Batman vs. Superman: Dawn of Justice

 

They kill Superman!  Oops, spoiler alert!

I was really hoping Batman would do it but no, they left that to Doomsday.  Doomsday was kinda weak.

Wonder Woman is bad ass.  It’ll be fun to see her in some more movies.  She’s powerful!

Jesse Eisenberg’s Lex Luthor I thought was just the right amount of unhinged.  And he gets more so as the movie progresses.

This thing isn’t as bad as reading facebook posts would lead you to believe.  It’s not as good as any of the Christian Bale Batmans but I really dig the pissed off Ben Affleck Batman we see here.  He’s not the hand to hand combat master Bale’s Bat was but who cares?  He’s got all the toys and he’s not afraid to break a thug’s neck if needs to.  He starts branding the criminals he catches with a bat brand!  That’s kinda awesome.

Jeremy Irons makes a good Alfred.  And mechanic.  And robotics expert.  Pilot.  Computer wiz.  Server of tea and wittiness.

Amy Adams is the best Lois Lane we’ve seen since whatshername from the old school Christopher Reeves Superman movies.  She also turns out to be Superman’s greatest weakness.  Well, and Martha his Earth mom.

Supes is a bit out of sort in this flick.  He’s all conflicted because of the negative press he’s getting.  And let’s be honest, if there were really superheros flying around blowing the shit out of everything, public opinion would wane quickly.  He gets suckered into Lex’s diabolical plot and doesn’t even see it coming.  X-ray vision or no.

The big fight scene at the end looked just like the big fight scene at the end of every superhero movie we’ve seen in the last several years.  The two heros throwing each other through buildings causing millions and millions of dollars worth of damage!  And I get it, Batman has a robosuit makes him withstand the beating but damn.  Just damn.  I would think the concussion would kill him getting tossed around like that.

But whatever.  Lex hooks Bats up with some kryptonite and he makes some weapons out of it to even the playing field.  And it’s cool.

Doomsday kinda sucks.  He’s a CG character that just looks like, um, I don’t know.  A deformed orc from Lord of the Rings or something?  He’s just bad.  Build a fucking puppet or something.  I’m tired of the generic CG bad guy.

Overall this is a fine effort but it falls short of the Marvel films we’ve seen and even of Deadpool.  But Deadpool is just awesome.  If I had to rate Batman v Superman amid all the superhero comic book movies of recent years I’d put it somewhere  Ironman 3 and Thor.

 

Side Effects, Beautiful Creatures, Dark Skies

So I’ve been slacking pretty hard.  With the Oscars last night, congrats Christoph Waltz, I figured I’d drop the dime on a couple flicks I’ve seen recently.  Not the cream of the crop by any stretch, but a decent film and a couple stinkers!

Side Effects: Jude Law, Rooney Mara, Channing Tatum, Catherine Zeta-Jones

This is a pretty good flick.  Involves prescription drug use and centers on a troubled woman, Rooney Mara and her depression after her husband, Channing Tatum, is released from prison.  She drives her car into a wall and Jude Law is the head shrinker on duty at the hospital when they bring her in.  So he becomes her doctor at that point and they go though some drug stuff.

It’s pretty well acted, I love Rooney Mara!  The more I see her the more of a fan I become.  Jude Law is pretty much always good.  I can’t say he outdid himself here or anything but he delivers the kind of performance you expect from someone like Jude Law.

Catherine Zeta-Jones is just damn sexy.  At this point she may die the sexiest woman ever because she just seems to keep getting better and better!  Her performance here isn’t necessarily anything to write home about, but she’s solid.

I’m gonna go 3 popcorn tubs out of 5.  If you’re a fan of any of the main actors, or you’re looking for something that doesn’t just outright suck, catch this before it’s out of theaters.

Beautiful Creatures: Alden Ehrenreich, Alice Englert, Jeremy Irons, Viola Davis, Emma Thompson

Ay carumba!  I almost walked out on this film until Jeremy Irons showed up.  Then I figured I could make it through.  Just barely!

As the credit rolled I thought to myself, “actually Twilight might have been better than this movie.”  Which is something I never thought I’d think.  But it’s true.  This is the same kind of teen love crap except with witches instead of sparkly vampires.  There is a bit more chemistry between the two main characters than ever was in Twilight.  You can actually see a relationship develop onscreen where as I always felt there was nothing going on between the characters in Twilight.  But that’s neither here, there nor anywhere.

Viola Davis is severely misused.  I hope she got a good pay check on this one because she really kinda mails it in.  But that’s not really her fault, there’s not much to her character.

And hey, Hollywood, if you are going to shoot a movie that supposedly takes place in the American South, hire actors that can actually speak with a southern accent!  ‘Cause most of these accents are pretty terrible.  Maybe in some parts of the country no one notices, but here in Kentucky, I’m like that dude is supposed to be from South Carolina?  But whatever.  This is teen romance tripe.

And I’m only slightly offended that this girl gets it on at 15 years old!  That’s the message we need to send America’s youths!  Not that i’m prudish or anything, but dang, 15?!?!?!

This movie is pretty well done otherwise I guess.  There are some cool special effects and Emmy Rossum is absolutely yummy as the trouble making cousin.

Skip this movie.  If you have teenagers, drop them off and beat your head against the wall in the lobby.  You’ll enjoy that better than watching it.

Dark Skies: Keri Russell, Josh Hamilton

Alright, Keri Russell and Josh Hamilton are pretty good in this.  They do seem to be losing their minds and that’s all believable and all.  There’s some serious weird stuff going on but….SPOILER ALERT!!!!

The aliens have been coming into your house for weeks.  For weeks they’ve been coming in closed doors and locked windows.  They’ve been coming in and fuzzing out your security cameras so you can’t see them when they are there.  Your security system has done nothing to keep them out, or even to let you know when they are there.

So at the end of the movie lock the kids in the bedroom by themselves?  That’ll work not ever.

When this movie was over, before the credits started rolling, the screen went black and there was silence in the theater.  This silence was broken by someone stating, “well, that was a dumb show.”

I couldn’t agree more.  Skip this one as well.

appaloosa

this is a pretty good western if you’re into westerns.  otherwise you ain’t missing much.

what makes it a true western i think is the way they used the scenery as part of the movie.  very john ford-ish.

ed harris is the bad assed, grizzley old law man that just happens to have writing credit on the screenplay that falls for renee zellweger who apparently came to the frontier to hook up with some old grizzled something.  i really have no idea what she’s doing way out there if it ain’t whoring.

she plays the piano at one of the nicer saloons.  not even a dead husband rancher backstory.  nothing.  she’s pointless except ed harris needs someone to fall in love with.

viggo mortenson plays ed harris’s bad assed sidekick who’s always got ed’s back thanks to a twenty gauge, lever action rifle.  and that is pretty bad assed.

jeremy irons plays the bad assed guy with all the money who’s trying to take over the town first with his thugs, then with his money.  just basically to get under ed harris’s skin is what the part of jememy irons plays.  and he plays it well.  i wanted to come across the screen and smack his snide face a couple of times.

so like i said, if you’re into westerns, check it out.  i give it two ten gallon hats out of five.