemble!

At the Super Bowl about 16 months ago, the first trailer for "The Avengers" debuted.  This was before we had even seen "Captain America" or "Thor".  That's a lot of hype to live up to...and "The Avengers" lived up to that hype.

Marvel has done a wonderful thing here starting with "Iron Man" in 2008.  For the last 4 years and 5 movies, Marvel has been building toward this...the first big super hero team up movie.  And while I don't think "The Avengers" qualifies for "best movie ever" status, it is an exceptional film.  I do think Marvel has elevated the super hero movie with this film, and I expect it will be hard for others to keep pace in the short term.  I'll be really interested to see what Chris Nolan does with "The Dark Knight Rises" later this summer.  "The Avengers" is gonna be really hard to top.

This movie picks up about a year after "Thor" ended.  Loki (Tom Hiddleston) has allied himself with an evil alien race, and is planning to use these aliens to help him take over the earth.  Loki's grand plan is to rule the planet his half brother, Thor, loves so much.  Somebody has "family issues".  To secure the aid of the aliens, Loki must give them the Tesseract (see "Captain America"), which is currently on earth.  So, Loki begins a war, which S.H.I.E.L.D, led by Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) is powerless to wage.  But, Fury always has a plan.  He enlists the help of Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr.), Captain America (Chris Evans), The Hulk (Mark Ruffalo), Thor (Chris Hemmsworth), The Black Widow (Scarlette Johannson) and Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner).  But, these heroes have egos and agendas...can they co-exist in time to save the world?  I know the answer, and you'll find out if you go watch. 

Joss Whedon directed "The Avengers" and did a masterful job.  No one character dominates...in fact, Whedon does this movie so well that fans of each hero will be satisfied with the role their favorite hero plays.  Each character has his or her moment to shine, and the cast meshes very well.  Robert Downey Jr. and Mark Ruffalo seem to really mix well on screen.  I hope we will see another standalone Hulk movie with Ruffalo playing the part of Bruce Banner...he's perfect.

As with any great super hero movie, you need a great villain.  Tom Hiddleston provides that great villain as Loki.  For those that thought he wasn't evil enough in "Thor", he's one bad dude now.  Hiddleston is the perfect actor for this role, and he has great interactions with each character, but especially with Chris Hemmsworth (Thor).  You can really see that Thor wants his brother back, but Loki has truly grown to despise his brother, which makes for very good on screen dynamics.

As with all Joss Whedon directed movies and TV shows, "The Avengers" is very funny, but not in a ridiculous way.  In fact, the mix of humor, action and drama is just about right.  And the length of the movie is not overwhelming.  Though it's about 2 and a half hours, nobody was getting up to go to the bathroom...in fact, I didn't even check my watch.  Time flew by.

So, "The Avengers" is a 5 star movie.  I highly recommend it.  I think PG-13 is the right rating, but it could really be PG-11 or so.  There is nothing gratuitous, just a lot of fantasy action, and a few scary moments with The Hulk.  I'm gonna take David to see it later this weekend. 

Recent Movies

Another Double Movie Review...and fittingly, the first movie is...

"The Double":  This is a movie that Nuke described as a "twist-a-thriller".  I like that description, so I'm gonna steal it, but give credit, so it's not really stealing.  "The Double" is similar to "Salt" in a lot of ways, except instead of Angelina Jolie, it has Richard Gere and Topher Grace.  I'll leave it to you to decide which is better.  Honestly, I think the two movies would be great in a double feature.

I really liked this movie.  I don't think Richard Gere is getting too old to play these roles, which was one of the comments Nuke made.  What I really liked about "The Double" is we get a twist in the beginning, another twist at the end, and a satisfying ending. 

I wish I could tell you more about the plot, but it's hard without giving things away.  If you like "twist-a-thrillers", I suggest you give "The Double" a shot.  I liked it enough to go 4 stars on my rating!

"The Eagle":  I have to admit, I was semi-disappointed by "The Eagle".  From reading the latest Percy Jackson books by Rick Riordan, I was very excited about this movie, which mixed in the Roman Eagle.  I thought we'd get an action packed, thrill a minute, sword fighting, axe wielding action flick.  Instead, we got a largely dull film, punctuated by a few really good action scenes.

