At the top of this review I want it made clear that I am a Cornetto Trilogy Fanboy. For those unfamiliar with this term it is the unofficial title to the three films Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz, and The World's End. These are directed by Edgar Wright and star Simon Pegg and Nick Frost.

This film is a perfect ending to the trilogy that really isn't a trilogy at all. The three movies don't have the same characters, the situations aren't the same, the towns are different, and the pubs are all different. It is still a good spiritual trilogy that deals with real life topics in difficult times. Shaun deals with a break up during a zombie apocalypse. Hot Fuzz deals with making new friends while a maniac goes around killing people. The World's End takes the idea of nostalgia and friendship and sets it against the backdrop of an alien invasion.

Gary King is the coolest guy in his mind and always has been. Unfortunately he has one major regret, never completing the Golden Mile: 12 pubs, 12 pints, all before sunrise. So like any person with massive regret who hasn't quite grown out of his “glory days” he gathers his mates and off they go to try to complete the mile.

This film has amped up everything from the other two. It's got massive amounts of action, which at times makes you wonder how everyone knows Kung-Fu, but you don't care because it just looks so cool! It contains great jokes and memorable lines that people will quote right next to “You got a bit of red on you” and “Yarp”. Finally, the stakes could not be higher in this film. Literal world annihilation is on the line and worse, losing yourself in it all, which could be worse.

This film takes friendship, self worth, and lager very seriously and coats it all in dick jokes, foul language, and British accent that makes you not care that he just said “cock”. It's exciting, it's suspenseful, and it's action packed. This is the perfect way to end the summer season of films! Go enjoy!

If you are a fan of Mark Millar's Kick-Ass comic book series, you will enjoy Kick Ass 2. Kick-Ass, Hit-Girl, and Red Mist are all back and this time the film focuses on the formation of superhero teams, like the Avengers or Justice League.

So what does happen when a social group revolves around fighting crime? Escalation. As the heroes start to form a group, so does our once “good guy” Red Mist, who now goes by the quaint moniker “Mother Fucker”. MF decides he is going to be the first Super Villain and starts to recruit the baddest of the bad to be his Legion of Doom or Sinister Six.

This film is very loyal to the comic. That doesn't mean it is a word for word remake, but even if it was that would be fine. Mark Millar has created a realistic superhero world that doesn't pull any punches, literally.

This film not only focuses on teams, but fitting in and finding out who you are. Kick-Ass isn't just about kids fighting in costumes, but it is still a coming of age story for both of our superhero leads. While Hit-Girl tries to fit in at High School, Kick-Ass finds a superhero group to be a part of. Both stories show depth of character and creates conflicts for each other that eventual culminate in more death.

It's a violent film, for sure, but it actually has less violence than the first one did and that violence is actually less gun related than the first movie was. The controversy over Jim Carrey denouncing this film seems a bit of a stunt after you actually watch Kick-Ass 2. His character in particular is Colonel Stars and Stripes. He is the moral center of the whole group and actually teaches the group to walk in a just and proper fashion as heroes. This lesson is revealed to have taken hold towards the end of the film as well. For me, this film is a superhero film and if Nazi's shooting Captain America is alright with the viewing populace, this film should be a cakewalk for you. Enjoy.

The summer season is not really one that lends itself to horror films that are not about teenagers finding a cursed book, an empty cabin, or hiding a murder. This is why we only had two come out this summer, The Purge and The Conjuring.

The Conjuring delivers everything we want in a horror film: Scary story, creepy ghosts and children, whispers in the night, and girls being pulled by their hair by an unseen demonic force. I thought of this film as a better scripted Paranormal Activity, which is not a bad thing. Paranormal Activity is still a scary movie, but it is covered in cheese and makes its scares from things jumping at the camera. The Conjuring uses some jumping and some moments of appearing faces and bodies, but not in such a way that it feels like a cheap scare.

Granted, this is your typical “family moves into a spooky house and gets haunted” film, it does a few things right to calm us about some of the obvious plot holes in those other films. First thing is the question of “Why don't you just move out of the haunted house?” This is answered in the film by mentioning the evil has latched itself onto their family and will go with them no matter where they go. Another trope the film takes care of is the “hidden information” trope. This is usually a kid seeing something dangerous or a psychic notices something or even the main parental figure experiences actual evil and keeps it to themselves till it's plot specific. This film almost delights in scaring the family and then sharing that information with the rest of the family.

This film did a number of other things that help make sense of the horror genre. It didn't try to reinvent it, it just tried to make it a little more realistic. The family is freaked out, the psychics do what they can, the police get involved. There is no point where people say “I saw evil” and get laughed at or sent away. If you want a good scare as we head into the end of summer, check this film out.

We're The Millers may actually surprise you. I say that only because, at face value, it seems like your typical storyline where people who aren't related bond over their wacky situation where they have to pretend they are related. Guess what, the characters do bond over their choices to help David, but the way they get there is what makes this movie worth it.

Everyone in this film is fun to watch. Jason Sudeikis is as good a drug dealer as he is a fake dad. Jennifer Aniston is still sexy enough to play a stripper, but clothes do make her the mom in the bunch and she plays mom with sugary accuracy. Will Poulter plays a great “fan-boy” character who just really wants to hang out with David...and score some drugs. Finally, Emma Roberts is so much like Jennifer Aniston in the “sweet-bitch” department that you'd think they were related.

Together these four actors create the perfect mix of “family” and “this plan will fail because we will kill each other”. Some of the cameos are well worth it as well. Ed Helms as David's “boss” is eccentric and fun while being threatening and a jerk. Nick Offerman and Kathryn Hahn play the best mid-west husband and wife this movie could ask for. They are equal parts wholesome and creepy. Ken Marino, Tom Lennon, and Luis Guzman all play...well, they play Ken Marino, Tom Lennon, and Luis Guzman. Their parts are not large, but they are funny in them and do the best they can with the limited time they have. Luis Guzman's scene is probably the funniest of the three. The only sad part for me was the use of Molly C. Quinn, best known as Alexis Castle in the TV show Castle. She plays Offerman and Hahn's daughter, but the part is just big enough to show that she is a little out of her depths and this was just a movie to do in between Castle seasons. On Castle she is amazing, here she either wasn't given enough to do, or just didn't want to be there.

