Jean-Paul’s Rating: 4/5 stars

Bottom Line: An emotional and devastating look at living with Early-onset Alzheimer’s Disease.  Well acted and well paced.  Sometimes a little over the top with the emotional manipulation.

I can think of nothing more terrifying than slowly disappearing into your own mind; finding moments of clarity becoming fewer and fewer; knowing in those moments of clarity that you are just becoming more and more of a burden on those that love you; not remembering from one moment of clarity to the next that you’ve come to the same conclusion many times already.  Such is how I imagine living with Alzheimer’s Disease would be.  Such is the story of “Still Alice”.

Julianne Moore turns in a devastatingly good performance as the eponymous Alice who is an accomplished linguistics professor who learns she has Early-onset Alzheimer’s Disease and, along with her family, does what she can to live with it.  There are many real and heart-rending scenes portraying the difficulty of doing so.  Moore is backed up in her effort by a top-notch cast portraying her family, including Alec Baldwin as her husband, John, and Kristen Stewart as her youngest daughter, Lydia.  Say what you want about Kristen Stewart and her wooden acting in the “Twilight” series; I think it was more the material than her abilities because she does a fine job in this movie.

All movies manipulate your emotions on some level or another and “Still Alice” does a fairly good job of organically making you feel for each of the main characters as individuals.  There are times, though, where it goes a little overboard.  Those times are when they show home movies of Alice’s youth.  Maybe it’s trying to portray the internal thought process of an individual with Alzheimer’s or something similar, but it just seems out of place with the rest of the movie and I’m surprised they weren’t able to find a more effective way to do it considering how effective the rest of the movie is.  It is really the only fault in the movie.

Minor quibbles about failed emotional manipulation aside, “Still Alice” is well worth your time.  You get great acting and an honest representation of both what it’s like to have Alzheimer’s and what it’s like to live with someone who has the disease.  There are a few highly impactful scenes that will stick with you for a long time.  Julianne Moore deserves every award she won for her role.

Jean-Paul’s Rating: 3/5 stars

Bottom Line: A slow-paced caper thriller that keeps you guessing.  It is light, enjoyable, and smart.

What just happened?  You may find yourself asking yourself that question at the end of “Focus”.  It can take a while for your brain to wrap around all the lies and misdirections that the movie throws at you near the end.  That the movie succeeds in walking that fine line of believability while doing so is much to its credit.  The movie is put together like a jigsaw puzzle and throws pieces at you that you’re not even entirely sure are part of the same puzzle that you’re trying to put together.

The biggest problem with “Focus” is that it is mostly setup.  We spend over half the movie just introducing the characters and getting to know the business when it suddenly switches gears and throws the characters around only to incongruously throw them back together three years later.  What saves the movie is that the setup is fun.  There is one scene early in the film when Nicky (Will Smith) is teaching his protegé Jess (Magot Robbie) the art of misdirection by stealthily sliding items off her person.  It’s straight out of a sleight-of-hand magician’s playbook and fun to watch even if it was most likely just play acting instead of the real thing.  The entire setup is like that; showing the various tricks of the trade of the con man.

When the main con does start, it feels kind of empty.  That isn’t to say that it’s not fun, it’s just that the movie spent all this time introducing you to this cast of characters and then it whittles it down to just the two main ones and a bit-player.  The movie slows here some as Nicky and Jess work through their attraction to each other and their trust issues.  The con is interesting if unlikely and fairly straight forward but just when you think Nicky is going to get away with it all, it throws a right hook at you and you’re left wondering where everyone’s allegiance lies.

The light fun makes this movie worth watching and the reveal may blow your mind a little, but there’s not really much there there.  So what we have in “Focus” is a good distraction.  Just be sure to check you still have all of your belongings afterwards.

P.S.  I am mildly amused that Will Smith plays the role of a con man given his penchant for a certain cultish religion that shall remain nameless but nevertheless quite resembles one of the largest cons since Bernie Madoff.

Jean-Paul’s Rating: 2/5 stars

Bottom Line: Another of those “throw everything at the wall and see what sticks” comedies.  Only a few good laughs.  The cynicism is strong with this one.

