Taken

This movie came out last year in 2009. I didn't see it back then, but I caught it on Netflix. My co-worker who is from Albania, told me about this movie which peaked my interest. The villains in this movie are mostly Albanian. To sum up the movie, it's about evil Albanians who are trying to kidnap or have girls "Taken" and force them into a life of prostitution by drugging them.

A retired CIA agent, played by Liam Neeson finally is convinced to sign the consent form to let his teenage daughter who just turned 17 go to Paris with her friend for the summer. As soon as she lands in Paris with her friend, they meet a boy who wants to share a cab with them. He says, "Cabs are so expensive in Paris, do you want to split one?" Through this, he figures out where they are staying and he calls his henchmen to come and abduct them.

The rest of the movie is Liam Neeson shooting a bunch of slave traffickers and killing a bunch of people to save and find his daughter.

I like to read movie reviews on yahoo movies. The Users gave this film an average rating of A+, but the critics gave this film an average of a C. I liked the movie, but the complaints by the people who gave the movie an F, D, or C were all true. Yes, it was predictable, yes, it was unbelievable, yes, some of the main characters seemed too unlikeable and stupid and one dimensional, and yes, it was bad casting.

Yes, the critics were right with a lot of their complaints, all true. But, despite that, it was likable, exciting, suspenseful, and entertaining. I think that's why the average yahoo user review gave it an A+. Despite all those bad things about the movie, it didn't detract it from its entertaining aspect. This movie made me feel a lot of emotions, and it made me get emotionally involved and committed more so than the average movie. It truly was an entertaining flick.

It was predictable and unbelievable? Really? It's a work of fiction! Got news for you, most works of fiction being produced lately are unbelievable, unrealistic, and frankly predictable. That's why it's fiction! But, truth is often stranger than fiction. I saw a movie based on true story about Chanel. Very unpredictable, except for what her career choice would be, and it had a very depressing ending. We don't get the depressing endings much with our fiction do we? We get fairy tales.

RED Retired and Extremely Dangerous

I went to see this movie not knowing what RED stood for. I caught the movie during a matinee. There were a lot of old people in the audience. When I realized that RED stood for Retired and Extremely Dangerous, it made sense as to why there were so many elderly viewers there. When I saw the A Team, there were a lot of teenage boys, and when I saw Takers, which had a lot of black main characters, there were a lot of black people in the audience.

It seems people like to go see movies about themselves. I heard that Buffy the Vampire Slayer didn't get as many male viewers as female, and that the spin off from the show, Angel, whose main character was male, had a lot of male viewers.

If I made movies, to reach the widest audience, I would have characters that were young and old. I would have white, Latino, black, and Asian, male and female characters, etc. I would just try to attract the widest audience possible. But, come to think of it, Angel was a character in Buffy, but that didn't seem to help bolster male viewership. Maybe it matters most who the main character is. In that case I would make my main character be whoever could attract the widest demographic. How boring and strategic though. Losing art for business.

This movie is about a retired CIA agent, played by Bruce Willis, who leads a calm relaxing life, talking on the phone to a girl he has a crush on in a call center. Puttering around the house, having calm relaxing mornings eating breakfast. That all changes for him fast, when he is faced with people trying to kill him. He also finds a list of names through a clue left by a dead reporter. His name is on this list. Most everyone on this list has been murdered recently. In this movie, he has to figure out why they are trying to kill him, and how all the people on the list are connected.

It's an action packed movie, with a lot of investigation work on top of shooting and fight scenes. I kind of liked the movie alright, but, it didn't leave much of an impression and it wasn't too memorable. I also thought a lot of the side characters that hung out with Bruce Willis seemed weird and unbelievable as real people. They were comical though, but It would have been better if they were somehow more normal, rather than strange side kicks. It made the movie more of a joke. The main characters didn't have the fear of someone trying to kill them either. It seemed like they had fun with the circumstances and enjoyed it.

In reality, this movie was a serious matter, they were trying to kill him. "They" being the CIA he used to work for. The CIA can just go around killing people, and on whose orders? This movie showed that the CIA received their orders to kill all the people on the list from almost the top of the government. The reason to have them killed was unethical. The CIA couldn't question it though, they had their orders. Could the government be corrupt like this?

