Magic in the Moonlight

Magic in the Moonlight is a 2014 American comedy film written and directed by Woody Allen. The film stars Emma Stone, Colin Firth, Hamish Linklater, Marcia Gay Harden, Jacki Weaver, Erica Leerhsen, Eileen Atkins, and Simon McBurney. Set in the 1920s on the French Riviera, the film was released on July 25, 2014 by Sony Pictures Classics. Magic in the Moonlight received a generally mixed reception. Critics were complimentary of Colin Firth's acting, but also felt the script was too rushed.

In 1928, an illusionist, Wei Ling Soo, performs in front of a crowd in Berlin. His pièce de résistance is making an elephant disappear. As he walks off stage we see that he is actually a British man, Stanley (Colin Firth). He berates his employees and is generally curmudgeonly towards his well-wishers. In his dressing room, he is greeted by an old friend and fellow illusionist, Howard Burkan (Simon McBurney). Howard enlists Stanley to go with him to the Côte d'Azur (French Riviera) where a rich American family, the Catledges, has been taken by a clairvoyant and mystic, Sophie (Emma Stone). In fact, the son of the family, Brice (Hamish Linklater), is smitten with Sophie, and his sister Caroline (Erica Leerhsen) and brother-in-law George (Jeremy Shamos) are concerned Brice is considering proposing marriage. Howard says that he has been unable to uncover the secrets behind her tricks and he admits that the more he watched her the more he believed she really has supernatural powers. So he would like Stanley, who has debunked charlatan mystics in the past, to help him prove she is a fraud.

Greetings again from the darkness. One of the most prolific writer/directors since the end of the studio era, Woody Allen cranks a new script and film out every year. A few are great, while the others fall somewhere between highly entertaining and watchable. None would be considered a true dud. His latest is a bit fluffy and falls comfortably into the watchable category ... with nary a glint of anything more ambitious.

The line of actors maneuvering for a role in Mr. Allen's films stretches around the proverbial casting couch. The lineup here is again quite impressive: Colin Firth, Emma Stone, Marcia Gay Harden, Jacki Weaver, Eileen Atkins, Simon McBurney, Catherine McCormack and Hamish Linklater. They each perform admirably, but aren't enough to elevate the somewhat lackluster script. Ms. Stone and Ms. Atkins are especially enjoyable here.

Woody mixes his love of magic with his cynical religious views, and blends those with his too frequent older man/younger woman sub-plot. The scenes with Firth and Stone are fine, but their on screen banter would have been better served as Uncle and Niece than awkward rom-com aspirants. Despite this flaw, there remain some excellent lines and moments, plus a hand full of staggering shots from the south of France locale. The wardrobe and cars are stunning ... the film is set in 1928.

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Rio 2

Rio 2 is a 2014 American 3D computer-animated musical adventure-comedy film produced by Blue Sky Studios and directed by Carlos Saldanha. It is the sequel to the 2011 computer-animated film Rio and the studio's first film to have a sequel outside of their existing Ice Age franchise. The title refers to the Brazilian city of Rio de Janeiro, where the first film was set and Rio 2 begins, though most of its plot occurs in the Amazon rainforest.

Featuring the returning voices of Jesse Eisenberg, Anne Hathaway, will.i.am, Jamie Foxx, George Lopez, Tracy Morgan, Jemaine Clement, Leslie Mann, Rodrigo Santoro, and Jake T. Austin, the film was released internationally on March 20, 2014, and on April 11, 2014, in American theaters. Rio 2 was Don Rhymer's final film after he died on November 28, 2012. The film received mixed reviews, but was a box office success, earning over $493 million.

Blu and Jewel enjoy life in Rio with their 3 kids, the oldest and music-loving Carla, book smart Bia, and the youngest and mischievous Tiago. Meanwhile, Blu's former owner, Linda Gunderson and her ornithologist husband, Tulio are on an expedition in the Amazon and eventually discover a quick-flying spix's macaw that loses one of its feathers. When word gets out about this through television, Jewel believes that they should go to the Amazon to help find the blue macaws. While the kids are ecstatic, Blu is uncertain, but is pressured into going along. Rafael, Nico and Pedro decide to come along. Luiz attempts to follow, but fails. Blu brings a fanny pack full of supplies, one of which he uses mostly is a GPS, much to Jewel's displeasure.

Meanwhile, the leader of a group that is in a line of illegal logging named Big Boss, discovers Linda and Tulio's expedition to find the macaws and orders his henchmen to hunt them down to avoid disruptions to their work. Also, Blu and Jewel's old enemy, Nigel the cockatoo, has survived the plane crash from the first film, but is now unable to fly and is working as a fortune teller/con artist. When he sees Blu and his family flying overhead of him, he immediately decides to seek revenge on them. He enlists two minions to help him in his plans; a silent anteater named Charlie and a poison dart frog named Gabi, the latter of which is in love with Nigel. Blu and his family use a boat to get toward the jungle (with Nigel's first plan of revenge being inadvertently foiled by Charlie), and when they arrive, they find nothing in sight. However, they are eventually taken to a flock of blue macaws that are hiding in a secret paradise land. There, they meet Jewel's stern long lost father, Eduardo, his older sister Mimi, and Jewel's childhood friend, Roberto. Eduardo seems unimpressed with Blu's domesticated behavior.

