2012 features a paper thin plot about crazy solar flares in the few years leading up to the year 2012 that somehow turn the neutrinos in the Earth’s core into microwaves that slowly, but steadily start heating up the planet.  This results in earthquakes, tsunamis, sink-holes and other natural disasters.  It’s all pretty dehumanized until these things start to affect Jackson (John Cusack) and Kate (Amanda Peet), a divorced couple with two kids.  Oh, Chiwetel Ejiofor plays a bleeding heart, government geologist who advises the president (Danny Glover) on all this, and eventually (spoiler alert!) gets with the president’s wicked hot daughter (Thandie Newton) to replenish the Earth’s population.  There’s a Woody Harrelson part there too.  He plays the crazy guy that predicted all this.

You’d think watching the Earth come to an end would take, what, ninety minutes?  Well, Emmerich thought it deserved two hours and forty minutes.  This ridiculous amount of time is spent listening to horrible one-liners, finger-wagging about global warming and rich countries abusing the poor ones, and watching most of the world’s recognizable locals being destroyed.

If that doesn’t sound too bad, it gets a lot worse two hours in.  I won’t spoil anything since it seems half the globe is flitting to theatres to ensure Emmerich gets another chance to direct something, but you’ll have to take my word on it, this film gets real ass-y.  Bad performances, a bad script, too long, insultingly stupid, that pretty much sums up my feelings on the matter.  Save your money.  Go see The Blind Side.

0.5 out of 4 stars

RocknRolla features a stellar cast.  Gerard Butler co-stars as One Two, a small time gangster who’s mixed up with some very, very bad people.  Thandie Newton plays Stella, the accountant to some of these bad people.  She’s cool as shit, and sexy as hell, always sucking on something phallic, whether it be a cigarette, asparagus, or her own hollandaise covered finger.  Mark Strong and Tom Wilkinson play the leaders of the ‘old school,’ as they wheel and deal with small time crooks, and members of the ‘new school’ (led by Uri, played terrifically by Karel Roden), trying to make a living, screwing people over left and right.  Toby Kebbell plays rock and roll star Johnny Quid, the son of Wilkinson’s character.  Thanks to poor fathering, Johnny is set on screwing up his father’s business, which is the setting off point for the race-to-the-finish climax.

Ritchie is brilliant when he doesn’t take himself too seriously.  Okay, brilliant is much too strong for the guy who made Swept Away (he really must have been Madonna’s bitch, I believe the domestic violence charges he alleged against her), but he is impressive when he’s on his game.  He finally recognized (maybe his current marital instability is a godsend) his place: a confident director of con movies, and no more.  And for what he lacks in character development, or plot lines, he makes up for by the fact that RocknRolla is just  damn cool.  Additionally, there was actually some pretty witty dialogue to go along with the action, good for you Ritchie (he also wrote the original screenplay).  Profanity and violence run amuck in the film that runs just under two hours, and it’s funny as all get out.  Is this a great film?  No.  But it’s pure, unadulterated entertainment, that will impress everyone on your next guys’ night out.

3 out of 4 stars

Rottentomatoes: 58% – Cream of the crop: 56%

I think most people aren’t quite sure what to make of this film.  It comes across as more of a documentary than a satire, following the Bush family from when Jed and Dubbya are in their teens.  It shows Dubbya’s inability to keep a job, his love of alcohol (all the way through is AA meetings), his tumultuous time while at Yale, all the way up through his elections, the first and second time.  The problem is, none of it was really interesting.  And since this seems to be a documentary, you have to wonder where Stone’s sources come from.  He obviously tried to make it somewhat accurate, now all I can think about is, ‘where did he stray from the truth?’  I have the same question while watching Michael Moore documentaries, and believe me, it’s no fun.

Josh Brolin excels as both the younger, and older Dubbya, and does an impression that would put the SNL cast to shame.  The rest of the cast was just as impressive, except for an oddly characterized Condolizze Rice, played by Thandie Newton.  It almost seems like Stone’s purpose was not to defame Bush, but to expose Washington to be an exclusive ‘good old boys club.’   He also encouraged actual sympathy for Bush, as he’s clearly just searching for the approval of his father most of the movie. In the lower points of the plot, Stone sought after his laughs in cheap ways, like showing Dubbya on the toilet for no apparent reason.  Thanks Oliver, that was hilarious.  He also attacks the media for being such whores when it comes to who’s side their on one day, and who’s the next. And I’m not sure what Colin Powell did right, but for some reason, he’s portrayed as the completely levelheaded one.  The film was uneven, it was unclear what the point was, who he was attacking, what is to be learned.  It fails to leave any sort of lasting impression on its audience.

1 out of 4 stars

Rottentomatoes: 55% – Cream of the Crop: 36%

W. features a stellar cast of fantastic actors: Richard Dreyfus as Dick Cheney.  Elizabeth Banks as Laura Bush.  Ellen Burnstyn as Barabara Bush.  James Cromwell as Bush Sr., and the list goes on. This is Stone’s first directing project since 2006′s widely hailed World Trade Center.  Though the film has been screened to several critics, rottentomatoes.com only reports five official reviews, leaving it with an 80% fresh rating.

On behalf of W.‘s production company Lionsgate, eBay will be auctioning off five of the film’s posters, signed by Oliver Stone, Josh Brolin, Elizabeth Banks, James Cromwell, and Ellen Burstyn.  The proceeds will all go to benefit Stand Up To Cancer.  The winning bidders will receive the poster as well as a letter of authenticity from Lionsgate.  Bidding has already begun, and will end on October 20th. Click here to find out more about the auctions, W., clips from the movie, trailers, etc., etc.

Check out the hilarious trailer: