Reviews

It's strange that this movie is averaging 5 out 10 stars as I write this. After looking through reviews it seems we all LOVE it. The only slight draw back is the quality might just be a tad under Hollywood high budget (I guess, maybe?), but even at that it is really well done. After watching a million throw-away empty films that you forget in week - this kind of film exposes the destitution that so many children face in this world and inspires you to open your heart the way Hud did. It breaks my heart to see so many little children orphaned and trafficked in this world. Let's all open our homes and adopt at least one child!!

Thank you Bring Me Hope for making this and highlighting this need! ALso thank you for showing the real adoption stories at the end!

I have wanted to be one of these quirky comic strip artists since I was kid reading Garfield and Peanuts in the papers. The problem was, in pre-internet days, how do you even know what to do do get there? You read some books you can find in your local library but trying to get the info you really need always seemed impossible to me. To actually see the faces and hear the interviews of Jim Davis, Stephen Pastis, Bill Amend and of course, the legendary Bill Watterson and others is just so sought after for a nobody cartoonist like myself. (The only other similar documentary I know of was Dear Mr. Watterson and that one's really good too). There are just a few scenes of the artists actually drawing and this is something I have been dying to see for I-don't-know-how-long.

It's sad that it's really a documentary about the death of newspapers and therefore the end of the printed newspaper comics as we used to know them. It does shine a little light of hope in the direction of web comics - but I'm finding, at least for myself that it's nearly impossible to get seen and heard in a world where any kid can post a meme on social media and call it a "comic". I still think to myself, there has to be another way to aggregate all of us old-school ink & paper cartoonists outside the web...Like a yearly...or quarterly...no weekly...well heck, how about a daily printed volume or something...I don't know. We could call this printing something like "The Funnies" or "The Funny Paper"...yeah that'd be funny.

Anyway, this is a MUST SEE for anyone who draws comics (of the funny variety) or who who just loves them.

I knew reading negative reviews was going to make me feel sick because I knew the pushback against such a movie would be almost overwhelming. This movie is well-made (not like a lot of the low budget, cheesy Christian flicks out there). The acting is top notch, the storyline is gripping and will make you cry. The writers did an excellent job with such a controversial subject, sticking with truth but not going overboard with the graphic details for shock value. The movie offers a gentle touch from the pro-life side, I promise. This isn't movie about hate and shame, it really is just a biography of the true story of Abby Johnson. Dear Woman-Considering-Abortion: Watch this for yourself and judge because you seriously have to ask yourself "Why are people so harshly tearing this movie down?" the same question you should ask when you see people standing outside PP praying. Why is this such a controversial topic? Why do many of these "medical facilities" have tall fences and restrict who comes on the property? It's because this ramifications of this "procedure" are far, far greater than getting a tumor removed. But you're an intelligent person, you know that. You're considering terminating your pregnancy because you KNOW there's no way you can take care of this kid, right? I get that, WE get that. Not all pro-lifers are here to shame you. Please, before you go to a PP, just consider talking to a Crisis Pregnancy Center first. They can help you TRULY explore your options. Your mistakes do not define you! You still have a chance to make a decision you live with the rest of your life!

My wife and I have become increasingly bored with what's on Netflix and Hulu. We've watched through all the TV shows we really like and have been floating around in limbo searching for something new for a while. We thought we'd give this show a try. After the first few episodes we were like "Yeah this is not bad, let's keep watching," and then the show just got funnier and funnier! You know what I like MOST about this show? It's relatively clean and doesn't have this underlying social agenda to cram a world-view down our throat like most modern TV shows. We breezed through the 4 seasons of this show and are sorely disappointed that it was already cancelled. Thanks a lot CBS - I guess you were looking for some more PC garbage to make sure society is fully indoctrinated in the modern globalistic, socially conscious, progressively tolerant, homogenization of the world.

We just happened to come across this on Netflix and gave it a try. Very quickly it moves from "oh here's ANOTHER cutesy animated film trying desperately to contrive feelings of Christmas magic" to "Oh my gosh, this is hilarious!" This movie is genuinely funny, excellently illustrated and quite possibly the most original Santa Claus story I've ever seen. The character of Klaus as this massively manly woodsman living out in the cold backwoods and friends only with the wildlife was so cool! The story of the fighting villagers was so full of little funny details and had my wife and I literally laughing out loud. It also has some heart wrenching moments that I won't spoil here.

