Worst Films of 2013

10. G.I. Joe: Retaliation- Not even The Rock and Bruce Willis were able to save this turd.  Somehow even dumber than first film but with none of the fun to make it bearable.  The action scenes with Snake Eyes and Storm Shadow are passable but they are sadly few and very far in between.

9.  The Incredible Burt Wonderstone- There's a decent cast here but the film does absolutely nothing with it.  The jokes are unfunny, outdated and will likely make you remember your trip to the dentist with fond nostalgia.

8.  Admission- Tina Fey and Paul Rudd give this one their best effort but the script is one of the clunkiest I've ever seen.  The film is so unfocused about the tone it wants to make that it tries to be a romantic comedy and a drama but fails at both.

7.  The Host- I'm sure there was supposed to be some kind of epic struggle in the movie.  For me, my epic struggle was in trying to stay awake during this tedious piece of crap that somehow achieves the impossible by making Twilight look downright interesting.

6.  Now You See Me- I am truly puzzled as to how this one managed to become a hit.  The only time I've ever witnessed anything so ridiculously convoluted, it was directed by Christopher Nolan.  This would've been fine if there had been an ounce of intelligence in the script but sadly in that department they fell horrifically short.

5.  The Fifth Estate- Benedict Cumberbatch gives a passable performance as Julian Assange but that's not nearly enough to save this snooze-fest.  Those of you interested to read my hatred of this film in greater detail can read my review here.  

4.  A Good Day To Die Hard- Live Free of Die Hard may have been brainless but this turkey makes it look like a masterpiece.  Bruce Willis quite evidently phoned this one in though really who could blame him.   This fifth entry of the Die Hard bears no resemblance to the classic original and is frankly an insult to the name of John McClane.

3.  I Give It A Year- I got suckered into renting this one because I was under the impression it would be a clever satire of those crappy romantic comedies I enjoy making fun of.  Instead what I got was a painfully unfunny ordeal that was every bit as cliched as the films they're supposedly mocking.  Special criticism is reserved for a particularly annoying character who gives the most uncomfortably terrible best-man speech I have ever heard.

2.  Texas Chainsaw 3D- After showing some stock footage from the original Texas Chainsaw Massacre, this film quickly goes downhill.  While these movies were never meant to be pleasant experiences, this latest installment takes it to a whole new level.  Amazingly this travesty actually makes the Texas Chainsaw's that Michael Bay produced look good in comparison.  Just let that sink in for a second.    

1.  Movie 43- There could not be less of a reason for this film to exist.  Even the "good" segments of this god-awful anthology comedy are funny mostly because they're so appallingly bad and the bad ones are so horribly, written Adam Sandler would call them lazy.  As I was watching this, I think at a certain point I could actually physically feel myself losing my sanity.

Click here to see some of my picks for the best films of 2013.

Turbo Review

                               

            When I watched Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter I thought to myself “There’s no way a movie premise could possibly get more ridiculous than this.”  Of course just a year later DreamWorks was there to prove me wrong with Turbo.  However, for a set-up as absurd as a snail racing in the Indy 500, they play it surprisingly straight and while it wasn’t as bad as I was expecting they didn’t really do anything to make it memorable either. 

            The story centers around a garden snail named Theo (Ryan Reynolds) or as he prefers to be called “Turbo.”  He constantly dreams of being a world famous race-car driver which (naturally) causes him to be the subject of ridicule among his co-workers and embarrassment to his straight-laced brother Chet (Paul Giamatti).  Then one night Turbo gets himself sucked into a drag racer where his DNA bonds with the car’s nitrous oxide which gives him super speed and several features of a car (headlights, radio, alarm, etc.).  Shortly afterwards, he and Chet are captured by Tito (Michael Pena), who runs a struggling taco truck with his brother Angelo (Luis Guzman).  Tito starts by entering Turbo in snail races and predictably Turbo blows the other snails out of the water.  So of course the next logical step is to enter Turbo in the Indy 500 (sure why not?).         

            The animation is pretty good most of the time but for a film with a plot as unique as Turbo, it’s surprisingly lacking in imagination and originality.  Almost everything that happens in this movie has been done before and much better.  Just off the top of my head I can see them borrowing from Cars, Ratatouille, Spider-Man and even Talladega Nights.  I might’ve enjoyed this more if the writers took more chances to make something inventive.  Unfortunately, Turbo takes zero risks and as a result every scene feels clichéd and predictable.  For example, when it’s inevitably pointed out that snails don’t compete in the Indy 500, Tito uses the old plot device that there’s nothing in the rule book that says a snail can’t race (a statement so ridiculous I don’t even know where to start) or as I like to call it the Air Bud Defense.  There’s also the arrogant champion racer who seems to exist because DreamWorks felt an obligation to include a villain. 

