Moving On Up

So I mentioned a few hours ago that I had plans for the evening. You may be asking, "Just what plans did you have, anyway?" Well, my family and I went out to the movies to go see the latest Pixar flick, Up. And it's in 3D too, which is always fun. So just what did I think about the movie?

I really liked it. I can usually give or take Pixar movies, since I only like about half of them. But I thought Up was a whole lot of fun. I wouldn't call it Pixar's best movie, but the fact that it was actually able to make me laugh and become misty-eyed within just a few minutes says a lot for the movie's quality. I'm amazed at just how good Pixar is at being able to generate actual emotion from viewers like that. Most live-action movies can't even do that. So yeah, Pixar rules.

But yeah, back to Up. The movie is wholly entertaining from start to finish. I didn't leave feeling disappointed. And I can appreciate that they didn't treat the 3D like some kind of cheap gimmick, either. A lot of 3D movies would be content to just point stuff at the screen, but that's not in Up. The 3D actually gives it a certain depth that it might not have had in 2D. And on the whole, I'll totally give Up four stars. I can't recommend it enough. Go check it out, won't you?

Now all that's left is for me to tie a few thousand balloons to the roof of my house.

Happy Birthday To Me

Yep, today is my birthday. I'm 27 years old, as a matter of fact. It feels weird being three years from thirty, knowing that I'm at least five years behind where I probably should be at this point in my life. But I don't want to get all mopey thinking about that, not today. Today's a day to be in a good mood, right? Of course.

Though today probably won't be the most active or exciting birthday I've ever had, I do have some plans for later in the day. I'm sure I'll post about said plans after the fact, but as for now, I'll have to leave you guessing as to what they are.

No, I'm not going out for a night of wild debauchery, since I've already reached my monthly quota for hiding dead strippers. And I'm not quite sure how to make it to Tijuana, so that's out of the question. Just hold your horses, and you'll find out later tonight, I promise.

Can I Have The Awesome Metal Claws Too?

You might recall a few posts ago when I mentioned that I was working on a brand new review. And as of last night, it's finished and ready for the Sutton At The Movies faithful to read. This particular review: the recently released X-Men Origins: Wolverine.

The review tends to lean a wee bit towards the negative side, but as with all my reviews, your mileage may vary. Wolverine is one of those movies that I'm not going to fault people for liking, even if my review is mostly complaints. That is, unless you want to try and argue that BloodRayne or Alone in the Dark were good movies. Because if you did, I'd have to hit you. I'm pretty sure that's in the Constitution or the Geneva Conventions or something.

Watch Out, The Robots Are Coming!

There are some movie franchises from the '80s that I'm an absolute sucker for. One of these is the Terminator franchise. I grew up loving the Terminator movies; my worn-out VHS copy of T2 is proof enough of that. And while I was disappointed that Fox very recently cancelled the Terminator TV show after only its second season, at least I had Terminator: Salvation. I just got home from seeing it at the local theater, and I really enjoyed it.

A lot of that enjoyment came from all the little callbacks to the earlier movies. Whether it be a line of dialogue, or a certain prop, or a music cue, or even sometimes how a particular scene plays out, there's so many fun little nods to the prior movies that it almost becomes a game to see if you can point out what the references are. And with the exception of the "I'll be back" gag, none of them really seemed forced. It could have gone badly, perhaps into one of those "spot-the-reference" sequels that makes you feel like you should have just stayed at home and watched the other movies instead. But the movie avoids that, which is nice.

Aside from that, Terminator: Salvation is a really fun and exciting movie. McG's direction and the action scenes are both very well done, the acting (primarily from Christian Bale and Sam Worthington) is good, and the special effects are fantastic. I had a blast watching the movie, and I can't wait for the inevitable release of Terminator 5. But as for Terminator: Salvation, I'm totally giving it three and a half stars out of five. It's not perfect, but I still liked it.

And with all the references to the past Terminator movies in the movie, it's too bad they didn't make a Batman joke at Christian Bale's expense. Maybe on the DVD...

