I made a terrible mistake watching this movie with an empty stomach, true story.
After directing big-budget movies for the past couple or so years, Directr Jon Favreau decided it's time to go back-to-basics and hence the idea of making a movie about cooking, titled "Chef". The movie follows professional chef Carl Casper (Jon Favreau), who after an altercation that went public, decided to quit his job in Los Angeles and go back to his hometown in Miami to fix up a food truck. Thus embarks a journey of celebration of food that you could have easily seen in TLC, but the movie isn't really just about that.
As a kid who likes food, I've spent my sembreak watching TLC almost every chance I can get. Until my parent, my siblings and some of my friends started to tag along, we ended up being a bunch of people with an absurd interest with cooking and food. I remember watching this movie weeks ago and I was definitely blown by the experience, but the succeeding weeks was so hectic and heartbreaking I forgot to talk about this film . One night I was so burnout and hungry I wanted to eat and watch a movie, until I remember this particular film. The first time I saw this, I was devastatingly hungry, so what I did is I made a myself a bunch of sandwiches and watched this movie for the full experience. It was still as lovely as I remember it, a food porn movie.
The movie, to begin with, was well acted. The character Carl might seem like a Mary-Sue to director/actor Jon Favreau, as the character struggles on being connected to his broken family under a busy schedule, which is probably why we feel every aspect of Carl. He's also under illusion of freedom to do his thing, but realizes that as long as he's working for someone he's never going to get that freedom that he wants. So when he basically burst throughout his own barriers and have that freedom that he's so craving for, all you want to do is to cheer for him and buy food from his food truck.
The movie is also a part-family road trip film, since he has his son Percy (Emjay Anthony) with him in his journey in the food truck. With the two, trying to strengthen their bond under the circumstances of being in a broken family, along with his ex-wife Inez (Sofia Vergara). Martin (John Leguizamo) was a surprisingly likable character, not gonna lie.
The movie is simply a feel-good experience, when it starts to go down that path. There's so much stuff in this movie that just hits all the right moves, all the right ingedients and all the right flavors, I don't wanna talk about all of them. You'll have to see this film whenever you get the chance.
I guess my only gripe would be the profanity. I know they were going on a realistic approach with this film, but the profanity was unnecessary for me.
If you want a real food adventure, go out there and find the best food that best suits your cravings, or you can watch this film before you go out or you can do both. Chef definitely tells you to do both.
(+)
FOOD, GLORIOUS FOOD!
Simple, but dynamic story/script
Great cast
(-)
Vulgarity
Score: A
Chef is now available in DVD, Blu Ray and Digital HD.
You can order Chef and other movies online here at CD Universe.
Imagine Micheal Fassbender wearing the Frank paper-mache head, wearing Magneto's helmet.
Frank is a 2014 comedy-drama directed by Lenny Abrahamson. Starring Domhnall Gleeson, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Scoot McNairy and Michael Fassbender as the title character.
The movie basically follows Domhnall's character, Jon, a hopeful musician, as he is burnout from his regular life and finds an opportunity to break free from his daily routine when he came across with this rather eccentric band led by Michael Fassbender's Frank.
You know that feeling when you wake up in the morning and you have important things to do, but instead you found yourself looking through your window and outside you see a group of people just goofing around and you don't know why, but your curiosity might trigger your body to go outside and get to know these people more until you realize you started to play with them?
Jon is our window to over these people. He is always the one trying to get the answers we are looking for. Even with his talents he is so ordinary that our inner average selves relates to him. Until he finally goes outside and play with Frank and his band that we realize not only Jon is getting sucked into this madness, but so are we. Domhnall did a great job portraying our looking-glass character. Even the character Jon himself, he's a well written character.
Speaking of well written characters, there tons of them here, but Frank shines out of them the most. There's a lot of mystery about this guy, he's like a cartoon character, one who doesn't blend well with real people, but gives this film its primary flavors. Even Michael's performance as Frank wasn't too obvious, which adds up to the mystery backing his big paper-mache head.
