Point Break (2015)

Warning:  Review contains spoilers for the movie.  You have been warned!

Point Break is a remake of a 1991 movie of the same name.  When it released it was met with generally negative reviews by critics.  While domestically it only made $28 million off of a $105 million, it made up the loss by grossing $133.7 million worldwide.  Despite hearing this, I wanted to see what this movie had to offer, almost entirely because of a crossover between the movie and the PC version of Payday 2.

Now I have not yet seen the 1991 version of the movie, so I don’t know how it compares to this one.  All I have to go on is what I saw while watching this movie.  I’m just going to judge this movie off of its own merits, not how worse or better it is than the previous version.

Point Break is a movie about an FBI agent candidate named Johnny Utah (Played by Luke Bracey), who believes a series of extreme sports related crimes are connected and the group behind them is attempting something known as the “Ozaki Eight.”  The Ozaki Eight involves performing eight extreme sports feats that push you to your limit, along with some acts that give back to the Earth.  In order to get evidence, he goes undercover, and is saved from drowning by a man named Bodhi (Edgar Ramirez), who happens to be the leader of the gang who are attempting the Ozaki Eight.  Utah joins with them as they attempt their next two tasks, where despite one member dying, he still manages to bond with the group.  However when the group tries to destroy a gold convoy as a means of “giving back,” Utah tells Bodhi he’s FBI and tries to get him not to do it.  Bodhi destroys it anyway and after a short chase scene Bodhi leaves Utah behind.

Since the FBI froze Bodhi’s sponsor’s assets, he and the group must rob a bank.  Utah and the police catch them, and the resulting shootout ends up killing two more members of the group, including Utah’s love interest.  This leaves one other member besides Bodhi left.  Utah figures out where the next ordeal will be, and heads there to intercept them.  All three of them end up rock climbing with no safety beside a waterfall, where the other member of the group ends up falling and dying.  With only Utah and Bodhi left, Utah thinks he has caught Bodhi, but Bodhi lets himself fall off the cliff and into the river, performing what should have been the final act of the Ozaki Eight.  Unfortunately, when Bodhi saved Utah from drowning, he had to abandon the Ozaki Eight task he was working on at that moment, which was “Life of Water,” or surfboarding an incredibly dangerous wave.

Seventeen months after the instance at the waterfall, Utah finds Bodhi in the middle of the ocean attempting to do “Life of Water” again.  He tries to get Bodhi to come with him and go to prison, but Bodhi says he has to finish the Ozaki Eight.  Utah lets him, and Bodhi rides into the wave and disappears, while Utah flies back to his life as an FBI agent.

Point Break wasn’t really what I was expecting.  I didn’t do that much research on it before watching it, so all I really knew going in was that it was a movie that had some heist action and extreme sports.  I assumed that the movie would mostly be robbery and heists with extreme sports sections sewn in, instead of the other way around.  The reason I assumed this was likely because of the aforementioned crossover between the movie and Payday 2.  Since Payday 2 is a game that focuses on heists and robberies, I assumed the movie would have the same focus.  The crossover between these two doesn’t really highlight the focus on extreme sports that the movie has.

I also felt like the relationship between Utah and Samsara was forced.  It doesn’t really feel like Samsara does anything other than be a love interest for the main character.  She’s given some backstory that’s mostly just her piggybacking off of Bodhi’s backstory, but other than that there’s not real reason for her to be in the group.  She doesn’t participate in the Ozaki Eight and she doesn’t help them with the “giving back” part.  The only things she does are hang out with the group, and when their assets are frozen, she helps with the heist (which really feels like just a way they used to kill her character off and not complicate further scenes).  Overall, Utah and Samsara’s relationship feels like an unneeded romantic subplot that was only in the movie because other action movies have unneeded romantic subplots.

I don’t really recommend you watch this movie.  While the stunts are really cool and visually amazing, the rest of the movie falls flat.  The plot is bare bones and just feels lazy, and the characters seem rather artificial.  The character of Bodhi was honestly the only one I was really even interested in.  If you’re really into extreme sports movies, and can forgive and bad and clichéd plot, then maybe there’s something here for you, but otherwise I suggest you pass.

Room (2015)

Image taken from IMDb

Warning:  Review contains spoilers for the movie.  You have been warned!

“Room” is a 2015 Academy Award winning film based on a novel of the same name.  Upon its release it was met with rather positive reviews across multiple sites, and was a success at the box office making about $35.4 million off of a $13 million budget.

I don’t want to spend a lot of time talking about the story, so I’ll just try to say what I think is necessary for this review.  “Room” is the story of a five year old boy named Jack, who has lived his entire life living in a single 10×10 room with his mother, Joy.  After showing some of their daily lives inside of the room, which they refer to as “Room,” it is revealed that Joy had been kidnapped by a man who calls himself “Old Nick” 7 years ago, and she has been trapped inside of Room by him ever since.

A little later Joy and Jack trick Old Nick into thinking Jack is dead so that he’ll take him outside and Jack will have a chance to escape.  He does, and the police manage to find his mother and rescue her as well.  This marks the halfway point of the movie.  From this point on, the movie’s focus shifts towards Jack and Joy trying to live in the regular world after what they’ve been through.

Personally I really enjoyed Room.  Despite going in with somewhat high expectations after hearing other’s praise of the film along with the knowledge that it won Academy Awards, I was not disappointed.  I think one of the reasons that I enjoyed the movie so much is because of the actors and actresses.  Brie Larson did an excellent job portraying a mother who is barely able to keep it together due to the situation she’s in, and I even liked Jacob Trembley’s performance, as he did an amazing job for a child actor.

