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(05/17/10 12:00am)
I know from firsthand experience that sitting between the Thresher Arts & Entertainment editor and the former Thresher editor in chief while reviewing a film can be intimidating. But as we watched Iron Man 2, Joe Dwyer and Casey Michel may have become more afraid of me after I kept gripping their arms in a deathlock during action scenes featuring Mickey Rourke's electroshock whips. Let's just say that Iron Man may be strong, but my grip can be even stronger.A vast improvement over 2008's Iron Man, Iron Man 2 is a more polished and classic-feeling comic-turned-film. While the original Iron Man had a strong focus on current events and attempted to tie terrorism and Middle East politics into the plot, Iron Man 2 goes back to the basics: It delivers an intense yet comedic action film with solid character development, high-tech gadgets and beautiful women who come to the hero's rescue.
(05/17/10 12:00am)
There's nothing quite like going to a chick flick with a guy in tow; it's a test of his manliness and the likelihood he'll get a second date. However, reviewing a chick flick with Casey Michel is an ... experience. And remember, I said it was a review, not a date. But apart from the awkwardness of him announcing to the box office attendant, ticket taker and popcorn lady that we were on a date, his running commentary and yelling at the big screen during the movie was entertaining. While Casey and I both agreed it was a pretty sorry movie, here's what I took away from The Back-Up Plan.Birth control comes in many forms, and The Back-Up Plan is now one of them. The Back-Up Plan's gross depiction of natural childbirth, the emotional havoc of pregnancy and the sheer awkwardness of the artificial insemination process are more than enough to make a couple on a movie date night reconsider any special plans after the movie.
(04/16/10 12:00am)
Tina Fey and Steve Carell, comedy superstars of "30 Rock" and "The Office," respectively, are today's funniest television personalities. And together on the big screen in Date Night, Fey and Carell prove they are a force to be reckoned with, creating absolute hilarity as an awkward suburban couple innocently caught up in an action-packed New York City scandal.Date Night finds Fey and Carell as a dorky couple from the suburbs looking for an enjoyable night out on the town. Without the reservation needed to score a table at a hip restaurant, Claire (Fey) and Phil (Carell) steal the reservations of another couple (The Book of Eli's Mila Kunis and Milk's James Franco), gangsters involved in a scandal with the Manhattan district attorney (Night and Day's William Fichtner). With the help of a good-looking security expert (The Lovely Bones's Mark Wahlberg) and an NYPD detective (I Can Do Bad All by Myself's Taraji P. Henson), Claire and Phil work to escape the district attorney's threats in what turns out to be their most exciting date in years.
(04/09/10 12:00am)
Think of novelist Nicholas Sparks as the Stephen King of the romance genre. He consistently churns out novels that are easily adapted into tear-jerking movies: Novel quality notwithstanding, he explores profound sadness, passionate romance and time-honored life lessons about family, and audiences eat it up. The latest Sparks novel-turned-flick, The Last Song, follows this pattern, with Disney Channel star Miley Cyrus stepping in as Sparks' leading lady. But while the addition of a teenage superstar to the mix makes the film's cast slightly more youthful compared to past Sparks adaptations, there is really nothing truly original about The Last Song. It fails to top Sparks' most acclaimed novel-to-movie incarnations, such as The Notebook and A Walk to Remember.The Last Song begins with Ronnie (Hannah Montana: The Movie's Cyrus), a rebellious teenager, being sent with her brother (Post Grad's Bobby Coleman) to live with their father (Green Zone's Greg Kinnear) in Georgia for the summer. While she stays at her father's beach house, Ronnie rediscovers her passion for playing the piano, befriends an abused neighborhood girl (The Consultants' Carly Chaikin), works to repair her relationship with her father and manages to fall in love with volleyball hunk Will (Triangle's Liam Hemsworth).
(03/26/10 12:00am)
The good news, ladies, is that your boyfriend might willingly accompany you to see The Bounty Hunter. The title suggests a testosterone-fest packed with action sequences, but The Bounty Hunter is actually a chick flick that features a few guns and a splash of suspense. Granted, the movie's marketers should get credit for using a title that might scam reluctant boyfriends into seeing the film, but be warned: The Bounty Hunter is not an action film.Nicole (He's Just Not That Into You's Jennifer Aniston) is a successful investigative reporter whose sleuthing is cut short when a warrant for her arrest is issued for a minor traffic accident. Bounty hunter - and Nicole's ex-husband - Milo (Law Abiding Citizen's Gerard Butler) re-enters Nicole's life to bring her in for the reward, but on their way back to jail, they begin to fall for each other all over again and unravel Nicole's original case in the process, with some help from Nicole's lounge singer mother (Christine Baranski, "The Good Wife"), Nicole's nerdy co-worker Stewart (Jason Sudeikis, "Saturday Night Live") and local bartender Jimmy (Up in the Air's Adam Rose).
