THE LEGO MOVIE 2: THE SECOND PART Review

It was a given The LEGO Movie would eventually get a sequel, but it's kind of crazy it took five years for that sequel to actually happen. That said, Warner Bros. has certainly expanded the LEGO brand by giving LEGO Batman his own feature as well as delivering their only misstep thus far, The LEGO Ninjago Movie. And while there was some trepidation going into this delayed, but inevitable sequel given original directors Phil Lord and Chris Miller were no longer at the helm there was some hope given it was still their minds that conjured up the screenplay. Thankfully, Trolls director Mike Mitchell was brought on board and has successfully converted Lord and Miller's screenplay into a sequel that keeps things in step with if not necessarily surpassing the original. Of course, given the precedent set for the original and what it turned out to be versus the raised bar for the sequel and what it has turned out to be-that's a solid accomplishment and a resounding endorsement. That is to say, upon initially hearing there was going to be a movie based solely around the LEGO brand and the toys and properties they owned it seemed obvious the eventual movie would turn out to be little more than a cash grab; nothing more than one big commercial, if you will. To expect this was ultimately foolish given the creative team behind it as Lord and Miller delivered a witty, colorful, and (per usual) meta piece of cinema that took some unexpected themes and conveyed them in a manner that allowed the children to enjoy the toys coming to life while the adults latched onto those ever fleeting moments of innocence that come with raising children and attaching certain memories to their playthings. The LEGO Movie intentionally evaded everything audiences expected it to be, disrupting the status quo and turning heads, but how was something so inventive and appropriately rowdy supposed to then follow itself up with something as conventional as a sequel? Especially given the abstract qualities of the first and having to continue the same narrative while holding tight to the themes the first film so perfectly encapsulated? It turns out, the trick is to lean into such things even further; deliver the same goods in a different package and through different techniques. And though The LEGO Movie 2: The Second Part might feel redundant in certain ideas, the ideas it's pedaling never don't need to be heard...especially when they're this creatively catchy.    

PACIFIC RIM: UPRISING Review

A year ago on this weekend a reboot of the nineties hit show Power Rangers was released and embraced a more moody and grounded tone than that of its source material. This year, with Pacific Rim: Uprising what we have is what that movie might have been had it decided to go another route and play up the more cartoonish aspects of that super hero series. This is to say that Uprising is so bombastically cheesy in its reliance on knowing exactly what it is and delivering on exactly what it promises that it's genuinely hard to fault the film for doing what it sells itself to be. Pacific Rim: Uprising is a five year-later sequel that no one in particular was necessarily looking for, but is here given the amount of dough that original ended up making in China ($411 million globally on a $190 million budget, $111 of which came from China-almost $10 million more than the film made domestically). Of course, with this kind of sophomore slump effect weighing on the decision of whether or not to even continue the would-be franchise this second installment has come to us not from "visionary" and now Oscar-winning director Guillermo del Toro nor does it star Charlie Hunnam or Idris Elba, but instead is co-written and directed by Netflix's Daredevil season one showrunner Steven DeKnight and enlists the fresh talent of Star Wars-breakout John Boyega as the son of Elba's fallen character from the first film. Uprising jumps a decade into the future and intends to reboot Pacific Rim the opposite way that Power Rangers movie did the original series last year. Meaning, while the first Pacific Rim was a little too self-serious given its story and a little more moody than might have been necessary, while more visually detailed to be sure, Uprising plays things a little more straight-forward and is exactly the kind of movie I would have loved when I was seven or eight years-old; it's big, it's colorful, and it has robots fighting robots and robots fighting monsters. That isn't to say this is a better film than its predecessor-I don't think I'd go that far as del Toro still enlisted a fun enough tone and built an entire world from which Uprising benefits-and Uprising maybe complicates things a little too much with its story whereas that initial film was so cut and dry in that aspect it was almost shocking, but the important thing is that Uprising is a fun if not ultimately forgettable slice of entertainment that plays to its B-movie strengths.

