Salt

Angelina Jolie does her thing in this. Unbelievable stunts. And I do mean that they were completely unbelievable. Interesting idea though, sleeper agents causing havoc. And it was a pretty good action flick all in all, but it was just completely unbelievable, like her character was a super hero.

Despicable Me in 3D

I saw this with my nephews. It was good. Funny here and there and my nephews enjoyed it.

Shrink

I was flipping through all the movies on demand and found one called Shrink. I looked at the info, and it stars Kevin Spacey, Robin Williams, and a few other people. I have liked many things that Spacey has been in, of course the Usual Suspects, Glen Gary, etc., KPax, and the Men Who Stare at Goats, so the guy has a good track record for picking interesting roles.

In this movie he plays shrink to the stars, whose wife recently killed herself. His character is self medicating with marijuana, which is ok in California, where the movie is set. The other characters are mostly his patients and what they are up to in their lives. There was a powerful agent (probably the most interesting character other than the main), a young black girl whose mother also just committed suicide, a writer that wants to be Spacey's patient, but is his god son through marriage or something like that. Also, one of the characters is Spacey's pot dealer, named Jesus. The young black girl, Jemma, was a pretty interesting character too, she's a movie lover, and one of the things she did with her mother was go to the movies. Also, the movie is set in the Hollywood Hills. Having wandered around Hollywood a little bit, it was kind of neat to see that neighborhood shown off a little.

This movie was filled with dark humor. For example, Spacey's character has just written a self-help book about making yourself happy, yet he is miserable because of his wife's suicide.

I enjoyed the movie and it did make me tear up a little here and there. Of course Spacey's character helps the other suicide victim cope with her loss, and comes to grips, as well as one can, with his own loss of his wife. He stops self medicating and moves on with his life.

I do not even remember hearing about this movie. I do not remember seeing one advertisement for it, trailer, etc. So, this movie was a find for me. It is the type of situation I really enjoy, not knowing anything about a movie, just giving it a chance, and liking it. But if you aren't going to give a Kevin Spacey movie a try, then you probably don't like movies. Sometimes movies are over hyped and they show you all the interesting stuff in the previews and commercials, then you see the movie, and are left feeling like you've already seen the good parts 30 times already, so it ends up being a little boring. But usually I at least hear about a movie, this one I didn't hear a thing about, but I am glad that I found it.

The Last Air Bender

I don't know why I saw this movie. I have never seen any of the cartoons that it is based on, but it looked interesting, and M. Knight Shamalamadingdong directed it, and I usually like his movies.

I did not see M. Knight's touch on this movie at all. It could've been directed by anyone. I remember this letter from William S. Burroughs to, I think, Allen Ginsburg, where Burroughs expresses his worries that the stuff he is writing could be written by anyone. Well, some artists imprimatur are unmistakable. They cannot hide themselves. But I guess Knight can. But I do not blame him, sometimes work is about getting paid, even if it is creative work.

The story is an interesting idea, with the world being divided into tribes that are somehow related to the basic elements: earth, air, fire, and water. The fire tribe seems to be super aggressive and is trying to rule the world. The last air bender is important because I guess air benders can manipulate all the elements. Each tribe is supposed to have people that can bend or manipulate that tribe's element.

It was not an amazing movie. It was enjoyable.

Predators

I was a little hesitant to go to this movie, thinking, "what if I get scarred?" I think I was kind of associating "Predators" with "Aliens," since lately they have been linked. Aliens scare to crap out of me. I actually saw the original in the theater, I think one holiday with my brother and uncle, maybe even my dad went. I think I saw it at the Parkway mall theater. Not the one that is there now, but the one that was there previously before the remodel. I saw the Blues Brothers there too.

But I digress.

Predators was a decent action/science fiction flick. Adrien Brody does his best gravely voiced action hero impression for the entire film. A new kind of role for him. I think he pulled it off. Topher Grace was the other out of place face. I would not expect to see him in a movie like this. His character reveals himself later as a serial killer, which was kind of interesting.

Pretty cool idea, instead of the predators coming to earth to hunt, they capture hardcore prey and have them dropped off at a game preserve for hunting. I liked the movie, didn't see enough in the previews and commercials to ruin it for me, so it was still a little fresh. They do reveal in the previews the idea of a game preserve, which they probably should have kept that detail back.