It’s not like I’m shocked that Texas Chainsaw Massacre, the Beginning is horrible, but I am shocked at how tasteless and horrendously filmed and acted it was, including how bad the special effects were.  The original movie by Tobe Hooper, who by the way put his name on this piece of trash movie surprisingly, was excellent in it’s camera shots and documentary like filming, and that’s what added to the creepiness of it.  Not only that, it really didn’t over do the violence, but more so alluded to the violence.

The Beginning isn’t gruesome, at least not in any realistic way since much of it looks fake, but it’s offensively stupid, with it’s backstory as to how Leatherface gets his mask, and how his adoptive masochistic “dad” got to be the sheriff of the podunk town.  With the first Chainsaw movie, I had a heavy feeling afterwards because I really felt as though those people died horrible deaths and that the story was somehow very real (it was supposedly based on a true story, by the way). 

With this one, I had a sick, heavy feeling after watching 2/3 of it (I skipped out and made my boyfriend watch the rest by himself, and I went in the other room and watched the first X Files movie, a much better choice), but that was because the characters were unredeeming, and really just made you want to go take a shower. 

My opinion on this movie is that it deserves an F minus if I were to grade it.  It was unoriginal, hurried, and lacked any sort of taste or style.  It was obvious and never clever, and wasn’t even scary, it just made you feel disgusted that you were wasting your time watching it. 

When I rented this movie from Netflix, I wasn’t really sure what we were in store for. The Mist is based on a Stephen King novella, which was part of the short novel collection for The Skeleton Crew a while back. By the title of the book and the movie, I thought this might be something akin to The Fog, or something that brought forth malevolent beings with it, maybe of a supernatural “ghost” genre, however I was wrong, and I really don’t want to give away what’s in the Mist, because finding out was half the fun of this movie.

Well, let me start by saying “I want to believe” this movie was meant to be good, and that maybe I’m being too harsh on it, being a longtime geek fan of the show the X Files, and huge fans of David Duchovney and Gillian Anderson, but alas, I can’t back the movie up with a good review.

Well, we went to the theater to see Heath Ledger’s last performance that has fully been captured on camera, and I must say, his character the Joker was the main excitement of the movie. His portrayal of this tortured soul and maniacal chaos seeker was nothing short of brilliant, and you couldn’t wait for the next time he would appear on the screen.

I remembered when the movie The Exorcism of Emily Rose came out in theaters initially about 4 years ago.  It was right up my alley because the dark trailers I had seen for it looked like something that would be thought provoking and different, as religiously toned movies, especially ones that are at all even loosely based on true stories, often are.  I thought it was along the lines of another religiously themed thriller/horror movie I had liked a lot with Patricia Arquette called “Stimata”, and it was sort of the same deal.

While I will say one of my complaints about the movie The Exorcism of Emily Rose is that sometimes the writing came off as hokey or cliche, I think the acting was very solid, and included a great cast of actors and actresses, including Emily played by the same woman who plays Dexter’s sister on the series about a serial killer called Dexter on Showtime, and Laura Linney, as always was good as the attorney who is reluctantly assigned the case to defend the catholic priest who is being tried for “negligent homicide” in the death of Emily Rose, because of a series of exorcisms.

Tom Wilkinson does a great job as the priest being tried, Father Moore, and Campbell Scott, whom I hadn’t seen in anything in years, was great as the attorney on the plaintiff side, the people.  What was interesting about this movie was that it was based on a true story, however I came to find out it was VERY loosely based on real events that occurred in Germany back in the seventies, where a woman by the name of Annelise Michel.

The real story was interesting and compelling, but the movie spun it as a supernatural occurrence while it sounds like the real life story was really an unfortunatel  series of mishaps for a seriously mentally ill young woman who was most likely schizophrenic.  The movie definitely took a lot of liberties and while the directors say they wanted to present both sides of the story and let the audience make up their mind, they definitely went for the supernatural, mystical angle. 

It worked - it was compelling and well directed, but the writing and scenarios could have used some work.  A good example of one hokey part (spoiler alert), was when one of the main witnesses is run over right in front of the defense attorney.  Oh, and they must have added scenes later, because there are two scenes where Laura Linney is clearly wearing a really bad wig, so there were some cases of bad editing that took away from the credibility of this otherwise solid movie. 

