CREED

Creed is so legit that I am still surprised - days later.  I kid you not, I felt like Italians must have felt in 1976.  This movie had all kinds of heart.  I even got, dare I say it, a little emotional.  Knowing that the last 3 or 4 Rocky movies were - as the French say - garbaaaage, I sure as hell did not expect to like a "spin-off" of Rocky.  And, on the heels of the Floptastic Four, Michael B. Jordan completely redeems himself. Maybe it's because Stallone didn't write or direct it that this movie ended up being something I could endorse...  Okay, it's definitely because Stallone didn't write or direct it that I can cosign a spin-off of the shaky, albeit iconic franchise.  I've been a fan of Tessa Thompson since Dear White People... you had me at cultural misappropriation, girl.  Jordan, The Wire put him on the map, but Fruitvale Station made him legit.  Stallone - hwhwhwiuhokay (he'll understand that was a compliment).  

VITALS
Ryan Coogler (Fruitvale Station) - Writer/Director
Michael B Jordan (Fruitvale Station, Fantastic Four) - Adonis Johnson
Tessa Thompson (Dear White People) - Bianca
Sylvester Stallone (Rocky, The Expendables) - Rocky Balboa
Phylicia Rashad (let's just say Clair Huxtable instead of mentioning the best sitcom in history because of a certain jello pushing, pill slipping, comedian) - Mary Anne Creed
Tony Bellew - "Pretty" Ricky Conlan

IF YOU MUST KNOW

Adonis Johnson (Jordan) is young man with a heavyweight chip on his shoulder (I bet somebody will steal that line).  He didn't know his father, bounced around foster care and juvy, until Mary Anne Creed (Rashad) - Appollo Creed's widow (ooops, SPOILER ALERT... you did see the one with Dolph Lundgren as Ivan Drago, right?) tracks him down and magnanimously raises him in her home.  I would love to think I am a good enough guy to take in the offspring of a woman who was unfaithful to me if the kid had no one else, but... IMnotTHATDUDE!  Anyway, Adonis ends up taking after pop-dukes in a way that displeases Mrs. Creed and seems unnecessary in light of his promising career in finance.  These crazy kids... leave it to a millennial to skip out on a solid, lucrative career for the long-shot prospect of something that is inherently dangerous.  Dummies.  Fortunately for him, this pays off in a huge way.  Due to a random series of events that are only unheard of in real life and a storyline reminiscent of "The Great White Hype" (Damon Wayan's at his most foolish, worth checking out) - in reverse, Adonis finds himself boxing for the championship against a seasoned fighter with everything on the line.   

Adonis wins a fight agains "Pretty" Ricky Conlan (Bellew, a fighter in the real world - although he looks about as cut up as I do after eating half of my mother's Thanksgiving turkey and a couple of servings of peach cobbler - which happens to be how I look right now). Johnson has the great Rocky Balboa in his corner as Rocky gives him the tools to battle his [CLICHE ALERT] toughest opponent... HIMSELF!  WHUUUUH?  He does MJ one better.  He's not standing with the man in the mirror, he's shadowboxing that dude to the mantra "one punch at a time; one step at a time; one round at a time."  Actually, that part was a pretty decent philosophical position that I would encourage people to adopt in either a physical or metaphysical context, but... that's for a different day.

I won't tell you how this movie ends, but I can say that I cheered right along with the idiots who forget that a movie is only a movie.  Adonis Johnson is just a made up character, fighting a choreographed fight that was shot on a movie set with countless takes-retakes. Still, I literally moved as if I had to bob & weave right along with Adonis as he fought through each round.  That's a sign of investment.  Kudos to Michael B Jordan and Ryan Coogler for making Adonis a likable albeit flawed millennial - much easier said than done!  The emotional rollercoaster ride and all the talk of battling memories and the feelings of loss that a adult child has to deal with when losing a parent(s) got me thinking about struggle and responsibility and all that business.  As a dude who grew up with a father who was widely respected from the streets to the pulpit, and whose name was bigger than most (in the Stuy and beyond), I found myself getting a little verklempt; then, I shook it off and remembered it was a damned movie spin-off of Rocky, son.  Rocky.  SMDH@IMTHATDUDE

IMTHATDUDE gives Creed: 4 

RATING SYSTEM:
5 = You should be about halfway to the theatre by now… Well… GET!
4 = Definitely worth the bread. Niiice.
3 = I won’t cuss anybody out and demand my paper back.
2 = Somewhere SOUTH of under-whelmed./I know it has a pulse, but…
1 = Not a good look. They played me AND I played myself.