Channing Tatum is fairly wooden as the lead actor, which I think contributed to some of the dullness.  Despite this, I think the Eagle had a lot of promise until the end when the last battle sorta fizzled in my mind.  I'll give this one 2 stars and recommend you stay away.

Why Don't These Super Heroes Have Movies?

I am very excited about the upcoming "Avengers" movie.  In fact, I may be excited enough to go to the midnight showing.  I can't really decide if the midnight showing is for 30 something married dads though...but I digress.

Over the last 15 years, we've had tons of super hero movies.  Everyone from Spider-Man to the X-Men, from Daredevil to Elektra, from Superman to Batman has had a super hero movie made.  Well, that's not true...not everyone has.  Here are some of my favorite super heroes who have yet to grace the big screen, but should be considered very soon. 

Author's Note:  Come to think of it, Marvel will make a movie about any character they have (Ghost Rider, The Punisher, etc.), so this list is going to focus on the DC Universe.

-Captain Marvel - ok...maybe a story about a 10 year old boy who says "Shazam!" and turns into Superman's equal is a bit awkward, but come on, we had to sit through 3 Blade films and soon to be 2 Ghost Rider films!

-Wonder Woman - She had a run on a TV series...but it's time for a movie.  Yeah, the costume is a bit out of date, and the invisible plane is sort of hokey, but she is the queen of the DC universe.

-Aquaman - Ok, so he's not that powerful out of the ocean, but who didn't love the underwater scenes with Jar Jar Binks in "The Phantom Menace"???  This could work...couldn't it?

-Green Arrow - It's gotta be better than "Green Lantern", doesn't it?

-Martian Manhunter - This is one I'd really like to see...the others are sorta tongue in cheek.  Martian Manhunter is one bad mama jama...this would seriously be a cool movie.

Ok, if we actually got Martian Manhunter, Wonder Woman and Aquaman movies, to go along with the lame Green Lantern movie, The Dark Knight series and the new Superman film, we could easily roll into a Justice League movie!  That would be most excellent.  Hey, if they can pull it off with "Avengers", why not the Justice League???  It would be superb!

10,000!!!

Google has this neat tracking feature, and through this neat tracking feature, I learned that my blog hit 10,000 page views recently.  I started this blog on the eve of the last Presidential election, so in a little under 4 years, I hit the 10,000 mark.  Now I know, there are some web pages that get 10,000 hits in an hour, or even faster, but I'm thrilled to hit this milestone.

Thanks to everyone who has taken the time to check out my blog and read my thoughts.  I hope that I've been thought provoking, funny, and recommended some good books and movies.  I'm planning to keep this blog going for the foreseeable future.  In fact, I've got a couple of new movies to blog about real soon.  So stay tuned!!!

Two Movies in One Week!!!

It's been sort of a crazy week.  I watched two movies!

"The Three Musketeers":  This updated version of the classic tale is wall to wall fun.  With lots of action, some humor, and a great role for Orlando Bloom, this is easily the best movie I've seen in quite a while. 

The story has all the elements of other Musketeer stories, including young D'Artagnan coming to join the Musketeers, the evil Cardinal Richelieu, the battle against Europe's foremost swordsman and finally D'Artagnan's acceptance into the Musketeers.  But, what this story has that others don't is some really good effects, updated stunts, and great action sequences.  Plus some of the more traditional battles are reinvented. 

I thoroughly enjoyed the 2 hours I spent watching "The Three Musketeers".  This is easily a 4 star movie, and I recommend it if you are in the mood for action and a good laugh.

"The Last of the Mohicans":  It's entirely possible that I am the only person in the world who hadn't seen "The Last of the Mohicans", and frankly, I could have remained the only person in the world to not have seen this movie.  I just don't get it...I don't understand how it can be so critically acclaimed?  I think Nuke put it best today when he stated something to the effect that I have the movie tastes of the average Joe, and to truly appreciate this movie, you need to have the movie tastes of a film critic.

That said, I did feel like this movie had one of the best film scores ever, so I still rate it 3 stars.  But it would have been 2 stars if not for the seriously good music.  If you like movies such as "The English Patient", and if you haven't already seen this 1993 film, give "The Last of the Mohicans" a shot.  If you didn't like "The English Patient", you won't like this.

Is This What Most People Deal With?

