Man from UNCLE

This is a fun movie.  Armie Hammer (Lone Ranger) was very good as a Soviet thug.   Henry Cavill  (Superman) played the always in control spy very well.  Alicia Vikander (Ex Machina) did a great job too, her character was fun and complicated.  Also the editing was excellent.  

As a kid I enjoyed those over the top spy movies, and Mike Myers' Austin Powers movies.  This movie adds to that cannon of funny spy films.  I never really watched the Man from UNCLE TV series, because I was too young.  Maybe not even alive when it was on the idiot box.

I always think it is absurd in movies and other media how spies, police, etc. are portrayed as flawlessly skilled in all activities.  These spy spoofs are kind of a relief from the Mission Impossble/007 movies where the main character can do anything at anytime.  

Fantastic Four

How many times are they going to reboot this Fantastic Four?  Four times perhaps?  I guess Fox owns this Marvel franchise, so that is probably part of the problem.  This reinvention of the concept was just ok.  They put the beginning in modern day, instead of using the original ideas.  Kind of a bad idea because the die hard fans will not like a complete overhall of the origin of their powers.  But in this day and age where people do not know the history of WW2 let alone the history of a comic book franchise, Fox is safe.

Still it was an interesting idea, if you are coming at the film not really caring about the original.   In this version the 4 people get their super powers from traveling to a separate dimension, a dimension that the Miles Teller (Whiplash) stumbles on as a wunderkind attempting to move object from A to B in a Star Trek/teleporter style.  

Stretching, flying around on fire, being invisible, being made of rock, all pale, to me, compared to the power to figure out how to travel to a different dimension.  So, to me the whole franchise is a bit flawed from the beginning.  But it was still interesting to watch if you like comic book based action movies with lots of explosions and other special effects.  

Vacation

I have seen the previous Vacation movies starring Chevy Chase and Beverly DeAngelo.  They were funny parts here and there.  This rebooting of this franchise was decent.  I would say that I probably laughed more at this new one, than at the older versions.

Ed Helms is very funny as Clark Griswald's grown son.  Chevy Chase's cameo was fun.  Charlie Day (Always Sunny) needs to be in more movies.  He is just a great comedic actor.  Steele Steebins did a great job as Kevin Griswald.  His character was very funny.  Skyler Gisondo was good too.  I think they did a better job than the original with the child characters.

I think that too much of this film was revealed in the trailers, but I still got some quality laughs from it.  Specifically, Chris Hemsworth's work was funny, the scenes with the strange car were very funny, especially when the driver's seat turned around.

Terminator Genisys

Arnold Schwarzenegger is back to acting, and the Terminator movies are back.  Good thing too, mostly.  This was an interesting reboot of the whole story.  I love science fiction time travel movies, so I was destined to love this one.  The Terminator timeline is starting to get a little confusing though.

I thought J.K. Simmons was great as the traumatized detective trying to piece everything together.  The new Kyle Reese (Jai Courtney) and Sarah Connor (Emilia Clarke) do a great job.

This is one of those movies that people point to when they worry about artificial intelligence.  Skynet can be used as a term to represent those fears that people have concerning AI.  I think that it is amazing that a B movie (the original Terminator movie, I think can be considered a B movie) expresses our fears and has entered the lexicon for conversations about something that will definitely impact our future (AI).  So when people express their fears about AI, they will use terms like Skynet.

Me and Earl and the Dying Girl

Ok, where do we begin with this one, and how do we presume?  I  was worried about seeing this movie, because it looked like a teen movie for the summer, kids being off and all.  But it did receive some award at Sundance, so what the heck.  

First off, the characters, a white teen, a black teen, and a Jewish teen all mashed together, ok.  The black teen character smokes menthols, and talks like a tough guy, seems stereo-typical to me.  Black teen character also lives on tough side of town, his older brother owns a pit bull, and of course the one "fight" in the movie is when the black teen hits the white teen in the stomach.  Oh, I forgot about the  other fight scene where the white rapper kid with corn-rows fights with the white teen character, and the black teen comes to his rescue and beats the crap out of the white rapper kid.  OK.  

The sick girl is dying of leukemia, and she is sick and dies.  

What did I like about this movie?  The idea of learning about someone after they die.  And of course the teacher character, with tattoos, is the one that just straight out says this is what he learned after the death of his father.  

Of course, we learn more about the dying girl after she dies.  She apparently wanted to be a squirrel when she was younger, and ran away to the park next to her house to become one.  

What did I not like?  There was a montage.  Waste of time, to show the passing of time in a movie.  I guess.  For some reason I don't like montages.  Also, the hollywood perfectness of it all.  This main character and his black menthol smoking tough guy friend make 60 something movies together.  Main character gets into college, but then is denied because he spends all of his time seeing this dying girl, and not doing homework.  And dying girl takes time off from dying to write letter to college to try and get main character back into college.  There is a scene where dying girl is confronted with her death in the form of the main character trying to get into college, and she forces main character to apply to college, but dying girl tells main character that she is going to die so no need to apply to college for her.  What about the black character?  No college mention for him that I recall.  This is messy, but what I see as hollywood perfectness of it all is that she wrote the letter, and that he probably gets back into the college.  They leave that part out, that he probably gets back into college.  But there is a scene where the father and mother discuss the situation and the father says it is not the end of the world.  That was kind of interesting and rational.  Also, we meet the main character's parents and the dying girl's mother, but not Earl's parents, just his brother and the brother's dog (are they stand-ins for the parents?).  Also dying girl scene is confusing, first he is going to the prom, but then he ends up at hospital where dying girl is dying.  Did I miss something?  

Also, this movie, I think, was influenced by Wes Anderson, which I think is great.  I love Wes Anderson movies. 

Overrall I liked this movie.

Spy

Melissa McCarthy is definitely a funny woman.  I would love to see a movie that comes from her mind, something that she completely comes up with, the idea, the writing, the story, all of it.  Until then, this is what we get:  Spy.

It is spoof of Spy movies, kind of a female version of a Mr. Bean movie, with McCarthy standing in for Rowan Atkinson.  McCarthy is amazing, so is Rose Byrne and Miranda Hart.  Jude Law and Jason Statham make good comic turns.  Overrall there are great people in this movie.

Deep Web

I saw this documentary last night, made by Alex Winter, the guy in Bill &  Ted's Excellent Adventure.  

This was a very interesting and informative documentary about the Silk Road website, and bitcoin.  I have only been moderately aware of these two things prior through the headlines, read a few articles, and there is a subreddit concerning bitcoin.  

This documentary informed me about the possible non-violent intentions of the Silk Road, that I was not aware of at all.  I, like many people, think that the war on drugs is a waste of time, lives, and money.  Drug addiction is a health issue, and should not be dealt with as a crime.  

The documentary made it appear that Ross Ubricht was possibly framed by the government.  Especially concerning the murder for hire charges that were never brought, but were used as excuses to deny bail, and keep information away from the defense.  

The best films make you think and question the way things exist.  The Deep Web definitely makes you think and question our current situation.