Best of... 2013 Halfway Point

We are basically at the halfway point of the year... so here is my list of the releases thus far. These are all films that have US release dates in 2013 that I've seen thus far (based off of BoxOfficeMojo).

Ok, so Les Mis is on this pic... that doesn't count for 2013.

1. The Sapphires
2. Starbuck
3. Star Trek Into Darkness
4. The Kings of Summer
5. Stand Up Guys
6. Mud
7. World War Z
8. The Internship
9. Quartet
10. Man of Steel
11. Iron Man 3
12. Side Effects
13. Identity Thief
14. Oblivion
15. Disconnect
16. Oz: The Great And Powerful
17. Warm Bodies
18. This Is The End 
19. The Host
20. Admissions
21. A Glimpse Inside The Mind of Charles Swan III
22. The Hangover Part III
23. Epic
24. John Dies At The End
25. The Croods
26. The Place Beyond The Pines
27. The Incredible Burt Wonderstone
28. Beautiful Creatures
29. G.I. Joe: Retaliation
30. Now You See Me
31. Trance
32. Broken City
33. Pain & Gain
34. After Earth
35. A Good Day To Die Hard
36. Wrong
37. Gangster Squad
38. Jack The Giant Slayer
39. Hansel And Gretel: Witch Hunters
40. The Last Stand
41. Parker
    

Notable movies that I still have yet to see from this year… or choose not to see:

• Fast & Furious 6
• The Great Gatsby
• Olympus Has Fallen
• 42
• Basically any horror movie... just not my bag
• The Heat, White House Down, and Much Ado About Nothing will go towards the second half

I'd call it a successful week

 We'll keep this one short and sweet... well, shorter than some of the others. In no particular order.

• The Darkest Hour - AVOID AVOID AVOID AVOID.... This was horrible. Yet another reason why Emile Hirsch is on my "do not like" list. F-----

• Liberal Arts -Very enjoyable indie movie. Not Segel, not Patrick Harris (or is it just Harris), but the other guy from How I Met Your Mother was in this and was great. I'm pretty neutral to that show (and him), but this movie may have won me over. Maybe this idea has already been out there, but is he the next Braff? He (Josh Radnor) wrote and directed both this and Happythankyoumoreplease ... I'll have to check that one out. PS. I'll take this Olsen over her stick sisters.
  

• Fat Kid Rules The World - Umm... probably most won't enjoy this one. I somewhat did... and that was about it.

• The Cabin In The Woods - For basically hating the horror genre, I did somewhat enjoy this one. Seemed to make as much fun of the genre then it did to play to it. 

• This Is The End - One of those "exactly what I thought it'd be" type movies. It was funny but some scenes got old. Even though he wasn't in it a ton, Michael Cera might have been my favorite.

• Death Of A Superhero - Surprise movie of the week! I had this in my Netflix queue for a while and always overlooked it. I never read the description for it... so of course, I just assumed it was about a death of a superhero. Wrong. I would very much recommend this one. Looks like Netflix has it on instant viewing, but has not been released on DVD here in the states. Here is the IMDB and Netflix descriptions:
• IMDB: A dying 15-year-old boy draws stories of an invincible superhero as he struggles with his mortality.
• Netflix: Sick of chemo -- since it hasn't cured his leukemia -- 15-year-old Irish lad Daniel is full of fear, anger and worry. Concerned about dying a virgin, he's sent to a therapist whose compassionate yet pragmatic attitude helps him face his fears.

• A Glimpse Inside The Mind Of Charles Swan III - I guess this would be the somewhat disappointment of the week. I did enjoy it, but I was really hoping to love it. Carlos Estavez was ok... Jason Schwartzman was good. Bill Murray was of course great. For those who like Wes Anderson movies (he and Roman Coppola are buds), you might like this.
  

• ParaNorman - A bit surprised that it was a bit more "grown up" than I would imagine. It was ok, but my favorite stop motion/clay animation of 2012 goes to The Pirates! Band of Misfits

• Smokey And The Bandit - Well, this was a surprise. I actually really liked this one. Figured it would be boring and way too country for my tastes. Wrong... well, it was a lot country, but I overlooked that. Saw this at an outside screen with the Austin skyline in the background... maybe it was the environment that made it better. PS... Sally Fields was a hottie back then.

• World War Z - The zombie movie that isn't a zombie movie. Probably why I liked it so much. There's a lot of chatter online about die hard zombie fans thinking this is a blasphamy because there isn't the normal blood/gore/zombie'isms that there should be. GREAT! I hate zombie movies. This had a I Am Legend type feel to it... dealing with Zombies, but didn't really feeling like a zombie movie. I really enjoyed it and suggest seeing it. The only showing I could get into on opening night was 3D... do not see it in 3D. Even though I loved the movie, I found it EXTREMELY pointless that it was in 3D. No need for it.
  

