Terminator Genisys

Plot: In the future, the war is ending, and John Conner (Jason Clarke) is sending his father, Kyle Reese (Jai Courtney) back in time to "mate" with his mother Sarah Conner (Emilia Clark). The old Terminator (Arnold Schwarznenegger) is still around to protect Sarah from the fresh terminators from the future. In a twist, a new enemy appears for Sarah and Kyle to battle as they try to prevent Skynet/Genisys, the evil computer, from being born. [imdb]    [photos]

Review: Terminator Genisys was pretty exciting. If you remember the plot from the previous movies, then this story all makes sense. The nearly indestructible bad robots keep coming, and our heroes are always in a high stakes battle.

Emilie Clarke and Arnold Schwarzenegger carry the action and the emotion. Even though 68 year old Arnold is a robot, he is still emotive and funny. Having an older body, make him an underdog, which makes him sympathetic. Sarah's character is serious the whole time, but because she is 5'3" she is also an underdog.

Cast: Emilie Clark, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Jai Courtney, Jason Clarke

Directed by: Alan Taylor

The Music: Lorne Balfe

The Visuals: Generally great. Not too bloody to keep the gore factor down. It is mostly robot on robot violence. 

Rating: 3.0 stars: Very exciting and fun to watch. It helps to remember the plot from the previous movies. 

More: Notice that Arnold became a shape-shifter. This opens the character up to being played by a different actor in the inevitable event of a sequel. 

Even More: Rumor is that there will be still more sequels as Skynet is still alive in other timelines. The Skynet character (Matt Smith) and the JK Simmons will both be in it. 

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Inside Out

Plot: Inside Riley's brain is a control center staffed by five emotions, Joy, Sadness, Disgust, Fear and Anger. When Riley is a little girl, Joy runs the show, and Riley is happy and builds happy memories. Later Riley's family moves to San Francisco because Riley's dad gets a job at a start up company. Making new friends and starting a new school creates a crisis with Riley's emotions. She gets depressed, and both Joy and Sadness get sucked away -- deep, deep in Riley's brain while Disgust, Fear and Anger run the show. In the end Joy and Sadness work together to help Riley adjust to her new situation. [imdb]    [photos]

Review: This movie is the best. Original, entertaining, emotional, and with something to say.

I loved how they dissected the emotion life of a young girl with these different characters. I like how real the different voices felt. The movie starts slowly and one sees how the emotions and Riley interact. By the end of the movie, the very emotional conversation makes a relatively mild event in the plot very emotional. I was teary eyed. It is a great device for playing out interior dialog.

The characters are well drawn and the voice actors were strong, especially Amy Poehler and Phyllis Smith. Phyllis Smith plays sadness with a lot of subtlety.

Directed and Story by: Peter Docter and Ronaldo Del Carmen

The Music: Stellar soundtrack by Michael Giacchino. I bought two songs from it. 

The Visuals: I liked the sparkliness of the emotions faces and hair. It made them less corporal. 

Rating: 4.0 stars: Top notch, entertaining, original and thoughtful. 

More: Afterwhile we see the inside the heads of Mom and Dad, where the little emotional characters are acting out a whole different play. Very funny. 

Even More Sadness says: "Crying helps me slow down and obsess over the weight of life's problems." 

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Spy

Plot: Susan Cooper (Melissa McCarthy) works in the CIA as a computer-based fixer, like Augie on Covert Affairs, but more like Tank in The Matrix. When agents get outed, she has to go on field assignment, and gradually becomes a bad-ass. She tracks down a nuke, and tries to bring in the black market bad-guys selling it including Rayne (Rose Byrne). She gets help from fellow spooks played by Jason Statham, Jude Law and Miranda Hart. After double-crosses and triple-crosses Cooper saves the world using girl-power. [imdb]    [photos]

Review: Spy is a spoof of a spy movie from the James Bond-like intro montage to spies-in-bed ending. It's not just that Melissa is a fat girl doing cool spy moves -- it is also that cool spy moves are kinda silly already. 

Melissa McCarthy is great. She is both relate-able and over-the-top. She is insecure, and a big time striver. 

I liked Jason Statham who is always trying to prove how macho he is -- very funny and way over the top. 

Cast: Melissa McCarthy, Rose Byrne, Jason Statham, Jude Law, Miranda Hart.

Directed by: Paul Feig

The Music: Great. I loved the big Bond-like opening song Who Can You Trust  by Ivy Levan. It recalls the Goldfinger theme by Shirley Bassey. Ivy's got the big voice. During the music, there is a spoof of a Bond-like open. 

