THE BOURNE LEGACY

Universal Pictures

Rated PG-13



Running time: 135 Minutes

Click below to watch The Bourne Legacy trailer.

In Universal Pictures The Bourne Legacy, Retired USAF colonel Edward Norton tries to terminate the Program that had created the Bourne Project - which includes several agents, including a very determined agent Jeremy Renner who wants to survive.

In a continuation of the Matt Damon Bourne series of movie sequels, this fourth movie which is based on the Robert Ludlum books, shows that there were more of the Bourne agents than Damon. While Damon was not in the movie, Damon's stock images were used in the movie to show a continuation of the series. Although having a tip that "Jason Bourne" is in town was confusing. You were expecting to see Matt Damon and he is not in the movie. I was wondering if that was a reference to the previous movie that was overlapping this movie, or if he was referring to Renner - and Renner was in the wilderness.

Ed Norton is working with secret government personnel about putting a lid on several covert programs that is in danger of being exposed by Matt Damon and CIA Director Joan Allen - who had a walk-on part, so it could have been stock footage. While in the process of the termination of the agents and the program's assets, Renner escapes with the help of wolves and rescues Dr. Rachel Weisz, who was involved in the medical and psychological evaluations of the program, from her own termination. Together, Renner and Weisz travel to Manila, Philippines where the medical laboratory is - which has the technology to cure Renner from his physical dependence on the cover program's medications which enhanced the chromosomes of the agent's physical and mental abilities.

When I heard the movie was being shot in the Philippines, I thought they were shooting a couple of scenes to give the appearance of traveling around and giving a worldwide presence. There were a few scenes that were shot in other countries to give that sense of world presence, but half the movie was set in the Philippines - with a lot of Pinoys as extras and bit-parts in the movie. As a Filipino, I found these scenes quite enjoyable to watch and was rather proud of the Philippines being shown in a movie. Although, my Filipino friends point out that it is a shame that the movie kept showing the poor/ugly side of Manila instead of the prettier side. They were very disappointed in that portrayal. It makes the Philippines and Manila seem like a poor ugly country instead of the beautiful country it is.

The opening shot is a freeze shot, so you might think that the projector was stuck on that shot until it starts up. As the star of the movie, Jeremy Renner was given much more to do in this movie than in The Avengers. However, Renner was still mostly an action star than an actor in this movie. Norton was appropriately dirty and unprincipled as the man responsible for the Black Operations and his betrayal in terminating the people involved by burning the program to the ground. The movie reminded me a lot of a James Bond movie. While I thought it was a nice action picture, there were several plot holes that got to me, unless the explanations went by too fast for them to register to me. The most immediate one to me - outside of the Jason Bourne tip off - was how did Renner wind up at Weisz's home? I also thought the ending of the movie was a little too pat. It was just a motorcycle chase. While exciting, there was no direct confrontation between Renner and the agent Louis Ozawa Changchien sent to kill Renner at the end of the movie.

Rated PG-13 for violence. Running time: 135 Minutes

Pancho
All people smile in the same language.

Pancho's Movie Reviews

THE WATCH

20th Century Fox

Rated R

Running time: 102 Minutes



Click below to watch The Watch trailer.




In 20th Century Fox's The Watch, Ben Stiller forms a neighborhood watch - and soon discovers that their neighborhood is being invaded by aliens.

When his newly American citizen security guard Joe Nunez is killed at his store, Costco manager Ben Stiller makes an announcement at the local high school football game that he intends to find the killer and starts a neighborhood watch composed of Vince Vaughn, Jonah Hill, and Richard Ayoade to see if they can search for the killer. As they bumble through being a neighborhood watch amongst the quirky neighbors, rowdy teenagers gone wild, and the local small-town hick police Will Forte and Mel Rodriguez as the Watch looks for the killer, the Watch soon run into aliens hidden amongst the neighbors in the neighborhood as more people are killed for their skins and that anybody could be an alien amongst them.

A combination of Ghostbusters meets ET and Aliens, with the film co written by Seth Rogen, this was a cute science fiction comedy about aliens invading a neighborhood. Although I can not recall why they wanted to invade that out of the way neighborhood, so the reason did not make an impression on me. However, I thought the movie was funny.

With lonely Stiller continually forming groups that he is in charge of, Stiller's put upon and baby-starved wife Rosemarie DeWitt wants Stiller home so they can have a child and must compete with Stiller's new group - The Neighborhood Watch. Fellow Watch member Vaughn meanwhile designs their logo and has to deal with his teen aged daughter Erin Moriarty and her horny boyfriend Nicholas Braun, of whom Vaughn did not like at all. 

The core group of Stiller, Vaughn, Hill and Ayoade made a nice group for the Watch - a group similar to The Ghostbusters - although Ayoade does not have the star power of the others. I had never heard of Ayoade before, and Ayoade was much more subtle in his characterization when compared to the others - especially with wanting sex with an Asian housewife. Hill was a typical Jonah Hill character. R Lee Ermey was great in one of his rare non-military roles as a cantankerous gun-wielding neighbor. Billy Crudup was an appropriately creepy new neighbor for Stiller. I liked that DeWitt eventually became an unofficial part of the watch.

