Be Kind, Please Rewind

He’s a Long Underwear Model. He’s the…

Vidiot

Week of November 16, 2012

What's behind the backdoor? First up…

Brave

The hardest part of being brave is finding someone wide enough to stand in front of you as you go and be valiant.

However, the maiden in this animated-adventure doesn’t need a human shield to be heroic; she has a bow.

Furious over her mother Queen Elinor’s (Emma Thompson) choice to marry her off to an allied clan, Merida (Kelly Macdonald) seeks a witch’s spell to prevent her from doing so.

Unfortunately the hex changes the Queen into a bear.

Worse, the transformation will remain if Merida doesn’t make amends with her mother before sundown.

Meanwhile, her father (Billy Connolly) prepares for battle with his former friends.

While the animation’s striking and the mother/daughter dynamic commendable, the sorcery subplot is convoluted and detrimental to the story.

During this recession, however, a mother shouldn’t force her daughter to wed a man of her choosing, but, instead, two men of her choosing.  0

Savages

The hardest part of retiring from growing and selling marijuana is remembering to retire from growing and selling marijuana.

Unfortunately, absentmindedness isn’t what’s keeping the dealers in this thriller from exiting.

Two soldiers from Laguna Beach, Chon (Taylor Kitsch) and Ben (Aaron Taylor-Johnson), smuggle marijuana seeds back from Afghanistan and cultivate a cash crop.

After years of success, the two decide to saunter into the sunset. But those plans are jeopardized when the ruthless head of a drug cartel (Salma Hayek) has her henchman (Benicio del Toro) kidnap their communal girlfriend (Blake Lively).

To save her, they must lower themselves to their enemy’s level, by resorting to their military training to kidnap the czarina’s daughter.

While Savages marks somewhat of a return for Oliver Stone, Lively’s languid narration and the erratic endings soil the menacing performances of Hayek and del Toro.

Besides, only conjoined twins should be sharing a woman.  0

The Watch

Neighbourhood watch is typically more concerned with patrolling their community to ensure lawns are mowed to Board specifications.

However, the concerned citizens in this sci-fi/comedy are coping with actual crime in their community: murder.

When his employee is slain in a gruesome fashion, Evan (Ben Stiller) forms a community crime watch cabal to bring the killer to justice.

Unfortunately, his call-to-arms only attracts his neighborhood’s strangest occupants: party-animal father Bob (Vince Vaughn), gun-nut Franklin (Jonah Hill) and recently divorced hornball Jamarcus (Richard Ayoade).

Despite his colleague’s lack of vigilance, Evan manages to uncover an alien plot to invade Earth.

Now it’s up to him and his rag-tag team to save the suburbs.

With a familiar cast playing familiar archetypes and a one-dimensional invasion plot that feels abnormal, The Watch is unbalanced.

Besides, if any community group is going to foil an alien invasion it’s going to be the Stargazers Society.  0

***Stepmonster***

My Stepmother Is an Alien

Every kid thinks their dad’s new wife is an alien - a buxom blonde alien that graduated from their high school last year.

However, in the case of this sci-fi/comedy, all concerns of step-parental unearthliness are valid.

When Steven’s (Dan Aykroyd) experiment involving transmitting radio waves into space disrupts an alien planets atmosphere, an envoy, Celeste (Kim Basinger), is dispatched to investigate the potential threat.

On Earth, she takes on the guise of a shapely female, who the recently widowed scientist takes an instant shine to.

However, Celeste’s unorthodox behaviour causes Steven’s daughter (Alyson Hannigan) to question her new mother’s origins.

Meanwhile, Celeste’s human experiences cause her to question her planet’s imminent invasion.

Though marred by hokey effects, a hackneyed script and cornball performances, My Stepmother Is an Alien does have a generous dose of kitschy 80s charm.

Incidentally, an extraterrestrial/human marriage involves way fewer appendages than a polyamory one.

He wants the Breasts of both Worlds. He’s the…

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