Iron Man 2 (2010)

The movie is written by Justin Theroux who previously cowrote that fantastic comedy Tropic Thunder. Director of the movie is Jon Favreau who also acted in the movie as Tony Stark's bodyguard.

The trailer first. The beauty or the not so beauty thing about this trailer is that you can get a really good idea of almost all of the plot points of the movie in this.

Not difficult to guess the best part of the movie. Sometimes you feel that a particular role was destined to be played by a particular person. You can't seperate the role and the person. Robert Downey, Jr. is Tony Stark. He is so convincing that if not for the backlash of the fans you may very well change the name of Tony Stark to Robert Downey, Jr. He is absolutely enjoying this role and it shows on the screen. Also Mickey Rourke is an excellent casting choice for Ivan Vanko / Whiplash. He is really cool. I read that it was Downey who initially proposed Rourke's name for Whiplash.

The Maltese Falcon (1941)

Verdict: 9/10

The Maltese Falcon is written & directed by John Huston and adopted from Dashiell Hammett's novel of the same name. The movies star cast includes Humphrey Bogart as private investigator Sam Spade, Mary Astor as Brigid O'Shaughnessy, Peter Lorre as Joel Cairo, Sydney Greenstreet as Kasper Gutman, Lee Patrick as Effie Perrine, Elisha Cook Jr. as Wilmer Cook, Gladys George as Iva Archer amongst others. There is a special cameo by Walter Huston.

The Maltese Falcon received Oscar nominations for Picture, John Huston for Adapted Screenplay & Sydney Greenstreet for Supporting Actor.

I won't give any plot details here except that this is a wonderful crime mystery that started the classic film noir period of Hollywood. The movie starts with these lines scrolling.

"In 1539, the Knights Templar of Malta, paid tribute to Charles V of Spain, by sending him a Golden Falcon encrusted from beak to claw with rarest jewels ----- but pirates seized the galley carrying this priceless token and the fate of the Maltese Falcon remains a mystery to this day ---".

So we know that we have to find the falcon & in the process we deal with lies, murders, characters full of deceit & cunningness. You know the typical film noir settings.

The Maltese Falcon is the first movie directed by John Huston who in his illustrious career was nominated for 15 Oscars. John Huston hated the two previous movie adaptations of the novel The Maltese Falcon. He thought that there is a lot of scope for improvement. The beauty of the film is that there is not a single waste line nor a single waste shot nor a single waste performance. Everything is so perfect & each character is very well developed. I felt Huston has filtered the movie like water, over & over, until it became so perfect.

Serendipity (2001)

Verdict:  9/10

How many of us doesn't like a good love story with some humour & some melancholy. I think the romcoms of the 30s, 40s & 50s are amongst the best in Hollywood history. We have such precious gems such as Adam's Rib, Roman Holiday, It Happened One Night, My Man Friday & the list goes on. The next 3 decades saw a decline in this genre save some rare exceptions such as Annie Hall. But the last 2 decades saw a revival of sorts. I think the success of When Harry Met Sally & Pretty Woman has a lot to do with this.

I like many romcoms from the last 2 decades but if you ask me to name 3 movies that I absolutely adore from the last 21 years, I would say 10 Things I Hate About You, My Sassy Girl (not the English version but the Korean version Yeopgijeogin Geunyeo) & Serendipity.

I actually saw Serendipity for the 1st time only a year after its release. At that time I haven't seen many rom-coms & also I wasn't thinking about movies in a critical way analysing their good, bad & ugly. It was just some rom-com which I was seeing to waste some time. But by the first 15 minutes, I started to love the movie. One reason was due to the interesting start & another reason was due to Kate Beckinsale about whom I never heard of before & who will always remain my 1st Hollywood crush.

Serendipity is directed by Peter Chelsom & written by Marc Klein.

How to Train Your Dragon (2010)

Verdict:  8/10

How to Train Your Dragon directed by Chris Sanders & Dean DeBlois is a big budget CGI animation film from the DreamWorks Animation stable. 

The story is set around the ancient & mythical Viking land where the glory of a man lies in becoming a dragon slayer. Dragons occasionally raid the Vikings & take the livestock & any other available food which invariably results in a fight. The protagonist of the movie is Hiccup (Jay Baruchel), son of the chief of Vikings (Gerard Butler). As with any other Viking, Hiccup wants to be a dragon slayer but is constantly discouraged by his father because he is 'different' read not muscular. So at one of the dragon raids, when Hiccup injures a most feared dragon called Night Fury, noone believes him. He goes to the adjacent woods to find & kill it, but when the time comes he couldn't do it because he realizes that it is as much afraid of him as he is of it. So he releases it & an unlikely friendship is forged. Gradually Hiccup finds that dragons are not harmful unless provoked & he tries to change the perceptions of Vikings especially that of his father. With the help of his lady love Astrid (America Ferrera), how he achieves his goal & brings peace between Vikings & Dragons forms the rest of the story. By the way, the intro of Astrid is hot, literally. There are enough action pieces & aerial fights in the film. The Big Daddy at the climax looked like a hybrid between T-Rex & Archaeopteryx. Imagine a flying T-Rex breathing fire.

