A Very Harold and Kumar 3D Christmas

I'm not a huge fan of Christmas movies, but I do love the Harold and Kumar franchise.  This is the third installment of the series.  A few years have past since the last movie and the characters' lives have progressed in a realistic time continuum.  Well at least Harold’s has.  He’s married his dream girl and he’s now a member of the 1% that owns 99% of the wealth.  Kumar hasn’t fared quite as well.  He’s living in a dump, his girlfriend recently left him and he’s still nothing more than pothead looking for his next hit.  Throw Neal Patrick Harris in the mix (again) along with a pissed off mob boss, a waffle making robot (Wafflebot) and Father Christmas himself and you’ve got a wild ride of a Christmas movie. 

I have to admit that I didn’t expect much from this movie, but I was surprised.  This movie was so dumb that it was smart, so wrong that it was so right and so messed up that it was neat!  Harold and Kumar have done it again.  

One hint of advice, if you’re going to see it make sure that you see it in the 3D, there’s a couple of gags that really play up to the effect...have fun and Merry Christmas!

Horrible Bosses

Once again a movie that I expected would be very funny, failed to make me laugh.  This movie had a promising premise:  Three long time best friends find themselves in terrible work environments and they come to the conclusion that they would be better off if their bosses were to stop breathing and set about to help make this happen. 

The problem is that the premise is flawed.  For one  of the guys, his boss  is truly a horrible person and when he threatened to quit, his boss threatened to ruin his career if he went elsewhere.   For another guy, his cocaine-addicted boss just recently inherited the company from his father after he suddenly dropped dead and his cost cutting threatens to cause an environmental disaster, the world would truly be better off without him around.  The error in logic occurs with the third guy who is trapped in his present job because he is undeservedly on sex offender registry and no one else would hire him.  It just doesn’t make sense him wanting his boss to die because he’d still have the same predicament of not being able to find employment elsewhere. 

Despite the lack of laughs and the imperfect premise, the movie isn’t half-bad and still worth a look if you’ve got some spare time and not very high expectations. 

Michael Jackson: The Immortal World Tour by Cirque du Soleil

After Michael Jackson passed away I was so touched by the number of people who told me that they thought of me when it happened.  Even people that I grew up with but had lost contact with over 20 years ago remembered how fanatical I was about Michael Jackson.  The truth is that I had forgotten how much I loved MJ.  It's sad. The music is so timeless that I see young children today who share in the same fervent love for his music as I did over 25 years ago.  

Tonight I attended the Cirque du Soleil show, "The Immortal".  I went in blind - I had no idea what to expect.  I've been disappointed by Cirque shows in the past, where I felt that they were too bourgeoisie for my taste.   More recently though, I saw the Cirque show “Believe” in Las Vegas which was thoroughly entertaining. 

The one thing that I did hear about this tribute to MJ prior to seeing the performance was a tweet stating that if you are in any way a fan of MJ, this show is a must-see.  I absolutely concur.

I was very touched by this show.  It went beyond being an absolute fitting tribute to the beauty of MJ’s soul.  I imagined that this would have been a show that MJ himself would have been happy to have been a part of.   I felt that wherever his spirit was that, he was seeing this show and he was proud of it.  They captured his very essence, his message and his music.  

Bridesmaids

After a summer of friends telling me how amazing it is, I finally saw Bridemaids.  Like most movies that have been hyped in that manner, I was sorely disappointed.  The storyline basically focused on a woman’s descent into a total meltdown.  It wasn’t funny at all and it was downright gross at some points, however about ¾ of the way it turned sweet and poignant.   


The highlight of the movie for me was that the actor that played the Illinois State Trooper was Chris Dowd, who also stars in the British sitcom, The IT Crowd, a big, big favourite of mine.

I'll never forget that day, but in the wee hours of this morning as I listened to a New York City Police scanner and heard, reports of shots fired here and there, I couldn't help but think that the Americans do such a great job of killing Americans, there really isn't a need for terrorists to do it.  


There's been a lot of talk of 9/11 unifying Americans, but people are universally violent.  Americans continue to kill Americans. Canadians continue to kill Canadians.  Middle Easters kill Middle Easters.  They say the world was forever changed, but has it changed in the right way?  The only change I see as a result of 9/11 is "justification" for more killing.


I miss those two buildings and every time I've see the New York skyline since then, my heart aches.  


For all our technological advances, man still no more than mere barbarians.  As far as relationships with each other, we our no more advanced then cavemen.  We continue to be Neanderthals.   


It's 2011 people, let's get beyond the savagery and learn to work to help each other and be good to one another.   

The Tourist

The Tourist is a movie that had been on my to-do list for awhile but after seeing many awful audience reviews of it, I’d kept it on the backburner for quite a while.  After seeing it, I thought maybe everyone else had been a tad too harsh.  It’s not as bad as the reviews would have you believe.  

Starring Angela Jolie, it reminded me of her previous outing, Salt, without the huge stunts and effects of that movie.  Johnny Depp is also a very watchable actor.  

One of my favourite things about this flick was the setting.  Most movies use Venice, Italy as a backdrop, but The Tourist gives a great view of this magnificent place.  The city is just gorgeous.  

All in all, I would not say that The Tourist is the total waste of time most of its reviewers declare it to be.

Green is the Colour of Will

I saw The Green Lantern back on its opening night on June 17th , 2011.  I usually don’t like to see movies as soon as they come out; I prefer to avoid crowded theatres, but the new Cineplex UltraAVX theatres with their reserved seating made it painless.  

I’ve been told that this is the summer of comic book movies.  A hardcore comic fan friend was interested to hear my take on Green Lantern.  He had attended the midnight screening as soon as it came out.  He wanted to know my thoughts, because as a non-comic book junkie I would not have any expectations.  

I like seeing movies when I don’t know what expect from them, it makes it hard to be disappointed.  I found The Green Lantern to be a fun roller-coaster ride of an adventure movie.  The best way I can describe it is that it’s Spiderman meets Top Gun meets Star Wars.  I have the feeling there would be a “meets Lord of the Rings” in there too, but I can’t in good faith say that, as I haven’t seen any of the LOtR movies. 

The only disappointment for me in this movie was the climatic battle, particularly the way it ended, it was pretty weak.  Also I thought the use of 3D in the film was well done, but for some reason 3D movies give me a headache and make my eyes hurt.

I had heard a lot about the principle actors in this movie, Ryan Reynolds and Blake Lively, but have to admit that I had no idea who they were.  Reynolds reminds me a lot of a younger Ben Affleck and Blake Lively is an absolute stunner whose mere presence would make a movie worth watching. 

So if you like Spider Man or Top Gun or Star Wars, I’d say give this movie a shot, you’ll probably like it too.