Meet The Spartans

Current IMDB Rating: 2.4/10
My Rating: 1.8/10

The only reason why I didn't shut this movie off 2 minutes into the You Got Served dance sequence was because I was honestly too tired to get up from my chair. I cracked a smile once during this "funny" movie. The only reason it has as high a score as it does is because - as shallow as it is - there was some decent eye candy for the duration of the film (even if the muscles were mostly fake) and for the unexpected appearance of Chris Crocker, who is the source of many inside jokes between my friends and I. Overall, please don't waste your time with this one.

Wind Chill

Current IMDB Rating: 5.9/10
My Rating: 7.8/10

I love a good horror movie. I love a good Christmas horror movie. I love this movie. Nobody will ever be able to explain to me why the rating is so low online, but that just goes to show you that you can't trust what other people like as your personal preference.

The movie is a supernatural horror film about two college students who find themselves stranded on a remote stretch of road. It just so happens that they are not the first to find themselves in this situation on the same part of the road and as they learn more about the history of the road, the bleaker their future begins to appear.

I think the thing I love about this film is that it's not your typical horror film, in fact I have a hard time calling it a horror film at all. It is definitely easier to market it that way, but it is actually very touching. Even though the events in the film are that of a supernatural nature, it is really a touching love story that brings you into the brief relationship the main characters have between each other.

It is always so long between memorable horror films for me, so to unexpectedly come across this one was a very welcome breath of fresh air to the genre.

Wanted

Current IMDB Rating: 7.0/10
My Rating: 7.4/10

This movie is meant to be fun, pure fun. You are meant to take the place of the main character who is so basic that he could be you. You are meant to live this adventure with him, and you do. The camera, the actors, they take you right inside his world and everything he is experiencing. His boss is your boss because his boss is an asshole. His friends are your friends because they can be assholes. He is a loser just like you, and now you're in for the ride of your life.

When Wesley Gibson finds out - suddenly - that he is not just an ordinary loser and that his father is actually a super-assassin who was killed in an attack, he starts an adventure that takes him bouncing around and killing people with Angelina Jolie. Now doesn't that sound like fun?

Eventually he is taught the ways of The Fraternity, a secret group of assassins who is hunting the man who killed his father. As he gets further into the depths of The Fraternity this all changes and he finds out that everything he knows is a lie and he is being used for other reasons. Ones I honestly didn't see coming.

This movie is nothing more or less than a thrill-ride. It doesn't masquerade as some important movie, one that will be remembered for all eternity. It is what it is, and that's what I like about it. It's not significant by the end of it all, you will feel some significance in your life.

The 16 Movies I Watched in 2008... From 2008

So I only saw 16 movies during this year that were made this year... I'll probably see a lot more from this year next year considering most of the good ones come out at the end of the year, but this is what I saw so far.

01. Wall-E
- One of the best movies I've ever seen. I love this movie and it will be one of my favorites for as long as I live. I could watch it 100 times and never get sick of Wall-E... woah!

02. The Dark Knight
- Watching Heath Ledger as The Joker is one of the reasons why I love the movies. To see someone get so lost in a character is amazing and one of the things I will miss about him.

03. Horton Hears A Who
- This was definately one of the more unexpected pleasures of the year. From scene to scene it was hard not to love Horton and even harder to stop laughing.

04. Get Smart
- Another really unexpected surprise from the year. This is the only movie ever to keep me laughing through the entire thing and for that I put it high on my list. Plus I love Anne Hathaway.

05. Hellboy II: The Golden Army
- The first Hellboy was a decent little movie I saw a while back, but this one sparked my interest for the character again. I can't wait for Hellboy III.

06. Wanted
- I went into this one expecting nothing and it blew my mind. By the end of it I was feeling so much better about myself and when a movie can do that, I love it!

07. Eagle Eye
- I had no idea what I was getting into with Eagle Eye. From one scene to the next my heart was pounding out of my chest. This is another of my favorites of the year.

08. Smart People
- This movie was an interesting character study. So far anything with Ellen Page in it has at least kept my attention and it's interesting to watch her evolve as an actress.

09. The Strangers
- This was the best horror film I saw this year. I can't say it's all that spectacular, but as far as low budget horrors go, it was very well done.

10. Cloverfield
- The one movie everyone was looking forward to had way too much of a build up. Yay, a big monster is destroying everything, but when we don't care about the characters, why would we care if they die?

11. Shutter
- This was a decent horror movie, but was far too long to keep my attention and by the time it gets around to explaining everything in the end, you just wish everyone would get killed so the movie could stop.

12. Saw V
- The Saw series doesn't seem to get much better with this installment. Save for a few gross out moments it really just seems to be setting up the next movie more than anything.

13. The Ruins
- Oh yay... killer plants... that imitate cell phones... even though they're in the middle of the Mexican jungle... and they're horrible CGI... ugh.

14. Funny Games
- I loved the original Funny Games and even though it's a direct remake, the actors are uninspired and show very little emotion for the horrible things going on around them.

15. The X-Files: I Want to Believe
- I wasn't expecting a damn thing with this movie... and even then I got let down. They introduce characters and never tell what happens to them. You're supposed to only care about Mulder and Scully I guess.

16. The Happening
- With the Quentin Tarintino excuse of "oh, it was supposed to turn out like that," M. Night has made this the last movie of his I will ever watch. And I was one of the ones who hated The Sixth Sense.

Shadows and Fog

Current IMDB Rating: 6.4/10
My Rating: 7.2/10

I'll start out by saying that I've never seen a Woody Allen movie that I liked... until this one. I guess it had to be just watching the right movie at the right time. One of my favorite movies is the classic German film M. Allen purposely sent this movie up to look like that one, and that is exactly what drew me into it... other than that each scene has a new A-list star to look at.

I think this will be one I'll watch a few more times because it's interesting to see so many contemporary actors in a film that looks like it could have been made 70 years ago. Plus there are some genuinely funny parts.