Paranormal Activity Review

I think at this stage everyone and their badger has heard of Paranormal Activity. Its the movie that was made for $11,000 dollars, $15,000 dollars or 3 camels and a goat, depending on what you read. Either way Paranormal Activity is gone well north of $100 million dollars in the USA alone.

The idea here is incredibly simple. Boyfriend / Girlfriend live together. Girlfriend is followed by a demon. On occasion they hear a few things go bump in the night. Boyfriend then decides this is the best excuse to go an splash out on a fancy camcorder. Said camcorder is more or less surgically attached to his hip until he unhooks it and places it on a tripod to record the bumps in the night in the bedroom. And that's the story essentially. All done in the Blair Witch “found videotapes” style.

An unknown cast more or less improvise all their dialogue for the duration of the movie. And it never shows. There’s a great performance here for the 2 main characters and no matter how much I fought it, I couldn’t fail to get sucked in. Paranormal Activity does indeed suck you in, but it takes a bit to get caught up in it. Excluding the occasional bump in the night, the first 30 minutes are full of conversations with the happy couple. But once things get going, this movie comes at you like an out of control freight train.Its pure and utter psychological warfare on the viewer, mainly caused by a sound effects track that will have you wishing you were deaf. Your hair will stand on end and your arms will produce a mountain range of goose bumps that you never thought humanely possible. And by the final scene and the Spielberg suggested ending you will be thrilled its over and then wonder why you never brought a clean pair of underpants.

Paranormal Activity is an incredibly simple movie with little or no special fx and no giant monsters, but it is incredibly well done. Its been described as the scariest movie ever made and I have to agree. I never in my life of watching movies have had so many chills. And I mean ice cold, full body chills. So much so that I could have stuck an ice cube tray up my ass and made ice cubes. Paranormal Activity is much more than a movie, its an actual psychological experience. Just bring clean jocks!

 

 

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Movie of the Year 2009

Hey all, the first ever Movie Bit,  Movie of the Year Poll kicks off right now. Movie of the year as voted by YOU will be announced on our final Movie Bit of 2009 on Sunday, Dec 20th - Corks RedFM!
So vote now either by selecting (3 choices) your top movies of 2009 on the big poll on the right, or click the link on the very top of the screen!  Movies that are currently not released will be added in the coming days.

Thanks for voting!

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Law Abiding Citizen Review

The bad guy always gets killed or those he? Law Abiding Citizen stars Gerard Butler as Clyde Shelton who has to endure his wife and child being raped and killed in front of him by 2 burglars. Jamie Foxx plays Nick Rice who’s the legal department justice person. So after the the horrific Shelton family slaughter, only one of the bad guys gets the death penalty with the other getting a prison sentence. All this happens after Rice cuts a deal, much to the disappointment of Shelton, and quite understandably so.

From here on in, the guy that got the prison sentence eventually gets out after 10 years and its from here the movie continues. Mr.Bad guy meets with Shelton, a box cutter and an electric saw. And slowly but surely Shelton starts popping off judges and officers one by one as he is still upset with the justice department. He manages this from his comfy prison cell after he gets put away for the electric saw incident.

In between a few more deals which include steak and a fancy mattress, we learn what Shelton actually is and then he ends up in Solitary after using his steak for more than eating. From here, the story throws a few twists at you and the body count racks up as the movie rolls along to its exciting ending.

Law Abiding Citizen has a solid cast and solid performances but none of them are Oscar worthy. Gerard Butler plays the role of a scorned man quite well. He show’s little or no emotion after the family slaughter and has zero contempt for the legal system. That said, he’s not an instantly likeable character as you don’t feel a great deal of sympathy for him. This is routed in the fact that the actual murder and rape scene are more or less like a 15 second montage which isn’t exactly as graphic as it sounds. If that particular scene was extended to some degree I feel it would have added to the story and indeed made the viewer have more of a connection and sympathy with Butler. Foxx is solid here as well, again not an instantly likeable character, as a matter of fact you’ll spend most of the movie thinking he’s a self centred pig, which is testament to his performance. Colm Meany is here as well and turns in the usual Meany performance, solid as ever. At 109 minutes, this film trundles along quite nicely and is well shot. Theres a few tense moments to boot, including one great scene with a judge a mobile phone!

The story is well written, the idea isn’t bad either but we’ve seen a million revenge movies. Either way though, Law Abiding Citizen is an enjoyable thriller and while it’s not one of the years biggest movies, it certainly is worth a watch!

 

 

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The Twilight Saga - New Moon review

For many people (primarily young teenage girls) their world has stopped turning as the second movie in the Twilight series arrives.
Lets be honest here, If Jesus turned up and told the fans this movie was rubbish, it wouldn’t matter. This is a fan movie.

