Four Christmases

TJ Says...This is the new Vince Vaughn/Reese Witherspoon christmas joint. I was looking forward to this, as it fits my "Stuff blows up or makes me laugh" criteria to go see a movie. And anything with Vince Vaughn in it makes me laugh.

I thought this movie was good. I went with my wife and it ended up being a good date movie. I mean, as with any RoCo (romantic comedy) there are plenty of plot holes. Like their relationship is rock solid at the start of the day, and by visiting all 4 families for christmas, some how it all falls apart at the end. Really?

With that being said, I laughed plenty of times. There was plenty of new family humor in there, and there were several ladies laughing in the theather. As a matter of fact, Ms. John Madden was sitting next to us, giving a running commentary of what was happening on the screen. HIGHLY annoying.

TJ's review....Go see it. Lighthearted and funny. I enjoyed it. Just don't sit next to old ladies that like to talk to the screen.

Chad Says...Man I liked this movie A LOT more than TJ. This might be one of Vince Vaughn's best roles up there with Swingers. He was hilarious in this movie. I laughed out loud so many times to the point where Kiley started elbowing me. And Reese was great in this too. She's funny. Her reactions to some of the situations were wonderful.

I'm a fan of the uncomfortable situation comedy stuff ala Meet the Parents and this one fits snugly in that category. Robert Duval was awesome in this too. "I don't want to disrespect your mother on Christmas but that woman is nothing more than a common street whore." Genius.

This is a good all around movie. Not necessarily a date movie but the ladies will like it too.

Chad's Review...See this. Or rent it since it's taken me this long to write this review. My bad.

Transporter 3

TJ says...Transporter 3 is the most recent (I dare say final) of the Transporter series. Jason Statham driving cars and kicking people? I'm in.

I didn't anticipate too much going in, other than a good time and watching stuff and people get jacked up. This movie had plenty of that. However, there was a good 45-50 mins in the middle of the movie where there was just dialogue. WTF? Come on. It's Transporter, not Pride and Prejudice.

TJ's Review...WAY to much talkie, not enough blow S up. Go see it, because J.S. is a bad mofo, but be prepared for the talking. Boo.

Chad Says...Oy vey was this movie terrible. Jason Statham doesn't make great movies, he makes action movies that are great. This one is the exception to the rule. Annoyingly horrible acting that the action couldn't make up for.

Chad's Review...Don't get me wrong, I'll still go see Transporter 4.

Quantum of Solace

TJ Says...OK, not too excited about this movie. It looked good and based on Daniel Craig, I definately wanted to see it, just not too excited. I don't remember a lot of Casino Royale, but I do remember liking it (probably because it had a lot of poker)...so let's go see QoS.

Basically, James Bond cannot be hurt by mere mortal bad guys. The movie starts with a car chase, followed by a foot chase, then here comes a boat chase, then a nice air to air combat/dog fight and finally a fire fight (both literally and figuratively at the same time). At no time was Bond ever hurt more than the obilgatory cuts and scratches. He even opened his parachute about 100 ft above ground, did the tuck and roll, and was unharmed. Come on.

The story...eh...not too exciting. Fighting fake environmentalists to control "the most important resource in the world". Not too enticing. The fight/chase scenes were cool, I just didn't think the plot was all that great.

TJ's Review...Stuff blows up, a lot. And I was entertained for two hours...so I gotta say, go see it and it's worth the time. But I guess I'm not too pumped about giving it 2 thumbs up.

Chad Says...So apparently this movie has a story. A plot if you will. Which was weird to me b/c I don't remember one. What I do remember however was a LOT of action.

The story was confusing and lost me. I don't remember the movie before this but apparently if you do this one makes sense. I had actually watched the second half of the Casino Royale a bit before this came out and remember thinking - I don't recall any of this plot, just the action.

So at least they stuck with the theme on this one.

Chad's Review...Go see this if you like action but not if you like understanding what's happening in between all that glorious action.

