The Reluctant Fundamentalist

I decided to take a quick break from my Oscars marathon that I've sort of been on for the past few days and check out a movie that I had on my Netflix watch list. I do have some movies on there that I have created for my 2017 movie list and I don't want to put myself in the same situation I did last year where I was rushing to clear out that list... even though I probably will end up doing that near the end of the year.

I found The Reluctant Fundamentalist by looking up movies with Kiefer Sutherland. If you're not familiar with the blog, I am a fan of 24 and Kiefer Sutherland has been one of my favorite actors for a while since. While I had never heard of this movie, I wanted to check it out and see how it was. These were my thoughts.

The movie begins with the abduction of an American professor in Pakistan. The CIA is trying to find this professor and so is a journalist named Bobby Lincoln (played by Liev Schreiber).

Lincoln gets the opportunity to meet with a Pakistani Professor by the name of Changez Khan (played by Riz Ahmed). He is unsure if Khan had anything to do with the kidnapping of the American professor and he wants to interview him to figure out if he did or not.

What follows is Khan telling his story from when he graduated from college, got a job with a top Wall Street firm, and his experiences, living in the United States right after the events of 9/11.

Prior to the attack Changez gets a job with a Wallstreet firm under the mentorship of Jim Cross (played by Kiefer Sutherland). He is incredibly successful and eventually even meets and falls in love with a photographer by the name of Erica (played by Kate Hudson).

The Reluctant Fundamentalist follows Changez as he watches the world change and the way people look at him differently. The movie does a good job at setting up his life and the way that it was prior to the events of 9/11 and then watching it all change as Changez not only falls victim to Islamaphobia and racial profiling, but in reaction, falls back on his roots and starts denying the American ideals that are expected of him.

The interesting part of the movie and the part that I appreciated was that the movie never felt like it was too over the top and hyperbolic like some movies about prejudices can be. After 9/11, while there are some pretty extreme things said about Middle Easterns basically right in front of Changez, it's not like he loses his job because he's Arab. While some of the moments where he is racially profiled are a bit extreme, it all fits within the context of what was going on in the aftermath of 9/11.

And then there's the relationship between him and Erica which starts off pretty strong because she really does stand with him even after all the Islamaphobia sets in. Now I do think that the relationship between Changez and Erica does end eventually for silly reasons that only happened because they were necessary to the plot, but since that wasn't really the main purpose of the film, it was minute enough that it didn't matter as much.

The strongest part of this movie is watching how much this character changes because of multiple factors. 9/11 is part of it, and his responses to prejudice also changes his outlook on the rest of the world. And then he starts to embrace his heritage and his culture begins to show. When this transformation becomes more and more apparent and when it gets juxtaposed with who the character is in the 2011 when he's having the conversation with the reporter in Pakistan, you really do spend a lot of the movie wondering if Changez has been radicalized or if he's just opposed to American intervention in the Middle East.

The movie has a pretty great message about the radicalization of men in the Middle East due to the actions of the United States in the War on Terror and it's an interesting and non-pandering outlook on that issue.

Riz Ahmed is a name I've heard more and more these days and I really am starting to like what I'm seeing from him. He had great parts in both Nightcrawler and Rogue One and now I see him in this. There are a couple of other things I want to check him out in but he has really impressed me with everything that I've seen him in.

I talked a little bit about the relationship he has with Kate Hudson's character and that does make it a little bit difficult to say that Hudson did a good job in this film. I think it's interesting seeing her in a serious movie like this and not in a romantic comedy, but I'm not totally sure that she was the right choice for the role. I think they could have used someone different. Maybe it's because her character is also written well but I wasn't incredibly wild about Hudson's role in this movie at all.

Some of the other performances worth mentioning are that of Liev Schreiber and Kiefer Sutherland.

Both of them fit really well with the rest of the cast and the story of the film. They fit the film both when it has a flavor of a thriller and when it is supposed to be a drama. I think it's a little bit more on the drama side most of the time and both Sutherland and Schreiber bring great performances that support the main story that centers on Changez.

There are definitely a lot of slow moments in this movie. But I think the cast and the story really pull it along to a point that make you care about them. You are interested in seeing the progression of Changez Khan's story and you want to answer the question on if he eventually is radicalized or if he's just a defiant man.

I would say the only thing to improve on with this movie would be the relationship with Changez and Erica. I'm not sure Hudson was the right choice for the part but I would have either preferred her to be a bigger part in the film or not have her in the film at all. Either way I think that would have had a stronger effect.

If you want to check out a film with a different outlook on the war on terror and isn't your regular run of the mill story about terrorism and how it forms, The Reluctant Fundamentalist might be a good one to check out. I think it's a little bit of a hidden gem in the middle of Netflix's expanding selection.

But what do you think? Have you seen The Reluctant Fundamentalist? Let me know what you think. Comment and Discuss below! You can also send me your thoughts on Twitter @cmhaugen24 as well as send me your requests for films I should review in the future. If you follow me on Twitter, you can get updates on future movie news and reviews coming out of this blog.

I'll leave you with this. I'm jumping right back on the Oscar train. I'm going to be reviewing Manchester by the Sea next. Here's the trailer. Enjoy!

Hell or High Water

Now for something totally different than Moonlight...

Hell or High Water is a movie I don't think a lot of people saw in 2016. It's a totally original script in a world full of reboots and sequels and it manages to be both incredibly genuine with a good script as well as action filled and suspenseful. I've heard people respond to other people complaining about the lack of original movies these days and they always pointed to Hell or High Water in 2016. I really have to agree with them 100%.

