Weekend Movie Reviews
Caught two more films on my "too see" list over the past week, "The X-Files : I Want To Believe" and "Pineapple Express."
The X-Files was movie was terrible, which given the terrible performance at the box office, should guarantee the once popular series another painful death. You would think that with seven years to work on it, Chris Carter could have come up with a better story than "psychic pedophile priest seeks redemption in helping Mulder and Scully find Russian Dr. Frankenstein in the West Virginia wilderness." But no, what we got was a story that would have been at best an above average episode, provided it was well-executed. Unfortunately for movie viewers excited to see Mulder and Scully once again, this one was not particularly well-executed.
David Duchovney does an excellent job as a believable Mulder who's been hiding in isolation for the past seven years. Yet Gillian Anderson's Scully seems almost nothing like the Scully we remember and the movie can't even be bothered to explain why. Scully looks thin, gaunt, and wearied and seems just plain miserable and I grew tired of her not long after the movie started. The plot is semi-interesting, but the lack of Mulder and Scully chemistry just drives the entire project into the ground. Even the appearance of Skinner near the film's end seems a bit tacked on. It's as if the movie was made for a general audience with hopes that a few scraps here and there would placate the fan base. But in the end, I doubt anyone was left satisfied.
Pineapple Express on the other hand, was well worth the viewing, and should be one of those films that draws plenty of laughs for years to come. In brief, the movie tell's the tale of Seth Rogen's Dale Denton, a 25 year-old stoner who makes a living as a process server and James Franco's Saul Silver, Dale's dealer and soon to be best friend. Dale witnesses a murder and flees the scene leaving a joint of his dealer's newest variety, pineapple express, at the scene. The murderer is Silver's dealer's dealer and with the pot easily traced back to our two lovable stoners, the film kicks into overdrive.
Compared with the other tropically-named action comedy from the summer (Tropic Thunder, which I mentioned a few weeks ago), Pineapple Express is far more engrossing. Maybe I'm just getting older, but the action humor stuff just doesn't quite do it for me anymore so the extended action sequences can be a bit grating. But unlike Tropic Thunder, where the penultimate scene seems to go on forever, Pineapple Express manages to wrap things up before getting too out of hand. But the movie is well worth watching for the dialog alone, with many a priceless scene between Rogen and Franco. If you've ever been a pot head or just known one, you'll certainly enjoy this film.
The X-Files was movie was terrible, which given the terrible performance at the box office, should guarantee the once popular series another painful death. You would think that with seven years to work on it, Chris Carter could have come up with a better story than "psychic pedophile priest seeks redemption in helping Mulder and Scully find Russian Dr. Frankenstein in the West Virginia wilderness." But no, what we got was a story that would have been at best an above average episode, provided it was well-executed. Unfortunately for movie viewers excited to see Mulder and Scully once again, this one was not particularly well-executed.
David Duchovney does an excellent job as a believable Mulder who's been hiding in isolation for the past seven years. Yet Gillian Anderson's Scully seems almost nothing like the Scully we remember and the movie can't even be bothered to explain why. Scully looks thin, gaunt, and wearied and seems just plain miserable and I grew tired of her not long after the movie started. The plot is semi-interesting, but the lack of Mulder and Scully chemistry just drives the entire project into the ground. Even the appearance of Skinner near the film's end seems a bit tacked on. It's as if the movie was made for a general audience with hopes that a few scraps here and there would placate the fan base. But in the end, I doubt anyone was left satisfied.
Pineapple Express on the other hand, was well worth the viewing, and should be one of those films that draws plenty of laughs for years to come. In brief, the movie tell's the tale of Seth Rogen's Dale Denton, a 25 year-old stoner who makes a living as a process server and James Franco's Saul Silver, Dale's dealer and soon to be best friend. Dale witnesses a murder and flees the scene leaving a joint of his dealer's newest variety, pineapple express, at the scene. The murderer is Silver's dealer's dealer and with the pot easily traced back to our two lovable stoners, the film kicks into overdrive.
Compared with the other tropically-named action comedy from the summer (Tropic Thunder, which I mentioned a few weeks ago), Pineapple Express is far more engrossing. Maybe I'm just getting older, but the action humor stuff just doesn't quite do it for me anymore so the extended action sequences can be a bit grating. But unlike Tropic Thunder, where the penultimate scene seems to go on forever, Pineapple Express manages to wrap things up before getting too out of hand. But the movie is well worth watching for the dialog alone, with many a priceless scene between Rogen and Franco. If you've ever been a pot head or just known one, you'll certainly enjoy this film.
posted by lonely libertarian at 3:45 PM
1 Comments:
The wife and I saw Austrailia couple weeks ago. Simply splendid! I left the movie theatre thinking to myself, this may very well be the best film ever made in history.
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