Morgan P Salvo

An endlessly cute, incoherent and ridiculous espionage action-comedy, Knight and Day stars Tom Cruise and Cameron Diaz as Roy Miller and June Havens, a pair of cartoony humans hopping from plane crash to car chase to helicopter to train to motorcycle chase to bull stampede. Cruise plays a secret agent with whom Diaz becomes entangled because, well… actually it doesn't really matter why anyone does anything in this film.
Cruise doesn't pack houses like he used to and Diaz won't get recognition until she wiggles her ass in the next Charlie's Angels movie. Both stars have become “themselves” so much so that they're all we see, not the characters they portray. The combo of beauty and pearly whites wears thin. Cruise has lost the talent of yesteryear when he worked alongside Newman, Hoffman and Nicholson. After producing gazillion-dollar action flicks, ranting Scientology and couch dancing on Oprah his credibility has taken a nosedive. Diaz had moments of real talent, but then fell into idiotic ditzy giggly roles. We get what's left of their shtick in this tedious piece of fluff that is neither amusing nor entertaining.

It all made sense during Jonah Hex's ending credits that this PG-13 tease had Neveldine & Taylor (responsible for Crank) written all over it. But then it made even more sense to find out they dropped out and whoever took over left the good ideas on the cutting room floor. Based on the DC comic of the same name, Jonah Hex is the newest comic-book-character-turned-anti-hero movie.
Jonah Hex (Josh Brolin) is an old west scar-faced drifter, bounty hunter and stoic gunslinger who can track down anyone…and anything. Jonah's violent history is steeped in perplexing myth and legend and has left him with one foot in the natural world and one on the “other” side. Hex is hired to stop terrorist Quentin Turnbull (John Malkovich), the same man who murdered his wife and family, so of course revenge becomes the driving motive.

In remake world where all dreams come true and sentimentality reigns supreme, comes the 2010 version of The Karate Kid. I assume there was karate in the original (I never saw it or its sequels) but this one is devoid of any – or, as Jackie Chan says, “everything is kung fu.”
If 12 or under, you'll enjoy this Karate Kid. Otherwise, prepare yourself for disappointment. For no reason whatsoever, single mom (Taraji P. Henson) and her child Dre (Jaden Smith, son of Will) move to China. Jackie Chan plays their maintenance guy who gives kung fu lessons to Dre so he can gain inner peace and defend himself against bullies. Predictability is the name of the game here as we see bullies kicking ass, an evil kung fu academy and a ridiculously cornball kiss. Even the “Feeling Strong Now” montage was weak.

Don't expect horror from this dysfunctional freak show. Splice is not scary and only pretends to be a psychological thriller. It's a “what if” scenario focusing on scientists who play God, splice together some DNA stew and then decide to raise the prototype like a child. They watch it grow, try to teach it, but give up and… have sex with it. I'm not kidding. Even with its international credits, Splice still comes off like a bad American movie about really bad parenting.
Splice starts off promising. The credits are spelled in veins popping out of embryo-like skin and the actors peer in at you as if you were the experiment. Bio-technology at the N.E.R.D. laboratories has created a new species of lumpy penis-headed slugs named Fred and Ginger. Top-notch scientists and live-in lovers Clive and Elsa (Adrien Brody and Sarah Polley) are on the verge of the next breakthrough using human DNA, but are blocked by corporate big wigs, so they go rogue and proceed with the experiment in secrecy.

Joining the ranks of flicks vying for worst movie of the year award is Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time. Persia is like a bad combo of Pirates of the Caribbean and The Mummy. Making Disney adventures out of a videogame is a testament to producer Bruckheimer's money-making schemes, but I can only assume that this is the most boring video game ever.
Beginning with a credo of destiny mumbo jumbo, this sword-and-sandal adventure takes place in the golden-hued sixth-century Persian Empire (now Iran) and focuses on the trials and tribulations of Dastan (Jake Gyllenhaal), an orphan plucked from the streets by a king (Ronald Pickup). In an only thinly veiled metaphor, the Persians invade a holy city to seize weapons of less-than-mass destruction (fancy swords) on false pretenses and bad intelligence. Thrown into the mix are Dastan's two stepbrothers, Garsiv and Tus (Toby Kebbell/ Richard Coyle) and their evil uncle (Ben Kinglsey). The plot hinges on a time machine-like dagger; one press of a button on the handle sends the holder back in time… or time goes back… or time spins around in a smoldering golden whirlwind. Yes, it's that confusing. The dagger comes in to play when Princess “pouty lips” Tamina (Gemma Atherton) is captured then escapes. Treacherous deceit and dagger pursuit ensues.

I was introduced to Shrek in two ways. First was the commercial hype and McDonald's toys. The next time was when I was painting a kid's room. I heard a lot of muffled cartoony chatter coming from another room along with laughter from kids. I also heard some cool music from the likes of The Eels, Joan Jett and, shockingly, John Cale. I thought that someone must've had some alternative radio show going at the same time, but there it was: really cool music attached to the childlike phenomenon called Shrek. I checked out the first one, it was sharp and witty with enough humor for adults and fun for kids. I checked out Shrek 2 for about five minutes, lost interest and by-passed Shrek the Third entirely. This time I was curious as to what they've come up with for the grand finale.

How many times and in how many mediums must we watch the saga of Robin Hood be botched? Among all the songs, movies, cartoons and TV shows, add one more with this boring one-note treatment of the band of not-so-merry men. Ridley Scott's Robin Hood is so hell-bent on remaining serious that it squishes the life out of itself. I guess the fact that no one wears tights at any point during this film is the first red flag.
This film is quite simply the longest intro in cinematic history – one long drawn-out prologue to set up how Robin Hood came to be. The plot drags on like a slow moving history lesson instead of an exciting, action-filled adventure. The mediocre opening battle sequence sets the tone for the remainder of this uninspired movie.

What's the big deal about babies? I'm not especially fond of other people's babies and there's nothing more torturous than baby home movies. Seriously, what's so special about babies? Who gives a rat's ass unless they're your own? I don't get it.
The new documentary Babies cashes in on the cute and, hopefully, shared fact that we are all enchanted by life's beginning and how awesome it is to be born while surrounded by a bunch of shit we can't comprehend. Clearly I was assigned this movie as a cruel joke, but nothing prepared me for how truly bad this flick would be.

Producer Michael Bay is on a murder spree. He is systematically slaughtering remakes of classic horror/slasher movies from the '70s and '80s, churning them out in slash-bang fashion. He has destroyed what was good about Texas Chainsaw Massacre, Last House on the Left, and Friday the Thirteenth and now, true to form, has lowered A Nightmare on Elm Street to new slice and dice depths of schlock and mediocrity.
Elm Street was created by Wes Craven (Hills Have Eyes, Scream) in 1984, franchised into nine slasher films and also spawned a television show, novels and comic books. In case you're from Mars, here's the plot: a group of teens suddenly share the same nightmare involving a scary guy in a tattered red-and-green-striped sweater and fedora. This serial killer/monster, Freddy Kruger, wielding a glove with knives as fingers is stalking and killing people in their dreams, resulting in their actual deaths. The wisecracking Freddy has a special motivation. His victims are the teenage children of a group of vigilante parents who hunted him down and burned him alive because he was a child molester.

The Losers starts off with a laugh-inducing, somewhat jaw-dropping beginning that is guaranteed to take some steam out of the upcoming A-Team movie. Based on a DC comic book from the '70s written by Andy Diggle, and illustrated by Jock, I thought I might hate this cartoonish, nonstop action movie, but I have to admit that it's actually pretty darn amusing.