Movie Review - Children of Men

We've actually been wanting to watch this one for a while but we've never sat down to do it. This weekend we were cleaning the basement and we got to a stopping point around eight or nine so we decided to watch this one with some frozen pizza. Let me tell you, every cook has their specialty...but my wife and I can make the hell out of some frozen pizza after a hard days work. So anyway, on to the movie review.

Children of Men is probably classified as a thriller of some sort, and this is one of those "the entire world has collapsed and Britain soldiers on." Apparently the person that writes these things values Britain above all else. Anyway. The world has collapsed because people can no longer reproduce. Tragedy happens as the worlds youngest person dies at 18 years. They made this out to be a huge tragedy and of course the entire world was in ruins having not seen the birth of a child in 18 years. The movie stars Clive Owen, and Julianne Moore (a Raul fav) makes a guest appearance. If you've seen the movie, you know what I mean. If you haven't, she's really only in it for a few minutes. Which is kindof depressing, because at her age she's still pretty hot. Anyway, the premise of the movie is that Julianne Moore is the leader of a rebel group and thinks everyone not being fertile is a government conspiracy. Personally I would have liked to see more of that angle in the movie, but you don't. So they have a pregnant woman that they're hiding from the government and Julianne Moore only trusts Clive Owen to get her to safety...or to The Human Project that they talk about but never go in to details on. It's not a bad movie, and I did like it, but it was missing a few things and the pregnant girl has an African accent or something, but she's hard to understand so we had to pause and back up a few times to make sure we got everything. A couple people speak a foreign language entirely and there are no subtitles so you kinda have to guess at what they say. I won't tell you how the movie ends, but it just kindof ends. It's at a place where I was hoping they would expand, or something, but they didn't. They just rolled the credits...that's it. I guess you can assume whatever you want, but for me I pay to see movies so I don't have to assume, I want them to tell me and show me all the cool shit that I was thinking about when I came to see the movie. The story is weird, and far fetched, but the movie is still good. It's a futuristic thriller I guess, but it's a dismal view of the future that no one hopes we have. If you get the chance, the movie is probably worth the rental. If you don't, it's not a life enriching movie but it's a good flic.

Tomorrow starts day one of physical therapy so I hope I'm on the road to recovery from this stupid neck injury. That's about it from us for the day. I hope everyone else had a good weekend.

Two things that are completely worthless...

Well, I had to exert little to no effort on finding these two...but they've proven completely worthless to pretty much everyone.

The Rite-Aid Pharmacist - I know...they're not doctors. They should be able to answer simple questions. After my last visit to the doctor I got new meds for my neck because I'd adapted to the old ones and they weren't working. Maybe I'm addictive or something, but I can get used to the same meds after time so it's time to get something stronger. I get the prescriptions filled and as usual they say "Do you have any questions for the pharmacist about your new meds?" Actually...I did. It's allergy season again and my allergies are acting up as usual. So I ask..."I'm probably going to take some Tylenol Allergy Sinus, or some Benadryl, or a Zyrtec if I get lucky for my allergies. Is that going to react with any of these to the point that I shouldn't take them?" So the nice little pharmacy tech goes over, asks the fat ass pharmacist to put down the twinkie and answer my simple question. The pharmacist gets somewhat guarded and says "Well. Without knowing the specific doses we cannot at this time determine what adverse effects, if any, could occur. In some cases this medicine has been known to cause extreme sedation and mixing with allergy medications can sometimes increase the sedation effects." You mean they'll make me more drowsy than they normally would? I of course got a funny look and said "Okay, so I'll be sleepy but I won' t be bleeding out my eyes or have my stomach rocket across the room will I?" Very seriously they just said "An increase in sedation is the only thing we know of without knowing specific medications, doses, and the regularity of them." I know that they can't give me a detailed explanation like a doctor can, but a simple "Might make you sleepy" would have made me much happier than that load of BS. Oh well. I took my allergy meds and I'm fine. Some headaches seem to be the only side effect.

Redline - This movie is awful. Wow...just wow. It's like the creators watched Fast the the Furious and said "What if we did that with high end cars and blew all the money on cars and didn't actually have a plot?" Somehow, this seems to be the only thing that would explain this movie. That, and why does every race scene have to have the cars slamming in to each other? Seriously, if I'm ever racing someone and they so much as nudge me, I'll stop, wait on them to come back, and beat them within an inch of their life. That is not how races are won or lost. Sadly I do know a few people that when racing they would try to wreck you rather than let you win. Anyway, back to the movie. To sum up the plot shouldn't take long. Hot lead girl played by Nadia Bjorlin owns a shop where they fix high end cars. She used to race, but her Dad was killed in a car wreck on the last lap of some huge wreck. She flashes back to his car blowing up all the time. You lose any sympathy you may have had for her. She's also the lead singer in a garage band that sucks immensely. Four rich guys, one of them being Tim Matheson, another being Eddie Griffin - who I REALLY hate - get together to bet insane amounts of money on high end car races. The previous races lead up to this $100,000,000 car race in the desert. Someone of course brings in the guy that killed lead hot girls dad. Yeah...because that just happens. They of course don't speak, and she wrecks him and his car blows up. Her only response is "have a nice ride." So she's just gotten her revenge, and committed a crime and that's her response. There is a subplot but it's so corny it's not worth mentioning. This movie really had potential to showcase some high end cars, have some legitimate showdowns, and do something other than just have high end cars and hot girls with stupid dialogue. Well, it didn't. The movie was apparently low budget enough that most of the Enzo Ferrari's, Porsche's, and GT 40's still had dealer tags on them. Like the movie was low budget enough they couldn't pay $8 a piece for fake tags. Yeah...it's that bad. Almost as worthless as the pharmacist I talked to.