(03/19/10 12:00am)
Sometimes even a movie can have an identity crisis. Such is the case with Remember Me, a film that promotes itself as a coming-of-age drama, yet mixes themes of death and deep loss with scenes of romantic bonding. The question of whether Remember Me is a drama, dramedy or action film is never fully answered because the plot has no real direction. Then again, Remember Me is less focused on plot than it is on serving up an intensely emotional Robert Pattinson as eye candy for the audience.Remember Me begins when Ally (Emilie de Ravin, "Lost") witnesses her mother's murder in a New York City subway just before her police investigator father (Where the Wild Things Are's Chris Cooper) rushes to the scene. Ten years later, Ally's life connects with that of Tyler Hawkins (New Moon's Robert Pattinson) after he has a run-in with Ally's father. On a dare from his goofy friend Aidan (The Invention of Lying's Tate Ellington), he decides to date Ally as revenge on her father.
(03/12/10 12:00am)
The highly anticipated Alice in Wonderland, the latest Tim Burton production based on the children's classic, delivers the magnitude of spectacle one would expect from a director who has cultivated a reputation for quirky retellings of well-known stories. In a startling departure from the book, however, unexpectedly dark themes ripple under bright, otherworldly colors and special effects in this re-imagining of the story - this romp through the looking glass seems like it's aimed more at adults than kids. But featuring a cast led by the eccentric Johnny Depp as the Mad Hatter and backed with beautiful computer-generated imagery, Alice in Wonderland is still an enjoyably unique yet gloomy film.Though the movie gets its name and premise from Lewis Carroll's books Alice's Adventures in Wonderland and sequel Through the Looking Glass, here it follows a much older, teenage Alice (Amelia's Mia Wasikowska). After her father's death and a surprise marriage proposal, the 19-year-old revisits the Underland of her childhood. In the course of her adventures, Alice re-encounters the Mad Hatter (Public Enemies' Johnny Depp), the White Queen (Valentine's Day's Anne Hathaway), the Red Queen (Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince's Helena Bonham Carter), the Cheshire Cat (House of Boys' Stephen Fry), twins Tweedledee and Tweedledum (both played by Astro Boy's Matt Lucas), the White Rabbit (New Moon's Michael Sheen), the Blue Caterpillar (Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince's Alan Rickman) and many other fanciful forest creatures.
(02/19/10 12:00am)
Like the previews suggest, Valentine's Day aims to be the American version of 2003's Love Actually. And like the British romantic comedy, Valentine's Day focuses on multiple, if maudlin, storylines and amasses a sizable all-star cast. While its British counterpart used Christmas as a romantic backdrop, however, Valentine's Day focuses on the magic of Feb. 14, and the result is a wonderfully charming film.The movie centers around the chaos at a Los Angeles flower shop on Valentine's Day, its busiest day of the year. Assisted by his funny sidekick Alphonso (Beverly Hills Chihuahua's George Lopez), flower shop owner Reed Bennet (Personal Effects' Ashton Kutcher) is smitten with the holiday, having just asked his girlfriend Morley (The Love Guru's Jessica Alba) to marry him. While love-drunk Reed flits around the shop, basking in thoughts of wedding bells, he fills Valentine's Day flower orders for others attempting to capitalize on the holiday.
(02/05/10 12:00am)
Paris may be the city of love, but Rome is the city of romance, the perfect place to find that special someone. And while When in Rome, which ventures into sometimes trite and overly hokey territory, is not a great movie, it is still a fun, playful chick flick about searching for love within the city's beautiful piazzas.Beth (Kristen Bell, "Gossip Girl") is a workaholic curator for the Guggenheim Museum who works under the strict supervision of her critical boss (Tinker Bell and the Lost Treasure's Anjelica Huston). When she attends her sister's (Alexis Dziena, "Entourage") wedding in Rome, Beth plucks four coins out of a nearby fountain, and in doing so, causes the men who threw in the coins to fall in love with her. However, in spite of the spell-induced suitors' attempts to gain her attention, Beth ends up falling in love with her sister's best man, Nick (Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen's Josh Duhamel), who helps her snap out of her hectic lifestyle as well as the fountain's magic spell.
(01/15/10 12:00am)
From a studly detective to a blossoming queen, this year's holiday films delivered delightful gifts wrapped from top to bottom. As they often do, a deluge of notable films flooded theaters over the past few weeks in order to take advantage of vacationing moviegoers and attempt one last swipe at an Oscar nomination. While the wealth is often distributed fairly equally during the winter months, 2009 propelled one film to the head of the class handily. James Cameron's (Titanic) Avatar outperformed any other film over the holidays by bringing in more than $441 million at the time of this writing - plus $906 million internationally - to make it the second-highest grossing film of all time. Even with its two-and-a-half hour runtime and middling plot, Avatar's stunning visuals pleased audiences and critics alike and earned four Golden Globe nominations.
