The Coen Brothers latest movie is a remake of classic western called True Grit. While Coen brothers receive critical acclaims for their movies, they rarely had big box office success with their movies. True Grit is a rare exception. It did better than most of their previous works in terms of box office success. It spent some time at the top of the box office. It’s also rare for a western to be received so well at the box office these days.

The story follows a girl on a mission to avenge her father. 14 year old girl named Mattie Ross hires a tough U.S. marshal to track down her father’s killer. She looks for a man with “true grit” to pursue the killer. She ends up hiring Reuben Cogburn. While Cogburn is definitely tough, he has drinking problem as well as problem with Mattie tagging along. Along the way, they are joined by a Texas Ranger named Laboeuf who is tracking the killer himself. The three of them venture into Indian country and face many dangers along the way.

The story is adequate at best. It isn’t anything we haven’t seen before in western. After all, it is a remake with similar plot. However, the acting by the four main characters makes it a great movie. Jeff Bridges as the drunk but tough marshal is spot on. Haillee Steinfeld was relatively new actress at the time of the release. However, she will be a major Hollywood star in the near future. Matt Damon as a little off Texas Ranger was good comic relief. Overall, the movie was definitely worth watching even for non western fans.

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I consider Nicolas Cage to be a great actor. He can do comedy, drama, or action movies without too much problem. You can believe him to be funny, dramatic, or heroic in his past movies. However, he has produced some awful movies lately. Knowing, Next, Wicker Man, Ghost rider, and The Sorcerer’s Apprentice were all pretty bad movies. While National Treasure movies were entertaining, it was not exactly great compared to his other works. With that in mind, I did not have too much expectation for his latest movie, Drive Angry. The trailer hinted at some ridiculous, over the top action movie. While it was fairly ridiculous and over the top, it was not as bad as I expected.

John Milton escapes from hell to find his kidnapped granddaughter. A Satanic cult leader kills Milton’s daughter and kidnaps his granddaughter in order to sacrifice the baby. Soon as his daughter is killed, Milton escapes from hell to track down his granddaughter. While looking, he runs into a waitress named Piper who is in need of help from her fiancé. Together, they follow various leads to track down Jonah King before he has chance to sacrifice the baby. Also, Milton has to evade the Accountant who was dispatched from hell to track down Milton and return him to hell.

The movie is a simple action flick. There’s not much plot except the hell twist. We get various chase scenes and some shoot outs. However, the over the top action sequence and really cheesy dialogue make the movie somewhat entertaining. Piper seemed like unnecessary character throughout the movie. But, with action movies aimed at younger males, it’s not a bad idea to have Amber Heard in some revealing clothes. Overall, its decent movie to waste few hours.

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If you watched The Rite’s trailer, you might have expected to watch typical exorcism movie in the mold of Exorcist or even the recently released The Last Exorcism. But, when you dive into the actual movie information, it clearly states that it’s based on a true event. The claim of true event relating to exorcism will probably put some doubts in many viewers. The Rite might not have garnered too much attention if it wasn’t for Anthony Hopkins. Any movie with Anthony Hopkins deserves the benefit of doubt as he rarely stars in a terrible movie.

The story is about a veteran exorcist who mentors a novice exorcist who does not truly believe in exorcism. An American seminary student is on a verge of quitting seminary school all together. As a last ditch effort, he is sent to Italy to take an exorcism course. Even there, he is very skeptical of exorcism and its validity. He is assigned to watch and learn from veteran exorcist played by Anthony Hopkins. He starts to witness some things that challenge his belief. Ultimately, he learns to believe and truly regain his faith.

I expected to watch some horror movie akin to The Last Exorcism. While there are a lot of supernatural events, at its heart the movie is about faith. I can almost brand this movie as a Christianity movie. The transformation of non believing seminary student into a full blown exorcist at the end affirms this movie as more than your regular horror films. While it’s admirable to explore one’s faith, the movie wasn’t all that exciting. There were some exciting moments and serious thinking moments; it lacked the usual horror film excitement. Overall, Anthony Hopkins carries this movie from boring to watchable.

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Once you see Jason Statham on the cast list, you know what type of film you are going to be watching. Mainly, Statham is associated with action movies. I can’t think of single movie that Statham started that didn’t involve some type of violence/action. He has made a great career out of playing a singular type of character in most movies. Even so, he does do fantastic job at being an action hero. The Mechanic is no exception. The 2011 version is the remake of the classic 1972 version starting Charles Bronson. Perhaps Statham is the newer version of Bronson.

