The Social Network (2010)

Directed by: David Fincher

Starring: Jesse Eisenberg, Andrew Garfield, Justin Timberlake

IMDB Page

Without a doubt, Facebook has changed the landscape of the internet ever since its debut in 2003. Its even changed what happens when you meet new people, usually you'll hear a "Facebook me" instead of a request for a phone number. Its now become somewhat socially taboo when someone tells you that they don't use Facebook for any variety of reasons. As it turns out, the creation and first few years of the worlds most popular of social network were a rather turbulent affair. It was only a matter of time before Hollywood would manufacture a dramatized version of that story. 

Don't worry, not that dramatized. 

Jesse Eisenberg fills the shoes of the site's creator, Mark Zuckerberg. He's a somewhat awkward college student with a knack for computer programming. After being dumped by a girlfriend, he goes on a drunken blogging rampage about his recent ex. He also creates a simple site, called Facemash, meant to demean female students. The site quickly gathers so much traffic that it crashes the university's computer network. Zuckerburg and a couple friends soon realize how a social networking site could catch on. Along with some (alleged) inspiration from a pair of twins trying to start their own site, Mark and his friends soon create "The Facebook". It becomes wildly popular, and the rest is history. Oh, and Zuckerburg's former friends and business partners file millions of dollars in lawsuits against him for intellectual property infringement and for selling off most of one of the founder's stock. 

The film is presented by cutting back and fourth between disposition for the lawsuits, and pivotal events in Facebook's history, and events relevant to the lawsuit. Its a simple format, but its very well done. The disposition scenes only make up a small percentage, but the film would have felt completely different without them. 

The biggest thing The Social network has going for it is the cast. All of the lead actors are superb. Andrew Garfield plays Eduardo Saverin, one of Mark's early business partners. Justin Timberlake is good as the smarmy Sean Parker, founder of the controversial Napster music sharing site who moved on to Facebook. Jesse Eisenburg's Zuckerberg is definitely an interesting character. At first, the self righteous college student kind of gets on your nerves. By the end of the film, you feel a little better about him, but still can't help but thinking he a bit of a jerk. 

Bottom Line: 8/10: The Social Network is an interesting film about the people who changed social networking forever. The real life versions of these characters have seen the film, and have said that the events and characters were altered a bit. I can't say its 100% accurate as to how Facebook came to be and its struggles along the way, but it sure is entertaining. 

  

MacGruber (2010)

Directed by: Jorma Taccone 

Starring: Will Forte, Kristen Wiig, Ryan Phillippe

IMDB Page

I didn't go into MacGruber with awfully high expectations. It is, after all, a film based off of a Saturday Night Live sketch, and therefore should be graded on a curve. Even with that taken into consideration, MacGruber manages only to be slightly better than terrible. 

Sorry, Pat... You're still in last place. But it was close. 

MacGruber, on its face, is a parody of 1980's TV action shows. Once you start watching, you'll notice the only things it draws from this source material is the main character's looks, and something to name the film. MacGruber (Forte) is an ex secret agent, skilled (so they say) in making weapons out of everyday objects. He is approached by the US government to stop a terrorist, Dieter Von Cunth (Val Kilmer) who has stolen a nuclear weapon. MacGruber is reluctant to take the mission, until he hears that the terrorist behind the plot is the same man who killed his wife years earlier. 

The humor is low brow, and usually consists of copious use of the F-word, and various instances of bathroom humor. Not that I have a problem with bathroom humor or cursing, its just that this film uses them as a substitute for actual humor. I could have pitched this to a group of third graders, and they could have told me I was a dumb ass and come up with something substantially better themselves.  The film managed to make me chuckle only a couple of times. And when it does find a joke that doesn't fall flat on its face, it repeated it multiple times until you are sick of it. Even the jokes that don't work are repeated more than once. 

Guys, guys.. Get this. We'll do the celery up the butt bit, not once -pay attention now- but twice. 

Bottom Line: 3/10:  Most of the jokes aren't funny, the characters can be annoying, and the story is downright dull. Watching Macgruber was only slightly less painful than having a vegetable shoved in your rear.  

