Make Mine Movies!

Director Joss Whedon with actors Robert Downey Jr, Chris Evans, and Chris Hemsworth on the set of The Avengers.

Director Andrew Stanton and actor Taylor Kitsch on the set of John Carter.

Director Gore Verbinski with actor Johnny Depp on the set of Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest

Ray Reviews: The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (2005)

Director: Garth Jennings

Starring: Martin Freeman, Zooey Dechanel, Sam Rockwell, Mos Def, Bill Nighy, Warwick Davis, Helen Mirren, Alan Rickman, Stephen Fry, John Malkovich

The Plot: Boring, tea loving Brit Arthur Dent (Big shock, played by Martin Freeman) is dragged into a universe of adventure when his friend Ford Prefect (Mos Def) saves him before the earth is destroyed by a race of unpleasant aliens named known as Vogons. The two Hitchhiker’s then join universal president Zaphod Beeblebrox (Sam Rockwell), Arthur’s ex flame Tricia McMillian (Zooey Deschanel) and manically depressed robot Marvin (Alan Rickman) on a journey to find the answer to life, the universe, and everything.

What Works: Douglas Adams’ original book is brilliant. This film keeps the book’s bizarre humor perfectly. The cast is also great (for the most part) Martin Freeman is the perfect Arthur Dent, Sam Rockwell is entertaining (even if his performance of Zaphod Beeblebrox isn’t like the character is in the book) Alan Rickman’s voice goes great with Marvin’s design and personality, and Stephen Fry’s excellent voice works like a charm as the Hitchhiker’s Guide itself.

Another thing that works great is the look of the movie. The aliens and robots are puppets and costumes rather than cgi, and the design of the creatures, ships, planets, and all that good stuff is fun to look at.

What Doesn’t Work:
Unfortunately, like all book adaptations, many things differ from the source material. For starters, Sam Rockwell’s portrayal if Zaphod isn’t the way the character is in the book, however, that doesn’t mean he isn’t fun to watch.

Zooey Deschanel as Trillian (known as Tricia in the film) isn’t what you’d expect. For starters, she doesn’t fit the characters description from the book. Also, a romantic subplot involving Arthur and Tricia doesn’t give her anything interesting to do or say. She does capture the characters sweetness, so I guess that’s a plus.

Mos Def as Ford Prefect is an inspired choice, seeing as how the character is supposed to be cool, and Mos Def seems like a good choice for that, even though he doesn’t fit the character description either. Besides doing his thing at the beginning with saving Arthur and such, once Zaphod and the other characters show up, he doesn’t have much to do. There’s many scenes where he’s just standing there doing nothing.

Final Verdict: Fans of the book are pretty split when it comes to this one. I actually saw the movie before I read the book, so I appreciate both. I actually like the movie a little more, but that’s probably just cause I like movies in general a lot more. If you’ve read the book, you might be disappointed but you never know. Don’t panic.

Rating: 7/10, +C

Ray Reviews: Marvel’s The Avengers (2012)
Director: Joss Whedon

Starring: Robert Downey Jr, Chris Evans, Mark Ruffalo, Chris Hemsworth, Scarlet Johansson, Jeremy Renner, Tom Hiddleston, Clark Gregg, Cobie Smulders, Samuel L. Jackson

The Plot:
When Loki (Tom Hiddleston) god of mischief, plans to unleash an alien army onto earth, S.H.I.E.L.D director Nick Fury (Samuel L. Jackson) brings together the greatest heroes to save the day. Consisting of billionaire Tony Stark/Iron Man (Robert Downey Jr), recently unfrozen World War II Captain Steve Rogers/Captain America (Chris Evans) god of thunder Thor (Chris Hemsworth), man on the run Bruce Banner/Hulk (Mark Ruffalo), and S.H.I.E.L.D agents Natasha Romanov/Black Widow (Scarlet Johansson) and Clint Barton/Hawkeye (Jeremy Renner), the heroes must first work out getting along if they will save the world from Loki.

What Works:
It’s pretty safe to say this movie would fall apart if it weren’t for Joss Whedon. While Jon Favreau, And the directors of the separate Marvel movies did great work with each respected characters’ style and worlds, Marvel needed to get a real master to create a film where all those different characters could co-exist and make it work. That’s when you find out Joss Whedon was the perfect choice. He brings the right tone, the right amount of action, the right amount of humor, it’s kind of hard to admit this movie doesn’t have the perfect balance of it all.

The characters and the way they work together is also great. Loki is deliciously evil, unlike his characterization in Thor, when all he did was be a whiny kid. Robert Downey Jr is great as always, but it’s Mark Ruffalo’s Hulk who manages to steal the show. Another great thing is Scarlet Johansson’s Black Widow, who’s a well written female character who gets a lot of screen time and great writing. The movie is worth watching just for her strong character.

