DVD Roundup: Hot Tub Time Machine and Killers

There are a lot of movies that you're pretty sure won't be any good, but you watch them anyway - either because you like an actor (John Cusack) or you just can't believe a movie that bad was made (Killers).  Hot Tub Time Machine is exactly what you'd expect - this group of 3 guys (and one guy's nephew) want to relive one of their glory weekends from the 80s, so they go up to a resort that they loved.  It's all run-down, decrepit, and managed by a bitter one-armed guy (Crispin Glover).  They get drunk and get in the hot tub, and something magical happens (like in Pleasantville when they get drawn into the TV show) and suddenly they're back in the 80s getting to actually relive their best weekend.  They see all the "roads not taken" and some they never knew were options.  It's FULL of gross-out humor, vomit, sex, etc. that could possibly fit into one movie, but some of it is pretty funny, and Rob Corddry is an actor I don't ever need to see again - he's vile.  However, Craig Robinson is really funny and John Cusack sort of sits back and watches the fun.  Unlike a lot of "go into the past and back to the future"  movies they DO try to change the lives they're returning to.  Fairly unique, and slightly better than I expected.  3 of 5 lambs/stars

However, Killers was not as good as I expected, and was mostly just dull.  Katherine Heigl falls in love with Ashton Kutcher in Nice, France.  He's there for a job with the CIA, and decides to quit and form a normal life when he meets her.  Cut to 3 years later, he has a normal job, they have a normal house, and her parents (Catherine O'Hara and Tom Selleck) live nearby and drive him nuts.  Then he gets a call from an old handler and before he can figure out what's going on, the handler's dead and people are out to get Kutcher.  Everyone in his life becomes a potential killer, and then the rest of the movie is fight scene after fight scene of Kutcher trying to protect Heigl, her yelling at him, and their neighbors and colleagues trying to kill them both.  It was trying to redo Mr. and Mrs. Smith a FAR superior film, and fell way short of the mark.  Kutcher wasn't bad, and I'd actually see him in another pseudo-action movie, but Heigl was dreadful again - she REALLY needs to get better costume and hair designers for her movies.  They constantly make her look like a bimbo who happens to be brilliant and have a terrific job.  It's just ridiculous.  1.5 of 5 stars/lambs

Sex and the City 2: Review (Spoilers)

I have a great big, "I told you so coming" from all the people who didn't think the new Sex and the City 2 movie would be good.  I really liked the first movie, and of course the series was terrific so I assumed they'd just do a bit more of the same - focusing on a different character than the previous movie, possibly Charlotte dealing with motherhood, Miranda dealing with her job and family or possibly bringing in a new man for Samantha.  Okay, they did all of those things, for the first 15 minutes of the movie, resolving the problems in the last 5 minutes of the movie.  The first 15 minutes had a terrifically over the top wedding between Anthony and Stanford (Carrie and Charlotte's best gay guy friends).  Liza Minelli performs the ceremony (the best line - "When this much gay energy is concentrated in one place, Liza manifests") and sings "Single Ladies".  The middle 2 hours of the movie were so dreadful, I almost left the theater.  Since I'm warning you not to see this movie, I'm going to spoil as much as I can.  Samantha is offered a trip to Abu Dhabi to possibly do publicity for a hotel.  She brings the girls with her, they have a lovely hotel, lavish time, and then become stupid, oblivious, racists (well mostly Samantha, but the others aren't much better).  Carrie runs into her ex-Aiden, they kiss and rather than keeping her mouth shut about an anonymous kiss around the world, she tells everyone, making her already tenuous marriage to boring Mr. Big a bit more tenuous.  Meanwhile, Charlotte and Miranda bond over the guilt of motherhood and the inability to be complete or perfect while just being a mom.  Samantha decides to defy both laws, culture, and fairly common decency by getting it on with a guy in Abu Dhabi.  She's arrested and her cushy trip is revoked.  However, Carrie forgot her passport at a store in the spice market, so before they can leave they have to get it back.  Of course the nice shoe store manager still has it, but menopausal Samantha drops her purse and condoms pop out, and she's collecting them in her less than covering clothes and starts to be accosted by Arab men (she is swearing at them, hip thrusting, and yelling about sex).  Two full bhurka covered women bring the girls to safety and reveal that they all wear super fashionable clothes under their bhurkas.   There is almost nothing believable about their trip.  Women this highly educated and professional would hardly expect to be allowed to escape either the laws or the custom of keeping yourself covered in a muslim country, particularly when all the women around them are already doing that.  Yes, Samantha is over the top back home, but I don't think she's dumb enough given that she works in publicity to think she can get away with whatever she wants. 

There are a few funny moments, only in the beginning, particularly at the wedding and when they show us what the girls looked like when they all met years ago (image).  Do not go see this if you liked Sex and the City.  This is like a typical single episode surrounding a really, really bad movie in the middle.  1.5 lambs/stars  The .5 is because the clothes are fun, typically ridiculous, but gorgeous.