Movie Reviews By Movie Reviews Pro

Tetro

Rating:

Movie: It’s Complicated (2009)

Studio : Universal Picture

Info : Click Here

Runtime : 120 min

Website : It`s Complicated

Trailer :http://www.dailymotion.com/video/xbapxy

Review:

The movie is fun with a laid-back plot. It has some great moments and scenes and it is very well casted.

The story is about a woman named Jane, beautifully played by Meryll Streep . She is a mother of three young kids and runs a bakery for a living. She has been divorced for a long time but still has a strong friendship with her ex husband Jake, played by Alec Baldwin who is now married to a much younger woman. When Jane and Jake get together for their son’s convocation things start to get spicy and hot between them. After the ceremony they decide to meet up for a meal and this is when things take an about turn. They both start falling for each other once again.

Later in the movie Jane starts to become attracted to an architect Adam, played by Steve Martin. The two meet when Adam is given the task to renovate Jane’s kitchen. Adam who also is recently divorced starts showing his admiration for Jane but eventually finds himself lost in an old affair between Jane and Jake. It is a funny and innocent love story where Jane reconnects with her ex-husband and secretly meets up with him behind their children’s and partner’s back.

The movie is a light romantic comedy and as it starts proceeding it gets more exciting and complicated. John Krasinki has done a marvelous job and he has outperformed everyone. The best part of the movie was the scenes between Baldwin and Martin.

Streep looks amazing and does a wonderful job in the movie playing the role of a woman above the age of 40 who gets caught in the maze of love.

Although the movie is a little slow in the beginning you become absorbed in the story. It is a highly edged romantic comedy about love, divorce and relationships. If you are eager to watch something like that then you would really enjoy the movie. The movie is all about Jane and how her previous life takes over her present life. It can be a good way to feel love in the air once again.

-Donald Lee-

Comedy, In Theaters, Romance it`s complicated

Tetro

Rating:

Movie: Tetro (2009)

Studio : American Zoetrope

Info : Click Here

Runtime : 127 min

Website : Tetro

Trailer :http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x96i8n

Review:

It’s been a long and tortuous decline for Francis Ford Coppola since his heady days as the confirmed Titan of the 70’s movie-brat scene. Who else has reached so high (Godfather 1&2 and The Conversation) only to fall so low (Jack)? Redemption (of a kind) now arrives, however, in the form of his latest film, Tetro.

The story centers on 17 year old Bennie (Alden Ehrenreich) as he arrives in Buenos Aires in search of his estranged older brother Tetro (Vincent Gallo). Initially hostile and suspicious of Bennie, Tetro slowly welcomes his kid-brother into his world and introduces him round to his colorful coterie of artist and writer friends (which makes the carnival-like first act of the movie seem like a slightly cheesy cross between La Dolce Vita and the high-camp 1960 film version of Kerouac’s The Subterraneans). Starker family secrets soon emerge though to put the drama on a darker footing.

Through the poetry of Coppola’s renewed filmic passion, we learn of Tetro’s shattered past, his apparent failure as a writer and his subsequent breakdown. The bond between the brothers is what drives this story forward yet some of the most revelatory moments are when Coppola reaches back into their shared history to explore the deep family wounds that kept them apart for so many years. Some of the most inspired scenes of the film are those depicting their tyrannical musical genius of a father and the stunningly cruel games he played against his sons.

Another of the films intoxicating charms is how it celebrates the women that keep both brothers sane and (literally) alive – from opera-singing mothers to Buenos Aires bubble-bath beauties, the role that women play as the eternal muse again echoes Fellini. That is not to suggest that the female characters are merely window-dressing. As fine and refreshing a performance as the always electrifying Vincent Gallo delivers, the best moments in the film belong to the brilliant Maribel Verdú (as Miranda).

Tetro is no masterpiece – Bennie’s underwritten character and a slightly disappointing “twist” finale both hamper the Coppola comeback – and it’s overtly “arty” style will certainly not appeal to all cinematic tastes. Nevertheless, if you are looking for something out of the ordinary and which is laced with a desire to tell simple human truths in a stylish way, Tetro makes you an offer you can’t refuse.

-Paul Meade

Drama, In Theaters Drama, tetro

Extract

Rating:

Movie: Extract (2009)

Studio : Miramax Films

Info : Click Here

Runtime : 92 min

Website : extract-the-movie.com

Trailer :http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x9oeph

Review:

The title of Extract comes from what the main character (Joel) sells: flavor extract. He is the founder of a local factory that makes nothing but flavor extract and loves talking about the stuff the same way a Trekker loves talking about the Enterprise. When one of his workers busts a nut at work (literally), things begin to get irksome as a pretty young con artist steps in to push Joel, his business, and his home life, into the ground.

Mike Judge has a talent for noticing characters that are absurd but strangely true to life, and this movie takes no exception with the minor roles of this film. If you ever worked in a menial manual labor job, you might recognize quite a few characters in the movie such as: the associate who keeps “voluntarily” soliciting you to go to events you don’t want to go to, the guy who remembers nobody’s name despite how long he’s been there, the musician who seems to be into really obscure musical niches, the gabby old lady who’s always been there and does nothing but gossip and blame the silent and unculpable immigrant worker for everything. There’s a lot there that I have (unfortunately) seen and experienced at one point or another, and I couldn’t help but praise Mike Judge for seeing this.

While it has its share of scenes that are funny just to watch, the humor as a result tends to borderline enough to make it a little too cerebral for the people looking for a quick laugh, and a little too primitive for folks wanting something witty, and I think this will not make it too popular. Still, considering how Mike Judge’s films tend to go cult as time passes, I can see this film’s popularity gaining steam once it hits DVD.

If you do find this film funny, you might also want to check out “The Promotion,” which is also fairly low-key, and strangely true-to-life (that, or my life is very, very, demented).

-Donald Lee

Comedy, In Theaters Comedy, extract, mike judge

Gamer

Rating:

Movie: Gamer (2009)

Studio : Lakeshore Entertainment

Info : Click Here

Runtime : 95 min

Website : gamerthemovie.com

Trailer :http://www.dailymotion.com/video/x99ofj

Review:

Do you expect a movie made by the guys behind Crank about a future of people-controlled first-person shooters to be a masterpiece worthy of several Academy Awards? If you do, then you’re probably going to be disappointed. For the majority of you that know better, you’re probably just wondering if you are going to see something violent and crazy and if your protagonist is going to give you something as epic as his time as King Leonitas. If you are those people: you’re probably going to feel mostly satisfied.

Reconstituted plot aside, Gamer does live up to its promise in being over-the-top with copious amounts of bosoms and blood. In a way, this movie manages to make you feel the mood of a First Person Shooter where you are chunking anything meaty (beware: the shaky camera approach gets used extensively during those scenes), while giving you the sensation of a hedonist humanity that seems too jaded with excess to care about their living toys and some eccentric bits that work fairly well.

That said, I can see people griping about the storyline having a fair number of gaps of nonviolent scenes where “Kable” (Gerard Butler) is piecing together his past. Me, I liked it. These scenes usually had a somewhat artistic slant with the camera work and it did its purpose fairly effectively. For those just expecting a pure modern grindhouse, though, it may seem offset with the rest of the film, moreso with its fairly underwhelming ending that I keep reminding myself is not a homage to Blade Runner despite how much of this film’s plot is reconstituted from other recent movies.

In the end, I can not really gripe the film. It is watchable, moreso with friends, but I’d recommend this film for a DVD night.

-Donald Lee

Action, In Theaters, Sci-Fi, Thriller Action, gamer, mark neveldine, sci-fi, Thriller