Trailer Talk: Rogue One "a Star Wars Story"

I did not expect to like this as much as I did....

I knew I would enjoy it, I mean it's Star Wars so why wouldn't I right? I just wasn't AS excited for this trailer as I was for say the Episode 7 trailer, mostly because it is a "spinoff" of sorts. But boy was I wrong.

First we're introduced to Jyn Erso and given a quick rundown of what her role in the movie will be. The trailer looks and sounds great! The swelling of the music and the jarring alarm sound at 0:56 just perfectly conveys the tone of the movie making it seem like the world is in a state of emergency and the fate of the galaxy depends on Jyn stealing the information on the Death Star. The trailer is damn near perfect aesthetically speaking but if you're interested in some of the finer details of why this movie is so high on my list now we'll have to talk about this cast and crew.

Felicity Jones seems right at home as the rebellious Jyn and is a mixture of Rey's resourcefulness with just enough of that Han Solo badassery that we've come to expect from this type of character.

While I'm sure her character will be great there's one actor whom I'm most excited for in this movie!

Ben Mendelsohn as "Grand Admiral" looks amazing and if his previous work is any indication of what kind of villain we're going to see I personally think we're in for quite a treat. I highly highly recommend watching Starred Up with Jack O'Connell or Slow West with Michael Fassbender if you'd like to see some of his best work as an antagonist or supporting character.

The director is possibly the most important position that needed to be filled when it came to this project and I was cautiously optimistic when Gareth Edwards was announced to be helming the film. Why? You ask? Godzilla (2014) was somewhat panned by critics but while I completely understand most of the criticism I know when certain aspects of a film are done right. The way Edwards used godzilla in the film by not fully introducing the monster immediately was refreshing and made the final fight scene that much more impactful. This can also be seen in Edwards 2010 film "Monsters" which is what got Edwards the job of directing Godzilla in the first place. He does not focus on the aliens and instead opts to make the human characters and their relationship the main focus and the setting of an alien invaded mexico the backdrop. Why does any of this matter? Well it is heavily rumored that Darth Vader will make an appearance in the film and since this (Rogue One) is about a group of non force sensitive rebels who would never stand a chance against vader, it'd be great if Edwards could give Vader the same treatment and have his ominous presence looming in the background. I can't wait to see Edward's vision come to life come december! 

So that's my thoughts on the trailer and I hope you enjoyed it as much as I did. Be sure to check out this blog and any of my social media pages for more info on Rogue One: A Star Wars Story

What to watch: Batman V. Superman: Dawn of Justice (SPOILER FREE REVIEW)

 It's finally here! Everyone please calm down!! There's enough seats and tickets to go around so please do not trample the children you brought as an excuse to see this movie multiple times.

  That's right the highly anticipated My Big Fat Greek Wedding 2 is out today and the masses are flocking to see it by the millions! 

I'd like to formally apologize for that terrible joke and get started on what you came here for!

My review of Batman V. Superman

It's the greatest gladiator match the world of comics has ever seen and we're smack dab in the middle of it. So does the film deliver? Well.....it's a little more complicated than just yes or no. Let's break this down and talk about what makes this film great and what makes it not so much. Of course like the title suggests this is a SPOILER FREE review and I won't be mentioning anything that hasn't been revealed by the films announcement and it's promotional footage. First i'd like to talk about just that, the movies promotional footage! The first trailer was amazing and left me with a wonderful sense of excitement much like other trailers did last year (Star Wars, Civil War). Sadly some time after that another trailer was released and it included footage of a secondary villain in the film (Doomsday) which I personally feel would've been a very great thing to save for the film. I honestly believe that anyone who is familiar with the superman story enough to know who Doomsday is would've already have planned to see the film, so who was the marketing team trying to "reel in" when they chose to include him in the second trailer? Anyway that's a topic I should save for another day.

This film is exceptionally tough to review because sometimes I have to go into a movie and decide whether I want to see a movie and review it as a film or if I want to shut my brain off and enjoy the mindless explosions and revel in the fact that these things that I and many other people did not expect to ever see are happening and on the big screen. 

It's Batman taking on Superman for heaven's sake!!

So here we go I guess i'll give it a try. This film is exactly the hard hitting and gritty super human throw down that a lot of people want to see but it's wrapped in a shitty shiny wrapper of a story.