James Bond: Spectre

Don't believe the hype!  Yeaaaaah, boyeeeeeeeee!  Forgive me.  It has been too long since I dissed a Bond film... Bardem was weird and whack in Skyfall as the villain - but the concept was there.  Movie was pretty lame though - re-watched it a while ago before this one dropped. Here you go (and shout out to my homegirl, Ellis; she said this looked like whackness, but then again, she hates all things Bond, so who would trust her movie selection on anything?)...

I fell asleep twice in one sitting.  TWICE!!!  Sure, I was tired, but it's James Bond... I don't fall asleep  in action movies (aside from that bananaballs flick that had Channing Tatum and Mila Kunis).  I am a bona fide movie-warrior.  I have denied young moviegoer's requests for me to move down so they can sit together - Sorry, suckers... get here earlier.  I picked my seat and skipped the concession stand for a reason.  I have braved the crappy 42nd Street and Prospect Park Pavilion theaters - No, sir.  No threat of bed bugs scares my fastidious a$$... I'm lying!!!  I will never hit those theaters again until I am satisfied they don't have a problem.  But, I did survive the dark depths of Sky Captain & the World of Tomorrow, Soul Plane, Punisher, Desolation of Smaug, Fifty Shades, and countless other craptastic nightmares without batting an eye.  Yet, I am rarely ever tired enough to sleep through a flick I paid for.  I am far to stingy with my paper to waste it on movies I don't actually watch.  I watched 95% of Spectre, and it was the most boring Bond I have ever seen next to In Her Majesty's Secret Service (Remember that one?  Stop lying, you don't.  Nobody does.  It was a$$.)

VITALS

Sam Mendes (American Beauty, Road to Perdition) - Director
John Logan (Sweeney Todd, Gladiator) & Neil Purvis (The World is Not Enough, Johnny English) - Writers
Daniel Craig (Munich, Casino Royale) - Bond, James Bond... kinda
Cristoph Waltz (Django Unchained, Muppets Most Wanted) - Ernst Stavro Blofeld
Ralph Fiennes (Schindler's List, Grand Budapest Hotel) - Q
Lea Seydoux (Blue is the Warmest Color, Fairwell, My Queen) - Madeleine Swann
Monica Bellucci (Shoot'em Up, Melena) - Lucia Sciarra
Naomie Harris (Miami Vice, Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom) - Eve Moneypenny
Ben Whishaw (Layer Cake, Cloud Atlas) - Q
Andrew Scott (TV's The Hour and Sherlock) - C
Dave Bautista (Guardians of the Galaxy, Riddick) - Mr. Hinx

IF YOU MUCH KNOW [SPOILER ALERT... STOP READING NOW IF YOU CAN'T HANDLE SPOILERS]

Bond has girl and disses her for a mission.  Almost gets killed, but escapes in a very Bond like way.  Gets a full grown woman (Monica Bellucci) after claiming responsibility for killing her hubby; but only needs her for information, so it's a smash and run job... again.  Then, he finds himself involved with the barely legal daughter of a target who has yet another piece of information for him... all the while he is running into or being hunted by the mysterious cabal of villains known only as as "Spectre" which turns out to be run by Ernst Gustavo Blofeld (Waltz).  Blofeld, for all his criminal mind mastery, puts Bond in a painful yet EASILY escapable situation and, shockingly, Bond escapes. Additional chasing ensues (literally and figuratively), before Blofeld and Bond meet again - eventually one must kill the other permanently.

