My prayers for NIU

This blog has served as a creative outlet for my own personal opinion regarding movies and movie reviews. But today, I have a much more somber topic having nothing to do with movies, reviews, or anything theatrically related.

Yesterday, February 14, 2008, a gunman by the name of Stephen Kazmierczak opened fire on the campus of Northern Illinois University in DeKalb, Illinois. The massacre began around 3:05 p.m. and within minutes, was over. And five innocent lives were lost, while more than a dozen were wounded. So far, no motive has been released. However, even if there had been, and I'm guessing there will be eventually, I don't think I will ever understand what could have possibly ever driven any human being to cause such chaos, such utter terror.

I grew up in a small town called Sycamore, Illinois. It's a small agricultural town in DeKalb county, less than two minutes from the town of DeKalb and less than five minutes from NIU. I learned to drive on the NIU campus. My prom was in the building right next to Cole Hall, where the shooting took place. I have so many good memories on that campus and in that town. I applied there for college after high school, but didn't go. But a large part of my graduating class went to NIU and still attends classes there. Even some of my family members go there. The complete fear and panic that strikes through a person when things like this happen is completely unexplainable. There are no words. Thankfully, everyone that I know that I've been able to get a hold of thus far has been fine. But for the five that are dead, the many wounded, and the thousands grieving, there are no words or actions that can make it go away. It's a constant nightmare that they can't wake up from. I wasn't there, and even I am finding it hard to walk onto my college campus. If it can happen in my hometown, where I always thought that it was so safe, so secure, it can happen anywhere. Nobody knows who's going to snap or where, or even why. But it's terrifying.

Northern Illinois University, Students, friends, family, community, and all of those affected....my thoughts and prayers are with you. I'm healing with you.

"Some Thing Has Found Us"

So it hasn't officially been declared the movie of the season yet, but in my opinion it is. I'm talking about "Cloverfield," the new action flick from J.J. Abrams, the genius behind Lost.

This movie comes off as more of a documentary than an actual movie, and the acting maintains that illusion throughout most of the film. Michael Stahl-David plays Rob Hawkins, the main character. Rob's a man who, after a college crush on a longtime best friend, Beth McIntyre (played by Odette Yustman), finally got the girl, only to be forced to give her up due to a move to Japan because of work. At his surprise going away party, a monster attacks New York City. The movie centers around the survivors quest to rescue Beth from her destroyed apartment complex. And the rest, you'll see it when you see it.

The acting is entirely authentic and believable save for two occasions when it's more the writing rather than the writing. But rather than post spoilers, I'll leave it up to your discretion. Just know that one scene involves Rob's reaction to an event, and the other is the over-acting at the end. But all the actors are all extremely talented entirely believable.

The storyline, although like most monster movies, is fare fetched, it's done in an usual way. Shown through the viewpoint of survivors attempting to continue to survive instead of the stereotypical view of the military dealing with crisis.

Yahoo critics are giving this movie a B while the users are, thus far rating it a B-. I disagree. I'd rate it more of an A- to an A. My main problem with the movie being this. The beginning of the movie, a lot of "US Department of Defense" paraphernalia and labels run on the film before the movie actually begins. Yet during the course of the movie, nothing is shown that would let the audience know that the government gets a hold of the tape. That, and nothing about the monster is ever explained. Not where it came from or how it came about. But then again, it's a nice twist on events from the usual monster horror flick.

So if you haven't seen it yet, give "Cloverfield" a shot. If you're not interested, give it a chance. It's worth it.

The Greatest Battle Lies Within

(Because my university has currently blocked YouTube and all other media viewing websites, here's the link to the preview of today's film)

Another blockbuster release, another midnight showing, another highly anticipated film...and another more than slight let down. Spiderman 3, I'll say right off the bat, was not what it was cracked up to be.

The critics are giving this movie a B- on yahoo, and the viewers are giving it a B. One of the rare times that critics and moviegoers are so very close in their "grading" scale for such a film. And there are more than a few reasons for such an event.

The acting, while still in conjunction with every other Spiderman film, was disappointing at times. Kirsten Dunst stepped it up for once, actually becoming a character instead of an actress playing a part. Suddenly, her emotions were real and the audience could sympathize with Mary Jane Watson instead of listening to Dunst. Tobey Maguire has never been a let down when it comes to the Spiderman movies, and he didn't let me down this time either. His character, now that's a different story, but I digress. Topher Grace, on the other hand, has seen better days. And much better characters. Playing Venom was simply not the role for him. A scrawny photographer who is overly emotional, and not nearly as intimidating as he should have been, Eddie Brock wasn't the Venom he should have been. An avid reader of the Spiderman comics and aware of the villians, I was more than disappointed. Brock was a burly man, intimidating and quite butch. Not the push over that was depicted. A better choice could have been made. Gwen Stacey, played by Bryce Dallas Howard, was decent. Although the character was all wrong, Howard did more than a good enough job portraying the blonde competition of Mary Jane. And Sandman, Thomas Haden Church, although not really a villian in my opinion, was appealing as well. It was the rest of the movie that left something to be desired.

