Avatar

Avatar is interesting because of all of hype surrounding it and the ten years it spent in development hell while James Cameron waited for technology to catch up with his vision. It's hard to talk about this movie without getting into crazy 3D technology or the motion capture technology that turned a Sigorney Weaver into a crazy blue alien, so I'm not going to.

In some ways the movie feels like a demonstration of Cameron's mo-cap and 3D technology. There are rumors that the movie's original script was more complicated with heavier Sci Fi concepts that were scaled back to turn it into a more accessible action flick. While this isn't necessarily a bad thing, it seems like they over-did it. The story is almost exactly the same as Pocahontas or Dances with Wolves with black and white morality that makes all blue people good and all white people outside of the hero group bad. Other than that, it's a slick action flick some some exciting moments and cool stuff to ooh and ahh at; exactly what one expects from the director of The Terminator.

The supposedly ground-breaking 3D didn't really do much for me other than put an ache in my bad eye, but I'll admit that I saw it on a standard-size screen and sat to the far left of the screen. From my experience there wasn't much that the 3D made better, but the computer animation and motion capture was impressive. There were times when I forgot that I was watching computer creatures all together, something that I never got over with Gollum.

Cost/Benefit analysis: I was lucky to have a coupon that brought my movie ticket down to 3 bucks from 13. The 3 dollar "3D handling fee" the theaters throw on is stupid. Now that I've seen a 3D movie, I never want to pay it again. That said, if I could go back in time and see the movie again for the first time, I would go all out and pay 15 at a true Imax theater. I wonder how much my experience would have been different, but I'll never know.

An Education (2009)

I think that a movie's quality is like a bridge supported by three pillars: cast, direction and script. When one of the pillars is weaker than the others, the bridge stands if they others are strong enough. When all of the pillars are weak, the bridge is washed away and no one misses it.

An Education is very nearly washed away; the plot is unsurprising and direction is unnoticeable. However, the cast is so strong that it turns An Education into a bridge that is so strong that you can jump up and down on it and yell to your friends, "HEY! THIS IS AN AWESOME BRIDGE, COME AND SEE IT FOR YOURSELVES!"

While old standbys like Alfred Molina and Emma Thompson are excellent in their roles as an upwardly ambitious father and an uptight schoolmaster, the movie belongs to Peter Sarsgaard and especially Carey Mulligan. As a bright young student, groomed for success at Oxford, she feels incredibly authentic in a way that characters in coming-of-age stories rarely do. As the English gentleman that seduces Mulligan and her family, Peter Sarsgaard turns the charm up so high that the audience, like the characters in play, can ignore the fact that hey, he's a total creep.

Cost/Benefit Analysis: I payed a full $10 for this one and regret nothing. It is definitely worth a rent at least.

2012

The movie 2012 is extremely disappointing. Coming from acclaimed disaster movie auteur Roland Emmerich, director of Independence Day and The Day After Tomorrow, one would expect 2012 to take the destruction of the world to a whole new level. The movie hits most of the same notes as Emmerich's other disaster movies, but spends too much of its time on bullshit science and inspirational speechifying; and misses the entire point of its own existance.

The world of science fiction has no shortage of pseudo-inspirational and -scientific rubbish. Your average episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation has better speeches and less offensive technobabble. A person goes to a movie like this to see shit get blown up real good. For about half an hour in the middle of things, 2012 delivers like no movie before it. The sequences of limosines and RVs and airplanes tearing around through giant earthquakes, giant volcanoes and giant dust clouds are fantastic, some of the best you'll ever see. It hits us with 3 of 4 of the elements, but doesn't reach the potential of the 4th.

Much more drama and action could have been milked from the giant-ass tsunamis that roll around the world. Instead we see "computer simluations" of waves and their radi of destruction while the scientists talk about how the earth's crust and magnetic fields are rolling around like the baggy skin over your grandma's knee. The south pole is somewhere in the middle of Wisconsin and China moves 1000 miles west into the Pacific ocean. Gee, that sounds neat, doesn't it? It would have been nice to see, too. The movie needed something more exciting in its final act, but never tops the thrill ride it takes us on in the beginning.

Cost/Benefit analysis: I saw this one on opening night and payed a whole 10 bucks to get in. If I could get a do-over I would wait until it showed up on tv somewhere, watch the chase scenes and be done with it. If you're really into disaster movies, don't pay more than 5 bucks to see this one.

Final notes: the writers missed a fantastic Leathal Weapon call back concerning President Danny Glover and the level of shit he is able to handle at his age.

