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‘Kung Fu Panda 2′ Review

Kofi Outlaw — Wed, 25 May 2011 13:00:44 +0000

Screen Rant’s Kofi Outlaw reviews Kung Fu Panda 2

When Kung Fu Panda was released in 2008, I was not prepared. Like Po, the titular Kung Fu fighting panda bear, the film was a diamond in the rough – a wise Buddhist parable about destiny, identity, mentality and harmony, which also happened to be a cute and funny cartoon that tripled as an epic kung fu movie. Needless to say, these were not achievements readily discernible from a title like Kung Fu Panda and the tagline “featuring the voice of Jack Black!”

However, like another big sequel being released this summer (The Hangover II) Kung Fu Panda 2 is facing a challenge in the raised expectations of its audience, and the potential staleness of its subject matter.

So, does the sequel build upon the strong foundation ...

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‘Thor’ Review

Vic Holtreman — Fri, 06 May 2011 15:25:05 +0000

Screen Rant’s Vic Holtreman reviews Thor

While I suppose Fast Five has claimed the early bird title of the film that kicked off the U.S. 2011 summer movie season, Thor is starting off what will be a summer heavy with superhero films. The question on everyone’s mind is will it start things off with a bang or a whimper?

Overall the story is pretty straightforward: Thor is the favored son of Odin over brother Loki, Thor is not shy about his position (poor self-esteem is NOT one of his problems), he disobeys his father, bringing danger to Asgard, is banished, and must somehow become “worthy” in order to regain his place (and power) in the kingdom.

Banishment sends Thor (Chris Hemsworth) to Earth – specifically to the outskirts of ...

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‘Scream 4′ Review

Ben Kendrick — Fri, 15 Apr 2011 20:05:28 +0000

Screen Rant’s Ben Kendrick reviews Scream 4

Back in 1996, famed scary-movie director Wes Craven teamed with writer Kevin Williamson on a film project that didn’t just introduce the world to a new iconic slasher personality (in the form of Ghostface), the pair succeeded in making a genre film that took every horror trope imaginable – and turned it on its head.

Scream, as well as its subsequent sequels, were love-letters to horror film fans with plenty of meta-references including Stab, the film series within a film series, as well as the notorious “rules for survival” that served as tongue-in-cheek winks at the genre – while also serving as an ironclad set of guidelines for each film to work around.

Number one: you can never have sex, number two: you can never drink or do ...

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‘Your Highness’ Review

Vic Holtreman — Fri, 08 Apr 2011 04:22:14 +0000

Screen Rant’s Vic Holtreman reviews Your Highness

Midgets. The movie opened with midgets. An entire village of midgets.

Right there, I thought “aw man – this is going to be a rough hour and a half.” But then the scene actually ended with an unexpectedly funny punch line and cut immediately to some interesting credits that gave me at least a little bit of hope.

Your Highness is a take off on medieval/fantasy films from the 1980s - with a modern, hard R-rated comedy twist. The movie stars and was co-written by Danny McBride, who plays Thadeous, the younger, slacker son of the king. The first-born (Fabious) is played by James Franco. Thadeous is of course jealous of his heroic and someday-to-be-king older brother, while Fabious loves his younger brother dearly and ...

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‘Source Code’ Review

Ben Kendrick — Fri, 01 Apr 2011 18:50:43 +0000

Screen Rant’s Ben Kendrick reviews Source Code

Duncan Jones, son of musician David Bowie, erupted onto the Hollywood landscape with his critically lauded film Moon – which the filmmaker both wrote and directed. Moon, which starred Sam Rockwell (and the disembodied voice of Kevin Spacey), was a fascinating and intimate science-fiction project that stirred up a lot of buzz following its debut at the 2009 Sundance Film Festival – putting Jones on the map as one of Hollywood’s premiere up-and-coming filmmakers.

