It was a long wait for this one to come out! Anchorman 2 continues the absurdity of the Ron Burgundy world. It’s now 1980 and after Ron is shown the door in favor of his wife getting the huge promotion on the nightly prime time news desk, Ron flips out and gets the band back together when given the chance to start GNN, the first 24 hour news channel.

The truth of how terrible news media has become is sandwiched between the weirdest and wackiest set ups a human being could think of. Anchorman 2 is all over the place with it’s jokes. With so much crazy going on (Chicken of the Cave, fighting sharks, blindness, douchbaggery in general) it’s often the more subtle lines that got the biggest laughs. While the four are all back (Will Ferrell, Steve Carell, Paul Rudd, David Koechner) and given their fair shake of laughs, Carrell’s Brick Tamland steals just about every scene he’s in. He totally commits to everything, something not everyone can do.

I do think that the movie is too long though. They made another news team fight scene that should have been cut. It goes on forever and was done much better in the first movie. A pointless retread that I’m sure Mike Myers wish he thought of.

Good times, a fun movie to see with a group of people.

15 years ago (!) Keanu Reeves did a movie called The Matrix. There he met and trained with Tiger Hu Chen and Yuen Woo-Ping for the fight choreography. Now Keanu has hooked up with these men to make his own martial arts movie, Man of Tai Chi. It turned out surprisingly well!

The plot doesn’t break any new ground for this genre, but it works and is told well. Chen is a student of Tai Chi and works as a delivery guy to make ends meet. He’s developed his own form of Tai Chi for combat that gets the attention of Donaka Mark, a wealthy business man that runs and underground fighting league. Donaka manipulates Chen behind his back to make him into a ruthless warrior out for blood, but when Chen figures it out, he fights to reclaim his honor and morality back.

With so many action pictures under his belt, Keanu has picked up an eye for filming fights and it shows. Tiger Hu is a hell of a talent and with chorography by Yuen Woo-Ping, there is some intense fights on show here. And there are a lotof them. While it is edited heavily, it’s easy enough to follow and not get lost in the shuffle (the fight with the strobe lights is a good idea, but I don’t think it showed well, my biggest complaint for the movie).

Keanu does his best to play the villain Donaka Mark with varying success. There’s a few times he gets really goofy, but he does portray a ruthless guy and a surprisingly daunting fighter at the age of 49. He might move like a golem, but his strikes pack a wallop.

A solid action flick, worth watching for when you are in the mood for some flying feet and fists.

Superman is a tough nut to crack. A being that is essentially invincible on Earth with amazing super powers is more god than human. It’s hard to root for a guy that seemingly has nothing to worry about. More than 70 years of comic books, 30 years of sporadic movies and a good 20 years of cartoons means there’s a ton of material on Superman. While a tough character to write for, there’s a lot to like about the ultimate boy scout. A true hero to humanity. Man of Steel is the most recent (and a reboot) of the Superman movie universe. After hearing a lot of mixed things about the movie, I’m happy to say that I loved it. It feels honest, grounded and true to the core of who Superman is supposed to be and represent.

Man of Steel is a very fitting title. The beginning of the movie starts with Superman’s birth and jumps around a bit from his adolescence and adult hood. I like how they handled his origin and arrival on Earth. While it’s something you’d think everyone would know by now, it’s interesting to watch and sets up General Zod perfectly for his role as the antagonist. The beginning shows us his luck of being raised by good people who show him the path to being good. And through his formative years, it seems like he can’t help but be good. He’s a natural defender.

But fear suppresses him. His foster father Jonathan Kent repeatedly tells him that the world isn’t ready to see what he can do, so he needs to stay off the radar. It’s a real and scary struggle for Clark and rightfully so in a world where many people are wary of others just from skin color that’s a different shade from their own. For awhile, Clark thinks he’s just different from everyone. Abnormally stronger, faster and with heightened senses than everyone else. So the time comes where Pa Kent shows him the space ship they found him in. That would make anyone wonder who they are and what the hell happened to him. Why is he here?

That’s the core of Man of Steel. Who is he in this world? What would motivate an alien being to become his adopted planet’s protector? Why would he do it with the threat of an entire planet afraid of him? It’d be just as easy to go the other way, either take off or break bad. That other half shows up to Earth as General Zod, who believes Kryptonians are the master race and damn anything that he sees beneath him.

