You, Me, and Dupree

Friday night there was nothing on so I decided to settle for watching a chick flick whic started out to be remotely a remotely funny movie and ended up to be a rather stupid movie. One, the humor was miniscule, two the lead guy needed to grow a brain (if he had simply shared his trouble with his wife the huge mess he created at the end could have been avoided), and three Owen Wilson's character was not all there mentally (which one might think would make him come off funny, but after watching the guy make stupid decisions for an hour and a half it got really old).

Plot: Movie starts out with the wedding (in Hawaii) of Carl and Molly with Dupree as the best man. Right off the bat Dupree starts 'ruining' Carl's new life by arriving on the wrong island (which coincidentally turns out to be the island golf course built by the survivors {namely Hurley} of flight 815 on Lost) and laughing at Carl's father-in-laws bad jokes about how much of threat Carl is not as far as the family business goes. Despite this when Dupree loses his job (and appartment and car) for attending the wedding Carl allows Dupree to move in with Molly and him. While living with them Dupree has many epic fails (the worst of which being bringing a date home and almost burning the house down) that get him kicked out of the house. After kicking Dupree out Molly and Carl go out to celebrate their freedom only to see Dupree sitting on a bench in the rain. Molly makes the decision (against Carl's advice) to ask Dupree to stay with them again and Dupree (after accepting the invitation) decides to clean up the mess he made in their house. Meanwhile at work Molly's father continuosly 'insults' Carl (by accepting his proposal on a housing district, changing everything about it, making Carl head of the team, not inviting Carl on a fishing trip, and suggesting that Carl get a vasectomy) which Carl fails to elaborate on to Molly who is bonding with Dupree because Carl is never around leaving Dupree to pick up his slack. Carl (who is very stressed) takes Molly and Dupree's friendship the wrong way and gets into a few fights with Molly, and finally snaps one night at dinner when Molly's father invites Dupree on a fishing trip. Carl attacks Dupree and gets himslef kicked out of the house by Molly. Now you may (or may not) be wondering why there is no spoiler alert, well that would be because I didn't finish the movie, it was too boring and too stupid for my taste and therefore was undeserving of my time. So if you are a sap who has no problem with innuendo and the like than go ahead and watch this mindless movie, otherwise don't waste the time or the energy it takes to hold your eyes open for two hours.

"Dream Runner" (Last Night's Episode of ER)

For all the harping I do on Grey's Anatomy I suppose I'm a little bit of a hippocrite or at least very biased as I am a fan of ER (more of an ER re-runs fan than a fan of the newest season), but anyway thanks to the colder than arctic weather we've been having I was able to actually watch ER when it was on TV rather than taping it and watching it later which is what I usually do. This season of ER is the last season the writers are trying new and daring things with the plot as well as bringing back lots of old characters to guest star. Last night's episode focused on Dr. Neela Rasgotra a resident surgeon who is about to become an attending surgeon. The episode presented three scenarios of how Neela could have handled a emergency situations she was presented with while working at County General Hospital as well as decision about her future as a surgeon and a future relationship she could possibly have with another doctor and old friend at county. The focus was on the possibilities in life if we were able to go back in time and try things differently, if you could fix mistakes you had made. It was one of the better episodes I have seen this year. It posed an interesting question, if you could go back and do something differently would it even make a difference? I am quite curious to see how the writers branch off of this episode next week.

Mamma Mia!

Excellent music with kind of a yawner plot. The recent movie was very well-acted and the singing/music was absolutely marvelous (made me want to find a group of people and go skipping down the street singing 'Dancing Queen'), the plot was kind of boring, but the music made up for it.

Plot: A girl who is getting married wants to find her real father (there are 3 possibilities) and have him walk her down the aisle at her wedding. So she goes behind everyone's backs (her mother, bridesmaids, and fiancee) and invites them to the wedding thinking that she will immediately be able to tell who her real father is. Unfortunately she is not able to tell and everyone finds out that the three guys are there before the wedding including her mother who doesn't particularly want to see any of them ever again.

