March 5, 2010, - 4:18 pm
Weekend Box Office: “Alice,” “Brooklyn’s Finest,” “Ghost Writer”
Nothing new that I highly recommend at the box office, this weekend. Here are my reviews:
* “Alice in Wonderland“: My full review is here. Director Tim Burton and screenwriter Linda Woolvertoon ruined Lewis Caroll’s charming “Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland” and turned it into a feminist, anti-male, anti-marriage propaganda flick. So sad. Again, read my complete review.
FOUR MARXES PLUS A BETTY FRIEDAN
* “Brooklyn’s Finest“: Two words: Cop-hatred Porn (or maybe that’s three words despite the hyphen). Plus some actual semi-porn inserted for excitement, because this horribly weak movie is such a piece of garbage. A very graphic sex scene and then an oral sex scene–that’s what they insert in a movie, when it has nothing to stand on.
We watch the lives of three Brooklyn cops play out. All three are unhappy. Two are law-breaking scum, and the third, the only good one (Don Cheadle), is, of course, a Muslim. That’s important because they let you know what a scumbag a very overtly Catholic cop is. Muslim cops–heroes; Catholic cops–cretins.
They don’t come out and tell you he’s Muslim, but his dialogue includes lines about being upset when his superior orders him lunch with real bacon and not turkey bacon. “You know I don’t eat pork.” And, in case, there’s any doubt, we’re shown the site of two Black Muslim men in his Brooklyn neighborhood, kneeling on prayer mats on the street, as he walks by. He’s an undercover cop pretending to be a major drug dealer, and–since he’s a good and moral guy–he wants to get out because he’s starting to feel for the drug dealers with whom he associates. Plus, he wants a safer detective job, after putting in his time. Wesley Snipes plays his friend–a drug dealer who saved his life. Cheadle’s superiors are trying to force him to entrap the guy in a new drug deal.
Then, there are the other two cops–the losers and criminals. First, there’s Richard Gere. He’s an alcoholic and addict about to retire from the police force. He hates being a cop and tries to poison the mind of a new recruit against it. Oh, and every night he has sex with a prostitute. That’s where the semi-porn scene comes in, plus a scene of her giving him oral sex. But, despite that, he thinks he can marry the prostitute and change his life. Hmmm . . . sounds familiar: “Pretty Woman,” starring Richard Gere. Come on, Hollywood, come up with something new for a change.
And the other loser/criminal: Ethan Hawke plays a Catholic cop who murders drug suspects for the money. Gotta attack (non-Muslim) religious people or it wouldn’t be a genuine Hollywood thing. He has five kids, and his wife is pregnant. Plus their house is too small, infected with mold, and he needs money for a new house that’s bigger. So, he beats and kills druggies and ultimately meets his just reward.
The end. The movie was vile. Not much more to say here, other than SKIP. THIS.
FOUR MARXES PLUS AN OBAMA AND A BIN LADEN
Here’s the Trailer:
* “The Ghost Writer“: Hmmm . . . how do you start a review of a movie directed by a rapist (Roman Polanski)? Well, you note that it couldn’t be shot where it’s mostly set (in the U.S.) because the director is wanted there and is a fugitive.
And then you note that what was otherwise a smart, sophisticated, entertaining, and intriguing mystery thriller became instead every far-left conspiracy theorist’s fantasy and bogged the entire movie down. Aren’t people tired of the anti-war, anti-American, pan-Islamic terrorist bullcrap propaganda parading as art on screen? I know I am. Plus, it’s a sort of cognitive dissonance and pot-kettle-blackness to watch a director decry America protecting its citizens by getting information out of terrorists, when you know that same guy drugged and raped a 13-year-old girl. Perspective, dude.
Pierce Brosnan plays Tony Blair, er . . . “Adam Lang,” a retired British Prime Minister who is obviously Blair. Lang is staying in the U.S., where he is writing his memoirs. But he can’t leave because he’s now wanted by the International Criminal Court at the Hague, as it’s now come out he helped the CIA “torture” Islamic terrorists from Iraq and Afghanistan via waterboarding. Good for him, in my book. But that’s not how the movie wants you to see it. Instead, the plot points to the CIA handpicking Tony Blair in college, when he was studying acting, and making him our U.S. Manchurian candidate for Prime Minister, where we directed his every move. Like I said, it’s every far-lefty’s fantasy.
The story is that an English writer (Ewan McGregor) agrees to become the ghost writer of the former Prime Minister’s memoirs, after the original ghost writer commits suicide. But soon, it turns out it wasn’t likely suicide and the circumstances are mysterious. The new ghost begins to see the intrigue behind the Prime Minister’s career and the first writer’s death. And all of this is amid constant shoving-it-down-our-throats moralizing on TV and by protesters against “torture” of “innocent” Islamic terrorists. Enough already. Plus, the twist in the movie quickly became obvious to me.
There were two parts of the movie I really enjoyed. One is the unlikely turn of a bald Jim Belushi as the book publisher of the former PM’s memoirs, which made me laugh. The other was a brave, enthusiastic response from one member of the audience at the screening I attended: when it was announced that the Prime Minister could remain in the U.S. unscathed because America is the only country (in my opinion, the only country smart enough) to not recognize this arm of radicals and Third World republics known as the “International Criminal Court,” this one person in the audience clapped loudly and enthusiastically. I second that emotion.
Loved it as a smart mystery. Hated its heavy-handed politics, which dominated all else. Very entertaining, but sopping wet–and, therefore, bogged down–with left-wing sophistry.
FOUR MARXES PLUS AN OBAMA AND A BIN LADEN
Watch the Trailer:
Tags: Adam Lang, Alice in Wonderland, bad cops, British PM, British Prime Minister, Brooklyn's Finest, Cahtholic, Catholicism, CIA, crooked cops, Don Cheadle, Ethan Hawke, evil cops, Ewan McGregor, Ghost Writer, International Criminal Court, Islam, Jim Belushi, Movie Reviews, Muslim, Pierce Brosnan, Richard Gere, Roman Polanski, The Ghost Writer, The Hague, Tim Burton, Tony Blair, Torture, waterboarding, Wesley Snipes
After seeing just the previews on TV of Alice… my daughter said it looked creepy. So, who’s gonna go see this flick? Perhaps a few Hop-Heads, and some kids that parents dumped at the theater on a Saturday-Sunday afternoon.
And what’s the big deal with Tim Burton flicks anyway? They all have that same creepy look about them.
P. Aaron on March 5, 2010 at 4:42 pm