Hell or High Water follows the story of two brothers in West Texas by the names of Toby and Tanner. They hatch a plan to rob a series of banks and build up a stable amount of money to keep the ranch formerly owned by their recently deceased mother. Their plan is to keep the money intake just low enough to keep the feds out of it and do it in a way that they cannot be traced.

Toby (played by Chris Pine) is the more straight laced one who doesn't has never really had much of a run in with the law and just wants to set his family up for financial security in the future. Whereas Tanner (played by Ben Foster) is more of a risk taker and is an ex con, more willing to use violence and get the job done one way or another.

The two of them are being hunted by a Texas Ranger by the name of Marcus Hamilton (played by Jeff Bridges). Hamilton is on the verge of retirement but wants one last hurrah before he turns in his gun and his badge. He is also incredibly racist for some reason.

He has a partner (played by Gil Birmingham) who is part Native American, part Mexican, and of course the entire time Marcus is just making all these really racially insensitive jokes the entire time.

There are other characters in the film but the movie mainly centers around both pairs as they travel throughout West Texas in this game of cat and mouse.

If I had to describe this movie in two word, it would just be, Straight forward. In the simplest of terms, it's Cops versus Robbers and its just a romp.

All the characters in the film are entertaining, they are compelling and they are well developed by the end of the movie. I would almost say they're almost too straight forward. Again I'm going to point to the Honest Trailer of the 2017 Oscars because they really don't have a lot to say about this film beyond it being just straight forward and having absolutely no chance of winning Best Picture.

Hell or High Water I think was 2016's Sicario. I'm finding that every year seems to have at least one film that is a pretty great action flick but at the same time is a pretty great and well done film. In 2013 it was Captain Phillips, in 2014 it was American Sniper, in 2015 it was Sicario, and now in 2016 it was Hell or High Water.

Like I said in my review of Moonlight, a lot of it comes down to personal preference when it comes to top picks for Oscar season. Hell or High Water appeals to the action heads like myself. I enjoyed this movie immensely, probably more than Moonlight and La La Land because it had both great action and great performances from Jeff Bridges, Ben Foster, and Chris Pine. Just because it's got a lot of action doesn't mean that good performances don't come out of it and Hell or High Water is a great example of that.

Ben Foster and Chris Pine play off each other very well. Like I mentioned before, Chris Pine is your straight laced guy who has never been very violent or had any run ins with the law. He's also the straight man with the more compelling and relatable story in this pair. A lot of people could see themselves in Chris Pine's shoes. He's the voice of reason.

Chris Pine actually surprised me in this film because he's usually so well known for his big blockbuster films like Star Trek, Jack Ryan Shadow Recruit, and soon Wonder Woman. Hell or High Water showed that he could actually act and there's potential for more serious roles there.

Ben Foster, who has shown he can act really well in past films but was starting to disappoint me recently, especially in movies like Warcraft, plays a totally different character in this movie and plays off Chris Pine's straight man very well. Tanner is the loud, obnoxious, and devil may care attitude brother. He part of the reason this movie is so entertaining.

These two brothers in any other situation would be considered the bad guys but because they keep to a code and they are robbing banks for a reason, they play it like a Bonnie and Clyde hero complex where you almost want them to get away with this money.

A similar dynamic plays out between Jeff Bridges and Gil Birmingham. Birmingham's character is a little more reserved and the one you relate to more while Bridge's character is a little more of a wild card.

The two sparing against each other works really well, especially when people start dying because the movie allows you to get to know these character pretty well and the reactions when people start dying are really great and show off the acting range of all four actors.

There's not a lot to say about Hell or High Water besides it's pretty damn entertaining. I would say that if you're comparing it to the other Oscar films I've watched so far, Hell or High Water probably has the least amount of substance. There's a little bit of a message about banks, treatment of Native Americans, and some other stuff, but overall this is just a really well made and well acted action movie.

With a run time of about 102 minutes you will definitely not feel like this is a long movie at all. The acting, the action, and the story really carries the audience through it pretty quickly and you'll just enjoy yourself while watching it. It may not be the best movie out of the Oscar picks from 2016, but it might be the most entertaining out of the ones that I've watched... I have to watch La La Land again to make that argument. But when I say it's something totally different from Moonlight, I really do mean it.

This might be a short review but I'm finding it hard to find bad things about this film. I can just say you're in for a fun ride.

But those are my thoughts on Hell or High Water. What did you think? Did you enjoy this film? Where does it rank among the other Oscar films? I think by the end of this I'm going to make a list of all the Oscar films that were nominated for Best picture and rank them. I don't know when but I want to do that soon. Let me know your thoughts and put them in the comment section below! You can also send me your thoughts on Twitter @cmhaugen24 as well as send me your requests for films that I should review in the future. If you follow me on Twitter, you can get updates on future movie news and reviews coming out of this blog.

I'll leave you with this. Apparently Jeff Bridges can sing... who knew. Enjoy!

Moonlight

So I'm sure by this time, everyone has heard about the flub that happened during the Oscars and I'm sure everyone reading this has their opinions on not only who should have won the Oscars but how the flub was handled. I've read articles claiming that the whole thing was systemic racism at work, others have just an honest mistake.

Myself, I wanted to check this movie out before it became a controversy, now I wanted to hit the iron while it's hot and look at the movie outside flub of the Oscars and give my honest thoughts on the movie that won Best Picture, Moonlight.