The movie is also hilarious. I don't say that a lot about movies, but when a movie makes something grim and depressing funny and you don't feel guilty about it, it definitely deserves the credit.
The film's also something of a musical. The best way to describe the music is like listening to some very deep indie music. It's not made for everyone. It may not even sound music to some, but it is. It's not pop music, I'll tell you that much.
The film itself is an adventure/roadtrip/self discovery film. Watching it makes you think about how miserable your life can be and how you can just simply set yourself free from it. It also has interesting message about the art of music itself. Sometimes, taking away its uniqueness also means taking away its specialty and makes it plain, ordinary and boring, like how your everyday life is.
The thing is, the movie works so perfectly being bizarre. You take that away and this film is nothing special anymore.
To be quite honest, watching this movie is a refreshing experience. Its got a lot of heart and spirit, but as how the movie suggest, taking something away from it would make it less unique.
(+)
Uniqueness
Humor
Overall direction and screenplay
Soronprfbs
Frank
(-)
Not pop
Sudden ending
Score: A-
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Finally, he got tired of saying "get to the choppa!"
Sabotage is one of the most recent post-governor film of Arnold Schwarzenegger which also stars a ridiculous amount of star powered actors. Directed by David Ayer, the film centers around Arnold's character Breacher dealing with some sort of depression after facing some disadvantages of being an old DEA agent and other shenanigans as well.
On the plus side, I can say that this is Arnold's best performance as of late. He really did justice to his rather dark character. I kind of feel sorry for the guy, most of his roles as of late had been kind of a joke aimed at himself, to the point where he felt like he had to make fun of himself while portraying those characters. At least here, he was given a more serious character and he did a good job portraying Breacher.
But that isn't enough to cover up the 5#!+ that this movie is.
At least the story was thought through. Those two pages that tells the entire story with brief descriptions and only minimal dialogues, that's where they got it right.
But there's this script with crappy, disgusting, unlikable characters. Some of them are even inconsistent and does things out of character. Granted a few of them were given each time to shine, but even the actors found it hard to shine through.
The movie also had this weird potential to be a good mystery thriller. There's this charade that's going on that even a summa cum laude would die to know the truth. Yet, all of this was mashed up with nonsense over nonsense. The movie terribly slowed down somewhere in the middle and when you get to the big revelation, you have already forgotten that there's this big mystery that you have to solve because your mind is crowded with other unrelated stuff from the movie.
And what's up with the gore? I mean I can see they're going for realism. I have nothing against violence in films, you've seen me go fanboy on The Raid. As long as they are justified and makes a lot of sense. The violence in this movie is just simply unjustified, senseless and everything was only to throw it to your face. Are you still realistic even with a toned-down violence? Yes! This movie doesn't understand that.
But overall, in spite of the negatives this movie had, I didn't hate it as much I should. It's just that I don't want to see it again.
With very few things to like about this film, Sabotage lingers on mindless story telling, unlikable characters and ludicrous violence way more than it should.
(+)
Best Arnold lead since post-governor
"Okay" action set pieces
(-)
Terrible (looking) characters
Senseless violence
Too much junk covering the good stuff
Score: C-
Sabotage is now available on DVD, Blu Ray and Digital HD.
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Big Red Cheese is finally getting some love in the big screen! After years of waiting, Shazam is finally in the works and set to be distributed Warner Brothers and New Line Cinema.
The first confirmed casting was from wrestler-turned-actor Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson in his Twitter. "Kneel at his feet or get crushed by his boot" My honor to become... #BlackAdam #TheAntiHero #DCComics, this was tweet made by the actor that made the internet (mostly fanboys) go berserk. I mean, seriously, he looks like Black Adam!
While Variety has recently said that writer Darren Lemke is on the scriptwriting duties for Shazam. Now everyone prays that he channel his inner good scriptwriting skills that he displayed with Jack The Giant Slayer and not the other of his talent that he has shown in Shrek Forever After.
