The Passion of the Christ

It is a story we all know. Jesus (Jim Caviezel) is pinned to a cross for all the wrong reasons and put to death. The story that turned Jesus into who he was and changed the world. This film from 2004 really had many unexpected things in it frankly.

The Passion of the Christ is directed by Mel Gibson. I guess his first decision was who was going to be cast as Jesus and he chose Jim Caviezel? I liked Caviezel in other movies but here there isn't much to him actually. Maia Morgenstern is cast as Mary and seems too young for the character and badly casted. Rosalinda Celentano plays a Satan character that is really not developed. Frankly, I think this is a film that needs more characters overall.

The actual story is interesting in that it brings out many emotions, both good and bad and is very inspirational but this is not conveyed very well in this film. One big problem with the story is that there is very little background given. I think it needed more information on Jesus, his friends and family and what Jesus did leading up to this. A film that also needs more dialogue to make it more convincing and inspiring. There are also many scenes that carry on too long and are more graphic than necessary for a story like this. The ending also should also have been more of a celebration than what it is.

There are some good things in the film and these would include the settings, costume design, the design of the cross and the weapons depicted. The problem here is these things should not be the highlights of the movie.

All this said, I do some give credit to Mel Gibson. This is daring filmmaking because of intense feelings surrounding Christianity and this story, there will surely be a strong reaction to it and there was. It is no doubt hard to tell this story.

The Passion of the Christ is what I call an "it is what it is" type of film. It is just there. The film that didn't have much of an effect on me and is something that I wouldn't watch again.

2/5

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The Rite

I find the exorcist genre in movies to be an interesting one. It is a genre that has many ideas to it and can be really scary and dark if done right but also a genre that can be quite lacking if not done right. With the exorcist movie, The Rite, I really came into this with low expectations. It is interesting no doubt. The cast is good and has been around and they know what they are doing. It is also orginal and if put in the right hands, it could have been a good exorcist film. There are worse exorcist films out there no doubt but this one could have been so much better.

Anthony Hopkins is the exorcist priest in this and his performance is really good even though his character is very unlikable. Colin O'Donoghue is also excellent as an ex-seminary student who is witnessing exorcisms. He handles many of the religious questions in a way I liked voicing many questions and concerns. The film does lack many secondary characters with only Alice Braga and Rutger Hauer mentionable.

This exorcist film is unique in that it uses the Vatican as it's setting. This is a good idea and includes many cool sets. It also uses English well as a second language pretty well at times which is a nice change of pace for a horror film.

So if the setting and cast are above average, what is wrong with this? Well, the plot is a problem. The plot that sets up O'Donoghue well as someone learning the exorcist field but then wanders off in the later acts not knowing what to do with this idea. It also contains a rip-off from 1973 movie The Exorcist with a young teen being possessed with a demon and the plot only really picks up during the last couple of minutes of the film with not much supporting it before.

The Rite is a dry horror movie with not a lot of purpose or direction to it. It is really a cookie-cutter movie type movie for this genre with not much to recommend to it.

2/5

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The Devil Inside

As many movie fans know, January is a terrible month for released films coming out. The film quality of January-released movies is usually very low, and for a person like me living in Michigan, it is  usually better to just watch the snow fall. The year 2012 was no better for January-released movies. Stinkers like One for the Money, Red Tails and the very crappy limited release horror film, Beneath the Darkness were released. The Devil Inside was released in this month but it was one of the more interesting ones. It brought something a little different to the horror genre and was one of the films from the January pool that really could have been something but it still really missed it's mark.

The Devil Inside is an exorcist/Cathohic religion-themed movie. It is the story a middle-aged woman traveling to Rome in 2009 to find her mentally unstable mother who was put away due to a killing that happened during an exorcism twenty years before.

The movie is filmed in the documentary found footage style. I usually like found footage movies but I didn't like this one. It seemed  as if the entire film was trying to copy the other successful found footage films of the past decade without looking at the bigger picture. The found footage style here is really unnecessary and gives the film an uneven quality and is the main reason that the film is not scary.

Just like the film Rite did in 2011, The Devil Inside setting is in the Vatican. While this is an interesting setting, there really is no passion to this film and the director William Brent Bell doesn't seem to know much about the place or the subject. This seems to be just thrown together and again Bell seems to be just trying to piggy-back on the success of the previous found footage films.

In just about every part of the film, we don't really care about the characters who are very dry and not developed and frankly it gets worse as the film goes on. Most of the characters are witless with no real soul or even human-like qualities. That said, the character David does starts to change and this gives the film a new approach that kind of fits.

The ending is frankly bad. I do get the feeling that Bell didn't quite know what to do with the ending and it seems thrown together and makes everything before seem meaningless; it is that bad.

I don't mind exorcist type movies but there hasn't been one done right in a long time. As a matter of fact, I think this subject matter only really worked once and that was in The Exorcist in the 1970's and now these movies just seem to be trendy and geared to the teen crowd. Because of it's religious theme, I will say that The Devil Inside is really a sin and just an all-around wrong discombobulated creation of a film. Avoid.

