So I have just had the pleasure of watching Hollywood’s latest heist film Takers. “How was it?” you may ask. Well, let’s just say that I liked it better when Michael Mann directed it in 1995 and called it Heat, or maybe even when Mark Wahlberg starred in it in 2003 when it was called The Italian Job. Either way, we’ve seen this film before.
The plot of this film is nothing new. Like I just mentioned, there are heavy elements of Heat in Takers. The heist plan is so much like The Italian Job that one of the characters actually refers to their plan as “going all Italian Job on it.” There is even a hotel room shoot-out scene that is almost shot-for-shot the exact scene from the end of True Romance, right down to the pillow feathers floating through the air. Continue reading

In the past few months, I have voiced two complaints that I now must retract, and for one of which I must also apologize. The first of these complaints was that the movies being released this summer, with the exception of a few shiny gems, pretty much suck. They’re not all awful, but this summer just hasn’t lived up to the summer movie hype. Secondly, I was one of those people who, while I did not object to Inception being made, I just felt like, “Come on, Christopher Nolan. We don’t need this other stuff. We need more Batman and we need it now!” Well here it is. I’m sorry Christopher Nolan. When I saw your name linked with Leonardo DiCaprio, Joseph Gordon-Levitt, Ellen Page, Cillian Murphy, Ken Watanabe, Marion Cotillard, and Michael Caine, I probably should have realized that you were working on your masterpiece. I am sorry I ever doubted you. It won’t happen again. Continue reading

Six character posters for the film adaptation Sucker Punch have been released. The highly anticipated film based on the graphic novel of the same title is being written and directed by Zack Snyder (300, Watchmen). Continue reading

I think we can all agree that this summer’s movie selection has been a disappointment at best. As far as the animated summer films go, we’ve had a bit of a split decision. Shrek Forever After, the fourth installment of a once great series didn’t critically bomb as badly as its most-recent predecessor, but the consensus was that it just isn’t very good. On the other hand, the second animated feature of the summer was Toy Story 3, a great final installment of the series, a great overall film, and in my opinion, the best film 2010 has given us to date.
So when it came to the third animated film of this mostly dismal summer, Despicable Me, I wasn’t holding my breath for greatness. However, on a scale ranging from Shrek Forever After to Toy Story 3, I’m happy to say that it fell closer to the Toy Story 3 end of the spectrum. Continue reading

The crew of the Enterprise could party like no other crew. Continue reading

Trailer Thursday has arrived once again, which means it’s time to enjoy some of the best clips some upcoming films have to offer. In this week’s edition of “Trailer Thursdays” I have chosen a few interesting-looking trailers for some films that will hopefully be as good as their respective trailers. Check out the trailers for: Life As We Know It, You Again, Gulliver’s Travels, and Nowhere Boy. Continue reading

Splice, the first sci-fi thriller of the summer, opened this past weekend, and what seemed like it would be nothing more than a rip-off of Species, turned out to be something far different and much more intelligent.
Splice centers around two young scientists, Elsa Kast (Sarah Polley, Go) and Clive Nicoli (Adrien Brody, The Pianist), who are partners in both their professional and personal lives. As the film begins, Elsa and Clive have just successfully spliced the DNA of several different species of animals to create a completely unique creature. Continue reading

The Hurt Locker‘s Jeremy Renner is reportedly in final negotiations to play “Hawkeye” in The Avengers. Continue reading

Golden Girl Rue McClanahan has passed away at the age of 76. Continue reading

Trailer Thursday has arrived once again, which means it’s time to enjoy some of the best clips some upcoming films have to offer. In this week’s edition of “Trailer Thursdays” I have chosen a few interesting-looking trailers for some films that will hopefully be as good as their respective trailers. Check out the trailers for: The Killer Inside Me, The Last Exorcism , Going the Distance , and Scott Pilgrim vs. the World . Continue reading

After the series finale of Lost, which I was sad to see go, I had to experience the series finale of my other favorite show on television, 24. To show my true feelings about these two shows coming to an end, I can only quote the arch-villain Castor Troy: “I hate to see you go, but I LOVE to watch you leave.” That pretty much sums it up. Let’s talk about how it all went down. Continue reading

Sad news today as actor Gary Coleman has passed away at the age of 42 as a result of a brain hemorrhage. Continue reading

The Vacationeers have been holding LOST viewing parties for six years. As the finale approaches, they reflect on some of their favorite memories.
If you do not watch LOST, this will make no sense to you. Continue reading