Moonlight follows the story of a man by the name of Chiron over the course of his life, segmenting into 3 parts, when he is a child, when he's a teenager, and when he is an adult.

If you're reading that and think that this premise sounds a lot like the movie Boyhood except without the 13 year production timeline, you'd be partly right. In a way, Moonlight is the version of Boyhood except the character is black... and gay... and lives in Miami... and has a crack addict mother...

So yeah, really the only connection to Boyhood is that it follows this kid from childhood all the way to adulthood. It's not the best comparison but it's a good frame of reference.

The story of Chiron starts when he's a kid (played by Alex Hibbert). He is a strange kid that gets picked on for being different. He meets a drug dealer by the name of Juan (played by Mahershala Ali) and gets taken in by Juan and his girlfriend Teresa (played by Janelle Monae). The couple become second parents for Chiron as his mother (played by Naomie Harris) is a drug addict who is verbally abusive to Chiron.

I do want to talk about the performances in this first act because there are some really good ones. Mahershala Ali actually won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actor for his role as Juan. I am personally a big fan of Mahershala Ali. I thought he was tragically underutilized in Luke Cage, and I have to think that he was tragically underutilized in this film. I know the film is centered on Chiron and the character of Juan supports the story not the actor playing it, but I would have liked to see more of Juan in this movie.

Janelle Monae does a good job as well. I've only known her as the crazy moves singer but this past year she was in both this film and Hidden Figures, two Oscar nominated films. I get the feeling she is still at the start of her acting career but these are not bad movies to start on. I'm actually interested in seeing more of her in the future.

And then there is Naomie Harris.

This carries over to the rest of the movie and Naomie Harris's role throughout the film as Paula, Chiron's mother. But holy crap. I used to only know her as Money Penny in the new Bond films and as the voodoo witch who turns into a giant crab person in Pirates of the Carribean but then I started seeing her in more films like Mandela: Long Walk to Freedom and of course this. She's a solid actress. I want to see her in a lot more because it seems like she is just going to keep on doling out these good performances. The best part of the movie, in my opinion is when the relationship between her and Chiron comes to a climax and both Harris and the actor who plays Chiron as an adult knock it out of the park with that confrontation.

I think out of the three actors that play Chiron, Alex Hibbert might have the weakest performance of them. Now this isn't saying its a bad performance. The kid is pretty young in this movie and it's understandable since he's a kid actor that he wouldn't have as strong of a performance as the other two actors playing Chiron. I just thought that all young Chiron did was kind of stare and stay silent while things happened around him. Again, it's not bad and it does create a baseline for the other two actors who play him. But there is a reason the focus is more on the people around Chiron in the first act and there's a reason why the center of the first act is almost more on Juan than it is on Chiron.

Then the movie fast forwards to Chiron while he's in high school and he starts to come to terms with his sexuality and figuring out who he is as a person.

He still is being bullied for just being who he is but it starts to escalate. Ashton Sanders plays Chiron in his teen years and this kid is really the star of the entire film. A lot of the film is centered on his teen experiences and Sanders has the opportunity to develop the character the best out of all three people playing Chiron.

I won't say too much because I don't want to give away what happens as it is the events in the movie that really make it powerful, especially those that happen in his teen years. But Ashton Sanders gives a pretty good performance.

And then there's the third act where Chiron is an adult and the story finally comes to a close.

Trevante Rhoades plays Chiron when he reaches adulthood and I actually was really drawn in by his character as an adult. An essential part of the story is Chiron's relationship to his friend Kevin (played by Jaden Piner, Jharrel Jerome, and Andre Holland over the course of the three acts). I thought it was fascinating that at the beginning of the third act, Chiron puts on a bit of a front and he doesn't seem like the same character but then when he reconnects with Kevin you can see that baseline that Alex Hibbert created in the first act come back and this hard adult sudden reverts back to the child we saw in the first act. There is so much about all three performances that blend so well together that again I have to say, it's Boyhood done better.

But again, because the character is very introverted and quiet, a lot of the film is him just staring and not saying anything. There's a lot of character that can be discovered by looks and non verbal acting but I felt like I needed some dialogue from this character and it was actually really weird seeing him talk, especially when he spends most of the movie not really saying anything.

It reminds me of Drive.

Remember that art house film where Ryan Gosling just stood around and stared with that "Hey Gurl" look the entire time? The main problem I had with that was that without at least some dialogue, it was very hard to discover a character when all he was doing was staring into the camera. The same can be said about Chiron in Moonlight.

The other thing about Moonlight was how it couldn't really decide on whether or not it was an arthouse film or not. There are a couple of moments that the frame goes into this really artistic mode and it did remind me of Drive a little bit, especially when they start playing classical music over really dramatic moments, it felt a little pretentious at times for me.

The difference, and the reason I like Moonlight more than I like Drive is that it does jump back into a cohesive narrative that makes sense and doesn't rely on that arthouse feel that Drive did.

And even the moments where it's quiet and it's just met with stares, I think Moonlight does a really good job at sending it's message across to it's viewers. Just make sure that you are totally awake during this movie because I could imagine falling asleep during this movie.

Last critique I'll put on the movie is that I felt like it just kind of ended. I didn't feel like there was much of a climax or a big emotional moment, the movie just kind of stops. Going back to the arthouse feel of the film, I felt it was more of an artistic ending than an actual ending and I wasn't the biggest fan of it.

