Saturday, October 22, 2011

Day Thirty: The Host

Day Thirty: Your favorite movie of all time
I love a good monster movie, which are few and far between. A movie where there is just a monster causing chaos, people getting trampled, buildings getting destroyed.  It's my jam.

When a monster comes out of a river in South Korea, Seoul gets put into chaos. Tons of people are either killed or go missing. When one family gets a missing relative because of the attack, the family bands together to search for her. They don't want to admit she was killed, so instead they hunt down the monsters hide out to see if they can figure out what happened to their youngest family member.

This movie has so much heart. Even when the monster is causing havoc, there is something emotion going on in the background. I find the monster incredibly interesting and unique and the main characters are honest and heartfelt. More people need to see this movie, I never get tired of watching it.

And that's the end of my Thirty Movie Day.. thing. I was almost able to post everyday. Sorta. It was close enough anyways. So onto new reviews, I have a few planned out already so it won't be too long before I have a new one up.

Friday, October 21, 2011

Day Twenty- Nine: Fantasia

Day Twenty-Nine: A movie from your childhood
You know how everyone has that one movie they watched over and over as a kid? Well Fantasia was that movie for me. I'm not sure what about it enthralled me so much - it's not the common movie kids repeatedly watch.

There isn't really a plot to Fantasia. They took classical works of music and added footage to it. For example they took the song Dance of the Hours by Amilcare Ponchielli and shows hippos and crocodiles doing ballet together. Or The Pastoral Symphony by Ludwig van Beethoven which had some Greek mythological characters including Zeus, Bacchus the God of Wine along with centaurs and the such.

I can still sit down to watch this movie and love it. I would also suggest Fantasia 2000, which has the best of Fantasia along with new additions. Some of my favorite song... video.. things are from Fantasia 2000 - they really upped the A game for that one.

Monday, October 17, 2011

Day Twenty-Eight: Howl's Moving Castle (Hayao Miyazaki)

Day Twenty-Eight: Favorite movie from your favorite director
Everything Hayao Miyazaki makes is gold. If you aren't that aware of anime, you may remember the animated movie Spirited Away that won an Oscar 2003 - well that was not only a Miyazaki movie (however my least favorite one), but also the first Japanese animated movie to win the category. Miyazaki has an impressive list of movies that he's made, or helped to make, or even just influenced. My Neighbor Totoror, Spirited Away, Princess Mononoke, Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind, Porco Roso, Castle in the Sky, Ponyo, Kiki's Delivery Service, Grave of the Fireflies and of course Howl's Moving Castle, are just some of them. Fun fact: one of the reasons Pixar movies are so good is because Pixar makes a habit of scooping up old Studio Gibli people - Studio Gibli being the company Miyazaki co-created and works in. Pixar admited that Toy Story 3 was a homage to Miyazaki, they even included a Totoro doll in the movie.

Sophie, a strong willed young woman, gets cursed by the Witch of the Waste which turns her into an old woman. With nothing left for her at home, she sets out to start fresh and finds her way to a warlock named Howl and his strange moving castle. There she strikes up a deal with the fire demon Calcifer who powers the entire castle- he promises to remove the curse on  her, if she can remove the curse on him. While trying to figure out what the curse even is let alone how to break it, Sophie finds herself falling in love with the mysterious Howl.

Howl's Moving Castle is one of the cutest stories around. A story about love despite appearances and per-determined opinions. A story about never giving up even when it seems hopeless. I watch this moving when I'm feeling down, when I'm feeling happy, even when I'm mad and just need to watch something. I even loved this movie so much that I went out of my way to read the book it was based off of (which is equally good and adorable by the way).

Sunday, October 16, 2011

Day Twenty-Seven: 28 Days Later

Day Twenty-Seven: A movie that you wish you had seen in theaters
I love zombie. I can get all over anything and everything that has to do with zombies. It's my thing; I have my Zombie Apocalypse survival plan laid out already and everything. I can even remember exactly when my love affair with the living dead - when I saw 28 Weeks Later. (Lets ignore the fact that those aren't zombies in 28 Days Later and 28 Weeks Later, I didn't know that at the time.)

Jim wakes up in a hospital after a car accident, only to find the entire place deserted and in ruins. He walks out into the streets of London to also find that deserted, that is until he happens upon a group of Rage Virus infected humans and gets chased down. He happens upon other survivors and learns that 98% of the population became infected with a virus that turns them into animalistic creatures that are only left with rage. They are basically the equivalent of a super rabid dog. Together Jim and the other survivors try to find a safe place to live in the new world they live in which trying to defend themselves against getting infected too.

Remember when I said I'm incapable of handling scary movies? Well I had to get dragged to 28 Weeks Later because I was so sure that 28 Weeks Later fell under that category of something I'd be incapable of watching. I can't express how surprised I was when I came out loving it. Since then I've gotten knee deep in the Zombie Business. My biggest regret is that I didn't get a chance to see 28 Days Later, the far superior of the two movies, in theaters to begin my obsession much sooner.

Friday, October 14, 2011

Day Twenty-Six: Cloverfield

Day Twenty-Six: A movie that you love but everyone else hates
This is a movie that you either love or hate. Although most of the hate is because people got queasy from all the shakey cam. I loved this movie. I'm into a good monster movie and I could definitely see where JJ Abrams was trying to go with it - Godzilla for America. King Kong isn't really a monster, he's just a sad monkey who wants to go home, so I personally don't really count King Kong. Obviously, Cloverfield didn't really gain the same popularity of Godzilla, or King Kong for that matter.

Cloverfield centers on a small group of people as New York gets attacked and destroyed by a monster. That's all there is to it really - it's just a straight up monster movie. Things blow up, buildings get destroyed, there's chaos everywhere. Just a bunch of good ol' monster madness.

I'm not afraid to admit that the main reason I love this movie is because I got sucked into the viral marketing. In case you don't know, 6 months before Cloverfield came out, it's teaser trailer was shown before Transformers. I was sold instantly. It didn't even show the title for the movie. Then I went home to google it, and was introduced to the wonders of viral marketing. From that point on, I was constantly looking for newly released Cloverfield related material. I had screenshots on my computer from the trailer where I though you could see the monster, I joined discussions about what the monster could be, and I spent hours on the main site trying to find clues to anything and everything. I could tell you the entire back story of every main character in the movie along with where the monster came from and everything. I even have a Slusho shirt. Don't judge me for my obsessions. Almost every waking hour of 6 months of my life was dedicated to Cloverfield. After all of that time and effort spent into it, it was practically impossible to not like the movie since I also knew all the back story that they didn't tell you in the movie - which by the way made all of us who were deep in the viral marketing feel awfully special.

Anyways, I don't care if you don't like Cloverfield. It's oddly nostalgic for me and I'm not afraid to get all up in the Cloverfield action.

Thursday, October 13, 2011

Day Twenty-Five: Hamlet 2

Day Twenty-Five: The most hilarious movie you’ve ever seen
This was another hard category to fill. mostly because it's not very often a movie gets me doubled over in laughter. The movies I do tend to find funny are more witty word play opposed to actual hilarity. Since Hamlet 2 was the first actual comedy I could think of, I decided to just go with that.

Hamelt 2 follows Dana Marschz who is a failed actor that then decided to teach Theater at a school to a total of 2 student. Between the 3 of them they produce downright terrible plays, then to top it off everything in Dana's life just generally sucks. One day when he goes into Theater class to find it packed full of students - apparently their usual easy A classes were cut, leaving them only with Theater.  When Dana is told Theater was being cut at the end of the year, Dana decides to put together one huge play to try and save it. He stays up all night trying to come up with a play for them to do, his finished product turning out to be extremely controversial in their town - Hamlet 2. A sequel to Hamlet. You know, the Shakespeare play where everyone dies at the end.

My problem with most comedies is that I hate poop jokes. It's just not my cup of tea. I consider 'hilarious' when you can't breath because you're laughing too hard - and you just don't really get that from witty word play. Hamlet 2 is one of the few movies that gets me to that 'hilarious' state, which is definitely saying something.

