The Bad Sleep Well (1960)
The Bad Sleep Well IMDB Link
Directed By: Akira Kurosawa
Written By: Akira Kurosawa, Shinobu Hashimoto, Hideo Oguni, Ryuzo Kikushima, Mike Y. Inoue, Eijirô Hisaita
Starring: Toshirô Mifune
“One thing that distinguishes Akira Kurosawa is that he didn’t make a masterpiece or two masterpieces, he made, you know, eight masterpieces”
- Francis Ford Coppola
The Bad Sleep Well feels very modern for having been made nearly 50 years ago. It courageously dives into the seedy underworld of corporate greed and just how far they go to keep their modern day empires. The worst part? They always win. How do you beat money and power? You don’t. Well, maybe.
In one of the best opening scenes to any movie we start with a wedding reception. The bride is crippled and needs help just to walk the aisle. Business men uncomfortably shift as they watch. Once everyone is seated the elevator door rings and a flood of reporters comes crashing in yelling about corruption, scandal and arrests. Police arrive, some men leave, some men come back. Information is being whispered to those in power. Fake composure is kept as the ceremonies must take place and all the while the reporters are feeding us bits of information from past scandals and the players involved.
And while all this silent commotion is taking place we see our star actor, Kurosawa’s partner in crime, Thoshiro Mifune as the groom standing silently and without emotion next to his crippled bride. The nervousness mounts and so do the similes from the reporters who love watching these men squirm and it all culminates in a mysterious cake of a building with a flag sticking out a window where someone supposedly committed suicide.
Someone once pointed out that when your watching a Kurosawa movie sometimes you think something and a character will say it out loud. How does this amazing twenty minute intro scene end? With reporters jabbering.
“Helluva Wedding”
“Truly Bizarre”
“Best one-act I’ve ever scene”
“One-act? This is just the prelude. “
* cue montage *
Years later Kurosawa commented that he made the film too soon. It’s nearly 50 years later and the film feels like it’s talking about now. There are lots of twists and turns, reveals, confusing relationship and deception. And on top of this well written story is again the mastery of scene construction of Kurosawa.
There is his signature pan focus in a lot of scenes and also an abundance of shots of the back of peoples heads. I think the reason he did this was not only for you to concentrate and follow the actor who is facing the screen but so many times you can just imagine how the other actor is reacting and something that’s more effective and powerful. And I don’t think anyone ever thinks “I think that scene would have been better had it been directed like X” because Kurosawa never seemed to make that mistake.
Coppola is right. Not only did Kurosawa create a ton of masterpieces but they can all still be revered, appreciated and studied today. Just his framing alone tells so much story with so little. A true master.
Filed under: Drama, Foreign, Thriller | Leave a Comment
Tags: Kurosawa, Mifune, movie review, The Bad Sleep Well, Warui yatsu hodo yoku nemuru
Stray Dog (1949)
Stray Dog IMDB Link
Directed By: Akira Kurosawa
Written By: Akira Kurosawa & Ryuzo Kikushima
Starring: Toshirô Mifune, Takashi Shimura
Kurosawa was famous for his love for western cinema, heck his favorite director of all time was John Ford. And one year before he exploded onto the world stage with Rashomon, a film that is still being studied and ripped off today, he made a noir detective film in Stray Dog.
Much like The Bad Sleep Well, it is incredible just how modern Stray Dog feels. A young brash detective teamed up with an old grizzled vet are hot on the trail of a serial killer who is terrorizing the streets of Japan. While on the hunt they are thrown into the seedy parts of Japan and we see just how much WW II has effected the people. Poverty, gambling, sex trade, it’s all steaming in the underbelly and Kurosawa lets you dive in and sweat in the filth. This is all shown in an amazing montage of deep focus panning shots dissolved and overlayed with close ups of Toshiro Mifune.
Like all things Kurosawa, the individual scene construction is well done throughout but there was one sequence in particular that I found really well done and very Hitchcock-esque. Not only does Kurosawa have a great sense for creating scenes but his overall understanding of the roller-coaster ride of emotion a film can produce is incredible as well. You never think to yourself “is this the end?” because it just feels like the ending.
Mifune’s character is at the train station and together with the audience is scanning everyone in the crowd. We know a few facts. We know the killer’s in a nice white suit, we know that his hand shakes sometimes, we know he’s carrying a gun and we know his feet should be muddy. The scene has an incredible amount of tension not only because we know he will blow Mifune’s character away if he realizes who he is but the soundtrack is simply Mifune whispering the facts to himself coupled with close-ups/tilts/pans of body parts. You don’t even want to blink trying your hardest to spot the killer before the movie does.
