Movie Review: Straw Dogs (Film Number 49 In My Goal For 2011 Films)

I was blissfully unaware of the original Straw Dogs until the remake was released. I had heard a lot of great things about the original, which led me to believe the remake would be at the very least watchable. I was wrong. Straw Dogs misses the mark pretty hard. This is a film that takes a whole lot of time to do absolutely nothing. The first 3/4 of the film is a redneck melodrama and the last 1/4 is a bloody massacre. Everything leading up to the finale is mostly just dead air and feeble attempts at character development. The film only gets worst as it enters the last act. The event that leads to the violent conclusion is extremely stupid. The only thing stupider than the event leading to the conclusion, is the conclusion itself. It's just so dumb and extreme that you can't even fathom how anyone could take it seriously. It's ironic that a film in where one of the main characters is a screenwriter has such a weak script. Really the only thing Straw Dogs has going for it is a bunch of decent performances (with the exception of James Woods, who gives one of the worst stereotypical redneck performances ever.) Straw Dogs is a dull, half-baked, extreme, redneck opus that was not even remotely enjoyable.

1.5/5 Stars

Album Review: Goatwhore-Blood for the Master

Everyone's favorite extreme metal band from the Bayou Goatwhore is back again with Blood for the Master. As usual, Goatwhore's mix of death, black, and thrash metal is a relentlessly aggressive treat for the listener.

I will say, that Blood for the Master didn't grab me right off the bat. The first few tracks are pretty good, but they aren't great. Maybe I was just getting greedy after Goatwhore's last record Carving out the Eyes of God which started off with the absolute rager "Apocalyptic Havoc". The ragers that Goatwhore does so well do set in around track four with "In Deathless Tradition". Sammy Duet's trademark distorted thrash meets extreme metal riffs from the swamp finally come out and they are as sick as ever. The greatness of the rest of the album from "In Deathless Tradition" on more than makes up for the good, but not great first third of the album. Goatwhore explores their vast range of influences expertly on the second half. "Embodiment of the Bitter Chaos" provides a melodic black metal-esque vibe where the best riffs of the album surface. "Beyond the Spell of Discontent" provides a blast of old-school death metal that sounds like it was recorded in the late 80's or early 90's. "An End to Nothing" is a full-on thrash assault at under 3 minutes and is a sure pit-starter in a live environment. If only the first part of the record was as good as the second part, Goatwhore would have made their best record so far.

Blood for the Master is another great release from Goatwhore. Although I didn't enjoy it as much as their previous record Carving out the Eyes of God, it's about comparable with the rest of their discography outside of Carving. They are a consistent band that knows what their auidence wants and  they deliver the goods on every record. Blood for the Master is pure Goatwhore and I am excited to finally get to see them live this year (spoiler alert: they are on Summer Slaughter this year).

4/5 Stars
Standout Tracks
1.Embodiment of the Bitter Chaos
2.In Deathless Tradition
3.An End to Nothing

Movie Review: Ghost Rider: Spirit Of Vengeance

Ghost Rider: Spirit of Vengeance dropped the ball. There really is no better way to put it. This had all the makings of a corny masterpiece (Nicolas Cage, lame flame puns, and most importantly Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor of Crank fame directing), but instead they just waste all that potential. What we are left with is a movie that is just plain dumb instead of being dumb fun.

Spirit Of Vengeance actually makes the first Ghost Rider look like some kind of groundbreaking masterpiece. This movie just fails in almost every possible way, but at the end of the day, the majority of the blame can be put towards the piss-poor script. It's chalk-full of stupidity and unintentional laughs, but the tone of the film is dead serious. It's kind of hard to enjoy a movie that contains cringe-inducing dialogue, absolutely awful villains, a half-baked story that doesn't really make sense (but attempts to make it seem like it had a deep and engrossing story line) and multiple scenes of Johnny Blaze as Ghost Rider pissing fire with a straight face. The whole time I was left thinking "This would've been great if it had a better script". They really should have just had Mark Neveldine and Brian Taylor write this. If they had written it, this would've have been completely amazing. Their scripts don't take themselves seriously and they have really mastered the art of making corny films that are entertaining and fun as all hell.

Ghost Rider: Spirit Of Vengeance is an exercise in pure crap without any form of entertainment value. This is an incoherent, terribly acted, movie that is crippled even further by a dogshit script that seems like it was written by an 8-year old. The action scenes don't even serve as a saving grace. I don't mind a corny movie (I actually really enjoy over-the-top movies), but when there is little to no fun to be had, it just becomes a very unpleasant experience. A complete and total missed opportunity to say the least.

