Divergent (PG-13): Mostly Succeeds

Score: 3.5/5               

              “Divergent,” at least to me, was a perfect example of why Rotten Tomatoes shouldn’t be a be-all-end-all declaration of whether a movie is enjoyable or not. While this movie may not win over anyone who dislikes the young-adult genre, it’s still worth checking out even if you haven’t read the book. I dare even say it was quite good.

                “Divergent” stars Shailene Woodley as Tris, a young woman living in a dystopian society divided into several factions. Now, for those of you who are quick to unfavorably compare this to the “Hunger Games” series, this is pretty much where the similarities end. Instead of being forced to fight against the other factions to survive, Tris faces the dilemma of being grouped into one of the factions via a government-run aptitude test. Once she discovers that her results are inconclusive (or as the movie calls it: “Divergent”), she is put in danger. Since divergent people are a sign that the government’s control is weak, the government actively seeks to destroy them. It is up to Tris to use her wits and physical prowess to avoid persecution for the government and hide her divergent results.

               

                While its premise alone is quite fascinating, “Divergent” does a fine job of setting up its world, and gives plenty of details to the audience about how it works. The fantastic blend of real-life sets and digital imagery is a pleasure to watch, and it really gives the viewer a sense of immersion. From underground caves to city catacombs, fans and non-fans of the novel will likely be delighted seeing author Veronica Roth’s work come to life.  

                Some of my favorite scenes involved dream-like simulations where the characters’ fears were put to the test. One scene involves Tris trying to stop a dog that was friendly to her from attacking a young girl in a hall of mirrors. A lot of creativity and effort was clearly put into bringing this scene from the book to the big screen.

                Shailene Woodley is truly outstanding in her role as Tris, taking on the role with great skill. From happiness and confidence to sadness and fear, Woodley remarkably relays these emotions to make Tris an absolutely riveting character. It certainly does help that her character is is so well written.  From the very beginning to the tail-end of the movie, the audience is given plenty of time to feel for Tris. Throughout the movie, she must make difficult choices, and every one of them is shown in full detail thanks to the fine screenplay and exemplary cinematography.

One particular scene involves the moment where she must choose what faction to join despite her inconclusive test results. Her parents are both part of “Abnegation,” the faction in charge of community service. On the other hand, her dream as a child was to join “Dauntless,” a faction dedicated to law enforcement and military duties. Without the proper test results to guide her, she must choose between the two in a scene that involves plenty of close ups to build a heavy sense of tension.

I’m not going to spoil anything about the plot, but I will say that there are plenty of dark, unexpected twists. These moments of shock and surprise give the screenplay a lot more meat to it than it could have had.

The cinematography alone is another high point of this movie. Every action setpiece of this movie is finely shot, and every punch and fall is hard hitting and realistic. One scene involving a human knife-throwing target was so suspenseful, that I (and I’m sure many other audience members) flinched at the excruciatingly close impact of the knives around the person’s body.

To be fair to this film’s critics, the love story does feel a bit unnecessary. Watching Tris as she builds friendships and evades her enemies would have been a fine concept on its own. Unfortunately, she is given a rather bland character as a love interest named Four (played by Theo James). James’ performance isn’t nearly as up to par as Woodley’s, and his character just seems too flawless to really care about. Add that to the fact that he has a troubled past, and this character just came across as a gary-stu/obligatory male love interest. On the bright side, his character does help Tris throughout the story, so he isn’t completely pointless. To be honest, he didn’t really seem like that major of a character, and Tris still rightfully held the spotlight.

While it may not be a groundbreaking sci-fi film, Divergent is still a pleasure to watch. Even its weak love story takes a back seat to immerse the audience in a fascinating world. Fans of the book will most likely enjoy it, and even non-fans will get a kick out of its many plot twists and dreamlike visuals.

Second Chance Reviews: Grown Ups 2 (PG-13)

Score: 0/5

                      Grown…Ups…2…

            Now, I had no plans on seeing this when it was in theaters. In fact, I made a vow to stay as far away from it as possible. However, as much as I wanted to tear this movie apart based on the abysmal trailers and reviews, I couldn’t fairly criticize it since I hadn’t seen it. So, with the introduction of my “Second Chance Reviews” series, I thought I’d give this movie a fair criticism by watching the whole thing and writing a review. Now, before I begin my immense critical thrashing of this sequel, I want to address something: I didn’t totally hate the first “Grown Ups.”

