Pain & Gain (2013)

  I haven't laughed so hard at a movie in weeks.  And it's by Michael Bay, of all people.

Danny Lugo (Mark Wahlberg) believes that attaining physical peak is the first step to achieving the American dream but he never seems to be able to get ahead.  His client at the gym, Victor (Tony Shaloub), is a total asshole but is able to buy and sell Danny ten times over.  So Danny gets the bright idea to kidnap Victor and force him to sign over all his assets.  To do this, he recruits his longtime friend Adrien (Anthony Mackie) and a recent parolee (Dwayne Johnson) to assist.  Victor proves to be a much tougher hostage than any of the men are really prepared to handle.

The fact that this is based off a real case is hilarious.  Wahlberg is playing a total idiot but he sells it like it's going out of style.  He commits to this role.  Johnson is amazingly comedic and always has been.  I have not seen Mackie in much other than the Marvel films, and he's not really been allowed to shine the way he is here.  I really wish Michael Bay would stop making his giant robot fetish films and go back to directing action comedies like this one.

Carol (2015)

  This was nominated for six Oscars this year but didn't win any.

Therese (Rooney Mara) is a shopgirl desperate to find herself.  A chance meeting with a beautiful woman named Carol (Cate Blanchett) shows Therese that there are more paths in the world than the bare few she has been offered if only she has the courage to take them.  Carol's life is not all wine and roses, however.  Her husband (Kyle Chandler) is not above using their child as a bargaining chip to keep Carol from divorcing him despite knowing that she prefers the company of women.

There has been a long-standing trend in mainstream movies about homosexuals that they must end with either violent death or quiet despair as the character forces him/herself to conform to society's expectations.  The unspoken message is that society still considers homosexuality to be a deviation, something that must be overcome.  **SPOILER-ISH**  Carol is the first film that struck me as being deliberately hopeful. The character stands up to her husband and refuses to claim that being a lesbian is a mental disorder, even though she knows she will lose custody of her daughter.  She reaches out to Therese, who has become confident and successful in her career, and offers a chance to resume their relationship openly.  **END SORTA SPOILERS**  These are huge strides forward.

Movies show thinly-veiled metaphors for the values of our society in most cases.  I feel like it's a very positive trend that we have moved beyond the stock "gay" stereotype characters to 3-D representations of real people and now we're even letting them have happy endings, instead of relegating them to "tragic cautionary tale" symbols.

Oz the Great and Powerful (2013)

  I absolutely hated this movie.  And not just because of my irrational hatred for James Franco.  That's part of it, but not the whole thing.

Oscar --called Oz-- (James Franco) is a magician with a traveling carnival who dreams of making it big.  When his hot air balloon ends up in a magical realm that shares his name, he feels that destiny is afoot, especially after he meets a beautiful witch named Theodora (Mila Kunis) and learns about a prophecy that names him king of the entire land.  Theodora and her sister, Evanora (Rachel Weisz), are more than happy to crown Oz just as soon as he rids the kingdom of the evil witch.  Oz discovers that his target is actually the rightful heir, Glinda the good witch (Michelle Williams), and that the two sisters are out to rule for themselves.

Here's my problem:  every bad thing that happens in this movie is because Oz the wizard is a venal, untrustworthy, narcissistic little shit.  He has no appreciable arc from beginning to end credits, remaining a complete douche throughout.  That's not a story.  Add that to Franco's anti-charisma and a total lack of humor and you have an interminable slog of a movie.  No wonder this didn't get a sequel.

Wing Chun (1994)

  I know this is super late in the day to be posting.  What can I tell you?  I went to a winery with my friend, Megan, and it turned into five wineries and a Mexican restaurant.  These things happen.  Not often, but they do happen.  It was either that or (continue) binge watch(ing) season 2 of Daredevil on Netflix.

First things first.  I really enjoyed this movie.  It was fun, well choreographed, and showcased a more comedic side to Donnie Yen.

Female kung fu master Wing Chun (Michelle Yeoh) has a lot to deal with.  There's a whole gang of bandits trying to kidnap her pretty employee (Catherine Hung). she can't get any respect from the other kung fu masters, and the guy she was betrothed to (Donnie Yen) thinks she's a dude.  Life is hard.  The only thing left to do is kick as much ass as possible.

Yuen Woo-Ping is an absolute legend as far as fight choreography goes.  He's not as well known as a director, but that shouldn't scare you off.  If you like martial arts movies, this is definitely worth finding.  It's a little more light and fluffy than I'm used to but I'll watch Michelle Yeoh in anything.