Well, this was an interesting movie, and brought back an old favorite, Marisa Tomei, who noticeably walks around topless for a few scenes in the film, and I must say as a fellow woman, she’s still looking pretty smashing for being in her forties!  Phillip Seymour Hoffman and Ethan Hawke play brothers in this movie, one seemingly on the borderline of being a sociopath until we see some real emotion come out later, played by Hoffman, and the other a sniveling cry baby who seems to have a good heart, but also blames others for his problems and is not averse to taking the easy way out for any sort of predicament - a coward, if  you will.

The movie is one about what seems like a victimless crime, thought of by Hoffman, the “bad” brother, and is carried out by his cry baby brother played by Hawke who turns in a good performance as well alongside the formidable Hoffman, which is much to say about acting abilities when you can hold your own beside a pro. 

The brothers hatch a plot to make some extra money, which they are both in desperate need of, for different reasons but both through faults of their own, to rob their mother and father’s jewlry store.  When things go horribly wrong, the events are told in a flash forward, flash back sequence, with a sort of weird format that I didn’t like, and you’ll know what I mean when you see the film. 

The problem I have with this movie is that I just didn’t care about these two brothers.  Instead of feeling sorry for Hawke, I didn’t care if he spent the rest of his miserable life in prison, since he seemed the type that would push you out in the middle of traffic if it were between you and him getting hit by a car.  As far as Hoffman goes, it seems the film maker teeters between trying to make you dislike him and feel sorry for him, both of which are unsuccessful, at least for me.

Tomei puts in a good performance, but we’re unsure of what her character’s point is, other than providing what seems like gratuitious sex scenes and topless eye candy.  If I were her, I’d wish the film I’d bared it all for several times grabbed the audience a bit more and stuck with you.  All in all, I can’t say I disliked the movie, but it wasn’t up to snuff for the actors that were in it, including Albert Finney, who did a great job as the father who seems to have some problems of his own. 

The Spanish language horror film called “The Orphanage” was one I put in my Netflix cue just because it was recommended by their automatic recommendations system after it’s tallied all the other genres and types of movies I tend to go for.  Apparently this recommendation feature is pretty good, because most movies it’s recommended so far are pretty high up on my “like” list.

The Orphanage has a very talented cast, headed by a woman who plays a mother to a young boy named Simon, prounounced See-Mone in Spanish, in case you’re wondering and want to prepare for the movie a bit.  We find throughout the movie that the woman has puchased a former orphanage on the beach with her husband, the orphanage that she actually came from as a child before being “rescued” by adoptive parents.

The house is huge and creepy, which adds to the element of the creepy factor for the movie, which runs longer than the average film of this nature, but it flies by with no problems at all.  The fact that it is set on a beach where the sun hardly ever shines adds to the eerie factor.  We find out that her adopted son, Simone has a grave illness throughout the film, and the film goes through most of the story trying to figure out where her son has disappeared to after he claims that he talks to other children that no one can see but himself. 

The poor mother is put through the ringer, but we find her conviction in finding her son to be compelling, and she portrays a concerned mother and strong woman very well, even in the face of her husband leaving the house because he can’t face what’s become of them after they have lost Simone. 

The cool thing about the Orphanage is that it accomplishes the creepy, jumpy factor without relying on obvious scenes that make one squirm, but rather, good old fashioned timing.  Accept for a few scenes that will probably leave an impression on you, and I don’t necessarily mean in a happy, good way, this movie was a superior modern day horror film with a twist that was unexepected.  It is a sad ghost story essentially, but it’s so clever in it’s angles and quiet suspense that you can’t help but think about for days after you’ve seen it. 

After watching Michael Moore’s documentary style movies, Bowling for Columbine, about high school violence, and Farenheit 911 as well as his other one about the car industry, who’s name escapes me at the moment, I thought I’d at least find his latest documentary movie about the terrible state of the American health care system, “Sicko” entertaining, or thought provoking, but what it ended up being was a message laced, agenda driven movie that was anti republican in it’s agenda.

It actually seemed very sensationalistic to me, and I think I stopped watching around the part where Moore takes a boat full of people in dire need of healthcare who can’t afford it for one reason or another and are being turned away by doctors, hospitals and the health care they should have a right to, to Guantanamo Bay prison, where prisoners sadly get better health care than the millions of uninsured Americans who’ve done nothing wrong.