Spoiler Alert!

In the end her mother walks her down the aisle, the three fellows agree to each make up a third of her father, the girl doesn't get married, but her mother ends up marrying one of the fellows = everyone is so happy that they burst into song.

Good music, catchy tunes, simplistic plot.

Chick Flicks and Hallmark Movies

The two types of movies named in the title are the most irksome types of movies around. Yes being a girl I enjoy the occasional chick flick because they always end happily and involve some sort of complicated romance, but if you think about the concept of chick flicks too hard you eventually feel sad because you know that there is about a one in a million chance of what happened in the movie ever happening to you. Chick Flicks usually involve a girl finding the perfect guy and in turn finding true love. A girl who watches too many chick flicks usually gets into the mentality that it is incredibly possible to fall in love within a week and get married to live a perfect life with the man of their dreams within a month, now call me a cynic, but that is never going to happen, at least not that fast. The fact that the girls in these movies always end up getting their hearts broken and then mended generally by the same guy is also depressing because I'm sure that pretty much every girl out there knows that said scenario is generally not the case. Also chick flicks are generally incredibly predictable, the viewer knows exactly how the movie is going to end the moment all of the characters are introduced, where is the fun in watching a movie when you know how it's going to end? The same is true with Hallmark movies. They usually portray a 'real life' situation in which some sort of problem arises and then is resolved through a bunch of family-friendly events. Hallmark movies are meant to teach a lesson about family and love that either most people are already aware of and do not need pounded into their heads or other people don't care about. (Disregard the last part of the last sentence, I realize how confusing it reads.)

My question is how on earth do these movies manage to flourish in the box offices and on TV?
My point is that these movies are pointless, depressing, and stupid when watched over and over, but okay for the spontaneous/occasional viewing.

For the Rest of the Lost Junkies Out There

Here are the season 5 promos (as you can tell I have very little to do today and I have writers block):

January 21st (only six days 15 hours, and 56 minutes until a most exciting television event)

Most people are incredibly excited for January 20th when President-Elect Obama loses the 'Elect' from his title. I however am not really excited for the 20th at all, I don't really enjoy watching politically biased news reports about what is practically old news. It was exciting when Obama won the election and made history and the swearing in seems to be much less exciting especially when it is being followed up with the new season of 'Lost' premiering on the 21st. I am truly a 'Lost' junkie (which ought to be blatantly obvious by now) and I could care less about the 20th. I do realize this is a potentially offensive and pointless post, but I don't really care, it's how I feel. I would much rather watch a 2 hour season premier of a high-paced, mind-churning, thought-provoking show than watch Lord-knows-how-many-hours of dry speeches, formality, and masked loathing by separate political parties. I can also guarantee that I am not the only person in the U.S. that feels this way. Now that I have successfully written about 100 words of absolutely nothing I feel that I have ineffectively ranted about this topic and should probably quit writing while I'm only a furlong behind.

Hancock

I actually enjoyed this movie which was good because I watched it the day after I finished Wanted. I thought it had a good plot that was fresh and new when compared to all the other 'superhero' movies out there in the world. I absolutely could not predict the end at the beginning, I suspected the twist but was still a little surprised when it happened (I only suspected it because they sort of ruined it in the trailer).

Spoiler Alert!

