John Wick Review Part 2
That attitude of “You Suck if You Never Heard of the Character We Just Made Up” marketing carries through to the film and is one of the parts the movie kind of falls into the laughable zone. Every character in the film more or less soiled themselves every time the name John Wick was mentioned and it took like half an hour of film time before we were given a clue as to why he was being treated with the same fear and dread as as Voldemort with the One Ring. I’m sure having everyone look like their mother found their porn collection (my own personal terror) whenever John showed up or was mentioned in passing sounded a lot more ominous on the script or even in shooting but on screen it just looked stupid. The really bad ass hitmen are the guys you never heard of.
The other issue I had was John’s motivation. He basically goes on a mass shooting spree killing and shoots dozens of armed goons and risks his life because some kid stole his car and killed his dog. Granted the car was super cool (vintage ’69 Mustang) and the dog was super, duper, uber cute but still it seems like a lot, especially when he could have probably called the kid’s father and gotten his car back and a chance to beat on the guy pretty heavily.
For all that the film was beautifully violent and extremely well shot. 
Keanu Reeves knows how to film fight scenes (image actually comes from the Karate Kid t shirt category) and the director must have had lunch with a fight choreographer because they did not fall back on the flicker vertigo inducing quick cut action sequencing most of Hollywood is falling back on to cover the fact that modern action heroes these days can not only not act but also can’t fight. They seemed to embrace their R rating (although no nudity in spite of ample opportunity). None of it was grossly over the top but all super fun, and John Wick is an interesting enough character to draw you in and root for his success. Also the Mustang was not the only great vintage muscle car and I appreciate cars.
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John Wick Review Part 3
The recap. John Wick (Keanu Reeves) is a recently widowed husband who’s wife died of some unnamed disease (I love this part where I get to make up a disease. For this review I am going to say she died of loupus garou, although given what’s going on in the world I should probably go with feebola) who gave him a puppy to remember her by and he spends his day doing donuts in his Mustang. The piggish son (Alfie Allen) of the local Russian mob boss (Michael Nyqvist) wants the car and steals it. 
He also kills the dog (sorry I know the image is in bad taste but I couldn’t resist. It comes from the funny t shirt category BTW). The mob boss has a ton of goons and deploys them. At that point the story boils down to shoot-stab-shoot-stab-shoot-stab and by that I mean it gets awesome. Oh yeah, some guys get hit with cars and for some reason William Dafoe and the hot girl from Red Dawn (Adrianne Palicki) show up to shoot and stab a few guys.
3.5 of 5 Decent
So what did I think? I had a blast and so did most of the packed theater with me. It’s the kind of mindless violence all men secretly crave (ladies, any guy who denies this is lying to you. We all want to shoot and stab things) without turning into a stupid joke portrayed by a dude with an English accent and no hair. It’s not mind blowing or even good from a story point of view and if I hadn’t enjoyed the violence so much I could find dozens of loose threads with which to unravel the entire film but I won’t. Want to see a bunch of guys get shot and/or stabbed? This is the movie for you. Want to have a complete story with character arcs, complexities, people having feelings besides anger, and very few guys getting shot or stabbed? Go see the Grand Budapest Hotel. 3.5 out of 5 Phasers.
the Infamous Dave Inman
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St. Vincent Review part 1
Feel good movie of the year!
Well, not really at least for most of it. In fact large swaths of it will bum you out like a fire at an anti-depressant and super soft bunny factory. This is not the movie to see while on an alcohol bender or having been miserable, single, and bitter for a few years and bitching about it incessantly in your nerd blog (dodged that bullet).
However not every movie has to draw a smiley face on your spelling test and give you a gold star for the achievement of not breaking your hip falling out of bed this morning. Life is hard and it’s OK to show us a movie that reflects that once in a while if only to give all the happy happy joy joy movies some contrast. And I’m not saying that St. Vincent is totally a bummer. If watching a irascible old man drink, whore, smoke, cheat, steal, and gamble his life away while secretly having a heart of gold (well, silver or perhaps silver-ish. There might be some copper in there too. Coppers good, right? Very useful in electronics) and bond with the wimpy kid next door this movie will work for you.