What perplexes me is that Bond is not Bond midway through this movie.  He regressed to his Vesper-loving days of when we were first supposed to be learning how Bond became the misogynistic prick that we have all known and loved for decades.  Instead, he gets a little whiff of that young "strange" and he changes into a lovestruck ordinary Joe.  I don't watch Bond movies to see him fall for some dame.  I watch to see his brackishness, callousness, machismo, a$$kicking and impossible stunts, and love of fine things (women, cars, winning, etc.).  Instead I got a Spectre of the Bond I knew and loved (see how I did that there? I make this look easy... enough).  Dude, you're an assassin with a license to kill.  Assassinate already.

As for Blofeld, he had flashes of awesome villainy, but then there was the whole tell my enemy everything and let him escape thing that usually wouldn't have troubled me if I didn't think the movie was so boring.  Even if the villain had a white damned cat.

Not enough Casino Royale action for me (or ever Quantum), and too heavy on Craig showing his actor-y nuance made this one of my least favorite Bonds in Craig's filmography.  Then again, what do you expect when your theme song is sung by the n'er happy Sam "Depress Me" Smith.  Great voice, but if you're down and happen to have a bottle of scotch, you might want to leave that Sam Smith playlist right next to your tickets for Spectre... on the shelf until a much happier time surfaces.  In fairness, this is a more chick-friendly Bond movie, but IMTHATDUDE and the same way I refuse to get a filet mignon at a pancake house, or go to a business meeting with a suit and my Sean John sneaks, I refuse to let a watered-down, sensitive James Bond retain its vaunted position on my list of all things dope.

IMTHATDUDE gives Spectre: 2.5 (Benefit of the Bond)

RATING SYSTEM:

5 = You should be about halfway to the theatre by now… Well… GET!
4 = Definitely worth the bread. Niiice.
3 = I won’t cuss anybody out and demand my paper back.
2 = Somewhere SOUTH of under-whelmed./I know it has a pulse, but…
1 = Not a good look. They played me AND I played myself.

Sicario

Sicario apparently means "dagger-man" (according to the movie and wikipedia - it comes from the latin, but then shares a history with Hebrew and Spanish words meaning substantially the same thing - dagger man or assassin); which makes this a serious movie and not to be confused with the tequila brand with the raunchy (but greatly appreciated) ad campaign.

Although, I would not have had a problem with a little of this in the film, it's probably a good thing that it was not connected... just sayin'.

By now, you know that I love spy movies, action movies, and thought-provoking movies, but when you successfully combine all of those together with great casting and strong writing... IMTHATDUDE that heads to theatres no where near me to catch the film the first weekend when they are in limited release.  (Thank, God it was playing at a theater that doesn't have bed bugs. That, would have been a problem.)  While most people I spoke to on my way to the theatre had no idea what movie I was referring to when I mentioned it, they all became interested when they found out that Emily Blunt, Josh Brolin, and the great Benicio Del Toro were starring in the film.

VITALS

Denis Villenueve (Maelstrom. Prisoners) - Director
Taylor Sheridan (a feature writing noob) - Writer

Emily Blunt (Edge of Tomorrow, Into the Woods) - Agent Kate Macer
Benicio Del Toro (Usual Suspects, Escobar: Paradise Lost) - Alejandro
Josh Brolin (No Country for Old Men, Oldboy) - Matt
Maxamiliano Hernandez (The Namesake, Thor) - Silvio
Daniel Kaluuya (Kick Ass 2, Johnny English Reborn) - Reggie
Victor Garber (Argo, Self/less) - Jennings
Jeffrey Donovan (Hitch, J. Edgar) - Steve Forsing

Other noteworthy performances include:  Raul Trujillo (from Apocalypto and Riddick), John Bernthal - my ninja, Shane from The Walking Dead.  RIP Shane, but hell of a way to exit a show!