As a result, Moon fans, and critics alike, have been anxiously awaiting the arrival of Jones’ follow-up film, Source Code. That said, unlike Moon, Jones is only sitting in the Source Code director’s chair – since the film was scribed by Species III (a direct to DVD release) screenwriter, Ben Ripley. Does Jones successfully inject ...

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‘Limitless’ Review

Vic Holtreman — Thu, 17 Mar 2011 14:59:28 +0000

Screen Rant’s Vic Holtreman reviews Limitless

Limitless wasn’t quite what I expected – but that’s OK. Actually I’m not sure what I was expecting, but what I got was more of a popcorn movie than a “serious” action film – and there’s nothing wrong with that.

The roguishly handsome Bradley Cooper plays Eddie Morra, a self-proclaimed writer who has yet to, you know… actually WRITE anything. He’s got ultimate writer’s block – can’t even get the first word of his novel typed on the computer. He looks like a homeless guy and has been dumped by his got-her-stuff-together (not in a bad way) girlfriend. Eddie isn’t too happy with himself, and in a moment of honesty admits to someone he hasn’t seen in a very long time that things aren’t going well ...

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‘Battle: Los Angeles’ Review

Vic Holtreman — Fri, 11 Mar 2011 16:22:09 +0000

Screen Rant’s Vic Holtreman reviews Battle: Los Angeles

Battle: Los Angeles (or if you’re into the “texting” version, Battle: LA) was #4 on our 2011 Most Anticipated Movies list – and as we’ve made clear before, just because we have a lot of anticipation for a movie doesn’t mean we know it’s going to be great.

Well Battle: LA isn’t great – but for a March action movie I’d call it at least good.

This film brings us yet another alien invasion story, with aspects we’ve seen before in movies in this genre – and others as well. Reminiscent of Independence Day, the story revolves around just a couple of days of events – the day leading up to the invasion and the day of. We’re ...

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‘Drive Angry 3D’ Review

Vic Holtreman — Fri, 25 Feb 2011 08:18:23 +0000

Screen Rant’s Vic Holtreman reviews Drive Angry 3D

Yes, I realize that Nicolas Cage is the star of the Drive Angry movie – but I thought you might prefer a picture of Amber Heard to represent the film. And lets get this out of the way: She doesn’t get naked in the movie. Why would I point that out you ask? Because Drive Angry is that kind of movie.

Nicolas Cage is on a mission – and he escapes from Hell itself (in an opening sequence that looks more video game than anything else) in order to accomplish it. Director Patrick Lussier wastes no time whatsoever introducing us to just what sort of film this is, with a scene in which Cage (playing a fellow named Milton) ...

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‘Unknown’ Review

Ben Kendrick — Fri, 18 Feb 2011 05:45:18 +0000

Screen Rant’s Ben Kendrick reviews Unknown

Liam Neeson returns to the international action-thriller genre in Unknown, previously Unknown White Male, as a man with a fractured memory in Berlin who must uncover the details of his life in order to reclaim his identity.

Is the film, based on the Didier van Cauwelaert novel Out of My Head, worth getting to know – or will you wish you could forget it ever happened?

Despite a headlining star like Liam Neeson, Unknown was brought into being by a mostly unknown group of filmmakers (I know, I know… sorry). The movie was scripted by a set of writers with limited film credits – Oliver Butcher and Stephen Cornwell, as well as helmed by director Jaume Collet-Serra, who has yet to enjoy a critical box ...

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‘The Mechanic’ Review

Vic Holtreman — Fri, 28 Jan 2011 15:51:47 +0000

Screen Rant’s Vic Holtreman reviews The Mechanic

Following on the heels of the most excellent updated version of True Grit we have a remake of the 1972 Charles Bronson-starring film The Mechanic (click for info about the original). While True Grit was quite excellent mainly due to the performance of its young star, sadly, this new version of The Mechanic is nothing to write home about.

It opens promisingly enough with a silent introduction to the head of a South American drug cartel. Within minutes we get a sense of not only his power and brutality, but of his enormous wealth. Statham appear on the scene to assassinate the guy in a pretty slick way (“the best jobs are the ones where they never ...

