Last Movies You Have Rented

[Critical]

Driving Lessons with Rupert Grint as a shy teen working as the personal assistant to an eccentric actress, Julie Walters. Laura Linney plays his mother. It was great fun just to see RG and JW work together NOT in the HP movies. "Coming of age" is always a label that makes me cringe because it hints at preciousness, but this movie avoided over-sentimentality.

[MiaT2]

The Tourist - Every bit as bad as the reviews said it was. Which is a shame really. Conceptually it had promise. Two gorgeous megastars in the lead roles. I saw what they were trying to accomplish but the execution failed miserably. Pacing maybe. Angelina gave a good try but it was hard to see under her 400 lbs of makeup they stuck her in. And Johnny Depp, one of the most handsome actors around, looked greasy, puffy and they had his character be too nebbishy from the outset. A waste of all the talent involved.

Tower Heist - The lower your expectations the better. Thankfully mine were pretty low so it was a moderately enjoyable event. I think Matthew Broderick had the best character in the film.

[waywyrd]

Just Go With It - Ugh, one day I'll just learn to not bother with Adam Sandler movies. There were a few laughs, but I found his character pretty unlikable and the movie about 30 minutes too long. Oh well.

We also watched Killer Elite, which I enjoyed. Assassin/espionage story featuring three of my favorite actors (DeNiro, Jason Statham, Clive Owen).

[Critical]

Just Go With It - Ugh, one day I'll just learn to not bother with Adam Sandler movies. There were a few laughs, but I found his character pretty unlikable and the movie about 30 minutes too long. Oh well.

I thought it was pretty bad too. I'm all for willing suspension of disbelief, but those two women having the hots for Adam Sandler? Sorry, but that's a bridge too far.

We also watched Killer Elite, which I enjoyed. Assassin/espionage story featuring three of my favorite actors (DeNiro, Jason Statham, Clive Owen).

Jason Statham is always a good idea! Some people have bedroom eyes - he has a bedroom voice! Oh, and Clive Owen and DeNiro are okay too!

[phat32]

Drive with Ryan Gosling. As far as I can tell, it's about a Canadian guy who drives fast cars and beats people with hammers. Sold!

[Critical]

Tonight I watched Tree of Life with a group of friends, all of us of above average intelligence and NONE of us who could ever really figure out what was going on. For about the first 30 minutes, we all sat there in silence, trying to concentrate on the movie. Once one person asked "Does anyone else know what's going on?" the tension was broken and we started to laughingly speculate on what the hell was happening. We never did come to a clear conclusion.

I will say that it was beautifully filmed. There was very little dialogue and what dialogue there was didn't actually say much. Now that I've seen it, I REALLY don't understand why it got an Oscar nomination, particularly for Best Director. I'm glad I saw it, but I'm glad I don't ever have to watch it again!

[Critical]

Footloose (2011) - I enjoyed it about as much as I thought I would. I have an affection for the original because it came out when I was in high school and a dancer. I thought the remake was good, but not great. It didn't break new ground of anything. I'd consider it an affectionate homage. The young cast was pretty good. I particularly thought Kenny Wormald and Julianne Hough were good, as was the actor who played Willard. Really Lori Singer from the original was never an actress - she got on Fame because of her musical ability - and I always thought she was pretty wooden and definitely not a great dancer. I was pleasantly surprised at how natural Julianne Hough was. I already knew she could dance. Obviously, Kenny Wormald was a better dancer than Kevin Bacon, but not quite the actor KB was.

The weakness in the movie, IMO, was the adults, particularly Ariel's parents. Sorry Dennis Quaid and Andie MacDowell, but you're no John Lithgow and you're definitely not Diane Wiest.

All in all, I'm glad I saw it, but it wasn't as good as the original. There was just something sweet (and, oh, original ) about the 1984 version.

[Critical]

I love it when I go into a movie not knowing much about it and not expecting much and it just completely surprises me. I just watched The Rebound with Catherine Zeta-Jones and Justin Bartha and really enjoyed it. It came out in 2009, but was just released on Netflix. If you saw Prime with Uma Thurman, this is a similar story - older woman, younger man - only I think it's much better. Prime sort of played things for laughs, but this film was just sweet and honest.

The supporting cast included Art Garfunkel, Joanna Gleeson, Lynn Whitfield and John Schneider, whose character goes out with CZ-J on a hilariously mortifying date.

Catherine Zeta-Jones plays a married woman who, in about the first 3 minutes of the film, finds out that her husband has cheated. She packs up her 2 kids and heads to NYC, where she ends up living above a coffeehouse where Justin Bartha's character works. He starts out watching her kids and the relationship develops from there. It wasn't over-the-top funny, but there were some moments when I laughed out loud. Was it the greatest movie ever made? No, but it was a nice little romantic comedy with likeable characters. Definitely

[Debb70]

We rented The Help and loved it. This movie really touched me, because when I was a small child in the 1960's (South) we had a black woman work in our home to keep house and take care of me and my brother. This movie really shows what happened to many of these women. I think the movie really teaches many lessons. It made me laugh and cry. I loved it.

It has no real sex scenes, some bad language that my mom did not appreciate, and no real on screen violence. IMO it's an adult movie.

[ClosetRTWatcher]

Drive - Before watching this I heard from different people that it was the best movie last year, and the worst movie, so I was curious! Overall I really did enjoy it. I putting some of my comments in spoilers to avoid giving anything away...
The pros: The filming was intriguing. It did an fantastic job using shadow and light, and using moments of silence to make a point. I also felt that even in the slow spots, there was a simmering undercurrent of tension that kept my interest.

The cons: I don't have an issue with hyper-violent movies, but this movie took it to the absurd. I actually laughed out loud at one point, which I do not this is what the filmmakers were going for. My other con is going in spoilers because I don't want to give anything away

Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides - I fell asleep and I don't really have any desire to go back and see what happened. What I saw was better than the third one, but was not even close to coming back to the fun of the first film.