Today’s review is Zapped!

THE GENERAL IDEA

Barney is a student/science lab nerd who obtains telekinetic powers after a lab accident. Along with his best friend Peyton Nichols (Willie Aames), a wealthy playboy with a dirty mind, Barney uses his new powers for no better reasons than beating up bullies, cheating at sports and stripping girls, particularly co-star Heather Thomas.

THE GOOD

This is 80s sexploitation at its most modest. For the most part we seen teens in lingerie (because all girls had fashionable matching undergarments in the 80s) and a few quick boob shots, but the whole movie is basically just a “what would you do” exploration and there really is no point to it. But its a fun ride, and you get to see the nerdy science geek get some revenge, and the inner teased school kid in you cheers (unless you were that bully – you jerks)

This film is also what started the relationship that got Baio and Willie Aames to work together again in TV’s Charles in Charge.

THE BAD

When Baio gets these superpowers the first thing he obviously thinks to do is strip women publicly. That’s pretty much the plot of the movie. Shirts popping open, dresses flying off in the air, skirts hiking up. Oh, he also uses his powers to freak out some priests and make the bully kick his own ass. So its basically just a free for all of “what would you do with telekenisis”

OVERALL

This is a brain off fun film that is more nostalgia than quality. I remember watching the crap out of this on VHS as a kid but then I was 11, so of course it was cinema gold for me. Boobies! It gets all its ratings for the cheap thrills it inspires, but worth the laugh to see just how pointless the story is.

I am going to introduce a new rating system for my Forgotten Fridays picks.

TV – If you are at least a little curious, catch it if it comes on TV.
Rent – If it is something you have heard of and forgotten, or just remember enjoying this as much as I did once upon a time, go rent it.
Buy – But if you are like me, and you agree with my review you should go buy it. If its featured here, I already have.

Like “Speed Racer” before it, Astro Boy was destined to bomb at the box office. Like Speed Racer, a semi-recognizable name that is too far removed from its days of popularity to the point that it lacked enough of a built in audience. Still, that doesn’t mean that the movie itself can’t be good (Speed Racer wasn’t). So off I went to see Astro Boy and I was very surprised by how strongly it started… but not so surprised about how it all went downhill from there.

THE GENERAL IDEA

The synopsis for Astro Boy reads something like this: “Set in futuristic Metro City, Astro Boy is about a young robot with incredible powers created by a brilliant scientist in the image of the son he has lost. Unable to fulfill the grieving man’s expectations, our hero embarks on a journey in search of acceptance, experiencing betrayal and a netherworld of robot gladiators, before he returns to save Metro City and reconcile with the father who had rejected him.”

THE GOOD

Without question the very best thing about Astro Boy was the hard hitting, and rather dark, first act that introduced us to the story. It was NOT what I was expecting. We are introduced to the brilliant scientist Dr. Tenma (voiced by Nic Cage) and his his bright excitable son. Being a kids film, I expected some sort of accident to happen where Dr. Tenma had to turn his son into a robot/cyborg in order to save his life and thus turn him INTO Astro Boy. What the film gave us was much darker. The son dies, and in his grief Dr. Tenma creates a Robot in his son’s image to replace him. He gives the robot all the weaponry and defenses science has conceived of to make sure nothing ever happend to this version of his son like it did to the last one. The emotional depth if this was surprisingly effective, and it got even better as the doctor realizes the robot does not replace his son, and only serves to remind him of what he lost… leading to him rejecting the robot (Astro Boy). This whole component, in my opinion, was handled brilliantly and gave the rest of the movie a solid base to launch from.

Some of the action in the film was quite visually appealing from both the perspectives of animation and cinematography. Those elements help the film become something quite pleasant to look at… if there was no sound… but unfortunately there was. Which leads us too…

THE BAD

After the effective first act, the film just spirals out of control to become the cheesy, cliche riddled, unfunny, uninteresting, ineffective piece of cinematic drivel we all feared it would be.

