Poseidon (2006)

Genre: Drama/Action/Adventure

Starring: Josh Lucas, Kurt Russell, Jacinda Barrett, Richard Dreyfuss, Emmy Rossum, Mia Maestro, Mike Vogel, Jimmy Bennett

The third movie remake of the book, The Poseidon Adventure by Paul Gallico, the story describes a group of people trapped in a sinking ship, trying to make their way out of it. Sounds like Titanic, tries to be like Titanic, but sadly the final outcome isn't Titanic. A new years eve party has been organised on the Poseidon, a massive cruise liner which gets overturned by a tidal wave. Dylan (Lucas) a professional gambler, doesn't believe that he would survive the sinking ship and decides to take things in his own hands. He attempts to make his way out of the ship by himself but gathers too much attention doing so and gets followed by fellow passengers. A single mother Maggie (Barett), her son Conor (Bennett), the ex-mayor of New York, Robert Ramsey (Russell) and Richard Nelson (Dreyfuss) accompany Dylan on the perilous journey to make their way out of the ship. Most of the story revolves around passing one hurdle after another, heart-rendering losses and the final victory. The plot is highly predictable with nothing original or unique to offer. The movie is filled with lesser known actors which put on a reasonably decent performance and becomes the only saving grace in the movie.

Thumbs up: Decent performance by a relatively unknown star cast
Thumbs down: Highly-predictable plot, unoriginal

Rating: 5.9/10

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Action, Adventure, Average Movies, Drama,

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Let's Go To Prison (2006)

Genre: Comedy/Drama

Starring: Dax Shepard, Will Arnett, Chi McBride

Every convict wants a reason to get as far away from prison as possible, but John (Shepard) cant wait to go back. Ever since he was a young kid, he has been sent to prison quite a few times and each time by the same judge. Finally when he is old enough, he decides to take revenge on the judge, only to learn that he died three days ago. He wants his revenge and so decides to target the judge's son, Nelson Biederman IV (Arnett). Nelson is a spoilt son of a rich father and John manages to frame him and sends him off to prison, but not without going to prison himself. He manages to land up in the same prison as Nelson and intends to make Nelson's life in prison hell. From eating food with condoms and human excreta and getting sold to Barry (McBride) a black gay man for a romantic night, Nelson experiences it all. The movie has a nice story with an interesting concept but lacks outright humour. The plot is unconventional and seems to be well thought out but probably if some more thought was given on making the audience laugh more, the movie would be worth a good watch.

Thumbs up: Nice story
Thumbs down: Not funny enough

Rating: 6.3/10

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Average Movies, Comedy, Drama,

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Frozen River (2008)

Genre: Drama/Crime

Starring: Melissa Leo, Misty Upham, Charlie McDermott

North County, upstate New York. Just a few days to go for Christmas and Ray Eddy (Leo) has enough problems in her life when a new one decides to show up. Her husband abandons the family and takes with him the money she had saved for a new house. When she goes on a hunt for him, she encounters a Mohawk, Lila (Upham) who stole his car while he got on a bus for New York. Lila knows someone who could buy her car but for that she has to illegally cross the border and go to Canada. In order to cross the border, she has to drive over the frozen St. Lawrence River and since they go through an Indian reservation area, they hope to avoid detection. In reality, Lila lures Ray across the border to smuggle people back into the United States. Reluctant to do it at first, she realises that it would be a good way to earn back the money that she had lost for their new house. The movie is very slow and is not the most delightful movie to watch, apart from the climax. It has an interesting end and becomes the only highlight of the movie. Melissa Leo puts on a fantastic and almost real-life performance and is well supported by the entire cast. If its entertainment you want then this movie is not what your looking for, if its a critical sound movie then this one ticks all the right boxes.

Thumbs up: Fabulous performances
Thumbs down: Boring and a bit slow plot

Rating: 6.5/10

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Average Movies, Crime, Drama,

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Race to Witch Mountain (2009)

Genre: Action/Adventure/Science-fiction/Thriller

Starring: Dwayne Johnson, AnnaSophia Rob, Alexander Ludwig, Ciaran Hinds, Carla Gugino, Tom Woodruff Jr.

