Now Playing At a Theater Near You

Finally caught American Hustle tonight and it was just meh. I much preferred Silver Linings Playbook. It didn't help that I was already tired when I went to see it but I kept wanting to go to sleep. The

Spoiler:

The Lego Movie was so good. I laughed like a loon, probably more than anyone in the theatre. When the Millennium Falcon turned up, I just lost it. I can honestly say that that thirty seconds or whatever was better than all three prequel films put together. Insanely good.

I plan to spend some time tomorrow screaming "SPACESHIP!" in my students' faces over and over again. God, that movie was way better than it had any right to be.

The Wind Rises was as sweet and thoughtful as any Miyazaki film. It felt very long though. My husband says it's one of his favorite Miyazaki films of all time, because it really captured what it's like to be an engineer. As I am not science-minded, I wouldn't say it's in my top 3, but I did enjoy it very much.

Took Plankton to see The LEGO Movie on Friday night and it was everything you guys said it would be. What a fun movie.

My favorite detail was the Astronaut's cracked helmet. I loved that they remembered that detail.

Saw The Grand Budapest Hotel at the weekend. It was very funny and quite violent. Ralph Fiennes was good enough that I no longer feel the residual taint of The English Patient. (I hated that film very much, obviously.)

I'm going to see Monuments Men tomorrow. Just on the off-chance, is there any post-credits scene?

300: Rise of an Empire is exceedingly stupid, exceedingly greenscreened, and exceedingly awesomely costumed. Eva Green steals the show from Discount Russell Crowe, and then in the last 30 seconds Lena Headey steals it right back. I'm pretty sure the working title was 300: A Lannister Always Pays Her Debts.

I saw Veronica Mars today and I loved it!  The only theater in my city that's playing it is downtown and I completely forgot they were having the big St. Patrick's Day Parade today.  So my parents and I drag ourselves downtown (where we never go normally, so we're shaky on directions anyway) and end up getting all twisted around trying to find a parking garage and trying to avoid all the road closures for the parade.  But we finally found one and had to walk, like, 6 blocks to the theater.  We barely made it before the previews were done showing, but I'm so happy we managed.  

It was so good!  It was a good mystery and I loved Veronica's arc.  I also loved all the cameos and in-jokes.  

Big spoilers for the main mystery:

I loved how they tied everything up pretty well, but still set everything up for there to be plenty of story left to explore in the books coming up.  I'm so happy and I can't wait for the books to come out.

I caught Divergent this weekend. I never read any of the books and I was able to follow along fine. It was ok. Not mindblowing and I snarked on a few moments with a friend afterwards but I didn't hate it.

I loved Muppets Most Wanted. Danny Trejo singing "God I Hope I Get It" from A Chorus Line was worth the price of admission alone.

I had no interest in seeing Divergent until my sister told me the main guy is Pamuk from Downton Abbey. Say WHAT??? I don't see it at all, but IMDb says it's true, so I need to see for myself. But probably in the dollar theater.

Snarryfan wrote:I loved Muppets Most Wanted. Danny Trejo singing "God I Hope I Get It" from A Chorus Line was worth the price of admission alone.

Agreed. I also want Constantin to be in every Muppet movie. I just about died every time he opened his mouth.

Guys, I don't even know, I went to see Sabotage, ugh WHY. Because 24 hours of constant driving rain makes me make bad decisions, apparently.  The plot is murky and inconsistent, every other word is fuck, and there are A LOT of heads blown off in a disturbingly realistic manner. The bizarre cherry on top of that sundae of bleh is genuinely good acting from the whole cast, especially from Ahnuld, Olivia Williams and Mireille Enos. (Side note: Bechdel test pass, and the two women are actually the most fully written characters. I KNOW.) There is a tense, character-driven, brilliant, bleak-as-hell action movie in there screaming to get out, and it doesn't make it. You get lots of shots of entrails, though, as a consolation prize.

Snarryfan wrote:I loved Muppets Most Wanted. Danny Trejo singing "God I Hope I Get It" from A Chorus Line was worth the price of admission alone.

That's pretty much what I've been telling everyone who's thinking of going to see it. I also loved Tina Fey's line, "Good night, Danny Trejo" - the fact she used his name slayed me (I don't think his character actually had a name but still, it was really funny. I was hoping he'd respond with "Good night, Tina Fey", heh).

