Cop Out

A 'comedy' about a veteran NYPD cop (Bruce Willis)whose rare baseball card is stolen. Since selling it was his only hope of raising the money to pay for his daughter's wedding, he enlists the help of his partner (Tracey Morgan) to track down the thief (Seann William Scott).

Comedy - was it? Irritating, especially scenes involving Seann Scott William who was really funny...ten years ago! The chemistry here was all wrong. The movie appeared old and tired, even Bruce Willis looked bored, clearly only there for the pay cheque.

1 elephant

The Losers - 2010

After being betrayed and with an attempt on their lives, members of a CIA black ops team seek out those who targeted them for assassination. Starring Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Zoe Saldana, Chris Evans, Columbus Short, Oscar Jaenada and Idris Elba.

Oh, Idris Elba, after your powerful performance in The Wire that made you a man in demand and left us devoted fans, what were you thinking when you read this script? Did you not look at it and think, 'A van. A mature, smartly dressed, smooth-talking leader. An out-spoken black guy. a goofy, white guy. A good-looking, clever guy...mm, this reminds me of something.' Because you sure as hell should have. This badly written, badly cast A-Team wannabe movie that was loosely based on a comic book, cost £25 million to make and made less than $24 million at the box office. A turkey with all its trimmings. Idris Elba - you deserve better than this. A waste of a Saturday night.

1 elephant (and that's only because Idris Elba is in it)

The Bucket List

Two Terminally ill men, Carter Chambers and Edward Cole (Morgan Freeman and Jack Nicholson) on a road trip with a wish list of things to do before they 'kick the bucket.'

Things we didn't like about this movie:
1. The bucket list road trip was not the theme of the movie.
2. Sentimental overkill.
3. Depressing to the extreme!

We conclude that Freeman and Nicholson are tremendous actors and that is this movie's only saving grace. And speaking of grace (you might have to pray for some to get you through this depressing tale) the only thing we liked was 'ex Will and Grace' actor Sean Hayes who played Edward Cole's long suffering, and often amusing, assistant.

Best line: "We live, we die, and the wheels on the bus go round and round."

1 elephant

The Invasion

An alien life form attaches itself to a space shuttle that crashes back to earth. Anyone coming in contact with debris from the shuttle and therefore the alien life form, becomes infected and contagious. When they fall asleep their DNA is recoded and they are robbed of all emotion. (Obviously this happened to Nicole Kidman before the film started!)

If you can get past Miss Kidman's frozen features and Daniel Craig's hair (was it a wig???) there is a one in a million chance you might enjoy it. This remake starts off well enough but come the third act it just seems the script writers ran out of steam and just thought 'c'mon guys, let's wrap this up asap.' The resolution was pathetic. And while we're at it, Nicole Kidman's running -- well, she just shouldn't.

1 elephant (and that's being generous)

Confessions of a Shopaholic

Rebecca Bloomwood has a major shopping addiction but she's in debt up to her Gucci neckline and she's just lost her job. As a result of a letter mailing mix-up she unintentionally lands a job with a financial paper where she unwittingly becomes a star when she writes an article about how to handle money - something she clearly cannot do. Living a huge lie and with a very persistent debt collector on her tail, Rebecca finds herself in big trouble.

A disappointing film from a really, really good book. Why do they always do this? The same thing happened with 'In Her Shoes' - nothing more to say. Don't bother with this movie.


1 elephant

The Happening

Suddenly and inexplicably people in Central Park, New York, stop what they are doing and start committing suicide. This strange phenomena spreads all along the north east of America and no one knows what is causing it? Is it terrorism? Is it the plants? The wind?

Disappointing movie from the master of "twist in the tale" endings M.Night. Shyamalan. Intended to be a B movie but ended up being a box office hit. Why?? Watching this movie is like sitting down to a gourmet meal. You get a delicious appetizer, a pretty good entree and you have left lots of room for a delicious desert, but oh, the restaurant has run out. You don't even get a coffee. It leaves you feeling totally unsatisfied. The story went no where. Desperately hoping for that oh so familiar "I wasn't expecting that" ending, the film finished with almost no explanation. In the end we discover that the reason all these things happened was actually explained in the first ten minutes of the movie, which basically was that the plants were giving off a chemical that affected people's brains causing them to kill themselves. But why the plants were doing that no one knows. This script has more holes than Swiss cheese. The only reason it was a hit was because Mr M has an amazing track record and surely he couldn't do a duff movie? Oh, yes he can.

1 elephant

How to Lose Friends & Alienate People

A British writer, Sidney Young (Simon Pegg) struggles to fit into life at a top notch magazine in New York.

Do we really need another movie that tells us that all people in showbiz and the media are transparent, shallow, youth-obsessed slimeballs? We think not. As per usual with this kind of movie, all the best bits are in the trailer. We giggled - twice. It really wasn't that funny and just turned out to be a run of the mill romcom with a cliche ending. The movie is based on Toby Young's memoirs and to be honest it made us embarrassed to be Brits. And other thing. In our opinion Simon Pegg (of Run Fat Boy Run fame) cannot hold his own in a movie without his hilarious sidekick Nick Frost. See Hot Fuzz and Shaun Of The Dead if you don't believe us.

1 elephant

Open Season

A happily domesticated grizzly bear named Boog, has his world turned upside down after he meets Elliot, a scrawny, fast-talking one-horned deer. They both end up in the woods during hunting season and it's up to them to rally all the other forest animals and turn the tables on the hunters.

We at Saturday Night Bright love animated movies, but this one is decidedly average. The story is weak, it's only 1 hour 23 mins (including credits) but hey! the kids will like it.

We give it 1 elephant.