Welcome back, and lets move on to day three. Yesterday we went into the realms of holiday horror/comedy, today lets testosterone things up a bit with:
Die Hard (1988)
Hans Gruber (Alan Rickman) has crashed the Nakatomi Christmas party, and only one man can save Christmas, shoeless John McClane (Bruce Willis). Assisted via radio by Sergeant Al Powell (Reginald VelJohnson), McClane delivers lots of small lead presents to the naughty boys while spouting one-liners, and just generally being a badass.
Even though the “Die Hard” series has gotten progressively worse with each passing sequel, the original is still one of the best action films of its era, and it proves that action stars can be in holiday films without them being crap **cough**JingleAllTheWay**cough**. So settle down with some cocoa and check out this bit of awesome.
Yippee-Kai-Yay, motherf***er!
Showing posts with label Bruce Willis. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Bruce Willis. Show all posts
Thursday, December 16, 2010
Wednesday, August 11, 2010
The Expendables
Are you tired of romantic comedies, and computer animated kids' films? Have you have it with sparkly vampires and talking dogs and cats? Do you want a manly film full of manly men blowing up manly things? Then you may just want to check out “The Expendables”.
The Expendables are a team of highly trained mercenaries who seem to have one real mission in life; blow things up. Led by Barney Ross (Sylvester Stallone: “Rambo”, “Rocky”), the team is offered a job by the cagey Mister Church (Bruce Willis: “Die Hard”, “Cop Out”) to go to the small island nation of Velina and assassinate their corrupt dictator, General Garza (David Zayas: “Dexter”, “Oz”) and whoever is helping to keep him in power. Of course nothing can be all that simple, right?
Following Ross into battle are Lee Christmas (Jason Statham: “The Transporter”, “Crank”), Ying Yang (Jet Li: “War”, “Hero”), Toll Road (UFC fighter, Randy Couture), and Hale Caeser (NFL player, Terry Crews). Rounding out the cast are Dolph Lundgren, Steve Austin, Eric Roberts, Mickey Rourke, all in supporting roles. For a simple old-school guns, knives, and explosions action film this is a huge cast.
Of course with such a large cast and the limitations of how long an action movie can be you are faced with the issue of finding enough stuff for everyone to do. This is where the movie falls short. Statham and Stallone do the majority of the heavy lifting for the heroes, which would be fine if they were the only two stars in the film. Unfortunately Li ends up being sadly underused, and Crews and Couture only have a handful of lines before the climactic battle begins. As it turns out it is possible to have too much awesome in one film.
Finding enough screen time for everyone is not the movie's biggest failing though. For me the worst part of this film was the camera work. During the fights scenes especially, we are hit with lots of quick cuts and shaky camera, and there are moments where I had trouble who was fighting who (is that Statham or Couture fighting with Austin? I had to ask my wife to be sure). Do not sit in the front row of the theater for this movie if you are susceptible to motion sickness.
Some may criticize the film for having a weak plot, and yes, I suppose it does. To me the plot feels like something you might find in a video game; merely an excuse to create a lot of awesome action sequences, but then again when is the last time you watched a true action movie for the plot? “The Transporter”? “Shoot 'Em Up”? “Crank”? “Die Hard”? No, this movie is not going to win any awards for its story, but really, who cares? If you are watching this film you are watching to see well choreographed fights punctuated by snarky one liners and things blowing up,
Lots of explosions, cursing, and a body count to rival the “Star Wars” trilogy, “The Expendables” is a violent, loud celebration of testosterone and explosions. It's an action film for people who like action films. I had really high expectations for this film (bordering on Phantom Menace Syndrome if I am being honest), and this film did fall short, but it was still a fun film with plenty of gags to laugh at and injuries to wince at.
If you like violent, manly films, then this movie is worth seeing in the theater for the fun of laughing, groaning, and cheering along with the rest of the audience (yes, people were actually cheering during parts of the film) when “The Expendables” opens on August thirteenth.. If violence is not your bag, and you want sensitivity and a message in your movie, well there's always “Eat Pray Love”.
The Expendables are a team of highly trained mercenaries who seem to have one real mission in life; blow things up. Led by Barney Ross (Sylvester Stallone: “Rambo”, “Rocky”), the team is offered a job by the cagey Mister Church (Bruce Willis: “Die Hard”, “Cop Out”) to go to the small island nation of Velina and assassinate their corrupt dictator, General Garza (David Zayas: “Dexter”, “Oz”) and whoever is helping to keep him in power. Of course nothing can be all that simple, right?
