Terminator Genisys

THE PITCH

WORTH

$$$1/2

THE VIEWING

"This is all wrong! John sent me here to save you!" 

    Terminator Genisys received a lot of bad reviews and probably rightly so depending on the individual expectation level. I am NOT going to be another bad review guy.  Ultimately, I was entertained, a feat the last two installments just could not provide. The ONLY reason it succeeded, in my opinion, is solely because of AH-NAWLD.

    Yeah he will more than likely never win an Oscar or proper recognition for his role in cinema, especially in the 90’s era but that is okay.  Those of us that know realize charisma and originality goes a very long way.  This Terminator movie would have been miserable without Schwarzenegger and that is a fact.

    Whenever you have an iconic movie franchise this fixed on a very specific date ("judgment day"), the more it’s stretched out over decades and decades of movies, the more we lose interest.  It is inevitable, like a kid promised ice cream at the beginning of the day and it’s past nighttime, the moon is out and still nothing… What!? You think we forgot!!???  Enough with the politicking already!!  We know you want to make money but forget that too!  You guys are going to lose a very sizable part of your fan base if you keep twirling that yarn in front of us cats… somebody at Paramount Pictures apparently got that memo.  We finally have proper direction. Amazingly that only adds to my then stagnant intrigue.

     I must admit to being frustrated roughly all the time in the beginning of this story.  Thanks to all the space time continuum being all mixed up and confusing but honestly, each time that happened, the story explained itself and I was able to catch on.  

    Emilia Clarke was decent and so was Jai Courtney as Kyle.  Shout out to J.K. Simmons!  I don’t want to be too prickly with critique.  One thing this franchise is going to have to do along with most other current CGI filled movies is go back to using real fire, real explosions and give more of a percentage to actual mockups and puppets screentime than post production computer imaging work.  Maybe I am becoming desynthesised to great GGI work.  I am shocked that this isn’t being dealt with in the focus groups.    Jurassic World even suffered a little bit of this.  I wrote about that very thing in the review here on Worth Watching.

    I think this movie is Worth Watching.  3D was okay but not a must.

BE SURE TO WAIT THROUGH THE CREDITS FOR BONUS FOOTAGE.

letter grade:  B-

SABOTAGE

THE PITCH

WORTH

$1/2

THE VIEWING

"Let's go do god's work."

That line was sooooo misused in this flick.  Little “g” was inserted hoping the context in the film wasn't as blasphemous as I thought it was.  Instead of that whole phrase referring to the nature of the work of the DEA, specifically the most dangerous division in that faction, the director allows that simple phrase to mean something way lesser, sinister even.  This movie was cluttered with shallow lines and sub-level attempts at comedy. The abhorrent attempts at a classic one-liner marred the seriousness of the main plot and all the events leading to it. The distasteful and unfunny banter went as low as the word “BOO-YAH”...  I heard Stuart Scott say that in the late 90’s.

     I went in thinking this was an action movie from what I could gather from the trailer.  Turns out it is more of an investigation/revenge film.  Reminds me of The Counselor in some ways.  Like way more dialog than I was expecting but Sabotage didn't have the depth of The Counselor.  Sabotage is more straight forward.  Devoid of any imagination, most may find the conflict resolution predictable.  There are a few plot twist but hardly anything that puts you on the edge of your seat.  Also, each character was hard to root for, good and bad.  As a result, I didn't connect/care what happened to any of them, but that may just be me.

    I’m not mad at Arnold for taking on this project.  It’s “marginally” different from anything he’s done in the past.  I also am willing to bet that this movie looked awesome on paper.  I was just poorly executed trying to bring this story to the screen.

Not worth watching.

letter grade: C-

Escape Plan

THE PITCH

WORTH

$$1/2

THE VIEWING

"If I don't get out, I will kill you."

Escape Plan was cute.  I don’t want to say ‘typical’ Sylvester Stallone movie because to me a typical Sly Stone movie is a tad bit better than Escape Plan… “Bullet to the Head”, for instance or “The Specialist”... both were very good, typical… Sylvester Stallone type flicks.

    Maybe it was the acting from the rest of the B level cast, including but certainly not limited to Curtis Jackson, otherwise know as 50cent.   Objectively, maybe his acting wasn't as bad as I think it is because I can’t separate the rapper from the actor but then again that should fall on the casting director and not me right? Perhaps it was the predictability besides all the MacGyver situations that Stallone's character get’s out of, you pretty much know how this is going to end.  Whatever the case, the popcorn was warm and the pop was cold (without the ice)... I enjoyed myself.

    Escape Plan is worth watching ONLY after everything else is scratched off your “must see” list… and maybe a few off the  “want to see” list.

letter grade: C-