• Career Opportunities - John Hughs written/produced early 90's (felt more like an 80's flick). Guy locked up in Target at night with Jennifer Connelly... sounds like me fantasy. Too personal? Stars Frank Whaley, who I find pretty annoying (in basically everything). I think I saw this movie back in the day because everything seemed familiar, or it could have been because of my days at Target. Who knows.

• The Kings Of Summer - I'd call this pretty close to perfect. Went to the art-house theater (don't tell the drafthouse), about 20 people at my showing and I was that lone guy laughing at stuff no one else was. Maybe I just get it. I'm not on the Nick Offerman band wagon like everyone seems to be these days, but I was laughing (sometimes cracking up) at every one of his scenes. The idea is simple: 3 teenagers runaway from annoying parents into the woods for the summer. Build a house. Live like kings. This also had the most surprising/hilarious character, Biaggio... weird loner who joins the 2 others in the woods for the summer.

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Ok... I lied. Not short and sweet. 

Next time: HALFWAY POINT - My personal top to bottom list of releases for the first half of 2013

The time after next: A few foreign flicks, The Heat, maybe White House Down,  my first book review'ish... if I can finish it by then, and maybe something else

Not one for documentaries, but...

Wow... Searching For Sugar Man. This was great. Just great.

I tend to find documentaries too depressing... seems like there are too few documentaries not dealing in war, poverty, scandal, disease, or something else horrible. My two friends Johnson and Whitlow have two different opinions on docs. Johnson enjoys the docs that are about the topics I previously listed. I can turn on the news to see all this. That's why I tend to lean towards Whitlow's thinking...

''I watch movies to escape reality, not to have it thrown in my face for an hour and a half."

Ok, so I quoted him, but not sure if that was his official wording... ask him.

Watching Searching for Sugar Man didn't open for my floodgates of loving docs... but it may be a stepping stone. Definitely suggest watching this if you are into documentaries and/or music. Here is IMDB's description:

"Two South Africans set out to discover what happened to their unlikely musical hero, the mysterious 1970s rock 'n' roller, Rodriguez."

The Kings of Summer

Best movie of the summer so far. Between the parents and Biaggio I was laughing a whole lot more than I ever expected to.

"Have you seen Nick?"
"No. But have you seen Biaggio?"

Part 1 Of My Summer Book List

Here are the first books of my summer reading list. Anyone read any of these?

Back In Full Swing Of Things

It has been a little while... can't blame me, a week on the beach will slow down my movie watching. Plus, before that I had my friends down here and a crazy week and a half of work... So here we go...

12. Parker
I'm not saying Jason Statham makes great movies... but sometimes he can come out with an entertaining action flick. THIS WAS NOT ONE OF THEM!!! So corny! The villains were ridiculous, so horrible. Jennifer Lopez was in this... why JLo in this, I don't know. Not that she's a good actress, but it just felt weird to see her here... must have been hurting for some money since American Idol/divorce from Marc Anthony. This might be Statham's worst flick yet. AVOID!!! F-


11. Why Stop Now?
This is one of two Jesse Eisenberg movies this entry... and both were let downs. Why Stop Now? has piano prodigy Eisenberg trying to get his druggy mom, Melissa Leo,  to rehab on the day of a music school audition. What got my hopes up was that Leo wanted one last high... so they had to go to her dealer, Tracy Morgan. Tracy was disappointing, and I don't think it was his fault. The writer seemed like he couldn't pick if he wanted to write a comedy or drama... it couldn't decide. So a lot of the humor Tracy would have had was lost somewhere. Eisenberg plays they same narcotic-cocky-Woody-Allen-wannabe... just like 90% of his movies. C-




10. After Earth
Bored one afternoon... nothing at home... lets go see Will and son. Most people know about this one, so I'm not really going into detail. This movie for me was "it is what it is". Going into it, I wasn't expecting much and I ended up not getting much. For M. Night, this was a win/loss I think. Win: it wasn't nearly as bad as The Last Airbender or Devil, and Loss: was his 3rd to last worst movie. PS... if you saw this, could someone explain to me Will Smith's accent?! PPS... hopefully this is Jaden's last movie.


