Looper

4.5/5

This was a near perfect movie. It was exciting, thought provoking, and very well performed. It suffered from the same issue as Inception, though - it was POSSIBLY too smart for its own good. I say possibly because unlike Inception, I can think of intelligent reasons behind all the possibly unintelligent moments, and at the time of writing this review, I'm just not sure if I'm overthinking it or thinking about it just right. I can't go into too much of the detail of it, because it would expose the ending, but the ending comes down to this question - is there a fairly large loophole, or is the point of the movie that nothing changes? I'll let you think about it if/when you see it. Regardless, although it's not his greatest performance even this year, Joseph Gordon-Levitt is great as always. We have a great performance and character from Bruce Willis, and a really nice performance from Emily Blunt. The story is new, interesting, a nice twist to what possibly could have been predictable or cliche. I like the world, even if it is a bit bluntly explained in the beginning. It's worth a watch, hopefully (for your sake of enjoying the movie), you don't notice the potential plot holes. Enjoy. 

Trouble With The Curve

2/5

I wanted this to be better than it was. Eastwood wasn't that good. Adams wasn't that good. The best part of it was Justin Timberlake, who I really enjoy. He wasn't enough to carry this though. It was predictable, it was sappy, it was kindof bothersome after a while. I desperately wanted there to be a point to this story, but I never really saw what was so beautiful or inspiring about this story. Most frustrating of all was the complete lack of urgency to the story. I felt like it was taking its time in a story that didn't need to take its time. It was slow despite a sudden urgency of an imminent draft decision. Simply put, there was no worth in the story that I could find. And since it wasn't true, cliche dramatic elements couldn't be forgiven. After Moneyball last year, this just doesn't remotely compare. In fact, it contradicts what Moneyball was about, which really got to me in a way. I guess I'm biased.

End of Watch

2/5

What an overrated mess. First of all, why on earth does it start off as a found footage film, and very quickly use shots that don't make sense? You can't have a camera used by a main character to shoot the movie unless you can make sure the camera is always in someones hand. Shots above a driving car DON'T WORK. Second, don't show us scenes that serve absolutely no purpose in a movie that's supposed to be suspenseful. Why are we watching Gyllenhaal do jumping jacks on a rooftop? Oh right. Because...? Anyway, I don't know if it was just me, but I really didn't see that much chemistry in Pena and Gyllenhaal. Maybe it's because I simply don't believe that Gyllenhaal would ever be taken seriously as a cop. Giving the gang a camera was obnoxious. We didn't need to see it. Why not just leave them faceless? It would have worked so much better. It was so silly watching them, so pointless. They had no character, and we knew their purpose from the police officers. And the ending...GOD. I could rant about the ending for hours...obviously I won't. I dunno, skip this until you can netflix it if you really wanna watch it.

Dredd

4/5

YEEEEEEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH. This is EVERYTHING I wanted out of a remake of Judge Dredd. First of all, WHY WOULD YOU REMAKE JUDGE DREDD?! Are there really Dredd nuts screaming for a remake of a super silly movie? Apparently. This was exactly as gritty, as bloody, as silly, as tongue in cheek, and as self aware as a movie like this needs to be. It was like The Raid: Redemption only more predictable (in a fun way),  and a different kind of badass. He had the perfect walk, the perfect voice, and the perfect moments to let himself be corny. I loved the villain, I loved the power she had and the drug she pushed. I loved how the movie didn't try to explain the future but delved into a very graspable story to avoid becoming silly in a science way, keeping itself tongue in cheek in an action way. Sylvester Stallone, I hope you're proud.

Resident Evil: Retribution

1/5

As far as Resident Evil movies go, this didn't bother me as much as the rest. But...well...jeez. It's still stupid. First of all, the plot summary before the movie was dumb...you're showing the audience who has almost surely seen every movie religiously, and you're telling them about everything they've seen? Realistically, how many people are going to see this Resident Evil movie if they haven't seen the previous ones? The action's fun sometimes. Other times, its standard, predictable, nothing special. As far as direction goes, I believe this might have had more slo-mo than any other movie I've ever seen. The entire opening scene is a slo-mo reverse scene...which we then see again? Why did we have to see that? All in all, its what you expect. So don't see it.

The Words

1.5/5

Admittedly, it wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be. But, it was still pretty dumb. It was incredibly predictable, filled with obvious plot moments, and silly realizations. More so, it was in a framing device, that then became ANOTHER framing device. It was annoying, confusing, and pointless. The first framing device, Dennis Quaid's character, is incredibly frustrating. He's supposed to be a brilliant writer, and yet the words that come out of his mouth are blunt, lacking detail, and boring. Bradley Cooper was fine, but the film forces us to like him whether we want to or not. Zoe Saldana was pointless, and nothing special anyway. Jeremy Irons had a long, rambling, uninteresting flashback that simply bored the audience. Oh well. It was a nice try, and I appreciate the attempt to write a script with such subject matter. However, it has to be done with care - how can you write a script about a story that's supposed to be brilliant without essentially forcing yourself to call your own story brilliant?

Lawless

3/5

I have to give the movie a lot of credit for its handful of great performances (Tom Hardy, Gary Oldman, Daniel DeHaan, and Guy Pearce specifically). But most of the movie I was frustrated. Why did I need to be told this story? For someone like me who doesn't know the intricacies of the prohibition bootleggers, it really wasn't clear until the end that the significance of this story was. And that was its downfall. It was a story with a lot of style, but no real point to it for a long time. And, I hate to say this, but all of the great acting was brought down a notch by Shia LaBeouf. Why, oh why is he acting? He was overacting or he was just annoying. And I can think of a few choice actors to replace him with, who also more closely resembled the other two brothers (my top choice being Andrew Garfield). All in all, it's one a lot of people are going to appreciate the grittiness, but that's really about all this had to it. The performances are enough to raise it a fair amount in my ranking.