Let's talk casting....Ben Affleck is (waiiiiittttt for ittttt) in my opinion the BEST portrayal of both Bruce Wayne and Batman that i've ever seen! Yep he is by far the best thing about this movie and if that's all that you care about well there you go! Henry Cavill is mediocre as Clark Kent/Superman but even though some might assume that would completely derail this movie since he is half of the main cast, I'm happy to say that there's enough cool stuff happening around this dull and forgettable Superman that you just kind of accept that this is him and you just move on. Gal Gadot as Diana Prince/Wonder Woman was in my opinion a strange choice but I had to eat up my words when she demanded the attention of the viewer without saying much as the Amazonian warrior princess. Next up I guess is Lex Luthor.....I defended the casting of Jesse Eisenberg as the evil and calculating genius who even as a mortal has given Supes a run for his money. Sadly i'm eating those words today as I watch a strange and oddly uncharacteristic portrayal by Eisenberg. He was more weasely and annoying than he was menacing, so he will go down as a failed attempt at trying something new with an already established and perfectly fine character.

The story starts slow but does a good job of introducing Wayne/Batman without going full "origin story" with it. Meanwhile we get a look at an unstable world that's divided on whether Superman is a savior or an impending threat. Much of the first act goes in depth about the politics of this matter and some (especially younger viewers) will find this first hour or so of the film boring. Fortunately the movie picks up the pace and we start to get a glimpse of what we came to see. The action especially the fight scenes are very well done as expected from director Zack Snyder but a lot of the plot seems convoluted and hectic which leads me to assume that the director and writers were trying to juggle way to many things at once and unfortunately the movie suffers for it. Even though the film felt exceptionally long at Two hours and thirty minutes I don't think they spent that run time properly and were left with some underwhelming character aspects and a lackluster story over all. Special Effects seemed way more polished than what we saw in the trailers and that is a huge relief because that was one of my biggest gripes going in. Another flaw this movie has that for me personally was the most distracting was it's editing. Many scenes transitioned very awkwardly and was reminiscent of how you would edit a trailer instead of an actual film if that makes any sense. Of course I understand that the not everyone came to see this movie for it's top notch editing or masterful writing but these are just things that I found to be flaws in the overall film. So let's recap some things before wrapping up here.

The movie had Batman fight Superman

Good 

The movie sets up further movies such as WW, Batman and the Justice League 

Super Good

The movie has an awesome portrayal of said characters

Good

The movie was sloppy in it's execution and is a mediocre film at best

Bad??...I Guess??

The movie is longgggggggggggggggggggggg.

Bad (depending on who you ask)

Included cool cameos and easter eggs that will hype us up for the future of the DC cinematic universe

GOOD.

So let's just put it this way, if you saw the trailer or poster and said "I can't wait! Fuck the haters!!"

then you will more than likely enjoy this so go see it regardless of what I or anyone else thinks.

Normal Rating: 6/10

Fanboy Rating 9/10

I'm Back??? (excuses, excuses)

Hello!

  If you're reading this i'd like to thank you for taking time out of your day to read something i'm very passionate about. First of all i'd like to explain why I haven't kept up with this blog and why I plan on changing that this year.
  I am very very critical of anything creative I do, including but not limited to Drawing, Writing, and anything involving being on camera (I wouldn't say I am camera shy but I can't sit here and talk to the camera without picking it apart and eventually deleting it.)
As you would imagine this gets in the way of both writing out reviews and filming myself talking about them. At first I blamed my job for taking up most of my time that I had to do these kinds of things but unfortunately that wasn't always the case.
  Today I realized that some special people actually care about my opinion on movies and that made me very very happy as well as determined to continue this little hobby. So there you have it folks, I gave you a lame excuse and I guess this is me making somewhat of a promise that as long as one person is willing to listen to what some nobody film lover has to say about all the latest movies and movie news, I will be here writing and hopefully once I don't hate my face on camera i'll make more video reviews.
  If you ever notice that I start to fall behind on this, I would greatly appreciate some positive reinforcement even if it does come down to yelling at me in CAPS LOCK to get off my lazy ass and talk about movies.
  Once again i'd like to thank you for going out of your way to read this and invite you to drop a comment here or on any of my social media if you'd like to discuss anything movie related!


