In Theaters: January 2nd, 2015

CAN YOU BELIEVE I WROTE A POST ABOUT EVERY WIDE RELEASE IN 2014?

NOW ON TO 2015!

Before I begin I have a very important request for all my readers.  I want to know what you want to see in these posts.  So far I've done it my way, only guessing at what sort of information you want to read here (sometimes adding things I know you won't care about - just because I want to and it's my blog).  So if you could take just a moment of your time and write in the comments (here or on facebook) what you want to see, and what sort of things you want to read about that would be MUCH APPRECIATED.  Thank you.

Now back to our regularly scheduled program.

There is only ONE wide release.  The first weekend in January is commonly occupied by a cheap horror film.  So it is this time.

The Woman in Black 2: Angel of Death

The first Woman in Black was actually not bad at all.  In fact, I enjoyed it.  It was a more traditional horror movie, favoring suspense and tension over jump scares and violence.

I believe the only returning people who were also involved in the first one are the producers, and that means this movie could easily be terrible.  Furthermore, there is no star power.  All in all it feels to me more like a direct to video effort than a full theatrical release.

The Woman in Black 2: Angel of Death is rated PG-13 for some disturbing and frightening images, and for thematic elements.

So at least it seems like they're sticking with the less gory and more suspenseful approach - truly a superior recipe for horror if made right.  Maybe it won't be awful!

      Big Shot Critic

In Theaters: December 26th, 2014

There are FOUR wide releases this week and they were all released on Christmas Day.

Big Eyes (Thursday Release)

You can definitely file this under "snuck past my radar."  I must have taken one look at the poster and the talent and assumed it was an independent movie.  I never heard about it in the news.  Evidently it's a Tim Burton movie.

I knew nothing about this movie until two minutes ago when I finished the trailer.  Amy Adams plays a painter in the 60's or so who marries Christoph Waltz' character.  She paints the portraits - all with big eyes - and they are sold under his name, "because people won't buy lady art!"  Eventually I guess Amy Adams' character gets tired of it and stuff gets a little crazy.  Why not?

I'll tell you why not.  Because that does not sound like something I want to watch for two hours.  Even if it is based on a true story.

Big Eyes is rated PG-13 for thematic elements and brief strong language.

The Gambler (Thursday Release)

Or the alternate title: "The only reason we know Rupert Wyatt isn't dead."

I don't know what else to say except it's a movie about a gambler who gets in deep.  And Mark Wahlberg plays the gambler.  Done!

The Gambler is rated R for language throughout, and for some sexuality/nudity.

Into The Woods (Thursday Release)

I don't like Meryl Streep and I don't like Anna Kendrick.  I have no interest in this movie.  Except maybe Emily Blunt.

Into The Woods is basically Shrek before Shrek existed.  It's a stage musical that is a mash up of many well known fairy tales.

Rob Marshall is a somewhat notable director though.

Into The Woods is rated PG for thematic elements, fantasy action and peril, and some suggestive material.

Unbroken (Thursday Release)

Finally a movie coming out this Christmas that doesn't look awful!

Director Angelina Jolie brings us the true story of a man who was punched in the face many times in a row, Louis Zamperini.  But more than that, he was also an olympic athlete, survivor of a plane crash in the ocean, and survivor of a Japanese POW camp during World War II.

My only concern for this movie is that true stories can be tricky.  Especially in a story like this where there are three majorly impressive events it can be hard to tie them all together thematically and with good coherence.  On top of that Angelina Jolie is still unproven as a director.  The cinematography and costume design look great though.

Unbroken is rated PG-13 for war violence including intense sequences of brutality (see two paragraphs above), and for brief language.

      Big Shot Critic

In Theaters: December 19th, 2014

There are THREE wide releases this weekend.  And I'm on vacation so I might make this really short.

Annie

It's a hard knock life.  For us who don't want Annie remakes.

