Mad Max: Fury Road + Jupiter Ascending

Jupiter Ascending
IMDB: 5.6/10
Rotten Tomatoes: 25%

I had to watch this movie based on how everyone was saying it's a complete disaster. And yup- this movie is awful! Just when you think the Wachowski's movies can't get any worse they pop this little gem out.
It's a long, convoluted, poorly scripted, badly acted, galactically stupid film.

It's hard to know what to say about it because every aspect of it is a mess...

Okay, so the main girl (when I don't know the characters' names, that's usually a bad sign) is like some sort of alien heiress or something who's the queen of Earth I think? Honestly I had trouble paying attention to this one.. and she goes on a space adventure with a "hot" guy to save the Earth or something. And then the "hot" guy who's protecting her is trying to earn his wings and he's part wolf... I just... wow.
And the badguys are these weirdo faux-psychology talking weirdos who like, drink human essence or something to stay young. It's crazy.

The problem with this movie is that it tries to be a Cinderella movie but is far too complicated to actually be one.
And also bees are attracted to the main girl because she's a queen. WTF.

SO. The way DrMistyTang discussed they could fix this movie by... change than main wolf "hot" guy into a muppet. For like, no reason. Just make him a muppet, never explain it, and play it dead serious. It would be HILARIOUS. Can you imagine it?


Go ahead and watch this movie with some friends. It's horrible in a laugh out loud way.





Mad Max: Fury Road
IMDB: 8.8/10
Rotten Tomatoes: 98%

Nyahaha. I totally digged it. (and apparently so did everyone else)
In true Mad Max tradition: this movie has a very simple plot and perfectly filmed action sequences. As far as reboots go, this is one of the best.
It has all the goofy outfits of the '80s movies, the same type of humor, goofiness, the same excellent stunts and direction... except amped up 100%.

Most of the stunts are real, which is a huge sigh of relief. There would be nothing worse than watching a pure car chase movie that's all CG.
Not to say there isn't a lot of CG in this movie. There is, but it's used far more practically than your average modern movie.

A fun thing about George Miller's movies is he likes to sneak in people with disabilites/sicknesses/abnormalities/whateveryoucallitsopeopledon'tgetoffended in ways you hardly notice. Parapalegics, amputees, gimpy legs, dwarfs, deformities, etc. He doesn't draw attention to it either. It just is.
On the subject of legs, the one thing I wish about this movie is that Max's leg brace would be more obvious like in The Road Warrior. Just a nice squeak every now and again, you know.

For those of you who've seen the other Mad Maxes: Tom Hardy does a pretty good Mel Gibson. He's got the mannerisms down pretty good! Not that it takes much to play Max: he's a man of few words. I do miss his Australian accent, though.

And for those of you who haven't seen the previous movies: No, you don't need to watch the previous ones to go see this. The Mad Maxes are pretty much self-contained adventures. It would be better if you did give them a watch before hand just to ease yourself into the crazy world of Max (the movies get nuttier and nuttier as they go) but it's not necessary.
You can find out how Max's leg got messed up in the first movie, though.

Oh. And it also has a very cool soundtrack.

So go and enjoy! Shoo, shoo.
Depending on what type of parent you are you may not want to bring your kids to see it. It's fairly violent, but there aren't any boobs or sex or anything. There's one nude butt, but that's it.