Review: DON'T BE AFRAID OF THE DARK

What is it about basements, old manors, and dark corridors that cause the dark side of our imaginations to soar? It would seem that most horrors seem to inhabit these places; common sense would tell you not to go in there, not to go were the light is scarce because there might be something creeping in the shadows. Something you can’t quite explain, and that most people won’t believe is there.

As a rule of thumb, you should not move to an old manor who’s previous resident disappeared after allegedly going insane. But alas, 10-year-old Sally (Bailee Madison) and her father (Guy Pierce) move into such a place. Bad idea.

Review: BEDTIME STORIES

This movie easily places in my top 5 favorite Adam Sandler movies. Adam plays a nicer (less jerky of a guy than usual) guy, the rating helps keep the cursing down from more recent comedies, and the plot - though very predictable - is super delightful.

Basically Sandler is a guy named Skeeter who has lived in a hotel his whole life with his dad and sister. The hotel gets bought by a rich mogul and Skeeter is promised a position of power in the hotel one day. Unfortunately, he serves his entire life as the janitor of the hotel. The hotel changes hands to new management and this is when the story truly begins. Skeeter is places in charge of telling stories to his niece and nephew. He tells stories, and whatever the kids contribute to the story happens for real to Skeeter in the following day. So he gets his chance to become the new hotel manager, and uses the new storytime opportunity to weasel life enhancing story arcs from the little kids so his life can be better.

Everyone in the movie is great. Guy Pierce makes a great, more-or-less believable villain (teamed with Lucy Lawless), and Keri Russell is a good foil for a love interest. The story is cute and the bedtime stories that Sandler tells are full of good ol'e clean yet Sandler-esque humor. Russell Brand was a great surprise in the film (He's not in even one trailer), he's basically Skeeters friend that sleeps over and watches the kids every night, providing a very wavy opinion at every choice made in the story, in a hilarious way.

The film does a great job of lampooning the degree that schools and parents watch over what their kids eat nowadays, with Rice Crackers and Wheat Germ being all the kids have, and when it comes down to it, when the kids in the movie eat sugar, nothing bad happens, showing that sometimes people just need to lighten up and have a good time once in a while, knowing that little harm is going to come of a light unhealthy experience.

The only thing I did not like about the movie was the inclusion of an obnoxious CGI Guinea Pig named Bugsy (Cause he has HUGE eyes). He is there for a constantly absurd call back gag, and I have no idea why the kids insist on taking him everywhere they go. Other than that, the movie is well worth the trip to go see.

Review: TRAITOR

Eh.

There's some spoilers here. Not major ones. You'll deal.

If this movie is about breaking down racial barriers, and presenting the idea that not all Muslims are terrorists, it pretty much fails. If anything, I feel like I am likely to start racially profiling more after seeing this movie.

Don Cheadle pays Samir Horn, a man born in Sudan, and trained in the United States as a Special Op. He has an American accent.

Also, is Muslim.

He spends his life as a terrorist helper, making bombs, delivering bombs, and overseeing flashy Islamic terrorist attacks. Right away, we get a sort of sympathetic feel from him, and it makes you wonder why our protagonist is a terrorist.

After escaping from a prison in Yemen, he decides to help his newfound friend Omar (Saïd Taghmaoui) in a complicated, but professional nation-wide terrorist attack. We spend half the movie watching him help Omar to recruit young kids from around the world to help in this impending attack. We get to see the terrorist point of view - Americans have spilled innocent Muslim blood for centuries, and now it is time to take back their honor. Attack and kill as many Americans as possible.

I couldn't help but feel uncomfortable for most of this movie. Really? Our protagonist is a terrorist? Just a guy who follows Allah and helps to kill Americans. For an American, it is odd to watch.

And all the while we have Detective Roy Clayton (Guy Pearce) on the case, looking to stop Samir. Pearce is a personal favorite actor of mine, and I naturally thought he did a great job. His accent was spot on.

So here's the problem: we have no antagonist. The film sets it up so that we want to hate Clayton. But how can we really? He's an FBI agent, a good one, a guy that wants to stop innocent people from dying. Sure, his assistant Archer (Neal McDonough) is a douche, but that is not enough for us to label Clayton as the bad guy.

Then I began to think it must be Samir that is the "bad guy". After all, he is setting off bombs and killing people all around the world.

And then he became the good guy! That's right, we find out about half way through that he is not in fact working for the terrorists, but he is in on something secret with FBI agent Carter (Jeff Daniels). Samir Horn is a not a traitor of the US, but a traitor towards the terrorists.

So now we have Clayton hunting an innocent guy, and he has no idea.

This movie takes you through too many loops. You have no one to hate, and no one to root for. You never find out Samir's plan until the end, so you feel like you are just waiting on something to go off, kind of like a bomb.

It seems like they wanted to make a "Bourne" style movie, but about terrorists. The movie is shot like it, Samir fights like it, and the music is a straight up knock-off.

It has decent action and decent performances, but it leaves you with nothing. You don't have to see it. If you want to, rent it. Don't waste your ten bucks.