            Of course, I’m not saying it is a good movie; there are still some moments of pointless toilet humor and a complete absence of conflict or story. On the other hand, the actors were likable and had good chemistry on screen together. It wasn’t too painful to watch, in fact, it was kind of nice to see these real-life friends interact on screen. Now…for the sequel…I’m going to try my best to be civil with this review, but let me tell you, it’s not going to be easy. That is because this pile of vomit deserves to be chucked into the nearest back alley trash can.

            All of the likability of the first “Grown Ups” is gone, and in its place is a cringe-worthy series of gross-out gags and bad puns strung together by robotic dialogue. The humor in this movie is on the level of a grade-school dropout and just to demonstrate how atrocious the jokes are, allow me to provide a few examples. WARNING: the mere description of these “jokes” can be harmful to the human brain.

            Let’s start off with the very first joke to start off the movie. Adam Sandler’s (I’m not even going to bother looking up his character’s name) daughter leaves the front door open and a deer enters his bedroom. His wife (played by Salma Hayek) wakes up and startles the deer, causing the deer to urinate all over Adam Sandler’s face and mouth. The deer proceeds to run down the hallway and urinate on Sandler’s son in the shower. Now, this joke was in the trailer, so if this was one of the funniest scenes according to the marketing team, I’d hate to see what they consider to be unfunny garbage. Though to its credit, it pretty much sums up the movie, and such a joke is the perfect way to start a horrendous abomination.

            Other jokes that Sandler seems to think are comedy gold are scenes involving a man accidently eating Cheetos that were stuffed up his nose, “burp-snarting” (which according to the movie is a burp, a sneeze and a fart in perfect sequence), and an effeminate male cheerleader licking bird feces off of a windshield. These jokes are only part of what seems like a constant barrage of audience-insulting toilet humor.

            Now please…for those of you who actually find this funny…please explain to me why such unpleasant gags are considered funny to you. If I were to meet someone who thought that licking bird droppings of a window was funny, I would think they have problems. So tell me, why on God’s green Earth do you find this repulsive, lazy disgraceful “humor” enjoyable. I’m just baffled here; can you tell me why this is worthy even of a chuckle?

            Not only is a lot of the humor disgusting, but most of it is just lazy and predictable. In one scene, a psychotic bus driver (played by Nick Swardson of the box-office-disaster: “Bucky Larson: Born to be a Star”) walks past a bathroom display in a K-mart and falls asleep in a nearby bed. When a staff member tries to get him out of the bed, he wakes up in a semi-conscious state and uses the toilet (complete with lots of “hilarious” farting sounds). The minute he walked by that toilet display, I knew that they were going to use this ridiculous joke. This joke isn’t even new; it’s been done before on an episode of “Rugrats” and in “Jackass: The Movie.”

            This movie is so lazy, that it even has to flat out explain the jokes to the audience. In one scene, Adam Sandler is at the supermarket with his daughter. A gay aerobics teacher that his wife thinks is attractive shows up and the daughter calls him “stud muffin.” This would have been a passible joke on its own, but she literally says “Mommy calls him stud muffin, so I call him stud muffin.” Do the filmmakers honestly think the audience isn’t smart enough to get the joke without bluntly explaining it? Was this film truly made for the half-witted?

            Not to mention, the dialogue is robotic and extremely forced. The way that the characters’ lines were written and delivered reminded me of “Birdemic: Shock and Terror,” but not in a funny way. It almost seems like Sandler just came up with a bunch of terrible jokes and slapped them together with a script that even the worst fanfiction authors would be ashamed of writing.

            Saying that this movie is an insult to filmmaking,” would be an understatement. I could quote Roger Ebert’s review of “Caligula” by saying that “Grown Ups 2” is “sickening, utterly worthless, shameful trash. If it is not the worst film I have ever seen, that makes it all the more shameful: People with talent allowed themselves to participate in this travesty.” However, even saying something that harsh seems like honoring this rancid middle-finger of a movie.