Wall Street

This movie is what it sounds like it's about. It's about someone who works on wall street. It took me into his world. I felt the joy with him as he made a ridiculous amount of money. He got a million dollar bonus! Felt amazed and prosperous right with him. I felt his pain as the world he felt comfortable and blessed in was falling apart when his firm started to collapse because the stock market dropped dramatically. I felt his pain when his boss commit suicide due to the blow of his firm being bought out 3 dollars a share. I was with him when he proposed to his fiance, who, oddly enough hates her father who was an investor, hates wall street, money and investing, but has a fiance who works on wall street.

I was very tied to the main character as if I was living his life and sharing his joys and pains more so than in any other movie I saw. It was a real disruption of my cushy life there to see that market crash. It was a real blow to see my fiance break off the engagement because she was upset that I was seeing her father; who she is purposely estranged with behind her back. I was with him and felt his betrayal when he realized his fiance shunned her father for good reason; when he realised he got robbed and lied to by the treacherous schemes of his fiance's father.

I was with him, when he realised that someone named Brenton sabotaged his firm and pushed his boss to suicide by making up rumors about their firm, and then making those rumors true. I rejoiced in his ability to outsmart his nemesis and find a way to pay back what they did to him and his firm twice!!

In this movie I was pulled into the world of the investment banker. Felt rich for an hour or so. Too bad it didn't last.

Easy A

I need to plan my movie outings more, I just go to the theater, show up, and watch whatever happens to be in my time slot. Now, I had slim pickings this time around. I was between exorcist, the Devil, and other weird Halloween movies. Now, as tempting as that sounds, I was never much for horror flicks. Anyway....

Easy A wasn't a bad movie, but it lacked dimension. It had one plot, and it stuck to that one thread like IRS sticks to your money. It got tiresome and repetitive after awhile. Yes, everyone thinks you are a whore. That's scene one, Then scene two is, everyone thinks you are a whore, scene three...they think you are a whore...what's scene four about? Still thinking you might be a whore. Pretty much summed up the plot of the movie right there for you.

It was about a bunch of teenagers in high school, it was so channel 19 abc family. I could see that movie on that channel. It's something to catch on tv.

I was impressed by the main character, or the actor that played the main character, Emma Stone. She had a strong way of presenting herself, which made the movie watchable. That's a good point, but at the same time, it seemed like she was too confident and adult in the face of all her opposition. She's a teenager, but she acted with the confidence of someone who rehearsed the parts, and prepared the lines. It wasn't real. In real life, someone wouldn't have had that kind of confidence and flare so easily. This could have been a true human story, to show the true plights of society. But, instead it was a story, or a drama, or a drop of entertainment for the movies, or abc family, and it had all the pride of an in your face production.

Persuasion by Jane Austin

Now what made the two main characters in Pride and Prejudice not get together at first was of course pride and prejudice. In this book, what made the two main characters not get together and get married at first was Persuasion. The main character Anne, agreed to be married to Captain Wentworth, but she was "persuaded" that marrying him was a very bad idea. Thus, she called the wedding off.

Her love to be, was so distraught by the rejection, that he moved out of town and was gone for 8 years. Then, he comes back to visit because his sister moves back in the neighborhood. They act prideful and ignore and shame each other as much as possible in the reunion, but the whole book you know for sure that they're going to end up together. And of course, you have to wait until the very, very, end of the book for it to happen, but they do end up together.

Anne was the youngest in the book. She had two older sisters, Mary and Elizabeth. The book describes her family, the Elliots as being rich and upper class. Sir Walter, their father, is really vain and superficial to the point he doesn't even like Anne, his own daughter, because she is not good looking in his eyes. His favorite is Elizabeth. She is very pretty. Mary, Elizabeth, and Sir Walter are portrayed as very proud, vain and materialistic. They are very concerned with social class, wealth, and beauty. They don't listen to or respect Anne.

Anne, however, is well respected by people outside her family. She is seen as the only Elliot not filled with the disgusting Elliot pride. She is seen as the only nice one in the family.