Many people over the past 2 days have said to me, "why don't you blog anymore?", or something to that effect.  Note, I am defining "Many" as 3 people.

But, I do have a blog topic today.  I read a headline today that Rick Santorum is suspending his campaign for President, virtually handing the Republican nomination to Mitt Romney.  Now, I don't think Mitt is a bad guy, and I'll vote for him in the general election, but I'm not excited about it.  I haven't ever been excited about a candidate for President in my voting life...EVER!!! 

I was hoping this year would be the one where I could really get behind a candidate for President.  I assumed, wrongfully, that the debacle called Obamacare and the disastrous Obama Presidency would embolden my fellow conservatives to finally vote for the real conservative choice in the Republican primary.  But, as we do every year, we settled for the "moderate", letting the media tell us that Rick Santorum and Ron Paul wouldn't be able to beat President Obama in the general election.  Too many of my fellow conservatives bought the media lie that Mitt was the only candidate who stood a chance against President Obama, and now we're left with a choice between a moderate conservative and a hard core leftist...just like we had 4 years ago, and we know how that turned out.

But enough of my whining.  What I really started pondering is this...do most Americans feel this way every election year, whether because of apathy or just the general lack of good candidates we seem to be able to find?  I am left to conclude that 75% of the country feels this way, and frankly, it stinks. 

Wouldn't it be fun to have a real debate in this country about the issues of the day?  Wouldn't it be so great to have someone who can really articulate their position without fear?  But instead, we have 2 politicians...we have 2 guys who are gonna sling mud, nuance everything they say, and if elected, there won't be a big difference between the two.  Frankly, I wouldn't vote at all this year, except I am convinced that Mitt Romney will attempt to dismantle Obamacare, or at least he will remove the mandate that faith based organizations have to provide contraception and abortion in their health plans.  That's really the only issue I am voting on this year.

I hope that I'm wrong about Mitt Romney.  I really hope that he has become more conservative than he was as Governor of Massachusetts.  And, I sincerely hope that he gets elected and immediately repeals Obamacare and institutes fiscally responsible policies.  I'm just very skeptical that any of this will happen.

Another Round of Airplane Movie Reviews

Last week's trip to Brazil gave me the opportunity to watch 3 new movies...well, new to me anyway.

"In Time":  Despite the fact that that Justin Timberlake and Amanda Seyfried really can't act at all, this was the best movie I watched on this trip.  The premise is kinda interesting.  Each person on earth is genetically engineered to stop aging at 25 years old.  When you turn 25, a clock on your arm starts counting...you either earn more time like you would earn currency, or you die.  Of course, there are those in the world that are practically immortal, while others live (literally) day to day.

Enter Will Salas (Timberlake), who gets over a century of time when a "rich man" decides he's tired of living and gives him the time.  After being accused of stealing time, Salas and his girlfriend (Seyfried) go on a Bonnie and Clyde type of run, stealing time and giving it away to the masses, thus upsetting the balance of the "time market". 

I really enjoyed this movie, despite the really poor acting.  I was a little surprised there are that many 25 year old people in the world to play parts in this movie, but hey, you roll with it.  I would give this one 4 stars.

"Hugo":  I was really excited about "Hugo" and frankly I was disappointed.  I was expecting this to be a really good movie, but it fell sorta flat from my expectations.  It was still an ok movie, but I'd only give it 2.5 stars.

Let me list out the things I didn't like about this movie, rather than the things I did.

1 - Sascha Baron Cohen is just terrible...he shouldn't be allowed to be in movies.

2- Ben Kingsley is not likable.  For a central character in the movie, you really don't find yourself liking him at all.

3 - The trailers were misleading...based on the trailers, I expected something completely different.

I would say don't spend your time on this one.

"The Adventures of Tintin":  Does Spielberg make good movies anymore?  Another disappointment!  Similar to "Hugo" it just wasn't what I expected, so another 2.5 star movie.  Here's what I didn't like about this movie.

1 - The animation...I'm never going to get adjusted to this style of animation.

2 - The story...it just didn't have a flow.  I was told that Spielberg took bits and pieces from Tintin stories, which Tintin fans really liked, but I found made for a disjointed story.

3 - The comic relief wasn't funny.

So there you go, three movies on this trip and really only one good one.