MMR Blog

Tonight I saw Kick Ass and if my eyeballs had asses, they would have had their asses kicked. I am going to put it out there right away that this movie was almost like a butterface. The movie was good, the "butter" part would be Nicholas Cage. Im sorry, I can't stand looking at his dumb face. The feeling I get is like looking into the eyes of an animal that should have been put down because it can't take care of itself any longer. I liked his weird quirky speak when in character, but for some reason I still hate looking at him. I actually feel really bad for feeling this way. Nicholas Cage is a person too, but he is a person that I wish would stay off camera. He is so distracting!

Anyhow, because of my poor time management skills (facebook, school and work in that order), I went back to my old school movie viewing style. I didn't have time to research so I went in pretty blind. I had the overall idea: Kids become heroes and kick some ass. I also read an article that was discussing whether it was irresponsible to have Chloe Moretz,the actress who played Hit Girl, taking part in such gory, profanity filled scenes.

I didn't really take sides after reading the article, but then I saw the movie. I was more uncomfortable with watching a little girl cussing so much than the gore, but then I remembered when I was only 6 or 7 and playing a stupid game with my little brother. The idea of this game was "hey I caught you cussing, so I get to say a cuss word" which would make us equally guilty and less likely to tell on each other. By 13 I was very aware of every cuss word you could imagine, I had seen my fair share of dirty magazines, and I got to see what turned out to be one of my all time favourite movies - Braveheart. My 13 year old self's favourite part of that movie? When William Wallace charges into the bedroom of that dude and smashes his face in.

So keeping that in mind, I feel far less guilty about watching little Hit Girl do her thing. I couldn't believe that I laughed at a kid getting shot though. That was a new experience. Don't judge. If you have seen it you know what I mean, if you haven't seen it yet, well go check it out and then you can judge.

I have a final tomorrow and no time to study so I will cut this short and say the general consensus of my brain is that I liked this movie and I would recommend it to those who enjoy action. Kick ass is a pretty hokey and cheesy movie at times but that gives the comic book flavour. I really felt that this was Chloe Moretz's movie though. She kind of left everyone else in the dust.

Tonight I went to see a movie that sort of "had me at hello" by way of title.

Hot Tub Time Machine.

Many of you may have seen the trailer, or perhaps a printed ad in your favourite newspaper only to wonder why someone would make such a ridiculous movie. You would not be alone. Personally, I like ridiculous movies, so to this movie, I was as easy as that really drunk girl at the party. You know, "that" girl.

Amazingly, this movie surpassed my expectations! This disclaimer has definitely been used in our podcast, but I say it again. I don't like time travel. I would say why it was okay in this movie, but I don't want to give anything away.

We have a comedy on our hands which seems to lie precariously close to the edge of "I have seen this done before". Early on there are a few statements that make it clear that this movie has been made with those considerations in mind. While it still stands as a movie on its own, I would say for time travel, Hot Tub Time Machine is like the dirty, uncensored, often socially awkward step sibling of Back to the Future. We are looking at some serious slap stick comedy here kids, and it gets kind of ugly at times but I laughed.

Character wise, I love Craig Robinson best, mostly due to his character in the Office. John Cusack's performance was okay, but his character could have been played by many other actor's without affecting the movie. He plays the semi responsible one, so its not his performance that was really a problem, but at times his character was just boring. I loved the wit of Jacob played by Clark Duke, but it was Rob Corddry who really gave purpose to the movie. He was the conflict and the laughs. He was that douche guy that in other movies you would hate, but in this one, he is just a mess that you can watch without being annoyed.

So if you were on the fence before, I suggest you go out and see this movie. Movie theatre isn't required, you could wait for rental if you like but I found it more than worth the time.

Signing out,

Aisha
Minority Movie Report

P.S. To those of you from Vancouver, check out the scene with the boat. The backdrop is of the Olympic village or False creek or whatever it should be called now.

