Droids Movie Confessions

I saw this over at brother Kloipy’s place, and well, decided to steal it.

The Dark Knight Rises (2012)

Please be aware, my talents are limited and simply put, reviewing ‘The Dark Knight Rises’ without revealing everything is beyond me. So I hereby provide this very, very important disclaimer.

If you haven’t seen ‘The Dark Knight Rises’, the film will be spoiled for you if read this review.

Now that I’ve protected myself with the official, ironclad online statute of ‘Don’t come crying to me if you ignore my warnings’, on with the review.

Trailerthon – June 17th, 2012

You all know what this is. Some to look forward to, some to avoid.

A Droid Premiere: Snow White and the Huntsman (2012)

As a word of warning, there is no way that I can properly review this film without talking about the story in detail. I usually don’t like to do this for films under the A Droid Premiere banner, because I know that most of us haven’t seen them. But this film is a little different. There are the makings of a brilliant film here, but there are a few reasons why it is not. In lieu of a “It was good, but it has problems.” non-committal review, I deemed it necessary to reveal a substantial amount of the story. Now I leave it in your capable hands to decide if that matters or not. I suspect most won’t care, but I provide this disclaimer in the name of covering my ass. Read on.

The Cabin in the Woods (2012): A deconstruction of a deconstruction. SPOILER WARNING!!!

There has been much discussion and debate around the details of The Cabin in the Woods, and the film has been getting one of those distasteful tongue baths by thronging hoards of self-aggrandizing nerds everywhere. Unfortunately, it is next to impossible to talk about the film in any remotely interesting way without crossing the line into SPOILER territory. So, if you haven’t seen TCITW yet, and you care one jot about having the films secrets remain, well, secret, then I strongly advise you to stop reading here.

A Droid Premiere: Battleship (2012)

The knives are out and no one’s been sharpening more furiously than me. ‘Battleship’ has got to be the nadir of Hollywood creativity. It’s a film, based on an antiquated 80’s board game. Hasbro, the company responsible for Transformers and GI Joe, are unflinchingly determined to exploit every possible product they have in their catalogue. But a board game? Transformers and GI Joe I can fully understand, because they began life as a line of toys, and by proxy have somewhat identifiable transferable characteristics and personality for a feature film. But what characteristics and personality does a board game have, when the whole game is just players taking turns yelling out grid coordinates in an attempt to hit the others plastic ship? And would the target audience know what ‘Battleship’ is? Does anyone even play board games any more?

Trailerthon–March 19th, 2012

It’s been a long time since I’ve done one of these (because I’m lazy), but there have been a lot of trailers lately, so here we go! A lot of big, glossy looking films in here.

A Droid Premiere: The Raven (2012)

I’ll be upfront and honest, I’m not very familiar with the works of Edgar Allan Poe. I haven’t read anything by him apart from The Raven and The Telltale Heart. I also know absolutely zero about him personally. I only discovered when looking him up just prior to seeing this film that he died at just 40 of an unknown ailment that has been the subject of much conjecture. He only wrote the most famous of his works in the last five or six years of his life, and at the age of 26, he married his 13 year old cousin. Nowadays he’d be hearing a rap-rap-rapping at his door alright. And a rap-rap-rapping up the side of the head as he’s dragged off in shackles. My how times have changed.

Droid’s Favourites of 2011

I’m going to angle this year end wrap up a little differently this year. There are so many lists around the internets that definitively state that theirs is the “Best of” when in fact it’s just some nerds personal opinion. So I’m going at it a little differently. I’ve compiled a list of “Droid’s Favourites”, in which I will list my Favourite Ten of 2011, along with some worthy efforts, great performances and of course, my least favourite films of the year. I’m essentially saying that this is my list, not yours, and you may or may not agree. But if you do agree, I commend you on your remarkable taste, my friend.

Don’t Look Now (1973)

EDITORS NOTE: This review is the first and last entry in the defunct ‘The Lovefilm Experiment’ series. The series never got off the ground because Lovefilm was useless. The turnaround from sending a film back to receiving a film was too long, and nearly every single junk selection I put on the list came through first. So unfortunately I won’t be continuing the series. I wrote this review in October, and haven’t re-read it, so apologies forthwith if it’s no good.

I recently got a three month subscription to Lovefilm for a steal. I’ve never had a use for the service before because if I want to watch a movie I’ll acquire it instead of waiting days on the off chance they decide to send something to me. So the decision to get Lovefilm was one made based on two requirements. I get it cheap and I don’t fill my list with the kind of standard Hollywood garbage that I can easily acquire if I want to atom bomb a few million brain cells.