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What to say, what to say. Let us start with the bads. The acting is terrible and so is the writing. I know James Cameron is talented as a writer because I just watched Titanic which was not corny and incredible. But there are some lines that make you shake your head and say, "That was stupid." The movie was super long and I don't think there was enough to keep your attention... at least not on the edge of your seat.

The Goods, Finally a 3-D movie that pleased me. If the story line sucked at keeping your attention the amazing graphics were sure to. After Pixar's lame attempts at 3-D, after watching Avatar you felt as you were in Heaven. Simply Mind Blowing!

My personal opinion, watch it in theatres in 3-D because it might not be worth watching with out the 3-D. My opinion as a Sci-Fi movie (It is no Terminator, also James Cameron) 7 out of 10. I did like the characters and the Native American influence of the Na-vi. But as an overall movie 6 out of 10. The acting and writing were just so terrible. That is why Sam Worthington (Jake Sully) has stuck to sci-fi, because to the sci-fi world he is good, to the rest of the world, he will only watch the Oscars on T.V. just like you and me.

Side note... There were about 5 S- Words, a few B- Words, and a few other minor obcsenities. There are a few parts where the natives pray to there Diety... Also some frightening images with monsters and stuff. Just so you know if you are thinking about taking the kids to it.

Final Statement, watch it in theatres and overlook the acting. The special effects were killer!

Wild Weekened!

First I'd like to say I am sorry to my faithful followers who have waited so long between my posts. I blame Hollywood because they have just had suck movies come out recently and new movies is which calls for my blogging. But I am about to step out of the movie realm...

I went to my first Seahawks game today. Early November so the drive was interesting. My wind shield wipers did not Work! Which I realized so conveniently when it started to rain. So I'm driving, not to bad because at 70 the rain rolls off even though I had about 60 percent visibility. Then the top comes, dry snow which is good because it did not stick to the wind shield. That heaven lasted for about five minutes until I had to suffer through slush which brought me to 30 percent visibility through my wind shield. Wow, I found out that our God is a good god, I'm a great driver, and windshield wipers are over rated.

Now to the good stuff. I got to the game and got my face painted for free which was cool. I got kind of a Phantom of the Opera in Seahawk colors. We make the trek to the top of the stadium and with in the first 3 plays my voice won't allow me to talk because I got caught up in the moment of my first game and sprinted before I warmed up vocally. So the rest of the game my yelling was the equivalent of a marathon runner pulling a muscle in the first mile. Great game except the drunk people who are absolutely retarded. "Score a home run!" "I could beat you in an arm wrestling match." " What kind of call was that." They all chanted these type of chants throughout the game. Useless. You don't score home runs in football, there is no way a guy with a beer gut is taking a pro athlete in an arm wrestling match, and don't you think that the ref can see the play just a little better from his view of 5 yards aways compared to our view of 500 yards away!

The game ends and we are waiting for our driver Scotty Woodward to come get us. We are in a parking garage. People are slowly getting out. People are honking. Dear God, what is honking going to do? There is a traffic jam, it will naturally flow out, event though it takes a while. It is not like people hear the horn and then suddenly realize there is open freeway. I think people need to mentally prepare themselves because there is 60,000 people in one stadium trying to leave at the same time, something tells me you should bank on there being a traffic jam! Idiots. Needless to say, I had a great weekend, I also went to a conference which I will get a little deeper with you in my next blog.

Disappointment

My life may or may not revolve around the summer movie releases. The summer of 2009 has officially come to an end. The word that comes to mind is disappointment. We had Transformers 2, Star Trek, Terminator Salvation, Up, and Wolverine. That is only four weekends of a lot of summer weekends. Those were the movies I was excited about and Wolverine even let me down a little bit and the new 3D let me down even more. (Makes me furious at the thought of the 3D)

Maybe, just maybe, the summer of 2008 spoiled me way to much. They came out with the Incredible Hulk, Iron Man, the Dark Knight, and so many more. Those are just the super hero movies. I had such high hopes and dreams then Hollywood went doo doo on them.

There will be a few coming out in the fall to hold me over till the winter/ Oscar season. The good news is that next year The Last Air Bender is coming out which is going to be awesome. 2010 looks to like a great summer.

Until next time, keep it real and stuff.

GI Joe Rise of the Cobra

What to say, what to say? GI Joe was an entertaining movie. There was tons of action, comic relief by Mr. Wayans, and of course there was cool special effects. This movie should be watched in theatres, preferably in the afternoon.

