Miss – newest addition to the vertical limit category Starring Sarah Jessica Parker, Kim Cattrall, Cynthia Nixon, Kristin Davis

While wrestling with the pressures of life, love, and work in Manhattan, Carrie, Miranda, and Charlotte join Samantha for a trip to Morocco, where Samantha’s ex is filming a new movie. – synopsis from IMDB.com

It is necessary to use the synopsis from IMDB in this particular case because this movie has no plot whatsoever that it is hard to pin point exactly what the movie is about. In a word the movie is about: NOTHING. Nothing interesting happens, there is no plot development, and there is no character development. The only possible thing that this movie has going for it is how offensive it must be to particular cultures. The best part of this almost-three-hour-film is when Liza Minnelli sings and dances to “Single Ladies.”

Favorite movie commentary from audience (this contains spoilers)- There is a part in the film where Carrie is calling Big to tell him that she kissed Aidan. Big listens as Carrie talks and then says something like this to her, “I have a lot of work to do, I’ll talk to you later,” and hangs up the phone. Someone in the audience responds by saying, “asshole.” My thought is… wait a minute, she is the one that cheated and he is hurt and doesn’t want to talk to her and therefore he is the asshole? That doesn’t make sense.

Bottom Line: Truly this film is the worst of the year, worst of the decade, and worst of the century.

Comedy

Rated R for some strong sexual content and language.

Running Time: 2 hours 26 minutes (also known as- Forever)

The Newest Movie to make it to the Vertical Limit

Miss – Starring Mark Wahlberg, Zooey Deschanel, John Leguizamo, Ashlyn Sanchez

Something fatal is happening to humanity and there is no way to stop it. In order to save themselves, a family attempts to run from the natural disaster.

This is quite possibly the worst film of the year. I know there are bad films that have come out this year, but so far, I think this one is number one on the list. I heard one person say that the audience needed to think of this film as an episode of “The Twilight Zone.” To that, my response is, exactly. It should have been a 48 minute episode of a show that we can see in our own homes for FREE. Another person said, “think of it as a B movie.” To which I respond, “why do I have to pay A movie prices for a B movie film?”

So why is this movie so bad? It tries to obtain the essence of what will happen to humanity if we continue to take the earth for granted.

It tries to be the baby sister to the movie Soylent Green in some ways. Unfortunately the impact of the film is too predictable.

By the way, the movie Soylent Green took place in 2022, which is in the not-so-distant future.

Bottom Line: This movie is not happening.

Fantasy

Rated R for violent and disturbing images.

Running Time: 1 hour 31 minutes.

Miss (winner of the Dyson award- it doesn’t lose “suck”tion) - Starring Clive Owen, Jennifer Aniston, Vincent Cassel, Xzibit

Two married business executives (Owen and Aniston) are in a life threatening situation after having an affair. A violent criminal taunts their adulterous behavior and begins to stalk and blackmail them. Now the two must turn the tables on him to save their families.

The trailer promised a Jennifer Aniston you have never seen. This movie didn’t deliver as promised. The trailer promised you would be guessing until the end of the movie, but sadly, anyone with an IQ over 120 would know the “twist.” I put the word “twist” in quotes because the ending was so obvious from the moment we met our criminal that the outcome could not be considered twist-like. The only twist this movie had was the fact that you weren’t getting your money back at the end just because it sucked. Bottom Line: Keep your change and check out something else. The newest addition to the Vertical Limit section.

Best Line: “I picked this jail.”

Thriller

Rated R for strong disturbing violence, language and some sexuality.

Running Time: Too long.

Miss (big time) – Starring Cole Hauser, Piper Perabo, Daniel Dae Kim

Spelunkers explore a cave that has been uncharted. Once they are trapped inside the cave they find that they are not alone. Now it is a race against time to find an exit and escape the ultimate evil that is hunting them.

I found that this movie is a cheaper version of the film Alien vs. Predator. In fact, everything about this movie had Alien vs. Predator written all over it. Let’s do a venn diagram comparison to show how these movies are different and how they are alike. * Since I am not savvy when it comes to graphics on the internet, we will have to settle for a list of how they are different and how they are alike.*

Differences:

1. The Cave spelunkers don’t really have a mission as to why they are exploring this cave. They are just doing it for their love of caves in general.
2. The creatures actually fly.
3. There is no real back-story as to how these creatures came to be.
4. A single species of predator involved (only an P not an A and P).
5. If you are a victim of the predator, you will eventually morph into the predator.

