ACTION AND SCI FI

These flicks A: Are action flicks, B: Have action in them sort of, C: Are science fiction flicks, or D: Could sort of be science fiction if you think about it.

Birthday Girl Nicole Kidman plays this Russian mail-order bride and her "fiancé" is this weenie British guy who works as a bank teller who is shocked that his Nicole doesn't speak English. It's not exactly what I expected from the previews which is good in this case. A very funny movie. You might also say it has lots of action and thrills but in a low budget British kind of way. ***

Blood Work  Clint Eastwood gets a new heart because he is a crumbling old man. The former owner of the heart was killed in a convenience story and her sister says "Pay up. Find the killer."  But Clint's doctor says "No killer-finding; you're too old an crumbly."  The new title of this movie is Clint and Dumber because Clint hangs out with Jeff Daniels a lot.  If you like Clint you'll probably enjoy this movie but I don't really.  I wasn't surprised by the ending. It would have been predictable if I hadn't been asleep from boredom. **

The Bourne Identity Matt Damon forgets that he's an assassin and travels around Europe with the girl from Run Lola Run. Good Flick.  I just have one question: what was Julia Stiles doing in this movie? Her pouty face does not belong in the assassin business even if she is just a computer geek.  I have a feeling they cut something out. I enjoyed it anyway. ***

Changing Lanes Two complete strangers (Ben Affleck and Samuel L. Jackson) get in a car accident and then spend the rest of the day doing mean childish things to each other. Ben's a somewhat crooked lawyer and Sam's a recovering alcoholic father.  I liked this movie because you never knew what devious prank Ben or Sam was going to pull next. Just when you thought they would kiss and make up they were at it again. Brilliant.  ****

Collateral Damage Arnie rules!  I really felt sad for Arnie when the Columbian terrorists killed his cute little kid and his pretty wife. As you know, emotion of any kind is unusual in Arnie movies so this one gets extra points.  Action packed (duh). Gordie Brewer (Arnie's name in the film) is a fireman so obviously he knows all about dodging bullets and making explosives.  Oh and John Leguizamo (the guy who played Toulouse-Lautrec in Moulin Rouge) is in it for a bit. There's a token Canadian character but he sucks. ****

The Count of Monte Cristo Guy Pierce and the guy from Frequency have a contest to see who's uglier.  The Frequency guy wins and is sent to a horrible prison where an old guy gives him a treasure map.  Naughty Frequency man uses the money for revenge even though the old guy told him not to.  Frequency man looks slightly better now that he's shaved and wearing fancy clothing so Guy Pierce's buck teeth and sunken cheeks win the ugly contest in a rematch.  Wasn't actually a bad movie despite the ugliness of the cast.  It left me wondering why everyone in France has an English accent.  ***

Daredevil Even blind guys can be superheroes.  This movie has all the fun cheesiness one expects from the superhero genre.  Question: if his other senses are so good that he can jump off building and such, then why does he still need a white cane?  Maybe next movie Ben will get a guide dog side kick. ****

Die Another Day Unlike the other Bond flicks starring What-kind-of-a-name-is-Pierce? Brosnan, this movie is up to the standards of Goldfinger and The Man With the Golden Gun. It's got all the cheesy villains, pithy one-liners, and far-fetched action scenes that make Bond movies fun.  Sean Connery, eat your pace-maker out. ***

HULK Ok so, this disappointed me. What's with the Thomas Crown Affaire comic frames? (If you haven't seen the original TCA, the one without Piercey, you have no idea what I'm talking about). I don't think there's really anyway to make the Hulk not cheesey but they tried REALLY HARD. Reminded me of the American version of Godzilla that way. *

Imposter Gary Sinise (aka lieutenant Dan) is accused of being a biomechanical robot with a bomb in his heart.  Gary tries to assure everyone that he's still Gary but nobody believes him and the guy who plays a gay guy a lot sends SWAT teams after him. This movie's pretty cool. It twists and turns like five hundred times at the end. ***

Insomnia Al Pacino can't sleep because it's light all the time in Alaska. Then he can't sleep because he accidentally killed his partner and spends more energy covering it up than trying to catch Robin Williams (who beat a girl to death).  I expected more from this movie. Al and Rob are such good actors. You guys could do better. Also Internal Affairs is investigating Al's department (in LA not Alaska) and every time I hear the word "Internal" followed by the word "Affairs" my eyes glaze over and I pass out from boredom. **

The Italian Job This movie is kind of Ocean's Elevenesque. Lots of stars in a team of criminals. That sorta thing. ***