A UFO crashes on the western coast of the United States and the government is desperately looking for any clues of the aliens within it. The two aliens, Sara (Rob) and Seth (Ludwig) in reality look like normal human children and posses great power. Jack Bruno (Johnson) is a taxi driver in Las Vegas and Sara and Seth hire him to get to an isolated place in the middle of the desert. The children explain to him that their planet is apparently getting destroyed due to environmental degradation and that their government wants to invade Earth to make it their new home. However, the children's parents conducted an experiment on Earth to prove that an invasion on Earth is not necessary and their own planet can be habitable once more. The children have come to Earth in order to obtain the results of the experiment since their parents couldn't come and must get back to their own planet on time if the invasion is to be avoided. However, it is not all that easy for them since an alien warrior known as Siphon (Woodruff Jr.) intends to kill them and make sure that Sara and Seth don't go back home. The movie starts on an interesting plot but doesn't manage to contain that interest till the end., where it gets boring and slow. The lack of highly-destructive action sequences and average performances are partly to blame. Nice movie but could have been much better. A remake of the 1975 movie, Escape to Witch Mountain.

Thumbs up: Decent plot, good start
Thumbs down: Bad ending, average acting

Rating: 5.9/10

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Action, Adventure, Average Movies, Science-fiction, Thriller,

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9 (2009)

Genre: Animation/Action/Adventure/Science-fiction/Drama/Fantasy

Starring (voice): Christopher Plummer, Elijah Wood, Jennifer Connelly, John C. Reiley, Martin Landau

A scientist created a robot known as B.R.A.I.N, which would serve mankind and help it evolve and thus improve society. The machine, however, went against the humans which eventually led to a war of machines versus humans. The scientist realising his mistake, built miniature human-like robots out of cloth known as 'Stitchpunks' and gave each of them a unique number from 1 to 9. Humankind is destroyed and the machines rule over Earth. Each of these 9 Stitchpunks come to life and form an alliance to protect themselves. They are led by 1 (Plummer) the eldest of them all who has been evading the machines and keeping the Stitchpunks safe. 9 (Wood) comes to life and joins the clan. He is not satisfied with 1's defensive approach and wishes to take on a more aggressive role. 2 (Landau) is kidnapped by a machine and 9 is determined to save him. Along with 2's close friend, 5 (Reiley), 9 & 5 set on a quest where they meet a warrior 7 (Connelly) who helps them save 2. In the midst of all this, 9 accidentally brings to life a dangerous machine manufacturing factory which puts the Stichpunks in a worse situation than they were in earlier. The story progresses at a very rapid face for the first half, which is slightly disturbing, but manages to collect itself together and end on a high note. The graphics are superb and are almost life-like which become the high point of the movie. The fundamental plot is nothing new but the entire concept of Stitchpunks is indeed very innovative. A nice watch for all age groups but the lack of humour in bits and pieces was sorely missed.

Thumbs up: Graphics, entertaining watch
Thumbs down: Lack of humour

Rating: 6.9/10

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Action, Adventure, Animation, Drama, Fantasy, Good Movies, Science-fiction,

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Matchstick Men (2003)

Genre: Drama/Crime

Starring: Nicolas Cage, Sam Rockwell, Alison Lohman

A smooth con artist Roy Waller (Cage) has one big problem. He suffers from agoraphobia, mysophobia, obsessive-compulsive disorder and a tic disorder and not to mention that he yells 'pygmies' whenever something upsets him. He along with his partner in crime Frank (Rockwell) have been successful so far in what they have been doing. Roy's wife left him 15 years back and he hasn't heard from her since. He doesn't know if he has any children and with the help of his shrink, he manages to meet his only known daughter, Angela (Lohman). He cant get along with Angela initially due to her messy habits but they eventually learn to live with each other. He teaches Angela the tricks of the trade and starts using her for smaller tasks during some of his jobs. The once daughter-father relationship that never existed suddenly comes to life and becomes very strong. Nicolas Cage, needless to say, puts on an amazing performance, something that has now become habitually expected from him. The story gets a tad boring somewhere down the half-way mark but improves later on. It has a nice climax with a good twist, but something even more twisted would have made the movie a more sensational watch. A decent one-time watch con movie but not something entirely fabulous.

