EPIC Review

Maybe I am growing out of my animated film loving stage. I'm finding myself bored with the environments created and feel that the originality in these films are lacking big time. Hell, even Pixar is rehashing old ideas in hopes that they can still be as magical as before. But maybe it's not just me, and maybe, just maybe, these animated movies just really fucking suck.

Take EPIC for example. Our main character M.K. (Amanda Seyfried) has daddy problems and is forced to move in with him after her mother dies. It's not like her dad beats or anything like that. No, the biggest problem with her dad (Jason Sudekis) is that people thinks he is crazy because he is a scientist that studies the Leafmen race.

We have officially ran out of ideas when we start calling a race "Leafmen."

But there are apparently such thing as Leafmen, and their goal is simple - protect the forest from Boggons, an evil race of creatures that shoot deadly arrows. The Leafmen army are all about teamwork, which is why one soldier, Nod (Josh Hutcherson) quits. This quite pisses off the Leafmen leader Ronin (Colin Farrell), who happens to be banging the queen of the forest, Queen Tara (Beyonce).

(SIDE NOTE: I wonder if Beyonce being queen has anything to do with some sort of Illuminati presence in the forest. Maybe the sequel.)

Queen Tara is about to choose the heir to her throne. The leaf pod she chooses will be her heir. This made no sense to me, but then again, the first thirty minutes is a lot to take in. However, the Boggins, led by SS-Colonel Hans Lan-I mean, Mandrake (Christoph Waltz) and his son Dagda (Blake Anderson) attack Queen Tara and the other Leafman. Tara dies, and magically falls on top of M.K., who's running away from home at the same time. M.K. finds this pod as well, and finds herself to have shrunk to Leafmen-size.

The hero's journey, as one might say, is supposed to be an epic-styled film, but nothing feels epic about EPIC. There are too many characters that add nothing to the story. Chris O'Dowd and Aziz Ansari play a snail and a slug that are the unfunniest characters in any animated film. Steven Tyler plays a glow-worm that keeps scrolls of things that happen. Pitbull plays a bullfrog, so I guess when he is trying to keep a party going, animated movies pay for his electric.

But how can a movie called EPIC feel epic when I'm not even sure the characters know that they only take up a small area of the forest? The script is so idiotic and boring that nothing even makes sense. I finally figured out the story a half-hour in, so I don't know how the hell a child is supposed to figure it out.

The characters in the film don't do anything to root for them. They're all know-it-all little fucking brats. There isn't even a funny joke in the script. I was surrounded by little children and they laughed so little that they actually left at the trailer for THE SMURFS 2 a lot more.

But EPIC's biggest problem is that, at times, it becomes a remake of AVATAR. The final fight scene looks like the Navi riding dragons. And to make matters worse? You barely see any of the fight scene. The film takes its weakest link, M.K., and tries to make her intro some kind of hero. There's even a scene when she kisses a Leafman.

Yeah, we might have ran out of originality, but I'd be the first in line to buy human-on-Leafman porn.

COMPLIANCE Review

It confuses the hell out of me when someone says that something is a bad movie when they are able to put their full attention to the film and never be bored. Why is it bad? Because you don't like the characters, their intentions, or the people that they are? Or do you just not like the film because it's stupid? Or do you just not like the film because it isn't the way that you want it to be?

COMPLIANCE can easily fall under any of these three categories. Where I can easily say that this 90 minute movie doesn't really slack at all, it is quite hard to watch. At the end of the movie, my girlfriend turned to me and said that it was the worst movie that she has ever seen. I asked her why, due to how her eyes never left the screen the whole movie.

Look, you are not always going to like the characters and decisions they make. It's just life. When it is the filmmaker's intention for you to not like a character, like a movie villain or just an asshole who runs your favorite character off the road, you're not supposed to like them, so get over it. COMPLIANCE is full of unlikable characters, and even though it is a very hard movie to watch, it's an important movie and a reminder of just how stupid the world is.

COMPLIANCE tells the story of a fast-food joint that happens to get an unexpected phone call. The manager, Sandra (Ann Dowd), is already in a bad mood before this phone call because the employees aren't listening to her and someone left the fridge open the night before, destroying over $1000 dollars in food and products. But somebody is on the phone for Sandra - a police officer, as a matter of fact.

The police officer, who goes by the name of Officer Daniels (Pat Healy), is really just a prank caller who gets the whole fast-food joint in a bother when he says that an employee named Becky (Dreama Walker) stole money from a customer's purse. Due to Sandra's willingness to cooperate this official, she takes Becky into the back of the fast food restaurant and interrogates her by doing what the cop tells her to do over the phone - by going through her purse, taking her cell-phone, and eventually, stripping her of her clothes.

Now Sandra's character just happens to be a test subject for what seems to be the Milgram Experiment, where people would shock subjects who got a question wrong when asked. But instead of Sandra stepping back and thinking about how absurd this situation is, she just gives into every last thing the cop tells her to do. She even calls her fiancee (Bill Camp) to come in and watch her. When the cop tells him to smack her ass and force her to perform oral sex, of course, nobody thinks twice about it.

I can fully get behind what the director Craig Zobel was doing, or at least trying to do. For an hour and fifteen minutes, COMPLIANCE works as one of the most disturbing films that you will ever watch. It's hard to watch - and I'm guessing that is what Zobel was trying to do. However, I'm still trying to understand what Zobel means by the last fifteen minutes.

This isn't a complete spoiler, since it was based on a case from 2004. At the end of the film, the girl apparently admitted of going through with everything not because she was afraid, but because she felt like she had to. The fiancee doesn't talk to Sandra after that night because he knew he fucked up. And Sandra, who is a really well-thought out character up until this point, doesn't admit to her mistakes and makes us feel like we should pity her.

Sandra's character was always about obediance - obediance at the work place through her employees and obediance with the law. Yet, whenever she put someone in charge with the situation, such as her fiancee or another employee, every time they would mention how stupid it is, and every time she would snap at them and tell them to obey the law. Not that Sandra's character is completely likable, but probably the most humane - she is just as much of a victim as Becky is.

However, Sandra admits to an interviewer (Jeffery Grover) that she don't feel like she should be in trouble with this situation, due to her being victimized and lied to. I'm not sure what Zobel is really trying to say - should we pity this poor woman, or should we laugh at her at how stupid she is? At any time she could have called the fast-food's supervisor, or the real police, or just hang up the phone. Because honestly, what cop calls on the phone?

And like the film reminds us with the title card at the end of the movie, stories like the one in COMPLIANCE happen all the time and there have been over 70 of these cases reported. So should we feel bad for everybody involved? Or should we just fucking laugh at these fools?

In the way, the thesis statement to COMPLIANCE feels like that Zobel is just trying to tell us that he thinks people are really fucking stupid, and maybe that's true. But then shouldn't COMPLIANCE be a metaphor as to what people really think about this film?

I'm sure as hell not going to be watching COMPLIANCE again, not because I didn't like it, but because I don't need to. One viewing is enough for me. It's not going to end up on any top ten list and Zobel isn't going to be the Jesus Christ of cinema. However, if COMPLIANCE serves that purpose as to a one-watch wonder, I can dig that. Like all of the REQUIEM FOR A DREAMs, the CLOCKWORK ORANGEs, and UN CHIEN ANDALOUs, COMPLIANCE just fits in there, but we really don't need to think about it anymore than what we just did.

EyeGolb Presents... The Directors Series (and other cool stuff)

It should be no surprise to anybody reading this blog that I love movies, but some people might not know that I'm trying to make movies as well. It's just one of those things that I have always wanted to do, but it's just a pain in the ass. Something tells me that to put in the work needed to succeed in my plan may become impossible, but I got faith in our lord and savior Steven Soderbergh.

Oh wait, Steven Soderbergh retired? So who am I going to look for inspiration now?

Yes, due to Steven Soderbergh's new career as a painter, there is one less filmmaker making movies. This, as sad as it sounds, can be a good thing. It paves room for more talent. Not saying that I will be that new talent, but I can sure as hell try, right? But here are a few things that are going to make me a better movie lover, a better filmmaker, and a better person in general.

1. Watch more movies - This one should be obvious. I love movies and I don't want to ever stop loving movies. I watch a lot of movies as it is, but I never talk about them enough. I want to watch great movies. I want to be able to form a Top 500 list in my head without having to dig deep on what movies I'm in love with.

2. Watch more bad movies - Even the bad ones need love. What I'm proposing as to watching bad movies are not movies starring Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson working at Google, but movies that are so bad that they deserve their own special list. Every movie-watcher knows bad movies, but not every movie-watcher loves bad movies.