John Q Not too bad. Poor Denzel's kid needs a new heart but Denzel doesn't have enough money. "Too bad. So sad," say James Woods the heart Doctor and Anne Heche the decides-who-goes-on-the-donor-list lady. I hate Anne Heche, no exception here. James Woods always plays a good sleazeball. Robert Duvall plays a cop. Usually I like him but he wasn't the best here. Good enough, but not the best. When Denzel takes the emergency room hostage I found there wasn't nearly enough shoot-em-up. Denzel's acting was good but not good enough that I actually cared if his character lived or died. **

K-19 The Widowmaker  This movie turned my stomach, but I think it was trying to do that so okay.  Liam and Harry maintain their Russian accents the entire movie (though I always wondered why they would choose to speak English when there were only other Russians around).  They are both Captains but Harry is the boss and the crew doesn't like him very much. Every two seconds someone tells Liam that Harry sucks and he wishes Liam were the boss.  Me too because if Liam were the boss I don't think there would have been as much stomach turning grossness. Also I think they should stop making submarine/army movies because there aren't enough female characters. ***

THE LEAGUE OF EXTRAORDINARY GENTLEMEN This wasn't nearly as bad as all the critics said. Actually it was pretty cool. At the beginning there was a bit too much "Hello my name is _______ and my super power is _______." but other than that it ruled. ***

Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring

The Matrix Reloaded This is nowhere near as good as the first one. The first one introduced a cool concept (the world is really a virtual reality computer program). The second one had special effects and what not but never played with your mind or anything. And it's totally obvious that the "REal World" is another MAtrix. **

Minority Report Sci Fi at its best. Tom Cruise is a cop that stops murders before they happen using a system that's eliminated all murder in Washington DC in only six years. Unfortunately the system imprisons people who haven't done anything wrong and exploits three clairvoyants in a pool (the pre-cogs). Tommy doesn't think there's anything wrong with that until the pre-cogs predict that he'll commit a murder next. "No way!" he says and runs around doing cool stunts until he discovers the truth (actually the other cute guy figures it out first but Tommy's the star). A fun and creepy vision of the future, I recommend this movie to every sci fi nut. ****

Ocean's Eleven My favourite Ocean's Eleven guy is the Amazing Yen.  This movie was pretty funny. Definitely better than the rat pack.  Sort of had a Mission Impossible feel (in a good way). ***

Pirates of the Caribbean Johnny Depp should lay off the eye-liner. He's definitely looked better (Eddie Scissorhands YUM). Orlando Bloom is a cutie. HE wouldn't where a ton of eye liner, not matter how girlie he is. Anyway I liked the flick.  Pirates that can't be killed. Spooky.  Lot's of fun action sequences where inept extras try to kill walking skeletons with guns. ****

Reign of Fire An English boy finds a dragon and by the year 2020 he's the leader of a whole castle full of English people, including Dr. Bashir, and the rest of the country has been burnt to a crisp by the dragons. Along comes Matthew McConaughey, a bald American in a tank who smokes cigars (which he really shouldn't do because it makes his voice all husky and dramatic). Anyway Matt tells the English people to stop hiding in the castle and go out and help him and his friends kill, kill, kill, all the dragons. I liked it. It was like Mad Max except it didn't have Mel Gibson, it wasn't boring, and it had dragons. ****

S1M0NE Al Pacino really does rule.  Even though one might say "Enough already" when he spends most of the movie talking to himself/Simone. Simone is credited as "Herself" but we all know she's not really a computer generated actress. Or do we? Rachel Roberts does a good job of making us believe she is anyway.  Some obsolete computer technology that even I could spot—A giant stone age floppy? Where did you even find one of those Al?—but we'll let it pass because the flick wasn't exactly trying for realism. And it was funny. And movies with silly little skits at the end of the credits get extra points from me. ****

Solaris This movie's weird. In fact it tries too hard to be weird.  I liked it though.  But George, you're dead wife's ugly. **

Spiderman Ever since I saw Cider House Rules I've hated Tobey Maguire. Whoever thought he could be a superhero is beyond me.  He didn't ruin the movie though. For one thing, Peter Parker is supposed to be a dweeb. This movie takes place when Peter Parker is still in high school and he gets bitten by a spider while on a field trip to the lab where scientists make genetically engineered spiders. Willem Dafoe plays a good cheesey comic book villain as the Green Goblin.  I really did enjoy this movie despite Tobey. It's a great comic book adaptation in the tradition of the Batman movies and X-men (it felt more like X-men than Batman). ****