Thumbs up: Nicolas Cage
Thumbs down: A bit boring at times

Rating: 6.8/10

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Crime, Drama, Good Movies,

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Open Season 2 (2008)

Genre: Animation/Drama/Comedy/Adventure

Starring (voice): Joel McHale, Mike Epps, Jane Krakowski, Crispin Glover, Cody Cameron, Billly Connolly

Elliot (McHale) and Boog (Epps) are still partners and best friends. Elliot is all set to marry Giselle (Krakowski) but is having last minute butterfly's in his stomach. To begin with, he breaks his huge antlers, and by huge I mean at least three times his flimsy body and they were possibly the only thing he could be proud of. The wild animals have a new domestic addition to the group, Mr. Weenie the dog (Cameron) who has escaped from his owner in a bid to taste freedom. His owner manages to hunt him down and takes him back with her, which becomes an excuse for Elliot to call off the wedding and go on a hunt for Mr. Weenie. It's a crazily hilarious mix up which includes an over-aggressive, foul mouthed and half-foot tall squirrel, McSquizzy (Connolly) along with an evil poodle, Fifi (Glover). The movie doesn't have fall-over-your-seat humour but decent to make it a breeze to watch. The only person who can really make you laugh is the character of McSquizzy which too takes some bit of understanding to get the true meaning. It aims to make your kid brother laugh and it will.

Thumbs up: Fun and smooth to watch
Thumbs down: Not overtly funny

Rating: 7.2/10

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Adventure, Animation, Comedy, Drama, Good Movies,

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The Manchurian Candidate (2004)

Genre: Drama/Thriller/Mystery/Science-fiction

Starring: Denzel Washington, Liev Schreiber, Meryl Streep, Kimberly Elise

A remake of the 1962 super-hit with the same name, The Manchurian Candidate retells the story of a 1991 Gulf War hero, Sergeant Raymond Shaw (Schreiber) and his troop leader Captain Ben Marco (Washington). More than a decade after the war, Captain Marco is approached by a former colleague who complained of hallucinations, bad dreams and flashbacks of the war. After ignoring him at first, Ben realises that he too has the same symptoms and starts investigating deeper. Captain Marco's investigation reveals that the entire troop was brainwashed and was made to believe a story that never too place. Sergeant Shaw, who was conferred the Medal of Honour for his courageous act during the war, is now running for the post of Vice President of the United States. Raymond hails from a prestigious family who have always been into politics and his mother Eleanor (Streep) is always calling the shots on his behalf. Ben approaches Raymond for help but Raymond doesn't give in to his story as easily. Ben looks like a mentally unstable man to society who is adamant on convincing everyone that there is nothing wrong with him. I haven't seen the original movie and hence a comparison at this point cannot take place. The movie in itself does a good job which was backed by an amazing performance by Denzel Washington. The movie did go a little damp somewhere around the half-way mark but it picked up the pace to deliver an astounding climax which is even more thrilling for someone who hasn't seen the original movie.

Thumbs up: Climax, Denzel Washington
Thumbs down: Weak and slow at some points

Rating: 7.8/10

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Drama, Good Movies, Mystery, Science-fiction, Thriller,

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Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief (2009)

Genre: Action/Adventure/Fantasy

Starring: Logan Lerman, Brandon T. Jackson, Alexandra Daddario, Sean Bean, Kevin McKidd, Catherine Keener

The Greek Gods are not a figment of our imagination as some would believe but are in fact existing and controlling the earth to this day. The lightning bolt of Zeus (Bean) is the most powerful weapon on Earth and it has been stolen. Zeus suspects his brother Poseidon's (McKidd) involvement in the theft and blames his son, Percy Jackson (Lerman) of being the lightning thief. The Greek Gods are often known to come down on Earth and mate with Earthlings to leave behind off springs that are half-god and half-human and thus known as demi-gods. Poseidon once fell in love with Sally (Keener) who gave birth to Percy. Poseidon started neglecting his duties and paid more attention to his new family which made Zeus pass a new law which forbid the gods from meeting their family members on Earth. Word soon gets around the gods that Zeus' bolt is stolen and everyone is in pursuit of Percy to get their hands on the bolt and become the most powerful being on the planet. Haedes holds Sally as ransom for the bolt and in order to save his mother he goes searching for an object he never stole. He has Grover (Johnson) a satyr, meaning half-human and half-goat to protect him at all times and Annabeth (Daddario) the daughter of Athena, goddess of wisdom and war strategy. The movie does explore a very interesting plot but still the fundamental outline is still very cliched. A boy discovering his unknown powers and eventually using it to save the world. Been there, done that. Adapted from a book with the same title, expect a sequel to it very soon.