One of my pet peeves in movies are useless characters. Characters who serve no function other that to take up valuable screen time and whose presence would not be missed in the slightest if they were to suddenly disappear. There are a group of these characters called the Robot Revolutionary Front. A small group of three robots dedicated to freeing robots from human enslavement. They don’t… do… ANYTHING. Their actions and presence have absolutely no effect, positively or negatively on the story or the path of the film. The movie itself acknowleges this at the end when Astro looks to them and say “Thanks for everything” to which the robots respond “well… I guess we didn’t actually DO anything”. So true… so true. If you’re going to have useless characters taking up screen time… at least make them funny or entertaining is SOME way. These things weren’t.

I need to do an editorial post about this later… but WHY DO THESE ANIMATED MOVIES FEEL THE NEED TO USE ALL HIGH PROFILE ACTORS FOR THE VOICE ROLES?!?!?! It’s stupid. The only voice that remotely worked was that of Bill Nighy who voices Dr. Tenma’s best friend. All the other voices were flat, emotionless and usually distracting. What ever happened to using… you know… trained VOICE actors for these movies? But I’ll go into that in another post later.

OVERALL

Astro Boy stars off with a bang, but then echoes out into an android like whimper. Clearly little to no thought was put into this movie other than “Hey, let’s do an Astro Boy movie”. No good humor, no interesting characters, no story and a completely wasted fantastic introduction leaves this film wanting. Because of how effective I thought the first act was, I’ll go so far as to give Astro Boy a 4.5 out of 10.

You can see our video Astro Boy Review below:

Continuing the trend of young adult books being turned into movies comes Cirque Du Freak: The Vampires Assistant. The trailers for the film seemed interesting enough, but right from the first time I saw one, the casting of John C. Reilly as the Vampire Crepsley seemed out of place. It’s almost as if I expected to see Will Ferrell in the next clip. Still, I’ve always enjoyed Reilly’s work in both drama and comedy, so why not as a Vampire? So off I went to see The Vampire’s Assistant. Was it worth it? Yes, but I can’t help but feel there was a lot of missed potential.

THE GENERAL IDEA

The synopsis for The Vampire’s Assistant reads something like this: “A young boy named Darren Shan meets a mysterious man at a freak show who turns out to be a Vampire. After a series of events Darren must leave his normal life and go on the road with the Cirque Du Freak and become a Vampire.”

THE GOOD

The trailers for the movie made it out to be a very thin concept of some young boy bored with his life who decides to run off and become a Vampire for thrills. However, that’s quite misleading and the underlying mythology and background story to the film is MUCH deeper and actually quite rich. There are two fractions of Vampires (One called Vampires and one called Vampanese. The only difference between them is that one kills humans to drink their blood, and the other just knock out humans to drink SOME of their blood. So it’s just a philosophical difference, nothing else) that have lived under a peace truce for 100 years. However, there is an ancient prophecy of the two sides going to war, both lead by young leaders, which brings about the apocalypse. As the film progresses we learn of the role Darren has to play in this. The idea is rich and leaves me quite interested in seeing a sequel (if they ever get to make one).

Where the film tries to be funny… it modestly succeeds. Though I can’t remember any “laugh out loud” moments in the movie, there are a good number of giggles which kept the tone light.

Despite the fact that his role is a relatively small one, Ken Wantanabe always just blows me away and his performance as the head of Cirque du Freak, Mr. Tall, he gives an erie and dark feel of texture to the movie that is otherwise missing from the film. This guy is just amazing.

THE BAD

This film reminds me a lot of the first Underworld movie. A fantastic mythology and background story, that is ultimately wasted. Referenced in passing, but left on the shelf for a much inferior plot line. In the case of The Vampire’s Assistant, the movie abandons this terrific mythology it introduces us to about the Vampire war prophecy for 90% of the movie in favor of whimsical teenage jokes of a kid adjusting to being a Vampire. It was such a wasted opportunity.

I think John C. Reilly is beyond fantastic, but as I suspected from the trailers, this movie is a firm example of miscasting. I was never able to buy him as a fearsome warrior Vampire general, nor was I able to buy him in his softer moments. Essentially, Reilly was a bust in this movie, and without buying into the character of Crepsley, the rest of the film seems to buckle under its own weight.

An efficient movie introduces us to side characters who, without taking up too much valuable screen time, add more dimension and depth to a movie… but not in this movie. We get introduced to a series of freaks who add NOTHING to the movie and just eat up screen time. For example… the snake boy you see in the trailers… if you remove him from the film… NOTHING CHANGES. If you remove Orlando Jones, NOTHING CHANGES. I kept expecting some sort of relevance to be revealed about these characters in relation to the story… but it never comes.

