Reviews by johanlefourbe

When I heard about this movie, I have to admit it, I thought it sounded really daft but, surprisingly, the whole thing turned out to be really damned entertaining. Indeed, I thought it would be all right but it was actually much better than I thought it would be. Basically, it is actually a very original animated movie, really weird but in a good way, with some very funny parts. Since then, Chris Miller and Phil Lord have then become some major players in Hollywood thanks to the success of this movie, ’21 Jump Street’ and ‘The Lego Movie’ and while all these projects sounded really silly on paper, they didn’t chicken out, they completely went for it with some really impressive results. Here, they managed to make a fun and rather surrealist animated feature and, of course, the whole concept didn’t make any sense but who cares? Instead, you get some hilarious characters, some awesome jokes and one-liners and I actually enjoyed it even more after numerous re-watches. A couple of years later, of course, they came up with a sequel (without Miller and Lord on board) and even though they developed a nice new concept with these mutant food animals, this 2nd installment didn’t have much else to offer, I’m afraid. Anyway, I was a really fun animated feature and I think it is definitely worth a look, especially if you like the genre. 

I already saw this movie but since it was a while back and since I had it on DVD, I thought I might as well check it out again. Even though it did receive some really poor reviews, I thought it was not so bad. Indeed, the cast was pretty good (Anthony Hopkins, Benicio del Toro, Emily Blunt) and the sets and costumes were also quite gorgeous. However, the story didn't really work. Maybe it's because it took like an hour before del Toro finally became a werewolf, I don't know. Anyway, it turned out to be actually rather boring, especially the 2^nd time around I watched the damned thing and they didn’t add anything really new or interesting to the genre. Eventually, the main issue was that the damned thing was just too generic and predictable. I really wonder how the whole thing would have turned out if Mark Romanek didn't leave the project in the middle of the production. I mean, Joe Johnston is a decent director at best, no less but not much more than that, whereas Romanek is a really intriguing director. On the other hand, it seems that Mark Romanek is a rather difficult guy who keeps dropping out from high profile projects. Anyway, even though the whole thing was indeed rather underwhelming, I don't think it was as bad as everyone says but it could have been much better. 

When was the last time that Will Ferrell had a box-office hit? I think it was with ‘The Other Guys’ which was, by the way, seriously disappointing. Anyway, to be honest, I wasn’t expecting much from this movie but, somehow, I still ended up watching the damned thing. However, to my surprise, I thought it was actually not bad at all. Basically, at the end of the day, it all depends if you can stand Will Ferrell or not and I thought he could be quite funny back in those days. I mean, you basically get a joke every 10 seconds and obviously some jokes were really funny but some were really lame. Still, even though I think it was not bad, I was definitely not blown away by the whole thing but I guess I'm not a huge fan either of this kind of over-the-top humor. I mean, when a story deals only with moronic characters, after a while, it becomes rather tiresome and not really entertaining. Seriously, at some point, I was thinking that they all could go to Hell since I didn't care much about them. To conclude, it is an average movie with some funny moments but if you like this humor, it is definitely worth a look, especially if you are a die-hard Will Ferrell fan.

Obviously, I wasn’t expecting much from this flick but since Nick, my step-son really loved The Mummy franchise, I thought we might as well check it out. To be honest, I thought it was not bad, at least, better than I expected. Indeed, even though the Rock made his introduction in ‘The Mummy Returns’, he was in the movie for only maybe 10 minutes which was rather disappointing so I thought it was pretty cool idea to make a spin-off about this character. Eventually, Dwayne Johnson was actually pretty good in this flick but, unfortunately, pretty much everything else in this movie was seriously underwhelming. Above all, what bothered met the most was the fact that there was absolutely nothing really original about the damned thing. Eventually, as a result, even thought this movie had some potential, I was kind of bored by the whole thing. Concerning Dwayne Johnson, even though he seemed back then to be  just another wrestler trying to become actor, he actually managed to become one of the most successful action movie stars in the world. Anyway, coming back to our main feature, to conclude, even though it could have been a decent guilty pleasure, I’m afraid the whole thing was just too lazy and I don’t think it is really worth a look. 

Since I kept hearing some great things about this movie and since it was directed by Alfonso Curaon, easily one of the best directors at work nowadays, I was really eager to check this movie and I definitely had some rather high expectations. Well, eventually, I’m afraid the whole thing turned out to to be rather disappointing. I mean, sure, it was rather well done and the girl playing the main character was really cute but I really had a hard time to care about this tale. In fact, I didn’t know it was based on the very famous book of the same name and, even though it is a very popular tale, it always bored me (maybe I watched too much the Japanese cartoon ‘Princess Sara’ when I was a kid). Indeed, it is all really cheesy and full of clichés and since this adaptation was really faithful, I thought it was also rather tedious, I’m afraid. Eventually, as a follow-up, Cuaron would once again adapt a very famous book, ‘Great Expectations’, and even though it didn’t get much love when it was released, I actually enjoyed it more than this movie. Anyway, coming back to our main feature, even though I thought it was rather underwhelming, it was still a decent watch and it is definitely worth a look, especially if you are interested in Alfonso Curaon’s work. 

I already saw this movie, in fact, I even saw it in the movie theater when it was released, but since it was a while back and since it was available on Netflix, I thought I might as well check it out again. In fact, the first time around, I was actually rather disappointed by the damned thing. Obviously, I wasn't expecting a masterpiece but after reading Roger Ebert's review (the guy actually gave it a 4 stars review), I became really curious and I was expecting something very good. However, I seriously couldn’t see what was so great about it. Well, after all these years, with some much lower expectations, I was much more able to enjoy the damned thing. Indeed, it is actually a very well made action flick and I'm surprised that Philip Noyce never became a major action director but maybe the guy didn’t want to be pigeonholed into a specific genre. Furthermore, Angelina Jolie, probably the biggest female movie star at the time, was just so charismatic and gave such an intense performance. I still think that she could have used 5 or 6 extra kilos of muscles but she was still really good nonetheless. Indeed, even if the story was sometimes rather preposterous, she always sold it very well. Another thing that I enjoyed was the fact that, nowadays, too many blockbusters have a ridiculous running time around 150 mins which is so annoying and I really did appreciate that, back then, this action flick was lasting less than 100 mins which was perfect for this material. Eventually, since it was some perfect material for a franchise and since it was a box-office success, they made right away some plan for releasing a sequel but, after many years, it never happened and, to be honest, I’m not sure that anyone would really care at this point. Anyway, to conclude, even though it was nothing really ground-breaking, thanks to Angelina Jolie’s charisma and some really solid action scenes, it is actually worth a look.