Monday, March 21, 2011

Battlefield: Los Angeles Review

Had a chance to see Battlefield: Los Angeles this weekend and I have to say I loved it. Admittedly this was a bit of a surprise to me, I was so highly anticipating this movie I never would have believed I could actually like it, but it was one of those rare cases where the hype lived up to itself.

Not a lot of plot in the movie, it was a conceptualization of an alien invasion from a soldiers point of view. A lot of confusing explosions, quick action sequences, and half seen horrors, exactly as you'd expect a full blown combat situation to look like.

The dialog and acting are heavy handed at times, but for the most part it worked. You don't go into this kind of movie expecting Shakespearean subtlety in wording and Sherlock Holmes puzzle solving, you want to see explosions and guns and that what this movie delivers.

Not much more I can say without going into details other than I would highly recommended seeing this in a theater, the action is meant to be seen larger than life. Watch it if you've ever enjoyed a first person shooter video game, if you enjoy seeing hero's and villains, and watch it if you like ass-kicking.

On the other side of the coin, check out Roger Eberts review here, but only if you need to be reminded that smart people can actually go out of their way to miss a point. Seriously, the only way I see he arrived at his conclusion is if he actually knew what the movie was supposed to be delivering and he specifically designed his review to see it from the wrong point of view.

Saturday, March 19, 2011

The South and Pop Culture Gold

Lately, I've been watching a lot of True Blood and with a fair amount of enjoyment. This surprises me because I'm seriously sick of human/vampire romance/lust plots. A part of the appeal is the location, the deep south of the good old USA. I've always enjoyed stories that take place in Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi, Georgia, and Alabama area. It might be because of the cowboy boots, damn I wish I lived in a place where I can wear cowboy boots and not slip on ice half the year. Anyway, let's take a look at some of the classics.



Simply put probably one of best if not the best comic book series ever. I've talked about this comic on the blog before and will likely do so again in the future.



This is perhaps my 2nd favorite vampire of all time. Cheesy in many ways but Bill Paxton's lines are gold in this movie.



I think this a truly underrated Vampire movie. Added plus the Vampires are actually evil not love interests.



Definitely the best of the 2 Kill Bill movies.




I suspect I likely wouldn't like this mini-series today but back in the 80s when I was a teenager with only 2 channels this baby got me through one winter.

I'm sure I could think of dozens and dozens more and if I got into westerns maybe even more.