‘Marley & Me’ Download and Reviews

December 15, 2009 by Paul Wall  
Filed under Comedy, Drama, Family

“Marley & Me” Movie Details

Marley & Me tagline: Heel the love
Marley and Me - DVD Cover

Marley & Me DVD Cover

Actors:
Owen Wilson John Grogan
Jennifer Aniston Jennifer Grogan
Eric Dane Sebastian
Kathleen Turner Ms. Kornblut
Alan Arkin Arnie Klein
Nathan Gamble Patrick
Ann Dowd Dr. Platt
Haley Bennett Lisa
Clarke Peters Editor
Finley Jacobsen Conor
Lucy Merriam Colleen
Bryce Robinson Patrick
Ben Hyland Conor
Sarah O’Kelly Neighbor Mom
Keith Hudson Big Guy
Directors: David Frankel
IMDB Rating: 7.0/10 out of 28,578 votes

“Marley & Me” Movie Review

“Marley and Me” Plot Summary

A family learns important life lessons from their adorable, but naughty and neurotic dog.

Best film of the holiday season

Short-attention-span synopsis: Best film of the holiday season

Marley & Me (PG, 2:00) 9I felt bad having to deliver the news to my fellow fans about what a poor crop of SF&F films we have to pick from this holiday season, so let me make it up to you by giving a totally unqualified recommendation for Marley & Me! It’s not science fiction. Heck, it’s barely fiction at all, since it’s drawn from the real-life experiences of newspaper columnist John Grogan, his wife Jen, their kids, and their yellow labrador retriever, Marley, ‘the worst dog in the world’.I do some database work for the Wisconsin Academy of Graduate Service Dogs, and I have to say that Marley would have washed out of the academy in 15 minutes. He’d be a terrible service dog, but he makes a wonderful friend

This film is utterly realistic. It never strikes a forced or false note. There are lots of laffs, but they all arise organically out of real life. John and Jen are good, decent people (like virtually all Americans), and they behave naturally, without any visible ‘acting’. It’s a little slice of Americana. If a big-budget spectacular like Benjamin Button had been able to muster a quarter of the heart of this modest film, they’d already be rolling Oscar’s red carpet up to its front door.’I'd like to be the man my dog thinks I am.’ — Mike McGuire, songwriter

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‘Armageddon’ Download and Reviews

August 3, 2009 by Paul Wall  
Filed under Action, Adventure, Romance

“Armageddon” Movie Details

Armageddon tagline: It’s Closer Than You Think.
Armageddon - DVD Cover

Armageddon DVD Cover

Actors:
Bruce Willis Harry S. Stamper
Billy Bob Thornton Dan Truman, NASA Administrator
Ben Affleck A.J. Frost
Liv Tyler Grace Stamper
Will Patton Charles “Chick” Chapple
Steve Buscemi Rockhound
William Fichtner Colonel William Sharp, Shuttle Freedom Pilot
Owen Wilson Oscar Choi, Geologist
Michael Clarke Duncan Jayotis “Bear” Kurleenbear
Peter Stormare Lev Andropov, Russian Cosmonaut
Ken Hudson Campbell Max Lennert
Jessica Steen Jennifer Watts, Shuttle Freedom Co-Pilot
Keith David Lt. General Kimsey
Chris Ellis Walter Clark
Jason Isaacs Dr. Ronald Quincy, Research
Directors: Michael Bay
IMDB Rating: 6.0/10 out of 110,110 votes

“Armageddon” Movie Review

“Armageddon” Plot Summary

When an asteroid the size of Texas is headed for Earth the world’s best deep core drilling team is sent to nuke the rock from the inside.

This just goes too far sometimes, but it’s good

I’ll say it straight out, this movie let me down quite a lot. I wanted an epic badass of a film that would revolutionize the way I see movies. I got an epic behemoth of a film with more then ample doses of goofy monkeying around inserted sometimes at the most inappropriate of scenes. Bruce Willis stars in this movie along with Ben Afleck and Liv Tyler as two young lovers, and it’s safe to say that there aren’t too many complaints with the acting (although admittedly there were some weak spots there, too).

No, my main problem with this movie is the comedy. Now, I’m all for comedy, but the directors of Armageddon didn’t seem to be taking their own plot too seriously at some point. I was in awe at the utter stupidity of the characters in this movie, especially toward the second half of it, and specifically Rockhound (Steve Buscemi, who does do a very good job acting here anyway). We all need some lighthearted fun in our movies, but what we don’t need is for the comedy to interfere with the dramatic parts of the movie, which it almost does a few times here. Rockhound’s foolishness and monkeying around almost ruins several scenes and it doesn’t fit with the whole theme of saving the Earth. Why did they even put the parts involving the stripper and then later the machine gun on the asteroid into the movie? It’s safe to tell who we can all throw rocks at for ruining the movie. Why on earth is he so lenient about it? It makes no sense. I can say the same thing for most of the crew at the beginning, too, they seem awfully laid back for a bunch of guys about to go save the world. Bear was falling asleep and making comments about a hot girl during the teaching sessions. What? Like I said, I like comedy fine, but here it just hinders what would otherwise be a phenomenal movie.

This movie is full of explosions (big explosions, too, we’re not talking about little buildings. We’re talking entire cities all at once here. That’s epic.), romantic love scenes, and other action clichГ©s. They’re actually done quite well, until we get Rockhound or Bear making more dumbass jokes. The whole mishmash makes Armageddon look like a PARODY of the action genre at some points, and it hurts the score. A lot. If I were to see this movie without any prior knowledge of action movies, and having never seen one before this, I would get a flawed first impression of the genre. It’s not quite to the level of Scary Movie and Date Movie, of course, but it’s not an upstanding example of how to incorporate comedy into an action movie. See Die Hard 3 or The Good, The Bad, and The Ugly for that. Sorry, but Armageddon just goes too far overboard sometimes.

No, I don’t hate this movie though. I do like it quite a lot. It’s great fun for a Saturday night with friends or if you’ve been drinking (lol). The ending scenes with Willis and Afleck are very touching, as are most of the scenes involving Liv Tyler. It’s also got some extremely triumphant moments, and the explosions and special effects are amazingly done. Check out those skies toward the end! The scenes with Chick (Will Patton) and his ex-wife and son are extremely touching, and are the saving grace of the quieter parts of the movie. Beautiful. And like I mentioned before, it’s EPIC. In all caps, too. There aren’t many other movies like this that can touch it in epic-ness. Not even Die Hard or it’s sequels are more epic than this monster of a film.

Recommended to action fans who can stand stupidity in their movie-viewing. I’ll be watching this one again, too.

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