Tuesday, October 11, 2011

Day Twenty-Four: Zombie in Space

Day Twenty-Four: That one awesome movie idea that still hasn’t been done yet

This one took me a bit to figure out what to write. The only thing I wrote down on my list for this was 'Zombie in Space'. I guess I didn't realize I'd have no idea how to write about it, so here's it goes.

Imagine a future, maybe Cowboy Bebop-esque or maybe instead like Firefly. Our main characters land at a planet to do their thing, and they here rumors of a sickness spreading. On their way back to their ship, a guy stumbles in their way, a moaning groaning guy, who immediately tries to eat their face off. The entire dock gets put on lock down and the planet is put into quarantine making it impossible to leave. Now our main characters have to fight off zombies to stay alive and try and get off the planet all illegally and stuff.

That's all I got.

Sunday, October 9, 2011

Day Twenty-Three: Finding Nemo

Day Twenty-Three: Favorite Animation
Let's just say I'm all over the Pixar. Except for Cars, I've loved every Pixar movie I've seen. But at the top of that list is definitely Finding Nemo. It makes me laugh so hard at times, then is able to do a complete 180 and make me borderline crying. I can't count the number of time my family has sat down together to watch this movie, it might just be all of our favorites.

Finding Nemo follows overly cautious Marlin as he searches for his son Nemo who got taken by the humans. Along the way he meets Dori, a fish with short term memory loss who believes she can talk to whales, Bruce, a vegetarian shark, and Crush, a radical sea turtle. This is a story of love, the willingness to do anything for someone and the desire to keep going - even when it seems impossible.

This movie has so much heart in it. The characters get so much depth to much that you start to feel like you really know Marlin, Dori and Nemo. I could honestly sit down and watch this movie over and over and over again without getting tired of it - I love it that much. This is one of the few movies where I've actually laughed so hard that I couldn't breath, as well as one of the few movies that I started getting all teary eyed for. Maybe I'll watch this movie again this week.

Saturday, October 8, 2011

Day Twenty-Two: This Film Is Not Yet Rated

Day Twenty-Two: Favorite documentary
If you haven't noticed, I'm a big movie fan. So when I was presented with a documentary ABOUT movies, well, I got all up on that.

This Film Is Not Yet Rated is about how the movies system gives movies its rating. It talks about how the MPAA(Motion Picture Association of America) is corrupted. How easy it is to pay off the board members to sway its rating higher - usually forcing the movie maker to change their movie around for contract reasons. The big thing they talk about is the boarder between getting an R rating and getting a NC-17 rating. Specifically the fact that it's an extremely biased process relying on the boards personal feels opposed to any per-determined guidelines.

This documentary made me extra watchful of R rated movies, seeing just what they allowed and what they didn't. I'm definitely still all up in the movie love, but I'm a little more watchful - willing to look past just what the MPAA says is appropriate and what isn't. This documentary is definitely for anyone who doesn't just love movies, but is also sorta curious about the process of getting a movie onto the big screen - for which getting it rated can be the biggest speed bump.

Thursday, October 6, 2011

Day Twenty-One: Rambo

Day Twenty-One: Favorite action movie
I was going to put Rambo:First Blood in this spot, but I'm not sure if that is Action-y enough. It's more stealthy and emotional. Whereas the new one is just murdering a whole bunch of people.

Rambo is now in Burma, trying to make a living on his own terms and away from the United States. Some Peace Corps type group seeks out Rambos' boss boating skills to take them up to Burmese refugee camp. Somehow they convince Rambo to take them despite his multiple warnings that it was super dangerous. Long story short, Rambo was right and had to kill a whole bunch of people. Like all the people.

This movie definitely doesn't have the heart and emotion behind Rambo: First Blood, but it's still a whole lot of fun. Unlike in the first movie where Rambo utilizes Vietnamese techniques to individually hunt down everyone. However in this one, he at one point hops onto a Gatling Gun and just kills everyone. This is also one of the few movies where if someone asks me what happens in it, my answer is 'Everyone Dies'. So that's pretty cool.

