The Conjuring

You know that any movie opening with a life-sized doll acting as a conduit for a demon is going to be a scary-ass movie. I didn't know that this film was also based on a supposedly true story until I watched the opening credit sequence. Any one of these films such as the Amityville Horror or A Haunting in Connecticut always tend to stick with me just because they supposedly happened. This film in particular was probably the scariest film I've seen since Paranormal Activity 3 about 1 1/2 years ago. 

The opening  sequence introduces the two paranormal investigators Ed and Lorraine Warren (played by Patrick Wilson and Vera Farmiga) showing a video of some of their work to a college class. After the title sequence the movie starts off like 95% of all other horror films, the family moves into the creepy old house that they got a great deal on from the bank because no one else wanted to buy it..... Besides the beginning of the film being filled with endless cliche's, I really enjoyed it for the most part. The acting and cinematography was actually quite good. I wouldn't expect anything less from a film being directed by James Wan. The film also did something that most other horror films don't, it included actors that I actually recognized such as Ron Livingston and Lili Taylor. 

I definitely thought the film lived up to all of the hype over how scary it was. With as many horror films as I've seen it's hard to make me actually freak out when watching a film and it did a pretty good job of that. It didn't include too many unnecessary jump scares and actually used suspense and make up to do the scaring. The film contained a lot of elements seen in other contemporary horror films like the Paranormal Activity franchise such as invisible entities pulling and dragging characters. However, it also did a good job revealing the terrifying face of the entity when necessary.

If you're someone that loves horror or going to see scary movies, this will be right up your ally. If you want to see it but are new to the genre, I would start with some older films on Netflix or from a friends collection until you've worked yourself up a tolerance that these films require. I honestly think that this film is today what The Exorcist was for audiences in 1973.

Film Rating: 9/10

The Wolverine

It's about time Wolverine got his own stand-alone movie (yeah were just going to ignore that other turd of a film). So anyone that likes Wolverine, the X-men, super heroes, or just awesome summer blockbusters will appreciate this film. The film had pretty good dialogue and interactions between the characters, the fight scenes were spectacular, and the special effects were great. 

Here's a brief synopsis if you're not already familiar: 
Taking place a few years after X-men: The Last Stand, Logan (a.k.a. Wolverine) is now living as a hermit, tormented every night by nightmares of him having to kill his love, Jean Grey. He feels that his life has no purpose and that he must suffer for an eternity. Until he is confronted by a katana-toting girl from Japan who tells Logan that her employer wants him to come see him. Her employer, a dying old man named Yoshida was once a Japanese soldier during World War II. Logan, being immortal happened to be in Japan when the bomb was dropped on Nagasaki and saved this soldier. Now Wolverine gets caught up in a war between the Japanese mob and ninja's protecting Yoshida's family.

I really enjoyed this movie. We finally got to see some well deserved justice brought to the Wolverine character on the big screen. Hugh Jackman always gets better, and better each time he reprises this role.
Although I really enjoyed this movie, there were a couple downfalls. I thought that this was probably one of the most violent superhero film's I've seen in a while. There is a decent amount of cursing as well. I would keep the younger viewers away from this film. Normally I would say a superhero rated PG-13 is okay for all viewers, but this one of the rare ones that I wouldn't recommend to anyone under the age of 13. However, this heavy rating did not weigh it down in the least bit:

Film Rating: 8.5/10

Pacific Rim

  I loved Godzilla, Gamera, King Kong, and giant monster movies as far back as I can remember. So when I heard that Guillermo Del Toro (one of my favorite film makers) was making a movie about Kaiju (Japanese for giant monster) fighting giant robots, I was in. 

The unfortunate thing about this film was that it was financially unsuccessful. I might dare to say, that it was my favorite film so far this year so it pains me to see it fail at the box office. However, this was not fault of the film makers, only the studio for doing poor marketing. 

Anyway, what I loved about the film....Kind of a big topic. In every other Kaiju film I've seen, the acting as not been so good. Not only were the actors great in this film, but their characters were actually relevant to the story. The special effects were amazing. Del Toro always puts in 120% into making sure his creatures are the most detailed things you will ever see. Each Kaiju was unique, yet paid homage to another monster from other films. The giant robots were done very well. The were just as big as these enormous creatures, and were made to look (for lack of a better word) realistic as possible. The way that they moved with their engines just made sense. 