IF YOU MUST KNOW

Kate Macer (Blunt) and her partner, Reggie (Kaluuya) are vigilantly fighting the good fight against kidnapping associated with the never-ending drug war and the brutal violence proliferated by the drug cartels and visited upon the cities along the U.S. - Mexico border.  After a particularly gruesome discovery and deadly incident, Macer is recruited to "volunteer" for a chance to strike at the heart of the cartels responsible for the mass murder and increasing bloodshed in her Arizona jurisdiction.  She enlists and works with the oddball Matt (Brolin) - is he FBI, Homeland Security, DEA, CIA...?  What matters most is that this team along with the ultra-mysterious Alejandro (Del Toro) are poised to disrupt the flow of drug traffic into the U.S. and deliver a major blow to the asinine war on drugs waged by a country who basically finances a controlling interest in all "illegal" drug operations.

Why is this movie dope (no weak pun intended), one might ask - in a word Benicio Del Toro is one of the very few big named actors who can successfully accomplish going from playing Fenster (in the Usual Suspects) to the Collector (in Guardians of the Galaxy) to Pablo Escobar (in Escobar) and then to Alejandro in Sicario and you don't think about how it is all the same guy while you're watching it.  He's the anti-Will Smith.  He's a legit actor with chops that make you respect and see the character rather than the actor and that says a lot to persnickety folk like me. Blunt's American accent was nearly flawless; Kaluuya's was very good too (call him the anti-Cheadle; see Oceans 11-13).  Then, there's the writing!  To say it was taut would deprive you of sufficient description.  Taylor Sheridan works seamlessly with the director, Denis Villenueve to make a film that doesn't waste a moment on useless or throwaway dialogue.  What could be spoken is said instead with furtive looks, shooting angles, and pregnant pauses.

Sicario is one of the best movies I've seen in the last few years.  It ain't perfect, but it is very, very good.  Great kid friendly film - aside from the mutilated bodies, domestic abuse, and language. When it hits theaters in wide release, you should go see it.

IMTHATDUDE gives Sicario: 5

RATING SYSTEM:

5 = You should be about halfway to the theatre by now… Well… GET!
4 = Definitely worth the bread. Niiice.
3 = I won’t cuss anybody out and demand my paper back.
2 = Somewhere SOUTH of under-whelmed./I know it has a pulse, but…
1 = Not a good look. They played me AND I played myself.

Straight Outta Compton

As always, I'll be honest.  I didn't think this would be much of a movie, so I put the trip to the theatre on pause.  Sure, there'd be some nice breastage, lots of profanity, and a the possibility of a cinematic circle jerk between the surviving members of NWA bordered the line of more probable than not; while it was pretty much everything I figured it might be, it still managed to be a legit film.  I put the credit on F. Gary Gray, SOC's director.

I admit that aside from F$#@ the Police, I never listened to NWA because I wasn't feeling the shootem up jheri-curl thing.  (NOTE: No offense, but Pop dukes was a firm believer that real men do not have "hair-dos" and they certainly don't use "activator" in it if they did.)

VITALS

Whoever did this graphic, did my job for me - but poorly...  As usual one of the most critical components to any movie-making process was excluded from the above graphic.  THE WRITERS!!! My favorite part of any decent film is the writing.  So, the forgotten vitals are -

F Gay Gray (Friday, Law Abiding Citizen, Italian Job) - Director
Jonathan Herman (well, from what I can tell, he's a rookie, so...) & Andrea Berloff (World Trade Center) - Writers
**Okay, fine.  I see why they didn't mention the writers filmography, but still... they're important.
Also not included in the graphic are Paul Giamatti as Jerry Heller (pretty pivotal figure in the whole NWA saga), Lisa Renee Pitts as Verna/ Dre's Mom Dukes, and Marlon Yates, Jr. as D.O.C.

