Captain America: The Winter Soldier

Marvel Entertainment

Rated PG-13

Running time: 136 Minutes

Click below to watch the movie trailer of Captain America: The Winter Soldier.



In Marvel Entertainment's Captain America: The Winter Solder - Steve Rogers/Chris Evans - also known as America's Hero, Captain America - struggles against a high ranking conspiracy as well as a Cold War "ghost" assassin - The Winter Soldier/Sebastian Stan.

In the latest film in the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Washington D.C. and the World Security Council has the covert agency of S.H.I.E.L.D. empowered with the hardware for a Project designed to preemptively eliminate threats after the events of The Avengers. The Director of S.H.I.E.L.D., Nick Fury/Samuel L. Jackson, soon discovers a conspiracy after the recovery of classified data - and soon becomes a target from police disguised assailants, as well as the Winter Soldier/Stan. With the help of the Black Widow/Scarlett Johansson and his new friend, Pararescue war veteran and PTSD counselor Sam Wilson/Anthony Mackie - otherwise known as The Falcon - Captain America/Evans goes after the people responsible for attacking Fury/Jackson, the major conspirators and the Winter Soldier - who has a secret connection to Rogers/Evans.

With this film being more of a political thriller, I think that this is the best of the Marvel movies and debuted to a record breaking $96.2 million in North America as of 2014. While Captain America: The Winter Soldier was mostly a serious drama, most of the light comedy in the movie was of  the Black Widow/Johansson trying to set up Rogers/Evans with a date. This is even funnier when you consider that Captain America/Evans is such a piece of Americana that he is now an exhibit at a Smithsonian Museum. For Stan Lee fans, Lee's cameo is as a guard in the Smithsonian Museum.

Being a political thriller, the movie deals with hard core political issues, such as disorder and war, that deal with today rather than the more simplistic issues of disorder and war that Steve Rogers/Evans grew up with in the 1940's. As Rogers/Evans says, "This isn't freedom, this is fear." Having friends of mine who very liberal and are into conspiracy theories, the ideas in this movie hit pretty home to me, just as these ideas hit pretty home to Captain America/Evans. The scenes of the fake police using S.W.A.T. tactics against Fury/Jackson was especially disturbing for me to watch, as I have had classes with the police as a Citizens Academy graduate. Robert Redford as a senior S.H.I.E.L.D. official and World Security Council member as well as Fury/Jackson's mentor is an homage to Redford's 1970's thrillers and made the movie especially believable. Having bystanders running away to safety in the background in the various action scenes helped to ground this movie into reality and not just some comic book movie with no consequences.

I liked how we got to know more about Fury/Jackson and Rogers/Evans in this movie than we had in the other movies. Getting to know about Black Widow/Johansson and Falcon/Mackie made these four characters more of a family to me, despite their dysfunctional backgrounds. The relationship between political opposites Black Widow/Johansson and Captain America/Evans was quite interesting and pretty hot, despite the fact that these two character are supposed to get involved with other characters in the Marvel Universe, such as Hawkeye/Jeremy Renner and Agent 13/Emily VanCamp.

I saw the movie during a matinee and the theater was pretty full. The audience reacted positively to the kick-ass action. Seeing Captain America/Evans using his shield as both shield and weapon during the action scenes was pretty awesome. Black Widow/Johansson kicking ass is a given in the movie. A most welcome surprise is that Wilson/Mackie's action scenes as the Falcon were just as good, especially since the idea of the Falcon seems pretty cartoony in the comics to me and could have looked really bad. After watching how they did the Falcon with his exoskeleton wing pack in the movie, I am pretty confident that Marvel will treat all their comic book characters right visually. This is especially important as the Falcon/Mackie is an African-American superhero which is why Mackie wanted to do the movie in the first place, for his son and nephews and nieces. The S.H.I.E.L.D. technology was pretty awesome and formidable, particularly the helicarriers. The movie looks more realistic and more impressive to me especially during the action scenes, which is mainly because the movie was done mostly as live action with very little computer graphics involved.

Since everything in the Marvel universe is connected, the big scale events in Captain America: The Winter Soldier also affect the events in the TV show Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. which is about a team in the vast covert agency of S.H.I.E.L.D. under the direction of Agent Coulson/Clark Gregg. After watching Captain America: The Winter Soldier, I now understand the events of Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. better, which will deal with the consequences of the movie on the team's relationships on a very personal, intimate scale. Since Coulson/Gregg is so involved into Marvel's Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D., I miss having him appear in Captain America: The Winter Soldier and having Coulson/Gregg relate to his hero Captain America/Evans. Despite the lack of Coulson/Gregg, several S.H.I.E.L.D. characters, as well as several characters from Captain America: The First Avenger reprise their roles in this movie. An Easter Egg mention of Stephen Strange in the movie was of particular delight to me. From the lack of reaction, I think I was one of the very few people in the theater audience who knows the comic book character name of Stephen Strange - who is the title character in the new upcoming Marvel movie Dr. Strange.

