Monster Trucks

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High school student Tripp Coley (played by Lucas Till) befriends a monster he names Creech that attaches itself to a truck. As he attempts to hide the creature from other people, a potential love interest, Meredith (Jane Levy) ends up joining him in his “quest.” Monster Trucks was an idea that came from the mind of a studio executive’s four-year-old son. That executive no longer works at the studio. I have no idea if there is a correlation between these two factoids. This movie kept getting pushed back until someone just kind of seemed to say “just put it out in January. Who cares?” This movie actually amassed a budget of $125,000,000. The cast is filled with good actors (most of whom just seem to be phoning it in). Never before have I seen Danny Glover care less. Hell, I don’t even know if he knows he’s in a movie. He just decided to pretend to be in a wheelchair one day. Someone saw it, and decided to shoehorn it into a family movie for no reason. On the other hand, Levy actually seems like she’s trying (the one actor in the movie that actually gives me that feeling). Her character is a bit annoying. I don’t blame her so much as the writing and directing that went into this movie. Lucas Till and Jane Levy are both in their late twenties playing teenagers. I wouldn’t mind so much except the two of them are constantly shown onscreen opposite actual teenagers. It looks goofy, not natural. The writing really doesn’t work in the slightest. Characters will show up, disappear for a long stretch of time, and reappear later in the movie. Oftentimes, this kind of thing will happen with no real explanation given, and we, the audience just kind of have to accept it. Overall, Monster Trucks is one of those bad movies I actually kind of have to recommend watching. This is one of the most baffling, bizarre things I may have ever watched. It truly has to be seen to be believed.

4 / 10

XXX: Return of Xander Cage

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A group of extreme sports enthusiasts/assassins steal a very dangerous McGuffin. CIA agent Jane Marke (Toni Collette) enlists help from Xander Cage, hence the movie’s title. I honestly really enjoyed this movie. That doesn’t make this movie good, however. The story is extremely stupid and doesn’t make any damn sense. Fortunately, this isn’t one of those movies I would even consider watching for the story. The writing is on the level of a cornball 80s action movie. A soldier tells Cage that he and his men aren’t “jacked up on Red Bull and Mountain Dew, asshole.” The movie follows a lot of your typical action movie tropes. There are a lot of awesome action scenes (director D.J. Caruso handles them surprisingly well), pretty, scantily clad women. I’m expected to believe that Nina Dobrev from The Vampire Diaries is supposed to be a tech expert. The woman is clearly trying, but she succeeds a little too well in making her character come off as annoying. Admittedly, she does grow on me as the movie goes on. On the other hand, I do enjoy the performances by Vin Diesel, Samuel L. Jackson, Ruby Rose, Rory McCann, and Donnie Yen. Yen, in particular, steals the show. Whenever he is onscreen, I find myself glued to him. On the other hand, actress Deepika Padukone offers little to be desired in her performance aside from being attractive. She feels wooden and lifeless when delivering her lines. Overall, XXX: Return of Xander Cage works because it is completely ridiculous. It doesn’t seem to aspire to be anything more than dumb action fun. For the most part, the acting isn’t bad (it’s not trying to win any awards by any stretch of the imagination). The writing, directing, and lack of story elevate this movie to very well deserved guilty pleasure status.  

6 / 10

The Book of Love

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Henry (played by Jason Sudeikis) is widowed when his wife, Penny (played by Jessica Biel) is killed in a car accident.  As a way to cope, he befriends a homeless teenager named Millie (played by Maisie Williams) build a raft so she can sail the Atlantic. One of the first things I noticed about this movie was that it was filled with people trying (often failing) to speak with southern and Cajun accents. The worst offender has got to be Jason Sudeikis himself. The man struggles with his accent, often slipping in and out of it. Even If I don’t necessarily care for Jessica Biel’s southern accent, at least she sticks to it when she’s on-screen. Justin Timberlake composed the music in this movie. I mention this because I do think the man is talented. The problem is the music feels incredibly overbearing nine times out of ten. There are attempts at humor sprinkled throughout the movie, and they typically fall flat. The pacing in this movie was sluggish. By the time I reached the half hour mark, I must have thought “what a snooze” to myself multiple times. There is very little CGI used in the movie, thankfully. I say this because when it actually is used, it’s pretty bad. I actually do want to commend the performances in the movie, especially Maisie Williams. Her accent may not be that good (it does get better as the movie goes on), but the rest of her performance actually is. I feel like there is a character to her, even she is, admittedly, a cliché. The same thing could also be said of Jason Sudeikis in the movie, bad attempt at an accent, but decent enough performance overall. Despite some solid performances and attempts at character development, this movie suffers from awful pacing and a somewhat predictable story.

