I Am Legend (2007)

Pretty interesting movie.

From a "lone survivor" point of view and again, very much copied by now (Oblivion (2013) comes to mind).

Probably one of Will Smith's best know work (we shall see if he survives the After Earth (2013), incident).

Picture Quality and Sound Quality is pretty impressive. Sorry am not in a mood to add more. I just finished the special feature where the American CDC keeps insisting the any modern pandemic would be an Asian thing. That is just bias...

My Two Sen

The Hurt Locker (2008)

I do not and could not understand why this movie stole the thunder from James Cameron's Avatar at the Oscars back then. Although Avatar was mainly eye candy but it was pretty impressive eye candy. This movie however defied any classification from me.

I am a pretty patient guy. Especially when it comes to watching a movie in the comfort of my own home on DVD with no one around to bother me. Having said that, The Hurt Locker managed to break one of my records - it became the one and only movie that I could not sit through even when I was watching it at home. So far this record had stood.

The movie is about the war in Iraq. It focuses on a particular bomb disposal squad. One member died early in the movie and then there's this obnoxious replacement that does things his way and defies orders and shows how macho he was in the field. I don't get the point. All I see is one obnoxious bomb disposal officer and the pacing is boooooooooooorrrrrrrrriiiiiiiiiiiinnnnnnnggggggg!

After about 60 minutes into the movie with no obvious plot, I hit the off button on my DVD player.

Rating : 0 out 5 stars

Wow i recalled it wasnt that bad haha.. i watched it due to the academy award hype. The explosion looks realistic though.

Not so bad, maybe not your taste...
For me is good...

Behind the Candelabra (2013)

Well, now I'm really sorry I made an earlier statement in the Behind the Candlelabre thread, because this is really good movie.

Well scripted, VERY well acted and well directed by Steven Soderbergh.

I'm actually old enough to have actually watch one/two of Liberace TV specials!!

I have to admit, that he know how to entertain people using the piano!!

I have never imagine his personal life to be so... complicated.

I really have to give Michael Douglas for his work here, because he actually captured Liberace's mannerism, down peg!!

This is a drama, and have to add, it is very engaging.

One more thing I would like to add here is.... How does one get from Captain Jonathan Archer to Bob (Scott Bakula)!!!???!

The unpredictable nature of the movie production world...

If you like drama, give this a try.

My Two Sen.

This post has been edited by Mov_freak: Sep 7 2013, 08:53 PM

World War Z (2013) Addendum

Supposedly, there was a lot of issues when the movie is in production.

Also, when they showed snippets of this movie was at Comic Con (I think) the fans were not impressed.

So, this movie received a lot of "bad press" before it was shown in the movies.

Investors were jittery, pressure were put on the director and star (Brad Pitt).

As you had notice, this is an addendum to my World War Z review

My original review can be read here

World War Z Review

What I like to add here is that for the life of me, I cannot fathom how this movie cost USD 190,000,000!!!!

PQ is decent.

AQ is good.

My added Two Sen.

This post has been edited by Mov_freak: Sep 8 2013, 12:44 PM

Fast & Furious 6 (2013)

Let me get one thing straight, the Fast and Furious is never my favorite franchise...

The first three were VERY disjointed, and have to add, the franchise had... evolved into something it was never meant to be, when the first was made...

My... concern about this movie franchise is that some car "enthusiasts" cannot tell the difference between movie and life, and I'll leave it at that.

This franchise is 12 years old the first being The Fast and the Furious (2001), and have to add Paul Walker compared to Vin Diesel, seems to be the one that is aging ungracefully...

Okay, credit where credit is due, the script writer for this actually took the trouble of going through all the previous script and tries to make head and tails out of all of them.

Fast and Furious 3 is still sticking out like a sore thumb though...

Car stunts are crazy.


Chicks are hot, which brings me back to my earlier statement about some car enthusiasts... Please remember these are movies and they have ALOT of stunt coordinator and planner to do what we see on screen...

PQ is good. AQ is fantastic.

