Why isn't Saw 6 straight to DVD...

Paranormal Activity beat out Saw 6 for the top spot this weekend. Could it be that audiences have grown tired of the franchise? I'm surprised that it isn't hitting the straight to DVD shelves by now. When you release a sequel every year for the last six years it's bound to happen someday.
Maybe this will show Hollywood that we would like a little quality instead of quantity for a change.

The true test comes next weekend though. Will Saw remain out of the #1 spot? The way I see it is that we have a Halloween weekend and people are going to want to go see a scary movie. Saw isn't scary. Saw movies are gross. It scares no one. With all the news agencies and twitter posts about Paranormal being one of the scariest movies ever I think people are going to flock to the theaters to see it on the one night of the year you are meant to scare the heck out of yourself. I know I would.

I wonder what the Saw folks are doing this morning as they get up and head to work? Are they having meetings about bumping up the marketing? Did they even see this as a possibility? Are plans for the next movie being rethought?

I would hope so. I would like to think that the studio has seen that the franchise has been drained of life and that it's time to move on to something new. I doubt it though. It still made a little money and it will make a little more as the weeks pass. Plus DVD sales are always pretty good. I guess we just have to wait it out.

Of course... I just read about the push to get Paranormal Activity 2 off the ground. Now that's scary.

Ghosts and Goblins...

One more week until Halloween. It used to be my favorite holiday of the year. My friends and I would plan a Halloween party, I would watch a ton of scary movies, and I would enjoy all the Halloween episodes of all my favorite tv shows.
As the years have gone by my love of the holiday has gone away. I don't watch horror movies that much. I don't get excited about finding a costume. Halloween on tv has been minimized almost to the point of exclusion.
What has this got to do with movies, you may ask?

I'm bringing it back this year. I'm bringing it back and it's starting with the movies.

After seeing Paranormal Activity last week I am excited to see some good horror movies this October and with only a week left in the month I really have to get cracking.
So my plan is to try and watch a couple movies a night for the rest of the week and I'm going to try and make sure these are movies I haven't seen before.
I'm going to throw in a few zombie movies, a slasher or two, and maybe even some good ol fashioned monsters.
If anyone out there has some ideas on the flicks I should peep let me know. I have a few in the Netflix instant watch already and a couple bought over the last couple years I have yet to watch so I'm set for the first few nights. But a little help couldn't hurt.

I grew up watching horror movies. I'm not sue why I was allowed to watch them at such a young age but... oh well. I grew up with Jason, Freddy, Michael, and Leatherface. I had seen all the originals and all the sequels and at a young age knew which ones were cool and which ones were jumping the shark. I became a critic of fine horror cinema. I remember getting at least one horror movie each visit to the video rental store. I would devour whole series in a weekend. One Saturday I managed to get through all the Puppet Master movies. No small feat.
I find it funny that my kids have a small collection of movies that consists of nothing but Disney and Scooby-Doo movies and when I was young I had Friday the 13th and Child's Play among my tapes.
Horror seems to have dropped in quality since I was a kid. What used to be left to the imagination has been brought into the light with horrifying detail as most horror movies coming out these days are pushing the graphic and leaving behind storytelling. I'm not saying the movies from before were gone with the wind. They just didn't need to show all the brutality to scare you.

But times have changed and now I find myself about to jump into the horror arena once again. Maybe I'll revisit the Puppet Master flicks again...

I saw me some movies...

It happens a few times a year. My friend Danny and I are able to leave our busy lives behind us and find sanctuary inside one darkened theater after another. We pick the movies, we figure out the order, and we buy the tickets.

Yes, we but tickets for all the movies we attend. No theater hopping for these adventurers...

A meal is thrown in at some point and snacks are consumed mid film. It's always a good time and we even see a few friends for one or two of these films.

This time the line up was Zombieland, Law Abiding Citizen, Where the Wild Things Are, and Paranormal Activity.

The started around 11:30. Getting to the theater we bought the tickets and then decided to get a quick lunch before the first movie began. There are a few options for lunch in the area we went to and we decided to try out the new BBQ place that had opened next door to the theater as we were short on time.
As we wandered into the eatery I noticed that there was a "Coming Soon" sign above the door. I thought maybe they weren't open for business yet but as we pushed open the door we saw people sitting at tables eating. So we figured they were open but just hadn't taken the sign down yet. We walked up near the counter and took a look at the menu to see if this was indeed the place we wanted to eat when the manager spoke to us.
"Is this going to be for here or to go, gentlemen?"
Not knowing if were going to be eating there or not I responded with "We're just looking at the moment, thanks."
"It's on us today, just so you know." he said before I could turn my attention back to the menu.
I was a little taken back by this statement and by the look on Danny's face I could see he was too. It turns out that the restaurant wasn't open yet but was doing a dry run to make sure they were ready for business when they did open in a couple days.
Needless to say, we stayed and had a really good lunch and that seems to have marked this day as a successful movie day right off the bat.