This review is about The Last Knight but will about sum up my feelings of this franchise. As an 80's kid whose heros were Jesus, John Elway and Optimus Prime you can imagine my excitement when I heard the Autobots were coming to live action big screen in '07 (As a side note I was absolutely thrilled when I heard Peter Cullen's nostalgic voice in that fist movie) But I was quickly disappointed and with each sequel in this franchise it is like salt in an open wound. There is barely a thread in these movies of the basic fabric of what it even means to be The Transformers. Admittedly these movies are visually stunning and exciting. They are fun to watch and even have some pretty deep and layered plots. All that is great, but Bay, if you're going to change just about everything about the Autobots and Decepticons....why not just go make your own thing? The things I cannot stand about these movies include (but are not limited to): 1. Obliterating the innocence of the original. When adapting a childhood favorite, you kill the essence by bringing in crude language and innuendos. Bringing a super hot, sexy chick is fun to look at but really is a just a distraction and has nothing to do with the story. 2. Character design. This is really the most annoying thing about these movies. The characters are so damn overly detailed it is hard to even realize what you're looking at half the time. I think a large part of what we loved about the Transformers in the 80's was their character design. Modern CGI artist have the ability to knock it out of the park and bring into reality those cars & trucks transforming into robots but here they just overdid the crap out of them and on top of it, gave them all these weird insect-like faces. 3. Tough chicks. *barf* This all Hollywood cares about anymore and I'm just over it. In the real world a tough-chick is a rarity - in the movies you'd think that's how all women are. 4. The "transforming dance". OK, on paper it sounds kind of cool, 'hey, let's make it like a break dance when they transform'. In reality it is just needlessly showy and seems to mask the actual transformation. Look, this entire story is about vehicles that transform into robots. Slow it down and lets see how that works. And don't tell me it doesn't: they did in the 80's cartoon and I have a dozen toys from that era that DO work. 5. Relentless action. OK, we all love action, but good grief, put in a breather every few scenes. The best way to really highlight a battle is surround it by quietness, not more battles. 6. Too much going on. Along the lines of that last point, this is the same reason I just can't with the Avengers franchise. Why on earth do the writers think they need to stuff EVERY character and EVERY storyline into the same movie and then ADD new characters? Do you even realize the The Last Knight really only deals with like four Autobots?? Where's Jazz and Ironhide and Powerglide and Cliffjumper? etc. etc. etc. 7. How do the humans even hold a candle to the robots whenever they fight? This is just unbelievable. 8. In The Last Knight, they ALMOST forgot to have Optimus transform. In a 2.5 hour movie about TRANSFORMERS, the main autobot transforms ONCE. 9. Is this movie about Mark Wahlberg and others about Megan Fox and Josh Duhamel and Shi LaBeouf and Anthony Hopkins? Or is it about the freakin' Transformers? 10. Why can Bumble Bee STILL not talk?....oh he kind of did in the end. And WHY does he not transform into a VW Beetle? Again Bay, go make your own thing.

I could go on and on and I would if I knew Bay would read this and just stop. If you want to make us 80's kids happy how about this. Reboot this and scratch everything Bay did. Start all over. Make a period piece so that you can still keep all the same vehicles. Make them transform into what they originally did. Simplify the animation so you can see them transform. Make the movie about the AUTOBOTS. Maybe a little about Spike and Sparkplug but they are the SIDE characters. Keep it innocent enough for 7 year olds to go see. Try to approximate their original voices or go find those actors like they did with Cullen. Keep Peter Cullen though....definitely keep him at all costs. You don't need to write new storylines or add characters. The original was fine. Hell, ALL you need to do is remake the original cartoons just use modern CGI to make it live action. Mm k? Thanks.

When did filmmakers start mixing up "Shock" with "Horror"? Most of these stories weren't scary at all, just horribly and utterly grotesque. Most of these filmmakers seemed like they were crunched for time and ideas so they just went for the nuclear option - shock value. How completely intellectually lazy! I can't believe how many depraved minds got together to write, act, film and edit this drivel. There is everything from pornography, racism, masturbation, animal cruelty, child pron (thankfully only alluded to), drug use, S&M, way too much gore, stupid juvenile, low brow humor, and on and on. A couple of the the titles may have made for a really cool full length movie, like Cycle or Vagitus, but the rest are mind rot that never need to be watched by another human being. I watched this as part of Hulu's "Huluween" and can't believe they actually have this kind of X rated crap on Hulu. I am always trying to find good scary movies, not a bunch of almost-smut thrown together for pure shock value.

I was drawn in by the cover photo...there was something "Royal Tenanbaum"_esque about it. Very quickly in the opening scene with the fortune teller it was clear we had rented yet another B movie by the film quality and acting. What really made this a bad movie, though, was the story itself. The fact that Jack becomes agoraphobic because of what the fortune teller told him was hard to swallow, but the fact that he becomes cartoonishly terrified is just too much. He is such a freaking pansy that I'm sure a 5th grade girl would even want to kick him in the nuts to see him do something brave. I can see where the writer was going with this story but it is just so one dimensional. Also most of the scoring and pacing was done so poorly that there was no punch in events. Audrey was all this film had going for it. She's beautiful and her character had a bit of depth (unlike Jack). Also...the secret (I won't give it away here) that Jack told his psychologist seemed to have nothing to do wiith the plot. Finally, I did not like how it ended.

