Wednesday, May 17, 2006

the last suburbian in the US w/o NetFlix

I rented two movies on Friday (which I haven't returned yet and are now very late): King Kong and Paradise Now.
Unlike the overwhelming marketing that told me about King Kong, I had heard nothing about Paradise Now. I rented it because it had olive branch award medallions on the cover. It was really good. Very well filmed, really current story about Palestinian suicide bombers but not hypey. Just authentic storytelling. I give it 4 stars.

King Kong on the other hand was not as good. Starring Jack Black, directed by Peter Jackson, how could it be bad? It could be, and it was. Peter must be worn out from all that Lord of the Rings business to pay attention to what he's doing because that movie was like 3 hours of stampeding cows. Lots of action, not much purpose. 2 stars.

I saw RV in the theater last week as well. I know some of you can no longer be my friend because I paid full price to see a poorly reviewed Robin Williams movie. But I liked it. The way one likes a kid movie. I wanted to be entertained with the predictable plotlines, generalized sterotypes and a big green recreational vehicle. Mission accomplished. 2.5 stars, because it Robin's family was annoying.

7 comments:

laura said...

rv? wow...i never took you for an rv kind of girl. bingo is next on our netflix &if we ever return what we currently have, i'll get to see it!

Unknown said...

We don't use net flix, we use blockbuster by mail. But, anyway, i want to see RV now. I didn't even know such a movie is out there, but I'd like to see it. Scott got King Kong, but I didn't want to watch it since I heard it was so craptastic, and you just confirmed that.

Anonymous said...

We're a NetFlix family, although I must say that they're laying off a ton of people in a certain department, one of which happens to be in our small group. This is after having their new and incredibly decadent building built like 2 minutes from our house. It has a two story marbly looking friggen' waterfall. But, they decided to move the department in question to another state and are decidedly NOT allowing anyone the opportunity to move for the job with or without relocation. Bad corporate citizenry if you ask me...

Anyhow, I've heard Paradise Now is pretty good from Randy. On your suggestion we NetFlixed MirrorMask. I'm hoping it will come together in the end, but we've only gotten through half of it... Something about this No napping toddler and newborn seems to consume mass quantities of time....

Tab said...

I don't have NetFlix either. Heck, I don't even have a Blockbuster account. But, I do want to get one or the other.

Anonymous said...

Netflix is cool. Even after February we will still be members. That sucks about King Kong being stupid, because that is the movie we get on the way back to California from our current vacation. Oh well my son will keep me busy I am sure on the plane.

Charlie said...

Wait, what's up with February?

Anonymous said...

That would be what Preston was referring to. My wife will be one of the ones effected by the department moving to another state.