A Fistful of Dollars reviewed

The Rojo brothers on one side, the Baxters on the other and Clint Eastwood right in the middle. Clint Eastwood has so much hype about him being the ultimate cowboy and so on but I had only seen one film with him in (Gran Turino) and he wasn't a cowboy in it, so I had no frame of reference. Then I saw a fistful of dollars and now I know, he is the greatest cowboy of all time. In the first five minutes I was hooked and that was before anything had really happened so the next ninety one minutes blew my mind.

The film starts of Eastwood riding in to a suffering town with two gangs fighting over leadership ( the Rojo and the Baxters) both gangs try to hire the Eastwood, he takes both jobs and sets about tricking them into fighting each other while he goes about taking their money. Of course by the end Eastwood proves himself to be a hero but at the start he seems very indifferent towards the suffering and frightened villagers but its all art of his "heroes journey." The film's colors weren't up to modern standards and the sound was slightly ahead of peoples mouths moving but in my opinion this simply adds to the effect of the movie. I have also recently watched the modern westerns 3:10 to Yuma and Appaloosa and while they were good films they were missing the grittiness of the old westerns, which add so much to these classic Eastwood films. Ennio Moricone (who wrote the score) did an outstanding job, his music emphasized the events as well as enhanced them.

This film was so absorbing that I found it almost impossible to look away, pause it or think of anything else for several hours afterwards. A fistful of dollars had it all comedy, action, drama, suspense it was even sad at times but it managed to pull off everything with class (unlike some more modern films that just throw them in where ever.) This was by far the greatest western film I have ever seen and is high on the list of my favorite films of all time. So if you haven't seen this film watch it, I can guarantee you will not be disappointed. It is the ultimate western but now I'm going to go watch For a few dollars more so I may change my mind.

The Rocker reviewed

I'm not bitter but I've seen better films. You've seen School of Rock, of course you have, who hasn't? If you enjoyed that film you will enjoy The Rocker. This film is a fun heart warming story (not unlike school of rock) however while i enjoyed this film it is not one I would watch more than a few times. The Rocker really is your average underdog film it may as well have followed a template, its simply a guy who gets kicked out of a band joins a new band and makes it big. It stars Rainn Wilson, Teddy Geiger, Josh Gad(who i like cause he's wearing a fedora in the picture to the right) and the oh-so-good-looking Emma stone.

I will not buy this film on DVD however I have recently purchased the soundtrack. This film is not better than school of rock, yes it is a bit of a rip-off and Rainn Wilson is no where near as funny as Jack Black but The Rocker has better sounding music. I like Jack Black as a musician ( Tenacious D being one of my Favorite bands) but he was out matched by Teddy Geiger. Teddy Geiger is an outstanding musician and "I'm not bitter" is a masterpiece. Normally I'm not too bothered withe the music of a film but this film would not have been even half as good without the music. The acting unfortunately was not so good Rainn Wilson failed to truly pull off the loser rocker stuck in the 80's and Teddy Geiger is a much better musician than actor. The strongest actor (or actress if you want to be technical) in this movie was the gorgeous Emma Stone, who was the only actor who pulled off a believable performance.

This film was very predictable and simple but it is worth watching at least once. The rocker is a fun movie, it doesn't have much effect on your life and it won't make you cry from laughing. It is however worth watching, the rocker is just a popcorn movie. I guarantee it will be years before you see a film as mediocre as The Rocker.


NB

I know this film came out ages ago but I get films from Lovefilm (the British version of Netflix) and when I get a film I will review it . Tomorrow's film Role models come back tomorrow for that review.

Superman and Batman issue #61

The second and last "mash-up" installment was once again filled with cheesy characters, although I rather liked Jimmy Two-Face (sounds like a 50's gangster.) Not all the super villain names were as cool as Jimmy Two-Face, Brainycat and Penguello for example however (as I pointed out when I talked about issue 60) while cheesy combining villains makes them more deadly. Combining the physical prowess of Catwoman with the intellect of Braniac makes her almost unstoppable however we never got to see much of a fight because the villains beat the heroes so quickly. We did however get an explanation of why they are all mashed up. It was a dream. Now I can hear all you people out there moaning at the cliché of they can just wake up and it was just a dream but I think the writers pulled it off. I also rather liked the how they ended it by pulling the only magic users of the Titans and the JLA (Raven and Zatana ) out of the dream so they could stop Doctor Destiny. To be honest I have always found the Superman and Batman title to be more of a fun comic and as such I have always enjoyed the reality warping kind of thing (my favorite series being when villains from the 31st century raised Superman and Batman to be rulers of earth.) This two part series is a great example of the fun reality warp kind of thing and everyone who has read the comic knows at times you laughed at the cheese and at others admired the pure genius of the cheese. Yes it was cheesy but you know you loved it!

