River Murders

A Seattle detective who a bit of a ladies’ man, gets into hot water, when all his past conquest end up getting murdered. Not only murdered, but murdered at places where he met them. It especially bad senses apparently the cop hitting wilt chamberlain numbers when it comes to how many woman he banged. Christ Slater plays a cop investigating/helping him.  Now one thing that may pop in your head how is a cop that looks like Ray Liota bagging this many women. Well I tell you something wise guy or girl.  Ray is a sex magnet…he makes the panties drop. He filled with so much sexual energy, that every time he masturbate, some woman around the world instantly gets pregnant. Every he unzips his fly, some lesbian around the world becomes straight. So think we got that out of the way. It’s a pretty fun thriller, and Ray plays it well. It plays a good down on his luck guy who world crashing apart. Christian pretty good as the guy busting his balls.  Ving Rhames has a nice scenes as his friend. The ending a bit iffy and kind of dumb.  Also how the killer knows about these women and so much about his life is kind of a huge stretch. Also there ending battle a bit anti climatic. I wasn’t expecting a bigger showdown and it pretty much just fizzle. But up to that it was a pretty breezy mystery. It not overly gory, but you see some elaborate crime scene set ups.  It’s a movie to watch in an afternoon when you got some time to kill.

The Caller

The Caller

                This is a unique that does the twist on the premise of talking someone through time. Imagine the movie Frequency and imagine if the guy in the past was a psychotic threatening to ruin their lives by F’ing with a passed.  The story is of a young woman who moves into an apartment. She ends up getting called by an old woman asking for some guy who lives there. The older woman is clearly insane and keeps assisting the guy lives in her apartment. The young woman says she isn’t. Turn out the confusion is to do with a wacky case of temporal physics, like a cross over with Doctor who and Threes company. The older woman lives in the past.  Somehow the phone allows them to talk to each other in the past.  She proceeds to harass the women from the president, killing people in the pass and changing the woman present. Only the two of them know of the changes in time. Pretty good movie. You really feel the tension...because it seems like the main character pretty much fucked. She always got some look she just constantly get shat on by the temporal gods, and it nothing she can do about. Some of the way she tries to get around it pretty good and cool.  Now you like got to get passed the normal time travel holes.  Like how does she remember the changes? Bu hey, just goes with that one. There also some logic stuff. The older lady would have been soooooooo arrested at certain parts of the movie. And the young version of the main characters kind of an idiot. .  Also before the time travel reveal you wonder why the chick doesn’t just get the caller ID or stop talking to this woman.  You only hear the older woman voice, but her voice sounds to old then what she actually is. It sounds weird. Also the little girl voice sounds odd to. Also the twist ending seem tacked on. The X boyfriend was a bit to LIFETIME (Woman getting beat woman of the week) for me. But it was still a great horror film.  B+

Beneath the Darkness

                A well respected Undertaker and widower (Dennis Qauid) hold sinister motives and only a teenage trouble maker seem to know of his horrible details. He much works to exposed him in a town where the cops don’t believe him and parents (as explain by noted poet Will Smith) just don’t understand. What starts out as kid investigating the spooky house of the local undertaker turns into a cat and mouse game begins.  The opening of this movie is pretty good. I always had a fear of being stuck into small spaces and a sense of helplessness and being buried alive does a trick. The bad guys start of pretty creepy at the beginning. But later on he goes to over the top into the Joker category... He more comfortless tying Batman to a giant bowling pin (as a giant bowling ball comes towards our Cape crusader) then being in a horror movie. Don’t get me wrong you can tell Dennis having some real fun going over the top, and it does have some fun cheese factor. But you can guess everything that going to happen step by step. The cliques are so clique that even calling them clique is now clique. It does nothing new and it not over the top enough to enjoy its goofiness.   Grade C

Way of the Warrior

Yang is a bad ass. He fights like a bad ass, he walks like a bad ass, when he eats his rice crispy treats he eats it like total bad ass. He part a clan of samurai ninja assassins, who trained sense there were kids to go around the world and just ninja the fuck out of people. Yang in the movie is pretty good slicing people up, taking out all the rival clans. His mission is to wipe out everyone involve into a clan. Sadly his master that includes a small baby. That is when Yang basically say “I did some fuck up shit, but I aint giving no baby the death punch”. So he escapes with the baby while being hunted by his Clan. He ends up in an old west town, that runs down and befriend a group of circus performers. Two of them that stand out is a sexy knife thrower, and old drunk with a bad ass past of his own. They help them learn that it’s more to life than just killing. He grows to love the baby, and like the family around. But he soon learns he can’t escape his past, and must fight his clan and criminals to protect this one horse town. The movie pretty good. It’s VERY cheesy but if you accept the cheese it fun. It's cheese that knows its cheese. It plays with that fact without constantly having to wink at you every second. The trust that you get the theme they are going for. The fight scenes pretty sweet and there not afraid to keep the body count high on both sides. It’s very stylish with rich red and yellow colors in the background. Sometime the sets could feel empty, but that more of a style choice. But that can make things fall flat sometime. Sometimes it runs into a problem most movies like this. The character sometimes bad ass to the point it’s no real danger. But the keep it exciting by people other people in dangers. Also some of the villains are not that memorable. Still it’s pretty good flick. Like of the actors play off each other pretty well. The main actor does a good quiet Asian Clint Eastwood type character. Good watch to kill some time.
B

