THE FIGHTER
5 out of 5 stars

WOW!!! this was the christian bale show, and i am just MIND-BLOWN by how much great acting this movie has!!! BRAVO, CHRISTIAN BALE!!! BRAVO!!! :) :) :)

based on a true story, david o. russell (director of three kings and i heart huckabees) gives us the candid and raw portrayal of a boxer named “irish” micky ward (mark wahlberg) and his crazy muthafucker junkie of a big bro dicky ecklund. (2010 oscar winner christian bale) the movie takes place in early 1990s/late 80s massachussetts in a town called lowell (40 min. outside of boston accord. to google maps), and dicky and micky are considered town heroes. their family is HUGE...consisting of 9 (holy cow!) children, and dicky is micky’s trainer and alice is his manager. alice ward is a CRAZY lady, and oscar winner melissa leo plays her sooooo naturally esp. in scenes when she’s trying to be a mother to micky, instead of the manager role. micky is down on his luck with a losing streak until he decides to change things up and get “rid” of his brother and mother. he’s torn between them and his GF charlene (boston-accented amy adams) and his father, who convince him to train with a real trainer since dicky is constantly MIA (well, smokin’ that crack pipe). well, one day his wish comes true when dicky is busted for assaulting a bunch of cops/resisting arrest and lands his crack-addicted ass in jail... the rest of the movie is very rocky-esque, so you get my drift... ;)

like i said, this quickly becomes the christian bale show becuz he dominates as a gifted actor. there isn’t one moment that makes you doubt the character, and it’s AMAZING how he lost all that weight to play the skeletal dick ecklund. that’s what makes him so great b/c he’s so dedicated to his craft! it’s amazing... plus, that accent! the man is welsh for christ’s sake, so for him to do a great american accent PLUS a dialect?! that’s skillz... i really don’t think this movie wouldn’t have gotten very far b/c w/o those two, this is just another boxer movie. they truly make this one worthwhile, and i’m glad they both got the oscar gold they deserve. like they say in boxing, KO (knockout) performances for sure... :)

YOGI BEAR
1 out of 5 stars

yogi: “kick it, boo boo!”
boo boo: “kicking it, yogi.”

do kids today even know who yogi bear is? do kids today even care? why hollywood decided to redo the children’s classic is beyond me! did y’all run out of creativity juice? ;/

we all know the story of yogi (dan ackryoyd) and boo boo (justin timberlake), two cuddly bears always scheming up ways to steal ppl’s pic-a-nic baskets and living happily in jellystone park. ranger smith (tom cavanagh) and ranger jones (t.j. miller) take care of yogi’s shenanigans as well as take care of the park itself. one day, rachel AKA miss movie lady (anna faris) comes to jellystone park to film yogi and boo boo in action, but the devious and corrupt mayor brown (andrew daly) has other plans for jellystone. he was to sell the park land and give logging rights to the logging companies, so that he can balance the city budget... (to close the gap of the deficit he caused in the first place) so, jellystone park is in trouble, and what’s yogi and boo boo to do? well, bring ppl to the park by showing off yogi’s water-skiing skillz! ;)

it’s one of my pet peeves when a movie that’s animated featured real live characters because the whole thing could have been animated. i think they did it to make it “interesting” but this movie is really cheesy...even for a kid’s movie! what happened to class and creativity and a certain finesse? it’s a grand shame that such a great cartoon classic is reduced down to a anorexic storyline with recycled lame jokes. at least, boo boo is cute? :/