Plot: The movie is about a dysfunctional, scruffy, alcoholic, belligerent superhero (Hancock) who has his own special way of doing good. Basically he gets the job done (i.e. gets the bad guy arrested) with complete disregard to the damage done to the city, other people, or the delinquents themselves. One day he saves a 'modern day superhero' (guy who is trying to save the world by getting big companies to give away some of their products i.e. food, medicine, etc. for free to people who really need it) from being hit by a train, the guy (named Ray) thanks Hancock profusely and offers to help him with his public image (the public hates him because of the way he gets things done). Eventually Hancock's ignorant ways get him into enough trouble that the public calls for his arrest (which of course would be impossible because bullets bounce off of Hancock and he listens to no one) , but Ray suggests that Hancock allow himself to be incarcerated letting the city go without him until the people realize how much they relied on him. (I forgot to mention that Ray's wife hates Hancock.) Anyway the public finally realizes that they need Hancock and so the clean-shaven, fully suited, newly mannered Hancock comes to the public's aid in a gentlemanly fashion. Ray, his wife Mary, and Hancock go to dinner that night and Hancock reveals that he cannot remember anything past 80ish years ago when he woke up in a hospital as a superhuman and that he doesn't age. That night it is also revealed that Mary is also a superhuman and that she doesn't want anyone to know about it. The next day she and Hancock get into a superhuman spat which leads to destruction of some of the downtown area. She reveals to Hancock that people such as themselves are created in pairs to protect the world and that hey are the only two left. She tells him that when they get too close to each other they lose their superhuman abilities, that this happens so that they can choose to settle down, fall in love, grow old, and die if they want to. I won't give the way the rest of the movie, but I will say that in the end Hancock moves to New York.

I liked this one a lot, it had a great plot and was well-acted. I recommend it to sci-fi, superhero, Will Smith, and action movie fans.

Wanted

This movie was a letdown for me. It looked like an innocent enough shoot 'em up action movie, but ended up being belligerence for belligerence's sake with a dash of gore. I found this to be incredibly stupid and rather obnoxious. Every other breath someone was swearing and every other move someone was getting either the crap kicked out of them or killed.

Spoiler Alert!

Wow, what a great plot, so incredibly sophisticated that I couldn't possibly have guessed the end in the first ten minutes (which might have been the best part of the movie). Basically the movie is about the son of this incredible assassin who was part of the 'Fraternity' which was a group of weavers (who decided they needed something more interesting to do everyday than make table clothes) who found a mystical cloth that was mysteriously being inscribed with a secret blanket code by one of the weaving machines. The incredibly bored and slightly psychopathic weavers magically decoded the code, found out that what was in the code was a bunch of names of people that 'fate' wanted them to kill, so they did so without question. Anyway, this guy's son is named Wesley. Wesley is a normal guy with a lying, cheating, annoying girlfriend who is having an affair with Wesley's best friend. Wesley has a normal job with a horrible boss. He also has 'anxiety attacks' when he is under stress. One night when Wesley is getting his anxiety attack prescription refilled he encounters Fox (or moreover Fox encounters him) who seemingly saves his life from some creepy fellow who has been stalking him since he entered the store. She 'rescues' Wesley and takes him to a Fraternity safehouse where he is given a gun and forced to shoot the wings off of a fly, after doing so he goes home and wakes up the next morning realizing that the previous job was not a horrific nightmare. That day the stress of work, his best friend, and his girlfriend makes him crack, he quits his job and smacks his friend with a keyboard before exiting the building and leaving in a car with Fox to the Fraternity headquarters which turns out to be a tapestry factory. There we re-encounter the head hancho who's name is Sloan (which to Alias fans such as myself was a red flag) who asks Wesley in many more words if he thinks he has what it takes to join the Fraternity, stupid child Wesley says "I'm ready." then is taken to a room to start his 'training.' He is asked why he's there and when he gives the wrong answer he is brutally beat upon until he passes out. He wakes up in a tub of white goo that apparently has healing powers to fix any physical (but obviously not mental) malady. The care-taker of the people in the tubs is an estranged Russian man who enjoys blowing up rats (just like Wesley's father according to said man). The rest of Wesley's training involves knife-fighting, bullet curving/gun shooting, running on top of trains, and grabbing one of the weaving instruments off of the machine. He is also continually asked the question and beaten when he gives the wrong answer until he answers that he is there because he doesn't know who he is. After he successfully completes the rest of his training he is shown the magical tapestry and given his first assignment (person to assassinate). I just realized that I forgot to mention earlier that Wesley's 'panic attacks' are the result of an overburst of adrenaline which allows him to experience life in slow motion; all the members of the Fraternity also possess this quality. He is also told that Crow (the stalker guy from the store who 'tried to kill him' on that fateful night) was the man who killed Wesley's father and that Wesley is supposed to kill him. After Wesley comletes his first assignment he is attacked in an alley by Crow who leaves the first 'traceable' bullet he has ever used. Wesley then tracks down the guy who made the bullet, Fox follows Wesley to meet the guy and shows up when the guy pulls a gun on Wesley, the guy sets up a meet with Crow at a train station, Wesley and Fox watch the guy from a closet while he waits for Crow, the guy runs, Wesley sees Crow and follows him onto a train while Fox chases the guy, blah, blah, blah, Fox crashes a car into the train in order to board, bad things happen, the train is derailed on a bridge, Wesley is hanging out the side of the train car he is in about to fall to his death when Crow grabs his arm (saving his life), Wesley shoots Crow who falls backward pulling Wesley onto the train, and then my favorite part ever:
Wesley: "You killed my father, bastard (some other profanity takes place)!"
Crow: "No Wesley I am YOUR FATHER." (dies)
Wesley: "NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
Wesley (to Fox): "Did you know?"
Fox: "Duh, his name came up and you were the only one he wouldn't kill, your name came up too."
Wesley: (shoots window he is sitting on and escapes with Crow's body, wakes up in bath tub of white goo)
The rest of the movie is Wesley getting revenge on the Fraternity, he finds out his father quit the Freaternity after finding Sloan's name encoded in the cloth (big surprise there) then he lets a bunch of explosive rats loose in the factory then goes in guns blazing and kills all his trainers save for Fox. The almost final scene is him standing in the middle of a circle of Fraternity assassins at the headquarters with no ammo and lots of guns pointed at him. He accuses Sloan of having his name in the cloth and Sloan reveals that every person standing in the room has had their name come up and if the other assassins want to follow the code of the Fraternity they should kill themselves otherwise they should kill Wesley. Exit Mr. Sloan. One of the assassins is about to kill Wesley when Fox curves a bullet around the room so that it kills everyone in the ircle including herself. Sad moment. Wesley monologues in a voiceover as you see someone who looks like him sitting at a desk at his old office, Sloan shows up and holds a gun to the guy's head then swears when he finds out that the person sitting before him is in fact not Wesey, but a decoy. Oh crap! Then Wesley shoots him with an untraceable bullet from across town then swears at the audience. End worst movie I saw this year.