I am of course a huge Bill Murray fan and love him in any role. Like the late great Robin Williams he is known for his comedy but honestly really shows his talents when doing a serious role. The writing on this film was top notch with a special gold star for the dialog which was brilliant.
Most times a kid in a movie (even kids movies) is the first sound of the suck train leaving the station but this kid Jaeden Lieberher did the impossible for me: he managed to really entertain and engage me while not giving my suspended a disbelief a nose bleed. 
Kids in films tend to suck because they just don’t have the acting chops and you can’t take a serious situation with appropriate seriousness knowing Hollywood would never let a kid die or have anything really bad happen to him or her. Kids always feel fake and out of place and destroy any gravitas a film might have had like a rodeo clown Photoshopped into DaVinci’s Last Supper (I’m looking at you, 8 year old Anakin Skywalker. Image comes from the many Star Wars t-shirts I have in my collection)
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St. Vincent Review part 2
Not to say this film is in all ways brilliant. Pacing dragged at points (it certainly felt a lot longer than a mere 102 minutes) and the supporting pregnant hooker Daka (Naomi Watts) tended to dominate every scene she was in and had a very thick layer of unrealism about her. The director seemed to have a thing for accents as she had a thick Russian one and Bill Murray had a Brooklyn accent that felt just off enough to be annoying (probably my West Coast bias, but my mom is from Brooklyn so I grew up with that accent and Bill’s didn’t quite nail it). I seem to be using the word misogyny a lot in my reviews later but the dominating secondary story about a Russian hooker who has to quit her job because she is pregnant is not going to inspire the next modern Belva Lockwood (look it up). The story tends to meander from set piece to set piece without much guidance from the overriding story arc.
But those are mere piffles on an otherwise fun and well executed movie. Melissa McCarthy took all the serious, non comedy work she did in her last comedy Tammy and nailed a great single working mom performance. The kid was great too and Bill Murray his usual brilliant self. Chris O’Dowd was very fun as the priest. The best part of this film was the dialog and you can really feel yourself pulled out of the theater into a fly on the wall of a grumpy old man’s interesting life (kind of like a less scripted reality TV show).
Quick movie recap: Vincent (Bill Murray) is a broken husk of an old man who spends his time drinking, smoking, sleeping with pregnant prostitutes, and gambling at the race track. He wakes up one morning to find a moving van wrecking his tree and thus does he meet his new neighbor Maggie (Melissa McCarthy) and her son Oliver (Jaeden Lieberher). Maggie and Oliver just moved to Brooklyn to get away from her cheating ex husband. Vincent takes an immediate dislike to both of them but later on she has to pay him to watch Oliver after school.
At that point the bonding begins a la Mr. Miyagi and Daniel-san (only with more alcohol. Image courtesy of the Karate Kid t shirt category). Vincent teaches Oliver how to box an Exacta, drink in a bar, and deal with crazy pregnant Russian strippers (I felt a kinship on the Exacta thing as the only two games my father ever taught me to play were chess and blackjack. I might not know thing one about baseball except it’s the game with the bats but I know what to do on a 12 when the dealer is showing a face card). Oliver’s father surfaces to cause trouble and uses Vincent as an example of Maggies unfit mothering. Meanwhile Vincent has a heartwarming secret but at the same time owes a bookie lots of money. Things go up and down, people get sick, and lots of other stuff happens.
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St. Vincent Review part 3
So should you see this film? Yes, yes you should. I can highly recommend it. 
In a world full of explosions and giant robots it is a true character study (image courtesy of the Transformers t shirt category). A very rare egg indeed. If you rate your movies by how many cars get wrecked and arms get broken accompanied by the sound of celery being bent odds are you will not want to see it but I say to you, sir, that this film experience is even more valuable. See what happens when characters are not armed and hardly ever fight. However for you there is a scene where Vincent teaches Oliver to fight a bully with hilarious results and another scene where Vincent gets drunk, slips on some ice, and ends up unconscious on the kitchen floor that you should find hilarious.
