The Rise Of The Hopper!

"Gone Girl" (2014)

It has been a long time since I have watched a movie that has taken me on an emotional ride like "Gone Girl." This movie is able to balance so many despicable characters who do terrible things to the people they "love" only for them to be redeemed in the eyes of the audience and have a new person to hate.

Like with other mysteries such as "Prisoners," it can be difficult to keep up the level of intrigue and excitement in the audience, especially when trailers can give away some of the movies biggest plot twists and tell the audience essentially what will happen. But "Gone Girl" takes a different route than most others with its point of view storytelling.

Nick Dunne (Ben Affleck) is celebrating his fifth wedding anniversary with his wife, Amy (Rosamund Pike), by spending the morning at the bar he and his twin sister own. When he comes home, expecting their annual wedding scavenger hunt to begin, he finds their home is wrecked and Amy is missing. Nick immediately calls the police, who discover traces of blood all over the house and begin to fear that something terrible might have happened to Amy.

I dare not say anymore on the plot, because that would give away the many twists and turns "Gone Girl" has to offer.

What I can say is that I found myself root for and against every single character at least once over the course of the film. At times, Nick is sympathetic for having his wife taken from him like that, but other times we learn just how terrible of a husband he was and you want to slap him.

But at no point was I tired of watching these people and their struggles. If anything, showing both the good and bad sides makes these characters all the more interesting and relatable. It is only natural to hide secrets and hold back those bad thoughts and moments that we all have. And "Gone Girl" is all about those secrets.

I can honestly say that I was never bored with "Gone Girl." Every scene had a reason to exist and added to the tense and gripping atmosphere. The actors did a wonderful job at making these multi-faced characters worth watching, even Tyler Perry who plays the lawyer defending Nick and has a retainer worth $100,000.

David Fincher adds his usual charm to the film, making the unnerving atmosphere even more creepy and unsuspecting. It makes the film more unpredictable, which is great for a mystery.

I can't say much more about "Gone Girl" without spoiling it for you, so go out and see this one for yourself. You will not be disappointed.

Final Grade: A



"The Judge" (2014)

I despise courtroom dramas.

Most of the time, they are simply two people talking back and forth over a crime that we most likely did not see, spouting legal jargon that I do not understand nor care about. Very rarely is there a courtroom drama that breaks free of this, but when it does it is films like "To Kill A Mockingbird" and "12 Angry Men" which break away from the tedious nature of the courtroom.

"The Judge" is a fine example of why the courtroom drama is boring and repetitive. Though the film has a stunning all-star cast, with Robert Duvall, Billy Bob Thorton, Melissa Leo and others, they cannot save a doomed script, riddled with clichés and unnecessary plot elements.

Hank Palmer (Robert Downey Jr.) is one of the best defense attorneys in Chicago and seems to keep his Tony Stark-like ego of being the best at everything. That all changes when his mother passes away and must attend her funeral in Carlinsville, Indiana, a place he had hoped he'd never return to, mostly because of his father, Judge Joseph Palmer (Robert Duvall). He tries to consul his family, while avoiding his father, and get out of there as fast as possible. But things change when the police find a dead body in the road and traces of his blood on the hood of Joseph's car.

Though that is a rough explanation of the plot, there is so much more going on, including a subplot about Melissa Leo's character, a former love interest of Hank, and the brothers of Hank who have their own problems to deal with. All the while, we're never told why Hank and Joseph hate each other so much, until the last ten minutes of the film.

Another problem with "The Judge" is its pacing. So many scenes drag on for longer than they need to be, all to give us clichéd dialogue and characters that have no reason to exist. The film takes its sweet time to get into the courtroom, as it would rather spend time in bars and looking at old film.

"The Judge" is two and a half hours long. In a story that could have easily been told in an hour and a half. The conflict between the leads is so forced and non-descriptive that it becomes infuriating to watch Duvall and Downey Jr. butt heads for all these unexplained reasons.

Overall, "The Judge" is cliché, poorly paced, unoriginal and far too long for its own good. While the cast does well with what they have to work with, they can't bring this film back. It's like trying to plug up the holes in an already sunken ship; it does not do you any good.

Final Grade: D-

Is "Seinfeld" really about nothing?

"Seinfeld" is often regarded as one of the most revolutionary and creative television comedies of all time. Many comedies these days, especially shows like "Modern Family" and "The Big Bang Theory," owe much of their success to the formula that began in Jerry Seinfeld and Larry David's brain child.

One of "Seinfeld"'s biggest claims to fame, and what set it apart from all other television shows at the time, was that it was a show about nothing. Where nothing is accomplished, nobody changes or learns anything and audiences would eat up how close it came to reality. Jerry, George, Elaine and Kramer were always the same people in every episode and, try as they might, they could never be anything more than what they were in the first episode.