First Trailer for PACIFIC RIM: UPRISING

I generally admire what director Guillermo del Toro does as I can appreciate the eye the guy has for filmmaking, but to be honest I was rather underwhelmed by 2013's Pacific Rim from a story perspective. I knew del Toro would be able to deliver on a visual level for sure, but that there wasn't a strong investment to be made in any of the characters or their plight of driving a seemingly obsolete special weapon in an effort to save the world from the apocalypse. More, I wanted to be invested in the world del Toro created and while there were certainly compelling elements to the original film it wasn't as wholly satisfying as I'd hoped. For further exploration as to why the film doesn't particularly hold up in my memory as being overly interesting you can read my original review here. Moving on though, we now have the sequel that was always something of an uncertainty. It was the huge numbers in China that convinced Legendary to move ahead with a sequel, this time Universal taking over the distribution for Warner Bros. In Pacific Rim: Uprising John Boyega takes over the protagonist reigns from Charlie Hunnam as the film begins a decade after the events of the original as Boyega plays Jake Pentecost, the son of Ideris Elba's character in the first film. Jake, who was a once-promising Jaegar pilot has become caught up in the criminal underworld, but when his estranged sister, Mako Mori (Rinko Kikuchi), gives him one last chance to live up to his father’s promise, he takes charge against a new wave of Kaiju attacks. All of that said, this first look at Uprising looks to be as visually promising as the first though I'm curious to see if new director Steven S. DeKnight (who worked as the showrunner for Netflix's Daredevil season one), who took over part of the screenplay writing duties once coming on board, will be able to make me more invested in this world and these people. That isn't to say I don't appreciate the visuals-del Toro's original was as inventive and grand as anything else the auteur has done-but while Uprising certainly looks to be a colorful action romp with Boyega having a lot of fun-his character teaming up with friend Lambert (Scott Eastwood) to pilot a state-of-the-art new Jaegar called Gipsy Avenger-I'm hoping it delivers on all fronts. Pacific Rim: Uprising also stars Jing Tian, Cailee Spaeny, Burn Gorman, Adria Arjona, Charlie Day, and opens on March 23, 2018.

FIST FIGHT Review

Going in with low to optimistic expectations there was no great weight on the shoulders of Fist Fight. It's February and Fist Fight is a comedy starring Ice Cube and what you get from Charlie Day in between seasons of It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia-which is more or less the same Charlie Day, but likely a little less energetic and manic due to his more lax schedule. There was no reason to believe Fist Fight would be a memorable comedic experience and it isn't, but it isn't the cheap altogether crap fest it very well could have turned out to be either. Rather, Fist Fight is a comedy that understands its premise is outlandish and unrealistic from the get-go and thus never takes itself seriously as a representation of the public school system (though some aspects could certainly be interpreted as exaggerated issues) and thus ramps up the ridiculous with every scene-testing the limits of how far the individual audience member is willing to go with them. It would be easy to drop off of the ride at any point along the way, but Ice Cube and Day offer a funny and different enough dynamic that the two parallel arcs are interesting enough to watch develop and culminate for the scant ninety minute running time. Sure, the premise is slim and one can feel the ride straining itself a bit as it nears the inevitable third act, but with a one-two punch of climactic scenes that includes both an elementary school talent show as well as the titular fight (which more than delivers on its promise) there is plenty to be pleased with once the credits begin to roll and the bloopers begin to play. Of course, Fist Fight isn't the pinnacle of comedic filmmaking and it certainly isn't what Thomas Edison had in mind when he imagined what his motion picture camera might one day be able to achieve, but as far as comic relief it is exactly that-it serves the purpose it was intended for squarely. We know what Ice Cube excels at and we know what we're getting when Charlie Day pops up on screen and the best thing to be said for Fist Fight is that it plays up those two personas until it forces them to collide and while that may indicate there is nothing new to be found in either the story or the performances it does mean it features two charismatic and admittedly funny people doing what they do best-what's wrong with that? Not a whole lot in my humble opinion.

THE HOLLARS Review

John is Jim and Jim is John and in his new movie, The Hollars, John is simply John. We're talking about John Krasinksi of course who parlayed his likable everyman gig on The Office for nine seasons into a brand all its own with which he will now try to both break (13 Hours) and embrace (The Hollars). In Krasinski's second directorial effort what we have is your standard tale of a white man who's been given little if nothing to overcome in this society other than his own emotions and how he deals with such emotional conflicts when his mother falls ill in the small town he ran away from long ago. It is in returning to this not only small town, but the man's hometown that we know our protagonist will learn lessons that might help him deal with his mental constipation. Naturally, there is a cast of quirky family members who are designed to be specific in certain ways, but just broad enough in others so that we may all find someone to relate them to in our own families. In venturing back to his homestead John with the titular last name rather than Krasinski comes to learn things about his parents and his other family members that he'd never been privy to before; intimate and mostly ugly details he doesn't necessarily want to know or see, but as something of the family savior he finds it his responsibility to try and put them back together. It is in this idea, this story arc that The Hollars attempts to differentiate itself from this genre of defeated middle aged men returning to their roots to remember who they really are by reminding themselves of where they came from. It is in this idea that the one who fled to search for more is the one who fled not wholly out of ambition, but also from the pressures imbued upon them by their clan. In The Hollars, John is the only character whose life is fairly average-he really has little to complain about aside from the fact he may not be where he imagined himself professionally at this point, but otherwise he lives in New York City and has a rich/hip girlfriend in Rebecca (Anna Kendrick) who is expecting their first child. The guy more or less has his stuff together sans a few emotional shortcomings, but it is in these emotional shortcomings that the crisis drives him to some interesting and introspective places that are hinted at through his re-connections with his hometown, but that Krasinski brushes over too broadly for them to really resonate instead resorting to genre cliché's to round out his movie.

