TRANSFORMERS: AGE OF EXTINCTION

Paramount Pictures

Rated PG-13

Running time: 165 Minutes



Click below to watch the movie trailer of Transformers: Age of Extinction.


In Paramount Pictures Transformers: Age of Extinction, Mark Wahlberg finds a broken down semi-truck - which turns out to be the Transformer Autobot Optimus Prime/Peter Cullen.

In this sequel to Transformers: Dark of the Moon, the film takes place four years after the invasion of Chicago. Using new characters, struggling inventor/mechanic and single father Mark Wahlberg is trying to make money for himself and send his daughter Nicola Peltz to college with his inventions, when Wahlberg tries to restore a broken down semi-truck that he had bought with his partner T.J. Miller's money. Wahlberg soon discovers that the truck is Autobot Optimus Prime/Cullen - and that secret CIA government agents Titus Welliver and Kelsey Grammer are searching for them, along with bounty hunter Transformer Lockdown/Mark Ryan.

Directed by Michael Bay and Executive Produced by Steven Spielberg, story-wise, I think this is the best of the Transformers movies. While Optimus/Cullen feels betrayed by the humans, due to Grammer's machinations of getting rid of all Transformers after what had happened to Chicago, this movie is really about the love of father Wahlberg and his daughter Peltz. But like all of Director Michael Bay's films, the movie is twenty minutes too long as far as the action at the end is concerned. As it it, Bay says this is the longest film in the series. I just wanted to get on with the story instead of watching all of this fighting and destruction. I was feeling sleepy because there was no story to keep me interested. As usual I got confused as to which Transformer was which during the final battle scenes as they all look alike. As a result - as much as I wanted to care who was who, I did not care. I cared more for Wahlberg was firing an alien gun. It is curious in that there seemed to be more collateral damage and bystander refugees in the international China scenes than in the American scenes.

While Autobots from previous movies have been destroyed, the movie does introduce new Transformers - including Hound/John Goodman, Drift/Ken Watanabe, and Crosshairs/John DiMaggio. There was also a logical reason for the new Transformers that are introduced that transform into cars and other things, not including Stanley Tucci's man made Transformers, which Optimus/Cullen brought about which goes all the way back to the Creators. This logical reason, and that Optimus/Cullen was leading them, made the introduction of the new Transformers really special for me.

The 3-D was awesome throughout the entire movie. Usually the 3-D in movies is bad as it is just a conversion, but I noticed the 3-D throughout the entire movie - most notably when dust motes are flying around. Even in ordinary scenes, you could see the depth of the scene as Bay shot 60 percent of the movie in IMAX 3-D. The 3-D actually made me flinch a couple of times as things flew out at me.

Hasbro and Paramount Pictures have stated that here are talks of a fifth and sixth installment in the Transformers series. As of the 2014 July fourth weekend, Transformers: Age of Extinction has earned $201.3M overseas. This makes the movie the highest-grossing weekend for a film.

Click below to watch another movie trailer of Transformers: Age of Extinction.



Rated PG-13 for violence and language. Running time: 165 Minutes.

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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
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MONSTERS UNIVERSITY

Walt Disney Pictures

Rated G

Running time: 104 Minutes



Click below to watch the movie trailer of Monsters University.



In Walt Disney Pictures Monsters University, before Mike - Billy Crystal - and Sulley - John Goodman - were Incorporated scarers, they had to go to school.

This film is the first prequel for Pixar. In this prequel to Monsters Inc. - a G Rated version of Revenge of the Nerds - before they were famous, Mike/Crystal and Sulley/Goodman are rival scare major students competing to be the best scarer during the Scare Games.

Several actors return to reprise their characters including Steve Buscemi, Bob Peterson, and John Ratzenberger.