That's it, that is My Two Sen

This post has been edited by Mov_freak: Sep 8 2013, 01:02 PM

The Purge(2013) - 7/10

The concept of this movie is great but film is just lack of something to make its hype to the fullness. Horror in this film is different from common ghost horror type or hunting victims that type of horror. I am sure almost everyone who watching this film will mumbling to yourself and put your hatred on every character in this film,trust me,you will lol
Not bad but just lack of something.

The Seasoning House(2012) - 8/10

A very cruel,brutal and violent film,based on true story as well,cant say much to this but worth a watch,too much mixed of feelings and emotions for this film. I watch this film because I want to know how the main actress can escape from "devil's playground".

Haha! Yes, the series has gone through some sort of transformation. It's now more of in line with heist movies that uses fast and powerful cars instead of just showcasing the cars as the stars of the movie.

The timeline of the series is non-linear. It goes like FF1 --> FF2 --> FF4 --> FF5 --> FF6 --> FF3 and FF7. We will see some tweaking to the FF3 story in FF7 as witnessed in the post credits scene in FF6 where Jason Statham made an appearance. All in all FF3 will be like a side story while the main storyline about Dom and the gang goes on.

Spoilers alert! The following contains spoilers about FF6. You have been warned!


In the post credit scene in FF6 we see Jason will be the new bad guy in FF7 and he's got a bone to pick with Dom and gang because his brother was killed by them. That's the reason Han was killed in the crash. It was no accident. It was revenge. This will tie back nicely to Dom's appearance at the end of FF3. Han was killed mid way through FF3 and Dom arrived in Tokyo at the end of FF3 and this should be the start of FF7.

I'm curious as to how they are going to make the story interesting. Han's dead. Gisele's dead. 2 of the more interesting characters are gone from the team and revenge is a plot device that we have seen so many times before.

As for the runway, yes, it's kind of silly. However I would like to think that most of the action takes place simultaneously but we were shown each of them one after another while they were happening at the same time. Kinda makes it a little more logical. Haha.

Planes (2013)


When you have kids, you go to the cinemas to watch animation films but then again, I am always up for animated features. Believe it or not with the recent offerings of live action mainstream movies from Hollywood these past couple of years, you can often find better stories in animated features.

The latest from Disney is Planes. It's a 3D animated feature ala Pixar's fare. There's a 3D version of the movie (a 3D of a 3D animated, haha) but I caught the 2D offering. If you don't mind the roller coaster ride, go 3D as in some parts of the movie the whole screen rotates to show you the cockpit view. I'm sure it'll be a blast for those who enjoy this kind of thing.

This is a spinoff from the world of Cars (Pixar's 2006 feature). If you are unfamiliar with Cars, it's set in a world where vehicles are sentient and replaces the human population. So the vehicles have eyes instead of a windscreen and can talk. Bear in mind that this is a Disney production and not a Pixar production. You can say that it's a product from the B-listers instead of the A-listers which Pixar is.

Planes tells the tale of one cropduster names Dusty Crophopper (voiced by Dane Cook). Dusty has been a cropduster all his life. According to him he has flown thousands of miles but have never been anywhere but his rural farm town. He dreams of being a racer plane and plans to join the Wings Across The World race. His buddy Chug (Brad Garrett) the fuel truck, supports him but his mechanic Dottie, a forklift, (Teri Hatcher) tries to discourage him and tells him that cropdusters are not made to fly very fast.

Dusty registers for the qualifiers anyway and tries to get Skipper Riley (Stacy Keach), an old Navy warplane to coach him. Skipper refuses at first and even without the coaching, Dusty makes impressive time at the qualifiers but wasn't fast enough to make it to the finals. Dusty's chance finally comes when one of the qualifiers found to be using banned fuel enhancers, was disqualified, bumping Dusty up the ranks.

Skipper once again tries to talk Dusty out of the race but seeing his determination decides to mentor him. During their training Skipper finds out that Dusty has one little problem :- He's afraid of heights. Despite this setback, Skipper continues to coach Dusty. Finally Dusty heads to New York to begin his first leg of the round the globe race. Can Dusty even survive the whole race?

