Reviews by Reno

From the two new directors debuting with this fine drama about a loner teenager. It was like the boy version of Hilary Duff's 'According to Greta', had all the elements like separated parents, struggling teenager, cheating husband and the summer holiday and job. The story was told from the character Duncan who is trying hard to fit in his new family.

'The Way, Way Back' tells the story of a 14 year-old Duncan who goes to a beach house in a small town for the summer vacation with his mother and her new boyfriend. Duncan was not happy and so his step father who talks tough with him. The vacation is the chance to understand each other but it won't go according to their plan. Each of them find their way of happiness, sometimes it ends in disappointment with others. Whether their bond strengthens or not is where the movie concludes with the simple ending.

Emotionally the movie had the upper hand than what they have called it as a dark comedy. Well written script by the duo who won Oscars for 'The Descendants'. Some of the portions of the movie were very nice like Duncan's job at the water park. Where Sam Rockwell comes across to cheer up him as well the movie. The rest of the movie was a little slow in pace, especially it was a slow take off from the opening and the end was also very plain. A good movie to watch if you are okay with the slow pace. Recommended.

A comedy about two 70s born middle aged guys who recently lost their job due to the new culture called e-shopping. It tells how the old fellows struggling to get the jobs in todays computer world. After forced to retire from their positions as salesmen, Bill and Nick applies for an internship at Google. Now these two have to compete with the energetic, smart, young generation seeking employment who are just coming from their college graduation. With the lack of computer knowledge Bill and Nick have to successfully complete the series of tasks to get the jobs.

Kinda cool comedy from the director who gave us many fine comedy features. It was a good combo between Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson, they were excelling in their respective roles. The lack of required knowledge in order to get the full employment at google make us to have fond on them. They really convinced us with their acting as innocence and middle aged strugglers. We can call it where the job hunting movie 'The Pursuit of Happiness' meets fun teen 'American Pie'.

It was a good comedy as well serious about getting jobs for old guys. I know it was not real, It won't happen in real life but a heartwarming drama with some good laughs. After 'The Social Network' and 'jOBS' we expected a movie about google and now here it is. Although it was not based on real but a fictional dramedy which can be thoroughly enjoyable.

7.5/10

Surprised adventure-comedy of the year. 'We're the Millers' tells about a fake family who are trying to smuggle the drugs from Mexico to United states. David is a single who is a drug distributor in small scale. One day his boss makes a deal with him after he was robbed by the street boys that he must bring a huge shipment from across the border. So he makes a team with the struggling stripper, homeless girl and abandoned boy as a fake family called Millers. The rest of the movie was full of fun adventures on the road.

A simple predictable concept with the potential theme to make the movie at its best. How could no one ever thought this kinda story before. The movie was nothing special except the unique lead four characters. Each performance was good, individually they all gave the life to the movie. Surprised to see 43 year-old Jennifer Aniston as a stripper. It might be about a family's road adventure but not suitable for the family audience especially the kids.

One of the best road movie in the form of unusual movie characters but same old adventures and comedy. Some of the scenes were nice which really brings the wide laughs out from us. The story might deal about the smuggling drug but in the presentation you will witness that no one consumes it. Yeah, kinda weird way a movie to get a rating R other than semi nude from the Aniston. A cool comedy, I recommend it for its rare and originality concept.

7.5/10

The success of 'Cars' is nothing to do with this movie, in fact it was let down because of that movie's popularity. It was only an inspiration to make the 'Planes', maybe someday in the near future we can expect 'Boats' and fusion of all the three like 'The Avengers'. Like the movies 'Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines' and 'The Great Race', 'Planes' is about a little crop duster plane who dreams to participate in the race event.

I did not expect much, I knew it would be highly influenced by 'Cars'. The movie was not bad, but the thing was it was hard to understand by everyone. Because, unlike 'Cars' this movie had plenty of dialogue lines related to automobiles. Something like 'This guy need his head gasket checked' and 'Kick some tail buddy' kinda stuffs. You know kids can't get those, it is purely for grown ups that too somehow who knows automobiles.

Priyanka Chopra's big leap on to Hollywood as a plane character called Ishani. Not a big role but quite a fair one to expose her recognition worldwide. I can call the movie just hit and miss. The production house already announced a sequel to this called 'Fire & Rescue'. Hope that would be a better than this. This is a one time watchable movie, more like one of the not so good but okayish animation of the year like 'Despicable Me 2'.

From the director, Michael Bay, who gave many mega blockbusters. Like the movie 'Bernie' it was also based on the true story which cinematically presented as a crime-comedy. 'Pain & Gain' centers around the three Boston bodybuilders who commits a series of crimes.

Like everybody else, these three bodybuilder wants to live the American dream. Since they are poor, they plan together to abduct a rich man and fetch some money. But it won't go according to their plan, somehow they pull the incident back into their control. Now they are rich, but past begins to haunt their happy and what happens then after to them is the rest.

I liked Dwayne Johnson's role, kinda cool, made all the difference to the story. Mark Wahlberg role as well, which was aggressive and energetic. But the third character was quite moderate other than in romance related scenes. There are few errors on technical aspects like crews are clearly visible in many scenes through the glass. Overall a good movie with a racy pace and very much enjoyable.