Similarities:

1. B-list actors.
2. Both movies take place underground.
3. Both are just as good as The Vertical Limit.
4. Main goal for producers – to make a lot of money.
5. They fall into the same film genre- Horror.
6. Their predators kill people.
7. They both suck.
8. They rob young, poor people, like myself, who are looking for a smart and scary horror or thriller film.

When I see big budget movies like this being made it makes me sad to think that there is a really talented writer or producer out there who is just waiting to be given a chance. Movies like this will never give the young hopeful a chance because movies like this prove that people who see them are willing to throw their money away on crap. Aye. It is sad to think that I fall into that category, but at least I know that I did not actually pay for my own movie ticket. That being said… the bottom line is: Take a wild guess, what do you think?

P.S. Cole Hauser is the poor man’s Gary Sinise.

Best Scene: Who cares?

Rated PG-13 for intense creature violence.

Horror

Running Time: 1 hour 37 minutes.

Miss – Starring Naomi Watts, Sissy Spacek

Although the original may have you believe that Samara is finally resting in peace, Samara is back, and this time it’s personal. The evil that haunted The Ring wants to take the place of the living and plans on using Rachel’s (Watts) son to breakthrough to the other side. This movie takes place six months after the original.

Holy Moly (I bet you haven’t heard that in a long time), this movie is so bad it joins our Vertical Limit club of bad movies. First off… they claim that this movie is six months after the original which would be ok except for the fact that the young man who plays Aidan looks more like 2 to 3 years older than he was in the first movie. Second of all, the movie provides no further development of character, which would be fine if the first movie provided this for us but sadly the audience is so disengaged from Watts’ Rachel that I just want her to stay in the well and never come back. This film provides no sympathetic character for the audience to relate to and therefore falls short of providing any emotional connections from the audience to the characters.

What did this film do that all horror films do? Beat a dead horse (or deer in this case). Seriously. I am tired of seeing movies that are purely scary because of their ability to use quick editing and creepy music. Personally, I like horror movies that are a little bit smarter and have a lot more style. I also enjoy horror movies that include some comic relief. This movie did not provide … anything. If there is one thing you can take away from this review it is this… Bottom Line: The better choice this weekend would have been Ice Princess. I obviously chose incorrectly.

On another note: The director of this movie was also the director for the original film Dark Water. This director was not asked to direct the remake of Dark Water starring Jennifer Connelly and it is speculated that this film is very similar in theme for the sheer fact of getting back at Hollywood for slamming the door on his Dark Water dreams.

Best Scene: An interesting water sequence when Aidan first is put in the bathtub.

Most laughable moment: Climbing out of the well made me think of American Gladiators.

Rated PG-13 for violence/terror, disturbing images, thematic elements and some language.

Horror

Running Time: 1 hour 51 minutes.

Miss – Starring (who else) but Alien and Predator. Also starring some B-list actors who knew that America would pay money to see this movie in the theatres.

I really don’t know what to say about this movie… it was just as good as Vertical Limit, which is my favorite movie of all time. I enjoyed the fact that the rich man with asthma was also in the movie Scream 3. This movie was a project based on money. Here is the math for those of you who are new to the business. Producer equation: Alien + Predator + B-list actors = a lot of money for the studio and myself (minimal money to build and manage Alien and Predator, and B-list actors will work for less money than A-list actors). I guess in this day and age of Hollywood movies, money is always the motive. But what happened to actually producing a quality film with some shadow of good morals? The only lesson I learned in this movie is: if you see a large hole that has been drilled for miles but there is no sign of who drilled the hole, maybe you should investigate first before taking the plunge into the abyss. Bottom line: The Pre-Show countdown (or the Twenty) has never been so entertaining.

Best Scene: Opening Credits

Rated PG-13 for violence, language, horror images, slime and gore.
Action / Science Fiction / Horror
Running Time: 1 hour 41 minutes

Photo © 20th Century Fox. All Rights Reserved.

Miss- Starring Michael Moore, George W. Bush, and plenty of non-union actors

Synopsis: Michael Moore’s viewpoint of what really happened surrounding the September 11th attacks. This includes information about what is being done now because of the tragic incident.

A note to those who are reading this review: My comments about this film are purely concerning the film itself and the filmmaking process. It does not reflect my viewpoints on the comments Michael Moore has made about our great nation. I, for one, agree and disagree with him on many issues.