Planes is your typical underdog story that leans heavily on the friendship can overcome hardship trope. Nothing surprising about the story line but it's well scripted enough to be entertaining for both kids and the adults accompanying them. Would I recommend adults to watch this if they don't have a kid in tow? Not really. Not unless you're a fan of animated features. The movie is great to look at. The backgrounds are beautiful but you can see that they didn't break the bank for it. All in all, wholesome family fun.

Rating : 3 stars out of 5 (for kids. For adults it's a 2.5 stars)

That is... interesting. Thanks for that. I did not know.

I suppose I'll watch, with James Wan directing, and them aligning the timeline to make Fast and Furious 3 make sense...

I do remember Lucas Black kinda made an appearance on one of the Fast And Furious after the 3rd...

Please correct me if I'm wrong. And Justin Lin actually made 3 - 6!!!

You know you are old when in the Special Feature the director mentions that when the first Fast And Furious was made, he was in Film school...

The Other Guys(2010)

Exceptional first 15 minutes...but the quaility just drops from there. Both protagonists are not really likable to me. Terry(Mark Wahlberg) is a gigantic d*** throughout the entire movie and Allen(Will Ferrell) is just annoying at times. Well, at least Allen has some depth as a character but Terry is just...meh. Mark Wehlberg's acting in this one also doesn't click with me, I am not sure if it's the character but he just feels weird to me in this one.

There are some scenes that are just dull to me. There are two possibilities I can think of: 1) The idea is funny on paper but not when it's on screen and 2) it's yet another "he thinks he's funny but he is not" situation. Either way, some dull scenes that are trying to be funny but fail to and most of them involve Terry so it's really hard to see him being a good protagonist in this one.

The story is also lacking. There's just...not enough going on. While the film has all the "key beats" in a movie to make the entire story looks connected as one but it's ultimately uninteresting. The climax is also pretty mediocre for what it is. Overall, it's too long for its purpose, being slightly shorter might help this one.

Rating: 3.5/10

This post has been edited by Goliath764: Sep 12 2013, 12:04 AM

Silver Lining Playbook(2012)

I have high expectation of this since it's regarded as one of the best of 2012 and has an Oscar(plus tons of other wins). Going in, the movie doesn't disappoint me at all. The mental disorder is interesting in the movie, I know mental disorder's no joke in real life, but it is interesting in this movie. Personally, I consider this a light drama about a guy with bipolar disorder looking to work his way back to proper life.

The most interesting segments of this movie to me is probably the first half of the middle part(or act 2 in screenplay term) when Pat(Bradley Cooper) and Tiffany(Jennifer Lawrence) are still new to each other as they try to accommodate each other into their life. The constant snapping, the amount of content, just great. The second half of the middle are more focused on the dance training though, which is fine(and needed to progress the story) but not as interesting as the first half to me. The actual dance scene is hot though, darn good scene.

The ending though, I feel it to be too "Hollywoodish". It's too...simple, there should be more uncontrollably stuff from Tiffany IMO instead of her being so calm all of a sudden, you know, to make it more SLPish than the typical and generic ending which is fine but not unique at all. The ending is fine, no need to change that but I am expecting a more SLP execution there.

Performance-wise, while great, I am not sure if Jennifer Lawrence's performance in here warrants an Oscar. It's great but I am not sure if it's really Oscar-worthy. Some don't like the casting of Bradley Cooper, I find it to be fine. The rating should have been higher but the ending feels rushed and with flawed execution and that dragged the score down a little bit. This might be 8++ if not for "one of the best of 2012", I have a higher expectation because of that and the ending falls short.

Rating: 7.5/10

X2 (2003)

Probably my favorite X-Men movie to date!

All the set piece are there.

Patrick Steward (Professor Charles Xavier) and Ian McKelley (Eric Lensherr / Magneto) are great!

Who would have thunk that Brian Cox (William Stryker) is such an S.O.B....