Date Night (2010)

Verdict:  8/10

Ads before the movie in theatre:

1. New Samsung 3D. The ad was amazing on the big screen although I doubt the real effect of the T.V.

2. Trailer of The A-Team, which was rather uninspiring with the only inspiration being Liam Neeson's face.

3. Insipid trailer of The Bounty Hunter starring Jennifer Aniston & Gerard Butler. I found the comedy rather bland. Never a fan of Aniston.

Date Night is directed by Shawn Levy whose previous credits include The Pink Panther & Night at the Museum movies amongst others.

The movie stars Steve Carell & Tina Fey as the married couple Phil and Claire Foster living in New Jersey with 2 children. They are one of those couples who lead the same monotonous routine life, day in & day out. Although they do love & admire each other, they feel nothing "special" or magic in their relation as well as life. Every week they go on a date night to the local restaurant where they make jokes & amuse themselves by imitating other couples' talks & guessing their stories. But even this has become a tiresome experience now. When their best friends inform the Fosters about their divorce by saying that they no longer feel like couple but good room mates, Fosters feel the same about themselves. So in order to rekindle their romance Steve takes Claire on a date to a costly Manhattan restaurant.

Jesus Camp (2006)

Verdict:  10/10

This is one of the most terrifying horror documentaries that I've seen in the recent past. Leave aside your exorcists, grudges & halloweens. I've seen Gin gwai 2 a couple of days ago & as far as horror is considered, Jesus Camp actually beats it. If this documentary doesn't send even a single chill through your brain, I promise I will stop seeing any horror movies in the future. 

A couple of quotes from the documentary.

Becky Fischer: It's no wonder, with that kind of intense training and discipline, that those young people are ready to kill themselves for the cause of Islam. I wanna see young people who are as committed to the cause of Jesus Christ as the young people are to the cause of Islam. I wanna see them as radically laying down their lives for the Gospel as they are over in Pakistan and Israel and Palestine and all those different places, you know, because we have... excuse me, but we have the truth!

(If I erase "The Book" from your mind Becky, Where/What is the truth that you are talking about?)  

Becky Fischer: I can go into a playground of kids that don't know anything about Christianity, lead them to the Lord in a matter of, just no time at all. They are so usable in Christianity.

(Usable! Since when did Kids became some junk stationary.)

Jesus Camp directed by Rachel Grady & Heidi Ewing is a critically acclaimed documentary film which received an Oscar nomination but lost the award to Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth.

Clash of the Titans (2010)

Verdict:  6/10

The first thought that came to mind after watching Clash of the Titans was What an opportunity wasted!

Now the movie isn't bad by any means & is an easy one time watch. But it could have been so much more.

The Greek mythology is as rich as the Hindu mythology. Titan is the term for god in Greek mythology. Although the Greek gods are nothing more than a myth now, it would be wise to know that once upon a time they were thought to be real & a great civilization has worshipped them for centuries. There are many wonderful stories in Greek mythology & the story of Perseus, son of Zeus (Zeus like our Indra is the head of gods) is one of them.

Based on the heroics of Perseus, Clash of the Titans was first made in 1981. With the current advances in visual effects, it's a nobrainer to remake it & so we have the current movie directed by Louis Leterrier starring Sam Worthington (Avatar fame) as Perseus, Liam Neeson as Zeus, Ralph Fiennes as Hades (god of underworld & brother of Zeus), beautiful Gemma Arterton as Io (kind of guardian angel to Perseus), Alexa Davalos as Andromeda (princess of Argos) among others.

Monty Python's The Meaning of Life (1983)

Warning 1: Both the movie & the following review are Rated A for India & R for America. So proceed with discretion.

Warning 2: If you haven't seen the other 2 Monty Python movies, don't see repeat do not see this movie.

Verdict:  9/10

Monty Python's The Meaning of Life, unlike the 2 previous movies each of which had a full length continuous plot, is a sketch comedy. The movie is directed by Terry Jones except for the opening short film 'The Crimson Permanent Assurance' which was directed by Terry Gilliam. The 6 Pythons played more than 75 roles among themselves in this movie.

The movie starts with an amazing short film called 'The Crimson Permanent Assurance' which is nothing like I've ever seen. Comparing tired old people working in a company to slaves in a slave ship & developing this into a short film! Only a Python can devise a satire like this. The old people revolting against their more efficient young bosses to take over the company is shown as the slaves revolting against their captors & taking over the ship. The old people now run the company (shown as pirate ship) & attack other big corporations & finally fall off the edge of the world. The whole sequence is so incredibly shot that I was completely left in awe. Even a Python hater should see the opening sequence which runs for roughly 16 minutes. The old actors who performed here are brilliant.