Predators (2010)

Directted by: Nimród Antal

Starring: Adrien Brody, Alice Braga, Laurence Fishburne

IMDB Page

I'll be honest, I wasn't expecting a whole lot from Predators. After the disasters that were the two Alien VS Predator films, I didn't think there was much life left in the series. Luckily the creative team behind this film thought the same as I did about the AVP films, and decided to ignore that storyline altogether. They drew most, if not all, of their inspiration from the first film.  Predators is a fun, no-brainer action movie, that gives a slick 2010 feel to the 1987 classic.

We open on our main character, Royce (Brody), as he is in freefall.  His parachute opens and he lands less than gracefully in a jungle. There, he meets up with a few other people who have fallen in the same fashion he has. Most of them are all killers of some kind (save for one doctor): Special forces, mercenaries, mass murderers, and gang hit men. They soon realize that the're not on earth anymore, and that something is hunting them.

One of the best thing that Predators does well is the casting. Adrien Brody is perfect as the impromptu leader of the group trying to survive. Alice Braga does well in her role as the tough Israeli soldier, who reluctantly follows Royce in their attempt to get off the planet. 

However, there are a couple of cast members that don't totally fit in. Laurence Fishburne is Roland, a crazy soldier that has been trapped on the predator planet for years. His acting is great, I was just surprised at how small his part ended up being. It seems as though the character was tacked on just so they could get another big name actor in the credits. Eric Foreman Topher Grace also feels awkward as a seemingly harmless doctor. Its another role that doesn't seem like it has a lot of purpose to it. Intentional for the character or not, Topher just seems out of place in a gritty action film.

"I'll never be typecast all the way out here in the jungle."

Bottom Line: 8/10: Predators is one of those no-thought-required action films. It managed to hold my attention from beginning to end, while capturing the feel of the original 1987 film. Best of all, it pretended like the AVP films never happened. 

The Mystery Team (2009)

Directed by: Dan Eckman

Starring: Donald Glover, D.C. Pierson, Dominic Dierkes

IMDB Page

The Mystery Team is a raunchy film from the guys at Derrik Comedy. They have gained a pretty big following on YouTube, and their increased popularity has allowed them to make their first feature length film. The humor is low brow, some of the jokes fell flat, and the acting can be a bit shaky in some areas. However, that didn't stop me from laughing out loud on more than one occasion. 

Our three main characters, Jason (Glover), Duncan (Pierson) and Charlie (Dierkes), are a trio of high school seniors, who seem to be stuck in their elementary school years. They venture around the neighborhood, solving "mysteries" for much younger kids. They mostly stick to juvenile "crimes" to solve, but still wish to  move on to become big league detectives some day. Most of their peers and elders are frustrated with them, seeing them as a bunch of naive losers. (Which they are.) Soon, The Mystery team gets a chance to prove themselves. A little girl commissions them to find out who killed her parents. Right from the onset, the team is dragged into a world of hired killers, gentlemen's clubs, and drug dealers. 

"Hi, we'd like to buy some cocaine." 

Most of the humor is low brow, with a few clever puns tossed in here and there. I didn't have any problems with most of the jokes, but I can still appreciate fart jokes. A few of the gags do fall flat, but the film doesn't dwell on them. It moves past them so quick and hits you with a new joke that you soon forget the one that didn't work so great. There are a few points where the film can get pretty disgusting- involving vomit and a scene inside of a seedy strip club bathroom. 

The acting, for the most part, is pretty solid. Glover steals the show with this one, while Pierson is close behind. Dierkes struggles in some places, and its pretty obvious, but he still manages to supply a good amount of laughs. The film manages to look pretty good considering it's low budget. Granted, there aren't any major action sequences or big special effects. 

Bottom Line: 7/10: Those who appreciate sophisticated humor should look elsewhere. For those who like bathroom humor, The Mystery Team may be perfect for you. The jokes fly at you non stop, the story is interesting, and the characters are enjoyable. I hope to see more from these guys in the future, it would be cool to see what they could do with more resources available. 

The Mist (2007)

Directed by: Frank Darabont 

Starring: Thomas Jane, Nathan Gamble, Marcia Gay Harden

IMDB Page

The Mist is a horror film adapted from a Stephen King novella. I haven't read the book (Who reads those anymore?), so I can't say how accurate it is compared to its source material. I can say its pretty dang scary and equally depressing.