With that said, it's only normal for a fanboy (like me) to speculate like crazy. Now I'm not the biggest Shazam fan out there, but I think that so far the filmmakers share my general and legit knowledge about the character. With New Line President Toby Emmerich quoted that the film will have a sense of fun and a sense of humor. But the stakes have to be real.
Here we will discuss 2 things:
What should be the tone of the film?
Who should play Shazam?
The Tone
I'll keep this one short, simple and to-the-point.
Billy Batson is only 10-years old. He's maybe a kid that has been going through bad times for as long as he remembers, but never was he a bad kid. He is a young boy with the golden heart and most likely one of, if not, the most respectful, kind and loving kid you'll ever see. These are the qualities that The Wizard saw as to why he was chosen as the new Shazam.
If this film does take place in the DC Cinematic Universe, it is only vital that he lives in a Post-Metropolis Invasion world. As suggested by the animated series and animated movies, Billy Batson is a fan of superheroes, especially Superman. If anything, he wanted to be like Superman. He lives in a world of divisive perception towards the Man Of Steel, and he believes that he is a hero that was just trying to do his job. Billy relates to the negativity of the people towards Superman, as he has been doing good deeds all his life and yet he's always been constantly being picked on.
To see an aggressive and violent world through an innocent child's eyes is something that is rarely explored in any superhero movies. Shazam has the opportunity to be the first of its kind, With right balance of a kid-family friendly movie to a larger than life action-adventure, we might just have DC's best superhero movie.
Seriously, this is a character that has out shined Superman in some point of time. It's not impossible for that to happen again.
The Captain
I know he's no longer named Captain Marvel (you can thank Marvel for that), but I'll just leave that heading the way it is just for the sake of it.
There are many actors out there that has a potential to capture the essence of the character and portray it flawlessly at the big screen. Here are some of the fan favorites or fan picks to play Shazam..
1) Brandon Molale
I am being honest with you, I've barely seen this guy in TV. But he has the built, the looks and he's even the same age as Dwayne Johnson so, why not?
2) Patrick Warburton
Most of you might remember him as The Tick, and that is saying a lot why he should play Shazam. Though his age might be a big question mark to the casting department.
3) Owain Yeoman
I mostly know him as Wayne Rigsby from The Mentalist. As far as I've seen from him, he's pretty good at what he does. Even if he was a one-sided in Terminator: The Sarah Connor Chronicles, it would be fun to see him play the titular character.
4) Kellan Lutz
People might always remember him as a lifeless character in the Twilight Saga or that really crappy Hercules kid from The Legend Of Hercules, but believe me when I say this. Give him some good material and the director to show him the right direction and he has a potential to carry out a franchise. Have you seen The Expendables III? He was the (second) best actor of the bunch, Mel Gibson the first. 5) Mark Whalberg
Please stay with me on this. I know this one's for laughs, but trust me I have an idea. I know he's a fun actor. Say what you want about Transformers: Age Of Extinction (I said it was bad, and I don't care if you don't agree with me), but he knows how to have fun with his roles, regardless of how bad these movies are. Just think of him from Pain & Gain, put him on a Shazam suit, I rest my case.
6) John Cena
Now this one's really for laughs. lol But think about it..
For those who didn't know, Nu metal is a sub-genre of metal which fuses a lot of music elements you wouldn't imagine would mesh well with metal, which includes; hip-hop, electronic, funk etc.
Believe it or not, Nu metal has a large impact on metal/rock music until today, encouraging metal/rock acts to experiment with their sound and to not be afraid of thinking outside the box. This genre was so big in the late-90's artist from this genre are still active as of today.
But, despite of it's everlasting influences, Nu metal just ended being irrelevant by today's musical standards. Forcing bands of this genre to either abandon their Nu metal image altogether and go full on metal or experiment in the fields of alternative rock.
