Author: Andy Labis

Bad News Bears

MPAA Rated – PG-13
It’s 1:53 Long
A Review by:
– The Dude on the Right

Bad News Bears
Movie Stats & Links
Starring: Billy Bob Thornton, Greg Kinnear, Marcia Gay Harden, Sammi Kane Kraft, Jeffrey Davis
MPAA Rated: PG-13
Released By: Paramount Pictures
Kiddie Movie: I’d say keep anyone under ten at home unless you want them to be a potty-mouth.
Date Movie: She might just be repulsed at Coach.
Gratuitous Sex: Some push-up bras and the team is sponsored by a Gentlemen’s Club.
Gratuitous Violence: Lots of kids fighting.
Action: Nah.
Laughs: Quite a few.
Memorable Scene: Coach explaining to one of his players why he was at his house.
Memorable Quote: Too many one-liners to pick.
Directed By: Richard Linklater

I have to admit that I was pretty much under the notion that it was totally unnecessary for them to do a remake of “Bad News Bears.” Then I saw the movie and I have to admit I was highly entertained. I will warn you, however, and apparently no one checks the movie ratings, that this version is PG-13, and I an hoping that the dad who brought his to not-too-well-mannered kids who appeared to be around 5 or 6, well, that he has a lot of explaining to do to mom when they start cursing up a storm around the house.

Now I don’t remember the original that well to really comment or compare, I really just remember the scene from “Breaking Training” where Tanner is running around the Astrodome because they wouldn’t let them finish the game. That being said, I’m not going to try to compare them. Let get to the story…

For “Bad News Bears” we get Billy Bob Thornton playing the drunk, Coach Buttermaker. He’s a pest exterminator by day who gets hired by Liz (Marcia Gay Harden) to coach a team of misfits. It seems Liz didn’t like that the lousy kids couldn’t be on a team, did some kind of protest/lawsuit, and now there’s pretty much a bunch of good little league teams, and the Bears. With their first game being a complete massacre, Buttermaker decides their only hope is to get Amanda (Sammi Kane Kraft) to pitch, and the team actually gets a little better. Then of course there’s the bad boy, Kelly (Jeffrey Davis), who ends up coming around after an encounter with rival coach Roy (Greg Kinnear). Yes, you can guess, our rag-tag team of losers eventually learn how to play as a team, Buttermaker realizes that being an asshole coach isn’t really a good way to help kids have fun, and everyone learns valuable lessons about teamwork, friendship, raising kids, and if winning is everything.

Kids insulting and fighting with each other is still funny to this day, and “Bad News Bears” makes the most of it, though they do take it to a level that is probably good for the ten and over crowd, but leave the younger ones at home. Billy Bob is great in this role, similar to his role in “Bad Santa,” just a little nicer I suppose, and the kids in this flick do a great job at messing with each other. In a showing, though, of how times have changed from the original, it appears that being sponsored by a bail bondsman isn’t as bad. There is an ode to “Chico’s Bail Bonds,” but for our 2005 Bears, “Bo-Peep’s Gentlemen’s Club” is our new sponsor, which isn’t a bad thing because they do seem to send some cheerleaders to the game.

I found “Bad News Bears” enjoyable for the older crowd, and I’m sure some parents may be offended at the language and actions of both the kids and their Coach. Lots of chuckles, and couple of good laughs, and just almost two hours of entertainment and I’m giving “Bad News Bears” 4 stars out of 5.

That’s it for this one! I’m The Dude on the Right!! L8R!!!

Bad Boys 2

MPAA Rated – R
It’s 2:27 Long
A Preview by:
– The Dude on the Right

Bad Boys 2
Movie Stats & Links
Starring: Martin Lawrence, Will Smith, Joe Pantoliano
MPAA Rated: R
Released By: Columbia Pictures
Directed By: Michael Bay

Did you know the original “Bad Boys” was released in 1995, that was like 8 years ago, and did you know that its original budget was around 23 million dollars and it made about 141 million worldwide? I didn’t, but I’m sure the folks at Columbia pictures did, hence a remake of a movie I didn’t even see.