This is a good, fun R-rated Family film. It definitely is one of the better comedies this season had to offer. It's a shame that it didn't come out sooner in order to make a little more money and prove that family films can be about drugs, incest, and anal.

For those of you familiar with Neill Blomkamp, you are most likely already familiar with his break out directing film District 9. Where District 9 was a commentary on race relations using aliens, Elysium is a commentary on immigration and health care using a section of Earth and the space station Elysium.

Matt Damon plays Max, a young boy who gets into trouble and stays getting into trouble well into adulthood. We are not told how, but eventually he decides to clean up his act and get a legitimate job and we then get to see him have the worst day ever. In one day he has his arm broken, he gets added probation in an unjust manner, and he gets radiated after having his job threatened in a manner I'm certain OSHA would not approve of.

This lines him up to have nothing to lose and take an illegal job to infiltrate Elysium and the adventure begins. The bad part is that the adventure begins about 70 minutes into this 110 minute movie. This movie was like a High School date. It kept getting you excited and then explaining it wasn't ready to go further.

By the time we got to the action scenes we were shown them in a very poorly shot way. There was far too much handi cam work for action that you could tell was pretty cool, if you could just see it. District 9 was a movie shot to look like a documentary, this was a movie that wasn't a documentary and still was shot in that manner.

It's a decent story that takes great leaps of faith to believe and holds logic at bay while showing you cool electronics from 2154 such as the Apple input and MacBook that can unlock doors. This movie is fine if you like your morals beating you to death by the end of the film, but if you are looking for an action film...move along, there's nothing to see here.

For those who don't know, 2 Guns just happens to be a comic book movie. For the people who didn't know that, they knew Mark Wahlberg and Denzel Washington were in it. After seeing Mark Wahlberg in comedies like Date Night, The Other Guys, and I Heart Huckabees people know he has the ability to be funny and we have seen Denzel Washington continue to be a very able actor that has the ability to mix drama and humor in most all of his roles.

This movie then begs the question: Do they have chemistry? I think they do. I was very pleased with the banter they shared and the action sequences that showed that Denzel Washington still has it in him to knock a guy around.

There are many points where we see Washington and Wahlberg separated and doing scenes with co-stars Edward James Olsmos and James Marsden who both play villianous roles very well, as does Bill Paxton who plays the agent trying to hunt down the bank robbers played by Washington and Wahlberg.

Overall this is a very entertaining movie that is fairly straight forward with a plot of two guys robbing a bank and unknowingly being set up by their superiors. It doesn't get boring or bogged down in trying to twist and turn you around inside the plot. If you are looking for an entertaining shoot-em-up, this is your film and I think you'll enjoy yourself.

You can tell we are getting to the end of the Summer Blockbuster Season when every film makes you leave the theater saying “Well, I just saw that film, wonder what's on TV”. Don't misread that, I really like Hugh Jackman as Wolverine, I just think the Wolverine movies have very little substance and also mangle characters that exist in the Marvel Universe.

That is the main issue with Marvel films produced by 20th Century Fox. They do not want to tell stories that comic fans have already read and know the endings to, but what about the movie goer that is seeing it for the first time? What about realizing that the people who loved the character in the comic will equally love the character you put on the big screen. Two of my favorite mutants have been mangled by Fox: Deadpool and Nightcrawler, I don't count Gambit as being mangled, because they just made him a two dimensional character with no traits instead of taking away his mouth!

So where is the happy medium? How do we create an X-movie that has characters we like and a story we can follow? First Class did a fine job and the next one should do a fine job as well. To add, this film does a very nice job of leading into the next First Class film using the same tricks that have made the Marvel Avengers movies worth going to.

This film is much like Iron Man 3 as it focuses on a soldier dealing with PTSD. This film is a “direct” sequel to X-Men: Last Stand and has Logan distraught over the death of Jean Grey. Logan then gets to deal with that in the same way Tony Stark had to deal with the destruction of New York City and the invasion that proved that Earth is not as safe as we'd like to think it was.

The problem is, these two instances are not similar and having a film where Logan deals with the death of a loved one is useless when you think of how many people he has known and grown close to over his years of existence and this is the one that really bugs him? Once again, Hugh Jackman does a great job, as does everyone, in portraying their comic book characters. It's the story and the characters they chose that make this film pretty blah. I couldn't even tell you an ultimate “moral” to this story and the film feels a bit like a poorly done Captain America movie that just leads us into the next film without giving a crap about the current film.

If you see this film, stick around into the credits for a very special “Nick Fury” like special appearance. Other than that moment, you are going to see a guy punch stuff.

When reviewing R.I.P.D one cannot help but compare and contrast it to Men in Black. This film fails in a big way. First off, aliens make sense. They come to Earth, they hide out, they need contained or deported. This film did not do anything to tell us why dead people weren't being dead. We understood the need to hide still, but I never once found out how a person dies and does not go to the other side.

Second, Jeff Bridges' character has been working for the R.I.P.D long enough that his literal “cowboy” attitude should either be accepted by his peers or dropped. Mary-Louise Parker has to spend the whole film being that Chief character that keeps telling them to straighten up their act and eventual puts them on suspension. In MIB Tommy Lee Jones played the right mix of hard nosed cop and punchline, but all we got from Jeff Bridges was a series of mumbled “I miss my hat” jokes and the feeling that he has not grown with the times after being dead for over 100 years.