I shouldn't be too hard on it, this movie actually looks enjoyable to me.  But be warned: if it's really important to you that Annie has red hair you will be disappointed.  She's black this time, so it's curly but not even close to red.

Annie is rated PG for some mild language and rude humor.

The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies (Wednesday Release)

I'm all about these Hobbit movies.  Sure, they're not as good as The Lord of the Rings movies, but they're so much fun!

Go see it, it should be good.  But don't take it too seriously.  Taking things to seriously leads to fear, and fear leads to anger - anger leads to hate - and hate leads to suffering.

The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies is rated PG-13 for extended sequences of intense fantasy action violence, and frightening images.

Night at the Museum: Secret of the Tomb

I liked the first one (enough to buy it) and I didn't see the second one (because it looked stupid).  I have very low expectations for this movie that will likely never be met or exceeded because I will probably never see it.  If I had to guess I would say all the funniest parts are featured in the trailer - and they aren't that funny.

I would skip this one.  You could do a whole lot worse, but you could also do better.  If you're looking for a family movie this weekend I would go to Annie.  Just don't go to a theater that is screening The Interview.  You might get nuked by North Korea.

Night at the Museum: Secret of the Tomb is rated PG for mild action, some rude humor and brief language.

      Big Shot Critic

In Theaters: December 12th, 2014

There are TWO wide releases this weekend.

Exodus: Gods and Kings

Ridley Scott is at it again.

This year we've already had one major motion picture based on an Old Testament story.  And it was a disaster.  I have to wonder if that will have an impact on this movie.  I remind my readers that in 2010 we saw one of the worst westerns ever made (Jonah Hex) followed later that year by one of the best (True Grit).  So it may be with Exodus.  Personally, I feel this is kind of unpredictable.  There is certainly a large collection of serious talent here, but if you don't think Ridley Scott can mess that up you forgot about The Counselor.  Early reviews are split down the middle.  Some say it's Scott's best film since Gladiator.

It relieves us to hear that Ridley Scott has taken a much more *faithful* approach to the material than Aronofsky did with Noah earlier this year.  From what I gather Moses is portrayed in "the grey area between mad man and prophet" but the plagues do happen in the movie.  And the Red Sea and everything.  Pretty sure that answers that question.  And he does not, at any point in the movie, try to kill any babies (I'm talking to you, Darren Aronofsky!).

All the reviews say that Batman and that dude from the Gatsby movie are great as Charlton Heston and Yul Brynner, respectively.

Exodus: Gods and Kings is rated PG-13 for violence including battle sequences and intense images.

Top Five

I just watched the trailer for this movie and I still have no idea what it's about.  I'll try my best to explain anyway.

Written and directed by Chris Rock, this movie stars Chris Rock as a comedian turned actor who isn't funny anymore and people want to know why.  So, except for the part about people wanting to know why, and the part where he was funny in the first place, this movie is about Chris Rock.

Top Five is rated R for strong sexual content, nudity, crude humor, language throughout and some drug use.  Don't see this movie.

      Big Shot Critic

Editorial: Spectre, James Bond, and My Favorite Movie

Bond 24 is officially titled "Spectre" and we are all very excited about that around here.  My relationship with the Daniel Craig Bond films is a special one.  When I began paying serious attention to movie news the casting of Daniel Craig as James Bond was one of the first major news stories.

I remember being a junior in high school in the Spring of 2006.  During Physics class we could sometimes use the computers for whatever we wanted after we were done using them for certain tasks assigned by the teacher.  I took the time to show my classmates the following promotional photo.

It was big news at the time.  Especially for my age group.  The last time a new James Bond was announced there really wasn't an internet to report about it.  It was all in print.  And my classmates and I would have been between four and six years old.

Although there were very mixed (mostly negative) opinions around the world of a blonde actor playing James Bond, I was very much in favor of Daniel Craig.  I also took the time to learn things like the fact that Casino Royale was based on the very first James Bond novel, and therefore should have - at the very least - excellent source material.  I knew the prior Bonds had gone a bit wrong after GoldenEye, and I knew they were rebooting it.  In short, I had faith.

