The Monuments Men - Movie or Party?

Sometimes movies are made for art; sometimes movie are made for a chance at making a lot of money; and sometimes a movie is made so a bunch of guys can party and have a good time. George Clooney, Matt Damon, Bill Murray, John Goodman..... I'm betting on the latter for The Monuments Men and something of a transformed Oceans 11 even though the story is based on a true event.

Monuments Men is a George Clooney project with a release date of February 7, 2014. Definitely the first must see movie of 2014 for me anyway.

It Really Was A Fantastic Voyage

I saw Fantastic Voyage in the theater as a kid. Some years later, a science teacher showed the movie in a junior high science class (this was pre-video days so I'm assuming 20th Century Fox made the movie available as a teaching aid). Here is the premise. A government scientist goes into a coma after an assassination attempt. The only chance to bring him back to life is perform laser surgery to remove a clot to his brain. In 1966, this kind of laser surgery can only be done from inside the body so the government has a miniaturization program to shrink humans to a microscopic size and inject them into the body using a kind of miniature submarine to get from point A to point B, the point where the surgery must be performed. This is science fiction at its best,

But its the medical aspects of the story and actors interracting inside the human body that brings out the best of Fantastic Voyage. This isn't an A class list of actors. The dialog can be kind of hokey at times. But the movie itself is quite compelling and well worth watching. Or maybe Raquel Welch in a wet suit is compelling enough. The movie also has Donald Pleasence as the bad guy and I don't if there was ever a creepier actor in the movies. 

Anyway, the movie was just released on Blu-Ray and I couldn't get it fast enough to watch it and plan to watch it again soon. It is that good of a movie.

Anchorman - Still Funny But Slipping

When I first saw Will Ferrell's Anchorman: The Legend of Ron Burgundy in the theaters back in 2004 when the film was first released, I thought it was one of the funniest movies ever. I put it up there in the Animal House pantheon. There are scenes (and lines) in the movie that are hysterically funny. "I'm kind of a big deal".

I watched the film again last night in preparation for the sequel Anchorman 2 set to come out before the end of the year. And while Anchorman still is fun to watch, I have to admit it has slipped over the years in my subsequent viewings. Uneven is probably a good word for it. While Ferrell and Christina Applegate really stand out in their roles, the supporting cast is pretty much hit or miss. Some of the gags work, some don't. 

I can still recommend Anchorman to someone looking for a funny movie to watch. I just don't have the enthusiasm for the movie I once did.