This eventually leads to a fast push in with wide eyes on reveal followed by a quick chase. When they arrive in the woods something strange happens. Both are motionless with one pointing a gun at the other but piano music starts to play. Right as we raise an eyebrow Kurosawa shows us a house in the distance where a woman is playing a quaint melody. A gun shot is heard. The music halts as she goes to the window to see what the commotion is. She can’t see anything and goes back to playing. Still no sign of what’s happened. And then we see it, blood slowly trickling down Mifune’s characters hand and landing on top of a flower.
So good.
I know I’m in complete fanboy mode here but it’s stuff like this that I wait for in my constant stream of movie watching. Little scenes or movies that I’ve never heard of that blow me away. This detective story was not only way ahead of it’s time but it was made before he even had clout which is awesome. On top of all that, Stray Dog was just damn well made. There’s the suspense and good writing of the actual chase, there’s the chemistry and learning between the rookie and the vet and there’s the social angle of how crime comes about and which side one falls on. So good. Major props to Kurosawa on Stray Dog.
Filed under: Drama, Foreign, Thriller | Leave a Comment
Tags: Documentary, Kurosawa, Mifune, Nora inu, Stray Dog
Ikiru (1952)
Ikiru IMDB Link
Directed By: Akira Kurosawa
Written By: Akira Kurosawa & Shinobu Hashimoto
Starring: Takashi Shimura
John Cassavetes’ A Woman Under the Influence contains the single most cringe worthy scene I’ve ever seen. There’s no blood or torture, only a wife off her rocker trying to host her husband’s construction buddies at dinner and my seat was squeaking due to my discomfort and constant re-shifting. Mind you, this was after years of watching Kevin on The Wonder Years perform red faced head slapping embarrassing moments one after another. ( I heard Paul is actually Marilyn Manson btw).
And while that scene specifically might be the most cringe worthy scene I think cheese is an overarching feeling that really makes me squirm. Sometimes cheese is a lot of fun like watching slow claps in 80’s movies but I try and avoid cheese in feel good Frank Kapra-esque movies. I knew going into Ikiru that it was about a dying man and I knew there would be a scene with him on a swing in the snow as I’ve seen that image countless times. But it’s Kurosawa, the OG, I had to give it a chance.
The film starts out with an X-Ray of our protagonist Watanabe played amazingly by Shimura. We learn that he’s been a bureaucrat for over 20 years; surviving but not really living. And unknown to him, he has less than a year to live. Kurosawa begins the tale with amazing storytelling using a voice over but quickly jumps into a great montage with comedic moments about the nature of bureaucracy. He frames people in squares of piles of paperwork to show just how much they have to do and just how little they care to do it. And then in rapid succession we see a group of women trying to get something fixed with every department telling them to go to another department.
Watanabe learns about his eventual death in a great scene at the hospital. Instead of the doctor just coming out and telling him, Kuosawa has a fast talking mosquito of a guy bothering Watanabe, going on and on and unknowingly revealing to Watanabe that not only will he die but if the doctor tells him that he can eat anything, he’ll definitely die within the year. When he goes into the doctor’s office his face turn’s pale as the doctor tells him it’s nothing and that he can eat anything he wants. That night he realizes that it’s not the dying that he’s afraid of, it’s the fact that he really hasn’t lived.
There’s a lot of sorrow, a night on the town filled with debauchery trying to catch up on lost times. Eventually he comes to the realization that he should instead do something meaningful, perhaps actually help people in his bureaucratic position instead of being red tape. He grabs his hat and rushes out the door ready to change the world. And this is when the movie really became interesting to me. A car horn is heard in the background and then it fades to his funeral. I was 100% expecting a happy-go lucky montage of him helping people with their faces glowing but instead Kurosawa leads brings us to his death with the Mayor underplaying what Watanabe did trying to take all the credit.
Slowly the other bureaucrats drink and talk and through them we see moments in his undertaking to build a park in a dilapidated neighborhood. A quick scene of him hunched over in pain in the office, him falling while walking in the park during construction only to have the residents come to his aid, a smile told through his eyes as he gazes on what he’s creating. It was all very cheesy but it wasn’t. Not only was there the interesting layer of finding out what happened with disjointed scene’s you puzzle together in your head but you also had the men arguing, each with a specific personality about how much or how little Watanabe had to do with the project. Surely he was just a cog in the machine says one while another stoically in the corner defends Watanabe and how much he accomplished.