There were only two movie trailers shown before Captain America: The Winter Soldier in the theater that I was in, Guardians of the Galaxy and Maleficent, both of which come from Marvel/Disney and both movies are movies that I really want to see when they come out.

I liked that during the end credits there were comic graphics of the movie with an iconic comic graphic of the stars in their roles of the movie. There are two movie scenes during the end credits. The first scene, in which Joss Wheedon directed, is after the credits for the movie's stars have been finished, in which the scene refers to Avengers: Age of Ultron. Most of the audience in my theater left after that scene - but there is another movie scene later after all of the credits at the end of the movie have been finished. The people staying for the rest of the credits were discussing Marvel as I was reading the credits and enjoying the music from the movie. The rest of the audience who stayed all went quiet when the final scene finally aired. I felt this final movie scene was quite moving for the movie.

The very last message before the Marvel logo appears is: Captain America will return in "Avengers: Age of Ultron."

Click below to watch another movie trailer of Captain America: The Winter Soldier.




Pancho 
All people smile in the same language.

Pancho's Movie Reviews

GOD'S NOT DEAD

Pure Flix Entertainment

Rated PG

Running Time: 113 Minutes

Click below to watch the God's Not Dead movie trailer.



In Pure Flix Entertainment's God's Not Dead, freshman college student Shane Harper must prove to his Philosophy teacher Kevin Sorbo that God's Not Dead.

When Sorbo refuses to waste time in his philosophy class debating about the Big Man in the Sky, Sorbo has his class write down God is Dead. Christian-based Harper can not do that - and Sorbo assigns Harper to defend the antithesis. The class soon becomes a mock-trial about the existence of God.

Based on the book God's Not Dead by Rice Broocks and the song "Like a Lion"  written by Christian artist Daniel Bashta - which became the song "God's Not Dead" for the Christian Band the Newsboys. I liked Harper's struggles in how to deal with defending his beliefs, in his Christianity. It made me think of if I were strong enough to take on such a task to defend my belief in God, and how I would do it if I could.

While some of the film is an over-the-top, in-your-face style of Christianity which bothered me, the blatant anti-Christianity also bothered me. Reporter Trisha LaFache's ambush interviews seemed especially mean-spirited. Things and ideas should be brought into the movie slowly. The small conversations discussing what this was all about were the ones that were the most profound to me. I did like the arguments, both pro and con, of the existence of God - especially the science arguments by Harper of Darwinism and the Big Bang. The list of philosophers used in the movie, most of which I did not make the connection that they were atheists before, drove home the intellectual elitism to me of which the college tenure portrayed. The film also showed how other cultures approach God, some of which felt very stereotyped to me in the movie.

I liked the fact that there were several mentions of the play Death of a Salesman. It is curious how some of the themes in Death of a Salesman actually plays into the movie God's Not Dead.

There was a large cast of characters, which I liked, but I was not exactly happy that all of the characters were connected to each other in some way. I would have preferred groups of characters having their own stories - in which they basically did, but have no connection to each other at all.

Not only is the title of the movie based on the Christian artist band Newsboys song God's Not Dead, the Newsboys have a larger presence in the movie than just a cameo. While the movie is definitely a drama between Harper and Sorbo, the movie is also a concert film for the Newsboys, which is not necessarily a bad thing. Other Christian artists songs are also used as background music in the movie. Cameos from A & E's TV show Duck Dynasty, Willie Robertson and Korie Robertson, made for an interesting appearance. I liked how Robertson explained that everything, money, success, life is temporary - but that Jesus is not.

It is great that both Kevin Sorbo and Dean Cain appear in this movie. Sorbo was up for the role of Superman in the TV series Lois and Clark: The New Adventures of Superman - in which Cain got the part, while Sorbo got the role of Hercules in Hercules: The Legendary Journeys. It is interesting to note that these heroes play not-so-heroic roles in God's Not Dead. Too bad they did not have any scenes together, but it is nice to know that Sorbo and Cain were in the same movie together.