The first “Hot Tub Time Machine” was a surprisingly good movie.  It had laughs and a plot that worked despite the absolutely ridiculously premise.  Much of the reason behind that is you cared about the characters.  Number 2 is not that movie.  Gone are the raucous group of friends who, while troubled, were still likable.  They have been replaced with their douchy twins.  This is a premise that can still succeed for a comedy, but that would require a group of writers who take the movie seriously instead of just trying to cash in on the magic of the first movie.  Instead what we have are a series of lame jokes that get repeated over and over again to the point that it becomes its own lame joke that they keep repeating the same lame jokes.  That’s not to say there are no laughs in the movie.  Some hit their mark well, but even they are likely made better because only because you feel the need to laugh at something since you’ve already put your money down on a movie that is supposed to make you laugh.

I think the biggest problem with Number 2 was it expressed a high level of cynicism, but it was all directed inward at itself.  There were a few “break the fourth wall” moments that were just oozing with “yes, we know this sucks”.  None of the actors really seemed to have their heart in the movie.  Of course, none of them are stellar actors, but they’re all decent comics and can really put on a show if the material is present.

I am pleased to report that there is one highlight in the movie.  In the year 2025, Jessica Williams will be the host of “The Daily Show”.  Yes, somehow they managed to release this movie the week after Jon Stewart’s retirement announcement and the call for Jessica Williams to be his replacement.  That would have been a great commercial tie-in that would likely have led to more bodies in seats since this movie bombed hard at the box office.  There were four people, including myself, in the theater when I watched it.

Jean-Paul’s Rating: 5/5 stars

Bottom Line: An absolutely ridiculous, rip-roaring, good time of a movie.  Some of the best stylized violence to hit the screen since “The Matrix”.

Ok, so a deeply engaging, thought provoking movie this is not.  What it is, though, is a romp.  It is a perfect blend of absurd, action-packed, comedic, and stylistic.  This movie has it all.  Ridiculously trained superspies?  Check.  Over the top supervillan? Check (Thank you Samuel L. Jackson!).  Convoluted plot to restore balance to the world?  Check.  Well choreographed action sequences?  Check.  Exploding heads?  Check.  Henchmen dying by the truckload?  Check.  Completely superfluous Swedish princess?  Check.  Sidekick with swords for feet?  Check.

At its heart, this is a James Bondish superspy movie, but this movie takes the genre beyond the limits of the absurd.  Despite, that, the story is pretty good.  Besides being crazy, it is self-contained and mostly credulous.  Samuel Jackson is hilarious as the lispy multi-billionaire tech genius who wants to solve the world’s global warming problem.  Colin Firth is a solid mentor who also happens to kick all sorts of ass.  And I mean ALL SORTS OF ASS.  It is highly entertaining.  Taron Egerton plays a perfect cocky, street smart, recruit as he goes up against the pure-bred, Oxford trained competition that he has to beat in order to join the Kingsman.

This movie can be watched again and again.  It did decently at the box office and I hope word of mouth gets out about it so there can be sequels.  I’m not sure this magic can be repeated, but I certainly hope they get a chance to try.

Jean-Pau’s rating: 3/5 stars

Bottom Line: Takes a while to get going, but fun when it hits its stride.  Worth seeing just for the completely unnecessary controversy it caused, but a comedy that can be viewed multiple times this is not.

I don’t normally do reviews on movies I see in the comfort of my own home, but if ever there were a reason to make an exception, the fooferaw surrounding “The Inteview” is it.  For the sake of posterity, since this movie will likely be quickly forgotten, “The Interview” was supposed to be released around Christmas 2014, but hackers broke through Sony’s defenses and stole a whole gob of data including emails where executives insult A-list stars, scripts, complete unreleased movies, etc. and then released the lot to the masses.  Those that care about such things got a good chuckle at how vain Hollywood can be.  It is widely accepted that North Korea was responsible for the hack, but there is not much actual evidence of that.  Then came the bomb threats and threats of general mayhem if the movie was released and Sony cancelled the release.  A few art houses here and there still went through with showing the movie, but mostly it went straight to pay-per-view and quickly to Netflix a month later.