The star for me in this movie is.... Alan Cumming (Kurt Wagner / Nightcrawler). Very well executed and acted character! I was most disappointed when they did not include him in the 3rd installment (supposedly, Alan Cumming got greedy. That is what I heard. True/Not, I cannot say)

I do have several small peeves about this movie, I don't understand why Aaron Stanford replaced as John Allerdyce / Pyro and that Jason 143 character is a little under developed...

PQ is much superior to X-Men

AQ is Great!!

My Two Sen

X-Men: The Last Stand (2006)

As stated previously, probably my least favorite X-Men movies...

Brett Ratner (Gosh I'm so glad I did not make Superman Returns) was good at making interesting sequences but seem to have issue stringing them properly together (like Disney hand drawn animation, after Walt Disney died)...

I do admit he was given the arduous task of putting from paper to movie, the Dark Phoenix storyline... Not for the faint hearted, I assure you (too many rabid fans), still the finished product...

Also abruptly taking Cyclops away and the Wolverine luvs Jean Grey angle... not handled very well at all...

A little bit of a mess...

As you guys can see, I'm already gearing up for X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014)...

Like always, this is JUST my two sen...

This post has been edited by Mov_freak: Sep 12 2013, 11:58 PM

^ Mov_freak sometimes i wonder how old u are. the range of movies that you've review are quite vast and of different genres. makes me wonder if u really watch those movies that you've posted or u copy pasta from somewhere. but, keep up the good work. i'm watching ur comments.

I'm ANCIENT!!!!

Okay, let me put it into perspective for you. Above I made a comment about XMen's Phoenix Saga... I actually own the original comics where the storyline happened....

As for the cutting and pasting, dude (I'm assuming you are a dude, I apologise if it is otherwise), if you can tell me where I can cut and paste my comments from, that would be great. It would save me alot of TIME!!!

Thanks for your heads up.

Will continue commenting.

Four Brothers (2005)

I don't know how many times I have watched this and for some strange reason I keep coming back to this.

This movie is about four orphan boys who were deem un-adoptable, so much so that the social worker working their cases ended up adopting them.

They are all grown up and returned to their childhood neighborhood after their adoptive mother was gun down in a store robbery... A simple case of wrong time, wrong place??...

Probably one of my favorite Mark Wahlberg movie.

The interaction between the brothers I believe is what draws me to the movie...

Mark Wahlberg is pretty bad-ass here, for all the right reasons.... as oppose to him being dump-ass for all the wrong reasons (Pain and Gain (2013) anyone?... *groan*)

This is a drama with some (not alot) action scenes.

I like it. Good Story, Good direction and definite good acting from all parties concern!! For those who has little kids, please do note that it is quite violent, contains rude language and also adult situation (no sex scenes, but alot of suggestions about sex)

Go for it why don't you, if you have not already.

My Two Sen.

This post has been edited by Mov_freak: Sep 14 2013, 01:33 PM

dun get me wrong. some of ur reviews are good. some of the movies u've review are those that interest me, and i've watched 'em before, and i share the same opinions of ur reviews. but i just cant fathom the fact that how many hours u spent on a daily basis watch movies? of cos u gotta really spend the time in order to come out wif those reviews.

nonetheless, i'll track all ur previous posts and see if i can find a gem or two in it and i'll go *ahem* and watch it.

We Need to Talk About Kevin (2011)

If you are a director and you need a very young gentleman to play an innately evil character, what do you do?

Apparently, director Lynne Ramsay, had found the answer. You hire, Ezra Miller!!

This movie is truly different.

Very low budget, very well scripted, acted and directed!!

This is categorise as a drama/thriller.

Tilda Swinton plays Eva Khatchadourian a well known travel writer. She suspect something is... off about her son. her husband Franklin played by John C. Reilly feels that she is over reacting and that their son, Kevin played by Ezra Miller is just a normal kid... The truth is... really really disturbing...

I wonder if this is a situation where art imitate life or otherwise, because if one reads the newspaper nowadays... similar situation seems to be... sadly... news...

A word of caution though. This movie is definitely NOT for everyone (slow paced) and also the editing can be somewhat disorientating because it jumps around different time line....

My two Sen

This post has been edited by Mov_freak: Sep 14 2013, 07:30 PM