I was bothered throughout the whole book by how some people were respected if you had money, connections, class and looks, and thought of little value or as no good if you didn't have these. Marriages, and all else rode on these things. If seemed heartless, and unethical to me. I was greatly disturbed by their values.

Now these values are muted today, but people are still very much like this aren't they?

Takers 2010

Someone asked me to drive them to the dollar tree at 9:15PM. I was thinking like...no way. I thought they closed at nine anyway. But in the end, I agreed to go since, I had to get gas and as it turns out, they close at 10PM. And...since I was the Dollar Tree, and the movie theater is right next door.....Long story short I went to see a movie on a last moment spur. Basically, we didn't know what we were getting ourselves into. I knew nothing about any of the movies playing, and two of them I actually saw already and I didn't want to see it again.

Takers was playing at a good time for when we arrived. I asked someone standing in line what that movie was about. She couldn't remember at first, then she said it was about mobsters. I got tickets to see Takers, and the funny thing was that we were the few white people in the whole theater to see the movie. Most of the audience was black. I was in great suspense to see the movie since I knew absolutely nothing about it. Didn't even see the preview. But, from the audience, I started to believe that the main characters would probably be black. Turns out Chris Brown, Tip T.I. Harris, Zoe Saldana, Idris Elba, Michael Ealy, and a lot of the other main characters were black. They also had a few white people in the movie, such as Hayden Christiansen, Paul Walker, and Matt Dillon. It was a diverse mix of actors.

After seeing the movie, and coming home, I read the reviews of some critics and some people. I read a lot of reviews of people that liked it, hated it, or they thought it was okay. I liked the movie. It was okay. I didn't love it or anything, but I don't think it was a bad movie.

Anyway, out of all the reviews, I agree with the one that said he felt like he was routing for both the bad guys and the good guys in this movie, which caused a internal conflict, and suspense. I disagreed with a lot of common criticism that I heard such as, the movie had no plot, the acting was horrible, the camera work was confusing and I couldn't tell what was going on.

I did agree with the criticism that the characters were not that well developed, so you didn't know them very well. Who and why were these people? Normally, I would have a problem with that, but somehow not knowing much about the main characters worked for this movie. I had no trouble seeing what was happening...the camera work was fine. The people who said that they couldn't tell what was going on probably had bad sensory skills, I don't know what their deal was.

As for it having no plot, I believe that the plot of this movie was actually interesting, and it had good twists and surprises. It wasn't your run of the mill bank robber movie. It had some extra complexity to it. I guess I'm not great at giving reviews, but, I did like the movie. It's not sophisticated or anything. It's an action packed bank robber movie for pete's sake.

Tip T.I. Harris made a great impact on this movie, and if his character "Ghost" wasn't in the movie, it would have been a lot less interesting and would have been a movie with no plot as they would say. It was very interesting to see his con game and how the betrayal fell. It was also stupid as to how they all fell for it. Teaches you to play the safe side, trust your instincts. Put yourself in other people's shoes to know their true intentions, and be realistic. One thing this movie teaches you is that crime doesn't pay. Especially since a lot of the criminals die in this movie.

Julie and Julia

This movie had a happy ending and it had an interesting premise. It really spoke to the human situation of not knowing what to do with yourself, and finding yourself. Sticking to something, and finishing it.

I just found this movie really boring though, despite it's grand nod towards the human condition. It wasn't what I thought it would be at all. Though it had clips from the life of Julia Child, it was mainly about a blogger named Julie Powell, who believing she was a loser, and going nowhere in her life, decided to find herself. So, she started a blog where she was to cook a recipe everyday from Julia Child's cook book "Mastering the Art of French Cooking" and then write about it in her blog.

This movie was too much about, "who read my blog?, and wow I have so many readers of my blog! Oh, my cooking is great, everyone is reading my blog!, opps, I dropped the chicken on the floor. I ruined the mold, the stew is bland, I'm not a good human, my days are going badly, freaking out when I have a disaster." "I'm learning about Julia Child, she was such a great women, she is an inspiration, I'm strangely connected to her and feel a kinship because I'm cooking all the recipes from her book"..."Am I a bitch, am I a horrible wife, I'm narcissistic and self centered because of my blog?" Then it's "Yay, everyone is calling me for a book deal, phone calls, publishers calling me...bla, bla, bla...yada, all that jazz."

