Reviews

I didn't quite understand the whole philosophy behind the 'beekeeper' and how he deals with the hive and all that. It sounded very convoluted, and quite frankly, the metaphor made zero sense.

But that was the least of the problems with this movie. It starts off confusing - the woman (Eloise Parker) Jason Statham's character Adam Clay is staying with, gets scammed and takes her life. Wait, this elderly lady is packing a semi automatic pistol in the house? I was expecting that it would turn out she was murdered by the people who's money she lost. There was burning food on the stove, so that seemed like a clue. Nope, she really did do herself in. No attempt to talk to anybody, including her daughter, an FBI agent, to try to fix the situation. The daughter by the way, was dull, and fell shoehorned in. If the daughter stopped showing up in the film, you wouldn't have noticed she was missing.

Going back to what sets off Adam Clay in the first place. Statham just happens to drop off a jar of honey at the same time that Parker's daughter happens to show up, and they both see Mother Parker dead. And we learn soon after that she hardly visited her mother, but just happened to visit the house this exact second, no reason. I was expecting that she would say 'my mom's burglar alarm was tripped and I was called to check it out', but nope, just random.

Then throughout the movie, Adam Clay goes on a rampage burning down the companies and subcompanies run by the scammer. The big twist, which was also pointless, was this spoiled brat scammer was the son of the current US (woman) president. What? How did that even matter to the story?

What is really odd as well, was that Statham's character went on killing people, and beating up law enforcement, but at no time did he show he even know how or tried, to get back any of the money. The charity was still out $2million at the end of the film, and that was pretty much it. He had one big fight with a merc at the end who for whatever reason, it was decided giving him an artificial leg would be a useful plot device. It didn't add much to the fight scene at all.

Also disappointing was the earlier fight scene where the 'current' beekeeper is sent to deal with Adam Clay, the former one. SHE goes on a murder rampage at a gas station with a mini gun, and nobody in Law Enforcement seems even mildly astonished at the scale of the damage. It was hilarious how bad this scene was done.

Overall a movie that I only give 2 stars because some of the fight scenes were well done, but overall, a waste of time to watch.

I felt that the director spent too much energy establishing the distance in time and location, that she didn't develop the characters enough to make you feel empathy for any of them.

Sure many of us have had that childhood crush that we wish could be revisited in later years, or at least some curiosity of what happened in the meantime. But it feels like those gaps in time weren't filled with anything. It's as if the characters had stopped for 12 years, then started again, then stopped, then started again, which would not be realistic.

I was also half expecting Nora to talk about 9/11 as they were on the boat, and how it affected her, as she would have been living in NYC at that time, but that wasn't even brought up. Not that it was crucial to the plot of the film, but it did shape a lot of people's lives who lived through it.

What really got under my skin, though, was the long pauses. I get it, you want to convey emotion through watching the characters pausing and looking at each other without saying anything. But after the 3rd or 4th time, it just felt really forced.

Ultimately, I didn't really feel any emotion for any of the characters, and what good is a drama if you aren't connecting with the people in it? Worth a look, but in the end, you don't really feel you learned anything at the end.

I can't believe that an adult directed this film, it was so poorly done, I would have thought it was done by a teen. The jokes were non-existent, and much of it depended upon the characters wearing silly wigs, or acting ditsy.

Examples of really glaring continuity issues: The three guys including Ice Cube's son, and a blonde Sam Rockwell clone, started walking into the woods looking for the coke pretty early on. It seems like they're walking for hours. Then older cop guy shows up hours later, who gets out of breath just getting out of the car, and he arrives at the gazebo LONG before the three stooges arrive. What?!!

Later said cop is on top of the gazebo and is SHOT by a rifle by Ray Liotta. You'd think it was done on purpose. But then you see the three guys run off into the woods, and meet up with Ray Liotta standing there with his rifle, and he has no idea what they're talking about when referring to going to the gazebo. Huh? You just shot a guy standing on it?

The ending with the water fall is ridiculous, where did that cliff come from? The ground for the whole movie was FLAT. But somehow, they walk in a cave from flat ground, and end up at a cliff 1000 feet high?!

The only fun part of this movie is the title and using it to reference other things. The film itself is terrible, and you're not missing anything if you haven't seen it.

I saw all the glowing reviews for this movie, so I was expecting a winner. But this menu lacked flavor.

Problems with this movie: Nobody you cared about; why did Chef decide to do this final menu; why did everyone believe in his cause; how were these people who came that 'bad' or deserving of their fate; why would he tell at least one of them what he was planning; and what was the point of setting up a fake coast guard, how did he know that would even be needed; what was the point of having his mother there; how does the protagonist not only figure out how to start up the boat but also pilot it in the dark.

