Thighs Wide Shut

Cedar Rapids
Convention-al
Official Website | Trailers & Mo

Cedar Rapids is fun, but not all that funny.  Ed Helms‘ smile and aw shucks attitude can only take us so far.  Same with him singing a song (you knew it was gonna happen).  Remove John C. Reilly‘s slimy, but welcome energy and all you have left is Isiah Whitlock Jr making two Wire refs and Anne Heche looking really really reallly fine.  Some showing of her side boobage doesn’t hurt, but that’s not a movie (and neither is showing Sigourney Weaver in a nightie).  And is it us or is director Miguel Arteta creatively moving backwards instead of forward?  How do you start with edgy shiz like Chuck & Buck and move onto whatevs dot net like Youth In Revolt?  Lets blame writer Phil Johnston! Rapids is his first feature writing assignment, and it feels like one, so he only has room to improve, and try to make us laugh! Try try try again PJ!

Arbor Weekend: Cedar Rapids was not filmed in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, but in Ann Arbor, Michigan, and mainly at their Clarion Hotel and Conference Center!!! [check out the pics!]

Verdictgo: Sum Merit But No Stinkin Badges

Cedar Rapidly semi-declines currently in limited release

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…

Battle: Los Angeles
District Zzzzzzzz
Official Website | Trailers & Mo

There are worser alien invasion movies than Battle: Los Angeles, but that doesn’t mean for a second that B:LA is anything above blah.  In fact, B:LA is one of the more boring alien invasion movies we’ve seen in quite awhile.  If we don’t have anything nice to say, we can at least say that B:LA is not as boooooo as 2012 was.  At least B:LA doesn’t dwell too much on having us care about its characters, cause these characters have no character!!!!  And we’re stuck with them the entire time.  You might not even realize that there are aliens in this movie.  Gunfire seems to come out of nowhere, over and over.  And when we do get glimpses of the aliens, they are the least menacing movie aliens in the bidness.  They’re like disposable beings with no purpose, stuck in some easy video game that a 3 year old could play, but shouldn’t bother playing.  We never find out what their true intentions are or really anything about them.  How can we even hate on these aliens if we don’t know shiz about em???

Poor Aaron Eckhart. And why put Bridget Moynahan in this movie if Eckhart doesn’t get a chance to bone her, or at least watch her shower.  And what a waste of Michael Peña and his mustache’s time.  And do you think Michelle Rodriguez every worries about being a one dimensional actor, stuck on automatic in two dimensional movies, and with Avatar, the occasional three dimensional movie?  Oh, and Ne-Yo is in this, but it doesn’t matter who’s in this cause you should juss say Hell-No to this

Chinning: the whole time we were watching this, our mind was elsewhere, still focused in on the chinternet

Verdictgo: Very Very Very Very Very Very Very Very Very Very Very Very Very Very Very Very Little Merit AND No Stinkin Badges (why any merit tat all?  cause it’s not 2012)

you wont love LA today at a theater near jews

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…

Uncle Boonmee Who
Can Recall His Past Lives
(Loong Boonmee Raleuk Chat)
Mumble In The Jungle
Official Website | Trailers & Mo

Yes, Apichatpong Weerasethakul‘s Uncle Boonmee Who Can Recall His Past Lives is one of the greatesteststest movie titles since 2 Fast 2 Furious, but it is not one of the greatestestesteest movies ever like 2 Fast 2 Furious, despite winning the Palme d’Or at last year’s Cannes and the praises of others who have been singing loud about it. So what’s the big deal? Dunno. Boonmee‘s a spiritual journey, with no real twists or turns or anything resembling what us westerners refer to as a story, juss a lotta lush Thai countryside footage and some interesting stuff that isn’t used nearly enuff… like the catfish that Uncle B might have been in a former life!! Being a catfish doesn’t sound all that interesting, but what if we told you that this particular catfish pleasures women by swimming under their gowns and making them groan??? Yeah, we’d wanna see more of that strange Asian sexual fetish hotness too, but all we get is one scene of fish on fish grime. More like BOO-youu!! Even worser is the under-usage of Uncle B’s long lost son who is now some sorta totally creepy/scary/scary-creepy ghost monkey with glowing red eyes (see pic above/gif below)!!!! No, we do not require an explanation about what the F the ghost monkeys is be, but all we ask is that all the other boring sh#t in this movie get tossed aside so we can have a horror movie about red-eyed ghost monkeys haunting jungles and hunting down people or something!!! LOOK AT THEM EYES!!! They make Jawas look as lame as Wawa employees!!