Outlander (2008)

  Another day, another shitty action film.  This is the fourth one in a row that I have scrubbed off the server, along with an anime called Otogi Zoshi, a TV show called Outcasts, and Our Idiot Brother.

An alien (Jim Caviezel) crashes on Earth, specifically in Iron Age Norway.  He is captured by the locals before he can hunt down the dragon-like creature that killed his people and wrecked his ship.  The Vikings don't believe him when he tells them there is a monster on the loose until their settlement is attacked.  Then they all band together to fight the evil beast.

The plot is ludicrous.  The cast is actually pretty decent and the creature is well done.  Maybe if you have one of those "so bad it's good" lists, you could throw this in there but there really isn't another reason to dig this up.  It can just sink back into the bog of obscurity.

Hugo (2011)

My friends, the Bowen's, gifted me with a whole box of movies after they digitized their collection.  (I've promised Christy first crack at mine when I get around to it.)  A blu-ray of Hugo was included.  It's nice to have seen it again.  I didn't think I was going to, since I wouldn't have bought it.  I enjoyed it the second time around, maybe more than the first because I wasn't looking to be super analytical about its Oscar chances.  It won five out of the 11 nominations it received, by the way, in Cinematography, Art Direction, Visual Effects, Sound Mixing, and Sound Editing.  I was also very pleased to see Michael Stuhlberg (whom I have recently espoused admiration for) had a very important role in this film that I had not otherwise noticed.  It's funny how much recognition you can have seeing movies another time.  Originally posted 29 Jan 12.

Nominated for Best Picture, Best Director, Best Adapted Screenplay, Best Cinematography, Best Editing, Best Art Direction, Best Costume Design, Best Original Score, Best Sound Mixing, Best Sound Editing and Best Visual Effects    Man this movie is up for a lot of Oscars.  Cinematography and Art Direction are definite yeses for me; the film was beautiful.  Adapted Screenplay I don't know because I never read the book, Costume is iffy since there weren't really a lot of stand-out looks and I don't know enough about technical stuff to say on Sound Mixing or Sound Editing.  I doubt it's the Best Picture of the year and I don't think Scorsese is going to cinch Best Director but I've been fooled before.

Hugo (Asa Butterfield) is a young orphan who lives in the walls of a Parisian train station.  His father's notebook is confiscated one day by an irascible toymaker (Ben Kingsley) which begins his friendship with the toymaker's god-daughter, Isabelle (Chloe Moretz).  The two children must discover the truth behind the toymaker's secret past and avoid the clutches of the Station Inspector (Sacha Baron Cohen) and his Doberman.

But that's really not what this movie is about.  At its heart, it is a story of film restoration and preservation.  I know Mr. Scorsese is very involved with the American Film Institute and his love for old movies comes through clearly.  I have no idea if that's what the book is about but if you've ever sat down and watched a movie from the '20s or been interested in the history of film, this is a good movie to watch.

How to Train Your Dragon 2 (2014)

This time around, the pacing didn't seem so jarring to me.  I was struck more by how much more emotional this film was over its predecessor, like they were really aiming for the gut.  I also watched the accompanying short, Dawn of the Dragon Racers, which was incredibly disappointing.  I found myself spacing out during it and it's only 26 minutes long.  Maybe if you have really little kids, they'll be amused but it doesn't hold a candle to the feature.  Originally posted 22 Jun 14.    Christy's birthday was this past week and she asked us to take her to see How to Train Your Dragon 2.  It was one of her better ideas.

This sequel works hard to channel the magic of the original, picking up five years after the events of the first.  The island of Berk has been transformed into a human-dragon paradise but Hiccup (Jay Baruchel) cannot help searching ever farther afield.  His partnership with Toothless is stronger than ever but he wants his dragon to possibly find his own kind, maybe even a mate.  There's also the fact that Stoick (Gerard Butler) is grooming him to take over as Chief, which Hiccup doesn't feel ready to do just yet.  Then he runs into a set of dragon hunters, led by Eret (Kit Harrington), looking for conscripts to the army of Drago (Djimon Hounsou), and suddenly his personal problems diminish in stature.  With help from an unexpected ally named Valka (Cate Blanchett), Hiccup and his friends must save their dragons and their community from enslavement.

The animation is beautiful, as always, and the characters are already established, but something about the pacing felt off to me.  It lagged in bits and felt rushed in others.  That is serious nitpicking, however, so you should feel prepared to enjoy yourself when you go see it.  We had a great time, Christy's boyfriend (who doesn't watch animated movies because he apparently hates joy) included.  I don't know if they'll make a third volume, since this one has underperformed at the box office so far, but we can always hope.