Enemy of the State (1998)

Genre: Action/Drama/Crime

Starring: Will Smith, Gene Hackman, Jon Voight, Lisa Bonet

The US government wants to pass a bill which would allow them to survey citizens private property which is been done in the interest of national security. Congressman Reynolds (Voight) murders fellow Congressman Phillip Hammersly when the latter refuses to vote for the bill. Unknown to Reynolds, the entire murder was shot on a nature watchers hidden camera who wants to make millions by publishing it. Soon Reynolds and his men are in hot pursuit of him and get him killed but could not find the camera on him. What they do realise is that he interacted with Robert Dean (Smith) an innocent labor lawyer and slipped the tape into his bag without him realising it. Its now a wild goose chase behind Dean who does not have the slightest of idea of who is following him and why. Brill (Hackman) an ex-NSA operator who also supplies Dean with any information he needs agrees to bail him out of his mess. The movie is no different from any other American crime movie which involves practically every law enforcement agency abbreviated, blowing up cars and buildings as if it were a video game. Will Smith's presence in the movie does not help it any way. The movie does however have an interesting story line, only if wasn't stretched to its very limits.

Thumbs up: Story, Gene Hackman
Thumbs down: Too long for its kind, over-stretched car chases

Rating: 6.4/10

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Action, Average Movies, Crime, Drama,

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Frost/Nixon (2008)

Genre: Documentary/ Drama/ History/Biography

Starring: Micheal Sheen, Frank Langella, Sam Rockwell, Kevin Bacon, Matthew Macfayden, Oliver Platt

A good movie can be aptly judged by two things. Firstly, the position of a persons back to the seat along with the expression on his/her face. In this case, my nose was barely inches away from the screen, staring as each pixel swiftly changed form and a broad grin on my face. Secondly, the flow of thought that immediately comes to ones mind right after a movie, which was the first few lines that you just read. Richard Nixon (Langella) is the only president of the United States to have ever resigned from office. Charges of corruption, burglary and misuse of presidential power hounded his feet. He never gave a pubic testimony accepting these charges and his successor gave him a presidential pardon, thus ruling out a court trial. The American publics sentiments were hurt and they wanted an all out confession. David Frost (Sheen) was a noted British comedian and talk show host, who had the brilliant idea of interviewing Nixon and trying to get a confession out of him. A lot of hurdles came across his way and his entire experience and fame as a journalist was put to test by this one man. The movie depicted a cold feeling between David and Nixon where they both seemed to fight a battle for coming out on top of the other. Michael Sheen and Frank Langella have beautifully managed to actually bring out that feeling on screen; simply watching them debate and hit out on each other is simply astounding. Its not just about representing the actual interviews but bringing out those emotions and facial expressions that bring it as close to reality. Langella's five second screen shot where he manages to show an array of thoughts and feelings of surprise, confusion, anger, sorrow, self-pity, humiliation and what not, all by one look on his face defines him as a good actor.

Thumbs up: Langella with Sheen not far behind
Thumbs down: Too busy appreciating the good points to figure this one out.

Rating: 8.5/10

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Amazing Movies, Biography, Documentary, Drama, Historical Event,

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Underworld: Rise of the Lycans (2009)

Genre: Fantasy/Thriller/Action/Drama/Adventure

Starring: Bill Nighy, Rhona Mitra, Michael Sheen, Steven Mackintosh, Kevin Grevioux

Being the third installment of the Underworld series, the movie like its predecessors, leapfrogs onto a very different story from what we have seen so far. The first movie gave a small glimpse of Sonja (Mitra) and Lucian's (Sheen) love. Sonja, daughter of the Vampire elder Viktor (Nighy) shares an intimate relationship with Lucian (Sheen) a Lycan. Lucian was the first werewolf to have the ability of free transformation between werewolf and human and hence gave birth to the Lycan race. Viktor on learning about their relationship, condemns his own daughter to death. The movie simply goes back to an old story and narrates with more precision of what exactly happened. Underworld Evolution focused more on the Vampires side of the story, and the focus this time, has shifted to the Lycans Evolution. If one has seen both the previous versions, this movie doesn't really have anything new to add to the entire Lycan-Vampiric mystery. It's merely a detailed story of an event already revealed in the earlier movies. It neither continues nor adds to the storyline which makes it a bit uninteresting. The only good part of the movie is that no prior knowledge of the series is necessary to understand the movies basic storyline. It would be a good watch for someone who hasn't seen the earlier movies, but can be very boring for someone who has. The movie did not end as a finale and since it did not follow the story of the previous movies, the place where the second movie ended is yet to be finished, which would happen later on in the fourth version of the Underworld series.