I think the main appeal of the movie is it's message and the story that it's telling. Moonlight is the first movie to win an Oscar for Best Picture that is centered on the issues of the LGBT community. It does have a poignant message and I understand why people are drawn to it, especially if it speaks to them personally. I think for me personally, the movie doesn't speak to me the way it does for others for multiple reasons. I don't connect to this story personally because I'm a straight white guy. That doesn't mean I don't see the importance and the significance of the story and there's absolutely nothing to relate to, I just didn't have a personal connection to this story the way I think other people did. On top of that, I've mentioned the arthouse feel to it and how I saw it as a little bit pretentious at times.

Screen Junkies did an honest trailer for the Oscars and mentioned how Moonlight hits all the Oscar bait expectations checklist and the joke title for the movie was "All the Oscar Things". I can't help but agree that this movie has all the flags needed for an Oscar film and to me it comes off as a little bit pretentious at times. Now I think that the movie is more focused on telling the story than it is on winning awards, but there is that Oscar Bait feel to it that makes me shy away from really connecting to the film.

Moonlight is without a doubt a good movie. It is without a doubt well made and it is for sure a milestone, especially when it comes to the subject matter and the historical context it comes out in.

I can only compare it to La La Land because that's the only other Best Picture nominee that I've seen and if I'm comparing the two it's very difficult. On one hand, Moonlight definitely takes on a more poignant and powerful message whereas La La Land is more light hearted and just more fun and care free but overall trite.

Moonlight has more moments that feel like actors are acting and emoting whereas La La Land, while it may not have as memorable performances, again just feels fun.

I think it's pretty obvious that I enjoyed La La Land more than Moonlight and the truth is, La La Land just has that re-watchability factor to it.  I'm going to buy La La Land on Itunes and re-watch it because I had more fun with that film than I did with Moonlight. Moonlight isn't to the level 12 Years a Slave was in that you watch it once and that's really all you need to get the experience, but I don't see myself bored and wanting to pop in a story about a kid getting bullied because he's gay.

Overall, it really depends on what you prefer and what your qualifications are for what should be considered Best Picture. Should Best Picture be about most powerful message the movie is trying to put across or should it be about technique and how well done the movie is. Performances come into play two which I would unequivocally give to Moonlight so maybe that's the deciding factor.

I think the important part I would want to suggest to people is not to pit these two movies against one another like one is the right choice and one is the bad guy. You can like both these films. If you enjoy La La Land more than Moonlight that doesn't make you a racist and if you like Moonlight more than La La Land that doesn't make you a buzz kill. They're two very different films and since film is subjective, you can enjoy one and not like the other for whatever reason.

Overall, I recognize the accomplishment that Moonlight is. It's a well done movie with a powerful message. It is not a movie I am probably ever going to watch again. Do I think it deserved to win Best Picture? Well, I am going to be trying to knock out as many Oscar nominated films in the next few days in order to see what it compared to but based on other Best Picture winners, I don't think it's as strong of a winner as we've had in the past. That doesn't negate the message or the merits the film does have, I just don't think it's the strongest Best Picture Winner out there.

But what did you think? Was Moonlight actually the Best Picture of 2016? What was your favorite movie of 2016? Comment and Discuss below! You can also send me your thoughts on Twitter @cmhaugen24 as well as send me your requests for films I should review in the future. If you follow me on Twitter, you can get your updates on future movie news and reviews coming out of this blog.

24: Legacy Pilot

So I didn't watch 24 from the very beginning. I came into the show around Season 4, went back and watched the rest of it, then finished the show until it completed it's 8th season and its 9th sort of season.  I have been a die hard 24 fan for a long time and while I recognize that the later seasons of the show got a little bit stale especially since they tried to keep alive a political climate that had been outdated when Obama came into office in 2008, I still consider it one of my favorite shows of all time.

I personally think the ending of the 8th season of 24 was fine how it was. It wasn't anything spectacular but it was a good way to close off the final season. And then Live Another Day happened... now I personally don't love the ending to Live Another Day because it didn't feel like a real ending. It felt like a cliff hanger to a future season with Jack Bauer that I don't think is going to happen. But I also said in my review of that ending that I would not support anything 24 related that didn't have Jack Bauer in it... and yet here we are.

24 Legacy takes place three years after Live Another Day and is set in DC. The story centers around a former Army Ranger by the name of Eric Carter (played by Corey Hawkins). Carter was apart of a special forces unit that worked in tandem with Counter Terrorist Unit (CTU) that led to the assassination of a high value terrorist by the name of Ibrahim Ben-Khalid. The operation was headed up by the former director of CTU named Rebecca Ingram (played by Miranda Otto). At the start of the show, it is apparent that Eric is having difficulty adjusting to civilian life with his wife Nicole (played by Anna Diop).

The pilot starts with terrorists finding and killing the other members of the Ranger team that killed Bin-Khalid. Soon it comes down to just Eric and another former Ranger by the name of Ben Grimes (played by Charlie Hofheimer). After terrorists come after him and his family, Eric must reach out to CTU find the people trying to hurt him and his wife and prevent a terrorist attack from occurring on US soil.

To start off, I will say that there really isn't any other show that is quite like 24 and it was really good to return to that form and that feel. Maybe it's the real time element, maybe it's just the music of Sean Callery, but whatever it is, it's good to return to this universe and to the high stakes counter terrorist world that was very specific to 24.