But now that we've had some time to reflect and re watch many key episodes, can we still say that "Seinfeld" was a show about nothing?



For that, we need to look at a summary of a basic "Seinfeld" episode. Most begin with a piece of Jerry's stand-up routine, which sometimes is a bit of hint as to the events of the episode, followed by one of our bumbling lead characters complaining about something they don't like, such as the owner of the newest soup restaurant. Then a subplot is introduced with another character, typically about an opportunity that has opened up, like Elaine getting romantically involved with JFK Jr. As the episode progresses, these two plots will cross in some way and ultimately lead to disaster for all of our main characters.

So the question becomes, is that "nothing"?

While it could be argued that nothing was accomplished, as our lead characters have not changed and these events will go unmentioned after the episode ends, something was at least accomplished.

"Nothing" implies that there is no substance. That the episode never wanted to say anything and went nowhere. I don't know about you, but from that plot description, it sounds like the show is about something. That may vary from episode to episode, but it certainly is not nothing.

Take, such as, the episode "The Bubble Boy," where Jerry, Elaine, George and his girlfriend, travel upstate to a log cabin and relax for the weekend. Along the way, they decide to visit a fan of Jerry, a boy confined to a plastic bubble, but due to George's need to make good time while traveling, Jerry and Elaine lose him while they travel in a different car and have to stop at a diner for instructions, getting caught up in a fan obsessed with getting Jerry's autograph. George, in the meantime, gets to the Bubble Boy, who is rude and unpleasant to everyone. Things heat up when they decide to play Trivial Pursuit and the two argue over the spelling on one of the answers, to the point where the Bubble Boy has to be rushed to the hospital and an angry mob forms to attack George for what he did.



To me, that's not nothing. That is an instance of many little things adding up to the point where they become a big problem. On their own, these little things might be insignificant and meaningless, but when you put them in the hands of the right crazy people, they turn in monster problems. It can turn something like driving too fast to make great time into a weekend from hell and getting chased by an angry mob.

Because of this, I find that it is more accurate to say "Seinfeld" is not a show about nothing, but a show about the little things. How those little things are often taken for granted and when they stop being little things.

If you truly want a show about nothing, watch the first season of "Louie." In that series, random and unconnected events will happen however they please, with nothing really being accomplished by the end of the episode. There is no internal continuity, and Louis C.K. even said that if one episode messes up the continuity or message of another, that he doesn't care.



Maybe back in the 1990s, we felt that "Seinfeld" was a show about nothing. But now that we have shows like "Louie" to compare it to, we can see that at least something happens in a regular episode of "Seinfeld." Kramer might burn down a cabin, or George becomes a hand model only to get his fingers badly burned by an iron.

It should also be pointed out that what happens in most episodes of "Seinfeld" has some relation to Jerry's stand-up routine at the beginning and end of each episode. So, another interpretation could be that "Seinfeld" is about how a stand-up comedian gets his material. That Jerry hangs out with people like George and Kramer because it gives him even more of a reason to go up on stage and make people laugh. All the hijinks and adventures he gets into makes for wonderful stand-up material.

In the end, there are many ways to interpret "Seinfeld" and what it is about. But to say the show is about nothing seems a bit out of date. That notion has given way to the show being about the little things, or how a stand-up comedian gets his material.

Mini-Reviews #1

Man, I've watched a lot of movies recently.

To be more accurate, I've watched a few films over the last few months and have not written reviews on most of them. In particular, films on DVD, television and Netflix. I've continued to write reviews to all movies that I see in theaters, but anything else lately has taken a backseat.

So let's fix that with a new section of the blog, Mini-Reviews. I'd like to continue to talk about the movies that I watch, even if it is for a moment. These reviews will be about a paragraph in length and I'll do my best to condense my general feelings into that small space.

We'll begin by taking a look at...



"The H-Man" (1958)

Some people might write this film off as a "The Blob" rip-off, made by the same filmmakers as the Godzilla movies, but then you realize that "The H-Man" was actually released before "The Blob." Ishiro Honda, especially during his early days, had a tendency to combine other film genres with a monster subplot, like with "Rodan" and "The Mysterians." In the case of "The H-Man," it is a gangster movie with monsters that reduce other living creatures to piles of goo running around. As with most Ishiro Honda films, the effects are damn impressive, especially with how they're able to make the monsters move across walls and pipes. It's too bad the story and characters are so forgettable.

Final Grade: B-



"The Picture Of Dorian Gray" (1945)

This film is all over the place. Based off the novel by Oscar Wilde, the film follows a young Dorian Gray, who is extremely youthful for his age and wishes that he could stay that way forever, especially after meeting a wealthy socialite who includes in all sorts of seedy activities. After he gets his portrait taken, Dorian just might get his wish as the painting seems to be magical. This one is basically an updated version of Faust, a man who sells his soul to the devil in exchange for eternal youth, except that it finds a way to make the protagonist an even bigger jerk. Dorian takes the socialites words to heart and basically removes his morality along with his soul, leading him to all sorts of diabolical acts over a long time.