I really liked the set up of the over arcing story. Clark finding out where he comes from and who he really is. Lois Lanes introduction and coming into his life. General Zod threating the planet to get Clark to come out and into the open. The fear of a crazy powerful being that’s been hidden on earth for decades (loved the scene with Superman turning himself in to the feds and he’s got handcuffs on that might as well be made of air and the discussion he has with General Swanwick. The last talk they have at the end of the movie is great too). The action scenes completely deliver as well. Way better than anything in Superman Returns (2006). Kryptonians fighting is a lot of fun to watch, the possibilities and level of destruction are near infinite.

It’s a great looking movie too. Some great special effects work that can look rather cartoonish, but I think that’s unavoidable considering the power these beings are throwing around. The strength and force they exert is something you’d never be able to see normally, so seeing someone hop huge distances and whipped around like a rag can look bizarre. I didn’t mind it though as it’s really high quality work and it’s a Superman movie so if I didn’t see crazy action, I’d be upset. Speaking of crazy action, I read a lot of viewer dismay over the destruction in this movie. Pretty much all of Metropolis gets leveled and they wanted to see Superman save every single person in sight. While that’s admirable, it doesn’t work that way. Read any of the most popular Superman books and animated shows and things simply get obliterated. He does save everyone he can in the movie and ultimately saves the entire planet, so I really don’t understand the gruff the movie got from that standpoint. Yes he’s fast, but he can’t be in two places at once. This fight is the first time Clark went all out with his powers and he’s up against beings who are just as strong and are all about planetary genocide. Was Superman supposed to fly around and catch everything that fell for an hour? Who wants to see that? Superman also kills someone which threw up a bunch of arms in disgust, but I think it was done right (for the most part). Given what’s happening, he doesn’t have much choice and is directly defending innocent people from a monster. The only fault I see is that while Superman shows remorse, it’s fleeting. A couple of seconds and it looks like he’s over it and we’re off to the next scene. My hope is that they refer to it in the next movie. It’s a decision that Superman has to live with and grow from now. This is his first outing, so I expect this hero not to do everything right on the first try. He has to figure out all of his potential for good on his own, there is no one like him now.

Finally, I loved the direction and the soundtrack. I only question the one redundant scene near the middle of the movie where Jor-El is telling Clark about his home and General Zod. It covers the exact ground that the intro does. With an 2 hour and 20 minute runtime, cutting out one of those scene (I think the intro would be easiest to cut as the speech with the visual aids in the ship covers everything faster) would only benefit the movie. Henry Cavill is a fantastic Superman and I completely loved Michael Shannon as General Zod. Fantastic villainous performance (love Antje Traue as Faora-Ul too). Great work from Russell Crowe as Jor-El; Kevin Costner and Diane Lane as the Kent’s are great too.

While there are a ton of rumors going around about the sequel that concern me (it could turn into an oversaturated mess like Spider-Man 3), I hope Zack Snyder and company can knock it out of the park again.

I liked Seven Psychopaths a lot more than I thought I was going to. It actually caught me by surprise in it’s creativity and execution. What I thought was going to be a straight forward “crossed the gangster” cat and mouse movie was much more than that.

Here’s the gist of it: Marty is a struggling screenwriter in LA whose friend, Billy, kidnaps dogs and returns them to their owner for the reward a few days later. One day Billy steals a dog that belongs to a lunatic gangster. Marty gets pulled into a world that he wanted no first hand experience in…but it turns out to be just the right inspiration for him.

The movie starts in a standard way. Billy is trying to come up with ideas for his movie script, ‘Seven Psychopaths’ and is having a really hard time going anywhere with it. He only has two characters and that’s about it. Now, here’s where it gets different. The movie you are watching, forms the script that Billy writes, which is the movie you just watched. The events you see happen turn into the inspiration that Billy uses for his script. You watch as Billy comes up with the ideas for his script as things unfold around him. He comes up with characters, gets advise and ideas from his friends and it all rolls in and over itself as you watch. It’s a really creative angle for a movie.

The topper is a great cast. Colin Farrell, Woody Harrelson, Sam Rockwell and my absolute favorite, Christopher Walken. Hans is the best character Walken has done in quite sometime. Props to Martin McDonagh for coming up with a role that really shows off Walken’s great acting ability without making him a walking cartoon.

I think this movie was really overlooked when it came out, highly recommended. And watch In Bruges if you haven’t, which Martin McDonagh also wrote and directed. Side note: No animals get hurt in this movie. Just people.

Monsters Inc. is one of my favorite Pixar movies and 12 years later the studio released the prequel, Monsters University.

