no, no, no, no, no, YES! No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no no......

Wait a minute.....

YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEES!

We miss you Madeline. Thank you for all the wonderful times.

If something gets in your way, turn.

As one of my family's favorite movies and part 4 of my modern Christmas Film Trilogy* it is now time to give you some of my favorite scenes from Better Off Dead

Two dollars.


Oh Badger. Such a misunderstood ginger.


[Howard Cosell accent] Language lessons.


CHRIST--MAAAS.


Gee, I'm real sorry your mom blew up, Ricky


Now that's a real shame when folks be throwin' away a perfectly good white boy like that.


*The modern Christmas Film Trilogy

1. The Ref
2. Scrooged
3. Die Hard

4. Better Off Dead

Tron double post.

Since Dr. Mrs Just Another Movie Geek I and saw Tron Legacy today, we decided to revisit the original again last night. I must say, Disney's pulling of it off the shelves in fear that it would hurt the new films chances are ridiculous. The film holds up amazingly well and still looks great. As I am sure has been discussed before, we found the parallels between Flynn and Jesus (the user/God who walks the earth) and Tron and John the Baptist to be very interesting.

I will let the film speak for itself with some cool shots:

If I ever worked in this Cube Farm, I would be so very sad for my life:



Something I never noticed before, Alan is a "Day the Earth Stood Still" fan (look at yellow banner on left wall of cube):



"Mine is an evil stare"



And some Frame within the Frame shots:







Tron Legacy:

I would like to thank everyone who had a hand in making Tron Legacy. That was truly a great early christmas present for my eyes, ears and brain. A rare occurrence of a sequel that actually felt like a natural evolution from the first. The film (while treading in very similar waters) managed to become its own creation. Homages a plenty were throughout the film and brought many a smile to my face. The amazing soundtrack (provided by the ever wonderful Daft Punk) also did not betray its evolutionary roots from Wendy Carlos' ground breaking original score. This film was clearly a love letter to the original and to the fans. Just Another Movie Geek highly recommends.

-Smallish Spoiler: I can think of no better actor than Cillian Murphy to appear as David "the bad guy in the first one" Warner's son. I was quite surprised by that cameo.

Cyrano...

Of all the versions of Cyrano out there, Roxanne will always be my favorite:

More legally required rap

As we have mentioned before (see here) in the 80s it was required by law for all actors to perform at least 1 rap video/song.

More proof: C3P0 schilling for Star Tours

More Hitchcock

Came across this today. Interesting project. 1000 frames from each Hitchcock film. Makes for an interesting view on his work:

1000 Frames of Hitchcock

genesis

Martin Landau in North By Northwest. The original Creepy Crispin Glover:

Frames Within a Frame 01: Highlander

A new series for this blog, I give you the first "Frames Within the Frame"

Highlander (1986)

today's movie question to ponder...

Misunderstood classic...

or

early signs of Eddie Murphy's inevitable fall from greatness?

Dear Martin Scorsese fans

While the 2006 film The Departed was a good film* with some great performances and won some little awards...it can't hold a candle to the brilliance of it's source material:

The 2002 Hong Kong film Infernal Affairs



Mrs. Just Another Movie geek and I gave it a viewing last night (her first, my third) and I was once again floored by its masterful creation. A gripping thriller that really kept you wondering the whole time about the duality of each character. Even Mrs. JAMG who wasn't in the mood for a cop drama when we started was enthralled by the film at the end. If you have never seen either or only seen The Departed, I highly recommend you check out the original.





*Full disclosure: I have actually not seen The Departed. Few reasons why: A. Leo isn't my favorite actor in the world. B. The original was so wonderful, I never understood the need to remake it.

Something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue...

who knew a TARDIS could fill all of those at once.

Stephen Moffat's freshman season of Doctor Who just came to a close and I must say I have enjoyed the ride. I have heard a lot of random complaints about this season and I was never quite sure what people were not enjoying. But this ending showed me that Moffat had some big pieces in play all season and they came together beautifully. I can't say much more without spoiling it but I am happy to say that the new Doctor is great and the show couldn't be in better hands. Bring on christmas 2010.

And on a closing note, as a wearer of one of the greatest hats ever...Fezzes are cool.

Action Movie-O-Rama

Can two films actually make an "O-Rama"?

Mrs. Just Another Movie Geek and I recently viewed two action films that we enjoyed greatly.