Thumbs up: Greek Gods in the modern world
Thumbs down: Fundamental outline is too cliched

Rating: 7.2/10

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Action, Adventure, Fantasy, Good Movies,

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Knowing (2009)

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

Starring: Nicolas Cage, Chandler Canterbury, Rose Byrne, Lara Robinson

In 1959, a schoolgirl predicted the outcome of natural disasters and major global catastrophes by writing a complex numerical chart and putting it in a fifty year time capsule. 2009, the capsule is opened and the prediction falls in the hands of young Caleb Koestler (Canterbury). Caleb's father, John (Cage) is an MIT professor who manages to decipher the code and learns about the details of life-taking accidents yet to occur. He starts investigating and wants to get to the bottom of the entire mystery and meets Diana (Byrne) the daughter of the girl who wrote the prophesy. As John keeps getting deeper into the mystery, he realises there is much more to it than he can imagine. The movie is a true thriller and Nicolas Cage is his amazing self as always. The movie explores a unique and interesting plot, but kills the entire show by the larger-than-life and unrealistic end. Probably a more sane and acceptable climax would have made the movie an even better watch

Thumbs up: Nicolas Cage, plot
Thumbs down: Unrealistic ending

Rating: 7.6/10

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

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Doubt (2008)

Genre: Drama

Starring: Meryl Streep, Philip Seymour Hoffman, Amy Adams

Set in 1964, a Catholic school in Bronx, New York. is run by Sister Aloysius Beauvier (Streep). Being the school principal, the students are afraid of her and she is a strict follower of discipline. Her way of life knows no fun and joy and only strict discipline and adherence to the rules. On the contrary, the church priest, Father Flynn (Hoffman) is fun-loving and knows how to balance work and play together. Sister Aloysius is a very suspicious being and always doubts peoples actions and their motives behind it. She doubts Father Flynn and his attitude towards the school boys and manages to get school teacher, Sister James (Adams) to spy on him. They suspect Father Flynn's behaviour with a boy as not as that of love and care but of other non-acceptable motives. Even though there is no firm evidence pointing towards the accusation, Sister Aloysius is banking upon her own beliefs of right against wrong and wishes to fight with the Father on these precise thoughts. The movie has an amazing star cast and each of them put on healthy performances. The movie has an interesting plot that it builds up upon but has an extremely abrupt ending. It shows how many of our beliefs of reality are actually centred not upon facts but suspicion which turns into faith and later a fact. Meryl Streep in particular, shines above the rest.

Thumbs up: Performances
Thumbs down: Abrupt end

Rating: 7.4/10

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Drama, Good Movies,

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The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (2005)

Genre: Drama/Comedy/Science-fiction/Adventure

Starring: Martin Freeman, Mos Def, Sam Rockwell, Zooey Deschanel, Bill Nighy, Alan Rickman (voice), Warwick Davis

Planet Earth has been destroyed. British national Arthur Dent (Freeman) never knew his true friend, Ford (Def) was an alien belonging to a planet which is in the vicinity of planet Betelgeuse . Ford rescues Arthur from the destruction of Earth by hitchhiking onto a Vogon spaceship. The Vogon's apparently destroyed Earth to create a hyperspace expressway and they resent hitchhikers. Due to an extremely rare co-incidence they get rescued by the galaxy President, Zaphod Beeblebrox (Rockwell) a man who became President for the fame and money and doesn't give two hoots about the galaxy. Arthur finds on board the ship his long-lost love, Trillian (Deschanel) along with a highly-depressed robot, Marvin (voiced by Rickman and acted out by Davis). Zaphod wants to know the ultimate question which would answer the problems of life and gets on an inter-galactic adventure to hunt for it. The movie is plagued with irrelevant psychological and scientific thoughts along with funny one-liners. Although the movie does make you laugh on more than one occasion, the story seemed to have lacked a structure and seems flimsy. The screenplay has been adapted from a book of the same name written by Douglas Adams.

Thumbs up: Humour and graphics
Thumbs down: Unstructured story

Rating: 6.7/10

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Adventure, Comedy, Drama, Good Movies, Science-fiction,

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Changeling (2008)

Genre: Crime/Drama/Thriller/Biography/History/Mystery

Starring: Angelina Jolie, John Malkovich, Jeffrey Donovan, Michael Kelly, Jason Butler Harner, Gattlin Griffith

Changeling by definition, is a mythical creature left behind in place of a human child. A true life story of Christine Collins (Joile) whose son, Walter (Griffith) abruptly goes missing while she was at work. The LAPD has repeatedly been pronounced as corrupt and incompetent by the citizens of Los Angeles. After several months of searching, Captain J.J. Jones of the LAPD finds Walter and hands him over to Christine. Christine, however, claims that the child been brought to her is not Walter and there has been a mistake. The police refuse to buy her story and give her various medical reasons for the change in Walters appearance, memory, height and other features. Christine gains the support of Reverend Gustav Briegleb (Malkovich) who helps her to find Walter. Christine is declared mentally unfit by the LAPD and is sent to an asylum. An absolutely astounding story and something one can expect from the stable of Clint Eastwood. One of the most fantastic performances put on by Angelina Jolie till date and I cannot think of any actress who can come even close in matching her performance. A movie worth watching right till the very end, absolutely flawless. I don't think I have ever sung so many praises for any movie.

Thumbs up: Angelina Jolie all the way
Thumbs done: None whatsoever

Rating: 8.8/10

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Amazing Movies, Biography, Crime, Drama, Mystery, Thriller,

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Bruno (2009)

Genre: Comedy/Drama

Starring: Sacha Baron Cohen, Gustaf Hammarsten

From the makers of Borat comes another stupidly mindless comedy, Bruno. Bruno (Cohen) is an Austrian fashion-designer, who like all other designers is gay. Due to an incident he loses his reputation and decides to go to Los Angeles to become famous. Repeated attempts at becoming famous miserably fail. Be it acting in a movie, starting his own talk show or doing charity, nothing helps Bruno in becoming a star. His side-kick Lutz (Hammarsten) is crazily in love with Bruno, but Bruno doesn't pay any attention to his advances. The movie is similar to Borat in some ways. The same immigrant with a companion coming to the United States. Sex-filled, stupid, mindless jokes that disgust you more than making you laugh are carried forward from its predecessor. If you liked Borat then only should you dare to watch this movie, else its better left alone.

Thumbs up: Sacha Baron Cohen's guts to do something like this
Thumbs down: Jokes, similar to Borat

Rating: 3.0/10

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Comedy, Drama, Pathetic Movies,

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Rachel Getting Married (2008)

Genre: Drama/Romance

Starring: Anne Hathway, Rosemarie DeWitt, Bill Irwin, Tunde Adebimpe

Kym (Hathway) a drug addict, is out of rehabilitation and rejoins her family. She was responsible for her kid brothers death, which happened cause she was driving while she was still high on drugs and their car drove off the bridge and she drowned. Kym's elder sister, Rachel (DeWitt) is all set to get married to Sidney (Adebimpe). Kym realises that she is finding it hard to get back into the family, with everyone either being overtly overprotective or despising her for her past. Her relationship with her sister starts to sour, when Rachel accuses her of trying to seek too much attention and still holds Kym responsible for their brothers death. Kym, in turn feels that her family fails to understand the situation she is in and the life she underwent and are doing little to help her. Majority of the movie revolves either on the family tension or on the wedding preparations. Rachel's wedding is a dream wedding for many and seems just so perfect. The movie gets monotonous and boring and the weak plot doesn't help things either. Decent performances and being a typical family movie one can expect something better.

Thumbs up: The wedding
Thumbs down: Average plot, performances

Rating: 6.5/10

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Average Movies, Drama, Romance,

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The Messenger (2009)

Genre: Drama/Romance/War

Starring: Ben Foster, Woody Harrelson, Samantha Morton

For regular civilians, the army has always been about guns and bloodshed. US Army Staff Sergeant Will Montogomery (Foster) has been reassigned to the Casualty Notification Team, after being injured during war in Iraq. His job requires him to notify the death of a soldier to their families even though he doesn't have any prior training in that field. He has Captain Tony Stone (Harrelson) for company, an alcoholic and sex-obsessed soldier who has never been on the battlefield. Will sees that going up to the front porch and giving bad news to families is not the easiest task in the world, although it may sound so. He suddenly finds himself attracted to Olivia Pitterson (Morton) a lady to whom he had notified her husbands death. He finds himself facing an ethical dilemma whether to seduce the wife of a fellow soldier or respect her feelings and stay away from the relationship. For a change this movie explores a different side of the army, relatively unknown to regular people and does a decent job. The movie doesn't have any plot to build up on and most of the movie shows the duo notifying families and the hardship of their job. Woody Harrelson puts on an amazing performance but that is probably the only highlight of the movie.

Thumbs up: Woody Harrelson
Thumbs down: Slow and repetitive

Rating: 6.4/10

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Average Movies, Drama, Romance, War,

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