Day 168: 30 Minutes or Less

Dwayne (Danny McBride) is the son of a rich ex-marine and he wants his inheritance to come a little quicker so he hires an assassin to kill his father. But the assassin needs £100,000 and so Dwayne kidnaps a pizza delivery guy and straps a bomb to his chest, saying that the only way he’ll survive will be if he can get that money. Nick (Jesse Eisenberg), the pizza guy, brings his best friend in on it and the two rob a bank.

Nick and Chet (Aziz Ansari) have to outrun the police after robbing the bank. Now I know they were being watched by Dwayne and Travis (Nick Swardson) and so they couldn’t physically go to the police but you know what they could’ve done? Phoned the police and told them what they were being made to do and then the police could’ve phoned the bank so that Nick could go in, get the (fake, probably?) money and then take it to the bad guys. I realise we then wouldn’t have had a film that went on ridiculously with car crashes, explosions and flamethrowers but maybe that just means we shouldn’t have had a film at all.

I don’t remember laughing at any point, despite this being a ‘comedy’. From what I understand, the funny bits were meant to be when the Dwayne character was swearing and talking about sex-related things? I don’t know, it was lost on me. I’m also not a fan of Jesse Eisenberg. People are always getting on at Kristen Stewart for her terrible acting but as far as I’m concerned, he is worse. Even when he was supposedly panicked after having a bomb strapped to his chest, he had the exact same expression on his face that he has in non-stressful situations. He’s just not interesting to watch on screen.

4/10

Day 140: Up In The Air

Ryan Bingham (George Clooney) spends the majority of his life on planes, flying all over America. When faced with the possibility of no longer being able to do that, he panics; it is all he knows and he loves it. But he comes to realise that maybe there is more to life than endless freedom.

I’ve always thought that it must be exciting to have the freedom to go anywhere without any responsibilities or restrictions, it always seemed like anything might be possible that way. But I’m not sure I believe that now, and the film does a good job of showing the change. People don’t want to be tied down in their lives and it’s natural to dream about being able to just take off and leave it all behind. But at the same time, people do want to be tied down. They want stability and someone to share a life with. Maybe it’s better to think of the stable aspects of your life as a base, or a starting point. And you can still be free and do the things you dream about, but you can always come back to the people who care for you and who allow you to be yourself.

8/10

Day 111: Due Date

Violent bastard Peter (Robert Downey Jr) is trying to get back to L.A. in time for the birth of his child but things go massively wrong when he meets Ethan (Zach Galifianakis). The two go on an adventure-filled road trip and learn some things about themselves. Obviously.

I’m not really sure people like Ethan actually exist in real life. They're probably the kind of people who end up in a cult. Or murdered because they wanted to check out the puppies some guy in a trenchcoat had in his van. Maybe he’s not that bad though, I think I’d have been able to suffer him much better than Peter did. Peter did end up making everything worse and was just a bastard for the majority of the film. And I understand that he was pissed off at maybe having to miss the birth of his child, but he was just rude to everybody he came across. He punched a kid in the stomach and spat on a dog. I mean, come on. But after getting stoned he lightens up and becomes a nicer guy. He obviously never thought he’d end up liking someone like Ethan but he goes with it.

Peter gets his friend to pick them up after the car wreck and they go back to his house. His friend, Daryl (Jamie Foxx), used to be with his wife years before but Daryl has a recent picture of the two together and he still talks to her a lot. Is it weird when people who used to be a couple spend time together? I never really understand the ‘We can still be friends’ aspect of a break-up, it just seems like it’d be really difficult to do well. But then just never really talking to someone again that you used to be so close with is also strange. Like, one day you’re together and they’re your person, then the next you just never talk. That is odd. My Mum says that being with a particular person is just a habit and when you break up, you’re not missing the person so much as you’re missing the habit and that if you just give it time then you’ll realise the person wasn’t all that important. I’m not really a fan of that opinion, however. But then it seems to follow along the lines of loving someone because of what they do for you and not because of who they are. Surely if you loved them for who they are then it would actually be them you missed, not just the little habits that you shared with them? Although I know it can be hard to really pull apart the love for the person and the love for what they do for you. I’ve gone off on a tangent, I think. Anyway!

The film wasn’t anything spectacular. I liked that Robert Downey Jr’s wife (Michelle Monaghan) was his love interest in ‘Kiss Kiss Bang Bang’. Now that’s a good film. This one, however, was kind of boring in places. I did laugh sometimes but I wouldn’t watch it again.

6/10

Day 94: Despicable Me

Gru (Steve Carell) is losing his status as the greatest villain to new kid, Vector (Jason Segel). To try and regain his power he plans to shrink the moon and steal it but in order to do that he has to use some cookie-selling orphans. Initially he is reluctant to get close to the girls but they melt his heart and he ends up caring for them a great deal.

I quite like this film even though it’s entirely predictable that he’ll end up loving the girls. It’s funny and sweet, what’s not to like?

7/10