The story is about a professional hit man named Arthur Bishop. He is one of the very best assassins who specialize in many different type of assassination. The latest assignment from the top is to eliminate his long time friend and mentor Harry. He agonizes over the decision. However, shown the evidence of betrayal by Harry, he goes ahead and eliminates Harry. When he runs into Harry’s son, he decides to mentor him to become a great assassin himself. After few missions, Bishop finally learns the truth about Harry and Harry’s son suspects Bishop had something to do with his father’s death.

This is fairly straight forward movie. I’m pretty sure you’ll see the ending half way through the movie. The ride toward the ending isn’t bad though. You’ll get to see Statham’s trademark action sequences as well as some great demise of bad guys. Ultimately, it is fairly predictable movie with little substance.

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No Strings Attached is another predictable romantic comedy with some good actors. To be honest, it is fairly difficult to come up with completely original plot in romantic comedy arena. Two leads meet, have conflict, and ultimately end up together at the end of the movie. No Strings Attached follows this script very closely. Good or bad, No Strings Attached was bound to get a lot of attention due to Natalie Portman and Ashton Kutcher as the two main leads.

Like the title suggests, the story is about whether two friends can casually have sex and remain friends. Adam and Emma meet early in the childhood and meet occasionally throughout their lives. In the present, they meet up again exchange phone number. During a drunken haze, Adam calls Emma and somehow ends up at her apartment. When he wakes up, he tells Emma about his dad sleeping with his ex girlfriend. They both somehow end up in bed after the sad tale. Soon after, they end up sleeping together on regular basis. While Adam falls for Emma, Emma refuses to officially call it a relationship. Eventually Adam decides he wants more while Emma stubbornly refuses his advances.

There is really no suspense on whether they will end up together or not. Never the less, the predictable ending does not detract from the funny story line between the two main characters. Even the supporting cast puts in a very fine performance. While not the most original story, the strong cast and performance make it a likable film even if you happen to be a male audience.

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We don’t often think of Robin Williams as a dramatic actor. Instead, we see him as a funnyman on big or small screen. Even with his Oscar win for Good Will Hunting, we don’t really see him as dramatic actor. Robin Williams followed up his 1997 Oscar performance in Good Will Hunting with another dramatic role in What Dreams May Come. With budget of around $85 million dollars, What Dreams May Come was considered one of the more expensive films to be made in 1998. Usually, that kind of budget is reserved for big blockbuster action flicks instead of a melodrama/love story/supernatural story.

What Dreams May Come is a Drama, Supernatural, Fantasy, and Romance film rolled into one movie. The story is about a man named Chris Neilson, Robin Williams, who dies and goes to heaven. After the arrival, he finds out that his wife is not there to greet him. He finds out that she is in hell for committing suicide. He sets out on a journey to find his wife and somehow bring her to the heaven.
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he visuals are quite incredible by any standard. The mix of computer generated images and actual set pieces are simply outstanding. After the plots and acting, the visuals will remain with you longer than the other elements of this movie. That is not to say that movie was boring or stale. On the contrary, it was quite impressive watching Robin Williams travel through heaven and hell to save his wife from eternal damnation. Setting aside religious aspect of the movie, the overall story is about love between a man and a woman and their love for their child. Overall, this movie definitely deserved a Blu ray transfer.

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The Green Hornet starting Seth Rogan is the remake of the 1960s television series starting Bruce lee and Van Williams as Kato and Green Hornet respectively. The television series itself was based on the popular comic book. With the recent fondness of movies based on comic books, it was inevitable for Green Hornet to be made into a movie. However, Seth Rogan as the main lead was little odd choice as I can’t wrap my head around an action movie centered on Seth Rogan as the lead. While I am a fan of Seth Rogan, I’m most familiar with him in a comedic role. The movie was written by Seth Rogen and you can clearly see he is a big fan of the franchise.

The plot isn’t overly complicated or even all that interesting. Playboy Britt Reid, played by Seth Rogen, inherits a media empire when his father is murdered. He quits his partying and becomes serious about fighting crime with the help of his side kick Kato. Britt becomes a “superhero” fighting Benjamin Chudnofsky’s crime empire. The entire Chudnofsky and his criminal gang run the city and somehow Britt connects his father’s death to the Chudnofsky gang.

To be honest, I didn’t think I’d like the movie at all. Seth Rogan is funny but I didn’t think he could carry a comic book movie. I think Seth Rogan fits well with the movie. If it was X-man or other action oriented movie, he would not be a good fit. However, he fits fairly well in the role of Britt Reid. Jay Chou as Kato is relatively new face for the western audience. However, he is one of the most popular entertainer in Asia. The interaction between the two leads was the highlight of the movie. I’d say this is more a comedic film than an action film. Overall, I enjoyed the movie.