And to top it all off we have the extra layer of his son slowly realizing that his father tried to tell him of his impending death but his son was too preoccupied and annoyed to even bother to listen to him. The best part? The movie really doesn’t end on an up note, it goes higher and higher then brings you back down into reality. A film still brimming with cheese but again, Kurosawa, the OG comes through with the craft and it overwhelmed any of my beef with cheesiness.
Filed under: Classic/Old, Drama, Foreign | Leave a Comment
Tags: Ikiru, Kurosawa, movie review, To Live
Kurosawa (2001)
Kurosawa IMDB Link
Directed By: Adam Low
Written By: Adam Low
Starring: *Void*
This documentary is 3 hours long. Well not really. The actually documentary is 2 hours long and it’s a conventional baby to kid to man to film maker to death. I really wanted more insight into his films from top film makers and some do pop in here and there but meh.
The second part of the DVD, the “extras” is an hour and a half long and it was way more interesting for me. It’s just a string of interviews with cast and crew about how he approached film making and things he would try and do. Overall I thought it was pretty disappointing and this might turn me off to watching other biographies of directors I enjoy.
Filed under: Documentary | Leave a Comment
Tags: Biography, Documentary, Kurosawa
Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen IMDB Link
Directed By: Michael Bay
Written By: Ehren Kruger, Roberto Orci, Alex Kurtzman
Starring: Shia LaBeouf, Megan Fox
Skip down to the ************* for the two-paragraph review.
I’ve had a general rule of thumb ever since I discovered my love for the celluloid: If critics hate a sci-fi/horror/action movie then chances are high that it will be awesome. Movies that I love not only for entertainment sake but also those that I admire for their craft such as Terminator 2, Starship Troopers, Army of Darkness and The Killer are all met with a wall of disdain, scoffs and phlem spit from critics.
What trash, what drivel, what tripe they all exclaim. Of course no one will ever agree on the merits of what constitutes good art versus bad art and I’m not going to sit here and try to convince you that Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen is the next coming of Citizen Kane. What I will say is that Michael Bay, a director who is hated by many and who I have a love/hate relationship with, has created the ultimate Michael Bay experience.
Here is a man who has an intense eye for framing, camera movement and obsessed with military might and destruction. It almost feels as if his whole career has been leading up to create Transformers: RotF, a movie so outrageous that it could be the pinnacle of Hollywood excess. You could debate if this is good or bad but the fact that it just happened is important. So much of art has to do with experiences, especially in film and I can’t think of one movie that feels anything like Transformers: RotF. The thing with Michael Bay is he is a unique artist and unique artists make unique pieces of art. No one can direct movies like Michael Bay can and no one can deliver Transformers the way Michael Bay just did. How Michael Bay can out Michael Bay himself after Transformers: RotF is beyond me.
Really it comes down to content. Most critics view sci-fi/horror/action as beneath them, genres for idiots that don’t explore other more “important” aspects of life including quiet moments of a dying cancer patient or how an orphan from Ireland learned to love her teddy bear. Something I admire about Transformers: RotF and what Bay has done, besides making a unique albeit brain numbing experience, is that there are no illusions as to what he was trying to accomplish. He rubs your face in the nerve-end sparking imagery of Megan Fox jiggling in slow-mo and robots shooting rockets at each-other with bits of metal and fire flying all over the place. So many other directors would have half-assed the experience trying their hardest to inject some amount of intellectual might into the frame like what we saw in Superman Returns. But in a counter sort of more intelligent move, Bay decided to relish in the ridiculousness of spending that much money on a movie based off a cartoon show that was created to sell toys.
Everything in Transformers: RotF is pure unadulterated subconscious and male desire driven to a point that you could look at it disparagingly on our society or understand that film is one of those outlets in which we can wallow in our filth of desires. What I can’t get over however is how simply this film is being brushed aside by many people in an attempt to somehow boost their own egos and intelligence when in fact the very act of shitting on the movie is perhaps dumber than the movie itself. Transformers is mindless sex and violence you say? What the fuck did you think you were going to get? More importantly however is, did you think it was even possible to take sex and violence to the Olympian heights that Bay just did?
I would love, no I would relish with glee and a big fucking grin being able to give every single critic out there the reigns to Transformers: RotF. I would hand them the directors chair, the 300 million whatever dollar budget and say “make me a blockbuster” and watch them squirm and sweat trying their hardest to produce anything even close to visceral amalgamation of imagery and sound, the pure assault on your subconscious and senses that Michael Bay just created.