Final Grade: C



"Heat" (1995)

Life sucks and it will only get worse as you try to help other miserable people. That is apparently the philosophy of "Heat" and its main characters, a famous LA police detective (played by Al Pacino) who has marital problems and a suicidal step-daughter, and a long-time criminal (played by Robert De Niro) who has problems connecting with everybody. Most of the film is spent watching these two work off of each other, as De Niro tries to commit one last grand heist and Pacino tries to stop him. The best scenes of the film are when they face-to-face with one another, especially their first meeting in a restaurant and they discuss their own problems and that they will stop at nothing to meet their goals. It is silent but menacing, showing off the incredible range of acting between Pacino and De Niro. Still, the problem is that the film is far too long for its own good and gets way too caught up with the uninteresting side characters that it gets lost along the way. Though it does lead to a unique final showdown on an airport runway.

Final Grade: B



"Judgment At Nuremberg" (1961)

I walked away with a lot of new thoughts from this film, but the one that resonates with me still is that the Nazis, as evil and terrible as they could have been, were still people. They weren't monsters and they did what they had to for a reason. "Judgment At Nuremberg" is the trail of several former Nazis for their crimes during the regime, but this makes it clear that these men aren't the ones on trail, but all of Germany. We hear testimonies on both sides, and all of them are quite convincing, with the American side bringing up the lives of those effected by the Nazis have panned out, but the German side showing how what they did isn't so different from what the Americans have done. relocating thousands of people based solely on their nationality, medical experiments on the mentally challenged and dropping atomic bombs on innocent people. So in that regard, who is truly more evil? The Germans or the Americans? "Judgment At Nuremberg" is wonderful at taking something like judging Nazis and making it not as clear-cut as one would like to think.

Final Grade: A



"Captains Courageous" (1937)

If this film came out today, it would be critically panned and forgotten within a week. But in 1937, this was something unheard of, and had such an amazing cast that it would be impossible to ignore. Directed by Victor Fleming, who also gave us "Gone With The Wind" and "The Wizard Of Oz," as well as starring Spencer Tracy, Lionel Barrymore and a young Mickey Rooney, this film follows Harvey Cheyne, a spoiled brat of a kid who has every handed to him by his rich father, falls off a cruise ship and is picked up a fisherman and told that they can't take Harvey back to land for three months, so they teach him how to fish and become a man. This type of story has been told time and again and will be told many more times. But the performances and personalities of the fisherman can be fun to watch, especially when competing against other fishing boats. I'd recommend watching this film with subtitles though, as almost all the main characters are difficult to understand with their thick varying accents and the constant sound of waves pounding against the boat.

Final Grade: C+



"Little Caesar" (1931)

There's something about very old gangster films that I admire. Perhaps it is because they were made at a time in Hollywood where there were no restrictions or rules to filmmaking and they could show gruesome violence at its most beautiful. Maybe because the time of the gangster was still in effect while these films were being made, with Prohibition only recently ending as well as the Great Depression. Or it could be because the things we make fun of in gangster films these days are on full display here: Constant backstabbing, fast-talking high-pitched weasels who want to make it big, and as many "Ya' see?!" as you can imagine. If anything, gangster films like "Little Caesar" are a product of their times, but are certainly not for everyone. I respect "Little Caesar" more than I enjoyed it.

Final Grade: C



"Robot & Frank" (2012)

This film, more than most other science fiction films, gets right at the point of whether or not robots can have souls. That living creatures are a collection of thoughts and experiences that they're encountered over their lifetime, and that who we are comes from those experiences. So if a robot learns to not get bullied and can becoming an old man's friend, how is that robot any different from a person? Set in the not-too-distant future, where libraries are no longer needed and robots to help out those who need it are starting to come about, Frank Weld (Frank Langella), a former cat burglar with memory problems, is having a hard time adjusting to this new technological world, especially after his son gets him a robot companion. The robot (who is never named) wants to get Frank into gardening, but Frank has another hobby in mind: Getting back into cat burglary. This is everything a good sci-fi movie should be. It's relevant to the times, still has a sense of heart and wonder about the world, yet can be both funny, dramatic and touching. At times, it does not even feel like a science fiction film, but just a story about an old man who is out to try to have one last adventure in a world that has long since passed him.

Final Grade: A-

What I'll aim to do is continue to view movies on television, DVD and Netflix as I have been recently, and then every month or so I'll do another group of mini-reviews on the movies that I watched. If you like that idea, or completely disagree with it and would like to see full write-ups on these kinds of movies from now on, let me know in the comments below.

The Trouble With "Vertigo"

WARNING: PLOT SPOILERS AHEAD!