                 

                 

Second Chance Review: Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2 (PG)

Score: 2.5/5

*SPOILER ALERT: 

CONTAINS SPOILERS FROM THE FIRST FILM*

Recently, I’ve been a bit unsatisfied with the lack of variety on this blog in terms of what movies I review. I mainly review new theatrical releases and not much else. Therefore, I have decided to introduce three new types of posts that I will write sporadically.

The first is “Second Chance Reviews,” in which I will take a look at films that I wanted to see in theaters but didn’t get the chance to. For example, I wanted to see “Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2,” but I simply didn’t have time to check it out when it was in theaters. Now that it is out on DVD, I will finally be able to see and review it, making it my first “Second Chance Review.”

“Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2” attempts to bring back the clever charm that made the first so memorable. The results are mixed.

As a fan of the original “Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs,” I had my doubts about a sequel. I was especially concerned that the original writers (Phil Lord and Chris Miller – writers of “The Lego Movie” and “21 Jump Street”) did not return to write the sequel. Though they still helped conceive the story, the writers of the box-office bomb, “The Incredible Burt Wonderstone” took the helm this time around. The first film had such a tight ending that I honestly could not think of how they could continue the story. The answer is simple: they didn’t.

The beginning of this sequel completely contradicts the ending of the first movie, which didn’t seem in any way to imply a sequel. To demonstrate this, I will provide a brief summary of the first film.

In the first movie, a down-on-his-luck inventor named Flint Lockwood (played by Bill Hader) invents a machine that turns water into food. After it gets launched into the sky, the machine mixes with the moisture in the atmosphere to turn rain into food to feed his whole town. However, in a rage of gluttony, the mayor of the town (played by Bruce Campbell) manipulates Flint into ignore the dangers of his machine and use it more frequently. Eventually the machine malfunctions and sends humorously cataclysmic storms of food onto the town. Flint eventually succeeds in shutting off the machine and is crowned as a hero once he does. In the credits, it is shown that the town is revived from the disaster and Flint and his father start a company using a special rubber Flint invented as roof sealant.  

However…according to the sequel, another famous inventor named Chester V shows up after the first movie and offers to clean up the leftover food that destroyed the town. He then offers Flint a position at his company “Live Corp.” to which Flint accepts. This triggers the plot of the second film. This was quite jarring, especially since the movie starts off by showing clips from the first movie. It’s almost as if Sony wanted a sequel so badly, that they had to change the ending of the first movie.

                Moreover, this sequel continues the first movie is with the sudden introduction of a new character. His name is Chester V (played by Will Forte of “Nebraska”), a Steve Jobs-esque genius that apparently inspired the main character Flint Lockwood to invent things.

                “Now just hold the phone here,” I immediately thought to myself. In the first movie, Flint’s mother inspired him to invent to tell him it was okay to be a “nerd,” before her death later on in his life. Sure, she’s mentioned in this movie as one of Flint’s inspirations, but with the introduction of Chester V, she is no longer the main influence for his inventions. That’s right; they actually changed one of the main character’s backstories for the purpose of introducing a sequel. I was truly taken aback by this, but I was willing to ignore it if the rest of the movie was good.

                 Besides the massive continuity errors from the first movie, the sequel on its own does have quite a few positive aspects. One of these aspects is the “foodimals,” a group of food/animal hybrids created after the events of the first film. They alone made me want to check this movie out, and the creativity used to put them together is astounding. One “foodimal” is the apple pie-thon; a snake with apple pie and vanilla ice cream for a head, a strawberry twizzler for a body and tic-tacs for a rattle. Another is a mosque-toast: a mosquito with toasted bread for wings, a cinnamon stick for a body and raisins for eyes. These and more are bound to delight the viewer, and it is a pleasure to watch them on screen.

                The scenery itself is beautiful, lush and charming as well, with bogs made out of pancakes and syrup and mountains of rock candy. The art department certainly deserves all the praise it can get for creating such wonderful visuals. The same goes for the animation, which is fluent and smooth as can be. It really is one of the best looking animated films I’ve recently seen. It’s just unfortunate that the screenplay that the film sets its foundation on is not as astounding.

                Don’t get me wrong, this film does have its moments, and there are some clever jokes and quirky dialogue scenes that elevated the film for me. One instance is a character trying to storm off while struggling to walk in maple syrup. The food puns, a criticism among many reviews, was actually something I didn’t mind and found kind of cute. The dialogue itself flowed well too, and it could have thrived with a better story.

