Deadpool: Lives up to Hype and…Don’t Get Greedy That’s Good Enough

In the vein of tongue-in-cheek super hero films/spoofs, Deadpool ups the ante as one of those splendid films that lives up to the hype. Imperfect as it is, this is swept quickly beneath the rug in favor of playing along with this self-aware, dark, violent comedy.

Premise: A military operative turned mercenary is subjected to a terrible experiment that leads him to become alter ego Deadpool. Result: A fun spoof on super hero films that is as smart as it is violent (oh and raunchy).

Skeptics need only wonder how many times Ryan Reynolds (Deadpool) can deliver the same film before somebody, anybody, could finally stop him. But unlike recent and not so recent catastrophes (Green Lantern, X-Men Origins: Wolverine, where he actually played the same, albeit vastly distinct, character) this film seems retrofitted to Reynolds and his self-deprecating, irreverent, machine gun style humor.

The 2015 Bang, Marry, Kill Orgy: Rob Cohen, The Wachowski Siblings, George Miller, Tarsem Singh & J.J. Abrams.

To answer your last question, yes, the Dutch eat farts.

I did it last year, so in the spirit of not having anything better to do, here’s the 2015 Bang, Marry, Kill wrap-up.

BB-8 approves!

What? I reviewed 5-ish directors in 2015 for movieMixology’s Bang, Marry, Kill series. Each right before they released new movies into theaters, in a crass attempt to piggy-back site clicks off their hard work. All while I nurtured my alcohol addiction and lazily threw out dick jokes.

The tortured artists: Rob Cohen, The Wachowski Siblings, George Miller, Tarsem Singh and J.J. Abrams.

Their 2015 masterpieces: The Boy Next Door, Jupiter Ascending, Mad Max: Fury Road, Self/less and Star Wars: Episode VII – The Force Awakens.

Bang, Marry, Kill: J.J. Abrams

“Buy your tickets for Star Wars Episode 7 yet?”

“Nah, the prequels sucked, Laz.”

“That was different, man. J.J. Abrams is directing this one, not George Lucas. It’ll be good!”

“You sure? What was his last movie?”

The Final Girls: Good Time!

While not nearly as impactful and groundbreaking perhaps as Cabin in the Woods, The Final Girls is a very fun satirical take on Slasher Films. Enjoyable from moment one, it mixes comedy with horror with drama and genuine emotion to deliver a genuinely intelligent good time.

Premise: Wayward teens are transported into a cult-classic slasher film. Result: A really well-delivered, fun time throughout.

Directed by Todd Strauss-Schulson, The Final Girls focuses on the legacy of slasher classic Blood Camp, an obvious parody of Cunningham’s horror staple Friday the 13th. At its center is Amanda Cartright (Malin Akerman), Nancy in the film, who twenty years later is still struggling to distance herself from that role and become the breakout star she’s always dreamed to be. But as she and her daughter Max (Taissa Farmiga) drive to dinner one day after a failed audition, rocking out to Bette Davis Eyes, a fatal collision leaves Max an orphan.

Dope: Fantastic and Unnerving

Writer/director Rick Famuyiwa delivers one of the more intriguing, humorous, painful and provocative films in recent memory. Dope is one of the more powerful stories audiences will experience this year based on imposing raw storytelling with an exhilarating twist.

Premise: Malcolm, a geek who’s surviving life in a tough L.A. neighborhood, has his life abruptly change after a chance invitation to an underground party. Result: A good, thrilling film that challenging the lenses by which we see the world.

Our story begins with a group of young teens Malcolm (Shameik Moore), Diggy (Kiersey Clemons), and Jib (Tony Revolori) poised to somehow make it out of the slums that otherwise should have smothered them. If nothing else, it is the strong identity these three have cultivated -as preposterously anachronistic 80/90s hip-hop artists- that has kept them isolated, unified and firm.

But when Malcolm finds himself with a brick of coveted contraband, as a result of being quite literally in the wrong place at the wrong time, he and his friends sink into a nightmare. The ensuing film is a poignant thought piece on race, color, uniqueness and identity while also delivering the pacing and power of a modern thriller.

American Ultra: Surprisingly Fun

If expectations alone were sufficient to determine a film’s worth, then certainly American Ultra would have required a ritual sacrifice with its leads burned in effigy among a bellowing crowd disgusted fans. But sometimes surprises happen and premonitions of catastrophe averted. Directed by Nima Nourizadeh, American Ultra is just such a tale: where we expected disaster and instead watched a film that might be considered likable.

Premise: A comedy-Spy thriller hybrid that revolves around Mike Howell who must use his unearthed skills to survive. Result: More fun than expected.

