What’s in store for us on 9/3/10 when Machete hits theatres? Well I think this movie will be #1 at the box office this weekend, with a big cult following of Robert Rodriguez fans out there. In saying that, I think we are going to get the same visual effects that we got on Grindhouse but for some reason with the likes of Steven Seagal, Lindsey Lohan and Don Johnson, im hoping we don’t get soap opera acting. *Keep your fingers crossed* Ill definitely will have a review first chance I get to see it.

So, a few rules and a few more pitchers of beer later, we had devised a drinking game to help us make it through what we were sure was going to be a mediocre horror flick.  Drink every time we hear a bone snap, every time we see a crucifix, or every time someone in the theater screams.

Were it not for the crucifix rule, we’d have left the theater completely sober.

As it turns, out, we ended up leaving loudly disappointed in a movie that started out with promise, and ended in disaster.

“The Last Exorcism” is set up as a behind-the-scenes documentary about the life of phony exorcist Cotton Marcus (Patrick Fabian) as he goes about debunking his former occupation.  We meet Marcus’ family, his church, his preacher father…all in shaky shoulder-cam fashion typical with these fake documentary scary flicks.  And while the setup is fascinating and the characters are intriguing and relateable, the character buildign means that nothing scary happens for the first 45 freaking minutes of the movie!

It isn’t until we travel with Marcus to the heart of Louisiana swampland that things begin to get interesting.   After Marcus performs his stock phony exorcism on Nell (Ashley Bell), he crew packs up and heads back to the hotel.  It is there that it becomes painfully obvious that Marcus has made a huge mistake.

I won’t get into any deeper into the plot, but as you’ve probably seen from the trailers, Nell starts acting pretty strange.  The only problem is that the change takes place far too late into the movie, and even when the scary bits happen, they’re way too few and far between.  Director Daniel Stamm and writers Huck Botko and Andrew Gurland inexplicably feel the need to cut the tension with unnecessary travel segments and false endings that destroy the film’s pacing, which was already sluggish due to the overemphasis on setup.  Plus, the ending that ends up happening feels so over the top and fake that it makes the whole fake documentary style feel like a huge mistake.

It’s not that “The Last Exorcism” isn’t scary at times, it’s just that it’s not the kind of scary that makes people in the theater scream — and thus, totally ruined our little drinking game.   Now if instead of screams, we’d have drank every time there was an unnecessarily long driving sequence, we’d have been totally smashed!  2 out of 5 buckets o’ popcorn.

Here are a few films you should look forward to for the remainder of the 2010 year.

September

Machete 9/3/10

Resident Evil: Afterlife 3D 9/10/10

October

The Social Network  10/1/10

Saw 3D 10/29/10

November

Skyline 11/12/10

Harry Potter and Deathly Hallows 11/19/10

Red Dawn 11/24/10

December

Black Swan 12/1/10

Tron: Legacy  12/17/10

Over the years, I’ve apparently become a little bit predictable in my movie-reviewing.  Several people who read/watch me regularly (all three of them!) have brought to my attention that if the movie features lots of explosions and gunfire, I’m probably going to give it a higher rating than if the movie features Julia Roberts eating pasta, falling in love, and smiling like an idiot.

Now, to me, that seems like a perfectly logical baseline for cinematic criticism.  However, to dispel this alleged perception of man-bias (and because she’s got a weird little thing for Mickey Rourke), I took my girlfriend Koda to see “The Expendables.”  These are her reactions:

(20 minutes into the movie): “If I wanted to watch 4 aging actors sitting and talking, I’d have gone to see ‘Sex and the City 2′!”

(after Mickey Rourke tells an entirely-too-long-side-story):  “I like him better when he speaks broken Russian and only talks about his bird.”

(after somebody roundhouse-kicked a guy in the face, breaking his neck):  “Whoa! Never seen THAT one before!” (reactions like that are among the many reasons why she rocks my world)

(her reaction after the credits finished rolling): “There is so much damn talking. Schwarzenegger was funny. Statham kicks ass, can act, AND is hot. Austin plays Austin. Stallone does Stallone. Li was great. Willis was sort of awkward… And my bf Rourke was mostly meh. I like my action movies with a lot less words. That being said, when they did bring the violence they did it right. Oh! And the lack of situationally appropriate swearing was a little distracting.”