In 1958, Alfred Hitchcock took one of the biggest risks of his long and illustrious career. By this point, he had already released a string of successful movies, both critically and financially, including "Rear Window," "To Catch A Thief" and "Strangers On A Train." But these films led up to one piece of work, which Hitchcock said would be his masterpiece; "Vertigo."

And "Vertigo" was met with a lukewarm response by critics and only did fair at the box office. At the time of the release, Hitchcock considered it a failure.

It wasn't until after Hitchcock's death in 1980 that viewers decided to give "Vertigo" a second chance.

This led critics to discovering there was much more to it than initially thought, in particular the cinematography, dark storytelling and reflections on how Hitchcock treated his leading ladies within the main character. Over the years, "Vertigo" has steadily risen in popularity, including being in the American Film Institute's Top Ten Films of All-Time in 2007. It would reach the height of its popularity in 2012 when Sight & Sound Magazine declared "Vertigo" the greatest film ever made, surpassing "Citizen Kane" for that title.

It seemed that Hitchcock's masterpiece had finally deserved its rightful place.



So why is it that something does not feel right about this?

For as much praise as "Vertigo" gets, some of it does seem a bit undeserved. But let me make this clear, I do not hate "Vertigo" or Alfred Hitchcock. Hitchcock is one of the greatest filmmakers and was the king of suspense. One thing people always forget is that Hitchcock knew how to work the camera to his advantage and make it just as much of a player in the scene as any of the actors. He revolutionized many filmmaking techniques that are taken for granted these days, including the dolly zoom used in "Vertigo."

As for "Vertigo" itself, there are many aspects to enjoy and immerse yourself in. Like many of Hitchcock's works, the pacing is tight and focused, always keeping you on edge. Even as the lead characters drive around the city, you're unsure of what the lead female psyche will make her do next. The score is atmospheric and haunting, much like the many themes of the movie. Also, the cinematography of San Francisco and its loopy terrain makes the film all the more tense and beautiful to look at.

I feel that "Vertigo" is at its best when we simply watch Scotty follow this woman around town, as she takes in the flowers or observes the paintings, and Scotty watches over her like a hawk. Few words are exchanged and not much is accomplished, but these scenes add a level of horror and creepiness to the film that would otherwise be absent.



That being said, this movie has many problems that drag it down. In particular, "Vertigo" has an insanely convoluted story and an unlikable douchebag of a main character.

For those unfamiliar with "Vertigo" here is a basic plot description: John "Scottie" Ferguson (James Stewart) has retired from the police force after an altercation where a fellow cop died due to Scottie's acrophobia, fear of heights. But an old friend of Scottie decides to recruit him to do one last job; the man's wife, Madeleine (Kim Novak) appears to be possessed by a dead relative and intends to kill her. Scottie's job is to follow this woman around and make sure she stays alive.

As strange as this premise is, there appears nothing wrong with it on the surface. It is not until the film is halfway over that "Vertigo" gets crazy.

After Scottie attempts chases Madeleine to the top of a high church, but can't keep up due to his acrophobia, Scottie sees Madeleine's body fall from the top and land below, dead. Scottie, now completely out of it, wanders around aimlessly, as he had fallen in love with this woman. Things get so bad that he must be put in a sanatorium.

Once he is out, Scottie almost immediately finds another woman, Judy (also played by Kim Novak) who looks very much like Madeleine. Scottie follows her around, this time not being nearly as subtle about it, until Judy confronts him and takes pity on him, agreeing to go on a date with him. Yet, after a terrible date where Scottie can't stop obsessing over Madeleine, Judy keeps wanting to see him. She even agrees to start looking more like Madeleine, even dying her red hair blonde and getting dresses just like hers.

This all eventually leads up to the climatic reveal: The man who had hired Scottie to follow Madeleine had also hired Judy to look just like his wife and make Scottie follow her around instead of Madeleine, so that the man could murder his wife and get away with it. Scottie never actually saw the real Madeline, just Judy pretending to be Madeleine. The body that fell off of the church was the real Madeline, with her husband chucking her already dead body once Judy reached the top.

The reason Judy stayed around so long after the crime was complete was because she had fallen in love with Scottie and went through being made in Madeleine once again just to make him happy. Apparently, she would rather be a fake dead person who has Scottie than to be herself without this stalking obsessed womanizer who wouldn't kiss her unless her hair was just like Madeleine.



There is so much to discuss with the plot alone, but lets start with the basic question I've always had: Why did this one guy go to so many lengths just to murder his wife? I get that he wanted to make her death look like an accident, but did he really need to hire two different people to do very elaborate and distracting jobs? To do something like that, he clearly needed a lot of money, which he could have put to use in other places?

