Simple Randomness

Review of Hancock

Well, I know that my reviews are really never all that deep.  Mainly because I’d hate to give the whole movie away.  Well, this one is going to be no exception.

I know that a lot of people have thought that this movie was really lame for one reason or another.  My wife and I actually liked it!  I liked it mainly because it was a different take on super heroes.  It wasn’t just the standard ‘I got (fill in the blank) by some radioactive (fill in the blank) and now I can (fill in the blank)” that so many other super hero movies fall into.  (Batman being the wonderful exception of course to this formula ).

Well, I don’t want to give anything away, but I liked that way that the back story in this one worked out.  I think that it could have been developed a little further, and it is by no means a great movie, but I still liked it.

P.S. I Love You Review

One of the other movies that we watched on Monday was P.S. I Love You starring Hilary Swank, Gerard Butler, Lisa Kudrow, Kathy Bates, and Harry Connick, Jr.

Definitely a chick flick.  No question about it, this was a chick flick.  But then again, I knew that just be reading the title.  But as far as chick flicks go, this one wasn’t bad.  It wasn’t all that sappy, and there were some parts that were genuinely funny.  Harry Connick, Jr. was really funny as a really blunt character who claims that he’s supposed to be on pills that will keep him from being rude.  Most of the other characters were also really good as well, but I’m not going to go over all of them.

Funny quotes:
Holly Kennedy: Oh, stop being all *bilingual*!
Gerry Kennedy: Kiss me arse!
Holly Kennedy: Kiss mine! In English!

Leprechaun: Are you Holly Kennedy?
Holly Kennedy: If I am will you sing at me?
Leprechaun: Yes.
Holly Kennedy: No, I’m not.
Leprechaun: Please don’t make this an issue. I gotta sing and deliver a letter.
Holly Kennedy: A letter? What’s the song?
Leprechaun: Ya I’m ‘gon be there.
Holly Kennedy: Oh please don’t, just give me the letter.
Leprechaun: I could get reported!
Holly Kennedy: By who? The leprechaun union?
Leprechaun: You know, I was in an off-Broadway play with Al $%@*! Pacino I don’t need this shit. Want the balloons?
Holly Kennedy: No.
Leprechaun: Fine!

Holly Kennedy: I don’t want to make any mistakes.
Gerry Kennedy: Then you’re in the wrong species, love. Be a duck.

Any way, pretty good chick flick. Go watch it for a good date night!

The Bucket List Review

With my wife being sick on Monday we decided to have a movie day.  I had the day off anyway, so we figured it was a good way to have a relaxing day.

The first movie we watched was The Bucket List starring Morgan Freeman and Jack Nicholson.  It’s a pretty funny movie about 2 guys that are told that they have 6-12 months to live, so they decide to make a list of all the things they would like to do before they “kick the bucket.”  Some of the things on the list include skydiving, driving a Shelby Mustang, etc.

Overall I thought it was a good movie.  I have to admit that Jack Nicholson still kinda freaks me out, but it was fun to see the way that he and Morgan Freeman interacted.

I was thinking of coming up with an overall moral for the story, but there are really several.  So rather than trying to state the obvious or be extra philosophical, I’ll let you go watch the movie and figure one out for yourself!

I Am Legend Review

So over the weekend my wife and I rented the movie I Am Legend staring Will Smith.  I must say that Will Smith really is an awesome actor. It’s actually funny to go back and see him in Fresh Prince and then see some of the things he’s done the last couple of years.  Who would have ever expected him to go from that to an action movie star?

Anyway, this movie was ok.  His acting was great, but the story itself was pretty weak.  I think it had a lot of potential, but it seemed like the just sort of ended it at the end.  That was very disappointing.  In fact, at the end my wife and I just looked at each other with a puzzled look on our face saying, “That’s the end?”

I read a synopsis of the book, and I think it sounds like the book would be quite a bit better.  But, isn’t that how it normally is with movies?

National Treasure 2: Book of Secrets Review

So last night my wife and I watched National Treasure 2 - Book of Secrets for the first time. I’ve been interested in seeing this one for awhile, so here’s my take on it.

I thought that overall it was what I expected: just a fun, family friendly, history filled movie. Nothing too spectacular, and in my opinion it fit pretty well what I expected. It was fun, a little cheesy at times. I don’t think it’s a movie that I would watch over and over again, but I enjoyed it.