Couldn’t agree more, babe. In this movie,  the only thing truly “expendable”…is the dialogue (with the exception of the Arnold-Willis-Stallone church scene, which was all kinds of hilarious)

3 out of 5 bags of popcorn (but they’re the kind with way too many unpopped kernels at the bottom, so it’s really more like 2 out of 5)

1. The Killer Inside Me.  A small-town sheriff (Casey Affleck) is tasked to go “check out” the new prossie (Jessica Alba) that just moved into town.  What follows is about  90 minutes of rough sex and murder.  I’d tell you more, but even after seeing it, I’m not exactly sure what the plot was about.  It’s a little muddy, except for all the rough sex and murder.

2. The Girl Who Played With Fire.  I have to admit, I am unfamiliar with Stieg Larsson and his “Girl With the Dragon Tattoo” book series.  But I know that the second installment, “The Girl Who Played With Fire,” is rated R for “for brutal violence including a rape, some strong sexual content, nudity and language.”  So, it looks like I’ll be renting “The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo” this week to get better acquainted with Ms. Lisbeth Salander and her smutty adventures.  Again, is this what you thought indie films were all about?

3. Winter’s Bone.  While not as sexified as the other films, “Winter’s Bone” has got plenty to offer in the hard R department.  Rated R for “some drug material, language and violent content,” this critically-acclaimed tale of a woman’s search for her bail-jumping hick father through the Ozarks is a great opportunity for drama…and to hear people say use the word “kin.”

So, if you thought indie films were all about hand-holding and red balloons, you haven’t been to the Bijou lately.  And, if you have, good luck trying to sleep tonight!

Steve Carell and Paul Rudd team up in this hilarious comedy about Tim (Rudd) trying to get a promotion at work by using Barry (Carell) at any expense. This movie is a classic comedy film using one liners such as “you may say im a dreamer, but im not” and “it had to be shipped from somewhere, and im handling it”. Steve plays a very good “schmuck” and had me fooled with the bowl hair cut and facial expressions. Paul is his usual character that we have seen over the years and have grown to like (I Love You Man,  Role Models, and Anchorman).

This is the best type of comedy, when you are  laughing at someone else’s expense, and not your own. I mean who likes to laugh at themselves right? Dinner for Schmucks provides that relief. Zach Galifianakis (Therman) plays his weird self, (The Hangover) but he does that so good that I really believe, he believes he has mind control.  You will root for the Schmuck in this movie, which is by far the funniest movie of the year and should take Inception head on at the box office. 4 out 5 bags of popcorn.

This movie is so good I want to hang this poster on my effing wall!

In the world of cinema, the summer movie season is as boring as our own realities, and its remakes, updates, sequels, prequels, and brainless blockbusters cradle us in their comfortable predictability.  But every once in a while, a movie comes along that is so original, so stunning, so interesting, intelligent and exciting that we reflexively pinch ourselves to make sure that we’re not just dozing off during another “Twilight” sequel.

Well wake up, movie fans!  “Inception” is that movie!  It’s an intelligent psychological drama, an intense action epic, a bewildering crime heist, an artistic visual spectacle, all without being pretentious or boring.  Simply put, it’s the first movie I’ve seen since I became a movie critic that I will rush out and buy the day it comes out on DVD.  Hell, I’m considering buying an HD TV and Blu-Ray player just so I don’t ruin this movie for myself by watching it in standard def.

In “Inception,” Leonardo DiCaprio plays Cobb, who is an “extractor” — someone who sneaks into people’s dream worlds to make them dream up their deepest secrets so he can steal them.  As you can imagine, it’s the sort of lifestyle that gets one in trouble with the authorities.  But after a particularly stunning dream caper, a shadowy business magnate named Saito (a perfectly dangerous Ken Watanabe) makes Cobb an offer he can’t refuse: plant an idea in the mind of a rival business owner (Cillian Murphy), and all of Cobb’s legal troubles disappear. While extracting ideas from a person is relatively easy, planting an idea (aka “inception”) is all but impossible…for everyone except Cobb, who we find out later in the film has some experience in this particular field of mind-trickery.

But before the inception happens, Cobb and his trusty business partner Arthur (Joseph Gordon-Levitt at his intelligent best) must assemble their team.  This is where the film really gets interesting.  As we are introduced to Cobb’s new team, we are also introduced to the world of dream creation.  Any good action film (and make no mistake, there are plenty of white-knuckle moments sandwiched in all this brainy plot) is built around a strong ensemble cast, and “Inception” is no different.  With each new introduction, be it the Architect (Ellen Page), the Thief (Tom Hardy) , or the Chemist (Dileep Rao), a different facet of this multi-level heist is revealed…like that Leo’s wife Mal (a hauntingly menacing Marione Cotillard) is stalking his dreams, for some yet-to-be-revealed reason.