Why would anyone be so upset over a movie to even bother going through the trouble of trying to get it shut down?  Well, people are stupid, but when your entire raison d’être is to be a living god to millions of North Koreans, I guess I can see getting a little upset when a movie comes out that tells the world that you have to pee and poo and can die.  That little stunt has probably quadrupled the number of people who have seen the movie.  Oops.

The plot, such as it is, revolves around celebrity news personality Dave Skylark (James Franco) and his producer, Aaron Rapaport (Seth Rogen).  Aaron is sick of doing celebrity puff pieces and wants to do serious journalism.  A piece of serious journalism sort of falls into his lap when he learns that Kim Jong-Un is a big fan of Skylark Tonight and they score the interview of the century with the president of North Korea.  When the CIA learns of the interview, they recruit Dave and Aaron to attempt to assassinate the young leader.  Hijinks ensues.

The movie itself isn’t good and isn’t bad.  It starts out a bit slow but picks up nicely after meeting Kim Jong-Un (Randall Park, who absolutely nails it).  Other than that, what you have is your standard Rogan/Franco buddy comedy without much to set it apart from every other film they’ve done together.  That said, this is a fun moment-in-time piece.  Its relevance to current events makes it a much more worth seeing film than it otherwise would be.  See it now because I’m guessing its relevance has a fairly short expiration date.

Jean-Paul’s Rating: 2/5 stars

Bottom Line: Moderately funny at times.  Has some charm.  Complex plots in a comedy are never a good idea.

And yet another movie that tries to get by on the premise of Johnny Depp playing a quirky fellow.  I assume Depp takes these roles not for the money but for the ability to show us his acting chops.  Though, I’m sure the money doesn’t hurt.  Mix a quirky Depp character with a good script and you are almost guaranteed to have an eventual hit on your hands even if it’s an after the fact cult hit.  Mix a quirky Depp character with a whole cast of quirky characters and a middling story and you get “Mordecai”.

Some of the humor in “Mordecai” hits the mark, but much of it is quite repetitive.  You can only laugh so many times at a man-servant being shot.  It is possible that this humor works better in book form and that pleasure can be derived from seeing the movie after reading the books the movie is based on.  Judging from the two women sitting behind me who thought the movie was hilarious, I can only assume they were book readers because what we were watching was not that funny.

There’s not much to say otherwise.  “Mordecai” tries very hard to be charming, but except for a few brief moments, mostly between Charlie Mordecai (Johnny Depp) and Johanna (Gwenneth Paltrow), it mostly fails.  Like the paintings in this movie, there may be a masterpiece hidden under the surface of this mostly unfunny convoluted plot of a movie, but it would take a master restorer to make a gem of this film.  Look elsewhere for your entertainment.

Jean-Paul’s Rating: 3/5 stars

Bottom Line: Good look into the psychology of a soldier.  Very strange way to tell a story, but it works.  Not sure about the Oscar buzz surrounding the movie.

Here it is Martin Luther King Jr. Day and I’m reviewing a war movie.  Oh, the irony.  Good news is this is not a movie that glorifies war, though Chris Kyle (Bradley Cooper) certainly believes in his mission.  Chris Kyle was a real person and this movie was based on a book based on his life.  There are a lot of soldiers alive today because of his exploits with a sniper rifle.  The Navy SEALs trained him to be a killer and he excelled at it and, like so many veterans, he lost his humanity in the process.  That’s about as good a one sentence synopsis of the movie as I think you’ll find.

The story is told in jarring clips.  We flash from Chris about to make his first human kill to his childhood and killing his first deer.  He’s on the phone with his wife when a firefight breaks out then he’s suddenly home with her.  Such is the life of a soldier.  You hold on to the memories that allow you to keep going and everything else is background noise.  It is very strange to watch a movie unfold like this and it’s really only after thinking about it after the fact that I think it worked well.

I did not know going into the movie that this was a true story and knowing that certainly changes how I viewed the movie post-hoc.  If this were not a true story, I do not believe there would be any Oscar nominations in the offing.  It is still a decently told story and worth seeing, but knowing that there is a person who actually experienced this filters our perceptions immensely.  Add to this America’s glorification of the military and our wanting to do everything for our soldiers except give them the equipment they need and the care they deserve and you have yourselves an Oscar nomination or six.  It certainly deserves the lesser nominations for screenplay, editing, and mixing, but best picture or best actor?  Nah.  Bradley Cooper was very good at displaying no emotion whatsoever, but I’m not sure that actually takes much skill as an actor.  I see the nominations as more an homage to Chris Kyle’s life.

