Star Trek

Star Trek does not disappoint and I am jazzed I got to see it as a free screening with my friend Ric. The casting is superb and the plot is just great with amazing starship battles that I have been missing as a Star Trek fan. Each actor channels the traits of the original series cast that we have all come to know and love but make the characters their own. Kudos to J.J. Abrams, Robert Orci, and Alex Kurtzman! I can not wait to see the next film and oh boy will there be another in this refreshed and relaunched franchise.

Click here to check out the official website.

Ragtime @ The Kennedy Center's Eisenhower Theater

The only thing I knew about this musical was that it was done as a movie with James Cagney as one of his last film roles before he past away. I was surprised I knew a lot of the songs from the musical and the Kennedy Center's production was wonderfully staged. I recommend anyone who loves musical theater to check this out if they get the chance. Did I mention I loved my box seats?

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Dragonball Evolution

Director James Wong, from The X-Files and Final Destination, takes his chance to bring to life the anime favorite, Dragon Ball Z. I did not go into this film with high hopes but on the intrigue to see what they could do with the material if brought to life. I really enjoyed this film and it was a lot of fun and funny where it needed to be. Justin Chatwin stars as Goku and does bring along his acting chops to this role to keep it from being campy or forgettable. I remember Chatwin from The Invisible and was amazed then at the great perform he gave in that film as well.

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State of Play

My colleagues at the Watergate can finally go to the theater and see the film that they stood around in the freezing cold watching be made in from of our offices. DC is showcased very well in this film and the story is good too. The cast includes Russell Crowe, the cute Rachel McAdams, Ben Affleck and my favorite mature and still sexy actress, Helen Mirren from such fantastic films as Calendar Girls, Teaching Mrs. Tingle, The Cook The Thief The Wife & Her Lover, and Caligula. Russell Crowe is great as always and Ben Affleck is finally acting again. If you love DC and all the things that make it iconic on all levels, you will enjoy this film just like me.

Click here to check out the official trailer.

Crank: High Voltage

Chev Chelios, aka Jason Statham, is back for another round of over-the-top action and mayhem. This film picks up where the last one stopped as Chev was plunging to his death from a helicopter. But one large bounce and then a scrapping off of the road with a shovel and Chev is off and racing to retrieve a body part that was harvested by the Triads. The action is in the en vogue style of choppy cuts and shaky camera angles to simulate action. Thanks Ripley Scott for giving lazy directors ways to give us vertigo and motion sickness instead of truely well thought out action sequences.

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Royal Kill

Well it is strike two for me today and I just headed back home after watching this film that should never even made it to the discount rental rack at the local Blockbuster. You know this piece of celluloid waste has been setting around for awhile since one of its stars is Pat Morita who has been dead since 2005. How did this get wide release? The film has no real action at all, the plot is ridiculous and the ending is something that is completely ludicrous unless maybe you are a zealous sleeper agent for Al Qaeda. The Manchurian Candidate this is not and I can not think of any part of this film I enjoyed in any way and I love bad films.

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Observe and Report

Seth Rogen is back on the screen in this dark and disappointing film that is suppose to be a comedy but all of the comedy parts you see were already revealed in the trailer. I like Seth but this film is just bad and the insane ending is startling and just wrong. Anna Farris is a favorite of mine too but contributes nothing but cleavage and weird looking lips. This film should die out quickly after this opening weekend and you should not even waste your time seeing it. The Washington Post critic, who hates everything, was right about this stinker.

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Fast & Furious

Director Justin Lin is back for a second helping of cars, babes and bullets with his follow up to The Fast and the Furious: Tokyo Drift but this time he actually has the original cast back from the original film, The Fast and the Furious, to star and produce. Paul Walker, Vin Diesel, Jordan Brewster and Michelle Rodriguez are reunited and seek revenge, or justice, for the death of one of their own. The car stunts are cool and the action non-stop behind the wheel thanks to extensive CGI enhancement. The use of GPS CGI of the racers as they race is reminiscent of the Uwe Boll stunt to liven up The House of the Dead with a gunfight sequence edited with scenes from the actual video game - never cool and highlights the cartoonish effect of the scene! All in all a good sequel which highlights how cheesy the other two sequels really were.

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Forget Twilight and see Adventureland

Horror fans all know Twilight was lame and limp when it came to portend itself as a vampire movie with teenagers.  Give me Lost Boys any day.  I will admit the movie was much better than the novel because it got rid of that tweener internal monologue that only teenage girls seem to get or understand.  Issue could be I am in my late 30s and should not be reading such juvenile stories  and hope to be enthralled by a captivating story.  Damn you JK Rowling!  Stephanie Meyer is so not your contemporary regardless of book sales or those rabid fans at last year's San Diego Comicon.  Sorry Denise but it's true.

Enough of that.  What I want to say is Kristin Stewart has redeemed herself in my eyes with a great performance in Adventureland that gets wide release in theaters tomorrow.  Forget Bella and give me Em any day.  I know this is not a horror film but so what.  Its my blog and I can rant on it however I want.  Besides that it is a great film and reminds me of the John Hughes films from when I was in high school.  If you grew up in the 80s, listen to Sirius channel 8 with abandon, worked shitty summer jobs, and wanted to have, or either had, that great summer romance, you must see this.  It was a great flash back to my younger days and captured my budding hopes and fears at that time on being on my own and in the harsh world without a net. 

Lastly, the soundtrack music is killer with classic tunes of the era.  I will have to get this for my ipod and not the iphone.  I am a Storm man through and through.  My review of the film will be on www.michaelwproffitt.com soon and I hope I still have something to say in Five Sentences or Less. 
-- sent via Michael's Blackberry Storm

Adventureland

Superbad's director, Greg Mottola, is back with his latest coming of age story that is reminiscent of the John Hughes films of the 1980s but much better. The film is set in 1987 and stars Jesse Eisenberg and Kristen Stewart , from Cursed and Twilight, as two college students working at the local amusement park who meet prior to heading out to fend for themselves in the real world. Kristen Stewart's performance here eclipses the one from last year's bloodless vampire tweener drama and shows her as an actress that can deliver great subdued performances. The 80s feel is dead on, the music is great and should make for a fantastic soundtrack, and the story really sucks you in and takes us thirty something's back to a cherished time. A good movie from a great upcoming director that is worth seeing as soon as possible in the theater - you will not be disappointed.

Click here to check out the official website.