The Mist takes place in the state of Maine, like a lot of Stephen King stories do. (Well, I haven't read much from him, but he is from Maine.)  David Drayton (Jane) is an accomplished artist, living in a nice house with his son, Billy (Nathan Gamble). After a rather turbulent storm, the two join their arrogant lawyer-neighbor, Brent (Andre Braugher), to venture into town for some supplies. After reaching the supermarket, the town is covered in a thick mist. Things turn even more strange after a bloodied man runs into the store, yelling about there being "things in the mist". The store is locked down as more odd events start to happen. Soon, it is relieved that there are truly "things" in the mist, as one of the store employees is dragged away by a couple spike laden tentacles. More and more creatures of various types begin to attack the store over the course of the night. David must soon put himself and his son at risk once the survivors' mob mentality turns out to be as dangerous as the creatures attacking them. 

Your local forecast: Highs in the mid 50s with mostly cloudy skies. Low visibility with a 90% chance of being eaten by giant tentacle monsters. 

The Mist manages to be a pretty frightening film. The various monsters are downright terrifying. There are the giant tentacle monsters, which you never really see in their entirety. There are football sized fly like creatures, that have a lethal bite. There are mutant pterodactyl creatures that eat the fly creatures, but will still eat your face. Also: 

AHHHHHHHHHH SOMEONE GET A FLAMETHROWER! 

Spiders. Too many spiders.Millions of little spiders. Spiders that shoot acid web.  Four foot tall giant spiders. Medium sized spiders, that like to jump on top of your head. If you have any degree of arachnophobia, you might want to watch this film with a change of undergarments ready. Or put the television in the bathroom, so you can watch from atop the throne and not have to worry about cleanup. 

Forget the flamethrower, I'm skipping right to the thermonuclear bomb. 

Apart from the fact it managed to scare me, there are a few things wrong with The Mist. First of all, the acting can seem a bit over the top and clichéd at times. (Although the only black guy isn't the first one to die.) I remember a couple scenes were ruined by an odd or over acted reaction from one of the characters. Not all of the acting is bad, there are some parts where the terrified murmur of the crowd as a monster or dead body comes into view will send a chill down your spine.

Thats not a kite on the other end of that rope... 

My biggest beef was with the way the religious zealot is portrayed. She serves as another villain along with the monsters, destroying the logic of the trapped people as they try to make a plan for survival. I'm not very religious to begin with, but I think the way they hammered the bible thumping types was a bit too over the top. The fact that people actually listened to her insane rants, even going as far to kill someone by throwing them out of the store, seemed a bit odd to me. 

(Minor spoiler below. Don't read the next paragraph if you haven't seen the film yet.) 

Those looking for a happy ending might not enjoy this one either. The film's conclusion is deeply depressing. I don't want to give too much of it away, but the actions of the main character seemed pretty hasty considering what he did. It just didn't seem like a normal person would choose to do what he did with almost no hesitation. 

Bottom Line: 6/10: The Mist is a truly scary film. Its held back by only a couple things, mostly I didn't like the ending. Its a well put together film, I enjoyed watching it, but wouldn't opt for another viewing. It just left a bad taste in my mouth.

Dead Alive (1992)

Directed by: Peter Jackson

Starring: Timothy Balme, Diana Penalver, Ian Watkin

IMDB Page

Browsing Netflix instant watching options one lazy afternoon, I stumbled onto a zombie category. Being a fan of zombie films, I quickly started looking through. I had never seen Dead Alive (Known as "BrainDead" to overseas audiences) before, thinking it was going to be awful. It had relatively good reviews on Neflix, and it claimed to be the "The goriest fright film of all time", so I figured "Why the heck not?". While it might not be very frightening, it sure keeps its promise of being "the goriest". 

Clam down, its only a flesh wound.

Dead Alive is less of a scary movie, and more of a dark comedy; with a very, very, very sick sense of humor.  Its a story about Lionel (Balme), a socially awkward mama's boy, who is constantly being controlled by his evil overbearing mother. His mother is soon infected after being bitten by a strange creature at a zoo, and begins slowly turning into a zombie. Lionel tries desperately to hide what is happening to his mum, as a few more zombies are created in the process. Eventually, he has to fight through an entire horde of the living dead in order to save the girl of his dreams. Also, lots and lots of blood. 