1.5/5

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Grosse Pointe Blank

I have grown up and lived in Michigan for all of my sixteen years. I can't imagine living outside Michigan and of course our state is not the setting for many Hollywood movies. There have been a few movies set in Michigan like the American Pie films, Beverly Hills Cop and Robo Cop. Grosse Pointe Black from 1997 is another one of the few films set in my state as the city of  Grosse Pointe is right next to Detroit. This is a film that tells many things about a relationship that was formed after ten years and which includes the CIA in the plot. This is a fun and different film and one that has unfortunately been kind of forgotten.

The acting from John Cusack and Minnie Driver might be what we have seen before from them in a dozen other films but they are very good here. Cusack and Driver are intelligent and likable with Cusack bringing a unique personality to the role. Both lead characters have chemistry working off each other and there is a good supporting cast with Dan Aykroyd, Jeremy Priven and Alan Arkin.

This film has a decent amount of meat to it and it is a film that is a little hard to figure out once we get in the middle of the CIA plot. That said, the film does kind of unwind a little as we get into it with the characters and their behavior going in directions that really don't fit the story at all. I wasn't sure if some of these confusing scenes were just thrown-in material or if this was all scripted like that on purpose but I didn't care for it, and I thought it made the film a little uneven.

Grosse Pointe Blank certainly has it moments in spite of some rough spots. It is a fine film from the late 90's that is smart, kind of quirky and has a fun edge. Being set in Michigan gives it a close to home feeling that makes it even better for me. I recommend Grosse Pointe Blank.


4/5

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Stake Land

I had a skeptical feeling coming into Stake Land but I do with most vampire films anyway. Well Stake Land is a road film that follows around a character trying to survive a vampire apocalypse.

For a film about vampires, there is nothing particularly noteworthy here but the movie does get a lot of the little things right. The make-up is done well and there are some good apocalypse sets here that work on what seems to be a low budget film.

The lead characters are Nick Damici and Connor Paolo and they are likable and can act but struggle with a sub-par plot. There is not a lot of premise developed with these characters which makes their performances a bit hard to enjoy and really turns what could have been a good horror film into just a rental.

The film has a splendid first act which puts the film initially in the right direction. Act 3 is really the exact opposite as it has many opportunities to end but the film really doesn't know how to and so it kind of falls flat a little.

I don't really love this film and frankly there is not a whole lot to say about it. That said, Stake Land is kind of a nice quality vampire film from 2010 which was a little refreshing as we haven't had one of these in a while.

3.5/5

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Leprechaun: Back 2 tha Hood

We are now at the final movie of the Leprechaun series, Leprechaun: Back 2 tha Hood. Here, we learn more about the origins of the leprechaun and how leprechauns are supposed to protect their gold in this world which is exactly what the plot involves in this movie. This movie is from 2003 and again is mercifully the last film in the strange series.

The setting is just like the last movie in the series which is also set in the hood. The lead characters can act somewhat but frankly they are more laughable than not. Again there is a plot involving gold plot and some kill scenes that don't make much sense. It is really a film that nothing to do.

As with all of the leprechaun films, I like Warwick Davis who plays the leprechaun. As with most of the other films, he can act but due to problems with the plot, he isn't given much to do. Aside from some changes in costume design, his characters is nothing new and more of the same.

Along with the rest of the series, Leprechaun: Back 2 tha Hood is lazy, uninspired, not very fun and a lame end to this series. Leprechaun: Back 2 tha Hood leaves us with a dead feeling and the feeling that this series really had nowhere to go.

1.5/5

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Leprechaun: In the Hood

One good thing about the Leprechaun movies is the settings whether that is in Las Vegas, a tree house or in space. The fifth Leprechaun movie is set "in the hood" with the leprechaun being more of an evil character than before. Frankly, it seems like another strange and questionable movie unlikely to work. Unlike the fourth movie though, Leprechaun: In the Hood is not completely terrible.

This movie has a bigger budget and better cast than the previous ones with a more realistic setting than the last one which was set in space. Led by Anthony D. Montgomery and Warwick Davis as the leprechaun, the cast is given more to do here especially Davis who is actually much funnier than in the prior movies. The hood setting is no doubt silly and cheap but is put put together pretty well and the movie actually has a good vibe to it.

With a halfway decent cast and setting, the plot isn't too bad either. Ice T makes an appearance as a fugitive and this works. Like the others, there is the four leaf clover theme but here it is connected to street drugs. There is also a interesting flute idea and finally a rapping leprechaun as shown below.

                                      
If you thought the last few movies in this series were weird, this one takes weird to a new level. In this movie are a lot of cross-dressing, illegal drugs, kill scenes with a hair pick and tons of of sexual stuff. While I appreciate something new in this series, I am not sure that there was a point here.

As with the other movies, this one is of course very hard to take seriously but there is some quality here which really came out of the blue as this series seemed dead with the last movie.

2.5/5

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