Movies! Yeah, it’s been a boring few days, and so I did what I do best. Watch movies. And this time it’s the action genre (needed some excitement). Caught up with some stuff I missed out earlier this year..

Live Free or Die Hard (2007)

Ah over the top action from Bruce Willis here, in fact, a little bit too over the top if you ask me. Extensive use of CGI makes the stunts too wild to be believable. Car crashes all over the place, rooftops, tunnels, offices and down an elevator shaft. Pure Hollywood. So so only. But got some eye candy in the form of the delectable Mary Elizabeth Winstead and Maggie Q.

The Bourne Ultimatum (2007)

Okay, when this first came out in the cinema, EVERY SINGLE ONE of my friends told me it sucked. They said it was lousy, it was ‘ok lar’ and that it was below expectations. Well guess what guys, you were all WRONG. This is easily one of the best action movies I’ve seen, and is a fantastic closure to the Bourne movie trilogy. The pacing was excellent, and unlike Die Hard, the lack of CG really amped up the action suspense here. I loved it.

Until Death (2007)

Jean Claude Van Damme returns! This time, he takes on a more ‘real’ role – a cop with an alcohol and drug problem. People who go in expecting this to be a typical Van Damme action movie might end up a little disappointed because he spends half of it recovering from a bullet wound in the head. It’s a character film foremost, and an action second. However, the execution, script and screenplay were really sucky and brought it all down. Give it 1-2 years and this is going to be one of those ‘endless repeat’ low grade stuff you see on Astro everyday

Mr. Brooks (2007)

This is one of the best, unpredictable thrillers I’ve ever seen. Kevin Costner does an amazing job as the wealthy, successful businessman, philanthropist with a loving family that just happens to have an ‘alter ego’ with an addiction to killing too. But that’s just the tip of the iceberg. This movie will keep you hooked until the very end – you just won’t know what’s coming next. The tone & atmosphere brings the dark, well thought out plot to life. I TRULY enjoyed this movie. *applauds*

Deja Vu (2006)

Ah, time for a little sci fi. I watched ‘Next’ earlier this year, and I’m interested to see what this one has to offer in comparison to it (both deal with manipulating timelines). I thought this was done in a pretty cool way – but most definitely wasn’t realistic enough for the hardcore sci-fi fans (like me). The sci-fi element was underdeveloped and over-hyped (not enough hard science, setup too ridiculous to be believable), but as a thriller action, its definitely still enjoyable.

The Hills Have Eyes 2 (2007)

Didn’t watch the first one, so don’t exactly have a frame of comparison – but the plot is fairly easy to pick up. Mutants inhabit the caves and hills of a top secret military area which was once a nuclear weapon testing site. And well, these mutants are hungry… Realllly bad acting, lame lines and horrible delivery here. But if you can swallow all that, it can get pretty terrifying in some scenes, and the gore more than makes up for it. Ah gore..

4 : Rise of the Silver Surfer (2007)

*recollections of X-Men comes surging back* And NOT in a good way. Whole thing is too campy. Yeah, yeah I know it’s done on purpose, but it sucks that I STILL don’t feel a thing for the characters. It’s not a nice feeling sitting through such a high budget movie based on a cool comic, and yet not giving a damn about anything that happens. What’s with them mutilating the entire Galactus and Silver Surfer stories? If Silver Surfer could have wiped out Galactus, why didn’t he do so from the very beginning and save his own world and his lover? JEEZ. Oh and the whole lame marriage sub plot? Sigghhhhhh..

Alpha Dog (2006)

A very gritty drama thriller based on the story of the youngest man to ever be on the FBI’s Top 5 Most Wanted list. It’s almost like a semi documentary, as the movie leads you through the chain of events that put him there (inclusive of captions that goes “Dude in Car – Witness #45″) plus interviews with the real life victims and people whom the story is based on interspersed throughout. It might start off a little slow, but have a little patience, and you’ll be surprised at how much power this film has. Not to mention, Justin Timberlake actually does a decent job acting too.

300 (2007)

Okay I definitely didn’t miss this when it came out in the cinema, and it ranks amongst my best movies of 2007. I just had to watch it for the 2nd time again on DVD. True, its nothing but a mindless actionfest – but BOY what a work of art it is. There’s simply nothing else like it around. Style oozes out of every frame, and extended slowmo violence has never been that cool (except since the first Matrix and Chow Yun Fatt days). Fantastic comic book adaptation – Frank Miller is definitely breathing some much needed new life into cinematic fiction. I can’t wait for more..