As the first episode of Music IN ONE GO!, I have gathered 10 Nu metal records that some of us used to loved and have forgotten as time goes by. My basis for this list are simple:
These records must have failed to succeed at any charts, but has gained attention from the underground scene.
These records are completely unnoticed by the time of its release, but has gained attention after the band has achieved success with succeeding records.
These record have succeeded on the charts and have very popular singles, but has completely vanished from the radar, along with the band themselves, as time goes by.
Keep in mind that this is not an exhausted list. There are many more forgotten Nu metal records out there that might not have made it to this specific list. I have gathered the ones that I am familiar with.
Time to wash those baggy clothes and wear them again, spike up your haird dye them with color and wear all your piercings 'cause here are...
Top 10 Forgotten Nu Metal Records
1. Tribal Ink, Surrounded By Freaks (2003)
If you're one of those people who pirated Linkin Park's single What I've Done, you've probably heard of this band, or more specifically their song Refugee. Taken from the album Surrounded By Freaks, this Swedish rock band has completely shown great potential of showcasing edginess to their more alternative driven Nu metal record. It's no doubt a fan mislabeled their song to those of Linkin Park's, Tribal Ink has seriously picked up what Linkin Park has left off from Meteora.
2. Crazy Town, Darkhorse (2002)
Let's be honest, no matter how bad the song is, we all used to love Crazy Town's mega-hit single Butterfly. But it looks like the band themselves hated that record as well, and their follow-up Darkhorse is case-in-point. Featuring heavier and much more aggressive sounds, Shifty and the crew has proved that they are much better than the Red Hot Chilli Peppers rip-off band they used to be. Sadly, seems like almost everyone gave up on them before they could prove they're worth the time.
3. Hed PE, Blackout (2003)
In case you didn't know, PE stands for Planet Earth. Hed stands for something that I honestly don't know and probably never will. Regardless of their confusing name, this band has achieved moderate success at the billboard charts with this record and has been touring with acts like Korn and System Of A Down. To me, that's a lifetime achievement.
4. Static X, Wisconsin Death Trip (2003)
If you have trouble listening to Ariana Grande's sweet, but non-audible voice, wait until you hear this guy. Wayne Static and company debuted their Industrial-inspired Nu metal record Wisconsin Death Trip. Imagine flashing neon lights on an underground pub with a pretty hot mosh pit, this is probably the record you should give to the DJ. Now enjoy dancing to the song and try to sing every single word this guy's saying.
5. Thousand Foot Krutch, Set It Off (2001)
You know there has to be at least one Christian metal act on this list and Thousand Foot Krutch definitely deserves that spot. After all that hard work Trevor McNevan had to go through, his efforts finally pay-off with their first indie label record Set It Off. With a little help from his friends, T-Rawk has gained success locally with this hip-hop inspired nu metal record and has gained even more attention after the success of their follow-up Phenomenon.
6. Incubus, Enjoy Incubus EP (1997)
Before vocalist Brandon Boyd looked like a slimmer, sexier version of Rob Thomas of Matchbox Twenty with a beard, he used to look like a cave man with dreadlocks and he smells a lot like a crack head. This EP serves as the band's first major label release which features remastered versions of songs from their first record Fungus Amongus made to sound a bit closer to the Nu metal sound we're all familiar with S.C.I.E.N.C.E. Don't worry, the lyrics haven't changed, they still love cocaine.
7. Helmet, Meantime (1992)
The oldest record of this list, this record takes us back to the early years of creating Nu metal. Sure the band themselves hated to be classified as Nu metal, it's completely understandable. The record itself sounded more alternative than Nu metal. But if Nu metal acts praises this band and consider them as heroic inspirations, even going as far as featuring vocalist Paige Hamilton on Linkin Park's latest release The Hunting Party, the deserve a spot on this list.
