All posts by Timothy English

2009 Movie Review

‘The Soloist’ (2009) — movie review

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Who’s in it?: Robert Downey, Jr. (Weird Science, The Pick Up Artist), Jamie Foxx (TV’s In Living Color, Any Given Sunday), Tom Hollander (Elizabeth: The Golden Age, Pirates of the Caribbean 2 & 3), Stephen Root (Office Space, O’ brother Where Art Thou?), Catherine Keener (Being John Malkovich, Where the Wild Things Are)

Let’s get the ball rolling here.  So RDJ is a writer for a news paper.  Jamie Foxx is a schizophrenic former musician turned homeless man.  RDJ wants to do a story on this guy but quickly learns that befriending a crazy guy off the street isn’t always as easy as it seems.  The movie is based on the true story of Nathaniel Ayers (Foxx) and the L.A.  Times writer, Steve Lopez (Downey, Jr.), that found him on the street and helped him get his life back together.

Okay The Soloist is a fine movie, I guess.  This is a good enough movie and all.  It has great acting performances all around but the movie really fails to connect on any personal or emotional levels.  It’s one of those movies you’d think would get nominated for an Oscar based on previews, etc. but then you see it and almost feel cheated when its over.  Sometimes producers think they can just throw a few good actors on screen, base the movie on a true story of someone with some sort of handicap or affliction and think its gold.  It’s just simply not the fucking case here.

RDJ is great and Foxx is good here and they have great chemistry together.  There are some sad moments and the film does a good job of focusing on the isolation and confusion felt by Foxx’s character.  Yet it doesn’t quite deliver.  It’s what you think and nothing more.  Sometimes that’s good enough, here it’s not.

I can’t say I didn’t like the movie because I did like it but its probably not something I’d go out of my way to watch again, therefore I’m sot sure I’d ask anyone else to check it out.

6/10

Would I recommend this movie?: Partly, yes, because it is well acted and RDJ is pretty good to watch in just about anything these days, but the movie is really kind of blah.  So unless you’re a fan of RDJ or Foxx or just curious to learn the movie adapted version of the life of Nathaniel Ayers, pass on this one.

2009 Movie Review

‘State of Play’ (2009) — movie review

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Who’s in it?: Ben Affleck (Armageddon, The Town), Russell Crowe (Gladiator, L.A. Confidential), Rachel McAdams (Sherlock Holmes, Mean Girls), Jason Bateman (Arrested Development, Teen Wolf Too) and Helen Mirren (The Queen, National Treasure: Book of Secrets)

Written by: Tony Gilroy (The Bourne Identity, Michael Clayton, The Cutting Edge)

Guess what?  I’m not going to bash this movie.  I probably could but I’m not.  I actually liked it.  Probably because it kinda flew under the radar when it came out, despite the fact that it’s loaded with top notch actors.  It stars Russell Crowe and Rachel McAdams who are reporters working on two separate cases and come to find out the cases are intertwined.  Ben Affleck is a Congressman who may or may not know more about a murder than he is letting on.

State of Play is written by Tony Gilroy, who wrote the Bourne movies and Michael Clayton; and is one of my favorite writers in Hollywood right now.  Come on, the dude wrote The Cutting Edge.  You know you love that shit.  Oh, come on, you know what I’m talking about:  Hockey player and figure skater team up to become an Olympic hopeful pairs skating duo but they have to over come their differences and learn about each other before they can— look, you know you know what fucking movie I’m talking about and I know you know you know that I know you know what movie I’m talking about it.  It’s a good movie.  Toe pick.

But I digress… The point is, that it’s a State of Play is a well written movie even if it is kind of slow paced.  But it’s the kind of slow pace where there is always something happening even though it doesn’t seem like it.  Oh, right…it’s called plot.  You’ll have to fucking pay attention to it.  Sorry.  It’s a good movie if you’re into political thrillers but let’s be honest, they’re all pretty much the fucking same, aren’t they?  Deadbeat reporters that everyone has given up on has a murder mystery thrown in his lap and knows there’s something rotten in Denmark.

Affleck is good.  Dude gets a bad rap.  Russell Crowe isn’t a total douche bag in it either, which is quite a shocker isn’t it.  He usually comes off as one.  Maybe that dude gets a bad rap, too.  But he did hit that guy with that phone once.  But maybe the guy deserved it.  Crowe was pretty bad ass as Maximus in Gladiator and do you remember Virtuosity?  What the fuck was up with that movie?  It was like The Matrix before The Matrix was cool, except it wasn’t cool like The Matrix.

7/10

Would I recommend this movie?:  If you’re into movies about political conspiracies and reporters and investigations then yes.  Like I said, it’s well acted.  But it’s not for everyone.  Then again, what movie is?

2009 Movie Review, Movie Reviews

‘The Last House on the Left’ riddled with dumb characters doing dumb things — movie review

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Who’s in it?: Tony Goldwyn (Ghost), Monica Potter (TV’s Parenthood) and Garret Dillahunt (TV’s Sarah Connor Chronicles)

Say it with me.  Remakes SUCK.  Now don’t we all feel better?  I went into this movie with a glimmer of hope. After all, the original was great when it was made but hasn’t stood the test of time. But making a movie look better doesn’t mean you are making a better movie.

The Last House on the Left, the remake of the Wes Craven’s 1972 directorial debut.  This movie was full of so many horribly written characters, it was actually pretty painful to watch.  I couldn’t figure out which was worse, the awful acting on display or the even worse plot.  I know it keeps fairly faithful to the original but raise your hand if you are sick of dumb hicks being villainous lunatics.  I’m going to raise your hand for you.

The movie is slow and boring.  It’s full of stupid people making one stupid decision after another.  Sure, it plays on some scary ass situations like watching your friend get murdered in front of you and being raped while a few retarded hicks watch and laugh, but ugh….and really would these idiots really show up and act so amazingly creepy after murdering one person and beating raping and thinking they killed another? Here’s an idea. Act natural.

lasthousePIC

Then again the victims are always dumber than the criminals. If these jokers showed up at my door, there is no way in hell me and my wife are letting them in.  “Oh, you guys look like crazy scumbags, please come in out of the rain.”  Note to Hollywood, movies are scarier when smart people are being threatened by people who are smarter.

Spoiler alert: The main bad guy gets his head nuked in a microwave by the father of the girl that gets raped and beaten.  I only say this because if you watch this movie, you’re going to want to stick your own head in your microwave.  Seriously, avoid this movie at all costs.  You will thank me for it.

3/10