Will Smith and Martin Lawrence are back as the cool cops, funny yet getting the job done at the same time. This time the twist is that Smith’s character falls for Lawrence’s sister, and it might get in the way of their case.

This is another movie that the plot really doesn’t matter. You will go and see it because it looks funny, Lawrence and Smith had good chemistry in the original, and you know there will be cool car chases, things blowing up, and maybe some nudity.

That’s it for this preview! I’m The Dude on the Right!! L8R!!!

The Bachelor

MPAA Rated – PG-13
It’s 1:38 Long
A Review by:
– The Dude on the Right

The Bachelor
Movie Stats & Links
Starring: Chris O’Donnell, Renee Zellweger, Artie Lange
MPAA Rated: PG-13
Released By: New Line Cinema
Kiddie Movie: They’d be bored.
Date Movie: She might make you got and then she’ll hate it.
Gratuitous Sex: Nah.
Gratuitous Violence: Nah.
Action: Nah.
Laughs: Ehh.
Memorable Scene: None.
Memorable Quote: None.
Directed By: Gary Sinyor

“The Bachelor” had a pretty cool premise. Chris O’Donnell plays Jimmy. He finds out that in order to get his grandfather’s inheritance, as well as save the pool table factory, he has to get married by his 30th birthday. The problem is that his 30th birthday is about 30 hours away and he’s totally screwed up his relationship with the girl he wants to but isn’t ready to marry, Anne (Renee Zellweger). Since he thinks she’s out of the picture on a trip out of the country he goes on a quest tracking down all of his old girlfriends to make them his bride. I wanted the movie to be funny, even though as a romantic comedy you know exactly where this movie would end up, but there was just something missing. Maybe I just couldn’t fathom how Jimmy could find all of his old girlfriends in the 30 hour span, maybe I just didn’t understand why he couldn’t want to initially marry Anne (sorry, but if I was dating her there would be no hesitation in my face to marry her), maybe the jokes were pretty lame, or maybe I’m just becoming a bitter, single, wondering were my future wife is thirty-something dude. I don’t know, but I was just let down.

Alright, let’s fill in some story blanks. Jimmy and Anne have been together about 3 years. Like I said before, Jimmy’s grandfather dies and leaves the stipulation in the will that to get the 100 millionish dollars Jimmy would have to fulfill some conditions (I did like the “What is this, ‘Bruester’s Millions?'” line), like staying married for 10 years and having a kid within 5. It should be simple except that Jimmy already botched asking Anne to marry him so she is questioning the relationship and is supposedly on her way out of the country. So, Jimmy searches for his old girlfriends (could you find 8 of your old girlfriends in a 30 hour span? He did.), and they all turn him down, mostly through his own bumbling of explaining what was going on. Hmm, I’m thinking for 50 million dollars (figuring I’d get half), hell, I’ll marry him. Anyway, it turns out Anne didn’t go overseas, just with her sister to their parents anniversary dinner, and she realized she really loves him and is on her way back to find him (she doesn’t know about the money). Well, low and behold they find each other (she finds out about the money but realizes he really wants to marry her), and it’s a happy ending.

I don’t know, I’m thinking the movie could have been funnier if Jimmy didn’t have a girlfriend and had 30 hours to find Miss Right because then you could have been routing for a certain girl instead of knowing the ending. The things women would do to win him over could have been hilarious, the running from crazed dudettes could have been more real, and it still could have had a storybook ending.

In the end I was disappointed and with that “The Bachelor” get 1 ½ stars out of 5 from me. I love a good romantic comedy, this just wasn’t one of them.

That’s it for this one! I’m The Dude on the Right!! L8R!!!