Then we have Ryan Reynolds. So far he is being touted as box office poison to comic book movies having been in Blade 3, Wolverine: Origins, Green Lantern, and now this. All of which are massively under performing. My take is that it is not his fault. I liked him in this. He was the only character I felt was comparable to their MIB counterpart. Now, if we put Will Smith and Ryan Reynolds in a film together, we are not going to enjoy it, but they played the same character with the same level of humor and seriousness the subject matter needs.

As to not ruin too much of the film, the villain is subpar at the least. His motivation is to stop anyone from having to cross over to the other side, but that plan works a whole lot better if we know what causes people to not go in the first place. When we see Ryan Reynolds die, which is in the trailer, we see no chance for him to stay, yet he is grabbed from the trip by the R.I.P.D. If they had spent one moment to explain how dead people stay dead and “alive” this whole film could have been a bit more interesting. Let's hope there is no sequel so Ryan Reynolds can get back to working on a better Deadpool film.

Monsters University is pretty much what I thought it would be. It's a money grab for the kid nostalgia of the fun characters it created, but it does manage to create a prequel that doesn't feel as though the obvious ending is to easily attained.

Here is the biggest issue with prequels: We already know what is going to happen. In Fellowship of the Ring not many of us would read the books cared when Gandalf “died” (SPOILER ALERT) because we knew he would be back. No one honestly thought Anakin Skywalker was in much peril because we knew he was Darth Vader (SPOILER ALERT). Prequels suffer from the fact that we know the end of the story. Therefore, the story has to figure out how to pull the carpet out from under us in such a way that we don't see the connections coming. This film does that in a decent way. It was a little disappointing due to the fact that they had to keep you guessing till the end, but the fact that they could keep you guessing till the end was impressive enough.

Monsters University was not as good as Despicable Me 2 and I feel that film will stand as my Family Film Pick of the Summer Season, but this film has a touching spot for the adults and the kids. Disney and Pixar have done a consistently good job creating stories that share a message. The message in this film has to do with teamwork and recognizing strengths in others that compliment our weaknesses. That is a pretty deep subject for a kid and even for some adults, but Pixar shows us how it works in a series of cliché filled Revenge of the Nerds style competitions, tests, and pranks. It's worth an afternoon watching if you have to entertain some kids, but it's my second choice if you want a fun family night out.

RED 2 is loosely based on the Wildstorm comic, which a division of DC comics, and is highlighted more in this film by the scene ending cartoon stills used to transfer us from one scene to another. I really enjoyed this film due to my own relatability to its characters. Now, I am not a hit-man, but I am an actor and there are conversations I have had that, to the outside world, seem weird. In that same vein, I have had quite normal conversations with a man dressed in a lion's outfit or while I was dressed as a Victorian Age doctor. These assassins are trained, elderly, and have lived their lives next to each long enough that asking how the kids are while shooting an informant or walking through a Costco talking about how best to assassinate someone are considered normal interactions.

That sells this entire film to me. Bruce Willis plays the character of Frank the way we love Bruce Willis to play any character: Bad-ass spy with a MacGuyver feel and a sense of humor about himself. John Malkovich as Marvin may be my favorite Malkovich part outside of Being John Malkovich. Add to it that you have Helen Mirren and Anthony Hopkins and you have some of the best octogenarians on screen doing the silliest things while being complete ass kickers.

The one complaint you can have about this Spy vs. Spy type movie is that director Dean Parisot gleefully uses the cliché of things happening off screen while we weren't looking and that is how characters get out of a sticky situation or make the classic switch-a-roo with a bag of cash. Granted, we rarely see it coming, but often it does not fit into the actuality of what we are seeing and creates more problems.

Outside of that, this film does everything in its power to keep you guessing about who is fighting on what side and when and still keeps the action going from start to finish. Byung-hun Lee is a great addition to this film and although he clearly has a number of snazzy suits hidden throughout this film to instantly change into after any fight, his character would be one I'd like to see return with everyone else if there is a Red 3. Go see this film and help it be a trilogy as DC could use the ego boost.

Turbo is a great movie if you think Fast and Furious 6 was just the continuation of a great movie franchise and your child wants to see a movie just like it while sporting his own mullet. If you enjoy the left turn action of NASCAR combined with the Home and Garden networks “Day in the Life of a Snail” series, this is the movie for you!

DreamWorks usually has at least one good movie a year and clearly this is not it. The story is a fine way for kids to learn to follow your dreams no matter how ridiculous they may be and the voice talent is a mess of over paid actors doing a sub-par job at creating fun characters.

Ryan Reynolds, Samuel Jackson, Paul Giamatti and Snoop Dogg head up a cast of snail characters that include a Fast and Furious style foursome that rally around an underdog with an over cautious brother to then go on and compete in the Indy 500. DreamWorks has created a film in which the main villain is reality.

Am I saying I believe Cars can talk and Toys run around saving each other from insane children with bottle rockets? Not at all, but the level of suspending disbelief it takes to buy into this film is high enough that even an 8 year old kid should be saying “I'm pretty sure this is BS”.

Everything from the way genetic mutation works to the theory of MASSIVE road rash on your undercarriage if you were to slide on it at 236 mph across a race track for ANY amount of time works to make this film ridiculous to adults and confusing to children.

This movie also fails at making snail jokes that are the hallmark of DreamWorks stories and proves that they should stick to making one movie a year. The only saving grace is that this film doesn't move at a snails pace and does a fair job of surprising you at the end, even if you do see the ending coming 200 laps away.

Grown Ups 2 is best summed up by taking the cast of SNL past and present, sprinkle in a few has been “actors” like Shaq and Steve Austin, lather it with jokes about bodily fluids, and then light it on fire and set it on the doorstep of a person you just “Ding-Dong Ditched”.