IF YOU MUST KNOW

Dre (Hawkins) was a a DJ with a love for hip-hop, but a passion for the intricate details musical details that make songs, Cube (Jackson, Jr) was high-schooler and wannabe rapper hopping the school bus back and forth from the hood, and Eazy-E (Mitchell) was a dope dealer of some sort with gang affiliations and some bread, but they were all from or living in Compton in the 80s.  For the youngins reading this (all 10 of ya), the 1980s was a terrible decade: it was the height of two of the greatest plagues in US history - the crack epidemic & the AIDs epidemic, both of which feature in the makings of the groundbreaking group N.W.A.  (If my name was Quentin Tarantino, I'd say the full name 150 times in this review for the sake of "reality" and call it art, but I'm not, so I wont.)  Also, prominently-featured in this film are also other images that I remember vividly from my own youth - police brutality, racial and social inequalities manifesting in judicial injustices (oh wait, that could easily be snatched from the recent news headlines).


Here's the story... Dre, Eazy, Cube, along with MC Ren and DJ Yella combine forces and funds to create NWA.  They are the West Coast's version of irreverence hip-hop (a less activist, more gutter version of PE, some might say... hell, I DO say) and they end up fighting battles against everyone from themselves, to their management, to the Po'lice and even the federal government.  While it should have been hard for any brown person in this country who had a microphone and a voice to not have spoken up in the midst of the Rodney King incident, Eleanor Bumpurs, Yusef Hawkins (the list goes on...), not every rapper, writer, movie star, or singer had the intestinal fortitude to so speak.  If for no other reason than, FTP - I give Ice Cube (the primary writer for most of the music I know from them) and NWA a ton of credit for vocalizing that frustration felt by so many.  (NOTE 2: I have several friends and family in law enforcement, I love them... I hate badge wielding, gun-toting, chumps with a god-complex who justify their violence by pointing at their shield.  See... talking all this NWA and Public Enemy stuff got me tapping into my Huey Newton/Freeman side.)

Back to the flick - it was surprisingly well cast.  Cube's real life son played Cube to near perfection, but one would assume that's an easy task.  The Dre character, I couldn't speak much on aside from the fact that the character establishing scene in the beginning of the film made me feel like that is what Dre's process MUST look like - listen to all kinds of music, surrounded in a sea of rich tones, and air-tickling the keys as you let the soul of the sound wash over you.  I knew I wasn't the only one to do that. (NOTE 3: I prefer a DJ who carries wax LPs to one who mixes MP3s - if  I had to choose; just like I prefer paper books to e-books.)  Aldis Hodge did a pretty convincing Ren, from what I know about him.  But the movie really centered on the degradation of the relationship between Eazy and the rest of NWA and the cause for the splintering of the group.  It only sniffs at the introduction of Tupac, Snoop D O double- G, and the affiliation, then swift dissociation with Suge Knight.  Not essential to the story being told, but some fun stuff that could be a movie of its own.

As Jerry Heller, Giamatti is an appreciably pathetic semi-villain in the best way possible (unfortunately, his voice kills me), Mitchell puts in a performance that makes you reconsider what you thought you knew about the man, and still... when it is all said and done, I still will not buy an album or the soundtrack to the music that is essentially the precursor to all that I hate about today's i'gnant hip-hop (I'm looking at you, Fetty Wap, Bobby Shmurda, and all your cohorts). No, you don't really learn anything from this movie.  Yes, I was right about what I thought would be in this movie (breastage, prolific profanity, and circle-jerk included - can't help but notice the absence of Doc Dre's allegations of domestic abuse). No, the writing was nothing to... well, write home about... hmmm, I can do better than that, but not tonight.  And, yes, it was still a good movie.  I might even watch it again - not pay for it, but if it comes on HBO... I'll give it a look.  It's kicking butt in the theatre, so that's awesome. It's not better than DOPE, but it wasn't too shabby at all.

IMTHATDUDE gives Straight Outta Compton: 4

RATING SYSTEM:

5 = You should be about halfway to the theatre by now… Well… GET!
4 = Definitely worth the bread. Niiice.
3 = I won’t cuss anybody out and demand my paper back.
2 = Somewhere SOUTH of under-whelmed./I know it has a pulse, but…
1 = Not a good look. They played me AND I played myself.

Fantastic? Four

Soooooo... on advice of a friend or six... if you don't have anything nice to say, Dude, go ahead and get it out of the way because you will damn sure say it anyway.

