Movie reviews:  Just In, Way Out…
August 14, 2009

Just in: “District 9″, directed by Neill Blomkamp; screenplay by Neill Blomkamp & Terri Tatchell

The Skinny: In the home of good ole apartheid, aliens park their ship above Johannesburg and after making no contact with the earth for three months, the people of earth take it upon themselves to break into their ship and put the aliens in refugee camps.  After twenty years, the people of Johannesburg decide to tell their government that the aliens gotta go.

Will you like it? Not sure on this one.  I honestly find anything Peter Jackson is involved in to be boring and filled with emotional character choices which are forced down your throat.  This movie has a lotta those.  That being said, if you can make it past the first forty minutes of almost make you walk out boredom, it does finally get going and take you on an interesting ride which sadly is ruined in the final run to the finish which comes off as a big f-u and that this whole movie was to set up the sequel “District 10.”  Kind of like the first “Lord Of The Rings.”

Full Review: Wikus Van De Merwe (Sharlto Copley) is put in charge of the alien relocation program by his father in law who’s the head of MNU, a Blackwater type company.  He’s a bit of a dink and his father in law has no respect for him so part of sending him into the refugee camps is one that he doesn’t want to do it himself and two, he’s probably hoping Wikus will get killed while serving eviction notices and his daughter can re-marry a proper mate.  Needless to say, Wikus goes in with an armed crew to serve the eviction notices to the aliens or “prawns” as they’re called.  The aliens are all uneducated sheep for the most part and sign the eviction notices or get themselves shot for not wanting to leave.  There is one prawn however named Christopher (sure aliens have Christian names) who’s a bit smarter and has some type of plan going on to get him and his people  outta there.

During their encounter, Wikus finds an odd cylinder which sprays him with some goo and finally, the movie actually starts to get going.  He soon gets sick, experiences horrific changes and finds he’s starting to turn into an alien.  Which is all too valuable for his evil father in law to pass up exploiting.  See, his father in law loves his government contract and would love to be able to use the outlandish weapons they’ve confiscated from the aliens, unfortunately they only work with aliens, to humans their useless.  But now that he has half man half alien Wikus, he can experiment on him, harvest what he needs and give soldiers the biological necessities to use the weaponery and make millions!  Mwwahahahahaha!

I don’t want to ruin the rest for you, so I’ll end there, but you can pretty much guess what happens.

Did I hate it? No.  Did I love it?  No.  If anything it depressed me.  It is entertaining throughout the second act and a bit of the third, but then as I said in the skinny, it’s ripped back to arched Peter Jackson style story telling that ultimately left me unsatisfied and feeling like “damn, they screwed this one up.”  And the blatantlent set up of a sequel just made me want to punch the screen.  But the audience did clap, so maybe I’m just an old fart who expects that to qualify as a great movie, you have to be great beginning to end and not just in the middle.

Way Out: “Up”  Directed by Pete Docter & Bob Peterson, written by Pete Docter & Bob Peterson

The Skinny: Old man who’s being forced out of the home he and the love of his life shared since childhood, decides to strap a million balloons to his house and take he and his wife’s ashes on the adventure they always planned on taking.

Will you like it? I think so.  Granted I didn’t like it as much as everyone else said I would, but for the first eight minutes alone that montages their lives together, it’s worth it.

Full Review: Carl (Ed Asner) is a crotchety old man with nothing better to do than to try and hold on to the memory of his late wife while annoying the construction workers building high rises around him.  He of course has refused to sell, wanting to hold on to every bit of what’s left of Ellie.  His protectiveness of their memories comes to a head one day and he cracks a construction worker with his cane.  The result?  A trip for him to the old folks home.  But Carl won’t have any of that.  Nope.  He’s got quite the plan.  Inspired by a famous blimp traveling adventurer whose films encouraged adventurous play between him and Ellie as children, he decides to turn his own house into a flying machine and head for Paradise Falls where he’ll live out his final years.

Unfortunately, he accidently takes a well meaning and overly talkative wilderness scout with him.  The two embark on a not so treacherous adventure that takes them to South America in less time than you could get there on a 787 and begin their journey toward the falls.  The movie hits a wall here for a while, they basically tread water story-wise with comedic bits of the two characters dealing with each others eccentricities.  When it finally pics up so does the story and from there on it’s pretty darn good and worth sitting through the downtime.  The action really pics up and the two fight to save a newfound friend and ultimately themselves from the very person that put the falls on the map.

Did I like it? Yeah.  Did I love it?  No.  It’s an in between kinda film for me that I honestly don’t think I’ll ever watch again, but am glad I saw it for those first eight minutes.

