Guess Who (2005)

3/5

Guess Who is a light, fun romantic comedy that provides solid entertainment for an hour and a half. It tells the story of a white boyfriend (Kutcher) who visits the parents (Mac, Scott) of his black girlfriend (Saldana) during their renewing of vows. Of course, the dad is giving the boy a hard time. And of course, things go wrong. The girlfriend is mad that he didn't tell her he quit his job, the boyfriend is mad that she didn't tell her parents he was white, the mother is mad at the father, and on and on and on. And so, instead of announcing their secret engagement, the young couple breaks up (oh no!). The movie throws a few curveballs your way (e.g., his reason for quitting his job), but is otherwise fairly predictable. The writing is simple but funny. The scripted characters felt shallow at first glance, but the acting filled them with honesty and heart. Bernie Mac is funny as always and Kutcher is charming as always. All in all, Guess Who is an expected 90 minutes of simple pleasure with cute couples and a tender family dynamic.

IMDb link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0372237/

Valentine's Day (2010)

3/5

Uhh, I have no idea why Valentine's Day has been getting such terrible reviews, but it is utterly undeserving of such negativity. It was a fine romantic comedy, equal parts predictable (Kutcher and Garner) and equal parts unpredictable (Cooper and Roberts). It had cliches, but it also had surprises. (Perhaps the biggest surprise is that Ashton Kutcher plays a charismatic hero with aplomb and sympathy.) And it made me laugh and smile, which is exactly what it set out to do.

The plot is too complicated to type out here (or maybe I just don't remember all the details), but that doesn't really matter. Just know that it's about a bunch of men and women who get into and out of relationships on Valentine's Day. The technical aspects are nothing to write home about. The characters were simple but the acting was good. Some of the stories were not as good as some of the others, but the ones that were good were very good. There was some repetition and it felt just a tad too long, but all in all it was a solid romantic comedy. Watch this movie if you're interested in it; I don't think you'll be disappointed.

IMDb link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0817230/

Dear John (2010)

2/5

Dear John is a bad movie. It is based on a Nicholas Sparks novel, and I presume that novel is bad as well, because the bad part about this movie is its story. The cinematography was fine, the acting was fine, but the story sucked. The story starts with an army sergeant (Tatum) during a 2-week leave back home with his dad (Jenkins) in Charleston. On the beach, he meets a girl who also went back home to Charleston for spring break from college (Seyfried). They fall madly in love and, at the conclusion of the 2 weeks, he of course has to go back to the army and she of course has to go back to school. They promise that they will write each other as often as is humanly possible and things go just peachily at first. But where would the romance be without some trials and tribulations along the way that they must overcome? Do they overcome it? Ah, I guess you'll have to see it to find out what happens next.

But I don't think anyone should see this movie, so I'll just tell you what happens next: she sends him a Dear John letter and tells him she's engaged to someone else. Oh no! The problem with this movie is that it sets itself up as a movie with the potential to tug at your heartstrings and ultimately satisfy your desire for their love to be fulfilled. Instead it is painful obstacle after obstacle until they finally smack into a brick wall and give up. It is not a story of true love triumphing in the face of uncontrollable external factors; it is the story of affection and need failing in the face of inconvenience. And don't talk to me about the ending. The ending is not a redemption; it is sap and sentimentality without any resonance of truth. It is the author writing a convenient end to an inconvenient setup. It is illogical, frustrating, and out of context. Don't watch this movie. You will either be disappointed or angry, and neither is what you want to feel after emerging from the theater.

IMDb link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0989757/

Brigham City (2001)

4/5

Richard Dutcher's Brigham City is a somewhat religious whodunit about more than what's on the surface. In a sleepy Mormon town called Brigham City, the local sheriff (Dutcher) and his deputy (Brown) come upon a car with a California license plate and a dead woman in a nearby shed. They try to protect the rest of the community by handing it over to the FBI, but no one can ignore it when the local townspeople start getting murdered.

To call it a sleepy town is an understatement. It feels stoic and muted and boring, and all of the characters within the town are just as stoic and muted and boring. For the first half hour or so, this slowness makes the whole movie unappealing in a cheesy 1990's style. But it works surprisingly well at building tension during the rest of the movie. And even thought it's predictable (you almost always know when the movie is trying to throw you off track), it still works. It works because you never really know who the killer is until the end. You may have guessed that person while running through all the potential suspects in your head, but I doubt you would have been confident enough to settle on that person before it was revealed.