No film should make you say “Rob Schneider is a freaking genius”. This film does that and also makes me say the best part of this film was Taylor Lautner. I am now going to die somewhere quiet as I have nothing to live for anymore.

UPDATE: I did my IMDB search just to make sure I've got spellings of names correct and found that Taylor Lautner is NOT CREDITED with his role in the film. He's the ONLY frat guy we see do any real talking!!! Other than that we've got Peter from “Heroes” and the oldest son from “Wizards of Waverly Place” getting credited and all they did was WOOT like monkeys!!! How is it that this movie now makes me feel badly for Taylor “I jump around because I have no other talents” Lautner!! Screw this movie, if you saw it for fun stop reading this blog and seek help.

Pacific Rim is not a Shakespearean tale, nor does it want to be. Guillermo del Toro wanted to make a Godzilla film beat up an Ultra Man film and that is exactly what he did. This film is a much better version of the Rock 'Em, Sock 'Em Robots film Real Steel we saw a few years ago and presents giants monsters better than any Godzilla film while holding to the style of those same monsters.

That may be what made this film so interesting; even though the monsters were CGI, they still resembled the familiar rubber suited animals we grew up watching. The great part is that we get a very interesting plot line as to why they even are around and they are given a reason to their actions. Planet Earth is put on the defensive in this film and it worked out for the best.

Character wise, this film has more cliches than I care to mention, but they are not the main meat of this movie and even as cliches, they work for this film. Our hero suffers loss almost instantly and we find a sassy rookie who wants to be his partner. However, the grizzled old commander, who will die if he pilots a Jaeger (the mechs humans use) again, is trying to protect the rookie by not letting her go into battle. Guess who works together in battle. Guess who does “one last mission” in a Jaeger. Is there a jerk who treats our hero rudely and thinks he's a “lose cannon”? Of course. All this and an “odd couple” science team made up of Charlie Day from Always Sunny and Burn Gorman of Torchwood that literally have a line drawn down the center of their lab.

Even all those cliches are not enough to make this film a mess. The plot is solid, the world is compelling, and the explanations of the Kaiju (the monsters) makes it all worth it to see just what does happen in the end.

Be on the lookout for Hellboy himself, Ron Perlman, to make another Guillermo del Toro movie showing. It is worth it and about as necessary as the Charlie Hunnam shirtless scene that no one is going to complain about as much as they complained about the Alice Eve underwear scene in Star Trek.

At the writing of this review I have not seen Monsters U, but I feel I can safely say that while that may be a great kids movie, Despicable Me 2 is THE best summer family movie of the season. We still have Turbo, Smurfs 2, and Planes left this summer, but I am sure none of them are going to be as focused on entertaining the parents as well as the adults as this film was.

Right at the start of the film we have a great scene where Groo has to fill in as entertainment for his youngest daughter's birthday party. If you aren't laughing through this scene, you have no sense of humor.

That scene sets us up for the rest of the film. If you've been watching the previews you have seen a good deal of good scenes, but you now have some form of reference for them and that makes them as enjoyable as when you saw them the first dozen times before other movies you went to see this year.

The minions are still great for a fart joke or getting hurt in funny ways, which keeps the kids laughing while the adults get to laugh at Oscar Wilde references going on at the same time. Note: there may not be any Oscar Wilde references in this film.

This movie revolves around the minions, in much the same way Dreamworks discovered we like the penguins from Madagascar, more than their highly paid main characters. While the minions are the focus, we also get to see Groo dealing with being a father, his oldest falling for a boy, and Groo becoming a secret agent to solve a mystery.

Be on the look-out towards the end for a scene I am certain Dreamworks was happy to have in once they saw World War Z do so well in the theaters. You will be the only one laughing for that reason, but it's the right reason to laugh at that scene.

The plot isn't the deepest and the mystery being solved isn't going to leave your jaw on the ground, but see this movie! Go by yourself, on a date, or with the family, but see this movie! Did I mention you should see this movie? You really should. Turn off your computer and go see this movie. NOW!

The Lone Ranger is not a bad movie if you like drawn out Westerns. It isn't even a bad movie if you just like sitting still for 150 minutes. It becomes a bad movie when it tries to be entertaining and fails.

Johnny Depp plays Tonto in the same way he played Jack Sparrow, which is good for the Pirate movie, not for the Cowboy movie. Armie Hammer is great as the masked man fighting on the side of right, but this film really doesn't take the "odd couple" idea of Hammer and Depp and use it to do much more than fill some time and space.

The plot is dull and the villains are pointed out to us nearly halfway through the film. Yet, we still have a scene that "reveals" our villains as though the audience forgot what happened an hour ago, which they may have.

Now, the last half hour of the film may be worth the first 2 hours because from the moment we hear the William Tell Overture start up till it ends 20 minutes later there is nothing but train foolishness and gun-fighting action and Johnny Depp making faces at things. I smiled the entire time and the song being the background to some impressive stunt/CGI work. I'm just glad that the train manufacturers made such an intricate railway or this would have been a horrible train chase scene.

Gore Verbinski knows how to make one type of film: Pirate films. Whenever he steps outside of that we get The Weather Man, Mouse Hunt, and Rango. Yes, he likes directing Johnny Depp, but so does Tim Burton. At least Tim Burton does us the favor of directing Depp a little differently in each movie. I was also pleased to see that there were a great number of Native Americans available to play extras in this film. Any chance one of them could have played Tonto? This film needed Depp and once I watched it, Depp's name is the only thing it has going for it.

I'm reviewing these movies together this week as they are both exactly what you would think they are. Essentially we have two buddy cop flicks that, between the two of them, play up every stereotype we have ever known.

