In Arnold's first lead role since Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines, Arnold is a small town sheriff looking forward to a nice quiet weekend after most of the town has gone out of town for the local high school's football game - when escaped drug lord Noriega heads toward his town in order to cross the border.
This is a good ol' boy version of Jack Reacher and Seven Samurai, but not as intelligent. Although, the characters were quite relatable, even the small town bit townspeople It is too bad that Harry Dean Stanton did not have more to do. He would have been a great town character. It is kind of nice that the movie played up the fact that as a character, Arnold has been out of action for a while and played up his being old. International drug lord Noriega was a character more interested in power than being an intelligent bad guy, and his henchman Peter Stormare is even worse and more over the top as a character. With Noriega driving a modified Chevrolet Corvette C6 ZR1 as his escape car racing towards Arnold's small town and the Mexican border, the movie had a Mad Max type of feeling as well.
Forrest Whitaker is basically wasted in this movie as his character really was not very dramatic or kick ass as Noriega escapes from FBI custody in Las Vegas. It was also disappointing that Whitaker does not interact with Arnold and Arnold's people, except by phone - and that generally being about the legal jurisdiction between the two of them on their manhunt for Noriega. Johnny Knoxville and Luis Guzman were basically the film's eccentric comic relief.
Having the town shootout done with assault rifles instead of your typical six-shooter wild Western shootout was quite fun.
Rated R for graphic violence and language. Running time: 107 Minutes.
In Columbia Pictures Zero Dark Thirty, CIA operative Jessica Chastain conducts a decade long search for Osama Bin Laden after the events of 9/11.
Based on the actual events, and directed by Kathryn Bigelow, this film is more of a drama than a war movie. It is very similar in feel to Argo, especially with Kyle Chandler playing similar roles in both movies, although Argo was a more suspenseful film.
After the opening of 911 calls of 9/11, young CIA operative Jessica Chastain spends her entire career interrogating various detainees to the whereabouts of terrorist leader Osama Bin Laden, or Usamah Bin Laden - otherwise known as UBL. Most of the movie dealt with the years of pursuing leads to Bin Laden, until they finally located the compound where Bin Laden is. Considering how long it took in pursuing those leads during the decade, it made me impatient for the movie to get to the scenes with the U.S. Navy SEALs.
In actuality Zero Dark Thirty was originally about the unsuccessful decade-long manhunt for Bin Laden - and had to be rewritten after the news story of Bin Laden being killed. I think the original story would have been very depressing and unsatisfying to watch for a movie. As a movie, the reality of Bin Laden being killed is more satisfying to experience as a movie-goer. Not that I am promoting killing people, but that the bad guy getting justice was very satisfying in a movie setting. It is curious that the sequence on the raid on Bin Laden's compound is only a few minutes less than the actual SEAL assault. I liked that the stealth Black Hawk helicopters used in the assault came from the secret aerial base Area 51. and the GPNVG-18 (Ground Panoramic Night Vision Goggles) made the SEALs look like bug-eyed aliens. The SEALs added a sense of normalcy to the movie on their downtime. Although I was not happy that the movie did not show the SEALs training on a mock up of Bin Laden's compound.
Zero Dark 30 means the very early morning hours when it is still dark outside and most people are asleep, and is usually said as "oh dark thirty" in the military. This was basically the time when the assault by the SEALs on Bin Laden took place as the assault took place at night.
While the torture scenes in the movie were bad, they were not as graphic as what I have seen in other movies with torture. This was a surprise to me, as due to all the publicity and protests about the torture scenes in the movie, I was expecting something really graphic. I don't know if that means that the U.S. is nicer in their treatment of prisoners than the rest of the world or that Hollywood is pretty sick in making movies. These scenes were especially relevant with a news clip of the President of the United States Barack Obama denying that the U.S. employs torture.
In Universal Pictures Les Miserables, former prisoner Jean Valjean, Hugh Jackman, has been on the run from policeman Javert, Russell Crowe, for decades because Valjean/Jackman broke parole for stealing a loaf of bread for Jackman's starving nephew.
This dramatic movie musical based on the theatrical stage musical of Les Miserables by Alain Boublil and Claude-Michel Schonberg - which has been performing world-wide for over 25 years as of 2012, and is the longest running musical in the world - is a musical where 99% of the dialog is sung. As a result, you have to really listen to the lyrics of the songs to follow the plot of the movie - which is based on Victor Hugo's novel Les Miserables, considered to be one of the longest books ever written. What is great is that instead of listening to a playback of the music and then singing the songs, the actors actually sang the songs while they were acting - thus giving more of a performance for the camera as they sing. Set during the time of the Paris Uprising of 1832, otherwise known as the June Rebellion, the story of Les Miserables follows Valjean/Jackman as he transforms from escaped parolee to prominent mayor who undertakes an obligation to rescue the daughter, Cosette - a young Isabelle Allen and Amanda Seyfried - of his former factory employee Fantine, Anne Hathaway, who was thrown out on the street. Although it was a little confusing for me and took me some time to realize that she was being ostracized by the rest of the factory employees for Fantine/Hathaway sending money to her illegitamate child Cosette/young Isabelle Allen.
