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rgenerosa
Reviews
Tropic Thunder (2008)
Ben Stiller brings the Thunder
What do you get when you put "Platoon", "Robert Altman's The Player", and "Three Amigos" in a blender? You get a very tasty concoction called "Tropic Thunder". By now, the premise of the movie is fairly well known...a group of actors (including soon-to-be has-been Tugg Speedman, overly-dedicated method-man Kirk Lazurus, and an obnoxious junkie/comic played by Jack Black) get trapped in a guerilla infested area of Laos, but think it's just another day on the set of their big-budget Vietnam flick, "Tropic Thunder". "Three Amigos", anyone? Part action flick, part social commentary, and part skewer of the movie industry,this film was a total blast, cementing beyond anyone's doubt Ben Stiller's comic genius (he directed) and Robert Downey Jr.'s reputation as,if not "the most talented actor of his generation", then at least "the most talented actor EVER..." Great dialouge, interesting characters , and action scenes better than most ACTION movies make "Tropic Thunder" an ass kicker...would've liked to see more Tom Cruise (as Les Grossman, a comically frightening producer/studio head) though....It's good to know that Hollywood heavies like Stiller, Downey Jr., and Tom Cruise can laugh at themselves. Because if you can't laugh at yourself, what the hell else can you laugh at?
Kids (1995)
What's all the fuss?
I don't know why this movie terrifies everyone....I saw where some critic was saying this movie should be "required watching" for every teacher and parent in America...chill out, it's just a movie and a pretty crappy one to boot! Wow, some punky, unwashed kids drink, shoplift, do drugs, and have random unprotected sex...what else is new? Pretty lame.... I think all the mass hysteria surrounding this film has a lot to do with all the moral panic we see in this country....don't do this, don't do that, smarten up, stop this, control that...when the people laying down these rules probably have more skeletons in their closet than Jeffery Dahmer... Whatever, sex and drugs don't scare me....I did it when I was young, the only difference between me and the punks in this movie was I took a bath in the morning....
Running Scared (2006)
Running Scared kicks!!!
This film is truly original. Gritty, atmospheric, and nightmarish, it's probably the only mafia/crime drama flick ever made that could be mistaken (or categorized) as a horror film. Joey Gazelle (Paul Walker in a remarkably believable performance)is a low level Mafia shooter who spends a dark and scary night searching the bizarre and dangerous criminal underworld of New Jersey for a missing child- a kid in possession of a stolen gun that could mean big trouble if the cops, the Russian mob, or Gazelle's bosses find it first. He's trapped in a twisting, shadowy labyrinth of mobsters, dirty cops, menacing housing projects, sadistic pimps, and snuff pornographers...a claustrophobic maze from which no one escapes alive. Everything about this film is, for lack of a better word, a trip. The direction, cinematography, dialouge, and action scenes are top notch, making the viewer's skin crawl on more than one occasion. Make no bones about it, this film gets pretty intense. You might want to sleep with the nite-lite on after viewing it. But if you like action movies and are getting tired with your typical Hollywood/Will Smith/ Bruce Willis fare, this film will smash you full in the face like a hockey puck. (And if you've seen the movie, you know what I mean when I mention "hockey puck.") This flick totally rocked!