The Avengers (2012)

Some fun one-liners, entertaining inter relational dynamics, and of course great visual effects. But it's still an action movie primarily and you'll find little else.

Thor: You have no idea what you're dealing with.
Tony Stark (Iron Man): Shakespeare in the Park?

IMDB

Hugo (2011)

When evaluating a film, I do my best to consider the intent of the filmmaker and their intended audience. I wouldn't hold the characters of this film to the same kind of standards I would in The Thin Red Line for instance. I believe the intent of Martin Scorsese was to tell Hugo's story of loss, imagination, and salvation in children's terms, much as how the book did so. So, the people in the story are more austere or more fat or more tender than they would be in a typical drama. It's also a classic happy ending which is rare these days among the film elite.

Hugo is a beautiful film with outrageous camerawork and flamboyant characters. These drew me into the title character's tragic circumstances and into the era of discovery that was Paris in the 1930s. The despair throughout the film made the ending all the sweeter.

Official Site | IMDB

The Adjustment Bureau (2011)

This is another adaptation of a Philip K. Dick story (Minority Report, Blade Runner, Total Recall) - written as usual to challenge people's ideas about free will.

David Norris has a promising political career that suddenly goes awry, but he manages to fall in love on the night of his election defeat. What happens next though is far more outrageous: agents prevent him from meeting the girl again. What agents? Well from the Adjustment Bureau of course - a sci-fi organization who makes sure everything is staying on track, God's agents, angels with hats if you please.

The film really can't be taken seriously since the story is full of holes and is actually quite ridiculous, but as a parable about free will, it can't be ignored. I was quite disturbed by it's conclusion actually.

Official Site | IMDB

TRON: Legacy (2010)

Oh Tron. So unbelievable, but oh, so luminescent. Disney cashes in on 3D, Jeff Bridges popularity, and a cult classic by releasing this souped up version of a movie based on an arcade game.

Kevin Flynn's son enters the videogame a couple decades after his father disappeared only to find that the dominant microchip force is bad and is looking for a way out of the videogame world and into the real world where they can take over! Yikes!

Not a great film. Probably fun to watch on the big screen with glasses.

Official Site | IMDB

Metropolis (1927)

This classic film about class struggle pulled out all the stops to generate a bleak, futuristic world where the masses were simply cogs in the wheel of progress (or at least labourers in an unfriendly factory). There are plenty of dials and steam in this analog future and not many smiles. Director Fritz Lang incorporates plenty of grouped choreographed movement and solo modern dances to demonstrate visually the moral of the film:

"The head and hand need a mediator, and that mediator is the heart!"

At the heart of the film is class struggle and considering that the film was made during the interwar period in Germany, I think it captures much of the sentiment of the Weimar Republic.

IMDB

Rise of the Planet of the Apes (2011)

Not ever being a fan of the Planet of the Apes franchise or having ever seen the TV series or the following movies, I didn't know what to expect in relation to the actual storytelling in this pre-quel, but my expectations were low. I watched this movie mainly for the stunning computer graphic renderings of the apes.

The story - pretty lame, including some super cheesy performances. The visual effects - really amazing.

Official Site | IMDB

The Animatrix (2003)

To complete my first viewing of The Matrix films, I watched this collection of animated shorts that flesh out some of the side stories from the live action films. Each of the nine animations are produced by a different production company and carry very different styles with them. It is clear that some of the films direct their efforts to emphasize very different aspects of the Matrix flicks: style, philosophy, and action.

Official Site | IMDB

9 (2009)

This is a terrific animated tale of heroism and self-sacrifice. It is a further contemplation of how our pursuit of technology and so-called progress can blind us from most virtues.

A collection of special rag dolls seek to redeem the world from a tyrant robot in a post-apocalyptic landscape. The dolls are mostly naïve, childlike giving the film a great tone.

Official Site | IMDB

Super 8 (2011)

Film makers J.J. Abrams and Steven Spielberg created here is an homage to sci-fi pop films of the 1970s and 80s where children are the stars and magic is in the air (think E.T. meets The Goonies). The movie is appropriately straddles the two decades as it is set in 1979. The young actors are set on making their own movie on super 8 film and inadvertently draw attention to themselves when they are caught shooting at the site of an alien escape. The feds are on their trail as the kids try to solve the mystery.

The film is masterfully shaped and expertly executed making for a really fun movie to watch.

Official Site | IMDB

Iron Man 2 (2010)

Fluff with glamour & effects. Not much else to say except that it didn't live up to its predecessor.

Official Site | IMDB

Cold Souls (2009)

This film begins with the assumption that the soul is a small, physical gland at the base of the skull. It then takes the viewer on a wild ride about what it means to be alive.

A fictional version of Paul Giamatti (played by Paul Giamatti) feels stiffled in his performances as an actor and jumps at the chance of having a new operation done that unburdens the patient of their cumbersome soul. His life becomes devoid of passion when his soul is removed and it becomes even more odder when he has a different soul implanted.

Official Site | IMDB

The Matrix Revolutions (2003)

Where there was satisfaction in the finality of the story, I think the resolution felt forced, a weak negotiation. The effects were terrific and the enigma at the beginning was fun, but the micro-stories during the battle were rather formulaic as was the final sacrifice.

A fun trilogy; I'm better for having watched it.

