Faster reviewed

Finally, The Rock HAS COME BACK.....to action movies!  Now, I know that isn't a good sign to be excited since I haven't really liked his action movies or his movies in general aside from Gridiron Gang. The Scorpion King was as good as it could be which is to say, not that good.  The Rundown had no pulse and Walking Tall had no balls.  And let's not even get into the horror that was The Game Plan.  But for some reason, I wanted to see this movie since it wasn't for kids and I don't think he starred in a R-rated movie so I was interested in what he was going to do in this one.  So know your roles and shut your mouths as we go layeth the Smackethdown to Faster jabronis.

The Rock plays some guy named...named....IT DOESN'T MATTER WHAT HIS NAME IS, or for that matter the other two players in this game but I'm getting a bit ahead of myself there.  The Rock was a getaway driver who was set up and watch his brother killed, then he was killed but that just pissed The Rock off.  After ten years, The Rock is going to get revenge against the people who set him up.  Billy Bob Thorton is Cop who's after his trail.  Then there's this other guy, Killer, who's a hit man hired to kill The Rock before he kills everyone.  And of course their paths come together at the end.


I got this to say about Faster, it certainly has a lot of style to spare.  As it's name suggests, it moves incredibly fast, rarely taking a break for anything except for some talking.  The movie is filled with cold lighting and even when there is sunshine to be found, it's still incredibly harsh.  And the action here is incredibly brutal with it being over as soon as it begins.  This is not a movie to see a whole lot of extended action sequences even though there are a couple of them.  But for the most part, this movie is efficiently shot with a style that makes this an intense ride until the last 20 minutes in which it somewhats sputters out.

As for everyone involved, The Rock is a man of very few words, two expressions and a whole lot of bullets.  For the most part that's fine since he is...err was the most electrifying man in sports entertainment and he always had a boatload of charisma even at his worst.  But when The Rock isn't growling lines or killing people, he has to act and it's not really good. There's no passion or emotion in his voice when he has to soft like in the flashbacks and he should have just channeled The Terminator for all of the movie.  Billy Bob Thornton flat outs sleepwalks through his role infusing no life, energy or passion despite a few isolated moments here and there.  The other guy who plays Killer, despite being a completely and utterly superfluous character, is actually pretty good with an easy-going English accent and a lot of charisma making him fun to watch even if he does have nothing to do.

Now if I haven't convinced you(and I doubt I had) that this movie is good, then find a DVD of your favorite movie, shine that real nice, turn it sideways and STICK IT STRAIGHT UP YOUR ROOTIE-POO CANDY ASS!  Despite some stumbles, a weak Billy Bob and a weaker ending this movie is a nice, effective thriller.  There's an air of brutality to this that makes it a bit hard to watch which fits in with the rest of the story and it is very effectively directed.  If you're in the mood for a hard-hitting revenge movie then you could do a lot worse than Faster...besides, I don't want take you down Know Your Role Boulevard which is on the corner of Jabroni Drive and check you directly into the Smackdown Hotel, do I?

7/10

Going Overboard review

So there are movies where you have your set of expectations all set and you think of how that movie would be.  The movie isn't something that's going to be readily available for whatever reason so it could be a long time before you see this movie.  Then you finally have an outlet to see it, in this case Youtube Movies, and you sit down to watch it to see your expectations be met.  Sometimes this doesn't happen, it could be better than you thought it was going to be or worse than you thought it was going to be.  Then there's Going Overboard, Adam Sandler's first movie, which destroys your expectations and leaves you whimpering on the floor as your mind is unable to figure out what the hell just happened.  So let's sift through the wreckage as we dig into Going Overboard.

So the plot...hmmm...how to explain it.  Alright, Adam Sandler is some guy whose name is hard to spell and I'm too lazy to look up, Scheky Mascowicz or something similarly Jewish.  He wants to be a stand-up comedian but at the moment he's at a cruise ship as a waiter.  The real stand-up comedian on the boat is a jerk and will not relinquish his comedian status to Sandler or even let him open up for him.  You can't blame him, Sandler is kind of horrible until he gets confidence by Milton Berle and King Neptune...don't ask.  Meanwhile, Burt Young, that guy who played Paulie from all the Rocky movies, is one of those dictator-generals who is not only watching the movie but he popped the VHS tape into his personal VCR.  Yeah, that's the framing device but wait, it gets weirder!  During the movie, Miss Universe contestants talk about stuff and Ms. Australia insults Burt Young.  He summons two of his soldiers to kill her and they infiltrate the movie to kill her...the movie that Burt Young is watching.  Yeah........it's that kind of movie.

So I am of two minds on the movie.  One one hand it could easily be The Marine of comedy but in the other hand it could be a sure sense of surreal humor gone horribly right.  On The Marine side of things, this movie may be one of the worst-made movies ever.  And by worst-made I'm talking about the nuts-and-bolts of film making.  Someone with passing knowledge of the movie may know that the cameraman had to shoot with the wrong camera lenses.  Now what does this mean to Joe Viewer here?  It means that movie looks like every other frame was cut resulting in a jerky look that looks worse the father the subject is from the camera.  People move fine when there's an ultra close-up though. Then the shot compositions are horrible with people crowding each other and blocking each other so much that Sandler has to lean to be seen over a sea of people.  There are only two establishing shots of the boat, one at day and one at night that are used all the time.

Now how do you determine if a comedy is awesomely bad.  Most awesomely bad movies that I like are action movie that is over-the-top enough where laughter is inevitable.  How do you react to what's supposed to be comedy that's awesomely bad.  It can't be laughter otherwise then the comedy is intentionally working so you have a real conundrum going on but I think I may have an answer.  It's the perverse, entertaining fear of where the movie will go and fail next.  I know what you're thinking, a comedy that's scaring you is bad.  That's very true but I do think it works in the awesomely bad category.

Now on the surreal side of things, the movie does some decent fourth-wall breaking with Sandler talking to the camera.  He even flat-out admits that the movie was only made because they had access to a cruise ship and Miss Universe contestants.  He even says that the movie is a no-budget film and demonstrates it with a no-budget earthquake.  And he does it quite a few times, even pointing out that two characters, a rock star that kinda looks like a paler, less muscular Glenn Danzig and his agent played by Peter Berg, has nothing to do with the movie, they're just there for variety.  And yes that Peter Berg, the one who gave us Hancock and The Kingdom.  But wait, Billy Zane pops up as King Neptune who just literally walks on set in a $5 costume and gives Sandler a pep talk and his daughter at the end, he is awesome.  Then you have Milton Berle whose scene plays out as sitcom with a laugh track, which does kinda fit.  Finally there's Billy Bob Thorton in a small role and he has already perfected the "Bad Santa" persona when he tells Sandler "A corpse would be funnier than this."

This movie....entertained me for reasons totally unclear to me.  I have no idea whether it is supposed to be that bad or just a romp through the surreal playground.  The only thing that is clear to me that I was entertained even if I was paralyzed by fear.  Now would I actually go out of my way to tell other people to watch this movie, of course not.  My friends are well-adjusted enough to not see the attempted humor and surrealism of this.  But if you are as crazy as I am, give it a shot.  Maybe you'll like it but if you don't that's cool.

7/10

If you wish to figure this out, here's the link to see it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7fcXzgJ_fBs