It is too bad that this movie did not get much promotion as I thought this was a fun movie. With Stiller being a manager at Costco, a lot of the jokes and scenes take place at the Costco store as well as the jokes happening throughout the neighborhood. The couple behind me were laughing a lot at this movie. Unfortunately, due to the shooting death of Trayvon Martin in Sanford, Florida shot by a neighborhood watch captain, 20th Century Fox altered their marketing for this movie. These changes in marketing, as well as the various events of the 2012 summer season and the movie's R rating, is what I believed helped kill the movie as I saw very little marketing for The Watch. I am also sure the film would have done better as a PG-13 film.

Rated R for language, sexual situations, violence. Running time: 102 Minutes

Click below to watch another trailer of The Watch.



Pancho
All people smile in the same language.
 Pancho's Movie Reviews

Ted

Universal

Rated R

Running time: 106 Minutes



Click below to watch the Ted trailer.



In Universal Pictures Ted, Mark Wahlberg's relationship with Mina Kulis is threateaned by his childhood relationship - with his Teddy Bear Ted, Seth MacFarlane.

This is the feature-length directorial debut of MacFarlane, who also wrote and produced Ted as well as the movie being the first live-action project for MacFarlane. MacFarlane does the voice-over for the grown-up Ted. After lonely child Bretton Manley wishes for his teddy bear to be a real-life friend, Teddy Zane Cowans becomes a real-life bear and soon becomes a celebrity. The movie then focuses on the present day, where Wahlberg and Ted/MacFarlane are now grown up - but very immature adults, even if they do have jobs. How Mila Kunis spent four years with Wahlberg and Ted/MacFarlane is a mystery to me. I could have accepted Kunis being with Wahlberg for four months instead, as in the movie Kunis finally has had enough of Wahlberg's and Ted/MacFarlane's relationship and immaturity.

While Ted is supposed to be a raunchy comedy, I found the movie uneven as half the time the movie seemed like a serious relationship drama. A chick flick. The movie is basically a dramatic version of the movie Paul, when I would have preferred Paul meets Superbad. I think part of the problem is that half of the characters were serious characters instead of off-the-wall characters which would have made the movie much funnier, much like the off-the-wall characters that were in the movie Horrible Bosses. There was a scene that was a takeoff of a scene in Airplane!, which I think would have made the movie much funnier if the entire movie was made like that - especially with the idea of a walking, talking, living teddy bear running around. Having Ted being a raunchy teddy bear was not enough, especially since in the film Ted is now a has-been 1980's celebrity and is an accepted member of society instead of some mythical character suddenly come to life. The movie opens with basically a 1950's feel with Wahlberg's childhood home, but then grows up into a raunchy film.

The 1980 film Flash Gordon was a great influence in the movie. The fact that the producers actually got Sam Jones from Flash Gordon to play himself in the movie was great. Although I prefered Jones as the kick-ass alien bounty hunter in Stargate SG-1 much more, rather than Jones portrayal as an aging actor trying to reclaim his glory as Flash Gordon in the movie. Cameos by singer Norah Jones, Tom Skerritt and archived footage of TV late-night host Johnny Carson integrated with Ted/Macfarlane was great. And an uncredited Ryan Reynolds made an impression with me. The opening and closing narration by Patrick Stewart had the right irreverance, which was first evident in the first couple of minutes of a politically incorrect statement. I just wish we got to see Wahlberg's parents Alex Borstein and Ralph Garman as characters when Manley grew up to be Wahlberg. Although I felt Manley was too old to be so excited about a stuffed bear, when Teddy became alive, I could accept Manley being excited about having a new friend.

For an R film, Giovanni Ribisi and his son Aedin Mincks were not creepily off-the-all enough for me to accept them being the movie's bad guys. They were just acceptable for a PG or PG-13 movie, but not enough for an R film. Actually having children actors in an R film, even if it is a comedy, is a little disturbing for me. Obviously, children could not see the movie - which cuts down on the box office on the family audiences that might have seen the movie. I just wonder if the child actors themselves saw the movie.

The computer graphics of Ted are very good due to MacFarlane being motion-captured. I just accepted Ted as a character, a living Teddy bear who even has sex. Ted/Macfarlane still can not run very convincingly, but the rest of the CGI and motion-capture appeared believable and was very detailed in his fur. It was cool to see the cosmic zoom from the Universal Pictures 100th Anniversary logo of Earth from space zooming down into Wahlberg's childhood neighborhood. I was surprised that various referances from several movie and TV studios were used in the movie. At first I thought that they all came from Universal as that would have been easy and cheap - until I recognized the theme from the Indiana Jones movies, and they were distributed by Paramount Studios and not Universal Pictures. Getting the rights to use all of these referances from the various studios and media would be difficult legally and expensive. For having Seth MacFarlane having the clout to get this personal project of his off the ground is incredible. For a small crowd in the theater, as the movie has been out for a few weeks already, there were quite a few laughs from the audience and I admit I laughed too - but I laughed very little as to me the movie was too much of a drama instead of a comedy.

Rated R for Language, Sexual Situations, and Drug Abuse. Running time: 106 Minutes.

Pancho
All people smile in the same language.