I thought it was quite appropriate that the scariest monster to me in this academic setting was the Dean of the school, Helen Mirren. I thought the movie was cute - although I liked Monsters Inc. better, probably because of the relationship that Mike/Crystal and Sulley/Goodman were having with the human child Boo - Mary Gibbs - in the first movie. Mike/Crystal and Sulley's/Goodman's relationships with Oozma Kappa did not have the same emotional relationship to me, even with the big Sulley/Goodman going up against Oozma Kappa. Although I did like little Mike's/Crystal's tutoring of Oozma Kappa.

I was with my nieces, so we left when the credits started. As a result, I missed the fact that there is a scene during the end credits.

Monsters University also had the premier of the Pixar short film The Blue Umbrella which I thought was a really cute relationship film.

Click below to watch another movie trailer of Monsters University.



Rated G with mild violence. Running time: 104 Minutes.

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the INTERNSHIP

Twentieth Century Fox

Rated PG-13

Running time: 119 Minutes



Click below to watch a movie trailer of The Internship.



In Twentieth Century Fox's The Internship, obsolete salesmen Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson suddenly lose their jobs when their company closes and they apply for a summer internship job - at Google, the gigantic Internet search engine.

Written, Produced, and Starring Vince Vaughn this comedy is a nice, feel-good movie for the summer with a strong Google and fanboy slant. Totally different from The Social Network - the other computer website related movie - and the small audience that I saw The Internship with was laughing throughout the entire movie. Actually, the young cast of the movie made me feel like I was watching a college oriented film with people who have dreams. What is sad is the reason that Vaughn and Owen lost their jobs. Now these old guys have to compete the young tech-savvy college crowd. As Owens says, They are looking at some sort of mental Hunger Games against a bunch of geniuses kids for just like a handful of jobs. Of course being the old interns, Vaughn and Owen have no idea of what all the fan boy slang is that the interns Josh Brener, Tiya Sircar, Dylan O'Brien, and Tobit Raphael are using.

I liked the fact that they played Muggle Quiditch. I had never realized that they actually had created a game called Muggle Quiditch. Given the fact that the game is played on the ground, Muggle Quiditch pretty much follows Wizard Quiditch. Muggle Quiditch was actually pretty much fun to watch.

John Goodman's uncredited cameo as Vaughn's and Wilson's boss was great as always. Will Ferrell's cameo was also uncredited. There is also a cameo by Google Co-Founder Sergey Brin.

This movie is basically about fitting in amongst this complicated world, especially with computers. Learning about computers in order to run the help desk appeared to be daunting as Vaughn can attest to. It is a sad state of affairs that Vaughn and Wilson lose their jobs because their company was outdated and the business had to close.

A lot of Google products were shown, including Google's Gmail, Google Plus, Google Wallet and Google Maps, and the Google's self-driving car gets a cameo too. While the movie may be considered a commercial for Google, I liked the fact that I got to know more about Google and it's culture. There have been reports from Google interns that a lot of the movie is pretty accurate. 

The end credits were designed by Google's creative team.

Rated PG-13 for sexual situations, language, and violence. Running time: 119 Minutes.

Click below to watch another movie trailer of The Internship.



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THE HANGOVER PART III

Warner Bros.

Rated R

Running time: 100 Minutes



Click below to watch The Hangover Part III movie trailer.



In Warner Bros. The Hangover Part III, the Wolf pack are back. This time, while the Wolf pack Bradley Cooper, Ed Helms, and Justin Bartha are on the way to take fellow Wolf packer and ADHD disordered Zach Galifianakis on a personal intervention - they get hijacked by mobster John Goodman who is after escaped gangster Ken Jeong.

In this third and final movie of The Hangover series, Written, Directed, and Produced by Todd Phillips, The Hangover Part III has the principal actors back in this movie, including Heather Graham and her young son played by Grant Holmquist.

I have not seen the second movie The Hangover Part II, but you do not have to have seen it to appreciate The Hangover Part III. There were a couple of references that I believe were to Part II, but I do not think it is necessary to have seen Part II - although it did make me wish I had seen Part II to really appreciate what had happened. While Part II was about Bangkok, Part III eventually returns back to Las Vegas which makes it more of a sequel for me and puts an end to the series. Just like in The Hangover, Wolf packer Justin Bartha is missing from most of the movie - and as a result you do not get to know him as a character. As Galifianakis tells Helms, they have been on a lot of adventures together - but I do not know Bartha, except that he is Galifianakis's brother-in-law.

