Monday Movie Madness

Ben and I took advantage of babysitting by brave grandparents and a got a chance to catch a couple of new releases. Nothing beats sitting in a dark movie theater sans baby.

Slumdog Millionare
There has been a lot of hype in the media about this sleeper hit. Slumdog Millonare is based on the life of a young man, named Jamal, who is born into the slums of Mumbai, India. During the course of the movie Jamal becomes a contestant on India's version of 'Who Wants to be Millonaire' and ends up being arrested and interrogated for correctly answering all of the questions on the game show. During the interrogation, Jamal's history is unfolded for the viewer and explains how he is able to accurately answer questions that would stump even India's greatest Lawyers and Doctors.

Slumdog lives up to all of the hype and more- I was blown away. This movie has the perfect mix of humor, emotion, action, amazing cinematography and a decent soundtrack. The storyline catches you from the get-go and keeps moving until you don't even realize that two hours have flown by. The movie is directed by Danny Boyle who has either directed or produced movies such as The Beach, 28 Days Later and Trainspotting. Boyle is well-versed in dealing with dark subject matter, but this movie is refreshingly uplifting considering some of the issues that it tackles.

Slumdog Millionare is worth spending two hours of your life and $10 of your hard-earned cash to check it out on the big screen. Happy Viewing.

Grade: A


Taken
When I first saw the trailer for this movie I thought to myself ' Lame, this looks like a rip-off of Mel Gibson's Ransom.' But Ben and I like Liam Neeson, the star of Taken, and decided to see the movie with low expectations of anything spectacular.

Taken revolves around Neeson's character (an ex-CIA agent) who feels guilty for choosing to focus on his career rather than being involved in his daughter's life. While attempting to salvage his pathetic relationship with his daughter, she is mysteriously kidnapped while vacationing in France. During the course of the movie Neeson must call upon his CIA skills and kick some serious butt to free his child from a human trafficking operation.

If you enjoy old-school James Bond movies and gratuitous action sequences then you will love Taken. If you are more inclined to check out Jennifer Aniston's latest flick, you will probably hate it. Ben loved this movie and wanted to come home and shoot a few aliens on XBox after getting all pumped up. I was rather ambivalent about the whole affair. Taken is pure action from start to finish and filled with retributive rage. If you are looking for something light and easy to watch I would suggest seeing a different movie.

Grade: C