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"Red light!  Green light!" -Ethan Hunt An IMF (Impossible Mission Force) assignment goes horribly wrong and results in the deaths of the entire team, except for Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise).  Ethan learns that the whole mission was actually a mole hunt to figure out which member of his team turned traitor and since Ethan is the only one left alive, he is assumed to be the mole.  Ethan is forced to flee for his life and go underground, working with arms dealers and ex-IMF agents to figure out who framed him.  Unfortunately, if he wants to learn the truth, Ethan must break into the CIA. What Works: The three major action set pieces are all really well done.  I love the 1st act of this movie as we watch the team function as a solid unit until everything falls apart.  The deaths of Ethan's teammates are very well done and Tom Cruise really brings his sadness and anger to the screen. The 3rd act helicopter sequence is also really excited to...

"I'm jumping out a window!" -Ethan Hunt After a mission goes wrong because of a decision made by Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise), a group of terrorists get their hands on enough plutonium to make three nuclear bombs.  Ethan and his team set out to recover the plutonium, but they are forced to take CIA agent, August Walker (Henry Cavil), with, who is much more brutal than Ethan and has no problem sacrificing innocent lives.  Also tied up in the mess is an old friend of Ethan's and a former MI6 agent, Ilsa Faust (Rebecca Ferguson), an arms dealer known as the White Widow (Vanessa Kirby), and the villain from the previous film, Soloman Lane (Sean Harris), who all have schemes and motives of their own.  With multiple groups and individuals on a collision course of destruction, it's up the Ethan and the few people he chooses to trust to stop the terrorists and prevent the fallout. I will be getting into spoilers below, so quickly I will say that Fallout is a r...

"Who would hack into a dead girl's account?" -Jess Felton On an average school night, Blaire Lily (Shelley Hennig), her boyfriend, Mitch Roussel (Moses Jacob Storm), and a group of their friends are all having a video call on Skype, but they notice there is an anonymous person in the chat with them and they can't get rid of them.  The person, who is calling themself billie227, reveals that each of them has dark secrets, most of which involve a student named Laura Barns (Heather Sossaman), who committed suicide exactly one year prior after being harassed about an extremely embarrassing video of her posted online.  Now it seems that someone has hacked into Laura's account to extract revenge, or could it be Laura herself, back from to dead to get her vengeance? What Works: I gotta say, I thought this movie looked extremely stupid and I had no desire to see it.  In the years since its release, I've actually heard some positive things about U...

Well, I have finally gotten around to watching all of the Ocean's films, including the Rat Pack original.  But how do they stack up when compared to one another?  Let's find out. #5. Ocean's Twelve (2004) Coming in dead last is Ocean's Twelve and it's not close.  This movie fails on almost level and it's one my least favorite sequels ever.  I do like the chemistry between the cast and the sequence outside the museum where most of the team gets arrested, but apart from that, this film has no redeeming qualities.  The film is overly complex and confusing, making it virtually impossible to follow, there are sequences that are drawn out for too long just to show each member of Ocean's team doing the exact same things, the way some scenes are shot is just bizarre in an uninteresting way, and the 3rd act plot twist is, simply put, stupid, and renders the last half of the movie a complete waste of time.  2/10: Awful #4. Ocean's 11 (1960) On...

"Everyone has secrets." -Lisbeth Salander Just a head's up before I get into this movie, this is the Swedish version, not the one with Daniel Craig.  Also, I watched the extended version on Netflix, not the theatrical cut. After losing a libel case and facing three months in prison, Mikael Blomkvist (Michael Nyqvist) is forced to step away from his duties as publisher of Millennium magazine.  He is approached by Henrik Vanger (Sven-Bertil Taube), a wealthy old man who hires him to investigate the disappearance and possible murder of his niece, Harriet (Julia Sporre), who babysat Mikael when he was little.  But, Harriet disappeared 40-years earlier and no amount of investigation by Henrik or the police led to anything.  He ends up teaming up with Lisbeth Salander (Noomie Rapace), a hacker and surveillance agent who had spied on Mikael previously, to help solve the case.  But what they discover is more violent and horrific than they could have pos...

"Tell him I saw the ocean and it was wet." -Gloria Burgle The third episode of season three of Fargo  is an odd one.  It follows Gloria Burgle (Carrie Coon) as she travels to Los Angeles to look into the life of her ex-stepfather, Ennis Stussy, aka Thaddeus Mobley.  Gloria goes to the motel Thaddeus stayed at when he was in Los Angeles and incidentally gets the same room.  After her suitcase is stolen, Officer Oscar Hunt (Rob McElhenney) manages to track it down and return it to her, albeit empty.  He invites her out for a beer and is unable to give her any information on Thaddeus Mobley.  Hunt propositions her, which Gloria declines.  She then tracks down Vivian Lord (Frances Fisher), a waitress and former actress who Thaddeus has a photo of.  Vivian claims she has no memory of the 70's due to her cocaine use.  Through the Writer's Guild of America, Gloria is able to find a screenplay written by Thaddeus and produced by Howard Z...