9-tie. Bronson
I'm not on the Tom Hardy train like everyone else seems to be. I think I might get some slack from some people for not loving this one. It seems like this movie has a "cult classic" (at least in Austin for some reason), which built up my expectations. But it was a let down for the most part. It was weird and interesting at times, but I can't forgive Hardy for making Bane a pompous-British-sounding-Darth-Vader. Also I could care less for who this movie is based on, "professional prisoner" Michael Peterson (who changed his name to Charles Bronson). I watched it because people suggested it... but if you love Hardy, you might like it. C

9-tie. Now You See Me

Movie two with Eisenberg this week... this one made me really not like him. Magic movies aren't that impressive when they try to be "awesome" with the tricks... with editing, it just seems stupid. Especially with this, they used a lot of CGI which makes the idea of these illusions even worse. Give me some good old illusions on live TV... I know it's fake, but it's more enjoyable to me. Another thing that really annoyed me was the "fight scene" with mini-Franco. Just because you do magic has nothing to do with your fighting skills... that whole scene got me so angry. It was like he had mutant powers. Very annoying. At least the French girl from Inglorious Bastards was easy on the eyes. By the end, I could care less about the twist and turns. C, could almost be a C-.




7. Freeloaders
Saw a preview for this on some straight-to-dvd movie. It looked mildly entertaining, but it had Nat Faxon in it. I tend to laugh when he is on screen... basically in anything. Turned out this wasn't as funny as I hoped, but it was still a bit fun. Probably wouldn't recommend this one to most people, they might get bored w/ it. But if you're game, might as well. Had a unlikely music artist role/cameo that was surprising. C+




                                                                         6. The Hangover: Part III
Well, at least it wasn't Hangover 2. Ok, so to be fair, it was good... for a random comedy. But comparing it to the first, it sucked. They did a lot better job with pretty much all aspects of the movie versus part 2... especially with Galifianakis. He still had predictable jokes, but not as bad as 2 (are you picking up on the theme... not as bad as 2). I was a bit surprised that it didn't have that Hangover situation... the events just started to happen. This shouldn't have been a part 3 as much as a Mr. Chow spinoff movie. The "celeb" cameo was pretty great (did you know the tattoo artist in 2 was originally supposed to be Mel Gibson, but someone got pissy on set about having him there. So they go that nobody for it). Now that the trilogy is over, I can go back and watch the first and enjoy it again knowing there won't be anymore sequels to ruin it. B-

5. Seven Psychopaths
This is the 4th movie with Christopher Walken I have watched in the last few months. Everyone talks how crazy amazing he is... or is it amazing crazy? Either way, they are both right. You can't help but love when he is on screen, whether he is a fallen angel in The Prophecy (worst of the 4 I've seen), a world renowned cellist, a dog thief (in this movie), or a retired gangster (see the #1 movie of this entry). Plus you have Sam Rockwell, who is my favorite underrated actor. Plus again, you have a fun-crazy-weird movie. Drawback... I'm not much of a Colin Farrell fan. Nothing really in particular that I dislike, just not a fan. 100% worth watching, especially any Walken or Rockwell fans... the last Walken scene is worth it (you know what I mean if you saw it).




4. For A Good Time, Call...
Call me crazy, but I actually thought this was really funny. Feel free to judge. Going to leave it at that... no I"m not. New crush = Ari Graynor. And Justin Long was hilarious for such a small role. There... now I will leave it at that.
B

3. The Internship
I'm keeping this one simple: This is exactly what I expected...

Fun. Funny. Not as good as Wedding Crashers (Me = Okay with that). If you go to see it, don't think it's a Wedding Crashers 2. B









1-tie. Stand Up Guys
Here's the 4th Walken film. Compared to the other 3, it might be tied with A Late Quartet... but they are two totally different movies, so it's hard to compare. Stand Up Guys find Al Pacino getting out of jail after 30'ish years. His old friend and fellow gangster Walken picks him up and takes him out for his first night out of jail celebration. Alan Arkin comes into the mix half way through the movie and is funny like always... half thought he was going to say "ArgoFuckyourself". The last few movies with Pacino have disappointed me (remember Jack & Jill?!), but I really enjoyed him in this one. It actually had some heartfelt moments that I didn't expect. Go support Family Video and rent this one... I may even buy this one for the collection. A-/B+ 

1-tie. Man Of Steel... some mild spoilers

Ok, so maybe #1 might be giving this one too much credit. But it's the first Superman movie that got it right... or at least as close to right as possible. For that, I'll give it a tie for the first spot.