I enjoyed the action and the corniness behind it. It is GI Joe, for it not to be corny would be ridiculous. I laughed out loud a few times. Brendan Fraiser made an awesome cameo which made me smile. Understand that one doesn't see this movie for Oscar winning acting or a best picture nominee. It is purely entertaining.

The bads... Channing Tatum. If I had an option of punching a celebrity it would most definitely be Meagan Fox but if I had a second it would be Brittney Spears, but if a third opportunity came along it would be Channing himself. The other bad is that when it came to computer animation I believe they got a little lazy or the producers didn't give out enough. The Sci-Fi stuff was cool but when it came to real things they did a crappy computer duplicate.

I give this movie a 7 out of 10 in the action genre. It is no Shia Lebouf movie. For a film as a whole, 6 out of 10. I'll give it to them, it was entertaining which I believe was their goal.

Summer Camp!!

Well, one week of summer camp down. I think it went pretty good, the first day was a rocky start, but good. I decided to get the kids there all safe, nobody was to badly injured except for scraped knees. Pastor Kyle and myself taught an all boys class, which was sprung upon us that day. Our last day we had a break down on our 5 foot high rock wall. The child would not move! He preceded to yell and shout and then he climbed higher instead of lower. Finally the problem was solved with a ladder only because we didn't have step stool. When I was his age I climbed to the top just to jump off.

Camp was fun, not a lot in the middle. The last day, the very end we are driving home. 3 years in a row e vantage hill has claimed our van and now I see myself face to face. Just like any other hill our van began to struggle, not unusual. We begin to creep up the monster and have almost summited the beast. "We did it," I said aloud. After hearing this I thought I heard a laugh, and then our van made a klunk noise and then we creeped to 25 mph then it turned off. The hill claimed our van for the 4th year in a row.

Just as I said in the previous blog I wanted a 95% return rate... which I achieved, only forgetting one person. I know, not bad for my first camp.

Kids Camp!

To my faithful followers (John) I apologize for my absence of blogs. Since we last met I had an auditions in Seattle with a big acting agency. Just as you thought they said no. I also have watched Eternal Sunshine of a Spotless Mind, which was one that blew my mind. However, that is not what I am going to talk about. Side note, I also apologize for various spelling and grammar errors.



Kids Camp is upon me. I leave tommorow at 9 am. We are taking 28 kids! Awesome right. What is not awesome is that the most kids I have ever been in charge of is 5. Now I'm taking these kids out of town. So if parents you are worried... you should be. Your kids are only semi safe. Rest assure though, if one is left behind it is either because he was acting up or they failed to know what the movie Topgun is. (If you bring your kids to Club 180, be sure to educate them on great movies so they can laugh at my references to movies like Topgun and Dances With Wolves).



Anyway, I will write again to tell you about my adventures. I am shooting for a 90 percent return rate. Thats an A, right.

4th of July

For the Fourth, our youth ministry went to the west side of the mountains to sell fireworks to make money for our ministry. We got there Friday sold fireworks and hung out. On Saturday the plan was to sell until midnight, light fireworks off, and then drive home.

We finished our business in Spanaway at about 1 in the morning. Then I took my death defying mission to drive our summer interns home on this 3 hour trip. I drank an energy drink hoping to increase my chances of living, then we were off. My friend had one task, talk to me and keep me awake. An hour past... he fell asleep. I found myself singing every song I knew out loud, white knuckle driving, trying not to close my eyes. We pulled into town at 4 in the morning with out any stops. Impressive, I know.

Sunday, I slept for an hour, went to the morning service where I played guitar. Then our Pastor put on a video that was slow at first, but regardless of the content the room was dark and I fought to try and not fall asleep. I succeeded. Then I taught our coffee shop lesson, about a confident warrior, which I kept their attention... Kabang! Then I decided to teach our children where I jumped around as much as I could until church was over where I went to sleep for a few hours.

Moral of the story, even though this was extremely hard to do, it was awesome and I don't regret it at all or think about what could have happened if I fell asleep. I just finished Stranger Than Fiction which reminded me to live my life. Afterward, I can confidently say I am.

Public Enemies

Public Enemies was great! It truly brought you into the story line and got you interested in all the characters. Michael Mann (Director/Writer) did a terrific job with the screen play, giving foreshadowing, humor, and intensity in this clever film. Mann has created great blockbusters in the past (Heat, 1995 and Miami Vice, 2006) but has out done himself in Public Enemies.

Johnny Depp plays an outstanding anti-hero in the form of bank robber John Dillinger. With his odd style of public relational robber, you fall in love with Dillinger, a straight to the point kind of guy that never lets his friends down, and he didn’t let us down either. Depp delivers an amazing performance giving us memorable lines like, “I like baseball, movies, fast cars, whiskey, and you.”

