Anonymous

Set in the political snake-pit of Elizabethan England, Anonymous speculates on an issue that has for centuries intrigued academics and brilliant minds ranging from Mark Twain and Charles Dickens to Henry James and Sigmund Freud, namely: who was the author of the plays credited to William Shakespeare? Experts have debated, books have been written, and scholars have devoted their lives to protecting or debunking theories surrounding the authorship of the most renowned works in English literature. "Anonymous" poses one possible answer, focusing on a time when cloak-and-dagger political intrigue, illicit romances in the Royal Court, and the schemes of greedy nobles hungry for the power of the throne were exposed in the most unlikely of places: the London stage.

Oh My God!  Total snoozefest.  I tried so hard to follow what was happening but couldn't care whatsoever.  I pulled the plug about 45 minutes in.

Do I really have to put in writing that nobody should bother with this movie?  Okay.  Nobody should bother with this movie.

Hugo

Hugo tells the story of an orphan boy living a secret life in the walls of a Paris train station. With the help of an eccentric girl, he searches for the answer to a mystery linking the father he recently lost, the ill-tempered toy shop owner living below him and a heart shaped lock, seemingly without a key.

This is a tough one to review. I felt myself wanting to like it throughout out because the movie was awesome visually with all the inner gear workings of the clocks, the cinematography was great and I really liked how they took us in to this train station and built a whole world of intriguing characters within its walls. I stayed very intrigued to these characters for over an hour before I started wondering where this movie was going. Then I played the game of checking to see how much longer there was and getting more and more disenchanted by how it wasn't really going anywhere and there was no actual storyline. The movie was about 2 hours long - MUCH longer than it needed to be and it ended up being really artsy fartsy.

I wouldn't recommed anyone bothering with this movie. It started off really good and had a ton of potential but ultimately ended up going nowhere.

Johnny English Reborn

 Rowan Atkinson returns to the role of the improbable secret agent who doesn't know fear or danger in the comedy spy-thriller Johnny English Reborn. In his latest adventure, the most unlikely intelligence officer in Her Majesty's Secret Service must stop a group of international assassins before they eliminate a world leader and cause global chaos.

This was just more one pony type silliness from Rowan Atkinson.  It's pretty much good for about 20-30 minutes of laughs and then you are eagerly awaiting the movie to end so you can go on to doing something that ends up mattering. 

I wouldn't really recommend anyone bothering with this.  Catch parts of it in passing on cable.  Definitely not worth a full sit down viewing.

Puss In Boots

Long before he even met Shrek, the notorious fighter, lover and outlaw Puss In Boots becomes a hero when he sets off on an adventure with the tough and street smart Kitty Softpaws and the mastermind Humpty Dumpty to save his town. This is the true story of The Cat, The Myth, The Legend... The Boots.
This movie was decent. It was definitely watchable but it also could have been better. You can kind of tell that this was intended as a direct to DVD movie that was tweeked a little for a big screen release. There were some good laughs (especially the Oooooooooh cat in the background 3 or 4 times) but not enough of the humor that was in the Shrek movies that I was kind of hoping for. Can you sense yet how middle of the road I am on this movie?

I would lukewarmly recommend checking this movie out. It's not a must see by any means but there are enough laughs to make it watchable and you could do much worse.

Tower Heist

Ben Stiller and Eddie Murphy lead an all-star cast in "Tower Heist," a comedy caper about working stiffs who seek revenge on the Wall Street swindler who stiffed them. After the workers at a luxury Central Park condominium discover the penthouse billionaire has stolen their retirement, they plot the ultimate revenge: a heist to reclaim what he took from them.

This is another one of those you see the trailer - you see the movie type deals. There were no great laughs or scenes that were you didn't see already. There was no real big twists that you didn't see already or weren't telegraphed long in advance. The movie wasn't horrible. It was somewhat watchable but really ended up just kind of being there.

I would lukewarmly recommend people checking this out. It's not really worth the time or money and you might be better just waiting to watch this one at home.

J. Edgar

J. Edgar explores the public and private life of one of the most powerful, controversial and enigmatic figures of the 20th century. As the face of law enforcement in America for almost fifty years, J. Edgar Hoover (DiCaprio) was feared and admired, reviled and revered. But behind closed doors, he held secrets that would have destroyed his image, his career and his life.

 

The first thing I have to say is that the makeup job on older J Edgar and company is one of the worst I've ever seen. It looked so fake. Very lame. That being said, this was a pretty decent movie. Good performances by the whole cast and there was really good back and forth between past and present and through lots of historical cases. One thing I absolutely am not is a history buff so at no point was I wrapped up in the accuracy of any of it. I just enjoyed watching this very complex character work through his sexuality, obsessiveness and awkwardness.

 

I would recommend people checking this out. Again, I'm not sure how much history buffs might be bothered by its accuracy levels but I enjoyed it enough to watch the whole thing.

The Son Of No One

A young cop is assigned to a precinct in the working class neighborhood where he grew up, and an old secret threatens to destroy his life and his family.

