- Jan 6, 2015
- 14,509
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Hidden Strike (Netflix) - John Cena & Jackie Chan. This movie is bad.
My kinda film, I'm sure I'll get to it and complain afterwards. Thanks for the reviews.
Hidden Strike (Netflix) - John Cena & Jackie Chan. This movie is bad.
Try Margin Call as a great follow upJust watched The Big Short (2015) netflix. Documentary style filming but with actors and pretty funny spin. About those figuring out the mortgage security bonds were garbage before the 2008 collapse.
Lots of star power.
2 thumbs up.
It was actually MUCH better than I thought it was going to be... I too enjoyed it.A-Team (2010)
IMDB: A group of Iraq War veterans look to clear their name with the U.S. Military, who suspect the four men of committing a crime for which they were framed.
TLB: Thought I'd already reviewed this...seems not. Got the itch to watch some guys flying a plane, so yeah, pulled this one up once more. It's a reboot/homage to the original tv series with Liam Neeson as Hannibal, Bradley Cooper as Face, Quinten Jackson (MMA guy) as BA, and Sharleto Copley (WHO?) as Murdock. Throw in Jessica Beal (but NEVER any skin) and Patrick Wilson (some CIA guy dumb as a post) as support/antagonist roles and we might have something going on.
I watched the extended version which gives scenes of the team coming together, but you are fine with the regular cut that starts off with them getting court martialled. Extra scenes were nice for this rendition, but not required. Story is they meet by accident, form a team, do special ops for the milit.....wait, you probably know all that part. So, for the film, they break out of prison and go to work to clear their names - some funny parts, a well played cameo, some absurd action scenes you'd expect/want from the 80's show. A bit more depth on BA's personality in this one, and Murdock remains a nut job but it works very well in this film. This isn't the tv show you remember, but it does an acceptable (cheesy) remake. Likely shouldn't be seeing a sequel, but that's ok.
Final verdict: 7.5/10
I liked this one too... but it would appear that you have a man crush on Bradley Cooper goin' on, might want to analyze THAT!Limitless (2011) <Netflix>
IMDB:A mysterious pill that enables the user to access 100% of his brain's abilities transforms a struggling writer into a financial wizard, but it also puts him in a new world with many dangers.
TLB: Again, one I felt like rewatching - perhaps one of my favorites of all time. And, again, thought I'd already reviewed it here but it appears not. Starring Bradley Cooper (haven't found him in a role where I don't like him) as a broke writer just surviving and living as a dreg of society. Stumbles upon a designer drug that gets yhou access to the untapped 80% of your brain and he starts taking off. There is the addiction issue, limited supply, and over time there are the others who are after the same drug. We have Abbie Cornish as a love interest (attractive, no skin) and Robert De Niro as a mentor who becomes an adversary as Cooper climbs the ranks of the powerful.
I think perhaps why this is so appealing is the 'what if' factor, and what he does with it. Plot isn't super deep, various sub-plots aren't deep but all somewhat tie into the main story. Overall enjoyable.
Final (biased) verdict: 9/10
it would appear that you have a man crush on Bradley Cooper goin' on, might want to analyze THAT!
Aloha ain't bad... not that I would know, I heard it from a friend!You may be onto something....lemme watch a few more of his films to verify.
You may be onto something....lemme watch a few more of his films to verify.
Speaking of old movies with young Asians in it, Cannonball Run was on last week. Was a scene with that whacky Asian Subaru team… I was like, “Ho Lee Fuk! That’s young Jackie Chan!”Fist of Legend (1994)
IMDB: In 1937, a Chinese martial artist returns to Shanghai to find his teacher dead and his school harassed by the Japanese.
TLB: Refreshing to see a fairly young Jet Li, though the story is one I thought was fairly old and/or remade. Apparently, I watched a sequel Legend of the Fist: Return of Chen Zhen (2010) starring Donnie Yen in the lead role. Would have made a bit more sense to watch them in order but whatevs. We have Japanese having invaded and controlling parts of China, treating Chinese like dirt. Jet Li as Chen Zhen is a chinese citizen studying in Japanese university after having left his clan awhile ago. He finds his headmaster was killed in a fight, and investigates to uncover foul play (poisoned master) is why he lost and was killed, then seeks revenge on the Japanese who did this. Some good martial arts fights, but a solid dose of history on the friction between nations and how it affected citizens at the time. He has a Japanese girlfriend and struggles to resolve having her in his life when all his Chinese friends hate her; meanwhile the leader who took over the clan used to be very close with Chen and is struggling with presenting his own girlfriend because she works at a whore house. Weave in that Chen's Japanese girlfriend is the daughter of someone big and important in Tokyo, and her uncle is a grand fighter for Japan....we get a bit of social interplay, and wisdom sharing on the martial arts between them. I like Kung Fu theater, but I'd place this a notch above give the effort to history and cultural interplay, despite the fairly cheesey 'lesson' applied by Chen from his gf's uncle.
Final Verdict: 6.5/10. No skin, decent fights, good casting.
Cannonball Run was on last week
I saw this in Afghanistan on a bootleg Pakistani CD right after it came out. Honestly, I get your 2/10 rating, but as a dystopian future/star crossed lovers movie, and probably because of where I was, this is quietly one of my favorite movies. Couldn’t really even tell you why, it just is. Loved most of the music in it too.Code 46 (2003)
IMDB: A futuristic Brief Encounter (1945), this is a love story in which the romance is doomed by genetic incompatibility.
TLB: The 1945 reference above is absurd as this appears to be modern times, or near future, post apocolyptic earth. Major cities have melded cultures (phrases from a handful of languages ahve become common tongue everywhere), and people within the cities are somewhat restricted based on having 'papels' to access other cities or areas. Tim Robbins, as our inspector/detective Wiliam Geld, is sent to Shanghai to determine who is forging papels. This leads him to Samantha Morton, as Maria Gonzalez a papel inspector who is one among many checking for forgeries. ...ok, just edited a bunch of detail out and will drive to the point.
There is a small amount of entertainment value in the alternate reality of things (language, use of viruses, social structure) but that is pretty small. Overall the story moves slowly, Robbins irritates given his affair with Morton while having a wife/kid at home. The meaning of Code 46 is genetic conflicts which he gets into with Morton (can't have mating between people with too much of a DNA match), but things go sideways with memory cleansing and at the end we're left not with a feel good, not with a morale contemplation, not with anything more than a WTF. Not even a good one, just a really dull meh kinda WTF.
Final Verdict: 2/10 avoid at all costs.