                Before I get to the true flaw of the screenplay, the increased use of juvenile humor compared to the first film is quite irritating. The first film did have toilet humor, but it was only one or two tiny jokes that barely distracted from how good it was. This film piles on more gross-out jokes, which is really out of place in a film about food. Jokes involving a strawberry defecating jam and a monkey writing with fecal matter really bring the value of the screenplay down. On the contrary, the toilet humor is nothing compared to the real problem with this movie: mediocre conflict.

                The first film had fleshed out conflicts like Flint’s relationship with his father (played by James Caan) and Flint’s ambition to be liked for his ambitions and inventions. In this film, they decide half-way through to introduce a conflict of Flint shunning his friends’ advice in favor of Chester V’s. This could have been a decent conflict if they fleshed it out more, but instead it pops out of nowhere like the Kool Aid Man bursting through a wall.

What’s worse is that this turns out to be one of the main conflicts in the movie. It is sort of implied in the beginning when Flint takes the position at Chester’s company instead of making a new one with his friends, but his friends encouraged him to take the position, and it seemed like the reasonable thing to do. It’s not even mentioned until midway through when Chester suggests that Brent (played by Andy Samberg) may still be a bully since he was one before Flint became a hero. It feels like the writers forgot to add a conflict and decided to throw one in at the last minute.

               

                 Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2 is not an awful film. Like I said, it does have its charm and its clever moments. Kids that loved the first will definitely get a kick out of it. Compared to the first film, this film’s taste buds aren’t as refined.  

Final Grade: C+

Need for Speed (PG-13): A Bumpy, but Fun Ride

         

          About a month ago, I placed “Need for Speed” as number five on my top five list of least-anticipated spring movies. While this movie certainly does have its flaws, it is far from the disaster it could have been. I dare even to say that with the delay of the next Fast and Furious movie, this is a pretty decent holdover for vehicle-based action fans.

                

          “Need for Speed” tells the story of a driver and mechanic named Tobey Marshall (played by Aaron Paul of “Breaking Bad”). Marshall seeks to avenge the death of his brother by defeating his slaughterer, millionaire car-enthusiast Dino Brewster (played by Dominic Cooper of “Captain America: The First Avenger”). Not wanting to be bested, Brewster places a bounty on him, and it is up to Marshall to get to the race before Dino’s goons kill him.

Let me start out by saying that I have not played any of the “Need for Speed” video games, even as a kid. I’m personally more of a fan of the Midnight Club games. Nevertheless, I’m at least sure that fans of racing games in general will love the set-pieces in this movie. Many of the vehicle stunts use real cars, and the near-flawless cinematography fits the high-octane race scenes perfectly. Viewers will certainly be on the edge of their seats with every crash and tight turn. The cars themselves are also pleasing to look at. From Ferraris to Lamborghinis to Mustangs, every vehicle is sleek and a pleasure to watch race on the track.

The race and chase scenes themselves are were this movie really shines. With every set piece come the sounds of revving engines and screeching tires, set perfectly to fine camera work and editing to give a truly exciting experience. While I am not one to complain about the use of CGI, the lack of it in the film’s production gave a much more believable look to the crashes and races, especially when the film cuts to go-pro-filmed footage of the airborne vehicle. To me, the use of the go-pro gave me the same exciting, immersive feeling that I felt while watching the barrel scene in “The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug.” When used well, I can honestly encourage filmmakers to use the go-pro camera to film

              

          A common criticism of the plot is that it is completely ridiculous and not in any way plausible in the real world. While this is certainly true, I feel that in an action/eye-candy oriented film like this, that it is best to leave your complaint notebook at the door and immerse yourself in the film’s world.  

When the suspension of disbelief is applied the story itself is not half bad. “Need for Speed’s” story was conceived by Academy-Award nominated screenwriter John Gatins and his brother George. Without giving anything away, the plot provides plenty of interesting events to keep the story moving and even bothers to throw in some character development. It’s far from an all-out character study like “Her,” but there are still a decent amount of scenes that bother to get the audience to care about the characters. Each character is given a decent amount of screen time, and I actually walked out remembering some of the characters. From the brooding but sincere Tobey Marshall to the comic relief of his friend Benny (played by musician Scott Mescudi –a.k.a. Kid Cudi), I felt that the fleshed out characters really added some meat to the action.