What they would create instead would be a laughable, hilarious and clumsy middle-school play action movie. It would be so atrocious on a simple movie making level that you would cringe in your seat not thinking about “Hey I wonder if Optimus knifes that decepticon in the face” but rather “dear god I hope the boom mic doesn’t pop in the shot because these guys have no idea how to make an action movie” It would be a joke, an utter fucking joke. Imagine the action sequences on a WB sci-fi tv show and then make it worse. That’s what it would be. You can even put scenes from Transformers: RotF next to recent big budget flicks like Wolverine and it makes them look like amateur hour. And while I shit on Wolverine for being dumb it was just more of the same kind of dumb. Transformers: RotF is such a beast of adrenaline and steroids of which I have never seen or thought capable of creating that it’s pure individualism makes it interesting to me.
But what does that matter if critics can’t direct? Of course they can’t create that’s why they are critics but they can still say the movie sucked dick. This is true and I’m in no way saying they are wrong because their qualms do have merit as all the classic elements of cinema are indeed poorly executed. I’ve just always been more interested in experiences and ideas and how critics of film can so easily brush off what Bay just created is confusing. Seriously, name me one movie not directed by Michael Bay that comes anywhere close to feeling like Transformers: RotF. In a strange twist, Michael Bay has taken the idea of what a summer movie is and exploded it with so many explosions that what he created is something unique and entertaining and that is what stands out to me the most. There are so many movies these days that are formulaic and more of the same shit that I’ve seen before that when Bay comes along and creates something outrageous for even outrageous standards it strikes me as unique. Sometimes a movie doesn’t have to be a Wes Anderson indi-film rip off to be different. It also doesn’t hurt that giant robots duking it out is awesome to me.
*************************************
The best way I can describe Transformers: RotF is it’s like cake batter ice cream topped with some chopped nuts, a little bit of sprinkles, hot fudge, peanut butter cups and whipped cream. You won’t talk about it for hours on end dissecting the brilliance of sprinkles and you’ll feel dumb several times from brain freezes but you will remember that big giant sugary fun high you had and you’ll remember enjoying it.
That pile of sugary goodness might not be as good as dinner at a 300 dollar a plate obscure restaurant in east Manhattan with the best chef on the planet but fuck man, sugar and fun are well, fun and I’m not turning down that ice cream just to feel superior. “Fuck that delicious, sugary, oh so sugary ice cream with whipped cream and caramel and chocolate. Fuck it. Fuck a unique sugar high experience” is a phrase you will never hear me utter.
Filed under: Action, Comedy, Recent, Science Fiction | 3 Comments
Tags: Michael Bay, movie review, rant, Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen
Moon (2009)
Moon IMDB Link
Directed By: Duncan Jones
Written By: Nathan Parker
Starring: Sam Rockwell
Moon is a sci-fi thriller from David Bowie’s son Duncan Jones. It’s very sparse and moody touching on all types of interesting sci-fi ideas concerning human existence. You read something like that and notice how much the film looks like 2001: A Space Odyssey and could come the conclusion that it is perhaps just a bootleg rip off the the Kubrick classic but that just isn’t the case.
I think the similar imagery and talking computer are not only used because of how 2001 almost created a standard film vocabulary for shooting space but also because it makes you comfortable while Jones explore other harder to grip ideas. Instead of wasting time trying to explain the specific space of this specific sci-fi universe, he instead injects familiarity into the air allowing you to relax and concentrate on what’s more important in the movie.
Sam Rockwell does an incredible job acting in the movie and is a major reason why this film is such a success. The whole movie is Sam Rockwell in space and the consistency and portrayal of his character helps you to dissect the situation. You become absorbed into his characters world, curious and discovering what exactly is going on and how Duncan Jones slowly peels the layers off makes for a very rich experience. I’ve almost forgotten that the title is Moon and will probably be remember it by as Rockwell in Space
Rockwell in Space or Moon is a great sci-fi thriller which is also layered by my boy Clint Mansel (Requiem for a Dream, The Fountain) who does the soundtrack. It’s interesting, thought provoking, visually striking and definitely worth checking out.
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Tags: David Bowie, Duncan Jones, Moon, movie review
Drag Me to Hell (2009)
Drag Me to Hell IMDB Link
Directed By: Sam Raimi
Written By: Sam Raimi & Ivan Raimi
Starring: Alison Lohman, Justin Long
At the peak of the American horror movie genre crumbling into a state of derivative blandness where “a creepy kid sings a lullaby, it’s creepy right?” to “let’s remake Japanese horror movies but take out the parts that made them awesome” Sam Raimi comes out of horror movie retirement and punches a big giant comical hand through the genre spraying awesome-nasty all over the place.