This part seemed particularly sensationalistic and exploitative in nature and it really turned me off from his movie making efforts.  I suddenly saw Michael Moore as an opportunist of sorts, someone to come in and criticize a system and make a public cry for reform, but with no solutions to offer. 

He spends the majority of the documentary demonstrating how much better healthcare is in other parts of the world, such as France, Cuba, and Canada, but also leaves out the factors that make this sort of public free or almost free healthcare possible.  Such as the fact that Canada doesn’t have to have an army and therefore can afford this sort of public healthcare system, or that Britain and France tax the hell out of it’s citizens.  He brings this point up, but only to show how comfortably it’s citizens still live. 

I just thought he could have presented other sides of the story a little better, but he really only presented the points that best supported his agenda for this movie, which was to point out, yet again, more ways in which America sucks.  Sorry Michael, this one really turned me off, and I’m willing to bet you turned a lot of other people off too with this latest self promotional attempt at pointing out the injustices we suffer. 

As a girl who has a boyfriend who is an avid comic book reader and endlessly interested in the movies that are based on comic books that have been coming out and slaughtering all other movies at the box office, I was thinking that Iron Man might be just another average comic book based movie.  But I was wrong.  Iron Man, starring the very talented Robert Downey Jr., who brings a fresh breath to the bad ass comic book heroes with a breath of real humanity and humor, was a thoroughly enjoyable flick.

The movie was directed by Jon Favreau, who’s come quite a long way since his first big role in Swingers, the cult classic that launched a bevy of catch phrases years ago.  Favreau clearly knows what he’s doing being the director’s lense, and he had a great vision with who he wanted Tony Stark, Downey’s character to be and how he wanted the other characters around him to interact with and complement his personality.

Jeff Bridges is excellent in his supporting role and barely recognizable with a shaved head and beard, and even Gwyneth Paltrow, whom I’m usually hard to warm up to, played her role as Mr. Stark’s nerdy assistant of years and his only real loyal friend to perfection.  There is so much that Iron Man has to offer, and it’s amazing that it does it with only moments of the movie being about Downey in his super hero outfit that makes him Iron Man the superhero.

There’s a lot fo comedic acting that is done well, including by Terence Howard, who plays another friend of Stark’s, and Downey himself is probably the best comedic actor of the bunch.  I can’t help but root for Downey in this role as well knowing that he’s suffered through some serious pain and addictions throughout his life and has come out of them only to rise above it and create this great new character, and make it totally his own thing. 

The audience loved the film, and we left the movie looking forward to a sequel, which will most definitely happen.  There is also a teaser at the end of the movie with Samuel L Jackson playing a character from the Avengers, hinting at a coming Avengers movie, which will include Downey and Jackson playing their respective roles.  All in all, Iron Man was great, every bit the blockbuster it was reported to be before its release and making up for box office disappointments like Speed Racer and a lack of other good films to go to the theater to see. 

It may be totally campy with a lot of grade school humor and far fetched situational comedy, but the chemistry between actors John Cho and Kal Penn has not changed since the first installment of the pothead comedy Harold and Kumar, and it’s still well worth the watch.  The opening scene starts off to set the tone for the movie, with a certain bathroom incident, blatantly put out their by the producers, a masturbation scene that was so ridiculous that you had to laugh or you weren’t human, and lots and lots of talk about weed.

Harold and Kumar were getting packed for their trip to Amsterdam, where of course we all know, weed is legal.  This is the equivalent of a paradise to a pothead, and Harold and Kumar were ready to go in the opening scenes.  Then it all goes wrong when Harold’s home made smokeless bong is mistaken for a bomb on the plane and Harold and Kumar are thrown into jail by a bunch of stereotypically ignorant “Americans” who are anything but diplomatic in their handling of minorities or anyone that appears “different”.

The political incorrectness in the movie is hilarious, and it’s nice to see a movie make light of subjects that some movies take way too seriously in an attempt to “make a point”.  If you want to just laugh for an hour and a half straight and you can handle bawdy, raw comedy, then this movie is for you.  If you watch it and you don’t laugh, you probably take yourself a little too seriously.  Just relax and suspend all reality for a while, and you may even feel like you’re getting high right along with the heroes of this hysterical romp!