That's it from here for now. More movie reviews to come this week. Heroes returns on Monday!!!!

Movie Review - Georgia Rule

I know what you're already thinking. YOU RENTED GEORGIA RULE??? No. My wife snuck it in on Netflix. Personally I refuse to watch anything with Hanoi Jane in it so I make it a point to take all her junk out of the Netflix Queue before it arrives but this one slipped by. Why? Because Jane Fonda is in fact a horrible person and should probably at best be rotting in a prison somewhere for the rest of her days and not enjoying the freedoms the rest of America get to enjoy. Why? Click the link.

Anyway, short of having an Anti-American Communist in the film, it also stars Felicity Huffman, and Lindsay Hohan...I mean Lohan. Probably the only real acting in the film is done by Huffman - who on an unrelated side note seems too tall to be married to William H. Macy...but I could be wrong. At any rate, I don't know that the movie is worth seeing or supporting but my wife liked it. It's not really a comedy like I thought it would be. It's more of a disturbing drama. To me, it was just kind of nothing...a story that didn't need to be told. It was Hanoi Jane Fonda being a raging bitch - no real acting chops needed for that one, Felicity Huffman being a recovering alcoholic - which she pulled off believably well, and Lindsey Lohan playing a rich, spoiled, recovering drunk and drug induced teen whore. Yeah...not exactly a stretch for her. The movie takes place in Idaho where Lohan is being dropped off at her Grandmother Georgias (Hanoi Jane) house because her mom can't handle her anymore and she thinks living with a communist...err...her grandmother will do her some good. I guess it's supposed to be a feel good movie with a happy ending where everyone learns how to overcome their differences and blah blah blah. It's a piece of cinematic shit starring a traitor and a ho-bag. Not sure how Felicity Huffman got roped in to this one, but she's a pretty good actress. For Lohan, while she did say in Maxim years ago that we'd never see her in a topless scene because that wouldn't be appropriate, I think she's changed her tune. In this particular flic she can be seen without a bra on the entire time and offering to fuck someones boyfriend stupid. Her playboy shoot and topless scenes are just a matter of time. As for Fonda, lets hope she stays off the silver screen, or certainly off my TV for years to come. Not sure how much my wife liked it, but as far as movies go, the stories weren't too bad. The acting from Felicity Huffman and Cary Elwes were both pretty good. The non-acting from Hohan and Hanoi were fitting to their real life personas, but again something that I could do without.

Still want to go see 3:10 to Yuma, but it might be a rental when all is said and done because I don't see any relief in the weekend schedules coming up.

Defining old

Our neighbors down the hill are probably the definition of inconsiderate. They block the rumrunners driveway on a regular basis, their dogs bark all hours of the day and night, and every now and then their toddler escapes the house and wreaks havoc on nearby lights and lawn fixtures. Pretty much if you want neighbors, these people wouldn't make the top ten. Hell...they might not even make the top 100, but on a list of neighbors you don't want, you'd be sure to find them. Anyway, they have a son who just turned 16 apparently so they bought him a nice Pontiac Firebird. Thankfully for the rest of us they got him a V6. I don't think they told him this because he still leaves as if he were exiting the pits to save himself from going a lap down. Dario Franchitti just won the IRL championship and I think he takes more time exiting the pits than this ass hat does leaving the driveway. Normally this wouldn't bother me. And I'm sure in my younger days I left fast, or loud, or both. But normally I did it when people were awake. Usually around 5:30, shit for brains cranks his car (which is usually parked in the street not far from our bedroom window and almost blocking our driveway) revs the engine as high as it will go, then slams it in to gear with the gas still on the floor. At first I was pretty pissed about hearing the hum of a weak V6 scream by my window to wake me up...but I realized today when I left that the weather is turning colder, and cold is hard on engines. So hopefully one day during the winter this year he'll do that and the stupid thing will come apart on him. One can hope. Anyway, just before 11 the other night he came down the street at 90mph as usual, with his radio as loud as it can be, turns around in the circle and attempts a burnout. Normally burnouts don't bother me...but after 10:00 or so at night, any noise that isn't my TV or my wife talking to me really annoys me. So I step outside to see him celebrating over a single wheel burnout that's less than two feet in length. I thought about mocking form, or length, or the fact that it's just one tire that burned out...but I have a few marks on the block that speak for themselves. All done during normal business hours so as to not wake anyone up. Seeing a six foot geeky white kid celebrate over something like this annoyed me...mostly because this kid thinks he's black. So I said "Little late for a burnout, don't you think?" He looks up, makes some gesture and says "Naw Dawg...uh...I was just cleanin up da tires yo..." Yeah...he thinks he's Eminem or something. So I point at that those are better done during the daytime and he says "Sorry Dawg...guess you just don't undastand yo." At this point I had to go back in the house. This kid would have never understood that it was the middle of the night, that my rumrunning homey the firefighter has to be up at 5am to leave for work, or that he's just in general, a huge fucking tool. I walk back in the house to start watching the Daily Show and think "Oh shit...I'm old. I turned considerate of my neighbors one day...and I just yelled at one."

So there you have it...just over 200 days from being 30 and I'm slowly becoming my Dad. Ouch...I'm defining old already.