The world of cartoons please all of us, no matter young or old, the colors, the images and the innocent appeal is just so likeable, the feeling of nostalgia and a break from the real world is just more than welcome. However, when you put humans inside the artificial yet pleasing world of cartoons, it would definitely spoil the broth. Warner Bro’s Speed racer comes as a total surprise this summer. When Wachowski brothers The Matrix was released, it gave us so much to cud on, the extreme action sequences, the incoherent dialogues, the binary-equated plot pleased us all. It was extremely refreshing and full of brilliant futuristic ideas, though the subsequent releases in The Matirx didn’t capture the fancy to that level but still they built a lot of expectations from the director duo. (more…)

Sometime it helps to take up a film that is so predictable that you can predict not only the story but also the box-office business as well. The method has been practiced to perfection; hate leading to love is a bull’s eye hit at point blank range that only a moron can miss. You absolutely do not need to let your imagination on a fly to understand what might happen next! Who can not figure out that antagonism is only skin-deep in What Happens in Vegas? This Cameron Diaz - Ashton Kutcher starrer supposedly romantic comedy takes you for a journey between hate and love with the background of a surprise shower of fortune. Though these two can not fall in the list of best romantic category, they give a seasoned performance and is quite a welcome break from the most unlike pairs of Hollywood that have flooded the screen of late. (more…)

(Stills) Comedy is definitely not enjoying the greatest heights today. And even if we do have splashes of comedy, they are primarily built on situational or contextual podiums that do not feature a perfect comedy of errors or comedy of manners. Judging a movie in a comedy scale makes one get anxious. Fine, no apprehensions, the audience does laugh, but that is definitely not an answer to the all-pervasive question, was it comic enough? This is when you rate a movie average, answerable for the fact that you are in a superb fix. So, when Walt Disney decided to take a break from its trademark fairytales and go for a pure comedy, it turned out to be a farce, a mere slapstick opera. Created for a teen audience, College Road Trip can not be tagged as a masterpiece, though it does take you for a light hearted family trip with the drizzle of laughter that occasionally takes the shape of a tropical thunder storm. Director Roger Kumble has given us a G-rated movie that deals with or rather showcases the good-natured clash between an over-protective father and freedom-loving daughter. Keeping this storyline everything goes for a pure surprise-free comedy. We expect a complete menace and we do get one by and by. (more…)

(Stills) The animal in man is like a primitive being that just waits to break free and take him into the deep dark dense jungles of a bygone epoch where the ruling spirit was survival of the fittest. Even it holds true today though the meaning of fitness has changed a lot for us, we still love the prehistoric fight for survival, the extinct animals, the intriguing myths and the illustrative legends. This is the very fact exploited by Roland Emmerich in 10,000 BC, a sure shot Apocalyptic success. Roland Emmerich agrees that he was influenced by One Million Years B.C. and Apocalypto but gives the credit to Robert E. Howard for his fictional work that inspired him to take us back to a harsh and primeval prehistoric age in quest of truth and courage. Making use of rampant digital imagery to recreate a beyond belief lost era of wilderness depicted in and out. (more…)

(Stills) What would you call another movie that spins around the assassination of the high priest of American Politics, the so-called most powerful man of the world, the President of United States? Simple, Vantage Point! Yet, another thriller with some punch in it! Through out the movie you get the feeling of untangling a bundle of entwined wool or a possible jigsaw puzzle while every piece intrigues you with a possible way out. Even if you get the feeling that it has been inspired from master director Akira Kurosawa’s Rashomon, a movie that kept the audience far from finding out the truth owing to the conflicting accounts or eye witnesses till the end, Vantage Point does give you something fresh to cud on, without any political, social or even moral sidekicks. (more…)

A murder mystery that does not stop at being a thriller only, The Walker appears to be the window to director Paul Schrader’s perception of Washington DC and how he sees politics pervasive in its nooks and corners, plaguing it. The story centers on a well-off Carter Page, who is son of a senator and a convenient recipient of the business fortunes of his tobacco tycoon grandfather. Carter Page has been shown a contented person to be living comfortably on his inheritance. He is ever well-dressed, pleasant-mannered and enjoying the good company of his elite married women friends. He frequently accompanies them to rich society parties when their husbands cannot be by their side. He is their good gay friend who funds a canasta game for them on weekly basis and takes pleasure in participating in the non-stop gossiping sessions during the game. (more…)

Daunting it is to imagine oneself being the only survivor on a wilderness or an uninhabited island. A tangible theme for a feature, yet not many movies try to explore a scene of total solitude from human race. One forceful reason may be that it is hard to hold the audience single-handedly (for any performer), without any entertaining situations arising out of interaction with ones own kind or warmth of relationships in the life of lead actor. (more…)

August Rush is a sweet, romantic story about a homeless musical prodigy, Evan and his parents. It has a dreamy and almost Dickens-like feel set in modern day New York. Coming to the story, there is a one-night passionate chance encounter between Lyla a gifted cellist played by Keri Russell and Lewis, a rock band member essayed by Jonathan Rhys-Myers. Lyla gets pregnant but her over-protective father keeps her away from Lewis. Some months down the line she meets with an accident and delivers a premature baby. In her interest, the father forges her signaure and puts the baby up for adoption, while telling her that he didn’t survive. (more…)

No Country for Old Men is directed by the hugely talented duo,the Coen brothers and based on the book of the same name by author Cormac McCarthy. It is a chilling and disturbing tale that uses raw performances by its lead actors to bring action and drama to the fore. The story begins with Llewelyn Moss, Josh Brolin finding a pickup truck filled with heroin and cash and twenty dead men around it. (more…)

The first Rush Hour flick was entertaining; I’ll give you that. The second got on your nerves a little, but then again, the first was a hit so there was no avoiding that. But when the third installment of the movie came out, I braced myself before entering the movie hall. You see, I feared that I would be subjected to mindless antics of tired stars who were doing the entire thing on a lark and the whole purpose of the movie is to rake in the moolah on the strength of the popularity of the predecessors. How I wish that I could say I was being simply paranoid and prejudiced and that the film is not quite bad! Sadly, I was right bang on and I could not wait to get out of the theatre. (more…)