Monty Python's Life of Brian (1979)

Brian: I'm not the Messiah! Will you please listen? I am not the Messiah, do you understand? Honestly! 

Girl: Only the true Messiah denies His divinity. 

Brian: What? Well, what sort of chance does that give me? All right! I am the Messiah! 

Followers: He is! He is the Messiah! 

Brian: Now, fuck off! 

[silence] 

Arthur: How shall we fuck off, O Lord?

Verdict:  10/10

The amazingly mad Pythons (Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Terry Gilliam, Eric Idle, Terry Jones, and Michael Palin) return for their 2nd movie Monty Python's Life of Brian after their hilarious 1st movie Monty Python and the Holy Grail. The movie is a cheeky irreverent satire about religiosity & to some extent politics.

Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975)

Verdict:  8/10

God:               What are you doing now? 

King Arthur:   Averting our eyes, oh Lord. 

God:         Well, don't. It's just like those miserable psalms, always so depressing. Now knock it off!

Monty Python is a very famous British comedy group which started in the early seventies. The group comprises of Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Terry Gilliam, Eric Idle, Terry Jones, and Michael Palin. The Monty Python has a cult following worldwide. Infact the goup was so famous that the word Pythonesque (see the dictionary) was coined after the group. They were also responsible for the word spam. A dinosaur was named after the group's name. Each of the 6 members has an asteroid named after them. 

Setting the basic info & trivia aside, Monty Python and the Holy Grail has all the six members of the group playing the principal leads, infact every one of them performs multiple roles. The movie is directed by two of the group's members Terry Gilliam & Terry Jones.

Jennifer's Body (2009)

Verdict:  6/10

Jennifer's Body is directed by Karyn Kusama & written by Oscar winning Screenwriter Diablo Cody. Cody won the Oscar for one of my favourites Juno. The movie stars Megan Fox & Amanda Seyfried in the lead roles. Johnny Simmons, Adam Brody, J.K.Simmons among others are in the supporting roles.


The movie is a comedy thriller set in the high school background. Jennifer Check (Megan Fox) is the high school hottie who although behaves very confident from outside, is actually a very insecure person. Her best friend from childhood is Anita "Needy" Lesnicki (Amanda Seyfried) who is the quintessential gawky, nerdy student typically present in every high school movie. One day Jennifer takes Needy to a rock show by a minor band. After a big fire accident, the rock band under the impression that Jennifer is a virgin takes her with them, offers her as a sacrifice to Satan in exchange for fame & money.

This Is It (2009)

Verdict:  8/10

“If you enter this world knowing you are loved and you leave this world knowing the same, then everything that happens in between can be dealt with.”  

  --- Michael Jackson.

This Is It was actually the name of a planned series of 50 concerts to be held in London by the King of Pop, one of the greatest entertainers, Michael Jackson. But with the unfortunate death of him, the concerts were stalled. AEG Live were the concert promoters & in an attempt to salvage whatever they could, AEG sold over 100 hours of rehearsal footage to Columbia. This footage was actually intended for Michael's personal library & was never thought to be released as a film.

Alice in Wonderland (2010)

First things first. Say big CHEERS to me because this is my first blog of any kind.

Verdict:  Alice in Wonderland (3D) -- 7/10       

       Alice in Wonderland (2D) -- 6/10

The first thing one should know about the movie Alice in Wonderland is that it is not the traditional story that we know. Directed by Tim Burton, the movie starts with the young Alice being told by her father that her Wonderland glimpses are only her imaginations. The movie cuts to the now grownup Alice (Mia Wasikowska) going to attend a Victorian party. Unknown to Alice is the fact that it is a surprise party planned for her engagement with the son of her deceased father's business partner. Alice is not particularly happy with this and when she sees the White Rabbit, she follows it by instinct to the Rabbit Hole & falls into the amazing Wonderland called as Underland in the movie.

Alice doesn't remember any of her childhood visits. Everything is new to her and she even pinches herself to check whether she is in a dream. She meets all the Wonderland characters which include the smoking Caterpillar (voiced by Alan Rickman, who plays Professor Snape in Harry Potter series), the White Rabbit (voiced by Michael Sheen), Tweedledum and Tweedledee (Matt Lucas), the Knave of Hearts (Crispin Glover), the White Queen (Anne Hathway), the Red Queen (Helena Bonham Carter) and the Mad Hatter (Johnny Depp). The Red Queen has taken control of Wonderland. How Alice remembers her past visits and helps the good people creatures of Wonderland in defeating the Red Queen forms the remaining story.