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2 Minute Movie Reviews

By Josh Brown ⋅ March 15, 2008 ⋅  Email this post ⋅  Print this post ⋅ Post a comment

Death At A Funeral (A-)
The first half of this movie was bland at best. Kind of funny. Kind of boring. But it felt like nothing really happened. Then it hit a point about half way through the movie where it got uncontrollably funny. I typically watch movies when Anna goes to bed early and on the nights that I can’t sleep. So I usually pull up my laptop and plug in some headphones and watch it in bed. Well about 1:00 in the morning I busted out laughing so hard that it woke Anna and Jack both up and freaked them both out. I didn’t stop laughing for 10 minutes. I got up and went to the other room and kept laughing. Now it may be because I was delirious. Or it may be because this had the rare combination of subtle and outlandish humor packed side by side. This for the most part was a “British comedy”. Peter Dinklage who you normally see in pretty “straight” roles was so over the top hilarious that it caught me off guard. I also like Alan Tudyk and he was pretty funny as well. All in all, this was a really good movie. If you can make it through the first 45 minutes, I think you might like it to.

Purple State of Mind (A-)
Craig Detweiler got in touch with me about doing a possible podcast to promote his new movie. So before we interviewed them for the podcast, Anna and I sat down to watch the film. Honestly not knowing what to expect. The film is a documentary which basically chronicles the friendship of a Craig (professor at Fuller and filmmaker) and author John Marks (producer on 60 minutes, editor for US News & Word Reports). Craig is a christian and John Marks an atheist. They were roommates in college, which was Craig’s first year in the faith and John’s last. So they tell the story of their friendship and their conversations back and forth about faith and God. John pushes back against the christian belief in God pretty hard and makes some very intelligent, great points. Craig shares about his relationship with God has helped him sort through stuff and make sense of the world. I’m really not doing justice to their conversations with that short overview. But the basic idea is that too often we exist at the polar edges of the spectrum instead of relying on the humanity that we all share. Not that we lose our particular distinctions and differences, but that we are able to appreciate and value our differences and provide enough space at the table for everybody. You can check out the website here to order a DVD or to set up a screening as well as watch the trailer. We met them the day after and Anna and I did a podcast with them that should be coming out soon.

Into The Wild (C+)
I think I like the idea of this movie more than I actually liked the movie itself. Right off the bat, I don’t think Emile Hirsch was the person for the part. Which may not make much sense considering I think he did a great job of acting. He just didn’t fit. He did a great job of acting but he just wasn’t believable in the role. No matter how hard he tried. Plus the movie just felt choppy. I know it’s the way they told the story with switching between past and present. But it just felt all over the place. Part of that is due to the style of the book and the story within. But it just didn’t transition very well into a movie. The movie wasn’t bad it’s just that it felt like it lacked something. I do appreciate the “point” of the film. Here was this guy who just wanted adventure and to live in Alaska off the land so bad that it was pretty much his whole consuming point to life. So much so that he missed out on the beauty that was around him in the people he met. For him to come to the awareness that people are the only reason to even have happiness at the end was a bittersweet ending. Perhaps I would have liked it more had I not had such high hopes for it.

3:10 To Yuma (B-)
Not really sure what I think about this movie. It was cool seeing Russell Crowe in a “bad guy” role. And I’m pretty sure I have some sort of man-crush on Christian Bale (I just saw where he’ll be playing John Connor in Terminator 4). The movie wasn’t average and I don’t know that it was necessarily good which I guess makes it above average. I really like a good western movie. And while this wasn’t necessarily it . . . I did wet my appetite for a few months. The ending worked very well for me. It had this redemptive quality to it while not being entirely cheesy. I appreciate the fact that they didn’t rely on cheesy effects to make this movie something more than what it was. All in all . . . I give it an “above average” on the old trusty, ambivalent, sliding scale that is my movie ratings.