            There’s nothing that’s particularly horrible about Turbo but everything about it is just so bland that I felt absolutely nothing for it.  I didn’t feel love, hate or anger or really any other emotion besides indifference.  Adults probably won’t get anything out of this but it’s a good way to keep your kids busy for an hour and a half.   

Grade: C+ 

Despicable Me 2 Review

                                    

            In the first Despicable Me the minions were mostly background characters that provided the occasional comic relief.  This time around in Despicable Me 2 the minions are pretty much front and center while the plot happens around them.  Admittedly, it’s difficult to fault the producers for this decision when the minions are easily the best and most marketable part of the movie.  The problem is that it occasionally feels like they’re just killing time until the Minions spinoff movie next year.  

            As the sequel begins Gru (Steve Carell) has more or less settled happily into his new role as a father and after his moon stealing episode seems to have retired from his work as a super-villain completely.  He is then recruited by the Anti-Villain League (who for some reason were nowhere to be found in the first movie) to find out who stole a powerful potion that turns living organisms into giant, furry, purple abominations.  Gru reluctantly agrees and goes undercover at the local shopping mall with AVL agent and obligatory love-interest Lucy (Kristen Wiig).  Gru quickly begins to suspect the culprit to be Mexican restaurant owner Eduardo Perez (Benjamin Bratt) whom he believes to bear a striking resemblance to the supposedly deceased super-villain “El Macho.”   His suspicions aren’t helped when Eduardo’s son Antonio (Moises Aries) begins to take an interest to his oldest daughter Margo (Miranda Cosgrove).  Meanwhile the minions are being quietly kidnapped as part of the mysterious villain’s plot.   

As anybody that saw the first film might’ve expected the minions are absolutely hilarious.  They’re as incoherent as ever but just like the last movie they’re cute, charming and make for great slapstick comedy.  For me the comedy highlights are two of the minions accidently parasailing from a moving car and singing their own renditions of “Y.M.C.A.” and “I Swear” in their trademark gibberish.  Their antics don’t necessarily advance the plot, but all of their individual scenes are so funny that for the most part it never really bothered me that much.      

The problem with the minions greatly increased screen time is that it takes away from the character development of pretty much everybody else.  Gru spends most of what little change he is given acting as a comic foil for the romance between Margo and Antonio and then eventually trying to woo Lucy.  Halfway through it dawned on me that Gru has basically been reduced to being a sitcom dad.  The youngest daughter Agnes’ only motivation in the entire film is that she wants a mother.  She doesn’t seem to be particularly concerned with what kind of mother as long as she gets one, to the point that the second she meets Lucy she wastes absolutely no time in trying to encourage her to get together with Gru.  Of course that’s more than I could say for the growth of middle child Edith (I had to look her name up on Wikipedia) and Gru’s assistant Dr. Nefario who both look to have almost disappeared from the plot altogether.  What’s really confusing about the broader focus on the minions is that they’ve already got their own movie coming out next year which makes me question why they couldn’t simply wait until that movie to make them the protagonists.  

            Despicable Me 2 for better or worse feels mostly like a rehash of the original.  The audience wanted to see more of the minions and Despicable Me 2 delivers.  While it’s hard to get angry at the producers for giving the audience what they wanted it also makes it a little difficult for me to truly take it seriously as a film.  They obviously went to great lengths to increase the minion’s appeal but I just wish they had put same effort towards everybody else. 

Grade: B-

Top 5 Movies I Can't Wait To See- Fall 2013

    1.      12 Years a Slave

       

          Release Date- October 18^th  

       

          Starring- Chiwetel Ejiofer, Michael Fassbender, Benedict Cumberbatch, Paul Dano

       

          What It’s About- Based on the autobiography of the same name, 12 Years a Slave tells the story of               Solomon Northup, a free and educated black man who in 1841 is kidnapped and sold into slavery.                 What follows is twelve years of working on Louisiana plantations before he is finally found by his wife in         1853.    

      

          Why I Want To See It- While the plot is certainly an interesting enough reason to watch it, the main               attraction for me is Ejiofer and Fassbender.  They are both truly wonderful, underrated actors and I am           looking forward to seeing them in a film where they can get some long overdue recognition. 