So, last time we left off with Jack at the hospital standing over the dead body of Renee Walker. I predicted that Jack would go all renegade and, to be honest, “renegade” doesn’t even scratch the surface. To quote Marv in Sin City, “This is blood for blood and by the gallon.” Jack is in a “take no prisoners and kill my way to the top” kind of mood, and quite frankly, it has been an awesome ride thus far. Let’s get to it.
As the episode begins, Jack calls Chloe to find out where Bazhaev (the Russian crime boss who sold the nuclear rods to the terrorists) is being held. Continue reading

Trailer Thursday has arrived once again, which means it’s time to enjoy some of the best clips some upcoming films have to offer. In this week’s edition of “Trailer Thursdays” I have chosen a few interesting-looking trailers for some films that will hopefully be as good as their respective trailers. Check out the trailers for: Jonah Hex, I Spit on Your Grave, Super 8, and Paper man. Continue reading

Fellow Gleeks, sorry I missed you last week, but I have a double recap here to make up for it. Without further adieu, let’s get to it.
Last week’s episode was entitled “Bad Reputation” and the Glee club is given the assignment of finding songs that have a bad reputation and bring them back into popularity. The episode kicks off with a few of the members of the Glee club watching a stolen video of Coach Sue performing Olivia Newton John’s “Physical”. Soon word gets out and the members of the faculty stop fearing Sue, which enrages her. Continue reading

NY TIMES–Lena Horne, who was the first black performer to be signed to a long-term contract by a major Hollywood studio and who went on to achieve international fame as a singer, died on Sunday night at New York-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center in New York. She was 92 and lived in Manhattan. Continue reading

It’s May 7th, and although summer has not officially started yet according to the meteorological calendar, Hollywood’s Summer Movie Season has officially begun. And it began with a bang at 12:01am this morning with the midnight release of the highly anticipated sequel, Iron Man 2. Tony Stark is back in red and gold, along with a few familiar faces and a few new ones.
This sequel begins where the previous film left off, with Tony Stark (Robert Downey, Jr.) announcing in a press conference that he is Iron Man. Continue reading

If you frequent the Awesome Village, something that you may have noticed is they we, especially me, like to make lists. Whether it be a list of the top 10 best movies of a certain genre or top 5 worst of something, these lists are fun to read and they tend catch people’s eyes. Perhaps it has something to do with my love of High Fidelity, but, for whatever reason, I love to make these lists as much as I like reading them. Continue reading

This past week’s episode of Glee, entitled “Home” had a much different feel than most other episodes of the show. For one thing, Rachel is usually the centerpiece of the show, or at the very least the centerpiece for one of the major storylines of each episode. In “Home”, Rachel had only a couple minutes of screen time. This wasn’t a bad thing. Rachel’s absence gave some much-needed screen time to some of the supporting characters, namely Kurt and Mercedes. Continue reading

Trailer Thursday has arrived once again, which means it’s time to enjoy some of the best clips some upcoming films have to offer. In this week’s edition of “Trailer Thursdays” I have chosen a few interesting-looking trailers for some films that will hopefully be as good as their respective trailers. Check out the trailers for: The Twilight Saga: Eclipse, Kisses, The Disappearance of Alice Creed, and The Last Airbender. Continue reading

In this “Madonna-themed” second episode since the triumphant return of Glee, the entire school is bombarded with the music of Madonna all day long over the school’s PA, after Coach Sue continues her blackmail of Principal Figgins, by threatening to show his wife the pictures she took of him in bed after she drugged him and put him there. She also tells Figgins that she wants to send a group of students off to New York on their own with almost no money, so they can start their careers just like Madonna did. Continue reading

The past three weeks of 24 have had some of the most gut-wrenching endings I can remember in the history of 24 , with two consecutive weeks ending with the infamous “silent clock.” For those of you not familiar with the history of 24 , every scene before a commercial break as well as every final scene of an episode ends with a visual of the real-time clock counting down for a few seconds, accompanied with the sound of the beeping of the digital clock. However, to mark events that are highly emotional, such as the death of a major character, the scene will end with a silent countdown. Since the beginning of the series, the silent clock has occurred 11 times, the final two being at the end of the past two consecutive episodes. Continue reading

Tuesday night marked the long-awaited return of one of the most popular new shows on television, Glee.
After the nearly four month hiatus, Gleeks around the globe tuned in to see their favorite fictional high school glee club back in the spotlight, still high on their big win at sectionals. All of the familiar faces were back in full swing in this first new episode of the year entitled “Hell-O”. Continue reading

Having now seen the first five parts of the 10-part HBO miniseries, The Pacific, it kinda hits home just how much these people put on the line for their fellow soldiers and their country, with little to no concern for their own well-being. These men and women were heroes, and I for one feel as if I take for granted all the privileges they maintained for the rest of us and how I never have had to and probably never will have to lay my life on the line like they did. That being said, I will now get off of my figurative soapbox and talk about the actual show. Continue reading