Movie News and Reviews

DL Hammons at Cruising Altitude has a challenge today – six short excerpts/flash pieces based on a prompt from six different writers. Can you guess which writer wrote which piece based on their ‘voice?’ Let’s just say I already know one of the writers…

Elizabeth Mueller asked if I was some kind of Hollywood Ninja spy since I know so much about films. While I do harbor a lot of movie knowledge and see a ton of movies, there are a couple key sites I hit.

For information, release dates, and reviews, I visit Rotten Tomatoes and the IMDB.

For hot-off-the-press news, I visit JoBlo and Blastr.

Now you too can be a Movie Ninja!

Battlefield Earth was easily the number one Worst Movie Ever in last week’s blogfest. After so many awful films, I thought I’d offer you some good ones:

Drive
Great reviews prompted me to see this one. Ryan Gosling is a stuntman/mechanic by day and a getaway driver by night. A man of few words, he befriends a neighbor and her son. When her husband returns home from prison, Gosling offers to help rob a pawnshop to pay back protection money. Things go wrong, of course…
If you remember my review of Hanna, this movie is similar – an art house action flick. Very slow paced and stylish, with great camera work and lighting, and a unique soundtrack. Think Michael Mann’s Heat and Manhunter. If you like that style of film, I highly recommend Drive.

The Warrior’s Way
I had no idea what to expect from this film but was pleasantly surprised. It begins with a ninja warrior, toting a baby he spared, seeking refuge with a circus group in an isolated Western town. As you can tell by the setup, it’s quirky! The entire film was shot on green screen and looks quite amazing, including a giant Ferris wheel under construction. It was like a comic book come to life and featured some bloody and intense action. Geoffrey Rush is excellent in his small role as a drunken former gunslinger. This movie isn’t for everyone, but I found it quirky and fun.

And this Wednesday Tucker & Dale vs. Evil is the featured film on Direct TV’s HDNet Movies! Last I looked, it was still a perfect 100% on Rotten Tomatoes with over thirty reviews.

Seen any good movies lately? Don’t forget to check out Cruising Altitude. And hey – less than three months to Christmas!!

Marvellous Movie Time!!

The blogging world is full of cool people. Now and then, you happen upon someone with whom you really connect. George (Nebular) is one of those people. He runs an awesome blog called CineMarvellous! where he offers sharp, concise movie reviews. George lives in Europe, so I doubt we’ll ever meet in person. But if we did, we’d talk movies for hours, because we share the same taste in films.

I asked George to share a bit about himself, his former Rotten Tomatoes journal, and how he came to us here in the blogging world…

Hey there, Alex’s army!


When Alex asked me to do this self-introduction I was as thrilled as I was anxious, because I’ve never done anything like this before. At first I was like – OMG, so many people will read this! Am I interesting enough not to bore them all to death?! J But then I thought – What the hell, I’m doing it. It will be fun!


First things first, my name is George, and I’m a cinephile coming from a small country in south-eastern Europe. Being obsessed with movies since young age, and working as a video store manager for a long time, movies have always been a huge part of my life. I’ve been writing reviews since 2004, and though I’m just a regular guy who has huge passion for film and cinema in general, I’ve always wanted to be a professional critic.


So, it all began 7 years ago, when I came across the Rotten Tomatoes site by a lucky accident. My first reaction was WOW! I found all this fresh/rotten thing to be pretty cool, and I was so impressed by its editors’ creativity and imaginativeness, that I’ve started to visit the site regularly, spending hours a day on reading critics reviews and stuff. Soon after, I became a part of the RT community, and started my own RT journal called “A Journal Made of Bricks” /because of the bricky pattern I used as a background/. I knew it sounds ridiculous, but at the same time, I kinda liked because it was unusual and unique.


Sadly though, my English was pretty poor at that time, and my reviews were extremely short and mostly consisted of simple, lame sentences like “The cast was great.”; “The visuals were amazing.”; “The story sucks” and things like that - there was nothing insightful, or original, or even remotely witty about those reviews. LOL. However, after a year of regular writing, my English has improved vastly, and I got better and better at reviewing movies. I’ve posted every single day, made hundreds of new friends, got thousands of visitors, and as a result of all this, my journal became hugely popular - I was in a complete shock when I found out that it has reached No. 12 on RT’s ‘TOP 25 Most-Visited Journals Ever’ list, and remained there for a long time. My journal even appeared on the main page of RT for about a week /I’ve got a screenshot to prove it ;)/.


However, in 2008 the guys from RT screwed up pretty much everything, by changing completely the interface design of the web site, which made it unusable for most users, plus, it was full of annoying bugs. A year later, I said goodbye to Rotten Tomatoes, and joined Blogger. In August 2009, I ran a movie blog, called CineMarvellous! (Check it out, and I hope you guys like it). It covers all the genres of film, from martial arts and horror movies to art-house drama, animations and recent sci-fi blockbusters. In the beginning, I’ve started with more detailed movie reviews, but last year I’ve changed the course and began to write brief and to-the-point reviews, because of my busyness, and because I realized that almost nobody likes to read long and tiresome movie reviews. I bet you don’t either. J So far, my blog has been visited over 63,000 times by more than 11,000 unique visitors from 135 different countries. I’m truly grateful to Blogger for giving me the opportunity to write and post reviews for free, and to all my blog buddies, readers and visitors, who make blogging worth it.


Besides RT and Blogger, I’ve done some writing for a local lifestyle magazine called “My Life”. Last year, they’ve contacted me and asked me to do an article for their St. Valentine’s issue – a list that features the ten greatest love stories in history of cinema. To be honest, I’ve struggled a bit with it, simply because romantic movies have never been my cup of tea, /I’m more into horror, sci-fi, fantasy and martial arts/, but I decided to do it nevertheless. The editor in chief loved it, and that’s how I got published for the very first time. J Furthermore, I’ve done some paid reviews, and won several awards, including 2010 TOP MOVIE REVIEW BLOG, which I consider a great achievement.

Thanks for sharing, George!

Now, my awesome army – go visit CineMarvellous! and see how a pro really reviews movies.

And my wife and I are taking off for a few days, so everyone have a safe Memorial Day weekend!

Movies!

Continuing the A-Z Challenge from Arlee at Tossing it Out

Today is M - and one of my favorite subjects, MOVIES!

I am a die hard movie buff. I visit the theater several times a month, buy the latest & greatest on DVD, and I watch movies on NetFlix all the time.

Today I'd like to share with you where I get my movie information and updates, and what genre movies are my favorite.

For the scoop on the latest movies, I have three sources:

IMDB - Every fact, date, and box office total - it's the most complete movie database on the web.
Rotten Tomatoes - RT gathers all the top reviews and provides news & updates.
JoBlo Movie Network Movie and DVD releases, reviews, insider news - JoBlo has it all!

Now for my favorite movies...

Science Fiction

The Abyss

Aliens

Avatar

The Empire Strikes Back

The Fifth Element

Jurassic Park

The Matrix

Mystery Science Theater 3000 The Movie

Serenity

Star Trek First Contact

Horror

Blade II

The Crow

Evil Dead II

Jaws

A Nightmare on Elm Street

The Ring

Sleepy Hollow

The Thing

Underworld I & II

Zombieland

Fantasy

Conan the Barbarian

Hellboy I & II

Legend

Lord of the Rings trilogy

The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe

Princess Bride

What are some of your favorites, particularly in the areas listed above?

And do you visit Dez's site? Remember, the Hollywood Spy loves you!