Christian Bale plays a FBI agent assigned to hunt down Dillinger and as the “Hero” Bale delivers a stone cold performance as just the right agent for the job in the young Federal Bureau of Investigation. Even though as good Christian Americans we are suppose to root for Bale and the FBI, Mann turns it around and you root for the bank robbers.

The things I didn’t like about this film are that a few parts were slow where it seemed the story line had a hard time moving forward. In these situations the dialogue was not clever enough to keep you interested, however there are not too many of these situations.

The rating I would give this movie as a drama is 9 out of 10 and as an overall film 9 out of 10. I would have no trouble watching this movie again and very well could have earned a spot on Jesse’s top 20.

(If you don’t like the movie, it’s not my fault; you just have a bad taste in movies.)

Transformers 2 Revenge of the Fallen

Transformers 2 was Awesome. I made my way to a midnight showing to watch the much hyped Transformers 2. Needless to say, I was not disappointed. I believe Michael Bay is becoming one of my favorite directors. The camera work that he does is awesome, it keeps you watching, and there is nothing annoying about it like in Hancock.

The film had just the right amount of fight scenes that blew my mind. (This film will win best special effects/computer animation.) The detail that they put into each Transformer was mind blowing. On top of all this action, the film had just the right amount of comedy relief thanks to a John Tuturro, Shia Lebouf, and newby Ramon Rodriguez. The kept the same essence of the first so I was very pleased.

Things I didn’t like about the movie, you see John Tuturro’s butt, Megan Fox is alive, and they try and put a “love” story in there that I could have done without. The way they did it just seemed corny.

If you are looking to be inspired, Optimus Prime has it covered. “Fate rarely calls upon us at a moment of our choosing.” Automatic goose bumps when you hear that. I would like to rate this movie in the kids section however they pulled it into a teenager/adult movie. I wouldn't suggest taking anyone under ten. (Unless you are the Looney parent that wasted money on your kids at the midnight showing! Stupid.) So I have to rate it as an action/adventure 9 out of 10. As a overall film 8.5 out of 10. Very, very entertaining.

Night at the Museum 2

The Night at the Museum 2, sorry it took so long, was pretty good. It had its funny parts, had some suspense, and a little love story. This movie is great for kids(except for the one behind me in the movie theatre who claimed "I'm never watching this again!"). But what does he know, he was four and didn't even know who Ben Stiller was. Idiot.

The acting was excactly what it needed to be. No, it won't win an oscar but it was fitting. I felt the directing could have been a little bit better but overall it was good. On the other hand, the screen write decided to take some of the jokes a little far and when we needed comic relief there was none.

The thing I loved most was the unexpected star power throughout the movie. Yeah Night at the Museum hand Ben Stiller and Amy Adams but they weren't the best part. This movie was helped along with stars such as Jonah Hill, Bill Hader, Christopher Guest, and yes the Jonas Brothers. Not to mention all the other star power from the first one. There is something that happens when a star steps into a cameo. Its just better that way.

Overall, Night at the Museum 2 had its funny moments, I thought a stroy line that fits children, and even some romance. (Actually, there was like 2 kissing scenes) Igive the movie a solid 8 out of 10 for a childrens movie and a 7.7 out of ten for a daily watcher.

Up!

This movie was, in one word, AMAZING. You will laugh, you'll hold back tears, you'll leaved satisfied. The old man is lovable and hillarious from his grumpiness. The little boy Russell is great, hillarious, and when the movie is over you'll say goodbye to the crew with a teardrop in your eye. As an animated film I give this movie a 4.8. A few more funny parts would have been nice. As a movie, 4.5. They were kind of predictible in what they did. A kid would have no idea though and thats their audience so it worked.

On a negative side, the 3-D sucked. I pay 2 bucks extra to get these glasses so I would like to see a ligit 3-D movie. Nothing popped out at my face, i didn't feel like I was "there" and to top it off I think my face is sensitive because they hurt after awhile. This movie, along with the other 3-D movies I've seen pixar do, would be bettter not in 3-D. After watching 3-D movies in Universal and crapping my pants when a Terminator pops out to what seems 2 inches away from my face, I might have too high of expectations. So a word to the wise (AKA Pixar) don't do 3-D unless you're going to go all out. Make it special and something we long for. Not common trash. You'll run out of the neeed within the next year. But I'm sure you already thought of that.

Movie Store

I go to the movie store often. It is ridiculously hard to find a good movie that is morally okay and I haven't scene. New Releases either suck or I saw them in theatres so I usually waltz down the comedy or drama section. At first it wasn't bad but a hundred movies later on my account since 18 years old it is hard.