Attended a special screening of The White Stripes documentary, Under Great White Northern Lights in Hollywood Tuesday night. Jack White is one of my favorite musicians so I'll watch anything he's in: Coffee and Cigarettes, It Might Get Loud, It Came from Detroit, etc. The kicker is that Under Great White Northern Lights is all about their 2007 cross-Canada tour. Could it be anymore perfect for a Canadian in LA?

The venue was "Space 15 Twenty" at 1520 Cahuenga Blvd, five mins away from Hollywood and Vine, which is interesting in itself. Space 15 Twenty is a project run by Urban Outfitters in which they have studios that showcase different designers and creative brands, rotating every month. In addition, they also run pop culture events like art shows and screenings revolving around pop art (last week they had a pop-up art show to celebrate the release of The Runaways). I love Urban Outfitters already, this may make it my favorite retail establishment of all time. Anyway, the screening took place in the courtyard, which was open air and had wicked acoustics.

Surprisingly, there weren't that many people there - maybe forty max, so I don't know if it's a case of bad marketing or that they don't have many fans in the city? I have to say though, that I was a little bit disappointed by the documentary itself. I love everything Jack White touches and one of my biggest regrets was missing The Raconteurs with The Kills when they came to the Malkin Bowl in 2008 (I did catch The Deadweather at the Commodore last year though, which eases the sting a little), however, Under Great White Northern Lights was lacking on a few aspects. For one, it was focused on the Yukon, Northwest Territories, Nunavut, and Nova Scotia legs of their tour. No shout out to BC at all and minimal clips of the other non-maritime provinces. It wouldn't have bothered me as much if it wasn't touted as a documentary of their cross-Canada tour.

I also wished that there were more behind the scenes looks at the band instead of just concert footage of their sets. Jack only goes on to talk a tiny bit about what they were going through as they traveled the country and Meg... well, Meg is Meg. The majority of the film is just them performing their biggest hits in front of a Canadian audience, which would have made for a great concert DVD, but was missing the insights of a documentary.

What it did do well was showcase Jack and Meg's creative spirits. From the opening of them playing their One Note concert (yes, they really did play just one note), the tone was set. There is a whole segment devoted to their now-legendary daytime adventures across the nation where they played for free in public places with little or no notice. I still remember reading about how they got on a public bus in Winnipeg and just started jamming. Seeing it happen on screen made me wish I was in the Peg (for the first time since they lost the Jets). What would have made it even better would be if they had more on why they did it and what it meant for them. They tried to have a bit on this but it was cut way too short (probably to squeeze in some more concert footage).

One moment that made my night, though, was a short introspective from Jack on making music. For a couple minutes, he talks about the hardships of creating music when they've already made it in the industry. When they were still struggling to make a name for themselves, they had hopes and the dream of playing in front of a sold-out audience was enough to stoke the fires of ambition. Now that they've made it and done everything they ever wanted to do, he feels he's lost the motivation he once had. Nonetheless, Jack goes on to say that the only way to get over this is to just do it. Creativity is hard work - you have to force creativity out of yourself because the danger of having time is that you don't make use of it.

Those words still ring in my head because it is the absolute truth. When you have all the time in the world, "tomorrow" is your worst enemy. Life itself is a struggle at any given time and too often we find ourselves deceived by the comforts of a pressure-less present only to pay for it with our futures. A friend of mine once told me that even though you may be well fed now, never forget what it's like to be hungry. So true. I might pick up the DVD of Under Great White Northern Lights just for this little bit of inspiration.

Another great moment was the end. I won't give it away but it ended on a note that was simply sublime. If only they had more moments like that in the documentary, this would have been golden film.

Overall, Under Great White Northern Lights is not a bad film. If you love The White Stripes as much as I do, you definitely need to watch it. I did have a lot of moments where I felt like I was right there at the concerts and the director Emmett Malloy captured their energy very well to the point where I almost stood up and cheered at the end of every song. Visually, it was very artistic in using the White Stripe palette of red, white, and black and it very much has the gritty feel of a rock doc. My only advice is to go into it with the mindset of it being a concert DVD and you'll be pleasantly surprised.