The movie had good pacing, but the direction this film was going, even who would survive in the end, was way too obvious early on. A shame that so many great actors were somewhat wasted in this film.

What a horrible start to a horrible idea for a season. The opening scene alone set the tone for the stupidity of the action. Was that Fast & The Furious meets Harry Potter?

Then we see the guy who is to be the new companion. He looks about as lively and charismatic as Bob Dole and John Kerry combined.

And what happened with the show's continuity? We see the terrier alien literally smash down his from door, and when he gets put in the cage, he's lying on the ground. The Doctor shows up, the door is intact, and there a perfect square on the floor as if the cage was upright. Huh?! In addition to bad writing, now they have bad continuity.

Then the doctor sees the flux is chasing after her, so she decides to head straight to Earth where it proceeds to chase her, like the TARDIS was a spaceship? What happened to dematerializing? And 7 billion dog ships is not going to protect the earth, they wouldn't even surround a fifth of the surface area.

I think this season is going to make the fans just pray for the show's death. Very disappointing it fell off the rails after Matt Smith....

Last year was spectacular, so sadly after two episodes, it appears we're heading down another weak season. The usual alternating good and bad seasons that have plagued Fear The Walking Dead.

I'm not loving this whole nuclear fallout world of walking dead. Seriously, they're still alive living inside that dark haze? None of it makes any sense.

Episode was particularly bad. You Grace acting all strange with a new baby, then you see they've been living in the nuclear submarine the whole time. Just cringe worthy forced drama. Then they meet up with the same two people that Grace was hiding from in the beginning of the episode. They were driving for how long? So how did Grace get there?

Then towards the end, the story seems to fall apart. You get these zombies that come and go, one minute they're not around so they're repairing the car in the middle of the street, next thing, they're all over the place.

Then Morgan and Grace leave that woman after Grace has just shot and killed her husband, and it's like it never happened. Would the woman be kind of upset?

And then what was up with that last scene, with the guy and the box with the head? I

It seems like they're going for a zombies meets Mad Max type of season. I sure hope it gets better.

The concept of tying in vampire lore with a mob movie was quite interesting. Mob movies were the rage in the late 80s, early 90s, so this could have been added to that sub-genre of crime film.

But sadly, this movie suffers from poor direction and poor story writing.

Let me first start with the technical problems. I found the editing really really bad. Scenes would end suddenly, then jump into another scene you thought was related to the previous scene, but then it turns out they were either happening miles apart, or at a different time. It was really poorly done. For example, the scene where Anthony LaPaglia first meets Marie, this is right after him and Chaz. Palminteri had their heart to heart talk, then he walks off, I'm guessing, to go to his car. LaPaglia is about to get into his car, has an interaction with Marie, she decides he's not worth eating, and walks off. Next second you see her cross the street, and get hit by Chaz's car. And then there's a huge yelling. Anyway, it feels like LaPagia's character should have been just across the street and come over to smooth things over, but that's not what happens. That's just one example of where the editing is weird and the flow of the story is jarring or thrown off.

As another reviewer mentioned, the whole plot of the Mobsters getting turned into vampires is interesting but goes nowhere. Well, one problem is right after Marie bites Robert Loggia's mafia Don character. For whatever reason, she doesn't run away before the cops arrive?! She was already out of the apartment, and was on the roof, and so she waited there until LaPaglia finally shows up, at which time she decides to run?!! That made no sense.

Anyway, as the movie progresses Loggia just keeps biting one mobster after another, and they all brag how they're going to 'run this town'. But we never see who the competition is. Who are these other organized crime groups they are up against? All you see is just this one family and so the movie feels half thought out by the end.

One thing that bothered me was Landis was sloppy with his vampire tropes. We never get to see them dispatched the usual way. I mean, when has a vampire died from a gun shot to the head? I understand if you blow off their WHOLE head, that's hard to come back from. But a small handgun shot? There were no stakes to the heart, holy water moments. Heck, this 'vampire' Marie even had a reflection and she was running around inside of a church! WTF?! I was beginning to doubt she was a real vampire, just someone faking it, because of those non-vampire characteristics.

There are a few 'cute' moments when you see cameos by horror royalty, like Tom Savini as a paparazzi, Sam Raimi as the meat locker employee, and Dario Argento as an EMT. And oddly, in January, there's an abundance of black and white, horror movies on TV.

Otherwise, this semi-homage to classic horror, falls short. Still worth a watch. Some find it fun, but it's far from Landis' best work.