Every so often the best looking man in the Retired Orangemen
Fantasy Football League goes to the movies (yes, just like the
rest of you). Sometimes I go with one of my many lady friends.
Still other times I go with fellow ROFFL members. After viewing
these movies, I form an opinion. Here in a new column, exclusive
to retiredorangemen.com, is Five Second Stare at the Movies.
There are 5 ratings:
HANDSOME
GOOD-LOOKING
DECENT
IF I HAD A FEW DRINKS IN ME
GROSS
Fantasy Football League goes to the movies (yes, just like the
rest of you). Sometimes I go with one of my many lady friends.
Still other times I go with fellow ROFFL members. After viewing
these movies, I form an opinion. Here in a new column, exclusive
to retiredorangemen.com, is Five Second Stare at the Movies.
There are 5 ratings:
HANDSOME
GOOD-LOOKING
DECENT
IF I HAD A FEW DRINKS IN ME
GROSS
 |
Five Second Stare at “Ghost Rider”
Final Rating = IF I HAD A FEW DRINKS IN ME
I’ve seen three movies in the last few weeks so I wanted to write one-
minute reviews for all of them.
First up is Ghost Rider.
Normally, for me, comic book movies get a bit of a pass. I really like
comic books and enjoy watching them unfold on screen. I loved
Superman Returns, Spiderman 2, and Hellboy, just to name a few. I
hated the Fantastic Four and Catwoman to name a couple. Ghost Rider
would land in the second category. The movie was written and direct by
Mark Steven Johnson who made DareDevil (which was better than this).
The movie is poorly written with some really cheesy dialogue. In fact,
Nicolas Cage (who plays the Rider), Peter Fonda (the evil
Mephistopheles) and Wes Bentley (the main villain Blackheart) all
seemed to know they were reading shit on a page. Didn’t really look like
their hearts were into this one.
Johnson does do some nice things with the camera and the visual effects
aren’t too bad. But the story was ludicrous and the dialogue was beyond
campy. I wasn’t expecting much from Ghost Rider, and I got less.
Five Second Stare at “The Number 23”
Final Rating = GROSS
I’ve had a shitty run at the cinema recently. With the exception of “Letters
from Iwo Jima” I’ve seen some pretty bad stuff at the movies. This time
Brian dragged me to see “The Number 23” (he paid).
The movie is about a man (Jim Carrey) who finds himself obsessing about
the number 23 and when I say obsessing, I really mean it. How about this
reach? A girl’s favorite color is pink. How do we make pink? Red 67 +
white 25, right? 67 + 25 = 92. There are 4 letters in the word pink, 92/4
= 23. HOLY SHIT!!!!!!!!! IT’S THE NUMBER!!!!!
It’s hard for anyone to buy into the premise of the movie and that kills the
film from the first frame. Carrey is not as bad as advertised, but he’s not
nearly good enough to save a film like this.
It was a thriller with no thrills.
Two other things I want to mention:
1) I don’t like Joel Shumacher. He’s made one good movie, “The
Lost Boys.” This was 20 years ago.
2) There’s a scene in this movie where a bus is bearing down on Jim
Carrey, who wants to commit suicide (don’t worry this is not a big plot
point). Now, the bus starts honking, but never turns or swerves out of the
way. Why not? It’s not a fucking train. Are you telling me the bus driver
was just like, “hey, I’m going in a straight line, and I’m not turning this
wheel. So if you stay in the middle of the road, I’m just going to
accelerate and kill you.” Why are there scenes like this in movies?
Five Second Stare at “Zodiac”
Final Rating = GOOD-LOOKING
Finally, a movie I can get behind. “Zodiac” is David Fincher’s 6th major
film. I am a huge fan of Fincher’s work. His 6 movies are (in
chronological order) Alien3, Se7en, The Game (one of my personal
favorites), Fight Club, Panic Room, and Zodiac. Even if you don’t like all
of his movies (and I do) you have to give him credit for always bringing
something visually stimulating to each movie he makes. He knows what
he’s doing back there.
Zodiac is 2 hours and 40 minutes long but doesn’t feel it. The credit for
this has to go to not only Fincher but to the screenwriter James
Vanderbilt who wrote a very tense crime thriller and to the actors.
Though Jake Gyllenhaal will get most of the credit the film does not open
up with top billing, which is fairly rare, Gyllenhaal, Mark Ruffalo, and
Robert Downey, Jr. share the opening card. It was these three
performances (especially Downey, who’d get nominated for an Oscar if
this film came out in November) and the supporting performances of
Anthony Edwards (as Ruffalo’s partner) and Elias Koteas and Donal
Logue (two other police officers) that carried the heavy weight of the film.
Zodiac is based on the books by Robert Graysmith and based on a true
story. The film does take some liberties with the material and gives us a
bit of a cathartic ending (the Zodiac killer has never been caught), but
that is forgivable.
Fincher is at the top of his game right now and is one of the most
underrated American filmmakers around.
I also want to mention how good Downey Jr. is. I mentioned this to Brian,
but I think he’s like Johnny Depp, with better comic timing and a little less
acting chops. It’s nice to see Downey sobered up. Hopefully he can
continue to make more movies like this and last years fantastic “Kiss Kiss
Bang Bang.”