Thumbs up: Watching the previous movies is not a prerequisite
Thumbs down: Story doesn't reveal anything new.

Rating: 5.9/10

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Action, Adventure, Average Movies, Drama, Fantasy, Thriller,

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Taxi (2004)

Genre: Action/Comedy/Crime

Starring: Queen Latifah, Jimmy Fallon, Jennifer Esposito, Gisele Bundchen

Andy Washburn (Fallon) is utterly hopeless. A disgrace to the NY PD and a bigger disgrace to the driving community. 'Ze Germans' are robbing a bank in Manhattan, which turns out to be a gang of stunning looking girls headed by Vanessa (Bundchen). Andy decides to take a cab to the location, since he lost his cop car and is the closest to the location. Belle (Latifah) the cab driver, knows the streets inside out has her car all pimped up. As usual, our fumbling idiot messes things up and ends up getting fired and Belle's car gets impounded. Andy wants to reclaim his lost respect by getting catching the thieves, and Belle wants her precious car back. I actually wanted the 1976 classic Taxi Driver and landed up with this movie. Queen Latifah looks sorely out of place and does not fit into an action movie from any angle whatsoever. The initial humour in the movie is laughable, but beyond that it gets tiresome. The car chases in this movie though are very interesting and are capable of matching more highly rated action movies. The plot is nothing very different, but perhaps if the humour was ruled out and replaced with more suspense and actually deciphering the modus operandi of the robbers, it would probably been at a very different level.

Thumbs up: Car chases
Thumbs down: A very out of place Queen Latifah

Rating: 5.8/10

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Action, Average Movies, Comedy, Crime,

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Surrogates (2009)

Genre: Science-fiction/Action/Crime/Mystery

Starring: Bruce Willis, Radha Mitchell, Rosamund Pike, Boris Kodjoe, James Cromwell

An American scientific-research company manages to create a robot in order to help the handicapped. The persons brain is synced with the robot, and whatever the human things, it is executed by the robot. However, this technology finds more appeal to the general audience, who can now put up a false physical profile for the world to see, while they sit back at home and control their bots, known as surrogates. These surrogates are designed in a way which will not kill the human, even if the robot dies. A young college student is found dead one day, who died when his surrogate was attacked, something which is not supposed to happen. The youth was later found to be the son of the inventor of the surrogates Canter (Cromwell). He and his son used look-alike surrogates and thus due to a mistaken identity, his son was killed instead of him. FBI agent Tom Greer (Willis) and his assistant Peters (Mitchell) are assigned to solve the mystery behind this impossible killing. His research brings him to the brink of a near-death experience in which he ends up losing his surrogate and realises that the 'flesh-life' is strikingly different from the fake life he has been living all this while. He wants the others too, to experience reality and give up the robotic one. The movie is a very typical big American corporation exploiting society to make money story. The mystery and the twists in the tale add some interest to the movie, but it only comes after the movies half-way mark. In order to differentiate from surrogates and humans, all surrogate characters were seemed to have been given an extra dose of make-up and the humans none. A lot of small detailing can be seen in the movie, which tries to bring you close to reality. The movie might get a tad bit confusing somewhere in the end, but you somehow get the point of it all. A unique concept and nothing else.

Thumbs up: Character detailing
Thumbs down: Same story, different technology

Rating: 6.9/10

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Action, Crime, Good Movies, Mystery, Science-fiction,

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Underworld Evolution (2006)

