Ed's Review Dot Com

DreamWorks SKG, Touchstone Pictures,

Vince Vaughn, Chris Pratt, Cobie Smulders, Britt Robertson, Jack Reynor, Bobby Moynihan

David Wozniak (Vince Vaughn) is a loser. He’s never been able to pull it together. His girlfriend, Emma (Cobie Smulders) tells him she if pregnant, but she’s willing to do it all alone because he just can’t be counted on. But a lawyer approaches him and tells him the 20 years ago he was a sperm donor and he has over 500 children. 142 of them have filed a lawsuit to force the courts to identify their father, even though they signed a paper agreeing that it would be anonymous. The lawyer assures David he will win the case, hands down, but David just can’t help being curious and decides to secretly meet some of these children that are biologically his without divulging his identity.

I really enjoyed Vince in this film. I was a bit surprised that it wasn’t outrageously funny, as I expected it to be. Instead, it was very heartwarming. Vince can play this guy too, who can crack you up one moment, and make you cry the next. I think this character is probably closest to Fred Claus, another film where Vince plays a lovable loser who finds his good side. I was really impressed with his performance here. This is a touching story about failure and redemption, and though it’s probably obvious where it’s going to end up, it’s not the destination, but the journey that is the fun in this film. I recommend it.

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Touchstone Pictures, DreamWorks SKG, 21 Laps Entertainment

Hugh Jackman, Evangeline Lilly, Kevin Durand, Anthony Mackie, Hope Davis, Dakota Goyo, James Rebhorn, Karl Yune, Olga Fonda, Marco Ruggeri

In the world of 2020 where real human boxers have been replaced by fighting robots, Charlie Kenton (Hugh Jackman) is a washed up boxer who tried to make the move to the robot boxing world, but hasn’t had much luck. Way over his head in debt, and in need of some quick bucks, he puts his only possession, his robot, up against a 2000 pound bull in a fight to the death. Unfortunately he brings his robot back in pieces. Then an 11 year old boy turns up who the courts claim is Charlie’s son Max (Dakota Goyo), and Charlie figures out a way to “sell” Charlie to get back into the robot game.

This is “Rocky” meets “Transformers”! This is an interesting concept for a film, fighting robots! The robots have a personality. When I was a kid we spent a lot of Saturdays on “Rock ’em Sock ’em Robots!

The star of this film is little Dakota Goyo. He is really a good actor. This kid has a ton of talent. Hugh Jackman is also very good playing the “Han Solo” type of character who’s lovable hero who’s always getting himself in trouble, mostly due to his own pride. There are some other good characters too. Evangeline Lilly plays Bailey Tallet, owner of her father’s gym where Charlie trains and repairs his robot. She’s a caring and faithful friend who’s running out of patience on Charlie’s shenanigans. The fighting sequences are AWESOME. Every bit as good as other great “human” boxing movies. There’s a whole lot of action and suspense the locations and seedy characters at the fighting arenas in the “lower class” unlicensed fighting locations remind me of the cockfighting pits in the Philippines, whereas the high glitz and glamour of the official WRF championship fight was better than a Mandalay Bay Las Vegas fight!

All in all it’s a long movie, a little over 2 hours, but it’s so interesting you hardly notice. This is really a great adventure movie with a great David and Goliath story that is fun for all ages. The relationship between Charlie and Max is really endearing. This is a very good film.

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Touchstone Pictures, Rocket Pictures, Miramax Films

James McAvoy, Emily Blunt, Ashley Jensen, Michael Caine, Matt Lucas, Jim Cummings, Maggie Smith, Jason Statham, Ozzy Osbourne, Stephen Merchant, Patrick Stewart, Julie Walters

“Gnomeo, Gnomeo, wherefore art thou Gnomeo.” “No really, I’m stuck!” This is the garden gnome (Travelocity?) version of Romeo and Juliet. Duh! There are two families, the Capulets and the Montagues who have gardens in their back yards. Except one has only red hatted gnomes and the other has only blue hatted gnomes. Not only do the neighbors not get along, but the gnomes do not either. And they have Toy Story disease which is when any human is around you FREEZE! Well the humans go away on a trip and the gnomes fight, except that accidentally a red gnome and a blue gnome fall in love, and the rest is history.