I really can’t get over just how refreshing Drag Me to Hell is. Before the movie ran I was getting depressed watching previews. Read these titles and tell me if either of these future horror movies draws any excitement: Orphan and Sorority Row. Then Sam Raimi slapped me across the face with my own hand (which he just cut off with scissors) and brought me back into his world where one upping the ridiculousness, hilarity, and sick awesome perversity called horror comedy is king.
Smiling the whole time, you will be treated to all sorts moments where you’ll squirm in your seat but giggle uncontrollably and then your giggles will turn into ghosts singing the McD’s special sauce song while gnawing at your organs. Well maybe not but you could imagine a scene like that and see how it would be funny and if you can’t, then fuck you, your the reason the american horror movie genre sucks.
What’s great is knowing 30 years from now, some college kid will see a Drag Me to Hell holographic disc (that’s DVD in the future) in a kids room and think “This kid likes ‘Drag Me to Hell’? He’s a-ok in my book” and they’ll go space bounding on the moon together reminiscing on and quoting the hilarity. Don’t let the douchery of Mac or the PG-13 label hold you back. If you love horror comedy, do yourself a favor and catch this flick.
Filed under: Comedy, Horror, Recent | Leave a Comment
Tags: Drag Me to Hell, movie review, Sam Raimi
Up (2009)
Up IMDB Link
Directed By: Pete Docter
Written By: Bob Peterson
Starring: Edward Asner
There is a fine line between a movie like Up and movies like Johnny Tsunami and Eddie’s Million Dollar Cook-Off. If you are at all aware of those made for TV Disney movies you are screaming at me right now “How dare you? How dare you put Pixar next to that trash?” No, I’m not writing a negative review just to be “that guy” to get attention, quite the opposite actually.
I brought up Chaplin in my review for Wall-E and I’m bringing him up again. Charlie Chaplin is an often forgotten amazing cinematic auteur. He not only produced, wrote and directed his movies, he also acted, edited and composed the soundtrack. What’s even more forgotten is how he had a very classic Walt Disney-esque approach to cinema where he would labor over his project, tweak them over and over until they were perfection. Why do people usually forget his incredible artistry? Aside from his character being so powerful and over riding any thoughts of creativity I think it’s just his ability to make you not think about it.
Like Walt and Chaplin, Pixar has a philosophy of film making that if you can see them behind the camera then they aren’t doing their job correctly; no superfluous scenes, nothing that’s not needed will be added, and always build the story and keep the audience engaged. But then why with all this adoration must you compare Up to Johnny Tsunami and Eddie’s Million Dollar Cook-Off? Maybe it’s because I’ve been soaking myself in the NBA Playoff’s but execution is something that can never be over looked. The difference between a team advancing over one going home can be as little as keeping your hands up while guarding.
If I wanted to be a dick I could break down Up’s story into a childish version of Gran Torino. Old grizzled man whose wife could never bear a child meets young Asian boy who has no father and they go on an adventure in South America where they learn to love one another and learn about life. But you can make anything sound cheap. The difference is movies like Johnny Tsunami and Eddie’s Million Dollar Cook-Off are executed so poorly that they lose you, you see the cheese seeping through and it doesn’t work because of it and they come off as cheap.
But in a Pixar film, you’ll be shown a medium shot where a character sits down, then notice a painting in the background building on his character, then realize the shot was really so you could see something through the window in the background building story, then the thing in the background will do something wacky and make you laugh all in a single medium shot that lasts for about 20 seconds and is filled with gorgeous art, lighting, style and great acting. This type of incredibly well executed cinema is exactly what separates the cheap from the incredible and Pixar is masterful at it.
Again in Up, the intro on paper could probably be read as cheesy but the execution is so good that within 20 minutes you have a big lump in your throat over computer generated character’s. Look around, you’ll see grown men with tears in their eyes. You are invested and that’s the key. With that sort of emotional investment brought on by the perfectionist attitude of Pixar, the rest of the film feels that much more important. Be not afraid, Up is no Johnny Tsunami or Eddie’s Million Dollar Cook-Off, it’s a beautiful and well executed film that will be added next to the long line of classics from Pixar and somewhere you know Walt Disney and Charles Chaplin are loving Pixar for continuing their philosophy of cinema.