VACATION Review

It was something of a surprise this new sequel in the Vacation series that also intends to serve as something of a reboot or re-make, but isn't really, included the line from the trailer about how this Vacation will indeed stand on it's own. It seemed a piece of dialogue specifically designed for the marketing campaign so as to let audiences know the movie itself was aware of what it represented and the pressures it might face in convincing audiences it was worthy of the challenge. This line, when given in the trailer, almost made the film more endearing (hey, it knows it has a lot of work to do), but the fact they included it in the final product gave an entirely different impression-one of desperation even. Maybe desperation is the wrong word, maybe a lack of confidence is a better way to put it. The statement itself wants to impose a sense of confidence though, a bold statement of this particular film being it's own thing and being successful on it's own terms whether there was an original or not. Of course, if this were a world where the original Vacation didn't exist we would have (a slightly altered) We're the Millers and that would be it. Instead, as brand recognition and nostalgia are at an all time high thanks to social media and our heightened sense of self-awareness it would be wrong to not try and capitalize on every big brand of generations past. And thus, we have what is essentially a remake (but it's a sequel!) of/to the original film where Stu from the Hangover movies plays a grown-up Rusty with call backs aplenty just in case you didn't get that this was in the same timeline as the 1983 film, but that it's still supposed to stand on it's own. These call-backs are of course intended to make audiences familiar with the 1983 version recognize the correlation and laugh while those who aren't will hopefully just laugh because...the comedy is timeless? All of these particulars don't really matter though as this is little more than a ninety-minute comedy intended to make audiences chuckle. When taken on such simple terms, it does it's job well enough. My qualm is why couldn't we do something with these actors/directors/writers that maybe didn't rely on tapping into nostalgia? If we keep re-making and re-visiting old properties what are future generations going to reboot or re-make? Or even worse, be able to call their own?

First Red-Band Trailer for VACATION Reboot

It's hard for me to admit, but I haven't seen any of the Chevy Chase Vacation films sans Christmas Vacation as the in-laws enjoy watching that every couple of years or so when Christmas in fact rolls around. I've seen bits and pieces of the original as well as parts of Vegas Vacation on TBS or TNT at some point in the past, but never have I sat down with the intention of watching any of these straight through. That looks as if it will change this year as Warner Bros. has decided to not necessarily reboot or re-make what you would typically label as a sequel, but kind of is, as it continues the story of the Griswolds, but more by treating us to the next generation of the family that started it all. Given I don't have as much of a history with this series I likely don't get some of the references or jokes that play in this trailer, but as it states outright this is a Vacation that will stand on its own and I can only hope it proves itself right. Ed Helms is playing the grown-up Rusty Griswold who is intent on picking his family up out of its current slump by recreating his childhood vacation to Walley World. Christina Applegate is playing his wife with Leslie Mann filling the role of sister Audrey. Both Chase and Beverly D'Angelo return as Clark and Ellen for what I assume are glorified cameos while Horrible Bosses and Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs 2 scribes John Francis Daley and Jonathan Goldstein take on their first directing gig. Vacation also stars Chris Hemsworth, Steele Stebbins, Skyler Gisondo, Nick Kroll, Charlie Day, Kaitlin Olson, Regina Hall, Keegan-Michael Key and opens on July 31st.