This movie sucked.  The only thing worse in years... Jupiter Ascending.  The producers must've been Max Bialystock and Leo Bloom.  I dare you to like this crap.

To those who paid for a seat:  You LOSE!  I say GOOD DAY!

IMTHATDUDE gives Fantastic Four: 1 (more specifically, the one between the pointer and the ring fingers)

RATING SYSTEM:

5 = You should be about halfway to the theatre by now… Well… GET!
4 = Definitely worth the bread. Niiice.
3 = I won’t cuss anybody out and demand my paper back.
2 = Somewhere SOUTH of under-whelmed./I know it has a pulse, but…
1 = Not a good look. They played me AND I played myself.

Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation

Not a huge Tom Cruise fan - his supreme weirdness trumps his commitment to verisimilitude in action scenes, but I will admit that these last two Mission Impossible flicks (Ghost Protocol & Rogue Nation) go a long way towards me dismissing the Oprah moments or the various rumors that his control freakishness is of diabolical proportions... it goes a long way, but we are light years apart, so it's going to take an awful lot more than travelling a long way for me to actually dismiss the strangeness that is TC.

Goofy couch jumping psychopathy aside, Rogue Nation and Ghost Protocol shared the common elements that make a good action movie that I have shared with you all before - excellent special effects and a good villain.

VITALS
*Christopher McQuarrie (The Way of the Gun, Jack Reacher) - Writer/Director
Tom Cruise (Edge of Tomorrow, Minority Report) - Ethan Hunt
Jeremy Renner (American Hustle, Avengers) - William Brandt
Alec Baldwin (TV's 30 Rock, The Departed) - Alan Hunley
Sean Harris (TV's The Borgias, Prometheus) - Solomon Lane
Rebecca Ferguson (TV's The White Queen, Hercules - the one with the Rock, not that other dude) - Ilsa Faust
Ving Rhames (Baby Boy, Pulp Fiction) - Luther Stickell
Simon Pegg (Shaun of the Dead, At World's End) - Benji Dunn

*MCQuarrie also wrote the screenplay for one of the greatest movies ever - The Usual Suspects

IF YOU MUST KNOW:
The Impossible Missions Force (IMF) is embattled on all fronts... I know, SHOCKER (like a pointer, middle and pinky finger - you can look that one up).  Once again, Ethan Hunt's (Cruise) team is being faced with a situation that gives rise to the acronym from whence the series draws its name.  This time, Hunt has been on the trail of the Syndicate, a cabal so secret the global intelligence community denies its existence.  (Aside #1: Anyone else notice that the bad guys organizations in these movies and TV shows centered around espionage and shadowy governments have certain similarities: example, James Bond it's called Spectre; Nikita/La Femme Nikita it was Section, for Alias the bad guys were SD-6 - and, even yours truly, in his as yet unproduced good faith attempt at writing a screenplay, called the villains the Seraphim... YIKES!  All I can say is my screenplay even had a twist with the terrorist group's name... that's how yoga-bendy my script was & reason #41 why nobody bought it.) ***If you think of any other movies or TV shows where they call the bad guys or a secret cabal of some sort is called by a name that starts with an "S" or even an S-sound, hit me up.  I know there are more, but these are the ones I though about while I was in the theater yesterday.***

What's new or fresh about this film... well, almost nothing.  The plot is virtually identical to every Mission Impossible movie since the first one.  If you haven't seen them, then this one will be fresh, but if you have seen ANY of them, then the formula will be wholly recognizable.  

Rogue Nation =  [Ethan Hunt + his IMF team (in the last few movies that's been Ving Rhames, Simon Pegg, and la femme du jour minus my bad Francais)] + the IMF is on the verge of being shut down for one reason or another + Hunt enlists the help of his associates + there's a heist of some sort from an impenetrable location + Hunt almost dies doing the impossible (as someone said in one of the earlier films "this isn't mission difficult, it's mission impossible") = most of the team lives to save the world another day, not including the franchise opener, in which his team got mercked, which really was a plus for the film.