I also have to mention here that I think the first National Treasure movie was much better than this one. I know sometimes that happens because the with the first one you really don’t know what to expect. But it seems like in so many situations the first one of a series really is just a better movie. This isn’t always the case (for example, I think Return of the Jedi was way better than A New Hope, and it was the 3rd movie to come out!), but seems to be all too often. I’m hoping that The Dark Knight, the new Batman movie that comes out soon, won’t follow this trend, but I guess we’ll just have to see.

V for Vendetta

I know I’m a little behind the times on this one, but I finally saw V for Vendetta over the weekend. I’ve been wanting to see it for some time now, but just never got around to it.

So what did I think of it? I thought this movie was awesome! Honestly I’ll have to watch it again to really get all of what’s going on, but I thought it was a really good movie. In a lot of ways it reminded me of Equilibrium, at least there were some similarities with all these different things being on the blacklist.

One of the coolest things about this movie is how Hugo Weaving put so much emotion into his acting behind a mask. Just based on the way he would move his head you could tell how V was feeling, even though his face is a solid mask.

Anyway, really cool movie. I’d highly recommend it!

The Joys of Not Watching TV!

So when my wife and I moved into our new place back in August, we quickly found out that the company that was supposed to connect us with cable was in no rush to actually do it.  We even followed up with them a couple of times but were never able to get a hold of someone.  So instead of complaining, we decided to just not worry about it and try life without TV.

And you know what, it’s actually been great!  So I haven’t really watched TV for several months now and I have to admit that I don’t really miss it.  We’ll keep up on some of the shows that we like either by renting the season on DVD or watching it online.  For example, I love the show Lost, and we’ve kept up on it by watching it online.

If you’ve never tried going without TV, you should give it a try.  Honestly, whenever I watch TV now I’m amazed at the kind of stuff they can show on TV.  I was probably just desensitized to it before…

The Ultimate Gift Movie Review

Over the weekend my wife and I saw the movie The Ultimate Gift.  I thought it was a really good show and would recommend it to anyone!

Granted, although I might recommend it to everyone I know that not everyone is going to like it.  It’s one of those movies that actually makes you think about what you’re doing with your life and after watching it I felt motivated to make some changes.  Good thing is I’ve been motivated to make changes already and so it mainly just confirmed what I’ve already been thinking.

I really don’t want to give away the plot or anything, but the basic idea is that this wealthy man dies and his family comes to the law firm handling his will to learn about their inheritance.  They are all a bunch of rich snobs/jerks that don’t even care that he died, they just want their money.  And, they are all upset with what he left them.  Then the one lone, most punk looking person there is told that he will be given a special gift.  So the movie goes through what he has to go through to get his ‘gift.’

Anyway, great movie, if you haven’t seen it you should!

“The Forbidden Kingdom” Review

Over the weekend my wife and I finally went on a date just by ourselves!  This is the first time we’ve done this since before the baby was born, so it’s been about 3 months.  So for our date we went and saw the new Jackie Chan/Jet Li movie “The Forbidden Kingdom.”

I really liked this movie!  It’s just a fun martial arts film that never takes itself too seriously.  In fact, it’s really quite funny when you listen to some of the things that they say.  And, there are some really great fight sequences.  The once between Chan and Li is really good.  It amazes me how well those guys can move, especially when you think about how old they’re getting!

The other really cool thing about this show is that in the end I think that Jet Li was funnier than Jackie Chan, which is something that I never would have expected.  I haven’t seen a lot of Jet Li movies, but I’ve never seen him laugh like he does in this movie.

Anyway, I would recommend seeing this film if you’re looking for just a fun movie to go see.  Great choreography in the fights, and its funny.

The Regret of Selling a CD

I used to have a pretty good collection of CDs. I was a member of BMG and would buy a CD every couple of weeks. Then I started to realize that I had a bunch of CDs but only listened to my favorites, while a bunch of others just sat there un-played. So what did I do? Well, I sold a bunch of them. Sure seemed like a great idea at the time, and I think I needed the money anyway.

So here’s what always happens when I do this: maybe a few months or a few years will go by and then I’ll hear a song that was on one of those CDs that I sold. Then I’ll think to myself, “Man, that’s a good song! I wish I still had it! DOH!”

I swear this has happened to me more times than I can count. It’s funny how when you have something you don’t give it much attention, but then once you’ve gotten rid of it you wish you hadn’t! It’s also funny how this applies to so many other things in life…but I’m not going to go all philosophical today about that.