8. Mushroomhead, XX (2001)
This list can never go on without a Slipknot-knock off band, or it was actually Slipknot who is the rip-off. Doesn't really matter, they're both cool with each other now. But no offense, they both sound the same, at least just a tad bit different. If Slipknot went more industrial, it's the Mushroomhead, if the Mushroomhead went with a more Nu metal sound, it's Slipknot. Don't get me wrong, they both sound really good in what they do and I'm happy that both have been very essential and even friendly to one another nowadays. If only the fans could stop this war like what the band members themselves had.
9. Alien Ant Farm, Anthology (2001)
The most family friendly record of this list, this Cali based rock band has hit the airwaves and has gained success on the charts with their pop rock inspired Nu metal debut album Anthology. I personally used to be very dismissive about this band, seeing them nothing but a cash cow on the Nu metal scene by just making a Nu metal version of Micheal Jackson's Smooth Criminal as their first single. Perhaps I was a bit unfair, even their follow-up single Movies proves that they can establish an image of their own.
10. Evanescence, Fallen (2003)
Easily the most successful record of this list. We're talking about chart topping singles, Top 5 at the Billboard charts. Singles played everywhere 24/7, dozens and dozens of covers from radio, YouTube to American Idol. We're talking about Grammy nominations on top of Grammy nominations and Grammy awards on top of Grammy awards. Some might argue they are the pop version of Lacuna Coil, but these people are thinking way too much. Amy Lee and her friends have successfully injected Girl-power to the Nu metal industry and by doing so have gained massive success throughout the entire world. After that, it was just a spiral downward journey for the band as the hype goes colder and colder each record. Where are they now? That's the point, three albums in and PUFF! They just disappeared. And that is why they deserve a spot on this list.
Special Mention:Drowning Pool, Sinner (2001)
Puddle Of Mudd, Come Clean (2001)
Sevendust, Animosity (2001)
Now that was a long editorial. After going through all this genre binding music, maybe listening to Babymetal ain't such a bad idea..
Let's just pretend none of us saw the leaked copy online.
The Expendables 3 is.. you guessed it.. the third installment of The Expendables franchise which stars your favorite 80's-early 2000's action stars as they team up in the ultimate throwback to 80's action movies.
The shortest verdict I could give this.. it is bad. It's a bad movie. Done, go on and move on with your life. Still here? Okay, let's talk about it.
If you've seen the previous movies, you'll know what you're into with this one. You don't expect Academy worthy writing and performances, you just want old men kicking butts and throwing 80's cliched lines at one another. This specific movie, tries to deviate itself from the formula in a certain extent.
Starting with the new blood, just like the old men they're okay. Kellan Lutz's character is actually the best one out of them. I mean they're all bad actors and they all play mediocre characters, I'm just saying that out of all of them he's the one who did a decent job of making his character at least likable and at some point relatable, I was actually rooting for this guy in the movie.
Let me address something first about Ronda Rousey. For those of you who didn't know, she basically said what most haters would say about Gal Gadot's Wonder Woman (who is set to appear in Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice) which included; she's not physically imposing and she [Ronda] would make a better Wonder Woman than Gal. First, she's right about kicking Gal's buns, she can. She is fully equipped to take down bad guys and her figure compliments that. Plus she's a really good looking person, she's beautiful you can't deny that. What I thought was "..well if she wanted to be Wonder Woman, why didn't she audition for the role?.." Physically, she has that Wonder Woman body, I can see that. But Wonder Woman/Princess Diana/Diana Prince isn't just all about outer beauty and buff-ness. I'm just saying, if her performance as an actress from this film serves as her audition tape for that role, I can see why Zack Snyder would pick Gal Gadot over her. Gal's a mediocre actress, but compared to what Ronda has shown here, I'm just saying she'll have a tall mountain to climb to be Wonder Woman. But who knows? Maybe she'll improve next time, maybe she can play Hawkgirl next time.
Basically the point of this new blood is that Sylvester Stallone's character couldn't take his old team to missions anymore so he tried new stuff. The premise wasn't terrible to be honest, it adds new flavor this rather old and rehashed movie. I'm just saying it didn't stand up to me like this movie wanted it to.
