Tonight we watched Disturbia, a story about a suburban kid who suspects his neighbor is a serial killer.
In the end, of course, the kid is right, but there are several attempts at revealing his neighbor’s true colors that work out as just the kid crying wolf. This story has been done before.
Even though it is predictable and somewhat cliché, it is a fun story and well executed. Overall I’d give it 3 out of 5 stars.
Saturday night we saw the latest Indiana Jones movie. As with most movies I avoided learning anything about it before I saw it just to make sure I didn’t have any preconceived notions.
I had heard how much Harrison Ford had focused on getting into top shape again for this role, although he wasn’t as in good as shape as I would have guessed. But then again, I can only hope I am in that good of shape at 65 years of age.
I heard some rumbling from folks that the whole sci-fi twist at the end wasn’t becoming of an Indy movie, but I found that it fit the series perfectly. There has always been a lot of conjecture that the Nazca lines were made for “aliens” so playing into that storyline doesn’t seem far fetched or out-of-line to me at all.
While Cate Blanchett is always nice to look at, I didn’t quite buy her role as a Soviet scientist. But hey, suspension of disbelief and all that.
Overall I’d give it 4 out of 5 stars.
Today we watched Evan Almighty. In this movie, God, played again by Morgan Freeman, has Evan Baxter, played by Steve Carell, build a great Ark in the spirit of Noah.
Evan Baxter gets chosen by God to build the Ark after he is elected to the US Congress on a Change the World platform. He’s skeptical of the entire ordeal but eventually enough strange things occur, such as animals coming to him in pairs, that he gives in and builds the Ark.
I’d give it 2.5 out of 5 stars. It was a fun comedy but not worth watching twice. Steve Carell, while funny, seems to be too typecast in the idiot role.
Tonight we watched Superman Returns. I was not expecting much from a sequel like this, but I was pleasantly surprised.
Brandon Routh‘s portrayal of Superman himself was probably not as good as Christopher Reeve’s original, but just about ever other character had a much better actor choice. Kate Bosworth was a fantastic Lois Lane and Kevin Spacey is an amazingly good choice for Lex Luthor.
I’d give it a 3.5 out of 5 stars.
Tonight we watched The Good Shepherd again. I wanted to watch this movie twice since it was so long (just under 3 hours) and deep enough that it warranted a closer look.
This movie focuses around Edward Wilson, played by Matt Damon, and his role in the OSS and the early days of the CIA. Wilson is a counter-intelligence expert who battles against the Soviets, climaxing with the Cuban missile crisis. The story focuses heavily on Wilson’s interactions with women, his colleagues, and his Soviet counterparts.
Neat things in the film are a relative lack of a classic Hollywood storyline and a great job seeing both Matt Damon and Angelia Jolie made up to appear as if they were in late middle age.
I’d give it 4 out of 5 stars.