Coward's Corner

*repost from 09/09/2008 with updated review of part 6. Someday Ill watch the movies.
I had never read any Harry Potter books or seen there movies. Many times people ask me about them and I cannot comment. I finally had to see what the big deal was. So this last weekend I sat down and go caught up on harry potter movies. there are 7 books, 5 are movies out to rent pt 6 the half blood prince will be released next July and the final book pt 7 the deathly hallows will be milked for all its worth making 2 movies out of it pt 1 and 2 will be released in 2010. Most people say the books are better and things were changed. This happens to all movies why should potter be any different.All I care about is are they good movies and how is the series.Well I'm ready for pt 6 since the bar was raised in pt 5 and the same director David Yates will finish out the series I'm pretty excited. I will do this review on the whole series then break down each movie on its own.
So we enter a fantasy world of wizards and witches. In this fantasy world wizards and witches all start out young and go to school. this fantasy world is governed by the ministry of magic and they try to keep a peace and safe world. Well years ago a evil wizard Voltamore and his followers led a rebellion and killed a few wizards and witches in his killing spree he killed a husband and wife team and tried to kill there baby. But the baby was not killed and Voltamore vanished. The baby is smuggled out of fantasy world and put in his uncles house to live till he is 11. At 11 he is allowed to come to wizard school to begin his training. Since he survived the attack as a baby he is all ready famous and thought to be this great wizard. Wizards are not made overnight. In fact these movies cover one year of Harrys life as he learns his form. This Is what makes the series.You See harry grow and have to accept who he is. Sometimes I missed the little kid harry just learning. As he gets older things get worse and more adult. You grow up with him and got through the same challenges he does.AS pt 5 ended I was ready for 6 I guess the series did its job.


Pt1 The Sorcerers Stone directed by Chris Columbus
To start off a franchise is risky if the first one does do well there can be no more so who do they get to direct. A safe comedy director. Chris Columbus has done such masterpieces as home alone, home alone 2 Mrs Doubtfire.This really scared me what he would do to it. Well as it turned out he was the right choice the first movie is a beginning tale about a 11 yr old boy.His first year of school buying wizard supplies like wands and broomsticks.Meeting new friends and learning about the teachers. The movie ended I wanted to know more about what harry would become.
Pt 2 The Chamber of Secrets directed by Chris Columbus
Now that everyone is introduced we start to get a mystery, this will be in every movie. Something is happening and harry and his friends have to solve it. With more effects and more magic you can see CC has more money.Overall I was kinda bored and it felt to family kiddie
Pt 3 Prisoner of Azkaban directed by Alfonso Cuaron
So now the stories are getting a little more dark and adult. So out with CC. I do not know how they chose AC but until this film he had did great expectations and the spanish hit "y tu mama tambien". The bar is now raised as AC shows us that its not all Disney and cotton candy. The story is a mystery but with a nice twist at the end. We also are introduced to Gary Oldman "who can do no wrong in my book" as a welcome co star to the series. With the effects out shining the previous 2 this one left me wanting more.
Pt 4 The Goblet of Fire directed by Mike Newell
Mikes last 3 movies were Pushing Tin, Mona Lisa Smile and Donnie Brasco. So nothing too impressive here. Well this story is the weakest one, IM not sure what they changed from the book but Im sure it hurt. I was bored until the end, even with dragons and evil mermaids could not help it.The ending is a cliffhanger with a friend of Harrys dying and Harry going one one with Voltamore. Worst of the series so far.
Pt 5 Order of the Phoenix directed by David Yates
Now harry is becoming a man and possibly going to the dark side, he has to make a choice. Finally we get wizard battles, the last 30 min had me cheering and wanting Harry to whip some ass. Special appearance by Helena Bonham Carter makes the ending even better.My order pt3 and 5 are tied for first, then prt 1,2,4

Pt 6. Harry potter and the half blood Prince
Damn I was wanting this to be good. The last movie order of the phoenix which I really liked left me wanting more. The same director David Yates returns and will finish out the series. After watching the last 5, I went and read the last 2 books and was blown away. So here we are with 2 movies left now, part 7 will be in 2 parts. Some people say it's for the money but I think to truly tell the final book it needs to be 2 parts or a 4 hour movie. Anyway on to this one. Of course like all the books they add and delete many things. This one they went too far. The scenes they added made no sense and they left out really important scenes especially the ending. This is the last one were Hogwarts is featured and they let that slide. No more
ghost or moving pictures, it's like they had no money to invest into it. Shit had not hit the fan yet so things still should have been normal. I think maybe the director was trying to copy Alfonso Curran from pt 3. I'm hoping he does not cheap out or change everything on the last 2 movies. I"m worried now since he messed this one up. The more I think about it the more disappointed I am. You have to see finish the series but do not get in a hurry to.





Rant: Dragonforce haters
I remember about 7 years ago or so I first heard the metal band Dragonforce. I loved it, the tight rhythms, awesome solos and great production. I told people about it and called it speed metal on crack.I always wondered though could they do it live? Well years later we know the answer. I have never seen them live but have read many reviews and seen many videos of them. The answer is no they cannot play this well or fast live. Because of this they are now on many peoples hit list. I see people in the internet community all the time trashing these guys all because they cannot play live. Watch any video on you tube and most of the comments will be negative saying there not a live band. I find myself having to defend them many times. As a metal community we have to understand that many people think bands like slipknot and disturbed are metal. We have to unify and show people what real metal is. Yeah they cant do it live but they have to do it in the studio. They show real skill and talent more than most so called metal bands. In fact most of the posers that rag on them do not know shit about guitar or how to do a solo. We should support the true metal bands and not tear them down. SO for you all you Dragonforce haters go plug in your guitar hero lock the door and shut the fuck up.