1.5/5 Stars

Movie Review: The Rum Diary

In 1998, a little movie based on a Hunter S. Thompson novel starring Johnny Depp called Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas was released and soon became a cult classic. Thirteen years later, Depp is starring in The Rum Diary,  another adaptation of a Thompson novel. Though it doesn't have the same levels of brilliant luancy and twisted genius that Fear and Loathing had (though it very well could also become a cult classic), The Rum Diary is still a clever and entertaining dark comedy ride. Much like Fear and Loathing, the two biggest strengths of The Rum Diary are Johnny Depp and the subtle, dark wit of Thompson's source material. Depp just owns the role of drunk journalist Paul Kemp. The whole film, no matter if his character is in a chaotic situation or just having a causal conversation, Depp maintains this calming and cool presence. He just has such a strange yet cool charisma that it makes almost every film he is in a pleasure to watch (with the exception of his frequent collaborations with Tim Burton). On top of Depp's great performance, The script is full of fun. The story is basic, but it's the wit of the script that makes it watchable. Kemp writes for a newspaper in San Juan, Puerto Rico and gets involved with a shady businessman (Aaron Eckhart) and falls in love with his girlfriend (Amber Heard). In the hands of weaker source material, this would have been a booze-soaked, misguided mess, but this is an intelligent, clever and amusing ride of unpredictable chaos for two hours. The Rum Diary isn't the abstract masterpiece that Fear and Loathing was, but it's still completely worth the watch .

3.5/5 Stars

Happy Valentine's Day!

It's been a slow few days in terms of blogging for me (I haven't seen a movie for listened to a new album in almost a week) so I figured I would wish my followers a Happy Valentine's Day. Anyways in the Valentine's Day spirit, I figured I would share my favorite love song with you all. Enjoy!

Album Review: Van Halen-A Different Kind of Truth

There has been a lot of hoopla about the new Van Halen album. David Lee Roth is back for the first time since 1984, this is Van Halen's first album since the last Sammy Hager disaster in 1998 and they have a huge tour lined up for the next few months. You would think this would be great right? Not so much.

I will say my expectations for this album were very low and they surpassed them, so at least Van Halen succeeded on that front. A lot of Van Halen's peers from that era have made far worse reunion albums than A Different Kind of Truth. Thankfully, there is only a couple tracks that are god awful ( The Hagar-era sounding"Tattoo" and the bluesy disaster "Stay Frosty"). That being said, there just isn't anything remotely special about it. It just seems like they were on auto pilot throughout the album. There is really no redeeming qualities to most of this album. The songs just lack the punch that old, Roth-era Van Halen had. There is a lack of great hooks, riffs, and just overall catchiness. David Lee Roth doesn't really do a bad job (especially considering his age), but let's just say he's seen better days. It's kind of a shame considering the glory days of Van Helm were when Lee Roth was the frontman. It's awesome that he's back, but I just wish this was more of a landmark record to celebrate his comeback. Even Eddie Van Halen can't make this album memorable. Sure Eddie Van Halen is still arguably the best guitar player of all time, but his solos are (for the most part) surprisingly pretty bland here. I will say at least his guitar playing is back where it belongs instead of on the insultingly bad material that was produced when Sammy Hagar was in the band.

A Different Kind of Truth did indeed surpass my expectations, but that doesn't excuse it's mediocrity. This is an album that just doesn't go anywhere for 90% of it's duration. It's mostly inoffensive yet very so-so hard rock. It's good to see David Lee Roth back and Van Halen going back to their roots, I just wish that they had made a better comeback album than A Different Kind of Truth.

2.5/5 Stars
Standout Track
1.China Town (the only track on the album that is actually good!)

Quick Movie Reviews: Diary Of A Wimpy Kid: Roderick Rules, Contagion, and A Very Harold and Kumar Christmas

I had a good number of films to write reviews for, so I figured I would just do some brief ones on each to conserve some time.

Diary Of a Wimpy Kid: Roderick Rules (Film Number 47 In My Goal For 2011 Films): An almost completely joyless and unfunny kids movie. The jokes are just so dumb I can't imagine anyone above the age of 8 thinking they are funny. When the funniest thing in the movie is the presence of a Brutal Truth poster in Roderick's room (being a big metalhead, the fact that there was a visible poster from such a legendary grindcore band in a kids movie was hilarious to me and probably no one else.), you know you have a major problem. The cast doesn't really make things better. The characters are mostly just annoying and you just sigh every time they enter a scene. Unless you have kid that is age 8 or under, stay away from this one.

1.5/5 Stars

Contagion (Film Number 48 In My Goal For 2011 Films): A pleasant surprise. Steven Soderbergh turned what could have been a very boring film into a pretty good disease film. What struck me most about this film was the fact that it's incredibly realistic. This could ACTUALLY happen and that is just incredibly scary. The film also makes good use of it's large cast of A-list actors. This is a great ensemble of talented actors and they are pretty much all on the top of their game here ( Jude Law, Matt Damon, and Laurence Fishburne give the standout performances out of this elite cast of actors). The only downside to Contagion is the narrative is a little too scattered and manic. If it had a better structured story, it would have reached it's full potential. Nevertheless, a good and effectively eerie disease movie.

3.5/5 Stars 

A Very Harold and Kumar Christmas*: Irrelevant to the quality of the movie, but it's very strange watching a Christmas movie in February. Anyways, back to the movie itself. As expected, it's hilarious. It's exactly what a Harold and Kumar Christmas promised to be and should be: lots of drug use, sex, vulgarity, stupid humor, lunacy and of course, another amazing cameo from Neil Patrick Harris, and even some holiday cheer and charm for good measure. It's good to have Harold and Kumar back, John Cho and Kal Penn really are a great comedic pair. I didn't enjoy it as much as the first two, but it's still a great comedy.

4/5 Stars