Genre: Fantasy/Thriller/Action/Science-fiction/Mystery/Adventure

Starring: Kate Beckinsale, Scott Speedman, Tony Curran, Derek Jacobi

In continuation with the previous movie, the movie goes into a flashback, tracing the evolution of Lycans and Vampires. Alexander Corvinus (Jacobi) was the first person to go against the order of nature and develop immortality. His sons Marcus (Curran) and William were bitten by a bat and a werewolf respectively to start the Vampire and Lycan races. Marcus offered immortality to Viktor to him and his army in exchange for his support to control his savage brother. Viktor instead imprisoned William and took the Lycans as slave. If William was killed, the Lycan race would die and hence Viktor would lose his slaves. Fast forward to the current year, Marcus has been awoken by the blood of a Lycan scientist and he learns all of Kravens misdeeds. With Viktor and Amelia dead, he has the opportunity to free his imprisoned brother. Selene (Beckinsale) and Michael (Speedman) the hybrid, are on the run. Selene knows the exact location of the prision, since her father was commissioned to build it. Marcus is on the hunt for the key to open the prison and to learn of its location from Selene. The movie takes on a slightly different course than the previous movie, and focuses more on the Vampires history rather than the Lycans. It also has little history and suspense than its predecessor, but definitely has more action. The Gothic approach with a hint of technology offers a brilliant blend. Kate Beckinsale's performance stole the entire show, which made Scott Speedman look like small change.

Thumbs up: Action, Gothic-tech combine
Thumbs down: Lack of enough mystery

Rating: 7.1/10

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Action, Adventure, Fantasy, Good Movies, Mystery, Science-fiction, Thriller,

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Underworld (2003)

Genre: Fantasy/Science-fiction/Thriller/Action/Mystery

Starring: Kate Beckinsale, Scott Speedman, Billl Nighy, Michael Sheen, Shane Brolly

Lycans or werewolves, and with the Vampires, have been co-existing unknown to the human race for centuries. Both sworn enemies, the Vampires have been killing the Lycans every since the fall of their leader, Lucian. The Lycans for years have been trying to form a hybrid of the two species, but have consistently failed. They found a trait in the bloodline of a certain Corvinus family which allows the amalgamation to take place. They start searching for that descendant of the family who holds the pure trait, Michael Corvin (Speedman). Selene (Beckinsale) realises that the Lycans are after Michael and warns Kraven (Brolly) the vampire in-charge of the coven about this. She also realises that Lucian (Sheen) who was supposed to have been killed by Kraven, still lives. When Kraven ignores her warnings, Selene decides to take things in her own hands. The Vampires have a unique way of ruling. Each Vampire elder hibernates for two centuries while the third one rules. At the end of the century, the ruling elder rests while the next one in line takes over. Selene has an attachment to Viktor (Nighy) the vampire elder who is currently resting. She feels he is the only one who can solve the issue and awakens him one whole century before his reign is to begin. The Vampire-Lycan combine manages to take place, to create a beast who is half-vampire, half-lycan but stronger than both. The entire movie is potrayed very well, giving a gothic cum modern feel to things. The movie ends with a small scene indicating that there is more to come, which did come in the form of Underworld Evolution in 2006.

Thumbs up: Good storyline and movie visuals
Thumbs down: Story could be a bit more complex with some more dramatic fight scenes

Rating: 7.3/10

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Action, Fantasy, Good Movies, Mystery, Science-fiction, Thriller,

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Charlie Wilson's War (2007)

Genre: Drama/War/Biography

Starring: Tom Hanks, Philip Symour Hoffman, Julia Roberts, Amy Adams

First, a short history lecture. The Afghanistan government was threatened by Islamic mujahideen's, who were revolting against the government. Feeling insecure, in 1979, the government asked USSR to invade Afghanistan and take over the countries defense. The United States was at cold war with USSR and at that time and the government had a lot of anti-communism sentiments. Charlie Wilson (Hanks) a Congressman from Texas long with CIA agent Gustav (Hoffman) fought with their government for the Afghani cause. They wanted the government to increase Afghan funding and give the mujahideen's capable weapons of fighting the mighty Soviet Union. The weapons could not be directly sourced from USA because if the Afghans were caught with American made weapons, it would mean serious trouble. Hence, they decided to purchase Soviet weapons stocked at Israel and smuggle them in via Pakistan. This eventually led to USSR withdrawing its troops in 1988. The entire move to support Afghanistan against the Soviets was cited as a very bold and strong move. However, the US government failed to re-build Afghanistan soon after the war, which led to a lot of Anti-American sentiments within the people of Afghanistan. According to them, USA supported them only to fulfill their own intentions and didn't actually care two hoots about their country. This is said to have eventually led to 9/11. The movie does require the viewer to have some amount of prior knowledge about the USSR-Afghan war if he were to understand anything. The movie doesn't reveal the implications of not helping Afghanistan re-build itself after the war. The movie is a good watch to improve ones knowledge of the war but can be slightly confusing and uninteresting for others.