Because of the college environment, this film should be seen by youth groups and has a definite youth group feeling to it - especially coming from the pastor David A.R. White and his missionary friend Benjamin Ochieng - and about the choices we make. The Free Will. The film reminded me of my college days and of my relationships with my professors. I saw this film at a matinee and the theater was half-full. This is very good for a limited release film on it's opening weekend. The audience was composed of a mixed audience age wise. At the end of the movie, the audience applauded.

Before the closing credits rolled, there was a list of legal cases concerning religious freedom on various schools and colleges. There were a lot more legal cases than I thought there would be. While the list of cases rolled through the screen too fast for me to read them all - I noticed that most of the cases were favorable about religious freedom, with the rest of the cases still pending as of 2014.

It is curious, that as I was waiting in line to get my ticket, there was a couple behind me that were going to see God's Not Dead as well, but one of them was confused about the time - because there was another movie with God in the title that was playing at the same theater there as well, Son of God. How often are there two religious movies released at the same time in mainstream theaters? The trailers showed another religious movie that is coming out around Easter that I also want to see Heaven is for Real. I think that would make the most religious movies in the mainstream theaters that would be out at the same time that I have ever experienced.

It is great to see a contemporary Christian movie dealing with today's issues for once, including mobile cell phone texts, than an historical religious film that is usually shown during the Lenten season. And for a religious movie in limited release for it's opening weekend - God's Not Dead wound up at number 5 at the box office. The Hollywood industry newspaper Variety says that "Faith-based audiences are once again proving to be anything but conservative at the U.S. box office."

Rated PG for violence. Running time: 113 minutes.

Pancho
All people smile in the same language.

Monuments Men

Columbia Pictures

Rated PG-13

Running time: 118 Minutes










Click below to watch the Monuments Men trailer.



In Columbia Pictures Monuments Men, a World War II allied squad is put together by George Clooney to rescue national art treasures captured by the Nazis.

Written, Directed, and Produced, as well as starring George Clooney, and based on the book The Monuments Men: Allied Heroes, Nazi Thieves and the Greatest Treasure Hunt in History by Robert M. Edsel with Bret Witter, Monuments Men is based on the true story of a special force of American and British museum directors, curators, and art historians Matt Damon, Bill Murray, John Goodman, Jean Dujardin, Bob Balaban, Hugh Bonneville, along with others such as Dimitri Leonidas and Parisian curator Cate Blanchett to prevent the destruction of thousands of years of Western civilization culture from the Nazis.

This film is more of a sentimental drama instead of your typical war movie. As a result, while there are consequences of war, it is not as graphic as your typical war movie. There are very few battles depicted and had more of a suspense feeling than actual action in the film. Having a group of out of shape, middle-aged art historians that Clooney put together as a military unit generated most of the laughs of the movie. While I had heard of Hitler confiscating art treasures all over Europe for his own use, such as his proposed Fuhrermuseum - I had no idea there was a task force created and tasked by FDR to rescue these works of art before I heard of this movie. Of course, there was a resistance for Clooney's squad by the allies as being unimportant compared to the lives of the soldiers fighting for their lives. For me, what made the movie is of Clooney's speech that art is the exact reason that we are fighting - for our culture and our way of life. As well as Damon's question of a collection of pictures and what they are and Blanchett's answer that they are of people's lives.

While there might be comparisons to to the movie Kelly's Heroes, which was also based on a true story, Monuments Men dealt more with art than with gold bullion.

This is an incredible cast, and I was glad to see that Clooney got Bob Balaban cast in this movie. I have been a fan of Balaban's since Close Encounters of the Third Kind. It is too bad that Balaban did not have a larger role, as I thought his character was perfect for Balaban. Having George Clooney's father, Nick Clooney in a cameo was a nice touch.

I have to concentrate that the movie is called Monuments (plural) Men. We saw Monuments Men at a more upscale theater because the theater was central to all of us. Before the showing, the usher described the movie to the audience. He joked that the movie starred just about every working movie actor working in Hollywood at the time. As it was, the movie had an incredible cast starring in it. Just before we went in to watch the show, I saw some friends of mine coming out of the theater. "What are you seeing?" "Monuments Men." "Great movie!" We all agreed after the movie was over, that Monuments Men was a great movie.

Rated PG-13 for violence and language. Running time: 118 minutes.

Pancho
All people smile in the same language.

Pancho's Movie Reviews

DELIVERY MAN

Touchstone Pictures

Rated PG-13

Running time: 105 Minutes



Click below to watch the Delivery Man movie trailer.
 

In Touchstone Pictures Delivery Man, Vince Vaughn is a slacker working at his Father's butcher's shop delivering meat - when Vaughn discovers that his sperm donations have produced 533 children.

