Reviews

While marketed as a divided America gone mad, it's actually not. Just a long anti-war message brought closer to home. Casting choices for the leads are a bit strange, while the performances are OK, there's still something TVish about their clichéd looks and scripts. The plot is thin and takes a while to get going while Dunst has to explain what the heck these over-eager photographers are doing. The 4 character archetypes are interesting but they're also delayed in thawing out.

Familiar gritty firefight sequences designed to make urban warfare disconcerting and random.

Even the toughest 2nd Amenders should hesitate to open their gun safes. The enemy will always be tougher and better prepped.

While the timeframe is not specifically identified, there's no reliance on cell phones or hyper modern tech, yet the characters are gung ho to jump into front line shootouts armed with just film SLR cameras. Gotta get that shot...even tho today's media is video, drones, nationwide and often indifferent enough not to risk dying for. Or in old Sam's case, taking a stray bullet that doesn't even get attended to as he bleeds out. The final storming the White House action scene makes no sense and misses the chance to stun the audience by instead falling back on a cliche ending that doesn't resolve, bring tears, set up or shock. A similar style and themed film is Aniara - the futility of life and leadership within a tragic setting that chews at the living.

For Civil War, a popcorn cruncher would have been more entertaining and worthy of IMAX; then throw in some tragic figures to help make the anti-war point.

A portrait of desperation and guts. We watch Emily grow into her life of crime and run with a hard crowd. The simple storyline carefully blends her relationships and temperament, guiding us to imagine various possible conclusions and fates. Unfortunately, the final sequences fail and disappoint, practically elevating Emily to anti-hero status instead of concluding with an open-ended scene, retribution, shock, tragedy or something else. Typical case of a good script falling down just on before crossing the goal line. Worth watching, esp for Plaza's range and physical demeanor. Just dont expect an ending worthy of a discussion.

Sweet but convoluted. Hard to see what is so cry- worthy when much of the dialogue is thru ASL with no captions or interpreters. Then add fishing, bullying, romance, singing lessons, poverty, conflicting paths and local corruption and you get an almost unsympathetic mess. BUT , the PC gods reign supreme and highlighting the deaf, with Marlee Matlin as the kicker, and its an automatic Oscar eventho it only made back 20% of its budget.

After a boring start and plot and characters set up, I was expecting a good or great follow thru with some moral preaching along the way. It worked very well in GT, but got derailed here. Repeatedly, the logic and characters disintegrate. Smart ruthless drug dealers turn into idiots. The inept FBI has tons of tech that works for a plot device one minute then is forgetten the next. Everyone becomes a suspect, pulled over by police copters that hover 20' away from suspect's cars, unnoticed. The law is hot on the trail of a huge cartel, but instead of embracing Clint's inside info, they charge, convict and sentence him in a pathetic ending that must have jumped months ahead. The drug kingpins are forgotten by the FBI and plot. Lastly, let's not forget Clint's nod to aging: hatred of tech, family closure, and a 3some with hookers, and another 3some with hookers. Just a train wreck that had loads of promise.

But why are the hosts "living" lives so independent from the guests. Isn't their only purpose to entertain the rich guests?? They end up shooting it out amongst themselves 2/3 if the time. I could deal with that if it was well into the season and a glitch had developed. Instead the tough talking scientists (huh??) let the hosts do whatever they want and just clean up at night. They couch this whole premise on letting the hosts evolve and participate in continuous storylines w/in the park. Sounds like BS. It's just a way to inject some action and violence into a talkfest series. A la Walking Dead. Hopkins character is worth watching. I'll give it a few more episodes before pulling the plug. Get it??

