November Movie Reviews

*****   Exceptional

****     Great

***       OK

**         So So

*           Blah

And While We Were Here is about a married woman (Kate Bosworth) in Italy with her husband who is a violist. Her marriage is not fulfilling, he never wants to talk, he doesn't seem to care about her even though he says he loves her. She meets a cute 19-year old boy who is goofy and fun and cute. Did I say cute? And she wants some fun in her life. I think sad marriages are depressing.***

Appaloosa was about two fine looking lawmen hired to keep the peace in a little Wild West town. Ed Harris and Viggo Mortensen are yummy.  Jeremy Irons plays the bad guy and he's pretty hot, too. A whole movie full of horse-riding hotties. Rene Zellweger is the woman who bounces between them. Great western. ****

Big Stone Gap was a mushy, romantic, feel-good movie about a little Virginia town in 1978 and its inhabitants. Costumes were great. It featured Ashley Judd as an "old maid" with Whoopi Goldberg, Patrick Wilson, Jane Krakowski, and Jenna Elfman. It was quaint and sweet, but not very interesting. The Virginia accents didn't feel authentic. ***

Butter  I thought this was going to be some mushy, feel-good Hallmark-style tear jerker movie and was very surprised the first time Jennifer Gardner yelled out the F-word. She plays a ruthless, self-centered, greedy butter carving contestant and with a lack of morality will stab anyone in the back to win. (Trump in heels.) Her competition is a sweet African-American foster child. It has an all-star cast featuring Ty Burrell, Hugh Jackman, and Alicia Silverstone, but the best performance was from Olivia Wilde who plays the village hooker. Great character.  By the end of the movie the Gardner character is running for a political office. Of course. ***

The Contract is about a father (John Cusack) who takes his son camping in the wilderness of Washington State and ends up running across federal agents trying to bring in a hit man (Morgan Freeman) who was on a mission. The hit man's friends are trying to save him, and of course, the government has hired one of the friends to take out the hit man. Excellent performances, intense plot, beautiful scenery, and never a dull moment. Landscape was appropriately rain-drenched, green, and authentic considering it was filmed in Bulgaria. ****

The 5th Wave is an apocalyptic movie about aliens who take over the planet in steps (or waves) such as electromagnetic surges to destroy all electrical devices, flash flooding, and a virus spread by birds. I'm still unclear what the fourth wave was.... The die-hard survivors including our teen star, Cassie, (Chloe Grace Moretz) gather at a make-shift refugee camp in the woods until the Army comes to inform them everyone is being transported to the local military base starting with children first. When the kids are gone, the adults are informed aliens are taking over human bodies and they have a test for children that is reliable but not for adults, panic ensues, guns are pulled and everyone is slaughtered. The army manipulates the children into thinking they are the key to saving the world when in fact the Army has been taken over by the aliens and the children totting machine guns are the 5th wave. If it wasn't so violent and scary it would be a great kids' movies since most of the actors are children. The first part was actually really great with lots of human interest and great special effects, but then half way through it starts feeling really staged, unbelievable, and even the acting becomes substandard. And then it ended at what felt like the middle of the movie. I think they are hoping for a sequel.***

The Final Girls was a very creative idea. It's about a girl whose mother is an actress and slasher movie queen. She gets killed in a car wreck and years later the daughter is asked to appear at the slasher movie cult viewing for the anniversary of her mother's death. A fire starts in the theater and she runs through the screen with her friends to escape and wakes up IN the movie. Of course, they know the movie plot, who dies, who doesn't (the final girl), heck, they know the dialogue by heart so they have to figure out how to survive believing if they survive the movie the nightmare will end and they get to go home. The daughter is reunited with her dead mother who is the character in the movie, but she hopes to save her thinking if she can keep her alive, she can come home with her at the end. It was very touching, but the whole idea was pretty weird and convoluted. I'm not sure why the characters didn't try to change some of the movie which might have changed the plot. It was all very bizarre and the ending didn't address some very basic questions: WHY and HOW and WHEN. **

God Grew Tired of Us is a documentary about the war-torn Sudanese refugees called the Lost Boys. When the Muslim Sudanese in the North attacked the Christian South, their mission was to kill all boys or if not kill them then render them sterile by poking holes in their testicles. Displaced boys of all ages fled their villages, separated from their families who were killed or fled in different directions, and walked hundreds of miles first to Ethiopia then Kenya to safety. With no food or water most of them starved along the way, yet tens of thousands ended up at the refugee camp just across the Kenyan border at Kakuma. This follows the story of a few of the boys after ten years in the camp who were granted immigrant visas to live, work and study in the United States. The cultural shock was really interesting. They are very determined to succeed working multiple jobs and attending school so they can help the countrymen they left behind and make a difference in the world. It always amazes me these young men who came from less than nothing are able to take advantage of the opportunities in America yet so many American youth fail so miserably.  Very sad stories. ****

Hail, Caesar! was a very strange movie about Hollywood filmmaking in the 1930s (?). It was slow and even with all the celebrities, I couldn't get into it. It wasn't funny and it wasn't clever. It was nothing. Either that or it went over my head. *

Horrible Bosses is about three men with three nightmare bosses. Unable to quit their jobs, they decide to kill them. Now, it started off really good with really bad work situations that anyone who has ever  been employed could relate to. The bosses are delightfully evil. Jennifer Anniston plays a dentist with a serious sexual harassment problem. Then the humor gets really stupid when the three dim-witted employees can't seem to do anything right. It's too bad because I think the writers could have made it smart and it had a great cast so the stupidity was a little unnecessary and surprising.**