Thumbs up: Tom Hanks as always.
Thumbs down: The movie could have described post-war implications for USA

Rating: 7.1/10

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Biography, Drama, Good Movies, War,

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Wake Up Sid (2009)

Genre: Drama/Romance

Starring: Ranbir Kapoor, Konkana Sen-Sharma, Supriya Pathak, Anupam Kher

Change is always refreshing, especially when it comes from someone you don't expect it. Karan Johar dumps his cliched star cast comprising of King Khan, Bachchan family and company. Not only that, he has also deviated from his stereotypical family drama stories and has taken up a funky, creative and urban storyline. Ranbir Kapoor, on the other hand, has nicely proven that he isn't here to act just cause his parents made him do it. He can actually do that stuff. Sid (Kapoor) is a spoilt rich kid, whose life has only one agenda, spending his dad's hard earned money. Sid meets Ayesha (Sharma) an aspiring writer from Calcutta who wants to lead an independent life. Sid's academic career goes for a toss, and after a family fight he leaves home and joins Ayesha. First few days go no different for him, until he finally realises that he has to do something if he wants to get anywhere. He pursues photography, the only thing he was ever interested in and finds himself a job. The movie is a big change from the Hollywood rip-off romance movies currently hitting cinemas. The story may sound familiar and not unique, but its not the story but the execution of the story that matters. The movie trailer hints at this very story and it leaves no surprise. Konkana plays the part of the creative writer wonderfully, no surprises there, since she always played the role of an urban youth. Ranbir Kapoor complimented her role with perfection throughout. The movie missed a few beats somewhere after the half-way mark, but she quickly picked up her skirts and came back on par. The perfect alarm the movie industry needs. WAKE UP!

Thumbs up: Ranbir, Konkana, portrayal of Mumbai
Thumbs down: An ending with more climax could do

Rating: 7.8/10

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Bollywood, Drama, Good Movies, Romance,

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The Invisible (2007)

Genre: Fantasy/Thriller/Drama/Crime

Starring: Justin Chatwin, Margarita Levieva, Marcia Gay Harden, Chris Marquette

Nick Powell (Chatwin) is a high-school smart and rich boy. A school street gang leader Annie (Levieva) steals some jewelry but gets busted later on. She doubts Pete (Marquette) Nick's best friend, for going to the cops and telling them about her. Pete puts the blame on Nick, thinking that Nick is on his way to London but he is actually not. The gang finds Nick and beats him up in which Annie accidentally kills him. Nick's ghost comes alive and he sees the true faces of many people. He also realises that if his body is found, he can still live. Annie's conscious starts getting the better of her and she also realises that Nick was not guilty of turning her to the cops. She repents her doings and wants to undo her mistakes. The movie goes quite well until half-time. The logic behind recovering his body and coming back to life is not convincing and a bit awkward. Annie's ability to suddenly start taking orders from Nick's ghost also is also not explained for. These niggles make the movie a bit far-fetched even for a fantasy movie. It lacks the entertainment factor in any possible movie genre.

Thumbs up: An otherwise decent story
Thumbs down: Unexplained logic

Rating: 4.8/10

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Crime, Drama, Fantasy, Pathetic Movies, Thriller,

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Do Knot Disturb (2009)

Genre: Comedy/Drama

Starring: Govinda, Lara Dutta, Ritesh Deshmukh, Sushmita Sen, Ranbir Shorey, Rajpal Yadav, Sohail Khan

Does David Dhawan intentionally make such mindless comedies or is that he is incapable of churning out something better? Govinda, the very person who pioneered this particular genre, features in this leave-your-brains-at-home comedy as Raj, an industrialist married to Kiran (Sen). Kiran dominates over him and he starts two-timing her by dating supermodel Dolly (Dutta). Mangu (Yadav) spots the two-love birds at it and takes a photograph. Co-incidentally, Govardhan (Deshmukh) gets in the picture frame. Raj must now convince his wife that Govardhan is Dolly's boyfriend and not him. The usual mess up takes place with an apparently dead detective Nunu (Shorey) at a Dubai hotel which tries to pass off as a Delhi location. You cant really expect good laughable humour from Govinda or Ritesh Deshmukh, however, certain one-liners would occasionally tickle your funny-bone. Lara Dutt seems to have worn clothes just because she was forced to and for a change Govinda looked sober. He seems to have swapped dressing sense with Sushmita Sen whose ugly dresses only made her look even more old and out of place. Its definitely an improvement from what we have been seeing since so long but still a long way to go.

