Nerd in the 'Noke

John Wick (2014), R, 101 minutes - John Wick has been on my 'need to watch' list for quite a while.  Longer than I had realized actually.  I remember hearing good things about it shortly after it was released, but apparently time then got away from me.  I was aware that it was well received enough that a sequel was being made.  What I didn't realize was that the sequel was already completed and being released last weekend.  That's when I decided that it was about time to see what all of the buzz was about.  Nothing like being two years late to the party! John Wick is a fairly straight forward, but wonderfully made revenge flick.  Wick (Keanu Reeves) is an ex-hitman, known as 'The Boogeyman', who has retired to the quiet life and settled down with his wife Helen (Bridget Moynahan).  As the film begins, we learn that Helen has recently passed due to an unspecified illness.  Knowing that John will require something to fill the void left in ...

Europa Report (2013), PG-13, 90 minutes - In this unofficial Year of the Sci-Fi Film, Europa Report may not be as flashy, well known, or widely distributed as other entries to the genre, but it is a top notch entry none-the-less.  I'm not even sure that Europa Report was released in my area earlier this summer when it first came out.  I was made aware of it when I heard it mentioned on two different podcasts within a couple of days of each other.  Being a sci-fi fan, my curiosity was peaked but I had to wait until I could rent it from NetFlix to check it out.   Europa Report is a fictional story about a privately funded space mission to Jupiter's fourth largest moon (Europa) in search of signs of life.  It is presented in a documentary style splicing of interviews and 'found footage', and does so to great effect.  The cast is small, but works very well together.  Unlike many films revolving around space missions, no member of the crew goes crazy o...

The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest (2009), R, 147 minutes - The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest is the third and final installment in the Millennium trilogy based on the novels of the late Stieg Larsson. If you have not read the books or seen the previous two movies (my reviews can be found here and here ), you'll definitely want to before jumping into this one. There are a handful of flashback sequences that touch on major plot points, but they really don't cover all that you need to know to fully understand what is going on this far into the story. Hornet's Nest picks up immediately where The Girl Who Played With Fire ends - with Lisbeth being airlifted to the hospital after her confrontation with Zalachenko and Niedermann - and advances through Lisbeth's trial while Mikael Blomkvist (Michael Nyqvist) and the staff at Millennium magazine try to expose the government conspiracy against her. Noomi Rapace continues her amazing portrayal of computer ha...

The Girl Who Played With Fire (2009), R, 129 minutes - It's been a while since my last post due to the chaos of trying to get moved into the house. It has been a slow process, but I'm making headway. So after too much of a delay, here's my latest review: I had been patiently waiting for The Girl Who Played With Fire to come to the Grandin Theatre back in Roanoke, but was pleasantly surprised this weekend in SC at my parent's house when I learned that it was playing at a theater about 30 minutes down the road. Not knowing when it will show up back home, I was able to sneak away this afternoon to check it out! The Girl Who Played With Fire is the second installment in the Swedish film trilogy based on the Millennium trilogy of books (the first of which was The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo). If you have not either seen the first film or read the books then don't bother taking two hours out of your day checking this out because you will be completely lost. I...

The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo (2009), NR, 152 minutes - The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo is based on Swedish author Stieg Larsson's first novel in his Millenium Trilogy titled 'Men Who Hate Women' (we silly Americans found it necessary to change the title). Many good things have been said about this trilogy, but I have yet to read it myself. I found myself having to decide whether to watch the movie then go back and read the book(s), or add the book(s) to my growing list of things to read and then watch the film at a later date. Two things helped me make my decision: 1) an old college friend Kerri (check out her book blog here ) both highly recommended the book and thought I should go ahead and see the movie first (this was a good call, as I'm not the world's fastest reader). 2) the Grandin Theatre, which is about a mile down the road (and the only theater around that ever screens such foreign films) began showing it this weekend. Suffice to say, everything ...