MOVIES

Grizzly Review: Colombiana

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I love Zoe Saldana so much that I don’t even want to say this movie disappointed me. But it totally effin’ disappointed me. I’m always one for a good revenge flick, and after seeing the trailer for this one it was a no brainer – I was going to enjoy it. It looked like something in the same vein as Leon (The Professional) where Natalie Portman played a little girl wanting to become a killer to exact revenge on the criminals who killed her parents. It’s basically the same thing except not as good.

Cataleya is a seemingly normal little school girl until her parents are killed by a rival crime lord. After bartering her way into the U.S. she reconnects with her uncle, played fantastically by Cliff Curtis (Live Free of Die Hard). She asks her uncle to train her to be a killer and he agrees only if she promises to still attend school… you know, to become a smart killer. The movie skips ahead 15 years later, and that is where our story starts with Cataleya in full swing with her revenge.

Zoe Saldana was perfect in the movie, playing one of the sexiest assassin-killers I’ve seen in a movie, and with some real tortured feelings lingering for the last 15 years after losing her parents so young. The action scenes seemed few and far between and I was kind of disappointed not being able to see the young Cataleya train as a killer with her Uncle. More Cliff Curtis as Uncle Emilio would have been awesome, which also could have shown if he was the one to actually train her. Other than being able to fire randomly in public to prove a point, there was no indication that Emilio trained Cataleya in infiltration or hand-to-hand combat. And I have to give special props to young actress Amandla Stenberg for her brief stint as young Cataleya. We’ll be seeing more of her in The Hunger Games next year.

Another aspect of the movie I didn’t enjoy was the love story angle that was unexpectedly spewed forth. I thought maybe the guy Zoe was all over in the trailer was another assassin, or a government agent, but nope. He was just an ordinary artist who wanted to talk about feelings and take pictures of her while she slept. Lame sauce in a revenge action movie bro.

There was also a CIA angle in the movie where Callum Blue (Smallville, Dead Like Me) plays a kind of villain. I thought maybe he would be a force to be reckoned with, but unfortunately he was pretty much wasted talent. Plus his American accent was terrible after only hearing him so much with his thick English drawl. Lennie James (Snatch, Hung) as Agent Ross was a definite strong addition to the supporting cast.  It was actually another big part of my disappointment to see such a promising cast not fully utilized like they could have been.

Overall I give the movie 2 out of 5. I went in thinking I’d be seeing more straight up action than I did. I’m a guy all for character development in a movie, but this is one movie where the romance between Cataleya and the painter guy (I can’t even remember his name and refuse to check) could have been sacrificed.

Movie Trailers

The Hunger Games – MTV’s Sneak Peak…

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Early in June we told you about the upcoming movie The Hunger Games. At that time there wasn’t yet any footage, but last night MTV aired a teaser clip at their shitty awards show. Here it is:

I didn’t read the books, so to me this just looks like a girl running though the woods. Granted, that girl is Jennifer Lawrence (X-Men; First Class), but still not a lot going on…

Fan Made Poster….
TV

Breaking Bad: Season 4, Episode 7 – ‘Problem Dog’ Review

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This week was all about Jessie trying to cope with Gale’s death, and Hank once again, about to inadvertently save our meth cooks. Walt, despite his massive amount of screen time is actually for the most part filler here. We start out with Pinkman playing video games, in what almost seems like training for the job. In his head he keeps seeing Gale’s face and it obvious that our beloved meth head isn’t quite right…

As the episode progresses Jessie is being pulled in 2 directions. First by Walt, who wants him to kill Gus, and secondly by Gus, who wants to control Walt. Gus’s influence seems to be taking hold too as we see the hesitation to poison Gus’ coffee. Walt treating Jessie like an idiot vs Gus making him feel important, he is torn.

In the middle with Pinkman is Mike, who seems to see what is happening, and to no real surprise is vocal about it in their talk about ‘loyalty’. Walt’s focus in this episode, other than being a catalyst for Jessie’s problems, is acting rather childish as he and Skyler get the car wash operation up and running. His actions with Junior’s car show just how careless he is becoming. No longer the constant source of worry, Walt seems headed down a path of self-destruction that undoubtedly be thwarted  by…Hank.

As foreshadowed in past episodes, Hank has determined that Gus is Hisenberg, which, while not accurate, is close enough to true and should ultimately prove useful for Walt and Jessie…assuming they both live that long.

Maybe the best scene of the episode is where the title comes into play – the ‘problem dog’. Jessie goes to his old support group as a result of his mixed feeling about Gus. He talks about a dog he killed, obviously referring to Gale, and seems to totally break down about it. He can’t vocalize a reason for the dog to be killed, because the ‘dog’ didn’t actually do anything, but was a problem none the less.  Jere Burns (Justified) returns as Jessie’s group leader and he becomes the focus of Pinkman’s outcry, giving us yet another excellent performance from an under-rated actor.

Overall, very good episode. This is without a doubt, one of the best shows on Television, and it continues to deliver week after week. 4/5 Bears.

TV

Entourage: Season 8, Episode 7 – “Second to Last”

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So let’s get to the part of the show that’s most interesting to me at the moment. Eric and Sloan. I was just thinking that in the last episode Eric may have been jumping the gun thinking that Galecki and Sloan were an item, but after Turtle spots them at lunch together I can’t help but think they are. Eric does too as he storms off angrily…. from the bed where just slept with Sloan’s ex-mother-in-law… again. Sparks fly at the farmer’s market and later a huge bombshell is dropped. I can only imagine where it goes from here.

Things are looking bad for Turtle. The only way for him to get Don Pepe’s off the ground is to find more money from his investors. Amare Stoudamire and Michael Strahan both tell him to screw himself and Derek Jeter says so much in a nicer way. To top things off, the tequila line that Turtle decided to invest in went public, making Mark Cuban and many other investors a ton of money. Sorry you lost out on that one Turtle. It will take a miracle for Turtle to pull the restaurant gig off at this point without asking Vince for help, which he vowed to not do. Will Vince bail him our or is Don Pepe’s done?

Things are only looking up for Drama after he and Dice successfully won in their work strike to get higher paydays and Johnny Bananas to stay on the air. Now he is going to star in his own movie, involving the miners and a rescue dog, on the Hallmark channel. Not much but it’s a starring gig. Hats off to Drama, even the bad ones he wears.

Vince still continues his pursuit of Sophia in this episode, this time with a bit of a different result thanks a lot to Drama and Turtle. And just when I thought Ari was over his wife, Dana urges him to try winning her back because he tells her how he is still in love with her. It seems like everything is starting to go good for everyone except E. Will Ari get his wife back before season’s end? We’ll have to wait and see in the next episode.

I give this one a 4 out 5 grizzlies. The show is definitely living up to the expectations I had at the beginning of the season even though I had begun to lose hope. Keep up the good work fellas!


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