Spy Game Robert Redford is such a dweeb. Plot of movie: Robert Redford cleverly outsmarts the guys at his office while Brad Pitt gets beaten up at a Chinese prison. Hurry up Robbie, Brad gets executed at 8am! Brad's not in it nearly enough because for some reason Rob thinks he's better or something. I enjoyed the bits when Rob outsmarted the guys at the office, they were amusing. Not to be sexist but guys are going to like this more than girls. I am not a guy. **

Star Trek: Nemesis Not as good as First Contact but much better than Insurrection.  Picard's clone is trying to make a name for himself by destroying Earth. But no matter how bald he is he will never look like Patrick Stewart.  Worf never gets any fun in the movies but at least no one threw him off a boat this time.  I don't pay much attention to the odd-even thing (trek-nerds like me know what I'm talking about) but this one was good.  The Star Trek movies now rank from best to worst as follows: 4, 6, 10, 2, 3, 8, 5, 7, 9, 1.  ****

Star Wars: Episode II-Attack of the Clones This movie was great. So much better that Episode 1. My favourite part was the Yoda fight scene near the end. I always suspected he was faking that limp. There are some cheesy bits though. The romance between Anakin Skywalker and Padmé Amidala for example. It's more plausible now that Skywalker isn't played by an 8-year-old (since Amidala didn't age in ten years Skywalker's the same age as her) but it's almost as if they went "Oh crap. A couple of flicks from now we have grown-up children! We'd better start falling in love or something." Also Anakin decided to start acting like an ass in case he needs to become Darth Vader soon. Anyway the rest of the movie had lots of shooting and light sabering. Great show. ****

The Sum of all Fears I enjoyed this movie. The farmer from Babe is now the president of the USA and Ben Affleck is trying to convince him that the folks who nuked Baltimore weren't the Russians. Very suspenseful. Morgan Freeman's also in it but Benny's the star. BTW: What's with that title anyway? I mean I get it: Russia's fear + the States' fear = the Sum of all Fears = nuclear war.  Not the most memorable title though. Anyways good flick. ****

Tears of the Sun The war movie is not my favourite genre.  I like action movies as much as the next gal but war movies are BORING. My bf, brother and dad dragged me to see this "Bruce Willis's best action film since Die Hard".  Can anyone name an action film he's done since Die Hard? Armageddon?  That was better.  This one had too much crawling around in a muddy jungle.  Bruce got dirtier and dirtier but the Nigerian refugees stayed clean. *

Terminator 3 Can you really go wrong? Really? ARNIE as the TERMINATOR! He's not one of those dudes who gets too old to play a robot either. YAH! *****

Time Machine Guy Pierce is so ugly. Suck in those cheeks some more Guy! Anyway Guy plays this guy from the 1890s whose fiancée gets killed so he builds a time machine to save her.  Easy enough to do if you have two sun umbrellas and a hand break with a crystal on it. Not so easy to change the past once he gets there. Anyway Guy has to go to the future to find out why he can't seem to change the past. He falls asleep in the time machine and ends up super super super far in the future. By the way this movie is really cool. It's got special effects and funny bits and action and all that. I just love Sci-Fi. ****

TOMB RAIDER: THE CRADLE OF LIFE You know, girl Indiana Jones, the sequel. Had lots of action and all that. ***

Underworld This movie is cool. It's like the Matrix only with vampires and werewolves and without the computers.  Ok so the only think it has in common with the matrix is a girl in skin tight leather kicking ass. But that's cool,eh? I love when the girls get to be action stars. ****

Vanilla Sky I really enjoyed this movie. It's weird. A lot of people in the theatre went HUH? (Including Tom Cruise). I just went cool! My brother didn't like it (I don't see why, Craig). My boyfriend bought it for me on DVD. What a sweet boy (my boyfriend, not Tom Cruise). ****

X-Men 2 I think this might even be better than the first one. I gotta see the first one again to be sure, but I think this one was better. Even though none of it was filmed in Spencer Smith Park (ok you have to be a Bulingtonian to get that one). Night crawler is cool. I'm still waiting for Gambit and (my personal fave) Beast, to join the movies. ****

XXX (Not XXX-rated) Samuel L. Jackson is in charge of James Bond land (which is in the states, go figure) and he needs to get an agent that is not so obviously James Bond that he gets killed in a mosh pit. Vin Diesel is a criminal (a nice one) with tattoos who gets recruited by Sammy.  He does a very nice job of saving the world. I enjoyed the obvious James Bond reference and Vin Diesel's fun secret agent gun.  Good Flick. ****

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