And agreed about Constantine. I'd love for him to be a recurring character in subsequent movies.

Constantine: My name will go down as the greatest thief of all time!
Dominic Badguy: You mean our names, right?
Constantine: Of course. My name first, then spacebar, spacebar, spacebar... your name.

Hee! Loved that bit.

I also loved how many unhighlighted cameos there were. Like James McAvoy as the UPS delivery guy who brings the big CIA badge - I only caught that one because I noticed his ridiculously blue eyes as he turned.

This seems like one of those who is in town/who is on the lot today, pull them in for a shot movies. It's great. (But not as great as "Good night, Danny Trejo." That was one of the biggest laughs in my theater.)

I had no interest in seeing Divergent until my sister told me the main guy is Pamuk from Downton Abbey. Say WHAT??? I don't see it at all, but IMDb says it's true, so I need to see for myself. But probably in the dollar theater.

I didn't know he was going to be in it either, and didn't even recognize him during the film, but the first thing I said to my friend as the credits rolled was "the male lead worked for me." And he did as Pamuk too, so he is consistent in his working for me, even looking quite different from part to part.

Theo James is definitely the best thing in that movie. That and

Spoiler:

I don't know what kind of crack the 76% positive reviewers on RT are smoking; Noah is a ponderous, disjointed, absurd, and boring shitshow.  Case in point:

Spoiler:

It's all downhill from there. And all the costumes look like they're from Anthropologie. It literally looks, multiple times, like they're wearing jeans.

Cynara wrote:I don't know what kind of crack the 76% positive reviewers on RT are smoking; Noah is a ponderous, disjointed, absurd, and boring shitshow.  Case in point:

Spoiler:

It's all downhill from there. And all the costumes look like they're from Anthropologie. It literally looks, multiple times, like they're wearing jeans.

I know!  I'll admit, I wasn't that interested in this movie -  I saw it because someone else wanted to see it - but still, given the epic quality to the story, I didn't think it'd be THAT boring.  Darren Aronofsky's movies are a lot of things, things I sometimes don't care for, but boring they are not.  The cinematography was nice & the acting was quite good though Emma Watson

Spoiler:

 The whole thing just felt like it dragged on terribly.

Spoiler:

Went to see The Raid 2; it's almost 3 hours long, and they spend a good part of the first third establishing "plot," but really there's lots of the sort of action that makes the audience groan aloud in sympathy. Definitely a worthy sequel, as far as action movies go.

Saw Godzilla, thinking it would be a piece of brainless action schlock, but ended up enjoying the hell out of it. The human characters were pretty nondescript, including a sleepwalking Ken Watanabe, but my god, if I didn't love Godzilla. That thing was magnificent, every time it came onscreen I wanted to cheer.

The total lack of cynicism in the story and characters reminded me a bit of Pacific Rim, but unlike that film, I didn't suffer from battle fatigue.
It dragged a bit in the beginning, but avoided burning out early by not showing too much. The director kept teasing us with little glimpses of the beast, so when we finally see it in all its glory, it's all the more awesome.

It also wasn't as goofy as Pacific Rim, and was perhaps a bit too dour for its own good in places, but that Godzilla, man. Couldn't get enough of it.

Just got back from seeing Neighbors, or Bad Neighbours as it's called here in Aus, just in case we all confuse it with the soap opera. And I'm clearly 12 years old, because I don't think I've cackled that loud in a cinema in ages. Like it was an embarrassing amount of laughter.

My biggest issue with that movie is that I just cannot take Zac Efron seriously as any kind of threat.

Godzilla was pretty stupid and a waste of a lot of good actors, but the effects were great, and honestly, the worst thing about it was Aaron Taylor-Johnson. He might actually have anti-charisma.  An actual random dude off the street might have done a better job.

Neighbors was unexpectedly hilarious.  If nothing else, it confirmed for me that Dave is the superior Franco.

Man I thought Godzilla was awful. So. Much. Explaining. Instead of just getting to it and letting the fights happen. The effects were great, but I was so checked out by the time the interesting stuff happened, it almost didn't matter. The directing was crap as was the "acting" which was really a bunch of empty reaction shots or "pensive" concerned shots. The trailer was so good but the movie? Not so much.