The Heat has Sandra Bullock playing your typical stuck up FBI Agent. She is good at her job, but not a people person. For some reason this is a bad thing and she is hated by all the other cops who clearly got into police work to make friends. Melissa McCarthy is the exact opposite. She is a filthy, dirty, foul mouthed cop who plays by her own rules. What would happen if these two had to be partners on a case? This film. That is what would happen. Cop and a Half, that is what would happen. Turner and Hooch would happen. 48 Hours would happen. Beverly Hills Flipping Cop would happen! DO I NEED TO GO ON?

White House Down pulls on our heart strings as a high school slacker and college drop out plays ex-military put upon divorced father of an 11 year old who calls him by his first name and he has to prove himself a good parent by doing the right thing and saving the president during an invasion of the White House by people attempting to stop a peace treaty and start another World War. Will he prove his worth when it counts the most and get a job guarding the president after all is said and done? Will he? WILL HE? OF COURSE HE WILL! What kind of movie would not allow that to happen? NOT THIS KIND!

Yes, both of these films ticked me off because I want better films to watch than this. However, do you like those odd couple cop movies? You'll like The Heat. Do you like movies that show massive gunfire where you wouldn't normally see it? You'll like White House Down. Both of these films offer nothing new and are just the same story with different people in it.

The Heat did offer genuine laughs when Sandra Bullock gets drunk and they do a montage, but the trailer has two very funny scenes that were switched out in the final cut for way less funny scenes and that is what this movie is, funnier as a trailer.

White House Down gave every Red State the Obama they are still sure Obama is. A typical black guy who will kick a guy off his Jordans and be inept at firing a gun. This movie does take the Obama presidency and creates a caricature that 47% of America will believe makes this a "What-If?" documentary. While it's mildly offensive to people who like President Obama, this movie isn't for those people, so little harm done there.

If you have something better to do than watch either of these films, do it. These are not worth your time unless these are the types of film you enjoy spending 12 dollars on.

I went into World War Z concerned that we had fast zombies, a PG-13 rating, and the only thing it had in common with the book by Max Brooks was its name. Outside of that we know that the plot involves a worldwide zombie outbreak and only one man can save us: Brad Pitt!

Or can he?

This is a very quick paced two hour film that has plenty of scares and is actually a very good thriller. Note: People want it to be a Zombie Horror flick, it isn't. It is very much a Zombie Thriller whose main idea is not “Kill the Zombies”, but “How do we stop the outbreak?”. The difference in those two questions is the difference between the film you think you are seeing and the film you are actually seeing.

I was unaware of George Romero's reasoning behind fast zombies and came to the same conclusions he did about the zombies in this film. They are Zombies, mind you, these people die and come back to life with a desire to eat. Romero's reasoning is that when people die and come back as quickly as “zombies” do, in this film we see a transformation take 12 seconds, the “zombie” still has all of it's muscle structure and bone density which would create full functioning fast zombies. As time goes on the bodies would decay and bring about the slow movie, decrepit, zombies we are used to.

With a PG-13 rating many people are not expecting a gore filled zombie movie and isn't that the fun of a zombie movie? Well, there is plenty of zombies eating people and the lack of gore does not mean a lack of horror and the lack of an “R” rating does not mean a lack of suspense filled moments. This film provided many good jumps and scares for any guys looking for that scary movie that will get her in your arms, but no gross her out.

The best thing I can say about this film was that I did not want it to end. I was fine with where this film chooses to stop, but the story could have gone on and I would have been fine. I am weary of a sequel because I am afraid they would try to ramp it up as a horror film, but I wouldn't mind a sequel that picks up where we leave off in this film and takes us through the “Z Wars”.

It has saddened me to see how many people are calling Man Of Steel a “cinematic splendor” and saying that if you didn't like the film “you don't know cinema”. This film is two and a half hours long and tells a story we already have seen three if not four times over (depending on if you count cartoon versions and I'm counting them ALL as one more retelling).

The beginning does focus on Kypton and gives us a better view of what the planet was like, the issues that caused the planet to rot, and the decisions that lead to Jor-El's decision to send Kal-El to Earth, specifically, and made Zod decide to hunt Kal down.

However, we are then taken through a series of Clark Kent incognito moments that are interspersed with unnecessary flashbacks and all of it leads us tot he same conclusions Richard Donner, Bryan Singer, and Uncle Ben brought us to: With Great Power Comes A Great Need To Hide That Power For Fear Of What Others Will Think.

This film is easily 45 minutes too long, with way too much time spent destroying New York/Metropolis, way too much time telling us the Smallville stories we already know and adding nothing to them, and way too much time spent in Michael Bay style fight sequences and Joss Whedon style CG camera zooms.

Now, let's talk about our sponsors. You may not notice the 7-11 or the Roadway Trucking signage, but you can't get away from the Nikon camera being placed in front of the actor's face and the fact that a main character works at an IHOP. Many thanks to Sears as well, who obviously spent a ton of cash to get almost a solid half minute of one shot of the storefront for a single scene. It's seriously Thor's product placement all over again.

Overall, this film was okay. I enjoyed Amy Adams as Lois Lane, I was fine with Kevin Costnar and Russell Crowe, as long as didn't start singing, and Henry Cavill was a decent Superman. I went with a friend and we sort of split on Michael Shannon as Zod. He did not care for him and I was luke warm on him. Granted, I have not seen Michael Shannon in much and my favorite role of his I have seen is the Funny Or Die short of him reading the sorority girl letter. So, as a superhero film it was alright. As a general film it was fine. If you had never seen or heard of Superman before it was a cinematic splendor the likes of which you've never seen in your life nor ever will. Just kill yourself. No other movie will ever live up to this one for you. And for God's sake, don't watch another Superman movie, or your head will explode in stupidity.

This is the end

A movie where actors play themselves in a heightened reality way is going to have some ups and downs. You aren't sure what is inside joke and what is actual truth. However, This Is The End does a very nice job of staying away from constant references and utilizes one main character to do all the audience commentary we have done for years.

