From Paris With Love

So I recently went to see the awesome action packed movie From Paris With Love. This movie starts not only John Travolta who I loved in many films, but also one of my personal favorites, Johnathan Rhys Meyers. You may recognize him from the popular showon Showtime The Tudors, or August Rush, or a few other hit films, but this movie is without a doubt one of the best I have seen lately. It starts of a little slow, but as soon as John Travolta's character, the gun totting, wise-cracking, trigger happy Charlie Wax walks on you know you are in for a real treat. Rhys-Meyers character, James Reese is an uptight personal aide to the U.S. Ambassador in France who is also a low-level agent for the CIA. He meets Wax who is to be his new partner, earning him the chance to be a real agent, not just the guy who switches license plates anymore. But when he meets Wax, it is nothing like he expected. Wax takes James on a white-knuckled ride through Paris, saying at first that they are hunting down drug dealers who killed the Secretary of state's niece. James quickly learns that it is much more then that, it is actually about trying to stop a terrorist attack on all the Consulates of the world. It is soon after that James realizes he may be in deeper then he thought, especially when he finds pictures of himself all over an apartment Wax has just finished terrorizing trying to find the leader of the possible attack. James has been romantically involved with a French women Caroline for the last six years and when she sees him and Wax in an elevator with a hooker she gets the wrong idea, making James want to desperately go home to her and explain things. This movie has something for everyone, the shoot 'em up thrill that most like, the romance between Caroline and James, the silly comedic ways of Wax, and the brain busting thrill of finding out...who really is behind it all? This movie was one I truly enjoyed, though definitely not one you could bring children to. But, with that said, overall grade...A-

The Bounty Hunter

Here is a romantic comedy movie that both men and women can enjoy. It has most of the aspects of a romantic comedy mixed in with some good old action, some awesome mystery and even a bit of suspense. This movie starts off with Jennifer Aniston's character, Nicole Hurley, who is a journalist trying to find out the truth behind this suicide she reported on earlier. She finally gets a lead but it is on the same day and time that she is supposed to be in court for assaulting an officer, after she skips her meeting her ex-husband gerard Butler's character Milo Boyd, who has become a bounty hunter since he was let go from the police force, finds out that he is to bring her in. This is just the beginning of this funny movie. It includes some extremely funny chase scenes, an overturned golf cart, an aging Atlantic City diva, and much much more. While I know there are some people who just won't watch romantic comedy's there are those who sometimes just need a good laugh, and the people who refuse to watch these movies just aren't laughing as hard as they should. I have watched more then just one or two romantic comedies in my day and this one is definitely one of the better ones. So overall grade B+

Toy Story

Since Toy Story 3 is coming out in June, I thought I should review a movie that changed the movie industry...for the better. Toy Story was the first full-length fully animated film. People from Pixar had messed around with this concept in other movies, like the Pixar Shorts, and Rescuers Down Under, but Toy Story really made Pixar into what it is today. The story is about Woody, he is a toy that can talk, move, sing, dance, etc. And so can all the other toys. Then his owner Andy, has a birthday party and gets Buzz Lightyear. Woody feels like he's being replaced and so he knocks Buzz out a window. So when Andy goes out for the night he takes Woody, who feels so guilty about what he did to Buzz he grabs Buzz and puts him into the car with him. Then when Andy's mom is getting gas, they start fighting and end up rolling out of the car, so they try to make their way to Pizza Planet, where they end up being captured by the evil Sid, the next door neighbor who destroys toys. Woody tried to convince his friends, Hamm, Rex, Mr. Potato Head, and the others that are still at Andy's. They go through various silly experiments trying to escape, but still don't succeed. This movie is silly, sweet, and all-around heartwarming. You really see how Buzz and Woody come together to become good friends. They are some of the best characters and they make a great movie for anyone of any age. This is one movie that is especially timeless and will be shown for years to come...overall grade...A