HORRIBLE BOSSES 2 Review

What do you get when you take an outlandish premise that every middle class American can relate to, mix it with a cast chock full of more diverse talent than any other comedy in recent memory and let them both free to wander where the wind takes them? That would be the original Horrible Bosses which, back in 2011, stuck out to me as one of my favorite comedies so far that year. It was just effortless. And that is saying a lot in a summer that also counted Bridesmaids among its hits. The film was immediately funny and fast paced with a cleverly written script that gave the summer season a feeling the raunchy R-rated comedy was here to stay. Naturally, after this type of high came the downslide with the less broad, but not as bad as everyone says Bad Teacher and the truly terrible Change-Up in which Jason Bateman also starred. Every year we get this slew of raunchy summer comedies intended for the masses that studios have thought we craved since Wedding Crashers truly revitalized their appeal, but only a couple, if any, ever break out to become genuinely funny over time or command real staying power. I liked Horrible Bosses the first time I saw it and probably watched it two or three more times once I bought it on blu-ray, but did it have the staying power of such recent classics that have also commanded sequels such as 21 Jump Street or Ted? Maybe not, but much like with the fellas from the Hangover series I simply like having the opportunity to hang out with these characters so a sequel seeing Kurt (Jason Sudeikis), Nick (Bateman) and Dale (Charlie Day) get into more mischief was completely acceptable and more than justified if not really necessary. At all.

New Trailer for HORRIBLE BOSSES 2

I was pretty taken in the dead of summer 2011 when Horrible Bosses showed up and gave us an original comedy that delivered moreso than the comedy sequel we'd been waiting on that year, The Hangover Part II. There was just something about the ensemble cast, the films carefree tone and slapstick roots that meshed brilliantly with the chemistry the three leads were able to pull together. In short, it became one of those comedies I could watch over and over again once it hit home video. In the days of short attention spans and legacies that never last though, if one wants to remain relevant they must continue to deliver and so this year, when we've already had both a successful original comedy (Neighbors) and a successful sequel to a comedy (22 Jump Street) it feels we're a bit spoiled by the fact we get another high profile comedy sequel, but unfortunately it also feels (at least on first impression) totally unnecessary. Don't get me wrong, like The Hangover trilogy, I wouldn't mind watching another one of these movies simply as an excuse to hang out with the leads, but the first film was such a solid single entry it seemed making a follow-up with the same characters having just as wild an experience would do nothing but devalue the memory of the first film. As is typically the case though, this new trailer for the film makes our boys look qualified for a comeback as kidnappers rather than murderers in pretty funny fashion. Horrible Bosses 2 stars Jason Bateman, Jason Sudeikis, Charlie Day, Jennifer Aniston, Jamie Foxx, Christoph Waltz, Chris Pine, Kevin Spacey and opens November 26th. Check out both the new trailer and poster after the jump.

THE LEGO MOVIE Review

Upon initially hearing that there was going to be a movie based solely around the Lego brand and the toys and properties they owned I believed it would turn out to be nothing more than a cash grab, something to build the name (not that it needed it) or possibly expanding the brand may be a better way to approach it. Essentially, I expected this to turn out to be nothing more than one big commercial. There was little reason for it to be more than that, why waste such effort or creative juices on something that would no doubt deliver zero gratification in the end and would only serve as something to decrease further the credibility of Hollywood products and the way in which children's entertainment disparages its audience much of the time allowing itself to get away with body function jokes and funny voices rather than actual, contextual humor? So, why would directors Phil Lord and Chris Miller, who took something like the beloved 1970's Judi Barrett children's book Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs and turned it into a witty, colorful piece of cinema that took some unexpected themes and conveyed them in a manner that allowed the children to enjoy the food falling from the sky while the adults latched onto the insight the story might be re-educating them on, but was at least delivering it to them in a new, almost inspiring light? That these guys went on to direct something like 21 Jump Street, a reboot of an 80's property that no one really put much faith in, and turned it into not only one of the best films of 2012 or one of the better comedies to come out in a good while, but a movie that used its interesting concept to delve into the strange dynamics of male friendships and the actual struggles it takes to maintain those types of friendships as each individual grows up and changes? That film didn't have to be anything more than a re-make slapped together by a board of executives to satisfy humor-hungry teens who move from R-rated comedy to R-rated comedy without a care, but Lord and Miller made it something more, something notable. All of that is to say that the directors have done the same here; they have transformed what could have been that one, massive commercial into something of a reminder, a love letter in ways to the spirit of childhood and how the imagination is just as precious as the adequacy we need to feel as adults. In short, The LEGO Movie is magical and reminds us of how simple it is to feel that little something extra.