The movie itself is a little odd as we are watching Michael Cera do cocaine and Emma Watson swear while swinging an axe. While none of that is bad, it happens early enough in the film that we still are ready to accept that all the actors are just playing themselves and it gets a bit jarring.

We spend most of the time inside James Franco's very odd mansion and very little time learning of what is actually happening outside. This is both a positive and a negative. It's a good thing because we get some fun fleshing out of the main characters, but its a negative because it starts to feel like we've spent too much time with the main characters.

The third act of the film delivers though, with some great final cameos and a discovery of what the hell is actually going on that satisfies the long setup and a finale that actually makes you happy you stuck with the film.

While it is weird to see actors playing themselves, this is a group that works well together and if you don't like them as their characters in Pineapple Express or Superbad, you should probably just skip this film then. However, you will miss Hermione saying fuck.

This film starts off using the Alanis Morrisette song "Ironic". The point is to show us that in the same way she doesn't understand irony, this film won't understand comedy film making, so brace yourself for a movie that you saw if you've seen the trailer.

Vince Vaghn and Owen Wilson play two down and out salesmen who get an internship at Google. Every obvious plot point is here: love interests, a jerk that constantly rags on the main characters, challenges that just happen to be scored in such a way that the jerk's team and the main character's team are always in direct competition with each other, and the obvious winning moment ending.

Also, can we please have a geek film that doesn't have the geeks learning about how awesome the real world is after a night of binge drinking?

The most frustrating part of this film was the fact that you had 20 something's that got 80s references and yet you had 40 year olds that didn't get an Xmen reference, a quidditch match, or how to use a webcam like you are under 80.

One can forgive the webcam issue and understand that not even Daniel Radcliffe knows the rules to quidditch, but XMEN? That was the film trying too hard to show these guys were out of their depth.

The best thing this film did was the ending. It had a cool touching moment with Josh Gad's character and if anyone thought this film was not going to hammer home the idea of Google, you were wrong, but they did it on such a way that you kind f cheered it on. Finally, stick around for the credits as they are pretty inventive as one would expect from a cutting edge film about Google. It would have been nice if they had put as much thought into the first two thirds of the film.

Now You See Me is an interesting film that seems to be written by a magician as much as it was about magicians. We spent the first portion of the film being introduced, very well I might add, to four top notch, but low level street magicians.

Danny Atlas (Jesse Eisenberg) is the street magician that would play bigger, if only he didn't depend on the up close misdirection. Merritt McKinney (Woody Harrelson) is the mentalist that can use hypnotic suggestion to con his way out of most jams. Henley Reeves (Isla Fisher) is the daredevil and is introduced to us in probably one of the most predictable, but enjoyable, magic tricks this movie has to offer. Henley just happens to be the ex-assistant to Atlas, a fact that is relevant for a few minutes and then disregarded. Finally, Jack Wilder (Dave Franco) who's pun filled named is matched only by the fact that he is just a con artist that uses magic tricks to distract his victims.

These four magicians are brought together by a hoodied figure, who they never see, to become the Four Horsemen and go off on a trilogy of amazing stunts each resulting in more and more cash being distributed Robin Hood style among the people.

Now that the movie has introduced it's characters, and you've picked your favorite, it shuffles them back in to the deck and follows Mark Ruffalo as Dylan Rhodes. Dylan is a cop who doesn't believe in all this magic mumbo jumbo. He is teamed up with a super model, I mean Interpol Agent from France, that is his exact opposite. See that one coming? Of course you did.

While the story does have some very nice moments of twists and turns, it does fail at showing us what we came to see: a magic show. The first caper is amazingly well shown to us and then debunked by Lucius Fox, I mean Morgan Freeman, in such a way that if they continued down this path, it would be fantastic. However, this film could not decide if magic was illusion or real and had moments of stage performance that was confused with moments of “real magic”. At one point a curtain that reveals a device swirls around like a Dementor on acid before revealing the device, an event htat could not have been done with stage tricks.

The overall film was not bad, but it did lack a coherent ending. It does a decent job of answering all the questions, but it does so after we stopped caring what the questions were and while I was gleefully surprised by the ending, it was the only way it could end and that was a bit of a disappointment. Finally, the ending includes a moment of folk lore that will be very confusing to anyone who does not know that it is a thing that people do.

During a few weeks of poor showings, this movie was a nice reprieve from total boredom at the theaters. I just wish they had spent more time with figuring out the story and less time playing movie magician with misdirects and some obvious tells.

The Purge is a great idea. Once a year, for twelve hours, all crime is legal up to and including murder. You have 364 days of plotting and planning and then at 7pm on the 21 of March you get to go crazy and kill your boss for not giving you a raise, kill a corrupt police officer who is extorting your business, you could kill a man who you found is sleeping with you wife. You can kill your wife who is sleeping with another man. The list is endless. There are absolutely NO rules on Purge Night.

Except there are rules. Level so and so weapons are still outlawed and Level 10 citizens, which I assume is like the president, his family, and other high ranking elected officials, they are off limits. So, you can kill people, just not certain people with certain weapons. Purge away America!

So for one night all the hate people have for one another is legal and how do they use it? Apparently young republicans go hobo hunting.

This film is just odd from a character standpoint. None of the characters we are supposed to care about give us any reason to care about them and their personal motives are so hidden, I'm sure they don't even know why they are doing it.

The film offers a number of tense moments and big jumps, but it also offers Michael Bay like fight sequences where you know something is happening, but you aren't quite sure what and once the smoke clears, you either aren't surprised or don't care.

If you are looking for intrigue and Purge reasoning, you have come to the wrong place. This is literally just a night in Gotham. In fact, watch the scene in Batman and Robin where Robin and Bat-Girl race motorcycles. Now watch that scene for 90 minutes. You have all the plot development and character evolving that The Purge offers you.