 I really believe this a movie that the whole family can enjoy. There is little to no cussing, and all of the violence is between giant monsters and robots. The only human violence was a martial arts fight scene and a short fist fight.This film is great for anyone that loves Kaiju films, or anyone that just wants to see a great sci-fi action film.

Film Rating: 9.5/10

Pokemon TCG Collection

   So lately I've been going through my old Pokemon cards, and with the help of my wonderful girlfriend, organizing and valuing them in hopes of selling them to another collector. I've also been expanding my collection the past couple weeks in order to make it as appealing and valuable as possible. After researching what others do to make their collections valuable, I found videos on YouTube of people opening sealed booster pack boxes of older cards in the series. I was able to find one for a very reasonable price so I took it. Here's the video of me opening my first 36-pack booster box: 

                                         

                                       

This Is The End

If you need a good laugh, look no further, this treasure of a film is the funniest comedy I have seen all year, probably longer. I was laughing non-stop from beginning to end. If you're not familiar with the premise, the film follows Seth Rogen, Jay Baruchel, James Franco, Jonah Hill, Craig Robinson, and Danny McBride, all playing fictionalized versions of themselves. The film begins as Jay comes to visit Seth in L.A. and they go to a party at James Franco's house where all the celebrities are going wild. As the party goes on through the night, the Apocalypse (as foretold in the bible) begins! After all the other celebrities are brutally (and hilariously killed) the 6 men must barricade themselves in James's house and ration what little food and water they have. Little do they know, they are not alone....

All of the celebrities at James Franco's party gather outside of his house to watch to their horror as a giant sinkhole to the pits of Hell opens right in front of them.

   Some of the things I liked most about this film were that they actors were able to make fun of themselves with the films they had been in before. There is even a scene where they make a home-made, Pineapple Express 2. After they become trapped in the house, you kind of forget that the film takes place during the apocalypse, meaning demons are running loose. I literally jumped out of my seat at one point during the film. Of course all of the humor is extremely crude, anyone who has seen any of the other films with these actors will know this. I was also really surprised at how high of a budget they got to make this film. There are actually amazing, and unique special-effects. All things considered, this is a great film. If you love raunchy comedies and apocalypse movies, this film is right up your ally.

Film Rating: 9/10

World War Z

   World War Z, based on the book of the same name by author Max Brooks. I did not read this book, however I did read his book titled The Zombie Survival Guide. This was a very interesting book for anyone who likes anything to do with Zombies, Sci-fi, or horror. Anyway, this is about the movie, not another book of his. Over all, this movie was alright, I wasn't expecting too much from it. The massive zombie hordes featured in the trailers for this movie looked way too animated, and at some points it was really unbelievable, like when they all pile up on each other to climb a big wall. These zombies were not the undead zombies that we're accustomed too as of late from media such as The Walking Dead, Resident Evil, etc. These zombies are really twitchy and still technically living creatures, just infected with a virus that resembles rabies or mad cow disease. If any of you have seen 28 Days Later, you know the kind of zombies we're talking about.

   From what I've heard, this film is very loosely based on the book (like most film adaptations), so major plot holes may not be the fault of the author. As far as the acting, this was not Brad Pitt's best performance, certainly not his weakest. He was the only character in the film that I actually cared about when watching the film. I honestly think he could have lost his family in the first 10 minutes of the film and the film would be just as good or better, because then he would have found more motivation to find the cure for the zombie-virus outbreak. Although this certainly isn't my favorite zombie apocalypse movie, I still enjoyed it, and would probably see it again if someone really wanted me to. 

Film Rating: 7/10

Rating System

So I decided that unlike most movie critics, instead of rating a movie out of 5 Stars, I'm going to give it a number between 0 and 10 points; 0 being the worst movie ever made, 10 being amazing. This way I can give or take more points as I see fit. Look for the rating I give to each film I critique at the end of the review. It will look like this: Film Rating: #/10