Finally got around to going to the MoMa and seeing the esteemed Tim Burton exhibit. Good thing I bought tickets last week as this thing has got to be the most popular exhibit the museum has ever seen and was sold out by the time I walked out a little after 1:00 pm. Even before I knew who Tim Burton was I knew his movies. They are dark, twisted, but comedic and humorous films who’s images seem to stick with you long after they are over. To name a few; Peewee’s Big Adventure and Beetlejuice among others. Both are classics of course and two of my favorite childhood movies. My father and I used to regurgitate Beetlejuice lines to each other from that very impressionable time in my childhood. “Hey there goes Elvis, YO KING!” is one that still resonates to this day.

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Good but not great. I’ve been wanting to see this movie for a long time due to the hype of course behind the Scorsese directed picture. It seems they had been running previews for this thing for a year and because DiCaprio came off a stellar performance in The Departed, I was looking forward to it. The previews were a little misleading. They almost made it seem like it was a horror, where Shutter Island was a haunted place and something like the house in The Shining. In terms of the actual movie, Leonardo definitely delivers as the great actor he is and you can’t take that away from him. Without a doubt he makes this movie worth seeing. I also liked how this movie was shot and developed like a novel keeping true to Dennis Lehane’s best seller, where themes were actually prevalent, keeping things tight and nicely connected. However, when it comes to everything else, I felt like I saw it a few times already; between the island, prisoners/patients, mental institution, corrupt cops and doctors. All of which make for an extremely predictable and traditional recipe for a “creepy” movie. Without giving it away I will say, there is ONE movie in particular from within the past 10 years, which Shutter Island lends itself to so much that as soon as the plot was revealed, I immediately thought “wow this is the 2010….” This type of realization coupled with what actually happens was mildly annoying. On the other hand, if you do not predict what will happen before it actually does, you will enjoy it a lot more. 3/5

Last night I finally succumbed to all the hype by everyone I’ve come across who has seen Avatar, and bucked up the $13 for a ticket and a pair of 3D glasses to see it for myself and extremely glad I did. This one actually lived up to it. Avatar basically about the US trying to expand on another planet called Pandora which is inhabited by another race of humanoids.   A paraplegic man named Jake Sully played by Sam Worthington, a marine, is chosen to control his deceased scientist brother’s Avatar and go to Pandora to carry out the expansion. An Avatar is a genetic representation of a human being in the physical form of a Navi; a humanoid indigenous to the planet Pandora. Basically scientists came up with Avatars to walk amongst the Navi, learn about the Navi people, their way of life, and ultimately control them with brute force.  It is very similar to what the British did to the American Indians and money other countries colonizing foreign lands and native people, except dominating with technology in order to tap the natural resources of another moon/planet as a result of a terrible economy and exhausted resources back on earth.  Jake Sully is ordered to go in and survey the area as an avatar and convince the Navi to relocate when he finds himself accepted into the Omaticaya tribe after learning the ways of the warrior and Pandora’s ecosystem.  However, he  faces the conflict of which side to choose when human’s decide to move in on the Navi’s and bulldoze their area of the jungle. There are so many references to terrorism, biblical ideologies, colonization, war, peace, genocide, and much more throughout, that there is no way to pick everything up in one sitting. I feel like this could have been some sort of hidden episode of LOST or something but with slightly cheesy CGI.  The 3D was awesome. I wish there was more stuff that looked like it was shooting out of the screen though.  Avatar took movie making and epic cinema to a new level.  It is the most expensive movie ever to be made and I believe James Cameron really is a genius for this script, story, and execution.  I believe this will be a trilogy and for good reason.  Don’t wait until this comes out on DVD or Blue Ray. (5/5)

Here is the making of the movie. pretty cool shit. embedding is disabled.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7c4kNLz_4E8

What can I say I’m a sucker for apocalyptic/post apocalyptic blockbusters. My type is comparable to those who make up the traffic before the scene of a car crash, except with people flocking to theaters to see the earth implode/explode, and mankind perish ultimately. 2012 had that trailer that sucked me right in. The one with the airplane flying through crashing buildings. remember? So the story is pretty much the run of the mill, earth is going to end because the sun is acting up and earth’s core is getting too hot and the Mayans predicted all of this happens in the year 2012 blah blah blahhhh. But the Mayans are mentioned once MAYBE twice. Can this tired storyline get any less predictable? BUT it’s NOT the tectonic plates! fuck the tectonic plates man they should have just made it them in the first place because it wouldn’t have mattered anyway. However, they assure you it’s not them so don’t even think about blaming it on the plates. Who gives a fuck really?! Adrian Helmsley is a scientist who figures out from another scientist in India that the earth is going to end. As that story develops and unfolds, John Cusack who plays the main role as Jackson Curtis, a failed author and husband, stumbles across Woody Harrelson as Charlie Frost, a deranged radio host/conspiracy theorist who seems to know the earth is going to end. And then the buildings collapse and the ocean takes out the world as Cusack tries to save his family. 2012 took unrealistic to another level. Jam packed with amazing imagery of the Earth and it’s natural destruction, there is enough suspense to keep you on the edge of your seat and tide you over until the next one of these rolls around. Suspense and Imagery are the the ONLY two things that keep this movie going and maybe kept it going for an hour longer than it should have. They should’ve killed off an hour and a couple more characters. Maybe I should’ve waited in line for New Moon? 3/5

