Spring Breakers (2013)

Written & Directed by: Harmony Korine

Cast:                                        

-Vanessa Hudgens
-Selena Gomez
-Ashley Benson
-Rachel Korine
-James Franco

REVIEW:

So basically Spring Breakers is a movie about four collage girls who are arrested for robbing a restaurant in order to fund their vacation. They then find themselves bailed out by a drug and arms dealer who wants them to do some dirty work.

PROS:

-          The characters are easily believable, not once was I rolling my eyes at how ridiculous they were. This film in all honesty, is now what you are expecting, it's not all fun in the sun, it's a very true social commentary on today's society. True, all the characters are oversexuallized and obnoxious but, thats basically the point! I'm pretty sure there is someone right now, with brothers, sisters and grandparents doing something very sexual. Even more sexual than this movie, might I add! 

 -         Hudgens and Benson are crazy in this film, we immediately see them passing vulgar notes in class obviously signaling that they will be wild. Franco too did an amazing job here, never would I have known that the guy in "Oz The Great and Powerful" could come out in a film like this, he plays his role so effortless, so natural that its almost scary. The shooting style is beautiful, long takes and very neon lighting which complements the soundtrack perfectly. The score was provided by Cliff Martinez (Provided the score for Drive) and Skrillex (Song at the start of the film, Scary Monsters And Nice sprites) I personally love dubstep, so that helped a lot.

CONS:

-      Obviously, this will not be everyones cup of tea. Some might be bored, and some who expected a really fun-in-the-sun EPIC AMAZINGNESS will also be disappointed. Most lines of dialogue are improvised and comes of as lazy film making.

Final Thoughts:

-      For a film with a formula as ridiculous as this i am glad to say that it works. The acting is believable, the characters are well-written and honest and the film is beautifully shot from start to finish. It's atmospheric, honest and one of the best insights of today's society that I've seen today. It works as an commentary, well-directed and it translates well to film. An artistic, cinematic feast!

SCORE: 5/5

The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey

GRADE: F

The Movie's Highlights:

Pacing: Awfully slow and droll, it takes forever to get from point A to B. Infact, they never make it.

Setting: Typical fantasy kingdom, impressive touch to detail but Style can NEVER substitute for substance

Ending: Falls flat. No starting goals ever get fulfilled. Equal parts confounding and appalling. Brings the story down another level.

          Many movies to cover within the next few weeks, but none of them as big as The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey. The plot revolves around Bilbo Baggins, a Hobbit without a sense of adventure with not much, of a past, nor much of an important future. One day he is summoned by Gandalf to join the forces of the Dwarf kingdom (Stupid, I know.) to take back the stolen mountain which was taken over by a dragon (Unexplained what the dragon's goals are) thus making them a bunch of thieves. (Seriously, am I supposed to be buying this?) Now being as it is a LOTR Prequel, I had high expectations that it would live up to it's name. Now let's talk about how the film viewing, it is shot in 48 frames per second in 3D and it looks terrible. The screen gets too bright and the camera seems to be too over focused, I had a headache and was prepared to walk out, but i just had to stay cause I was anxious for something amazing to happen. But alas, nothing. 
          
          This movie is an adaptation of a 250 page pre-teen book, and yet is stretched out into 3 hours. Not to mention the fact that the writers of the film designed it like a video game, first the trolls, then the Orcs then the this, and the that, and the BOSS ORC and as soon as we're about to get to the dragon, BOOM the movie ends. No joke, this movie felt like a 3 hour filler and left me so impatient. Now about the plot, it's dull we have so many jumps in logic, even for a fantasy film, and so much unimportant filler stories like the one of the Brown Wizard, and the Necromancer. I just didn't care for anything in this movie, not to mention the fact that it felt like a LOTR copy-paste and had few like-able characters (Mostly ignorable and only put in to fill their stereotypical roles) and tons of un-interesting flashbacks and back stories. Now about the special effects they were great, although most talented directors could pull it of if given a huge budget. I was under the impression that the characters in the film were slumming, and the fan-base over-hyping the film only care to see it cause it has relations to LOTR, but at the end of the day, its just not as good. 