THE NEXT THREE DAYS
2 out of 5 stars

i didn’t think this one was that great because hollywood totally marketed this movie as a thriller/mystery, but it ends up being about this guy planning a prison break. i’m sorry, but if i wanted to watch a movie about a prison break, i’d watch the show... SMH... such a waste... :(

this is the story of a college professor named john brennan (russell crowe) who decides that he’s going to break his wife lara (elizabeth banks) out of jail after his wife is sentenced to prison for life for killing her boss. what, you say? that’s right... she gets thrown in jail for killing her boss with a fire extinguisher, and the horror of it is that she gets sentenced and put away for life because the evidence against her was too substantial. (i.e. her co-worker witnessing the fight between her and the boss, the fire extinguisher with her fingerprints on it) john and his son are left with no $ because they spent it all on lara’s pricey defense, and it’s actually heartbreaking to see john and lara cry when they realize they’re not going to be getting an appeal any time soon... so, what’s a husband to do? he plans her prison break meticulously from procuring fake IDs from some deaf guy on a motorcycle, doing field research by interviewing a known convict who successfully broke out of prison (liam neeson in his worst role), and even getting drug money to fuel his “project” by killing a known meth dealer and stealing his stash. so, the question becomes: does john successfully break out his wife? i’m gonna be a good girl, and not tell... ;)

there’s a lot of things wrong with this movie i.e. confusing storyline and russell crowe looks bored... maybe he should stick with period movies then in particular roman times?  being that this one was WRITTEN AND DIRECTED by paul haggis (the guy who made the oscar winning movie crash), this was a total disappointment. like i said, it focuses on too much on the planning of the break out when what you really want is a good thriller! a good thriller that should have focused on the mystery behind john’s wife and the crime she “committed”. THAT would have been an interesting movie, although it’s been done before, but i feel like paul haggis could have taken that genre on well. oh, well... :/

FAIR GAME
4 out of 5 stars

“the responsibility of a country is not in the hands of a privileged few. we are strong, and we are free from tyranny as long as each one of us remembers his or her duty as a citizen. whether it's to report a pothole at the top of your street or lies in a state of the union address, speak out! ask those questions. demand that truth. democracy is not a free ride, man. I'm here to tell you. but, this is where we live. And if we do our job, this is where our children will live. god bless america.”
– joe wilson

what an INTERESTING and well-produced movie about the scandal that rocked the bush administration! sean penn and naomi watts team up again but this time...as former ambassador joe wilson and CIA agent valerie plame. :)

based on true events, CIA agent valerie plame (watts) is essentially betrayed by the u.s. government when lewis “scooter” libby (david andrews from JAG) and f-ing karl rove (ugh...hate that guy!) when her husband writes an op-end piece in the NYT re: the lies behind president bush’s state of the union address. what happens is that valerie recommends her husband as the person to seek out whether yellowcake uranium was sold by niger to sadam’s people as this could potentially be a problem if this transaction did take place. (think nuclear bombs) well, joe wilson (penn) goes on his mission, and reports back that no such transaction happened. joe wilson is an expert when it comes to africa and african relations and pretty much all things africa being that he was the director of african relations during clinton’s presidency. the white house doesn’t like that answer, and libby comes to the CIA to cherry-pick data, so it may look like iraq is building a nuclear weapons problem, thus proving that WMDs do exist in iraq. (which they don’t)

so, basically, one person demands the truth from the govt, and their spouse pays the price. their spouse, whose a covert agent for that same govt... it’s all really screwed up, and i am baffled that the u.s. govt did such a thing... SMH and WTF all come to mind, and it’s a damn shame an innocent person’s career got shattered all in the name of covering up the bush adminstration’s lies... it’s a GREAT story and everyone should def see it so you too know valerie’s story! ;)

MORNING GLORY
3 out of 5 stars

rachel mcadams is sooooo adorable in this! she’s young, eager to please, and enthusiastic in this movie about early morning show production. :)

becky fuller (mcadams) is a young and energetic TV producer working for a NJ TV channel, but then she’s laid off due to budgetary problems for the station. so, she searches for a job, and finds a rare executive producer position at a early morning TV show called daybreak. only problem with this dream job is that it comes with a few strings attached... in the form of beauty queen turned TV host colleen (a hilarious diane keaton) and a cantankerous and pretentious co-host mike pomeroy, who thinks morning television is beneath him. (harrison ford doing his best walter kronkite impression) mike causes problems on the show because he refuses to report on anything besides the traditional news, and becky tries hard to break his shell. mike is a handful, but becky has bigger problems at hand... if daybreak doesn’t get high enough ratings, the network with cancel the show. and...since becky can’t afford to lose another job, what else is a girl to do? SENSATIONALISM!!! like...YOUTUBE WORTHY SENSATIONALISM! :P