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‘TRON: Legacy’ Review

Vic Holtreman — Fri, 17 Dec 2010 03:29:47 +0000

Screen Rant’s Vic Holtreman reviews TRON: Legacy

TRON: Legacy has to be one of the most hyped, if not highly-anticipated movies of the year. It’s been teased at the San Diego Comic-Con for three years in a row – where the footage shown wowed the crowd. It’s obvious how much hard work and dedication went into the visual aspect of the film, but unfortunately that’s about all it has going for it.

The original TRON was released way back in 1982, and at the time was considered groundbreaking for its use of computer graphics in a live-action film. If you’ve never seen the film and watch it for the first time today, you’ll probably find yourself laughing at the “hokey” visual effects – ...

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‘The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader’ Review

Vic Holtreman — Fri, 10 Dec 2010 08:01:22 +0000

Screen Rant’s Vic Holtreman reviews The Chronicles of Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader

Will this be the final Narnia movie? I suppose the box office will tell – While the first film, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe grossed $745MM worldwide, Prince Caspian did little better than half of that. The consensus is that each film is not quite as good as the one that came before, and we’ll see if Dawn Treader’s box office goes along with both the financial and critical trend.

In this third film (and the order of the films does not match the chronology of the books), Lucy and Edmund Pevensie (Georgie Henley, Skandar Keyne) are stuck living with a dismissive uncle and bratty cousin ...

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Black Swan Review

Kofi Outlaw — Sat, 04 Dec 2010 01:02:06 +0000

In terms of technique, Darren Aronofsky’s Black Swan is arguably a masterpiece. The way Aronofsky manipulates sight, sound and editing to create this story of ambition and madness, shows that he is truly one those increasingly-rare directors who is worthy of the title “filmmaker,” as oppossed to “glorified video game and/or music video maker.”

So why am I not yet ready to tout Black Swan as “the film of the year?” Because for all its technical marvel – and wonderful performances – the movie falls short of its primary goal: conveying a moving and/or interesting story.

Nina Sayers (Natalie Portman) has been a dedicated little ballerina all her life, but even though she belongs to a prestigious New York ballet company, she’s never really had her opportunity to shine in the limelight, center ...

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‘Faster’ Review

Vic Holtreman — Wed, 24 Nov 2010 05:48:38 +0000

Screen Rant’s Vic Holtreman reviews Faster

Faster is not exactly what you might be expecting.

Is it (at long last) the return of Dwayne (formerly known as “The Rock”) Johnson as a big, tough, scary badass of the sort you wouldn’t want to run into in a dark alley? Oh, yes. Is it just another another check-your-brain-at-the-door action flick? Yes… and no.

Within moments of the start of the film, you will understand that “Driver” (Johnson) is, well, a driven man. Everything about his demeanor says “man on a mission” – and he is the very definition of single-mindedness. He’s being released from prison after 10 years and the only thing on his mind is the need to avenge the murder of his brother.

Driver is a man to be reckoned ...

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‘Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1′ Review

Kofi Outlaw — Fri, 19 Nov 2010 16:38:42 +0000

Screen Rant’s Kofi Outlaw reviews Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1

There are three types of people who are going to see Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1: People who were diehard fans of the books; people who have been faithful fans of the movies; and finally, people who have seen some of the movies and know something about the books (at this point how could you not?), but have really only admired the Potterverse with a casual eye.

The first two types of people will very much enjoy Deathly Hallows: Part 1 – but that casual fan may not walk away with same sense of satisfaction from what is essentially half a story, chock-full of references and characters that could fill ...

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Megamind Review

Vic Holtreman — Fri, 05 Nov 2010 15:11:05 +0000

Screen Rant’s Vic Holtreman reviews Megamind

I stopped watching Megamind clips and trailers over a month before this movie opened. It wasn’t easy, because between trailers, clips and featurettes, over 30 videos have been released for the movie (big, BIG push there). After watching the film I checked out the 3rd trailer, and I’m glad I didn’t see it beforehand because it gives away a TON about the movie.