OVERALL

The Vampire’s Assistant has a terrific foundation for a solid movie with an interesting mythology and background, but wastes all that potential as it uses its screen time for other, more useless stuff. John C. Reilly is completely miscast and never works as the key character in the film. I’d be willing to see a sequel because of the potential of the mythology, but I wouldn’t recommend this movie on its own merits to anyone. Over all I give The Vampire’s Assistant a 4 our of 10.

And being October, I wanted to focus on scary films. This one comes straight from the comments section and while this feature is designed to remind you of older films you may have forgotten, this time commenter David Lopan reminded me of a Forgotten film.

Today’s review is House

THE GENERAL IDEA

Roger Cobb is a Vietnam vet. Whose career as a horror novelist has taken a turn for the worse when his son Jimmy mysteriously disappears while visiting his aunt’s house. Roger’s search for Jimmy destroys his marriage and his writing career. The sudden death of his aunt brings Roger back to the house where his nightmares began. The evil zombies in the house force Roger to endure a harrowing journey into his past.

THE GOOD

This is a comedy horor, but where its horror its really dark, and the comedy is great too. Its a tough blend. William Katt (The Greatest American Hero) plays Roger, who’s son goes missing and it messes him up pretty bad. Rewatching this now as a father I really connected with that. I would be a mess too. Katt plays a man who has hit the bottom and it really does hit hard. There is some deep serious themes in this movie. The house is more than haunted, and the embodiment of that House is a creepy bloated old lady clown looking ..thing. That creature gave me the creeps.

There is a lot of comedy in it too, and George Wendt (Norm from Cheers) plays the neighbour, and we even get Richard Moll (Night Court) as well. This cast of three different 80s comedy classics work well together to bring some laughs to a pretty dark story.

THE BAD

The film has a lot of heart and dark themes but when you mix in the comedy it gets a little hokey. If you think of it as a comedy first it might help you deal with some of the silliness, but it can be a tough swallow if you go into it thinking its a horror.

Other than that, I love this movie. Its a little 80s dated, but it adds to the charm so I hesitate to use that as a Bad thing.

OVERALL

Its a fun silly comedy featuring some 80s minor icon staples, and worth the watch. I suggest adding this into your Halloween Horror marathon to stave of the therapy inducing nightmares a run of truly scary films will provide.

And while you might fall in love with this movie, I am going to recommend NOT watching any of its sequels. They get worse and worse as time goes on. In fact the third one is often considered to not even be a part of the series as it just stole the name for marketing and has no connection to the first two. In the 4th Katt returns to reprise his role just to die in a car accident and his widow and daughter return to the house. Terrible stuff.

I am going to introduce a new rating system for my Forgotten Fridays picks.

TV – If you are at least a little curious, catch it if it comes on TV.
Rent – If it is something you have heard of and forgotten, or just remember enjoying this as much as I did once upon a time, go rent it.
Buy – But if you are like me, and you agree with my review you should go buy it. If its featured here, I already have.

And being October, I wanted to focus on scary films.

Today’s review is Friday the 13th

THE GENERAL IDEA

THE GOODThis was one of those movies that TRULY frightened me and gave me nightmares. I had a hard time with this one, granted I was like nine when I saw it (evil babysitters). This made me afraid of the dark and nervous at night when camping. This has the stereotypes that were not yet present in the world of Horror. When the power goes out and one person drifts off on their own into the dark to go find out why, you don’t roll your eyes. That just made sense.

And there was no Jason. Not yet. Just a masked killer. There was mystery and there was no supernatural. This was REAL and could happen. Some Kids are hired to re-open the camp and legends resurface as to why the campground was closed and someone starts killing them. Simple and terrifying.

It is also one of the very earliest appearances of Kevin Bacon.

THE BAD

The movie is a little dated, and while much horror that followed this film is attempting to emulate the terror presented here, its hard to forget the history. While you are screaming at the TV saying “Why would you do that?? He is behind that tree waiting for you with a machete!! Don’t you Watch Horror movies? ” Well in 1980 there wasn’t a lot of this going around in film.

