Toronto - So I have been watching a lot of movies lately. I don’t know why, maybe, just maybe it’s because the theatres are air conditioned. Here is what I think of them

You Don’t Mess With The Zohan - Light hearted film featuring Sandler and his gang (Turturro, Schneider). The film has some hilarious over the top action sequences and Emmanauelle Chriqui is ridiculously hot. Who would have thought that watching YTV a few years ago? The formula is similar to a lot of Sandler movies, but the jokes are alright and I enjoyed it. It’s definitely better then most of the crap Sandlers put out in the past few years but him and his buddies are falling further and further behind the Apatow and Frat Pack groups in terms of putting out quality flicks.
2.5/5

Speed Racer - Holy ADD overload. This movie is great for two groups of people - seven years old hopped up on sugar, or adults who just dropped acid. The visuals in this movie are stunning, and the world created by the Wachowski brothers is ever so colorful. However, the story and acting in this movie is rubbish and the subplot with a kid and a chimp are just downright painful. However, the racing sequences are great, made me want to turn on my 360. The only problem with CGI movies is that there is a total disconnect from reality, so you never really worry about the characters being in harms way or anything. Shame for Emile Hirsch though, he followed up a stunner of a movie (Into the Wild) with a crappy ass action movie. I am also surprise Susan Sarandon has been relegated to minor support mother characters now.
2/5

Forgetting Sarah Marshall - surprisingly good movie. I don’t really know whether it’s a comedy or not. However, everyone here does a pretty job playing their roles and the story was pretty good. Mila Kunis is unbelievably hot in this movie as well. What makes this movie good is that the characters are pretty well rounded and you get to see the story from everyones point of view. I would say this and Knocked Up are my favorite Apatow flicks. Also, one of the few films were Jonah Hill did not manage to annoy me.
3.5/5

Be Kind Rewind - I rented this one on DVD, and it’s a very cute, heart warming movie about a neighborhood coming together. I am sure by now you know it’s about Jack Black getting magnetized, erasing all the films in the video store and remaking them with his buddy Mos Def and a few folks from the neighborhood. Really, it’s about the ability for a community to pull together in a time of crisis and the hippy spirit stuff that goes along with that. A creative, enjoyable film.
3.5/5

Here’s a song by Portland’s The Blow called ‘The Love I That I Crave’. Ten Points to the person who can find the connection between the Blow and one of these movies.

 

 The Blow - The Love That I Crave: Play Now

Toronto - Jennifer Connelly really shouldn’t do this to herself (and consequently her fans) anymore. Look at the imdb listing of recent offerings from her. Requiem for a Dream, House of Sand and Fog, Little Children, and now Reservation Road. Seriously. Just reading that list made me manically depressed. What, A Beautiful Mind broke that line, but it’s also not entirely happy. Blood Diamond? She was barely a figment of imagination under Archer’s skin. Granted, she was good in each of those films, even discounting nudity and other insane stunts. But there wasn’t one movie where her characters and their cohort aren’t suffering 2hr-long accelerated downward-spirals-with-occasional-derailment to hell. So. Reservation Road certainly wasn’t going to break that tradition.

As soon as the movie starts you can see it’s not going to end well. Two families are portrayed in their prime, and of course the screenplay wouldn’t work in the traditional sense if their paths do not cross. Little Josh gets to play road kill and the lawyer who will handle this exact case decides to perform a hit-and-run. The rest of the film has the father of the boy seek revenge on the lawyer. I thought the most powerful part about the movie was the obsession a wrongful death can grip normal, even excellent characters. Even as calm as the college professor can be in a debate over policies and morality, Ethan still cannot out-run vengeance. But then contrast his reaction to Grace, who came across for me at least to be very cold and unforgiving, you see the other extreme.

I’m still not totally convinced that denial was a solution and I think the screenplay could have been more lenient on Grace to express her grief other than those small bursts of utter devastation. Which is also what I didn’t like about this film. Yes. A sense of total sadness is a powerful thing. But when you require the audience to take that too frequently, they get uncomfortable and really, denial sets in so that we mentally remove the association and even sympathy with the characters. In this case, I prefer the slow creepy demise of House of Sand and Fog and Requiem over the overnight transformation of Reservation Road. Of course, there’s also guilt from the lawyer Dwight. But I felt that was like background decoration to the grief. Sure you want to feel sorry for him, but you also want to see a bullet through his head.

Verdict? JC wasn’t baring twins. But this is still something you want to see if you need to come down from a sugar high.

(Toronto) For a while now, the Oscar nominated short I Met The Walrus has been appearing on YouTube. It’s the animated audio recording of a 1969 interview done in Toronto by then teenager, Jerry Levitan, with John Lennon. This kid skips school, tracks down Lennon in his hotel and asks him for an interview. Lennon then invites him back later that day to do the interview. Jerry Levitan told the story on The Hour of how after his first initial meeting with Lennon, he had to go and buy or borrow some sort of recording device to actually do the interview. The animation is slick and the interview is honest. Have a watch and listen and then review for yourself.

If this version of the movie gets taken down, head over to YouTube and find another one.

