This movie has a few things going for it. 1. historical theme, you get a portrayal of living in East Berlin during the transition from Communism to Capitalism. 2. A heartwarming story about a kid who loves his mom. 3. Germans 4. Some pretty funny moments as the son creates an illusion of a still living GDR for his mother.
I found the film to be pretty good overall. It had some creative stuff and the acting was convincing, though I think foreign actors have an unfair advantage here. It was interesting that their was some tension regarding the living lie put on, but we didn’t get bombarded with internal angst.
I really liked the first two X-Men movies, despite their somewhat slow pace. The third installation does have a lot more cool action scenes, but the film suffers blah blah blah. I am onboard with most critiques of this film. I think the way to understand this film is to realize that at one point Rattner and his writers were overlooking San Francisco bay and said, “This is where we shall paint our masterpiece.” Everything clearly builds up to that point in almost Dickensian fashion. The Iceman cometh, Angel rescuing his falling father, the whole thing. I was a little shocked that they seemed to kill off the professor and Cyclops but it was probably good to narrow the cast down, it was getting way too confusing. I was also intrigued by how they worked scenes of the comics into the film while almalgating so many different plot lines. I also thought the whole Phoenix thing should have been more of a plot driver. Still I do like the X-Men and their is lots of fun stuff hapenning. So I do rate it an enjoyable watch.
Somehow Orlando Bloom parlayed his role in Lord of the Rings into big parts of five other motion pictures, six if you count the third Pirates movie. This is only the second one I have seen, but he once again leaves me cold. He does a nice job in all the action stuff, but othewise doesn’t seem like a real person. Does he keep getting parts because he is good looking? How come the only thing Viggo has done is Hidalgo?
Anyway, I enjoyed all the fighting and portrayals of feudal life in this film, though I did not get a chance to watch the special features. It had a history channel special on and some other documentary that might be more interesting than the movie. Though probably not as many action scenes. The parts I liked about the movie might have been enough to bump this up to a B+, but Bloom’s character and some aspects of the plot were just a little too ridiculous. I appreciate Ridley Scott trying to solve the Middle East conflicts, but he should stick to chopping people up.
Some may say, he hasn’t posted a review in over a month and comes back with fever pitch? Well the school year started so I have less time to devote to watching and writing about movies. Though now that I am no longer a Chemistry teacher I will have a lot more time. Anyway, in that spate of time I have been playing more games and watching less movies. The movies that I did watch came off the shelf from the library. So this is the first of two reviews of mediocre pieces of work.
My wife saw Jimmy Fallon live and thought he was hilarious, plus we both like Nick Hornby. So we hypothesized that this film could produce some enjoyment. It produced a little.
Main plotline and character interactions left me pretty cold. I really don’t think much of Fallon as an actor. I have heard many movie romances for lack of chemistry, but this one really took the cake and I blame Jimmy. I hope he worked better with Queen Latifa. I did enjoy some of the parts of the movie when Fallon was interacting with his students and friends. But I would probably still avoid a second viewing if I could help it.
