Mike's Movie Tips

2/4 Starring: Mark Wahlberg, Dwayne Johnson, Anthony Mackie, Tony Shaloub, Ed Harris, Rebel Wilson, Bar Paly, Rob Corddry Rated R for Bloody Violence, Crude Sexual Content, Nudity, Language Throughout and Drug Use One has to give Michael Bay credit for trying something different.  Bay, the king of monster budget special effects extravaganzas (like the "Transformers" franchise and " Bad Boys " and "Bad Boys II"), opted to do a smaller budget ($25 million, which is a fraction of his usual budget) movie for a change of pace.  Fair enough.  I'm about as sick of metal robots pounding the hell out of each other as he probably is.  The film looks great, as his films always do.  Unfortunately, he commits the cardinal sin of any movie: he filmed the movie with a script that is in desperate need of a few rewrites to clean it up. Daniel Lugo (Wahlberg) is a personal trainer at a gym that he has saved from ruin.  But he wants his own version of the America...

3.5/4 Starring: Zachary Quinto, Paul Bettany, Kevin Spacey, Penn Badgely, Simon Baker, Demi Moore, Stanley Tucci, Jeremy Irons, Mary McDonnell Rated R for Language No gunshots.  No car chases.  Unbearable suspense. How is this possible?  When you have a top-notch everything, a lack of violence and stunts is irrelevant.  The acting is superb from top to bottom.  The writing is strong and intelligent.  The direction, by a filmmaker who has only made one other professional short, is terrific.  Those three things, my friends, are what really make a good movie. A major financial company is going through severe cutbacks, and Eric Dale (Tucci), the risk management division head, is one of the victims.  Before he leaves, he hands a jump drive to one of his underlings, a 28-year old guy named Peter Sullivan (Quinto), with the warning to "be careful."  The jump drive contains a project that Eric was working on but wasn't able to finish. ...

2/4 Starring: Josh Lucas, Jessica Biel, Sam Shepard, Jamie Foxx, voice of Wentworth Miller Rated PG-13 for Intense Action, Some Violence, Brief Strong Language and Innuendo While it's unfair to lay the blame of "Stealth's" failings completely at the feet of director Rob Cohen (the script is ambitious but half-baked, and the performances are flat across the board), most of it has to do with Cohen's utter lack of talent as a filmmaker.  Cohen can only make brainless popcorn flicks, and he's not even very good at those ("The Fast and the Furious" was wimpy and I'm going to pretend that the third "Mummy" movie doesn't exist).  At least he has flair, unlike another special effects director who shall remain nameless ... Ben Gannon (Lucas), Kara Wade (Biel) and Henry Purcell (Foxx) are the top three pilots in the Naval Air Force.  As such, they are assigned to fly on the cutting edge of military technology.  Now, the three of them ...

3/4 Starring: Bailee Madison, Katie Holmes, Guy Pearce, Jack Thompson Rated R for Violence and Terror "Don't Be Afraid of the Dark" does exactly what it sets out to do: chill viewers for 99 minutes.  This is a creepy monster movie that will cause the hairs on everyone's back to stand up.  It's not particularly ambitious, nor does it take any chances, but it is effective. Sally (Madison) has just been shipped off to New England to live with her father Alex (Pearce) and his business partner/girlfriend, Kim (Holmes).  She's uncommunicative with her father and borderline hostile towards Kim.  Things change when Sally discovers a basement to the house that Alex and Kim have been refurbishing.  It gives the three of them a chance to bond, although that doesn't last long when Sally begins to realize that there are creatures living underneath the house and they want something from her. The film is solid, but not spectacular, on all fronts.  The performanc...

3.5/4 Starring: Tom Cruise, Olga Kurylenko, Andrea Riseborough, Morgan Freeman, Nikolaj Coster-Waldau Rated PG-13 for Sci-Fi Action Violence, Brief Strong Language, and Some Sensuality/Nudity When I watched the trailer for "Oblivion," I was intrigued because it looked awesome, but I had absolutely no idea what it was about.  There's a reason for this: the film is about ideas, rather than action.  No doubt Universal wanted to highlight the gunfire and special effects to bring in the teenagers.  They'll earn their money's worth, although not in the way they were expecting.  This is not "Star Wars." A war has decimated Earth.  In Jack's words, "We won the war, but lost the planet."  Jack is a technician who cleans up the last of the aliens that attacked Earth, and making sure that the machines that are being used to extract the last of Earth's resources (which are going to be moved to Titan, Saturn's largest moon).  But strange...