My Own Worst Enemy

Chad Says...Very interesting. I haven't liked anything Christian Slater has done since Gleaming the Cube but just the concept of this had me. Action and spies pretty much does that every time. So the jist is, regular dude is also programed to be a super spy and people he works for can switch him back and forth. But he's switching back and forth on his own at random times unexpectedly. Delicious. I've been needing a good spy show since Alias went off the air. Correction, since the 3rd season of Alias when it should have gone off the air.

The show itself was very impressive. It must have been high budget b/c it looks great. The first episodes of shows are usually just setup the characters and start the story. You get to meet the spy side pretty well and a brief intro to the regular guy side but that was enough of a good start for me.

Christian Slater does seem to like himself a lot though. I bet there were times when they were filming this and he went, "Wait, hold on. I didn't get that eye squint just right. Let me do that again." As long as it isn't anywhere near as bad as Horatio on CSI Miami I can live with it. Seriously he turns to the side and poses in shots. Disgusting.

Chad's Review...I look forward to seeing more of this show. Added to my regular rotation.

Chad's Prediction...I think it'll get at least a season. NBC put so much production value into it they'll likely do whatever it takes to get a good audience. That didn't work for Studio 60 but we'll see what happens here.

TJ Says....This wasn't too intriquing for me. Christian Slater, I'm lukewarm about at best and I didn't know how they were going to pull off the story line. So my expectations we're very in the middle.

Throughout the episode I alternated between interested and bored. It was a little slow, but I think they were just setting up characters. But there was some interesting plot lines when Henry/Edward do or don't know about each other and how that all works out. I thought the acting was pretty good and I had not problems with that.

The guy from "Yes, Dear" that always wears a hat is in the show. Couple things, I've never seen him without a hat for more than 2 seconds on TV, and is this guy the best as the co-worker action star guy? Really?

TJ's review...I'm still in the middle. Not too excited, but I'll watch it again. It has some promise.

TJ's prediction...I think this show will make it an entire season, and then we'll go from there. Definately not a hit.

Kath and Kim

Chad Says...what a joke. Which is ironic since this show lacked any of those. I blame the awfulness of this show on one person. Selma Blair. Horrible. I chuckled a few times at Molly Shannon and her boyfriend - I love that guy, but I could not bear Selma. How she got cast in a comedy is beyond me.

The premise of the show is a daughter who got married is a selfish brat and leaves her new husband to move back in with her mom but she's turned the daughters room into a workout room. Meanwhile the mom is about to get engaged. So on a technicality this show is still labeled a "situational comedy" but it fails to produce laughs. The shots of the wedding video were funny and Molly Shannon's workout gear was amusing but after that I just stood there staring at the tv with my mouth open in shock that this show made it on the air.

Chad's Review...if they can go back in time and recast Selma Blair this show would be worth watching again. Unfortunately they'll have to figure out time travel on Fringe before this show can be saved. Oh well. Until that happens I'll just refer to this show as Kath and Krappy.

Chad's Prediction...I'll be surprised if this show makes is a full season. Because of the cast it'll get longer than it deserves though.

TJ Says...New "comedy" on NBC with Molly Shannon and Selma Blair. This looked promising. NBC needs to take CBS' approach and LOWER expectations.

This show was awful. I made it 13:52 before I quit watching out of boredom. I didn't laugh once.

TJ's Review...If you need help going to sleep, TiVO this and watch it before going to bed. Otherwise, avoid like the plague.

TJ's Prediction...This show can't make it longer than "Do Not Disturb". But it will...6 shows, then off to where it belongs, trash.

Eagle Eye

Chad Says...I have a drink idea for Starbucks. It's called a venti go see Eagle Eye. It's got a triple shot of slap yo face! Geez louise people. This movie was action packed. And it made me think of my dream job.

I want to wear a bone mic in my ear and have someone tell me what to do. No thinking. Just listening and doing. All the while the person on the other end is making all the dominoes fall into place so you make it from A to B in stride. Cool huh? That was this movie. With explosions. Lots of them.