Mike Howell (Jesse Eisenberg) and Phoebe Larson (Kristen Stewart) live their sheltered lives as filthy stoners in the middle of no place, West Virginia (a possible redundancy) living in a hovel and working at the local mart. The mundane is their existence and they couldn’t be happier in their situation. But when Howell attempts proposal on a perfect trip to Hawaii, he is unable to board the flight due to a terrible panic attack.

This sets of a chain reaction at Langly, where it is revealed that Howell is really part of some buried government program to create some sort of elite military force. Formerly under the protection of Victoria Lasseter (Connie Britton), Howell has now been subject to termination by Adrian Yates (Topher Grace), a ruthless new overlord at the CIA. And so it begins.

Pixels: Misses Expectations – Despite Being So Low to Begin With

Occasionally Hollywood delivers a film that defies expectations in all the wrong ways. Pixels, surprisingly directed by Chris Columbus (Harry Potter 1 & 2, Home Alone), is one of these films, somehow managing to be boring, irritating and pathetically sloppy all in one sad helping.

Premise: Video Games as Aliens threaten to destroy the Earth and only nerds and convicts can help. Result: Unfortunately, as awful as you think. Or maybe worse.

Pixels sets up the calamity that will ensue by taking us to our past where Nintendo and arcades reigned supreme in the hearts and minds of geeks and nerds all across America. We are introduced to younger versions of Brenner (Adam Sandler), Cooper (Kevin James), Ludlow (Josh Gad) and villainous Eddie (Peter Dinklage) all of whom excel at said video games.

Rivalries are propped up with vacuous characterization and a time capsule is fired off into space. Little did we know that our rudimentary technology and hilariously innocuous 2D games would be taken as monstrous threats by a significantly more advanced race of beings.

The Top 10 Highest Grossing Movies of All Time (and why humanity is DOOMED because of them) Part 1

 

No need for a long-winded intro here. We’re looking at the top ten highest grossing movies of all time and examining all the horrifying things that they imply about human nature.

Adjusted for inflation, of course, because I’d rather toss a hobo’s salad than watch Transformers 3, Harry Potter 8 or Furious 7 from the unadjusted list.

10. Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs (1937)

Source

The scene in the photo isn’t nearly as sexy as it looks.

Adjust gross revenue: $1,819,000,000

Historical context: Everything sucked in 1937. Shirley Temple was their Megan Fox, Errol Flynn was their Vin Deisel, Clark Gable was their George Clooney, and Jean Harlow was their YouPorn. You try spanking it to this and tell me you wouldn’t rather watch an Albino spaz wandering through the forest, shacking up with 7 mini Unabombers and singing to animals while they pooped on her instead?

Magic Mike XXL: Not Enough Sexy, Way Too Much ZZZZZ…

It is difficult to imagine that a film about beautiful men and women gyrating and showing off their bodies could somehow go wrong.  This film went wrong.

Unlike the first film which at least managed some degree of entertainment, director Gregory Jacobs’ XXL is a series of small sexy islands in a vast sea of dusty dialogue, unbearable existentialism and boring everything else.

Premise: Mike Lane and his crew have one last hoorah at a stripper convention with many laughs and antics on the way. Result: Boring and messy even when naked is a terrible, terrible thing.

It is difficult to tell what XXL is about or better what it is not about. It attempts to be a naked-fest, a thought-piece on life and love, a quasi-romantic comedy, a drug-use cautionary tale, a commercial for frozen yogurt, a bordello-how-to kit, and just about anything in between. It successfully executes on none of these objectives.

Ted 2: Disappointing…

The hotly anticipated sequel to Ted – one of the funnier, nonsensical films in recent memory- simply does not deliver. While there are certainly many laughs to be had, or at least some, the film’s desperate need to be profound drowns the entertainment value in a shallow bath.

Seth MacFarlane & Co. Are no strangers to raunchy laughs as Family Guy and the first Ted film demonstrated do well. But this film mixes melo-drama with raunchy fun and everybody suffers.

Premise: Ted has to prove he is a person. Result: Unworkable mess with laughs few and far in between.

This film picks up not too long after our first film ends but long enough for Ted to marry Tami-Lynn (Jessica Barth) and John’s (Mark Wahlberg) life to come crashing down around him. John and Lori (Mila Kunis) somehow never gelled in marriage, an initial premise that is nonsensical enough to derail the film in its infancy. The entire premise of the first film was how loving and supportive she was and how he had to learn to appreciate her – to have a major storyline focus on their inability to stay married after their lengthy dating and engagement feels wrong. Is wrong.