Verdictgo: Sum Merit But No Stinkin Badges

The Adjustment Bureau
Fedorable
Official Website | Trailers & Mo

Don’t know about you, but we never really cared all that much for Inception and its udder pretty petty nonsense.  Sure, it was a cool-ass looking and feeling movie, but it was a brainy confusing overload, for something that really wasn’t all that brainy or confusing when you actually thought about it.  9 dreams within a dream may sound crazy, but it’s not, cause we say so.  So, if yer like us, and wanted Inception to be leaner, cleaner and simpler, you’ll probably super-enjoy George Nolfi‘s take on Philip K. Dick‘s short story Adjustment Team, cause it’s like all the fun and mystery of Inception, but without all the overdone hullabaloo.  It’s also one of the better K Dick screen treatments, and in general, an all-around delightful little love story between Matt Damon and Emily Blunt.  Wish there were more romantic flicks like this one and less ones like all the other crap that blows smelly farts into theaters every month.  Wish John Slattery could star in something where he didn’t have to wear a fedora.  Wish Anthony Mackie could be my BFF, cause he just looks like such a rad dude, with such a smooth-ass mustache!!!

Verdictgo: Jeepers Mos Worth A Peepers

Take Me Home Tonight
License To Reheat
Official Website | Trailers & Mo

Had little expectations going into the 80s throwback flick Take Me Home Tonight, but came out with nothing but a giant smile plastered on our faceses.  Sure, it’s not anything all that ingenious, but it was neither nor ignoramus either!  It’s like a leaner, cleaner and simpler Hot Tub Time Machine, and it’s actually better too, which isn’t saying much, cause HTTM isn’t really all that good, despite what you think or remember.  In TMHT, Topher Grace does his lovable dork thing he was typecast born to do, Teresa Palmer makes us forget that that actress chick from Twilight exists, Anna Faris does nothing, Chris Pratt is stupid, but in a different way, Demetri Martin is kinda good for like twice, and Dan Fogler proves once again that’s he’s the funniest heavy in comedies.  Dear Hollywurst, please give all of Jack Black’s roles to Fogler.  Dear Dan Fogler’s manager, please get him better movies, but not like Gulliver’s Travels… starring Jack Black.  Oh, and any movie that puts Angie Everhart‘s boobs on display is probably something worth watching, or at least JOing to!

Verdictgo: Jeepers Worth A Peepers

Of Gods And Men
(Des hommes et Des Dieux)
Holy Snoozefest!
Official Website | Trailers & Mo

In some Muslim country, some priests or monks or something (including Lambert Wilson and Michael Lonsdale) live at a monastery on top of a mountain.  They help the local poor people with medicine, clothing, food, and divine guidance.  Then one day some bad terrorists Muslim dudes come to the area and the priests/monks have to decide whether to flee or stay put.  This conundrum gets discussed over and over for what seems like 29838238 hours before they decide to stay put, cause giving up on the locals and themselves seems like the wrong thing to do.  Well, apparently staying was the wrong thing to do cause the terrorists show up in the end and kill a bunch of the holy men. Yep, we juss ruined the entire movie for ya cause you deserve to be spared from this borefest.  Even after we learned at the end that this was a true story, it didn’t help to turn it into a good true story

Verdictgo: Sum Merit But No Stinkin Badges

Boonmee and Gods must be crazy, currently in limited release, while Tonight and Bureau are studio fun rocking out at a theater near jews

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…

Unknown
Memory Lapzzzzzzze
Official Website | Trailers & Mo

What is unknown in Unknown is best left unknown.  Not cause telling you would ruin the unknowing fun, but cause once you do know the unknown knowningess that’s not known to recently memory-impaired Liam Neeson that eventually will be known to him, you’ll know juss how stoopid you felt waiting for some sorta awesome knowing reveal to happen, but being in this know is more of a groan than a known.  Know whatta we mean???? You don’t know what we mean, but let it be known that you won’t be as taken with Unknown has you were with Neeson’s Taken!