PACIFIC RIM Review

As I sat watching the latest from director Guillermo del Toro I couldn't help but wonder how much I would have loved this had I seen this movie when I was seven or eight. It likely would have been an earth shattering event, a childhood defining piece of entertainment that would influence countless Halloween costumes and inspire me to want to make my own monster movies. Unfortunately, I'm not seven or eight but was still able to sit in awe as these giant, man-made robots did battle with these monsters from the deep that have come to be known as Kaiju. If you are going to see Pacific Rim it is likely due in large to this aspect and on that basis the film delivers in spades. It was admittedly nice to walk into a big summer action film in the vein of something that is usually part of a franchise (and if this does well enough financially, it soon enough will be) and being able to know you can expect something new and fresh that requires no prior knowledge or research. With so many of these comic book adaptations and reboots being produced with hopes of cashing in on name recognition it feels somewhat of a rarity to have a studio lend this type of film the budget it needs to be and look credible enough that we become so invested in these people and the world they live in that we want to go on another adventure with them. Pacific Rim is a sometimes cheesy, but mostly raucous good time that is aided by the fact it has a very straightforward story, characters we can root for and no intentions of being anything other than flat-out, B-movie entertainment. I wasn't overly looking forward to the project and have never really understood the fascination that has come to surround del Toro as I enjoyed the Hellboy films as well as Pan's Labyrinth, but besides a signature style didn't see much in the way of why his name was being singled out so heavily as being so creative. With this film, the director has given me reason to know that he really understands the audience he is making his films for. I still wasn't as enthralled or as wowed by the film as I'd hoped, but was at least entertained enough to say that Pacific Rim is the kind of summer action movie we don't get enough of these days.  

MONSTERS UNIVERSITY Review

Leave it to Pixar to deliver a movie that is not only fun, but honest in a way most films for kids tend to avoid. When movies aimed at the younger set skew the truth in order to make everything turn out in the best of ways for the main characters it is hard to sometimes take the lessons it is trying to teach with more than a grain of salt. Now, given the fact we know where the story of Mike (Billy Crystal) and Sully (John Goodman) eventually ends up it is not without surprise it was an adventure getting to that point, but what is slightly surprising is the way in which they so effortlessly stumble upon their careers in a world that's been completely imagined and realized through technology. This authenticity of the world created for these movies lends itself well to the lesson here that you aren't always going to get what you want no matter how hard you work, but instead the cold truth has to be accepted and in some ways you come out stronger and more proud having admitted and come to terms with your own weaknesses. Though the idea of hard work always paying off is a nice sentiment and in a perfect world might be true, the real world doesn't always allow our dreams to pan out the way we hoped and so we have to adjust to fulfill the potential of the hand in which we were dealt. That all may sound somewhat insightful given the fact the point of discussion here is an animated film, but that is what continues to set Pixar so much further ahead of the pack. Sure, they've had their missteps over the past few years as no one was asking for a sequel to Cars and despite the fact I found it gorgeous and engaging the majority of audiences and critics weren't too pleased with Brave. Monsters University may not be the return to top form the majority of people are hoping it will be, but by this point the bar is so ridiculously high for Pixar it is almost unattainable. On the plus side, this prequel to 2001's Monster's Inc. is a hilarious and colorful adventure that will have the kiddies in stitches and the parents chuckling at all the references and college humor their children are too young to even comprehend.  

First Trailer For Guillermo Del Toro’s PACIFIC RIM

I am not a huge fan of Mr. Guillermo del Toro but I enjoyed Pan's Labyrinth and the Hellboy movies well enough to look forward to what he is doing next and a ton of fanboy anxiety has been circling that project. Titled Pacific Rim and documenting the rise of massive monsters from our own seas and the human race attempting to fight back by creating weapons known as Jaegars that can be controlled by human pilots from a distance. The concept is pretty interesting but the visual flair you expect from such a project seems a little unfinished in this first trailer we have been delivered. I did not know much concerning the plot going in, but it was hard to avoid the posters and talk of the film after this years comic-con. I am excited to see how this turns out because there is certainly a level of expectation with del Toro but despite having an interesting idea the way the story looks to be executed could prove tiresome and overly familiar to a summer audience looking to find something new rather than, dare I say it, Transformers or Battleship. The quality may end up (and hopefully will) being miles ahead of those films, but this trailer does have a slight feel of deja vu to it. Still the film has an international cast led by a charismatic Idris Elba and also features Charlie Hunnam, Rinko Kikuchi, Ron Perlman, Charlie Day, and Clifton Collins Jr. Pacific Rim is slated to hit theaters on July 12, 2013 in 2D, 3D, and IMAX 3D.