Category Archives: movies

Undead Week: Zombieland

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Now, from its pedigree, Zombieland should have been a disaster. The writers previous movie experience were limited to Clifford’s Really Big Movie and Cruel Intentions 3 (and creating the tv show The Joe Schmo Show). The director’s big prior experience was the MTV reality show Rob and Big. Yet, it all came together to make a surprisingly entertaining movie. Now, where exactly is Zombieland?

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Undead Week: Shaun of the Dead

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Simon Pegg was an English stand-up comedian who drew interest from BBC for creating a TV show. From that came Spaced, a BBC sitcom written by Pegg and his friend Jessica Hynes (nee Stevenson). The show was directed by Edgar Wright (who we have just seen direct Scott Pilgrim) and was very successful. Pegg had brought his best friend Nick Frost into Spaced to play his best friend on the show. After two series were aired, Pegg, Wright and Frost decided to move onto a movie. That is where Shaun of the Dead comes in. Pegg and Wright wrote it, Wright directed it and Pegg and Frost starred as best friends. And it is the funniest undead film you will ever see. So, who is Shaun and what is his problem?

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Older Movies to Watch – War Games

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Among many movies that focus on computers, there are a lot of groans when Hollywood tries to get computer use correct. From the “It’s Unix!” cry in Jurassic Park when a random graphical interface is shown, to hacking an alien spaceship with an Apple laptop in Independence Day, the use of computers in Hollywood movies is usually laughable. But when you ask computer people what movie did the best job of showing computers and hackers, they usually agree on War Games. Made in the early 80s, it was a lot of people’s first introduction to hacker culture and it’s never been as accurately potrayed.

But the movie was also a thriller and played into people’s fear about automation and nuclear war. While the basic plot was somewhat unrealistic (with an amazing AI that hasn’t been equaled since), the basic questions are still around, just in different forms. So, who was playing War Games?

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Scott PIlgrim Movie Review

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Having read the Scott Pilgrim books, I was slightly worried about Michael Cera playing our hero in Scott Pilgrim vs. the World. The movie makers were compressing all 6 books into a 90 minute movie. How would slacker king Cera do in the role of a fighter. It was obvious that Cera could handle the rest of the role (music, slacking, pining for women, stuttering, etc), but could he make the fight scenes come to life. And could the 90 minutes for the movie bring the world to life with all 7 fights, plus Knives, Ramona and the whole gang?

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Best TV/Movies/Games of 2010

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Ground Rules first. This is a list of the best TV shows, movies and video games that I saw (played) for the first time in 2010. The TV/movies/games didn’t have to be distributed in 2010. And this is the best TV/movies/video games I saw(played) this year in no particular order.

  • Dr. Who – Prior to this series, I was not a Dr. Who fan. I hadn’t seen any episodes before (although I had heard about it). So when the new Doctor (played by Matt Smith) came on boards, this seemed like as good a time as any to jump on. And I’m glad I did. With Karen Gillan as the companion, Matt Smith’s Doctor was quirky, funny, exciting and just plain good. Steven Moffat was the new showrunner and he made the show great for a new viewer (and I hope existing viewers as well)
  • Sherlock Holmes – Not the movie, but the TV series from BBC and Dr. Who showrunner Steven Moffat. Sherlock Holmes and Dr. Watson are brought into the 21st century while keeping it quintessentially Sherlock Holmes. The three 90 minute episodes were exciting and fun. The first and last were much better than the middle one though.
  • Avatar – I can’t say how well it translated to DVD (or Blu-ray), but it was the movie spectacular of the year, possibly the decade. It was a technological marvel with a story existing only to bring us from exciting 3-D vision to exciting 3-D vision. Don’t watch this for the story or the characters, the landscape and the technology is the movie.
  • Toy Story 3 – Pixar did something that most people would consider impossible, they improved on two great movies and made a fitting bookend to the characters we’ve known and loved for 15+ years. A wonderful story and characters with Pixar’s distinctive style.
  • Batman: Arkham Asylum – A wonderful game that showcases Batman and his cast of characters and rogue’s gallery. Great gameplay with a good storyline. We’ll see if the sequel lives up to the original next year.

 

This post is part of the thread: BestOf – an ongoing story on this site. View the thread timeline for more context on this post.

Wallace and Gromit

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The lovable Englishman and faithful canine companion (Wallace and Gromit) have 4 shorts films, a movie and even a fewbooks. They are a scrappy duo and the studio that made them (Aardman Animation) and their director (Nick Park) deserve all the accolades, Oscar wins and appreciation they’ve received. But who are Wallace and Gromit.

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Bubba Ho-Tep movie review

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Joe R Lansdale is a award winning writer who loves writing about horror, mystery and martial arts. So when he wrote an award winning novel that dealt with all of these, a movie had to be made. The result, Bubba Ho-Tep, is a weird, horrific and hilarious duel between famous senior citizens and an Egyptian spirit for the souls of the nursing home residents. The result is touching, funny and well worth your time. So, how did Elvis and JFK get into a fight with an Egyptian Soul Sucker?

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Airplane movie review

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RIP Leslie Nielsen. As I heard about the passing of the beloved comic actor, I found myself thinking about Airplane. It was Nielsen’s first comedic role and what made that movie so special. When Airplane came out, it was like nothing people had seen before (well, mostly), it wasn’t clever or visually interesting. It was a bunch of dumb jokes barely hanging on a plot that was stolen from an earlier movie and pulling it bits from otherrecentmovies. But, it caught on and became much more popular and influential then anyone expected.

Surely, this little stupid movie can’t be that influential?
Yes it is and stop calling me Shirley, so I can tell you why.

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Roger Rabbit Movie Sequel?

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MTV is reporting that Robert Zemeckis is still working on a sequel to the Roger Rabbit movie.

We asked the director whether Price and Seaman were still typing away at that script, to which he replied: “That is correct, that is true. They’re slow,” he laughed.
So the screenplay isn’t finished yet… but has Zemeckis read any of it? “It’s great,” he said, nodding his head enthusiastically. “Oh, it’s going to be great. I think it’s going to be great.”

H/T IO9.com