Tag: cinema

Carnage review

Director:
Roman Polanski
Cast:
John C. Reilly
Jodie Foster
Kate Winslet
Christoph Waltz
Rated: R

No wonder the kids who fought each other did what they did with the parents that they have.

“Carnage” opens with two young boys getting into a fight and one of them ends up getting hit in the mouth. Because of the scuffle, the parents of both boys decide to meet. On one side is Michael (Reilly) and Penelope (Foster), and on the other is Alan (Waltz) and Nancy (Winslet).

The two couples are civil with each other at first however as time goes on they begin to have disagreements and arguments and it goes from couple against couple to just a full on free for all with everybody taking shots at each other making the whole situation into a giant trainwreck.

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Martha Marcy May Marlene review

Director:
Sean Durkin
Cast:
Elizabeth Olsen
Sarah Paulson
John Hawkes
Hugh Dancy
Rated: R

Wait a minute, you’re telling me that not only do the Olsen twins have a sister, but that she actually has acting talent?

Martha Marcy May Marlene follows a young woman who has just run away from what seemed to be her home. We immediately find out though that she was actually running away from a dangerous cult that she had been a part of for an extended period of time. Martha (Olsen), after getting away from the cult led by Patrick (Hawkes), calls her sister Lucy (Paulson) to pick her up and take her home.

After getting to Lucy’s house Martha starts trying to live a normal life again with her sister and her sister’s husband Ted (Dancy), however she finds it difficult to do so. Memories of what had gone on during her days being in the cult continue to cut deep into her head and leaves her in a paranoid state for the rest of the film as she continues to wonder if the cult will eventually find her.

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The Descendants review

Director:
Alexander Payne
Cast:
George Clooney
Shailene Woodley
Amara Miller
Nick Krause
Rated: R

The Descendants follows the character Matt King (Clooney), a man who is a descendant of very wealthy Hawaiian land owners. Matt now holds in his hands the sole responsibility of whether to sell the remaining land he owns or not. However, he is under pressure due to the family feuding about which way to go. To make things worse, Matt’s wife Elizabeth was in a boating accident and is left in a coma, he is then informed that Elizabeth’s condition will not improve and that she will pass away within the week.

Because of this Matt and his daughter Scottie (Miller) decide to pick up his oldest child Alexandra (Woodley) and bring her back home. Once they get back home Alexandra has a sour attitude and eventually Matt finds out why. The reason is that Alexandra was angry with her mother since Elizabeth was cheating on Matt. This sets the family on a search to find the man that Elizabeth was having an affair with.

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Hugo review

Director:
Martin Scorsese
Cast:
Ben Kingsley
Sacha Baron Cohen
Asa Butterfield
Chloe Grace Moretz
Rated: PG

I’ll have to get my flame shields ready for this one.

Martin Scorsese’s latest pic Hugo is based on the novel “The Invention of Hugo Cabret.” The film follows a young boy by the name of Hugo (Butterfield), who after his parents dying is forced to work for his uncle in the main train station of Paris. After his uncle leaves Hugo continues working on the clocks and is left isolated. The one thing he has is a small robotic like machine that him and his father (played by Jude Law) were working on together.

Things change though as the shop keeper (Kingsley) of a small toy store in the station discovers Hugo and takes his notebook. When trying to get it back he meets the store keeper’s God-Daughter Isabelle (Moretz). Together the two of them begin to find out more about the robot and start to see a connection with the shop keeper and the machine.

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Immortals review

Director:
Tarsem Singh
Cast:
Henry Cavill
Mickey Rourke
Luke Evans
Freida Pinto
Stephen Dorff
Rated: R
Trailer

Immortals is the latest film set in the wonderful world of Ancient Greece. The plot follows a young warrior named Theseus (Cavill) who was taught how to fight by Zeus (Evans), although he was hiding as a human at the time. At the start of the film things seem to be going well for Theseus, however his world is thrown upside down as his mother is killed by King Hyperion (Rourke).

Theseus decides to go after King Hyperion and bring him down, to do this he must get the legendary Epirus Bow. Along the way, Theseus is joined by a bandit named Starvos (Dorff) and an oracle named Phaedra (Pinto).

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Tower Heist review

Director:
Brett Ratner
Cast:
Ben Stiller
Eddie Murphy
Matthew Broderick
Gabourey Sidibe
Tea Leoni
Alan Alda
Casey Affleck
Michael Pena
Rated: PG-13

This film felt like a last ditch effort by Murphy, Stiller and Broderick to have their careers recover.

Tower Heist follows the character Josh (Stiller), who is the general manager at a luxurious apartment tower complex. Josh runs a tight ship at the Tower and seems to have everything in line. However his world is spun around when he finds out that one of the residents, Arthur Shaw (Alda) turned out to be a Wall Street man who has many accounts of corporate crime.

This leads Josh to find out that Shaw stole nearly all of the pension money from the employees of the Tower. After this, Josh decides to get back at Shaw by stealing some of his money, and to do this he recruits some of the other employees of the tower as well as a thief that he met earlier by the name of Slide (Murphy.)

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The Ides of March Review

Director:
George Clooney
Cast:
Ryan Gosling
George Clooney
Philip Symour Hoffman
Paul Giamatti
Marisa Tomei
Evan Rachel Wood
Rated: R

The candidate that Clooney plays in this film is very similar to another one that ran a few years back.

The Ides of March follows a young man named Stephen Myers (Gosling), working on the campaign trail for presidential hopeful Governor Morris (Clooney). The campaign season is right in the middle of a heated Democratic primary with both candidates setting their sites on Ohio to deliver the knockout.

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Real Steel review

Director:
Shawn Levy
Cast:
Hugh Jackman
Dakota Goyo
Evangeline Lilly
Hope Davis
Rated: PG-13

Insert your “Rock’em Sock’em Robots” joke here!

Real Steal follows the story of Charlie Kenton (Jackman) who living in a future world where the big fighting sport is actually robot boxing instead of human boxing.

Kenton at one time was a great boxer himself and a contender for the title however once the fight game changed he started to go into a bit of a spiral downwards and now has any robot he can get, fight in any match up he can get.

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September 2011 Mini-Reviews

Shark Night 3D – 1 out of 5
This film had one mistake that made it trip over itself at every level. It advertised itself as the next Piranha 3D, but unlike that film, it was only rated PG-13. This hindered it. Without the over the top sex and violence which made the other film actually enjoyable, it fell flat.

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50/50 review

Director:
Jonathan Levine
Cast:
Joseph Gordon-Levitt
Seth Rogen
Anna Kendrick
Bryce Dallas Howard
Rated R

50/50 follows the story of Adam (Levitt), a 20-something who has a steady job, a girlfriend, a house and keeps himself in shape. However, his life is completely thrown upside down when he goes to the doctor for back pains and discovers he has a rare form of cancer on his spine. After researching about it he discovers his chances are 50/50.

The rest of the film follows his personal journey through his treatment, meetings with a psychologist (Kendrick), dealing with a relationship with his girlfriend Rachel (Howard) and spending time with his friend Kyle (Rogen).

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