Though the story and characters themselves are not too shabby, I had a lukewarm opinion on the screenplay. Unfortunately, John Gatins only helped conceive the story. His brother George wrote the screenplay by himself, and his results are mixed. In films like “Fast and Furious 6” and “Iron Man 3,” the screenplay is well balanced with good humor and light drama to blend well with the fun factor. Here is a different story; the film’s tone will often switch from humorous antics (one such scene involving streaking at an office) to borderline-melodramatic scenes (such as one hospital scene). It is quite jarring and it feels as if Mr. Gatins was trying to take the film more seriously than it should have been taken.

Another thing I have to say is that this film felt a tad too long. Clocking in at over two hours, “Need for Speed” does contain some scenes that feel like they could have been cut and are there just for filler. While I did admire the development of the characters, some of the dialogue simply repeats what was already stated, leaving me to say “OK, I get it” a few times in my mind. Perhaps if the film was trimmed about 10-20 minutes short, then it would have been much smoother to suit the sleek action sequences.

This film is far from perfect, though to be honest, I was honestly entertained by it. While it’s impossible to deny that Hollywood has had a bad reputation adapting video games into movies, this was honestly a pretty good attempt. It’s not the saving grace of video game adaptations, but in my mind it is absolutely a step up from busts like “Resident Evil: Retribution” and “Silent Hill: Revelation.” If you love thrilling races and colorful cars, I can almost guarantee that you’ll be entertained.

Final Rating: B

Pompeii (PG-13): Enjoyable Eye Candy

It's pretty much impossible to say that "Pompeii" is a flawless film. It's love story is cliched and and its lighting at times leaves much to be desired. On the other hand, I believe the term "guilty pleasure" fits perfectly here, as I certainly enjoyed this movie enough to recommend it. 

"Pompeii" tells the story of the legendary natural disaster that covered the Italian city of Pompeii and its residents in ashes, preserving their bodies for eternity. Like "Titanic," "Pompeii" mixes in a star-crossed lovers story into the disaster genre. Following the rich-girl-loves-poor-boy trope, a wealthy woman named Cassia (played by Emily Browning of "Sucker Punch") falls in love with an enslaved gladiator named Milo (played by Kit Harrington of "Game of Thrones"). When Pompeii’s volcano erupts, it is up to Milo to save Cassia from being left to die in the eruption (there is more to the story but I don’t want to give anything away).

Admittedly, the love story is by far less convincing than the one in Titanic. The two leads Cassia  and Milo spend a bare minimum of time getting to know each other and their relationship lacks development. However, in a disaster movie that focuses more on providing audience-pleasing thrills, this is much less of a problem than it could have been.

On the contrary, Milo's relationship with a fellow slave named Atticus (played by Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje of "Thor: The Dark World") is surprisingly well developed throughout the film. In the first act, Milo learns that he must face Atticus, a man who has been promised freedom after one more battle. Several scenes of dialogue in a prison cell and action in the arena they are forced to fight in give the audience a good feel for who these characters are and give a good enough reason to root for them. Considering that this is a disaster movie made by Paul W.S. Anderson, both characters have a substantial amount of substance to them, and the actors give good enough performances to make their friendship believable. 

On the subject of Mr. Anderson, I have never really been a fan of his work. "The Three Musketeers" was mediocre at best and his "Resident Evil" movies are absolutely dreadful. Here he seems to have improved his ability to tell a story, though there are a few flaws here and there that carry over from his other works. Much like "Alien vs. Predator," Anderson struggles to properly light a few nighttime scenes, casting what could have been a great looking shot into 50% blackness. In addition, his editing can occasionally be choppy, but compared to something like "I, Frankenstein," it's nowhere near as jarring.  

To his credit, which I believe is often overlooked, Mr. Anderson certainly knows how to stage and take advantage of an action setpiece. One scene involving gladiators fighting soldiers chained to a spiked pillar made full use of its environment, and will likely have audiences entertained. Something else worth nothing are the special effects; they are very well done and it is clear that the VFX team put a lot of effort into bringing the legendary eruption of Mt. Vesuvias to the big screen. What's even better is the 3D; lately 3D has been sorely mediocre in Hollywood films, but in this case it is very effective. From volcanic ashes to falling beams of wood, "Pompeii" succeeds in taking full advantage of the 3D technology with stunning results. 