  

    2.      Dallas Buyers Club

          

          Release Date- November 1^st

          Starring- Matthew McConaughey, Jared Leto, Jennifer Garner

          What It’s About- Dallas electrician Ron Woodroof, is diagnosed with HIV in 1986 and given 30 days to       live.  When his FDA approved medication proves to be useless he decides to smuggle some more                 effective but also illegal drugs in from Mexico.  Eventually other HIV/AIDS patients start to seek him out         for the medications and with some help from his doctor and a transvestite named Rayon: Woodroof               starts the Dallas Buyers Club, a service that provides its paying members with alternative drugs.

          Why I Want To See It- McConaughey has surprised me the last couple of years by actually doing some         good movies and more amazingly giving some good performances.  In Dallas Buyers Club however, he         seems to be taking it to another level even going so far as to lose almost 40 pounds for the role.  I never         thought I would say this a few years ago but I can’t wait for McConaughey’s next movie.

    3.      Thor: The Dark World

          

          Release Date- November 8^th

          

          Starring- Chris Hemsworth, Natalie Portman, Tom Hiddleston, Christopher Eccleston, Anthony Hopkins

          What It’s About- Thor has returned to Asgard and now faces a mysterious enemy known as the Dark           Elves who are older than the universe itself.  They are so powerful that Thor must forge a shaky alliance         with the treacherous Loki if he hopes to stop them and keep the world from plunging into eternal                     darkness.

          Why I Want To See It- I think that after Iron Man 3, Marvel proved they can still make good movies             after The Avengers and I believe Thor: The Dark World will be just as good.  Also, with Doctor Who         playing a comic book villain, how could I possibly resist?

    4.      The Wolf of Wall Street

          Release Date- November 15^th

          Starring- Leonardo Dicaprio, Jonah Hill, Matthew McConaughey, Kyle Chandler, Jean Dujardin

          What It’s About- The Wolf of Wall Street tells the story and eventual downfall of wealthy New York           stockbroker Jordan Belfort. 

          Why I Want To See It- For me it’s mostly because of Martin Scorsese.  He’s one of my favorite                   directors and I’m really excited to see how his follow-up to Hugo turns out.  Also, from I saw from the           trailer it looks to be similar to Goodfellas but with stockbrokers instead of gangsters.   

   

    5.      The Hunger Games: Catching Fire

          Release Date- November 22^nd

          Starring-Jennifer Lawrence, Josh Hutcherson, Liam Hemsworth, Woody Harrelson, Phillip Seymour               Hoffman

   

          What It’s About- After the events of The Hunger Games, Katniss and Peeta’s victory begins to spark a       rebellion within the other districts.  In an effort to squash the rebellion, the Capitol forces previous winners       from the Hunger Games to compete against each other again, including Katniss and Peeta. 

          Why I Want To See It- While I admit that I didn’t enjoydnt I admit that i  reading Catching Fire quite as much as I did the     first book I still found it to be pretty good.  Also, some of the actors that have been added to The Hunger     Games: Catching Fire cast has me cautiously optimistic that this sequel might actually improve on the           original.  

Box Office Winners and Losers Summer 2013

***WARNING-NONE OF WHAT I SAY IN THIS ARTICLE IS A COMMENT ON THE QUALITY OF THE MOVIES.  IN FACT, I HAVE YET TO SEE MOST OF THESE SO I’M CURRENTLY NOT IN A POSITION TO OFFER MY OPINIONS ON THEM ANYWAY.  ALSO, ANY BOX NUMBERS I USE ARE EFFECTIVE AS OF AUGUST 23, 2013.  THANK YOU AND ENJOY THE ARTICLE. ***

Winners

Iron Man 3- Iron Man 3 didn’t match up to the figures of last year’s Marvel’s The Avengers; the numbers however, are still nothing to scoff at.  Iron Man 3 still managed to make $408 million domestically and over $1.2 billion worldwide which are figures that no other movie has been able to touch this year.     

Despicable Me 2- I have to admit that I underestimated Despicable Me 2.  I had it pegged to do just well enough to validate another sequel but they proved me wrong in a pretty big way.  With a worldwide gross of over $800 million it managed to out-earn all of their competition with the exception of Iron Man 3 (see above).  

Horror movies- So far it looks like a good year for horror movies (at least financially) and the summer was no exception.  The Purge ($84 million worldwide/$3 million budget) and The Conjuring ($220 million worldwide/$20 million budget) not only made back their budgets many times over, but managed to put some of their bigger budgeted counterparts to shame in the process (see Losers).    

