Movie of the Week: Now You See Me

"An FBI agent and an Interpol detective track a team of illusionists who pull of bank heists during their performances and reward their audiences with money." IMDb

Ok, I love magic...especially card magic.  I've studied it for years, and have practiced for untold hours.  I like practical tricks with real decks and real sleight of hand.  Or, if it's stage magic, I like seeing it because you have an idea of how it's done, but you're not absolutely sure, and that's why it's great.  The movie The Prestige was the perfect representation of this.  That movie would get a 5 star rating from me all day long.

Then we have this piece of shit...

I'm gonna be brief here cause I really don't feel like spending all day telling you why this movie is terrible, why it fails as a working plot, and so on and so forth.  I just want make one gripe and then I'll shut up about it.  You can't show me how certain practical tricks are done, and make that part of your plot working things out cause it's all a big magic trick...and then in the same scene show me tricks that are completely and utterly impossible and are clearly just movie special effects.  "Oh look this rabbit was in the box the whole time cause, check out this mirror that made the box look empty!  Now I'm gonna turn the rabbit into a hat and float away in a cgi bubble."   Fuck you.

The only reason this is getting 2 stars out of me is because it had a good cast, and the movie was visually appealing.  However the rest of the movie I find pointless and frankly kind of insulting, especially given the ending.

Olympus Has Fallen Review

"Disgraced former Presidential guard Mike Banning finds himself trapped inside the White House in the wake of a terrorist attack; using his inside knowledge, Banning works with national security to rescue the President from his kidnappers." - imdb.com

The prequel to White House Down. Lawls. Ok, not an original joke, everyone has made that comparison but I honestly had them confused. I seriously thought it was going to be Channing Tatum guarding Morgan Freeman as president. When it began with Gerard Butler hanging out with Aaron Eckhart and Ashley Judd, I was confused for a second. And Morgan Freeman doesn't show up til a quarter of the way in.

 I'm Not In The Movie.

The movie opens with the fall of Gerard's character as he fails to save the first lady in a car accident. I thought it was going to be something more, like it was caused by something but I was wrong. Now he's a desk jockey, pushing pencils for some chick. And bam, the North Koreans attack. And Gerard runs in to save the day. Saving a little boy, then the president, and over all, the world from another war. Loads of bad guys and Secret Service guys die in the process.

"Can you read this list of Chuck Norris facts, Mr. Freeman?"

There is not a whole lot to say about this movie. Is it Die Hard in the White House. It's a little smarter than your average action flick but it goes back to its rated R roots. Showing lots of blood, a swearing up the wazoo. It has a few twists in it, and some conflicts end a tad different than you except. The acting is sub-par, no one really stands out or does anything new. Loud action, quite talking. I was a little annoyed that I had to keep adjusting the volume for deafening action scenes to whispers during the dialog parts. Turning on the captions because I can't hear the actor shouldn't happen. Over all I enjoyed it, it's worth a rental. You know what you are getting with this kind of movie and you shouldn't expect much more. Check it out.