Essentially the story here follows on the love story of Bella and Edward. Between the jigs and reels, Edward (Robert Pattinson) and the rest of the family Cullen decide to up sticks and leave, as one of the school going family members has aged quite a bit. So poor old Bella gets the heave ho and she goes a little bonkers. Kristen Stewart to her credit, plays the completely obsessed ex girlfriend probably too well as her constant whinging gets annoying quite quickly. Either way, she ends up pushing her own boundaries and when she does, she gets glimpses of Edward telling her not to do whatever she’s about to do. She then goes off and starts hanging out with a potential love interest, who’s also a werewolf and subsequently starts hanging out with a group of werewolves. And look, these aren’t your ordinary werewolves' either. They’ve been eating a lot more than Pedigree Chum with rice and vegetables.

Between more mundane dialogue and attempts at extreme sports, Edward thinks she’s dead and goes off to the Vampire Mafia about killing himself because he can’t bare life without Bella. They disagree and he decides to go and reveal himself to the public as a vampire. If he does, the vamp mob bosses won’t be too happy and will kill him. Will Bella turn up in time? Will Edward die? Will a werewolf start dry humping somebody's leg?

New Moon at times look’s great. But, more times than not the special effects leave the whole thing down in particular the werewolves don’t look too convincing. That said, the cast are quite solid here, and Robert Pattinson is exceptionally charming and likeable. There’s more dialogue here than anything else though and bar the occasional werewolf scrap, the movie for me anyway, seemed to drag and drag to its incredibly cheesy cliff-hanger ending. Don’t get me wrong, this movie isn’t aimed at the average joe soap. This is directly aimed at the millions of fans worldwide and I have no doubt they will all squeal their way through the whole thing. And I can certainly appreciate that.  If your not a fan though, as piece of film New Moon doesn’t really hold up. So there’s not alot here for your average movie goer, unless you fancy staring at teenagers and their rippling torsos!

 

By the way, on the Movie Bit on Sunday night, I’ll be getting some words of wisdom from Robert Pattinson and Kristen Stewart!

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2012 Review

The director who brought you a giant lizard trampling around New York and a giant Tsunami complimented with an ice storm is back and this time it really is the end of the world.
Roland Emmerich’s 2012 opens from this Friday. The world is ending as predicted by the Mayans and December 21st is the day its all coming to an end for mankind. And it’s nothing to do with asteroids, ice storms or giant lizards. The world is going to cook itself from the inside out and essentially the cement that hold’s all the tectonic plates together will weaken thus causing a huge shift of the continents. So Volcano’s and earthquakes abound in 2012. But all is not lost, as usual. Gigantic arks are being constructed in China as the world unites and attempts to survive. Well as long as your a head of state or have a billion euro per person in your family, then your more than welcome on board.

Cusack on his morning run

John Cusack plays Jackson Curtis who is a limo driver and of course he has an estranged family who seem to love their step dad more than their real dad. As thing’s kick off and California starts the cooking process, Curtis turns up to the family home in a limo and they all drive off as the whole neighbourhood falls into the fiery pits of hell or something. This is the first major set piece in the movie and it is absolutely breathtaking. You will cling to the edge of your seat, disbelieving that a Limo driver can drive a huge stretch limo through collapsing skyscrapers and so on. You will continue your disbelief as the step dad who only has a few flying lesson’s, manages to take off from an airport that is imploding on itself. All unbelievable and ridiculous, but maybe they are just a lucky bunch. Besides the luck and limo stunt driving, this is still an incredible scene with tonnes of detail going on. Either way Cusack and co plough through another few set pieces involving volcano’s and Russian cargo planes as they attempt to stay alive and try and get to China.

Drinks and snacks are now being served

Emmerich’s movies are not really known for the quality of acting, and its surprising to see John Cusack in a movie of this style. What’s even more surprising is that Cusack dials in his performance…from the moon. The only notable performances are from Chiwetel Ejifor (American Gangster) who plays one of the big wig scientist folks and Woody Harrelson plays a bonkers radio host quiet convincingly. Danny Glover keeps his head above water in a barely adequate performance as the president. Then again, this type of movie isn’t about quality of acting. Its about bangs for bucks and gigantic set pieces, and on that front it does deliver, once it finally gets going.

If you look out of your window you will see some of the rougher parts of L.A.

2012 clocks in at over 150 minutes and takes the bare bones of nearly 45 minutes for the end of the world to begin. If they dumped some of the ridiculous subplots they could have shaved nearly an hour off the running time. Even if they placed some of the sub plots with more global destruction, that might have lifted it some what. So putting that to one side and a plot that makes little sense, you are left with a movie that's really a showcase for the gargantuan power of CGI. And when Tsunami’s and Volcano's are wiping the place out, 2012 does indeed entertain and keep you on the edge of your seat. But that's about it. You just then wait around for the next set piece and repeat. And to be honest, the majority of the set pieces are shown in the many clips and trailers online. If you can leave your brain in the car, then you will just about enjoy 2012.

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