Sloppy Joes for dinner anyone? Compared to Bowling for Columbine I found this “mockumentary” to be the most horrible display of filmmaking I have ever witnessed. Michael Moore should be ashamed of his lack of storytelling and structure. I feel that my personal documentary of my family vacation to Washington D.C. was a better representation of acceptable filmmaking. Being my first family documentary at 12 years old, I find it to not only have commentary and interviews that follow a linear fashion, but it also contains candid and uncontrived situations and interactions with “real” people.

Michael Moore, it is doubtful that you will ever read this but if you do I want you to know that I expected great things, but what I got was a whole bag of nothing.

Watching this film made me feel like I was a little kid in 1st grade. It reminds me of watching those films on the projector that tells us how we can be clean by washing our hands with soap and combing our hair. “Look, Johnny uses bar soap to wash his hands before dinner.” From the first frame of the film I felt as though I was being talked down to. I know it is desirable to save money and have yourself be the narrator, but really, your narration sucks. I would suggest Liam Neeson because he has an excellent narrator voice. Bottom line: Not worth renting the film for $3.00. Instead I suggest buying a Starbucks coffee (which will really make Michael Moore happy).

Rated R for some violent and disturbing images, and for language.
Mockumentary
Running time: 2 hours 2 minutes = the best nap of your life!

Photo © Copyright Lions Gate Films. All Rights Reserved.

Miss– Starring Jake Gyllenhaal, Dennis Quaid, Sela Ward

The Day After Tomorrow brings the audience back to the ice age. A global warming threat is lurking and the only one to save us is Dennis Quaid. I think the best part of this movie was when one of the characters actually out-ran air. That is physically impossible but apparently in Hollywood, anything of the impossible is certainly possible. This movie was all over the board and you didn’t really have any feelings for any of the characters. Movie trailers can sometimes give away the entire movie, but in this particular case, the trailers showed you everything that was disasterous of this movie. Bottom Line: I expected this movie to be one hour and a half of disaster and a half an hour of drama. Instead I was left with a half an hour of disaster and an hour and a half of drama. No thank you.

Best Scene: When a giant tidal wave takes over NYC.

Rated PG-13 for intense situations of peril.
Action
Running Time: 2 hours 4 minutes

Photos © 20th Century Fox. All Rights Reserved.

Miss (big time) – Starring Kate Hudson, John Corbett, Joan Cusack

The series of events that comprise this film are painfully contrived. Had I not been trapped on a 5 hour plane flight over the pacific ocean there would have been no way for me to make it through this film. The fact that the left speaker on my airline supplied ear torture devices did not seem to work also did nothing to help this film out.

About half way into this movie I was struck by the nagging thought the only reason Kate Hudson took this role because she felt that somehow it would prepare her for motherhood. It’s akin to a couple having ducks as a test drive for child rearing. I comprehend the urge that drives this sort of behavior, but I fail to understand it.

Sometimes I wonder how a movie like this manages to get made. Actually I don’t wonder at all, but I need some sort of clever means into a notable quote from the film that will shed some light on this conundrum. Upon being hired as receptionist at a “previously owned” car lot, Helen announces over the dealership loudspeaker, “Helen to payroll.” And to payroll she went, it seems that Kate Hudson was paid in the neighborhood or 7 million dollars to appear in this film.

Kate is undeniably attractive and a talented actress, but I don’t think anything could have saved this movie other then the possible addition of a post humorous cameo by Charles Bronson because quite frankly he kicked some major ass. In fact if Jean-Claude Van Damme, who was once sued for “willfully” gouging the eye of an extra in a sword fight while filming, and Charles Bronson met in a dark alley about half way into this film, it could have possibly swayed this reviewer, but alas there was no such encounter and the world continues to turn around the sun.

I’m gonna stop kicking this horse as it appears to have passed some time ago not to mention the plane must land and I have to turn the computer off or risk being branded an international agent of terror and possibly a threat to homeland security.

Best Scene: When the sisters wore red step pyramid Devo Hats and sung along to the song “whip it,” because a “whip-it” is also a method for obtaining a nitrous oxide high. And a nitrous oxide high, much like this movie can cause long term side effects such as: loss of motor control, inability to walk, numbness in the limbs, and most alarming, vitamin B12 depletion.

Rated: PG-13 for thematic issues involving teens.
Comedy and Romance (a.k.a. Hollywood pilfering of movie goers)
Running Time: 1 hr. 59 min.

Photo © Touchstone Pictures. All Rights Reserved.