Of all the plans to murder someone else throughout the Hitchcock films, this guy's plan to murder his wife is by far the most elaborate, insane and easily collapsible plan of them all. What if Scottie had found out there were two Madeleine's? What if Judy decided to place her faith more in Scottie and tell the police what is going on? Why go with the whole possessed by a dead relative plan when it was just an act? Wouldn't it have just been easier to kill her with poison, take her body out to the middle of the ocean, tie a cement block to her legs and dump her over? Or hell, why did this guy want to murder his wife in the first place?

Yeah, that important question goes unaddressed. He just wants to murder his wife to see what it feels like. This wouldn't be nearly as bad if it weren't pulled during the last few minutes of the movie. We're led to believe that "Vertigo" is more about paranormal possession and getting over one's fears of the past, only to find out that this was all a convoluted murder scheme by a character that is on-screen for less than five minutes. This reveal makes me so scratch my head every single time I watch "Vertigo." Not only is it a moronic murder plan, but it reduces the roles of our main characters to pawns in this guy's scheme.

But then my favorite part of the plot happens: While Judy is telling Scottie about all that happened and Scottie scolds Judy about what she did, they have been climbing the same church tower that Madeleine died on. By the time they reach the top, Scottie has realized that he is over his fear of heights. All looks well for our couple, until they hear someone else climbing up the tower. Judy, scared that it might be the man who hired them, runs away but seems to forget that she is on a tiny ledge at the top of a large tower, and falls to her death. Out of the shadows comes a nun, who came to see who was climbing the tower. Scottie looks down at Judy's body, but at least his acrophobia was cured.

I'm not going to lie, this ending makes me laugh every single time. It is so sudden, so out of no where, and so disturbing that it is hilarious to me. It's made even more gut-bursting when you remember that this was supposed to be taken seriously. Yet here is our main female lead thinking that a man who hasn't followed her in months has suddenly come back, and runs over the edge of tower. That's something I'd expect out of a Looney Tunes cartoon, not an Alfred Hitchcock movie.

My overall point on "Vertigo"'s plot is that it is illogical and puzzling, even for an Alfred Hitchcock film. It works while Scottie is tracking Judy disguised as Madeleine, but once Scottie creeps on Judy after Madeleine's death, the film loses something. It becomes less about a man tried to redeem himself for his failure and more about stalking someone who looks like a dead person and making them look like that corpse. It's creepy and messed up, but that is what Hitchcock was going for, so I can't fault "Vertigo" for that.

I've talked about how Scottie does many unpleasant things in "Vertigo" but what really gets me is that Scottie is played by James Stewart, who is known for playing nice, lovable, average joe characters, like in "Mr. Smith Goes To Washington," "It's a Wonderful Life" and "Harvey." Yet here he is playing a guy who is so obsessed with a dead person that he makes another woman lose her identity and become this other person. He stalks, creeps and won't stop until he can get someone who never existed. That makes Scottie all the more disturbing.



If the main character of your story is so unlikable and unsympathetic, then why should I care about anything he does?

Some people might argue that this was a change of pace for Stewart and that Hitchcock was going for a disturbing feeling. To those, I say this is disturbing for the wrong reasons. You can have a relatable and interesting main character and still have a creepy atmosphere. But by making your lead be played by a man known for how friendly he can be just makes me think that Scottie is going to go beat up Jefferson Smith and George Bailey after the film is over.

Certain actors carry stigmas with them: Robert De Niro is associated with gangsters. Humphrey Bogart is associated with detectives and military officers. Rob Schnider is associated with terrible Adam Sandler flicks. James Stewart is another one of those actors.

When you think of James Stewart, scenes of "It's A Wonderful Life" come to mind, where he gives up his happiness and chance at the life that he wanted to save the lives around him, or "Mr. Smith Goes To Washington," where he stands in front of Congress and the entirety of the United States to defend the lives of innocent people, no matter what the odds are against him.

Sometimes actors can go against their stigmas and give wonderful performances. And while Stewart does give a one-of-a-kind performance, seeing him demand Kim Novak to die her hair and wear Madeleine's clothes does not seem right. It could have worked, but because I see those eyes of his stare at me with unflinching obsession, I know that this is wrong.



So the question is whether or not "Vertigo" deserves the title of "Greatest Film Ever Made"? I don't think it even deserves the title of Hitchcock's best film. I can think of at least five other movies made by Alfred Hitchcock that I thoroughly enjoyed and would not mind watching again, which include "Shadow Of A Doubt," "Strangers On A Train," "Rear Window," "North By Northwest" and "Rebecca" and "Psycho." Hitchcock's work has stood the test of time in many regards and many still continue to be as suspenseful today as they were upon their release.

