Greenland, 2020

 

You've seen it before. Pretty often, actually. Big thing falls from the sky, gonna wipe out the entire human race, cause Armageddon, the usual. And then there's a person, family, group of some kind who is racing to get to save the planet, or just to get to a safe place, etc. 

Yes, you've seen this movie over and over again since 1916 (yep, you read that right, not 2016) in The End of the World, which, by the way, was about a comet passes by the earth. 

As it turns out, this movie is about a comet passing WAY too close to the earth and what happens when all those thousands of pieces hit. 

However, you haven't seen it with Gerard Butler and Morena Baccarin as leads in this film directed by Ric Roman Waugh. Well, maybe you have seen it, so that's good. 

I say "that's good" because this is just a refreshing movie with nearly no hints of humor whatsoever in it. It's a straight on legit drama between John and Allison Garrity (Butler, Baccarin) and how they have to deal with their marriage falling apart. 

Nathan, their son, played by Roger Dale Floyd, is really the center of the entire film, not the comet that comes down and wipes out 75% of humanity. 

The film basically introduces you to the Garrity family, and the fact that their marriage is completely on the rocks. Nathan, their son, has diabetes and he needs insulin on a regular basis. 

So there's your little "oh, yeah, that's gonna suck if a comet breaks apart in the sky and starts wiping out the planet" plot point. 

The Garritys get picked to go to a secret government facility (location unknown) through a huge loud message on their television and phones, while their neighbors question why they didn't get similar messages themselves. 

They then have to fight their way into the airbase to jump on a series of planes to some unknown location for safety. 

As they travel, they get separated, kidnapped, and miraculously brought back together at the last moment to somehow mysteriously wind up not even a mile from a special bunker in Greenland designed to withstand the apocalypse. 

Although you've seen this movie hundreds of times over the past century, it was still fun to see an interesting dramatic twist here and there, some interesting actors you might never get to see in a film, and Gerard Butler. 

I'm going to give some ridiculous algebraic equation to determine a completely random rating. 

Another apocalypse movie: 7

Getting to see Gerard Butler's six pack: 1

Having Morena Baccarin in a movie after seeing her in Deadpool 1 and 2: 6

Somehow believing yet again most of the planet could explode except for one tiny little bunker in some remote part of the world: 6

General sense of everyone is going to die!: 8

 

Which brings us to a noteworthy 5.6 out of 10. 

 

Not the greatest apocalyptic film of all time, but certainly not the worst.

Chef, 2014

If you want to see a very cool feel good exciting drama with and awesome cast of actors and actresses, with an edge of comedy (not too funny, though), that hits you right in the Little Cubans, than this movie is for you!

John Favreau (known for his role in Iron Man, Avengers, Cowboys and Aliens) steps out of the action movie genre into this dramatic happiness as a chef on a quest. The gist of this film is pretty simple. He is trying to be the best he can possibly be and his entire career is being held back from his boss (played by Noteworthy Mr. Dustin Hoffman) when he finds "twitter."  He tweets his way into a series of life changing events, eventually leading him to purchasing a dump of a taco truck from his ex-wife's ex-boyfriend (played by Robert Downey Jr.).

Turns out he always wanted to drive a food truck but felt being a chef was the better option in life. Along the way he gets to know his son, who's been feeling though his dad is ignoring him and not caring about him, and they wind up building a much stronger relationship together. The father son relationship building part of this whole movie was by far the best part of the film, the underlying plot which actually is the best part of the movie, to me.

I have to say it was a refreshing movie that I actually have recommended to quite a few people, including personal friends, which is saying a lot. I don't typically recommend any movies to anyone, but this was just fantastic. To watch the cooking alone was worth the time to watch the movie. I do recommend this film to anyone, regardless if you like to cook or not.

Without getting into detail, I'm just going to throw out a random 8.37 rating out of 10 for this film because it was just fantastic.

Lucy, 2014

Okay, so let me just get one thing straight here before we begin this review of Lucy. Scarlett Johansson is by far one of my favorite actresses. She plays smart, witty strong characters, and has recently made a rather successful transformation to beautiful kinda air-headed roles to super hot action star actress roles. She's ridiculously beautiful and talented and I am rather biased by this for any film she's in. I've been a fan since I first saw her in Lost in Translation (with Bill Murray, directorial debut of Sophia Coppola). She'd done some work before that, but that was the first movie I'd seen her in.

Morgan Freeman is also one of my favorite actors, although I will have to admit, I don't get a hard-on for Freeman like I do for Johansson. Nonetheless, Morgan Freeman is epic as epic can be for a sci-fi film like this.

The film starts with Johansson's character being duped into bringing drugs to a huge drug overlord. She winds up being kidnapped and having a pound of this weird drug surgically implanted in her stomach. Of course, at some point, the bag it's in bursts and the entirety of the bag of drugs gets dumped into her system. Instead of killing her, it makes her capable of using more and more of her brain, giving her super powers and unlimited knowledge of all things in the universe.

She then turns into a computer, compiles all the information she learns in this brief time, and transforms into a rather tiny little USB flash stick.

That's really it. The rest of it is Scarlett Johannson in tight clothing, being an awesome tough bitch with magical powers. Amr Waked played a very believable confused french police detective, by the way, a difficult role to get down as he did.

Directed By Luc Besson
Staring Scarlett Johannson, Morgan Freeman, Min-sik Choi, Amr Waked

Tits and Ass: 10. Scarlett always gets a 10.
Interesting plot : 6
Morgan Freeman: 9
Action sequences: 7
Min-sik Choi playing awesome bad guy: 7

Giving this a 7.8, which, although meaningless, in this case I really mean it, go see this film. It was worth the wait and it was an awesome cool flick to see.