Following Ross into battle are Lee Christmas (Jason Statham: “The Transporter”, “Crank”), Ying Yang (Jet Li: “War”, “Hero”), Toll Road (UFC fighter, Randy Couture), and Hale Caeser (NFL player, Terry Crews). Rounding out the cast are Dolph Lundgren, Steve Austin, Eric Roberts, Mickey Rourke, all in supporting roles. For a simple old-school guns, knives, and explosions action film this is a huge cast.
Of course with such a large cast and the limitations of how long an action movie can be you are faced with the issue of finding enough stuff for everyone to do. This is where the movie falls short. Statham and Stallone do the majority of the heavy lifting for the heroes, which would be fine if they were the only two stars in the film. Unfortunately Li ends up being sadly underused, and Crews and Couture only have a handful of lines before the climactic battle begins. As it turns out it is possible to have too much awesome in one film.
Finding enough screen time for everyone is not the movie's biggest failing though. For me the worst part of this film was the camera work. During the fights scenes especially, we are hit with lots of quick cuts and shaky camera, and there are moments where I had trouble who was fighting who (is that Statham or Couture fighting with Austin? I had to ask my wife to be sure). Do not sit in the front row of the theater for this movie if you are susceptible to motion sickness.
Some may criticize the film for having a weak plot, and yes, I suppose it does. To me the plot feels like something you might find in a video game; merely an excuse to create a lot of awesome action sequences, but then again when is the last time you watched a true action movie for the plot? “The Transporter”? “Shoot 'Em Up”? “Crank”? “Die Hard”? No, this movie is not going to win any awards for its story, but really, who cares? If you are watching this film you are watching to see well choreographed fights punctuated by snarky one liners and things blowing up,
Lots of explosions, cursing, and a body count to rival the “Star Wars” trilogy, “The Expendables” is a violent, loud celebration of testosterone and explosions. It's an action film for people who like action films. I had really high expectations for this film (bordering on Phantom Menace Syndrome if I am being honest), and this film did fall short, but it was still a fun film with plenty of gags to laugh at and injuries to wince at.
If you like violent, manly films, then this movie is worth seeing in the theater for the fun of laughing, groaning, and cheering along with the rest of the audience (yes, people were actually cheering during parts of the film) when “The Expendables” opens on August thirteenth.. If violence is not your bag, and you want sensitivity and a message in your movie, well there's always “Eat Pray Love”.
Thursday, February 25, 2010
Cop Out
What do you get when you take Bruce Willis (Die Hard), Tracy Morgan (30 Rock), a valuable baseball card, a Mexican gangbanger named Poh Boy, a free-running burglar, a teddy bear with a hidden camera, a stolen car, a lot of cursing, and have Kevin Smith direct it all? You get the new buddy-cop comedy “Cop Out”
Willis and Morgan play veteran New York police officers Jimmy Monroe and Paul Hodges, who after nine years together as partners have just been suspended for a month after spectacularly screwing up a case and embarrassing the entire department. This is bad for Monroe, as his daughter (Michelle Trachtenberg: “Buffy the Vampire Slayer”) is getting married and the bill is going to be $48,000, so he can hardly afford a month without pay.
In order to get the money to pay for the wedding Monroe decides to sell an extremely valuable Andy Pafko baseball card. Unfortunately the sports card shop is robbed during the sale, and the card is stolen by a quirky and somewhat annoying thief, Dave (Seann William Scott: “American Pie”), and the quest to retrieve the card quickly gets the two detectives caught in the middle of the plans of an up and coming Mexican drug dealer.
I will admit that from the trailers and the title I expected that this to be something like one of the fictional movies that Tracy Jordan would have starred in on “30 Rock”, but I am happy to say that I was totally wrong. “Cop Out” may not be original, it may not be action pakced, and it certainly isn't family friendly, but it is a lot of fun to watch.
To say the humour in this movie is childish would be an understatement. Not only are there the requisite poop and dick jokes, but there are actually knock-knock jokes, and a couple of scenes with Scott's character copying everything other characters say in order to piss them off. This is not a slight on the movie though, as you weren't expecting highbrow humour from a film like this anyway, but this is the only movie I can think of where a knock knock joke has actually made me laugh out loud.