Baby Mama

MPAA Rated – PG-13
It’s 1:39 Long
A Review by:
– The Dude on the Right

Baby Mama
Movie Stats & Links
Starring: Tina Fey, Amy Poehler, Steve Martin, Sigourney Weaver, Greg Kinnear, Dax Shepard, Maura Tierney
MPAA Rated: PG-13
Released By: Universal Studios Home Entertainment
Kiddie Movie: They will be bored and you will probably have to answer where babies actually come from.
Date Movie: It’s a 5 Star movie on The Dudette Scale.
Gratuitous Sex: Cleavage, talk, and pushed up boobies are all you will get.
Gratuitous Violence: Umm, no.
Action: Umm, no again.
Laughs: Probably more for the dudettes who can understand it more than us dudes.
Memorable Scene: The shower scene (Dudes, it’s not what you instantly put into your head).
Memorable Quote: “My avatar is dressed like a whore!”
Directed By: Michael McCullers

I saw “Baby Mama” in the theater, and even though this movie screamed dudette-flick, I enjoyed it. The weird thing is that as I watched the DVD, pretty much everything I thought in the theater crept back into my head, and you know what? I still liked it.

“Baby Mama” is a tough movie to review, but not because of the content but maybe just because I see too many movies. The reason I say that is because as the movie starts out, I was buying the entire process, but the movie shifted to “let’s put in a twist” and then “make the ending obvious mode.” I was already set with the original “obvious ending mode,” but I pretty much hated the one the movie finished with. I suppose we’ll start with the basic story, first…

Tina Fey, she of “Saturday Night Live,” “30 Rock,” and “Mean Girls” fame plays Kate. Kate is a 37 year old business woman who has given up love and children for her career, and although she’s not looking for love, she now wants a baby. Unfortunately for Kate she is cursed with a T-shaped uterus, which I guess means it is nearly impossible for her to conceive a baby, even when she was going the sperm donor/in vitro route. Adoption isn’t an option for her, either, so she ends up looking for a surrogate mother with the help of Chaffee Bicknell (Sigourney Weaver) and her surrogate agency. Enter Angie (Amy Pohler) and Carl (Dax Shepard), two, over-the-top, for no better way to put it, white trash folks, looking for a paycheck. Angie agrees to have Kate’s baby, Angie and Carl break up so Angie moves in with Kate, and we now have a white trash girl living with a female executive, but they both have a lot they can learn from each other, especially Kate as she finds a new man, Rob (Greg Kinnear), while Angie, well, she needs to learn some basic manners and how to sing.

Angie and Kate are bonding as Angie moves along in her pregnancy, and for me the new love interest and Kate’s over-aggressive mother were fun enough, but suddenly Michael McCullers (he wrote and directed the movie), I guess, felt the movie needed some kind of diabolical turn to mix things up. I didn’t need mixing up, and once the mixing up happened I instantly knew how this movie was going to end.

Now that might sound a bit obscure, but I really hate to give this movie away by saying anything else, thus ruining it for most of you, the casual movie-goer. Ughh, I so want to give it away!!!!

So let me get to the good and ignore the bad; Tina Fey and Amy Pohler were fantastic as polar opposites actually needing each other and letting their bond as baby mama and surrogate mama grow. Hooray! Sigourney Weaver was great as the creepy, overly fertile Chaffee Bicknell. And the person who made me crack up the most was Steve Martin as Barry, the hippie/guru/wanting his new store to have the “essence of a shell he found on the beach while he was walking” man. So as far as star-power goes, I’ve got to recommend “Baby Mama,” even for the dudes. For me, well, I was just disappointed the film folks felt they needed to “stir-up” the original story.

Let’s see, me, being disappointed in the ending story, I’m giving the movie 2 ½ stars, but on “The Dudette” scale the movie is probably the perfect length with an uber-happy ending for 5 stars on that scale. I’ll average them together and round up because I loved Steve Martin’s character and Tina Fey’s slutty outfit therefore leaving “Baby Mama” with 4 stars out of 5.

For you dudettes out there, especially those that are mama’s, go ahead and round up your dudette friends and have a dudette DVD viewing party, leaving the kids with your dude, and for you dudes out there, “Baby Mama” isn’t that horrible, and just remember payback can be a bitch when you rent “Iron Man”!