The best actors of this movie are definitely Mel Gibson, Harrison Ford and Wesley Snipes. You can tell they are the three that had the most fun. Especially Mel Gibson, which the character he portrays I call the best villain of this franchise. The rest just plays a parodied, Jar Jar Binks-ed version of themselves and they're getting tired of it.
Actually, the movie is getting tired of itself. It's just the same thing over and over again, now for the third time. For me there's nothing wrong with that, all they have to do is to give their best at what they do and what they're supposed to achieve. That is not the case here, the old cast looks tired, it's the same writing again. Everything just looks and feels tired and weary, and they also edited the action scenes that felt Rated-R to fit the PG-13 rating? C'mon! Seriously, the movie's too tired of itself even I'm too exhausted to write a review for it.
New faces, but same old tricks and they're not even giving their best on this one.
Today we welcome this generations live-action adaptation of our beloved four ninja, mutant, turtles, teenagers or as we call them- Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.
I'm not going to pretend that you don't know what the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles are, if you've seen this movie and you're reading this review YOU KNOW what the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles are. But I'm guessing some of you didn't know or at least haven't seen the previous live-action films.
I was tempted to do a ..MOVIES IN ONE GO! article for the previous movies, then I saw the movies. What I have to say is very short...
I saw all four previous films and I know there are huge fans of the films out there. But I'm sorry, they are just bad movies, all of them, and this one isn't different. If you're going to crap on this film because it's ruining your nostalgia, please don't, those TMNT movies of your generation are just as bad as this one. Don't worry, all the kids of this generation's film will probably say the same, don;t worry I'll tell them the same thing when the time comes. But again, I'm sorry, but they are what they are, a bunch of really bad movies made to entertain kids. Let the kids of this generation have their fun, same as you had yours back in the day.
The four turtles; Leonardo, Donatello, Raphael and Michelangelo, are all spot on. From their characteristics and their interactions and chemistry not only towards each other, but also from every other character is spot on. I'm not even bothered by their looks, I think it worked pretty well for me, and for them for the most part. The turtles are easily the best thing in this movie, which the film itself is sadly a mess.
My main problem with this film is that they got the Turtles right, but we don't get to see enough turtles. I don't really like comparing movies from one franchise to another film from another franchise, but this film could have been as fun as Guardians Of The Galaxy. I can look past the silly writing, the villains that I don't care about, the illogical thinking this film has IF we had the Turtles leading us on this adventure. The problem is, they're not the drivers of this bus, she is..
I mean, I get it, the filmmakers believes that this film would need a touch from a sex symbol, so BAM! Megan Fox as April O' Neal. But she never goes away on this movie, she is everywhere. I want less April, more Turtles, how hard can that be? But considering how badly this character was written, I'd say Megan did a decent job as this film's April O' Neal.
There are so many useless and wasted characters in this movie, but the one that bugged me the most is Shredder. Again I apologize for the comparison, but Shredder is like that Marvel Cinematic Universe villain that is so physically imposing, but is so shallow in-depth like Malekith, Ronan or even Whiplash.
This film obviously has some terrible writing in it. I mean I know that the concept of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles is just plain silly from head-to-toe, but at least it deserves a decent writing and logic to it.
But I will say this, the film has some pretty hardcore action scenes. The first couple of fights, the fight on the snow and even the The Amazing Spider-Man-esque climax, they all looked really awesome.
Lastly, even though Michael Bay is attached to this film as a producer and not a director, I kinda wish that he directed this instead of Jonathan Liebesman. Because if you're gonna make a Bay-tastic film, there's no other guy that can make this look authentic and real Bay-tastic than the Bay-man himself. Don't hire a director that would abandon his own style just to project a Bay-tastic film, just get Michael Bay. It's that simple.
Regardless of how silly and dumb this movie is, you're still going to have a fun time with Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. That is if you can wait for them to spring into action.
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