             The last act of the film is among one of the most thrilling disaster scenes I have ever scene in recent years. Fans of disaster movies will likely be pleased by all of the mindless carnage and destruction, and like "2012," the visual grandeur is seat-grippingly epic.

"Pompeii" is nowhere near a high-quality film, nor is it free from typical Hollywood cliches. However, this was not a film that left me feeling insulted or just jaded. Rather, this was actually a memorable disaster/action period piece that I could easily recommend taking some friends to see. The experience alone is pretty damn cool. 

Final Rating: B-

Top Five Most (and least) Hyped Spring Films

Ah yes, the springtime movie season of March and April; a time where studios warm up audiences for the big releases of summer. As opposed to last year where we were stuck with duds like "The Host," "Temptation" and "G.I. Joe 2," this year there are actually quite a few spring movies worth looking forward to. Of course there are some duds coming out too, but we'll get to those later. Here are my top five hyped springtime movies.

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Top 5 Most Hyped Spring Movies

5. Muppets Most Wanted

In 2011, Jason Seigel succeeded in his ambition to bring the Muppets to the public eye after several mediocre television movies and specials. Last Thanksgiving, the popularity of the Muppets took a hit from the ratings dud: "Lady Gaga & The Muppets' Holiday Spectacular." Hopefully, the latter won't negatively affect this film. This time around, it looks to be another blast to the past with the pop culture jokes and celebrity cameos that the Muppets got their start on. "Muppets Most Wanted" looks to be a whole-heated effort from a committed fun-loving cast and crew.

4. Divergent

Coming off of the success of the hit novel, "Divergent" could easily be another interesting entry in the dystopian and young adult sub-genres. What makes this movie more appealing is the fact that its star: Shailene Woodley is not dolled up in revealing outfits or tons of makeup (this does not pertain to the poster -seen above- which puts a strange emphasis on her skin-tight pants). This makes her outcasted, revolutionary character seem more believable and nowhere near the shallow mary-sue type character it could have been. With an appealing story of a world controlled by an aptitude test and a guaranteed visual flare, "Divergent" could very well be another early-year hit. I'll certainly check it out when it hits theaters.

3. Transcendence

Christopher Nolan's production company strikes back with a unique sci-fi film about a man brought back to life with a web-based computer system, practically downloading his brain to the internet. Besides the obvious visual eye candy, "Transcendence" seems to offer an interesting tale from a fresh-on-the-scene writing/directing. Even more appealing is the fact that the director has had plenty of experience as a cinematographer, serving as the photography director for films like the Dark Knight Trilogy and Inception. The film has the possibility of being a disappointment, but given the talent behind it (including Johnny Depp in a performance that could be a comeback after "The Lone Ranger"), "Transcendence" looks to at least be an enjoyable day at the movies.

2.  Captain America: The Winter Soldier

I personally found the first "Captain America" to be one of the best Marvel films. Though this film will lack the retro-50s flare of the first, it looks to be just as entertaining with thrilling set pieces and an overall sense of grandeur. This time around, Black Widow (among my favorite Marvel characters) joins the ride and Scarlett Johansson is guaranteed to put bums in the seats. That and a menacing-looking villain could very well make this another smash hit by Marvel. Even if you thought "Thor: The Dark World" was an underwhelming disappointment, it seems pretty hard to pass up a film like this, especially with "The Avengers 2" scheduled for 2015.

1. The Grand Budapest Hotel

Love him or hate him, Wes Anderson is an undeniably unique and colorful film maker. I for one absolutely love his films, and his love for symmetry and colorful eloquence looks to shine again in his next film. It is odd that the studio decided to release this film in March; after the triumphant "Moonrise Kingdom," one would thing that a film like this would be put in November for an Oscar campaign. On the bright side, a film like this so early in the year very much subverts the trope that early-year movies are of poor quality. With a massive but tasteful ensemble cast and a gleeful color palate, I'm marking my calendar for a 2 hour trip to Budapest this March.

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And now, because I want to pad out this post, here comes the top 5 least hyped films of March/April of 2014.