Wednesday, October 5, 2011

Day Twenty: Fright Night with David Tennant

Day Twenty: Favorite movie from your favorite actor/actress
To be honest, my main reasoning for seeing this movie was because of David Tennant. I never saw the original and probably never would have even heard of it if it wasn't for the David Tennant-ness of this movie. Don't get me wrong, I love vampires, I'm a huge Interview With A Vampire fan. Also the fact that Colin Farrell was going to be the vampire and Anton Yelchin was the main guy were big pluses. It's just that David Tennant was the huge selling point for this movie.

Fright Night follows Charley after he fulfilled every teenagers high school dream of becoming popular and getting a hot girlfriend. So he does what every newly formed popular kid tries to do - distance himself from his old friends. However that become extremely harder to do when his super nerd ex-friend comes to him saying that their Third Musketeer got eaten by a vampire, who also happens to be his neighbor Jerry. At first, Charley doesn't believe it, but when he's provided with undeniable proof he understandably freaks out. Now he takes it upon himself to kill Jerry the Vampire.

This movie is a killing fest, which I love. You actually care about the main characters and the movie definitely doesn't beat around the bush about getting to the vampire part. David Tennant isn't in a whole lot of this movie, but when he does have screen time he definitely steals every scene. This is actually the second David Tennant movie I have put on this list. The first being Casanova, where he of course played Casanova. There is just something about David Tennant that draws me in, not matter what he's in.

Tuesday, October 4, 2011

Day Nineteen: X-Men 2

Day Nineteen: Favorite movie based on a comic
Remember when I said I love the X-Men? Well I guess it's no real surprise then that it's my favorite movie based on a comic book. Briefly I debated putting Spiderman 2 or Thor in this spot, but then I decided I love this movie way too much to bump it. Who cares if I already did a movie review based on the X-men universe, I'm doing it again. So there.

In the first movie we mostly followed and were introduced to Rouge and Wolverine. This time around Wolverine is in the center of the plot. Someone has been controlling mutants and making them perform 'Mutant Freedom' acts that greatly in-dangers multiple high up humans. Of course the X-Men aren't to pleased about that. Quickly it becomes apparent that Wolverines' quest to find out about his past and the X-Men's quest to find the guy behind the attacks are connected.

The characters were done so well in this movie and it had wonderful scenes with them. Even though Magneto was arrested at the end of the first movie, he still shows up in this one through visits from Xavier. They do an excellent job of showing the old friendship between Xavier and Magneto - even though they are on different sides, they still don't completely hate each other.

We also get to see some teenage mutants. I'm sure it would be incredibly difficult being a teenage mutant at that time. It's already hard being a teenager, having to deal with school, making friends, general drama and such. Now add in that you have powers, and if you go to Xaviers School then all your friends also have different powers that none of you can completely control yet. All around you is the beginning whispers of a war brewing. People are picketing mutants, governments are trying to find ways to control and restrict mutants, and there are even other mutants that are making trouble with the humans as well as Xavier's school. Personally I'd feel so.. caught up in everything. There would be so much anger, hate, and violence everywhere. Being a teenager is hard enough, a mutant teenager even harder, but a mutant teenager growing up during war times? Even worse.

I find it fascinating to think about. Obviously.

Monday, October 3, 2011

Day Eighteen: Wristcutters: A Love Story

Day Eighteen: A movie that you wish more people would’ve seen
No, this isn't a movie making light of suicide. If anything this is the opposite, an anti-suicide movie. I forget when I first watched it, but it's definitely one of my favorite movies. Has some romance, comedy, life lessons, heartfelt scenes, Tom Waits. What's not to love? (I did mention of the Tom Waits part right?)

Wristcutters follows a guy, Zia, right after he kills himself (by cutting his wrists, see where the title is from? Get it?) The movie suggests the idea that after you kill yourself, you wake up in this alternate world consisting only of other people who have killed themselves where everything is slightly.. worse. All the walls are more grey, the jobs slightly more sucky, the people more depressing since everyone there has found some reason in the past to kill themselves. However everyone in the world is afraid to kill themselves again, worried they'd end up in a world even worse than that one - so instead they just go about living. Zia killed himself because his girlfriend Desiree broke up with him, but while in this alternate world he gets wind that Desiree killed herself shortly after him. Now Zia goes on a quest to find his ex-girlfriend to reunite with her along with his two new friends Mikal, who is looking for the People in Charge with the belief she was put in this world by mistake, and Eugene.