Filed under: Comedy, Documentary, Recent | Leave a Comment
Tags: Chaplin, Disney, movie review, Pixar, Up
X-Men Origins: Wolverine (2009)
X-Men Origins: Wolverine IMDB Link
Directed By: Gavin Hood
Written By: David Benioff & Skip Woods
Starring: Hugh Jackman, Liev Schreiber, Danny Huston
I think we all could tell before seeing X-Men Origins: Wolverine that it was a C-level comic book movie, especially after we were all treated to The Dark Knight which wasn’t built on action but rather intense drama from the characters and story. So instead of pulling a Wolverine and enhancing the dumb lets just point out the dumb.
Why did they use CGI for his claws in the bathroom? Couldn’t they tell that it looked like some 1994 CGI?
Why did Striker send Agent Zero to kill Wolverine only to reveal after Agent Zero dies that he has adamantium bullets, you know, the kind of bullets that can actually kill Wolverine? Did I mention Agent Zero has sick aim? Ugh.
What were certain characters mutant powers? I couldn’t tell half of them because it seemed like they all had the ability to run wicked fast, climb walls, jump 40 feet in the air and land like a ninja.
Will i Am-never mind. Too easy.
How did Striker have 2020 computer technology in the 80’s? And did they really expect us not to snicker when he was controlling Deadpool like a 1980’s text based computer adventure game? “Walk towards Wolverine” “Decapitate” “Congratulations Striker, you win!” *beep boop*
Let’s bring up a line of dialogue that I will not enhance for comedic value. You decide how funny it was. “Back to back!”
Why did Gambit go from having a New Orleans accent to a Texan accent to having no accent? And when did Gambit’s mutant ability involve being able to float cards and launch them with some sort of telekinesis? And why did they have to introduce him and then ruin him? And why…forget it.
How about when Striker picks up the adamantium bullets and proclaims “I will wipe his memory” instead of “I’m going to kill him”
I think we all can agree that the better ending would have been Wolverine in an explosion only to walk out with no skin and only his adamantium with the Terminator drum music thumping followed by Optimus Prime duking it out with him on Venus in the 3rd alternate worm hole reality of 3018. That would have been at least a little less dumb.
Filed under: Action, Science Fiction | 1 Comment
Tags: Dumb, movie review, X-Men Origins: Wolverine
Star Trek (2009)
Star Trek IMDB Link
Directed By: J.J. Abrams
Written By: Roberto Orci & Alex Kurtzman
Starring: Chris Pine, Zachary Quinto
Star Trek is back and for the first time it’s kind of cool or at least it’s ok to see the movie and tell a girl about it. Heck I bet a lot of dates probably went to see Star Trek and then actually had real life non-virtual sex afterward.
There are lots of lens flares (I’m convinced Abrams got the idea from Mass Effect) a Mac store looking bridge and an abundance of intensity. Like most things J.J. Abrams, intensity is the key. He again balances really nerdy ideas without alienating the normies and it looks like he’s got a hit on his hands.
I gotta say I’m impressed with the writers and how they brought back Star Trek. Not only did they bring it back and include a classical Star Trek sci-fi-ey idea of time travel but how they introduced it allows people to reminisce on the character’s nostalgically and at the same time it gives the writers freedom for sequels with new story lines in their alternate universe. Also, the nerds can’t bitch and moan because it’s a new time line. The writers solved a lot of franchise rebooting problem’s with this film.
There are lots of action sequences, quirky characters, an interesting dynamic between Spock and Kirk, green alien girls, tons of fan service and a smattering of laughs. It’s a classic summer blockbuster. I could have done without the chase sequences that were mostly compromised of zero drama and lots of loud music and sounds and the exploding bit to get out of the black hole at the end was a bit on the dumb side.
But why was Tyler Perry from Tyler Perry’s House of Pain and Tyler Perry’s Meet the Browns Tyler Perry in the movie? I haven’t seen that many people raise an eyebrow since Kumar was in Superman. “Was that Tyler Perry?” “Is that admiral guy Tyler Perry?” “Maybe we should leave because Tyler Perry’s House of Pain is about to start”
All in all this was a lot of fun and a great time. It’s one of those “family” films. I don’t mean that it’s a Disney movie but lets say your uncomfortably killing time with your parents you could take them to Star Trek and everyone would be entertained. Terminator on the other hand…
Filed under: Action, Recent, Science Fiction | Leave a Comment
Tags: J.J. Abrams, movie review, Star Trek, Tyler Perry
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