Which movie should you see this weekend? I’d have to say “District 9.”  Although I didn’t love it, it’s an interesting idea and with the flawless special effects and the grand scope of the world they’ve created, you gotta see it on the big screen.  As for “Up”, it’s a good second choice if “D-9″’s sold out.

This is the start of an experiment I’m doing.  Not one to see a lot of movies, I often find myself seeing something that’s on its “way out” of theaters.  On rare occasions, I see something when it’s just opened or “just in” theaters.  And on other occasions, like this week, I see one of each in the same week.  Just in: “Orphan”, way out “Drag Me To Hell.”  I figured I’d share this type of reviews with everyone since often when you go to see a new release it’s sold out and you have to see something else and seeing something on the way out is a better alternative to driving home.

First up, Just In, “Orphan”, directed by Jaume Collett-Serra; screenplay by David Johnson; story Alex Mace

The skinny: Classic case of buyer beware.  Parents adopt an orphan that turns out not to be so sweet.  She begins killing seemingly everyone and everything around her in an attempt to win the father’s love.

Will you like it? Probably not, unless you’re a sixteen year old girl going to see it with a group of friends or if you’re an adult looking to burn an afternoon on a silly horror flick whose jump out of your seat moments are when they crank the sound up to get you to jump.  Otherwise, go with the Way Out.

Full Review; Kate (Vera Farmiga) is a loving mother of two whose third child with her husband John (Peter Sarsgaard) was still born decides she’s ready to adopt a child since the last one tore out her ovaries and left her apparently barren.

So they adopt Esther, a seemingly adorable and wise beyond her years Russian girl and bring her into their home.  At first all is well, sure her clothing choices are odd, but she’s sweet and instantly bond with the family’s youngest daughter who’s deaf.  The older brother however is suspect that she’s a freak.  This is soon proven when he wounds a pigeon with his paintball gun and Esther smashes it with a rock to “put it out of its misery.”

From there things start rolling down hill, Esther’s behavior spins out of control as she lashes out at anyone who’d get in the way of her happiness.  A girl at school makes fun of her, she pushes her off the swing set.  A nun delivers some info about Esther’s past, she kills the bitch.  And on and on and on, all the while “manipulating” the father to take her side while the mother feels like she’s losing control.  But mom won’t take it lying down, she searches and fights to the end to prove to everyone how crazy this kid really is and that everyone else is wrong.

In what leads to the final confrontation (don’t worry I won’t tell you), I (and the entire audience) was literally left laughing by the ridiculously complicated “twist” that was supposed to put everything together for us.  Sure it made sense if you suspend all reality, but wasn’t very satisfying.

Did I hate it?  No.  Did I love it?  Definitely know.  The acting’s great, the direction is good but the writing is mediocre and silly.  But sometimes on a hot summer’s day, you just gotta take a little silly and laugh while you enjoy the A.C.

Way out: “Drag Me To Hell” Directed by Sam Raimi; written by Sam Raimi & Ivan Raimi

The Skinny: Twenty-something bank loan officer gets a curse put on her by a disgruntled, crazy old gypsy which slowly beats her down mentally and physically as the curse comes to fruition, trying to drag her soul to hell.

Will you like it? I think so.  I mean, Raimi’s been doing horror forever and he doesn’t let you down here.  He mixes those fun jump out of your seat scares along with classic moments so uncomfortable and simply creepy that you’ll be thinking about it for days.  I freak out when I see a fly now.

Full Review: Christine (Allison Lohman) is a young, dreamy bank loan officer who’s seriously involved with also young and dreamy professor Clay Dalton (Justin Long).  They make the cutest couple you ever could ask for and everything’s going great.  They’ve been together almost a year, she’s about to meet his parents and she’s even up for a promotion at the bank.  Then a creepy old lady comes in whose house is being foreclosed on.  When she can’t help the woman, the woman begs and when she calls security on her, the old woman claims she’s shamed her and flips out like a psycho.

Later that night, the woman attacks her and after a crazy-ass, Raimi-style close quarters fight, the woman puts a hex on her which then slowly begins Christine’s descent into madness and ultimately a fight for her life which takes her to a “Seer” and causes her to kill a kitten all while having creepy flies crawl in her mouth while sleeping and cause her body to spurt blood or maggots at the drop of a hat.  This of course affects her job and her relationship and when it looks like it’s all going to go away, she takes one last step to go with the “Seer” to get the shit fixed.

In her final run she takes the reigns as a kick ass heroine, having put together the perfect plan.  She repays the seemingly undead dead old woman for what she did to her in her own special way.  Is it over?  Did she fix it?  You’ll have to see it to find out.

It’s really a great film that makes you jump and sticks with you.  Just typing this I’m getting creeped out.  So this weekend, go check it out before it’s gone and leave “Orphan” for the way out.