(01/15/10 12:00am)
With Leap Year, it's clear that the 1960's legacy of Rock Hudson and Doris Day movies lives on. The plot of Leap Year is simple, the humor is basic and the romance is perfectly clean - no messing around in the bedroom for this couple. And while audiences still enjoy Hudson's and Day's flicks - Pillow Talk was added to the National Film Registry just last month by the Library of Congress - Leap Year lacks the special spark that marked Hudson and Day's movies, and instead exhibits a minimalism that tosses aside both excitement and originality. In Leap Year, Anna (Julie & Julia's Amy Adams) is a sharp young professional living in Boston with Jeremy (Step Brothers' Adam Scott), her boyfriend of four years. When Jeremy gives her diamond earrings instead of a diamond engagement ring, Anna decides to follow him on his business trip to Dublin after her father (Confessions of a Shopaholic's John Lithgow) tells her about an old Irish tradition that allows a woman to propose to a man on Leap Day. Anna's trip to Ireland turns into an adventure full of pitfalls and passion, and after many mishaps, she falls in love with her Irish cab driver, Declan (Watchmen's Matthew Goode).
(12/04/09 12:00am)
In response to those who attempt to trivialize sports, proponents point to the range of emotions found within the sporting spectrum, highlighting especially those of indomitable spirit and underdog status. Hollywood has taken note. From the timeless Rudy to the near-decade-old (can you believe it?) Remember the Titans, moviemakers salivate over a sports tale of David trouncing Goliath, whether in society or on the field.
(11/20/09 12:00am)
Many head out to Los Angeles to become stars, but few succeed. One of these elite and talented individuals is Rice graduate Ron Bozman (Hanszen College '69) who has served as executive producer of box-office hits including The Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Failure to Launch, The Stepford Wives and Confessions of a Shopaholic. However, Bozman is best known for his production of 1991's Silence of the Lambs, for which he won the Academy Award for Best Picture.Last week, Bozman visited Rice to share his experiences with students, and the Thresher chatted with this producer about his career at Rice and his experiences in film.
(11/06/09 12:00am)
When your sweet tooth is calling, you can't expect a 99-cent soft serve ice cream cone from the McDonald's drive-through to hit the spot. Sure, it fits the bill for a cheap dessert, but the quality is somewhat lacking, and the drive-through fails to provide the appropriate social environment. However, we're still college students, so we would be hard-pressed to shell out $10 for a slice of chocolate cake from The Chocolate Bar.
(10/30/09 12:00am)
Amelia Earhart was known for flying high. Unfortunately the new biopic,Amelia,doesn't quite reach the same heights as its real-life counterpart. Hilary Swank (Birds of America), who portrays Earhart, may bear a striking resemblance to the pilot; this fails, however, to make up for the stilted dialogue and characters, though they are based on real historical figures. The outcome, alas, is a flat movie that fails to live up to its potential. The film opens with Earhart beginning to capture the heart of the American people, displaying her daring escapades and achieving numerous firsts for women. Pushed by her manager-turned-husband George Putnam (Nights in Rodanthe's Richard Gere), Earhart begins as a phony who only wishes to garner publicity - and a boatload of money - for her famous flight across the Atlantic when, in actuality, she was only a simple passenger.
(10/23/09 12:00am)
Despite its origins as a children's book, the film adaptation of Where the Wild Things Are is not a kid's movie. It's dark and deep, melding haunting images with equally haunting themes. Yet the film reminds us of what it was like to be a child - both the good and the bad - and touches audiences in a way that few films can. Based on the children's picture book by author and illustrator Maurice Sendak, Where the Wild Things Are is the coming-of-age story of a young boy named Max (The Brothers Bloom's Max Records). He struggles in a world in which his mother (The Soloist's Catherine Keener) doesn't understand his "wildness" and his sister (Blue Heelers' Pepita Emmerichs) starts to make new friends and ignore him.
(10/09/09 12:00am)
Imagine a world where no one lies; where everyone says exactly what is on their minds. Everyone knows what their friends, bosses and significant others are thinking, making day-to-day activities simple and predictable.And, in the case of The Invention of Lying, exasperatingly unexciting. Despite its efforts at humor, the film, disjointed and bland, becomes as trite and boring as the world it tries to depict.
(10/02/09 12:00am)
Bright Star is a high-minded, intellectual film, if you can somehow translate "intellectual" into a lot of staring, a lot of breathing, a lot of silence and a whole lot of boring.One would think a film about Romantic poet John Keats would feature dialogue akin to that of a poetic master. But while Bright Star places an emphasis on Romantic poetry and beautiful scenes, it neglects essential elements of a good film, such as realistic character interaction and a plotline that actually develops.
(09/11/09 12:00am)
The 1950s, or so the stereotype goes, were a time of peaceful picnics and families happily cruising in four-door Cadillacs. Staid and calm, they were borderline uninteresting and often uneventful. With its pearl-necklaced housewives and tweed-suited fathers, My One and Only nails this stereotype just right.Unfortunately, My One and Only also stays true to the high level of boredom wrought by the decade. Aside from a slight dose of feminism, this film contains nothing unique, nothing special and nothing that makes you stop your Cadillac-cruising to go see it.
(08/28/09 12:00am)
The theme of Post Grad was timed perfectly. Students are just returning to school, and like the film's main character, many recent college graduates are struggling to find jobs during these hard economic times.So, good for the filmmakers for releasing the film at the right moment. Because that was about all they got right in this comatose, dithering attempt at cinema.
