Hick (2011)

“You could grab the past and drag it with you like a bag of rocks. You can grab that new diet with grape fruits, and a brand new exerciser, and maybe that new washer-dryer set. You can grab and grab and grab, 'til your fists turn green. You can grab everything you ever wanted. Shake it. Try to make it go boom. Yeah, you can never ever grab enough. Pop!”

            I wish I could just pack up and go. Leave my house and my family for an adventure to anywhere. I am twenty-seven and bored at shit living at home in a town that voted one of the most boring places for young people to live and working a shit part time at a library where I get hit on by old creepy guys. If I had the money and a car that worked I would pick up and leave in a heartbeat. My mom told me I should move out to California and live with my uncle but I am not going anywhere without money. I literally have less than two hundred dollar in my bank account right now. If I were to go places I would want money so I can enjoy myself and not stress the fuck out over not having any money to do anything or go anywhere else.

            I wish I had the guts to pack up and go like Luli McMullen (Chloe Grace Moretz) does in the movie Hick. The girl is thirteen and has the balls to leave her home to travel to Las Vegas where she thinks she will find a sugar daddy. I would not go to Vegas I would want to head out to California so I keep in tuned with the movie scene (as a fan and watcher of movies not as an actress. You do not want me to act)… also the weather is ten times nicer than New Jersey’s.

            Luli lives in a small town in Nebraska. Her parents are alcoholics and never really pay any attention to her. After seeing a commercial of show girls in Las Vegas Luli decides to run away. While walking she gets picked up by a guy named Eddie (Eddie Redmayne). He says something she does not like and gets out. Luli then gets picked up by a sweet southern girl named Glenda (Blake Lively).

            Glenda and Luli travel together for some time until they come to this guy’s house. Glenda is apparently working with him in some capacity. When they get to the guy’s house they see Eddie is now working for the guy and neither girl is very happy to him. Eddie convinces Luli to go out with him to leave Gelnda and the guy alone. Eddie is a dick. He basically kidnaps and rapes Luli and ties her up to a bed. The following day Luli wakes up to Glenda in the room. Glenda recalls her story about her and Eddie. Eddie comes back into the room. He has a gun which he says is not loaded but it goes off and there was a still a bullet in it that winds up killing Glenda. Eddie tries to smooth things over with Luli but she grabs the gun and kills Eddie.

            Luli makes it out. She gets help from the hotel owner Beau (Alec Baldwin). He brings her to the bus station. Luli calls her mother but her mother has other shit going on that makes Luli not want to go home. Beau puts her on the bus with a note in her sketchpad telling her where to find him and his sister out in California.

            I was bored watching Hick. It literally took me three days to watch it because I would get bored and fall asleep. It was not god awful but it was not fun to sit through. The story did solidify that I will never travel without money or a car. I never ever want to end up in a situation like Luli’s! I will not say to skip Hick it was not that bad but it was not that great for me to even say it is worth watching once. 

Rock of Ages (2012)

“This place is about to become a sea of sweat, ear-shattering music and puke.” 

            I am not sure how I feel about Rock of Ages. It was not bad but it was not like “wow that was awesome!”. I was not attracted to the all star cast or all the glittering sets and pictures I just wanted to hear the music and how everyone sounded on the songs. I was not disappointed with pretty much all the songs they were sung very well.

            The story is neither new nor creative. Sherrie (Julianne Hough) comes to Los Angeles in 1987 to try to become a singer from her small town in Oklahoma. Ho, hum bored with the plot already I know I was too. Sherrie gets mugged and a nice sweet boy named Drew (Diego Boneta) helps her. He works across the street at a famous bar called the Bourbon Room. A waitress has walked out and they are in need of a new one (oh movie luck). Drew begs his boss Dennis (Alec Baldwin) to hire Sherrie and, oh hey, she gets the job, big shock there.

            Everyone who works in the bar worships the singer Stacee Jaxx (Tom Cruise). He is a rock god with some of the biggest hits of the decade with his band Arsenal. Dennis is lucky enough to have Arsenal play their last gig at his place before Stacee goes solo. Meanwhile the new mayor of Los Angeles (Brian Cranston) wants to rid the strip of all the vice that lurks on the streets and get rid of the Bourbon Room and all with the help of his supposed bible banging wife Patricia (Catherine Zeta-Jones).

            So yeah it is the story of an aging rocker with some issues, a woman fighting against rock n’ roll when she was once its biggest groupies, the main guy and girl having a fall out because he thinks she screwed the rock star when she did not, an old rock club that might be shut down, and an oily manager who wants the money and does not care about music as art. Pretty much summed the movie up right here.