ZOMBIELAND

It was funny. I had a good time watching it. Was it the best? Was it as good as people had been saying it was for the past few weeks? Not really. I suspect there is a really good movie in the somewhere but it's hidden under the desperate attempt to be Shaun of the Dead.
The acting is there as Woody Harrelson does what he's best at. The rest of the cast follows suit and pulls off each of their characters. I didn't feel super connected to any of them on a personal level though.
There was an attempt to bring some emotion to the flick in a couple places but only one works really well but it's dropped as soon as it happens and that left me feeling a little cheated out of what could have been a good story.
Danny liked the flick more than I did, which was a surprise, as he isn't in to zombie movies at all. In the end I give it a good 3 stars.
And the secret cameo in the flick is as awesome as people were telling me it was. I won't spoil it for you though.

LAW ABIDING CITIZEN

This was the movie we saw that when ever I told folks what movies I was heading out to had never heard of. It wasn't pushed hard in the marketing and even I had only seen a couple trailers for it in front of other movies.
It's about a man whose family is killed and the people responsible are not prosecuted to the full extent of the law. When his voice isn't heard the father decides to prove to the people of the city that the system is flawed. This leads to death, explosions, and a pretty good thriller/action flick.
Jamie Foxx plays the city's hot shot prosecutor and Gerard Butler plays the man who was wronged.
It was surprisingly good and turned out to be the second best movie of the day. It's not essential for it to be viewed at the theater but it's worth a rent the week it comes out. I give it 3 1/2 stars.

WHERE THE WILD THINGS ARE

I didn't grow up with the book. I didn't have fond memories of this story and it's characters to pull me into the theater the second it came out.

That being said...

It was BORING. It really felt like a super expensive art film. About twenty minutes into the film I was bored and ready to move on to the next movie on the list.
The kid was a bit of a whiner, the monsters were a bunch of depressed whiners, and to top it off... there really wasn't a point to the flick. Yes, the kid decides he needs to go home and be with his family in the end but it was mostly because he had made a mess out of things with the monsters and they really didn't want him around anymore.
I don't see the allure of the film and I don't see what has people loving the book as much as they do.
I know I'm going to get some people thinking I don't know what I'm taking about on this one but I just wasn't feeling it.
1 1/2 stars.

PARANORMAL ACTIVITY

This is the movie I was worried about the most for the day. I love ghost movies. I love ghost stories. They creep me out. They scare me.
This flick came out in limited release at first and I kept hearing people saying that it was the scariest movie they had ever seen. This had me excited. They had a campaign for people to demand a wide release and soon it was coming to a theater near me. At this point it had hyped to the point that I was afraid it wouldn't live up to what all these people were saying. Plus, the way things had been going all year with the movies I had been wanting to see I was thinking this was going to be another disappointment.
Danny didn't join me for this one. He had no interest. So I teamed up with a few other friends and went to a later showing. At night. In the dark.
What happened next shocked me.

The theater was packed full. A sold out crowd. People were excited. They were hoping to be scared out of their minds. I was hoping that the movie could at least live up to some of the hype that had been thrown about online and in talking to friends.

And it didn't.

It surpassed them.

I am still creeped out by this flick. It is, without a doubt, the scariest movie I have ever seen. Period. And it was a very well made and well acted movie.
The story we are thrown into is that a couple has been having issues in their house. Strange noises. Things moving. the normal haunting stuff. So the man of the house has bought a camera and is going to try and catch whatever it is on tape and prove that it's not a ghost. And he does prove it's not a ghost. It's actually worse...

The flick is "Blair Witch Style" film making. We watch the footage this guy has taped over the course of a few weeks. It's not as shaky and nausea inducing as you may think. A lot of the time the camera is mounted on the tripod in the bedroom and the times it's not the footage is pretty solid and well framed. These people have figured out how to make a film in this style without alienating the folks who may not be into the other films made like this.

It's awesome and frightening and I'm still creeped out. And that's all I'm going to say on the subject because you have to see it for yourself. If someone tries to tell you about the movie don't let them tell you about anything that happens. You don't want to spoil this one. Trust me.
4 1/2 to 5 stars

.........

And that was the day. It was a successful movie day with only one movie being weak and I didn't even have to deal with stupid annoying people at any of the viewings I went to. That is a rare feat indeed.

Filling the void...

I hate having this thing blank so I'm going to write a little bit to show you all that I can actually spell.
The purpose of starting these blogs is so that Danny and I have an outlet for our film love during the week when we aren't recording and to fill some gaps that are created when real life gets in the way of sitting in front of a mic and talking to you all. Of course, I can't promise that I will be able to keep this thing updated on a regular basis but I'm going to give it my best shot.

My first official post for this blog is going to come on sunday after a day long movie marathon. I'm going to talk about the day and what we saw and how I felt about the movies... and the crowds. I can't go see a single movie without people causing a headache so just imagine what going to four movies in a row is like.

I think that's what this blog is going to be for the most part. Me talking about watching movies. And a little bit of reaction to whatever is going on in Hollywood. There's always something happening...

So I hope this will be fun for both me and you as we get into this whole blogging thing. It's a lot easier for me to talk than it is to write so I make no promises as to the quality of the posts.

We'll get through all the bad grammar...