I know that everyone is asking how Corey Hawkins compares Kiefer Sutherland as the leading man. Now I'm not going to sit here and pretend like Eric Carter is the hero of 24 we've been waiting for. I don't know how you make a show like this with such an iconic hero and expect to create another hero to match someone like Jack Bauer. You can't. Instead you create as compelling of a character as you can and hope that people still might enjoy him and the rest of the cast.

Now I'm only a few episodes in and it's still very early to figure out who Eric Carter is and if he's a compelling character and it's kind of hard to determine.

Corey Hawkins is by no means a bad actor. Despite the minute fact that he's incredibly skinny, I could believe that he was an Army Ranger and that fact alone is kind of a cool angle. I'm currently re-watching the first season of 24 and Jack Bauer's backstory was pretty generic and definitely not the main purpose of the story. Instead the focus was on his job and his mission to hunt down terrorists and make America safe again. If you didn't know Jack Bauer's backstory from the few hints that they give you in the first season, I would almost say that Eric Carter actually has a more interesting story that Jack Bauer in some regards.

And I will say that the show does give him a couple of genuine moments, as few as they are. There is a pretty good scene where he and his former teammate, Ben are sitting on a train and they're talking about the meaning of duty and what the country owes them or whatnot. It's actually a pretty well done scene.

24 has a knack for reflecting the times we live in and the political climate and outlook towards the War on Terror. Back in 2001 when the show first aired, it reflected the midst of the battle we face against terrorism and the fear we had towards it with the attacks on 9/11 still very fresh in our minds. In 2008 when the Obama administration was coming into office, the background of the season was Jack Bauer testifying in Washington DC and almost being brought to task for the things he did in the name of national security.  And now, Eric Carter is a Soldier who has fought long and hard in a war that has gone on for longer than he expected it and he's trying to figure out what his role is in new conflicts even though he believed the conflict to be over... hmmm ring any bells? America!

I definitely like the rest of the cast. You have Miranda Otto who I really only know from Lord of the Rings, but still enjoy in this show. Then you have Jimmy Smits playing her husband who is a Senator running for President. I'm not totally certain how well he fits in with the rest of the show but I'm willing to give him a shot. Those are the big names of people you see in the show. There's a lot of other characters but none of them are really that interesting if I'm being 100% honest. Perhaps they will be developed in later episodes but they don't really pop out. Instead they more seem like they're there just to fill a role that was vacant from previous seasons.

And that's something that I think 24 suffers from and it's the reason the show was cancelled in the first place. It's how predictable the show can get.

24 gained acclaim when they had a lot of twists and turns and a lot of characters who we thought were good people who turned out to be moles and traitors. In the first few episodes, it seems like the same motifs are still being utilized, and it's not just the idea of traitors and moles.

A couple things you can always count on in 24 is the Jack Bauer character having to work outside the confines of the institutions for a little bit in order to get the job done. Another thing is that behind every stereotypical muslim character, there is a traitorous white character who you perhaps didn't expect because 24 does this weird thing where they think you expect the terrorist to be the middle eastern character when its not, which I guess when it first happened was interesting and perhaps a way to combat islamaphobia but instead just seems predictable now. There are a lot of other examples that I've already seen in the first three episodes, but you understand how this show can be difficult at times. The reason the show got cancelled is because of this predictability. You can only go so many seasons before a terrorist plot to destroy the American way of life is thwarted by a Jack Bauer type.

I'm enjoying the show, but the biggest issue I've seen is that the characters beyond Eric Carter and Rebecca Ingram (and even them to a certain extent) really only seem to be there to fill a character spot that they wiped clean. Jimmy Smits is supposed to be taking over the Presidential role like David Palmer did back in the day. Eric Carter is obviously taking over the Jack Bauer type. You've got David Bucatinsky playing the nerdy computer analyst with glasses. You've got Bailey Chase playing your hard head of operations at CTU. The list goes on and on. None of these characters are over the top interesting (besides Carter and Ingram) and none of them are really compelling enough to say that this is any better than 24 ever was, even in its later seasons. At least in Season 8 you cared about Jack Bauer.

He hasn't shown up yet in the episodes I've seen, but apparently Tony Almeida (played by Carlos Bernard) is supposed to make an appearance in this season and that is something I am actually really interested in. And it's telling that the main appeal of the show is to see how it connects with the earlier seasons.

I'm going to keep watching for now because I do want to see where this show goes. Usually it takes about 4 episodes to really get a feel for the plot of the season and to see where it's all going. There are four episodes that have aired so I think right after this I'm going to watch that 4th episode and that will determine if I'm going to continue watching this season of 24.

Overall, I haven't hated 24 Legacy. I think it's trying to recapture the magic of 24 and in a way it does... just not in a way that I think will be lasting. It's great to have that 24 feeling of a guy single handedly fighting terrorism. It's like Homeland but with more gun play and more fast paced action. There obviously is an audience based on the numbers the show has been pulling in.

Here's the biggest problem I have. The nostalgia factor.

It's kind of strange that in the same year, two shows that I used to watch regularly on Fox are being brought back to continue what seemed to be a pretty concise ending. And it's not just these shows. You have shows like Minority Report, Lethal Weapon, and Taken that really just blows my mind that they bank so much on people's nostalgias that they either continue a show that definitely had an ending and was cancelled for a reason, or they create a show based on a movie that had no business being a TV show in the first place.

I can't speak for all of these shows because I haven't seen all of them. Apparently Lethal Weapon is doing alright as far as viewership goes and who knows, maybe Minority Report, Taken, and Prison Break all have really good premises that they needed to be turned into TV shows.