OVERALL

This is a great film to watch with friends around Halloween. You can wonder at the very young Kevin Bacon, wash your brain of that weak unscary remake and see the origins of the Jason Voorhees we know from the sequels that dominated pop culture ever since. SPOILER Remember that Jason was the motivation of the killings, but it wasn’t until a stinger after the credits a morning after that this turned supernatural and Jason’s aged-to-adult form leaps out of the lake taking the film’s last victim.

This is worth a watch for those who have never seen it, or just want to actually

I am going to introduce a new rating system for my Forgotten Fridays picks.

TV – If you are at least a little curious, catch it if it comes on TV.
Rent – If it is something you have heard of and forgotten, or just remember enjoying this as much as I did once upon a time, go rent it.
Buy – But if you are like me, and you agree with my review you should go buy it. If its featured here, I already have.

Since the trailer first emerged with the classic line – BLACK DYNAMITE: “I’m going to declare war on anyone who sells drugs in our community”. PIMP: “But Black Dynamite, I sell drugs to the community”, my anticipation level for Black Dynamite was through the roof. However, my anticipation was tempered by the fact that the movie looked like it would be better served as a set of Saturday Night Live skits rather than a full length feature film and would ultimately not live up to the trailer. I was invited to the premiere of the film last night and off I went, excited but not holding my breath. Did Black Dynamite deliver? You bet your jive turkey ass it did!

THE GENERAL IDEA

The synopsis for Black Dynamite reads something like this: “This is the story of 1970s African-American action legend Black Dynamite. The Man killed his brother, pumped heroin into local orphanages, and flooded the ghetto with adulterated malt liquor. Black Dynamite was the one hero willing to fight The Man all the way from the blood-soaked city streets to the hallowed halls of the Honky House.”

THE GOOD

I always say the most important thing a comedy must accomplish is making the audience laugh. Almost everything else can be forgiven if you make the audience laugh. Well… Black Dynamite may not accomplish much else as a feature film, but dear heavens IT MAKES YOU LAUGH. This movie is flat out hilarious. I literally lost count how many time it made me burst out… and when I wasn’t laughing hysterically I was grinning from ear to ear most of the time.

This is the most quotable movie I’ve seen since “Army of Darkness”. Every single scene holds at least one immortal line. The only problem is that there are so many of these fantastic one liners, you forget most of them. As a matter of fact that’s essentially what this movie is… a big container for all these magnificent one liners. If you see this movie with a group of friends, I guarantee you you’ll be quoting lines from this movie to each other for a LONG time.

Michael Jai White was magnificent. No seriously, this guy throws the movie on his back (that he also co-wrote) and single handedly makes it work. Not only from the way he delivered the incredibly funny dialog, but also for his kung-fu (as it’s called in the movie). White is a legitimate pure action star in the making. I can easily see him transitioning out of this film into legit mainstream action films.

THE BAD

This is not a long film, but it really should have been about 10-12 minutes shorter. As I feared, the movie starts to feel played out by a certain point, and goes from hilarious parody, into just plain silliness that I think it honestly could have done without. By the time you get to the end and they reveal who the BIG bad guy is, it lost me. Oh there are still some solid one liners in the last 10 minutes, but even they lost a little of their effectiveness as the film started to feel a little more like “Disaster Movie” than anything else. But do keep in mind, that’s only once you get into the last 10-15 minutes.

OVERALL

Black Dynamite is a hilarious parody of the 70’s blacksploitation films filled with fantastic one liners and impressive martial arts that you and your friends will be quoting for a long time. It starts to lose a lot of its steam near the end of the film, but by then you’ve already had a great time. Michael Jai White will be a star, you can quote me on that. Overall I give Black Dynamite an 8.5 out of 10.

You can see the video version of our Black Dynamite review below:

You’ve gotta love stories like this one. A little, ultra low budget indie film that YEARS after it’s made gets some traction, gets picked up by a “name” studio, and then gets a theatrical release with some MAJOR positive reviews. Such is the story of Paranormal Activity.

The hype surrounding this film has ben of the scale. Many well respected horror sites going so far as to call it “the scariest movie of all time”. Those are some big claims.

