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It amuses me how the news keeps reporting how much money Avatar is pulling in.  A ticket for an evening showing of Avatar at my local multiplex is $14.  This obscene price makes the total box office a little meaningless doesn't it?  If you consider that Star Wars brought in $798 million, then the $429 million that Avatar has brought in after 4 weeks isn't too impressive.  World wide there must be thousands of more theaters than there were 30 years ago and when you adjust for ticket prices (A little bit of research shows that the average ticket in 1977 was a little over $2), Avatar would need to bring in more than 4 and half billion dollars to be as popular as the original Star Wars.  So until the news starts reporting the total ticket sales or adjusts for differences in price, I'm going to keep ignoring the gross sales.

As for the movie, the story was a little lacking (which apparently Cameron tried to make up for with length) but if you can get through slow pace and the unbelievable setup in the first hour, then you can sit back and enjoy the last hour and half.  The is nothing mind blowing about this story like we saw in The Matrix, but the special effects are simply amazing.  I saw it in 3D which looks amazing most of the time, but also hurts my eyes in others so while I can do without that, the computer animation is simply believable (not unbelievable like in the aforementioned Star Wars.  You can't tell where the actors end and the computer begins.

It is expensive, but this is a movie you need to see on the big screen.

A normal holiday tradition around here is to go see a movie while everyone else is home with their families.  Apparently around here, that is a pretty common idea.  We went to see Sherlock Holmes at a sold out theater.  This just reinforced my rule about not seeing movies on opening day.  Robert Downey Jr. was great in the movie but he would have been better if I didn't have to sit in the front row.

Downey does a great job of playing troubled characters.  He added a great deal of complexity to the character that another actor might not have been able to.  If you are already a fan, this is a can't miss.  However, if you aren't a fan already, you may want to wait for this to come out on DVD.

I want to applaud the screen writers, Johnson, Peckham, and Kinberg for not being tempted to throw in a "Elementary my Dear Watson" (even out of context).  I think back to the Get Smart movie that tossed (or perhaps forced ) in all the catch phrases at the expense of the movie.  This was well done all on its own.  I look forward to the sequel (which was certainly left open by the ending).

Nothing much to do here in Texas on a Wednesday night so I want to dollar theater.  I had already seen most of the movies there to tonight was Cirque du Freak: The Vampire's Assistant.  For a dollar, I'm still undecided if it was worth it, but for any more than that, it certainly isn't.

I'm a big fan of John C. Reilly and although he did have some good lines delivered in his typical over the top style, he couldn't make up for a weak plot.

Not much more to say about this.  Since it is already at the dollar theater, you probably won't have to time to catch it while it is still in the theater, but don't worry about that.  And if you miss it on DVD, you'll be ok too.  If you see it on cable next year and have nothing better to do, sit back and enjoy.

Hooray for the dollar theater near my hotel.  I was bored tonight so I decided to go catch a movie.  I had heard some mixed reviews about Zombieland, but for $1.75, it can't be that bad, right?  I'm not big on horror movies but the comparisons to Shaun of the Dead as well as having Woody Harrelson gave me enough incentive to go see it.

To the point, I thought it was great.  The appearance of Bill Murray really put it over the top for me.  It isn't the best movie ever made, but it was very enjoyable for the 88 minutes it ran.  The Texas and Redneck jokes at the beginning were especially great since I saw this while in Austin.

I'm still not sold on Jesse Eisenberg though, he always seems like he is playing Michael Cera's character.  The only other movie I remember him from is Adventureland which was a painful 90 minutes and perhaps that just left a bad opinion of hm in my mind.

Anyway, if you don't mind some gore (well a lot of gore) and like zombie humor, this is a pretty entertaining movie.

Thanks to dollar movie night I finally got to see the new G.I. Joe movie.  I've been waiting all summer to see this.  I started traveling right before this came out and just haven't had time until now.  Had I known how bad it was, I wouldn't have worried about it so much.  At a buck, it was well worth the investment, but if I had paid full price I might have been a little more upset.  Even Terminator 4 was better than this.

I'm not sure when Hollywood will learn that more (especially not better) CGI doesn't make up for a weak story.  I appreciate that they tried to drop in the classic lines "Yo Joe" and the classic "Knowing is half the battle" but forced is a little bit of an understatement.

Why couldn't they just have a simple shootem up story?  They tried to make this a little to cool.  I would have preferred something a little more realistic (as much as it can be) rather than over exaggerated.  This reminded me more of a live version of Team America rather than G.I.Joe.

In spite of my better judgment, Jenny and I went to see District 9 tonight, the new movie from Peter Jackson.  I have yet to forgive Jackson for the 3 hours of my life I will never get back which he called King Kong.

To my surprise, I found out that Jackson wasn't the director, only the producer.  It was actually directed by Neill Blomkamp.  I understand that this was Blomkamp's first real movie, but I would have been more likely to see it without Jackson's name attached to it.  However, there was nothing else playing that looked good to me, so District 9 it was.

As for the movie... it was different.  Not quite like anything I've seen before.  I don't agree with the comparisons between the aliens and segregation (since the aliens had technology we desperately wanted and typically that is not the case with racial differences).  If you ignore any guilt imposed cultural references, this is just a good sci-fi movie that is not quite like anything you have seen before.  The is some great character development Sharlto Copley was excellently cast.  He really made the character believable and you really empathized with him.

If you don't have a chance to catch this in the theater, be sure to rent it if you like sci-fi.

I was a bit too young to see the original Terminator movie when it came out in 1984, but I remember seeing T2.  The second installment was pretty good, perhaps good enough to rival the original.  As for the third movie,I thought it was ok, although not up to the same standard James Cameron had set with the first two.

Being a fan of Christian Bale, I thought I would go see the new movie in the series, Terminator Salvation.  (Hooray for dollar movie night).

Well, there were some good parts but to me special effects can't make up for a bad story line (which too many gaping holes in it).  Perhaps McG should stick to music videos and lay off the feature movies.  It is interesting to see that even some of the actors agree the movie wasn't as good as it could have been.

I will take a minute to note that while some of the references to the past movies (such as the obligatory, "I'll be back") didn't do much for me and could have been left out, I appreciated the inclusion of Guns 'N Roses in homage to their contribution to T2.  It was also nice that the Governator isn't too full of himself and allowed his image to be used in the movie.

So if you find your self with nothing to do and a theater playing dollar movies, go for it, otherwise it can wait until it comes out on DVD.  No need to rush out to see this one.