7.5/10

The chick's version of cop movies like '21 Jump Street' and 'Hot Fuzz'. This movie was about the two cops, a honest cop and a mad cop. Sandra Bullock as the FBI agent land in teaming up with a local Boston cop Shannon (Melissa McCarthy) for a drug trafficking case. Unfortunate her new partner Shannon is a foul mouthed mad cop who handles the situation in her own violence way. That puts them into a deep trouble when another organization like DEA interference in the case.

Yeah the fun was good, sometime I felt in some scenes they tried to do over the limit, I mean overdose comedies. It was a fine combination between Sandra Bullock and Melissa McCarthy, actually it worked for the movie. The filmmakers also announced the sequel to it, that's a good news.

It was a quite good entertainer because this movie was a bit different than usual chick movies. The action sequences were not breathtaking like men movies, it was a action-comedy so somehow does a justice to female characters. It was not my favourite movie but I enjoyed it, thanks to the director of 'Bridesmaids'.

I might be a coincident that two similar movies to release on the same year. Yes it was a similar kinda theme to 'Olympus has Fallen' but a different storyline. In both the movies, white house has been under attack by the paramilitary forces. Like Gerard Butler as a special agent, Channing Tatum is the one man army in 'White House Down' who defends the US president from bad guys to take him as a hostage.

Yes the story was simple as that. I felt Channing Tatum still not capable of handling whole movie by himself. Without Jamie Foxx the movie would have been a tragedy, he controlled the movie in many parts, the saviour. Individually everyone performed very well, especially Joey King was proficient at her acting. I liked her in 'Ramona and Beezus', now I think this movie will give her a breakthrough to gain more roles to her in near future.

I loved many movies from this director but not this, at least not as much. Since 20 years, the first time he gave a movie which is just an average. Hope 'ID Forever' series will be much better than this. It is a another movie in the list of movies like 'Die Hard' and 'Air Force One'. It was not too bad as well not too good but okay as a decent entertainer. I guess the audience blaming it because of similarities between this and other movies. Other than that it was a reasonable movie with the different actors and different perspective of the similar result.

The concept was a slightly different, kinda fresh but messed up with a bad story. It was one more movie where men with guns fight against the evil invasion. Nick (Ryan Reynolds), a recently deceased honest cop joins the Rest in Peace Department (R.I.P.D.) and partners with an arrogant officer Roy (Jeff Bridges). The first assignment as a team begins when they track a dead one hiding in the earth which reveals the big secrets. These two men not only fights for their everlasting life after death from being erased their souls but also fights to keep the two worlds in peace.

The movie was at least fun, had a hard time to have a laugh. It was a quite acceptable action-fantasy than to be called a comedy. But there were no short for the good performances. Both Ryan Reynolds and Jeff Bridges were great, in some of the scenes Jeff Bridges had the upper hand with his brilliant expressions and lines.

It was based on the comical book by the same name. I never read it, in fact I never knew it till now. Fine adaptation but did not deliver the images similar to comical style like most of the adapted superhero movies do. The concept was interesting but it was not enough to it's success, could have been a more reliable movie.

6.5/10

OMG, we waited ten long years for a sequel and they gave an astonishing movie. When 'Monster Inc' came, that was the time of the beginning of the new era in filmdom of 3 dimensional (3D) animation movies. I remember I liked it but my 'understanding of a movie' was par below then compared to now. So I feel I liked this movie more than the first and that is normal because it happens to most of the people.

'Monsters University' was the prequel to the 'Monster Inc' where it exposes the college lives of Mike and Sullivan. Mike had a dream ambition from his childhood. When his school takes him for the trip to power plant called 'monsters, incorporation', he wants to join the MU to become scarier like them. In other side, James Sullivan, the son of Bill Sullivan, the scarer joins the same university. Mike and Sullivan challenge each others and when something goes wrong they have to join hands to make everything back to normal. Now they have to face a series of challenges together and overcome it to achieve their destination.

Since the storyline is about the college life the movie was a perfect entertainer even for the adults. It was just like seeing the two movies 'American Pie' and '3 Idiots' together at once. But the big problem was, the plot was not fresh, it was inspired from various teen movies that deals about college lives. Other than that the movie had lots of fun as expected and also the sentiments in various stages. Wow, for the moment I felt like 'do I am watching an animation or a live action movie?'. In my opinion adults will love this movie more than children do.

So far the best animation of the year, even slightly ahead of 'The Croods'. I want this movie to win the Oscar, now let wait for the nomination to announce. But I still believe this movie do lots of magic in upcoming American Academy Awards. And I wish all the best for the cast and crew. A must-must see movie if you like teen themes, college stories and animations.

Superman was never been my kinda superhero. I think the first time I liked him because of this grand presentation which commercially feels good. The old one was more drama kinda movie than the heavy stunts. Compared to 70s superman, this movie had computer technology with it to make every impossible things to possible and that was the highlight of 'Man of Steel'.

Like I said it was a heavy graphic movie and I loved it to the core. Tell me if you are a graphic geek then how could you not like Zack Snyder's movies, ahh?. The stunts and all were the massive. I knew Henry Cavill can pull this movie but the surprise was Michael Shannoni. He was the best villain I have seen in any Superman movie, a backbone to 'Man of Steel's success. Others like Amy Adams, Russell Crowe and Diane Lane's supported very well.

This reboot was dumped deep details of the superman from the old movie. They retained only main storyline and went straight to the 'Superman II'. Hope the its sequel will tell us the superman's job at the press company and affair with Lois Lane. I eager to see the clash of Henry Cavill and Ben Affleck in Zack Snyder's 'Batman vs Superman'.