But when the show is focused more on banking on people's nostalgia for the ratings instead of just creating something with a good story, that's when I get a little bit angry. In all reality, there was not reason they couldn't just create a show around Corey Hawkins doing basically the same thing he's doing in 24 Legacy and call it something different. 24 does not have the patent on going off and fighting terrorists. Sure it might not be in real time, but that's almost a constraint rather than something absolutely essential to the structure of the show. From what I have seen, besides one of the characters being a cousin of one of the previously deceased characters of 24, there hasn't been any connections to the previous seasons of 24 and there didn't need to be a reason to have this set in that universe besides the nostalgic factor of it being called 24.

At the end of the day, I hope 24 Legacy does well. I hope it finds its footing and makes something successful. As of right now, I haven't seen anything that has blown my mind, but I'm open to seeing more. I'm hoping that the characters stick out a little more in the future, I'm hoping that they move away from the conventions that made the original stale, and I hope they utilize the new cast to do something different this time around.

But those are my thoughts on the pilot (and first couple episodes of 24 Legacy. What have you thought? Are you going to continue watching? What're your thoughts? Comment and Discuss Below! You can also send me your thoughts on Twitter @cmhaugen24 as well as send me your requests for movies and shows I should review in the future. If you follow me on Twitter, you can get updates on future movie news and reviews coming out of this blog.

I'll leave you with this. I wanted to get this out so I could just watch some more episodes... so here's Kiefer Sutherland on Fallon. Enjoy!

Keanu

So it is definitely a thing that some movies are going to be funnier if they are watched with other people. I've seen plenty of movies that people have sworn are incredibly funny and when I watch them by myself they aren't as funny. Keanu was a movie that I started and I didn't think it was that funny, and then someone came in and joined me to watch the last act of the film, and suddenly the movie got a lot funnier.

Keanu is a film starring Keegan-Michael Key and Jordan Peele, the duo from the Comedy Central show, Key and Peele. These two play cousins who are very straight laced guys. Keegan-Michael Key plays Clarence, a suburban dad who drives a mini van and listens to George Michael. Jordan Peele plays Rell who is a bachelor who just smokes week and watches movies. He doesn't have a lot going for him until one day, there's a small scratch on his door and a little cat comes into his life.

And yes, I'm not even a cat person and I will say this might be the most adorable kitten I have ever seen in my life.

Rell becomes obsessed with the cat and names him Keanu.

The conflict comes when someone breaks into Rell's house and catnaps Keanu from him. And instead of moving on and maybe getting another cat like a normal human being would, Rell decides that he and Clarence are going to find Keanu and bring him home.

In order to do this, they find their way into the lair of a gangster played by Method Man and through a case of mistaken identity, the two of them are mistaken for hardened criminals and are told they need to go on a couple of drug missions for Method Man in order to get Keanu back. All the while they are being hunted by a pair of shady criminals who look strangely like Key and Peele as well.

What I'll say is that for a movie called Keanu, the actual cat is not in this movie as much as I initially thought he was going to be. This could be a good thing as the movie would be different if they had to take care of a cat the entire time. Instead, this movie throws these straight laced guys into a world where they need to act like hard gangsters.

The focus is mainly on these two and a lot of the humor comes from their different personalities. Keegan-Michael Key can be pretty loud and boisterous and definitely carries a lot of the film. But Jordan Peele plays off of him pretty well too. He's more quiet but he does have some funny lines and reactions throughout the film. It's to be expected, especially since these guys work together on their TV show that they would have chemistry. That definitely carries over to the film as they play off each other really well and it really does feel like one giant Key and Peele sketch. '

Now, like the show, some of the sketches are really funny and some of them are not. The same thing goes for this movie. You have moments that are really funny and then you have moments where the jokes fall flat. There's a cameo from Anna Faris in this movie that is actually really funny and then there's the two assassins that are also played by Key and Peele and that isn't always funny.

Overall, I liked Keanu. It's not the greatest comedy of 2016 but overall I just liked the premise. It doesn't feel overly generic like other comedies I saw in 2016. I think it was a good idea to give Key and Peele some movie credits and I'd definitely like to see more films centering around these guys.

It doesn't need to be a Keanu sequel, but I would like to see these guys do more comedy.

But those are my thoughts on Keanu. What did you think? Did you like it? Would you want to see more of Key and Peele on the big screen? Comment and Discuss below! You can also send me your thoughts on Twitter @cmhaugen24 as well as send me your requests for films I should be reviewing in the future? If you follow me on Twitter, you can get updates on future movie news and reviews coming out of this blog.

I'll leave you with this. I wanted to find at least one Key and Peele sketch. Enjoy!

Triple 9

So I'm realizing this has become a thing. A year of movies happens and there are a list of movies I wanted to see. There are those movies that are higher on the list that I definitely see in theaters. Then there are the films that go straight to streaming services in the same year and I see them pretty quickly too. Then there's movies like Triple 9 where I wanted to see it when it came out in theaters, never made it out, and I end up catching up on these films the following year.

The movie begins with a heist being carried out by a team led by Michael Atwood (played by Chiwetel Ejifor) He is a career criminal and is supported by his friend Russell (played by Norman Reedus), Russell's brother Gabe (played by Aaron Paul) and two corrupt cops, Marcus and Franco (played by Anthony Mackie and Clifton Collins respectively). They pull off a job for the wife of a Russian mobster (played by Kate Winslet) but she pulls them in to do one more job and threaten their lives if they choose not to. Their plan is to spark a 999 police code which means an officer is down in order to distract the police away from the heist. And in essence, that's the movie.

