Be Kind, Please Rewind

He Works Out of Shape. He’s the…

Vidiot

Week of August 30, 2013

Home gyms are just installation art. First up…

Pain & Gain

Since prison is more or less a free gym, bodybuilders becoming criminals seems an obvious progression.

However, the muscle-heads in this comedy would prefer to be out spending their ill-gotten gains.

Daniel (Mark Wahlberg) is a personal trainer who aspires to make millions.

To achieve this, he enlists his dimwitted buddies (Anthony Mackie, Dwayne Johnson) to help kidnap and extort a fortune from a client of his, Victor (Tony Shalhoub).

While the three dumbbells successfully get Victor to sign his riches over to them, they fail to properly kill him - on more than one occasion.

As a result, Victor hires an ex-P.I. (Ed Harris) to find his bogus beneficiaries. 

Based on real events, director Michael Bay softens the malevolence of these murderous meatheads with kooky comedy, and the tragic story with stylized hyperbole.

What’s worse: being the hostage of a body-builder means that you have to spot for them.  0

Kon-Tiki

The biggest squabbles between 5 Norwegians and a Swede adrift on the ocean would likely be over the last bottle of SPF 50.

However, the fair-skinned seafarers in this historical-drama have bigger sharks to fry.

Determined to prove his theory that Polynesia had been settled by South Americans, explorer/ethnographer Thor Heyerdahl (Pål Sverre Valheim Hagen) puts his money where his mouth is.

Hiring a crew (Anders Baasmo Christiansen, Odd-Magnus Williamson, Tobias Santelmann, Gustaf Skarsgård) and assembling a raft adhering to the islanders’ balsawood technique, Thor sets sail.

Unmoored in the Pacific, Thor and his crew face a number of adversities, including storms, Great Whites and dissention from the crew.

While this epic adventure plays fast and loose with Thor’s real journey from Peru to Polynesia, it is to the visual benefit of the viewer.

Academics aside, the real reason these Viking ancestors wanted to sail to Polynesia was to pillage it.  0

***Pacific Emotion***

Hell in the Pacific

The worst part about conducting a war on a South Pacific beach is trying not to step on any of the sunbathers.

Fortunately, the warring factions in this drama are the only people on the island.

Amid the dogfights of WWII, an American pilot (Lee Marvin) is shot down over the Pacific.

Deserted on an islet, the pilot discovers he’s not alone - a Japanese Navy Officer (Toshiro Mifune) is also marooned there.

Instinctively, the two immediately try to kill one another with their limited weaponry.

Overtime, however, the pair must learn to cooperate in order to survive.

But is there enough room on the atoll for the Japanese castaway’s honour and the Yankee castaway’s bullheadedness?

With only two stars, minimal dialogue and an exotic setting, Hell in the Pacific breaks war down to its basics, and dissects.

Furthermore, this island coupling led to the creation of Japanese-American fusion cuisine.

He’s a Type-Castaway. He’s the…

Vidiot