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Without any previous knowledge about Micky Ward, you might find The Fighter to be a standard sports movie. The story of down and out underdog making it big is nothing new to the genre. However, if you are a boxing fan or a sports fan in general, you can’t help but love this movie. I recall all 3 Ward Vs. Gatti fights. They were 3 of the most epic boxing matches in recent memory. If you were a fan before the movie, you will most likely love the true story based on Micky Ward. While there are some embellishments, the movie stays fairly true to the overall life story of Micky Ward.

The plot is taken from the life story of Micky Ward. While it is a boxing movie, the most of the movie is about Micky’s relationship with his family. The story of his overbearing mother and his drug addict half brother who trains him in boxing. Micky’s brother, Dicky Eklund, is a local hero who used to box. However, he gets hooked on drugs and drags down Micky’s career. Micky decides to take control of his life with help of his girlfriend. While all this is fairly straight forward, the performances of the lead actors and actress set this movie apart from other typical sports movie.

Brilliant performances by Mark Wahlbert, Christian Bale, Amy Adams, and Melissa Leo are the reason why this is such a great movie. The stark contrast between Bale’s Batman role and the strung out addict in this movie is incredible. You will not recognize Bale at first. Mark Wahlbert is terrific as Micky Ward. The family conflict between the mother and brother is the main subject of the movie and such made great by the lead actors. One problem I had with the movie is the complete lack of Ward Vs. Gatti moments. While Micky Ward story is so much more than Gatti fight, the Gattif fight is what most people are familiar with. Never the less, The Fighter is one of the better sports movie in a while.

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With so much success with Saving Private Ryan and Band of Brothers, it was no brainer for Tom Hanks and Steven Spielberg to team up again for another war drama. This time, they decided to focus on the Pacific theater of the World War II. Aptly titled The Pacific, the drama follows several characters as they go from beginning of the war to the surrender of Japanese that marked the end of the war. Being a big fan of Band of Brothers, I had very big expectations when The Pacific was announced. Some have expressed little let down when compared to its predecessor. However, The Pacific is a very fine series even if it is very different from Band of Brothers.

While The Pacific does follow some central characters, it does not come close to Band of Brothers in terms of character driven war drama. We get to follow the Easy Company from start to finish in Band of Brothers. In The Pacific, the focus is on the entire Pacific theater of operation. This isn’t to say that there aren’t any character developments in The Pacific. On the contrary, we do get to follow central characters throughout the war. But the stark differences in the battle and battle conditions are clearly there for us to delineate Band of Brothers from The Pacific. For one thing, the weather plays big part in The Pacific. While we do see the bitter cold conditions in Band of Brother in few episodes, the constant rain and wet conditions permeate the island fighting from start to finish.

The realistic portrayal of war in Band of Brother is carried on by The Pacific. The producers of The Pacific pull no punches in depicting the horrors of the war. In one scene, we witness Japanese sending wave of civilians to be used as human shields. While the action and storytelling are excellent, I do feel like we missed out on getting to really know the central characters. The character development could have been better even with the wrap up on the series on the last episode. Overall, this is series that should not be missed by anyone. Buy it and watch it on every Veterans Day.

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With gluttony of animated films flooding the market, How to Train Your Dragon is easily one of the most entertaining CG animated film in a long time. It seems like DreamWorks and other studios have consistently churned out CG animated films to keep up with Pixar’s stranglehold on the genre. While DreamWorks have had some success with Shrek franchise, it still lags far behind Pixar in terms of quality and entertainment. However, How To Train Your Dragon is on par with any of the Pixar’s offering. While the voice talent is as spectacular as some of the previous offerings, it does not lack any quality compared to other animated films.

The plot revolves around a young Viking named Hiccup. He is the son of fearless leader of his village named Stoik. Stoik is one the best warrior and most admired unlike Hiccup. While Hiccup might be lacking in physical prowess, he is a very talented in tinkering and inventing. The town, named Berk, is constantly under siege by the marauding dragons that steal their food supplies. In a constant battle with dragons, the village trains the youngster to fight dragons. In an attempt to receive his father’s attention, Hiccup unleashes his latest invention and manages to down a powerful Night Fury dragon. Instead of killing the dragon, Hiccup releases the dragon and befriends the dragon. He gets to know the secret behind the attacks and attempts to enlighten everyone on the reason behind the dragon attacks.

While the plot isn’t overly complicated or original, the story is fun enough to keep your attention from start to finish. The interaction between the dragon and Hiccup is very funny. The underdog story and the boy and his pet relationship is very well done. The animation was well done and the voice acting by Gerard Butle, Jay Baruchel, and America Ferrera are spot on. This is without a doubt one of my favorite animation film in a long time. I highly recommend this film to children as well as adults.

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