3 / 10          

Live By Night

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Joe Coughlin (Ben Affleck) is a small-time crook that is offered the chance to help a crime lord run his empire during the prohibition. He slowly rises through the ranks of the mob, making power plays. Now, I was excited for Live By Night. Recently, Affleck has really sold me as an actor, and I’ve always been impressed with him as a director. This movie gives a strong performance from Ben Affleck. For the most part, this movie is really well directed. Unfortunately, the story is a bit of a mess. I get the feeling that this is supposed to take place over a decade or so, but it’s never all that clear. There are points where I do notice Affleck’s direction actually suffer a little bit (something I never wanted to say as someone who has always loved Affleck as a director). I wasn’t a huge fan on a lot of the quick cuts used during the shoot out scenes. They really made the action tough to make out a lot of the time. The ending was a problem for me as well. There were several points of this movie where I felt like it could’ve easily wrapped up, but it kept going. The movie had a ton of things going on in it, and it was really hard to keep track sometimes. Occasionally, the movie did hit some pretty predictable beats. Other times, it did actually surprise me a little bit. Those aforementioned shootouts aside, the rest of the time, Affleck’s direction was really damn good (something I have come to expect from the man). I have already mentioned Affleck’s lead performance, but I don’t want to take away from the rest of the cast either. All of them actually do a tremendous job. The standout for me actually might be Elle Fanning. In this movie alone, she plays a naïve teenager, an angry (sometimes downright terrifying) zealot, and a frightened girl. She has maybe twenty minutes of screen time. Overall, I think this could’ve been a much tighter film if they just narrowed the focus. Ultimately, despite solid direction, costume design, and performances, it ends up being an uneven and disappointing mess.

5 / 10    

Underworld: Blood Wars

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Underworld: Blood Wars is the fifth installment in the Underworld franchise. This time around, Selene (played once again by Kate Beckinsale) is hunted by vampires and lycans alike. They want her to find her daughter, Eve. Eve apparently has special blood that can give the lycans special abilities. The costume design is pretty solid, though it’s nothing that screams “Oscar” to me. I actually love the production design, however. Much like the previous movies in the franchise, there is this level of coolness to the Gothic imagery and atmosphere surrounding the movie’s sets and backgrounds. Kate Beckinsale actually works in this movie because she can practically play the part in her sleep by now. Charles Dance also works in his role as something of an aged, wise mentor character. I also loved Tobias Menzies as the film’s villain, Marius, though for a different reason. This guy goes incredibly over the top (in an Eddie Redymane in Jupiter Ascending sort of way.) The action sequences feel a bit hit and miss. It’s clear that there is good stunt work involved here, and sometimes the fights are easy and comprehensible to make out. Other times, not so much. The same, I feel could be said of the direction by Anna Forester. There’s a scene where Selene watches a massacre happen before her eyes while she is helpless and paralyzed. The editing often feels jumbled, almost like it can’t sit still on a shot for more than a few seconds. The story is one of the movie’s weakest elements. There are a lot of things that don’t really add up or even make that much sense. Why do the villains keep hunting Selene when she doesn’t know where her daughter is? Why was using the daughter so important when the character never actually appears in the movie? Much like the previous films in the franchise, I think Underworld: Blood Wars fills a certain niche. It’s just stupid, popcorn, guilty pleasure-style entertainment. It doesn’t aspire to be anything else, and I really did enjoy the movie for that reason.

6 / 10