I picked up Tim & Eric’s Billion Dollar Movie (because of course I did) and sat down and watched the whole film again with commentary with Tim and Eric. There’s something very interesting about Tim and Eric and their approach to “commentary” in one way or another so I wasn’t sure what to expect.

Select episodes of their first show - Tom Goes to the Mayor, along with the first season of Tim and Eric: Awesome Show, Great Job! featured pretty normal commentary. They would tell stories of absolute absurdity of what happened on the set, the people responsible for ideas and how some of the casting decisions were made. After the first season of ASGJ, there was no more commentary. Instead, Tim and Eric began to make the rounds on TV and radio being their characters of themselves - over the top and outrageous. I was surprised that the commentary for Billion Dollar Movie was much more similar to their other commentaries though, and was taken fairly seriously.

If you haven’t seen this film yet, please rent it. If you’re a big Tim and Eric fan - you won’t be disappointed. It’s amazing.

Buy it on Amazon.ca:
Tim and Eric’s Billion Dollar Movie - DVD
Tim and Eric’s Billion Dollar Movie [Blu-ray]

Very excited about this.

Avengers was the perfect superhero film. I know you’ve heard all of the positive reviews by now, and I’m sure some of it seems like the film has been over-hyped - but it hasn’t. It’s just that good.

The film is incredibly perfect: the pacing, storytelling and character developments are spot on. Everything happens in such a comic book way that it feels like the first film of its kind. No one character overshadows another, everyone gets a great story and nobody seems “useless” (I’m talking to you, Hawkeye and Black Widow). Despite a team consisting of The Hulk, Thor, Captain America and Iron Man, every other character is able to stand out on their own and contribute to the initiative in their own way.

Of course, there’s added benefit to knowing the back stories of all of these characters - it almost seems essential to have seen Thor (despite being quite possibly one of the weaker standalone stories just behind Captain America). I have a complete love for all things superhero though and I’ve seen and own all of the films so far, aside from The Incredible Hulk.

My problem with The Hulk is that the studio keeps trying to jam him down an audience’s throat. Edward Norton’s Bruce Banner in 2008 was a huge leap in the right direction, but replacing him with Mark Ruffalo seemed like a really dangerous idea. Turns out it had absolutely nothing to do with the actor and absolutely everything to do with the writing. Joss Whedon really made Bruce Banner accessible to the viewers, and I finally found myself in awe at the incredible fury of The Hulk as if for the first time.

I could talk about this film for hours - and have. I honestly could go on and on about how much my nerd senses tingled after watching it. Get out there and see this film. You won’t be disappointed.

Buy it on Amazon.ca:
Iron Man
Thor
Captain America
The Hulk

I’ve never been a crazy huge fan of the Mission Impossible films. I’ve always enjoyed watching them, but I was never adamant about it. I never really cared whether or not I eventually got around to watching them and only saw the second one in theatres because my dad had a free pass. They’re fun and full of action, but overall for me - they’re just there.

After burning through all three of the Bourne films a couple years ago, I realized that the pacing and style of these James Bond-esque films really piqued my interest. The style, action and storyline were thoroughly engrossing and I realized that this type of film was what Mission Impossible was always missing for me. The action and suspense was always good, but it felt like all the “in-betweens” were lacking. The dialogue was okay, but it just felt like placeholders to get to more action.

The fourth film isn’t much different, although I felt it did inject more humour than was necessary. The ensemble cast seemed forced and I think the film could have benefited from a better script. The writers have done a lot of television writing and producing on Alias, October Road, Life on Mars and Happy Town and I feel like the short form episodic writing style was probably detrimental to MI:4. The story seemed forced, but the action and suspense was very well done. It went a little heavy on CGI this time, but if it weren’t for these scenes - the film wouldn’t have even been worth it.

I also thought it was interesting to see Jeremy Renner in a more action-heavy role. It gave me a little bit of hope that his role in the new Bourne films might be worth watching after all. There’s something about Jeremy Renner though (and it could have something to do with the fact that he always plays the worst people) that I don’t really like. I feel like he’d be a jerk in real life or throw a tantrum and I have a really hard time watching him on screen. Only time will tell I suppose.