In this comedy remake of Writer/Director Ken Scott's French/Canadian film Starbuck, Vaughn owes $80,000 to some thugs and his girlfriend Police woman Cobie Smulders is pregnant with his baby. When lawyer Damian Young informs Vaughn that Vaughn's fertility clinic made a mistake and used his sperm multiple times, Vaughn suddenly finds himself the father of 533 children - adult, grown up children who have joined together in a class action lawsuit in order to force the clinic to reveal who their real father is. With the reluctant help of Vaughn's friend and lawyer Chris Pratt, Vaughn goes through the profiles of his children and finally finds his true purpose - deciding to be a guardian angel to his grown up children.

This was a cute film, and not as nasty about sperm donation that I thought the film would be. I liked the fact that Vaughn eventually decided to become involved in the lives of his children. Some of the children of course are a little suspicious of Vaughn, but to see the children's lives change for the better as a result of Vaughn's encouragement was a tear-jerker for me. Having Vaughn observing what their jobs and lives are like was very touching for me. What I did not like was the fact that there were several concepts and ideas that were brought up in the movie that were not followed up to their conclusions. And Vaughn's relationship with one child was both illogical plot wise considering the lawsuit and was not followed through to the end, although Vaughn's relationship with this child was a tear-jerker of a relationship.

Among the media coverage, cameos with Jay Leno and Bill Maher appear as themselves as they discuss who this mysterious father is as they appear on their talk shows in the movie.

Rated PG-13 for language. Running time: 105 Minutes.

Pancho
All people smile in the same language.

Pancho's Movie Reviews

THOR - THE DARK WORLD

Marvel Entertainment

Rated PG-13

Running time: 112 Minutes



Click below to watch the Thor - The Dark World movie trailer.



In Marvel Entertainment's Thor - The Dark World, the Dark Elves led by Christopher Eccleston invades Asgard and Earth. Thor/Chris Hemsworth must then recruit his criminal brother Loki/Tom Hiddleston to stop him.

After an ancient battle between Odin/Anthony Hopkins father Bor/Tony Curran, and the Dark Elves led by Eccleston - Eccleston and a handful of Dark Elves escape into suspended animation.

In modern-day London, astrophysicist Doctor Natalie Portman discovers a place where objects disobey the laws of physics and disappear into thin air. Portman winds up being teleported to another world. When Thor/Hemsworth learns of her disappearance, he goes in search of Portman as the Asgards learn of the Convergence, the rare alignment of the Nine Realms with portals linking them all. Eccleston and the Dark Elves awaken from suspended animation and return to threaten Asgard and Earth through the Convergence portals. In desperate revenge Eccleston and the Dark Elves, Thor/Hemsworth seeks an alliance with his imprisoned traitorous brother Loki/Hiddleston.

I had mixed feelings about this movie. Actually, I had opposite feelings about this movie than for the first Thor movie. I liked the Earth scenes better than the Asgard scenes. The Earth scenes dealt with more interesting scenes, like scenes in London instead of scenes in the middle of nowhere in America, and the scenes that dealt with the warping of the laws of physics. The Asgard scenes were too human for me, more human street level, instead of using more godlike fantastical situations.

I liked the eventual meeting with Thor/Hemsworth and Natalie Portman, as well as the meeting with Portman and Loki/Hiddleston. Portman of course has issues with both Thor/Hemsworth and Loki/Hiddleston after what happened in The Avengers. Thor/Hemsworth also has to deal with the issues he has with both Portman and Loki/Hiddleston. I also liked the uneasy alliance between Thor/Hemsworth and Loki/Hiddleston. You are never sure when Loki/Hiddleston will betray Thor/Hemsworth. Their relationship was possible the most interesting one in the entire movie. Portman's relationship with Thor's/Hemsworth's parents Odin/Anthony Hopkins and Frigga/Rene Russo. While Odin/Hopkins did not think Portman worthy, Frigga/Russo had a motherly affection for Portman. Frigga/Russo also kicks ass if you mess with her, which I loved.

For Stan Lee fans, I think it is appropriate he is a patient in a mental ward. Chris Evans uncredited cameo was great.

As a by-product, the events of Thor - The Dark World will affect the events in TV's Marvel's Agents of SHIELD.

During the end credits - there is not one, but two scenes that are shown. Most people left after the first scene was shown. The first scene was more concerned with The Collector story - with an uncredited Benicio Del Toro as The Collector - which leads to Guardians of the Galaxy, so the people leaving after learning the story was okay. The next scene was a love story scene with Porter and Thor/Hemsworth.