3. Analyze different directing techniques and trademarks - For film, a director's techniques and trademarks mean everything. I want to know every director's techniques. I don't want to be known as a hack filmmaker - I want to be a filmmaker who pays love to the movies he loves.

4. Watch more TV - This is kind of important, because TV shows are really movies that have a long narrative that are broken up into half-hour or hour segments that have to stay interesting. If you can't stay interesting for an hour and a half film, what makes you think you will be interesting for a 24-hour long episode season?

So here is what I propose - EyeGolb, while still writing reviews for brand new theatrical films, will be a place for my directorial an analysis. I composed a list of over 200 directors (no exaggeration) that I hope to be watching all of their films. I got a netflix account now so things make it a lot easier. I'll be watching every film that the directors put out, taking one director at a time (NOTE: Sometimes this may be difficult, due to availability of a certain film, so there may be two or three different directors spotlighted at one time.) and realizing what makes them great.

And while I'm at it, I'll be reviewing more films that I've seen, but I'm going to make a special point to review some bad films. This will probably start on Monday, and make a feature out of it. B-Movie Monday, I like the sound of it. And even more while I'm at it, I'll be watching more TV - except I probably won't be reviewing any of it, unless if I find something that I really have to write about.

If there are any director requests, just send me a list. Lord knows I probably have them on my list, but the more the marrier. I put together a list of directors that I will be doing so far for my first ten. That list goes as follows.

1. Coen Brothers
2. Nolan
3. Soderbergh
4. Coscarelli
5. Von Trier
6. Jaramusch
7. Del Toro
8. Carpenter
9. D. Lynch
10. Spielberg

And yes, I will be reviewing Soderbergh's BEHIND THE CANDELABRA, but not for a while. But if you need any assurance, it is one of the best films of the year. Watch it.

The first Coen Brothers review will be published on either Saturday or Sunday (probably Sunday) - that being, BLOOD SIMPLE. The first B-Movie Monday review will be on Monday (of course) and the movie will be... wait for it... THE ROOM.

And you are going to get more reviews too. Look out for COMPLIANCE in the next few hours.

THE HANGOVER PART III Review

I am pissed off.

Since the turn of the 20th century, film has become the way of life. We watch movies not because it's the only thing to do, but because they provide an escape. We watch movies because we want to be entertained. During the Great Depression, we watched movies because they were cheap and a getaway. During the 50s, we watched movies because we were shown things we never saw before. During the 70s, we watched movies because suddenly there were things that were once frowned upon that suddenly became okay. During the 90s, we watched movies because of greats like Tarantino, the Coen Brothers, and later on, Paul Thomas Anderson.

But I don't know why we even watch movies anymore. 120+ years since the invention of cinema and we are finding old ideas to recycle and make them brand new. It's getting to the point where we just don't care. Filmmaking has become film business. When one of the great auteurs of cinema, Steven Soderbergh, is about to retire because it is getting too film business-y, you know there just isn't anything left in this god forsaken art-form.

I'll give THE HANGOVER props. The original film was something truly different. We were given three characters and watched them trace their steps to finding their best friend. Even though I don't find the movie that good, there are still moments of pure bliss that still keeps people talking to this day. And I don't think there have been closing credits that entertaining since.

THE HANGOVER PART II came out two years later and people hated it. Critics called it unoriginal. Suddenly the characters were unlikable, though I find it mind-blowing that people think they were unlikable all of the sudden. In the first one, didn't Bradley Cooper's character steal from little children, Ed Helm's character cheat on his fiancee, and Zach Galifianakis drug his best friends?

But guess what guys? The director, Todd Phillips, made bank off the first one. He asked for a share in the movie's profits instead of a director salary. The movie became an unexpected hit, but no one knew what he was doing except for Todd Phillips himself - he was ripping you off. We should be ashamed that we let it get to this point, because two movies later, he really proves he doesn't give a fuck about these characters and their situations - he just gets his paycheck.

And this installment of THE HANGOVER PART III is just as bad as PART II. Our characters are faced in a situation that is just as ridiculous as the other two, yet everything is lazier. The characters haven't changed. They're still unlikable. They still do stupid stuff. And guess what?

NOBODY IS HUNGOVER.

How about that for marketing? THE HANGOVER PART III is false advertising. The title promises you that you are going to get to see something similar to the first film, which was the reason why you are seeing PART III in the first place, right? It just so happens that aside from a casual scene drinking beer at a Tijuana Bar, nobody even drinks in this fucking movie.

Imagine that - a HANGOVER movie that barely has any drinking. It sounds like a, what's that? Quick cash-grab?

I'd go on about the plot, but basically, suddenly Alan's (Zach Galifianakis) family members are getting worried about their son being a 42 year old retard. When Alan's dad dies (Jeffery Tambor), their family is faced with many questions - did he leave because he had to film the next season of ARRESTED DEVELOPMENT, or did he just stay so he can get his paycheck?

And suddenly, there is this idea that Alan needs to go to this place to make him better. There is no idea what this place is - it's just a happy place where people go to feel happy. I'm calling bullshit because there is nothing different in this movie that Alan doesn't do in this movie. But then again, I'm not the one writing it. But if you guys even think about considering to criticize the STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS script and give this one a free pass, you guys should hand in your film-lovers card.

So the Wolf-Pack (Bradley Cooper, Ed Helms) and Doug (Justin Bartha, who is also collecting a paycheck) go to take Alan to this happy place and are ran off the road by a bunch of people in masks. Their leader (John Goodman, who neither hurts nor helps the film) and Black Doug (HOLY SHIT IT'S BLACK DOUG! Mike Epps) are looking for Chow (Ken Jeong), who just recently escaped from prison. Goodman takes Doug as collateral until the Wolf-Gang can find Chow and return him to Goodman and the gang.

Aside from the stupid plot, there is almost nothing the film does to add any kind of enjoyment. There are really stupid jokes that Galifianakis still tries to make and Bradley Cooper trying to be Bradley Cooper. Mike Epps and Heather Graham return to their old roles from the first one and it's so good to have them back - for a paycheck, I mean. And there is a scene that is so goddamn stupid in a police station that I can't even figure out the point of it.

The only huge difference from this one is that Galifianakis is given a love interest with Melissa McCarthy, and since McCarthy hasn't done anything good since BRIDESMAIDS, I'll just come out and say that she is here for the paycheck too. Her introduction is probably one of the worst scenes in the movie, yet who am I to judge? I'm not getting paid to write the script nor the review.

And Ken Jeong, who I do like, really lets me down. I'm not sure how much is scripted and how much is improvised, but Jeong is really just on the screen to try and come off as stupid and crazy as Galifianakis's character. Yet everything he says is just a bunch of shit. And for some reason, whoever handled the music with this idea thought it was a good idea for him to rape Johnny Cash's cover of Nine Inch Nails's HURT.

The product placement in this movie is insane. It's like one big ad for everything cool. Alan listens to music with his Beats by Dre headphones as his father dies of a heart attack. The World's Most Interesting Man is getting a hulky paycheck as well with all of the Dos Equis bottles that are drank in the film. And Chow really makes cocaine look cool, but of course, we didn't need product placement to tell us that.

Even at the end of the movie, when the characters are walking and all of the sudden we get flashbacks to when the Wolf Pack was first formed to the present day, it feels like the writers don't care about it anymore. They're not likable. None of them have changed. They're still the same characters. It is completely offensive to film fans. We invested time and money into seeing these characters grow, but I watched my hair grow faster than these assholes do.

Would I call Todd Phillips a genius? Not in a million years. Let's not forget he didn't write THE HANGOVER (part 1). He took over the writing for the second and third and was able to make everything so much more lazy. To explain how much he owes to his characters, he made fifty million off of the first movie alone. And he even stated in an interview how much he don't care about the bad reviews.

This is the film business guys. They don't call it business for nothing. There is money to be made, and it is all of our faults. It's my fault. It's your fault. It is Hot Topic's fault for selling HANGOVER shirts. We have ruined good comedy, funny comedy, and good cinema all together. We threw it all away, all for a film that makes bad Jewish jokes and kills animals.

THE HANGOVER PART III is going to blow the house down, while MUD just sits in a movie theater waiting for your attention.

FURIOUS SIX Review - YESSSS!

Do you remember the days when it used to be cool to hate on THE FAST AND THE FURIOUS movies? If you liked the series, people frowned at you. I liked the first two films - and not too many other people do. Then the third one apparently changed everybody else's minds - including mine, because that was the first one I didn't really like. I didn't bother with the fourth one - even to this day, I still haven't seen it.

But FAST FIVE kind of impressed everyone, even myself. It wasn't just a movie about fast cars and criminals - it was fucking fun. The cast looked like they were having the time of their lives. FAST FIVE was so good that I even consider it as being one of the best films of 2011. But FAST AND FURIOUS 6, or FURIOUS 6 as it is called in the credits, blows FAST FIVE out of the water.

