Ed's Review Dot Com

Antidote Films (I),

John Turturro, Woody Allen, Vanessa Paradis, Liev Schreiber, Sharon Stone, Sofía Vergara, Tonya Pinkins, M’Barka Ben Taleb

Fioravante (John Turturro) is shutting down the family business due to bankruptcy and his friend Murray (Woody Allen) asks him if he’d be willing to try a threesome with his dentist. Reluctantly Fioravante agrees and when the ladies give him a fat bonus for his efforts, Murray comes up with the idea of renting Fioravante out to the wealthy ladies who are willing to pay big bucks for sex. With Murray as the embarrassed pimp, and Fioravante as his gigolo, things go well financially for a while until guilt and romance interferes and things start to turn really uncomfortable for the business partners.

This was a surprising film. Filled with typical Woody Allen irony and sarcasm, this is a typical Woody film of old. I wasn’t sure what to expect, and it was a lot different than what I expected. I wasn’t blown away by this film, but I was interested throughout. This is one of those films with mostly talking and lots of long scenes that are a couple people talking and talking to each other. Trying to figure out their values and their motives, you switch between different modes a number of times. Is Murray using Fioravante, or is it the other way around? Are the women worth of pity, or are they rich old biddies getting what they deserve? And then we have the love story that is really twisted around in the end. All in all, not a great film, not Woody’s best work by far, but pretty interesting so if you’re a fan, you’ll probably want to see it. If Woody bores or disgusts you, I understand and you can just pass this by. Perhaps Woody was trying to get some of this out of his system in the first place. He has a lot to ponder. It is what it is.

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Marvel Enterprises, Avi Arad Productions, Columbia Pictures,

Andrew Garfield, Emma Stone, Jamie Foxx, Paul Giamatti, Dane DeHaan, Campbell Scott, Embeth Davidtz, Colm Feore, Sally Field

Peter Parker (Andrew Garfield) is back, along with Gwen (Emma Stone), but Spidey is keeping his distance as her father asked him to do. But his old enemies are back, and now led by freak, Electro (Jamie Foxx), all of New York is at dire risk, unless Spiderman can save them one more time. But this is the hardest fight Spiderman has ever had to fight, and this time the whole city is at risk of being wiped out.

When the Amazing Spider-man came out, I thought to myself, why do we have to do this all over again? How can you possibly do it better than the first time? As I was watching this, I expected the same feeling, and I was surprised that I was blown away. So I went back and read my review of the first remake [The Amazing Spider-man (2012)] I found I was blown away by that one as well. I have to admit, this movie was very well made. I also went in expecting not to care for Jamie Foxx very much either, as the villain did not seem a fit role for him, but I was pleasantly surprised to find out his bad guy was awesome. His role starting out as the feeble, nearly invisible Max who was stepped on by everyone in the company on their way to the top, and his change to a ultra powerful villain Electra, was extremely well done. He played a kind of sad, if pissed off powerful guy who you almost feel sorry for. It’s a lot like Peter Parker’s story as well. The story was really well constructed, and I have to take back all the negativity I expected to feel. It was very well done, special effects are great, the soundtrack is very good, and the actors did an awesome job. All in all this is one of the best superhero films I’ve seen, and I was really impressed. Even if you’ve seen the Toby Maguire/Kirsten Dunst versions, you ought to check these out as well. For sure they’re very much worth the effort.

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Movie Rentals Releasing Tuesday September 23, 2014

• The Calling
• Fort McCoy
• Ida
• The Last of the Unjust
• Neighbors [Click Here for Ed’s Review]
• The Rover
• The Signal
• Very Good Girls

Archer Street Productions, Latitude Media, Lionsgate,

Nicole Kidman, Stellan Skarsgård, Colin Firth, Hiroyuki Sanada, Jeremy Irvine, Sam Reid, Marta Dusseldorp

We meet Eric Lomax (Colin Firth) riding on a train in Great Britain. Eric lives a lonely life and is fascinated with trains and is an expert on the equipment and the schedule and loves to spend his time on the train. On this day he meets a lovely lady, Patti (Nicole Kidman) and the sparks fly. Before long they are much in love and married, although Patti learns that Eric has some deep demons that torment him during awful nightmares and is ruining his life. After some digging she finds out the story of Eric’s military service in World War II and his time spent being tortured in a Japanese POW camp. Finally they find out that the tormentor is still alive and guiding tours of the very camp where Eric was tormented. Eric decides to seek him out, but must decide what to do when he confronts the person who ruined his whole life.

This is an excellent drama based on the book written by Eric Lomax himself. This is a very dramatic film, and though most of it is quiet and quite beautiful, that only makes the vivid scenes of torture that they were forced to undergo. The stark contrast is jarring and makes a strong impression on the viewer. The situation that Eric finds himself in, once he learns his captor is still living makes him really delve into his deepest parts of his soul to figure out how to handle it. He feels compelled to visit the man, but really is not sure what to do when he gets there, and if this will make any difference in the horrible days and nights he is spending. The acting is absolutely superb. I’m amazed at what a great actress Nicole Kidman has become, and this is absolutely the best character Colin Firth has played since the good King George himself. The story is so well portrayed that I was deeply touched by this story and the way it was portrayed. Most everything in the story is true, at least from Eric’s viewpoint (since it’s his book), and though some important events are left out, the parts that are covered are very well done. [This is an excellent summary of what is true and what is missing in the story] Although I would recommend you watch the movie first before reading this page, as it gives a way a lot of the story that will ruin the movie. I highly recommend this film, and I must say it’s one of the best films I have seen in a long, long time.

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Twentieth Century Fox Animation, Blue Sky Studios,

Anne Hathaway, Leslie Mann, Jesse Eisenberg, Rodrigo Santoro, Jemaine Clement, Jake T. Austin, Jamie Foxx, Kristin Chenoweth, John Leguizamo, Amandla Stenberg, Andy Garcia, Rita Moreno, Bruno Mars, Tracy Morgan, George Lopez

You may remember from the first film, Blu (Jesse Eisenberg) and Jewel (Anne Hathaway) thought they were the last Blue Hyacinth Macaws left, so when they find out there may be others deep in the jungle along with their 3 children, they set off to find others of their species. The find their family, including Jewel’s father, and her ex-boyfriend, Nigel (Jemaine Clementa) who goes to head to head against Blu all the way. The Blu family are happy to find others of their kind, but there is trouble in the Jungle and Blu finds himself in the middle of it. It seems like there are too many problems to go around.

This sequel to the original Rio, Rio 2 was probably not as good as the first, but it was nice in many ways. This was more about the birds and much less about the humans which I found refreshing, and it is beautifully drawn. The scenery and colors are truly splendid, and the sound track was typically nice and tropical sounding. There’s an awful lot of Bruno Mars, so that’s a plus or a minus, depending on how you feel about that, but I couldn’t find fault with the music. The story is a little weaker. The battle between sides of the jungle is a lot like many of the old Our Gang shorts, and is nothing new, and we get preached at about the environment and taking care of the Earth which I find annoying, but I was able to enjoy the story and get past that. All in all, it was really well put together, and though they could have used a bit more work on the script, the voices, not only the ones who returned, but all the new characters, added a lot to the story. This is a who’s who of animation voice over characters. I really enjoyed watching this, and I think the folks at Blue Sky Animation did a good job for a sequel.

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