IMDB

The Matrix Reloaded (2003)

While there are obvious stylistic and realistic flaws in the telling of this story (as in Where do these "soldiers" find all that time to maintain such great hair? Where did Zion get all their supplies and energy to live deep beneath the earth? etc.), the story is compelling and brings out all the best questions about determinism. I personally enjoyed all the dialogue pertaining to free choice. That, and it's a great kung-fu flick too.

Official Site | IMDB

The Matrix (1999)

I wasn't particularly impressed by this epic film when I first saw it - just the stage of life I was in at the time. I picked up all four movies for $10 a while back and decided to rewatch it along with the continuing saga.

Keanu Reeves wasn't as bad as I expected and the film, while quite melodramatic and over the top one-liners, was great! As one of the better early comic book type films in recent years, The Matrix redefined what smart action was capable of. It also tells a great parable!

I'm actually looking forward to seeing the next three (though their reviews drop considerably from what I recall).

IMDB

Monsters vs Aliens (2009)

Dreamworks animated flicks, while they possess impressive artwork and creativity, lack the heart and dramatic story-telling that flows from Pixar studios. Monsters vs Aliens supports this.

A codependent bride gets zapped by some freak radioactive beam and becomes a giant (really, really big) amazonian woman. She is taken captive by a secret government agency and then used with other "monsters" to fight an alien invasion. She finds inner strength through this process rather than finding her identity in her weather man groom.

The other monsters were funny and Ginomica (the big chick) will certainly cause some girls to fret about body image, but the story lacked resonance.

Forgettable.

Official Site | IMDB

Terminator Salvation (2009)

Not really any reason why this film should have been made except to feature some special effects and make money on a lasting franchise. I expected more with Christian Bale taking the lead, but it really is quite boring.

The Machines still want to kill John Connor (the kid from Terminator 2) who is an adult now in 2018. So the Machines develop another elaborate trap for Connor involving another sophisticated machine. A couple children, being the remainder of the human Resistance in L.A., become central to the story and that doesn't help the movie.

Some cheesy lines, melodramatic scenes, and predictable ending make you wish John Connor would throw in the towel.

Official Site | IMDB

Iron Man (2008)

Back to comic books - this time with a loose cannon, self-involved, and cavalier hero, and of course he's a billionaire too.

Tony Stark co-owns a wildly successful weapons manufacturing corporation, in fact he's the inventive force behind it. When he is captured and wounded in Afghanistan, he dresses his wound with a powerful energy thingy that helps him escape his captors. Once he's back home and has gained clarity, he decides to turn his trinket into powering an armoured suit and he fights misuse of his company's weapons and then his own company.

As far as action hero flicks go, this one is full of sophisticated and adult humour making it far more successful among young adults as opposed to the teen gang. Robert Downey Jr. makes the film with usual cunning and jerky movements.

Official Site | IMDB

Avatar (2009)

In 3-Dimensions!! Despite my plan to boycott the film (because Mr. Cameron doesn't need my $10), I ended up caving and going to see it based on many people's recommendations.

Futuristic mining operation on a distant and inhabited planet is being run by the US military. The indigenous tall and naked blue people are resistant to the plans to turn the whole place into a mound of dirt, so a subversive method of sending in spy blue people in to learn how to convince them to yield is employed - a human controls the body of a void blue person (an avatar). A lame soldier controlling his avatar ends up falling in love with the indigenous and joining their cause (big twist!!).

So yeah, the visuals were pretty great, though I would have enjoyed more real life mixed in with CG (the final sequence has quite a bit). The 3-D element worked really well and it wasn't abused.

What wasn't terribly impressive was the story, the characters, and the overall challenge. It is clear that they are drawing a parallel between the blue folks and planet earth's indigenous population. The happy ending scenario is clearly a departure from reality and is clearly motivated to make money, not good cinema. The notion that the earth is a deity is lectured heavily too.

Official Site | IMDB

Gentlemen Broncos (2009)

Napoleon Dynamite creator generates a quirkier and slightly less sympathetic character within Gentlemen Broncos. Still a super fun film though. He even managed to add some existing star power to the film (Sam Rockwell, Mike White).

Benjamin is a home-schooled senior who helps his nightgown designer mom. Ben also writes sci-fi and enters his latest novel into a writing competition. A guest judge and hero of Ben's steals the script, adapts it slightly and presents it as his own book and is published.

The tension in the film is great. The just awful characters who usurp Benjamin's book are so colourful and deadpan that viewers can not predict outcomes. The intermittent scenes from the book are downright hilarious - Sam Rockwell sewing on his man parts!

Be sure to check out the Chevalier site below if you want to get an idea of what the movie will be like.

Dr. Ronald Chevalier | Official Site | IMDB

Moon (2009)

When one thinks of sci-fi films, usually images of super hi-tech CGI, weak plot lines and equally feeble acting. But Moon is of a different breed and having Sam Rockwell as the centre piece makes all the difference.

Sam is the solitary inhabitant of the moon and is completing his third and final year in a mining contract. He begins to see things that don't make sense and his health begins to deteriorate. A mystery and adventure begins on the monochrome surface of Earth's moon.

The simple fact that the film is original makes this film terrific to watch. But the sentiment is startling does not abandon the viewer quickly.

Official Site | IMDB