So does Paranormal Activity live up to the enormous praise and hype? No, not at all. However, that’s not to say it isn’t still a solid little horror film that is quite enjoyable.

THE GENERAL IDEA

The synopsis for Paranormal Activity reads something like this: “After a young, middle class couple moves into what seems like a typical suburban ’starter’ tract house, they become increasingly disturbed by a presence that may or may not be somehow demonic but is certainly most active in the middle of the night. Especially when they sleep. Or try to.”

THE GOOD

The very best thing about Paranormal Activity to me is the concept of escalation. I can honestly say I’ve never seen a horror film do a better job of slowly, gradually and effectively “taking it up to the next level” throughout the run time. As the film progresses it gets a little more creepy, then a little more… then a little more… then holy crap… then HOLY CRAP… then CRAP I JUST CRAPPED MYSELF! It never moves backwards and it does a fantastic job of not “blowing its load” too early. The result is that it you’re never given a chance to really catch your breath. With the fear level ALWAYS going up, it creates a pace to the film that leaves your fingers digging deeper and deeper into the theater chair arm rest. This is where the real strength of film resides.

The use of the handycam may be a little “blair witchish”, but in my opinion it’s the reason the film works at all. The FEEL of it being real is what gives the movie its underlying sense of eerieness that quite frankly I don’t thing would have been there if this would have been a multi-million dollar production. You could have done this exact same movie, same dialog, same action, same location, same everything… but if you did it on a huge budget with multi high quality film cameras and lighting crews and editing, it would have completely lost the effect of the film.

The performances by the 2 actors in the film is what sells it. They were both so natural that you sometimes forget you are watching a movie and not a real home video.

The movie is scary, and that’s the #1 most important thing about any horror film. No, it’s not the scariest film I’ve seen, no it’s not as scary as some of the hype suggests… but it IS scary and has the theater jumping out of its seats on more than a couple of occasions.

There are obviously not a lot of visual effects in Paranormal Activity, but when they are used, they are PERFECT.

THE BAD

Remember that old comedy bit by Eddie Murphy where he talks about how black people would never make good horror movies… because the moment they heard the house say “get out”, they would actually GET OUT. The problem is, if the family or couple actually “gets out”, then the movie is over. That’s the dilemma for the filmmakers in Paranormal Activity. Because listen folks… if ANY of the stuff that was happening to these people in this house were happening to ANYBODY, they would get the hell out of the house and run. EVERYONE… except these two people. That’s the only time the movie didn’t feel real to me. All this crazy stuff starts happening, and they just stay in the house… which is stupid and would never happen. They needed to come up with a better device to explain why they would stay there.

There is a friend character who shows up a couple of times in the film that I thought was just a complete waste and didn’t need to be there at all. Whenever the character showed up, the story seemed to stall. That’s not a criticisms on the ACTOR playing the character, but rather the character itself.

Dead empty time in a horror movie can be very effective to built tension, and for the most part Paranormal Activity uses it quite well… however, it also uses it too much in spots. It also repeats the same conversation between the couples too many times that makes some of the scenes just feel like time filler.

OVERALL

While Paranormal Activity may not be the “scariest movie of all time” or live us to the insane hype its been getting, it is nonetheless a VERY GOOD movie executed very well that will leave you both entertained and pretty creeped out. What more can you ask from a horror movie? Overall I give Paranormal Activity an 8 out of 10.

On the surface, Couples Retreat looks like just another cheap, throw away, romantic comedy that at best could be mildly entertaining, and at worst a complete waste of time. However, the film sports a fantastic cast (with the likes of Vince Vaughn, Jason Bateman, Jon Favreau, Kristin Davis, Kristen Bell and a few others) and was written by Favreau and Vaughn, who have a pretty decent track record together. Add on top of that the fact that the trailers have looked pretty solid, and I found myself really looking forward to it.

Did it live up to my mildly heightened expectations? No, it didn’t, but at the same time it wasn’t a complete waste either.

THE GENERAL IDEA

The basic synopsis for Couples Retreat reads something like this: A comedy centered around four couples who settle into a tropical-island resort for a vacation. While one of the couples is there to work on the marriage, the others fail to realize that participation in the resort’s therapy sessions is not optional.