The Visuals: Nothing special.

Rating: 3.0 stars: Fun.

More: So its funny, but is it a great movie. Does it have any other themes besides fat girl makes good? No not really. Maybe it does not need that. At bottom this is a summer comedy not an Oscar contender. 

Even More: Stay for the blooper after the end credits. The end credit graphics are kind-of entertaining anyway.

Jurassic World

Plot: Two kids,  Gray (Ty Simpkins) and Zach (Nick Robinson), go on vacation at Jurassic World where their aunt Claire (Bryce Dallas Howard) works along with dinosaur trainer Owen (Chris Pratt.) Jurassic World is the fully realized theme park contemplated in the original Jurassic Park movie. 

As soon as they get there, guess what? Dinosaurs escape, and they are meaner and bigger than ever. Monster movie action ensues. [imdb]    [photos]

Review:  I liked it. It was predictable and simply a monster movie, but it was fun. A good monster movie. It has a lot in common with San Andreas, last week's action flick.

I also liked Bryce Dallas Howard and Chris Pratt who played entertaining and imperfect people. 

The special effects are flawless, and there were enough references to the original movie to be interested without being stupid. The pre-disaster scenes of the tourists milling around with the dinosaurs was jarringly realistic -- so much that it seemed like animal abuse.

Being the fourth movie in the series, it is not surprising that the wonder of bringing dinosaurs back from the past is gone. That was the best part of the original. The science was for the kids, for a roomful of nameless white-garbed minions, and for the morally questionable scientist. 

It is fun to compare Chris Pratt with San Andreas' Dwayne Johnson. Chris is the reluctant hero -- more emotive and a more bad ass. Dwayne is the eager hero -- all duty & honor overlaid with concern for his kids. In Jurassic World, concern for kids was with Bryce. Bryce was on the screen as much as Chris, where as San Andreas' Carla Gigano's part was smaller.

Cast: Bryce Dallas Howard, Chris Pratt

Directed by: Colin Trevorrow

The Music: Great. Like the original John Williams score, but not exactly.

The Visuals: Great. It looks like dinosaurs. Especially the multiplicity of dinosaurs interacting with people.

Rating: 2.5 stars: fun to watch; well made. As I left the theater, I was thinking 3 stars, but the next morning -- I am thinking Jurassic World is a little forgettable. The characters aren't memorable and there were no any big ideas. 

More: The message was a little more anti-military and anti-corporate, rather than straight anti-science and Luddite. I see that as an improvement.

Even More: A lot has been written about the sound design for earlier Jurassic movies -- how the sounds were composites of many animals designed to be evocative and emotive. Three times I was thinking how the roaring was suggestive of words. I wonder if that was really in there -- I bet it was. 

Yet More: It is pretty obvious a sequel is coming.

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San Andreas

Plot: .The big one hits California, and rescue pilot Ray (Dwayne Johnson) struggles to save his wife Emma (Carla Gugino) and chesty daughter Blake (Alexandra Daddario). Meantime grizzly-bearded scientist Lawrence (Paul Giamatti) and reporter Serena (Archie Panjabi) serve-up the facts. [imdb]    [photos]

Review: It's disaster after disaster for 114 minutes as Dwayne Johnson struggles to save his relatives (and mostly ignoring other people's relatives.) during massive earthquakes, a dam disasters and a tsunami. It's fast paced action, with the disaster episodes almost independent of each other, like a road movie. 

I saw it on an extra big screen with a fancy room-shaking sound system, and it was pretty fun. 

Dwayne Johnson does a great job at this kind of adventure: he has the right amount of over-emoting, and tough-guy macho-ness. 

Cast: Dwayne Johnson (an ideal role for him), Carla Gugino (fine), Archie Panjabi (our favorite from The Good Wife), 

Directed by: Brad Peyton in his first big budget movie

The Music: Loud orchestral music - dramatic; but not good enough to  download

The Visuals: Top notch visuals. Nobody can knock down CGI buildings like these guys. 

Rating: 2.75 stars: Pretty fun, great visuals. 

More: Someday there will be a real earthquake. . . 

Even More.

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Tomorrowland

Plot: Frank (George Clooney) and Casey (Britt Robertson) find magic coins, and get one-time visit to a futuristic utopia called Tomorrowland. When they snap back to reality, they are greeted by a young girl Athena (Raffery Cassidy), who has tries to recruit them. Soon Casey finds Frank, and they hook up with Athena to journey to Tomorrowland, which is no longer a utopia. 