As far as the DVD goes, I’m still in the dark ages, without a Blu-Ray player, so I couldn’t partake in cooler things like getting insights into scenes instantly, without stopping the movie, or having to listen to the entire commentary, and fine, as much as I liked the movie, I don’t think I would be creating clips, “My Scenes” as they would be on the Hi-Def side, but on the standard DVD side, I have to say I was happier with the actual ending, rather than the alternate ending, there were a couple of quick, “Hey, this is how this movie ended up being made!” clips, but I have to say that there were a couple of deleted scenes, that although I can understand why they were deleted, they were funny as hell. Do your self a favor and at least watch the deleted scenes.

That’s it for this one! I’m The Dude on the Right!! L8R!!!

Babel

MPAA Rated – R
It’s 2:22 Long
A Preview by:
– The Dude on the Right

Babel
Movie Stats & Links
Starring: Brad Pitt, Cate Blanchett, Gael García Bernal and Kôji Yakusho
MPAA Rated: R
Released By: Paramount Vintage
Directed By: Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu

The trailer for “Babel” reminds me a little of “Syriana” where you get a bunch of different stories that somehow intertwine, and how no one seems to be able to understand each other. The trouble seems to start when Susan (Cate Blanchett) gets shot and her companion Richard (Brad Pitt) is having a hell of a time communicating to the people in the town that he needs help, needs to call the US Embassy, and then, somehow, this shooting turns into an international incident bringing even more people into the story.

I’m sure this is supposed to be put on the radar for some Oscar nominations, and it does look interesting, but “Syriana” was hard enough to follow without the language issue, now we’ve got intertwining stories where people can’t understand each other.

A renowned director and a good cast, so I suppose I’ll do my best to catch this one.

That’s it for this preview! I’m The Dude on the Right!! L8R!!!

Timmmmmberrrrr! Memorial Day Weekend Movies, and Chicago Closes a Beach!

By: The Dude on the Right

Download and ListenDownload the Podcast!

A recent lightning strike took out a tree in the Stu Gotz backyard, and during this “Weekend Wrap-Up!” podcast, I mention to Stu that I saw some guys on TV competing in Timbersports that might be able to help him out. Storm damage continues wreaking havoc with Stu, with a mini basement flood, but lucky for me, my weekend was mostly about movies and maintenance, so I skip the work and tell Stu my thoughts on “Red” and “I Am Number Four.” Both of us saw “The Hangover Part II” and enjoyed it for what it was, pretty much the same story as Part I but with a different bachelor, even though we sort of had our own instance of “Losing Doug.”

Stu is worried that “Kung Fu Panda 2” might actually be kind of rough with the mom-dying scene as his Little Gotz seemed a little freaked out, Stu doesn’t want to talk about Jim Tressel resigning from Ohio State, my wife likes going to Hooters, I saw a “South Park” episode Stu didn’t see yet, and Chicago closed their beach because it was too hot (or so they say).

All of that and more, and thanks for listening!

That’s it for this podcast! I’m The Dude on the Right!! L8R!!!

I Am Number Four

MPAA Rated – PG-13
It’s 1:49 Long
A Review by:
– The Dude on the Right

I Am Number Four

Movie Stats & Links
Starring: Alex Pettyfer, Timothy Olyphant, Dianna Argon, Teresa Palmer
MPAA Rated: PG-13
Released By: Walt Disney Studios Home Entertainment & Dreamworks Studios
Release Date: May 24, 2011
Kiddie Movie: Not too young – teen girls mostly.
Date Movie: Not really.
Gratuitous Sex: Skimpy outfits are all.
Gratuitous Violence: Alien violence, and some hinted at gruesomeness.
Action: Lots of chasing and running around.
Laughs: Not really.
Memorable Scene: Nothing stands out.
Memorable Quote: Nah.
Directed By: D.J. Caruso
Produced By: Michael Bay

Sometimes a movie seems to try to be a few too many things, as is the case I found with “I Am Number 4.” The premise is fairly simple – There is a group of people left here from another planet, and they have some special powers.  The problem is that their planet is pretty much gone, and these assassin dudes have been dispatched to kill them.  Sounds simple enough.  Now try to make it a “I’m a teenager and have all of these other issues to deal with,” and also leaving some of the characters as caricatures of bad dudes, and a grandiose ending, and you get “I Am Number 4.”