How to Be Single is a comedy about four young single women (Dakota Johnson, Rebel Wilson, Leslie Mann, and Alison Brie) living in New York each with a different perception of singlehood.  Great commentaries on gender differences. It was very good and thought-provoking, with some funny dialogue and clever moments. "Dicksand"...HAHAHA! Rebel Wilson had some great lines. ****

The Next Three Days is about an innocent woman (Elizabeth Banks) who is sent to prison for murdering her boss. After her husband (Russell Crowe) exhausts all options to prove her innocence and she attempts suicide, he calculates a desperate and very intricate prison break plan. Very well-written story, excellent performances, suspenseful, and exhaustingly thrilling. That last hour I was shaking uncontrollable from all the tension. Well-done.****

Ratter  Well, this one was unbelievably creepy and scary. I saw the previews and avoided it for a while then I figured it might be a good cautionary tale with educational value. According to the DVD case the definition for ratter is: someone who hacks personal devices to stalk their victim's lives. The movie is about Emma, a sweet twenty-three year old college student who moves from the mid-west to the big city. Like most young adults she has a laptop, desktop or TV, and cell phone and has at least one of them if not two of them with her at all times. The movie is filmed through these devices watching every move she makes: walking down the street, in class, in the library, in the coffee shop, out at dance clubs, on dates, with friends, in the living room, kitchen, bedroom, and bathroom. She has been hacked and is being stalked 24/7.  The stalker has various views of her apartment, listens to her phone conversations (she gives her address to a take-out place), tracks her geodata when she's out, snaps photos of her while she's dressing, sleeping, peeing or bathing, send her emails and porn from her friends' email addresses and deletes emails and voice messages from other people. He gets more brazen as the movie progresses, enters her apartment when she isn't there and even in the middle of the night when she is sleeping. It's so incredibly creepy. Little by little she figures out something is wrong and she becomes paranoid, but she never connects it with her devices. She keeps changing her passwords, but it does little good. I kept wanting to yell JUST TURN OFF ALL THOSE DAMN DEVICES! Why does everyone have to be ON all the time??? I find it really obnoxious. Give it a rest! And I'm not sure why it makes people feel more secure to talk on the phone if in a potentially dangerous situation. If you are going to get attacked, the person on the phone isn't going to be able to do anything but listen to you scream. Very creative filming and editing, great photography. It made me feel really paranoid and creepy which I am sure was the intention. ****

Rock the Kasbah was about a music manager/has-been rock tour promoter (Bill Murray) who in a desperate attempt to make some money takes his only client (Zooey Deschanel) to Afghanistan to perform for the troops. Her role is very small. She steals all his money and passport, leaves, and he ends up as a munitions runner in the desert. In a remote village he discovers a young woman who sings on the sly in a cave at night. He puts her on a television talent show. Hmmm...It wasn't very realistic. I mean if their culture would kill a young woman for singing in public, but this buffoon gets her on a TV show with very little effort? Didn't buy it, and I wasn't sold on Bill Murray as a leading man either. His comedy style felt outdated. Bruce Willis was some kind of mercenary and Kate Hudson a hooker. I lost interest in the plot about halfway through. *

Stay is about an Irish professor (Aidan Quinn) hiding in the countryside of Ireland with his Canadian girlfriend (Taylor Schilling). Both have emotional baggage dealing with relationships, parenting and children. It was a nice human relations story with lots of complex characters trying to deal with one another. ***

Stealing Cars is about a exceptionally smart teenage boy who ends up in the last-chance Bernville Camp for Boys with abusive guards and dangerous inmates. Excellent movie with lots of human relationship drama and outstanding performances. The use of flashbacks was perfect. All-star cast. Never dull moment and Emory Cohen is adorable and mesmerizing. *****

Take This Waltz was about a woman (Michelle Williams) who has been married for five years and they take each other for granted. She's bored and he is dismissive. She meets this dashing, gorgeous romantic who lives across the street. Most of the movie is about her falling in love with him, but determined to remain faithful to her husband she never acts on it.  It's very slow, but Williams is a wonderful actress and very interesting to watch as she can convey emotion with very little effort. The ending is very thought-provoking. I like a movie with a message. ***

Tarzan  Oh! My! That vampire guy is a delicious ape man! Great special effects swinging through the jungles, beautiful sets, great story, great performances. Jane was kick ass. The story focuses less on Tarzan's background (the one we all know from the old movies) and more on an updated storyline of greed and slavery. The bonus feature on how they filmed it was fascinating. A few cameramen went to Africa to shoot scenery, but other than that nothing was filmed in Africa!  They had huge sets of recreated jungles, CG animals (not one animal in the whole film was real!), whole towns and villages built, and extras as African tribes people who went through lots of workshops to become authentic. Don't miss this bonus feature. Quite Amazing. ****

To Write Love on Her Arms is based on the true story about a young woman who struggles with bipolar, addiction, and self-mutilation. The special effects when she's a kid were awesome, performances were excellent, the lead actress Kat Dennings was outstanding. ****

Who's Afraid of Virginia Wolf? with Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton based on the play of the same name. I've never seen this movie. Talk about dysfunctional! Boy those people never stopped drinking. They can't walk, but they just keep drinking and screaming at each other. I can't imagine living with or around alcoholics. Great performances especially from Elizabeth Taylor. Of course, it's very dated with excessively-emotional dramatic performances.***