Pirates Of The Carribean: At World's End

This was a long ass movie.

Just because you're the third part of a movie franchise does not mean you get a Lord Of The Rings run time. This movie goes on for 3 hours, and I can recap the plot in about 2 minutes. So it's all out war now between the pirate lords of the seven seas, and the british navy, and the Flying Dutchman with our usual cast of pirates smack dab in the middle. Bam, done! An easy story to tell, and it's done quite well. Although, the whole movie is about 2 hours of buildup to the final ship battle, 20 minutes of good action, and 10 minutes of resolution. But, the 2 hours is fine. Kinda. It starts off pretty damn grim though, if I put this opening scene on you would seriously not guess it to be Pirates Of The Carribean. More like Schindler's List mixed with Les Miserables. Yeah. But the movie is fine after that, it has a great size and scale to it, really giving the impression that this is the big finale to the story of the past 2 movies. And it....kinda delivers. Revelations are told, battles commence, people die. You know what, screw it the opening is just the beginning of this movie's darkness. I mean you see people get shot dead square between the eyes, have spikes shoved through people's skulls, the epitomy of a skull f*** if I have ever seen one, and several impalements. Guys, are you dead sucking ferious? This is supposed to be a movie for you know, kids, families, not really adults. You just had to get that PG-13 rating didn't you? Christ. I don't hate this movie, but I got problems with it. A lot of people do, people really did not like this movie. I can kinda see why. My main gripe though is it should have been the end. That should tell you something about the next movie, eh? Everyone's story comes to an end, it should have just ended with Will and Elizabeth together, Barbossa having his crew and ship back, and Jack wandering off to go on more marvellous misadventures. But no! Tune in tomorrow for Jack Sparrow to find the Fountain Of Youth!! I swear it's true! Oh boy, here we go....

Pirates Of The Carribean: Dead Man's Chest

Sequel time!

Okay second film in the Pirates series, which I actually quite like even though it was quite literally written as it was being filmed. Oops. But anywho, story time! Jack has a debt to pay to the infamous Davy Jones, and in order to get out of it Jack as well as several other parties search for the eponymous dead man's chest. Not as hard to describe the plot as the last movie is it? Plot's pretty straightforward all things considered. Acting is still just as fine as ever, although Bill Nighy is quite engaging as the captain of The Flying Dutchman, in fact Davy Jones is my favorite part of the movie. His character beyond superstitous talk and legend of him and what power he wields in the seas, is actually a mystery. And I love the design of him and his crew, cursed men which have morphed with various sea life, for example a man has a normal body but has the head of a hammerhead shark, Davy Jones is a man with tentacles for a beard and a crab leg and arm attached to a human body. Sounds pretty great and it looks outstanding too. Surprisingly there's not much action wise, but when you look back at the first movie we had, a town raided, a ship chase, and the final fight between Jack and Barbossa. In this movie we have this very bizzare escape from an island filled with cannibals (Don't look at me, I didn't write it!), two attacks by the Kraken, one long ass swordfight which I have no doubt goes on for about 15 or 20 minutes which is the only swordfight by the way, and a brief ship chase. Yeah....not quite the action masterpieces our memories had of these movies. But action isn't everything if the story is good, and we like the characters. The story isn't that great, but I still like it just for the villain. Jack and company are still fun to be around so I can't say the film has truly flopped. But tomorrow, we talk about the film most people consider to be the absolute worst and I have not seen that movie for years so it will be interesting to say the least. So tune in tomorrow where we meet our cast At World's End.

Pirates Of The Carribean: Curse Of The Black Pearl

We're devils and black sheep, we're really bad eggs.....