Another reason I believe I liked this movie was that the script was really nice.  Room provides an interesting scenario, and as the movie goes on, the mystery surrounding that scenario is slowly uncovered.  In the beginning of the movie, the viewer is much like Jack, and only knows of the world inside of Room.  Because of the way the movie is written, we are able to find out about the world right beside Jack.  The movie focuses more on Jack’s view of the world than anyone else’s, and I think that really aided the movie.  Jack, being a small child, tells the world as it is, or at least how he sees it.  It’s interesting to be able to hear Jack’s monologue as well, as we get a chance to see how Jack tries to make sense of everything going on around him.

The two halves of the movie also show two different sides of Jack and his view of the world.  The first half of the movie explores Jack and Joy’s life in Room, showing how they have come to adapt to this lifestyle that was forced upon them.  We learn about ways that Joy has hidden evidence of the outside world in order to protect Jack, which I found rather interesting.  The second half is more of an exploration into Jack’s discovery of the world outside of Room.  His entire life he had only known of what was in Room, and suddenly he was thrust into the rest of the world.  At first he’s rather standoffish and will only speak to Joy, but then after a while he begins to warm up to the world and his other family members.  The blending of Jack’s isolation from and discovery of the world is what really makes this movie memorable.

One last thing that I would like to talk about is Jack’s mom, Joy.  While Room’s main focus is on Jack, it also delves into Joy coming to terms with what happened it her.  Most of the time she is able to put on a brave face for Jack’s sake, but the move does she her crack from time to time.  Once they get out, she seems to be a bit better, but also struggling to move past her imprisonment.  At one point, an interview says something to her that absolutely destroys her, to the point where she attempts suicide.  Jack manages to call for help, so Joy manages to survive.  Later when she talks to Jack, she seems to really regret her actions and promises never to try to leave Jack again.  Joy’s character arc really shows how much thought and effort was put into this movie.

I would definitely recommend giving “Room” a shot.  If you’re in the mood for a good drama, and can handle some of the rather intense moments in it, then this movie has got you covered. “Room” will not leave you disappointed.

Memento (2000)

Image taken from IMDb

Introduction

Memento is a psychological thriller released in 2000 from the mind of Christopher Nolan, who also directed, produced, and wrote the newer Batman movies. The movie is based off of Nolan’s younger brother’s short story, “Memento Mori.” The movie has been praised for its amazing representation of anterograde amnesia, a type of short term memory loss. This movie won several awards, as well as put Christopher Nolan into the big league of movie directing. But what is it exactly that makes this movie so great?

Plot (may contain minor spoilers)

The movie is separated into two sequences. The first sequence is in black and white, and is played chronologically. The other sequence is in color and is plays the scenes in reverse chronological order. At the end of the film, the two sequences meet up, creating a single story. I’m not going to go into the story like I usually do, since I want everyone reading this to go see it for themselves, instead of just reading my synopsis of it. I’m only going to highlight the basic plot, so that you know what you’re getting into.

The story focuses on Leonard Shelby (Guy Pearce), a man who suffers from anterograde amnesia, or short term memory loss. He was injured in some accident, and since then he has been unable to make new memories (the specifics of the accident are revealed later in the plot). Leonard is searching for the man who killed his wife. The police do not think that his wife’s killer exists, so Shelby is forced to look for the killer himself. Leonard knows several things about the killer, such as his name being John (or possible James) G., or that he is still in town. Leonard remembers this and other information using a unique method of Polaroid pictures and tattoos.

One of Leonard’s only “friends” is a many that goes by “Teddy” (played by Joe Pantoliano). Leonard doesn’t fully trust Teddy, because on the back of his Polaroid picture of him, “Do not trust his lies” is written in pen. As the movie plays out, more information is given on him, and on other people that Leonard runs across.

One of the recurring motifs in this movie is Leonard’s story about a man named Sammy Jenkins. Sammy was a man that Leonard know earlier in his life, when he worked as an insurance investigator. Sammy also suffered from short term memory loss caused by an accident. Leonard based his method of note keeping off of the story of Sammy Jenkins. I won’t go into any more details about the story, as I want there to still be some mystery for when you watch it.

My Opinion

I loved this movie. This movie is currently on my top ten movies of all time, alongside Breakfast at Tiffany’s and One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. It has everything that you could ask for in a movie. There’s suspense, mystery, murder, romance, flashbacks, and one of the most shocking plot twists I have seen. The story may seem a bit confusing at first, but after about 30 minutes, all the pieces start falling in place and answering your questions, and then leaving you with twice as many as you had in the first place.

I love the use of reverse chronological order in this movie. In most other cases, it wouldn’t work, as the story might get too confusing, but it works for this movie. The blending of the Sammy Jenkins and Leonard Shelby stories works perfectly, especially at the end. This is one of those movies that you won’t instantly understand the movie. You will need a few minutes to gather your thoughts and put all of the pieces of the story together to form a conclusion. I have to say that this is one of the first logical, yet out of nowhere twists I’ve seen in a while, and I loved every second of it.

Conclusion

If this is your first time hearing about this movie, go see it. If you’ve seen a bit about this movie, but haven’t yet watched it, go see it. If you’ve already seen it, but want to go watch it again, then do it. This is a great example of how modern thrillers can try to not be terrible. This movie has convinced me to check out some of Nolan’s other works, including rewatching the newer Batman trilogy. Memento is a unique, amazing thriller that will be stuck inside your head for the next week after watching it, and possibly beyond that. I just hope that I can find a movie that can match it’s amazing storytelling.