Deep Something

Adventureland – A Movie Review

September 10, 2009August 10, 2015 279 Views 0 Comments Adventureland, Bill Hader, Drama, Greg Mottola, Jesse Eisenberg, Krsten Stewart, love, Martin Starr, Summer

Welcome to Adventureland, where the worst job imaginable is about to inadvertently turn into the summer that changes everything. Adventureland, a self-professedly “funtastic” Pennsylvania amusement park, appears to be the bane of recent college graduate’s James Brennan’s existence. He previously had big plans to spend the summer on a life-altering trek through Europe that would initiate him into real adult life. But when his family suffers an economic downturn in the middle of the Reagan 80s, James’ only summer trip is straight to a minimum wage job manning a game booth so existentially bankrupt, no one is even allowed to win the giant stuffed panda. Yet, Adventureland isn’t quite what it seems on the surface. And the movie itself, while very good, is not what you expect based on the marketing.

Culture Movies

Sunshine Cleaning – A Movie Review

August 31, 2009 B. John 217 Views 0 Comments Alan Arkin, Amy Adams, Christine Jeffs, Comedy, Drama, Emily blunt

Once the high school cheerleading captain who dated the quarterback, Rose Lorkowski now finds herself a thirty something single mother working as a maid. Her sister Norah is still living at home with their dad Joe, a salesman with a lifelong history of ill-fated get rich quick schemes. Desperate to get her son into a better school, Rose persuades Norah to go into the crime scene clean-up business with her to make some quick cash. Lay and I both agreed it is probably the best film we’ve seen recently.

Culture Movies

Band of Brothers – A Mini-Series Review

August 16, 2009 B. John 274 Views 0 Comments 101st Airborne, Adventure, Drama, Easy Company, History, Steven Speilberg, Tom Hanks, War, WW II

This is the story of “E” Easy Company, 506th Regiment of the 101st Airborne Division from their initial training starting in 1942 to the end of World War II. They parachuted behind enemy lines in the early hours of D-Day in support of the landings at Utah beach, participated in the liberation of Carentan and again parachuted into action during Operation Market Garden. They also liberated a concentration camp and were the first to enter Hitler’s mountain retreat in Berchtesgarten. A fascinating tale of comradeship that is, in the end, a tale of ordinary men who did extraordinary things. Worth everyone of it’s 705 minutes.

Culture Movies

Taken – A Movie Review

June 6, 2009August 10, 2015 248 Views 0 Comments Action, Drama, Liam Neeson, Maggie Grace, Pierre Morel, Taken

We watched this movie on DVD last night. Liam Neeson, as “Bryan Mills,” reminded me of Denzel Washington’s role in “Man On Fire.” In that film, Washington played a relentless-and-brutal bodyguard who did what he had to do to get kidnapped Dakota Fanning back to her parents.

Culture Movies Politics Presidency

Frost/Nixon – A Movie Review

May 25, 2009 B. John 232 Views 0 Comments Adaptation, Drama, frank langella, michael sheen, Nixon, Oliver Platt, Ron Howard, watergate scandal

A posting a couple of weeks ago by a friend on Facebook reminded me that I had failed to write a review of the movie Frost/Nixon which Lay and I watched as an Amazon download nearly a month ago. I thoroughly recommend this film.

Culture Movies

Seven Pounds – A Movie Review

May 6, 2009 B. John 203 Views 0 Comments Drama, Gabriele Muccino, PG-13, Romance, Rosario Dawson, Will Smith, Woddy Harrelson

Ben Thomas is an IRS agent (?) with a fateful secret who embarks on an extraordinary journey of redemption by forever changing the lives of seven strangers.

Culture Movies

Synecdoche, New York – A Movie Review

March 23, 2009 B. John 236 Views 0 Comments Catherine Keener, Charlie Kaufman, Comedy, Drama, Michelle Williams, Philip Seymour Hoffman

Theater director Caden Cotard is mounting a new play. His life catering to suburban blue-hairs at the local regional theater in Schenectady, New York is looking bleak. His wife Adele has left him to pursue her painting in Berlin, taking their young daughter Olive with her. His therapist, Madeleine Gravis, is better at plugging her best-seller than she is at counseling him. A new relationship with the alluringly candid Hazel has prematurely run aground. Worried about the transience of his life, he leaves his home behind. He gathers an ensemble cast into a warehouse in New York City, hoping to create a work of brutal honesty. Worth watching, but be prepared to have to think. I’m still trying to decipher the meaning of the burning house.

Culture Movies

In The Electric Mist – A Movie Review

March 8, 2009 B. John 189 Views 1 Comment Bertrand Tavernier, David E. Jensen, Drama, new orleans, Tommy Lee Jones

Detective Dave Robicheaux is trying to link the murder of a local hooker to New Orleans mobster Julie Balboni. But during his investigation Robicheaux is led into a series of surreal encounters with a troop of Confederate soldiers.

Culture Movies

Blindness – A Movie Review

March 8, 2009 B. John 200 Views 1 Comment Adaptation, Don McKellar, Drama, Fernando Meirelles, Foreign, Julianne Moore, Mark Ruffalo

When a sudden plague of blindness devastates a city, a small group of the afflicted band together to triumphantly overcome the horrific conditions of their imposed quarantine.

Culture Movies

Slumdog Millionaire – A Movie Review

March 8, 2009 B. John 144 Views 0 Comments Adaptation, Anil Kapoor, Danny Boyle, Dev Patel, Drama, Foreign, Irrfan Khan, Loveleen Tandan

The story of Jamal Malik, an 18 year-old orphan from the slums of Mumbai, who is about to experience the biggest day of his life. With the whole nation watching, he is just one question away from winning a staggering 20 million rupees on India’s “Who Wants To Be A Millionaire?” But when the show breaks for the night, police arrest him on suspicion of cheating; how could a street kid know so much? Desperate to prove his innocence, Jamal tells the story of his life in the slum where he and his brother grew up, of their adventures together on the road, of vicious encounters with local gangs, and of Latika, the girl he loved and lost. I know I’ll be taken to the wood shed by some, so let me get this over with right away. I don’t think it was the best picture of the year.

Culture Movies

Gran Torino – A Movie Review

February 9, 2009 B. John 212 Views 0 Comments Action, Asian, Bee Vang, bigotry, Clint Eastwood, Drama, Gangs, Gangsters

Archie Bunker meets Dirty Harry: Walt Kowalski is a widower, grumpy, tough-minded, borderline-hateful, unhappy old man who can’t get along with either his kids or his neighbors, a Korean War veteran whose prize possession is a 1973 Gran Torino he keeps in cherry condition. When his neighbor Tao, a young Hmong teenager, tries to steal his Gran Torino, Kowalski sets out to reform the youth. Drawn against his will into the life of Tao’s family, Kowalski is soon taking steps to protect them form the gangs that foul their neighborhood. It’s worth seeing, just wait until it is out on video.