1. The A-Team (2010)



Who would have thought that a film made from an 80s cheesy tv show could actually entertain me? I will admit I was never a fan of the original show. Came on to late for my 8 year old viewing habits and on the rare chance I could stay up, Dad didn't like it so we didn't watch. I never felt I was missing anything but being a child of the 80s I knew enough of the concept to carry me through. Going into the film I had no expectations other than it needed to be "The A-Team." Team of ex-military guys forced into being mercs by being setup for a crime they didn't commit. The film hit all of the tropes of the original series but made them work. From Hannibal's catch phrase and cigar chomping, Face being the ladies man, Murdock being nuts and BA being afraid of flying (which the film manages to set up perfectly) the characters were all spot on. As well as the most important aspect of The A-Team was also present; their outlandish plans and technical prowess to get things done. As a good friend of mine recently proclaimed "I only watched The A-Team when I was a kid because I loved watching them weld shit together!" the film pulls this off twice and made me smile at the ingenuity involved there in. One liners flew as fast as the bullets did and most managed to make me chuckle if not seriously cackle out loud. A few moments of suspension of dis-belief caused my reality sensor to ping, but they were all handled well enough that they didn't bug me too much. Outside of one moment of a bad guy monologuing I found this to be a quite enjoyable action romp and well worth my attention. I am just sad that the remake of The Karate Kid beat it at the BO this weekend.


2. Banlieue 13: Ultimatium (2009)



6 years ago a little French action film came my way starring the creator of Parkour, David Belle. Quick action and alot of parkour helped shape this films dystopian future of Paris into a great action/fight movie. Last year gave us a sequel to the film that continues the story. Of course we have some great action and some parkour, but something felt off to me. Maybe I have seen and appreciated so much parkour in the last few years since the first film but this sequel didn't seem to focus so much on that aspect. A great early scene shows our hero cop giving a great homage to Jackie Chan by fighting a large group of bad guys while protecting and using an original Van Gogh painting during the fight. Canvas-Fu has never looked better. Even with the less than shiny parkour, it was great to visit this world again. Outside of one moment of the application of the law of inverse ninjas, the film manages to have a great time and keeps the pace well.

All in all if you are hankering for a decent action film with some good fights, great explosions and a fun time...you can't go wrong with either of these films.

Iron Man 2

Jon Favreau and team deliver a worthy sequel to one of my favorite modern super hero film

A great visual treat and an enjoyable story I highly recommend it especially if you liked the first one.

A few direct thoughts and potential spoilers down below.













-Don Cheadle as Lt. Col Rhodes. Don't get me wrong, I love Don Cheadle and I have never understood the details on why Terrance Howard left but Don didn't really do that much for me here. If there is a third and he's back, I am hoping the role is a little beefier.

-RDJ continues to shine.

-For the first time ever, Scarlett Johanssen didn't bore the crap out of me.

-Oh and Micheal Bay...The final suit battle at the end? THAT is how you do big robot battle action.

-John Favreau? I again applaud your work. Thank you for being a director who understands his source material properly. (and I loved your beefed up role..I always love you just as much in front of the lens)

Final rating:
On a comparative scale of modern Super Hero sequel films:
In second place behind Spiderman 2 and just beating out The Dark Knight*

On its own.. a great fun film.




*I know..sacrilege from a hardcore Bat-fan like me right? Guess I should someday back up that rating.

The Return of JAMG...a review of NInja Assassin

Ninja Assassin.


It's a ninja flick. Not much more you need to know about it than that. It's a bit bloody but it's over the top. As a saturday night actioner, you can't go wrong.

Rain (the Korean pop sensation) played a decent ninja fighting back against the evilness of the clan he grew up in. Having previously enjoyed his appearance in Speed Racer, I was happy to see him get lead role and hope he gets more opportunities in film.

Thanking the master movie reviewer Joe Bob Briggs, I would like to return to the "INSERT TYPE HERE-Fu" classification system.

-LaundryFu

-Blind Fold-Fu


-Highway-Fu

-Burning Dojo-Fu


-Silhouette-Fu


Other great points of interest:

Ninja Hidey-Holes
1000 Shuriken Barrages
Telepathic Heart beat Mutual Masturbation (don't ask)
Best advice: When you come home to find two ninjas fighting in your living room...run.

And on a unrelated note, in this film we got to enjoy the presence of the British actor Ben Miles.