Since I avoided so much media, I didn’t really have much of an idea in my head regarding what the movie would be like beyond the initial trailer or two. I liked the idea a lot: A riff on the Superman origin, with another baby that arrived on earth at the same time but turned out to be a super-villain. Heck, that’s an interesting ...

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Due Date Review

Ben Kendrick — Fri, 05 Nov 2010 14:26:27 +0000

Screen Rant’s Ben Kendrick reviews Due Date

Due Date, the on the road comedy from director Todd Phillips (The Hangover), starring Robert Downey Jr. and Zach Galifianakis, is exactly what you’d expect – a fun, though somewhat over-indulgent ride that revels in the film’s star-driven premise: What would happen if Tony Stark and Alan Garner (Galifianakis’ character in The Hangover), were forced to travel across the country together?

Downey Jr. and Galifianakis draw from the same creative well as their iconic blockbuster counterparts, RDJ is intense, while Galifianakis is whimsical. Most of the time, the combination works. While the star-powered mash-up offers some great comedy set-pieces, there’s also a deeper subtext present in Due Date – though the film almost always dismisses the fleeting moments of thoughtful drama with another set of gags. It’s an ...

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‘Jackass 3D’ Review

Roth Cornet — Fri, 15 Oct 2010 14:59:54 +0000

Screen Rant’s Roth Cornet reviews Jackass 3D

The whole Jackass gang returns for a series of borderline psychotic stunts, pranks and live-action gross-out jokes in Jackass 3D.

Bam Margera, Ryan Dunn, Steve-O, Jason “Wee Man” Acuna, Preston Lacy, Chris Pontius, “Danger Ehren” McGhehey, Dave England and of course Johnny Knoxville reunite under the direction of Jeff Tremaine; to bring audiences a gut-busting (in more ways than one) adventure that was created with an appropriately ridiculous use of 3D.

Jackass 3D is everything you would expect if you are familiar with the series, and a welcome surprise if you’re not. It is nearly impossible not to get caught up in the infectious sense of fun that these guys impart. They bring an element of play and very boyish humor into all that they do, and you simply want to ...

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‘Tamara Drewe’ Review

Mike Eisenberg — Tue, 12 Oct 2010 00:53:37 +0000

Screen Rant’s Mike Eisenberg reviews Tamara Drewe

Amidst all the explosions and car chases in this season’s movies, there’s one film that gives you a chance to simply sit back and smile. Stephen Frears’ Tamara Drewe is a dark comedy that lets you have a little fun at the expense of others. The official selection at this year’s Cannes, Telluride and Toronto International Film Festivals features Gemma Arterton in a low-profile cast that delivers high-profile performances.

While the sheer number of main players in the British film creates fast-paced, witty dialogue, it also takes away character backgrounds and motivations. But without a cast like this, we wouldn’t be graced with so many great performances, including the unforgettable Jessica Barden. The crowded cast is both the film’s strength and weakness.

Tamara Drewe is based on Posy Simmonds’ ...

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‘Legend of the Guardians’ Review

Vic Holtreman — Fri, 24 Sep 2010 19:30:15 +0000

Screen Rant’s Vic Holtreman reviews Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga’Hoole

Legend of the Guardians: The Owls of Ga’Hoole is a gorgeous 3D, CGI feast for the eyes with a story that you’ll have seen many times before. It has your young, inexperienced (eventual) hero, initially full of self doubt; a pending invasion from a dark, powerful enemy army; and a weapon that is seemingly impossible to fight (does that sound even vaguely familiar yet?).

That’s really your plot in a nutshell. I won’t bother naming the characters because frankly, they didn’t really register with me. You’ve got your “good son” owl who gets the attention of mom and dad and his jealous brother. There’s also a wide-eyed little baby sister owl who loves to hear the stories of ...

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