In all these years, I had never seen the musical Les Miserables or read the book. I have only heard clips of the music and knew of the general story of Javert's manhunt of pursuing Valjean. While my musical theater family and friends were not happy with the stars singing performances in the movie - and with good reason, especially with Crowe's singing - they loved the ensemble cast. It seems like the producers just got stars to make the movie so they can have a greater movie audience. Personally, I accepted the stars, except for Crowe's singing. At least the movie did have some of the Les Miserables stars from the musical production performing in the movie, and the ensemble cast throughout the movie were great. Several of the ensemble cast had performed in various stage productions of Les Miserables, so it was great to have them performing in the movie.
I was blown away by Hathaway's emotional performance of the song "I Dreamed A Dream." I could feel her pain of hitting rock bottom in her life and never climbing out of the hole that she is in - even if her singing might have been a little rough, but that roughness added to the emotion of the song for me as Hathaway did not want to sing it pretty considering the scene. Hathaway supposedly blew everyone away at her audition, leaving them in tears, and I would not be surprised if she had used this song for that audition. Hathaway also cut her hair and lost weight for the role as the sickly Fantine. Make no mistake, this is not a pretty Broadway movie - but a dark historical movie, dealing with the various castes of historical France as well as the bloody Paris Uprising of 1832 from which Hugo's novel is about. Having Hathaway's mother, stage actress Kate McCauley Hathaway, being the first Fantine in the First U.S. National Tour of Les Miserables makes a nice continuity touch with Hathaway portraying Fantine in the movie. Young Isabelle Allen as the young Cosette was very good for her age when she performed. Young Daniel Huttlestone was also good as the young Revolutionary urchin Gavroche.
Sacha Baron Cohen and Helena Bonham Carter as Samantha Barks/Eponine's parents - and cruel guardians of the now motherless Cosette/Isabelle Allen - added to the comic relief to the movie, which was a nice contrast to the darkness of the rest of the movie, thus giving their part of the movie a Sweeney Todd type of feel to the movie.
I felt the sudden romantic triangle with Cosette/Seyfried, Marius/Eddie Redmayne, and Eponine/Barks was an obligatory love story - especially when Marius/Redmayne spots Cosette/Seyfried across the way and it is love at first sight, which totally made this plot point unreal for me. Having Cosette/Seyfried losing the hardness of her childhood and becoming seemingly innocent again was also unreal for me. I felt she should have kept her cynisism when initially meeting Marius/Redmayne. But eventually this romantic triangle became an integral story plot to the rest of the movie and made sense, however it did take awhile for this love story to become acceptable to me. I was not happy that the revolutionaries were too well off to be downtrodden citizens, especially Marius/Redmayne with his rich uncle. The revolutionaries were basically liberal college students protesting against the conservative establishment rather than being real downtrodden citizens. The revolutionaries became acceptable to me when they were singing their song of revolution "Do You Hear the People Sing" with the citizens, but otherwise the revolutionaries were still liberal college students instead of poor French citizens.
I was surprised that the movie was not in 3D, but Director Tom Hooper felt that it would not receive a wide enough audience if the movie was in 3D. From the opening shots, the movie would have been great in 3D and would have been one of the first 3D musicals - if not the first 3D musical. As it is, the movie was very visual for material originally developed for the theatrical stage. The Paris Uprising in the movie were actual battles, and not a light show such as shown in the 25th anniversary concert that I had seen on PBS, although the movie uprising was not as graphic as a real uprising would have been. Having Javert/Crowe leading the French soldiers seemed quite appropriate as the symbol of the oppressive establishment, especially as he goes after Valjean/Jackman. What I did not like about the story was that there was no reference to Valjean/Jackman's nephew or sister years later. They were the reason he went to prison. What happened to them? Instead of being with his family, Valjean/Jackman creates a new family with Cosette/Seyfried.
With Valjean/Jackman encountering the Bishop Colm Wilkinson, thus experiencing compassion for perhaps the first time in his life, Valjean/Jackman begins his journey to redemption for his sins of being a thief. This religious encounter basically transforms the rest of Valjean/Jackman's life as he takes on numerous responsibilities for himself and for other people's lives. Valjean/Jackman's redemption is perhaps my favorite theme of the movie - even as Valjean/Jackman struggles with moral consequences, especially when someone is arrested believed to be him - as Valjean/Jackman continuously turns to the God for help and I am glad the movie ended with this theme. I will admit that at the end of the movie, I teared up - which I think was mainly due to this theme, and I am glad of that.
After the movie was over, the audience applauded.
Rated PG-13 for violence and sexual situations. Running time: 157 Minutes.
Keynote Speaker/Emergency Response Provider -
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