These days I'm just about sick of computer animation and special effects. It seems each new movie is just trying to out-do the last with more CGI, louder effects and packing the movie with more & more action. Guardians of the Galaxy had all the ingredients to be another blockbuster Marvel movie yet somehow sidestepped (most) of those pitfalls. I have to be honest, I had never heard of the comic book and actually never even saw a trailer before seeing this. There was a TON of action and there were the clichés that make me want to throw-up (tough guy girls, bad guys that are just cartoonishly bad, unstoppable & unknown powers being volleyed between the good guys and the bad guys),but here's what made this movie great: The plot was unpredictable, it was original and creative - except the main guy being kind of Rocket Man/Ironman-ish, the cast of heroes were unlike anything I've seen (especially from Marvel movies). Lastly, just when you think CGI has reached its peak, somehow some studio comes along and is still able to wow you with the visuals! This movie was visually stunning! PS Groot was easily my favorite character and probably won me over for the entire film. Stories need more characters like him who are slow, thoughtful, wise & loving even while being the most of the team.

I don't know why, because I'm a pretty harsh critic, especially when it comes to horror movies. I feel like the majority of "scary" movies rely too much on the "boo" factor and are somewhat predictable or have some silly monster that is just not believable. A lot of them, too, seem to borrow from others and just try too hard. I knew nothing of this movie going into it and started to roll my eyes after the first scene. However, when the real story in the 1800's got going, things started to get pretty chilling and I was pleasantly surprised. I was also surprised at some of the cast being some big names(Sissy Spacek & Donald Sutherland)I didn't think the plot was predictable which kept me on the edge of my seat. Unexpected elements such as the black wolf are necessary to keep a movie original and unpredictable. I wasn't a huge fan of the twist and how the hauntings were explained...In fact, that seems to be the downfall of a lot of horror...when they try to neatly tie everything up and explain the happenings.

The only thing I enjoyed about this movie was the concept. I was hooked by the cover art and the synopsis on the back of the DVD and so I rented it. I was very disappointed in the low budget quality and poor acting. I could have made a better movie using my old mini-DV camera. If "B" quality doesn't bother, perhaps you could get into this. I can think of hundreds of cool ideas to take this idea - the idea that only 180 something people are left on the planet. Think of the infrastructure - buildings, roads....THINGS, you could pillage from billions of abandoned buildings! The film seemed to barely touch on some of the essentials you'd be forced to deal with right away, like how to sustain your food and shelter. Let's hope maybe a bigger studio or something buys the rights to this story.

Me & my buddies love obscure, art- house, independent films & so we're always going out on a limb to find something good. I really wish there was some kind of warning like a scarlet letter for movies like this. This movie is painfully slow and so dull I couldn't follow what was happening. The acting is bad, the sets & costumes are low budget. The eyeliner on the bad-guys was so distracting I think I paid more attention to it than the dialogue. It seems they could only film in 5 locations, one of which was someone's apartment. There are no ups & downs in action- if the pacing of the film were on a graph it would flat-line.

We kept hoping things would change but a half hour in we gave it the fast forward treatment.

The first time I saw a trailer for Iron Sky I thought it looked like a high-budget blockbuster type film and looked kind of cool/interesting in the vein of Sky Captain & the World of Tomorrow. Then I believe production was held off for a few years & I forgot about it. Yesterday I saw it on the shelf at the video store & thought "Oh yeah! I'm very curious about this movie about moon Nazis!" As the opening scene unfolded I started getting that yucky feeling that I had just rented a "B" movie. Through the movie there was that low-budget feel, but it was as if the producers knew it and owned it. Iron Sky does not take it self at all seriously and this attitude is precisely what it needed to bring us to a place of actually being impressed with the special effects, the humor, even the plot with its societal commentary. You might think there's not many turns you could take in a movie about Nazis on the dark side of the moon, but this movies takes many twists and turns making it very unpredictable.

