Top 10 Films I am Looking Forward to This Year

Top 10 Films I Want to See in 2014

     The year can seem long looking ahead from January.  By time you get to August though, you wonder where the year went.  The summer goes by so fast.  The spring too.  There's usually a movie out at least every other week that some of us want to see.  This year it seems to be quite a bit less than that.  I was very disappointed in the movie selections of 2013.  I used to go to the theaters every week or so.  This past year it's been maybe once a month.  People over the past decade have been saying that Hollywood has no original ideas left.  (They actually never really did.)  I'm not one of those people that goes around complaining about all the remakes (Hollywood has always done remakes), or about how teen centered movies have become.  As long as there's a good story, competently told and interesting, I find it has value.  Heck, even films I utterly despise probably have value to someone out there.

    2014 looks about the same as 2013 did.  A lot of action films this year.  Lots of eye-rollingly bad science fiction films is what sticks out the most to me.  Quite a few biopics.  A few sports films (I don't really go for those).  Lots of generic comedies that you can't decide whether you want to see them or not based on plot alone, only by who's in it.  Very very few horror films, just like last year.  As the year goes on, some of the films on this list, I may decide I don't want to see.  There are no trailers for the films that come out in the fall or winter later this year yet.  Heck, not even for the summer films for the most part!  But as for right now, here's my list.

10.  Dawn of the Planet of the Apes - July 11

     This is the sequel to 2012's Rise of the Planet of the Apes, and is set eight years after the events in the first film.  No James Franco in this one, though.  Instead we have Gary Oldman...  In fact, besides the Caesar ape character, we have a whole new cast of characters.  I wouldn't be looking forward to this if it weren't in the capable hands of director Matt Reeves (Cloverfield and Let Me In).  He's proved he can do both a massive scale destruction picture, and a smaller more heartfelt horror film, and that's about the balance one needs to go for here.  This picture looks to be very dark from the trailer I saw the other day, and until then, I'd been kind of dreading this one, as the first one was just a bit above 'okay'. 

9.  Jupiter Ascending - July 18

     As you can see, this movie at least has cool visuals going for it.  Of course, that doesn't necessarily equal a good movie.  Just look at Star Wars: Episode II.  This is a sci-fi epic from the makers of The Matrix, the Wachowskis.  The film is also written by them.  Now, the Wachowskis have been considered hit and miss since The Matrix.  I personally loved Speed Racer, others hated it.  I've not seen their last film, but I hear it was yet again a love it or hate it affair.  I expect nothing less of this.  This has Sean Bean in it.  Anyone want to bet on whether he dies or not?  Also, Mila Kunis has become a better actress than I ever thought she would.  Not a great one, but not the horrible one I thought she'd become either.  Apparently Terry Gilliam also has a bit part.  The story is an old one.  A lowly peasant is suddenly embroiled in a war she never knew about, and apparently she is the key and has some sort of destiny.  I think that's the oldest plot in the history of space opera.

8.  Into the Woods - December 25

   This one is so far off it doesn't have a trailer or a poster yet.  It's an adaptation of one of Sondheim's greatest musicals.  (He also wrote Sweeney Todd and the lyrics on West Side Story.)   The story is about a husband and wife who were cursed by a witch.  They must go into the woods, find some objects to break the spell and have a baby.  Along the way, other brothers Grimm stories are irreverently brought to life in the woods.  Of course, this is a musical as well.  The cast is very good here, which is why I'm looking forward to it, as well as loving the score.  Meryl Streep is the witch, which is excellent casting.  There's also Chris Pine, Johnny Depp, Emily Blunt, Tracey Ullman, and even the kid that played Gavroche in Les Miserables as Jack (as in 'and the beanstalk').  There's got to be a musical to look forward to every so often, right?

7.  Guardians of the Galaxy - August 1

   This one seems to get under the radar of those that only casually follow the Marvel Universe.  This film, I don't even know too much about.  It's not got a poster yet, nor a trailer.  It's got an okay cast with Vin Diesel, Bradley Cooper, Zoe Saldana, Lee Pace, Glenn Close, Benicio Del Toro, Michael Rooker, etc.   Same director as Slither and the Thor: The Dark World mid-credits sequence.  I don't see this being as big as the other Marvel movies, as these aren't exactly top tier characters in general public perception.  Being space-based, let's hope this one does better than DC's Green Lantern did a few years ago.  Being more sci-fi sounding, I think this one should.

6.  Gone Girl - October 3

    Yet another release late this year.  This one is based on the bestselling book by Gillian Flynn.  It's about a man who's had a seemingly happy marriage... One day he announces that his wife has gone missing.  The press starts hounding him and the public eye is now on him, and it appears that he may have lied about that happy marriage.  Some start to think he may have killed his wife.  The interesting part?  The book was told from his POV, and I'm sure they do the same thing here.  It's a David Fincher film, and he likes doing movies that way.  Also, in my opinion, Fincher has never directed a bad film.  I even like Alien 3, which isn't really his since the studio took over control of that one and he's disowned it.  The cast is pretty great here too.  Ben Affleck, Rosamund Pike, NPH, Patrick Fugit (haven't seen him since Saved!), Tyler Perry... okay... maybe that last one isn't necessarily a positive for some people.  I think he's good in serious roles though.  I've never read the book this is based on, and I'm still excited to see it.