That's what this movie felt like. Overkill of all the above. The movie was dull and uninteresting.

Anne of Green Gables

This book was written a hundred years ago by a Canadian Author from Prince Edward Island. By some strange coincidence, it takes place in Prince Edward Island too. Though it was so long ago, and in a different time and place, I felt that this book was very easy to relate to and understand. It makes me think that we barely changed in the last hundred years. In some ways that is actually a good thing.

I never liked a book so quickly as I did this one. After the first page or so, I was really was impressed. The way L.M. Montgomery writes is hard to explain, but it really shows the story from a good vantage point and from a witty and smart frame of reference.

I liked the book a lot better in the beginning when Anne was a very silly, fun, colorful character. Reading a book full of her thoughts and her sayings is perfect for putting someone in a good mood because she is so positive and really enjoys the little things in life.

Towards the end of the book, it had some good plot twists and turns, and I was surprised by how it turned out, however, it became more of a summary, lacking the life it used to have, and the main character was not as entertaining as before. Anne became more mature, in the beginning she was 11 years old, and at the end of the book she was 16 years old. For most of the book, she was 11 and 12, then towards the end it just did a quick overview of her older years.

She became less imaginative, less talkative, and more serious, competitive and sober. I didn't see the passion and life in the older Anne like in the younger Anne. I supposed it was a good thing she grew up some.

Though I'm not as happy with the end of the book as the beginning, I am very curious to read the next book from the 6 book series, Anne of Avonlea.

Inception

I wanted to see this movie just because Leonardo DeCaprio was in it. I don't like him as an actor that much, but he was the main character in one of my favorite movies, the Aviator. I also saw on Oprah that Leonardo really cares about making good movies that will be a classic. I thought that Inception has to be good if Leonardo is in it. Only because he is so passionate about making good movies that will be talked about still, one hundred years later.

The writer and director of this movie is Chris Nolan. Chris said, "Films are subjective-what you like, what you don't like. But the thing for me that is absolutely unifying is the idea that every time I go to the cinema and pay my money and sit down and watch a film go up on-screen, I want to feel that the people who made that film think it's the best movie in the world, that they poured everything into it and they really love it. Whether or not I agree with what they've done, I want that effort there-I want that sincerity. And when you don't feel it, that's the only time I feel like I'm wasting my time at the movies."

I really sense that Chris poured everything he had into this movie. I thought to myself when it was all over; This movie was very carefully, masterfully done. Every t was crossed and i was dotted. He tied all loose ends and accounted for and explained everything. His intense amount of commitment to this movie showed. It has been awhile since I have seen a movie this polished.

Some people complain that this movie is too complex and hard to understand. It is complex, and a bit hard to follow at times, but Chris Nolan takes you by the hand and guides you through the complexity. All things I wondered about was explained by one of the actors in some way or another, anything that confused me later became crystal clear because Chris Nolan was careful in his execution of the complex. He really made sure you got it. If you didn't get it, you weren't paying enough attention. He didn't fail to account for one detail in the movie. It's not hard to follow if you just relax and let yourself get into the movie. It's like you are being guided through the movie, and not watching the movie.

I really thought that the message of the movie was interesting, which was, an idea can be powerful and take affect in your life and change who you are. An idea is more dangerous than a virus, parasite or bacteria. An idea is the ultimate threat.

A Team

I have vague memories of watching the show A Team as a kid. I was really entertained by the main characters of BA Baracus and HM Murdock. Seeing the previews for the movie the A Team based on the TV show, spurred my memory, and I ended up buying season 2 on DVD really cheap. I enjoyed it as much as I did when I was a kid(at first) but after many episodes, the plots seemed to be the same for each episode. A boring trend ensued. Despite this, I really like the interaction of the main characters and I was impressed with how the plot was about them helping people and risking their lives for a good cause. It is a naive series, since, even with all the violence, shootings with machine guns, cars getting flipped over, and explosions, people rarely get hurt in this show. No blood and no bruises.

