Wednesday, September 8, 2010

Autumn Cometh

So… after receiving ZERO comments on any of the posts I’ve made over the past month, I finally had the sense to go and check the blog and see what the heck was going on, and… BLOGGER HAS NOT EVEN BEEN DISPLAYING THE POSTS!!!

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Haha, yeah… no… I seriously just have not done any posts within the last month. o_o My bad. So, insert various half-hearted excuses about being busy, seemingly self-deprecating criticisms of inherent apathy, and earnest (but ultimately unrealized) promises of improvement here: ____________________, aaannndddd… moving on!

What have I been watching? Well, since late July when I went and saw Inception, I have viewed (in theaters): The Karate Kid, How to Train Your Dragon, Salt, and The A-Team.

Four Movie Posters

Of those four films, only one of them was on my “top ten” list (The Karate Kid), and one was on the “runners up” list (Salt). How to Train Your Dragon would have been on my top ten list, but I created the list after the movie was released in theaters. I ended waiting to see “Dragon” at the cheap theater, which doesn’t get stuff in until waaaayyyy after the other theaters have stopped screening, but you only pay $1.00-$3.00, so… worth it.

I had debated going back and doing a review post on each film, but it’s really trippy trying to review a movie more than a few days after you’ve seen it, so the longer I kept trying to do that, the longer I ended up putting off posting, and I finally just said, screw it. I’ll post whatever the heck I want, and it’s not gonna be movie reviews. However, I will note that the above films were: Good (Salt), Good (The Karate Kid), Great (How to Train Your Dragon) and Good (The A-Team). Interestingly, I saw each one with a different person, and none of them were the people I usually go with. All good company, however.

If you’re an avid movie-viewer, and would recommend at least renting all of them. Salt and The A-Team had very summer-movie-type plots with either a very simple or “been there, seen that” feel, but were great on action. How much you enjoy them might depend on how you like your protagonists (testosterone-laden Army Ranger team, or femme fatale Russian spy), but both are good entertainment.

The Karate Kid was a little better story-wise, and seeing Jaden Smith in action will always be a treat. Definitely worth a viewing, even if you’re not into martial arts, but definitely if you’re into Jackie Chan. He really digs in with his acting spurs, drawing emotion out of his otherwise-quite-stoic character at the appropriate moments. Other than the mom getting kind of obnoxious at times, and the love story being a little awkward-tween-icky, I enjoyed this one (and was glad to cross the first “to watch” film off my top ten list, finally).

How to Train Your Dragon

My favorite of the four was definitely How to Train Your Dragon. An excellent picture from Dreamworks that has received loads of positive reviews, I convinced my mom to take me to see this one for my birthday. She was iffy because of the title, and because if was from Dreamworks. I think she had more a of a Shrek-like film in mind, with the oft-inappropriate humor and spoofy story-line. However, she walked out voicing surprise and approval at how good the film was. Another winner from the ol’ Dream machine. They may not be quite on par with Pixar (yet), but they’re sure as heck giving it their best shot.

In completely unrelated news, my Mozy backup has passed the halfway mark like a herd of turtles. Also, I found out the upload speed was being severely throttled (my bad), so I adjusted that and it’s running a little faster now. I just hope these segmented sessions don’t results in a fuzzy backup. Only time will tell.

PS- My fellow bloggers whose posts I normally comment on… do not despair. I’m still reading, I just haven’t had time to comment. I’ll get right on that.