Random Reviews: Megamind

Rating:3 stars out of a possible 5

Dreamwork's post-HTTYDragon and ShrekFA attempt is not a roaring success, nor is it a failure at all. At this point in the animation game, there are two types of animated-superhero films for cinemagoers: Ones that are "The Incredibles" and those that aren't. It's on the same level as Dreamwork's other offerings,but it still manages to make a small but welcome addition to the major interest in superhero/comic films.

Megamind (Will Ferrel) is fist seen in the film falling to his iminent death over the skyline of Metro City, before he begins telling us his history. As it turns out, he was pretty innocent when he decided to become a supervillain; the poor dude was brought up by inmates, who warped his sense of good and evil, and was shunned by his classmates when he attempted to go to school. From there, we follow our anti-hero as he finally succeeds in death-raying his nemesis Metro Man (Brad Pitt) into oblivion, becomes depressed and bored after taking over Metro City,and then decides to use MM's DNA to invent another do-gooder to combat and rejuvenate himself. Comedy, heartbreak, and superpowered combat ensue.

Like "The Incredibles", this film's genius is it's mixing and messing with the accepted themes and core components of superhero myth. Megamind is destined to be a good guy, but he has built himself a life of evil that he can't walk away from without some effect (in this case, losing his top henchman and best friend Minion). Roxanne Ritchie, the red-hot reporter that Megamind loves to kidnap, is far from another helpless Lois Lane:she is an independent and highly-intelligent, and does not get pushed around by anyone, especially not by a guy with a big blue head. Compared to Megamind, Metro Man is a blunt knucklehead, who even questions his role as guardian and hero of multiple lives. And Jonah Hill's character is actually quite scary when he gets all sinister, rather than the good Megamind intended him to be.

Will Ferrel's hilarious voice work for Megamind includes a high-pitched but still menacing voice, as well as a pretty funny Marlon Brando impression ( "Iiieee aahhhm yuu ffaauthfher" ). All in all, it's still a more-than-worthy effort, and I hope we start seeing more superhero-parodies like this and keep the "Incredibles" torch burning.

5 Reasons To See Beetlejuice

Halloween has passed, but our appreciation for this twisted masterpiece is still strong. It's the best Tim Burton film I've seen thus far (Oh come on, it's awesome enough...okay, there may be better ones... I haven't seen "Edward Scissorhands", all right!) and the season has come to once again view the movie that's so wierd it's genius. Here are my top five reasons to do so:
#5-Sand Worm
If Salvador Dali had designed those giant worms from Dune,it would have looked something, or a lot, like one of these.Weird and actually pretty freaky, these babies are scarier because they're not CGI, but unadulterated '80's Claymation, made with TLC by the master of whatchamacallits and yahoozits, Mr. Burton.The sand worm seen in the movie can now be seen inside the lower intestine of the guy sitting next to you on the subway.
#4-Shrunken Head Adventurer
Like a darkly humouresque Gonzo from the Muppets, except this was a human being. Who, you know, had his head shrunk.Very profound.
#3-Creepy Factor
Do not expect cute and cuddly from Tim B., for anyone who does will be ridiculously/pleasently surprised.The giant snake scene is particularly noteworthy, as is the spooky reference to "The Fly".
#2-Great Humour
Say it with me now: "De-me-sa-de-e-i-o.Daylight come and me wanna go home".Classic.
#1-Micheal Keaton's performance/Great cast
It was my dad who first told me the best part about "Beetlejuice":the insane and geniusely hilarious acting from Micheal Keaton, which virtually steals every stinkin' scene he's in.Alec Baldwin and Geena Davis are sweet and not annoying at all as the lovely (but dead) couple and have more-than-decent chemistry.Then there's the pretty and perfect turn from Canadian comedian/actress Catherine Hara,who is the nastiest (and therefore funniest)screen yuppie this side of that guy from "Aliens".Winona Ryder makes a great goth girl, and makes the role hers, but at the end of the day, this film belongs to Burton and Keaton

Random Reviews:101 Action Movies to see before you die

Just recently, I bought the super cool new edition to the "101 Movies" series, which is Action Movies. You can bet this was one of the awesomer books, weird choices not withstanding (Yes, "Avatar" is a weird choice for an action movie).There were a lot of different things about this one, a lot of things I thought were cool and others I didn't agree with.

3 Things I Enjoyed:
1:Variety-Everything from superhero films to sword-fight classics, with some high-adrenaline shoot-em-ups in between. There's even an Alfred Hithcock film thrown in, "North By Northwest" (on my "To See" list), as well as Lord of the Rings:The Return of the King.Awesome if funky choices.
2:Choice- I'm glad, for one, to see that Spiderman numero uno made the final cut, usually overlooked in favor of Spidey number 2. To not include "Chrouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon" would have been a tragedy of woeful proportions, but a whole score of sweet-looking martial arts films, including Crouching Tiger, are spread throughout the book.
3:Oldies but goodies-When you think action movies, you don't really consider something like "The Adventures of Robin Hood" or "Captain Blood", but they're all here.Every one is a classic, from "The Great Train Robbery" to "Safety Last".You just can't beat Golden Age Hollywood.

Now, I'm not on board with all the Bay-Bruckheimer productions, especially after seeing "Transformers:Revenge of the Fallen" (Since when does Transformers need to have Frat parties and dogs mating?),so I'm probably going to ignore those ones. Besides those, and the surprising lack of Akira Kurosawa samurai films-Mercenaries with katanas really only reminds you of action-the book is pretty dang epic.This is also probably the one I've seen the most films from.