Wednesday, September 3, 2008

Weekend Movies

Over the Labor Day Weekend I was able to check out a couple of movies I had not seen yet.

The first movie we checked out was The Ex, a rather under-the-radar comedy with a pretty large cast.

The movie stars Zach Braff, a favorite of mine thanks to his portrayal of JD on Scrubs, as Tom Reilly, a chef in the big city who is about to have a baby with his wife Sofia (Amanda Peet).

Paul Rudd, in his only scene of the movie, plays Reilly's boss at the restaurant and on the day his wife is about to give birth - Tom is fired.

So, he caves and accepts a job in Sofia's father's ad agency. The big-time ad executive of the office is Chip Sanders (Jason Bateman), who is paralyzed from the waist down. He also had a huge crush on Sofia in high school (or college, can't remember) and apparently still does.

A lot of things start to go wrong for Tom at the office, and in his life, thanks to Chips doing. Although no one else in the family has any clue that Chip appears to be sabotaging Tom at both work and in his personal life.

The movie is pretty decent, but I can see why I didn't hear much about it when it first came out. It's your typical love triangle-type movie - with which the current boyfriend/husband drives himself berserk.

It is a fun watch, however, and the number of different actors you will recognize is pretty large. Charles Grodin and Mia Farrow play Sofia's parents. Donal Logue is the head of the ad agency while Amy Poehler and Fred Armisen both play ad execs who befriend Tom.

Grade:

The second movie of the weekend is one I have been looking forward to all summer long.

I become pretty infatuated with the original, so I was pretty eager to see the sequel - and I finally was able to see Harold & Kumar: Escape From Guantanamo Bay.

We checked out the unrated version, and it was pretty vulgar. A lot of things even I couldn't believe were in the movie, but it was alright. The movie itself does not live up to the potential of the first film - but it still had me laughing a lot.

The movie starts off right where the first one left off, as Harold & Kumar are heading to Amsterdam to find Maria, Harold's new love.

Of course, Kumar screws things up as he brings a bong aboard an airplane, which is mistaken for a bomb and the two get tossed into Guantanamo Bay by a pretty racist security advisor.

The rest of the film follows them as they escape from prison, look to track down a friend to clear their name and also break-up a wedding where Kumar's old flame is getting married to a total 'douche'. All the while getting chased by the racist security advisor.

Neil Patrick Harris returns to play - Neil Patrick Harris. His role was pretty cool, until the final part which I felt was a little unnecessary.

Overall, the movie gave some pretty good laughs. This time around it was Kumar chasing down the girl of his dreams. But, if I had to choose one or the other, the first one wins hands down.

Grade:

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