THE GOOD

Vince Vaughn is pretty much a one character actor these days. Oh he may have started out dramatic, but he’s made a fortune in comedy, and made it with the exact same character over and over and over again. However, unlike Michael Cera, this character doesn’t seem to get old (at least it hasn’t really yet). It’s a more charismatic character with more personality and is, well… funny. When Vince Vaughn is “on”, he has some of the best comedic timing in the business which means whenever his character opens his mouth, you’ve got to be prepared to laugh, and in Couples Retreat, Vaughn is on.

This is a dialog driven movie and for the most part the dialog works really well (for a comedy at any rate). Many comedies rely on shtick, gags and physical comedy to get their laughs (and there is nothing at all wrong with that when it works), but I found that the best moments of this movie were with the straight forward dialog between the characters.

This part may sound redundant since the movie takes place in the tropical paradise… but the movie really was very pretty to look at. The cinematography in the film took full advantage of the surroundings and really helped us “fell” the place the way the characters did.

It’s just a funny film most of the time.

Carlos Ponce, who plays Salvadore the Yoga instructor is brilliant. I loved this character. He was this movie’s McLovin (a side character who ends up stealing the show every time he’s on the screen). I can honestly say I would go see a “Salvatore” movie.

THE BAD

I find these sorts of movies are best when they know exactly what they are, and stay within those limits. For example, when you look at Wedding Crashers, the film quickly identifies itself as a mid-shallow comedy with minor life lessons encompassing a comedy based on a pretty unrealistic set of circumstances. The movie knows that’s what it is, and never moves outside of that and firmly establishes its identity. When I comedy establishes it’s identity and operates within it, it has a greater chance of success. However, Couples Retreat never establishes and identity, because you quickly get the feeling that the movie THINKS it’s smarter and deeper than it really is. This creates several moments in the film when it wants to be taken seriously, but you as an audience member just can’t. At times the movie tries to make deeper and more insightfully observations about real marriage and relationship problems, but they just come off as silly, especially when they’ve already used blatant slapstick comedy tools.

The movie veers way too much into the pure “silly” at times. Once again, if it had established its identity as that right off the bat, then it could have worked, but it doesn’t. For example, there is a completely ludicrous “Guitar Hero” battle scene about 2/3 of the way through that felt so out of place it just made me feel embarrassed for everyone involved in it.

Like many comedies, Couples Retreat all too quickly and all too conveniently wraps up everyone’s problems into a big happy ending. Some deep and potentially complex life issues suddenly rectified by a 45 second epiphany conversation 5 minutes before the end of the movie. It felt cheap. It felt forced, and it felt like the filmmakers just had no idea what else to do with it.

Whereas the first 2/3’s of the film moved along pretty well and was quite funny (if not all that smart), the last act grinds to a complete and painful stall.

OVERALL

Couples Retreat, at its heart, is a funny movie with a pretty solid premies that shoots itself in the foot repeatedly by not developing an identity for itself, acting like it’s smarter than it is one minute, and the nose diving into unfunny nonsense slapstick comedy the next minute. A movie that starts pretty strong but leaves you feeling like the filmmakers didn’t have a clear vision for where they wanted the film to go, and thus the movie stalls in the third act. Still, there were enough laughs and smiles in the film that I don’t regret taking the time out to see it, and so overall I give Couples Retreat a 5 out of 10.

This month I am going to focus on scary movies in favour of Halloween.

Today’s review is Pet Semetary

THE GENERAL IDEA

The Creeds have just moved to a new house in the countryside. Their house is perfect, except for two things: the semi-trailers that roar past on the narrow road, and the mysterious cemetary in the woods behind the house. When the family cat dies they bury it in the Pet Semetary and discover its magical properties to bring the animal back to life. But when their young son falls victim to the dangerous highway, in a fit of grief they opt to bury him in the Pet Semetary hoping to return their son to them. It works, but is it their sweet child or a demon from hell?

THE GOOD

The premise is simple, as most Stephen King stories are. But it is the execution of the roles by each of the actors that makes the story so frieghtening. The child actor who played Gage was absolutely brilliant. He was just as sweet as a button and the type of perfect child every family hopes for. But when he returns from the dead he is an evil possessed boy who cusses and murders. Seriously terrifying to see this child act out those parts.