The film starts off as usual for an animated movie these days -- the businessman is the bad guy. In this case, it is a logger who refers to the Blue's humans as "tree huggers." The good guys are trying to find evidence of an endangered species in the rain forest so that they can shut down logging operations. It seems fairly typical child environmental propaganda at first. Then it turns dark. It starts by desensitizing the kids to violence by showing some animals eaten by other animals during a song and dance sequence. The movie climaxes with a violent attack on the logging operation at the end of which the bad businessman is actually killed. I am not kidding. This movie seems to advocate violent environmental activism. It makes the movie much less entertaining -- for adults and kids.

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Planes Fire and Rescue

Planes: Fire & Rescue is a 2014 American 3D computer-animated comedy-adventure film. It is a sequel to the 2013 film Planes, a spin-off of Pixar's Cars franchise. Produced by DisneyToon Studios, it was theatrically released by Walt Disney Pictures on July 18, 2014. Dane Cook reprised his role of plane Dusty Crophopper. New cast members included Julie Bowen, Ed Harris, Wes Studi, and Dale Dye. Stacy Keach, Brad Garrett, Teri Hatcher, Danny Mann, and Cedric the Entertainer reprised their roles of Skipper, Chug, Dottie, Sparky, and Leadbottom, respectively.

 Took my 5 year old to see this fully knowing the franchise is worn out after having seen the disappointing Cars 2 and the first Planes. The plot is more interesting here as it plays out like an 80 minute episode of Rescue Heroes.

It was great to see a true kid movie that was still entertaining for adults. The movie was well geared towards young kids, with age appropriate themes, just the right amount of tension, and a solid story. A much more cohesive movie than Cars 2 and a different style story from either of the Cars movies or the 1st Planes. In truth, my kids would have loved to see another racing movie as they love cheering Dusty or Lightning McQueen on, but as the parent, it was nice to see a different story line. This is not a movie I'd seek out as an adult without young kids, but tagging along with them was a fun time for all. The tribute and dedication to actual firefighters was a nice touch as well, adding some depth to a kid fair. Some reviews have criticized the film for lack of depth, intensity, detail of animation, etc., etc. Those reviews are misplaced as the movie is not aiming to be Citizen Kane or art house fair. Its a young kids movie, plain and simple, and its a good one at that. Nothing wrong with being a good kids movie that is aiming to only please kids. My kids loved it and could care less if the frame rate matched that of Frozen or Toy Story.

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22 Jump Street

22 Jump Street is a 2014 American comedy film directed by Phil Lord and Christopher Miller, produced by and starring Jonah Hill and Channing Tatum, and written by Michael Bacall, Oren Uziel, and Rodney Rothman. It is the sequel to the 2012 film 21 Jump Street, based on the television series of the same name. The film was released on June 13, 2014, by Columbia Pictures and Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. The film received generally positive reviews, and earned over $290 million at the box office.

Two years after their success in the Jump Street program, Morton Schmidt and Greg Jenko are back on the streets chasing drug dealers. They thought by going to actual college that they would be hunting down real criminals once again. However, unannounced to them, they were assigned to an online university, only looking for keywords and phrases during online lectures that might give off any indication of any illegal crime happening around the city. Eventually, they come across the meeting time and location of another powerful gang in the docks. However, after failing in the pursuit of a group of dealers led by the elusive Ghost, Deputy Chief Hardy puts the duo back on the program to work for Captain Dickson—now located across the street at 22 Jump Street. Their assignment is to go undercover as college students and locate the supplier of a drug known as "WHYPHY" that killed a student photographed buying it on campus.

At college, Jenko quickly befriends a pair of jocks named Zook and Rooster, two football player fraternity members that become the prime suspects of the investigation. Jenko starts attending parties with the jocks who do not take as kindly to Schmidt. Meanwhile, Schmidt gets the attention of an art student, Maya, by feigning an interest in slam poetry. The two sleep together, to the disapproval of Maya's roommate Mercedes, and it is revealed that Maya is the daughter of the vehemently disapproving Captain Dickson. Despite sleeping together, Maya tells Schmidt not to take it seriously, and he starts to feel left out as Jenko bonds more and more with Zook, who encourages him to join the football team.

Review:

Loaded with potential, 22 JUMP STREET is the sequel to the comedic buddy teamup (based on the 1980's Johnny Depp TV show) where Christopher Tatum and Jonah Hill posed as high schoolers to bust a drug dealer… Not only did it score at the box office, 21 JUMP STREET was actually really funny and involving, and the duo made a fantastic polar opposite team.

The first of many inside-jokes is when Ice Cube's grouchy Captain of the 22 Jump Street's new abandoned church location comments on how no one thought the first "reboot" (referring to the church within the movie, but not really) would actually work like it did... And now they're piling more money into this new one (again quasi-referring to the church)… Something sequels actually have to do to win over audiences, a second time.

The intentionally mirrored storyline of Hill's Schmidt and Tatum's Jenko in college lacks the suspenseful undercover element of keeping their identities secret: Not only do they constantly shrug off the mission at hand… finding the drug dealer that sold to a girl who fatally overdosed… but the students they're involved with are equally pointless and unmotivated.

Jenko bonds with a fellow football jock while Schmidt scores (much too easily) with a girl way out of his league. The twist on who that girl's related to provides some laughter but the joke gets old after a while. As do the bromantic metrosexual comparisons about the bickering cop-partners being in and out of a close relationship... You're straight but seem otherwise: We get it already!

The best scenes take place after the weary college story peters out… Not like it had any real juice in the first place… Hell, even their current psychedelic overdose is lame and contrived. So when the boys infiltrate Spring Break/Mexico there's a neat burst of overboard sequel-action to make us forget two things: 22 isn't as good as the first venture, and the first 3/4ths of this movie isn't very good at all.

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