Fast and Furious 6- Two years ago Fast Five surprisingly proved to be a massive hit, and from a box-office standpoint Fast and Furious 6 actually managed to top its predecessor.  Finishing at about $786 million worldwide it’s safe to say that we’ll be seeing more of these movies for better or worse. 

World War Z- Admittedly I’m probably being a little generous with this one.  While a worldwide gross of $526 million isn’t overly impressive for a summer blockbuster, the fact that World War Z managed to avoid a Lone Ranger level disaster was a pretty major victory for the film. 

Losers

The Internship- Vince Vaughn hasn’t had a hit movie in almost four years and The Internship did absolutely nothing to change that.  The Internship did so badly on opening weekend they made only half as much as their far smaller budgeted competition The Purge.  In retrospect, Vaughn and Owen Wilson’s follow-up to The Wedding Crashers was probably about a few years too late to leave any impact.   

Ryan Reynolds- Poor Ryan Reynolds just can’t seem to catch a break.  He went 0 for 2 in the summer of 2011 with Green Lantern and The Change-Up.  Two years later things might have actually gotten worse for him.  After headlining the “disappointing” Turbo ($142 million worldwide /$135 million budget) and the just plain embarrassing R.I.P.D. ($59 million worldwide/$130 million budget), I don’t think movie producers will be in any hurry to make him the lead in their next summer blockbuster.    

After Earth- Not even the star power of Will Smith could save After Earth from the stigma of being an M. Night Shyamalan movie.  While the studio might’ve made their money back overseas, After Earth only made a paltry $61 million domestically which looks to be lowest for a Will Smith movie since Ali back in 2001. 

White House Down- A movie directed by Roland Emmerich (Independence Day, 2012) and starring Channing Tatum should’ve been a no-brainer.  So what went wrong?  The popular theories are bad scheduling, unenthusiastic reviews, and that the audience basically seeing the same movie three months before with Olympus Has Fallen.  Whatever the reason, it appears to be highly unlikely that White House Down will make back its production budget ($150 million budget/ $134 million gross worldwide) before the DVD release. 

The Lone Ranger- There are so many reasons this movie shouldn’t have been made I don’t even know where to start.  Television show adaptations rarely translate into box office gold much less TV shows that are over fifty years old.  Also, westerns are typically modest hits at best so making one with a price tag of $215 million (not including several years of pre-production and expensive marketing) is not only ill-advised but just plain stupid.  Here I thought Disney had learned their lesson after the similarly disastrous John Carter.  Just in case you’re curious, the worldwide gross is around $230 million.    

Pacific Rim Review

                         

            I’ve often heard some movies be described as “so awesome your head might explode.”  I never really understood what they were talking about until I went to the theater to see Pacific Rim.  Like so many summer movies before it, Pacific Rim uses style over substance, but unlike many summer movies from before it has style in spades.  It would be easy for people to write this off as another Transformers rip-off (I’m talking to you Battleship) but Michael Bay will never make anything close to this.  Guillermo Del Toro has had a lengthy absence from the directors’ chair (his last movie was Hellboy II) but the wait was well worth it. 

            In the near future, coastal cities come under attack by giant alien monsters called Kaijus, who appear out of an inter-dimensional portal in the Pacific Ocean.  To fight the Kaiju, the humans build massive robots called Jaegers, which are each controlled by two pilots since the mental load quickly proves too much for anybody to control the Jaegers alone.  While the Jaegers appear to be winning at first, Kaiju attacks become more frequent and dangerous.  Eventually, the Jaegers are being destroyed faster than they can be built and the government decides to disband the project in a few months in favor of building gigantic walls along the coasts (which goes about as well as you might expect).  The leader of the Jaeger program Stacker Pentecost (Idris Elba) decides to use the four remaining Jaegers to make a last stand against the Kaijus.  To help with his plans, he recruits former Jaeger pilot Raleigh Beckett (Charlie Hunnam), who is still recovering emotionally after the loss of his brother/co-pilot in combat.  He is partnered with rookie pilot Mako Mori (Rinko Kikuchi) who also happens to be Pentecost’s adopted daughter with her own traumatizing history with the Kaiju.  Meanwhile, research scientist Dr. Newton Gieszler (Charlie Day) is studying the Kaiju brain in the hopes of finding a way to establish a mental link with them with the reluctant help of Dr. Hermann Gottlieb (Burn Gorman).

