Category: Movies

Not A Review Of “Gran Torino”

~ James Viscosi ~ 1 Comment

So this week we watched “Gran Torino“, one of Clint Eastwood’s late-career movies that doesn’t go the way you think it’s going to go. In this film, Clint Eastwood plays Walt Kowalski, a recently-widowed Korean war veteran living in a neighborhood that has become rather dilapidated, and also largely ethnic Hmong, including a thuggish street gang whose members like to cram, clown-car style, into a rather junky little beater with an ugly spoiler and a hood that’s not the same color as the body. Walt’s prized Gran Torino catches the gang’s eye as a much more suitable ride. Hilarity does not ensue.

"Ask yourself this question: Do I feel like getting off Walt's lawn? Well do you? Punk?"
“You’ve gotta ask yourself one question: Do I feel like getting off Walt’s lawn? Well do ya, punk?”

Continue reading “Not A Review Of “Gran Torino”” →

Teaser Tuesday 12/16/2014: “Gone Girl

~ James Viscosi ~ 1 Comment

So this week, having finished A Tale of Two Cities:

ATaleOfTwoCities
It is a far, far better thing that I do, than I have ever done; it is a far, far better rest that I go to than I have ever known.*

I have now moved on to Gone Girl, by Gillian Flynn, thereby reducing the “twenty-one people who haven’t read it” to twenty.

GoneGirl
Exit, stage right.

Continue reading “Teaser Tuesday 12/16/2014: “Gone Girl” →

Not A Review Of “Just Like Heaven”

~ James Viscosi ~ Leave a comment

So having in recent weeks subjected my wife to “Snowpiercer” (“What kind of train has an aquarium and a nightclub in it?”) and “Ender’s Game” (“All I’ve figured out so far is it’s a bunch of kids playing video games.”), I decided we needed something she might actually pay attention to. Enter “Just Like Heaven“, AKA the romantic comedy where the ghost of Tracy Flick meets the Incredible Hulk, with an assist from Napoleon Dynamite. Or something like that.

Attack of the Fifty Foot Flick
Attack of the Fifty Foot Flick

Continue reading “Not A Review Of “Just Like Heaven”” →

Not A Review Of “28 Weeks Later”

~ James Viscosi ~ 3 Comments

So I recently watched “28 Weeks Later“, the sequel to Danny Boyle’s classic “28 Days Later“, the film that helped to usher in the “fast zombie”* boomlet of the early 2000s.  Like its predecessor, “28 Weeks Later” boasts a very strong cast (including Rose Byrne, Robert Carlyle, Harold Perrineau, and Jeremy Renner) and it delivers the apocalyptic mayhem, but unfortunately it suffers from the fact that the characters behave in incredibly stupid ways.  If you imagine that they took Season 3 Andrea from “The Walking Dead” and put her in charge of a military operation to repopulate Britain after it was devastated by the rage virus from the first film, you’re not far off.

Because my wife studiously ignored the presence of this movie in the house, I can’t use the usual rating system of how long it took her to fall asleep.  Therefore, I’m going to dust off the “badmovies.org” style of bullet-pointed summary, which I think was last used in my infamous pan of “August Rush“, to illustrate some of the important things “28 Weeks Later” taught us.  Needless to say, there will be …

spoilers Continue reading “Not A Review Of “28 Weeks Later”” →

Freezing Bad; Or, Not A Review Of “Frozen River”

~ James Viscosi ~ 2 Comments

So, it’s been a while since I posted a “movie review”. The reason for the dearth of recent writeups is not that we haven’t been watching movies, but that she hasn’t really been paying attention to them lately, for various reasons, including that none of them is “Breaking Bad“. Anyway, here’s a sample of some of the selections that have arrived and departed unremarked. (Longtime readers will recall that the ratings system I use is, “How many minutes did it take for this movie to put my wife to sleep?” By that standard, none of these did very well.)

Continue reading “Freezing Bad; Or, Not A Review Of “Frozen River”” →

Broken Bad: The Search for Another Show

~ James Viscosi ~ 8 Comments

So I previously mentioned that, having finished “Breaking Bad“, I have now been charged with finding a new show that can catch and hold my wife’s attention. Although there’s been no shortage of suggestions on shows that might fit the bill, those who are familiar with my movie rating system (“This movie put my wife to sleep in X minutes”) will not be surprised to hear that the search is not going well. WARNING: Minor spoilers below!

Continue reading “Broken Bad: The Search for Another Show” →

Neither A Review Of “Breaking Bad” Nor Of “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen”

~ James Viscosi ~ 8 Comments

So as everyone knows, for the past several months we’ve been binge-watching “Breaking Bad” (which, for us, means watching one to one-and-a-half episodes a night). Sadly, we have recently come to the end of the series. Season Five started out a bit slow, and introduced some new characters, which caused a very slight and temporary slump in interest.

Continue reading “Neither A Review Of “Breaking Bad” Nor Of “Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen”” →

Not A Review Of “Flight”

~ James Viscosi ~ 3 Comments

So a few weeks ago we were between Netflix discs (“The Heat” had gone back, “Pacific Rim” had not yet arrived), and while looking through the list of streaming movies one evening, I noticed that “Flight” was there.  I’d been interested in seeing that for a while, and my wife is a fan of Denzel Washington, so I decided to start watching it, which led to a conversation that went something like the one described below:

Continue reading “Not A Review Of “Flight”” →

Review: “The Hobbit”

~ James Viscosi ~ 4 Comments

Most readers probably know that I do the occasional film review here, and that because I like just about every movie I see, instead of actually rating movies myself I judge them based on how long it takes for them to put my wife to sleep.  A few readers may even remember that, several years ago, I had been trying in vain to get my wife to sit through “The Two Towers” and “Return of the King”, after having subjected her to “The Fellowship of the Ring” in an actual movie theater.  Alas, my efforts were in vain, until she happened to wander past the television when I was watching “The Two Towers” for the umpteenth time, and she happened to see Gollum.  A bit more back story:  When we finally got replaced our picture tube last year, it was with a 3D flat screen; and because it’s difficult to find 3D movies for rent locally and I am too cheap to buy them, I rent them by mail, a la Netflix, from an outfit called 3DBluRayRental.com.  Are you with me so far?  Good.  So here is my non-review review of the 3D Blu-Ray of “The Hobbit”.

Continue reading “Review: “The Hobbit”” →

Review: “Beasts of the Southern Wild”

~ James Viscosi ~ 6 Comments

So it’s been a very (very) long time since I posted a movie review, and the Oscar-nominated “Beasts of the Southern Wild” seems like as good a film as any to break the lengthy review hiatus.

Continue reading “Review: “Beasts of the Southern Wild”” →