5.  Hobbit: There and Back Again - December 17

     I'll tell you the truth.  The first one was only okay.  The second one was right up there with the Lord of the Rings trilogy in my opinion.  I'm hoping this third one will be as well.  Apparently a lot of the third film will be based on stuff from the appendices of the Lord of the Rings books instead of The Hobbit.  I don't really have much to say about this one as there's no trailer yet and I'm still getting over how good the second film was.  It'll be sad to say goodbye to middle earth again, though.  And this time it truly will be the end.

4.  X-Men: Days of Future Past - May 23

   The last X-Men film was so good, I've really been looking forward to this one.  This unites the prequel film and the main series, which should be interesting.  I've still yet to see last year's Wolverine, so I can't say how I feel about the film in comparison to that one.  Again, the cast is a great one.  They seem to be going uber-serious for the trailer on this one, but that doesn't always mean the movie itself will be.  First Class was that way too, but had plenty of fun in it.  Bryan Singer, director of the first two X-Men films, is back at the helm for this one.  I'm a bit less excited about that than some are, but I'm not disappointed either.  I just felt First Class was the best in the series, and he didn't do that one.  Still, this is one to look out for.  I'm interested to find out what happened to Banshee here, as he's not in this one, but was a main character in First Class...

3.  The Grand Budapest Hotel - March 7

   This one will be very short.  The reason?  It's a Wes Anderson film.  These films aren't for everyone.  I know quite a few people who hate everything he does.  And know more that love everything he does.  I'm one of those, so this is on my list.  I need no other reason than it's directed by him.  He's never made a bad movie... Just like David Fincher.  And the plot to this one looks outstandingly hilarious.  (And no, I'm not a hipster.  I just like Wes Anderson.)

2.  Interstellar - November 7

    Another director that's never done a bad movie.  Christopher Nolan.  (Though I do hope it's better than Dark Knight Rises.)  This is his eagerly awaited original idea by the Nolan brothers.  Inception was so good, there's a lot of hype for this one.  The details of the project are largely under wraps, but we do know that it's about voyaging through a wormhole.  It's a movie about the unknown.  About something none of us have experienced.  Wormholes could be portals through time... through space.... to alternate realities.  We don't know.  And we don't know what Nolan is going to show us either.  I love that directors now are trying to keep us in the dark as long as possible.  (Tarantino just quit pre-production on his latest film because the script leaked!)  The cast here is pretty good, i suppose.  I'm not the biggest Matthew McConaughey fan, but I don't hate him either.   Something tells me I must see this one in IMAX when it comes out.  Will it be Nolan's first bad film, or be another in a stream of fantastic beautiful films?  I'm betting on the latter.  In a time when space travel has become something American government doesn't want to pay money to do, maybe this will bounce it back too.

1.  Godzilla - May 16

Oh! My! God!!!  I've been waiting for this for years.  It was announced a few years ago, and sat in development hell for about two of those.  I never thought it would come to fruition.  And now my dreams have come true.  An American Godzilla film (Toho in Japan hasn't made one in 10 years now.), and one that actually looks like it has Godzilla in it!  I love how the trailer takes it's queue from my favorite trailer (Alien) to show us what to expect from the film.  Looks like a lot of destruction, pretty darn serious, good production values...  Even folks in Japan seem to be pumped for this one.  After the 1998 Godzilla, we owe them.  This one probably means more to me personally than any of you all.  I'm a huge fan of Godzilla, owning all 28 films and being a fan of every era Toho made them.  (Those 28 don't count the 1998 American version.)  I think Legendary pictures has a good thing going here.  Like Pacific Rim, I'm sure it'll do better in foreign markets than here, but I expect more will see it than Pacific Rim just off the Godzilla name.  In fact, del Toro, director of Pacific Rim would like to do a cross over.  The director of Godzilla on the other hand, wants to bring in other Godzilla franchise monsters if this one takes off.  We can only hope they do both!

Runners up include Muppets Most Wanted and Captain America: The Winter Soldier.  I'm looking forward to those both, but I only had room for 10.  And the Muppets one I'm a bit less excited about than I was as they are basically remaking The Great Muppet Caper, which was the least best Muppet film.

Amazing Spider-Man 2 wasn't on the list due to my disappointment with the trailer.  I'm still hopeful, but it seems to suffer from Spidey 3 syndrome.  Let's hope not, as I loved the first one in this reboot series.