           But enough with the plot, let’s talk about the action.  The fight scenes between the Jaegers and the Kaiju are nothing short of spectacular.  They gave me an at-the-edge-of-my-seat feeling they I don’t think I’ve had in years.  Every time I watched a fight I was in a state of what I can now only describe as incredulous glee.  The visual effects are also unbelievable and just like with last year’s Life of Pi, if this movie doesn’t walk away with a Best Visual Effects Oscar for their efforts I will lose my faith in the Academy.

           The only real problem with Pacific Rim is that the human characters aren’t very interesting.  Their development mostly ranges from mediocre to clichéd.  One person in particular who stuck out like a sore thumb was Ron Perlman.  Here he plays a black market trafficker of Kaiju parts named Hannibal Chau (I dare you not to laugh at that name).  His sole purpose in this is to provide useless exposition and apparently be a glorified cameo for Del Toro (kind of like how Bruce Campbell always gets shoehorned into Sam Raimi’s movies).     

           While Pacific Rim has some problems with the script but I loved the special effects and fight scenes so much that I was more than willing to let that go.  As a matter of fact Pacific Rim is probably been my favorite movie so far this year (though I expect that will change soon enough with award season kicking in soon).  I’ve got my fingers crossed for a sequel.  

Grade: A-

Next Review: Turbo  

The Incredible Burt Wonderstone Review

                             

                              

            The Incredible Burt Wonderstone is painfully unfunny and completely wastes a talented cast.  There are occasional moments that reminded me why I thought magic was cool as a kid.  It also reminds me why I stopped thinking magic was cool in the first place.

            

            The “story” begins with young Albert celebrating his birthday and for a present his mother gets him the magic kit of renowned magician Rance Holloway (Alan Arkin).  Magic quickly becomes an obsession for him and he makes fast friends with classmate and fellow magic enthusiast Anthony.  They eventually grow up to become Burt Wonderstone (Steve Carell) and Anton Marvelton (Steve Buscemi) with a headlining act at the Bally’s Hotel in Las Vegas.  After working together for ten years however, they’ve both gotten sick of each other mostly due to Burt’s arrogance.  If that wasn’t bad enough their act is being upstaged by local (and quite possibly psychotic) street magician Steve Gray (Jim Carrey).  In an effort to regain their audience, Burt and Anton attempt a stunt similar to Gray’s but because of Burt’s laziness things go horribly wrong almost instantly and Anton is hospitalized.  Anton furiously severs ties with Burt, who gets fired by the hotel soon afterward.  Broke and out of work, Burt is quickly reduced to working as an in-house entertainer at a home for retired Vegas performers.  There he meets his boyhood idol Holloway who of course inspires him to resurrect his love for magic.  

            There are some potentially promising scenes (that mostly fall flat) but for the most part the script for The Incredible Burt Wonderstone is completely unbearable.  Most of the jokes are unfunny and very noticeably outdated.  I’m pretty sure this is one of those scripts that gathered dust on a shelf for several years since most of the subjects they’re lampooning haven’t been relevant for some time now.  Jim Carrey’s character is an obvious satire on street performers like David Blaine and Criss Angel.  This could’ve been funny back in 2007 when people actually gave a crap about those guys but instead comes off like a badly written Robot Chicken sketch.  Burt and Anton are also a less than subtle parody of the magic duo Siegfried and Roy who are even more dated than Carrey’s character since neither Siegfried or Roy has performed onstage since their infamous tiger attack almost a decade ago.   

Even worse the movie finds it necessary to shoehorn a love interest for Burt in the form of his attractive but bland assistant Jane (Olivia Wilde).  Even if I were willing to overlook the fact that Wilde is almost literally half Carell’s age, they have no chemistry whatsoever making the romance feel even more forced than it was already.  It also doesn’t help that Burt spends most of the movie acting like a sexist douchebag (for most of the movie he deliberately calls her Nicole) making her falling for him all the more implausible.

            The only thing that makes this tolerable is Alan Arkin who sadly isn’t in the movie much.  Thankfully, however his presence in here provides a short-term relief from the rest of the film.  He actually manages to make a couple of scenes with Carell slightly funny (which with this script is like squeezing blood from a stone) and pulls off his own amazing magic trick by being the only cast member in this train wreck to not completely embarrass himself.  

            Almost every frame of The Incredible Burt Wonderstone is a gigantic waste of time and an even bigger waste of potential.  They take a great cast and do absolutely nothing with them.  Even worse, the script uses jokes so old they make those lazy spoof movies look innovative by comparison.

Grade: D

Next Review: Pacific Rim