The prior year (2005) I had had my first truly bad experience at the movie theater.  I expected Sahara to be a great adventure movie along the lines of Raiders of the Lost Ark or (to a lesser degree) 1999's The Mummy.  Even though the movie wasn't that bad I really didn't like it because my expectations were so high.  I knew that my expectations for Casino Royale were very high and I knew the risk I was taking, but I decided that if it didn't at least meet my high expectations then it didn't deserve to be enjoyed.  By me.  I'm not full of myself or anything.

Anyway the movie finally came out in my senior year and I went and saw it and it basically changed my life.  Slowly but surely.  First I just loved it and thought it was really great.  It exceeded my expectations.  Then the more it sunk in the more I realized that this one movie represented everything I love about movies.  Eventually I decided it actually was my new favorite movie (beating out the life-long incumbent - Return of the Jedi)

the force is strong with this one

To make a long story short, while neither Quantum of Solace nor Skyfall are as good as Casino Royale in my opinion, I love Daniel Craig as James Bond so much that my love carries over very much into his other Bond films.  Despite the fact that I would have had no particular love for Quantum of Solace or Skyfall had it not been for Casino Royale.

And now there is another one coming out next year.  SPECTRE.  For the uninitiated, Spectre is an evil organization that has butted heads with James Bond more than once (and in more than one movie) in the past.  It's been at least thirty years since a Bond film has featured Spectre.  But most of the reason I am excited for Spectre is everything I have written above.  I love Daniel Craig as Bond.  Casino Royale is my favorite movie.  

Let's take a brief look at who is involved in Spectre.

• SAM MENDES returns to direct.  This is good and bad to me.  Good because Skyfall was technically beautiful and very successful, bad because he has a theater background and that was manifest in a lack of action.
• John Logan/Neal Purvis/Robert Wade return to write (sort of).  Last time Neal and Robert wrote it then John did a once over.  This time John wrote it and Neal and Robert did a once over.  This I like because John is the very thematic one and Neal and Robert are the more experienced action writers.
• Daniel Craig, Naomie Harris, Ralph Fiennes, Ben Wishaw, and Rory Kinnear return as James Bond, Eve Moneypenny, M, Q, and Tanner, respectively.  They all did great before.
• Noted newcomers are Andrew Scott (Moriarty from the BBC's Sherlock), Christoph Waltz, and Dave Bautista (Drax the Destroyer from Guardians of the Galaxy).  I like all three actors.
• The Bond girls are Monica Bellucci and Léa Seydoux.  We have no opinion on them.

If you don't know why Andrew Scott is of interest, watch the BBC's Sherlock.  If you don't know why Christoph Waltz is of interest, you're probably normal.  It's because he's a very talented actor.  And there are rumors that he will be playing Blofeld, the mastermind at the head of Spectre.  If you don't know why Dave Bautista is of interest go see Guardians of the Galaxy.  His character is an alien in that movie so it wouldn't really translate directly into the Bond universe, but his career is interesting because he's not an actor originally.  He's an MMA fighter who got the role in Guardians for his physique.  Besides that he's a really kind and sweet guy in real life.

As for the Bond girls, Monica Bellucci has been around for a while.  Although the only film I can think of off hand is Shoot 'Em Up.  I guess she's kind of B list.  Léa Seydoux is hot off the critical success of a recent foreign film called Blue is the Warmest Color.  She's one of the leads and it's about lesbians.  It looks like a VERY inappropriate movie.  We like that she's coming into the realm of "real" movies.  Real movies tend to be more appropriate than independent movies because they are for the masses, not for the critics.

Another indicator of good things is that Bond 24 and Bond 25 were planned as two parts of the same story (in this era of franchises the pressure to serialize is immense) but it was later announced that that idea was scrapped.  In other words, there is a God.  The Bond franchise has many strong traditions, and NOT being serialized is one of those traditions.