FURIOUS 6 is the definition of a true summer blockbuster. There are likable characters, exciting action pieces, and a really fast pace. The two hour movie didn't feel like it at all. FURIOUS 6 is kind of that puppy that you want to adopt and nuture it - it really loves you. It doesn't want you to stop petting it. Justin Lin, even though he didn't blow me away before, has put together two great films that stand on their own.

The film begins with Toretto (Vin Diesel) and Brian (Paul Walker) racing to get to their hideaway as Brian's girlfriend Mia (Jordana Brewster) is about to have her child. Before Brian walks in the door, Toretto reminds Brian that he is bringing another member into the family. If you need any reminders, these movies are all about the family. Unlike THE HANGOVER III where everybody hates each other, these characters just saying the word 'family' makes us love them so much more.

Hobbs (Dwayne Johnson) has been investigating a group of criminals who have been stirring trouble around the world, led by a former Special Agents officer Owen Shaw (Luke Evans). Hobbs comes to Toretto asking if he can help Hobbs put together a team (or "family") that can help bring him behind bars. The kicker to all of this? Shaw's henchman happens to be Letty (Michelle Rodriguez), Toretto's old girlfriend who was thought to have been killed in the fourth movie. Hobbs promises the team that if they can capture the crew, he can get them all pardons and allow them to live their lives in freedom.

So as you can tell, there is little actual plot to this one. What we are watching are action pieces set around character development. All of these characters throughout this movie mature just a little bit. Brian begins to realize the meaning of family. Han (Sung Kang) finds love in Gisele (Gal Gadot). Roman and Tej (Tyrese and Ludacris, respectively) are still doing their thing and living large - but do big things with their money. And these are all characters are a lot of fun to be around.

None are more fun than the action sequences however. There aren't any cop-outs in this film. We get an awesome action sequence that takes place through the streets of England, a girl-fight between Michelle Rodriguez and Gina Carano (yes, that one), and a really awesome scene that takes place on a highway. There is even a scene where Han and Roman have to fight Joe Taslim, who if you don't remember kicked some serious ass in THE RAID.

I mean they got Joe Taslim to star in this movie. This movie has such a kickass action cast that only Sylvester Stallone can get a better gang together.

Unlike FAST FIVE, you should probably go into this movie with good knowledge of the other ones. The movie brings back a lot of stuff from the third and the fourth one, but even the montage at the beginning of the movie tries to catch you up. And even if you are a FAST AND FURIOUS apologist, it feels good to watch that. These are characters that should stay close to our hearts, and a montage containing all of their finest moments is just soothing.

It is almost impossible to review FURIOUS SIX. It's a lot of fun, but what else can you say about it? It's just characters you love to be around. Sure, they all have faults. But it's like being with your best friends. It's like Justin Lin watched MIAMI CONNECTION fifty times and discovered the meaning of friendship. And I'm in full approval.

TEXAS CHAINSAW 3D Review - Only the second worst TEXAS CHAINSAW movie

In the history of horror films, I don't think there has been a franchise raped like the TEXAS CHAINSAW MASSACRE franchise. The original film was made back in 1974, followed by a sequel twelve years later. Then there was a third and a fourth that no one really cares about, but only the true horror fans remember that the fourth one starred Renee Zellweger and Matthew McConaughey. Never forget.

I'm not the hugest fan of the franchise, but I can respect it. And when it was remade back in 2003 with Jessica Biel and the chick from BLAIR WITCH 2, I thought it was a decent remake. There's a lot wrong with it, but I can dig it as a horror flick. Then the "prequel" to the remake came out in 2006, and this film was released just this year. I'm a little bit late to the parade, but you guys will understand that it isn't necessarily a bad thing to be late to this one.

TEXAS CHAINSAW 3D has a really misconstrued timeline. The opening scene takes place right after the original 1974 film ends, then jumps ahead 20 years in time where suddenly everybody has iPhones. It completely abandons what happened in TCM 2, 3, and 4, but they consider this part of the remake's series. I think. I don't know. They really raped this franchise.

But the timeline is the least of the problems. TEXAS CHAINSAW 3D is a poor excuse for a sequel. The script is truly terrible, the editing is awful, and the cast is extremely horrendous. Not only that, but the kills are so fucking uninspired. Everything about this movie is uninspired. If you can take anything from TEXAS CHAINSAW 3D, anybody can make a movie, no matter how bad it is.

Like I said, TEXAS CHAINSAW 3D begins with flashback scenes of Gunnar Hansen trying to kill people from the original film. Sadly, this is as scary as this film gets. But Hansen gets his paycheck anyway, because he plays Boss Sawyer. The opening scene takes place right after the 1974 film ends, and Sheriff Hooper (Thom Barry) is trying to tell the Sawyers to release Leatherface (Dan Yeager) to the police. A few hoodlums, led by the mayor Burt Hartman (Paul Rae) burns down the house with everybody inside.

Then one of the townspeople (David Born) find one of the Sawyers outside holding a young baby. He takes the baby and murders her mother, and raises the baby. In this time, nobody notices that all of the sudden he has a baby. But in twenty years time, Heather Miller (Alexandra Daddario) has gone from being a redneck sack-of-shit defenseless baby to a sexy chick.

Heather gets a letter in the mail saying that her grandmother has died and left her a huge fortune that she has to travel to Texas to retrieve. She gets into a hissy fit with her parents over never telling her that she was adopted. Her parents apologize, blaming a destroyed uterus. No seriously, they do. And that's only one of the bits of screenwriting that is terrible.

Anyway, Heather, her boyfriend Ryan (Trey Songz), her friends Carl (Scott Eastwood) and Nikki (Tani Raymonde), and this hitchhiker they accidentally hit with their car named Darryl (Shaun Sipos) go to get this fortune, which ends up being a huge mansion with a grave yard, a pool table, and a letter that gets ignored. When everybody goes out into the town to get steaks, Darryl decides to ransack the house of candles and silverware. The clan comes back, and Darryl's not there. They don't realize he is in the basement getting chopped up by Leatherface, who occupies the bottom floor.

And everybody else succumbs to the wrath of Leatherface. So when Heather escapes finally into a carnival, Leatherface ignores everybody running past him and just keeps his eyes on her. The police are able to get him away, yet Heather is soon to realize that the Mayor gets word of this situation and puts together a crew to execute Leatherface and the rest of his family. The rest of his family = Heather, who is revealed to be Leatherface's long lost cousin.

To be frank, there really isn't a moment in TEXAS CHAINSAW 3D that is interesting. The characters are really unlikable and dumb. All of the movie could have really been avoided if the letter was read, but I guess a horror movie wouldn't be a horror movie without dumb choices. TEXAS CHAINSAW 3D then dives into some poor subplots, including one where Ryan is cheating on Heather with her best friend Nikki. It never gets resolved and is kind of useless.

Then there is the change of the plot, which is completely ridiculous. All of the sudden, Heather has to make a choice between siding with the police and the Mayor or helping out her blood relative, who killed all of her friends and her cheating boyfriend, but that's not important at all. The aforementioned carnival scene too is probably the WORST scene ever in a TEXAS CHAINSAW movie. This is including the one in which Matthew McConaughey screams, "Welcome to my world!"

I watched the film in 2D, so I can't really compliment or hate on the 3D. But from what I could tell just from watching the 2D film is that a lot of the scenes were shot using the 3D gimmick. The shots include the obligatory chainsaw coming through the screen and things being thrown. If you're a fan of ducking at a chainsaw coming at you, get the 3D version.

The cast is a bunch of untalented actors, and that is putting it nicely. The lead actress Alexandra Daddario is beautiful, but is a terrible actress. Unfortunately, the filmmakers have lowered their standards on trying to show her titties. Scott Eastwood doesn't die soon enough and Tania Raymonde, who played Alex Rousseau in LOST, features a similar fate that her character did in the television show. And Trey Songz is as good as an actor as he is an artist. Hint: He is a terrible artist.

By the way, the soundtrack is pretty uninspired as well. Trey Songz plays pool to a Trey Songz song. I can't make this shit up.

The TEXAS CHAINSAW franchise is a place now where horror movie ideas go to die. TEXAS CHAINSAW 3D is no exception. I could live the rest of my life never watching a sequel to these films ever again, but there will be more made. In a few more years, I expect to see the sequel to this film, and I can only hope that TEXAS CHAINSAW 3D 2 features Chris Brown getting slashed.

STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS Review - Terrible Scriptwriting + Great Cast = Okay Movie

STAR TREK (2009) was one of the most pleasant surprises of that year. J.J. Abrams brought together an amazing cast that had great chemistry with one another and was able to make a great science-fiction movie. There are a few problems with it - the time travel stuff is a bit confusing and the script is a little dumb at times, but it is fucking tons of fun. It was nominated for Best Picture that year for a reason, you know?

STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS is a different story.

Let's get this out of the way. I really enjoyed STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS. It is a lot of fun for what it's worth, and like the original, the cast really does an awesome job with what they are given. There are tons of great moments in the film and the 3D is actually very good (especially in the first scene). That being said...

I feel bad for J.J. Abrams. STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS, with its terrible title and all of that bad stuff, could have been a much better movie, film-wise. J.J. Abrams does a better job with each film he directs. He brought the lens flare down a little bit, constructed a few better action beats, and still made it as fun as what a science fiction film should be.

But there are tons of faults with STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS, and every single fault is attributed to the terrible, terrible, TERRIBLE script. The film, written by Roberto Orci, Alex Kurtzman, and Damon Lindelof, has so many problems with it that I'm not sure where to begin. It's fun, but I really wish there was a better film behind it.

STOP RIGHT HERE! If you do not want to be spoiled, don't go any further than this until you see the movie. Or, if you were like every other person online and knew a certain reveal, then continue on.

The movie opens up with the crew of the U.S.S. Enterprise trying to save a planet in the galaxy. Captain Kirk (Chris Pine) has to rescue Spock (Zachary Quinto) before he dies in a volcano, revealing their cover. This scene is one of the highlights of the film, and looks fucking stunning in 3D. I am not sure what is a better opening scene - this one or the opening of the previous film.

Anyway, Captain Kirk gets demoted to first officer for breaking protocal and Admiral Pike (Bruce Greenwood) assumes the Captain's chair again. Spock is transferred to a different crew as well, but it is quickly forgotten about after a suicide bombing takes place in England. When an emergency meeting takes place, Kirk realizes that the man behind this attack - John Harrison (Benedict Cumberbatch), a former Starfleet officer gone rogue - is about to attack at the meeting. But it's too late - he shoots the place up and gets away, but not before killing Pike. Kirk swears his revenge against Harrison, and word is that he is on the unoccupied Klingon planet Qo'nos.

This is at the point where the film goes from great to just good.

Before I go ahead and discuss any more of the plot, I should mention a few things that most people should know if they haven't been hiding under a rock. The writers of the film have worked on many projects before this movie. Roberto Orci, when he isn't screaming "False Flag" on Twitter, wrote the first two TRANSFORMERS movies, along with Alex Kurtzman, who directed PEOPLE LIKE US last year. I never bothered seeing it because it looked like I would just be wasting my time.

Damon Lindelof, however, is an even bigger name. Outside of being credited as the one to ruin PROMETHEUS (which, on a side note, was ruined to begin with), most people attribute him as to completely destroying the sixth season of LOST. He wrote the final episode of that show and the episode that is known to EVERYBODY as the worst episode of LOST ever, titled ACROSS THE SEA.

Lindelof has explained through interviews and interviews on why he had to write ACROSS THE SEA into the television show. In the third-to-last episode of the show's run, we get backstory into two characters that mean something to the TV show, but then we get backstory into this glowing cave that was never shown on the TV show before. And in the final episode of LOST, our main character, played by Matthew Fox, has to arrive at this glowing cave and save the island.

Remember all of this...

Back to STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS, the crew gets aboard on the U.S.S. Enterprise to go to Qo'nos (which is spelled wrong in the film, as Kronos). It is all of the same crew as the first time, with the exception being Carol (Alice Eve), the daughter of Admiral Marcus (Peter Weller). Oh, and Scotty (Simon Pegg), who is the only sensible one on the ship who realizes that the 72 torpedoes they brought onto their ship to bomb the shit out of Qo'nos with can possibly take down their ship as well. He quits when Kirk doesn't listen to him.

The villain John Harrison, after they pick him up at Qo'nos, happens to reveal himself as Khan. Someone thinks that revealing Khan as a villain is spoiler territory, and it really isn't. One, if you have gone on the internet in the last year and a half, you would have realized it. Two, it happens not even halfway through the movie. It's not a plot twist - it's a character. And the character has back-story. He goes into it, but all of his back-story is ignored later in the movie.

I am choosing not to go into the back-story because it is unnecessary. But I am nitpicking not just this scene, but maybe four or five scenes. There are quite a few moments where characters need to explain their actions in words. Khan explains his backstory. Admiral Marcus has an explanation for the crew that shows that he is just as much of a bad guy as Khan is. Spock calls Old Spock and asks him how he defeated Khan back in the old days. Seriously that happened. And people clapped.

This is probably all of Damon Lindelof's doing. Laziness, pure laziness. I call it the ACROSS THE SEA-equation. And I know that there are some ways that you just can't get by explanations, but at least limit it down to 1 or 2.

I'm not going to spoil any more of the film except there is a scene that Kirk has to save the spaceship by going out of his way and doing something without anyone else knowing about it and being able to stop him. This almost entirely mimics what Matthew Fox did in the final episode of LOST, which, as you remember what I just told you, was written by Lindelof. Lindelof precisely plagarized himself.

There are few other nitpicks here, but I do have a feeling that Paramount and Bad Robot really rushed this film. It has been four years since the last one, which don't seem like it should have been rushed. I know that they probably wanted to make the best TREK film they could, but ultimately, it is just a fun popcorn flick, nothing more.

And from the way I keep on talking about STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS, you would think that I really dislike it. However, I do like it. Plausibility and script is terrible, but I actually think there are some very solid moments in this film. The opening scene is quite brilliant as mentioned. There is a scene where Khan and Kirk work together and invade a different ship by flying through outer-space using some sort of jet-packs or something like it that is really fun to watch. And to see Spock take command of the ship in a couple of scenes is tons of fun.

I have a feeling that a lot of what happens in this film is going to make a lot of Trekkies mad. It's a shame because there is still a lot going for it, especially when it comes to the cast. The cast probably understood how bad of a script it was, but they really do stand out in this film. Chris Pine and Zachary Quinto work really well together chemistry-wise, just about as good as Shatner and Nemoy did together. Karl Urban is a lot of fun to watch again, and I'm wondering why Simon Pegg doesn't have a role in every film ever made.

Because of different stakes, a lot of characters don't see the screen as much. Zoe Saldana's Uhara has one moment when she is able to shine, but doesn't get as much playing time as she did in the last one. The same goes for John Cho and Anton Yelchin, and unfortunately, they could have been used in a couple of scenes that would have made the film more enjoyable.

But let's discuss Benedict Cumberbatch, who plays Khan/John Harrison/Spoiler. He has quite the potential for playing a truly evil villain, but given what we have seen of him in this movie (probably due to the script), he isn't given the chance on truly getting his moment to shine as a bad guy. I know that Cumberbatch has a following through BBC's SHERLOCK, but it's a shame that people are going to look at him as just another STAR TREK villain and not KHAN.

However, as much as I kill it, STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS is fun to watch. It isn't as dark as the terrible title suggests, but it is an enjoyable film. Trekkies might hate it, and science-fiction geeks may disagree with a lot of this, but for a summer movie, it's not terrible. It could be a lot worst, but sadly, STAR TREK INTO DARKNESS could be a lot better.

THE GREAT GATSBY Review - Nice try, Old Sport.

Baz Lurhmann does not have the best eye when it comes to film. People will defend him to no end, but I don't understand why. His type of art is very different, which to anyone else, I would respect it. He gave ROMEO AND JULIET guns and pop-rock music, allowed the cast of MOULIN ROUGE to rape Nirvana's SMELL LIKE TEEN SPIRIT, and found a cure for insomnia with AUSTRALIA. Yet, a lot of people still receive him positively.

This is shocking to me because his best film, THE GREAT GATSBY, has been received so negatively by critic-circles. On one hand, it still isn't a good movie, but it isn't a terrible movie. It has its moments and doesn't really hurt anything, but I can't see this movie being Baz Lurhmann's fault. He and cinematographer Simon Duggan has filmed a movie so beautiful that it may be too beautiful. THE GREAT GATSBY's failures lie in the hands of the three editors connected to the project.

Baz Lurhmann, being Baz Lurhmann, changed a bit of the story from the classic F. Scott Fitzgerald book (which I don't think it is a classic by any means). Instead of sticking completely true to the book, we meet our main character slash narrator Nick (Tobey Maguire) in a mental institution due to alcohol abuse. This works in the favor of the original book because I always found Nick's narration to be shakey.

But this also becomes a problem with the movie. Nick writes everything down to express his feelings because he don't want to talk about it. And as he narrates it, the words play out on the screen. This is probably the director's way of reitterating it, but it don't work as well as it should. In my opinion, it dumbs down the themes and how the story is told.