Wild Things

So, surprisingly a lot of people I know have never seen this movie. Some haven't even HEARD of it. And I think that is just not right!! How can you play Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon without this movie?? It is CRITICAL!!! The reasoning behind it....Matt Dillon, Denise Richards, Bill Murray, and Neve Campbell!! So, any movie they starred in can now be used to connect someone ELSE to Kevin Bacon!! (I know this because we somehow connected Hannah Montana and Shirley Temple to Kevin Bacon, it was AWESOME!!) Anyways...this movie has it all, sex, drugs, violence, backstabbing, double-crossing, murder and soooo much more. This movie starts off with a millionaire's daughter, Kelly Van Ryan (Denise Richards) accusing her teacher (Matt Dillon) of raping her, probably because he wouldn't sleep with her. Then Kelly's trashy classmate Suzie Toller (Neve Campbell) accuses him as well. So, after loosing the respect of everyone he used to work with and his community Sam Lombardo (Dillon) hires freelance lawyer Ken Bowden (Bill Murray) to defend him in court. This is where Ray Duquette (Kevin Bacon) comes in. He's the one investigating the two girls claims, but the deeper he digs, the more sinister things seem to become. This movie was wild and crazy, and kept you guessing until the very end. And actually, even at the end, you kind of wanted to go back and see what you missed. I really enjoyed this movie, but some of the double-crossing got a bit confusing since it kept happening so much, so quickly, and sometimes it was hard to follow. With that said, overall grade.....B!!

Watchmen

The reason I picked this particular movie was because I am a Greys Anatomy lover. I am in LOVE with that show!!! I watch it EVERY SINGLE Thursday PLUS (almost) everyday from 6 to 9 on Lifetime. I just LOVE syndication. Anyways, the REASON for picking the movie Watchmen was because Jeffery Dean Morgan (The Comedian) in Watchmen also played Denny Dukett on Greys Anatomy and was one of my favorite ARC characters. So, without further ado, Watchmen. First off, I'll start with the GOOD things. The score (music) of the movie was FANTASTIC!! If I could grade a movie on JUST the score this would be one of the only movies to EVER receive and A+, however, I can't. So, the other good things about this movie...the guy who played Rorschach was quite good, I really enjoyed his character. as well as Jeffery Dean Morgan as The Comedian, and not just because of Greys Anatomy, I didn't even regocnize him the first time I tried to watch the movie. Also, Ozymandias did a fabulous job and I really liked his character, even though he wasn't in there much till the end. So, now on to the bad things. Silk Spectre 2...well, no offense to Malin Akerman, but your character was slutty and stupid, I really just didn't like her at all. And sadly, a LOT of people agree with me. I had to try THREE TIMES to watch this movie all the way through, then when I finally did, I watched the directors cut, which added about a half hour to an already TOO LONG movie. There were some serious issues with the violence in this movie. It seemed to be there just to satisfy the males in the audience, I'm not being sexist, it's just true. I also believed that hiring a bunch of B-movie actors to play for a (shoulda-been) A-movie did not go over all that well. This movie had a TON of potential, but failed to follow through. Parts of this movie were good, parts of it were actually pretty funny and quite good, but overall, this movies good parts didn't overcome the bad parts. So...I guess I have to give a grade now...well, sad as it is since some VERY good actors were in this....overall grade....D-

Harvey

So I have decided that every Friday I think I'm going to review a movie, new old, young, famous, indie, whatever I really feel like, and I thought the perfect thing to start with would be Harvey!! It stars Jimmy Stewart, the ONLY person who could have pulled off this role SO fantastically, and it was released in the 1950's. It started off as a play on Broadway and, like so many others at the time, was created into a movie. At first when casting, they thought that Jimmy Stewart was too old to play Uncle Elwood, but after the movie was released and became so popular, no one could EVER think of anyone else who could play it the way Jimmy Stewart did. It starts off with Elwood Dowd's aunt's hosting an afternoon tea. You quickly learn that their Uncle Elwood is a bit odd, after you meet him and his friend Harvey, you begin to realize just how strange he really is. The man has a best friend who is a human-sized talking imaginary rabbit. A pooka to be exact. His sister tries to send him to a mental institution but since you don't find out until later exactly who he is trying to introduce all his guests too, you think he is perfectly normal. Then, when his sister keeps insisting that Elwood actually does have a six foot 3 inch invisible rabbit for a friend convinces Chumley it is she, not Elwood, who is hallucinating. After Elwood goes to his favorite bar Charlie's, and the doctor has "gone off with Harvey" everyone finds him and are convinced he did away with the doctor, and they summon the police. Elwood is swept off to the sanitarium even though the doctor really did go off with Harvey, but doesn't tell anyone. Much more madness and chaos ensues, but overall this movie is a fun-filled movie that anyone would enjoy. Overall grade A+ (and not just because I LOVE it!!)