Superman: World of New Krypton #4 reviewed

I'm a bit behind In the World of New Krypton) title as i have yet to pick up the first issue or the third for that matter however i do have two and obviously four. I am officially blown away by this title. I love the idea of Superman being just a military man and not a Superhero, I love watching his determination not to kill a living creature even when ordered to do so but all of this was trivial compared to the Green lanterns showing up on New Krypton. You can see from the beginning that Hal Jordan disapproves of New Krypton and even more so of General Zod but this gets worse throughout the book until it gets to a point where its obvious he really doesn't like New Krypton. When Hal says "nice home you've got here, Kal." you can see that he is almost disgusted with General Zod and with New Kryptons lack of co-operation with the Green lantern Corps. At the end of issue four Superman gets arrested for treason, now its my hope that he will escape and hide on Earth as Clark Kent but I'm not sure because as I said i am a bit behind in the Various Superman titles. Overall I'm loving the New Krypton title and yes I do miss the cape and the Clark Kent persona but Hopefully we will see all that again soon as I do not think I would like New Krypton to go on forever as I would miss the Red and Blue.

Superman issue #688 reviewed

Now let me make one thing clear "Superman" is my favorite superhero but the problem with the Superman title at the moment is it is lacking in superman. Thats an understatement Superman is simply not in the Superman title at the moment. This dear readers infuriates me, now i can see the appeal of the Mon-el and The guardian. I understand the that the fact that Mon-el is dying and that adds to his character, I even kind of like The guardian however Mon-el is not Superman. IF this was the Mon-el comic I would thoroughly enjoy it but it is not. I pay two pounds every fortnight for a Superman comic not for a Mon-el comic. Aside from the fat that superman is not in the Superman title, I'm actually quite enjoying this story. The fact that Mon-el is dying adds greatly to his character as does his loyalty towards Superman. I also rather like the Mon-el/guardian friendship (Its rather similar to the Batman/Superman friendship.) The Science police are rather uninteresting to me, maybe its my lack of knowledge about them, maybe there just uninteresting but to be honest i don't see what they offer the story. I maintain however that while the story is good the need to give Mon-el his own title and bring Superman back into play!

Superman and Batman issue 60#

Every month I am going to try and write a quick review of the latest "superman and batman" comic. Issue 60# was entitled "Mash-up part 1" and the basic plot is for some reason every member of the JLA has somehow been combined with a member of the Teen Titans (apart from Batman an superman.) Admittedly it is a bit cheesy what with combinations like nightwing and green lantern. However some combinations while still some what cheesy actually make very powerful villains for example when Doomsday (the destroyer of superman) is combined with Deathstroke (a tactical genius and assassin) to make Doomstroke you have the raw strength of Doomsday mixed with skill of Deathstroke. I'm not going to ruin the ending or you but the combination of villains on the last page will either make you cringe from cheesiness or scream in anticipation of the next issue. Like i said this is only going to be a short review due to lack of material. So this is all till next month.

Memorable lines or quotes

Batman:Don't trust me? Trust him. He never lies

Fedora wearing Biggins reviews All the way

Andy Behrens has not only caused my sun burnt arms,legs and toes but also two weeks of waiting by the door for the postman. About a month ago I saw Sex Drive a truly spectacular and hilarious film, then I found out it was based on a book. Obviously I just had to buy the book however this book can not be found in the UK let alone in Swansea (famous for having the most teen pregnancies in Britain. Impressed?) Fortunately you can buy anything on the internet and I found a copy for £1.84 ( with a £4.96 postage charge, I hate amazon.) The only problem was the only one I could find was in Canada, which is approximately 3600 miles from Swansea. Now I understand that Canada's far away but i could have walked to Canada and back to Swansea quicker than the book took to fly here. I had too wait two weeks!

The book did eventually get here and it was well worth the wait. The 216 page book was read in three hours. Admittedly this book is a bit of a romantic comedy which is not really my normal book choice (im more of a Stephen King/David Gemell kind of guy) but this has just become one of my favorite books of all time. The story is about three friends on a road trip across 1,870 miles because a girl promised sex to Ian if he came and saw here before she left for Spain. Now I know this book sounds like another one of those oh-so-similar-teen-comedies but its really a lot more interesting and funny than the normal teen comedy. The funniest most intriguing aspect of this book is the various characters you have the main characters Ian (the geek who has never had a girlfriend), Lance (the guy who gets all the girls) and Felicia (the moral compass of the group) the interaction of the three friends had my sides hurting from laughing. The real comedy is provided by the outside characters such as the hillbilly who catches Lance with his girlfriend and the policeman who pulls them over for speeding . This book is a must buy if you need a good laugh, I have honestly never laughed so hard while reading. In fact I enjoyed this book that I have now read it four times and have only had it or three days. In fact I would be reading it now but if I sit in the sun my skin hurts, so go buy the book but spend four hours on the beach reading it or for that matter your garden, my garden or the park because you will end up with severely burnt arms,legs and toes. By the way the book is called "All The Way" and was written by the skilled Andy Behrens (who is responsible for my sun burnt flesh.)