If you like to swear and kill people with unbelievable stunts than this movie is for you (it's out on DVD) otherwise save your money and your time.

Marley & Me

This was possibly the best movie I have seen in theaters all year. By the end of the movie the theater was silent except for the occasional sniffle of someone crying in the audience. The trailer wasn't lying when it made the statements that you would laugh and cry because indeed anyone with a heart and a good sense of humor will laugh and cry.

Plot: You follow the lives of John and Jennifer Grogan starting at their wedding (before Marley the dog is even born) when they are both starting reporters living in Florida. John takes Jennifer to pick out a puppy as an early birthday present because to distract her from wanting to have kids so soon. They ask the price of the puppies and learn that the puppy that Jennifer is holding is $100 cheeper than the rest earning him the title of 'Clearence Puppy' as well as a new home. Two weeks later John brings Marley home while Jennifer is on a business trip to KS. On the ride home Marley gets his name in honor of Bob Marley. From this point on we watch Marley grow up with the Grogans, he turns out to be the 'Worst Dog in the World' which is proven when he gets kicked out of obedience school. His antics are many and hilarious, but you truly fall in love with him when the Grogans lose there first baby and Marley is there to comfort them. Eventually the Grogans end up with three kids (Patrick, Connor, and Colleen/Whoops). John gets his big hit as a journalist when he is asked to take up a column and he writes mostly about Marley's many stunts as well as some other random, yet amusing topics. The family moves twice, eventually ending up in Pennsylvania, by which time the kids are getting big and Marley is getting old and beginning to suffer from some age-related maladies.