Recently my mother said to me that she doesn't like watching movies with buildings blowing up. Ever since the Oklahoma City bombing she's felt this way. It's become an prerequisite for me to earn an A+ rating.

This movie had a little Matrix feel to it for a bit then a little War Games flavoring with some Die Harder on top. It also had a little Flight of the Navigator to it...but don't pay attention to the "how all this is happening", just enjoy the explosions! It also had a lot more actors that you know of in it. Nice little cast. Shia Labeouf is charming. And he fantastic at running away from things. Whether it be Decepticons or the police, he does it well. And yelling while running. Down, pat. In short I liked this movie. A lot. Action packed, good story, fine cast. And explosions. Lots and lots of explosions.

Chads Rating...Awesome. I put this up there with Wanted as one of the most recent movies that made me sweat while watching it on account of the massive amounts of action my brain was processing.

TJ Says...I had high expectations for this movie. It looked really good in the previews and an interesting story line. Someone controlling people just by accessing all the computers around them. Cool.

The moview was very action packed. Very fast paced. I wasn't bored at all and only looked at my watch once. I thought the actors all did well in their roles.

All that being said, isn't this just Enemy of the State II? Things I've noticed that Hollywood isn't a big fan of: #1. The Right. #2. Aritificial Intelligence. #3. Big Government (doesn't that go against #1?). Anyways...this movie villanizes all three of those.

The first half the movie was great, up until you learn who's pulling the strings, and then it gets pretty unbelieveable for me and I check out. It was still fast paced, but the "twist" didn't do it for me.

TJ's Review... It was worth seeing, just from an action standpoint. The story is a let down. But it was enjoyable. I give this a thumbs sideways.

Gary UnMarried

Chad Says...Another funny comedy on CBS? I feel like we're in some sort of bizarro world where up is down and down is up. This show has got something. I laughed quite a few times at it and enjoy CBS's new way of advertising shows. Shows lots of commercials of their shows but not really making you want to watch them. Almost as if to say, "You might not like it but hey, give it a shot." Then you go in with little expectations and end up liking what you see. Nice work CBS.

The writing in this show is funny. We'll see what kind of storylines they can come up with before I'd say it's good but it's certainly funny. The kids were really good in this show too. A show about a divorced guy with two kids who is dating could be aweful if the kids can't hold their own. I laughed at most everything they said.

Jay Mohr. I like this guy. He hosted Last Comic Standing way back when you only knew who he was thru Jerry McGuire and he was really funny. He held his own actually doing standup and I was pretty impressed (can't say the same for Bill Belamy). And his timing and delivery in this show as really good. I have nothing negative to say about this show. Everything was really well done. I hope it makes it.

Chad's Review...I'm in. It's solid. Not crazy funny but neither was my favorite show 30 Rock in it's pilot and look how far it's come.

Chad's Prediction...much worse has lasted way too long on CBS. It's not edgy enough for the older CBS crowd to not watch. I think it'll make it a season.

TJ Says...This is a new Jay Mohr comedy on CBS. Going in I had VERY low expectations. Mainly because I heard an interview of him on The Ticket and he was just an ass. No other way to really say it. He wasn't funny and wanted big laughs and ended up big timing the hosts. But hey, it's a new sitcom, so I'll watch it.

Basically, it's a new spin on a family sitcom. I use the term "family" highly loosely. The basics are that Mohr is just divorced and is starting a new relationship, and has two tweenagers. His Ex wife ends up **SPOILER** being engaged to their marriage therapist (Ed Begley Jr., who I'm quite intrigued by due to his over the top greenness). That relationship causes comedy.

The show exceeded my low expectations. It's not Worst Week, but it's not bad. There were a bunch of one liners in the show that I laughed at. I'm not certain I'll make it must see, but I'll probably check it out again.

TJ's Review....Not Bad, Not Great. There's been worse on TV that's made it longer (See According to Jim).

TJ's Prediction...It won't last the season, but may be a fill in show down the line for other failed shows.