MOVIE
REVIEWS
5
Sweet revenge proves successful By LISAJOYCE VERGARA For the Daily Titan
From director John Singleton, who directed “Boyz N the Hood” and “Baby Boy,” comes a story about four brothers, Bobby (Mark Wahlberg), Jerry (Andre Benjamin, from the music group OutKast), Angel (Tyrese Gibson), and Jack (Garrett Hedlund, “Troy”), who come from different walks of life and were raised by their loving mother who adopted them and saved them from the mean streets of Detroit. One tragic night, their mother, Evelyn (Fionnula Flanagan), isgunned down in a liquor store robbery. Police are on the scene investigating her killers, but the Mercer brothers unravel the death to be a set-up, execution style. Despite their different races, they are bound by ties thicker than blood. They all come together to bury their mother and to bury her killers. The brothers are determined to find her killers and will stop at nothing to find answers.
While the movie revolves around a murder, it also focuses on how the brothers grew up together and lean on each other in their time of tragedy. The boys were the worst of all delinquents. No one wanted to adopt these four troubled boys until one woman saw the goodness inside each of them. Bobby, the hot-headed big brother is an exthug, Jerry is the ex-hustler, Angel is the pretty boy and ex-thug of the family, while Jack is the baby boy rocker. Together for the first time in years the four catch up on their lives while dealing with their mother’s death. The four set out a mission to find these thugs. Aside from police investigation, they decide to take the murder into their own hands. Their investigation intensifies and they start to use methods outside the law. Violence and bloodshed is showcased throughout this actionpacked film, with gun battles, car chases and good old-fashioned fist fighting. Singleton once again brings out
Paramount Pictures
the best in filmmaking with his signature action and drama filled sequences. The ethnically mixed
cast gives great chemistry of different personalities. It was strange to me to see Andre from OutKast
in this because I didn’t know he could act and he’s actually good! Watch this movie, it’s a must-see!
40-year-old Hustle keeps it movin’ virgin star still not getting any By DAVID BARRY
Daily Titan News Editor
By SUZANNE SULLIVAN Daily Titan Photo Editor
The film 40-Year-Old Virgin is about Andy Stitzer, a man who works in an electronic store, lives in an apartment filled with action figures and video games, and who is, big shock…a virgin! 40-Year-Old Virgin looked like a promising film initially, with Steve Carrell from “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart” and the american version of The Office playing the main character and Judd Apatow, director and cowriter with Carrell who has been a part of many entertaining tv shows and movies (Freaks and Geeks and Anchorman), it seemed like it was destined for comic gold. The fatal flaw is that all of these jokes have been done before: the over-sexed females that scare Andy, the co-workers who give horrible advice, and the stunted man who still plays with action figures. Catherine Keener, plays Carrell’s love interest, Trish, who works across the street from him in her “We Sell Things on Ebay” store. Andy meets Trish when she
comes into the electronic store to buy a VHS player. After a week or so, Andy finally gets the nerve to go over to her shop and ask her for a date. The relationship between the characters is fairly dull and as the story progresses you don’t really care if they stay together. The supporting characters are not developed enough to make them interesting. They try to assist Andy on a quest to get laid, but while they are experienced, they too have no success with women. Paul Rudd’s character, David, is obsessed with his cheating exgirlfriend, Jay (Romany Malco) cheats on his girlfriend, and Cal (Seth Rogen) doesn’t have a girlfriend either. The minute a character comes into view, you know exactly what he is going to say. It’s not to say that predictability is what kills everything, but a film needs to have a little imagination. What is sad is that the funniest scene of the movie is the last scene, once you have already given up on the movie. No chemistry between characters, a plot that is annoyingly predictable, and jokes that are just not that funny.
Once the excitement of buying textbooks dies down and the endof-summer blues settle in, one may find oneself browsing the comedy section of Blockbuster or Netflix, searching for that perfect distraction. Fresh out on DVD, “Kung Fu Hustle” delivers the kick-ass martial arts spoof that its trailers promise. Surprisingly, it contains a bit more substance than most farces, action flicks or combinations thereof. Stephen Chow, who also wrote, directed and produced the film, plays Kung Fu Hustle’s main character, Sing, a wannabe Kung Fu
gangster. He desperately wants to join the violently successful Axe Gang, but his incompetence seems to doom him to the life of a petty criminal or a homeless person. Sing’s wretchedness is somehow endearing – so much so that the audience is magically hustled into rooting for him to transform into a hero either a hero or anti-hero. This transformation, hinted at in the opening title sequence which shows a butterfly fluttering along a Grand Canyon-like landscape, materializes in the strangest of ways. More fumbling than fluttering, Sing and his loser sidekick enter an impoverished district – Pig Sty Alley – and try to extort money from a barber who has just given the sidekick a reasonably good hair cut.
Sony Pictures
Sing complains that the haircut doesn’t make his friend look tough enough, and demands ‘protection’ money from the barber. This logic doesn’t work with the bumpkin of a barber, who’s genius is not noticing that his sagging pants reveal a bit too much cheek. Sing’s sidekick also tries to intimidate the barber, but suddenly falls into a narcoleptic nap. When Sing continues to harass the barber, the other residents step up to defend him. Sing singles out people from the crowd who appear to be weak, but when they approach they are considerably taller or more muscular than they first appeared to be. An older woman approaches Sing and gut punches him so hard he spits blood. She turns out to be quite sturdier than she appeared. Several other Pig Sty Alley residents reveal unlikely strength and fighting skills. A cowering tailor, a reserved noodle cook, and a humble coolie deliver unexpected help to defend their Pig Sty from the Axe Gang that Sing desperately wants to join. These unlikely heroes, and others, emerge from their masks of weakness and idiocy with strengths sometimes even unknown to them. Like the bumbling, mumbling fool in “Office Space,” Sing steps out of the rubble of his senseless life and into one neither he nor the audience imagined. In other words: this DVD is a perfect distraction from the start-of-the-semester stress.