Awesome random actor: the captain of the ark our heroes end up on is the same guy that played the bartender in The Shining and the head of the Tyrell Corporation in Blade Runner. I didn't know he was still alive! Awesome! He didn't look like he'd aged a day! Go him!

Sunshine

Sunshine is an awesome serious science fiction movie, a rare breed that only emerges from the crowds of superhero, horror, space opera and other related genres. Really a science fiction / psychological thriller, this movie shows the way a small crew on a long haul in a dangerous mission vital for the survival of the human race handles themselves when everything goes wrong. The psychological aspect seemed realistic to me, as did much of the space stuff, but macguffin seemed a little sketchy.

Sunshine is a treat for the eyes and ears. After just 15 or 20 minutes I was already amazed at the use of color, blues and grays and greens inside of the ship and violent yellow and white for the sun create a strong contrast and give insight to the strange dichotomy of stress and boredom that must come along with a long trip to save the world when you have only one chance to do it. The music is great and helps create much of the drama during spacewalks and other such moments. I actually had to turn down the volume during a couple parts so I would be able to handle it better.

Cost/Benefit Analysis: I didn't pay to see it, but I would love to see it on a big screen with a great sound system behind it. I would gladly pay full price to see it.

Moon

Moving from the Sun to the Moon, here is another great serious Sci Fi movie. This is what you call "soft" science fiction, I guess, one of the movies that is more about ideas than it is about future technology or spaceships. SPOILER ALERT: there is a twist and pretty common one at that, revealed and then dealt with in a casual and unconventional manner. The movie is full of sci fi tropes, but subverts them left and right, especially with the robot character. Refreshing.

Sam Rockwell is great. He has a lot of charisma, charm and chemistry with the cast. His laid back demeanor is a comfortable alternative to the take-charge assertive protagonists often seen in Star Trek and other more operatic space adventures.

The special effects are kind of strange strange because they often look like scale models or toys bouncing around on a model of the moon, but they still look good. Maybe I'm remembering things incorrectly, but these shots look like they were recorded from a satillite orbiting the moon or a with a high-quality moon security camera, a great move to make (if it was made at all) considering the anti-corporate tilt the movie has.

Cost/Benefit Analysis: I actually paid to see this one in the theater. Totally worth it, and I dragged two friends along to give more money to serious science fiction.

Food, Inc

Food Inc. is a crash-course in all of the things that suck about the food industry today and should be required viewing for everyone that eats food. Inspired by the writing of Michael Pollan and Eric Schlossinger, Food Inc. covers the industrialization of animals and crops, the sins of Monsanto (patenting genes), congressional/governmental infiltration by food company people, the profliferation of corn, loss of diversity in food product manufacture, treatment of slaughter house workers, etc. If you've read those authors before, then this is a refresher course, but if you're a freshman-level foodie, there is some eye-opening stuff here.

Although the movie is fairly entertaining as far as documentaries go, it is still very obviously portraying one group as good (organic farmers, the two writers) and another evil (food industry). The two groups as presented are similar to the kind of Good vs. Evil seen in The Lord of the Rings. Based on similar documentaries I have seen on the subject, the film makers could have shown footage much more damning, but I think that they protect their message this way.

When you were little, you were undoubtedly told, "Don't put that in your mouth, you don't know where it has been." This is why everyone should see this movie. You may not feel the need to change your eating habits to avoid industrial food (but you certainly might), a responsible person should know.

Cost/benefit analysis: I saw this in the theater, but my dad paid for my ticket (yay family fun) so I paid nothing. It's not the most ground-breaking message, so wait for Redbox or Netflix to see this one.

Yellowbeard

Yellowbeard is a late 70's or early 80's comedy with an incredible cast, a bunch of pirate ships and fake facial hair, and a completely nonsensical plot. Starring Graham Chapman, Eric Idle, John Cleese, Peter Boyle, Marty Feldman, Madeline Kahn, plus Cheech and Chong, the movie worth seeing just for the cast alone, but that's pretty much the only reason to recommend it.

Sometimes strong acting can overcome a stupid script. Horrible acting also has a way of doing this. Sadly, the cast is too good for the movie to slide into so bad it's good territory, but they don't seem to care enough to put in the effort it would take to make the script work, leaving Yellowbeard a collection of half-baked jokes from the least-funny member of Monty Python.

I would see this movie only if you are intrigued by the cast. I can't recommend it as either a good or bad movie.

Cost/Benefit analysis: I paid nothing to see this movie, but I got to see some people I hadn't in a while and I got a good free meal. I'd gladly do that again if I was watching a different, but just as bad movie but I hope I never have to see this movie again.