It is nice to see Bruce Willis playing the snarky cop again, bringing back shades of the “Die Hard” trilogy (there is no fourth film). There's nothing about this character that we haven't seen him play before, but it's nice to see him playing it again in a movie that doesn't suck.
As for Tracy Morgan, he brings to the screen the same sort of borderline mentally handicapped character he plays on “30 Rock”, so if you like Tracy Jordan, then you should enjoy Paul Hodges. Morgan steals more than a couple scenes based on the fact that his idea of playing good cop/bad cop means doing (frequently random) movie quotes from movies like “Heat”, “Jaws”, and “Star Wars”. Morgan ultimately brings an almost frenetic Robin Williams-esque vibe to the role, and I fully expect to see a number of deleted scenes with him when this comes out on DVD.
“Cop Out” dances along the line between plausible and zany. This is not a “Police Squad” style parody, but it's also not as straight as a “Lethal Weapon” movie. Characters frequently do things that are just beyond the bounds of believability, but never so much as to actually ruin your suspension of disbelief.
If you are looking for a buddy cop film with less violence and more laughs than a “From Paris With Love” then “Cop Out” is the perfect flick for you. It won't make you think, but it will make you laugh. There's no real reason not to just wait and give this a rental, but if you want a good laugh you could do a whole lot worse.
“Cop Out” opens fire on theaters starting February 26th.
Willis and Morgan play veteran New York police officers Jimmy Monroe and Paul Hodges, who after nine years together as partners have just been suspended for a month after spectacularly screwing up a case and embarrassing the entire department. This is bad for Monroe, as his daughter (Michelle Trachtenberg: “Buffy the Vampire Slayer”) is getting married and the bill is going to be $48,000, so he can hardly afford a month without pay.
In order to get the money to pay for the wedding Monroe decides to sell an extremely valuable Andy Pafko baseball card. Unfortunately the sports card shop is robbed during the sale, and the card is stolen by a quirky and somewhat annoying thief, Dave (Seann William Scott: “American Pie”), and the quest to retrieve the card quickly gets the two detectives caught in the middle of the plans of an up and coming Mexican drug dealer.
I will admit that from the trailers and the title I expected that this to be something like one of the fictional movies that Tracy Jordan would have starred in on “30 Rock”, but I am happy to say that I was totally wrong. “Cop Out” may not be original, it may not be action pakced, and it certainly isn't family friendly, but it is a lot of fun to watch.
To say the humour in this movie is childish would be an understatement. Not only are there the requisite poop and dick jokes, but there are actually knock-knock jokes, and a couple of scenes with Scott's character copying everything other characters say in order to piss them off. This is not a slight on the movie though, as you weren't expecting highbrow humour from a film like this anyway, but this is the only movie I can think of where a knock knock joke has actually made me laugh out loud.
It is nice to see Bruce Willis playing the snarky cop again, bringing back shades of the “Die Hard” trilogy (there is no fourth film). There's nothing about this character that we haven't seen him play before, but it's nice to see him playing it again in a movie that doesn't suck.
As for Tracy Morgan, he brings to the screen the same sort of borderline mentally handicapped character he plays on “30 Rock”, so if you like Tracy Jordan, then you should enjoy Paul Hodges. Morgan steals more than a couple scenes based on the fact that his idea of playing good cop/bad cop means doing (frequently random) movie quotes from movies like “Heat”, “Jaws”, and “Star Wars”. Morgan ultimately brings an almost frenetic Robin Williams-esque vibe to the role, and I fully expect to see a number of deleted scenes with him when this comes out on DVD.
“Cop Out” dances along the line between plausible and zany. This is not a “Police Squad” style parody, but it's also not as straight as a “Lethal Weapon” movie. Characters frequently do things that are just beyond the bounds of believability, but never so much as to actually ruin your suspension of disbelief.
If you are looking for a buddy cop film with less violence and more laughs than a “From Paris With Love” then “Cop Out” is the perfect flick for you. It won't make you think, but it will make you laugh. There's no real reason not to just wait and give this a rental, but if you want a good laugh you could do a whole lot worse.
“Cop Out” opens fire on theaters starting February 26th.
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