The story takes the stars Mike and Sulley back to their formative years. We see Mike first, a very young monster on a field trip to Monsteropolis. He witnesses the master scarers at work and is inspired to become one himself. He hits the books hard and gets into Monsters University years later. This is where Mike and Sulley first meet and they do not get along. They take very different angles at scaring and butt heads at every step because of it. Mike has the book smarts, but lacks that special something to be effectively scary. Sulley is the son of a master and rides on his family’s coat tales to the top. But one scary face a monster does not make! Once they are forced into a corner by the dean of the school, Mike and Sulley realize that they work together far better than apart.

So is the story of how Mike Wazowski and James P Sullivan became friends and broke scaring records as an unstoppable team. This is a great return to the Monsters world. New monsters are all over as well as monsters from the first (seeing what turned Randall is great). The voice acting is great and complimented perfectly with Pixar’s legendary animation. Mike’s story is a particularly rocky one as he faces adversity at every step. He’s told time and time again that he will never make it, but pushes ahead to prove everyone wrong. While he doesn’t reach his dream goals exactly as he saw it, his smarts and attitude get him farther than any of his doubters thought. Sulley climbs the same mountain, but from a different side. The great friendship we see in Monsters Inc is born believably and sincerely in Monsters University.

With the few average movies Pixar has put out in the past two years, Monsters University is a strong return to form. The Monsters world let’s the studio go wild with their creativity and it’s all on display here. A lot of fun to watch, check it out!

I’ll get right to it, The Bling Ring isn’t a good movie. It’s based on the true story of teenagers living in LA who break into celebrity homes and steal just about anything they can carry out. Dumb kids doing something dumb and they get caught only because of their greed and stupidity. How they did it was pretty smart (!) though. They’d read about who was leaving town for a few days online, Google their address and then look at Google Maps to find the easiest way to get into the property. Then, just look for an unlocked door or window. To be honest, it was probably a lot of fun to do. They got away with it for awhile and stole well over a million dollars of stuff.

And that’s it. A story better left as an article in a magazine, there’s not much worth watching here. You get your fame obsession, celebrity worship and materialism finger wagging. The acting is passable at best (Emma Watson’s worst work to date) and the direction showcases Sofia Coppala’s ability to point a camera at people talking. Skip it.

I remember seeing the trailer for Mud and quickly dismissing it. Nothing about it really jumped out to me, more like a predictable story being told again. After it came out, I heard very good things about it which led me to believe that the trailer simply didn’t do the movie justice. So on the list it went and I’m happy to report that all the praise for Mud is well deserved.

Two young friends, Ellis and Neckbone (awesome name) are stomping around their home turf in Arkansas. Neckbone spots a stranded boat on a nearby island just down the river (Ellis lives right on the water, Neckbone not too far from there) so the boys go check it out. They find it curiously stuck up in a tree and while it’s a mess, they think they can fix it over the summer for themselves. That’s where they meet Mud, a fugitive on the run. They become friends and the kids agree to help Mud fix the boat so he can escape with his girlfriend, Juniper, from the bounty hunters who are closing in.

Mud is really Ellis’ story. He’s 14 and just starting to become a man. He’s starting to leave childhood, he’s got a crush on a girl and his parents are at a low point in their relationship. With everything changing around him, Ellis struggles to make sense of it all. He’s a very honest and sincere kid and when the ugly parts of the world start showing themselves, he’s thrown for a life altering loop.

Meeting a stranger on a little island is weird for anyone. Ellis and Neckbone are cautious around Mud, but he wins them over as they get information out of him. Mud happens to be a great story teller. His little life lesson speeches, his tales of love and loss. Then the big one on why he’s in hiding. Mud killed Juniper’s abusive partner and now that man’s family have put a bounty on his head in addition to the law coming for him. This is enough for Ellis to side with Mud, he thinks Mud is justified in his actions. He did it to protect someone he loves which is an honorable trait, something Ellis sees slipping away from the people around him seemingly every day.

Since this movie rides on two kids, casting them is of the utmost importance. They nailed it with Tye Sheridan (Ellis) and Jacob Lofland (Neckbone). Great young actors who look and sound like they’ve been in the game all their lives. No bad acting, each emotion hit just right. It goes a long way to make Mud as good as it is. Matthew McConaughey holds it down as Mud, a strong role model for the kids (a father figure really), but one who is deeply flawed as well. Mud has made a lot of poor decisions in his life and this is one that he may not be able to get out of.

The Mississippi river makes a great backdrop for this story, the dialog is smooth and smart and the growth you see from the main cast from start to finish is a real treat. Highly recommended.