Casey Affleck plays the partner of Anthony Mackie's character. He's a new cop but he's a straight laced one. Woody Harrelson plays the uncle of Casey Affleck's character and he's also a cop. And then Gal Gadot plays the sister of Kate Winslet's character and Chiwetel Ejifor's character's ex-wife who plays a part in the whole criminal organization.

The first thing to say about this film is that when there is action, the action is good. There are a couple of heist scenes in this film and they are pretty good scenes as a matter of fact. I enjoyed the movie a lot when there was action on screen and I was wondering if these heists were going to go down the way they thought they were going to.

On top of that, you have a really good cast. This is a pretty stacked cast with some really power house actors and actresses. I think if I had to choose a standout it would probably be Casey Affleck and Anthony Mackie. I was the most invested in their story and their relationship throughout the film and that was supplemented by their performances.

I by no means think anybody gave a bad performance in this film.

The biggest issue I have with the film is when I feel like a lot is happening and yet nothing is happening at all. And this mainly happens because there are so many characters and they're trying to give justice to every one of them and then they end up not giving justice to any of them.

Like I said, Casey Affleck and Anthony Mackie give pretty good performances because there is that duality that Anthony Mackie brings to it of being a corrupt cop. And again, since both these actors are really good, I am interested in their character.

But then we have Chiwetel Ejifor's story with his son, and then you've got Aaron Paul and his shitty situation, and then you've got Woody Harrelson investigating the heists that have happened with a really interesting cameo by Michael K Williams. But overall, a lot of stories are happening and yet I had moments where I just had to ask, what the hell is happening?

It's interesting because this movie reminded me a lot of the 2nd season of True Detective that nobody really liked (I was gonna do a review on that a while ago now that I think about it...). The film was centered around the subject matter of bank heists, organized crime, and police corruption.

I actually think that this movie could probably have made for a better HBO TV show than a movie because I do want to see what's the deal with Woody Harrellson and the conversations he has with Michael K Williams in Drag. I do want to see Chiwetel Ejifor deal with his mobster in-laws and the balance between taking care of his son and living a life of crime.

Hell, Kate Winslet and her role as the wife of a Russian mobster is actually really interesting and could make for a Netflix series on its own.

And this is not to say I didn't enjoy the movie. I just thought that it had points where it was pretty boring and just didn't go anywhere. The story was so spread out among a really strong cast that it wasn't able to really center in on the things it needed to and in total, the movie just didn't really live up to my expectations.

I was really hoping that this movie was gonna be good. I don't think there are enough good crime thrillers these days and I don't think that enough of them do Heat level bank heists. Triple 9 doesn't even come close, but there were a lot of good elements about the film that I enjoyed. The action was good. I'm not going to say anybody in this film did a bad job, I just think they were under utilized.

I think this probably should have been a TV show or a third season of True Detective. But as is, it's an alright movie. Nothing spectacular but nothing horrible as well. Just meh.

But those are my thoughts on Triple 9. What did you think? Comment and Discuss below! You can also send me your thoughts on Twitter @cmhaugen24 as well as send me your requests for films I should review in the future. If you follow me on Twtter, you can get updates on future movie news and reviews coming out of this blog.

I'll leave you with this. Triple 9 just reminded me of True Detective and reminded me of the opening number. Enjoy!

X2

So, there are a couple of things I should get out before I start this review. First off, you might have noticed that I haven't been posting a lot this month. That is because I have been on military training for the past 3 weeks and haven't had a lot of time to both watch movies as well as write about them. I can tell you that there is a good chance that this sporadic posting might be a thing for the next month or two. These are the realities of having a real person job and not getting paid to write these reviews. I am going to do my best to keep watching films and writing reviews where I can, but I wanted my readers to know that if the number of reviews I put out goes down, there is a reason for it.

I write this review with a little bit of hesitancy because I have not re-watched the first X-men and I don't really like reviewing movies out of order. The way that I rationalize this is that the X-men franchise has a problem with consistency in their timeline. At the end of the day, while I like this movie, I'm not totally sure how it connects with the larger timeline if it does at all. The good part about this is that it gives me the opportunity to look at this movie on it's own merits as a solo film. And on it's own, this movie does a pretty good job.

X2 begins with a really cool action scene where a mutant by the name of Nightcrawler (played by Alan Cumming infiltrates the White House and tries to assassinate the President in the middle of a politically charged time where mutants and human relations are not that great. The attempt is unsuccessful, barely, but it underlines the foreshadowing and set up this film does really well that there is a war coming and it's going to be messy.

The movie then goes to Charles Xavier (played by Patrick Stewart) and his school for gifted youngsters and informs the audience how things have been going since the last film. Their nemesis Magneto (played by Ian McKellen) is locked in a metal-less prison for the crimes he committed in the first movie. Wolverine (played by Hugh Jackman) has returned from an abandoned research facility that he believed to have the answers about his mysterious past. Rogue (played by Anna Pacquin) is adjusting nicely to the school and she has a boyfriend in Bobby Drake, or Iceman (played by Shawn Ashmore).