Thumbs up: Govinda for his serious attempts at laughter
Thumbs down: Sushmita Sen

Rating: 5.4/10

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Average Movies, Bollywood, Comedy, Drama,

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Shortbus (2006)

Genre: Drama/Romance

Starring: Sook Yin Lee, Paul Dawson, Lindsay Beamish, PJ DeBoy, Raphael Barker, Jay Brannan

I don't know what made me watch this movie and what is the bigger thing that is making me write this review. I thought The Dreamers was the closest one could get to seeing high levels of sexuality in an openly released movie. I was wrong. Shortbus surpasses all levels of expectations. Gay, lesbian, threesomes, you name it and this movie has it. Many would get simply grossed out after watching the first few minutes itself. Its more like a porno with a story. Sofia (Lee) is a sex therapist and is disappointed about the fact that she cant reach an orgasm and feels singled out from society. Jamie (DeBoy) and James (Dawson) are gay partners. Jamie is disappointed with life and feels lost and alone. They meet Ceth (Brannan) and very soon their duo becomes a group of three. Severin (Beamish) is a prostitute who is under depression because of what she is doing. Eveyones life in this movie seems to be a mess right now and they all meet at a sex bar called Shortbus. They all end up finding sanctuary in someone else and relieve their sexual tension and become better beings. I simply don't understand why such high and detailed levels of sexuality were required to portray this story. Even if it was, some utterly gross scenes could be avoided. The movie doesn't actually create an impact and the motivational feel that it tried to bring out. A very avoidable movie even in the censored version (I doubt if there is even one).

Thumbs up: The star casts' guts to perform those scenes on camera
Thumbs down: Everything else

Rating: 2.2/10

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Drama, Pathetic Movies, Romance,

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Snatch (2000)

Genre: Comedy/Crime/Drama

Starring: Jason Statham, Brad Pitt, Alan Ford, Benicio Del Toro, Stephen Graham, Dennis Farina, Rade Serbedzija, Lenni James, Vinnie Jones, Robby Gee

I had to see this movie the second time just in order to post a review for it here. A long cock and bull story all for an 84-carat diamond. A very typical Guy Ritchie movie with black humour, sarcasm and one-liners. Every character has their own funny accent to talk in and the movie is best understood with subtitles, especially if you wanna get past what Brad Pitt is trying to say. Franky Four Fingers (Toro) stole a diamond and brought it to London. He informs Cousin Avi (Farina) and in the course of time, a bit too many people get informed. It now becomes a wild goose chase to reach the diamond first. Somewhere else, Turkish (Statham) the boxing promoter named after an airline and his associate Tommy (Graham) not named after a gun but in fact a ballet dancer, go out caravan shopping to some gypsies. They end up losing their best fighter who has a match coming up and decide to replace him with Mickey (Pitt) the gypsy who knocked him out. Brick Top (Ford) the boxing event organiser and a gangster notorious for feeding people to the pigs, has the event rigged and wants Mickey out in the fourth round. Boris the Bullet Dodger (Serbedzija) sends Franky to Brick Top's bookies to put up a bet for that very boxing match. He sends Sol (James) and Vinny (Gee) behind him to steal the case carrying the diamonds. Avi learns about Boris' scheme and hires Bullet-Tooth Tony (Jones) to go look for the sneaky f****** Russian and retrieve the diamond which now is in his possession. It's one whole big mess which also involves a dog who swallowed half a shoe, a squeaky toy and an 84-carat diamond. Might not be a laugh out loud comedy, but definitely worth a watch, if not two.

Thumbs up: Everything
Thumbs down: Nothing

Rating: 8.4/10

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Amazing Movies, Comedy, Crime, Drama,

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