Comedy/Family, 91 Minutes, 2013
Hey, kids: want to watch a completely bland, totally mediocre, computer animated family comedy! It stars famous people! It has topical references and horribly bastardizes history! It’s 90 minutes long! It’ll cost just as much as a good movie to watch, and you’ll never get the time you spent with it back!
I’m old enough to remember the rise of tabletop role-playing brought by “Dungeons and Dragons”. The popularity of the game (and the personal infighting of the authors) led to many versions of the game, multiple incompatible editions and dozens of imitators. Public confusion about the game led to accusations of demon worship and dumbass TV movies. Despite all this, my friends and I poured our imaginations (and meager allowances) into it.
In retrospect, that the game was so broken may have been a large part of the allure. Sure, it was complex – that kept away the people that we preferred not to deal with in the first place – but it was also versatile. We’d argue about the rules, toss those we didn’t like and make up our own. At every level of the experience the game offered awkward kids power. Imaginary power, to be sure, but power nonetheless. We created the world, we controlled it and we decided how it worked.
These two movies represent separate, but similar, evolutions of my childhood obsession. The first celebrates the transition from the tabletop to online multiplayer. The second to the more physical experience of live action role-playing (LARPing). Both embody such a deep-seated respect for the things I used to hold dear that I couldn’t help having a ton of fun with them.
Sci-fi, 114 Minutes, 2013
Let’s start with the elephant in the room: Orson Scott Card, author of “Ender’s Game”, is an asshat. This is a man that, when contemplating government recognition of gay marriage, said “I will act to destroy that government and bring it down.” He also defends the non-science of Intelligent Design and evidence against Climate Change as victims of scientific dogmatists.
Horror, 100 Minutes, 2013
In this dark, but very confused, sequel to the 1996 family classic “Matilda” [IMDB] we see our precocious heroine several years later. Much of the confusion is due to the fact that, due to some ill-defined problem, Matilda and her adoptive mother, Miss Honey, have been forced to move and change their names. This transition is made more confusing by the cast changes.
“The Secret Life of Walter Mitty” on IMDB
Adventure/Comedy, 114 Minutes, 2013
This isn’t an adaptation of James Thurber’s classic 1939 short story. The story, as wonderful as it is, would make for a terrible movie. Its charm, and genius, is that the main character does literally nothing exciting. It’s an amazing literary work but would be wholly unsatisfying as a film. Nor is it a remake of the 1947 Danny Kaye [IMDB] classic. That film, wonderful and timeless as it is, is a product of its time and simply wouldn’t translate well into a modern film.
Action, 107 Minutes, 2013
There are certain things that you don’t question. Like, why is there always some jackass that tries to cram the boats in diagonally in “Battleship”? Why is there no “gluteus minimus”? Who actually watches “Mike and Molly”?
Drama, 134 Minutes, 2013
Slavery was a reality in the United States for the first 89 years of its existence and in the colonies for 157 years before that. It was abolished only 149 years ago. It’s impossible to underestimate the devastating impact this had, and continues to have, on this country.
Comedy, 104 Minutes, 2013
For some reason I’m finding it very difficult to write this review. My computer is ready to go (in other words, Minecraft isn’t running). I’ve got a cold beverage (water). I’ve got some good writing music playing (Queen’s “A Night at the Opera”). I’ve got my review pants on (which is to say, I’ve got no pants on).
Adventure, 102 Minutes, 2013
Hey kids, it’s time to dig up Hans Christian Anderson and carve another chunk from his desiccated flesh! Sure, we’ve left him alone for awhile, but it’s time. We’ve been gouging at the Grimm boys for a while. We even did some Japanese imports! The crew over at Pixar’s been good to us but, dammit, we need a new princess to feed the machine! And this is a two-fer!
Drama, 98 Minutes, 2013
Leigh (played by Kristen Bell [IMDB]) is having an existential crisis. Life just hasn’t turned out the way that she had hoped it would. In high-school she was a straight “A” student, class valedictorian and spent her summers working as a lifeguard at the local public pool. In real-life she’s working as the most junior of reporters at a scruffy newspaper in New York, dating the wrong guy and unable to get anybody to take her seriously.