Overall, the film is good. The action is great but the film is just fine. It’s worth a watch and I’m sure those who have more invested in the Mission Impossible series will enjoy it more than I did, and good for them. There was a plant for another entry in the series at the end of the film, so we’ll have to see what happens.

Buy it on Amazon.ca:
Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol - DVD
Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol (2-Disc Blu-ray / DVD / Digital Combo)

I’ll keep my review on The Darkest Hour brief. It was bad. 

Okay, I’ll elaborate a bit: The Darkest Hour had a lot of good things going for it - a half decent plot, interesting special effects…and maybe that’s it. The film centres around young entrepreneurs who are trying to sell a hook-up website to a bunch of Russians and get cut out of the deal by their business partner. Upon defeat, they end up at a bar the night when invisible monsters crash land on Earth - and these monsters begin vaporizing everyone in their path.

The trailer for The Darkest Hour makes the film look interesting, action-packed, and overall like a really awesome post-apocalyptic film about a group of survivors fighting off these aliens. There was maybe a total of 15 minutes of action throughout, the rest was some of the most poorly written dialogue and cliché “survivor” moments that just turned my stomach. 

It was just bad. The special effects were cool. Everything else was bad. Bad. Bad. Bad.

Buy it on Amazon.ca:
Darkest Hour - DVD
Darkest Hour [Blu-ray]

Insomnia is somehow the only Christopher Nolan film I have never seen. I’ve seen Following, Memento, Batman Begins, The Prestige, The Dark Knight and Inception and loved every single one, but somehow missed Insomnia. This film wasn’t rated or reviewed very highly, most likely due to the content and slow, methodical pacing of the film, and the sometimes chopping writing and editing - but it was very good.

The film feels very much like a matured, less surreal version of Twin Peaks. A detective is sent to an isolated northern town to investigate the murder of a local female teen. The girl has a boyfriend who is rough around the edges, is secretly sleeping around with her best friend, and rides a motorcycle. Meanwhile the detective (in this case Pacino) is suffering from crippling insomnia which is causing hallucinations and is crippling his decisions.

I found the film to be stressful and managed to capture my interest thoroughly. It definitely isn’t my favourite work by Christopher Nolan, but I would put it on the chart above Batman Begins as my second-to-least favourite film he’s directed (Which isn’t to say it’s bad - it’s excellent. It’s just hard to map something like this out against so many other successful films in his career so far). I would highly recommend checking it out - especially if you enjoyed Twin Peaks. I really felt like Nolan took some of the atmosphere from that show and transposed it into his film. Check it out - it comes highly recommended.

Buy it on Amazon.ca:
Insomnia [Blu-ray]
Insomnia - DVD

Somehow I never reviewed 21 Jump Street, despite seeing it in theatres twice.

Christopher Miller and Phil Lord can do no wrong. They made one of my favourite animated cartoons of all time - Clone High, and one of the funniest, witty and all around bizarre animated films - Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs. Their writing credits are a bit more muddled, having written a couple episodes of How I Met Your Mother and Extreme Movie - but directing wise, it’s pretty much three for three with 21 Jump Street.

The question isn’t really “is 21 Jump Street a good film?” The film itself is fairly one dimensional and the storyline is predictable, but it’s just fun. The film is very funny and Jonah Hill hits it out of the park again for the first time since Superbad (his minor roles in Walk Hard, Forgetting Sarah Marshall and Funny People are always very funny, but lacked the sort of introductory “punch” that Superbad had). The film is sharp and very aware of itself the entire time, but that’s what makes it so appealing.

I have to also say that the supporting cast did an outstanding job, and in this case I think I would lump Channing Tatum in this category. He played his character very well and for the first time ever I thought he was really funny, but he was still Channing Tatum. My brain exploded when I looked into IMDB to find out Dax Flame was in this film - and that he did a really good job. Then there was Brie Larson, Dave Franco, Rob Riggle, Chris Parnell and Ellie Kemper, and Johnny Simmons (who played Young Neil in Scott Pilgrim and who absolutely stole the show in 21 Jump Street for a 30 second appearance).