A whole week of Pirates, huzzah! First movie that kicked off the franchise way back in 2003. Crazy it's been that long huh? Hell of a movie to kick things off! The story is....quite complicated for the first movie. I find it difficult to compress this film into a synopsis, I'd almost have to tell it step by step but that would ruin the movie. So let's attempt to recap here, so the movie follows three main characters, Captain Jack Sparrow a pirate, Will Turner a blacksmith, and Elizabeth Swan the daughter of a governor who pretty much gets kidnapped by pirates and Jack and Will set off to save her. There's a hell of a lot more to it than that so don't let this review fool you. Now to the cast, I can sum it up in one word. Awesome! Johnny Depp is awesome as a pirate, Orlando Bloom does okay though I prefer him more as an elf in Middle Earth, Keira Knightley is really no nonsense in this movie which I enjoy, but...I think Geoffrey Rush as Barbossa steals the show. He is so wickedly amazing and devilishly cool, he really seals this movie as a damn good movie in my eyes! The action is terrific, with well choreographed sword fights and ship battles. The sets are incredibly well done, it is a period piece obviously, I'm guessing late 1600s or early 1700s, either way the film looks great in terms of costumes and set design. The music which was composed by Hans Zimmer is fun, that's the best way I can describe it! It has mystery and intrigue, all out swashbuckling action, and even comedy! However, there is certain flaws with this movie. One, Commodore Norrington is planning on marrying Elizabeth. Fine! No problem, if he you know, didn't age I mean, at all,  and he looked about 27 when she was maybe 10. Eww. Seriously, dude didn't age a day in about what, 15 years? Bugs me. Two, how did Will get the medallion? In fact, why and how was his shipped attacked when he was a small boy? If Barbossa was looking for the medallion, how did he know it was on that ship and/or not find Will? Third, boy that ceremony seemed complex. Not as complex as the whole mermaid thing in the fourth movie, but one step at a time here. All in all, it's a fun movie, it's highly enjoyable, a popcorn movie if there was one, and I give it two thumbs up!

Tomorrow, Jack meets the devil of the seven seas himself....

The Desolation Of Smaug

Yeah, that....that's a way to end a movie.

The story continues in The Desolation Of Smaug as our travelling heroes inch closer and closer towards The Lonely Mountain and finally come face to face with the dragon Smaug. Meanwhile a much greater evil has been uncovered. To be truthful, I think this is my favorite of The Hobbit movies. The story progresses at a very good pace, never once do you get bored (And in some cases fixes problems of the book.), the characters are still fun and we get two new arrivals to the cast. An old friend from previous films, Legolas Greenleaf plus an entirely original character created for the movie, that's right a character not created by Tolkien is featured in the movie, Tauriel played by the absolutely stunning Evangeline Lilly who I have to say is a great welcome to this series. She doesn't feel out of place at all, she is an honorable and caring figure, and somehow is Arwen fully realized. Not many people know Arwen had much bigger roles planned in the films beyond horse riding and sexy crying, she was planned to be a warrior who fought at the battle of Helm's Deep but for some bizzare reason she got cut out, which sucks but now we got a true representation of an Elven warrior in full action, she is awesome. But not as awesome as something scaly, breathes fire, and flies. It's time to talk Benedict Cumberbatch people. Short version, best part of the entire movie. Long version, Jesus fish this is incredible! I mean what a casting choice, Ben really makes this creature leap off the screen, he is cunning, he is devious, he is everything you would want in a villain. After I saw the trailer for this movie, heard his voice, saw Smaug, it became very apparent I had to read the book. So I did, and you could bet millions of dollars when Smaug speaks in the book, Ben was heard in my head. The reveal of him in this movie is perfect, for those of you who just saw the trailer and said, oh I've seen the dragon now. No. You have seen hardly a thing. He is huge in this movie, and for the first half of his scenes you only see him with Bilbo (Insert Sherlock reference here.) which makes him look even bigger. If there was ever a single reason to see this movie, yeah it's Benedict Cumberbatch as Smaug the dragon. And the ending...oh God, the ending. I saw this opening day, when that scene happened I was not very happy. Stupid cliffhangers right when I don't want it to stop. It still makes me mad, I want to watch the last movie right now. But I want to hold off until tomorrow so I can review it properly. I mean let's get down to brass tacks, if you stuck around to see the first movie then you will be hooked by the second if you haven't already. I know fantasy is still an underground film genre, but Lord Of The Rings really is what made it big and popular, so I understand if not many people can't get their heart into it like I have. And that's fine, opinions are never wrong but I always try new movies and tell people about them regardless because you never know if a movie will stick with you or not. But regardless, we have one more movie to wrap up so I will join you on the conclusion to this journey tomorrow.

The Return Of The King

Well here it is, the almost 5 hour conclusion to The Lord Of The Rings!

You want an epic end to an already epic trilogy, look no further than Return Of The King. This film is all about the battles, and I'll be damned if I ever forget one. The action is phenomenal, the acting is at it's finest, the stakes have reached their peak, and boy oh boy, do you have to see the extended version to get the full experience. Cause cool stuff and very important stuff happens in the extended cut that is not in the theatrical cut, and it hurts the theatrical cut. Now you may be saying to your self, 5 hours?? My ass is going to be numb before the 4 hour mark! It really doesn't feel that long, it keeps you so interested in the journey, and the characters, and the battles that you hardly notice how long you have been seated. And a lot of people complain about how long the ending is, but you have to realize this was a huge story with a lot of loose ends that needed to be tied up so it makes sense why the ending was so long, and I cry every time at the end. Christ, I cry at all of the movies because there is heavy stuff going down and you care so much about these characters! So it wrecks you at the end of it all. So go out tomorrow, watch Star Wars read these reviews whenever you like after the fact, and enjoy these movies. I actually do have an important question to ask, but it can wait until tomorrow. See you soon!