But I would not call "Vertigo" a bad movie. For as much as I've bashed the film here, there is something to be respected. In a way, the movie is just as much about Hitchcock as it is Scottie. How he treated his leading ladies and used them as pawns in his own game of filmmaking. To him, they were nothing more than tools to be used to meet his goals, much like Judy was to Scottie. Hitchcock is putting himself on the screen for everyone to see, completely exposed and naked, in all his awkward, disturbing self. For that reason, I respect both Alfred Hitchcock and "Vertigo" for being so honest with us, but at the same time fun to watch.



Is "Vertigo" the best movie ever? No. But is it a film that deserves to be watched? Most certainly, yes.

The Hopper Returns!

"The Boxtrolls" (2014)

If you've read my blog long enough then you know how much I enjoy animated movies. It could be hand drawn, computer generated, stop-motion or claymation. So long as it has some grasp of imagination, creativity and still tell a well-rounded and fascinating story, it is a worthwhile experience. The problem is when the film fails to give the audience a story that is worth watching.

"The Boxtrolls" was created by Laika Studios, who have before brought us "Coraline" and "Paranorman," both of which are wonderful at balancing that carefree child attitude with terrifying surroundings. While "The Boxtrolls" has an inspiring balance of computer generated imagery and stop-motion, it fails to deliver on every other level and leaves a bittersweet taste.

In the town of Cheesebridge, the townsfolk must continue to deal with the same haunting problem: The carnivorous boxtrolls who hunt at night. The leader of Cheesebridge, Lord Portley-Rind, decides to hand over the task of dealing with these monsters to Mr. Snatcher (Ben Kingsley), who may or may not have plans for these creatures, if it means that he can get his hands on Portley-Rind's fancy white hat.

This film, much like its predecessors, looks beautiful. The animation is flawless, from the small little details of the city, to the large mechanical beasts that Mr. Snatcher uses. Not to mention, the world of the Boxtrolls is intrigue, detailed and makes perfect sense. They fully use their boxes to blend into their surroundings and are fascinated with machines and wish to build. The scenes where the Boxtrolls are in their home, building up to make a society, are the best scenes in the film.

Where "The Boxtrolls" falls apart is everywhere else, in particular the story. There are so many clichés and repeated scenes from other films that I could predict exactly how the film would go after just twenty minutes. The Boxtrolls aren't actually monsters, just misunderstood, and the humans are the real monsters by hunting them down and not caring about anything other than themselves. We've heard this so many times before that its just eye-rolling by now.

This is made even worse when you realize that the characters development is more flat than the animation. Outside of the main character, a boy who thinks he's a Boxtroll, no one changes over the course of movie. The villain is obsessed with getting a white hat, for vaguely explained reasons, the love interest insists on telling gory descriptions to stories, and Lord Portley-Rind is the worst offender of all.

One of the main lessons, I think, is that adults are supposed to set a good example for their children to help raise them. Except that Portley-Rind never comes to this revelation. By the end, he is still a greedy bastard who cares more about cheese than the safety of his town and is extremely hesitant to give up his white hat just to save his daughter. Far too much emphasis is put on that white hat without giving the audience a good reason to care about it.

"The Boxtrolls" is a sad movie. I don't mean that it'll make you feel sad, but that there was so much effort, dedication and passion put into this film, only for it to be so forgettable and disappointing. On the one hand, the animation and detail is stunning. But on the other hand, the story is bland at best and infuriating at worst. If you wanted to see this one, wait for a DVD release.

Final Grade: C-



"Tusk" (2014)

I've never seen a Kevin Smith movie before today. Now that I have, I'm glad "Tusk" is the only one.

Going into this film, I knew that it would be disturbing and off-putting. In fact, I expected that and wanted to see it more than anything else. But what I got was something far more over the top and unnecessarily disturbing that I left feeling disgusted for all the wrong reasons.

After traveling up to Canada to conduct an interview for a podcast, Wallace Bryton (Justin Long), finds out that the man who went to see had killed himself. Desperate for material, he finds an extravagant letter exclaiming about stories at sea and Wallace immediately wants to meet this man. He travels to a nearby town and meets Howard Howe (Michael Parks), a disabled old man who seems to have a fascination with walruses. As the night goes on, Wallace dozes off until he is face down on the floor and Howard stares over his body, ready to enact his plan.

I'll let you in on a little secret: I adore transformation stories. Tales of people turning into something that is either unhuman or far removed from what they once were are adventures that I can't get enough of. Movies like "Black Swan" and "The Fly" best personify this, as they show the descent into madness and how their mentality slowly turns to match their new bodies.

"Tusk" may try to be like that, but does not come close to what it aspires to be.

Rather than seeing Wallace lose his mind and sense of self, we get to see Howard torture him and mutilate his body to be the perfect specimen. All the while, Howard reflects on his life experiences and how other people beat him, used him and violated him. That the only compassion he ever received in life was from a walrus, which he in turn does unspeakable things to.

