So I have now seen three movies this holiday week, and two are the movie blockbusters, LIVE FREE OR DIE HARD and TRANSFORMERS, while the other is the sleeper hit good family flick, Ratatoulie.
Saturday night, I was getting off work after a week which saw things just turning for a change. Times to move on and move forward, get the store back to ranking well, and be successful, and I decided early that night that I was going to see LIVE FREE OR DIE HARD because I needed an adrenaline moment that gets the blood moving, makes you realize that Bruce Willis still has it at age 52 (and hell, read his Playboy interview this month for his changes on how he deals with things, including his stance on american politics as well as his movie performances), and is just fun. Did I really feel John McClane in the character...no. I have to state that first, because with his bald head and it being PG-13, I felt that the character was watered down and missed the most important aspects of his character...his whit, his disregard for his personal health and his charm. When you look at this against the original DIE HARD, HOW did he catch up to the bad guys in this? In the first film, they are in the same building...EASY TO CATCH THE BAD GUY... here, he somehow drove through NY to get to Washington, then went to WV, MD, and then back to jump on an F-37 fighter jet...NOT John McClane, but definitely Jack Bauer. HOWEVER, I enjoyed the movie for the simple fact that it did what I expected it to...entertain me, and make me realize that if they ever wanted to put these two FOX properties together (DIE HARD and 24) I'd be perfectly okay with a 50 year old NY detective taking over for the other 50 year old CTU runner. Yes, that's right...if FOX were able to talk Bruce Willis into taking over for Keifer Sutherland, *I* would continue to watch it, and probably be happier, so Keifer could go back to being a villain in movies...I'd even suspend Disbelief that a man named Detective John McClane was being brought in to run the tactical of CTU...Anyway, I give DIE HARD a strong 8 for being fun, funny, action-packed and just overall enjoyable. I do wait for the UNRATED version, which is guaranteed to have different lines used in certain spots, and for those that have seen the movie, Bruce Willis mentions that you can only use the word, "fuck" twice in a PG-13 film, but you can kill all the badguys you want...so I guarantee you will KNOW where other things were said and new lines were spliced in...its obvious in a couple spots...
TRANSFORMERS...hm. This one is a little tougher to review. On one hand, you can ask my wife, I was literally giddy in my seat bouncing back and forth making sure I was going to be one of the first to see this movie on Monday, that's right, Monday, and then I was going to let all my friends know I saw it. Christy was less than enthusiastic about seeing it, but was a good sport and went along, while texting to her friends, instead of watching the robots smack each other around.
Okay, so I'm watching it, and when you first hear Peter Cullen's voice of Optimus Prime, you just feel 8 years old, again, and you just wait to hear Bumblebee, Jazz and IronHide...unfortunately, Michael Bay decided that returning all the voices for their characters was not important, and neither were the 29 year olds in the audience of this film that was created to make 8 year olds giddy. Yes, I had problems with Transformers. At one point, and I don't call this a spoiler, but it may be, Optimus Prime is telling the 16 year old Sam Witwicky, "Can you hurry up, looking for those glasses?" While hiding from his parents, and I watched as this scene took up 10 minutes of screen time, and I found myself thinking, "Can you hurry up and get to Megatron?" Some of the action scenes were great...some were underwhelming like the climactic scene of Prime versus Megatron, which was WAY TOO short, and since when has Optimus Prime been such a puss? Inclusion of lines like, "More than Meets the Eye," "One shall stand, and one shall fall," and "Roll out" were great, and nostalgia builders...but lets be honest, this, ONCE AGAIN, was another film where the director had a great vision but then missed the audience that it was important to appeal to...THE AUDIENCE THAT GREW UP AND WANTED TO SEE IT...originally, I gave TRANSFORMERS a 7, but now, I rethink it a little more and drop it to a 6.5, based purely on Peter Cullen and the awesome special effects...that's good enough for a 5.5, and Megan Fox is good enough to add another 1.0 to the score for her beauty...that chick is flat out HOT, and didn't have a horrible aussie accent like the blond girl, but if I could shut her up by shoving something in her mouth (if the wife would let me), I'd be MORE than happy to oblige.
Finally, Ratatoulie...I loved this film, and very well think this MAY be PIXAR's best film ever. It's tough to say that, but it seemed it, and was adorable. You feel for the rats, and the one thing I loved MORE than any other part of the movie was that people didn't suddenly understand what rats were saying...they squeaked to humans, but could understand each other, but humans just heard a rat...it was a great move on their part...though you suspend disbelief that a rat can A) read and B) understand a human. But you have to, as it is an animated movie. I won't spoil a lot from this simple yet delightful plot, and the fact that I got to see it with my niece and nephew made me enjoy it even more, especially after my brother dumped his popcorn and my niece kept stepping in it to make it crackle on the floor. This is a wonderful family film, and it makes you hungry by the end, but I'll say this...just see it. I'd assume PIXAR will take home another Oscar for best animated picture, and the visual aspect of what Pixar did with Paris is just amazing. I give this a 9, and by far say its my favorite film of the summer season so far... though I did NOT go see Pirates, since I hadn't seen the second one.
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