Best known here in Just Another Movie Geek headquarters as Patrick Maitland, the Well Endowed, Tory Voting, Loveable Sexist Pig from Coupling. His character as a flirt and "player" is a trait that seems to be carrying over to other roles. In both this film and his small role in Speed Racer, certain "Patrick-isms" have come through. Conscious decision on behalf of the actor or production, I can't say..but I can only offer this hypothesis:

Patrick will always be Patrick

A question...

Is it humanly possible to hate Ned Beatty?



I mean seriously. Think of any role you have seen him in.

Pure genius.

He plays both slimy/evil and sweet/good with equal gusto.

call me one to commit Anime Sacrilege...

..but I have an interesting idea.

Remake the original Super Dimensional Macross.



Don't get me wrong, I love the original Macross. From its humble dubbed roots as the first chapter of Robotech, to the original Japanese versions deep and compelling story. This anime is a cornerstone of my love of animated works from Japan. However the original run looks a bit worn at this point in time. There was even one studio who worked on it who did some rather shoddy work. This master piece needs a facelift.

But I do not really want to see it just remade* ... just reanimate it.

Use all of the original sound fx, voices, story and script. Just update it to the same animation level Macross Zero was done at and you would have a winner. However, I do not want just a frame for frame remake. At least not entirely.

You could do the following and still keep the original feel:

-Flesh out many static scenes.
-Make life on the Macross even more believeable.
-Make the battle scenes even more impressive (you could even cheat a little with new animation on many of the unfortunate re-used scenes)
-Erase Minmei entirely! (just kidding..I actually like her)

Its a dream for sure, but I for one think it would be beautiful.

*I know Hollywood keeps banging around the idea of live action Macross. Even with the CGI beauty of Avatar, I don't feel the world of Macross can be condensed so easily. Yes, I do know Macross DYRL did kind of what I am asking for, but I don't care for the changes to the story it made nor do I enjoy that it has been retconned into continuity.

ignore me too

Cause I am nothing unless acted upon by an outside force.

this is a test

ignore this post...it means nothing to me.

Avatar, Holmes and The Doctor

It's been an entertainment filled end of year for us here at Just Another Movie Geek headquarters. We hosted our last Saturday cinema for 2009, got to the real cinemas twice in less than a week and said goodbye to a very good fictional friend.

AVATAR:
I don't have much to add to what has already been discussed about this film. I enjoyed it, but fully accepted I was just looking at something pretty with the simplest of stories to tie it all together. To all the animators and visual people who worked on this film I salute you, you did a great work and I look forward to what we will be entertained with in the future with the new techniques and technology you have invented. However, 3D still isn't doing anything for me. It's a gimmick just to get more people to pay lots of money at the theater. When the only thing that impresses me in the 3D in the movie is the ash falling from a fire, then something isn't working. There are those that like it I am sure, but it just aint for me.

SHERLOCK HOLMES:
Just saw this today actually and Dr. Mrs Just Another Movie Geek and I thoroughly enjoyed it. RDJr gave us an excellent performance as the tortured genius side of Holmes we rarely see in the visual realm. And Guy Ritchie, thank you for finding your skills again, it's good to see you back to good things. While I will admit my actual knowledge of Holmes is limited to the few movies I have seen and a random spattering of some trivia, I must say this portrayal and the world created worked very very well. The script was tight and funny. Not to hard of a plot but didn't pander to the LCD. For all the talk of "Holmes and Watson are gay!!!" stuff, sure...you can see that. But what I saw was the tortured soul of Holmes and his support and friendship of his best friend and Hetero Life Partner Dr. Watson. If you like a fun movie or just find RDJr dreamy, I recommend checking it out.

DOCTOR WHO:
No spoilers here for those who haven't seen it yet. The ending is wonderful, and pure Russel T Davis. But of everything that was great to these episodes, the greatest of course is the final performance of David Tennant.

While Christopher Eccleston will still and probably always be my favorite Doctor, David gave us such a brilliant run in the last 4 years. I look forward to the new guy and Moffat's direction but David, you will be missed.

Okay, one spoiler:
Who was the old woman Time Lord who appeared to Wilf and was Crying to the Doctor? My money: The Doctors Granddaughter

Sure, the last we saw of her was The Doctor locking her out of the TARDIS but who is to say she never got back to Gallifrey?