Spoiler: One night Marley runs off and is found lying under a tree with a twisted stomach -> John rushes him to the vet who untwists his stomach. He pulls through and comes home the next day. His age really begins to show after this as he no longer walks up stairs or frolics as he used to, he also loses most of his hearing. Eventually he twists his stomach again and has to be put to sleep. He is buried in the front lawn along with a few momentos of his life (including the necklace he swallowed at the beginning of the movie).

I highly recomend this movie to anyone looking for a movie to see in theaters this holiday season. I would say kids 10 and up could probably see it, kids below that age are too young for the length of the movie and some of the humor.

This is the only movie I have ever seen that made me want to read the book that it was based off of. I loved it.

The Curious Case of Benjamin Button

This looks to be a potentially interesting and most likely tear-jerking movie and so I will probably not go see it (I'm not really the slow-paced sentimental type), but for those of you who fit the profile I say go for it.

Synopsis:
This movie tells the story of Benjamin Button a man born in his 80's then progressively gets younger as everyone else in his life ages. The movie follows Button's story beginning right after WWI all the way up to the 21st century. It's based on the 1920's story by F. Scott Fitzgerald, is directed by David Fincher and stars Cate Blanchett, Brad Pitt, and a myriad of other rather famous people.

Slideshow

My take:
Honestly I think it looks like a pretty good movie even though I am not a major Brad Pitt fan. I think it will be interesting to follow Button's life as well as the lives of those around him change as time passes. I am also curious about how the movie will end, will Button become a baby at the age of 100? This movie looks to be a mindtrip so for those of you out there who do not like to think, I do not recomend that this be the movie you see over Winter Break, otherwise it presents as an excellent choice.

Release Date: December 25, 2008

The Librarian: Curse of the Judas Chalice

Despite their somewhat cheesy qualities I do enjoy the "Librarian" movies. These movies are to me as a 10 cent love story novel is to the serious book-a-holic, they are not everyone's cup of tea. So in all fairness I must give an bias-less review.

If you are like me and enjoy the cheesy action-adventure Indiana Jones type movies then this would be a good movie for you. (I did not mean to insinuate that Indiana Jones was cheesy by the way, those movies are lactose intolerant as far as cheesiness goes.) This movie involved vampires and had a no-thought-required plot in which Flynn Carson travels to Louisiana on vacation per a dream he had of a beautiful woman and ends up searching for the Judas Chalice (a goblet made out of the pieces of silver paid to Judas for the betrayal of Jesus Christ) that has the ability to resurrect dead vampires (here is a full synopsis). It contained some good mythology and a few brain teasers, but was very predictable as far as who was bad and what would happen in the end. The one thing I found interesting was the conspiracy surrounding Judson (the owner and keeper of The Library) who is, as viewers found out in the latest movie, over 2000 years old and the very first Librarian. The legend is that Judas hung himself after betraying Jesus and was cursed to forever wander the night making him the very first vampire. Judson's last name technically could be pronounced Judeson = Judason or son of Judas which was a nice play on words. The end of the movie also left an opening for another movie to be made which can either be annoying (because it is inconclusive) or to the true fan exciting (because it means that there is more to the story).

On the other hand if you are a very serious movie watcher and feel that movies in which you can predict the end at the beginning are a waste of your time then I highly recomend that you not watch this movie because it wasn't all that terrific. The graphics were easily detectable and the jokes were mainly one-liners. There wasn't really any majorly thought-provoking material and 'ah-ha' type moments were scarce if not nonexistent.

While I may have enjoyed the movie many others probably did/would not. If I had to un-bias-edly rate the movie I would probably give it one and one half stars due to the previously stated facts and on top of that it was not family-friendly which can be a major determining factor for some viewers. The first two movies were better although they probably wouldn't light any fires in Hollywood either.