            Now I am going to get to what I really want to write about: the performances both acting and singing. Julianne Hough and Diego Boneta were alright. Hough’s singing voice was too high for me and I felt she ruined some of the songs she sang on. Boneta is handsome (I feel weird saying this since he is three years younger than me... whatever I would totally be a cougar with guy!) with a great singing voice but by the end of the movie he got on my nerves. Catherine Zeta-Jones and Mary J. Blige’s characters were completely pointless. THE BEST performances come from Tom Cruise, Malin Akerman, Alec Baldwin, and Russell Brand. First off, the best song and scene of the movie is when Cruise and Akerman sing “I Want to Know What Love Is.” Who knew Malin Akerman could sing?! I had no idea and she was awesome! The scene is hysterical and both actors sound fantastic on the song. Cruise was brilliant he completely made the entire movie. The role is so different for him but he just nailed it. And holy crap can the dude belt out those notes! Cruise hit notes that amazed me mostly because I could not believe he could sing. I have never been attracted to Tom Cruise whatsoever I can never see in him what other women see but here he is so HOT!! Alec Baldwin and Russell Brand were like a team. Brand was Baldwin’s right hand man. They were fantastic together. They have a scene that is so funny and so unexpected that you will be laughing so hard. Brand in his films is sometimes a bit too much but he gave a much underplayed performance that I really enjoyed him.

            With the typical dull plot with a happy go lucky ending the music is able to keep your attention. You know all the songs already (hopefully you do if you don’t you need some help). Before the singing even started I heard the beat to some of the songs and my feet were moving right along with it. It was awesome to hear “Shadows of the Night” by Pat Benatar near the end that is one of my favorite songs by her. There is music by Foreigner, Journey, Joan Jett, Poison, Bon Jovi, and a bunch more good bands and singers from the 80s.

            Rock of Ages is a simple movie that attracts audiences of all kinds. It is glittery and fun but it feels more like pop-fluff than hard rock, it is cute and fluffy trying to make out all the characters are so into rock n’ roll. The only characters that looked like they listened to rock and were rough around the edges were Stacee Jaxx (obviously), Dennis, and Lonny (Russell Brand). But besides this if you can get past the predictable story and Julianne Hough’s singing you will have a good time watching Rock of Ages.  

Beetlejuice



“Barb, honey... we're dead. I don't think we have very much to worry about anymore.”

            I can remember watching Beetlejuice all the time when I was little. This is one of my childhood movies. I just recently bought this on DVD and I seriously do not know what took me so long to get it. Watching Beetlejuice again after such a long time it felt like I had just watched it yesterday I remembered all the scenes.

            Adam and Barbara Maitland (Alec Baldwin and Geena Davis) are a young couple. They live in a very rural area of the Northeast in a house they have lovingly decorated and made their own. When the movie starts they are finally on vacation from work and planning to spend the week in their home working on things and relaxing. Adam wants to run out and Barbara goes with him. On the way home their vacation becomes a prolonged one when their car crashes in to the local river. Next thing they know they are wet and back in their house with no memory of how they got there.

            When they look into a mirror they realize they are dead they drowned when their car went into the river. They are given a guide book on how to live in the afterlife but the book is really confusing. They take a travel to the other side and are told by their advisor Juno (Sylvia Sidney) in order to stay in their house forever they must scare the yuppie hipster New Yorkers that have just moved in. Adam and Barbara have no idea how to scare these people they try the whole sheet thing but that totally backfires. The only person in the family who can really see them in human form is the morbid daughter Lydia (Winona Ryder).

        The couple really does not know how to get these people to leave. There is however this one strange ghoul they have been hearing about named Beetlejuice. To talk to Beetlejuice they have to say his name three times. When Adam and Barbara come face to face with the “bio-exorcist” he is nothing but a disgusting menace.

            Ever since Lydia took the pictures of Adam and Barbara in the sheets her parents have and their friends have been nagging for her to show them the ghost to make them come out. One of their friends reads from the recently deceased book along with other paranormal readings and he gets Barbara and Adam to appear in their human form. Their human forms start to disintegrate. Lydia in desperation runs to Beetlejuice for help to save them. He does but then the troublemaker is sent on his way back to the other side.

            Good God where to even begin on why I love this movie so much. I am such a loser but I actually started tearing up in happiness over seeing the ending when “Jump in the Line” comes on because I remember loving it so much as a kid.

            Watching it now I love the cast. Geen Davis is one of my favorite actresses she was so adorable as Barbara. Alec Baldwin for as much as he is an asshole now he is a good actor and I cannot even believe how handsome he once was (I am so used to seeing him as Jack Donaghy on 30 Rock that it is weird to not see him as a fat man with a really low voice). Catharine O’Hara was such a bitch in this movie but I love her she could really do no wrong in whatever she is in. Winona Ryder was good this was before she went really weird. Michael Keaton amazes me I mean anyone who can pull of this role then do all kinds of serious movies is a very good actor in my book. I never knew who Sylvia Sidney was and I only just noticed her name. It is odd to think she was a classic actress who made films with actors like Cary Grant and James Cagney. I guess in a way I have always loved the cast even when I was little and I just never knew it.

            Tim Burton is a genius. The way his mind works is kind of scary and unusual but that is what makes him so different and stand out from other directors. The world he creates and captures is what really makes Beetlejuice awesome.

        Best scenes of the whole movie:



No explanations are needed they are just awesome. They’re two of my all time favorite scenes from the movies.

            If you have a good sense of humor you will enjoy Beetlejuice if you have been living under a rock for the past twenty-three years and have not seen it. The best thing about the DVD- there are three episodes from the Beetlejuice cartoon in the extras!! Now how many of you remember that cartoon?