"We can talk about that when I'm dead." -Reuben Tishkoff After Reuben Tishkoff's (Elliot Gould) business partner, Willy Bank (Al Pacino), screws Reuben out of being a partner in a new hotel and casino, Reuben suffers a heart attack.  The rest of Danny Ocean's (George Clooney) comes together to get revenge on Willy.  Together, they come up with an uber-complex scheme to destroy Willy, but they are forced to get help from an unexpected source, their old nemesis, Terry Benedict (Andy García), but can they trust him or he Benedict plotting something on his own? What Works: I'm a huge fan of Ocean's Eleven , but one of my only problems with the movie is why they went after Benedict.  Sure, he was kind of a jerk and someone who was very feared, but I don't really think he deserved to be robbed like that.   Ocean's Thirteen fixes that problem and gives us the best antagonist of the series in Willy Banks.  This is a guy who deserves ...

"Today is a good day to die." -Nelson Wright Nelson Wright (Kiefer Sutherland), a medical student, convinces four of his classmates to help him with an experiment to see if there is life after death.  Together, they stop Nelson's heart for one minute before bringing him back.  Nelson cannot effectively explain what he experienced, but something was there on the other side.  As the others try their hand at "flatlining" for longer and longer periods of time, they begin to notice their reality is changing upon their return and they may have brought something back from the land of the dead with them... What Works: First off, the cast is solid.  Keifer Sutherland is an odd protagonist because he's a real jerk at the beginning of the movie, but he's still an interesting character.  Plus we have Julia Roberts and Kevin Bacon who are both great, and William Baldwin plays his role well.  Oliver Platt is the least important of the group, b...

"It's not in my nature to be mysterious, but I can't talk about it and I can't talk about why." -Rusty Ryan A few years after the first film, Terry Benedict (Andy Garcia) manages to track down all 11 of the men who robbed his casino and gives them two weeks to give him back the money, plus interest: $198 million.  With few options and less time, Danny Ocean (George Clooney) and the others travel to Europe where they plan a series of heists in order to make the money.  Unfortunately, Rusty Ryan's (Brad Pitt) ex-girlfriend, Isabel Lahiri (Catherine Zeta-Jones), is a detective with Europol and is determined to stop them.  Plus a thief known as the Night Fox continuously gets in Ocean's way. What Works: In the first film, the cast had fantastic chemistry.  This continues into the sequel, which is an incredibly inferior film in every way, but the cast still has the chemistry and in the scenes where they actually get to talk to one another...

Well, I just watched The Rise of Skywalker .  Here's hoping that's the last Star Wars movie for 20 years.  I am beyond burned out.  Anyway, let's rank the Star Wars series from worst to best. #11. The Phantom Menace (1999) This should come as no surprise to anyone to see Episode I in last place.  It's the only film in the series where the bad outweighs the good.  While I like the podracing sequence and the lightsaber duel between Qui-Gon, Ob-Wan, and Dart Maul, the characters range from boring to insufferable, the story makes no sense, and the film fails to make me care at all about what happens.  This film is shockingly bad and easily earns last place.  4/10: Bad  #10. The Rise of Skywalker (2019) Unfortunately, the Skywalker saga ends with a meh.  While Rey and Kylo's scenes together are fun and there are some good action sequences, the script is a mess with poor setups and lazy attempts to undo The Last Jedi .  A...

"This is stupid." -Will Sawyer Former FBI agent turned security consultant, Will Sawyer (Dwayne Johnson) is hired to assess the security of "The Pearl", the tallest skyscraper in the world.  After delivering his results, the tablet that controls "The Pearl" is stolen and a group of armed men, led by Kores Botha (Roland Møller), seize control of the building and start it on fire to go after the owner of the building, Zhao Long Ji (Chin Han), who is at the very top.  Meanwhile, Will's family is trapped inside, while Will is stuck on the outside.  Will must find away to get in the building, while avoiding the police who believes he is working with Botha.  Even if he can get inside, can he save his family and stop Botha from getting what he's after? What Works: I love Dwayne Johnson.  That guy has more charisma is his pinky finger than I have in my whole body.  Every film he's in, no matter how bad, he delivers.  He's fun...

"Impressive.  Every word in that sentence was wrong." -Luke Skywalker Just after the destruction of Starkiller Base, the Resistance is forced to flee their base, but the First Order is in hot pursuit, having figured out how to track a ship through hyper-space.  Low on fuel, the Resistance can only hope to stall and keep out of range of the First Order long enough for a miracle.  Finn (John Boyega) and BB-8 team up with a Resistance Maintenance worker, Rose Tico (Kelly Marie Tran), to recruit a codebreaker to help them stop the First Order from tracking the Resistance.  Meanwhile, Rey (Daisy Ridley), Chewbacca (Joonas Suotamo), and R2-D2 (Jimmy Lee) travel to Luke Skywalker (Mark Hamill), who refuses to cooperate and help the Resistance.  But when a psychic connection is opened between Rey and Kylo Ren (Adam Driver), the truth forces them and Luke to think seriously about their next moves as the fate of the galaxy is in their hands. What Works:...