But its more than just a demon child on the rampage. There is an emotional struggle of the parents, how it strains their relationship, how they deal with their murderous child on the rampage. All played out brilliantly

THE BAD

I am certain that boy who played Gage needed therapy after this. Seriously. The stuff they made him do shouldn’t be shown to children, let alone making an actor play out those parts. That he didn’t end up in a mental ward is beyond me. But the part that disturbs me most is how deeply this movie impacted me. This was one that gave me nightmares, even as an adult. If you are sensitive to this sort of thing, you might want to give it a pass.

OVERALL

So while you inevitably plan a movie night with scary movies closer to Halloween, you might want to grab this one!

I am going to introduce a new rating system for my Forgotten Fridays picks.

TV – If you are at least a little curious, catch it if it comes on TV.
Rent – If it is something you have heard of and forgotten, or just remember enjoying this as much as I did once upon a time, go rent it.
Buy – But if you are like me, and you agree with my review you should go buy it. If its featured here, I already have.

So off I went to see it. Was it good? Was it bad? Does Bruce still kick ass?

Yes actually
No
He sure does.

THE GENERAL IDEA

The synopsis for Surrogates reads something like this: “People are living their lives remotely from the safety of their own homes via robotic surrogates — sexy, physically perfect mechanical representations of themselves. It’s an ideal world where crime, pain, fear and consequences don’t exist. When the first murder in years jolts this utopia, FBI agent Greer (Willis) discovers a vast conspiracy behind the surrogate phenomenon and must abandon his own surrogate, risking his life to unravel the mystery.”

THE GOOD

As a Bruce Willis movie, the first thing an audience member will probably expect (rightly or wrongly) is some good action, and Surrogates delivers on that. No, this movie isn’t a wall to wall action film, nor does it want to be… nor SHOULD it be, but the action sequences that are in there are pulled off beautifully. Not only is it exciting stuff, but it all feels “real” and fits in with the context in which the film takes place… both in Bruce’s robotic form and in his human form.

The thing that surprised me the most about the movie was that it’s a good mystery. If you’ve seen the trailers, you know someone has figured out how to actually kill real people through their Surrogates (which was thought to be totally impossible). The story behind who is doing it all and why turns out to be quite compelling and has a terrific “reveal” moment in the film that I honestly never saw coming, yet made total and perfect sense within the context of the movie.

Although the film isn’t as cerebral as it could has tried to be, it ends up making some interesting observations about how things would be in an entirely artificial world. The disconnect we experience with the “real” world when we get too plugged in. There’s a scene where a woman stumbles onto the streets for the first time in a while and squints when she sees the sun… it reminded me of someone I know who spends too much time on World of Warcraft and Facebook (you know who you are).

The pace of the movie is wonderful. Always moving forward, moving from point A to point B and then on to point C once point B has ben adequately established. It never feels rushed, and never feels like it stalls or lingers on a point that’s already been made.

THE BAD

Although you know that the movie doesn’t aspire to be a 2001 or any deeper than it ends up being, one can’t help but get a sense that perhaps they should have delved a little bit deeper into the socio-consioucness of a society that becomes completely reliant on technology (which some could argue we already are). What questions does that raise? How does it effect our identity and how we interact and fit in with the world around us? Oh sure, a few passing comments are made here and there, but they only serve to make us wonder if they should have gone just a bit deeper.

Some of the visual effects were just dreadful. Granted, the budget for the movie was only about $80 million and thus one can only expect the effects to be so good… but if you can’t do the effect well, then work around it and don’t put something bad, or cheesy looking on the screen that pulls us out of the movie.

There is a side story to the film about Bruce Willis and his wife. I completely understand this side story was meant to serve as Bruce’s anchor to reality and real human contact… but it didn’t quite click for me and ultimately felt more like dead weight in the film. They either needed to better develop the side story, or let it go. They did neither and it hurt the film overall.

OVERALL

Overall, Surrogates ends up being a lighter sci-fi look into our future and our dependance on humanity that keeps its main identity as an 80’s style action film with more depth than you’d expect, but not quite as much as you’d hope for. No masterpiece, but by the time the end credits roll a movie that entertained. The biggest complaints ends up being that you know if could have been even better, but we’ll take what we can get. Overall I give Surrogates a 7 out of 10.