I'm Having a Fan-Girl Moment....for Lost

I am very excited for the next season of Lost (which I do not believe was supposed to happen, but will complete the J.J. Abrams tradition of coming back for a 5th season even if it is only partial) and so I thought I have decided to put the elongated season 5 trailer on my blog (then accompany it with a homemade video of me screaming and hyperventilating....I am kidding by the way, I am very excited though). Here it is:

Random Thought that is Topic-Related

Last night after watching an episode of 'Lost' that I had recorded I began thinking about a certain character's name. One major character is the French Woman whose name is Danielle Rousseau who has been stuck on the Island for over 16 years during which time she had a daughter who she named Alex. A few days after she had the baby the child was taken away by 'The Others' people left over from the Dharma Initiative project. In the third season (the season the episode I watched last night came from) Alex reappears in the plot as a potentially defining character. The funny thing is that if you add her last name to her name her name is Alex Rousseau which is also the name of a character in a major Disney Channel show. This got me thinking about why these names were the same (let's face it, what are the odds of two shows having characters that look kind of similar with the same names?) then I remembered that Disney owns ABC which owns 'Lost' and I was sad. This is just another shred of evidence showing Disney's major expansion (and perhaps corruption) in the media.

Here's an interesting question, why would Disney have character's in two of its shows with the same name? Most likely coincidence, but potentially a publicity stunt eh?

The 'Twilight' Epidemic

I just want to say before I type anything else that I read the first 3 books before they were popular. Actually when I was reading them I was spurned for reading creepy scifi vampire books and now I am spurned for having no desire to read the fourth. Well that's not entirely true, I do want to read the fourht, but not because I am obsessed, I want to read it because it is a good story that left off at a bit of a pinch in the third book and I want to know what happens.

Now that the media has gotten its claws into a good book every tween girl (by the way what does tween mean?) in the nation is in love with Edward Cullen (I however am rooting for Jacob) and fantasizes that they are Bella. Girls who are in love with Edward seem to feel the need to be protected from everything bad in the world (as Edward does for Bella) by an incredibly jealous overprotective, formal/stiff, boy with incredible strength. Now before I go on I must admit that after reading the first book I felt a little the same way, but after reading the next two books Edward is seriously starting to get on my nerves, why would anyone want to be held captive by their boyfriend's sister? I find it kind of sad (not to bash the girls in these videos or anything I'm sure they're great people and all) that a girl would let herself slip so far as to become so obsessed with a series of books and fictional characters that she practically devotes her life to it:

Trouble Starts With 'T' Which Rhymes With 'E' Which Stands for Essay

I have had some major difficulties with writing essays very recently. To be more accurate yesterday I had an anvil dropped on my head when I found out that the essay that determines quite a chunk of my final grade had received a C+. I am an A average student so one can only imagine how I felt. It was ironic because a week ago I caught part of an episode of Gilmore Girls, it was a very early episode from the first season in which Rory has just transferred to Chilton and is taking an AP Language Arts class. During the previously stated episode Rory gets her first paper back and is shocked to see a red D circled at the top of the paper. I remember watching that episode and not being able to imagine the shock of a D paper and being glad that I didn't have to, but Lo and behold yesterday I practically did. I struggled yesterday with deciding whether or not to drop down to a lower level LA class because I felt incredibly stupid, at the end of the day (literally) I decided the class offered a chance to improve my writing and experience a bit of college, besides I'm going to be a nurse not an essayist so no worries as far as my career goes.

Today I had another anvil dropped on my head when the class was assigned another essay identical to the last. I have no idea what to write about and am clueless on how to effectively go about writing that which I have no clue. I don't even know what the purpose of the essay is supposed to be. I am lost. Wait a minute...

I've just grown a brain and decided to look at the essay options and they are indeed different from the last essay. Hark, light on the horizon, I am saved. This essay actually looks to be something I can write successfully about. I think I am going to use my bad essay as an oportunity to grow. I read throught the remarks last night and was able to come the the conclusion that my essay was filled of rubbish and had about as much use as kindling, but the comments made should help me write my next essay...I hope. Well now that I have finished ranting about absolutely nothing important I feel much better and can now move on to a different rant. Oh happy day (if you could actually here me say this you would know that it is oozing sarcasm).