Cowboys and Aliens

Independence day in Arizona. James Bond’s magic bracelet helps him fight not so Super eight thousand alien gold-diggers, because they stupidly abducted Indiana Wayne’s milkshake hungry son. Ham-handed character development, ridiculously silly story, and inanely Wilde phoenix scene add up to a film that tries too hard. Camp vs. A-listers.

Rise of the Planet of the Apes

Amazing effects, fantastic character development and plotting, and an alarming degree of respect for source material genetically engineer one of the best prequels ever. Familiar turf for all actors involved. Henderson re-unites with Harry. Malfoy stays douchy. Green Goblin relearns the dangers of modern science, and King Kong goes ape.

Captain America

Evans flames on patriotically in this exceptionally simple action flick. Marvelous performances and aesthetic make up for complete absence of plot originality. Basically a fast guy with a strong shield does exactly what he was supposed to do (fights Agent Red), without any internal conflict, plot twists, or historical relevance.

Batman Forever

Schumacher’s warmup for even bigger flop features odd choice heroes but brilliant bad guys. Carrey finally finds his niche and Tommy’s two face, though worse scripted, seems a prophetic prediction of Ledger’s Joker. Comes complete with all the cheese and camp of comic books, but lacks heart of other films.

Narnia: The Voyage of the Dawn Treader

Disney doesn’t make a decent epic, so someone else does for them. Best yet of Narnia franchise. Still religiously infused, still kind of corny, but finally well-acted, smoothly scripted and rendered on appropriate scale. Eustace is well cast and better as a dragon, and Caspian has a major stardust flashback.

Unknown

Neeson’s life gets Taken away, and no one has faith that he’s actually Aslan. Hitchcock-esque thriller that actually ends in the only rational, albeit implausible conclusion. Bit cheesy at times, but overall a fairly decent genre flick. Kruger is inglorious at best and Langella can’t get out of the box.

Sucker Punch

Snyder returns from Ga’Hoole and suffuses first original story with his usual sleek cinematic style. Browning, Malone, and high school Hudgens go through series of unfortunate events and Browning Pan’s her way out by imagining I, Robot and LOTR. Alarmingly deep story for Snyder, where exciting action often seems unnecessary.

Leaves of Grass

Two Eds are not better than one in this Coen Brothers wannabe complete with Tim Blake Nelson. Both Nortons characters are over the top while the plot can hardly stand up. A couple of amusing jokes can’t help but emerge from the hodge-podge of super-quirky dialogue, and equally crazy action.

The Losers

Racing the only slightly better Expendable Team, this appropriately loses. Evans steals every scene, but audience wonders why he’d want them. A blisteringly bad bad-guy and the Comedian’s subpar jokes can’t even make this comic-lover’s nightmare into a winner. A couple great kabooms, but the result is far from Earth-shattering.

The Adjustment Bureau

Heavy-set Damon takes to the mat and wrestles with fate and well-dressed angel-demons in pseudo-sci-fi flick which, to be Blunt, is cheesy and consequently riddled with holes. Like Narnia-wardrobe, magic doors transport hat-wearers to land of overt religious allegory… still New York. Concludes with literal Deus ex Machina. Silly book.

The A-Team

More like C+Team, but still grades about the Expendables’ D-. Qui-Gon joins a hung-over Cooper and an MMA fighter to help take down a Bond-esque District 9. Biel and Wilson tag along and it becomes terribly ridiculous at points, but only out of respect for the utterly inane source material.

Whip It

Barrymore directs herself, the unknown Wilson, and 30 actresses under 30 in this oddly compelling roller-derby romp. Juno plays an adorable Rocky on wheels who rockets the feisty ducks derby team to a rock-n-roll season in this fairly formulaic coming of age tale. Co-stars Juliette Clueless and Marcia Gay Hardass.

Source Code

Gyllenhaal’s video game vantage point, again and again and again. Jones moon’s us again, and again he satisfies. Sure there are some plot holes to be ignored. But then, maybe if viewed 50 times they start to make sense. Regardless, it’s a fun ride, albeit not for the other passengers.

Rabbit Hole

Like a similar alternate dimension, a brilliant adaptation from play into book. Kidman and Eckhart play the leads perfectly, and Wiest makes sister’s relationship plausible. This white rabbit leads away from Revolutionary darkness to much more optimistic take on grief. Functions as anti-iPhone propaganda. Hard to delete this film, though.

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2

Happy Potter and the Octilogy ending battle. Final chapter is far-cry from blue-balled predecessor. Kill Voldemort vol. 2 leaves all the apparating behind and focuses instead on hurling digital fire back and forth. Brief stop by the Matrix weapons room precedes Aslan Potter saving the day. Then poof, aging spell.

Rango

Dir-Actor duo leave Pirates Gore behind to bring new Deppth to untapped Western animation genre. Clunky plot and weak character development don’t overshadow great animation and original concept. Clever film references are great but Eastwood’s too far from this west desert. Alternatively titled, The Ga’Hoole, the Bad, and the Ugly.