I seriously love this movie. It's so beautifully crafted, doesn't hit you over the head with its life lessons and moves at a good pace. It can be so heart warming one second, then laugh out loud the next. And the soundtrack for the movie? Excellent. Gogol Bordello did most, if not all, of the music. If you haven't heard of Gogol Bordello yet, you probably should. They are a Ukraine gypsy punk rock band, who I dig real hard. I could listen to their song Start Wearing Purple all day long. And I have too.

Sunday, October 2, 2011

Day Seventeen: X-Men Orgins: Wolverine

Day Seventeen: A movie that disappointed you the most
I'm a huge X-Men fan. The main reason I love Marvel more than DC is because Marvel has the X-Men. I absolutely loved the first two movies, as in a periodically re-watch them, and the third one was.. okay. Not great by any means, but not Spiderman 3 bad. To be honest I didn't have very high hopes for it - something about third movies just always seems to go bad (see: Spiderman 3, Shriek 3, ect.). Well for Wolverine I was unbelievably excited for it. Wolverine is just an interesting character that I'm sure it'd make a kick-ass movie. Then I heard Gambit was going to be in it - and I. love. Gambit. Easily my favorite character ever and the fact that they were going to put him in the movies satisfied every excited particle of my being.

X-Men Origins: Wolverine set up out Logan's early life. How he grew up, first found out about his mutant powers, who he made friends with, eventually leading up to the amnesia ridden mutant we knew in the X-Men movies. Along the way there was Sabertooth, Deadpool, a young Cyclops, Gambit, The Blob, William Stryker. The whole gang. It was suppose to be so wonderful.

Well it wasn't. It wasn't even kinda wonderful. The CGI for Wolverines claws was strangely terrible even though it was great in the X-Men movies, a lot of the acting wasn't too great at times, and it was like they didn't even read the characters back stories. Logans' was generally right, but Deadpool and Gambits? So wrong. It's like they took the wonderful character Gambit was and watered him down until he was a boring blob of nothing. And Deadpool? Definitely one of the best characters was destroyed. The Deadpool everyone knew and loved was a psychotic mercenary who was incapable of dying because of a healing mutation who occasionally broke the 4th wall  and talked directly to the reader. Well Ryan Reynolds did great as early Deadpool, before all that stuff set into place. Then they turned him into Weapon X and destroyed him, he no longer had the flamboyant and enthusiastic personality where he'd sometimes shoot himself in the head just because he knew he couldn't die. It was just.. sad. The movie ended and I just sat in the theater, surrounded by a bubble of disappointment and crushed childhood.

Saturday, October 1, 2011

Day Sixteen: Cars

Day Sixteen: A movie that you used to love but now hate
When I first saw Cars in theaters, I loved it. I told everyone I knew how good it was and how enjoyable it was even though I wasn't 10 years old. Then I didn't even really think about it for years and years. Just recently I was at my cousins house and my little cousin suggested watching Cars. Well of course I was all for it, why not? Last I remembered I loved that movie. Turns out I don't anymore. Some of the lines made me cringe and the characters got annoying. The movie in general was so.. un-Pixar like.

If you don't know, Cars follows Lightning McQueen who is a famous race car. Somehow he gets lost on the way to the biggest race of his life and gets stuck in some little town no one has heard of. There he learns to not be such a dick all the time and gain some friends.

Boy the main character is extremely unappealing. McQueen has no redeeming qualities as the entire movie just basically yells "hey look, he's learning life lessons. In case you haven't figured it out yet, he's learning a life lesson. Just checking you didn't miss the life lesson McQueen just learned." Maybe it's because of all the other extremely good Pixar movies that have come out, but Cars just leaves a bad taste in my mouth now.