Posts Tagged ‘Helen Mirren’
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Aww, what did Space Cowboys ever do to anybody? It’s just a sweet old film about launching geriatrics into orbit to teach them young whipper-snappers a thing or two!
If you’ve never seen Space Cowboys, don’t. It’ll ruin your impression of Clint Eastwood’s late career Oscar streak. Before directing movies like Mystic River and Million Dollar Baby, he directed and starred in junk like Space Cowboys and Blood Work. Avoid at all costs.
As Cami ascertained in today’s comic, RED is very much like Space Cowboys in that it stars a cast of borderline-elderly actors running around, doing things they probably shouldn’t. I don’t care if it’s entering a low orbit around the planet or blowing up a pallet of C4, you have grandkids to worry about!
At least RED isn’t taking itself too seriously.
Except it kind of is.
In the way that Space Cowboys limply tried to assert the value of The Greatest Generation, RED is basically an “eff-you” thrill ride for Baby Boomers, rapidly approaching obsolescence.
I’ve ranted about this in the past. Bruce Willis is a key offender in this area. Look at Live Free or Die Hard. He can still kind of get away with it, though. Ever since he figured out he could shave his head and look like a bad-ass, audiences have kind of forgotten he is 55.
Sylvester Stallone is worse. The Expendibles was fun, but his extension of both Rocky and Rambo were a little desperate.
These guys need to let it go. Make room for the next generation. Right now, there’s really no one to take their place because the old guard won’t get out of the way.
And Bruce! Bruce… You’re dragging Morgan Freeman, John Malkovich and Helen Mirren into it with you? For shame.
RED might be a rental for me somewhere down the line if for no other reason than to see John Malkovich in full-on crazypants mode. He doesn’t play up his intensity for laughs very often, so when he does, it’s devastating.
It looks like the movie may have legs, considering it stood its ground with a $22 million opening this weekend against Jackass 3D. Johnny Knoxville and the boys raked in $50 million at the box office setting a record for a fall movie (September – October) ever seen. In fact, I nearly doubled the take from the original Jackass and its sequel Jackass Number Two.
I’m kind of lamenting the fact that I didn’t make it out to the theater this weekend to catch it. But Cami had relatives in town this weekend from Texas and we spent a lot of time hanging out with them. I don’t know if there’s a point of seeing the movie on a school night. I doubt it would generate the uproarious response it seemed to attract this weekend.
What say you? Did anyone see Jackass 3D or RED this weekend? What was your take? Did you have fun screaming at the infantile antics of the Jackass crew? Was RED a viable choice for anyone who can’t remember where they were when Kennedy was shot?
LEAVE YOUR COMMENTS BELOW!
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Remember the Summer of 2011? The sequels, the superhero movies and the throngs of “adult” movie goers who complained that there wasn’t anything that met the needs of their discerning taste?
Somehow, Crazy, Stupid Love filled that void and became the antidote for kiddie movies and blockbusters. I’m not sure how. The movie was very much about surface impressions and, in the end, very much a farce. But the whiners were appeased and went back to their domiciles to eat cheese and drink a nice merlot.
Meanwhile, here comes The Debt – a taut, emotional espionage thriller about former Massad agents who worked together in 1960’s East Berlin to track down a Nazi war criminal. Things go wrong and they’re still dealing with the fallout several decades later.
Meanwhile, no one is talking about it.
I don’t know if the pedigree of the film is turning people off or if it just looks too complex since it’s about espionage and takes place in two different time periods. But it’s been getting great reviews and is probably worth checking out. Frankly, you had me at “Helen Mirren.”
Is anyone else planning on checking out The Debt this weekend?
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