All in all Spectre will place Daniel Craig in a tie with Pierce Brosnan for third place for number of Bond films made.  Mr. Craig's original contract didn't even cover four films but it had the option for up to four films.  Is this his last one?  Is he too old now?  The answer to those questions will only come from himself, Barbara Broccoli, and Michael G. Wilson.  The important takeaway here is that this could be his last - it's possible.  I have a feeling it won't be, but it could be.

In the meantime we will all look forward to November 6th, 2015 and the release of SPECTRE.


      Big Shot Critic

In Theaters: November 28th, 2014

There are TWO wide releases this weekend . . . and because it's a Holiday weekend they are actually BOTH coming out on Wednesday.  So the title should actually read "In Theaters: November 26th, 2014."  But we don't care enough to change it.

Horrible Bosses 2 (Wednesday Release)

I was living under a rock when the first Horrible Bosses came out so I had to watch the trailers for both of them to know what I was talking about.  I just did that.

This one is a comedy about three entrepreneurs who get themselves into financial trouble when they invest half a million dollars to fill an order and the order is then cancelled.  In the previous film they resorted to murder to solve their problems so expect similar ideas for solutions to float around in this one.

Writer/director Sean Anders is known for a variety of other raunchy R-rated comedies - with the notable exception of the first Horrible Bosses.  So even if you liked the first one, proceed with caution.

Horrible Bosses 2 is rated R for strong crude sexual content and language throughout.

Penguins of Madagascar (Wednesday Release)

I have never seen a Madagascar movie all the way through.  I'm pretty confident there are three of them . . . checking . . . okay yes there are three of them and I've never seen one.  But from the parts I have seen these penguin characters are the funniest and most interesting characters to watch.  For some reason I am completely willing to believe this movie would be pretty enjoyable!

Benedict Cumberbatch is in it, for all you Benny Batch fanatics.

It will be far more family friendly than Horrible Bosses 2 anyway, that's for sure.  I think it looks good.  Maybe I'll sneak off to the movies this weekend and see it.

Penguins of Madagascar is rated PG for mild action and some rude humor.

UPDATE: Last weekend I actually did sneak off to see Mockingjay and I liked it!

      Big Shot Critic

In Theaters: November 21st, 2014

There is only ONE wide release this weekend - but I wouldn't be surprised if it made a billion dollars worldwide in its theatrical run.  No joke.

The Hunger Games: Mockingjay - Part 1

For those of you who don't know what this is all about (read: for those of you who were born on Mars) The Hunger Games is a trilogy of books that were (are) wildly popular YA novels.  The first one was adapted and released in March 2012 as a feature film starring (then fairly unknown) Jennifer Lawrence.  Fans loved her.  Critics loved her.  It worked out.

Anyway the second movie came out a year ago (to even more success) and now it's time for round three.  Er . . . you know, part one of round three.  Because for some reason it's basically a rule now that if you're adapting the last book in a popular franchise you split it into two movies (Peter Jackson misunderstood this memo and accidentally made three Hobbit movies - oops).

Catching Fire, the second Hunger Games movie, very nearly made one billion dollars worldwide.  Less than twenty movies have ever done that.  Suffice it to say that expectations are justifiably high for this movie!  I myself might just sneak over to the movie theater this weekend.

It almost goes without saying, but there is another reason to see this movie.  Her name is Jennifer Lawrence.

She's a babe.  I rest my case.

The Hunger Games: Mockingjay - Part 1 is rated PG-13 for intense sequences of violence and action, some disturbing images and thematic material

      Big Shot Critic

In Theaters: November 14th, 2014

There are TWO wide releases this weekend.

Beyond the Lights

The main character is a singer who becomes a pop star and struggles through the expectations placed on her by her manager and her fans.  Because, you know, having enormous amounts of money is obviously very difficult.  It gets to the point where she attempts suicide but is saved by a police officer.  They fall in love.  Surprised?  Neither are we.  But then he has trouble understanding how to fit into her world and what he can do to help her through it all.