But anyway, the story continues as you remember it from the story. Nick tells the story of how he moved in to a small cottage in the West Egg of Long Island, next to this big mansion owned by some mysterious guy who throws these banger parties. Apparently, he has a time machine too, because he likes to play a lot of Jay Z and will.i.am. Who would ever use a time machine to play will.i.am., I have no idea. But that isn't the point.

Nick goes to visit his cousin Daisy (Carey Mulligan) who is married to Tom Buchanan (Joel Edgerton) on the East Egg of Long Island. One day, Tom takes Nick out to the "Valley of Ashes", where they stop at this car garage owned by George Wilson, who is played by Jason Clarke. They share a bit of dialogue, where Edgerton asks Clarke if he remembers the good ol' days trying to hunt Osama Bin Laden.

Anyway, George Wilson's mistress Myrtle (Isla Fisher) is cheating on her husband with Tom and she throws this hotel party and everything goes cuckoo, and Nick discovers he really likes alcohol. He is invited to another party, this time next door at the mansion that is owned by a man named Gatsby (Leonardo DiCaprio). He discovers he really likes alcohol again and makes a fool out of himself to Gatsby. But Gatsby takes a liken to him. Probably because his time-travel machine reveals to him that in about eighty years, Tobey Maguire will be humiliated as an emo-Spiderman.

But Gatsby's real reason of wanting to get close to Nick is because he knows that Nick has some kind of contact with Daisy, who he once fell in love with at this party. So Gatsby gets Nick to arrange for a tea-party and invites Daisy, and this affair begins.

Of course, I'm not really spoiling anything. From here on out, it is actually pretty close to the book in terms of plot, and the only thing that is off as far as anachronisms go is the music. However, I understand that jazz music isn't as hip as Jay Z so it's understandable. I'm just happy that there isn't a character that uses a cell-phone, because that would be truly disappointing.

You haven't read me talk about my obsession with mise-en-scene yet because there haven't been many movies this year that have mastered the craft of that yet. There is one film that comes to mind (STOKER) and I will be reviewing that come DVD time. However, Baz Lurhmann's THE GREAT GATSBY has a keen eye for mise-en-scene. If you don't know what mise-en-scene is, it is a French term for what is exactly going on in a single shot. Where the actors are placed. What is going on in the background. How the characters are acting.

We get that THE GREAT GATSBY looks beautiful, but something has to be said about the wonderful cinematography. Shots of this movie are flooded with excellent detail. A particular scene near the beginning of the movie when we first meet Daisy is when curtains are flying all over the room due to the windows being open. When the windows close, Daisy is revealed. It is probably the best scene that Lurhmann has ever directed in his career.

However, mise-en-scene is only perfect if the editing is just as detailed as the picture is. A few transitions in the film are really messy, and during the driving scenes, the lighting is very off and becomes obvious that there is use of a green screen. The film is a textbook lesson to what makes a film look good, but a lesson on how to fail at an editing course.

But there are moments of pure bliss in THE GREAT GATSBY, and this is coming from somebody who doesn't like the book at all. The scene in the hotel where Tom and Gatsby go at it is very well-acted and well-detailed. The sweat on the characters' faces in that scene looks about as detailed as the amounts of confetti used in one of the party scenes. The scene where Gatsby and Daisy meet for the first time is very light and comedic. It's actually kind of... you know... sweet.

I have to admit that I didn't really find Leonardo DiCaprio to be a convincing enough Gatsby. Where DiCaprio has plenty of charm, there are moments that his character has to feel weak and DiCaprio just can't pull them scenes off right. Tobey Maguire, however, plays weak throughout the whole film, and never really controls the film at any time. If any cast member truly shines in this film, it is Carey Mulligan. She brings her own sort of talent to the role of Daisy Buchanan, adding a twist of innocence to her role.

But I find it hard to believe that people of my generation and generations after are going to look at this adaptation of THE GREAT GATSBY as the definitive adaptation of it. The 1974 film is quite bad, so I feel like it is a shame that this is going to be the best GREAT GATSBY movie we will ever get. What could have been a homerun with the right type of casting and better editing is left with a shitty soundtrack and words on screen. I feel more sympathy for Baz Lurhmann than I ever felt for Gatsby himself. He deserved a better editing crew, and the fans of the book deserved a better GATSBY movie.

AFTERSHOCK Review - Eli Roth Unsuccessfully Tries To Take Selena Gomez's Shirt Off

I saw the trailer for AFTERSHOCK in theaters for the first time on the night I went to go see SINISTER. The trailer, which wasn't really well put together, showed signs of, "Hey, maybe this will be a good movie." The last shot of the girl coming up from the gutter was new and different, and something I wasn't really expecting. So after SINISTER ended I looked up to see when AFTERSHOCK was coming out. There was no release date.

When a trailer for a film like AFTERSHOCK premieres without a release date, that isn't always a good sign. It's risky - you're giving somebody a sneak preview of a movie that doesn't have a release date. It may never even see a theatrical screen. Plus, how can someone look forward to a day when they don't even know when the day is?

But because of that trailer, I was sold. I wanted it to be a great horror film. I'm not a religious man, but in religious terms persay, I prayed that it was a great horror film.

And then I read reviews from the Toronto International Film Festival, which made the film sound great. The film was announced a release date - May 10. A horror film in summer is never a good thing. AFTERSHOCK was made for about ten million. IRON MAN 3 was made for 200 million. Big difference. It's a lot easier to sell a big budget blockbuster than a low budget horror film during the summertime. AFTERSHOCK was the studio's way to dump the film so they can make a few bucks and gather up on it.

But then critic reviews started pouring in. More and more people that have seen AFTERSHOCK have said bad things about it. I wanted to not believe it. Then I found out it was only being released in just over 100 theaters but on VOD. Even the director, Nicolas Lopez tweeted to me and confirmed it to me. When a director cares about his project that much to tweet every single person that speaks a word about his movie, you know he has put his heart and soul into it.

I wanted to love it. But there is a reason why the movie only made $40k this week. Divide that by 110 theaters. That is $367 dollars per screen.

AFTERSHOCK is, without a doubt, one of the worst movies that you will see this year. It is unfortunate to say this, but it is very true. I bet Nicolas Lopez really put his heart and soul into this film. But reality is that he will probably never make this ten million back. I really think that we can blame this whole film on one name alone - Eli Roth.

Eli Roth's name is all over it. I don't know how this guy finds work, but apparently Quentin Tarantino really believes in him. And it's kind of offensive actually. AFTERSHOCK is HOSTEL disguised as an earthquake movie. Unlike HOSTEL, where the characters are the ones being tortured, in AFTERSHOCK, the audience are the tortured souls.

AFTERSHOCK begins with lots of Eli Roth character development. Basically, we spend thirty minutes following characters around the country of Chile as they hit on girls, make Jew jokes, and foreshadow events. Gringo (Eli Roth), Pollo (Nicolas Martinez), and Ariel (Ariel Levy) are touring the country of Chile and but Pollo seems like that he is the only one having a good time. Ariel's fighting with an ex-girlfriend. Gringo's girl problems is that his ex-girlfriend/wife has a new boyfriend, so he must find a new girlfriend.

They go to a wine factory, and they see a girl who has a Wu-Tang Clan trampstamp. It's admirable, especially for the Wu-Tang fan in me, but I bring this up because we see the girl for one more second and then she is shrugged off for the rest of the movie. Literally. She's shrugged off. One of the main characters says that he can't talk to her at the second or something like that in an ignorant manner.

Oh yeah, and have I mentioned how unlikable these three characters are? Pollo is a bald douchebag who sends a picture of his balls to Ariel's ex- girlfriend. Gringo and Ariel make Jew jokes for no reason other than to make it sound funny. And Gringo hits on Selena Gomez. Did I forget to mention Selena Gomez is in the movie? She's only in it for about thirty seconds, but it is the scariest scene in the movie. Eli Roth's character tries to work his magic on getting her in bed, but she shrugs him off. Eli Roth is 41. Selena Gomez is 19.

After all of this Selena Gomez mess, Gringo and the gang meet a group of ladies: Irina (Natasha Yarovenko), a young single mother who makes 150k a year modeling; Kylie (Lorenza Izzo), a young girl who has a drinking problem; and Monica (Andrea Osvart), Kylie's sister who follows her around and make sure she doesn't do anything stupid.

So they go to a club one night and the night's already fucked after Pollo sends a picture of his nuts to Ariel's ex and Gringo feeling like shit that Irina went dancing with some richer, smarter, better looking dude (Ramon Llao). But the night's fucked super more because of an earthquake.