Toronto - This movie was fucking awesome. Seriously. It deserves all the hype around it. The acting was solid (no Katie Holmes = good), the story was great, the tone was good, the twists were nice and the action scenes were spectacular. Once the movie starts, it grips your attention and doesn’t let go. I thought I’d have to pee sometime during the movie, but man the movie was so good i think the pee just evaporated in my system. I may be dead tomorrow.

Considering you are going to see this movie regardless of what I write (I hope), it’s fair to say the face of the super hero action movie just got changed with this movie’s blend of realism and fantasy and every bad guy from now on will be compared to Heath Ledger’s Joker. Extremely highly recommended.

5/5

Toronto - I thought the movie was as weak as this playmobil set made Hellboy look…

Just kidding. The Golden Army turned out to be quite fun. The opening story background with John Hurt as Professor Broom added warmth immediately - reminding us that Hellboy isn’t just some captured animal in a steroid-abuse K9 unit - he has a heart and his is a sad life punctuated by frequent superhuman bouts. And the action is what you were looking for when you paid your admission. In that department this film certainly does not disappoint. All you have to do is to watch the Forest God battle and you’ll be hooked to the sweet animation and graphics. Even when the story is resting at development stages, whether in NYC’s sewers where the elves hide (Galadriel would be pissed…), or back at the paranormal research headquarters, there are tonnes of fist fights, gun battle, vaporous remote control, anonymous devilish creatures killing their human handlers, etc, etc. Comedy is mixed into the fights so HB doesn’t come across a blood-thirsty loose cannon. Messages that coincides with current political climate of saving the earth doesn’t really hurt, either.

I can keep describing the fight scenes where Prince Nuada slaughtered everything in his path with awesome ninjitsu skillz like what you had hoped Yoda would do every time you see him pull out that little green rod, but words can’t do justice. Oh and then the troll market… it’s like Diagon Alley on acid. All very fun and dandy that it almost felt inconsequential - that was the feeling I had - they had gone through the whole 9-yards to create this very organic and vivid setting only to have HB & Co. walk through it like a bad adventure game with non-interactive background where one would mouse-scan for points of interests. A bit of a waste if you ask me. The film did have good moments - like when Hellboy and Abe Sapien sang Can’t smile without you - just like normal guys would. Like I said before, Del Toro did a good job with this movie not only because of freaky character creations like those in Pan’s Labyrinth. It’s because he reminded the audience what Hellboy really is - a human incarnate. And that’s what set this movie above the others. I liked the film, as you can see, but I don’t know where to put it… it’s doesn’t have the simple charm of Pan’s Labyrinth, but it does outdo itself as a blockbuster action flick.

And I kept thinking Wink would be un-spike-roller-mushed after the credits…

Toronto - Yeah, it is a bit shallow of me to review the fringe fest after seeing only two shows. But if you’re from Edmonton, you know that most people who goes to the fringe there don’t even move past the fire breather/juggler, candy floss and carved candles. Street fringe is fun, but there are only so many tricks you can stomach before deciding to keep your $5. So this year I watched the plays. Apparently the Toronto fringe doesn’t even have a street-side to it - so all the more convenient. I went to see Sherlock Holmes & the First English Gentleman, and The Movies (abridged) - first at the Robert Gill theater (hidden in UT’s student center), the other at Theatre Passe Muraille.

Sherlock Holmes has always played the 2nd fiddle to Arsene Lupin for me. He’s never as much fun, charming, or daring, and he always took to himself for information. That is, much of the clues you’d expect to find while reading the cases will not be there, because Sir Doyle didn’t want his hero surpassed. This is a tradition followed strictly in this fringe play. As the story progressed from the initial museum robbery in Paris to diamond theft, next to the British Museum fighting with their own naturalist on a immitation homo ancestralis (erectus, habilis, ergaster, whatever it was). Although it never seemed dull (there was even a point where all 3 actors broke out in full song and dance a la Broadway or too-much-sugar), you really need to take the story in hand and analyze it as you go along, otherwise the jokes and developments become orphaned. Although this were not one of the shows where they posted stars after, I’d say it’s solid entertainment.

The Movies abridged, however, WAS one of those with stars as if Tweety had hit it with a 100lb ACME mallet. This was an non-stop comedy, kind of like the one I watched at the Fringe in Edmonton, a Marx Brothers imitation. The backdrop was that of a Blockbuster clerk who needed to undergo a re-education of all movie genres in order to get his promotion. In the process, the trio of actors makes fun of an array of movies. Elan Farbriarz and Josh Levine handled much of the physical comedy, while the bald-english-sounding-dude (okok Rob Gee) handled the voice. Don’t be disappointed if your favorite movies are not mentioned or parodied - that’s not the point here - the play’s a commentary on the state of North American film industry and how its success has ironically destroyed its roots. Nothing really new to those of you who’s reading this blog anyways… but you really want to listen to the long poem-reading by Rob about horror movies and everything else that is much more horrifying. It’s a thousand words long and his syllables were as solid as Japanese. There’s a reason this was starred - ’tis good.

Btw, whatever happened to “The Adventures of”?