This will probably go down in history as one of the strangest cast lists of all time. You have no talent (Channing Tatum/Katie Holmes), comedic talent only (Tracy Morgan), artsy talent only (Juliette Binoche) and major actors (Ray Liotta and Al Pacino). It was just downright strange watching all of them on screen together. And the really unfortunate thing is that the lack of legit actors throughout the cast kind of held the movie back. The story was great and there was a good back and forth between past and present thoughout the movie. However, Channing Tatum and Katie Holmes as the "emotional" leads were just as painful as you would expect. And I will be the first to admit that there are single parts of movies that can annoy the living hell out of me and I can't let go of them. Ray Liotta plays Channing Tatum's police captain. He also places threatening calls to Tatum and Holmes and they don't know who it is in the movie. The voice is blatantly Ray Liotta's voice on the phone. No effort to cover it up at all. I could not stop ranting about this the whole movie.

I would lukewarmly recommend people checking this out. Again, it's a decent/short story but the acting kind of poo poos all over it.

Paranormal Activity 3

The third film is being envisioned as an origin story set in the 1980s that will detail how the "activity" began.

I'm a huge fan of these movies. The first two scared the hell out of me and I was shocked at how good the continuity was from the first to the second and that it wasn't just another ghost story but instead an evolving story. Now comes this third one that is a prequel of what happened to the sister from 1 and the sister from 2 when they were kids that led to those two movies. This movie was not as creepy and psychological as the first two. The first two legitimately made me lose sleep. This one was by far the scariest of the three though. There were a LOT more scenes that make you jump. As opposed to the first two where it was just tension build up to the last holy $hit 10-15 minutes, this one had moments like that throughout and then the crazy holy $hit last 15 minutes. The use of a rotating camera by hooking it up to an oscillating fan made those scenes beyond unnerving to watch. And once again the overall story evolving was great.

I loved this movie. I have loved all three of them. I am extremely grateful though that this one had more of a less psychological fear installation because I was able to sleep last night. Scary as hell but not as scarring.

The Rum Diary

Based on the debut novel by Hunter S. Thompson, The Rum Diary tells the increasingly unhinged story of itinerant journalist Paul Kemp (Johnny Depp). Tiring of the noise and madness of New York and the crushing conventions of late Eisenhower-era America, Kemp travels to the pristine island of Puerto Rico to write for a local newspaper, The San Juan Star, run by downtrodden editor Lotterman (Richard Jenkins). Adopting the rum-soaked life of the island, Paul soon becomes obsessed with Chenault (Amber Heard), the wildly attractive Connecticut-born fiancée of Sanderson (Aaron Eckhart). Sanderson, a businessman involved in shady property development deals, is one of a growing number of American entrepreneurs who are determined to convert Puerto Rico into a capitalist paradise in service of the wealthy. When Kemp is recruited by Sanderson to write favorably about his latest unsavory scheme, the journalist is presented with a choice: to use his words for the corrupt businessmen's financial benefit, or use them to take the bastards down.

This was an up and down movie and honestly if it wasn't for Johnny Depp, I probably would have pulled the plug due to total loss of interest. The movie would drag for a while and then pick up in both laughs and tempo and then go back to blah. It did this like 3 or 4 times and it wasn't nearly as trippy (a la Fear & Loathing In Las Vegas) as I had expected. Regardless, I will pretty much watch anything with Johnny Depp and his facial expressions/delivery. That held up this movie for me but I was honestly kind of disappointed.

I would lukewarmly recommend people checking this one out. It's not a must see and those just wanting to see Depp will be bored by the story while those who are going for the story will probably leave having expected more.

Breaking Dawn - Part 1

The Twilight Saga: Breaking Dawn illuminates the secrets and mysteries of this spellbinding romantic epic that has entranced millions.

They don't even bother giving these movies legit plot summaries anymore. Basically, there isn't one. This is literally a "you read the book so you are going to see the movie" franchise. This one was really nothing more than a three scene set up for the second part. They get married. They go on a honeymoon. She has a baby. That's it. Seriously. I was pretty bored by this one. Definitely more so than the previous three installments. But none of that matters because if you love the story - you love the movie. If you don't - then you don't.

Like I said - my recommendation really doesn't matter whatsoever. You either live for this "story" or you have no interest whatsoever. I felt like it was just a set up but Part 2 really won't make much sense without this three scened movie.

A Very Harold & Kumar Christmas

The new Harold & Kumar comedy picks up six years after the duo's last adventure. After years of growing apart, Harold Lee (John Cho) and Kumar Patel (Kal Penn) have replaced each other with new friends and are preparing for their respective Yuletide celebrations. But when a mysterious package mistakenly arrives at Kumar's door on Christmas Eve, his attempt to redirect it to Harold's house ends with the "high grade" content and Harold's father-in-law's prize Christmas tree going up in smoke. With his in-laws out of the house for the day, Harold decides to cover his tracks, rather than come clean. Reluctantly embarking on another ill-advised journey with Kumar through New York City, their search for the perfect replacement tree almost blows Christmas Eve sky high.

I tried. I did. I had zero interest in seeing this movie. How is this a franchise at this point? It was a couple of laughs one trick pony that got a sequel that was garbage. Now there is a third one that on top of the one trick pony joke of getting high - it wants to be a spoof on 3D now too. I made it literally 15 minutes in and just couldn't be bothered anymore. There are so many other things I could do with my time.

I wouldn't recommend anyone wasting their time with this. Not even the 15 minutes I did. This is just plain lame.