Now, the storyline. Come on. I understand Raimi's goal and his twisted sense of humor, but the absolutely ludicrous depiction of both Spiderman and Parker's infection by the Simbiote were laughable when they should have left the audience confused and perturbed with the situation. For example, when the suit begins to "infect" Parker, I really don't need to see him dancing down the streets, pointing and winking at everybody, walking like a clown, and dancing on the bar during a jazz performance. It doesn't really portray what the entire idea of the simbiote was.

Spiderman 3, while well intentioned, just didn't live up to the hype. The storyline was fair, the villians (although lacking a certain Mysterio that was promised) were well chosen (just not the actors), the idea was good. But the product left much to be desired.

It's still worth seeing for those Spiderman fans, either of the comic or of the films. But don't be expecting too much. You'll leave disappointed. And in my case, wishing you had waited a few days and spent the hours from 12 a.m. until 2:30 sleeping.

What hath God wraught?

This weekend's movie of choice? "The Reaping." A movie that, when it first came out, I had little to no intentions of seeing it. The basic plot follows an ordained minister, Hilary Swank, who, after the death of her family, has turned her back on God. Since that point, she's become a professor at a predominant university in Louisiana and spends her "free time" investigating so-called miracles and negating them, offering instead a scientific explanation. After being contacted by a man from a town called Haven about a possible plague and a town that blames a 12 year old girl for it, she goes to Haven to investigate.

I sat in awe of the entire film while it played. I loved it. However, if you're an atheist, you probably won't like this movie.

The script, while to me it was slightly predictable, was acceptable. The events that occurred made sense and were presented in a way that the audience, whether they know the Bible from cover to cover or not, will be able to keep up with the plot line and determine their own opinions. And the actors were pretty convincing. Swank actually delivered an almost stellar performance as I actually believed some of her emotions for the first time in a film. David Morrissey, a less-than-mainstream actor, comes up as her co-star and does a decent job of it. His character is Doug, the man who has asked Swank's character to come to Haven. He's charismatic and slightly charming at the appropriate times.

While the "professional" critics are rating this movie pretty low, I'd say it's far too underestimated. It'd be safe to call this movie a religious thriller, but I wouldn't go so far as to call it horror. It had it's scary points; I found myself jumping a bit in my seat, squeezing my hands a bit tighter, and getting a bit nervous every once in a while. But if you go in to this film expecting to come out unable to sleep, you're going to be disappointed. Instead, go in expecting to see tension personified on screen and the typical religion versus science struggle that may actually surprise you.

If you're looking for a good movie to see, this one is definitely worth it.

The Scariest movie I've seen in a long time

I didn't go to the theater this weekend.

Now, after you pull yourself up off of the floor, begin breathing again, and realize that this is, in fact, reality, let me say this. Instead of going to the theater this weekend, I ended up renting about 7 movies to watch and review. And to start off with, I'm picking this one. An independent film called "Dark Remains."

I'm a scary movie buff. I love being scared, I love ghost stories that make your blood curdle, and I can't get enough of horrifying scenes that make you want to scream. Sad part is, I have yet to see a movie that's done any of that since I was watching "Pet Sematary" when I was 8 years old. Until I picked up this stunning movie. Granted, the first time I rented it and watched it was a few months ago, it still scares me and keeps me lying awake at night, incapable of sleeping.

I sat in my livingroom, with the lights on, watching this movie with my fiance, hoping that I'd finally have a good review from a supposed scary movie (See my review on Hannibal Rising if you don't know what I mean). And I was not disappointed. My fiance and I were fighting over who got to hide behind who while the misdirection and entirely unforeseen plot twists caught us off guard every time. It was impossible to look away, at the same time, I really, really wanted to.

The story is of a young couple who live in a large city in Atlanta, GA. with their daughter. After she is killed while they slept down the hallway from her, they move into a secluded mountain area in order to grieve and escape the towns whispered rumors. But strange things begin to happen. Julie, the wife, who is an amateur photographer, begins seeing disturbing images in her photos and begins to investigate them deeper and deeper, until both her and her husband, as well as her neighbors, seem to be in far deeper than even she could've expected.

