Horrible Bosses

“I’d like to bend her over a barrel and show her the fifty states.”

Plot-in-a-nutshell: Three guys with three awful bosses decide to kill them. With hilarious consequences.

See it if you like… the concept of Throw Momma From The Train mixed with The Hangover.

This is one of those films with a storyline a lot of people could relate to. I’ve certainly had bosses in the past who’ve made my life miserable, though not as miserable as certain ex-neighbours, and in honesty if pushed hard enough the brain does start to wish evil things up on them. So what if a couple of your friends were in the same situation? How would you help each other?

Well, the three friends in this film (played by Jason Bateman, Charlie Day and Jason Sudeikis) find themselves up against an overbearing asshole (Kevin Spacey, in a role possibly out-evilling Lex Luthor), a drug-addled toss-pot (a brilliantly hateful Colin Farrell) and a sexually harassing vixen (Jennifer Aniston, who I have never, ever seen sexier. Wow. I mean… WOW). They are aided and abetted by dodgy man-in-a-pub Motherfucker Jones (Jamie Foxx). So a superb supporting cast, then.

The story is nicely paced and the boss characters wonderfully portrayed as the evil individuals they are while our hapless heroes try their best to convince themselves to go through with this. Seth Gordon has done a great job with the pacing of the story and the little incidents throughout are both hilarious and – in many cases – feed back into the story as plot points.

OK, it’s a little predictable. As soon as you see the mobile phone being dropped (no, that’s not a huge spoiler) you just know where the story is going. But it’s not the end that’s important, it’s the journey getting there and this is a genuinely funny one. I wouldn’t say I laughed quite so much as with The Hangover, but it still got a large amount of giggles. We weren’t along, either, as it seemed the whole (fairly busy) cinema audience at our showing thoroughly enjoyed it.

Definitely worth watching for the laughs. And for putting Jennifer Aniston into the spank bank. Did I say “WOW”?

Captain America: The First Avenger

“And Hitler looks for trinkets in the desert.”

Plot-in-a-nutshell: Origin story of the superhero used by the US as a morale-booster during WWII

See it if you like: well, superhero films. Dur. Oh, yes, and mom. And apple pie. And kicking nazi ass.

The final “prequel” to next summer’s The Avengers hits the screens and it’s not bad. It’s certainly better than Thor which I thought was incredibly weak, but also not as good as the two Iron Man films, which lead the pack predominantly due to the excellent script and banter.

Most of the story is told back during WWII when the US is recruiting as it finally gets off it’s arse and realises it’s part of the “world”. Young men are queueing up to become cannon fodder, including one young Steve Rogers (Chris Evans – not the ginger twat who ruined Virgin Radio). Thing is, little Stevie is a wimp. Up for the fight, but physically a wreck.

Special effects are used to reduce the somewhat buff Evans to a 9 stone weakling, and they work surprisingly well. Except for one close-up sequence in a car with leading lady Hayley Atwell (who plays Agent Peggy Carter) where Rogers appears to be taller, shorter, nearer and further away from her all depending on the camera angle.

A fleeing Nazi scientist (aided by Tony Stark Sr., father of the modern-era Iron Man) imbues him with muscles, power and the likes and off he goes to start kicking nazis around (via a music hall tour to raise war bond sales). Of course, Hitler’s not good enough as a super villain, so we’re introduced to Johann Schmidt (a.k.a. The Red Skull, played by an as-usual excellent Hugo Weaving) who was the first human to be given the power serum and who didn’t come out of it quite so well.

Visually the film is stunning, although the animation of Cap jumping is reminiscent of the recent Spiderman films and a little jerky. The sets are fantastic and very much the kind of thing you’d expect from a film of the era in places. That is, not exactly an accurate depiction of the times, but a slightly comic-book version. Perfect.

There’s the usual moral message that you get from the Marvel comics (this one – “bullies are mean”), but mainly it’s a good spy/action/superhero film which introduces the character well.

