Trailer Review: FAST FIVE

This movie looks crazy, ridiculous, but dammit if I'm not ready to blow 15 bucks on an IMAX ticket to see it!

The Fast and Furious franchise has had it's ups and downs (2Fast,2Furious), but had a slight resurgence with it's third installment Tokyo Drift, mostly because it abandoned the title characters and followed an entirely different group of characters and style of driving. At the end of that movie Vin Diesel makes a cameo that brought us the fourth film, simply titled Fast and Furious and now, Fast Five.

FF4 brought back all the original characters from the first movie and was by far the strongest of the series. Although it had a cliche villain in the form of a drug trafficker, the story was solid based on the characters history with each other and the loss of a key player, Michelle Rodriguez's "Letty". A moment of silence please.

Director Justin Lin has definitely pumped some much needed NOS back into the series that started with FF:Tokyo Drift. Much like what Len Wiseman accomplished with the 4th Die Hard, Lin has gone the route of good ol' fashion stunt work in complex action sequences, which has made the series more fun to watch in my opinion. He's also made this potentially one-time cast into a modern day Magnificent Seven-esque group of sorts. Not to mention giving us the coolest edition to the group into the form of Han, a drifter in Tokyo Drift.

I know it's been nothing but a constant praise for the series and Fast Five, but here are my bones that need a pickin'.

Fast Five collects characters from all four movies before it, to give us a Marvel-team up kind of adventure. The trailer was rockin' until I saw Tyrese and Ludacris.

Tyrese returns as Roman Pierce, whose wanna-be gangster attitude from 2Fast2Furious was one of the most annoying additions to the series. Perhaps under the care of Justin Lin that will change but I'm not holding my breath. Also, Ludacris, who was in the same basterd movie, made mention that his character doesn't even race anymore because of a previous accident. So why is he here?

I honestly would have loved to have seen Lucas Black and Bow Wow from Tokyo Drift.

We now come to the paradox of the character Han who sadly died in Tokyo Drift. But was in the opening action sequence in FF4 which in the FF timeline was revealed to be a prequel to Drift, so it made sense that he was there and now is part of Fast Five. I cringe at what the explanation will be for his resurrection but I hope it's not a lame one.

Another pitfall this trailer falls into is simply showing us way to much in the form of action. It looks like there are two different action sequences that we get too much of a preview of. A movie franchise as successful as this one could most definitely have gotten away with a teaser trailer. One of those scenes has Paul Walker and Vin Diesel going "car diving", which looks so 'effin cool, but should have cut away sooner from going off the cliff. I hope there is something even bigger than that sequence in this movie cause if thats it, then it blows that I've already seen it.

Second to last, the title of this movie sounds like a porno. No one can argue how terrible this title is. Some personal suggestions of mine are; FURIOUS, FURIOUSLY FAST, VROOOM!!, FAST to the 5th POWER, or FAST AND FURIOUS 5.

Lastly, the wild card;THE ROCK! I simply love that he's in this and that we are going to see a throw down between him and the Diesel. It's kinda nuts and a little corny that he's in this movie but what are the FF movies but nuts and corny fun.

Overall, Fast Five looks like the fun, over the top, tagline spewing, car crashing, money stealing, half naked girl wearing action movie that sometimes you just need to see. This is definitely an opening weekend movie for me. I've heard rumblings of a 6th and 7th movie, and although these are fun movies; how long can this really go on for?

The final review will be when the credits roll and the house lights go up.

Fast Five runs the red light to IMAX and regular theaters near you on April 29th, 2011

Deuces,
StuntmanBob






- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Trailer Review: ARTHUR

To preface I have not see the original movie that this remake is based off.


So lets break this trailer down. At its core its a movie about a guy not wanting to have an arranged marriage and trying to prove to his family and potentially himself that he can have a life separate from his wealthy lifestyle and be happy. This is obviously a plot line we are familiar with. Arthur looks funny, but more and more it looks very tiring. I like Russell Brand, he's unpredictable and funny, but only in small doses. The potential upside to this movies is that it ends up like the other Brand vehicle Get Him to the Greek. Greek was received well critically because it was more of a dissection of his character, Aldous Snow, than just a big, sex, party and drug movie. I mean it was "that movie" at times but the story, in the best way, was definitely more the main focus.