4.5 of 5! Really good.
I’m even going to rate this one a good date movie BTW. It’s got enough touchy feely stuff to keep her engaged while being funny enough to keep you happy. Plus seeing Bill Murray in a good film will soften the blow for when he finally capitulates and does Ghostbusters III. Is there even the slightest chance that film will do anything other than suck? If you believe so contact me immediately as I have some Nevada beachfront property and a big bridge I’d like to discuss with you. 4.5 of 5 Phasers.
Incidentally let me know if you like these shorter, more broken up reviews. I actually find them easier to read. Those big ones I used to do could get ponderous and I like to think I still keep my rapier like wit and manage to retain more of my day to engage in my rock ‘n roll party lifestyle. Thanks and have a great day.
the Infamous Dave Inman
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Star Trek Retrospective: Episode 18 Arena
The difference between Seasons I and II verses III is pretty staggering and as I get closer to the beginning of the series the difference becomes even more apparent. It’s not just that they ran out of ideas but the basic was better early on. Arena is nigh flawless, with a complete arc, clearly understood motivations, a twist, and an underlying message regarding morality. In general a great episode.
By the way, I keep meeting Bobby Clark the man who wore the Gorn suit. He is super cool.
Anyway, one cool thing about this episode is when the crew debates whether the Federation was wrong to set a colony on Cestus III. It’s nice to see that it is run by fallible creatures. I think it added a nice humanizing touch to the society of Star Trek. It’s also fun to see Kirk not be the biggest, baddest guy around. The Gorn captain pretty much curb stomped him the whole time and only by inventing gunpowder (the great equalizer) was Kirk able to save himself.
The influence of this episode is felt even today in shows like Firefly where a ship Captain opted to prove his greater humanity by showing mercy to his defeated opponent in the episode Shindig. Star Trek is pretty much the precursor of everything. (Mal image courtesy of the Firefly tshirts)
the Infamous Dave Inman
The Judge Review Part 1
I Judge thee…mediocre.
All four of my regular readers will have heard me whine about how boring mediocre movies are to watch and (more importantly) to review. I don’t do this for money but because it is fun and when the writing becomes a chore I tend to have “What the hell am I doing with my life” moments. Movie that are great are fun to watch and decently fun to review and movies that truly suck are morbidly OK to watch (in the same way you slow down to check out a traffic accident on the side of a freeway) but super fun to review. However when a film opts to sit dead center on the fence (or in this case on the fence but lean pretty precariously over to the suck yard which in my neighborhood was ours) this job suddenly turns into a job.
I’m was at something of a loss as to how this film could have come out so poorly. It couldn’t have been cast better. Robert Downey Jr. is one of the modern great actors and Robert Duvall the consumante professional actor. The writer Nick Schenk wrote Gran Torino, one of my favorite films. Then I looked at the director David Dobkin, realized he directed the Change-Up and Jack the Giant Slayer and the mystery was solved. He seems to be the master of movies with an interesting idea and a few decent moments but then suck and die like a banana slug in a salt factory.
And this film did have a few good moments, almost all of them reserved to the courtroom. Most Americans enjoy a good court drama and have a love of seeing justice delivered (image courtesy of the Punisher t shirt category). The scenes where Robert Downey Jr. is in court trying to defend his father and out trying to solve the mystery of what happened are downright intriguing. You care about Robert Duvalls character and if you loved Tony Stark you are in for a toned down version of him as the worlds greatest defense attorney. The whole thing had a cool True Believer vibe (the James Woods True Believer. Great movie IMO) that was great.