harrison ford and diane keaton are hilarious as co-hosts that hate each other, and becky’s relationship with patrick wilson’s character is really cute... (it’s a rom com, so she falls in love w/ the all-too-perfect guy) it’s also a good movie that shows a workaholic individual loosen up after all works out in her favor. YAY for happy endings! YAY for stuff that works out in the end! sometimes, you just need that in a world where reality can be a really cruel bitch... ;)

PIRANHA
2 out of 5 stars

“they took my penis...” – derek ross (played by jerry o’connell)

WOW... well, i was expecting boobies and killer fish, and it looks like i got JUST THAT. :P

besides the boobs and the flesh-eating fish, there is an actual "story" here... it starts out with richard dreyfuss randomly fishing out at a lake, when a small earthquake hits. the earthquake opens up a deep underwater lair, which the piranha escape from, looking for their next victim(s). they obviously eat poor richard dreyfuss, and move towards where the spring break partying is happening on lake victoria. it’s spring break, so college kids are drinking, having sex, dancing, and having wet tee-shirt contests all the while a school of hungry piranha circles around them. the sheriff of lake victoria (elizabeth shue) tries hard to warn all these drunk kids that the waters are dangerous, but no one listens. even when hardass ving rhames is talking to them! (no respect!) it wouldn’t be a horror movie without teenagers, so naturally, the sheriff’s son is a teen, along with his wannabe GF kelly. (vanessa from gossip girl!) oh yeah, lest not we forget jerry o’connell’s character derek ross, who is filming footage for his girls gone wild-esque videos during SB... 

highly entertaining! it’s a horror comedy and it’s totally campy, stupid, and just fun when the piranha have no mercy and eat a girl’s ass first THEN the legs... i guess you gotta start with where the meat is first? very much like snakes on a plane, where scientifically this makes no sense but explores the whole what-if scenario.  too bad there's no SLJ angrily stating,"i am sick of these muthafucking fish in this muthafucking lake!" :P  oh, i love how christopher lloyd plays the scientist type AKA the marine biologist and town fish expert, but he cray cray like he is in all his movies. weird that elizabeth shue was the sheriff NOT ving rhames, but gotta hand it to a man who can kill piranha with a boat rotor, sheriff or not! chew on that, muthafuckers! :P

127 HOURS
4 out of 5 stars

watched another oscar contender, and i have to say this was the most intense movie i’ve seen in a while! it’s amazing when one is faced with a “live or die” sitch, that one will do whatever it takes to get out of it... including cutting off an arm! :/

the movie starts out with a guy named aron ralston, who LOVES to rock climb the canyons of utah. he drives out to the middle of nowhere, and begins mountain biking, hiking, the works. he’s charming and outgoing, and we see that when he meets these two girls, whom he shows a secret lagoon of water underneath a deep canyon. they’re swimming and having fun, and soon they part ways... suddenly, aron is trying to climb down as per usual when a big boulder snaps off, lodging itself next to his right arm. his arm is basically a lost cause because the boulder is way too big for him to move it...at least, by himself. he’s trapped, is low on food and water, and doesn’t know if anyone can find him since he’s so deep into the canyon. he starts to videotape his “experience” and the end result...

beautifully done and def has the danny boyle color touch! (a la millions, one of my faves) the natural beauties of the canyons are well shot/captured, and you can almost see some surreal effects going on as well. (reminding me of georgia o’keeffe’s artistic style, sorta?) aron’s hallucinations are vivid, and you can’t really tell if what’s reality and what’s not. one would be in that state after no food and water for 5 days, i suppose? james franco does give a great performance, which earned him an oscar nod...no kidding on that part. i mean, the guy ends up eating his contact lenses and drinking his own pee from a camel bag... if that doesn’t earn you an oscar nod, i dunno what does... ;)