The supporting cast consists of Jennifer Garner as Arthur's arranged wife, who looks like she's trying really hard to be Isla Fischer from the movie Wedding Crashers. Fischer does a better job, for now. Luis Guzman plays the limo driver, which seems like a really reserved character for him. Guzman is usually seen as a more loud and punch line character but I'm hoping that his subtle comedy gets to due time in the spotlight. Lastly, we have Helen Mirren who gives this movie its biggest credibility. Mirren, who is Arthur's nanny and naturally the only one who believes in him I'm sure will make the most of the scenes between her and Arthur. I'm hoping she brings a very sweet and deeper subtext to said scenes.

Arthur seems like it will just be gags, massive amounts of pop culture references and crazy antics all the way through, then about halfway through he'll meet a girl he really cares for, lose her at some point, win her back and then his mom will let him be with whoever he wants cause she's seen a great change in lifestyle. Movies done, I just saved you $10 bucks.

I don't think this is an opening weekend movie for me, personally I'm hoping Hanna wins the weekend.

As always the final review of this movie will be when the credits roll and the house lights go up.

Arthur tries to prove to you that he's worth our time on April 8th, 2011

Dueces!
StuntmanBob

Trailer Review: HANNA

"Once Upon A Time"

Director Joe Wright whose past work includes Pride and Prejudice, Atonement, and The Soloist; directs this story about a small girl trained by her father to be an assassin and from the looks of it go after a CIA agent played by Cate Blanchett. The juxtaposition in the opening words, the lullaby-like music and scenes of actress Saoirse Ronan as Hanna screaming like a viking and viciously attacking Eric Bana, her father, are just surreal. There's also a really nice color palette that go throughout the trailer. For example, those opening scenes start out in the snow; the stark, white, dream-like environment represents an innocence and the purity that we the audience should feel for the young girl. Which then shifts to very vast colors of blues, reds, and grays. Even Cate Blanchett's hair, RED, makes her more a villain. Aside from the action, drama, CGI and "entertainment" in movies trailers; colors, play a huge part.

What I find most interesting about this movie is its similarities to the movie Kick-Ass, directed by Matthew Vaughn. When Vaughn was shopping around the script for Kick-Ass there was an 11 year old girl who was cutting off people's arms and legs with samurai swords and brutally murdering bad guys. Studios only request was that they up the age of the girl to 19 or 20. Long story short, Vaughn didn't cave and Kick-Ass became a huge hit because of that young assassin.

Hanna, while it looks really good, is Hollywood's answer to Kick-Ass; A PG-13 movie with a small child assassin. PG-13, in a movie that looks this visceral really turns me off, because I get the feeling that the movie will be restricted by its rating and not reach its fully crazy, assassin like potential. Granted there are movies rated PG-13, like Taken, with Liam Neeson that still "bring the pain" as it were. But then there are movies like the Angelina Jolie vehicle Salt, that was really affected by its PG-13 rating and turn out to be very unoriginal as a result.

I'm not really a fan of Hollywood doing such things because once again we reach the reality of Hollywood not having anymore any original ideas. But at the same time all movies are inspired by something else. It shouldn't impair your judgement of a movie but its definitely something to look at when you see movies.

Personally, I'm going to be there opening weekend to see Hanna, I think Saoirse Ronan looks fantastic as the title character and I'm really curious at what the McGuffin in this movie, which is some sort of DNA revelation about Hanna. Test tube baby? Alien? Perhaps she was created from the DNA of the finest Judges in Megacity...oh wait sorry that was Judge Dredd.

Anyway the final review of this movie will be when the credits roll and the house lights go up.

Hanna screams its way into theaters on April 8th 2011.

Dueces,
StuntmanBob


oops almost forgot to mention, the score is done by the Chemical Brothers!!! Oh yea!