Brent's AV Club

Synopsis: Adam and Dr. Lawrence Gordon wake up chained to pipes at opposite ends of a dirty utility room. They soon learn that they have become the victims of the Jigsaw, a serial killer who devises intricate situations to get his victims to kill each other. Pitted against the clock and each other, the two must work to outwit their captor and save Gordon's family, who have been taken hostage by the killer.

My Thoughts: I had no idea what the movie was about when I began to watch it, but I soon got very into it. This movie just captured me and my eyes were glued to the TV all the way until the ending credits. To me, this movie was absolutely amazing. It's in the Horror/Thriller genre and it doesn't disappoint. Usually these movies leave me wanting more, the plots are predictable, you sometimes know what will happen after the first five minutes. That's not the case with Saw. I had no idea what was going on all the way until the very end.

The killer, nicknamed Jigsaw, captures his victims and puts them in unusual situations in which they will either die a slow, horrible death, or survive and be able to live a normal life after. The two characters are chained on two sides of a room. They each have a tape to listen to. One man is basically there for no reason, the other is there and along with the tape he has a bullet. He's supposed to kill the other guy before 6 AM or his family will be killed. There is a gun and a dead guy in a pool of blood in the middle of the room. After trying to figure out a way to outsmart jigsaw, they actually find a couple of saws. If they wanted out, they could have cut their ankles off and slipped out of the chains.

What would you do in that situation? Cut off your ankle, pickup the gun and kill the other guy or let time run out and have your family killed?

Rating: Because I was so impressed and captivated by the storyline, something that hasn't happened since Se7en I have to give this 5 pretzels. It was just an unbelievable movie and I can't wait to see the sequel.



Closing Touch: If you're a fan of the genre, this should be added to your collection. It's well written, well directed and you will be impressed.

Synopsis: A man raised into behaving like a dog, escapes from his captor to start a new life, who seeks to reclaim him because of his unnatural martial arts skills that are triggered when unleashed.

My Thoughts: Holy Hell, I wanted to gouge my eyes out with a meat hook and stick dynamite in my hears so I wouldn't have to watch or hear anymore of this pathetic piece of crap. Needless to say, I hated this movie. It's quite possibly the worst movie that I have ever seen. I would have stopped watching halfway through, but I chugged along for the purpose of reviewing it.

It's a 100 minute movie. 15 minutes are spent fighting, the rest are spent "searching for himself". Jet Li is a friggen idiot and because of this movie I will never watch another movie that he's in. He co-produced it.

The storyline is he was raised by this man named Bart. He was kept in a cell with a collar. Bart would do business with scum and if they didn't pay him, he would take off Danny's (Jet Li) collar to "unleash" him. He would then kill everyone except for his group. Cool.

But then he escaped and runs into Morgan Freeman who is tuning pianos in an antique shop. Morgan brings him into his home and teaches him about life. Not exactly what I want to see in a martial arts flick. And this lasts for a good hour before he fights another person. It's ridiculous.

My last complaint is the woman in this movie. She is terrible and should quit acting. Firstly, she's about 35 and was playing an 18 year old college freshman. Secondly, she was the most annoying girl you will ever meet. Thirdly, for reasons that had -5% to do with the plot/storyline, she had braces. She got them removed and they showed a closeup of her teeth.. Yeah, they're crooked and yellow so the braces didn't work. Where was the "stunt" double?

The only good part is the ending, which still sucked. And all of a sudden Morgan Freemans character changed on a dime. He went from speaking like an old wise man to a young black thug, it was completely out of character and made me hate it even more.

Rating: This gets my highest rating ever, 43 pretzels! Nope. It gets a half because some of the few fight scenes are ok.



Closing Touch: Do yourself a favor and never watch/rent/buy this movie. Never. Ever. Seriously, never. Just go to a zoo, break into the elephant cage and lay down next to the elephant and hope he steps on your private parts. It would be less painful then sitting through this 100 minute long hunk of crap.

Synopsis: Stewie, the maniacal baby genius, is distracted from his plans for world domination when he sees a man who looks just like him on television.

My Thoughts: Well, it is what it is; A Family Guy movie. It is basically a 90 minute long episode of the show. As for the quality, I think the show is actually more funny. In the movie their seemed to be some scenes where they really tried to be funny, whereas in the show, they rarely have to stretch something to be funny.

Like the TV show, it has some outrageous and downright awful scenes. There was actually one scene that kind of offended me, it involved Jesus. I did laugh throughout the entire movie and if you're a fan of the show, you will too.

The storyline is amusing but lacks regular characters. Quagmire, Joe, Cleveland, Old Pervert and the Greased up naked guy are all in the movie, just not enough. Joe isn't in the movie until the very end, Cleveland has about 5 lines and Quagmire is in a few scenes where he is up to his normal sexual predator self. Still, the movie focused to much on Stewie and Brian, even Peter lacked enough screen time in my opinion. Of course the movie is about Stewie as he travels cross country to find a guy he saw on TV that he believes is his real father.

