Jimmy P's House of Movies

Every summer audiences look forward to the big event movies that Hollywood has in store for them. We usually get the mindless action movies and the big animated movies that compete for the Oscar the following year. In past summers we have seen the likes of Batman, Spider-man, Shrek, and the likes that have graced the screen. We have had bonafied classics like The Dark Knight and Wall-E and bombs like Gigli and The Adventures of Pluto Nash.



The summer season is supposed to be a season where you can check your brain at the door and have a good time. The summer of 2010, however, has been a summer where you check your brain at the door, but there isn't really a fun time to be had.

The summer got off to a bad start with Iron Man 2, a movie that proved that the first Iron Man may have been a fluke. So original and awe inspiring was the first Iron Man that a follow-up seemed like a home run. Whereas The Dark Knight showed us how a sequel should be done, Iron Man 2 showed us how a sequel shouldn't be done. The Dark Knight expanded on the characters already well established in Batman Begins and went deeper all the while giving us one thrilling action scene after another.

Iron Man 2 adds almost nothing to story other than characters. We get a new bad guy. We get a new lust interest for Tony Stark. We also finally get to see War Machine in action, but that is a bit of a let down. The one thing that the filmmakers did add that I thought was kind of cool was a lifespan to Tony Stark. The core thing that he made that he put into his chest is slowly killing him. I thought this added some much needed drama to the movie. By adding this ticking clock I thought that it would make Tony Stark a little more reflective. But it doesn't. He finds a way to stop the clock.

From Iron Man 2 we move onto Robin Hood, the new Ridley Scott/Russell Crowe action movie. There are many things wrong with this movie: the running time is way too long, there are way too many subplots, and the action scenes seem like outtakes from Scott's earlier movies Gladiator and Kingdom of Heaven.

But the biggest problem with the movie is that they inserted Robin Hood into the real world. To me Robin Hood has always been timeless legend. A man who steals from the rich and gives to the poor. Even the other Robin Hood movies had a fanciful element to the team. Here is a hero that defies the common notion of someone who actually existed. By placing Robin Hood in the down and dirty real world all of this is stripped. Sure he still robs from the rich and gives to the poor, but the "legend" aspect is gone. The thrill is gone.

Next up is Shrek Forever After. This was a movie that I was not looking forward to as the trailers made the movie look terriible. The trailers did not lie. This is a terrible movie. I guess I shouldn't have expected much after the below average Shrek the Third, but at least that movie had a few laughs. This movie is devoid of anything resembling comedy. The movie is about how Shrek hates his life and wants to go back to being a normal orge. This plot might have been fine if it wasn't the plot for every single Shrek movie. I understand that the movie is called "Shrek", but can't the filmmakers come up with something a little more original or different?

Since they are calling this movie "the final chapter" (yeah right, it didn't work for Friday the 13th and it won't work here.), you would figure that the filmmakers would have given Shrek and company a proper send-off, but all they do is insert him and his friends into one sitcom situation after another. Everything in this movie has a "been there, done that" feel to it.

Another movie was released the same day as Shrek Forever After but didn't get the type of box office it should have. This movie would be MacGruber and is based a one joke skit on SNL. The movie is very funny, but had the SNL curse attached to it so no one went to see it. If they had gone to see it they would have found what is arguably the funniest movie of the summer.

Sex and the City 2 came next, but I did not and will not see it. The movie is a box office flop so I am not the only one who feels this way.

Prince of Persia came out the same day as Sex and proved once again that most video games do not make good movies. I remember seeing a trailer for this movie last year when 2012 came out and the audience groaned through the whole trailer. The problem with this movie is the fact that the main character can turn back time whenever he wants to. This takes any suspense out of the movie because any problems the prince of Persia faces will quickly be taken care with the sands of time.

Marmaduke, Killers, Splice, and Get Him to the Greek came out on June 4th. I opted to save myself the time and effort by not going to the first two movies. I have no problem with talking dog movies, but this one just looked bad. Killers is a movie that I would not be caught dead watching and hope that it puts another nail in Ashton Kutcher's career.

I did catch Splice and thought the movie was pretty good, yet marketed wrong. The trailers made the movie out to be a horror movie when in fact the movie is more of a family drama. Sure the movie turns into a horror movie at the end, but the first two thirds of the movie is quiet and dramatic. Had they not released this movie in the summer I think the movie might have had a chance.

Get Him to the Greek is the latest Judd Apatow produced gross out comedy. The movie stars Jonah Hill as a music executive who comes up with the idea of bringing back Alduos Snow (Russell Brand) to the famous Greek theater. This involves a lot of comedy hijinks, which are mostly funny. The movie suffers from putting the very unfunny Jonah Hill in the lead. Anyone else and the movie would would have been funnier. The movie does benefit from Brand and P. Diddy. Both are very funny in the movie and bring the movie up to a recommend level.

The Karate Kid came the next week and swept away an doubt that people might have had about it. The movie is a very faithful remake of the 1984 movie of the same name, but this time the movie takes place in China and deals with the kid being an outsider. Everyone is making a big deal about Jaden Smith, but the real star of the movie is Jackie Chan. While he doesn't fight very much in the movie, he does show that he does have range as a dramatic actor. The movie is very good and teaches kids some very valuable lessons.

The A-Team was the other release of the week and continued the trend mindless, unexciting action that Iron Man 2 established at the beginning of the summer. This movie fails at almost everything that it tries. The macho talk isn't very macho, the action scenes are lame and boring, and there is not one badass character in the entire movie. The movie is filled with wannabe badasses, but not one true badass character.

Jonah Hex followed the next week, but was trumped by the also-released-this-week Toy Story 3. The less that is said about Jonah Hex the better. This is a movie so bad that the studio dumped it and had no expectations for.

Toy Story is not so much a bad movie (it is okay) as much of a disappointment. Pixar is the king when it comes to CGI animation, but with TS3 it seems that they are losing their touch. The movie has the same "been there dones that" feeling that Shrek Forever After had, just not as much. The movie is recommendable, but I wouldn't expect too much out of it.

Well that is it for the first part of my three part series "The Summer of Suck". I will be back again in about a month with the second installment.

Editor's Note: I never finished this series because there was a lot going on in my life that I had to deal with. The summer season finished on a high note with The Expendables, The Other Guys, Scott Pilgrim vs the World, Piranha 3-D, and The Last Exorcism.