John Goodman as the mobster was good - although with him playing such cute, cuddly characters in the movies so often, I could not really see Goodman as being bad in this movie because this is supposed to be a comedy except for his actions. The same thing with Jeong. Jeong is just too funny to be considered a bad guy, except for his actions.

The opening music was pretty dramatic over the film's production logos, which was making me think that I was in the wrong movie theater. Once the picture actually starts and the credits start to roll, the music changes slightly so that you realize that is was stylized music for the movie. I loved the use of Schubert's Ave Maria that Galifianakis had sung for the funeral scene. I do not know if that was really Galifianakis's voice, but as Cooper says, Galifianakis sounded like an angel. I also liked the use of popular music illustrating the plot of the movie - although the background music was mostly pretty dramatic, which made the music kind of a downer for me.

I admit that the main reason that I saw this film is because of the freeway scenes that were filmed at my hometown's Costa Mesa's/Corona Del Mar's 73 Freeway in Orange County, California - which was closed for a weekend. My cousin said that they had filmed right by where they often go to dinner. The freeway scenes were pretty involved in the movie and makes me think that part of the scenes was CGI as those scenes were rather involved for a weekend daylight shoot.

I saw the film with a small audience, but the audience was laughing throughout the movie. Being locals, they especially laughed at our freeway scenes.

At the end of the movie, there are basically shots of the Wolf pack walking around as a pack in the styles from the various movies.

When the end credits start to roll - stick around, as there is a pretty large scene that is similar in style as a party from the original The Hangover.

While there is controversy about animal cruelty, the American Humane Association did On-Set Oversight on the movie and states that no animals were harmed.

At the end of the movie in the credits is a disclaimer for the Caesars Palace hotel and casino, "The scenes at Caesars Palace in the film are fictitious and not all activities depicted therein are authorized or endorsed by Caesars." 

Rated R for violence, language, sexual situations, nudity. Running time: 100 Minutes.

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FLIGHT

Paramount Pictures

Rated R

Running time: 138 Minutes



Click below to watch the Flight trailer.



In Paramount Pictures Flight, after flying through a turbulant storm - a drunken airline pilot Denzel Washington makes a miraculous crash landing with his passenger airliner.

Produced and Directed by Robert Zemeckis, in his first R rated film since Used Cars, this is a tour-de-force performance by Denzel Washington. Similar to real-life events, the focus of the movie really is on Washington and his situation rather than on most anything else in the movie. Just as the rough weather was rougher than I thought it would be, the movie is much more dramatic than what the trailer makes it out to be. I could see an Oscar nomination for Washington for this role. With the media staking out his home and the National Transportation Safety Bureau, NTSB, hearing for the plane crash headed by Melissa Leo after him, Washington is in for a rough ride - with the possibility of going to jail. It is a shame that he has this situation as after such an incredible feat to save the plane because Washington, for a time, is called a real American hero for his relevant skills as a pilot. Even with the help of his airlines collegue Bruce Greenwood, his lawyer Don Cheadle, and his new girlfriend, addict Kelly Reilly, Washington is in for a rough time. Even being sequestered in a hotel does not help him. It is sad that it is a tradition that passengers are called souls by the flight crew. John Goodman was a lot of fun as Washington's hippie best friend.

Rated R for alcohol and drug abuse, nudity, language, smoking. Running time: 138 Minutes.

Pancho 
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ARGO

Warner Bros. Pictures

Rated R

Running time: 120 Minutes



Click below to watch the Argo trailer.



In Warner Bros. Pictures Argo, Ben Affleck is a CIA ex filtration expert who has to get six U.S. Embassy escapees out of Iran during the Iran hostage crisis. 

