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Thursday, July 16, 2009

Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince


I saw Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince yesterday. Yes, I saw this movie on opening day. Not only did I see it on opening day, I watched some of it on the second day. I saw this movie at 10:30 pm. I hadn't even planned to see it at 10:30. It was a spur of the moment kind of thing. My mom was looking at movie times for some movies and I was like, hey, we should go see Harry Potter right now! She was a bit reluctant, and my brother had to take a shower and stuff before going out. So we had to get ready in 10 mins because it takes 20 minutes to get to the theater. By the time we left it was already 10:05 so we knew if there were a lot of people there we would get a shit seat, or maybe no seat at all. Even when we were driving, there were a bunch of slow people and even a little bit of traffic so we couldn't get there any less than 10:30.

Well when we got there the car parking lot was packed and we knew we'd get some really bad seats. We got in and some fat dude who totally looked like a pedophile was on the verge of legally harassing this one <21 year old cashier chick. I suppose that's why they're behind glass. Anyway, we got our tickets, and avoided the popcorn and drinks until we got our seats. We walked into the theater and what do you know, 2 empty rows of 4 seats on the right side of the theater. My brother got the first row, while I got the second row with my mom. So she went to get popcorn, and I was happy now that I avoided all of those 10 year old fucks who would be driving me crazy.

The movie started and every got really really quiet. No one made a sound, besides some laughter, throughout the entire movie. Good moviegoers seem to come at 10:30 showings :\

The movie starts, Harry gets curb stomped and survives with only a broken nose, and everything is pretty good. The movies ends and I'm like: "What?"

Nothing was accomplished. The only things that were accomplished are Dumbledore's death, learning about some objects, realizing that Voldermort may have been evil as a child, and to witness the fall of Michael Gambon's career. Even though that nothing was really accomplished, it was still the best Harry Potter. Maybe the Goblet of Fire was a bit better, but this one was dark funny and with the few action moments it had, it was really good. I actually can't wait to see it again.

I didn't feel any of the hype other people had for this movie, I just wanted to see something at 10:30 pm. I had no expectations, and I think I only saw the last movie once, so I was ready for anything. Halfway through the movie, I was pleasantly surprised to see myself enjoying it.

I've never read the books but for a film that makes a book to movie translation, you shouldn't have to. The reason a movie is made that is based on a book is to tell the story of a book to people who are too lazy to read. The Harry Potter series is a fine example of what a book to movie translation should be.

Monday, July 6, 2009

Public Enemies




Just got back from watching Public Enemies at the theater. Decent movie, though I did notice a few plot errors. Since Public Enemies is set in 1933 or something so I can't be too sure on certain plot errors but I'll still point them out. Please ignore those if I'm wrong.

Public Enemies is directed by Michael Mann with top actors Johnny Depp and Christain Bale up to bat. Johnny Depp did a well performance, but Christain Bale sucked. Hard. As it is a movie set in 1933, you know you have to have an accent. Johnny Depp's accent is sort of believeable, but Christian Bale's is pretty bad. I swear, at times he sounded like Keanu Reeves in Bill and Ted. His performance was definitely underpar. I'm starting to get the feeling, as with everyone else, that Christain Bale, as dedicated as he may be to his movies, isn't that well of an actor. It's the same kind of feeling when you see Dane Cook for the first time, and think he's not all that bad, but soon realise that his jokes are all the same. For some reason, Bale's characters seems to always end up as someone with a retarded voice.

This movie had some obvious flaws. Like when they were sneaking away, they stopped at a red light, and they were getting really apprehensive at the people eying them. When the light turned green, they turned right. Couldn't they have turned right on red? There were no other cars around. It was a bit strange, but I'm not too sure on the road laws of the 1930's so I can't say for sure.

Public Enemies isn't really an action movie. The action scenes they did have weren't amazing or anything. This is more of a movie about the drama of a criminal's rise and fall to power. Kind of like Scarface, but worse. Public Enemies, as good as some people say it may be, is pretty average. Yeah, it's better than most of the stuff that's come out so far, but that's only because this is the year the fallout from the WGA strike hits us. If this came out any other year, this wouldn't have the scores it has now. I wouldn't spend money to see it again, but if you're into movies for the plot and see actions as a good secondary element, then you'll like this. If not, you'll probably not like it as much.

Friday, July 3, 2009

Transformers 2: Revenge of the Fallen




So I just got back from seeing Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen and I have to say, it's very, very, mediocre. I have a lot to say about it so I figured I should make two reviews for two classes of people. This review is the shorter, spoiler free review. My next review of this movie will contain spoilers and be longer. It'll take me about a day to do, so don't expect it tomorrow or the next day. I have stuff to do tomorrow! Anyway, on to the review but first, the prologue.

I got there about 20 minutes before the film started and it was already pretty packed. I got a seat on the end of the row, right next to the stairs, so I had to use my awesome ability of contortion multiple times throughout the movie while people shimmy past. Kids were sitting in front of me. They were really annoying. Before the movie even began, they started chanting "Transformers" and everyone went oddly quiet. Their dad was like shh, nobody else is chanting. It was pretty funny. 8 year olds definitively enjoyed the movie. Out of their screams of laughter and other things, they made their view clear.

The movie starts off in 17,000 BC, showing some tribesmen chasing a tiger across the plains of... I suppose it's Egypt. They come across some robots with some huge cannon type thing and the bots start killing them. Then it cuts to Shanghai where some Decepticons were detected and a secret task force called NEST is coming to take down the robots. What does NEST stand for? I dunno, just roll with it. They use the Autobots to take down the Decepticons in the area and all is fine and dandy until Optimus Prime is given a warning about some dude named the Fallen.

Meanwhile, Sam Whitwickey, played by Shia Lebeowolf, is going off to college to learn about technology and astronomy. His mom is all crying and being annoying (which some people in the theatre misinterpreted as being humourous) and wishing he wouldn't go. He finds a piece of the all-spark in his jacket pocket and it beams the location of something that is unknown at this time into his head. He starts seeing weird symbols which'll help find the unknown item. He says goodbye to his parents and his girlfriend, which he promises not to blow off once he gets into college, and of course he'd never do that right? So he heads off to college and meets with his 3 roomies, 2 of which only have like 5 lines. The other one is godly annoying and unnecessary for the plot. Speaking of which, a lot of people and events are unnecessary for the plot. Those two dogs humping each other is really retarded, going to college is unnecessary. Even the humans are unnecessary.

A Transformers movie should be about Transformers, and not about human drama. I don't care about the seductive poses of Super Hot Megan Fox, I want to see stuff getting blown up. Who cares about love interests, this should be a movie about robots fighting robots and humans getting intertwined in the conflict. Everything they could of done correctly they failed horribly on. You can't pick out and name Decepticons, they're all gray and the same exact model. There is way too much Star Trek shaky camera, and you can't tell what is going on during the battles. The sad thing is this movie is so horrible, yet theaters are packed with people who are going to see it. I like to review movies, so I wanted to see this movie for the sole purpose of hating it. I really hated it. I'd barely consider renting the thing let alone buying the dvd. You should probably avoid this movie until the DVD comes out.

I'll explain all these plot failures and retarded themes in a lot more in detail in my spoiler review.

Stay tuned!