August 2012 Movie Update

A few weeks on travel has afforded me the luxury of seeing a few movies either in my hotel rooms (thanks to my new Micca Slim-HD 1080p enclosure and L5 Universal Remote Control for iPhone (b/c the Micca remote blows chunks)) or at the theatre.  Some quick reviews:

Twilight: 2.5 Stars. Not bad for a sparkly-vampire epic.  True Blood is more fun.
Twilight 2: New Moon: 2.5 Stars. Ditto.
Twilight 3: Eclipse: 2.5 Stars. Ditto.
Twilight 4: Breaking Dawn Part 1: 0 Stars. One of the worst pieces of shit that has ever graced the silver screen.  MST3K worthy.
Captain America The First Avenger: 3 Stars. Fun story. Great cast and special effects. Nazis always make the best bad guys.  Looking forward to Winter Soldier/Bucky Barnes coming back in the sequel.
Thor: 2.5 Stars. Kind of ridiculous with an overreliance on special effects, but I liked it.
Scott Pilgrim vs. the World: 1 Star. I really wanted to like this movie, which is probably why I disliked it so much.  Excepting Michael Cera, I really liked the cast, especially the stunt casting of Chris Evans, Brandon Routh, Thomas Jane, and Jason Schwartzman. Even Mae Whitman, in a none-too-subtle shout out to Arrested Development was fun.  Beyond them, the entire flick was a colossal disappointment.  The story made no sense.  The effects were distracting rather than enhancing.  Maybe reading the source would help, but otherwise just...Ugh.  Hope I didn't lose too much geek cred there.
The Dark Knight Rises: 3.5 Stars. Being intimately familiar with the source material, the twists in the plots weren't terribly surprising to me, but overall this was an excellent superhero flick.  My only real complaint is the same one I had with V for Vendetta.  Don't cover a character's mouth with a mask.  It works great in a comic book, but horribly on the screen.  At the least, go with a Shadowman or Doctor-Doom-like mouth slit.
Moonrise Kingdom: 4 Stars. Freakin' masterpiece.  Wes Anderson is like Los Angeles.  People either love him or hate him.  I'm in the former camp, and this is just a wonderful, wonderful film.  I look forward to the inevitable Criterion Blu Ray release.
Magic Mike: 3 Stars. Really well-done film.  I'm starting to think Channing Tatum can act.  I've always known McConaughey can act (Contact and A Time to Kill had great performances, and his role on Eastbound and Down is fantastic), but it's nice to see him in a decent film for once.  Really want to catch him in Bernie and Killer Joe.
360: 2.5 Stars. Caught a preview of this on HDNet Movies.  Pretty good flick, if nothing exceptional.  Really enjoyed the ending.

Up next: nothing till I catch up on all the DVRed stuff during the Olympics, but Iron Sky is high on my list.