In Tomorrowland, they meet Govenor Nix (Hugh Laurie) who explains their predicament. By eliminating negative expectations, our heroes save the world. [imdb]    [photos]

Review: The first three fourths of this movie are super: more fun than any movie since Into the Woods. I loved the optimism, and I loved the banter between the negative Frank and the effervescently optimistic Casey. Maybe I am a sucker for optimistic movies, but this does a nice job of being positive while not be too juvenile.  

The acting was great throughout. I liked the alienness of Athena from the young Raffery Cassidy who shows a not quite human girl. George Clooney has some great moments too. He delivers some great pessimistic lines to keep the mood from getting too cheesy.

Last week I saw Mad Max: Fury Road with its implicitly catastrophic view of the future. Tomorrowland has a deliberately positive and optimistic view -- rather like the early Star Trek shows & movies. Both movies were fun, Mad Max being cool and desperate; and Tomorrowland being hopeful and determined. 

What I didn't like was the science fiction mumbo-jumbo in the end to set up the (NOT A SPOILER) happy ending. The fast-moving, wonder-based story took a left-turn into lengthy exposition to set up a vague, last-gasp project and a big PG-rated fight. The big fight being the only part of Tomorrowland that felt like a kid's movie.

Cast: George Clooney is as good as ever - he plays a depressed guy pretty well;  Britt Robertson from Under the Dome, who does a great job; 13 year old Raffey Cassidy who carries the movie -- if her role had gone bad -- it would be a whole different film. 

Directed by: Brad Bird, who also has a writing credit. He was involved in many Disney movies including The Incredibles. 

The Music: Boring orchestrial music -- yawn.

The Visuals: A few great special effects. None better than flying in the jetpack. 

Rating: 3.5 stars: loved it -- but not the ending. It has an innovative story, great dialog, a good message, but lapses into after-school-special for the ending. 

More: In our cynical age, optimism is in short supply. 

[SPOILER] Even More: I loved the message about how the people love dystopian stories, and this causes them to accept failure. Tomorrowland story has an optimistic theme -- in contrast to Mad Max, Hunger Games, and Divergent. It recalls the positive attitude of post-WWII Americans when people trusted science, business, and government, at least far more than today. 

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Mad Max - Fury Road

Plot: In post-apocolyptic Australia, Imperator Furiosa (Charlize Theron) takes her battle wagon off raiding duty and into the mountains looking for a utopia called Green Place. Meanwhile, Max (Tom Hardy) is captured by warlord Immortan Joe (Hugh Keays-Byrne), who needs to catch Furiosa. The bad guys tie Max to the front of a jeep to use for replacement blood and as human shield. Because the enemy of my enemy is my friend, Max ends up working with Furiosa, who is secretly smuggling Immortan Joe's young wives to the Green Place. 

In the end, Furiosa and Max risk a final battle, and this wraps up the story. [imdb]    [photos]

Review: Cool. And Epic. The steam-punk cars and puffy tattoos and aerosol makeup look great. I loved the style and art direction. I liked having a film that was so fast moving that the vehicles almost never stopped.  

It is a simple story - understandable without a lot of dialog because fleeing girls chased by bad guys is an archetype, that is, oppressed women are trying to escape to a feminist utopia. It is more feminist than any action movie that I can think of, more in a league with Frozen. As readers of Depth of Processing know, 21st Century women characters rescue themselves without need of male heroes. Is the feminist message sincere or just pandering to get an audience? Answer: This is a Hollywood movie; the best you can expect is both. 

Max is really a side kick for Furiosa, who is the primary hero. It is unusual to have a side kick in the title role.  

Cast: Tom Hardy, who plays Max minimally and tough; Charlize Theron, who is tough and cool at once. 

Directed by: George Miller (This is the George Miller who made the first Mad Max -- not the other one.)

The Music: Cool music. I loved having the drums on the trucks. 

The Visuals: The best. It better win Oscars!

Rating: 3.5 stars: Fun with some good ideas. 

More: The trailers were so guy friendly that my wife wouldn't see the movie. This despite the feminist message and heroine. 

SPOILER -- Even More: I like the idea that the utopian Green Place turned out to be barren. Utopia always is. I liked that they needed to go back home, and try to work out their problems. And I liked that the friends that they made on the journey help Furiosa succeed. 

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