But even with an ensemble cast this tight, “Inception” is Leo’s show.  As Cobb, DiCaprio is a detective, a con artist, a thief, and a businessman…but also a tormented, guilt-stricken husband and father who has lost access to all he loves due to the choices of his past.    DiCaprio not only shows us all these emotions, but flows through them with such ease and believability that, once again, we forget that we’re watching him play a role.  Unlike many of his contemporaries, DiCaprio does not play the same character in each subsequent film.  He is not the same man he was in “Shutter Island,” or “The Departed,” or “Catch Me if You Can,” and yet, we can see how his experience in those roles is being used to make Cobb a more complete character.   In fact, it’s his most complete character to date, and I have no doubt whatsoever that after 3 nominations, this is DiCaprio’s best chance to date at that elusive best actor Oscar.

Salivating yet?  Because it only gets better from there.  With two “Batmans” under his utility belt, director Christopher Nolan has had plenty of experience with action sequences, and he’s finally gotten good at them.  Gone are the days of shaky close-ups where the audience never really knows who’s punching or kicking or shooting at whom.  The dream world of “Inception” gives Nolan and cinematographer Wallly Pfister the green light to slow things down when necessary, and the action scenes are fluid and hypnotic while still intense. Hans Zimmer’s score is equally appropriate, since music plays an integral part in the plot of the film.  And you know I’m totally in love with a movie when I start blowing kisses to Hans Zimmer.

With its perfect blending of brains, brawn, and beauty, “Inception” is Christopher Nolan’s masterpiece.  It is the realization of the potential that we saw bursting through the seams of thought-provoking films like “Memento” and “The Prestige.”  In short, it makes “The Dark Knight” look like a college film project.  I know Nolan and co. are already planning “Batman 3,” but “Inception” is so damned good that it makes me want to scream “No, Chris! No!  Don’t do it!  Leave the comic book melodrama behind!  You’re too GOOD for it!!!”

The world of summer cinema needs another Batman sequel like it needs another Spider-Man reboot.  What it really needs is more movies like “Inception” - movies that fulfill our wildest dreams of what the summer blockbuster can be.  5 out of 5 bags of popcorn…with butter and M&Ms in them! (seriously, don’t knock it ’til you’ve tried it!)

Calling all “Pink Ladies, Thunderbirds, Scorpions” and even those “Beauty School Drop Outs”- tonight is the night!

IF you are like me, upon hearing Grease: The Sing Along was coming to theaters you were immediately set on whipping out that Grease soundtrack, brushing up on all of your favorite songs, grabbing your pom pom’s and high-tailing it to theatres on July 15. And now it’s finally here! (And yes, I am prepared to actually, “sing along”!)The original high school musical has returned! Whether you’ve seen the original or it’s your first time, this is not something to be missed- so tell your daughter to turn off “The Hills”, detach herself from the iPhone and have a mother/daughter date night instead, she will thank you later I promise!

Because, in the words of Vince Fontaine- “It doesn’t matter if you win or lose, it’s what you do with your dancin’ shoes.”

-Amanda

Which song are you looking forward to singing- along to??

• “GREASE”
  “SUMMER NIGHTS”
• “HOPELESSLY DEVOTED TO YOU”
• “SANDY”
• “BEAUTY SCHOOL DROP-OUT”
• “LOOK AT ME I’M SANDRA DEE”
• “GREASED LIGHTNING”
• “IT’S RAINING ON PROM NIGHT”
• “BLUE MOON”
• “ROCK ‘N’ ROLL IS HERE TO STAY”
• “THOSE MAGIC CHANGES”
• “HOUND DOG”
• “BORN TO HAND JIVE”
• “TEARS ON MY PILLOW”
• “MOONING”
• “FREDDY, MY LOVE”
• “ROCK ‘N’ ROLL PARTY QUEEN”
• “THERE ARE WORSE THINGS I COULD DO”
• “LOOK AT ME I’M SANDRA DEE (reprise)”
• “YOU’RE THE ONE THAT I WANT”
• “WE GO TOGETHER”
• “LOVE IS A MANY SPLENDORED THING”
• “ALMA MATER”
• “WHOLE LOTTA SHAKIN’ GOIN’ ON”
• “LA BAMBA”