Anyway, on to the movie. As you can gather from the previous paragraph, I had a refresher in the show before watching the A Team movie. There was something likable about this movie, however, I am really disappointed with the way they re-did the main characters. My one reason for really loving this show was how the main characters interacted, and they didn't interact that much in the movie. They were together in one explosive scene after the other, but not enough interaction took place for me. They remade the characters all wrong. It's as if they went out of their way to redo them differently. They remade Murdock very wrong. His craziness was scary in the movie, and in the show it was a fun kind of crazy. In the show his craziness made him do a better job, because it made him get into his roles more, and be more creative and savvy. In the movie his craziness made you wonder if he would be competent. They did the worst job with him by far.

I can live with how they redid the other three characters, but they really stole the joy, fun and soul of these characters and made them something they are not. BA was into peace and non violence. Faceman was scrubby, Hannibal wasn't the planner in this movie. I was really disappointed that this movie murdered the whole premise of the main characters because that's what makes the A Team enjoyable.

The whole premise behind the plot really stunk. I just plainly didn't like the story line. I could see people go through all that trouble for real money, not counterfeit money.

Prince of Persia Sands of Time

Ummm....I liked the movie. But, I guess I'm not passionate enough about it to really say anything much. Huh. There were nice looking people in it, nice looking costumes, nice looking cities. Very good visuals throughout the movie. How shallow of me to notice.

Like the Robin Hood that recently came out, there were a lot of battle scenes, sword fights, and arrows flying too. But as Robin Hood was filled with ugly scenes, and ugly people, wearing mostly hideous dark clothing, in dreary looking lands; this movie was filled with everything beautiful, it made for a better experience in that regard. But, Robin Hood being so ugly made it more real and serious. This was a polished Disney movie, and Robin Hood was rough, real and rugged.

In both Robin Hood and Prince of Persia, there was a a betrayal by a trusted friend or relative that really helped shape the plot and drama of the movie. In both movies too, the main characters were excellent in battle, and brave to stand up for what is right despite the terrible risks involved. I saw both movies only two days apart from each other, and I can't help but compare.

I complain that Robin Hood is too ugly, and Prince of Persia is too pretty. I am surprised to complain about that, because everything being so gorgeous made the movie more watchable and enjoyable. The reverse was true for Robing Hood. But, Robin Hood had the rawness and the misery of real life. It would be interesting to see the reverse. The makers of Robin Hood filming the Prince of Persia, and the makers of the Prince of Persia filming Robin Hood. That would be a fascinating turn of events.

Extraordinary Measures

This movie always claimed that it was based on a true story, but despite that, for some crazy reason, I thought that the disease the children were suffering from called Pompe disease was a made up fictional disease. I never heard of it, and it just sounds fake..."Pompe." Turns out, the disease is real, and much of the story is in line with what really happened.

Pompe disease is a very rare genetic disease that is a kind of muscular dystrophy. Most kids don't make it past two years old, and rarely does anyone live past 9 years old. The parents in this film have two children with this disease. They know that they will die. Because the disease is so rare, there is not treatment for it and doctors can do little to help.

The daughter almost dies in the hospital in one scene, but she pulls through. The father sees the determination in her eyes, and he keeps thinking of her eyes while in a business meeting. He gets up and walks out of the meeting and flies all the way to the Nebraska to talk to a doctor that researches this disease for the U of Nebraska without telling anyone in advance. His wife is furious that he will lose his job for just walking out like that.

He quits his job, goes into business with he doctor to start a genetics company to find a cure to the disease, raises millions of dollars and risks it all for the slight chance of finding a treatment to the disease before his children's time is up. It was amazing to see such will and determination to put everything on the line.

He said it's crazy to quit my job, and to spend so much money, and to work so hard for something that could not even work, but I can't just watch my kids die. His wife in the movie said, I thought you were crazy at first, but when we started doing fund raising, and working to save our children, I realized it was better to do something rather than just accept what the doctors say and have no hope.

Robin Hood 2010

When I was a kid, I do have memories of watching Disney's Robin Hood. However, I was surprised to be told by my sister and mother that I watched that moview around a hundred times. My sister said it was a part of my daily routine, to put that Disney movie in the VCR.

I went into this movie with the hope that it would be a Robin Hood better than Prince of Theives. This movie was more like a prequel to the Robin Hood story. There was no stealing from the rich and giving to the poor. It was the story of the events that led up to him being an outlaw or a wanted man.