So, basically, it's a movie about serious emotional issues and serious communication issues.  How dramatic!

I was poking around for something to make fun of about this movie and I found a couple things.  I love that all the promotional material says "from the writer and director of Love & Basketball."  It might just as well say "from the writer and director of another movie that nobody cares about."  Also, the main character is played by a woman called Gugu Mbatha-Raw.  I'm not 100% sure, but I believe she was named after a villain from a cartoon show in the 80's.

Beyond the Lights is rated PG-13 for sexual content including suggestive gestures, partial nudity, language and thematic elements.

Dumb and Dumber To

If I tell you people have been waiting a long time for Interstellar (as I did last week) then I'm not sure what I can tell you about this.  It's been twenty years since the original.

I recommend we completely ignore 2003's Dumb and Dumberer: When Harry Met Lloyd.  Other than this paragraph we will do so.

For those of you who don't know (nobody) Dumb & Dumber came out in 1994 and it was simply about two idiots making their way through life.  It was pretty funny.  When I say "pretty funny" I mean one out of every two guys you ask to list their favorite comedies will mention Dumb & Dumber.  Can they do it again?  Maybe.  The only twenty-years-later sequel with the original creative team that I can think of off-hand was . . .

. . . not well loved.  People hated it.  A lot.

I say Dumb and Dumber To could work.  Anyway they get bonus points for their posters that parody the Lucy poster from earlier this year.

Lucy poster

one of the Dumb and Dumber To parody posters

Dumb and Dumber To is rated PG-13 for crude and sexual humor, partial nudity, and some drug references.

      Big Shot Critic

In Theaters: November 7th, 2014

There are only TWO wide releases this weekend.  Sorry I'm late!

Big Hero 6

This one is a little interesting.  Big Hero 6 is a Marvel property but it is not in the same Marvel universe as the Avengers and Spider-Man and all those guys.  I believe it was just a one off thing.

This is from the same team as Tangled, Wreck-It Ralph, and Frozen.  So that's good.

Other than that the early reviews are in and are generally positive!  They say it's solid.

Big Hero 6 is rated PG for action and peril, some rude humor, and thematic elements.

Interstellar

Christopher Nolan's latest.   A lot of people have been waiting a long time for this one.  Including me!

Basically there's some kind of problem with Earth that we can't fix so we send, like, five people into space . . . for some reason.  The trailers never say it outright, but it is generally believed that they go to space to find a new home for humanity.  Maybe the rest of us are packed away in a suitcase on board, I don't know.

This is the first time since July 11th that EVERY release is one that I would personally want to see!  Cool.

Interstellar is rated PG-13 for some intense perilous action and brief strong language.

      Big Shot Critic

In Theaters: October 31st, 2014

There are THREE wide releases this weekend.

Before I Go To Sleep

This is a psychological thriller about a woman with a memory problem.  She retains memories until waking up the next morning.  Then she remembers nothing.  The trailer seems to be trying to sell it with some horror elements, but I think that's just because it's coming out on Halloween.  Either that or the film unwisely degenerates into random horror nonsense - not entirely unlikely for inexperienced director Rowan Joffe.

As a side note, it seems like it's been forever since Nicole Kidman had a starring role.

Before I Go To Sleep is rated R for some brutal violence and language.

Nightcrawler

Oscar bait.

Jake Gyllenhaal plays a man desperate for work who finds his way into crime journalism.  But he sort of blurs the line between reporting the crimes and being involved in the crimes.  It looks kinda weird to me.  But I almost don't care at all, because this writer/director also wrote Freejack.  If you haven't seen Freejack you should.

Nightcrawler is rated R for violence including graphic images, and for language.

Saw 10th Anniversary

All the posters are gross, so nevermind.

It's a dumb horror movie.  Ten years later - still dumb.

Saw is rated R for strong grisly violence and language.