I will give this scene much props. If there is a scene to watch from this movie, it's this. The death scenes are creative. An act of kindness turns horribly wrong. It's fun to watch. And then we get back to reality.

For the next fifty minutes (yes, it took forty minutes to get to this point), we follow this group of six people as they make bad decisions to try and rescue themselves. This is, however, a problem due to prisoners escaping from a prison during the earthquake and are after this group of people for whatever reason.

I won't say any more about the story. However, you should be warned. AFTERSHOCK, though manipulating, is an Eli Roth movie through and through. The characters are not good people so it defeats the purpose to root for any of them. The script is poorly written and the acting is wooden. (Someone tell Eli Roth he is not a good actor.) However, I'm not offended by any of this. What I am offended at, like I am with every single Eli Roth film, is his sexism.

Aside from the afore-mentioned Selena Gomez scene, there is a scene where one of the characters are getting raped by a prisoner. The scene runs for a pretty damn long time, but when she makes her escape, someone catches her and puts a bullet in her head. I'm trying to learn what the fuck this scene was really about. They made the rape scene look brutal (even from a wide shot) but just to kill her anyway seemed like Roth's way of showing how much he hates women.

I get attacked by feminists enough, but when rape is in a movie for no reason other than rape (as in, not used as a plot device), it's completely irresponsible. Will the leader of the feminist army attack?

And I'm not putting my blame on Nicolas Lopez for this scene. I feel like Eli Roth, who co-wrote the script with Lopez, asked for this scene for shock value. However, I will blame Nicolas Lopez for his poor direction and a terrible ending, but other than that, I really do feel bad for Nicolas Lopez. It was a nice chance for trying to break out in the mainstream, but nobody put any hope into this film. I guess this is why.

IRON MAN THREE Review: The whole world's gonna be watching

Critic proof is a term in the "business" that means that no matter what is said about a film, good or bad, it don't matter. Audiences are still going to flock to it due to how popular it is. The film, good or bad, is going to make an assload of money, and in many occasions, it's going to loved by a group of people that threaten anybody who writes a bad review of the movie. This has happened to films that nobody has even seen yet. It's called the Rotten Tomatoes effect.

IRON MAN THREE is a movie that no matter what you say about it, good or bad, it won't matter. You're already there. You already buying a ticket. If you're not buying a ticket, you will catch it when it comes out through home video release. Yet, you shouldn't really have to worry much about being disappointed by IRON MAN THREE. There are a few story problems here and there, most of it coming with the last five minutes, but IRON MAN THREE is a damn solid entry in the Marvel Avengers series, and the best IRON MAN film in the series.

Director Shane Black hasn't made a great superhero movie - he's made a great Shane Black movie. IRON MAN THREE is as Shane Black as it gets. The dialogue, the buddy-comedy feel, the detective aspect of the film, the Christmas setting, and high risks - these are everything that Shane Black brings to this film. If you love the LETHAL WEAPON films this is great. If you love KISS KISS, BANG BANG you'll fall in love.

If you haven't seen KISS KISS, BANG BANG, why not? It's one of the best films of the last decade.

There is so much to love about IRON MAN THREE. The acting is fantastic. The action is intense and very well-shot. The script allows for so much character development while bringing the laughs. And even though there are a few storytelling problems, if we never had to see Tony Stark again, this is a great way to close his storyline.

Tony Stark (Robert Downey, Jr.) has been dealing with some sort of anxiety disorder/PTSD since he just barely made it through a wormhole in THE AVENGERS. He hasn't been able to sleep, and due to his problems, he has been going down to the lab and working on his different Iron Man prototypes. He has been able to do this cool thing by actually not walking in the suits, but being able to control every movement and talk through it. He almost gets away with it talking to his girlfriend Pepper Potts (Gwenyth Paltrow).

Seriously, how awesome would that be if there was a way to escape a girlfriend's complaining like that?

But Stark's world, and the rest of the world, have been threatened by this terrorist that goes by The Mandarin (Ben Kingsley), who considers himself a teacher and drops "lessons" from time to time, which are really bombs. But they're not bombs, because bomb markings are never found at the scene. And after Tony's bodyguard (Jon Favreau) is caught in an explosion and is thrown in a coma, Tony sends a threatening message to The Mandarin through a news interview. Fifteen minutes later, the Mandarin responds back and blows up Stark's mansion. Tony and Pepper escape, but Tony is sent all of the way down to Tennessee.

This is just the first half hour, and there is still so much story left. I haven't even began to explain that Rhoads (Don Cheadle) has settled into this Iron Patriot life, a nerdy scientist named Killian (Guy Pearce) hits on Pepper and he may or may not have some kind of part in this Mandarin stuff, and one of Tony's ex-girlfriends (Rebecca Hall) has come to warn Tony something.

But all of this is all fine and dandy, but the best moments of the film come after the opening thirty minutes. Tony Stark, while in Tennessee, teams up with a little boy named Harley (Ty Simpkins). The boy helps Tony get back on his feet and serves as Tony's motivation. The problem with the character of Iron Man is that there aren't so many great Iron Man villains, but the best villain of Iron Man is Tony Stark himself. We will probably never see a DEMON IN THE BOTTLE storyline in a film, but this is probably the best we will ever get.

Shane Black, who made his whole career on buddy comedies, is able to create this dynamic between
Tony Stark and Harley. For the first time in Tony Stark's timeline (at least in these movies), he feels like a true human being. Shane Black brings this life-quality that Jon Favreau never brought to this character. Essentially Harley is the same person as Tony is - he has daddy problems, loves science, and has a little cocky edge to him. But Harley brings out the human in Tony. It's some of the best moments in any superhero film.

And there are many more great moments too. I loved every scene Ben Kingsley was in. He really stole the movie away at many points and the "reveal" scene is fucking perfect. Another great moment in the film is when Tony Stark breaks into the Mandarin hideout and gets by the guards by using a bunch of homemade tools to take them out. The scene in the trailers that show everybody falling from the plane is probably the best superhero saving scene since SPIDERMAN 2's train sequence.

But there are quite a few problems with this film, and one of them is Stark's PTSD. I liked the scenes that it was used, but I would have liked to see Stark truly overcome this instead of just seeing him breathe his anxiety attacks out. That would have been a better defeat than any big action finale (and this one's big and still a lot of fun to watch). The last five minutes is kind of problematic, but I can deal with that.

Robert Downey, Jr. and Gwenyth Paltrow are just as good as they were in the first film, but the true star in this movie, aside from Ben Kingsley, is Don Cheadle. The character of Rhoads has become so much more likeable than the last time we saw him. Maybe it was a better script (I don't want to blame IRON MAN 2 on the writer's strike like everybody else does, but it don't mean you couldn't make a half-decent fucking film), but Don Cheadle really brought something to this role. For the first time playing the character, he actually looked like he was having fun.

There is a lot of Phase Two talk after this one. The movie promises a lot of great stuff in the future for the Marvel Avengers movies. The new THOR looks pretty good, and even though I still question the choice of directing in CAPTAIN AMERICA 2, I am interested in the way they shoot this film. (It also doesn't hurt that they assisted in the making of the first three (and good) seasons of COMMUNITY.) And fucking James Gunn is directing GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY. This is too good to be true. Marvel has not only become great storytellers, but they really care about their product.

It also doesn't hurt if Shane Black directs and writes every movie there-after. Because Shane Black is awesome. And so is IRON MAN THREE.

PAIN AND GAIN Review: I Believe in Fitness

I am not a Michael Bay apologist. I am not sure that many people are. Sure, there may be someone that is in LOVE with Michael Bay, but keep in mind that there are people that are in LOVE with AQUAMARINE. It isn't a secret in the movie industry that Michael Bay movies aren't well-liked by critics. There are a few people that defend THE ROCK to death and even a group of people probably love the first TRANSFORMERS movie, though I doubt anybody can really defend the third film. I can kind of defend the second one, even though I am pretty sure I will lose. As I was saying, Michael Bay isn't the best director ever.

But like Michael Bay, everybody has their failures. Bay's films, though critics hate them, are loved by movie audiences who go to see explosions, i.e. teenaged boys. However, Michael Bay is still making movies. Why? He brings in the dough. You give him an A-list star who has the looks to sell a movie and he can set a backdrop with some great fucking lighting and a really cool explosion. And if you give him a Mack truck...

This isn't a "Michael Bay sucks" session though. If I wanted to do that, I could log onto his IMDb message board page or AICN and really express how bad the last TRANSFORMERS movie was. However, I am better than that, and since I know the challenges one must overcome to make a great movie, I can look over it. Some filmmakers have to make a few piece of crap films in order to make the one film that they really want to make. Hell, Kevin Smith had to make COP OUT to be able to secure funding for RED STATE.