The Two Towers

So our story continues with a fantastic sequel!

The Two Towers is a great follow up to Fellowship Of The Ring, adding more awesome characters and even better action sequences. So sadly the fellowship has split, Sam and Frodo are continuing toward Mordor and Aragorn, Legolas, and Gimli are tracking down the Uruk-Hai which leads them into the land of Rohan where we meet several new, but still interesting characters and they get swept up in this fight against Saruman's forces and this is where Christopher Lee really gets to shine! He is the main bad guy of this particular movie, and I love that because he is the man. There's so many great scenes in this movie, my favorite probably being besides the battle of Helms Deep, the very much exorcism like scene with King Theoden because it has just great writing, perfect music, and a battle of wills which I have always enjoyed in films. Andy Serkis playing Gollum is pretty much the reason you need to see this movie, and he got snubbed out of an Academy Award for best supporting actor because he was all CGI in the film! Everything you loved about the first Lord Of The Rings film is in this and it adds more to the world and the characters as it should, but it does it with more refined ways of filmmaking so of course the film itself is presented better than the first. I could just spout off trivia left, right, and center on these movies like how Christopher Lee actually met J.R.R. Tolkien and was one of the fountains of knowledge while filming, Viggo Mortensen actually broke his toe when he kicked a helmet so his yell was real, and how they changed several things from the book but I won't get into that cause honestly the changes that they made did not hurt the film. The extended cut gives more character development to both old and new characters, with more interesting insight into the world of Middle-Earth, and it almost clocks the movie in at about 4 hours. So have fun with that! I'll get back to you tomorrow with the last Lord Of The Rings film.

The Fellowship Of The Ring

What the hell? You're reviewing Lord Of The Rings when Star Wars is coming out this week?! I already did Star Wars, so just read my reviews on those then go see the new movie, then get back to me and read these reviews during the holidays.

So why exactly am I reviewing The Lord Of The Rings movies? Well to be perfectly honest I got so used to a new Hobbit movie every December, and the actual meaning of the movies is companionship, loyalty, and friendship, qualities found in this world especially around Christmas time. I'm actually going to review the extended cuts of these movies cause they are the only true way you can watch The Lord Of The Rings movies. Needless to say I am a huge fan of these movies, have been since 2001 and it does not take long to get you interested. Just the opening sequence hooks you, and not once does it get slow, it keeps a steady and interesting pace. It gives you plenty of time to get to know the characters and the world. It is an epic tale of a Ring Of Power that if not destroyed can plunge Middle-Earth into eternal darkness, so it is up to our heroes to destroy it before it is too late. The term perfect cast has never ever been more true than with this cast, Elijah Wood is the only Frodo Baggins ever, Ian McKellen is wise and friendly as Gandalf the Grey, Orlando Bloom is nothing to me but Legolas he just has the physique of an Elf, friggin' Christopher Lee (God bless him) is pure menace as Saruman the White, just to name a few and everybody is so perfect. New Zealand is the most fitting backdrop for Middle-Earth on this planet, and I need to visit there one day. The music by Howard Shore just...my God. The best examples of it are actually the songs with singing in Tolkien's Elvish and the Black Speech of Mordor. I would recommend watching the theatrical cut and if you loved it enough to view the extended cut, it adds to the movie in every sense of the word. Every thing they added makes the movie better to the point where, really it kind of ruins the theatrical cut because of the lack of the additional scenes. It makes the film better in my eyes, but the theatrical cut is still a great film on it's own but the extended cut is leaps and bounds better. If you think you are hardcore enough and want to jump right into the extended cut alone, you rock! You will greatly enjoy it and it will not hurt you if you have never read the books written by J.R.R Tolkien, cause I haven't read the books. Not yet anyway and I still praise the movie and can't wait to read them. Even if you know nothing about Lord Of The Rings, the film, either cuts of it will fill you in. It is a very accessible movie to non-fans which is good if you feel that you might not have the proper beforehand knowledge and might find it a bit daunting. Anyone can watch this movie so have no fear. I hope you enjoy it, and you can find the extended editions just about anywhere, probably cheaper now than they were when first released and the best part is it includes both cuts of the movie and not just the extended cuts. So tune in tomorrow where we continue the trilogy.