Based on a true story, the movie starts out with movie storyboards describing the historical background of Iran - then the movie goes into the story as the U.S. Embassy gets stormed by Iranian protesters during the Islamic revolution of 1979. Six of the Embassy staff sneak out the back of the Embassy during the takeover - and takes refuge at the Canadian Embassy with Canadian Ambassador Victor Garber. 

As the head of the C.I.A.’s Graphics and Authentication Division, producer, director, and star Affleck - as the real life Tony Mendez - was responsible for foreign agents and the agents cover stories. After watching a clip of Battle for the Planet of the Apes from his hotel during a phone call with his son Aidan Sussman who is sitting at home, Affleck comes up with the idea of getting the refugees out of Iran by having them pose as a Canadian film crew making a science fiction movie that needs exotic Iranian locales - so they can fly out of Iran after the "location scouting" trip. With the help of Hollywood makeup artist John Goodman as John Chambers - who had created Mr. Spock's pointed ears, as well as worked on the Planet of the Apes movie series - and Producer Alan Arkin, they create a production studio for the fake science fiction/fantasy film. Arkin takes this project seriously - if the story has a horse, "it's a western, not a science fiction film." I loved what Alan Arkin said, "If I'm doing a fake movie, it's going to be a fake hit." The audience laughed at all the Hollywood jokes. 

The juxtaposition between the intense real-life Iran and the fantasy land of lowest-common denominator Hollywood was quite ironic. The run-down Hollywood Sign, before it's renovation, stresses the fact that this is the time period of 1979. The costumes in Hollywood were straight out of a science fiction convention and were pretty funny, while the Iranian Anti-American protesters were very scary. I wished there was more of the Hollywood aspect in the second half of the movie with John Goodman and Alan Arkin waiting back in Hollywood, at least arranging more of the Hollywood support system needed for the refugees extraction considering how rushed the project was put together.  The Hollywood aspect would have lightened the tension of the intense second half of the film as the Iranians hunt for the refugees, which was very draining for me. Having the refugees not trusting Affleck and the Iranian military searching for the refugees definitely was intense. When refugee "location scout" Kerry Bishe takes location pictures as part of her fake ID job, she gets into a confrontation with an Iranian business owner for taking a picture of his business. This was just one of the intense scenes in the second half of the movie as Affleck is determined to fly the refugees out, despite a problem with their airline tickets. It was fortunate that one of the refugees can speak Farsi. 

Having the Embassy using strip paper shredders instead of cross-cut paper shredders did not make sense to me - especially when they also had a furnace for burning sensitive documents - and of course the use of strip shredders was used to the detriment of the Embassy hostages and refugees. I am sure, after this incident - and the Oliver North Iran-Contra affair - cross-cut paper shredders are part of government facilities now. 

While I understand the storming of the Embassy, there was no real resolution of the U.S. Marines stationed at the U.S. Embassy. It is implied that the Marines were overrun and taken hostage, but you never really saw that. Given the fact that the Marines had a no-shoot-to-kill order - it is sad, but not surprising that the Embassy and the Marines were overrun. 

It was interesting to see the archival TV news clips of the time about the hostage crises, with the nationally famous network newscasters looking so young - as well as seeing the news clips of President Jimmy Carter and U.S. and Canadian government officials. Iran government officials, as well as Iranian women reading statements denouncing the U.S. Embassy and the U.S. and Canadian governments in the aftermath of the incident is still rather disturbing. Affleck had the film processed in a way so that the movie looked like it came from that time period. The Warner Bros. logo used for the movie was the logo used during that time period. 

While in reality, British and New Zealand diplomats also had put their lives at risk to help the American refugees - but I do not recall any mention of them in the movie, so their involvement in the movie was very light.