What Doesn’t Work:
At the risk of sounding like a fanboy, I have literally no problems with this movie. All though if I really have complain, the first time I saw it I thought Thor didn’t have enough screen time, but upon repeated viewings I think he’s in it enough, along with the others.

Final Verdict:
Not to be sucking Marvel’s dick or anything, but this movie is awesome, flawless, and just the maximum form of excellence and entertainment.

Rating: 10/10, +A

Ray Reviews: The Dark Knight Rises (2012)
Director: Christopher Nolan

Starring: Christian Bale, Michael Caine, Gary Oldman, Anne Hathaway, Tom Hardy, Marion Cotillard, Joseph Gordon Levitt, Morgan Freeman

The Plot:
Eight years after the events of The Dark Knight, Bruce Wayne (Christian Bale) has retired from being Batman, and has become a recluse. However, a mercenary known as Bane (Tom Hardy) arrives to Gotham, and Bruce must don the mask once more. Gordon (Gary Oldman) and Lucius (Morgan Freeman) are back to help, but this time, Batman needs the help of beat cop John Blake (Joseph Gordon Levitt) and cat burglar Selina Kyle (Anne Hathaway) to stop Bane from destroying Gotham.

What Works:
I gave an incredibly simple plot synopsis because there’s so much going on in this movie, that I would just write forever, and I don’t want to spoil it. But what I will say, is that this movie is awesome. Pretty much everything works and is awesome, but what do you expect from the follow up to The Dark Knight?

Batman himself gets to be a badass because even though I love The Dark Knight, there’s too much focus on the Joker, and not enough scenes of Batman being a badass. That brings us to the villain of this movie, Bane. Bane is awesome. He’s in the movie the right amount of time, he says the perfect things to say, does the prefect things to do, and is just a great force for Batman to go against.

Another thing that worked like a charm Anne Hathaway as Selina Kyle. She’s just fantastic, she’s a lot of fun to watch, and she’s pretty easy on the eyes too, so that’s a plus. Also Hans Zimmer’s score kicks major ass, but that goes without saying.

What Doesn’t Work:
The reason this movie has so many mixed reviews is that people either nit pick, or had their expectations way too high. That being said, there are a few things that kind of bug me about this film although they’re very minimum, and require me to spoil certain things so if you haven’t seen The Dark Knight Rises, watch out for the spoiler zone below.

SPOILERS START HERE
I didn’t like Talia’s death. It was just terrible. If you’ve seen the movie you know what I’m talking about. Also it’s kind of lame how Bane just gets tossed aside near the end. Not just in his death scene, but in the last few minutes of his character when Miranda’s true identity is revealed. While these things are pretty lame, they do not ruin the movie for me in the slightest.

*SPOILERS END HERE*

Final Verdict:
I’d be lying if I said it was perfect, but this is in my opinion the closest you can come to a perfect movie. Or at least a perfect Batman movie. I love it, I love watching it, I love thinking about it, and I’ll continue to love it.

Rating: 9/10, +A

Ray Reviews: Rock of Ages (2012)
Director: Adam Shankman

Starring: Julianne Hough, Diego Bonneta, Russel Brand, Paul Giamatti, Catherine Zeta-Jones, Malin Akerman, Mary J. Blige, Alec Baldwin, and Tom Cruise

The Plot:
The film takes place in Los Angeles in the 1980s, and follows different groups of people all connected by a club, concert hall place, thing. We shift from small town girl Sherrie (Julianne Hough) as she gets work at the club, The Bourbon Room, and meets Drew (Diego Bonneta) and of course the two fall in love. We also meet the owner of The Bourbon Room, Dennis Dupree (Alec Baldwin) and his reallll close friend Lonny (Russel Brand). There’s also the mayor’s rock n roll hating wife Patricia Whitmore (Catherine Zeta-Jones), and eccentric rock god Stacee Jaxx (Tom Cruise), his manager Paul Gill (Paul Giamatti) and reporter Constance Sack (Malin Akerman).

What Works:
The setting and music is great. Rather than having original music, the actors sing rock n roll hits of the 80s, full choreographed and such. Tom Cruise’s performance as Stacee Jaxx is great, and I especially loved the relationship between Stacee and Constance, which unfortunately doesn’t get much focus.

What Doesn’t Work:
Sherrie and Drew are uninteresting, and their story arcs are kinda bland and predictable. Unfortunately, they’re the main characters so, yay. The movie has a lot of characters, so of course it’s long. At 2 hours and 16 minutes, the movie could be cut down a lot. Some character arcs, such as Patricia Whitmore’s get “resolved” way too quickly, and others like the mayor’s gets no attention at all.

Final Verdict:
While not perfect by any means, Rock of Ages is a very entertaining good time, and with so many characters and stories, there’s bound to be something you’ll like.

Rating: 7/10, -C,