Best of Movies 2011

Jables: Might as well follow the crowd and create a best of 2011 list.  Unfortunately due to a lot of reasons I haven't seen near as many movies as I would have liked but I still got to see plenty of great flicks.  Also some terrible ones.  Here we go.

Must sees:


The Adventures of Tintin - Amazingly clean fun.  What an adventure movie should be like.
X-Men First Class - A brilliant James Bondish X-Men flick.
13 Assassins - Ninjas galore.  What a great ride.
Tucker and Dale vs Evil - A great spin on the tired horror movie genre.
Drive - Perfectly paced flick with a great 80's inspired soundtrack.

New Release Movies: Cowboys & Aliens (2011)

Quantom: Every now and then a film will come along and tell you exactly what it is from the title alone. Films such as "Batman Begins" and "Snakes on a Plane," among many others. Batman Begins obviously tells us it's about the origins of Batman, but it builds up a rich story throughout the course of the film, which is still continuing two films later. Snakes on a Plane on the other hand, is 90 minutes worth of Samuel L. Jackson and snakes on a plane. So here then, we have "Cowboys & Aliens." The question is, which is it? A film that uses its title as the basis for an intriguing story, or two hours of cowboys and aliens?

New Release Movies: Green Lantern (2011)

Jables: Just looking at the movie poster you can almost tell what this movie is going to be like.  Ok let us have a quick look at the premise of the film.  Basically you have this super awesome corp of superhero aliens (round about 3,600 of them) and they use the power of "will" (which apparently is the colour green, go figure) and use this to fight all types of evil.  Anyway, this big bad guy named Parallax has turned up again after a very long time to do bad stuff.  So Tom Strong (pinky red guy on the poster) goes to the Jedi council and asks for help and stuff.  He takes a bunch of these super awesome superhero guys in green to the big bad and get their arses handed to them.

First Reactions: The Avengers Teaser Trailer

Jables: So even before watching this trailer I must state the following.  I love movies and there have been some really cool and fun comic book movies but OMG another comic book movie?  Really?  Ok I’ll play along. 

Lets go through the players involved.  

Hulk.  Ang Lee’s version didn’t really hit the mark even though Bana was great and the opening scenes were pretty groovy.  Then there was the forgettable Norton reboot that wasn’t good and wasn’t shit.  It really was just nothing that you could be forgiven to not even know ever exisited.  

Thor.  The flick was alright.  Aussie boy Hemsworth was really good and the flick was fun in parts.  Yeah they tried to ruin it with the pointless Portman love story but hey it’s Hollywood. 

Iron Man.  Fuck yeah.  The first movie was amazing.  Brilliantly acted and amazingly directed.  A really fun flick.  But then there was the sequel.  This was basically a teaser for the Avengers movie.  With Scarlett and Samuel L just ruining Iron Man’s groove.  

Captain America.  I haven’t seen this flick yet but by all accounts it wasn’t as fun as Thor and a bit disappointing.  

And then Hawkeye.  A guy that can shoot a bow and arrow really well.  Cool.

Game of Boards: Battlestar Galactica

Overview:

Whether you're a fan of the TV show that this is based off or not, you will love this game.  The premise of the game is that you are a military ship named Galactica and you are protecting civilian transport ships as you make hyperspace jumps to get to your destination planet of Kobol.  However, along the way your enemies the Cylons are trying to make you fail.  There might be traitors in your crew or wave upon wave of Cylon fighters trying to kill your population, break your morale or destroy your food or fuel supplies.  When one of these things hits 0 it is all over.

Q: I had never seen the original TV show nor the updated version, and I have to say Josh is spot on the money. I didn't know my Kobols from Cylons, or the assortment of characters from Gaius Baltar to Admiral Adama. Regardless of my knowledge of the universe, the BSG board game was a great way to be introduced to the series, which I will be watching sometime in the near future. This game will make you laugh. It will make you accuse your friends of being "a dirty Cylon." All for the sole goal of "doing a massive Hazza."

New Release Movies: Source Code (2011)

Cheesy Poster

Source Code is the latest film from director Duncan Jones, better known to some as Zowie Bowie. It follows up from his great first effort Moon, which was a low-budget but brutal story about Sam Rockwell on...well on the moon. He has made use of an increased budget to cast a couple of good names, Jake Gyllenhaal being the biggest. He is supported by Michelle Monaghan and Vera Farmiga in the title roles. The film, like Moon, is another semi science-fiction job, having many futuristic ideas but staying well in the modern world or near future.