Check more info here:

The Official Site of Under Great White Northern Lights: http://www.whitestripes.com/film/film.html

Space 15 Twenty: http://space1520.com/

~Vince

Now, the Oscars did not turn out how I had predicted. I should have made predictions in my mind, and then chosen the opposite on paper. That is how wrong I usually am. This year was a slow year for me movie wise (I blame my return to school), so I had not seen a lot of the movies up for nomination.

Am I disappointed? No. Award shows just don't do it for me. Perhaps it is because I am a self motivated person and somehow push that kind of persona on the outside world. I am sure that it means a lot to every single nominee, but to me I know if I liked a movie or not and the awards do not have any power over that. Don't get me wrong. I do not want to make the awards themselves seem trivial by any means, if I were an actress... *enter daydreams* ...it would be amazing to even be nominated, but as the lowly masses, I find it hard to connect. I love Sandra Bullock enough to switch teams, but I was blown out of the water when she won an Oscar for her performance in "The Blind Side". I just don't have an eye for these things I suppose.

Now, on a very different subject I turn to "Zombieland" starring Woody Harrelson and Jesse Eisenberg. I have a personal journal that I update as close to daily as I can. I don't think I can count the number of entries that have entered either the subject, or first sentence of "I am an idiot". Zombieland has given me yet another chance to say these words to myself, and now to you.

I came home from work with a bag of Taco Del Mar and a determination to watch this movie as treat for being caught up in my night class I would attend later in the evening. I pressed play and started to mow down on my food as the opening scenes began. Within 10 seconds, I thought "Why didn't anyone warn me not to eat while watching this!?!?!", and then I realized, "I am an idiot". This is a Zombie movie! It is rated R! What else was I expecting? Due to time constraints, I chose to just pretend the people had strawberry sauce all over their faces and continued eating with the movie anyway.

And what a movie. The first 5 to 10 minutes are kind of a smack to the face with all the gore but the gore does not continue at the same intensity throughout the movie. The characters are entertaining, but I wouldn't say they are very well developed. Harrelson's character is a rather stereotypical tough guy opposite mega wuss "Columbus" played by Eisenberg. There are clues dropped in rather blatantly about each character that try to show some depth but I didn't really feel it worked all that well. Any attempt at depth kind of killed the movie really, relationships, belonging, family blah blah blah... Give me more Bill Murray! (Watch the movie and you will understand).

And I have pretty much left out the other two significant characters in this movie. The sisters "Wichita" and "Little Rock" are played by Emma Stone and Abigail Breslin. Other than their names which indicate where they are from, we never learn very much about these girls. They are trouble makers and have been even before the world became Zombieland, but there is not really any indication as to why.

All in all I would say yes, watch this movie for the sheer entertainment if you do like a fun zombie movie. Just don't start it with a meal.

Signing out,

Aisha
Minority Movie Report

This evening is one of the biggest movie nights of the year. The 82nd Annual Academy awards are here to tell us, the lowly masses, who's who for the films of 2009.

There are live feeds coming from www.oscar.com if you are like me and have forgone cable.

I can't say that I have always agreed with the selections that come out on top at the Oscars on any given year, but it is always fun to speculate isn't it? With that in mind, I chose some of the most popular categories and made some predictions on my own. In all honesty, I have not seen even half of the movies nominated, so this is just a guessing game of fun. Here are my selections for 2009:

Leading Actor: Morgan Freeman - Invictus

Supporting Actor: Christoph Waltz - Inglorious Basterds

Leading Actress: Gabourey Sidibe - Precious

Supporting Actress: Mo'nique - Precious

Animated Feature: Up

Visual Affects: Avatar

Directing: Inglorious Basterds

Original Screenplay: Inglorious Basterds

Adapted Screenplay: Precious

Best picture: Inglorious Basterds

You may notice I have a bit of a bias on my choices. What can I say, I loved Inglorious Basterds!

If you are ready to make some (better informed?) selections of your own, go to www.oscar.com and click the option to download your own ballot!

Signing out,

Aisha
Minority Movie Report