In response to the assassination attempt on the life of the President, the US government authorizes the operations of a mysterious Colonel William Stryker (played by Brian Cox). Styrker has a mysterious relationship with mutants like Charles Xavier and he definitely has a connection with Wolverine. He has a thing against mutants and kidnaps Charles and Cyclops (played by James Marsden) and the X-men must hide from him and discover the true nature of his plot against mutants.

The first thing I wanna mention with this movie is that it was concise and deliberate of who to focus on and who not to focus on. X-men films have always been movies with a large cast. But they also have a tendency to have shameless cameos of random mutants just to show off their power. This was not the case in X2. The cast of this film seemed like it had a purpose each character needed to be there outside of Wolverine. Jean Grey (played by Famke Janssen) was there to find her husband and allowed the movie to further explore the forbidden attraction between her and Wolverine. Rogue was actually a bit of a badass in this movie and wasn't just there to be the little girl who needed to be saved. Even Magneto and Mystique were essential to the plot and it made the team up that happens later in the film make sense. Now I think Magneto has been overused in later films such as Days of Future Past where he didn't really need to be in the film because it was so obvious he was going to remind us all he's the bad guy by the end of the film, but in X2 it just seemed nature for Magneto to be there and for them to have an uneasy alliance form in order to stop William Stryker's plot.

There are supporting characters like Nightcrawler, Storm (played by Halle Berry) and Cyclops who take a backseat in this film and don't have a huge role, but their interactions are pretty limited and I never thought any of them were wasting my time.

Then you've got William Stryker.

Now having never seen this movie before, I never saw Brian Cox's Stryker. The only exposure I had of Stryker was that of Danny Houston from Origins: Wolverine and Josh Helmen in the new films. From those films, I definitely knew who William Stryker was but I guess I never knew exactly how much of an appeal he had until I saw this film.

Brian Cox gives actually one of the best military villain performances I have seen in a long time. He's actually the epitome of the non-mutant threat that the X-men would more than likely face and he does it so very well. And yet there is a personal aspect about his character that is really tragic and really compelling.

And because he's so compelling and the story brings him in on such a personal level, the entire film is actually very small if you think about it. I mean his overarching plot is pretty large in scale but the execution and the entire plot of the movie maintain it in a very small capacity. The story is personal and closely knit, making for less grandiose action, but for better performances and a better story.

 I heard it a lot prior to watching this film and not that I've seen it, I one hundred percent agree. X2 is probably one of the most underrated superhero films, especially prior to the creation of the MCU.

The movie is so personal and centered on building up and developing these characters that I understand now why people were so disappointed by what was supposed to be the final chapter in a trilogy that had two really great installments before Last Stand.

One minor critique with the film having seen all three now and having watched Last Stand before this one, it does do a lot of set up. There's a lot of things that this movie is doing to point towards the final chapter. But here's the thing, it's done in a way that it doesn't take away from the movie as a standalone film. The fact I was able to watch this film and enjoy it on it's own merits as opposed to the other Marvel films where a good portion of the viewing experience is based on your knowledge of the characters and the requirement of watching previous films in the franchise. X2 was definitely a sequel, but it wasn't trying to be the next installment in the X-men franchise, it was continuing the story set up in the first X-men movie.

Another surprising thing about X2 was how well it showed off the X-men's powers. I feel like we live in a world where super powers are not anything new and we need something huge and epic to show off super powers. X2 came out in 2003, CGI wasn't what it is today, and yet I still was amazed at the way they displayed people's powers in this film. Again, I feel like everything was pointing back towards the story and everything served the purpose of the plot, not the spectacle.

X2 isn't my favorite superhero movie of all time because in all honest, while I enjoy the personal and small scale of the story, I felt like it was a little bit forgettable and that's why it's a little bit more of a hidden gem these days. However, it is a strong film. I think it's probably one of the best, if not the best X-men film and it's because it's building off what the original movie gave, pointing towards a sequel but not relying on the hype of that movie to propel this one, and it's its own condensed story that is great to watch on it's own. You don't need to marathon the X-men movies to watch this one, you can watch it on it's own and it will still be a strong film.

X2 is a different breed of movie from a different time. It has the feel and quality of the superhero movies of today, and yet it feels more like a movie as opposed to a comic book movie. You look at movies like X-men Apocalypse and you look at the way this franchise has changed. Now I think this movie benefits from utilizing the themes and ideas that came out of the X-men comic books before they became over used.

X-men has always been used as a metaphor for anybody disenfranchised or in the minority. There's a scene in the film where Bobby actually "comes out" to his family as a mutant and it's actually done really well.

These are themes that have been used over and over again since this movie came out and having never watched this one until now, I guess I watched the lesser tellings of those themes. Again, because this is so personal, because this is told in such a three act story telling way, I really enjoyed it a lot more than any of the other movies and their attempts to tell the story of the X-men.

Again, I don't think this is my favorite superhero movie of all time because I've seen movies tell personal stories and be more epic than this movie was. But this was the first time I had ever watched X2 and it already goes pretty high on my list of superhero films.

But what did you think? Where does X2 rank against the other X-men films? Where does it rank in all the superhero movies of all time? Comment and Discuss below! You can also send me your thoughts on Twitter @cmhaugen24 as well as send me your requests for films I should review in the future. If you follow me on Twitter, you can get updates on future movie news and reviews coming out of this blog.

I'll leave you with this. I mentioned the exposition of mutant's powers earlier. I was thinking about posting the opening scene with Nightcrawler but this shows off the raw power of Magneto that I think we've gotten from Michael Fassbender but I hadn't really seen from Ian Mckellen until now. Enjoy!