Emily Blunt

Looper

/ / Movie Reviews
  • Title: Looper
  • IMDB: link

looper-posterWritten and directed by Rian Johnson (Brick, The Brothers Bloom), Looper gives us a time travel story that focuses on how far a man will go to protect his future, and how far the world will go to stop him. In the year 2072 time travel has been outlawed but is still used by gangsters and shady corporate big wigs who send their victims back in time to be killed in the days before the invention of time travel by hired assassins known as Loopers, thus creating the perfect crime.

The film centers around the actions of a single Looper named Joe (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) whose largely empty life is filled by bad diner coffee, learning French, doing lots of drugs, shooting hooded strangers who suddenly appear in an empty field and disposing of their bodies, and carrying a torch for a stripper (an alluring, and scantily clad, Piper Perabo) who cares only for his money. In other words, his life is perfect (for what he wants out of life – money, women, and drugs), at least until the arrival of his Loop (Bruce Willis) derails his entire future.

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Salmon Fishing in the Yemen

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  • Title: Salmon Fishing in the Yemen
  • IMDb: link

salmon-fishing-in-the-yemen-poster

Adapted from the novel of the same name by Paul Torday, Salmon Fishing in the Yemen is the kind of quirky reserved British romantic comedy that won’t knock your socks off, but, when it’s not getting in its own way, will deliver an enjoyable time at the movies.

Ewan McGregor stars as Dr. Alfred Jones, a scientist for the National Centre for Fisheries Excellence who is pressured by his boss (Conleth Hill), the British Prime Minister’s Press Secretary (Kristin Scott Thomas), and the representative (Emily Blunt) of a Yemeni sheikh (Amr Waked) into helping the sheikh in his rather absurd dream to introduce salmon fishing to the deserts of Yemen.

Despite his incredulity at a project he believes impossible, Alfred finds himself in a situation where money is no object and the British Government, hungry for a good PR story, are willing to do anything to see the project succeed. And the longer he spends on the project the more Alfred becomes won over by the sheikh’s dream and Harriet (Blunt).

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The Muppets

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  • Title: The Muppets
  • IMDB: link

the-muppets-posterIt’s time to play the music. It’s time to light the lights. It’s been a long time since the The Muppets took Manhattan, had a great caper, or set their sites on an original movie. Sure there was that attempt to give Gonzo his own film, and the series of movies adapted from literature to star The Muppets over the years, but for the first time in a long time, with no small part to Jason Segel, The Muppets are back.

The story begins with brothers Walter (Peter Linz) and Gary (Segel) traveling to Los Angeles with Gary’s longtime girlfriend Mary (Amy Adams). Although the trip was initially set as an anniversary getaway for the lovers, Gary brings Walter along to let him realize one of his dreams by visiting Muppet Studios.

Walter is crushed to find the studio in disrepair and horrified to learn that an oil tycoon (Chris Cooper) is set to take ownership of the property and destroy it. The Muppets have only one chance, the contract leaves a clause that they can buy back the studio before the deadline if they can raise $10,000,000.

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The Adjustment Bureau

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  • Title: The Adjustment Bureau
  • IMDb: link

the-adjustment-bureau-posterIs your life your own? Does fate need an extra push? Is there a grand plan? Is someone watching? Loosely based on a short story by Philip K. Dick, The Adjustment Bureau attempts to answer these questions when one man looks under a curtain he wasn’t even supposed to know existed.

When we meet U.S. Congressman David Norris (Matt Damon) his career isn’t going quite as planned. On the eve of a lost election, while working on his concession speech in a men’s restroom, he meets a beautiful young dancer who will change his life in more ways than either of them can imagine.

David and Elise (Emily Blunt) make an immediate connection only to be separated for years by fate… or something else. A chance encounter years later is also derailed and that’s when David comes face to face with “The Adjustment Bureau.” For reasons left unsaid, the Bureau don’t want David and Elise together, and will do everything in their power to stop this deviation from their mysterious plan.

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Gulliver’s Travels

/ / Movie Reviews
  • Title: Gulliver’s Travels
  • IMDB: link

A BIG DISAPPOINTMENT

I’m not sure, but I’m willing to bet the central idea for putting Jack Black in a remake of Gulliver’s Travels was for the express purpose of having him fight a giant robot in the town square as the miniature masses looked on. As ideas go, this one is less than inspired (but, then again, so is the rest of this hapless film).

How you take the talents of Jack Black, Jason Segel, Emily Blunt, Amanda Peet, and Billy Connolly and create something as thoroughly inane and painfully unfunny as Gulliver’s Travels is a mystery. This might be the dumbest movie I saw this year.

Black stars as slacker mailroom worker Lemuel Gulliver. To impress news editor Darcy Silverman (Peet), for whom he’s had a secret crush for years, Gulliver plagiarizes various travel articles earning him a spot to write for the paper. (I can’t imagine how such a well designed plan might blow up in his face.) His first assignment takes him to the Bermuda Triangle. (Cue ominous music.) After sailing into a storm Gulliver finds himself in the land of Lilliput, a kingdom filled with people less than 6-inches tall.

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