Movie Review: Eagle Eye

Eagle Eye

Director: D.J. Caruso
Year: 2008
Genre: Action
Notable Cast: Shia LaBeouf, Michelle Monaghan
Quote to Note: You had sex with her yet?

Review: I was really stoked for the garbage barge scene in Eagle Eye. When I saw the preview on my brand new Palm Pre there was a split second when you see Shia LaBeouf plunging into an overflowing garbage barge and I am not afraid to tell you, I got wood right on the spot. I turned to Barry and said, “throw the engines into reverse, turn back toward the harbor and god-damnit get that juice needle out of your ass.” Anyway after visiting Little Chung over on Fantasy Street to pick up a chinese subtitled bootleg dvd, I got down to business. It goes without saying that I love any movie that features a chase scene that ends on a garbage barge. It’s a boat filled with garbage to conveniently break your fall. Here is a pop quiz for all you math whores out there. How many movies feature garbage barges? Answer: all of my favorites. Dirty Hairy, Bullet, The Matrix, Stuart Little 2, Star Trek 5 (the one with the whales), I could go on all day. And then there is Shia LaBeouf. For me, he is like Captain Stubing after going on the South Beach diet for one year. The rest of the movie sucked. There's a giant computer that is made of up of a roomful of red balls that look like the testicles off a giant squid. But what makes it all worth it is that at about 38 minutes into the movie Shia and some ugly chick are being chased by FBI agents and they drive their SUV off a friggen pier and then they land in a pile of garbage on a barge. A BARGE! Then they sail blissfully away. Why doesn’t the FBI scramble choppers and F-16s at this point to continue the chase? Who knows. Something to do with the squid nuts computer I guess. Did I like this movie? Fuck yeah.

Score:

(6 Swayze Heads out of 10)

Movie Review: Videodrome

Videodrome

Director: David Cronenberg
Year: 1983
Genre: Sci-Fi / Horror
Notable Cast: James Woods, Sonja Smits
Netflix Link: Videodrome
Quote to Note: I think you'll find a little S&M will be necessary.

Review: How do you name your movie Videodrome but not have a single boat in the film? Talk about the mother of misleading titles. Jesus Christ! If I knew there was only going to be murder, torture, cybernetics, and nudity I would've watched something else. Like maybe that movie with Cuba Gooding Jr. in a submarine. Fuck. There are pulsating VHS tapes, an abdominal vagina, and Professor O'Blivion, but not even a schooner. God Damn It. I just saw a woman extinguish a cigarette on her tit. Still, no boats.

And then, just when all hope was lost, we have a condemned vessel. 82 minutes into an 87 minute movie we have a ratty old tug boat. Shit! That makes up for the rest of it. I really thought I wasted my time.

Score:
(7.5 Swayze Heads out of 10)

Movie Review: Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

Harry Potter and the Half Blood-Prince

Director: David Yates
Year: 2009
Genre: Children and Family
Notable Cast: Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint
Netflix Link: Harry-Potter and the Half Blood Prince
Quote to Note: That was fun. Most people vomit their first time.

Review: I have a general rule of thumb when it comes to movies: If there's a hyphen in the title, its probably going to suck. This one proved my rule. The run-time on this little biscuit was 153 minutes, which was roughly 150 minutes longer than it needed to be. The main point of the movie as near as I could tell was to introduce the world to the concept of 'snogging'. I checked my English-2-English dictionary and apparently 'snogging' is some sort of British casserole designed to bore you to death. The movie did have a boat, though. It was shaped like a leaf. The leaf-boat was being stored underwater for some reason. It main purpose was to transport people to a secret crystal island that was guarded by Anorexic Water Zombies. So here's what I don't get: its weird enough to keep your boat stored underwater in the first place but why would you bother keeping a boat around at all if you're trying to keep people away from your secret island with Anorexic Water Zombies? Seems to me that you could fire all the Anorexic Water Zombies and spend that money on hookers and blow if you just got rid of the frickin' leaf-boat altogether. Generally just a bad use of a boat in a movie.

Score:

(3 Swayze Heads out of 10)

Movie Review: Burn After Reading

Burn After Reading

Director: Ethan and Joel Coen
Year: 2008
Genre: Comedy / Crime
Notable Cast: George Clooney, Frances McDormand, Tilda Swinton, Brad Pitt, John Malkovich, David Rasche
Netflix Link: Burn After Reading
Quote to Note: Appearances can be... deceptive.

Review: I'll get right to it. There are a shitload of boats and boat scenes in this film. There's boat sex, a replica of said boat, a person in a wheelchair on the boat, and Malkovich living on the very same boat. The boat gets a lot of screen time. I know what you're thinking. Isn't this a movie about spying and government secrets? Yes, but the boat is still pretty pervasive.

George Clooney's character is obsessed with the quality and origin of everyone's flooring. He fancies himself somewhat of a handyman and decides to craft a contraption he discovered in a gentleman's magazine. After much speculation his own personal ark is revealed, and it is breathtaking.

For those of us old enough to remember, one of the main governement agency leaders is none other than Sledgehammer. Another fantastic cameo is the appearance of Dermot McDermott in a fictional romantic comedy called "Coming Up Daisy". We also have a Richard Karn sighting.

Other hilarity includes Hardbodies and numbers. Overall, a very fun movie and a return to form for the Coens.

Score:
(7 Swayze Heads out of 10)

Movie Review: Tideland

Tideland

Director: Terry Gilliam
Year: 2005
Genre: Drama / Fantasy
Notable Cast: Jeff Bridges, Jennifer Tilly, Jodelle Ferland
Netflix Link: Tideland
Quote to Note: He looks like a burrito.