I'm also terrible at finishing off things like this so bye I guess...


                                                               

What to watch: Mission Impossible 5 and Paper Towns

So in the last few days I've seen both Paper Towns and Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation and long story short I really enjoyed them both! 

MI: Rogue Nation picks up shortly after the events of Ghost Protocol and I am happy to report that this film is even better than the last. While still boasting huge stunts and action scenes, this film also felt very reminiscent of the intensity and suspensefullness of the first movie in the franchise, which if you ask me are a winning combination. We are introduced to a few new mysterious characters which is always fun but the best part of these movies is the chemistry between Hunt and his team which make for plenty of laughs and excitement. Something I noticed about this movie though is the fact that Ethan Hunt is borderline super human in this! Seriously some of the things he survives are insane but I think that's explained throughout the film in that not only is Hunt absurdly good at his job but in his career he's also been incredibly "lucky" which if you look back at some of the things he's done you'd see what they meant. This is a great fun summer blockbuster and I can't wait to see how this team tops the crazy situations they got into here. Rating: FULL PRICE!

Paper Towns is another John Green story turned movie and like it's predecessor "The Fault in our Stars" this movie was made for a very specific demographic. If you've seen the trailer it doesn't seem like something you'd be into then you're probably not going to enjoy this. I personally felt the story and characters were very charming and short of a few certain aspects of some of the characters the film as a whole was mostly enjoyable. 

The friendships, relationships and portrayal of high school life felt very real which was refreshing. As a person who hadn't read the book I was happy with the film and so was my girlfriend whom had read the book. Is it the best movie I've seen all summer? Absolutely not, but do I regret seeing this? No. If you really care for this movie than you've probably seen it already otherwise I'd recommend just to wait to rent this. 

Rating: RENTAL. 

Maze Runner: The Scorch Trials | Official Trailer 2 [HD] | 20th Century FOX

The Hunger Games: Mockingjay Part 2 Official Trailer – “We March Together”

Sequel announcements!

Sequel announcements and rumors! According to Jurassic World's official Facebook page the next film in the franchise will be released 6/22/18. The director duo behind John Wick told Movies.com that they are indeed working on the sequel to their unexpected hit and Reeves will reprise his role as wick. Finally after 13 years Kung Pow 2 is officially under development! Writer, director and star Steve Oedekerk confirmed at Dragonfest 2015 that he is in fact working on the sequel to the 2002 martial arts comedy film. Are you excited about any of these? If so which one do you want the most? Let me know in the comments. 

What to watch: Ant-Man (2015)

With the huge success of the Marvel Cinematic Universe it'd be difficult to find someone who hasn't already seen marvel's latest film. If you are one of the few people on the fence about seeing this film I'm here to tell you it's a damn good time at the movies! 

Sure not everyone is a die hard fanboy but honestly this film while having many connections to all the other MCU films is very easy to enjoy without prior knowledge or context. 

Since it's announcement many have speculated that this film would be the first marvel film to fail due to it's more obscure protagonist. The same things were said about Guardians of The Galaxy and now "Groot" is a household name! So I'm not too worried about how much of a financial success this will be. 

The movie starts off with good music and sets the tone right from the get go, making you aware that this is a light hearted action comedy much like several other of marvels films. It's no surprise that Paul Rudd as Scott Lang brought the laughs but I sure as hell wasn't expecting Michael Peña to absolutely steal every scene he was in! Michael Douglas was great as Hank Pym and I very much enjoyed his story arc but I honestly can't say the same for Evangeline Lilly and her portrayal of Pym's daughter Hope Van Dyne sadly. Hopefully she will give a better performance in future films she's in. 

Like most of the marvel origins films, we're given an easily forgettable villain which is sad because I'm a fan of Corey Stall and would've loved to see him grow to be a much bigger threat for Lang in a future Ant-Man movie. The use of large and small scale set pieces is very very enjoyable and it added a wonderfully fresh aspect to the action and fight scenes we've seen in other marvel movies. I personally didn't see this in 3D but I have heard that the use of 3D was very immersive and you'd benefit from seeing it in that format if you're open to that. The movie made an effort to indicate that this was not a job for an entire team of super heroes therefore explaining why the avengers weren't involved and I really liked that. All in all I enjoyed the movie and I'm sure most of you will, especially if you're already a fan of the MCU! I'm going to give this a Full Price and say see it ASAP! Also remember that there's a scene shortly before the full credits start and another (Huge) one after the last of the credits roll so be sure to stick around if you're into that. Once again thanks for taking the time to read my review and I hope you have a great time at the movies. 