If the film is not attempting to gross you out with what happens to Wallace, then Howard's stories and justification for his actions are making you feel uncomfortable. I understand this is what Kevin Smith was attempting to do, but I feel that he overdid it.

If you are attempting to gross your audience out and make them feel disturbed by what they're watching, then you need the right dose of it. It takes the right amount of sanity and insanity to pull something like that off. If you overdo that, it ceases to be entertaining and enters the realm of torture porn.

That's what "Tusk" feels like. That you are watching someone get brutally beaten and you didn't ask for that. Some might enjoy how disturbing the movie can be and others will argue that being disgusting is exactly what Kevin Smith attempted. However, "Tusk" has far too much of that and it comes across as unnecessary. Overall, an unpleasant experience.

Final Grade: D

The Decline Of Comedies: Are They Funny?

I will be the first to admit that, over the past few years, certain genres of films have steadily been getting better than they ever have in the past. CGI has now gotten to the point where it is either harder to tell what is real and fake or is just so good that we do not care that it is from a computer, studios are beginning to focus more on having a good screenplay before anything else in the filmmaking process, and audiences are getting smarter and learning to not go see the same types of movies all the time.

But if there is one genre of film that has gotten worse over these last few years, it would be comedies. As Hollywood has pushed more towards the action and thriller genres, films that focus specifically on comedy and laughter have been going downhill and not doing what they're supposed to do: make us laugh.

I've mentioned this in the past, but comedy is an even more subjective subject matter than cinema. What one person finds hilarious maybe boring and dull to someone else. Good comedy, for the most part, comes down to the individual and their personal tastes. If you'd like to see my personal tastes in comedy, check the bottom of this editorial for the types of things that make me laugh.

However, something that has not been making me laugh lately are these film funnies. Last year, for the longest time, the movie that I laughed the hardest at was "Iron Man 3" until "The Wolf Of Wall Street" came along. This year, the only film that consistently made me crack up was "The Guardians Of The Galaxy."



Here's the thing about all three of those movies: They're not comedies.

The two Marvel movies fall more into the group of action/adventure/sci-fi with some comedy thrown in for good measure. "The Wolf Of Wall Street" is a heavily exaggerated depiction of an actual Wall Street stock broker. Humor is not the focal point of these movies, yet any time the over the top personalities of Tony Stark, Jordan Belfort or Rocket Raccoon are on-screen, I laugh so much that my sides still hurt the next day.

You know something is wrong with the state of comedy when a talking racoon is funnier than most of the big name stars.

Just to give you an idea of what I'm talking about, here are some of the "funny" movies released over the past few years that did very little for me: "This Is The End," "22 Jump Street," "Anchorman 2," "The Heat," "A Million Ways To Die In The West," "Don Jon," "The Secret Life Of Walter Mitty" and "Despicable Me 2."

While I could go on about why each of these movies failed to deliver, they do all share the same major complaint: They failed to make me laugh.

This is not even that hard to do. Just show somebody slip on a banana peel or make a funny face before getting hit in the face with a pie or something. Charlie Chaplin made it look so easy.

Part for the problem might be that these recent farces get too caught up in their own egos. Before the opening credits begin to role, the filmmakers seem to know they're going to be hilarious and everything they so or do is golden. Like when Jonah Hill and Channing Tatum act like tough gangsters pulling out their guns and posing, or the continuous set up for the slow-motion RV crash in "Anchorman 2."



This makes the film seem superior to the audience. That the filmmakers are so much better than you that they don't even need to be funny to make you laugh.

An example of how to make a fantastic modern comedy is "Hot Fuzz" or nearly any film directed by Edgar Wright. His films are filled with all sorts of hilarious moments, including visual gags, film manipulation, logic loops that make the villains motivation both realistic and hysterical, and still have great one liners with wonderful comedic setup.

Part of what makes Wrights' films so great to watch is that, not only are there so many jokes going on that you need to watch the film multiple times to see every little detail, but also that every little detail is planned out ahead of time. The way the camera moves, how the scene will be edited, what will be in the background, and most importantly, the script.



"Hot Fuzz" has one of the tightest screenplays I've ever seen. Every scene has a purpose, every character adds something to the story, all the lines of dialogue have a function that makes the film even better. Nothing is wasted, and that makes it stunning to watch.

But with a movie like "The Heat," you can tell the filmmakers are letting the actors improv most of their lines. Many of the scenes with comedy are not well thought-out or have much of a point to it other than to halt the story and try to make the audience laugh.

To matters worse, from a filmmaking perspective, there is even less thought put into it. Just look at the scene from "This Is The End" where Danny McBride and James Franco talk about masturbation. The camera hardly moves, only keeping the actors in the center of the shot, and very light editing. It is so undynamic that it makes the scene boring.

This makes it less of a movie and more of a improvisational act.