Jean-Paul’s Rating: 3/5 stars

Bottom Line: A mess of a movie, but enjoyable nonetheless.  Not as much Liam Neeson kick-assedry as I would have liked.  Don’t try to make sense of the plot.

There isn’t much that can said about “Taken 3”.  If you’ve seen the first two, you know what to expect.  If at all possible, the third in the trilogy has an even more absurd plot, but plots are secondary when you’re watching a movie like this.  This one, though, the absurdity of the plot gets in the way and, in some ways, enhances the enjoyment of the film.  This doesn’t put it in “so bad it’s good” territory, but it helps you keep a sense of humor about the movie you are watching.

One thing missing is an astronomical body count.  This is mostly because of the plot.  Much of ass-kickery in the movie is Bryan Mills (Liam Neeson) escaping time and again from the police.  And if you’re a good guy, killing police is a big no-no unless said police are corrupt.  The police in the movie are shown as mostly bumbling incompetents except for Detective Franck Dotzler (Forest Whitaker) who is mostly useless except for his OCD habits and providing multiple opportunities to tell us how Mills is too smart for them.  There is quite the body count tally at the end but it’s more of a spree killing than a sustained bad-assedness campaign.  Then there are your unnecessary explosions, which I admit are cool even as you’re rolling your eyes at the over-the-topedness of the amount of flame and damage caused by a rolling car.

“Taken 3” is a movie that makes fun of itself.  At least, I hope that’s what they were doing.  The ending suggests to me that they were making fun of themselves the entire time, but it is really hard to tell.  My suggestion is to go into the movie assuming it’s true and it will make the movie more enjoyable.

Jean-Paul’s Rating: 3/5 Stars

Bottom Line: The songs are done right.  The story is more fleshed out than the play.  Sadly, the fleshing out makes for a boring second act.

“Into the Woods” is one of my favorite plays due to a certain redhead with an amazing singing voice who introduced me to it many generations ago.  I’ve seen the play a few times and was trepidatiously eager when I heard Disney was making a film of the play.  Because Disney.  It’s a fairly adult themed play.  Would they tame down the Wolf?  Would they gloss over the adultery?  Would they dance around the death?  Would they do the magnificent musical score justice? The answers are no, somewhat, yes, and YES!

Act 1 was a marvel.  The casting was perfect except, maybe, for Johnny Depp as the Wolf.  Though it is easy to see Johnny Depp as a creepy pedophile, he doesn’t really do “Hello, Little Girl” justice.  It’s not bad, but neither is it fantastic.  It’s just there.  I also was a little put off by the kid they cast as Jack (Daniel Huttlestone) at first, but he grew on me.  Other than that, my goodness, did they do the first act right.  It contained all the magic and beauty that I wanted to see for the movie.  No one can top Bernadette Peters as the Witch, but my does Meryl Streep give her a run for her money.  Even the odd choices for cast members like Chris Pine as Prince Charming worked well.

Then, sadly, Act 2 happened and all of the magic disappeared.  Even the play suffers somewhat in the second act, but the movie, instead of using the time to make sense of a fairly convoluted plot, decides to go on a half hour long song drought where there’s lots of exposition on what’s going on before just throwing together all of the remaining songs together in a haphazard fashion.  The songs are still great, but even I saw my interest waning by the time they got around to them.  If they threw in an original number in that half hour gap, maybe making fun of the craziness of the entire situation, the second act would have been much more enjoyable.

They really should have just ended the film at the end of the first act.  It’s certainly a little “happily ever after”, which Stephen Sondheim doesn’t do, but it’s a complete movie and was thoroughly enjoyable up to that point.  What you end up with is another movie with a fantastic soundtrack that is well worth getting.  I can see getting the DVD and fast forwarding through the bad parts to get to your favorite song, but it’s not worth sitting in the theater for.

So, yes we’ve had this moment.  Even though it was a bad one.  And Rob Marshall’s made atonement by making “Chicago” which is a rad one.