Rated PG-13 for violence, nudity. Running time: 112 Minutes.

Pancho 
All people smile in the same language.

Pancho's Movie Reviews


 

ENDER'S GAME

Summit Entertainment

Rated PG-13

Running time: 114 minutes



Click below to watch an Ender's Game movie trailer.



In Summit Entertainment's Ender's Game - Earth had been attacked by aliens, so now Earth is readying soldiers to fight them. These soldiers are children - especially the chosen leader Ender Wiggin/Asa Butterfield.

Directed by Gavin Hood - who plays the giant in the mind game - and Co-Written by Hood, the movie is based on Orson Scott Card's book Ender's Game, and is Produced by Card who also wrote the screenplay in order to preserve the vision of his book. This live-action movie of Ender's Game is a study in the near future of how desperate the human race would be if we were trying to prepare ourselves for another invasion. The use of training children from the start with war games instead of normal play with educational kid games is rather sad. Too bad several themes from the book never really got a chance to be developed in the movie as they were concentrating on Ender's/Butterfield's story.

Actually, despite what the trailers may imply, this is Ender's/Butterfield's story. You see Ender/Butterfield going from student to being recruited to Battle School as Mankind's last hope of a military leader against the aliens. You also see the jealousy of the other students for Ender's/Butterfield's brilliance, and I felt for his isolation and his manipulation by Harrison Ford. In a sense, this is the ultimate bully movie as Ender/Butterfield fights back.

While initially I did not think Ben Kingsley's facial tattoos were unnecessary and detracted too much for me from appreciating Kingsley's performance in the movie, the tattoos were explained in the movie as part of his Maori background and I accepted them.

The movie is actually very close to the book. While not everything could not be put in and explored, at least all the major themes were mentioned. The children were more young teenagers from high school instead of the elementary school children from the book however. This is probably due to the fact that you can not do this kind of graphic material with very young children, as well as having the marketing factor of having teen aged stars being in the movie. The videos of the aerial battle with the alien Fomecs used contemporary military fighters, so the alien invasion could have taken place today - and the battles in space were believable too. I like the fact that the U.S. Marines have Ender's Game as recommended reading for lessons in leadership.

Having read the book in college, I have always wondered how they were going to do the zero gravity effects of Battle School - if this would be an animated film or a live action film. As a live-action film, the zero G Battle School scenes in Earth orbit were very believable - especially as the young actors were trained in wire-work by Cirque du Soleil. The performances by the Academy Award Nominee stars Hailee Steinfeld, Viola Davis, Abigail Breslin, Harrison Ford, and Academy Award Winner Ben Kingsley make you get into the characters. I think this is the best military science fiction movie I have seen. As for Ender Wiggin/Asa Butterfield - this is no game.

Rated PG-13 for violence. Running time: 114 Minutes.

Click below to watch another movie trailer of Ender's Game.



Pancho
All people smile in the same language.

 Pancho's Movie Reviews

LAST VEGAS

CBS Films

Rated PG-13

Running time: 105 Minutes


















Click below to watch the Last Vegas movie trailer.

 

In CBS Films Last Vegas, three sixty-something lifelong friends of 50 years from Brooklyn, New York, Robert De Niro, Morgan Freeman, and Kevin Kline travel to Las Vegas in order to throw a bachelor party in for their single pal Michael Douglas who is going to marry Bre Blair - a woman half his age.

Directed by Jon Turteltaub, Last Vegas is a comedic senior version of The Hangover. I loved the relationships between all of the characters, with the relationship between De Niro and Douglas being especially intense with their unresolved issues. Lounge singer Mary Steenburgen makes their way into their lives as she shows them around Vegas as the guys get into all kinds of trouble.

I liked the juxtaposition between seniors De Niro, Freeman, Kline, and Douglas and their younger selves RJ Fattori, Aaron Bantum, Phillip Wampler, and Noah Harden. This was also the first time that De Niro, Freeman, Kline and Douglas ever appeared together. Actually of the seniors, I was surprised at how old Kline got. I think the last time I saw Kline in a movie was in the movie Dave, which was done in 1993.

Although the movie is rated PG-13, Jon Turteltaub convinced the MPAA - Motion Picture Association of America - to bring the movie down from an initial R rating, so audiences should be prepared for the movie because of the sexual situations.

Rapper 50 Cent, credited under his real name as Curtis Jackson, makes a cameo. This was a delight, when the guys wound up with a celebrity suite at their casino hotel.

Rated PG-13 for violence, language, and sexual situations. Running time: 105 Minutes.

Pancho
All people smile in the same language.

Pancho's Movie Reviews