      Big Shot Critic

Editorial: The Fast and the Furious

The Fast & Furious franchise is really a great work of art.  You just don't know it yet.  I really do love these movies!

It started in an era before the franchise was king.  Trilogies were definitely a thing back in 2001, when The Fast and the Furious was released.  But usually you stopped after three.  The only franchises that went beyond that had been around for a really long time, like James Bond, Star Wars, and Star Trek.  Those franchises only had nineteen, four, and nine movies respectively in 2001 (now they have twenty-three, six, and twelve respectively - plus one more on the way for each).  The sick thing is I didn't even have to look any of that up.  Okay!  I'll stop showing off.

I'm not sure when it became okay to just keep making movies.  There were franchises that tried, but ultimately got rebooted (X-Men and Spider-Man).  Maybe Indiana Jones was the first new one to do it.  Maybe Pirates (that fourth one was in development FOREVER).  In any case Fast & Furious was the first franchise to truly break the three film barrier in ten years.  But I feel like Star Wars doesn't even count, and this is my blog, so I'm gonna say thirty-three years instead (since Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home).  And the best part about this franchise doing it?  It was never meant to be a franchise.

Remember when Iron Man came out?  Superhero movies were in a major slouch and nobody expected it to be anything special.  Remember when Taken came out?  Word of mouth made that movie.  How about the first Pirates of the Caribbean?  Nobody knew that was going to be any good.  These are called sleeper hits.  The Fast and the Furious was a sleeper hit.  And it made Vin Diesel and Paul Walker famous.

You might say a sequel is inevitable when a movie does well, but people know that sequels to sleeper hits sometimes don't have the magic of the original (just ask Pirates or Taken).  So Vin Diesel didn't take part in 2 Fast 2 Furious in 2003, but Tyrese Gibson and Ludacris joined in, and it wasn't half bad.  It didn't do as well as the first, but producer Neal Moritz was ready for round three!

Destiny intervened.  Justin Lin was hired.  He would go on to direct the third, fourth, fifth, and sixth installments, turning down the seventh because of a schedule he believed was too . . . FAST AND FURIOUS I had to say it!  I apologize.  But really, he turned down Fast & Furious 7 because he didn't think he could do his best work in such a tight schedule.  Ironically, the film will be coming out almost a full year after the originally planned release date (for very tragic reasons).

So anyway they came out with The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift in 2006 AND it's one of my personal favorites.  They couldn't afford to bring on Paul Walker or Vin Diesel for major roles, but Vin Diesel does have a cameo.  Supposedly he wasn't payed for it, but instead took ownership of the rights to his Riddick character from Universal.  That would make sense.  He had enough clout to pull something like that, and it is a well-documented fact that he loves the character of Riddick.

Anyway, thus far in the franchise the events of one movie hadn't really affected the stories of any other, so 2009's Fast & Furious was a new direction.  It also featured the brilliant tagline:

"New Model.  Original Parts."

It was the first sequel to bring back all four main characters from the first movie.  Get it?  New Model?  Original Parts?  Fast & Furious was pretty good, and it was the first to very clearly set up for a sequel.  Without any spoilers I will say I was surprised the first time I saw this one.

Fast & Furious wasn't a runaway success by any means, but they made enough to keep going.  The franchise was - as some terribly punny critics pointed out - "running out of gas" at this point.

I was genuinely surprised when I found out they were making a fifth one.  Fast Five came out in 2011.  And, I kid you not, it rocked everyone's socks off.  It was the first in the franchise to receive a "fresh" rating from Rotten Tomatoes.  Do you have any idea how rare that is?  For the fifth movie in a franchise to be the critical favorite?  I'll tell you how rare, it's NEVER HAPPENED before or since.  It was kind of a huge surprise to everyone.  It was like a sleeper mega hit.

Marvel's The Avengers claims to be the first movie to bring characters in from their own individual movies and have them team up in the same movie.  In a lot of ways that's true, but Fast Five came out a year before and featured almost every major character from all four previous movies.  It's a great movie.  Seriously.  It's great.