The cinematic qualities in this film are subpar (the low-cost film Mystery Team had better acting, writing, and filmmaking), but that's not the movie's strong suit. The great part about this movie is that you think about it after you finish it. You wonder about all the unspoken workings of the movie, both an impeccably well thought out reflection and homage to the silence of God. This movie is very openly Mormon, in a lot of aspects, but there are also a lot of subtle religious overtones and comments that make it far more intriguing than one might think after an initial viewing without giving it some extra thought. The choice of killer is extremely interesting, and the unsaid motivations and truths paint an even more fascinating picture when you look beyond the film. The story is much stronger than its component parts (from dialogue to characters to acting), but the story is a compelling one. Watch it if you like a good mystery movie, or if you've entertained conversations on God's presence or absence in our lives. It will get you talking about it again.

IMDb link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0268200/

Mystery Team (2009)

4/5

Derrick Comedy's Mystery Team is awesome. It is by far one of the funniest movies I can remember seeing in the past who knows how long. Written by and starring Derrick Comedy (Dierkes, Pierson, Glover), the movie follows three seniors in high school who still act like 7 year old detectives. They run a detective agency called Mystery Team and their latest customer is a young girl who wants them to solve the murder of her parents. The gritty dark side of their suburban Oakdale community overcomes their childlike innocence and they soon realize that they must grow up if they want to survive and solve the case.

The comedy in this movie is superb. It is edgy, profane, and innocent in just the right proportions. They take risks that pay off almost 100% of the time. (Even if they don't, you applaud them for trying because they just crossed the line you thought would never be crossed.) And I promise that you will be quoting this movie for quite some time after seeing it. The cinematic qualities were actually very, very, very impressive, especially given the independent nature of the film. The creativity in the filmmakers is evident in every shot; the only thing holding them back is the technology they're able to afford. All in all, this is a striking first feature for all the right reasons. The people who made Bro Rape, Girls Are Not To Be Trusted, and Blowjob Girl have somehow miraculously made the shift from short online sketch to professional feature length film. And it is a treasure to behold. Watch it as soon as you can. You will not regret it.

IMDb link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1237838/

Monsters vs. Aliens (2009)

3/5

Monsters vs. Aliens is an all right movie. Even watching it on an HDTV with a group of friends, you could tell it was made with the intent of being seen in 3D and that the target audience was more kids than their parents or their older siblings. The plot follows Susan (Witherspoon) on her wedding day, who gets hits by a meteor and becomes 50 feet tall. She is taken by the government, represented by General Monger (Sutherland), to a monster storage facility, where she meets BOB the blob (Rogen), the lizardman called The Missing Link (Arnett), the mad scientist Dr. Cockroach (Laurie), and the ginormous silent Insectosaurus. When aliens, represented by Gallaxhar (Wilson), start invading earth, the government unleashes the monsters to fight them off.

The movie is pretty slow to start, not making any good jokes and not progressing the plot much. In fact, it's kind of awkward and unsettling to see Susan's relationship with her fiance (Rudd). Once it gets going (about halfway in), there are quite a few laugh-out-loud moments. The graphics aren't particularly awesome, especially compared to Pixar films, but they're still pretty good (especially in HD). All in all, the movie is fairly average. It garnered some laughs, but there weren't really too too many jokes or moments that I can see myself quoting or remembering in the future. Pass on it unless you're a huge B monster movie fan.

IMDb link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0892782/

While You Were Sleeping (1995)

4/5

While You Were Sleeping is a wonderfully light romantic comedy with just the right amount of emotion at the end to warm your heart. Sandra Bullock stars as the awkward fare lady for the Chicago (!) commuter rail. Peter Gallagher is the guy of her dreams who she sees take the train every day but has never talked to. One fateful morning, he falls on the tracks and she rescues him from an oncoming train. As he lies in a coma at Northwestern Memorial Hospital (!), she gets mistaken as his fiancée by the staff and by his charmingly dysfunctional family. Through a series of very unrealistic but incredibly funny twists, she is forced to maintain her guise until he wakes up. But that is not the only twist! After spending Christmas with the family, she meets coma guy's brother, Bill Pullman, and soon falls in love with him.

Shot extensively (if not entirely) in Chicago, the cinematography is an absolute treasure for Chicago lovers. The shot compositions themselves aren't that great, but they do have an amazing backdrop at which I stared joyfully in every scene. But what is really awesome about this movie is seeing the hospital in which I'm going to be doing rotations come July. (Well, I guess that's not entirely true--Passavant Pavilion no longer exists and all the buildings I'm going to actually be working in were erected post-1999--but still!) The acting by all was pitch perfect, the characters were quirky before it was hip to be quirky, and the writing was fun while the dialogue was funny. This movie comes with a lot of twists and turns and explores the topics of love and family expertly. Despite my overly enthusiastic praise for movies set in Chicago, While You Were Sleeping is a true treasure for any movie fan and a really enjoyable movie. You won't be disappointed.

IMDb link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0114924/