Prepping For Later

No, I haven't forgotten this poor blog. I'm still here, I promise. It's just that there's been nothing going on worth talking about this week. No movies I wanted to see came out, I didn't go anywhere of any real note, and I don't have a job or friends. So I've been stuck just sitting around this week. I have been putting in work on a new movie review, but I'm only about halfway through, so I'm not really in a position to discuss it at length. I prefer to wait until it's finished. I'm hoping I'll have it done in the next week or two, in time for my birthday.

Speaking of, my birthday actually is coming up soon. A little less than two weeks, as a matter of fact. It'll be number 27, which means I'll be only three years from being 30. Yeah, no kidding. Thirty years old. I still have a few years to hit that big milestone, but considering how much I've been slacking off for the last decade or so, I've got to put in quite a bit of work to get where I feel like I should be by then. I still need to find gainful employment, before moving into a place of my own. I'm hoping to take care of that first one in the next few months, and hopefully have the other one accomplished within a few years. Total self-reliance is what I'm aiming for, hopefully before we get too deep into the 2010s. But none of those things are going to happen overnight. They're going to take work on my end, otherwise they'll never get done. I'm just hoping they go by smoothly.

Anybody know where I can get a job doing nothing for decent wages? :)

Beam Me Up, Scotty

You've probably seen all the commercials for the Star Trek movie lately. And if you haven't, you've probably been watching the wrong TV shows. Anyway, as a Star Trek fan, I made a point of going out and seeing the movie this afternoon. And I really liked the movie a lot.

The movie stays really faithful to the original show from the '60s, but even on its own, it's a whole lot of fun. The acting is good, the effects are stellar, and it's a thoroughly entertaining, exciting movie. I'd definitely put it up there with the classic Trek movies like The Wrath of Khan, The Voyage Home, and First Contact. The new movie is that good. So on the usual star scale, I'd give it four and a half stars out of my typical five. And I might just have to see it again sometime.

Yay, An Unnecessary Prequel!

Wow, has it been so long since my last post? Shame on me. And here I was hoping to improve upon the span between posts. Anyway, I actually have some things to talk about.

Today was Free Comic Book Day, so my mom and I made a point of heading out early and partaking in the festivities at our usual comic book shop. Did you know that you could spend ninety bucks on comic books and still not get all the ones you wanted? Yeah. But I still came home with a pretty good haul, especially considering I managed to score quite a few books for less than two bucks a piece, plus the huge amount of free ones I landed.

After that, we picked up my dad and went to see X-Men Origins: Wolverine. And it was alright, I guess. It could have been better, but it could have been worse too. My problems with the movie can be summed up as such: quite a bit of the CGI looked lousy, the writing could have used work, and the whole movie just felt unnecessary. The whole thing could have been done as a five-minute flashback or soliloquy in X-Men 4, to tell you the truth. I will admit that that I liked Liev Schreiber, I thought Hugh Jackman was good, and Ryan Reynolds was funny. But other that... meh.

Like I said, the CGI needed some improvement. A lot of it looked like it didn't advance much farther past the workprint that was leaked online a while back. And as for the writing, not only does it put a negative dent in the mystique of the cinematic Wolverine, but it feels like the writers just threw whatever they could at the wall to see what would stick. Pointless appearances by Emma Frost and a teenage Cyclops? Replacing the traditional Deadpool with some kind of genetically-altered super-mutant? Whatever.

Honestly, I'd put the movie on about the same level as the Daredevil or Fantastic Four movies. It's not good, it's not bad, it's just adequate. The fight scenes aren't bad and the acting doesn't suck, but for the most part, it's unfortunately forgettable. There's so much room for improvement here. I'd probably give the movie a thumbs-in-the-middle with two and a half stars out of the typical five if I was pressured, but I'll probably have to see it a second time in order to get a more accurate feel of it.

And is it wrong to hope the movie rights for all the Marvel characters revert back to Marvel, just so they can be introduced into the shared cinematic universe that Iron Man and The Incredible Hulk have started building?