I like that this prequel adds a lot of layers and demension to the Robin Hood story. It showed a lot of history from the time period. The plot is complex and masterminding. The movie was filled with tretchery, spying, betrayal, scheming, etc. Basicaly, what the movie had going for it was that the plot was great and complicated.

I do wish that the visuals were better for the movie. The actors were not good looking. Kate Blanchet played Maid Marian and Russel Crow played Robin Hood. There were a lot of war scenes and everyone was wearing dark ugly clothing surrounded by a dark and dreary land. The war scenes were somehow more depressing than in the average movie. I was like ouch! I just saw another movie with plenty of arrows shooting and people getting stabbed too, but it didn't capture the "scary ouch" effect of war. Just saying the plot was good, but the movie was hard on the eyes.

Sex and the City 2

I didn't see Sex and the City 1....the first movie. But, I did watch the actual TV show when it was on re-runs late at night a few years back. I liked the show a bit, and I did get into it, just because I had only 5 channels at the time and the only thing on late at night when I came home from working a late shift while in college.

It was about 4 single women (getting up there in age) with good careers trying to find someone. It talked about dating and relationships a lot in a very thoughtful way through the eyes of Carrie Bradshaw, who had her own column in the newspaper called Sex and the City. Each episode was narrated with thoughts from her column that would be published in the paper. A lot of the thoughts were deep insightful and witty. This movie was set up with the occasional narration from Carrie Bradshaw about her thoughts on marriage instead of dating. A change from the TV show. Carrie in this movie, unlike the show, was married. It was about getting along in married life and finding different ways of living together. This movie was scattered with a lot of funny moments, and it was very entertaining to watch.

I am surprised it received so many poor reviews from the critics. Not just the professional critics, but regular people said horrible things about this film. I can see where they are coming from, they thought it wasn't funny, long and boring, offensive to Muslims and gays, about four privileged women whining, a stupid pointless plot. A shallow movie. I think all those people missed the real meaning and spirit of the movie. They missed the point, and the humor. Look, it's not Masterpiece Theater, it's entertainment. I disagreed with the negative reviews.

I found many of the reviews to be nit picky, overly serious and too snobby and judgemental towards the main characters and the plot. It lacked compassion. Get off your high pedantic pseudo sophisticated high horses. Maybe I have to be Muslim to to see why this movie was offensive to Muslims. But, as I'm not Muslim, I didn't find myself getting a bad impression of Muslims from the movie. If anything I had more respect for them after this movie, and saw them as real people, instead of foreigners in a strange land. That I didn't get a bad impression of them counts for a lot. Muslims should be relieved in that regard. The situations were silly, but that's what the movie was...silly. I don't think people should have been truly offended.


As an American that doesn't travel much, the rest of the world starts to seem fictional. America is surrounded by Ocean, Canada wilderness, and Mexico. It sound nuts, but to us, most of the world and it's people seem to not exist. Even one of our Presidents went down to South America and made the comment, "There is actually people down there." It sound super dumb, but the world starts to seem like a myth such as Avalon when you don't see it, but only hear about it; being removed from it in a remote location as we are.

I thought overall it was well done. It was a fun movie, with a slap of real life struggles and problems to be faced. There were a few things that didn't make sense to me...like why would that Arab dude pay for Samantha and three of her friends to stay in Abu Dhabi on an extravagant trip. The hotel was 22k a night!!! And the odds of Carrie meeting her ex-boyfriend in Abu Dhabi was so slim, it would be close to impossible.

I really liked this movie. It was entertaining, I liked the characters, and the thoughtfulness of each of the plots pertaining to each women. It was professional, and all the threads of the movie came together and made a lot of sense. I have seen a lot of movies lately, and I liked a lot of the movies I watched, but I wasn't that entertained by them though I liked them. But this one was truly entertaining the whole time.

Coco Chanel with Shirley Maclain

This story about someone's real life was more touching to me than a lot of the movies I have seen that are about love and romance. It wasn't a made up fairy tale, or formula written like a lot of the movies out these days. It didn't have a happy ending unless you count her fashion success. Both of the romances of Coco ended up badly with depressing conclusions. It was about real people, and it felt real. I enjoyed the movie a lot, and I wish more movies could have that realness to it, and that much touching emotion and life.