It comes highly recommend. It isn’t high brow, it isn’t artistic or mind-blowing. It’s just fun, and fun is good.

Another film I finally got around to seeing was Kevin Smith’s Red State. I’m sure everyone knows by now that I’m a huge Kevin Smith fan, yet this one slipped through my fingers when it was released. I had lost my job and couldn’t really justify purchases when it came out on DVD and Blu-ray - so I just watched it this past weekend. It was also really good.

It was great to see Kevin Smith do something different. I have to admit that it definitely had a unique sense of cinematography - much different than the other films that he had done in the past. I remember thinking when I saw Zack and Miri that it was really surprising to see how far he had come in an actual directing style, and Red State takes that up a notch and even further. The almost complete lack of comedy really helped make this film stand out against everything he’s done in the past. Sure, it was still lewd and crude at times and was dialogue intense (as it is Smith’s strong suit and style), but it was breath of fresh air.

It’s hard not to comment on the “religious” aspect of the film as the premise centers around a parody of the Phelps family and the Westboro Baptist Church. The entire film is about religious extremists and the incredible lengths these people will go to for their religion. I won’t comment or go off on a tangent about my opinions on the subject other than to say that it’s absurd and the film does paint a very telling representation of these types of people.

I would highly recommend this film to anyone who is interested in something that hangs on the edge of “horror” or appreciates Kevin Smith films. It’s nice not to hear a “snoochie boochies” throughout a film for once and for an independently produced and advertised film I think he did a great job.

Buy it on Amazon.ca:
Red State - DVD
Red State [Blu-ray]
Kevin Smith: Too Fat For 40 [Blu-ray]

Somehow I completely missed out on the whole Pee-Wee Herman craze. I don’t know what happened or why, but I never saw any of his show, any of his appearances (aside from clips here and there), or this original film by Tim Burton. It just completely passed me by. That’s not to say I didn’t appreciate his type of humour, it just never clicked until very recently. I had watched Pee-Wee Herman Live on Broadway a couple of months ago and was just blown away at how incredibly sharp and funny Paul Reubens is. 

The film is really great and not over the top Burton-esque. There are some scenes where Burton takes great liberty and creates his usual nightmare dreamscapes where crazy things happen, but the film relies heavily and almost primarily on Pee-Wee Herman and Reuben’s acting. He’s able to move the film along without it feeling too long or stale or even boring at any time. It’s witty and clever and insane - but that’s what makes it perfect.

If you’ve never been a big Pee-Wee Herman fan, or just don’t “get it” - I have to recommend watching this film. It’s ridiculous in the best way. Here are some of my favourite clips to whet your appetite.

Buy it on Amazon.ca:
Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure - DVD
Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure [Blu-ray]
Pee-Wee’s Playhouse: The Complete Series - DVD
Pee-Wee Herman Show on Broadway - DVD
The Pee-Wee Herman Show on Broadway [Blu-ray]

I have no idea what took me so long to see UHF. I love Weird Al and always have. I watched his TV shows and I’ve listened to all of his albums for as long as I can remember - but somehow I never saw UHF. I remember when I was in grade 9 it was 2am and my friend Erik put the film on but I was so tired I just fell asleep. Almost a decade later I watched it all the way through…and it was good!

I use the word “good” loosely because the film itself isn’t very good. The acting is bad and the writing is horrible, but it’s so incredibly cheesy…so incredible…”Weird Al” that it’s something that I really enjoyed. The premise is very simple - Weird Al as “George” takes over a dying TV studio and creates wacky and weird programming for viewers. This all occurs while a rival network tries to destroy the station.

There were a lot of instances that made me think of Airplane! or The Naked Gun, or Hot Shots. Just pure insanity and ridiculous in your face parody and humour that doesn’t really exist to the same extent now. Unless something is a direct rip off of another idea, it seems like those Scary Movies and everything that came after doesn’t really have the same mocking “parody” that exists in these types of films.

If you like Weird Al - then watch this film. Don’t be like me and wait your whole life for something that has been out for almost 25 years. 

It’s been out for so long that there aren’t even any new copies of it on Amazon.ca - just used ones from authorized resellers.