Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation
Simon
Pegg reprises the role of Benny and is out in the field, he’s got some
help from stalwart Ving Rhames while some terrorists get ready to take
off on a plane fully loaded with nuclear arms. And here comes Tom Cruise
in a last ditch effort to foil the scheme- he hangs on to the lifting
plane as winds threaten to tear him from the side! Can he do what needs
to be done or will the world be threatened with nuclear devastation?!
Start the fuse.
Hit the music.
And
we’re on another Mission with the IMF. The Impossible Mission Force is
threatened with disbandment after a few spectacular missions that result
in massive damage and diplomatic nightmares throughout the world. Tom
Cruise is after “The Syndicate”, a secret organization of international
spies from around the world who have decided to stop working for their
governments and utilize their skills to bring about the change THEY
want. It’s a fairly standard gimmick and the plot is fairly standard,
but what works is the delivery when Tom Cruise and the team are placed
in the “impossible” position of stopping them. And it’s not just
hyperbole when I state that this is the best film in a franchise that
just keeps getting better with each progressive sequel.
And,
it starts off exactly as a Mission Impossible movie SHOULD start off
with a rather familiar looking credit sequence that follows the formula
of the original television series. That was a huge bump for me, as I do
love the original series. There are plenty of nods throughout- with the
expected facemask gag, the twists and double-crosses, the edge of your
seat suspense sequences that rely just as much on timing as they do on
subterfuge and misdirection, and of course the an incredible performance
from the films primary villain. In a summer filled with a number of
disappointments and tired sequels, this sequel does an unexpectedly
fantastic job of upping the ante and delivering all the goods.
5 out of 5.
PIXELS
So.
It’s
been hailed as the “worst” Adam Sandler film ever made. There is quite a
bit of literal hate-rage regarding this film, the kind of vitriol
reserved for some of the most wretched films of all time. It’s a front
runner for the Razzies- This movie is supposed to be so awful, so dull,
so “un-funny” that there’s talk of burying it deep in a landfill out in
some desert. (True nerds will actually get that joke… I’ll let the rest
of you normal faceless readers just sit there wondering what I mean.)
Is it that bad?
No.
No, it’s really not that bad. It’s lazy, it’s predictable, it’s fairly
standard fair that never really goes anywhere too interesting but it’s
not really “bad”, per se. It’s not Adam Sandler at his worst, but it’s
also not his best. Honestly, this may be one of the most standard films
ever made and I’m not really certain that the honest hatred is nearly as
severe as it’s been made out to be. Mostly, it just seems that hating
this movie seems to be the “cool Hipster” thing to do- and so people are
either avoiding the movie or going to see it in droves just to mock how
horrible it is. And it’s never really as bad as people seem to want to
think.
Adam Sandler’s
character is a former video game prodigy who once lost a 1982
championship match to the Peter Dinklage’s character. That loss pretty
much knocked him loose from his life goals and he now works as a
audio/video technician and installer for a big box store. His best
friend is the President of the United States. When an alien intelligence
invades earth, they come in the form of pixilated energy that simulates
the video games of that 1982 Championship year. (Nerdy Quibble: various
game pixels are FAR too advanced to belong in the 1982 time period. But
never mind.) The world is given three “lives” in order to defend the
Earth in a series of battles. Each battle results in the taking of a
trophy for either the humans or the aliens.
Look,
the movie is fairly predictable here- a team is gathered from those
nerdy kids who grew up to become nerdy adults, there’s a love interest
for Sandler’s character, there’s a strange sub-plot involving the
President being made to look like a fool by the press, and Peter
Dinklage steals the show with his performance. It’s not that the movie
is un-funny, because there are pretty standard gags that tend to work
pretty well- none of which really involve the conceit of the whole film,
but that’s really to be expected here. It’s not the worst film ever
made, it’s not the best film- it’s just one of those films that float in
the middle and that may be the worst thing to be. Look, for a Saturday
Matinee show the movie was worth the price of admission and I was
reasonably entertained and there are some good performances from
Dinklage and Josh Gad.
2.5 out of 5.
WYRMWOOD: The Road to Hell
“Mad
Max meets The Walking Dead”- that’s the tagline on the Blu-ray box for
this 2014 Australian horror flick released through IFC Midnight. That
right there is professional attention to detail for you, my Faceless
Reader. But the truth of the matter is that the tagline is really all
there is to say about the movie on the whole- this is “Mad Max”
post-apocalyptic wasteland stuff with zombies and gore. It sounds like a
hodgepodge bit of fan-fiction nonsense, and it largely caters to that
whole idea- but that’s not always a bad thing. The movie tells you that
it wants to kick ass- not a bad thing at all. The movie knows precisely
what it is and that’s also not a bad thing. But I have to admit- part of
me really didn’t believe that the movie could really be all that good
when it promises oh so much.
The world faces a new zombie menace when people suddenly turn in to
flesh eating zombie monsters- there’s something in the air after a comet
comes streaking across the sky, turning anyone who doesn’t have an “A”
blood-type into one of the beasties. We follow the story of a brother
and sister, both of whom are immune to whatever is in the air. The
brother is a family man whose wife and daughter do not fair so well in
the zombie uprising. He’s trying to find his sister and he comes across a
rag-tag group of other survivors when we discover that formerly
combustible elements have been altered by the chemical in the air and
Zombies produce a combustible element that creates fuel for vehicular
use. While we follow the brother, the sister is captured by unsavory
“Military Bad Guy Types” who are experimenting on the infected and
immune alike while wearing gas masks to protect themselves from the
change.
It’s a gory
film with some good splatter gags and decent performances all around.
The writers wind up building a world that seems far more interesting
than a single film could contain and looks ripe for table-top gaming
excursions. This movie is basically Redcapjack-bait and it’s everything I
look for in a film, everything I dream about, everything I get
goosepimples for and want to take long savoring licks of in order to
absorb the awesomeness that is a low budget trash cinema piece of art
like this. I loved this movie. It wasn’t perfection, but it was damn
close enough to be called a “Hit” in my book and one that I’m definitely
going to savor again at a later date. This is a “Must have” for zombie
fans and a “gotta’ see” for post-apocalyptic wasteland fans.
4.5 out of 5.
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