Quick Movie Reviews: The Thing, Bucky Larson: Born to Be a Star, What's Your Number?

Sorry for the lack of posting, I've been a bit busy. Here are some quick reviews for the films I have watched in the past week or so.

The Thing (Film Number 51 In My Goal For 2011 Films): Not a bad monster movie at all. I haven't seen John Carpenter's original, so I can't say how it compares, but i was decently entertained throughout. Even though it's not even remotely scary, The story is pretty solid and there is copious amounts of gore (in a good way). The Arctic setting did wonders for it as well. It adds this claustrophobic and deadly effect that influences the character's decisions and makes the events of the film that much more compelling. It's not going to reinvent the wheel for monster movies, but it's still a pretty good creature feature.

3/5 Stars

Bucky Larson: Born to Be a Star (Film Number 52 In My Goal For 2011 Films): I've been hearing all the hype about how bad Bucky Larson: Born to Be a Star was. It actually wasn't quite as bad as I heard it was, but it's still fucking bad. This movie is really, really dumb and not in a funny way at all. About 98% of the jokes fall completely flat and the ones that do stick aren't that funny. You get a feeling that there were a lot of the scenes in the movie were supposed to garner huge laughs (For example: Every scene with Bucky's roommate played by Kevin Nealon and all of the really lame porn puns and jokes on display throughout) which makes it almost sad in how desperate the attempts at humor are. Nick Swardson has really gone down the tubes since having a hand in writing Grandma's Boy. He's been in a good number of quality movies since then, but everything he's written (like this and his godawful TV show Pretend Time) have been pure shit. It's like he used 100% of the good material he had in Grandma's Boy or he just wasn't responsible for any of the good jokes. Not quite as bad as it was made out to be, but it is still pretty damn terrible.

1.5/5 Stars

What's Your Number? (Film Number 53 In My Goal For 2011 Films): Now this is a movie that is much worse than Bucky Larson and deserves at least double the Razzie nominations. What's Your Number? is just flat-out abysmal. This has to be the most groan-inducing, formulaic, and unfunny romantic comedy to come along since Sweet Home Alabama. I spent pretty much the whole movie with one hand over my face thinking "That's the best they could come up with?". I actually like Anna Farris and Chris Evans, but there was nothing they could do to save this trainwreck. Almost everything that happens in this movie is cringe-worthy (The scene where Anna Farris's character falls while running in a bridesmaids dress was probably the worst of all). I wanted to turn it off numerous times, but somehow I made it through the whole thing. Farris and Evans are the only reason this didn't get 0 stars. They do their best with the dogshit material that they were given. What's Your Number? is a monumentally bad romantic comedy that shouldn't even be viewed by big fans of the genre.

1/5 Stars