As you all know, I'm a strong supporter of gay rights.  The LGBT movement, which has been in full swing for the past thirty years, is the great civil rights battle of our time.  Progressions towards gay marriage are sweeping the nation, including a trio of issues that are before the US Supreme Court.  Support for gay rights has never been higher, and numbers are growing.  Celebrities like George Clooney, Tom Hanks, Brad Pitt and Steven Spielberg (to name a few of many) are active supporters.  Businesses are also taking note, adding protections against discrimination in the work place and giving benefits to their gay employees. But there is another, more important, reason why I'm such a gay rights booster. I'm gay myself. Coming out in public isn't an easy decision for anyone, and it wasn't for me.  I've come out in stages, starting shortly after I first realized and accepted it towards the end of my junior year in high school.  Admitting it is th...

2.5/4 Starring: Bradley Cooper, Eva Mendes, Ryan Gosling, Ray Liotta, Ben Mendehlson, Rose Byrne, Dane DeHaan, Emory Cohen, Bruce Greenwood, Mahershala Ali, Harris Yulin Rated R for Language Throughout, Some Violence, Teen Drug and Alcohol Use, and a Sexual Reference There's no denying that Derek Cianfriance's sophomore feature is ambitious and has potential.  But while there are elements that are worthy of high praise, the film is too problematic for me to recommend. Luke (Gosling) is a stunt motorcycle rider for a travelling circus.  He wants to reconnect with an old flame, a pretty waitress named Romina (Mendes), but she's already in a relationship with Kofi (Ali).  But Romina has given birth to Luke's son, of which she only just now has informed him.  Luke wants to provide for his new baby, but a job is hard to come by.  With the help of a mechanic named Robin (Mendelsohn), Luke takes up robbing banks.  But then he has an interaction with a poli...

2/4 Starring: Steven Weber, Patrick Stewart, Michael T. Weiss, Bryan Batt Rated R for Strong Sexuality and Language What a weird movie. "Jeffrey" is as unconventional as they come.  From the bizarre asides that show what the lead character is feeling (the movie takes the "show, not tell" rule to new heights) to humorous asides which include weightlifting as a metaphor for sex and advice from a randy priest, this is not a normal movie.  But for all the cleverness and rule-breaking the film does, it doesn't work.  The comedy isn't funny, the acting is flat, and the writing is shallow. Jeffrey (Weber) is a sexually compulsive gay man.  But the AIDS crisis and a number of bizarre in-bed experiences has led him to give up sex.  Then he meets Steve (Weiss), a handsome man at the gym.  Steve is interested in him and the feeling is mutual, but thinking that it would lead to uninhibited sex, Jeffrey bails.  Eventually, Jeffrey agrees to date Steve, but...

3/4 Starring: Hugh Grant, Julianne Moore, Tom Arnold, Joan Cusack, Jeff Goldblum, Robin Williams Rated PG-13 for Language and Sexual Innuendo Typically in romantic comedies the formula is meet cute, fall in love, complications, then get back together and happy ever after.  With "Nine Months," that's not strictly the case.  It goes from being in love to complications.  And the complications are what typically happens after the final reel (or close to it): pregnancy. Samuel's (Grant) life is, in his words, "dangerously close to perfection."  He's a successful child psychologist (despite everything pointing to the contrary), has been in love with Rebecca (Moore) for the past five years, and has a gorgeous Porsche.  But Rebecca is missing something in her life, and it's only after she says the two words no man in the movies ever wants to hear that she knows what it is.  Samuel's perfect life is changing, and he's either got to get with th...