Rating: I am also going to give Stewie Griffin: The Untold Story 3.5 pretzels. It'll make you laugh for 90 minutes, it just seemed to be lacking something that the TV show has. I can't pin-point it, but watch the movie and see if you agree with me.



Closing Touch: I do strongly recommend the movie if you're a fan of the show. If you have Net-Flix, use it on this movie. I wouldn't really suggest buying the actual movie (like I did) but who am I to tell you what to do? Buy it or not, see if I care!

Synopsis: The story of how Bruce Wayne became Batman, fighting to save Gotham City from the mob, corrupt cops, and other villains.

My Thoughts: When it first came out in theaters, I said that Batman Begins was going to be the movie the others should have been. It didn't disappoint. What I really liked about the movie was that it had a realism that the others had lacked. By the time the later movies came along, it was horribly campy and just terrible. So scrapping all of that was absolutely necessary. In the new movie, they have made a Gotham that could actually exist and even the supervillains and Batman's skills are plausible. I think that ended up being done rather well. More thoughts:

• Christian Bale (also seen in Newsies and American Psycho), is Bruce Wayne/Batman and he pulls it off pretty convincingly. He has multiple personas (Batman, public Bruce, real Bruce), but he plays them all being part of the same person. And he throws a little Patrick Bateman in, which can never be a bad thing.
• Good supporting cast all around, except for one who I'll get to in a second. Michael Caine is great as Alfred and has some comic relief. Morgan Freeman is Morgan Freeman so you can't really complain there. And all three major villains are all good and bring something different to the table.
• All I can think of watching Katie Holmes is that she's now carrying Tom Cruise's spawn of Scientology. Not a pleasant thought. I also just don't think she's all too convincing as an actress in the movie.
• When I first read that Scarecrow would be the main villain, I couldn't figure out why, of all villains, they pick him. Then after watching the movie, I realized first that they pull it off pretty well, making him pretty creepy with just a burlap sack over his face. Second, it was good idea to use a completely different villain from the other movies to separate it from the others and show they're starting the whole thing over.
• Seeing everything before it all happened (the Batcave when it's just a cave full of bats, Gordon before he's Commish, the Bat Signal, etc.) was pretty sweet. And I really liked the background story from when Bruce is a kid.
• It's obviously set up for a sequel. Looking forward to it.

Rating: I give Batman Begins 4 Sams out of 5:

Synopsis: Balian of Ibelin travels to Jerusalem during the crusades of the 12th century, and there he finds himself as the defender of the city and its people.

My Thoughts: As a whole, I enjoyed the movie. I had a few things that I disliked, but the good far outweighed the bad. I am a big fan of epic adventures and Kingdom Of Heaven lives up to the billing.

The story is your basic epic tale, which is one of my dislikes. But as I got to thinking, what else would make it "epic"? I don't really have the answer to that question, hence the reason that I am not a screenwriter. This movie was directed by Ridley Scott, the same man who directed Gladiator and you could definitely see the similarities in the film. Bear with me here; If you combine Gladiator, Braveheart, a little bit of Lord Of The Rings (ROTK) and The Patriot, the result is Kingdom Of Heaven. The difference is basically the time frame of the film.

I say it is like all other epic adventures because the main character is a blacksmith who in what seems to be a matter of days becomes a brilliant war hero and king. Do you ever notice these Joe Nobodies always rise to glory? Like Lord Of The Rings, mere mortals seem to rise to epic levels to fend off a far superior army when they are clearly outnumbered by at least 10:1. The film is a tad over 2 hours long, has several key fights, but nothing as extensive as the Lord Of The Rings. KOH, as usual, has a romance story added in as a filler; I personally feel the love angle is pointless in this movie. At first, I thought the dialogue was shaky, alternating between modern and 12th century, but that was just a couple of lines and I ended up having no grief with the language.

So far I have been bashing the film, but I do and did enjoy watching all 2:20 of it. From start to finish its got a gripping storyline and it really gets you into the movie. If you are a fan of epic adventures and long movies, you will enjoy this one. It's not obsessively long, as it's just long enough to get the entire story played out for the viewer.

Rating: I would rank Kingdom Of Heaven just below (well a few notches below) Braveheart and just ahead of Gladiator. I give the film 3.5 Pretzels (out of 5)



Closing Touch: If you are a fan of long, epic adventures this is a movie you should check out. However don't be disappointed if it is very similar to the rest of the group. You will be entertained by the fight scenes (which awesomely lack tons of special effects) and by the tale of heroism displayed by Orlando Blooms character, Bailan.

KOH Trailer