The movie starts out when Coco Chanel is an old lady in the 1950s. Her most recent fashion line up received poor reviews claiming that her clothes are for old ladies. Her business partner wanted her to sell the business and quit. She said she is in no mood to retire. She wasn't supposed to design a next line because of contract, but she did anyway, and it was a huge success. She became a famous designer in the US too, and she continued to design for the next 20 years. She said she wanted to continue to design for the love of her life that died. She wanted to honor his memory. If it wasn't for him, she would have never been able to get started with her career. Despite bad reviews and fierce pressures, through determination she continued. This is proof that just because you are old, and have had failures you don't have to give up. There is a lot of life left in you. Her biggest successes are in her later years.

Love Destroys the Beast

I recently watched an old Disney Classic, Beauty and the Beast. As a child, this was one of my favorite Disney movies. Watching it again as an adult brought on new perspectives for me.

The end of the movie, where the beast is transformed into a human was a glorious moment for me, and it made me cry. This scene didn't have this kind of affect on me as a child. It was love that caused the spell to be broken, so this beast could turn back into a human.

When I saw him transform, I was reminded of the Resurrection. Our corruptible bodies will become incorruptible. Through the atonement of Jesus Christ, we can become transformed into glorious beings. And just like love got rid of the beast in the movie, love can transform us, to get rid of our inner beasts.

A person would have no trouble keeping the commandments of God if they had love and charity. In the Bible, when someone asked Jesus what the most important commandment was, he said to love God with all your mind might and strength,and to love your neighbor as yourself. This is where all the law and the commandments hang.

When I saw the beast in the movie turn into a glorious human, I found myself hoping and wishing that I can be reborn with my inner beast removed when I die and return to God. I know that love is the way all beasts can be removed. Seeing that scene in the movie really hit me very hard.

Date Night

This movie was I guess a comedy, but it wasn't really full of jokes, or moments that were going for humor. It was trying to convey a moral or a lesson maybe, but the movie wasn't heartfelt. Overall, it missed an emotional and dramatic flare giving the affect of a sterile movie. Also, both of the comedians in this film, Steve Carell and Tina Fey are kind of straight men. They needed someone more goofy to offset their straight man comedy. Watching the two of them is like watching I Love Lucy without a Lucille, but with two Ricardos. (Ricardo being the "straight man" of the duo.) It would have been a much funnier movie if they had a goofy person like Lucy offsetting a serious type like Ricardo.

The movie is about a married couple who are getting along okay, but are very tired with their packed schedule. Despite this packed schedule, they still go out on date nights. Their date nights are usually lame, and unhip. But, when they hear that another married couple that they are friends with are getting a divorce; because their love life got too boring, and they were more like good roommates than a couple....they decide to have a more glamorous date night in New York City.

A case of mistaken identity has them running for their lives from bad cops working for the mob because they believe they stole a flash drive from them that contains incriminating evidence. It is basically an adventure of life or death for a married couple on a date from New Jersey late at night in New York City.

It has a few funny scenes, but overall it felt like an action flick. But, it didn't seem that real, which made it uninteresting. Other people said it was hilarious. I don't know where I was, but I missed that hilarious vein somehow.

Back Up Plan with Jennifer Lopez

The person writing the movie was trying to be cute, romantic, and memorable, they were really going for something and it showed. But they really missed their target on this dart board. It was a bit painful to watch at times. My friend watching the movie with me was just as put off as me. She made grunts that were akin to rolling your eyes. However, luckily for me the viewer, the movie did get less corny as time went on. I did find this movie entertaining, and it wasn’t such a dorky train wreck after the beginning humps. I have to give it that. Most romantic comedies bore me. I guess I find some of them too mundane.

Jennifer Lopez's character gave up on finding the one, but she wanted a baby or a family. She talked to her best male friend about getting a sperm donation, but he was aghast at the suggestion. She ends up buying sperm from a clinic and gets artificially inseminated.

Then she meets the guy of her dreams, she really likes him, but after their first few dates, she finds out that she is pregnant. She was so excited to find out she was pregnant, but that was faded by thinking this would ruin her new relationship.