Okay, I made things a little simpler than they should be, but for this movie we have John Smith (Alex Pettyfer).  He seems like your normal, teen, outsider, only he’s an alien.  He has his protector (Timothy Olyphant), but he’s not really one to help John as he’s discovering things like girls, and his abilities.  All of his life he has been on the run from assassins dispatched to kill him from his home planet, and in the world of the internet, things get even harder when your image can pop up at any time when someone snaps a photo and puts it on their Facebook page.  So John can’t be normal, yet he still likes to fall for the ladies, and of course that tends to be a problem when he ends up in his new small town.  The problem is that the bad guys are hot on his trail, there’s some weird backstory about a kid at the school whose dad seemed to be on the trail of our alien visitors, and of course John suffers the same “nerd v jock” attitude in most high school themed movies.

Look, for me, this movie is mostly one for the teen girls, looking for the cute guy with superpowers, and they’ll find that in John.  For the dudes, well, this dude anyway, things got almost too cheesy with the bad guys as they carted around this big monster in a truck and scared little kids as they passed them in their car.  In the end it’s kind of just an okay movie, and I’ll wrap things up with a 2 stars out of 5.

As far as the Blu-ray and DVD, you don’t get too much in the way of extras.  Most of the deleted scenes are better off deleted, although I did like the scene with the Mom, and the bloopers are a waste of DVD space.  I do admit I did like the “Becoming Number Six” featurette, which was kind of a “The Making of…” thing, especially seeing how “blue-screen” kind of scenes ended up becoming what they were in the movie.  In the end there’s nothing that special – you’re getting this set for the movie.

A movie that had potential for a series of films, but one that gets lost in typical “I’m a teen trying to fit in high school” story.  That’s my end take on “I Am Number Four.”

That’s it for this one!  I’m The Dude on the Right!!  L8R!!!

Arena Football is Fun, John Rich is a Winner, Dr. Strangelove is Good, and Balls are Clean.

By: The Dude on the Right

Download and ListenDownload the Podcast!

Stu Gotz is watching old movies (Dr. Strangelove), and I’m watching girly TV (Real Housewives of New Jersey), and during this podcast episode of our “Weekend Wrap-Up!”, we dissect is all, sort of. We have talk about a Chicago Rush game, talk about The Celebrity Apprentice, but surprisingly no review talk about “Pirates of the Caribbean.” I tell Stu he should catch the season finale of “Saturday Night Live” with Justin Timberlake and Lady Gaga because it is was very funny, and Stu learns his kids might be a little too young for “Doctor Who” sometimes.

We have tick talk, “American Idol” talk, and whether you want it or not, a lot of talk about washing my balls.

All of that and more, and thanks for listening!

That’s it for this podcast! I’m The Dude on the Right!! L8R!!!

Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me

MPAA Rated – PG-13
It’s 1:35 Long
A Review by:
– The Dude on the Right

Austin Powers:
The Spy Who Shagged Me
Movie Stats & Links
Starring: Mike Myers, Heather Graham, Michael York, Robert Wagner, Rob Lowe, and a bunch of cameos.
MPAA Rated: PG-13
Released By: New Line Cinema
Kiddie Movie: Nope.
Date Movie: Sure. She might laugh.
Gratuitous Sex: Lots of jokes.
Gratuitous Violence: Not really.
Action: Not really.
Laughs: Lots of them.
Memorable Scene: The scenes with the “penis” rocket.
Memorable Quote: Too many to mention.
Directed By: Jay Roach

“Mommy, can you explain what was so funny about that spaceship?” That might be one of the many questions your six or seven year old may be asking you if you bring them to see “Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me,” and from the audience in the theater when I went, a lot of parents brought the little ones. This movie is rated PG-13 for a reason, and I would say that maybe it’s because a lot of the humor is sexual, although not blatantly, and that would leave a lot of explainin’ to do for your youngin’. Me, I’m over 13 and, well, easily amused, so I didn’t really need that explainin’, I just laughed a lot.

“Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me” seemed to have nearly as much hype as “The Phantom Menace,” at times it seemed even more, and even though no Star Wars, the movie has it’s own merits on an adult level.

The movie opens with Austin Powers recently married to Vanessa, and well, shagging her in a hotel room. But Austin notices something is wrong as he’s using the remote control: He presses “rewind” and Vanessa goes in reverse, he presses “forward” and Vanessa goes forward, he presses “mute” and Vanessa’s mouth moves but nothing comes out (The Dude on the Left seemed to find this a great feature as he chuckled and said “Cool.”), but then problems arise and the previously banished Dr. Evil returns to get back at Powers.

The plot revolves around time travel, but don’t try to get to technical about it, where Dr. Evil goes back to the time when Austin was frozen and steals his mojo (his love power), and Austin is a man who now loves women, but can’t love women. Evil also has new plans to dominate the world, revolving around, as he calls it, the Alan Parsons Project (yes, that being the same name as the group put together by Alan Parsons, and Evil’s son, Scott, brings that up but Dr. Evil is oblivious to it), and the Austin who travels back in time to retrieve his mojo now has to save the world.

Yes, there’s a new babe this time around, this time in the likes of Felicity Shagwell (Heather Graham), and she helps Austin save the world, and find his mojo. All is well with the world again, and we are safe again until Dr. Evil returns again, with Mini-Me (his miniature clone), to once again try to kill Austin and dominate the world.

The movie is a goof, and I mean that in the best sense, with scenes poking fun at the nineties culture as Scott Evil and Dad Evil square up on an episode of Jerry Springer, poking fun at sixties culture with the, well, the entire movie, and making a lot of jokes about sex and bodily functions (two scenes come to mind – one where Austin and Felicity are in a tent, backlit, and from the outside it looks like Felicity is grabbing stuff out of Austin’s butt, and the other is the sequence of people looking up at Dr. Evil’s penis looking spaceship, shifting from one group of people to the next, with the transition word being something slang for penis). And like I said, I’m easily amused, and “Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me” amused me.

If you liked the first Austin Powers, I’m thinking you’ll like this installment just the same. Scott Evil is once again great at trying to explain to dear old dad how stupid he is, Mini-Me is a hilarious addition, and Mike Myers ability to play the endearing Austin Powers, the bumbling Dr. Evil, and this time adding in the totally gross Fat Bastard (I swear I almost had to throw up watching Fat Bastard and Felicity in bed together) is just about amazing.

It’s 4 stars out of 5 for “Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me.” I laughed, I cried, I almost vomited. What more can you ask from a movie?

That’s it for this one! I’m The Dude on the Right!! L8R!!!

Atonement

MPAA Rated – R
It’s 2:10 Long
A Review by:
– The Dude on the Right

Atonement
Movie Stats & Links
Starring: Keira Knightley, James McAvoy
MPAA Rated: R
Released By: Focus Features
Directed By: Joe Wright

From the best I can tell and from the synopsis I read that just seemed confusing, in the end it looks like a movie about he loves her, her loves he, she loves he, she frames he, he can’t see her, she feels bad the rest of her life while he tries to find her for the rest of his life.

As a fan of Keira Knightley I do want to see this movie, but I worry that since it is in the art-house side of December the movie might not make it to my gigaplex. In an artsy way this movie looks great, and in a sexual way this movie looks great, I just hope it might open near me, although this one might be better in the privacy of my own home.

It’s movie award time, and this movie is looking to try to snag a nomination or two, and since most nominating folks aren’t snobbish about sex, this movie might have chance.

That’s it for this preview! I’m The Dude on the Right!! L8R!!!