Alright dudes, I saw Titanic 3D in fake IMAX (IMAX "experience" at a local Regal chain) and it was amazing. I won't bother you with a full review of the movie. I mean, at this point, you either love it or hate it. I fucking love it, and with (almost) IMAX picture and sound quality, it was a true pleasure to revisit it in theaters. I hope they re-release this movie every 5-10 years because the only true way to experience it is on the big screen.
Next up is The Raid, an import from somewhere in Asia about a police squad raiding a high-rise that doubles as headquarters for a local drug kingpin, and well, shit hits the fan. That's pretty much the entire movie. It's premise is extremely simple, but its execution is anything but.
In the first 15 minutes or so, I was a little worried that this movie was over-hyped. It wasted no time in getting to 'the raid' as it were, very quickly establishing the good guys and bad guys ( quite effectively, by the way), but the first action sequence was blurry and hard to follow, making me think that there was nothing really special about this flick.
But then, I found myself having to actively try to keep my jaw from hitting the floor.
The chaotic nature of the first action sequence was intentional, and from then on, the camera stays put and lets the action play out in a way that most action films can only dream of. Fast, brutal, and moving at a break-neck pace, The Raid is an early qualifier for one of the best action films of the new decade.
Finally, that brings me to The Cabin in the Woods. Man, if there was ever a movie to see with an Alamo crowd, this is the one. Smart, clever, and fun as hell, Cabin was meant to be seen with an engaged audience. Unfortunately, only about 1/3 of the crowd I saw it with actually got what the movie was trying to do.
There has been a lot of talk about this movie, specifically that you shouldn't read anything about it and go in as blind as possible, and while I generally try to go into movies as spoiler-free as possible, I have to admit that I don't think it really matters too much here. I didn't know everything about it going in, but I knew the very general gist of what it was about, information that the movie gets out of the way in its opening scene by the way, and it in no way spoiled my enjoyment. There's really no 'twist' per se, though definitely some worthwhile surprises are littered throughout.
I'm not a huge horror fan by any means, I generally only dive into the genre in October (Poser, I know) but I think The Cabin in the Woods is an important revitalization for the genre, similar to what Scream did in 1996. The makers of Cabin delve much deeper than Scream in terms of why we love the genre so by dissecting it piece by piece, stereotype by stereotype. It all leads to a conclusion that only someone like Joss Whedon could come up with.
Self referential, funny, and genuinely exciting, even if you are barely a fan of horror, check The Cabin in the Woods out and try not to have even a little fun. I dare you.
I know this was a short one, and not particularly in-depth, but i got finals this week and next week which is stupid. However, upon completion of my last final a week from today, I will be seeing The Avengers. I absolutely promise to come back here and have something before the weeks end. So, until then, suck it.
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