I am almost positive that Michael Bay had to make those robot movies so he could make PAIN & GAIN.

PAIN & GAIN was made for in the mid $20-million, which is far less than anything that Michael Bay has ever made a film for. But Bay proves that you don't need a big budget for summer fun. PAIN & GAIN is such a fun movie to watch and I can't stress it enough. Everything this film has is full of magic. I really doubt you are going to see a movie like PAIN & GAIN again. This, along with SPRING BREAKERS, is quite possibly the biggest risk-taking movie that you will ever watch.

PAIN & GAIN is based on a true story. According to a few articles online, there are significant changes in the real story, like every film, that make the film more interesting than what really happened. However, don't let that turn you off. If you were going to see THAT movie, I'm sure it wouldn't have been half as fun as this.

The first hour of PAIN & GAIN goes by so fast. Literally, it don't seem like it is an hour at all. Daniel Lugo (Mark Wahlberg) is a fitness instructor at a gym in Miami. He has the perfect body and thinks really highly of himself. He just doesn't have the money and the luxury that the people he trains has. He devises a plan with Adrian Doorbal, (Anthony Mackie) a weight-lifter whose dick is broken due to steroid abuse, and Paul Doyle, (Dwayne Johnson) an ex-cocaine addict who overcome his substance abuse through the Gospel of the good Lord, to kidnap rich, Jewish man Victor Kershaw (Tony Shalhoub) and steal his money and house and everything the man owns.

There is just one big problem - the three kidnappers are the dumbest three people ever.

But when things seem to be going swell, Victor is able to recognize who the kidnappers are due to Lugo's cologne. Once Victor is tortured (and when I say tortured, I mean tortured), he finally stops fighting and signs everything over to the guys. Victor, who gets forced-drunk by Doyle, believes he is getting on an airplane, but really he is being killed by the three idiots. Another problem arises however - he survives and lives to tell the tale.

Of course nobody believes a drunk baboon like Kershaw was, until he calls Private Detective Ed Dubois (Ed Harris) and tells him his story. Originally Ed shrugs it off, but the more Ed looked into it, maybe Kershaw wasn't lying. Everything that actually happened to Kershaw was so ridiculous that it was actually true. Ed goes out and gets proof on what these three idiots have been doing with their money. Lugo plays basketball with neighborhood children. Doorbal marries his penis doctor (Rebel Wilson). Doyle goes back to snorting coke.

This sounds completely ridiculous, but mind you, it is a universe that was skillfully created. Every single detail in this film has been crafted to seem more ridiculous than the next, but Christopher Markus and Stephen McFeely have skillfully crafted a film that no matter how ridiculous it gets, it never seems unrealistic. I'll go as far as calling these guys masterful storytellers. The film is a little bit over two hours long, but not a single scene feels unnecessary. There are moments of character development that add to the actual film and make it better.

There is a reason why these guys are writing the scripts to the Phase Two AVENGERS films.

Anthony Mackie and Mark Wahlberg are given moments to shine. This is neither of their films. Mark Wahlberg is best when he is performing next to an actor who can keep up with him and Anthony Mackie is truly great whenever he is in the same shot as Rebel Wilson. Wilson, who I usually can't stand, is actually pretty damn funny in this movie. She has a great line at the end of the film that may be the funniest line in the film. Ed Harris seems to have had a great time filming this movie - he was a blast to watch delivering every single line. And Tony Shalhoub should be nominated for Best Supporting Actor just for the scene in which he wakes up in his hospital bed.

But this film don't belong to any of them. This film is ruled by Dwayne Johnson. Finally, he is able to throw his "Rock" persona away and play a character that really isn't badass. He plays Doyle as a likable character who is so pathetically serious that really brings out a sympathetic reaction from the audience. Yet his character drives everything we see. He don't need women, money, or cocaine. He wants to be accepted in the way he accepted Jesus Christ. His character's conflict is the definition of peer-pressure.

If the film is ruled by Dwayne Johnson, then it is dominated by Michael Bay. Remember how I said how ballsy this film is? In two hours, he makes three criminals completely likable and sympathetic human creatures. Yet, this movie draws Holocaust parallels all at the same time. The torture that is inflicted on the Jewish character that Shalhoub plays is a play on torture that took place at concentration camp. There is a scene in the film where Shalhoub is hung upside down like a piece of laundry and is sent around the room until he signs a piece of paper.

Michael Bay, however, is Jewish, and I doubt that he would ever make a film that is anti-Semetic. (SIDENOTE: Megan Fox called him Hitler, so if you trust Megan Fox, maybe he would.) But with all of the Christian-overtones (including a gay priest) and a homosexual toy-warehouse setting, I feel like maybe there are more questions to this film on what Michael Bay was aiming towards. But then again, Michael Bay is an "artist" (whether you like that term or not), and this is his art. It should only really matter to him. In an age where Emmett Till's family demands an apology from a low-life shitty rapper, we really shouldn't be worried about how ballsy Michael Bay's film is.

The film also has some of the best camerawork shown in any Michael Bay film. Cinematographer Ben Seresin goes from TRANSFORMERS shakey-cam to PAIN & GAIN steady-cam and I actually really approve of this work. My favorite shot in particular is a sequence that takes place in Mackie's characters home that show what's taking place in two different rooms.

Critics compare PAIN AND GAIN to FARGO. I will take FARGO and raise you to a more fun version of ALPHA DOG. Michael Bay don't deserve to be in the same class as the Coen Brothers. He still has a few more masterpieces to make until then. But to the people who write this film off because of the Michael Bay name should probably stop what they're doing and go see it. I'm not sure that they will have the same reaction as I will, but it is the best film Bay has made yet.

But if you don't like this film, Michael Bay is making TRANSFORMERS 4. He'll be back to Bay-form in no time.

MUD Review: Love, Friendship, and Fucking In Scuba Gear To The Beach Boys

Love sucks.

There is no better way of putting it. I would hate to use the quote "Live, laugh, love." because there is no such phrase that is worst than that. There is nothing funny about love, and you can't really live with love because love will one day kill you.

Love is a great feeling. You love to be loved. People loved being loved by you. Nothing is more comforting than a significant other or a family member telling you how much you mean to them. It keeps people going on even the worst of days. And on the worst of days when you're tying a noose to your neck, just stop and remember that. There is always someone that loves you. I gave that to you for free.

But love can be an equally terrible feeling. There's that obsessive kind of love, when you have a crush on someone and feel really strongly about this person, yet they don't have the same feeling as you. There's that abusive kind of love, where no matter how much you love person, it just fucking kills you. And then there is that cheating kind of love, where you love the person and then you find out that she has been fucking three of your best friends and sucked off your enemy.

I've been in love many times - or at least I thought. Love is a bitch, and a slap in your face is the only way you can truly understand it. But if you need a happy story, after many failed relationships (relationSHITS is the proper term) and many crushes that never liked me back, I have been with a girl for more than two years. Couldn't be happier.

The movie that I am reviewing today, simply titled MUD, is a story that is about friendship, loyalty, and love. It's not a happy story, because if it was a happy story it wouldn't be that exciting. Instead, director/script-writer Jeff Nichols has solidified any doubt of a filmmaking career with this excellent story. There are great performances, outstanding cinematography, enticing dialogue, a super environment, and well-developed character arcs.

I give you permission to love this movie. You may kiss the bride.

Ellis (Tye Sheridan) and his friend Neckbone (Jacob Lofland) travel down the Mississippi River one day and come across this boat that is up in the tree. The little explorers they are climb it and discover that someone has been living up there. They run back to their boat and see the man that has been staying in the boat. His name is Mud (Matthew McConaughey).

Mud, like your reviewer, has had some rough patches with love. His backstory is as followed - one day when he was younger, he met this girl Juniper (Reese Witherspoon). Juniper saved his life one day after a snake bit him and went out of her way to take him to the emergency room. Ever since, Mud has felt like he needs her in his life to be happy. So whenever Juniper has a bad relationship with a guy, she tells Mud and Mud goes out of his way to rough the guy up.

One specific guy that he roughed up, however, pushed Juniper down the steps and killed any chance of her ever having a child again. Mud was driven mad and shot the man in cold blood. Now on the run, Mud is hiding on a patch of land off the Mississippi and hoping nobody finds him. But he has a proposal for the two boys - help him get the boat down from the tree and back into working shape and he will give them his pistol.

This simple plot has been done before, and I'm not calling MUD an original story at all. But Jeff Nichols invests a lot of time in these characters and instead of making these simple creatures, he puts so much backstory into every single character that it makes them so much more likeable. We are given heroes to root for and villains to root against.