Dead Alive isn't very scary at all, but it is a shock film. The gore is so insanely over the top, its not realistic in the slightest. However, that doesn't mean it isn't stomach turning. I found myself grossed out several times over the course of the film, and that is saying something. Some of the ideas for killing humans and zombies are as brilliant as they are disgusting. The effects are well done, on par with films like The Thing. The folks behind this picture have some very active imaginations... And maybe a bit of mental illness as well. Zombies are torn to shreds, impaled, disemboweled, ground up, pummeled to death, and hacked to pieces.  To hammer the point home, have a look at this tidbit taken from the IMDB trivia page:

"During the lawnmower scene, movie blood was pumped at five gallons per second."

You now want to watch this movie.

One of the most surprising things about this film is the director: Peter Jackson. Yes, the same guy who directed the Lord of the Rings films and the upcoming Hobbit films made a film that features two zombies having sex, and a reanimated pile of guts complete with farting anus. 

Bottom Line: 7/10: Its not for everyone, but I enjoyed it. There's not much to the story, but that isn't what this film is about. You're here to watch a man get his entire ribcage torn from his chest and to see a disembodied head mashed into a running blender, not for a deep and interesting plot. There's enough wit and tongue and cheek gore here to keep any horror or zombie fan entertained. Just make sure you don't have a weak stomach. I'll leave you with one last tidbit from the IMDB trivia page: 

"The rental in Sweden (and probably other countries as well) came with supplemental vomit bags."

V for Vendetta (2006)

Directed by: James McTeigue

Starring: Natalie Portman, Hugo Weaving, John Hurt

IMDB Page

From the writers behind the Matrix trilogy, V for Vendetta is an amazing imagining of a not too distant future. Aside from being politically relevant, it wraps a great plot, characters, and action scenes into a rather kickass package. 

Great Britain is now a fascist state. The people are spied on at all times. The government's henchmen, called "fingermen", assault civilians on a whim. Constant propaganda is blasted over the television sets. Any kind of dissent gets you whisked away in the middle of the night, never to be seen again. The film definitely draws from influences like Orwell's 1984. 

It is on her way back from work at a television station that Evey (Portman) runs into a couple of the government "fingermen". Just before they are able to have their way with her, she is saved by a mysterious masked vigilante, who only calls himself "V" (Weaving). V wears a mask bearing the image of Guy Fawkes, a man who attempted to blow up the British parliament hundreds of years earlier on the fifth of November.  The two part ways, only to be reunited later. V attacks the television station that employs Evey, broadcasting a message asking the citizenry to join him in one year's time, on the fifth of November. This time, Evey prevents V from being captured by the government. He rescues her, taking her to a place away from government eyes. 

I don't want to give away too much more, because V for Vendetta is one of those films best enjoyed when you go in not knowing too much of what will happen. However, I will say that I have barely scratched the surface with this description. The plot is very deep and complex, but not too convoluted. It is a story of personal revenge, revelation, as well as a story of revolution. 

Another area where the film shines is in the acting department. Natalie Portman is absolutely perfect in her role, showing true emotion all the way through. If anyone deserved an Oscar for best actress in 2006, it was her. Hugo Weaving (Agent Smith from the Matrix films, for those looking to put a face to the voice.)  is equally good as V. His role has an added level of difficulty: He wears a mask throughout the entire film, allowing him to only emote with his voice and body language. John Hurt has a rather ironic role as the tyrannical Chancellor Sutler, who is always seen on large video screens angrily spouting off propaganda. His role is ironic because John Hurt played the opposite role of the film adaption of Orwell's 1984, as the citizen constantly being watched by a government figure on a television screen.  

Stephen Rea also turns in a memorable performance. He plays a detective tasked with tracking down V after the attack on the television station. As he slowly uncovers a vast government conspiracy, his feelings about the "terrorist" he is supposed to apprehend change.  

Bottom Line: 10/10: V for Vendetta is one of my personal favorites. Its very easy to make political connections between the world in the film and the world we live in today. This may be a turn off for some, but its not a movie that hammers you too hard with a political message. Its a well done drama film, with some truly moving moments and characters. Theres even a couple of well done action scenes thrown in, but don't expect non-stop bullets and explosions.