Edgar Wright and "Hot Fuzz" understand the boundaries of a movie and manipulate that as much as possible. You can show the passage of time with a few simple cuts and use of a montage, or have someone completely off screen and out of the viewers vision do something funny, like offer Simon Pegg a piece of cake when he's criticizing his fellow police officers.

What many of these movies don't seem to get is that this is not just an excuse to film whatever you consider funny and put it on the big screen. We can get that by watching a stand-up routine or going on Youtube and looking up our favorite clips of "Saturday Night Live." With movies, you must treat it differently.

I laugh at Jordan Belfort, not because DiCaprio has great improv skills, but because he is so far removed from reality and lives in his own little world where anyone who isn't the highest possible upper class is living a sad and pathetic existence. The comedy comes from the character and his antics, not necessarily the skills of the actor. This why Melissa McCarthy was funny when she played the loud-mouthed, independent yet screwed up woman in "Bridesmaids" but not the fifth time she played the same character in "Tammy."



We've seen Ron Burgandy get drunk on live television and be sexist towards women already. We've already watched the "Hangover" crew get lost and have no idea what they did last night. We've gotten enough of Seth MacFarlane acting like a prick. What else do you have?

Show us something new. Give us comedy that we've never seen before. With all the technology and wide range of actors at your disposal, that shouldn't be too hard. Just be bold, be creative, be surprising, don't play it safe and do something that you actually think is funny.

Movie Review: "A Walk Among The Tombstones" (2014)

Sometimes a movies' biggest crime is being average. Both a good movie and a bad movie can stick with you long after you are done watching them, though for very different reasons. Scenes, characters and story elements stick out to you that either made you excited to see more or were so poorly executed that you could not help but laugh.

But an average movie, one that is neither good nor bad, is forgotten rather easily. Very little sticks out and by the time you are done with your popcorn and walk out of the theater, you already don't remember the majority of the film. Maybe you'll remember a line or two or have one scene stuck in your head, but if you were tell a friend what happened in the movie, your description would be vague or scatter shot.

In a way, it might actually be better to be a terrible movie than it is to be an average movie. At least people remember the horrendous works of cinema.

"A Walk Among The Tombstones" falls into the class of an average movie. It is basic, by the numbers and doesn't try to do anything that would get people to hate the film. Nothing is that bad movie, and the actors do a competent job, but nothing necessarily sticks out or is that memorable. A good distraction for two hours, but not much else.

Matt Scudder (Liam Nesson) is a former New York City cop and Private Investigator, who decides to take on a case about a couple of kidnappers who seem to be taking the wives of drug dealers and holding them ransom for large sums of money, only to murder the wives anyway in gruesome fashion. All the while, Scudder must deal with the man who hired him and his wish for angry revenge and a homeless child who wishes to follow in his footsteps.



My biggest complaint with "A Walk Among The Tombstones" is that it clearly wants to be dark, edgy, gritty and be taken seriously, but never takes that far enough. The women in the film get killed in the most brutal and gorey way (great way to portray all your female characters, by the way), but we are only told about it. The kidnappers are meant to be sick freaks who do this for pleasure, but we don't really see them do anything that intimidating other than a few phone conversations. There is shady business being conducted with drug dealing, but we don't see anyone do drugs or how drugs are making anyone's life miserable.

It's like a crime boss who talks a big game and makes a lot of intimidating demands, but never backs it up. That's not a threat to be taken seriously, that's a child with a megaphone.

See, last year "Prisoners" did what "A Walk Among The Tombstones" attempted to do and succeeded. It told a compelling mystery set in a world of twisted and perverted people, and it made you want to see more of those insane people try to cope in this equally crazy world. "Prisoners" also didn't pull any punches with its subject and showed us every desperate step that our characters took to save the lives of these children, even if they did immoral things to get their kids back.

"A Walk Among The Tombstones" however wants to be edgy and disturbing, like other Liam Nesson films such as "Taken," but at the same time wants to play it safe so that the mainstream accepts it. The problem with that is this ends up pleasing nobody. The story gets watered down by many side characters that don't add much to the story other than to lighten the mood, and mainstream audiences are thrown off by how disgusting the film can be.



As I said earlier, the actors do a good job with what they're given and there are some good moments of suspense and tension, especially building up to the final climatic showdown. It is typical Liam Nesson-fare and we do get some good moments of him being a badass. It is strange how the older Nesson gets, the more he tends to go for the roles where he gets to be the action star who gets to throw punches and break some noses.

But again, "A Walk Among The Tombstone" does not do anything to catch your attention. Many scenes are predictable and clichéd by this point that you know exactly what'll happen three scenes ahead of time. As such, it's hard to recommend this film to anybody. If you like Liam Nesson, then you'll at least enjoy him intimating thugs over the phone. Other than that, don't expect much out of "A Walk Among The Tombstones."



Final Grade: D+