After Fast Five people couldn't wait for the next one.  And even though it didn't get quite as high a rating on Rotten Tomatoes as Fast Five did, Fast & Furious 6 did not disappoint when it hit theaters last year in 2013.  I maintain that it was the most fun you could have had at the movies in 2013.

So why do I love these movies?  What's so special about them?  When they started, franchises were not such a big deal but now franchises are king.  Every Studio wants franchises.  Why do you think DreamWorks released Need for Speed earlier this year?  They wanted their own Fast & Furious type franchise!

The hilarious thing is that all prospective franchises are master-planned from the beginning nowadays, like the MCU (Marvel Cinematic Universe - the first successful, master-planned franchise).  The Fast & Furious franchise is ANYTHING BUT master-planned!  It's so easy to tell they had no idea what they were doing early on and it's hilarious to me!  If you only knew how jealously all these studios guard their franchises.  And Universal practically has one by accident, it's great.  Just take a look at the titles of these movies.  In order:

The Fast and the Furious

2 Fast 2 Furious

The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift

Fast & Furious

Fast Five

Fast & Furious 6

Does that sound like a master plan to you??  I love it!  And that's not even mentioning the fact that, chronologically, Tokyo Drift comes last - for a very simple reason that I cannot explain without spoilers.

What's more, in an era when so many movies take themselves so seriously (I'm talking to you, Man of Steel), it's so refreshing to have one franchise that is kind of running around like a chicken with its head cut off.  How can you not love that?  We need a franchise like this that will stand up and say, "I don't care what the critics think, I want real people to enjoy this!"  We need movies that can counterbalance the seriousness of Nolan and the Nolanettes (I'm talking to you, Man of Steel).  We need fun movies.  We need Fast & Furious movies.  They lead that charge in a big way.

* * *

For those of you who don't know, Fast & Furious 7 is to be released on April 10th, 2015.  They say Paul Walker's character does not die, he retires.

Interesting side note: I ordered the six-disc blu-ray set of all of them while I was in the middle of this post.  Less than $50 on Amazon!

      Big Shot Critic

In Theaters: October 24th, 2014

There are THREE wide releases this weekend.

23 Blast

A high school football player goes blind and the coach wants him to play anyway.  Based on a true story.  It's one of those inspirational dramas.  It is the directorial debut of Dr. Connors.  I mean, Dylan Baker, the guy who plays Dr. Connors in Spider-Man 2.  Not a lot to say about this one.

23 Blast is rated PG-13 for some teen drinking.

John Wick

I kinda sorta had no idea this was going to be a wide release.  It just looks smaller than that.  And it hasn't really been in the news.  But never fear.  I just watched the trailer so now I am qualified to pass judgment!

John Wick is a retired assassin.  He comes out of retirement for revenge when a group of thugs (ready for this?) kill his dog and steal his car.  Yep.  They didn't murder his family, they didn't steal his fortune, they killed his dog and stole his car.  And beat him up, to be fair I should mention that too.

It was written by Derek Kolstad, which means nothing to me, but this is his picture on IMDb.  I think it's worth pointing out.

an action writer if ever I saw one

I poke fun, but he's a dad who has fun with his kid!  How can you not want to support that?

However, this film was directed by two stuntmen who have never directed anything before.  Yikes.  And (surprise!) one of them was Keanu Reeves' stunt double in The Matrix.

John Wick is rated R for strong and bloody violence throughout, language and brief drug use.

Ouija

I will never know how or why something spelled, "ouija" is pronounced, "weejee," but it is.

I don't do ouija boards.  And I don't do movies about ouija boards.  No gracias.

Anyway it's just another horror movie.  And I don't do those much either.  Some kids find a ouija board and try to use it to talk to a dead friend of theirs.  And then stuff gets all haunted.  You know.

Ouija is rated PG-13 for disturbing violent content, frightening horror images, and thematic material.

      Big Shot Critic