This weekend was one of those weekends in which time seemed to stretch. I was only off for two days but it felt more like four. There was much togetherness with the fam and the animals. And of course, there was movie watching.
The Joneses
I thought this movie was a comedy. I don't know what gave me that impression way back when the trailers were out, but The Joneses is not a comedy. At all.
It's about a group of four people called a "cell". They function as a family - parents and two kids - a boy and a girl. David Duchovny plays Steve Jones and Demi Moore plays Kate Jones. They sell products by becoming walking advertisements, basically.
They're pretty and seem to have it all. They network with their rich neighbors to get them to buy certain products like cars, golf clubs, jewelry, cosmetics, beer, televisions, etc.
The movie was entertaining but sad in many ways. Steve wants a relationship with his "wife", but she's all about business. So he eats dinner alone and yearns for a less pretend life. Mrs. Jones does nothing but work. The "kids" who actually look like adults in their 30s have their own personal problems that mess up the carefully crafted facade.
Also sad are the Jones' envious neighbors want the lifestyle very badly.
The Joneses did have a few funny parts but many more not so funny. It was still a really good, albeit sad, story. It made me wonder why someone would damage themselves in the push toward material excess and what they perceive as success just to keep up with the people they admire. The thought-inducing movie gets a B+.
-------------------
Unstoppable
Yes, it's the train movie with Denzel Washington and that guy who played Captain Kirk in the Star Trek movie, Chris Pine.
A genius of an engineer (played by the guy who played Randy on My Name is Earl) jumps off the train he is driving to pull a switch or something, and then attempts to catch his train by running alongside. Not a good plan. He fails. Train rolls away. Did I mention there are hazardous materials on it? Well, there are.
They need to catch the train before it causes death and destruction in residential areas.
Rosario Dawson is Connie, a yardmaster. She is the brain of the rescue, giving orders to the various guys involved in trying to get the things stopped.
As you can probably imagine, Unstoppable has a lot of action. There are explosions and objects being hit by the train and all sorts of fun like that. It wasn't my favorite movie of all time, but not bad. It gets a B.
_________________________
Hey, want some free reading? Check out the fiction freebie page on this very blog!
There you shall find links to two free ebooks on Smashwords and novel excerpts on Scribd.
Other places to find me:
http://www.LeaRyan.com/
Twitter: http://twitter.com/LeaRyan1
Didn't I tell you about this movie? This was the movie that caused the rift between one of my friends and I. I enjoyed the movie, and its commentary on our society. Thankfully, my friend and I got over the rift.
ReplyDeleteLOL, glad you made it past the rift. I did remember you talking about going to see it but I guess I didn't listen to your notes on the movie itself.
ReplyDelete