Movie Review: Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit

Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit

     For those that don't know who Jack Ryan is, here's a little bit about the character.  He was created by author Tom Clancy (who died a few months ago), and had a series of nine books with him as the main character from 1984 to 2002.  In that timespan, four films were made of certain books in the series, and three different actors played the character.  The first film was 1990's The Hunt For Red October, which was also the first book.  In that film, Alec Baldwin played Jack Ryan who was trying to decide why an armed Soviet prototype submarine was heading towards America captained by a Russian Sean Connery.  It was one of the biggest hits of the year and the critics loved it.  It won an Academy Award and was nominated for two others.  Two years later, the book Patriot Games was turned into a movie, this time with Harrison Ford in the lead role as Jack Ryan.  The film was about an Irishman played by Sean Bean, who joins a more militant breakoff of the IRA after Jack kills his brother (the brother was trying to kill the the British Secretary of State to Northern Ireland)  and finally intends to kill Jack and his family as well.  The movie this time departed from the book quite a bit and Clancy disowned the film.  However it got good reviews and was a financial success.  That one was quickly followed by Clear and Present Danger with the same core cast, including Harrison Ford.  Even the director was kept.  Released in 1994, the film was again a success, was nominated for two Academy Awards, and even got better critical reviews and bigger box office than it's predecessor.  The series would lay dormant for eight years until 2002 saw the release of Sum of All Fears, this time with Ben Affleck as Jack Ryan.  Again, the story was changed a lot from the book, moving the film from the cold war to present day 2002, and changing the Arab villains to neo-fascists.  (This was not due to 9/11, as the film had been completed by that time.)  The movie was a financial success, but reviews were mixed.  I myself felt Ben Affleck was not right for the part.  He had not grown into the actor he is now.  Also, it was presented as a prequel to the other films, but takes place after them in 2002.... Doesn't make much sense, eh?  

    The character of Jack Ryan has stayed the same throughout the series, even in this new film starring Chris Pine.  Jack Ryan is a Marine (in this film, he joins due to 9/11) that gets injured when his helicopter is shot down, and his back is severely injured.  He becomes addicted to painkillers while in rehabilitation of his injuries.  He eventually gets better and is recruited to CIA.  That's about where things stand about 20 minutes into this film.

   Now this film wasn't adapted from a Tom Clancy novel like the others were.  This is an original story, and a reboot of the franchise.  It's been updated for modern audiences, since this isn't the cold war anymore.    The story starts it's real story when Jack Ryan joins the CIA doing covert work looking at money transfers that could indicate terrorist activity is going to happen or is being funded.  While there he notices that the markets aren't doing what they are supposed to do after a Russian vote failed at the United Nations.  He looks deeper and discovers that Russian assets are being put away in different areas that could cause a financial catastrophe if something, say a terrorist attack, were to happen.  So disguised as the stock broker still, he travels to Moscow to visit the company that is moving the money around and audit them.  But he's too late... or is he?   

   This may seem like too much of a techo-geek film, but it's really not.  Jack Ryan films were never really about action sequences, but there's enough here at the end to ease that hunger anyway.  These films were always more espionage and hacking than explosions and chases.  And for me, that's always better.  Like the best Bond films, they know how to balance the two here.  There's quite a bit of suspense, some human drama between Jack Ryan and his fiancé, and the cold war is even brought up again with the bad guy not forgiving the United States not supporting Russia during the invasion of Afghanistan in the 1980s.  

   The acting is pretty good here.  Chris Pine is there to look handsome I suppose, and according to my sister, he does that very well.  Kiera Knightly, who plays the fiancé is okay in her role as well, though it's nothing to write home about.  The ever-emotionless Kevin Coster (whom I'm a fan of, despite that) actually does well in his role as the recruiter/mentor of Jack Ryan.  Then there's the bad guy, played by a Russian accented Kenneth Branagh, who also directed the film.  He's the top actor here, really sinking his teeth into the part.  He even does well coming across as menacing and batshit insane, which surprised me.  (It shouldn't as I've seen him play Frankenstein...)  As for how he directs the film, well, you can hardly tell it's the Kenneth Branagh of old.  It feels like any competent director could have directed this film, but as there aren't many of those left out there, this is a plus.  There's very little shaky-cam to be had here.  The action sequences are all very good.  There's a motorcycle chase through New York city, and UNDER the city as well.  There's a car chase/foot chase through Moscow...  In fact, the film seems a bit like the Bourne films, but without the shaky-cam.  That wasn't a put-off for me as I love those films, but I can see how it could be for Clancy fans.  (I've never read the books.)  

   Still, it's a good addition to the series, a good reboot as well.  It doesn't seem to be lighting up the box office lights, coming in at 4th place on it's opening weekend.  Sadly, I don't think this franchise will be reignited.  It was a good diversion, much better than the Bourne reboot that came out in 2012.  My review may have seemed a bit negative, but I did actually really like this one.  I just don't think it's one that will be remembered much by mass audiences.

I give this one 5 stars out of 7.