NEVER BACK DOWN 2- The Beat Down

Never Back down 2 takes the same formula of the Warrior. The Warrior was like Rocky accept both of the fighters are Rocky, so thus your alliances is split. Never Back down 2 takes the formula of Karate Kid where all 4 of the kids are the doucebags from Cobra Kai. The movie has no returning character accept the nerdy kid from the first one who runs the Beat down now. It follows 4 people who enter the fight for various reasons. 1 does it because he can’t box anymore and need one last bout.  The second does it to get over his family problem, another join so he won’t get picked on. And the final joins is so his mom won’t have to strip. They all get trained by Black Dynamite himself (Michael J White), an X-con who used to be an ultimate fighter. He was the best character. He wasn’t as Zen as the other mentor. He kind of a jerk who did it for the money. He was kind of a terrible role model who wasn’t for that anti violence thing like other mentors in these movies. But he played it in a fun way, be overly angry and having some great lines. He pretty much a guy who didn’t give a crap but will turn you into a top fighter. It was kind of a tough love that some of them needed. I also like how the train them all differently matching their skill sets and personality. It has a lot of cool action scenes that pretty intense even if you’re not into mixed martial arts. If you are you will really like it because it has a lot of different fighting style and cool training montages. Problem with the movies shows it direct the video status. 1 is there a love triangle with two people I defy you to try to tell them apart. The love triangle isn’t that great and it no spark between the characters. You basicly The Situation and his DJ Pauly getting into a kung fu fight over Jai wow. If you don't get the refrence I just made, then you should feel a sense of pride.  There jerks each other to much that when they eventually hang out it seems false. Also it no real bad guy till the end. So it no real stakes.  You kind of don’t care who wins, no one lives will be change if they lose.  That said it’s a decent movie just for the fights scenes. C+

Bag of Bones

Bag of bones

Or

JAMES BOND AINT AFRAID OF NO GHOST

This is a story of a horror writer who pregnant wife dies getting hit by a bus. He goes to the Lake House him and his wife use to stay at to write. There he thinks his wife giving him a message, and want him to investigate something.  There he finds the town has chock full of secrets, and that his wife was investigating something about their families  There he gets threaten, run into wicked town folks and found his wife isn’t the only ghost haunting it.

Always had a problem with tons of Stephen King miniseries, is a lot of them really doesn’t need to be a miniseries. Its stretch out too much. Now for his bigger stories it makes sense, like the Stand which was pure awesome sauce. But this movie, it was a lot of time where nothing happen.  It was like I was watching a tour guide of Maine. And really let’s talk about the town; I know it’s a small town. But it seemed like the entire town made up of like 6 people. It makes Mayberry looks like a booming metropolis. I know that builds into the isolation. But it seemed empty.

Now this not to say this Town didn’t have scares. Some of the dream sequences and the flashback scenes were really scary. The ending scenes were very creepy and gave you a sense of dread.  Also they had the good excuse of why he doesn’t just leave the house. He kind of has to be there.  Also he pretty good in the roll. Although his brother American and I assume he is. He doesn’t even try an American accent.  I just made a back-story, am he pulling a Madonna and just spent a week in Europe but never lost the accent. Imagine his family turning into each other and saying “Why is he talking like Mary Poppinngs where all from Hoboken NJ for Christ sakes”.  But that easy to get past after a while.   You really root for for him. As a 2 hour TV movie it would have been perfect. It has a lot of weird Stephen King Tropes. Writers Isolated in a deserted area, weird townsfolk, rural areas, and bad cops.

In fact Stephen King made me afraid of writers. If any writer tells me they have writers Block I will Pepper Spray them and kick them in the balls...cause 9-10 he a derange Killer.  Other times he hunted by them. So you better take them out. If you’re a Stephen King fan your probably like it if you want to kill some time. It’s not his Best, but it’s not his worst either.

Middle Men

Middle men trailer

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Am_T56uOOnw

Middle Men is set around the creation of the computer code that allowed people to pay for porn sites, using their credit cards anonymously.  What interesting about that is now days it not such used for porn but most internet transaction? So the create a new way to due commerence...is just so happens like most science breakthrough it was originally created as a way to release our sinfull sinfull seed… in a way that makes baby angels cry. That where rain comes from you know. Either way back to the movie starts off with the inventors of the invention. They are two drugged, out genius low lives who manage to create it. But those people aren’t the star. The star is a character that helps them out get involve as the middle man. He is a suit, a clean cut guy who wants no part with porn but just the guy who organizes the deals and talks to people. He kind of the fix it guy if you get in trouble. Problem is things get over his head, as he get richer he gets more and more into a seedy world of gangster, mafia guys, and kidnappers, with a little terrorist and FBI.  One thing you probably got to do is not get hang up on the base on a true story deal. Figure most of what happened was pure crap.  This story make Abraham Vampire Hunter look accurate. But that ok. Because let’s face it, it would be boring following computer geeks around...feeling up on porn stars in a non porno movie.  So they had to add some violence. The main character is pretty likeable. Luke Wilson always plays a good guy you can root for. Although some of his decision are iffy. Don’t seem like the character would make the choices he does given what we knew about him. Also they final save...not sure how that would hold up in court. But it stills a fun twist. You see stuff pile on the guy and wonder how he gets out it. So it satisfies none the less.