The Internship (2013)

3/5

The Internship is a fairly predictable buddy comedy that I've come to expect from the likes of Owen Wilson and Vince Vaughn. The movie focuses on two middle-aged salesmen who lose their job and apply for an internship at Google in the hopes of rebooting their career. As you might expect, they have no technical background but a wealth of people skills and they eventually triumph in the face of much smarter but less experienced college-age kids. The movie has its fair share of laughs, romance, and feel-good moments. There's honestly nothing surprising at all about this movie. It's a light piece of fluff that will brighten your day if you have it on in the background while doing some actual work.

IMDb link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2234155/

22 Jump Street (2014)

3/5

The sequel to the TV show reboot that took the world by storm is more of a mixed bag than the slam-dunk repeat formula success story that I'm sure its producers wanted. The writing, which combines raunchy humor with bromance and heart, is adequately funny but never feels emotionally honest. The jokes feel recycled, as does the overall plot progression. The novelty of 21 Jump Street is entirely lost. It's a great piece of entertainment, but it's also an empty, forgettable one.

IMDb link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt2294449/

21 Jump Street (2012)

4/5

I didn't know this going in, but 21 Jump Street is a comic adaptation of an 80's police procedural TV show about cops who go undercover into high schools and colleges because of their youthful appearances. In this 2012 version, best friends Jenko (Tatum) and Schmidt (Hill) are sent into the undercover unit at 21 Jump Street, aka the Aroma of Christ Korean church, with the mission of infiltrating a drug ring that has popped up at a local high school. Jenko is excited to relive his glory days, but soon discovers that the status symbols and hierarchy that put him on top have completely reversed compared to 7 years prior. Now the environmentally-friendly vegans (Franco, Larson) are the cool kids, and Schmidt realizes he may finally get a second chance at high school popularity.

To put it simply, the movie is awesome. It is one of the funniest I've seen recently, on par with the best of Judd Apatow (and in the same raunchy, irreverent style). It pokes fun of endless remakes, of the action comedy genre, and especially of itself. It spends no time on character development and no time on plot progression. Instead it spends 100% of the time on comedy, and it more than pays off in the jokes department. However, it doesn't try to make a point, and therefore it doesn't have the same potential as the best comedies in terms of staying power. But this movie is spectacularly funny, and I cannot recommend it enough.

IMDb link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1232829/

Killers (2010)

2/5

Killers is such a stupid movie. When I first saw the trailer, I thought that it might be cool. As time went on and reviews came out, I got less and less excited for it. If I had just waited for my interest to dwindle to nothing, I might have spared myself from watching this stupid movie. It follows the awkward relationship that develops between awkward CIA agent Spencer (Kutcher) and awkward computer nerd Jen (Heigl) after awkwardly bumping into each other in France. Spencer is there to kill someone while Jen is there vacationing with her alcoholic mother (O'Hara) and overbearing father (Selleck). They get married and, several years later, Spencer discovers that a bounty has been placed on his head. All of his neighbors start attacking him with machine guns and kitchen knives like something out of Hot Fuzz, only bad. There are also a few side stories that are worthless and a final "twist" that would have been obvious if it made any sense.

Now that you know how stupid the plot is, I can tell you how stupid the rest of the movie is. The characters just don't work. At all. None of them. The two leads have absolutely no chemistry together; it's like they're talking cardboard cutouts. There was no passion, even in their arguments. There's very little romance and there's very little comedy (although the movie as a whole does provide some moments to laugh at, like the alcoholic mother, before you come to the depressing realization that alcoholism has become a punchline). The pacing is atrocious and the special effects are terrible. The gunfights and car chases failed to keep my attention (although the hand-to-hand combat was actually not bad). It's not the worst movie in the world, but I would seriously ask anybody who was intrigued by the trailer to just step away and let this one go. (The only reason it is not 1 star is that it didn't offend me in any way.)

IMDb link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1103153/

The Hangover (2009)

4/5

The Hangover is a raunchy comedy full of great one-liners and hilarious situations. The plot follows three groomsmen waking up in the aftermath of a Vegas bachelor party with a killer hangover, a missing groom, and some mild retrograde amnesia. For the next 24 hours, they attempt to sober up, figure out what happened, and return with the groom in time for his wedding. It's a funny, vapid movie with lots of laughs and no message. But it's fun and entertaining, so go out and see it as soon as you can.

Technically, the movie is pretty impressive for a comedy. The framework of a mystery to progress the plot was new and inventive for the genre and kept things interesting. Seeing the smoking chair and clucking chicken lets the audience's mind run wild with possibilities that might even be funnier than the writers would have come up with. The fact that they're never explained, even at the film's end, opens up possibilities for some pretty awesome DVD extras if they choose to. The cinematography was usually pretty humdrum, but they were occasionally spiced up by truly awesome shots that made the movie stand out from the pack. The editing was accomplished, with relatively few unnecessary scenes and some magnificent surprise laughs. All in all, this is a fantastic comedy that attempts something new and succeeds. Reward them for their success--go see this movie.

IMDb link: http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1119646/