Tag: cinema

Director:
Neill Blomkamp
Cast:
Sharlto Copley
Jason Cope
Nathalie Boltt
Sylvaine Strike
Rated: R

A new director on the scene might have just delivered the best movie of the summer.

Neill Blomkamp’s film begins 28 years after a large alien ship came to Earth in an alternate reality, eventually settling over Johannesburg, South Africa. Eventually, humans went inside and discovered aliens, which they called Prawns living there. As a response, a corporation called Multi National United set up a relief camp for the prawns, but it eventually went into bad shape, becoming more of a slum.

The film picks up with a relocation effort by MNU to move the Prawns to a worse camp. One of the teams sent to do this is led by Wikus Van De Merwe (Copley), an MNU worker. However, while working in the area, he is sprayed with a substance that begins to change his DNA, making him very valuable to MNU for his new ability to use alien tech.

Continue reading “REVIEW: ‘District 9’”

Director:
Nora Ephron
Cast:
Meryl Streep
Amy Adams
Stanley Tucci
Chris Messina

One biopic isn’t enough? How about two.

“Julie and Julia” follows the lives of titular characters, both famous for their cooking. The film explores Julia Child (Streep) and her adventure in publishing a book on French cuisine as well as Julie Powell (Adams) who cooked all of Child’s recipes and wrote about the experience in a blog.

Both stories, while relatively unrelated, are interwoven by exploring similar issues, challenges and joys as their adventures go on.

Continue reading “REVIEW: ‘Julie and Julia’”

Cast:
Will Ferrell
Anna Friel
Danny McBride
Jorma Taccone
Rated: PG-13

You know a movie is bad when it makes you want to stare at the ceiling rather than the screen.

In “Land of the Lost,” a re-imagining of the original 70s TV show, audiences follow the story of Rick Marshall (Ferrell). Rick is a sort of crack scientist who’s discovered another dimension and is trying to make a way to get to it. Eventually one of his fans, another scientist named Holly (Friel) helps him find a portal and the two, along with another man named Will (McBride) get transported to the other world.

However, the dimension they go to immediately shows itself as dangerous and they have to find out a way to return home.

Continue reading “REVIEW: ‘Land of the Lost”

Cast:
Shia LaBeouf
Megan Fox
Josh Duhamel
Tyrese Gibson
John Turturro
Rated: PG-13

As a fan of the first film, I was rather excited for this. What a disappointment.

In this sequel to the 2007 flick, we continue with the character Sam (Labeouf), as he’s about to enter college while remaining in contact with his girlfriend Mikaela (Fox). Meanwhile, the Autobots are secretly fighting alongside only American humans to eliminate any remaining Decepticons.

While the movie shows both story threads going relatively well for the heroes, things soon take a turn for the worse when the leader of the Decepticons, Megatron, is resurrected and returns to ruin the lives of Optimus Prime and Sam.

Continue reading “REVIEW: ‘Transformers Revenge of the Fallen’”

Cast:
Chris Pine
Zachary Quinto
Leonard Nimoy
Eric Bana
Rated: PG-13

What a great way to kick off the summer movie season.

This reboot of the original “Star Trek” premise opens with the death of James T. Kirk’s (Pine) father at the hands of an unknown enemy. As a result, Kirk has grown up rather rebellious. Meanwhile on Vulcan, a young Spock (Quinto) is also finding a rebellious path in life.

The movie follows both characters’ journey to joining the Federation Star Fleet and how they become stationed on the USS Enterprise. Along for the ride are other members of the classic crew.

Continue reading “REVIEW: ‘Star Trek’”

Cast:
Hugh Jackman
Liev Schreiber
Danny Huston
Will i Am
Lynn Collins
Rated: PG-13

Well, it was better than “Last Stand.”

Rather than another sequel, “Origins” serves as a prequel to the first three movies, displaying the backstory of Logan, also known as Wolverine (Jackman). The movie begins with Logan’s youth in Canada where he discovers his powers and runs away from his family with his brother Sabertooth (Schreiber).

After running away, the film follows their lives through various wars before being recruited by the U.S. government for special missions with other mutants.

Continue reading “REVIEW: ‘X-Men Origins Wolverine’”

Cast:
Zac Efron
Leslie Mann
Thomas Lennon
Matthew Perry
Sterling Knight
Michelle Trachtenberg
Rated: PG-13

Not bad Zac Efron, not too bad.

In this twist on a high school comedy, the story centers around Mike (played by Perry and Efron), once a popular basketball star in high school who missed out on a chance to go to college. The film picks up as his life is hitting a rocky point, as he’s in a dead end job, facing divorce and has a bad relationship with his kids.

This changes, though, when he falls into some sort of whirlpool and is suddenly 17 years old again. For this reason, he gets another look at life and a chance to fix his relationships with his family from another angle.

Continue reading “REVIEW: ’17 Again’”

Cast:
Reese Witherspoon
Seth Rogen
Hugh Laurie
Will Arnett
Rated: PG

It’s classic ginormous monsters taking on alien invaders in this animated picture, setting up a heavyweight bout.

The film mainly centers around the character Susan (Witherspoon), who gets smashed by a meteor and absorbs super powers on her wedding day causing her to grow to 49 feet and 11 inches while also getting enhanced strength and agility. For this reason she’s taken into a government facility with other monsters who are kept for research.

The team of monsters get a chance to get unleashed, though, when an alien species, after the powers that Susan now has, comes to Earth.

Continue reading “REVIEW: ‘Monsters vs Aliens’”