I was expecting something different...perhaps a more snarky look at the placement biz and how audiences react, companies profit and actors struggle with fake looking/sounding/feeling products jammed into scenes. Instead we get him putting the movie together as he's putting the movie together. I fun idea but then it gets derailed with too much info and pointless interviews...Trump, Tarentino, JJ Abrams and a few others that left me wondering if Spurlock sold out in order to cash in a favor for this movie or his next. Had he not reached so high this would have been a fun ride from start to finish. Instead we get a mish-mash of jokes, setbacks, ads, info, boring mtgs and happy teachers. huh? If he sold out as part of the joke, the movie lost out on entertainment value. Altho the shampoo ad almost makes it worth it.

I agree with the other reviewers listed under Hated It. A kinda dull movie can still have its good points - artistic, sad, mysterious, left to interpretation - esp when dealing with a pandemic and personal stories using a strong(ish) cast. (rent Take Shelter or Sunshine) But this thing is DOA. The only really interesting character is Kate Winslet as a hard core Dr. But even with the clock ticking as the virus makes its way around the world, this movie has no plot. Outbreak was better, even the original Andromeda Strain (1970) was 100X better and made all the medical stuff real but understandable. Here, the characters are either mixing medical research with politics (Zzsnore) or revert to CGI drawings to help moviegoers understand high school biology. The ending should have been the beginning of the good part, after leaving all the gabbing and Jude Law's trite char on the cutting room floor. I still want to know if Paltrow's 'friend' ever got sick? And why did the woman run out of the airport waiting area? I guess questions like these can be answered by jumping to different chapters of the DVD. But in this case, not worth the time.

The other reviewers missed a few key points, mainly that the crasher is suffering from writer's block. That's the driving point in the script as we see him mix inspiration with sexual tension while basically never leaving the apt. A short movie and worth renting, but not a "Let's hit the sack" comedy romp AT ALL. It starts slowly and could have started with some later scenes where he actually moves in, but then we'd miss the character set up, which didn't have to be ham-fisted, since the rest of the movie isn't. Yeah! The tension builds as he gains confidence and the 2 girls flirt more and more, but not in a schoolgirl way. Yeh, the acting is a little wooden and the girls are kinda boring, but that adds credibility that pays off with the cool happy ending.

Saw it at a preview last night. It was better than I expected, but lacked logical survival methods and also, thankfully, trite protracted power struggles like on Survivor. Pretty basic theme with some non-specific character development. Nice parallels drawn btwn the wolves and the men...who are the TRUE animals? Many scenes could have been better and many were uncomfortably long...as in is this dopey dialogue ever going to end? Acting was decent and the characters somewhat believable. The wolves not so much...the CGI was murky and close-ups wooden with a laughable walking paw shot. After one attack we see a trail of perfect wolf prints in the snow...the wolf must have picked up the victim with his front paws and tiptoed away on toe legs. Lots of goofs like that. Liam was decent...altho I cant help but wonder if he channeled the death of his real-life wife for the part. I'd rec it if you want a guy-flick with some scares and a mild message. Maybe they'll make a sequel and feed Liam's idiot daughter from 'Taken' to the wolves.

This script and production could have gone many ways...gross out, cheapo, campy, low-budget action, weird. But I think I see what the director was trying to accomplish and he did...very well. Take a gross, hideous idea but focus on the cruelty and insanity by highlighting the Dr. This film isn't for the faint-hearted in that it's gross but not in a Starship Troopers kinds way. It hits pretty hard. More like a Rob Zombie movie, but with a motive. (Hated Devil's Rejects) It was a great balance of science gone mad with cold calculation, punched up with graphic images and constant feelings of desperation, denial, and acceptance on the part of the centipede. I like sci-fi movies with less dialog - Alien, Sunshine, 2001 - and by muting the 2 girls, the audience can understand more. Plus, they weren't the best actresses in the world. There are a few logic glitches and the usual gripes about opportunities to escape, but one has to get past it. The Dr's line "Feed her!" pretty much sums up the whole movie. I've read about the sequel and it sounds like it's more of a typical slasher/basher script with little authentic depravity, just lots of gore. I'll pass on HC2 but rec the first.