And yet, regardless of how un-kick-ass and silly director Jaume Collet-Serra‘s Unknown is, we dont want to unknow that we saw Unknown.  Even if January Jones‘sss acting chops make Scarlett Johansson’s look like Katharine Hepburn’s!  Even if fine German actress Diane Kruger is sporting some horrid Eastern European accent when the movie takes place in her home country!!  Even if a solid collection of co-stars like Bruno Ganz, Sebastian Koch, Aidan Quinn and Frank Langella play along with the cloak and daggery that’s more like clunk and slaggery!!!  Put some less charismatic actor in the Neeson role and the results wouldn’t be unknown, they would be unwatchable, but Neeson = watchable.  He’s the reason that despite Jar Jar Stinks, 9 hour pod races and the stoopid kiddie kid stuff in Episode 1: Phantom Menace, it’s the only remotely decent Star Wars prequel, cause Neeson brings class to things that suck a$$

Neeson!!!!

Needsome Neeson!: skip Unknown, and get to know these 3 lesser-known Neeson flicks… Five Minutes of Heaven, Breakfast On Pluto and The Dead Pool (not a little known film, but did you remember that Liam was in it???)

Verdictgo: Neeson Merit But No Stinkin Badges

Unknown knows not much today at a theater near jews

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…

The Eagle
Soar Subject
Official Website | Trailers & Mo

When not in HBO’s Rome we don’t really care what Romans do, cause none of them there Roman TV shows or movies that have come after HBO’s Rome are nearly noble Roman enuff to be fully worth roaming out and about to see.  But if you haven’t seen HBO’s Rome then maybe you can be more open to Romanesque Roman things (Romain lettuce or Polanksi don’t count), but if you haven’t seen HBO’s Rome, well then you’ve missed out on one of the bestestestest shows of the 2010s.  Yadda, yadda, yadda.  Sorry, but we work for HBO’s Rome street team, even though the show ended 4 years ago and there is no street team, and even though the term ‘street team’ is almos more lame than saying yer a part of some team like ‘team Jacob’.  GO TEAM HBO’s ROME!!!

Anywhooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo… welcome to The Eagle, director Kevin Macdonald‘s take on Rosemary Sutcliff’s book The Eagle of the Ninth, which was inspired by the real life doings of (not HBO’s) Rome’s Ninth Spanish Legion.  That’s a lot of 9s and eagles and adaptions!!!  It’s also a pretty decent premise about a 2nd century young Roman dude (dude Channing Tatum, who’s actually a purty dependable leading man) who wants to restore pride in his family’s name after his papa and his solders disappeared in the tribal hinterlands north of Hadrian’s Wall in Great Britain, and lost their treasured GOLDEN EAGLE THINGIE!!!!!  So Roman Channing dude leaves the confines of some forts and Roman hanging out places where wise dudes like Denis O’Hare and Donald Sutherland (who’s voice is almost worth the price of admission to any film he’s in) roam, and takes his newly acquired slave and future BFF (Jamie Bell) on a quest to conquer the unknown questions, and the unknown in general!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

So the journey begins, and while the vistas we travel thru are mightily vistastic (Hungary, doing a fine job standing in for the ye Olde Country!), this puppy doesn’t really start cooking until Roman dude and his Billy Elliot slave meet up with a tribe of Native American looking savages covered in mud that are called Seal Peoples or something (led by A Prophet‘s Tahar Rahim), AND THEN the tables are turned and like the Roman dude is now like a slave and the slave Billy Elliot kid is like a Billy Elliot with all the power cause the tribes people hate Romans (no word on what they think of HBO’s Rome), but not the slave cause he’s from the area, but none of this is as awesome as HBO’s Rome.  What does this all have to do with dude’s lost pops and that golden eagle???  Uh, everything!!!!!  And it’s kinda cool, but its only a sliver of cool, cause there was like a ton of sorta nothing & boringness leading up to it, and a sum of sorta nothing & boringness following it, and sometimes when Mark Strong shows up in a movie it can either be a strong thing, but sometimes it can be a weak thing

So, have you ever seen HBO’s Rome???  DO IT!!! Or check yerself out some of Macdonald’s munch munch more munchable non-fictional frictions One Day in September and Touching the Void

Bold MacDonalds: Kevin Macdonald’s brother Andrew has produced a lot of his films + Trainspotting & other Danny Boyle joints, and their second cousin is…. NORM FORKING MACDONALD!!!

Verdictgo: Sum Merit But No Stinkin Badges

Eagles lands today at a theater near jews

and until next thyme the balcony is clothed…