All right I've got a lot to talk about so let's get things rolling.
REDBOX
'The Last Stand' (R) **3/4
After the leader of a drug cartel escapes custody and is making a break for the Mexican border, it's up to small town Sheriff Ray Owens (Arnold Schwarzenegger) and his inexperienced deputies (including Luis Guzman, Johnny Knoxville, Jaimie Alexander, Zach Gilford) to stop him. It's a fun, solid rental with plenty of explosive action and bloody violence to go around. Nothing too special.
'Gangster Squad' (R) **3/4
Set in Los Angeles in 1949, 'Gangster Squad' tells the story of a secret group of police officers (Josh Brolin, Ryan Gosling, Anthony Mackie, Robert Patric, Giovanni Ribisi, Michael Pena) who leave their badges at home and go to war against Mickey Cohen (Sean Penn), a former boxer turned gangster from Chicago who has Los Angeles under his control. With Nick Nolte as the Police Chief who creates the Gangster Squad and Emma Stone as Mickey Cohen's social etiquette coach/lover and Ryan Gosling's love interest. When you break it down it pretty much is a more stylized version of 'The Untouchables'. But taking that out of the equation, this is another fun movie that's also a very solid rental. The performances are all pretty good, and the movie itself has a fun stylized 1940s look to it. This is from the director of 'Zombieland' (great movie) and '30 Minutes Or Less' (bad movie).
'The Host' (PG-13) **
Really Jake? You redboxed 'The Host'? WHY?? Yes, I redboxed 'The Host', the latest adaptation of a Stephenie Meyer book. I didn't like any of the 'Twilight' movies (though a few are more tolerable than others in how hilarious they are), so why did I rent 'The Host'. Reason being: This is getting worse reviews than any of the 'Twilight' movies. Heck, it's getting worse reviews than any of the 'Twilight' knock-offs. Looking at Rotten Tomatoes, the worst-reviewed 'Twilight' movie, "Breaking Dawn - Part 1" (by far the worst of those movies, and the most hilarious) is sitting at a 24%, meaning out of all the reviews tabulated 24% were positive. 'The Host' is sitting at 9%. Worse than 'Twilight'? I better watch this and find out for myself!
So the plot: The human race has almost been wiped out by a parasitic alien race known as 'Souls', who inhabit the bodies of humans. Melanie Stryder (Saoirse Ronan) is captured and infused with a soul who is called 'Wanderer' in order to find any remaining human survivors. Usually the human's personality goes away as the soul takes over. But not in Melanie's case as she fights for control over her mind and her body from 'Wanderer'. Admittedly, this is an interesting concept. But the first thing that bogs the movie down is that it's slower than molasses and it NEVER picks up or gets interesting again after the initial 10 minutes. The voice over that makes up Melanie's thoughts gets a little irritating, but that's something I just got used to. The slow pace was already infuriating me enough but then the love square kicks in, and it is forced like no other. There are far more interesting stories that could've been told in this world, but instead thanks to the imagination of Stephenie Meyer we get a love square. So what's the final verdict on 'The Host'? It's an interesting concept that gets ruined by a slower than molasses pace, some rather poor acting, and a forced love square. The only positive is that 'Radioactive' plays over the closing credits. What? I like that song.
NETFLIX
'A Haunted House' (R) **1/2
Malcolm (Marlon Wayans, who also co-wrote) decides that his girlfriend Kisha (Essence Atkins) should move in with him. As soon as she moves in, spooky things start happening around the house. With Cedric The Entertainer as Father Doug, David Koechner as a surveillance camera technician and paranormal investigator, and Nick Swardson as a gay psychic. This is a spoof of found footage movies in general, but most of the time it spoofs the first three "Paranormal Activity" movies and "The Devil Inside". I did chuckle more during this movie than I did during 'Scary Movie 5' which I know isn't saying much so take it for what that's worth. I actually chuckled many times for the first half of the movie, and then it just got less and less funny as it went on. If you like spoof movies, this one's okay. There's better spoof movies ("Airplane!" still remains the best) and far far worse spoof movies ('Meet The Spartans' and 'Scary Movie 5'.....enough said). I won't exactly be the first in line to buy a ticket to 'A Haunted House 2' next year.
Well now that those are out of the way it's time to switch gears a bit. School has started back up. If all goes well this will be my final semester at Ball State University, which means I will be graduating in December. Am I excited? Currently, no. There are far too many things that need to be done between now and then for me to get excited about graduating. And then after that comes the real world....which will be a topic for another post somewhere down the line. Anyway, in addition to being my last semester this will also be my busiest semester I have ever had. 18 credit hours. To answer the next question, these are the classes I'm taking:
MWF
HIST 407 - The American Civil War and Reconstruction
HIST 415 - History of Indiana
TUES/THURS
HIST 373 - History of the Middle East
POLS 210 - Political Science Research Methods. Very heavy on statistical analysis, I barely failed this class last fall. After taking another statistics class in the spring (but in Sociology) I decided to retake this class.
SOC 341 - Sociology of Health & Illness
MW (starting mid-October)
WPP 393 - Writing Proficiency Course. A requirement to graduate is to either pass the Writing Proficiency Exam or take the Writing Proficiency Course. I have too many credits to take the exam, so I'm stuck with the class. Oh well.
ALL SEMESTER HIST 440 - The Big Senior Year History Major research project. I will be working with a professor on this project, which will roughly be between 3000 and 6000 words. When finished, this will be the longest paper I've ever written, academically or not. Somehow I've been able to get by at Ball State without having to write extremely long papers. The longest paper I've written at BSU was an 8-page book review. That's it. The topic I chose for this project was the Presidency of Andrew Johnson. The US presidency sparked my interest in history, hence why I decided to do a project about it. I'll need all the luck I can get on this project. My procrastination habits sometimes get the better of me on big projects.
Another question you might be asking: Why didn't you just break this up into several different blog posts? Well, this blog is called 'Jake says stuff!!'. Today I just happen to have a lot to say lol.
The NFL is back, with Thursday night's opener featuring the Super Bowl Champion Baltimore Ravens (BOO!) traveling to Mile High Stadium to play Peyton Manning and the Denver Broncos in a playoff rematch. Throughout the season I will be posting up my picks of who I think will win. Look for the first of those posts to come on Thursday morning, just ahead of the Broncos/Ravens game. We'll see how I do picking the games.
Which leaves me with the last topic I want to write about: The September Schedule for this blog.
9/5 - NFL Week 1 Pick 'Em
9/8 - REDBOX (not sure yet)
9/12 - NFL Week 2 Pick 'Em
9/15 - REVIEWS 'Insidious Chapter 2' & 'The Purge'
9/19 - NFL Week 3 Pick 'Em
9/21 - REDBOX (not sure yet)
9/22 - SUMMER
9/26 - NFL Week 4 Pick 'Em
9/28 - REDBOX
9/29 - MISCELLANEOUS
Well that about does it for today. Time to get back to a Labor Day full of reading, quizzes, and finishing up my End of Year Report for camp.
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