Ellis, like every fourteen year old boy, is confused and crushing, but he believes in love. He puts all of his faith in this thing called love and nobody can change his mind. Lord knows how many times I stayed up at night wondering if this girl ever felt the way I felt about her. His parents fight all of the time and they talk about getting a divorce. His neighbor across the river, Tom Blankenship (Sam Shepard), tells him that Mud is just going crazy in love for no reason. He falls for a girl a few years older than him (Bonnie Sturdivant) who doesn't share the same feelings for him as he does to her. Yet, he still believes in such thing called love. It's something to admire truly.

Neckbone, like every OTHER fourteen year old boy, just wants to see a girl's tits and ass, which is natural too, I guess. I guess we all watched our fair share of internet sex. Neckbone never knew his parents and has lived with his Uncle (Michael Shannon), who has sex with random trashy girls to The Beach Boys "Help Me Ronda." Yet, his idea of love is totally different than Ellis. The tale of MUD is not just about love, but nature vs. nuture too.

To be honest with you, I am really happy with this film and a lot of it has to do with the character preparation. All of the loose ends in this film are tightened and secured. But where there is great screenwriting, there will be no film without its location. The location is just as much as a character as Ellis and Neckbone and Mud. Nichols has created an environment that is so small that it feels so real. At one point, Neckbone and Ellis ask each other if they have ever seen Juniper around. There is even character development on the locations!

Mud is an anti-hero, but you root for him because you know he has good intentions and he is a protector for the children. But every character has a weak spot. Ellis gets mad too easily and punches people in the face. His father (Ray McKinnon) yells a lot. Tom Blankenship has a dark past. But these are all likeable characters. They have likeable attributes to them, and their weaknesses make them more likeable because you feel for them.

The villains, however, are so easy to root against, which is really hard to say. There are bounty hunters that are after Mud, and it just so happens that the bounty hunters are the father (Joe Don Baker) and the brother (Paul Sparks) of the man that Mud killed. They follow around Juniper in the town to make sure that she isn't assisting Mud on escaping anywhere. They are so unlikeable that the first scene we ever see Paul Sparks's character is when he is beating the shit out of Reese Witherspoon's character.

This is such an odd time that this is in a film, because a man who just saved three women from being kidnapped for ten years has past history with domestic abuse. Yet we still call him a hero.

There is some excellent cinematography in this film. The cinematographer, Adam Stone, has only really DP'd (while we are on the subject of love, snicker snicker) a few films and has done a few films working as a second unit crew member. MUD really stands out and proves this guy's future in the business. Watch the nighttime scenes and, in particular, the last night time scene in the film. Beautifully lit, beautifully shot. This is textbook cinematography.

I think it is about time we start taking Matthew McConaughey seriously. No longer is he making romantic comedies without the comedy and playing one-note characters. He took a few years off, worked his craft, and is now finally playing great characters. First KILLER JOE, then MAGIC MIKE (and let's face it, he was the only GREAT part about this movie), and now MUD. He brings life to this character when it needs it the most. For now, we can only hope that he can bring more of this kind of acting to more films.

MUD is a film that will have to stand the test of time. If you watch it really closely, almost nobody uses a cell-phone, yet it takes place in 2011. The cars that are driven are older automobiles. Even some of the clothes look dated. Yet, Nichols's vision is remarkable. Every detail is accounted for. If you would compare this to another coming of age film, MUD will leave that film in the dirt.

Pun intended.

Welcome to EyeGolb

I love movies.

This isn't a secret to anybody. In the years of my life, I have seen about 5000 movies. This is no exaggeration. I was born around movies. My parents would put me in my playpen and put on movies for me. I would sit in there and even back then, I knew the proper thing to say was, "Fuck these stupid toys."

As I got older, movies became more of an obsession than love. I blame this on my sister's godmother. She dropped off a box of VHS tapes that she didn't use anymore. My guess was she upgraded to DVD or she just thought the movies were shit. But there were two treasures in that box: SOUTH PARK: BIGGER LONGER UNCUT, which transcended my knowledge of humor and vulgarity, and THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT, which transcended my knowledge of filmmaking.

Yes, it was a little horror film made for little to nothing that made me want to be a filmmaker. I would watch it every day I woke up to get ready for school. I would watch it every night before I went to bed. When I say every day, I mean EVERY DAY. I must have watched THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT 200 times during the year of the third grade. I once wrote a fan-fic story back in the third grade and my teacher told my parents that I was too violent.

Now I go back and watch THE BLAIR WITCH PROJECT and I will fully admit that it is a terrible movie. But I digress.

Throughout the years, movies have been my best friend. For long car rides or to go out to dinner, I would bring a portable DVD player to watch a movie. Whenever I was bored and needed something to do, I would pull out one of my DVDs and watch a movie. Whenever I was sad, lonely, and needed a friend, no one came to the rescue - except for a movie.

Movies were there whenever I needed them. They never carried a cell-phone but they were always at the tip of my fingers. The greatest thing in the world about where I grew up was living around the corner from a videostore. Before there was Netflix, they had a Netflix-like membership where I could take out three movies at a time. I would go every day, rent three movies, watch them, and return them the next day to get three more. I watched everything they had. The people working there knew my name and phone number by heart. It was crazy how close I got with everybody there.

My parents never had a problem with anything I have ever watched. I'll never forget in the third grade, the day before my little brother was born, they told me to pick a movie to watch at the videostore. I picked JAY AND SILENT BOB STRIKE BACK. As my little brother was seeing the light of day, I was witnessing the miracle of birth in film. It was something of amazement - how someone could make movies like these?

But until the eighth grade, I never really went to the theater. I never had any money to go, until my parents got me a $100 dollar giftcard to the AMC that year. I saw so many movies that year and loved so many. 2007 was such a great year for film. It's amazing.

But then my interest in movies didn't totally go away, but it just mellowed out. My videostore closed due to the success of Netflix. A lot of bad movies were released in 2008 and 2009. I got into playing hockey and made a few friends. All of the sudden, movies weren't my best friend. They were about third down the list.

But since then, film and I have been getting along just fine. The end of 2009 brought some great films, and 2010 introduced me to some life-changing movies. My interest was back, and in 2011 I got a girlfriend who loved watching movies just as much as I did. When she went away to college, I had movies to fall-back on. I stayed at home for school and hated what I was doing. Communications and physical education never did anything for me. I wanted to make movies.

So since then I signed up for film school. At this moment of writing I have about six weeks left and then hopefully I can start getting behind a camera and shooting some stuff. I needed to be able to gain an audience, so I started a blog called EyeGolb. I think I'm a good writer, but what am I going to write about? My love for hockey isn't going to interest too many people, and my life is quite boring.

Maybe I could write about movies that come out, and talk about what makes a great movie, what makes a bad movie, and talk about what influences me. Hell, if I'm going to make movies, I need to know what a good movie is, right?

Just a few things to note:

1. People call me quite the contrarian. Not like the Armond White-kind of guy, but there are a lot of things that I find about film that I don't like that entertain other people. If I don't write what I really feel about a film, what's the point of lying?

2. I like to use the English language and stick true to my beliefs. This can be a problem for people who are easily offended. I don't believe in a God, I support gay marriage, and I really like to curse. If this bothers you, I'm sorry, but I promise you - there is more to me than what you see. I think I'm a good writer and might even change your perspective in some cases.

3. I don't get paid for this. Movies are expensive to make, and for people who watch them like I do, it is expensive to watch. I don't get screeners or early passes to go see the movie for free, so I have to pay for everything I watch. I'm not asking to get paid. I'm not asking for money from you guys. But I will watch anything. If you would like me to see any specific movie, just ask me, especially if it is in theaters. But if you guys would like to send me some tickets to go see some movies, my email address in boondocksaint048@aol.com. Thanks in advance.

4. DVDs are different. You don't have to send me DVDs. I got a library where I can just put them on hold and wait to watch them. But if you would like, again email me. (I prefer Blu-Rays though, so don't send me DVDs - send me a Blu-Ray.)

5. If you're a filmmaker and you want me to watch your movie - sorry, I won't do that. I've gotten into fights with a few independent filmmakers who didn't like what I had to say about their films and I refuse to watch them anymore for free. If your films ever get released, I will gladly pay to watch them and review them. But don't send me stuff for free. My name isn't Harry Knowles - I like telling the truth.


And who knows? Maybe one day something will become of this. Maybe I will start posting stuff about my movies. Maybe I will start getting paid for writing this. Maybe this will become bigger than me.

All will be known. Look out for a few theatrical reviews in the next few days. Follow me on Twitter at @therealtrex048. I look forward to your readings.

* I bought a domain name through Google/Blogger at www.eyegolb.com. Don't try clicking it because it don't work. I have no idea why and it is pissing me off. So if anybody is willing to help me, I can't offer pay or anything. Just know you would be in my greatest gratitude.