Movies that Don’t Suck - September 8, 2008

Author: Jenn, Category: Play

The title of this post may have been the first time I’ve typed “September” yet this month, and damn did that feel good! And it’s a quarter over to boot.

Anyway, down to business - I haven’t had the time to watch too many movies recently, but here are a few I’ve watched that didn’t completely rot.

The Jane Austen Book Club - I’d wanted to see this one for a few weeks. I love Jane Austen (note to self: must re-read all - yeah yeah, I occasionally have a stereotypical female urge to do such things). That of course made me curious about the movie. At the same time, every time I picked it up debating whether or not to rent it, I just wasn’t “feeling it.” Finally I broke down (read: there was nothing better to rent, and I was in a hurry). I was pleasantly surprised. It wasn’t overly sappy bullshit. I was happy with most of the ending (all but one story line). There was a certain amount of truth in there - any movie that makes me reflect on my own life in even a small way gets my vote. Not amazing, but one of the “smarter” chick flicks I’ve seen lately (although as the movie tries to show - Austen ain’t just a chick thing). - 3.5 stars

Halloween 4 - The Return of Michael Myers - If you’ve seen my past “movies that don’t suck” posts, you may have noticed that I’m finally working my way through the Halloween series (sans 3 for the time being). I was very pleasantly surprised by the first. In true sequel fashion, 2 wasn’t quite as good (but I still enjoyed it). I was worried about 3. I actually rented it three times I think before I finally sat down and watched the thing. I was concerned that by the third, we’d be getting to the point where they’d dive more into the gore and other shit for the sake of competition (and for the record, I have no problem with violence, sex, gore, etc. in movies as long as it furthers the plot and isn’t gratuitously thrown in there for the sake of appealing to a young male audience too dense to see beyond it). In that sense, it was better than I expected (although, and I’ll admit I was kind of distracted by something else while watching it, did it seem like there was an odd amount of ripping holes into people - was it maybe just me?). The storyline itself was annoyingly predictable for the most part (life’s too short to watch shit when you know what’s going to happen), and the whole Dr. Loomis thing was too much. It’s one thing for the villan to be some supernatural-esque death-defying stud. It’s something else entirely for Donald Pleasance to mysteriously survive all kinds of crap. Anyway, the kid was cute and not bad, and she might be the only reason this one barely squeaked by with a high enough rating to make the list. I’m not thinking I’m going to enjoy 5 - seems to be quite the downward slope from one to the next. In 4’s defense, it did give me nightmares (well one) - waking up was kind of funny, because I couldn’t believe I’d dreamt about some murderous movie-based foe. Cool. - 3 stars

Near Dark - This one I watched on a recommendation after mentioning that I tend to like a good vampire story. It wasn’t bad. Nothing amazing, but overall the characters were pretty strong. As it often is in horror movies, the youngen was one of the better actors on board. There did seem to be one really odd discrepency in the dialogue that was driving me nuts, but it’s possible I misheard something, so won’t judge on that until I eventually watch it again (if I watch it again). The ending kind of ruined it a bit for me - pissed me off actually. (Spoiler: The whole “cure vampirism with a blood transfusion” thing was just a cheap-ass way out, and frankly, I wanted him to let the bitch fry - after all, she was the one who caused all of his problems, put his family at risk, etc. because she decided to turn him rather than kill him.) - 3.5 stars