I looked forward to this film a lot, but never got around to trekking out to the theater to see it. It finally released on DVD, and I watched it today, and I must say it wasn’t nearly as good as I expected. It’s a cute film with cute characters, and I’m sure the kids will have fun (especially the little boys) with all the battles and explosions, but it was definitely bland. It is clever to take the Romeo and Juliet story and make it fresh, but that’s been done before, so it’s not original. It has a “Smurf-y” feel though, I have to admit. The most recognizable voice in the film is, of course, Michael Caine. It’s so easy to recognize him, probably Patrick Stewart as well, but otherwise, the voice actors are fresh, even though some are well known. And of course Disney has to have a “Disney Death” at the end, but has to have a new ending as Mr. Shakespeare’s ending is bit too tragic. (If you’re not familiar with Disney Deaths, it’s like Baloo in Jungle Book, and basically one character in every film who appears to die causing great sorrow among his friends, only to wake up at the right dramatic moment. This one basically has THREE Disney Deaths, so enjoy that!) So, it’s colorful, and has some funny characters, but was not as awesome as I expected, and ranks in the middle of the pack of the great animation in the past couple years. But still it’s a good rental if you have kids, and they’re sure to be entertained for 90 minutes or so. So it’s good for that, for sure!

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Summit Entertainment, Touchstone Pictures, Offspring Entertainment

Rick Malambri, Adam G Sevani, Sharni Vinson, Alyson Stoner, Keith Stallworth, Kendra Andrews, Stephen Boss, Martin Lombard, Facundo Lombard, Oren Michaeli, Joe Slaughter

The new gangs I guess are street dancers.  The Pirates including Luke (Malambri) and Natalie (Vinson) team up with a kid the see dancing on the street named Moose (Sevani) and try to take on the number one champion hip hop dancers in New York in contest.  They need the money, and they need the respect.  The showdown of the century “The First Annual World Dance Jam” is destined to change their lives forever.

Yeah, right!  I hated this film.  I don’t get the modern street dancing anyway.  I’m much too old to enjoy seeing people flip-flopping around on the floor like a fish out of water or a chicken with his head cut off.  Then the dialog in this film is enough to make me choke!  “One move, can make you believe there’s something more.  One move, can set a whole generation free.”  Gak.

I did not see this in 3D.  I understand the 3D process added a lot to dance fans and I watched it on DVD.  But I was bored to death.  Practice-battle-fight-battle-practice-battle-battle-battle-done.   There was no story at all, just a bunch of kids who live and practice in a big building and do dance battles at every time they meet somebody.  There was just nothing going on here at all.  I was horribly bored with the whole thing, and the climax was about as boring as the rest of the film.  The Pirates got their butts kicked 900 ways to Sunday and then the judges without any question just name the Pirates the winners.  Like there wasn’t really any real contest to begin with.  And the commentary by the announcer was really lame!   On and on with stunning insight like “Did you see that?” “Ooh, that’s old school” “Say what?”
This was a waste of my time!

Note: My better half is a big fan of “So You Think You Can Dance”. At least one of the stars of this movie is from that show. She was thrilled to recognize someone from the show, then promptly fell asleep. The next day we tried to watch it again, but she was as bored with it as I was.

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Oops Doughnuts Productions, Touchstone Pictures

Kristen Bell, Jamie Lee Curtis, Sigourney Weaver, Odette Yustman, Victor Garber, Betty White, James Wolk, Krisin Chenoweth, Sean Wing, Kyle Burnheimer, Billy Unger

This is a very funny movie. 

One of the reasons to attend your high school reunion is to see old friends.  Ok, no it’s not.  It’s to watch the train wrecks and disasters of those who were so popular in high school.  It’s to see the babes that turned into dogs and the dogs that turned into babes.  Well, when you grow up in a small town, as I did, you know everybody.  Go back to visit 30 years later, and attend a high school football game, as I did, and you find the same names being called out on the P.A. system.  Everyone is that guys son, or that girl’s daughter.

But this poor girl was invisible in high school.  And through flashbacks, we get to see how hard high school was for her.  Finally out of school, she went to college, worked hard, and found a great job!  Then word comes that her big brother is getting married.  But when she finds out who, she finds it’s the one who bullied and tortured her the most.

Home for the wedding, suddenly you’re a little kid again, and facing the same challenges you threw away.  Lucky Mom has some good advice.  That is until she finds out that her new daughter in law’s only family is her former best friend who had a major falling out in High School too.

Then there’s Victor Garber, as the dad who has no clue what the heck is going on and why the whole thing is falling apart.  No help there, and Grandma Bunny? (Betty White)  She’s got tons of issues on her own.

So things go from bad to worse, and some of the best physical comedy in a long time happens.  Hilarity ensues, and everyone learns to “just get along!”

Everyone in the theater seems to be laughing along, and it was really an enjoyable evening.  Total relaxation, and forgetting all your problems while watching the poor folks was easy.  I’d highly recommend this movie as one everyone is going to like from the kids – to the grandparents, and everywhere in between.  Good film.

EdG – EdsReview Dot Com – A Movie Review Blog