Brave

Brave

Rating 5.5 out of 10

I have been a big Pixar fan from the start.  Loved nearly every movie they have released (Cars II?).  From the first trailer released I was looking forward to this movie.  With a Pixar film you know you are going to get incredible visuals.  Usually have characters you fall in love with and a cute story you can root for.  What I really like is their movies are for the whole family.  It's just as entertaining for the parents as it is for the small kids.

Sadly Brave is little of that.  While this movie probably deserves better than a 5.5 rating I just expected so much more that it is a let down.  The biggest star of the movie is the cool red hair attached to our star, the young princess.  She is cute enough and likable enough but for the life of me I can't remember what her name (or any other character in the movie) is.  The story is probably pretty good for the ten and under crowd.  It had the wife and myself checking our watches.

In Brave there is a kingdom that has been split into four areas.  Our redhead's father is the King of it all.   Her mom desperately wants a prissy girly girl to be the next queen.  Instead she is very much the tomboy that prefers to riding horses and shooting arrows to dressing up and fine china.

When Mom throws a big party with the son's of the other kingdoms battling it out for her hand in marriage Red want's none of that.  She runs away to the forrest and finds a witch who creates a magic potion to change her mom.  The potion goes wrong and mom is in a bad way.  Can't say much more than that without giving spoilers other than to say it's up to Red to save the day.

Not a bad movie.  Just aimed at the much younger crowd.  Kiddos will love it.  Parents will be bored.

 : <

Calico Joe- Book

Calico Joe by John Grisham

Rating 8 out of 10

I have been a fan of Grisham's books since the beginning with mixed results.  Some I really liked ( The Firm, Painted House, the Appeal, the Summons, the Pelican Brief, the Rainmaker and Playing for Pizza to name a few) and some I did not ( The Testament, the Brethren, Skipping Christmas and most of his newer books).  I would put Calico Joe on the books I liked list.

The book parallels the lives of a would be great baseball player for the Chicago Cubs and a young boy who idolizes him while is own very abusive father is a major league pitcher for the New York Mets.  Joe Castle (from the small Arkansas town of Calico Rock thus the nickname of Calico Joe) starts is baseball career is historic fashion that Summer of 1973 when it is tragically cut short.

This is a book that is hard to describe without giving spoilers.  You don't have to be a baseball fan to enjoy this book, but I would say it helps.  The book is a little slow to start and some of the baseball stories are a little far fetched (no rookie is going to hit 20 home runs in his first 50 at bats).  The book does wrap up all the loose ends and has an ending I think most all will be happy with.

It's not a very long book and is a quick read.  If you like Grisham books in general I don't think you'll be disappointed here.

Prometheus

Prometheus


Rating 5 out of 10

I am a huge fan of the first Alien movie by Prometheus director Ridley Scott.  In my book it's a classic as is Aliens.  We don't have to talk about three and four.  Scott has swore to high heaven Prometheus is not a prequel to Alien and after viewing I'd say he's probably right.  But he threw in enough Alien things and made it similar enough to get the fans into the theater seats.  Prometheus definitely does not explain Alien.  In fact it goes two hours without explaining much of anything.  It leaves you with more questions than answers.

The movie starts with our star Elizabeth Shaw (played all by Noomi Rapace- the original and best Girl with Dragon Tattoo) and her partner finding paintings on a wall somewhere from cave man days that match paintings other other walls around the world that somehow proves there is another planet way out there that has beings that created humans on Earth.  Hollywood always seems to go out of their way to try to prove there is no God and this movie bends over backward trying.

When a Ted Turner type old guy on his death bed funds this zillion dollar trip to that planet he is hoping since these beings created us they can show him how to live forever.  Problem is when they get to the planet things are not as he hoped.  Hard to say much more than that without giving spoilers.  Things go bad right away.  Not sure I get the "if we leave now there may not be an Earth to go back to" line in the movie.  That along with about a hundred others.

Still the movie is visually fun to look at (even in the 2D I saw) and acting is very good.  Charlize Theron shows us for the second time this month she can be very good in an average movie (looks good too).  Michael Fassbender (how did Hollywood not get him to change his name?) is great as the robot droid guy that it seems will be common thing in 75 short years.

It's after you leave the theater and try to make sense of what you just saw when the problems start.  My rating dropped 1.5 points from yesterday.  If this movie looks like something you want to see I'd recommend a theater viewing rather than small screen dvd.  It's worth a watch just set the bar lower than I did.

If you have seen it and would like to discuss I'd love to hear from you.  You can email me or add comments in the section here.

Snow White and the Huntsman

Snow White and the Huntsman

Rating 6 out of 10

I have a problem with movies that via their trailers make a movie out to be a non stop action adventure extravaganza.  I understand why they do it, but still have a problem with it.  Even if the movie is otherwise pretty good I still feel somehow cheated.  Of course this is one of those movies.  This movie does indeed have some action.  Just not nearly as much as you would be led to believe.

This ladies and gentlemen is not your childhood Disney Snow White cartoon.  In fact this movie has very little in common with the cartoon.  It has the evil queen played by Charlize Theron who seems to get better looking year after year.  Of course there is Snow White.  This time it's played by the vampire loving Kristen Stewart.  Snow White is a princess (don't recall that being the case in the cartoon) her father, the king, is tricked into marrying the lovely Charlize who then kills him and takes over the kingdom.  The child Snow White is imprisoned.  Many years later Snow escapes prison as the queen realizes her heart will keep her young forever.

When Snow White escapes into the dark forest the queen enlists the huntsman (played by Thor himself Chris Hemsworth) to track her down and bring her back.  He falls for her charms and takes her side.

There are dwarfs although not really seven.  They are named Gus and Trajan instead of Sleepy and Dopey.  They are ax wielding warriors instead of happy go lucky miners.

This is a mostly entertaining movie that would make a good rental in a few months.