None of the actors do anywhere near a good job with the characters they portray and every chance for a twist is ruined by us not caring about any of these people. Even the ending could have been a triumphant moment and left everyone hanging because we did not care about these people. This film can't even be chalked up to “they tried”.

James DeMonaco may be able to be forgiven for poor directing, but he's written films I have enjoyed, “Jack”, “The Negotiator”, and...alright, just those two, but still not poorly written films and having written things that work, it is surprising to see such a lazy job done on a premise that could have had a number of stories told and intertwined in a “Crash” or “Magnolia” style ending with us being impressed with the film and not just bored with it.

In a season where every other film is about the Earth being destroyed it is nice to see one where we already destroyed it! Yes, Earth is gone and we have colonized another planet and live healthy happy lives. I guess. really hard to tell if life on New Planet is better or if it is just a factory for war and highrise condos.

The plot revolves around Will Smith and his son playing Will Smith and his son. Will Smith is the best warrior on the planet and has the ability to "ghost". "Ghosting" is controlling one's fear to not excrete the pheromones one would and therefore not be picked up by the genetically altered beasts bred by the aliens that took over Earth. Beasts that are otherwise blind, except for their sense of smell, and all they can really smell is fear pheromone.

In a routine space trip to train cadets to "ghost", the ship carrying Will Smith and his son, as well as the cadets and one of the fear smelling beasts, gets caught in a meteoroid shower and has to make an emergency landing on the only planet in range...Earth.

Of course this landing turns horribly wrong and leaves everyone dead except for Will Smith and his son. Will Smith is incapacitated and his son is his only hope.

M. Knight Shyamalan took this story, written by Will Smith, and did exactly what this movie was created to do: Showcase Jaden Smith as an actor. Here's the Shyamalan twist: Jaden is a horrible actor.

It could just be this film, as I am not familiar with the oeuvre of young master Smith, but this is not a film he should have been in nor should it have been made at all. It became a metaphysical story of a son wanting to be like his warrior (actor) father and then spending two hours proving why he isn't ever going to be like his warrior (actor) father.

Jaden's speech impediment, which may be a 2000 years in the future faux English accent that Will Smith also affects in a manner to show his son is not crap at speaking, and Jaden's poorly acted angry outbursts and inability to emote in a manner that is appropriate or believable conspire to bring this kid and this movie crashing down.

Then we have "Earth", a planet where every beast is "genetically bred to kill humans". Every beast except for 85% of the ones he meets and doesn't aggravate or bring with him on a spaceship. Other than that "every" beast is out to kill him.

Maybe it is time for Will Smith to accept that it just isn't going to happen for Jaden. Maybe Jaden just needs to take a page from Willow Smith's playbook and decide to "just be a kid" for a few years. At least until he gets Carl Weathers to help him with his acting.

It has taken me a bit of time to write this review not because of a busy schedule or an internet issue, but because I am not sure how I feel about this film.

When all is said and done it is not a horrible film, if you liked Avatar, Pocahontas, Fern Gully, or Dance with Wolves you will probably like the message this film gives (trees good, decay bad). As a movie for kids it really lacked any sense of fun or even humor.

There are probably four "jokes" in the movie and if you saw the previews you saw the biggest attempt at humor this film had. Epic tries to create a father/daughter issue and gives it all of ten minutes before the daughter gives up and starts to leave. Of course she gets whisked away to a magical world via a plot point (voiced in a very flat manner by Beyonce) and the "adventure" begins.

It isn't a bad first draft of a film, but it seems that Blue Sky is trying very hard to be the next Pixar or Dreamworks and they are just not getting the writing staff to create stories that even kids would like.

The one child that was in the theatre with me laughed at one joke. That was it, other than that the kid was failry bored with the film. That's the issue though, I wasn't really bored, I just found myself mad at the lazy writing and lazy plot points that were just textbook script writing for adventure stories.

This is the first summer "kids" movie and thankfully we have many more to look forward to, because this was just a dull film with bland acting due to poor writing.

I went into this film a week late, already hearing friends complaining about how bad this film was. I was determined to see it for what it would be: a silly mystery with fun twists, turns, and something physically horrible happening to Ed Helms.

I got none of that. Hangover 3 was a heist movie without the heist and a hangover movie without the hangover. The only thing that made the movies watchable was the "mystery" of discovering what happened to them the night before. Yes, the second one was formulaic to the point of being a remake of the first film, but at least we knew what we were getting into and the second one had a monkey! Who doesn't love a drug dealing monkey?

This wasn't even a film that you could chuckle at. I did not have many people in the theatre with me, but the only laugh came from the black couple when there is a mention of doing a huge amount of cocaine. This film felt like it was begging you to like it enough to see the next one (and yes, they have set up a fourth, but god-willing, it will never be made due to the awful returns they are seeing on this one) and yet, this film gives us no reason to want to see the next one.

There were a few well done points that were not capitalized on: Black Doug returns and brings with him the infamous “Marshall” we heard about from the first film. Marshall is well played by John Goodman who apparently just brought character from Big Lebowski out for another run. We also get to see Heather Graham, now married and pregnant with a second child, whose scene gives us a frightening look at a plot point I hope the writers never get a chance to share with us.

Ken Jeong is once again the one trick pony Mr. Chow. He brings us no surprises in his character, shows no growth through three films, and really, I'm not dissapointed because there shouldn't be any growth in Mr. Chow. He is a horrible human being and that is exactly how Jeong plays him. The biggest issue is that this film was supposed to be a story of growth and there was none of that in any of the characters.

So brace yourselves, the wolf pack will return in Hangover Four: The Hangoverest Hangover You Ever Hangovered. Shit.

While the Fast and Furious franchise seems, at face value, to be a series of car ads for the High School Head Quarterback in all of us, sometimes it can surprise us. This is not one of those times.