I have to separate myself from my tiny little involvement as an extra in this film to write a fair review. Let's start with the bad: After having been a part of the Moab, Utah shoot I decided I had better brush up on my Lone Ranger knowledge and so I bought a DVD of the first few black & white episodes and watched them all. The Lone Ranger was an epic character. He was a courageous, fearless good guy who, with his horse silver and his signature silver bullets, became a legend in the old west. In this 2013 rendition, he is reduced to a cowardly wimp who is scared of guns. When you cut away all the action sequences, he really didn't bring anyone to justice, little lone Cavendish. I am so tired of our modern cinema's reliance on special effects rather than plot lines to tell stories. There were plenty of my pet peeve moments when I'm left rolling my eyes going "yeah right!", like when Tonto jumps from one train 40 or 50 feet down to another movie train & it doesn't break both of his legs. Though I think Johnny Depp is great actor, I think his personality & his version of Tonto made this into a huge Depp-fest whereas they could have given the role to a full-blooded Native American to give them honor & stay true to the story. Another bone I have to pick is the senseless deprecation of Christians or, I guess, "church folk" in this movie. They are made to look like a bunch of backwoods, nerdy, half brained dogmatists preaching hellfire & brimstone. What was the point in that? Also John Reid makes it a point to show that his "Bible" is a law book, rather than the Bible. The original Lone Ranger could actual be seen quoting the Bible in the old black & white episodes! OK, now for the good: This movie is a high-budget non-stop adventure. It's fun to watch & is has a good amount of humor dispersed throughout. I enjoyed the aspects where they stayed true to the original story. The look & feel of the film seems authentic and is overall visually exciting, not to mention filmed in beautiful locations. If you really liked movies like Pirates of the Caribbean, then you will probably like The Lone Ranger.

I really wish people would stop making hit movies into franchises. I guess from a monetary standpoint, why not milk something for all its worth? From an artistic standpoint, however, movie makers should only make sequels if the original material planned for it (i.e. Lord of the Rings). To add more stories after the fact is to dilute what made it a success in the first place. The first Paranormal Activity was one of the creepiest movies I have ever seen and it wasn't because of some formula that you could apply to another movie. This is exactly what they are doing with each successive movie. It was like they thought "Oh it really freaked people out when something invisible yanked her out of her bed" and so they just keep doing the same thing over & over. IT'S NOT SCARY ANYMORE! There were certain things that happened in the first one, like the main girl actually becoming possessed and the way her character just changed, that you cannot just repeat. Anyway, this particular film is basically just a teenage girl Skyping with her boyfriend the whole time and maybe like 2 scary things happen in the whole movie, but you've been waiting for it so much that it's anticlimactic when it finally happens. The idea of this spooky little boy seems to have potential but in the end he's not spooky at all. Dear writers & producers of Paranormal Activity, it is time to move on to something new.

Something in the trailer of this movie made me think of a story I've been trying to write since I was a teenager & that was why I was curious to see it. However,The Tall Man was nothing like what I had expected. For the first 2/3 of the movie I was getting more and more disappointed. I was thinking "Why do they always make these movies about a heroine that is constantly crying & screaming & limping & dragging herself away from some bad guy?"Boring! I thought it was going to be hard to finish the movie because it seemed like another cliché thriller. The plot makes two hard twists, however, that make it all worth it and you will be replaying the movie in your head hours after its over to see how it all fits together. There are very, very subtle clues throughout and you are left trying to figure what in the world is happening right until the very end! It's strange that I could be hating a movie so much until the end where it changes my mind and I say "Oh...well...OK...now that's pretty cool and original!"

How this movie has an average rating of 6.1 at the time of me writing this review is beyond me. The semi-serious base story of Shaun, a high schooler trying to get into Stanford is a good enough drama on its own, but then you ad the social commentary (albeit exaggerated...maybe)on the southern California mindset with an all star cast including Jack Black Lily Tomlin and Chevy Chase the movie becomes outrageously funny. I think Colin Hanks is an excellent actor (I have no idea why he has all but disappeared in the last 10 years), and does a bang up job of being the one kid in school who actually cares about his education all the while being pulled away by his numb-skull surfer buddies. Another of the cast who seems to have disappeared is Schuylar Fisk who plays Shaun's girlfriend Ashley. Ashley is the overly positive sweetheart girlfriend who will support Shaun through thick and thin. This is honestly one of Jack Black's funniest performances. He plays Shaun's druggie dead beat brother and when he gets mixed up in Shaun's quest for Stanford, hilarity compounds! Even 10 years after the movie was released I still laugh out loud watching this!

My brother & I probably watched every episode of the original Hannah Barbara Scooby Doo cartoons in the 80's and so I am very leery of all these newer versions that keep popping up. There was a certain feel in those originals that will never be reproduced and perhaps Scooby is best left in the 70's. I was pretty let down by the Freddie Prince Jr. movies which tried to update Scooby (like a lot of CGI updates, Alvin & the Chipmunks, Smurfs, Garfield, Transformers, etc.)with modern lingo & culture which for some reason means crudeness, krass jokes and even sexual innuendos. This movie was better in that sense, but is annoying when they stray from the original (Freddie is blond, ghosts are ALWAYS people in masks, etc.) And since we're making a "realistic" version, why is Scooby CGI? Why not just use a real Great Dane? Nick Palatas, though doing a decent impression of Casey Kacem's "Shaggy" voice comes across annoying and contrived after a while. Maybe I'm a purist...maybe I'm a grouch, but I kind of wish people would leave the old cartoons alone.