I tried a new section, action/adventure. This is a tough section because they're are some good movies (Shooter, Rambo, Super Hero movies). I saw one called Rescue Dawn with Christian Bale and Steve Zauhn. After watching Terminator I am on a Christian Bale kick so I thought it had a great chance of being good. Killer cover, great actors, great plot... suckfest. I would rather watch Fireproof.

Netflix on the other hand is there for me. I rate movies I've seen and after rating 200 or 300 they know me quite well. They'll tell me what movies I'll love and which ones I won't. So I won't ever waste my time with another Rescue Dawn.

17 Again

So I know that this is not opening weekened but I'm not a God. However I did go watch it this weekened and loved it.

As Burr Steers' first big movie directing; I thought he did well. Nothing to spectacular directing but the film didn't really need any. There are a few scenes that hold out suspense due to his camera shots which I appreciated.

Well, Zac Effron in his first big movie outside of disney. At firtst I'll admit I was judgemental. "Oh Zac gets to play another highschool student who is popular." However he proved me wrong. His character is an adult trapped in a teenagers body so he did need to act outside of his normal high school role. With a lot of funny parts and a few emotional Zac Effron did a great job in his first non-disney movie.

Thomas Lennon, better known as Lut. Dangle from Reno 911. One word describes his character, hilarious. Nuff said.

Overall this movie was very funny, sometimes awkward, and entertaining. Luckly the movie is clean minus a few sex jokes which is awesome to see. I give this movie an 8 out of 10 in comedy and as an overall movie 7.6 out of 10.

Terminator Salvation

I saw terminator the first chance I got yesterday and needless to say, I was blown away. I was impressed by the acting all around in the main characters. Christian Bale is always the man and proves it again in this film. Anton Yelchin, (Kyle Reese) did a great job, exploding into the sci-fi world in Star Trek and Terminator. The good thing for him is that sci-fi is not what it used to be.

I enjoyed the plot and how they kept you on the edge of your seat. There was enough to keep the story line going but never gave a ton away. With lots of action, in this post judgment day, Terminator was an excellent start to the summer movie releases. I give it 8.5 out of 10 stars which means that it was awesome.

Classics

I just feel impressed to tell everyone that it is not always about the new summer release movies. Although I will see Terminator tommorrow and I just rented curious case of benjiman button. However, there are a lot of great movies that you might have missed before you were born or you just didn't get to it. I just watched Escape from Alcatraz with Clint Eastwood. Great movie. I also just rented a movie called winchester 77. Netflix is convinced that I will absolutley love it.

So I encourage you get a little classic in your life. Philidaphia Story with James Stewart, The Man Who Shot Liberty Valance, also James Stewart and John Wayne. Any type of Hitchcock movie. Psycho will blow your mind. Casablanca. nuff said. So do it, get a little classic in your life. I'll be more than happy to suggest or answer any question you have about it.

Friday.

I saw Wolverine today. Yes it di have a few corny parts but I thought they did a good job of it. If you didn't see him losing his memory at the end then you either are not a true fan of the Origin comic books which are sick. or you have never seen either of the X-Men.

On another note, I went to mixed martial arts to watch. This is an interesting gig because I had a drunk guy yelling behind me acting like he knew what was going on. Hit 'em in the face, punch faster, you suck, stuff like that. This guy was an idiot to say the least. If this guy went against any fighter there, (including the 12 Year old) he would get his face beat in. I'm not saying I'm a great fighter however if you go to a sporting event educate yourself on what is going on. I don't want to hear at the next baseball game, pitch a strike! Catch the ball! Run Faster! Get real lay off the boose or don't come into public. Other than that Jesus loves these people almost as much as the rest of us.

Ponder This...

So I am in a delima right now. I have been convicted by God to be more humble. So I don't want to say I'm the most awesome. However, I don't want to lie either because that is a sin too. So I'll leave it blank.

Another Day

I shot a fairly good round of golf. Pondered on a few things. Made a kickin video. Watched grumpier old men. Which brings me to my point. In the movie they are chasing this monster fish and always try to catch it. Finally they do catch it. Then they release it even though they had the dream of mounting it on there wall. So my point is we are all chasing this monster fish, well at least people who fish are. One day you'll catch it. But if you don't fish then you've wasted your time reading this.

First Blog

Mothers day today. We went to Black Angus to celebrate and I had a heart warminh bacon cheese burger. About 3 hours later I had the worst case of diareah I have ever had. Need less to say I feel a ton better.