Top 5 Least Hyped Spring Movies

5. Need for Speed

Clearly somebody wants to capitalize on the massive success of the Fast and Furious movies. While those films have strayed away from street racing in favor of an action/heist style to widen audiences, this film looks to bring street racing back to the forefront. While I do give the film credit for trying to bring car culture back to the forefront, the film itself still looks forgettable. As most films based on video games, this strays far from the plotline of the series and simply seems to have the name "Need for Speed" to attract fans of the game. Though it is partially written by Academy Award-nominated writer John Gatins, what I've seen so far is less than appealing, with dialogue that tries too hard to be epic and a brooding tone that doesn't match the high-octane thrills the film promises to provide. There is a possibility that it could be a fun little joyride, and I will give it a chance when it arrives. Considering the history of attempted video-game based films though, that is unlikely.

4. The Single Moms Club

Tyler Perry has not been doing well lately. With critical duds like Temptation and A Madea Christmas (the latter under-performing significantly), "The Single Moms Club" looks to be another attempt to appeal to a fixed audience that contains an uneven tone of broad humor and dismal melodrama. Considering that "A Madea Christmas," alternated scenes of Madea "humorously" tying a bratty child to a cross with serious scenes of child abuse, this movie looks to do the same. It's unfortunate that Tyler Perry keeps cranking out movies like these when he could make competent films like "For Colored Girls" and "I Can Do Bad all by Myself." He's not even that bad of an actor. This film, while not looking nearly as bad as "Temptation," does nothing to grab my interest.

3. 300: Rise of an Empire 

Zack Snyder does not come across as a good writer. "Sucker Punch" pretty much proved that he pays little attention to the story and tries to waddle his way out of writing something decent with incoherent attempts at being artsy. To be honest, I wasn't really a fan of the original "300." It had its moments, but it came across as a monochromatic, overacted action movie that didn't know whether to be serious or silly. This looks to copy that, adding nothing more than a rehash of the same slow-motion effects and bloody but  forgettable fight scenes. What's more troubling is the fact that this film serves as a prequel, a sequel, and even a midquel to the original "300." This pretty much guarantees that the film will be a mangled up mess of plotlines and
shallow characters.

2. A Haunted House 2

Apparently "Scary Movie 5" was so bad, that people thought that the original "A Haunted House" was a masterpiece and asked for a sequel. While it was indeed superior, "A Haunted House" was still a painful display of mugging by Marlon Wayans and a slop of racial stereotypes and lazy slapstick. "A Haunted House 2" will repeat this indeed, and unless you are a fan of the first one, it will be the ultimate movie to skip this March.

1. The Other Woman

A rehash of the film "John Tucker Must Die," "The Other Woman" sees a group of women trying to get revenge on a man that cheated on all of them. From what I've seen so far, this looks like nothing more than a bland buddy comedy with unlikable, immature characters much like the abysmal "Bride Wars." I could also mention that this will include the fearful acting debut of Nicki Minaj, but I'm betting that it will be an overblown cameo that is not worth mentioning. Cameron Diaz is far from a bad actress, but she needs to be more selective and pick something that does not look as forgettable as this.

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On a closing note, I'd like to add that my review of The Lego Movie will be up soon, as I plan on re-watching it in the near-future.

Quick-Write: No Lego Review This Week

          I did indeed see The Lego Movie last weekend, however I did not review it. Why? Because I couldn't grade it fairly. You see, I went into the movie expecting a fun-filled and giddy adventure with plenty of action setpieces and humor. While this is true for the first two acts of the film, the final act takes an emotional and somewhat downbeat turn that I did not expect. I cannot spoil it but I can say that there is an emotional plot twist that confused me. Emotion is the last thing I expected out of a film like this, so I at first thought it was a total tone-shifter and did not belong in the movie. However, at the same time, there is nothing wrong with a movie having emotion.

         Just look at Toy Story 3, the whole movie is full of emotional scenes and downbeat moments mixed in with the jokes. However, upon first viewing, I loved it and found nothing off about it. That was likely because I expected it from a trilogy-ending Pixar movie. For a movie about toys, I did not expect Lego to have ANY emotional scenes, but that is not a problem with the film. Therefore, I need to view The Lego Movie again with proper expectations so that I can fairly grade it.