The basics: The fight scenes were what you would hope for. Well, maybe a little less destruction would have been better. I did not like everything about this movie though... the big thing, Amy Adams. She is a good actress, but she's no Louis Lane. The Christopher Nolan'isms were there, but I'm glad he didn't completely commandeer the movie from Zach Snyder. I know Sucker Punch and Watchmen were disappointments, per the masses, but visually I think he's a genius... Look at 300 and argue that fact. Well don't, because I just won't agree with you in the end, so what's the point? Michael Shannon, better than I thought. Russell Crowe, great... more involved than I (or anyone) thought. Is this the official return of Kevin Costner?! I welcome him back. Detective Stabler, small role but good. The female villain... hubba hubba. Diane Lane... even as old Ma Kent, I'll always have a thing for her. Overall, made me miss regular Smallville watching.

Definitely suggest seeing this one in the theater. If you wait to rent it, you better watch it on a huge TV with surround sound... it's one of those movies. This year, we'll have Iron Man 3, Man of Steel, Thor 2, and The Wolverine (as the "big comic book movies")... it's hard to say where this one will fall.
B

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Next week: World War Z. Zombies that run. WTF?

Short week... but got a Master Pancake show in with friends!

Been pretty busy with work the last week and a half and didn't get to see too many movies... but what I did see was great. Also had a bunch of friends in town for the holiday weekend... which was a blast. Did the standards: food, 6th st., food, shootin' some guns, food, and a visit to The Alamo Drafthouse Ritz for a Master Pancake show of Star Trek 2: The Wrath of Khan. I was a bit nervous not thinking some of my friends would like or get the Master Pancake setup... especially since it was Star Trek movie. Would have been for sure if was Jurassic Park or Forrest Gump. Luckily, they loved it (or at least that's what they said).





About two-thirds of the way through the show, the Master Pancake comedians stop the show for a skit, then finish out the movie. The photo is of the skit... Spock and Kirk's encounter with Man Boobs Khan... doing an Irish Jig.





Now for the new movies of the week. Only three movies, but all were great.

3.     Sweet Land

This had a "Sarah-Plain-And-Tall-esque" feel to it... A German woman comes to Minnesota to marry a man a she hasn't met. Simply, the story was good, the acting was good... it just made you feel good. The interesting thing about this was the foreign language dialog. One of the biggest aspects of the movie was how the characters all had to learn how to communicate, because they all basically spoke different languages. I'm not sure if this is why the director left out subtitles, but you got the same experience as the other characters in the scene... not really sure what the others were saying. You knew what they were trying to convey because of the situations/context clues... so you weren't anymore lost than what the other characters were.


2.     Charade

 "Do women find it feminine to be so illogical, or can't they help it?"

Charade definitely got the quote of the week here. I've had this movie in my Netflix queue for quite some time now, but never got around to watching it. I was looking over the Drafthouse's website one weekend and saw that it was going to be playing that night... it was "now or never". I chose now. I was glad I did. This was suck a great movie. It was a fun movie that never really felt dated 50 some years later. With Grant and Hepburn, it's a must see... Hepburn really was a hottie.   

1.     The Intouchables

I remember seeing previews for this one a while back and was itching to see it as soon as possible. Unfortunately I didn't get a chance to see it in theater when it came to Austin, so I had to wait sometime more until it came out on disc. Here is the Netflix's description:

Based on a true story, a quadriplegic aristocrat's world is turned 

upside down when he hires a young, good-humored ex-con as his 

caretaker. This unlikely duo overcomes adversity of every flavor 

as they shatter preconceptions of love, life and each other.

It stars François Cluze, who I think is the French Dustin Hoffman... look at the poster and tell me I'm wrong. I first saw him in my favorite French movie, Tell No One. He was great, Omar Sy was great, the story is great, nothing really gets lost in translation... all are a plus when looking at this one. It's not half way through the year yet, but I wouldn't be surprised if this is one of my top 10 favorite of this year. 

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Like I said, I'm behind. I actually started writing this one a while ago and have been sidetracked for the last handfull of days. My next entry will have...

The Hangover 3, After Earth, Epic, Now You See Me, Freeloaders, Parker, Stand Up Guys, Seven Psycopaths, and Why Stop Now?... there will probably be more coming but probably not until after vacation...

Speaking of which, picked up some books for the beach: Odd Interlude and Odd Apocalypse (Got through the first books real quick, then just stopped. Time to get back to it). Also both of Owen Egerton's books, The Book of Harold: The Illegitimate Son Of God and Everyone Says That At The End Of The World. Owen can be seen as Khan in the Star Trek picture up top... he's one of the members of Master Pancake. And also Ready Player One by Ernest Cline, an Austin arthor... a suggested read by people down here.

Has anyone read any of these... or have any FUN suggestions for beach reading?