3/4 Starring: Clint Eastwood, John Malkovich, Rene Russo, Dylan McDermott, John Mahoney, Fred Dalton Thompson Rated R for Violence and Language The best villains know the heroes as well as they know themselves.  They know their weak spots (their wives/girlfriends, their kids, past mistakes, and so on), and they know how to stick a knife in the wound and twist it.  Any man can kill someone.  It takes a special breed of psychopath to punish the hero as he races against time to prevent a tragedy. Frank Horrigan (Eastwood) was once "the best and the brightest" in the Secret Service.  He was JFK's favorite agent until he failed to take a bullet for the President.  Now nearly washed out, he is doing undercover work with his new partner, Al D'Andrea (McDermott).  Then he gets a call from a creepy man (Malkovich) who knows all about him, and reveals that he plans to kill the president.  Horrigan must play the man's game in order to trap him before hist...

3/4 Starring: Sarah Polley, Adrien Brody, Delphine Chaneac, Simona Maicanescu, David Hewlitt, Abigail Chu Rated R for Disturbing Elements including Strong Sexuality, Nudity, Sci-Fi Violence and Language Typically speaking, it's a filmmaker's second feature that stinks (hence the term "sophomore slump").  Due to studio interference, a lacking script, or just plain inability to make lightning strike twice, many careers have taken a hit (and a few have been snuffed out...at least in the mainstream) after the second, better funded film turns out to be less than stellar.  With Vincenzo Natali, the opposite is true.  His "breakthrough" first feature, " Cube ," was a abomination of a motion picture.  "Splice" is actually a good film.  Not flawless, but it at least follows through with what it promises. Clive (Brody) and Elsa (Polley) are two scientists who live for pushing scientific boundaries.  They genetically mix different creatures...

1/4 Starring: Jane Levy, Shiloh Fernandez, Lou Taylor Pucci, Jessica Lucas, Elizabeth Blackmore Rated R for Strong Bloody Horror Violence and Gore, Some Sexual Content and Language I have not seen Sam Raimi's breakthrough cult classic "The Evil Dead," although I own it on Blu Ray (courtesy of the discount section at Best Buy).  Reportedly, it is a mix of scary horror and goofy humor and filled with obscene amounts of blood and gore.  The 2013 remake, has only the latter.  It's not scary and it's not funny.  All in all, it's a drag. Five friends are spending some time at a remote cabin in the woods, although this is not a weekend getaway.  Mia (Levy) is a drug addict, and her know-it-all nurse friend Olivia (Lucas) thinks that time in forced seclusion with no dope will cure her.  Along with them are her estranged brother David (Fernandez), his girlfriend Natalie (Blackmore), and their cynical hipster friend Eric (Pucci).  In the basement, Eric f...

2/4 Starring: Gerard Butler, Aaron Eckhart, Morgan Freeman, Rick Yune, Angela Bassett, Melissa Leo, Dylan McDermott, Finley Jacobsen, Radha Mitchell, Cole Hauser Rated R for Strong Violence and Language Throughout After watching "Olympus Has Fallen," I can guess the pitch to the studio with a fair amount of certainty what the pitch was: "Die Hard" meets "Air Force One."  It's solid thinking, since both were highly successful action movies.  Unfortunately, director Antoine Fuqua has taken elements of the aforementioned movies and cobbled them together in a less than satisfying result. Mike Banning (Butler) is a trusted Secret Service agent assigned to protect President Benjamin Asher (Eckhart), Asher's wife Margaret (Ashley Judd in a cameo) and Asher's son Connor (Jacobsen).  After a car accident claims Margaret's life, Banning is sent to the Treasury Department (despite the fact that everyone knew it wasn't his fault.  Then, the...

3.5/4 Starring: Jude Law, Gwyneth Paltrow, Giovanni Ribisi, Angelina Jolie, Bai Ling, Michael Gambon, Laurence Olivier Rated PG for Sequences of Stylized Sci-Fi Violence and Brief Mild Language I can't believe it's taken me this long to review "Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow."  I've seen it many times and I always have a ball watching it.  It's certainly not flawless, but it's definitely a lot of fun. Kerry Conran's debut feature is a love letter to those old serials that were popular in the 1930's.  The handsome and tough but vulnerable hero, the plucky heroine, the genius inventor, and the megalomaniacal villain.  You won't find brooding, tragic heroes or aliens or alternate dimensions here.  Conran keeps everything simple and innocent. Polly Perkins (Paltrow) is reporter chasing down a story of some missing scientists.  While she's chasing down a crucial lead, the city comes under attack but a bunch of flying machines.  ...