          The film plays out as a special effects bonanza relying on a thin plot and since I wasn't given a satisfying conclusion with the Dragon and the character connections, the film had no impact on me whatsoever and has probably killed the franchise cold dead. What can I say? I paid money to see the start of a masterpiece but, I walked out of the theater half asleep. I'm done with LOTR.

Brave


SCORE: 94/100


Pixar's first movie with a female lead, did it work? Yes! [I'm going to try and keep this review spoiler-free.] Brave tells the story of Merida, a young princess who is soon to be married, as her mother arranged. But this little princess doesn't want to be married just yet, she wants to have control of her own life, and choose someone that she is truly in love with, other than that she wants to shoot her Bow and Arrow. So eventually, Merida gets in a fight with her mom and runs away from home only to find a witch, she then trades her necklace for a spell which would "change her fate",  in order to make the spell work, she would have to take the pastry given to her by the witch, and feed it to the Queen. So she ends up getting her mom to eat it, and strange things start happening, can Merida make it right? Brave is a very good movie, I honestly has so much fun seeing it in theaters, the 3D was great, the voice acting was great, and the jokes were allot funnier than the ones in Ice Age 4, and Madagascar 3. What was also working was the action! Whenever Merida brings out that Bow of hers, you better be ready for some Katniss Everdeen epicness, especially when she has to fight the bear! The scenery was awesome, and the animation was great! I highly recommend you see this in theaters, it's really great and just so much fun, with a touching story.

The Dictator


SCORE: 68/100


I don't even know where to start, honestly. This movie starts out with an "In Honor of Kin Jung Il", by I assumed that this movie would be extremely rude, offensive, and would require 25 minutes worth of cuts. But to my surprise, all the obscenities that I was expecting [Since it's the same actor as Borat, who is now ruling a country] were toned down, so much that this movie only got R-13. Anyway, it follows the story of Wadiyan Dictator, Aladeen who assumed power at a very young age and was taught how to run a Dictatorship. Eventually when he gets older, he is  looked at as one of the worst rulers on the planet, abusing his power and the people's rights. Eventually, he is asked to address the United Nations. So he flies of to the USA and is then captured and well, had a major appearance change. So much so that nobody could even recognize him anymore. He then meets Zoey as she helps him out of a protest, and by using her as a cover-up, he starts plotting how to get back to his hotel and become Dictator again before his traitors turn Waidya into a Democracy. This movie i extremely rude, and racist. Sometimes when the jokes aren't working, this movie is down-right Un-watchable. But, when this movie stops being lame and slapstick, it starts to get really funny. I had lots of fun here, but I wouldn't recommend it to most people who are after a "good movie". 

The Dark Knight Rises


SCORE: 100/100


This movie starts off eight years after the previous one, where in we have a new villain who calls himself Bane, the movie starts out with an epic fight scene in an airplane, where our main villain is introduced. It later shows a party in honor of the late Harvey Dent (Two-Face from The Dark Knight), where in the citizens of Gotham still believe that it was Batman who killed him. As Batman has disappeared from Gotham City, so too has Bruce Wayne, locking himself inside Wayne Manor, Wayne Enterprises is crumbling after he invested in a clean energy project designed to harness fusion power, but shut the project down after learning that the core could be modified to become a nuclear weapon. This movie also features some new faces, such as Anne Hathaway, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, and Marion Cotillard. (They all play big parts) Okay, so what worked in this movie, a lot! My heart was pumping with all the action, and how the story just kept getting better and better. I also liked for how fast-paced this movie was, and how it jumped from one storyline to another, and included awesome fight-scenes here and there. I also like how director, Christopher Nolan didn't go all-out comic book, like in The Avengers, and used a sort of dark tone here but at the same time paid so much attention to the character development of the script, and how the characters progressed all together with the storyline. Some of the critics who are giving this movie bad reviews prefer the villains in the other two Batman movies, but for me Bane and his gang of underground thugs were very appropriate into showing the crowd all the hopelessness that the City of Gotham was feeling. I won't explain further on the plot, as to avoid spoilers. But, just so you know, the final act of this movie was so great that is sent chills all the way down my spine, from top to bottom, I had goosebumps, and the whole ending up until the credits, my heart was beating so fast! This movie is one heck of an experience which you cannot afford to miss, especially in the theaters, most preferably in 3D. The Dark Knight Rises, you have made your way into the years top 10, and earned a well-deserved 100/100!