I went to Paranormal Activity expecting to see a horror movie in the same vein as The Blaire Witch Project as I heard all the comparisons and how this movie is on it’s way to being the most profitable in terms of profit margin compared to what it took to make it. Unfortunately this movie was not really scary to me. I wouldn’t compare it to Blaire Witch anyway except for the use of the handheld cam POV, which has since been done with much greater success in my opinion. I’ll put it this way, there are two scenes that were “scary” and I saw one of them in the trailer. Without completely ruining it for you, the premise goes like this. A young couple lives in a house in San Diego and the female happens to have been haunted by a demon for the majority of her life. The boyfriend decides to try to capture it on film and audio and is very successful at it. The characters were a little annoying and mildly entertaining at best. Every point of view you see is through the camera he/she is using throughout the film. It takes some time for things to get rolling, building suspense, but the pay off in certain scenes didn’t really pay at all. And waiting for something I was hoping for started to become more and more frustrating as it progressed. On the bright side, this movie was short (90+ minutes) and definitely kept my attention, even through the anticlimactic scenes. I feel like I would have liked it more if I watched it at home….and I’d also be a few dollars richer. As an indie flick, yeah I can dig it for what it is I guess, but major motion picture? not so sure about that. (2/5)

1/5

I heard about I Hope They Serve Beer In Hell by Tucker Max from a friend and usually when I’m home from the road I try to pick up something worth reading. This book strays from the choice novel I would otherwise get, however, I must say if you haven’t heard or read this yet and your into hearing stories about hilarious drunken debauchery, this might be of interest to you. It’s consists of random stories occurring from his high school days through college and law school (mostly law school) about his sexual and punch drunken experiences. It’s not for the faint and feminist hearted in the least but it’s laugh out loud funny. And I have laughed out loud many a time throughout his adventures. Mason even got his share of Tucker Max one morning and I smacked him with the book after he chewed and left it sopping in his doggie saliva. Afterwards was peeling the pages apart with vigor to read it. Funny thing is when I had the book in my hands, he’d be afraid to come near ever since he took a couple swift ones to the grill, but upon seeing it laying around he can’t help but sneak up and snatch it. We approve.

Looks like they are even making it a feature film.

LOOK AT THAT FACE!!!@#$@!%$@ AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH

I been slacking a little on the blog since I’ve been home from tour. My apologies. I did finally get to see District 9 and I’m glad I did. This movie, to me, was the most entertaining movie I’ve seen in the theater since Star Trek. The storyline is consists of aliens, or “Prawns” coming down from wherever and basically living on earth among humans, in a blocked off area in Johannesburg, for 20 years and treated as if they were subhuman. Of course they aren’t human but the way they were being treated could be compared to Nazi Germany. I saw the trailer a while back at my friend EL’s and the actual UFO/Ship captivated me but once I saw the movie, there was much more to be captivated by. First of all I love that the aliens don’t look like stereotypical aliens in every single sci-fi movie. However, I really think the storyline in this movie was the best part and I couldn’t pick out holes that normally ruin these types of films for me. Shot like a documentary, but still played out like a cinematic picture with pretty good acting from people I really have never heard of, as well as amazing camera work and imagery. Surprisingly funny as well. This movie has so many underlying themes and messages if you can see past the gore, which didn’t bother me and seemed appropriate. The most important theme or message I thought shined through the most is, humanity, or lack thereof, but strangely depicted through a race of aliens. Terrorism, propaganda, and racism are all messages this movie addresses, which make it not just a good movie, but great in my eyes. Hard to believe it’s number 1 for this reason. Lastly I think the end of this movie took the cake for me. You aren’t left completely hanging, and it was just enough to make me walk out like, hmmmmm that was damn good. The ending I felt ended on a note a sci-fi flick would have in the 80’s. I think all unanswered “mystery” in newer movies is just an excuse for writers not knowing where else to take it without people thinking it’s going to suck. Put it to you this way, I’m buying District 9 on DVD when it comes out. 5/5

This movie was so well done. I knew it was going to be funny but the way Sasha Baron Cohen depicts how sick our society is, should be the reason why people go see this movie. Bruno initiates the most awkwardly funny situations and manipulates people to expose who they really are, on their own. It’s truly brilliant. There is some penis shown in this movie but it seems like a lot of people were focused on that, which to me, wasn’t even anything to focus on in a negative sense. Those parts may have been the funniest in my opinion. Again, this is Cohen playing on the audiences insecurities and homophobia. It’s disturbing how anti-gay, people can be as displayed by scenes in this movie. However, their reactions to homo-erotic acts and homosexuality are hilarious. The story line played out very much like Borat but the story line is not the reason anyone is going to see this anyway. I think he hit it on the nail with Bruno. Only question is, what can he do next? He’s exhausted his best characters. 4/5

The first 3/4ths of this movie was so boring. I was in and out of sleep the whole time. What a drawn out movie this was, holy shit. It’s about Johnny Dillinger, played by Johnny Depp, who robs banks for a living and is being chased down by agent Purvis, played by Christian Bale. Both of these actors I like a lot. Did not like them in this movie. Between the Johnny Depp closeups every second and Christian Bale’s horrible southern drawl or whatever that was, I was not feeling it. I got a second wind and watched the last hour, the only part of the movie worth watching, of this two and a half hour, slow-paced, overrated, sorry excuse for a Michael Mann film. The best thing about this movie is Katy Perry. She is beautiful. 1/5