To nitpick – I’m prepared to forgive the fact that Cap has a shield made from something called “Vibranium” that absorbs all vibrations. But if that’s the case, why does it make a ringing sound when it’s shot by a bullet?

Stay past the end credits and you’ll see a trailer for next summer’s picture as well.

Related articles

• Horrible Bosses review (vault9.net)
• Horrible Bosses – review (guardian.co.uk)
• Film Review: Horrible Bosses (filmophilia.com)
• Horrible Bosses – review (guardian.co.uk)
• ‘Horrible Bosses’ Review (screenrant.com)
• Horrible Bosses Review (ginosblog.com)
• Horrible Bosses (kymx.radio.com)
• TBTS Reviews: Horrible Bosses (thebrowntweedsociety.com)

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Horrible Bosses / Captain America

The Men Who Stare At Goats

Weird title, weird film. Apparently based on a weird book – which I actually remember seeing in the Popular Science section of Waterstone’s many years ago.

Plot-in-a-nutshell: a journalist with a failed marriage heads for Iraq to write a war story. On the way he encounters a retired soldier who claims to have been part of an elite psychic soldier outfit. And this is apparently based on a true story…

The main cast is astounding: George Clooney, Jeff Bridges, Ewan McGregor, Kevin Spacey… Robert Patrick is headlined, but he’s only in it for five minutes. They’re all damn good as well. McGregor managed to pull off a decent American accent without sounding stupid while Clooney pulls off stupid without looking… well, stupid.

This is a film about complete mentalists. It’s hard to tell where the line is drawn between docu-drama and complete fiction. I’d guess that the book is the same, partly as it just seems to far-fetched. Yet how unlikely is it that armies were throwing cash a potential psychic “weapons”?

There are laughs a-plenty, most of them quite dark. The fact that McGregor’s character ends up in a quest to become what the psi-ops regiment called a “Jedi” is not lost on the viewing public either.

Overall a good film that doesn’t outstay it’s modest running length.

Jennifer’s Body

The last decent female-based teen horror film was Ginger Snaps and that was released ages ago. Jennifer’s Body goes more down the “monster” than “werewolf” route but does it well with some great black humour. And two hot girls snogging.

Plot-in-a-nutshell: Town bike Jennifer turns from slut to blood-hungry psycho, requiring the blood of scared teens to survive. Her best friend is the only one to know her secret and she doesn’t like it.

When I saw the trailers I thought “rubbish – move on”. Then I saw some reviews, and not just from the likes of Baz Bamigboy and Jonathan Ross‘s far less talented sibling who will say anything is the “Best film of 2009″ if it gets them a free bag of popcorn. The schedule fitted in with my free time so I took a chance.

The film opens after the end of the main plotline with one of the characters putting us into the scene. The story then jumps to the beginning and is more or less linear from there except for a brief jump back to explain exactly what happened to Jennifer (Megan Fox). Fox, incidentally, is hot. Scorchy hot. I-would-give-a-limb hot. But credit must also go to co-star Amanda Seyfried who plays the frumpy best friend, Needy – “frumpy” in the sense that as soon as she takes off her glasses and shakes out her hair she’s also typically sexy.

Everything happens at a good pace with the characters not being too stereotypical. The gore isn’t over-the-top and the effects are good. What I liked most, other than the humour, is the way the two main characters act opposite each other and how Needy develops.

You can pretty much guess what happens, it’s the ending that’s fairly original. Although not a huge twist, it’s definitely well written.

Don’t avoid this film just because it has obvious eye candy in. Don’t get me wrong. Fox isn’t that great an actress, but her hotness is actually useful in this film. And you get to see her with her tongue down another hot chick’s throat. Admittedly this scene was made somewhat less erotic by one numpty in the cinema crying “YAY” in a dull monotone, resulting in a huge outburst of laughter and a smattering of applause.

Still, that’s a throwaway moment in the film in my opinion. The main reason to see it is Seyfried’s performance. And the poor jokes.

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• Review: The Men Who Stare At Goats (thejc.com)
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Film Saturday