Mr. Brown Versus

Hello again, Michael Bay. Hollywood's biggest hack has returned, and this time, we're not being treated to robot-on-robot CGI carnage, robot testicles, dog humping, or a dude stuffing an animal cracker down a woman's pants. This time, he's making a smaller, low-budget character piece that's borrowing from Quentin Tarantino and Joel & Ethan Coen flicks. No, really. That's what Pain and Gain looks like, and it's what Bay was aiming for: an unholy union of Tarantino's lurid and hypnotic dialogue, the Coen Brothers' idiosyncratic characters, and Bay's own directorial traits of fast editing cuts, slow-motion shots of sunrises and sunsets, and Bay's camera lusting over beautiful women in bikinis, skimpy outfits, ass shots, etc. The only thin missing is his signature trademark of racial stereotypes being trotted out for cheap laughs, though I'm certain it'll be in the finished product. Anywho, here's the red-band trailer for...

 I had high hopes for Sam Raimi's prequel to the beloved 1939 classic The Wizard of Oz . After the letdown that was Raimi's last outing with a block buster-type budget with Spider-Man 3 in 2007, I was hoping this update on the fabled land of Oz before Judy Garland followed the yellow brick road would be a return to form for the mufti-talented genre director. What the audience got was a slightly-better version of Tim Burton's fiasco Alice in Wonderland , minus the shitty 3D conversion rush job. That's not to say Oz the Great and Powerful was a carbon copy of that poorly-executed madhouse. The tile sequence and the opening 10 minutes, shot completely in black and white, is a terrific use of the 3D format and pays a nice tribute to how the '39 film opened, before the filmmakers break new ground and shoot the majority of the film in Technicolor. On a technical level, Raimi delivers a visual knockout: the size, scope, colors, look and feel of the film is tailor made...

This maybe the most infuriating review i've written on my blog thusfar, and considering that i've written about Sandler's astronomically spiteful and mean spirited That's My Boy and the Twilight sequels New Moon and Eclipse (and coming in the near future, the conclusion with Breaking Dawn Part I and Part II ) that's saying something, so apologies if I start dropping F-bombs left, right and center. You're probably wondering,  'What brought me to this level of frustration?' Well, let me tell you the story about a novelist who's books would become a hot commodity in the Hollywood: Nicholas Sparks. It all started with the 1999 romantic drama, Message in a Bottle , the first of the author's novels that would be later adapted to film. The movie was a modest hit domestically, bringing in $52 million and additional $66 million abroad, combining for a worldwide gross of $118 million. Warner Bros, the studio that distributed the film, saw the movie...

I know I haven't posted many reviews really in the last few months, especially January and February  and this is for a few reasons: The first one being that it's January and February! The first two months in the year are where major studios dump out crappy movie after crappy movie, and frankly, those are the months I go to the cinema the least, unless it's to catch up on an Oscar-nominated film that i've yet to see. Sure, I could have talked more about the Oscar race, but there are people who do this better, namely the good folks at Awards Daily.com, and Kristopher Tapley at In Contention (btw: great job on the covering the race, you guys!). Another is just flat laziness. Sorry, but it's sadly true. Anyway, to make up for the lack of activity, I'm starting a new segment called, The Netflix Files.  Basically, I'm going to review obscure movies that I, otherwise, never would have seen, nor heard of, thanks to the wonders of Netflix. To kick off the segment, I...