While Fast Five was a direct vehicular remake of Ocean's 11, FF6 was Ocean's 12 without the fun. It's a revenge movie and everyone knows that revenge has to be done a certain way for it to be interesting and this is not a franchise that cares about being interesting.

They brought back Michelle Rodriguez for this, as well as the whole gang from Fast Five minus the characters Tego and Rico who may be flat broke and back to robbing casinos after their storyline in Fast Five, but in the end one wonders if there was really any reason to bring Rodriguez back.

The film relies on night shots, dark alleys, and unlit rooms to cover any and all action sequences that may have been interesting if you saw what was happening. The epic car chases we've seen before are bigger, except everyone is driving the same car and most sequences were needlessly shot too close to the action so they look as though Michael Bay was giving filming tips.

If you like the series, you'll like this movie. If you don't like the series, this isn't going to change your mind. It is a nice little middle movie for 5 and 7 though and feels like a short bridge rather than a movie you could watch as part of a whole.

Notice how I didn't talk about the acting in it? Yeah, I'll leave that alone as this movie has enough going wrong for it already.

I'm going to have to start off by saying that I did like this movie, I didn't quite enjoy it, but I did like it as a sequel.

There's an old Star Trek myth about the odd numbered films and just like J.J. Abrams altered the timeline in the first film, he altered the myth with this second film. My issues with it are not the actors, they are all still portraying their characters in a believable way that allows me to think that indeed Chirs Pine could grow up to be William Shatner.

I enjoyed the first third of this film and there comes a point in the film where you can see Abrams getting the call that he can direct Star Wars and he just phones in the rest of the film and has the whole crew watch Wrath of Kahn for notes.

You see, this is essentially Wrath of Kahn repackaged. I have not seen Wrath of Kahn in a long time, but every cliched action that takes place in that movie is replicated here in this one. There are a few twists just to remind us it is a different timeline, but it is essentially the same film.

It also falls apart when Abrams starts to not only spoon feed us the morals of the film, but he creates forced nostalgia that is unnecessary at the very least and becomes annoying to the point I said to the screen "This is what we're doing now?"

It was also oddly predictable. J.J. Abrams is known for complex storylines that keep you guessing, but this one was as simple as who the bad guy is and once you figure that out you have every plot point pointed out to you and you will think you have seen this film before.

As for the 3D aspect of it, it isn't that bad. It's set in space and that is always enjoyable from a depth perspective view, but it is not necessary to enjoy this film nor does it really do all that much to enhance it.

This film is not bad, but I'll be waiting on Star Trek III: The Search for New Plots.

To be fair, I hated Baz Luhrmann's Romeo Juliet and it took me multiple viewings to appreciate Moulin Rouge! so I was prepared to walk into this film and hate it.

I did not. That, above all else, shocked me. I attribute most of it to his use of modern music in this film being used more as in Knight's Tale where it's a clever juxtaposition, instead of his Moulin Rouge! way of jamming in modern music for little to no purpose, but to say "Look! It's a song you know".

I've never read the book, nor have I seen the original Robert Redford 1974 version, and so I cannot speak to it as an adaptation. I did that on purpose though. Knowing that I have an inclination to hate Luhrmann's films I wanted to take it in as a story I did not know.

The actors all seemed to play there parts well and each, though flawed, made you root for them at different points of the film and even feel bad for them. The love triangle (more like a love Octagon) between Tom, Daisy, and Gatsby is very well played by Joel Edgerton, Carey Mulligan, and Leonardo DiCaprio. Toby Maguire even puts in a decent performance as Nick Carraway. Granted, Maguire is more believable as the young boy wide eyed about his neighbor than he is in the doctor's office working through his emotions.

Luhrmann's regular cinematography pops out again and although I saw this in 2D I am sure it would just be distracting and more surreal in 3D. He uses his style to create realistic cartoon worlds and at a few points has cars doing what seem to be Benny the Cab style lane changes. Thankfully, it doesn't take out of the film and if it does, it'll be over soon.

At two and a half hours, it is just as long as the 1974 film, but the film moves quickly enough that by the time you notice, it's almost over as well.

Overall, not a bad film from a director I don't care for, but certainly not his worst.

Dave Kempher

For those of you afraid of seeing a rehash of Iron Man 2 you can rest easy. Iron Man 3 makes me want to see Thor and Captain America's sequels all the more because it has chosen to incorporate The Avengers plot line into this single character film and create a universe as opposed to a single franchise film.

This is, for the most part, not the rock 'em sock 'em robots film that Iron Man 2 was, although there is some of that in it, but this film is a turning point for Tony Stark. As for Pepper, Rhodes, and Happy (who finally gets to have a bigger part as he wasn't so busy directing this time around) the supporting cast does just that - support.

I managed to stay away from every trailer for this outside of the one for The Super Bowl and was surprised by the villains used in this film. I knew Ben Kingsley was in it as the Mandarin and I love the way this character was used. When this film is out of the theaters I will add a spoiler review that explains why. I do say "villains" though because we are given more than one and while that sounds like a recipe for Spider Man 3 style disaster, it was handled with the same grace as 6 heroes in one film ala The Avengers.

Drew Pearce and Shane Black write a very compelling story that sometimes turns into a Lethal Weapon style buddy pic, but works for the character of a man on his own and hunted by terrorists. Ben Kingsley easily steals the film and has a scene that will leave you breathless for the first half of it. Guy Pearce plays a character that reminded me of Edward Nygma in Batman Forever and looked like Val Kilmer. He isn't bad in it, he's just your typical "Mr. Stark I have an idea. Oh, you're going to ignore me? I'LL GET YOU!" sort of villain.

The ending is a little concerning from a canonical stance, but is a great bookend to the beginning and that explanation will have to wait for the spoiler review. All in all this was a very good film that shows us that Disney and Marvel are going to create a grand universe for us all!

Dave Kempher