Review: I’m not sure where to start with this movie, so how about here? I love Terry Gilliam. I love that he is one of the original members of Monty Python, and I love his films. Except this one. This movie was not only excessively boring, but it was also repulsive. I believe Gilliam was trying to get the viewers to experience what it is like to be a child again by telling the story through Jeliza-Rose's eyes. But the world she lives in is so corrupt and revolting that it actually becomes impossible to become attached to any of the characters. Are we meant to believe she is having a psychotic breakdown after the death of her parents? That is the only explanation for the horrific events that unfold after the death of her father. But not only are these events transpiring, she is partaking in most of them.

I did enjoy that Jeff Bridges' corpse was in most of the movie. Jeliza-Rose cooks his herione for him and he overdoses shortly after the movie begins. Now his corpse begins to rot. Jeliza-Rose continues to "pretend" that her dad is alive so she puts makeup on his bloated stinking corpse and stuffs peanut butter in his mouth. Later she meets new "friends" from a nearby house who promptly empty his corpse and stuff it with barbie doll heads. He spends the rest of the movie being moved around from scene to scene like The Texas Chainsaw Massacre meets Weekend at Bernie's (which is a great idea for a movie now that I think of it). While this is happening Jeliza-Rose, who is about 10-12 years old, falls in love with a ~30 year old retard. As if the movie wasn't dismal enough already they kiss a number of times.

Anyway, I digress... The retard thinks he has a submarine. It's actually a large sheet of plastic covering a bunch of garbage and he sits in his "U-Boat" and acts like a retard. Also, Jeff Bridges has a viking boat model that he dreams of sailing to Jutland with. If it wasn't for the overabundance of boats and fake fucking retard boats I'd give this movie the middle finger.

Score:
(1 Swayze Head out of 10)

Movie Review: National Treasure: Book of Secrets

National Treasure: Book of Secrets

Director: Jon Turteltaub

Year: 2007

Genre: Action & Adventure

Notable Cast: Nicolas Cage, Diane Kruger

Netflix Link: National Treasure: Book of Secrets

Quote to Note: "It's a little, golden man."

Review: Even though the producers gave this movie the “Full Turteltaub” treatment, it couldn’t make up for the horrible plot, worse acting and embarrassing hair of Nicolas Cage. A more appropriate title would have been “National Treasure: Book of Feces”. The plot bounces senselessly from one unsolvable puzzle to the next while a desperately-trying-to-act-intelligent Nicolas Cage miraculously works out what to do next. A note to the hair and makeup folks: if you’re going to give a guy a wig, don’t give him a male pattern baldness wig. Spend the extra 40 bucks and give the poor guy something that doesn’t make him look like Abe Vigoda. This earns one Swayze Head (SH) for Diane Kruger and her hilarious attempts to do an American accent and one SH because there’s a boat…I think it’s a Boston Whaler with a center console.

Score:

(2 Swayze Heads out of 10)

Movie Review: The Mist

The Mist

Director: Frank Darabont
Year: 2007
Genre: Horror / Sci-Fi
Notable Cast: Thomas Jane, Marcia Gay Harden, Chris Owen
Netflix Link: The Mist
Quote to Note: The day I need a friend like you, I will just squat and shit one out.

Review: Movie Timeline:

1 minute: Awesome, a John Carpenter's The Thing movie poster.
5 minutes: Racist neigbors. Could be fun. Also, there's a boathouse.
10 minutes: If you're stuck in a mist, never attempt to get into an El Camino.
15 minutes: Tentacles and the fucking Sherminator!
16 minutes: I can honestly say that nothing scary or interesting will happen in this film.
17 minutes: CGI has ruined movies.
60 minutes: Stephen King should be banned from writing and movie making.
120 minutes: Holy shit! Something amazing just happened, unfortunately it was the end of the film.

This would be 1 Swayze out of 10, but I gave it an extra head just for the last scene. This was truly a piece of shit.

Score:
(2 Swayze Heads out of 10)

Movie Review: The Hangover

The Hangover

Director: Todd Phillips
Year: 2009
Genre: Comedy
Notable Cast: Bradley Cooper, Zach Galifianakis, Mike Tyson, Heather Graham, Ed Helms
Netflix Link: The Hangover
Quote to Note: He's jackin' his little weenus!

Review: Vegas. 4 men set off for the time of their life. Apparently the time of their life includes: concussions, pantsless men, Mike Tyson, tiger dry humping, a baby, roofies, strippers, larceny, Asian penis, kidnapping, tasers, sunburn, cursing, a crowbar, ruh-tard, a rooster, vomit, a tooth, Holocaust rings, a mattress, and a satchel. Is it a good idea to consider replacing your friend with a person of a different race who has the same name? Did Caesar actually live here? Just remember, Whatever happens in Vegas stays in Vegas.... ....except herpes, that shit will come back with you.

UPDATE: Not a single boat in this film, not even a floatation device.

Score:
(8.5 Swayze Heads out of 10)

Movie Review: The Dark Knight

The Dark Knight

Director: Christopher Nolan
Year: 2008
Genre: Action / Crime / Thriller
Notable Cast: Christian Bale, Michael Caine, Heath Ledger, Morgan Freeman, Maggie Gyllenhaal, Aaron Eckhart, Gary Oldman, Eric Roberts (snicker)
Netflix Link: The Dark Knight
Quote to Note: If you're good at something, never do it for free.

Review: Sadistic. Bonus points for boats with bombs. Me likey…

Score:
(10 Swayze Heads out of 10)