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The Judge Review Part 2
However the writer and director must have gotten a bad batch of Cliche-b-Gone® because this film was rife with it. Each cliche more trite and boring than the last and each giftwrapped in another sub plot. The sub plots had sub plots. There was the ex girlfriend who might be the mother of the protagonists illegitimate child (who wants to be a lawyer and made out with Downey in a skin peeling scene). There’s the long suffering older brother taking care of the youngest Asperger brother. There is the broken relationship between Downey and Duvall as well as the miserable upbringing Duvall delivered. There is the errors of the past coming back to haunt Duvall and Downey both. There was Downey coming to doubt his integrity as a lawyer. There was the whole “I hate the small town I grew up in but secretly love it” thing. There was a cancer sub plot. There was Downey’s divorce from his wife and his attempting to build a better relationship with his daughter, who also is bonding with Duvall. The list goes on and on and each one getting only about five minutes of screen time before fading out sort of resolved but not really. It was like watching TV while your dog chews in the remote control, constantly changing the channels.
The net effect of all these sub plot was a movie that seemed to lack direction. It also had the pacing of a sick man suffering simultaneously from the worlds worst case of diarrhea and constipation. The whole film moved in fits and starts. The film ran 141 minutes and you will experience every one of them with excruciating slowness.
The characters, while well portrayed, had the stink of cliche about them. 
Downeys was pretty much the slightly less flamboyant Tony Stark: fast talking wise guy with no respect for anyone else (image courtesy of the Iron Man t shirt category). Duvall was the crotchety old man who wasn’t going to change for anyone and was going to do things his way come hell or high water. The prosecutor was the weaselly lawyer out to get Duvall just to put another trophy on his bookcase. There wasn’t a single character who didn’t fall out of another dozen other movies.
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The Judge Review Part 3
Again for all that it wasn’t irredeemable. The courtroom scenes were cool and in spite of playing cartoon cliches both Downey and Duvall delivered solid performances, as did the rest of the cast. The mystery of what happened was intriguing. If you could fast forward through anything not involving the case you could see a really cool 20 minute short.
The story. Hank Palmer (Robert Downey, Jr.) is a high priced defense lawyer who learns that his mother died. He goes back to the one horse town he grew up in and has to deal with his ornery father Judge Joseph Palmer. The Judges worst enemy gets run down and the Judge is charged with murder (Judge Death image courtesy of the comic book t shirts category. Sorry but I couldn’t resist). Hank has to defend the Judge in spite of the fact that Joseph really doesn’t seem to care and also has to deal with about 100,000 other sub plots that rise to the surface to clutter up the screen.
So worth seeing? Meh. Depends on your inclination. If you are a fan of Robert Downey Jr. maybe. If you have a really poor attention span and like the idea of 25 After School Specials packed into one movie sure. However if you were hoping for an in depth drama or crime story with a concise story that ties up all its loose ends give it a pass. It’s not Gran Torino or Sleepers. It’s not even the Incredible Burt Wonderstone. I can’t say it sucks, but I can say it disappoints in it’s mediocrity. 2.5 of 5 Phasers.
2.5 of 5. Meh
the Infamous (and mediocre) Dave Inman
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Star Trek Retrospective: Episode 19 Tomorrow is Yesterday
I did enjoy this one as a kid. My father was in the Air Force and I liked jets a lot. As a movie reviewer I also have to say this is an example where a voice over monolog is well placed. The plot device of the Captains Log as a monolog is a great Star Trek trick and by using it at the beginning of this episode to replace filming the actual accident that sent them back in time they saved a lot of time.
The problem with this one is the very loose approach to the Butterfly Effect Spock takes. Sure Captain Christopher didn’t do much but just by not being on the planet things could have changed dramatically. If he hadn’t been on line at the bank one day someone might have gotten out 30 seconds sooner and been hit by a bus that would have otherwise not happened. This was kind of the whole point behind City on the Edge 
of Forever so I guess I have an issue with them changing time travel mechanics 9 episodes later. Also the “go super fast to travel back in time” was totally lifted from Superman. I like to see more imagination. (image from our collection of Superman t shirts)
the Infamous Dave Inman