Jennifer Lopez tells the story of how her mom died when she was a young child. Her mom got cancer, and her father walks out on her mom while she was sick. That's when she realized things don't last forever. She never trusted in a man. Even though her new boyfriend said he would stick by her even though she was pregnant, she just couldn't believe him, and ended up dumping him because of all her doubts. But, as the movie goes on we learn that the moral is to trust in love, and have faith in others.

Tyler Perry's Why did I get married too?

I only saw one other movie made by Tyler Perry called "I can do bad all by myself"--which I really enjoyed. It had a good message, and it was funny. I went into this movie thinking that this would be a comedy because of the other movie I saw. I also didn't realize this movie was a sequel. I was quickly corrected for thinking that this movie was a comedy--I was surprised by the seriousness of the movie and the realistic way the main characters interacted with each other.

It was about 4 married couples going on a retreat just for married people, so,they didn't take their children. They had a time share in the Bahamas. It showed the problems and trials of the four couples. In the beginning, you just get a superficial understanding of what's going on with them. You see a lot of pointless bickering and quaint mundane chatter, but as the movie progresses, a lot more depth and dirty laundry is exposed, unraveling many layers of their relationships.

Janet Jackson is one of the main characters in this movie. She announces on the retreat that she and her husband are getting a divorce. After the scenes in the Bahamas, they are back in Georgia, and things get very ugly. They fight horribly over money in the divorce. The character Janet plays goes to her husband's job to harass him. He leaves his job and gets in his car to get away from his wife. He is so distracted from his wife yelling and calling him names, that he gets into a bad accident with a truck. In the hospital, while they are in the waiting room, Janet says I don't care about the money, he can have all of it. It turns out that her husband didn't make it and ends up dying.

This was really striking to me. I know someone who might be divorcing and a part of me is angry at her husband, and almost feels like she should go out for the kill in the divorce settlement. Part of me felt like starting World War 3, because I was upset at a lot of things the husband did. This movie was a good movie for me to watch given the way I was feeling. It's better to not get the war paint on.

Avatar

This movie was done with a lot of craft and finesse because it made far fetched plot points seem very plausible and realistic; with the way they were set up and executed so smoothly. What could have been a very hokey and painful movie to watch, was not because of the great tact by James Cameron. I would compare it to Iron Man in this way: Both movies have all the makings to be really corny, but were done so well that it managed to escape such a fateful outcome.

I was very affected by the green message of the movie. The people of the planet Pandora co-exist with nature and work with it not against it. The humans in this movie were trying to destroy nature for the sake of profit and greed. Jake Sulley said that where the sky people (humans) are from, there is no more green. That is true in much of the world today. I also noticed a lot of the humans in this movie were often inside a plane or a robot. In many scenes they were busy controlling some sort of machinery.

I got into my car when the movie was over, I drove the "machinery" like the humans in the movie did, all the way home in my barren land where they tore down most of nature to make room for man, I never felt more like a human than at this time and I didn't like it. I never saw it that way before until this movie. This movie opened my eyes to the disturbing revelation to my life as a human.

It made me see as if for the first time, the way that we really live. No matter how green we become, it won't matter because we destroyed great chunks of it to make room for us. But, we live in climates that is too cold or too hot. If it were perfect year round, we would never have needed houses to begin with. We could not walk around almost naked like the blue people in this movie and not suffer from exposure. I would have liked living like them better than the way we live if we had nice weather. Oh well.

I saw Avatar in 3D and that was amazing. I guess I'm a 3D virgin. I had no idea how spectacular 3D was. All movies should be in 3D. Seeing in 3D is like seeing it as I would in real life, as if I were there. Despite that being said, when I saw the planet Pandora, it seems so fake at times. It was all digital. The trees did not even look real. The backgrounds on this alien planet looked so fake!! In that way, I wish the special effects were better.

The blue people were done really well. I enjoyed their characters a lot. I was taken by surprise by the spunk and personality of the blue aliens. They are a big part of what made the movie entertaining. Some people complained that the movie did not have developed characters. I could see that, but I really thought they were developed enough for me to get emotionally involved and care what their outcomes would be.