The crowd in the theater was definitely and older crowd and the theater was pretty full for an afternoon matinee. This was definitely the type of crowd who were around during the Iran hostage crisis. While I remember the 52 hostages, I barely remember the release of the 6 refugees - so this movie was very suspenseful for me as I did not know the refugees story. I loved all of the Star Wars toys on Sussman's bedroom dresser shelves at the end of the movie as they ran the end credits crawl. During the end credits, there was a "where are they now" crawl of the people involved with the incident and a crawl of the involvement along with the Canadian government - as well as a voice-over statement from former President Carter describing the Argo incident. The credits also showed the movie shots being compared with the real-life pictures of the hostage crisis. At the end of the movie, the audience applauded. 


Rated R for violence and language. Running time: 120 Minutes

 Pancho 
All people smile in the same language.
 

TROUBLE WITH THE CURVE

Warner Bros.

 Rated PG-13

 Running time: 111 Minutes



 Click below to watch the Trouble with the Curve trailer.

 

In Warner Bros. Trouble with the Curve, Clint Eastwood is an aging baseball scout, who had signed up some of the best ball players in the business, trying to convince everyone - including his lawyer daughter Amy Adams - that he can still scout baseball talent.

While in his last few movies, star and producer Eastwood has been playing characters who of course are old - this is the film that I have seen one of Eastwood's movie play up the fact that Clint Eastwood as being old the most. Directed by Eastwood's longtime associate Robert Lorenz in Lorenz's directorial debut - Eastwood came out of acting retirement for this role, and I think the role most suits him. This is the first time since In the Line of Fire that Eastwood has not both directed and starred in a movie.

The Trouble With the Curve mostly concentrated on Eastwood's decreasing eyesight and his possibly not being able to perform his job anymore, especially as Eastwood tries to scout a new high school "green power hitter" Joe Massingill in a small town in North Carolina as Eastwood and Adams stay in a local motel. The concern of Eastwood's boss and best friend John Goodman and Eastwood's daughter Amy Adams over Eastwood's condition showed their love for Eastwood, despite the dysfunctional father-daughter relationship Adams and Eastwood have throughout most of the movie, as Adams leaves home to go with her father Eastwood to look after him. Even young baseball scout Justin Timberlake's admiration and respect for Eastwood's experience added to Eastwood's aging and his inability to adapt to the changes in the business of Major League Baseball. Despite the high tech aspect of baseball, the fact that everyone still travels in cars instead of airlines while scouting shows that the game of baseball really still has not changed.

The juxtaposition between Adams and Eastwood's jobs on the line hit home to me for both father and daughter as smarmy General Manager wannabe Matthew Lillard, with his computerized tracking system of players, wants Eastwood with his old-school scouting experience of scouting real players out of the organization - and Adams is threatened by another lawyer taking her presentation her client as well as the lawyer taking her spot as a partner in her lawyer's firm.

This is a nice role for Timberlake. Timberlake is such a nice guy in the movie as a young baseball scout for another team that gruff Eastwood practically pushes his relationship-challenged single daughter Adams at his young prodigy Timberlake. I guess it was keeping baseball all in the family as Adams grew up with baseball - and has learned quite a lot from Eastwood - and also assists Eastwood in scouting and recruiting talent, despite not always being with her single father Eastwood as she was growing up. It was great to see Robert Patrick as the owner of Eastwood's baseball team the Atlanta Braves - but we really did not get to know Patrick as the owner, which I think is a shame. The other aging baseball fans were also a delight to see. Actually, I am not sure if they were fans or were scouts as well since I did not recall seeing them take notes.

There was definitely an older crowd for this movie when I saw the film. I am sure most of them were there for Clint Eastwood rather than were actual baseball fans. That is how I felt about the audience for Eastwood's Space Cowboys, where the audience were more of a fan of Eastwood rather than of NASA. While I understand movie reviews have been mixed for Trouble With the Curve - as a fan of both Eastwood and baseball, I enjoyed this sports movie. It would be a shame if more of the younger generation do not see Trouble With the Curve.

Rated PG-13 for violence, language, sexual situations. Running time: 111 minutes.

Pancho
All people smile in the same language.

Pancho's Movie Reviews