Movie Review – Star Trek Into Darkness (2013)
“For those who are impatiently waiting my review of J.J. Abrams’ Star Trek Into Darkness I present the following mini review in two simple lines.
Is it good? Yes.
Is it better than the all-time franchise standard bearer, Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan? No.”
Feeling a sense of déjà vu? For long time fans of this blog some might notice that the previous italicized lines come from my review of JJ. Abrams’ 2009 Star Trek reboot but as I started to write my critique of Into Darkness it came to my mind that the same two questions needed to be answered yet again. However, this time around it is the second question that needs major attention as it has the power to play havoc with how you will feel coming out of this new installment.
Movie Review – A Good Day to Die Hard (2013)
A Good Day to Die Hard is akin to watching a former World Heavyweight boxing champion enter the ring for one last kick at the can only to have his opponent pulverize him into submission in no time flat. Make no mistake, not only is A Good Day to Die Hard, the worst installment in the franchise but it is also one of the lamest and totally irrelevant action adventures to come out of Hollywood in years. This is the type of movie that ends careers and this time I am not talking about Bruce Willis but his on-screen alter-ego, John McClane.
Movie Review – The Great Gatsby (2013)
The roaring twenties spring back to life in a visually and aurally dazzling assault on the senses from Romeo & Juliet/Moulin Rouge director Baz Lurhmann that is both exhilarating and exhausting yet the veteran director’s decision to essentially flip the traditional movie structure by revealing all his cinematic tricks in the first act is a decision that will come back to haunt him as the movie has nowhere to go but down and with each passing minute finds itself quickly decelerating until the point where what should be the emotional climax ends up feeling empty, inert and ultimately disappointing.
Movie Review – Chinese Zodiac (2012)
Supposedly Jackie Chan’s “last full-length action spectacle” Chinese Zodiac certainly marks the end of an era yet does Chan go out on a high note or does he embarrass himself silly? For the most part, Chinese Zodiac is a return to form that exemplified Chan’s Chinese movie output circa the 1980s and early 1990s before Rumble in the Bronx propelled him to make a slew of average Hollywood movies. This basically means that Chan has returned to making a lighthearted hokey film where the focus is clearly on innovative physical action sequences featuring Chan doing all his own stunts at the expense of plot, characterization and pace. At the same time Chinese Zodiac features one horrendous misfire by including a totally pompous and preachy morality angle where characters often lurch into long patriotic diatribes that have as much subtlety as a giant mallet to the face.
Movie Review – The Guillotines (2012)
A modern reworking only very loosely based on the 1975 Shaw Brothers film this new installment of The Guillotines (2012) by director Andrew Lau is completely D.O.A. with a completely impenetrable patch-work plot, cardboard characters and a lack of guillotine-inspired action. Lau is no stranger to the action genre having helmed some of the biggest Hong Kong films of the past few decades including Young and Dangerous, The Storm Riders, A Man Called Hero and the entire Infernal Affairs trilogy making The Guillotines’ total lack of action acumen a mystery on the level of the location of the Lost Ark of the Covenant.
Movie Review – The Darkest Hour (2011)
The Darkest Hour oozes cheese at every turn from cut-rate special effects to a script that surely numbers a scant few pages to the oftentimes groan worthy dialogue this is a film that screams straight to video or TV movie of the week. It is nigh dumbfounding then to realize that the film opened wide in theatres during Christmas Day back in 2011 giving money paying moviegoers one big lump of coal as a gift in exchange for their hard-earned dollars.
Movie Review – The Treasure Hunter (2009)
Treasure Hunter is a film so inept that it defies explanation and begs the eternal question, “What were they thinking?” It is almost as if the entire cast and crew got together at the start of production with one goal in mind to make a movie so abysmal that it would give eternal whipping boy Battlefield Earth a run for its money as one of, if not the worse, movie of all time. This is one of those films that leave a foul odour in its wake and all involved should be supremely embarrassed by the end product so shockingly dire that they should count themselves lucky if they ever are employed in the industry again.
Movie Review – Thermae Romae (2012)
Thermae Romae (2012) has got to have one of the most absurd setups I have ever seen about an Ancient Roman bathhouse engineer named Lucius Modestus (Abe Hiroshi) who one day stumbles upon a method of time travel utilizing mystical whirlpools at the bottom of baths that whisks him between Rome circa 128 AD and modern day Japan. Using this funky “hot tub time machine” Lucius learns to appreciate and then incorporate Japanese bath designs into his own with the help of a local aspiring manga creator named Manami ( Aya Ueto). As his renown grows back in his own time period Victus eventually meets the current Roman Emperor Hadrian (Masachika Ichimura), a kindred spirit who also believes that a good old bath experience will somehow enhance the morale of the Empire that is currently under duress from threat of a Barbarian invasion.