Suicide Squad - Comic-Con First Look [HD]

After the leaking of the Comic Con footage for the film, director David Ayer expressed his feelings on the matter on twitter saying that wasn't how he intended for people to see the trailer. He went on to "make it right" by having the studio officially release the trailer on Legendary's youtube. Check it out here!

SDCC panels for Star Wars, Batman V. Superman and More!

On the first full day of San Diego Comic Con we've seen some pretty amazing things!
Here I've gathered some that I feel are the most anticipated panels from 2015 Comic Con.

First off the wonderful panel for Star Wars Ep. 7

Another great video shared during the Star Wars panel was the BtS footage that for the movie.

Next up was the panel for Warner Bros. Batman v. Superman be sure to check it out to see Batfflek's impression of Chritian Bale.

Moving along with more DC superhero films we have here the panel for Suicide Squad! Can't wait to see Leto as the Joker! check it out here.

I'll be updating this post with more panels as the are uploaded so stay tuned!

The Man from U.N.C.L.E. - Comic-Con Trailer [HD]

Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice - Comic-Con Trailer [HD]

Everest - Official Trailer (HD)

This looks intense and the cast is amazing! Watch the full trailer here! 

What to watch: Mad Max Fury Road

Mad Max: Fury Road is....intense, brutal and most of all ALIVE! 

This movie had me excited since it's announcement along with the casting of Tom Hardy as the lead. Every poster and trailer leading up until the release of the film was beautiful and captured the tone of the film perfectly. 

Max is mysterious and quiet while still seeming cool and just a bit unhinged while the world around him feels fleshed out and all of these characters seem real. The action is non stop right from the beginning and doesn't let up very much until the credits role!

There's humor, there's action and while the plot is minimal it isn't just a turn your brain off and enjoy type of film. The scenery is beautiful and the music is just as intense as the action sequences with the war drums pounding and a flame throwing guitar playing psycho riding a monster of a vehicle! 

The use of cgi is kept to a minimum and many will embrace the abundant use of stuntmen and crazy post apocalyptic vehicles in all of the chase scenes. 

All in all I must say Mad Max: Fury Road is just a roller coaster ride of fun and if I had to say anything negative about it'd be the sound mixing at times. For example many of the voices of the characters where almost completely incomprehensible and I'll probably have to wait until it's bluray release to watch the film with subtitles. Other than that I very much enjoyed the movie and I highly recommend it if you're a fan of action films. 

Rating: Full Price!

Set photos of Captain America: Civil War

This week we've gotten our first looks onto the set of the HUGELY anticipated marvel film Captain America 3: Civil War and while we see several things that are to be expected we also caught a glimpse of some things that will be meant as a sort of dramatic point in the film.

Here we see Cap in what looks like an African setting which we can assume is the fictional country of Wakanda since we know it is the homeland of upcoming super hero Black Panther and it was also hinted at in Avengers AoU. 

Another photo from the same scene. If you're interested in finding out more about Wakanda and it's hero Black Panther watch this video here. 

Not much is new in regards to Anthony Mackie and his character Falcon. I imagine we'll see him play the same role of a sidekick in this as he did in Cap 2.  

As seen in these photos we will also see Cap attend a funeral of an unknown person but we do know the person was close enough to have Rogers serve as a pallbearer! 

From this photo we can gather that the deceased is british since the flag over the casket seems to be Union Jack. Peggy Carters death is everyone's best guess and I'm thinking the same. 

Now most importantly we get our first look at Frank Grillo in costume as villain, Crossbones! I personally think he looks very cool and I did like his character in Cap 2.

So there you have it folks some on set first looks at some of the characters of Captain America 3: Civil War! Are you excited? Do you like crossbone's look in the film? Let me know in the comments here or on any of the social media outlets I shared this on! 

Credit for photos goes to JustJared.