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Showing posts from October, 2011

Paranormal Activity 3 (2011) R

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This "spooky" franchise obviously isn't going anywhere anytime soon, so we can choose to ignore it or perhaps embrace it. I, however, take these films for what they are: scare-less, oft-comical, head-scratching, disappointing and genuinely entertaining genre films. I was mildly freaked out (as much as a 22-year old watching a stupid documentary style horror film can be) at the first edition. However, the second film was insanely boring, unfunny, unoriginal and anti-climatic. I went into this one having little to no expectations. You do not want to set any sort of bar heading into a Paranormal film, because you will then be disappointed in every aspect; trust me. The team behind the genius "documentary" Catfish got the call to film a third and not final Paranormal Activity . They accepted, obviously strictly based on the paycheck, because these films make a ton of money. Henry Joost and Ariel Schulman didn't drop the ball though, they re-livened up the scri

50/50 (2011) R

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Obviously this film resembles Judd Apatow's Funny People in more ways than one; and yes, it also stars Seth Rogen (Funny People, Pineapple Express), but it's a tremendous film with plenty of laughs, terrific performances and lots of heart. This is film is based (somewhat loosely) on the friendship between writer Will Reiser and actor Seth Rogen. Reiser battled with cancer a few years back and survived, thanks in part to the support of Rogen. After Reiser made it out alive, Rogen convinced him to write a screenplay based on his battle with the deadly disease. This film lacks the star power that Funny People had with Adam Sandler, Jonah Hill, Jason Schwartzman and Aziz Ansari, but it makes up for it with a funnier performance by Rogen. Director Jonathan Levine (The Wackness, All the Boys Love Mandy Lane) had yet to make a watchable film, so expectations weren't extremely high, but the three main leads had me quite intrigued. Joesph Gordon-Levitt (Inception, 500 Days of Summe