I definitely recommend Zodiac to the ROFFL. Much like “Inside Man” last
year, this could be a March movie that gets lost in the shuffle of “Best
of…” lists at the end of 2007. Well I’m saying it write now, Zodiac could
very well be one of the 10 best movies of the year.
I’ll be seeing 300 next week, a full review of that will come with it.
Good Night, and Good Luck.
Final Rating = IF I HAD A FEW DRINKS IN ME
I’ve seen three movies in the last few weeks so I wanted to write one-
minute reviews for all of them.
First up is Ghost Rider.
Normally, for me, comic book movies get a bit of a pass. I really like
comic books and enjoy watching them unfold on screen. I loved
Superman Returns, Spiderman 2, and Hellboy, just to name a few. I
hated the Fantastic Four and Catwoman to name a couple. Ghost Rider
would land in the second category. The movie was written and direct by
Mark Steven Johnson who made DareDevil (which was better than this).
The movie is poorly written with some really cheesy dialogue. In fact,
Nicolas Cage (who plays the Rider), Peter Fonda (the evil
Mephistopheles) and Wes Bentley (the main villain Blackheart) all
seemed to know they were reading shit on a page. Didn’t really look like
their hearts were into this one.
Johnson does do some nice things with the camera and the visual effects
aren’t too bad. But the story was ludicrous and the dialogue was beyond
campy. I wasn’t expecting much from Ghost Rider, and I got less.
Five Second Stare at “The Number 23”
Final Rating = GROSS
I’ve had a shitty run at the cinema recently. With the exception of “Letters
from Iwo Jima” I’ve seen some pretty bad stuff at the movies. This time
Brian dragged me to see “The Number 23” (he paid).
The movie is about a man (Jim Carrey) who finds himself obsessing about
the number 23 and when I say obsessing, I really mean it. How about this
reach? A girl’s favorite color is pink. How do we make pink? Red 67 +
white 25, right? 67 + 25 = 92. There are 4 letters in the word pink, 92/4
= 23. HOLY SHIT!!!!!!!!! IT’S THE NUMBER!!!!!
It’s hard for anyone to buy into the premise of the movie and that kills the
film from the first frame. Carrey is not as bad as advertised, but he’s not
nearly good enough to save a film like this.
It was a thriller with no thrills.
Two other things I want to mention:
1) I don’t like Joel Shumacher. He’s made one good movie, “The
Lost Boys.” This was 20 years ago.
2) There’s a scene in this movie where a bus is bearing down on Jim
Carrey, who wants to commit suicide (don’t worry this is not a big plot
point). Now, the bus starts honking, but never turns or swerves out of the
way. Why not? It’s not a fucking train. Are you telling me the bus driver
was just like, “hey, I’m going in a straight line, and I’m not turning this
wheel. So if you stay in the middle of the road, I’m just going to
accelerate and kill you.” Why are there scenes like this in movies?
Five Second Stare at “Zodiac”
Final Rating = GOOD-LOOKING
Finally, a movie I can get behind. “Zodiac” is David Fincher’s 6th major
film. I am a huge fan of Fincher’s work. His 6 movies are (in
chronological order) Alien3, Se7en, The Game (one of my personal
favorites), Fight Club, Panic Room, and Zodiac. Even if you don’t like all
of his movies (and I do) you have to give him credit for always bringing
something visually stimulating to each movie he makes. He knows what
he’s doing back there.
Zodiac is 2 hours and 40 minutes long but doesn’t feel it. The credit for
this has to go to not only Fincher but to the screenwriter James
Vanderbilt who wrote a very tense crime thriller and to the actors.
Though Jake Gyllenhaal will get most of the credit the film does not open
up with top billing, which is fairly rare, Gyllenhaal, Mark Ruffalo, and
Robert Downey, Jr. share the opening card. It was these three
performances (especially Downey, who’d get nominated for an Oscar if
this film came out in November) and the supporting performances of
Anthony Edwards (as Ruffalo’s partner) and Elias Koteas and Donal
Logue (two other police officers) that carried the heavy weight of the film.
Zodiac is based on the books by Robert Graysmith and based on a true
story. The film does take some liberties with the material and gives us a
bit of a cathartic ending (the Zodiac killer has never been caught), but
that is forgivable.
Fincher is at the top of his game right now and is one of the most
underrated American filmmakers around.
I also want to mention how good Downey Jr. is. I mentioned this to Brian,
but I think he’s like Johnny Depp, with better comic timing and a little less
acting chops. It’s nice to see Downey sobered up. Hopefully he can
continue to make more movies like this and last years fantastic “Kiss Kiss
Bang Bang.”
I definitely recommend Zodiac to the ROFFL. Much like “Inside Man” last
year, this could be a March movie that gets lost in the shuffle of “Best
of…” lists at the end of 2007. Well I’m saying it write now, Zodiac could
very well be one of the 10 best movies of the year.
I’ll be seeing 300 next week, a full review of that will come with it.
Good Night, and Good Luck.
 |
