VIDEODRONE

By only

Monday March 26, 2007

New Movie Mondays
Happy Feet
This movie was really difficult to figure out. Sure its about a loveable tap-dancing penguin who befriends some other antarctic characters who together have adventures and sing and dance and stuff. Good fun right? Except that it is soooo gleamfully annoying and tender heartedly cheery it drove us bonkers. Like, why does everything have to be so fucking cute? And then we realized it came from George Miller, the guy who directed all the Mad Max movies and even did Babe: Pig in the City (which is like a big old thumb in the bum of a kids movie–kinda shocking/disturbing at first, but once you relax it’s better than pizza). That’s what really threw us. How did it go from hockey masked dustball maniacs and feral children with boomerangs to frickin dancing penguins? It baffles zee mind.


The Pursuit of Happyness
Now this is a story of about how my life got flip-turned upside down, and I’d like to take a minute just sit right there, I’ll tell you how I became a homeless single dad and then a stock broker because I had great hair and knew how to solve the Rubick’s cube and didn’t mind getting hit by cars. Smell ya later, Will.


Children of Men
Contrary to popular belief this is NOT a movie about Clive Owen as a pregnant man. Howevs, it is more proof that Mexican filmmakers are pulling out the stops and making movies that are better than almost anything coming out of Hollywood. This movie–set in 2027–is about a future where women can no longer give birth and society is in chaos. It’s bleak and gritty and has a 7 minute one-take action sequence with machine guns, tanks and rocket launchers going off all over the place. That alone is worth the time. Based on a P.D. James book, the movie is a riveting political nightmare about a future without hope but where good weed still works as currency. Pretty much the best dystopian future we’ve seen in a movie since… what? Mad Max? Seriously, see it.


Turistas
It doesn’t take much to revitalize the horror genre. Just like Scream did a decade ago, it’s looking like Hostel is going to be the film that all other horror films aspire to be like. In this case, almost exactly like. But you couldn’t have picked a better flick to emulate. Where Saw tried and failed, Hostel did absolutely everything right. The actors were nobodies, the nudity was gratuitous, and the gore was extremely innovative. Up until the gore kicks in, Turistas is pretty much a carbon copy of Hostel, but set in Brazil. From the camera work to the refreshingly long setup to the Americans lost in foreign-land, it’s all the same. But if you loved Hostel like we did, then you understand how rad that is. There’s a really sweet underwater cave chase scene, and far less gore, but the body count is pretty even, so enjoy.


Van Wilder: The Rise of Taj
In case you didn’t know, avoid anything that says “National Lampoon” as if it were trying to sell you chronic diarrhea.