For anybody who has ever been even slightly entertained by a horror film or a ghost story, this is the perfect story for you. We haven't seen many descently done horror flicks and it's entirely rare to see one done as well as this, especially independently. The make up job is so very realistically gruesome that you're not sure whether what you've just seen was just a character in a movie, or an actual ghost.

Either way, if you pick up "Dark Remains," get ready to be scared. And be sure to keep the light on. You may find that you really do need it.

***Edit*** For those in the St. Charles, MO area, the only rental store that has this particular film available is Hollywood Video. It is also available on NetFlix***

I am the Goddess of War.....2

Since Tuesday night around 7 O'clock, I have been spending every spare moment I have, sacrificing time for eating and sleeping, even studying (because I am just that much of a geek) in order to play my newest video game for the PlayStation 2. God of War 2.

My beloved Kratos, who is still as devine as ever, even covered in the ashes of his dead family, is still battling the Grecian Gods in his neverending battle to rid himself of his horrid memories of killing his own family while under the control of Ares, the original God of War. In the first game, Kratos kills Ares in order to escape his bonds of slavery. After making a pact with the god in order to beat down his enemies, Kratos became a rampaging maniac and, in the midst of his slaughterous ways, killed his wife and daughter.

After that, he developed an insane grudge against Ares and saught revenge which he got en mass by killing him and becoming the new God of War. Now, in the sequel (yes, this is me, advocating a sequel), Ares is betrayed by the Gods and stripped of his powers. Because of this, he must go find the Sisters of Fate in order to go back to the time when Zeus first betrayed him, rewrite history, change the past, and return the world to the way he wants it to be.

Amazing cinemography, new moves, more hidden surprises, harder and longer levels, more bosses, more challenging puzzles, and simply a better game which I never thought possible have brought God of War 2 up on my list of must have games. I'm just glad they didn't release it exclusively on PS3.

My only complaint is that the creators got so much of the Greek Mythology so very, very wrong. Granted, it's mythology; it isn't exactly right or wrong to begin with. But there is a general consensus as to what did or did not happen. And for the most part, God of War 2 is lacking a few essential factoids in the plot line. But if you can ignore that and focus solely on the game, you won't be disappointed. Not in the slightest.

300

It happened early this morning, around 12:10 a.m. Something absolutely amazing. The curtains moved to the side, the lights dimmed, the crowd cheered and then became entirely silent. And for the next two hours, I sat in complete awe of the masterpiece that was and is "300."

For a movie that I've been looking forward to for nearly 6 months, it exceeded every expectation that I had for it. Based on the graphic novels, essentially comic books (and I mean that in a good way), by Frank Miller, this movie was one of the least comic book-like movies ever to be made. The entire movie was filled with the most brilliant cinematography that I have seen so far this year; I'd even go so far as to say that it was better than Pan's Labyrinth which, for me, is saying more than I expected.

When I first heard about this movie, my initial assumption was that it was going to be filled with senseless violence but it wasn't. The gore that was involved was appropriate and fitting, not too much but not too little. Granted, I'm a person who likes to see that type of thing, especially when it's well done and realistic which was a feat that "300" reached for, attained, and exceeded again and again.

David Wenham, who plays Dilios, one of the Spartan soldiers, narrates the film. But it happens in such a way that while you realize you're being narrated to, you don't mind. I've never been a fan of narration in movies. After Double Indemnity and Citizen Kane, I believed the days of movie narration to be over and entirely obsolete. But in "300," it's done so stylistically that it's needed. Almost essential to the plot. And the entire story ends up coming around full circle.

Gerard Butler, one of my favorite actors, brought King Leonidas to life, so much so that it was impossible to escape being brought into the film. You ended up feeling as though you were one of his men throughout the entire thing. And you couldn't help but respect him. Dominic West, who played Theron, was the perfect bad guy. I found myself hating him so purely that by the time I got to the parking lot, I had to remind myself that it was an actor playing a role.

I've been obsessed with the Greek culture since I was in junior high school. So of course, I knew how this one was going to end. Yet still, I sat in my seat waiting for things to happen, and for the course of mythology to change on film. It didn't; they stuck to what was documented, however bittersweetly that may seem to the audience. I both loved and hated that fact.

If you don't want to see 300, see it anyway. If you want to see it, see it today, and again tomorrow. If you haven't heard about it, hear about it now, trust my opinion and go see it. No matter what, you won't be disappointed.