Sound familiar?  That was the formula and plot from Mission Impossible #2, #3, and #4 - if you want the one for #5 - see the above formula and add a couple years Cruise.  Yes, some of those movies were not solid.  Ghost Protocol was fun; so was the one with Maggie Q (was it 3?) - you know the one when she popped out of that banana whip in that red dress looking like she was constructed of nothing but legs and a neck...?  I refuse to google it, because I love how it lives in my memory more than the actual plot of that particular installment.

Anyway, overall, Rogue Nation held no surprises.  Even the twists were expected, the saving grace was Cruise's commitment to making us believe he could do the action stuff that he did in this film - that's largely because Tom Cruise is playing out what can only be described as a very public death wish/cry for help by doing so many of these stunts himself.  It will not be until there is a "tragic" accident onset that people stop patting cheering him for doing things best left to professionals.  Don't get me wrong, it looks cool when you don't see the usual camera tricks that cut away from stuntmen to make us believe the actor is really hanging onto the side of a plane, but damn.  Jackie Chan - professional, but even he turned it down as he got older.  Word to the unwise: Tom, fall back before the obit ends with #LUNACYdefined  That said, what's good about this film is... you guessed it, the ACTION sequences.  The car to motorcycle chase, the fight scenes when they alternate from direct shots to silhouettes doing hand to hand-to-hand combat behind a sheet.

But Faust (Ferguson) is the best thing about this movie.  Aside: I grew up around strong women who used to kick the a$$ess of big dudes around the way and at school on my behalf when I was a wee lad, so watching Ferguson get busy, stand toe-to-toe with the toughest SOBs in the movie and show that she's not just a pretty face, really made this remake of MI's 2-4 not just tolerable, but legitimately watchable.  I wouldn't be surprised if she gets one of those rare female reappearances in the next film; better yet, she should start booking some action leads in her own flicks.  Also, I'll give honorable mention to both Jeremy Renner and Alec Baldwin for bringing in the comic relief that helped to move this movie along in an enjoyable way.  Wait for Baldwin's speech about Ethan Hunt, the seriousness makes you laugh.  


IMTHATDUDE gives MI-Rogue Nation: 3

RATING SYSTEM:

5 = You should be about halfway to the theatre by now… Well… GET!
4 = Definitely worth the bread. Niiice.
3 = I won’t cuss anybody out and demand my paper back.
2 = Somewhere SOUTH of under-whelmed./I know it has a pulse, but…
1 = Not a good look. They played me AND I played myself.

Minions [movie review]....by dough

In "No Exit", Jean-Paul Sartre's seminal work on the ontological paradox of ascribing to another's

world view in a meaningless universe of indifference, he writes:  "Anything, anything would be better than this agony of mind, this [Minions Movie] that gnaws and fumbles ... and never hurts quite enough."  I might be paraphrasing, but Sartre's inability to reconcile a world that would produce The Minions Movie with a true and living God seems on the face of it, a bit harsh.

Surely The Minions Movie is despicable (see what I did there?) or at the very least indifferent to anything resembling humanity or human interaction, but that doesn't seem to me to be completely incompatible with a benevolent and ever loving creator.  Scripture might say that the Lord of Hosts seeks only love and compassion for his creation and thus he wouldn't subject his children to 104 minutes of mind numbing tedium, tiresome machinations and a glaring lack of whimsy.  But remember that The Minions Movie is not a creation of "I AM WHO I AM". It is a creation of man.  Man.  With all his flaws and shortcomings.  Man.  With all his guilelessness and clumsy plot choices. Man.  And a studio destined to squeeze every last dime from a charming if ultimately limited diversion.

Jehovah imbued in his most precious fruit free will.  And though that will may sometimes be used for wicked or at least terribly boring means, surely those means are not proof of a cold unforgiving universe unconcerned with mankind and his many struggles with mediocrity, banality and insipidity.  I cannot consign humanity to that fate simply because The Minions Movie exists.  Music will still be played.  Poetry will still be written.  Pyramids will still be built.  Sartre be damned.