Rant: Paul WS Anderson
Earlier on this site a rant was made on Bryan Singer. I agree with it.there is one more director that I have to discuss, for he is about to rape my childhood. I remember when I first saw the commercial for Death Race. I thought wow this looks like a Paul Anderson movie and low and behold it was. Most of the time when I say this looked like a "blank movie" its normally a good thing. Many master directors have perfected there craft and you can tell from the style of the movie that it is them. For Paul though his style is crap so if it looks like crap, smells like crap it must be crap. Lets look at Pauls history of movies before death race, AVP resident evil, soldier, event horizon, mortal kombat. Every one of these movies was a good rental. SO why is he not making straight to video movies?Well most of those movies made good cash for the studio so they ask him to come back. This happens many times in Hollywood make the studio money first have no talent second. Paul's next movie is spy hunter which I could care less about. But he is writing and producing the adaption of one of my favorite video games ever Castlevania. A early review on the script from aicn proved I was right. My childhood is about to be raped by some talentless hack. Please stop supporting this scrub and send a message to the studio by boycotting all of Pauls movies.

Rant#6
Address Bar!
Im so sick and fucking tired of customers not knowing what an address bar on an internet browser is. At my job I have to direct customers to our website on a daily basis. It seems like 10% of the dipshits dont know what a fucking address bar is. I tell them what to type in there and instead they put it in the google, ask, yahoo, aol (whichever one) search bar! I have to tell them repeatedly they are doing it wrong. I can see if they are elderly and never touched a computer but come on, how hard is it to understand the concept. Even when I explain it to them it still takes minutes for them to figure it out. This is not just elderly. I often have people in the 20-40 yr old range that do the same thing. If you have a grandma, cousin, sister or friend that dont know about the whole internet thingy, please do me a favor and at least show them what an address bar is!

Rant #5
World at War: Dog Murder Rant
Alright now this is getting fucking ridiculous. For those not in the know, in the latest Call of Duty: World at War if you kill 7 people in a row you get to unleash a pack of dogs on the enemy. If the dogs attack you or the enemy then they can be shot and killed. Recently there is a Massachusetts High School that is getting together a petition to stop the game. Of course it only took PETA a few days to get involved with this. In Petas blog they suggest (this is a direct quote, im not making this shit up) "perhaps the next Call of Duty game will have you unlock achievements for petting the dogs you encounter and going on walks or playing Frisbee with them."
They are suggesting this in a fucking war game! Im an avid dog lover myself with two dogs at home but Im not fucking delusional like these dickwads. The best feeling in the game is when you blast away a dog about to rip your throat out or when you see one of your pooches take down the enemy. I do this on a daily basis and I dont have any temptations to hurt any real animals. I guess some people never learn.
Dog Rape

Rant #4
Loud Car Horn
*updated with correct video (sorry)
Im sick and fucking tired of these dipshits that go around blowing their horns. I dont know if you personally experienced it but there is a new trend of the little fuckhead kids riding around in their trucks blowing their horns trying to scare people. These arent regular car horns either. These are holy shit louder than a semi or train horns. Im talking horns so loud that they could break glass if held down long enough or loud enough to cause a heart attack in some old dude or someone weak hearted. I was in St. Charles, La a few weeks back and this happened to me and my family while we were walking through a shopping center. This was the third time it has happened to me in a year. I was so fucking enraged I ran to my car jumped in and chased the long haired white trash kid and his g/f down at a stoplight. After I flipped him off and made sure he wasnt packing heat, I jumped out of my car and went over to his truck to scare the shit out of him. The truck door was locked and I banged on his window threatening to shove his nuts down his throat. He and g/f were scared shitless. The light turned red and I just let him go hoping maybe I taught him a lesson. Heres a video I found giving you an idea of what I am talking about. The horn in the video is not even as loud as the ones I heard. One of these days those kids are going to fuck with the wrong person.

Video

Rant #3
Bryan Singer
How the fuck does this dingleberry keep getting good jobs? How many more super hero franchises is he going to ruin? Xmen 1 was such a big piece of shit. No action, boring dialogue and shitty effects and a cheesy ending. When Xmen 2 was released everyone was happy cuz it was better than the first one. Yes it was definitely, but it still was a piece of shit. He wouldnt know good action, even if Tony Jaa came and kicked him straight in the nuts. Then he leaves that franchise and Ratner comples the trilogy with another piece of shit. Yeah it was bad but look what he had to work with before him. Next then you know he gets hired to revamp the Superman franchise. And what does he do? He makes one of the most boring fucking super hero movies ever! As far as directing it was a big step up from Xmen but the movie still fell flat big time. The only good sequence was the airplane landing one. The finale was fucking pathetic. Some people would point out look at how much those movies made. Just about any fucking director could have made Xmen and Superman and made that much money. They are money franchises. Now if they would have had a great director then im sure they could have made Spiderman type money. Yall can tell me about his newest Superman sequel the Man of Steel. He aint ever getting a dime from me.

Rant #2
I fucking hate toll roads. I wish I could kick whoever invented them right square in the nuts. Its bad enough gas and every other bill and expense is higher than ever and now you gotta pay just to drive on fucking roads that you pay taxes for the government to build! Last weekend I was driving to my Aunts and I had to get off the highway at the last possible exit to avoid the toll. I went through a few lights and went back onto the highway 10 minutes later and all that was just to avoid about a half mile stretch of toll road! Now if it was a quarter then maybe i wouldnt bitch that much but when its over a dollar or more each way thats fucking ridiculous.

Rant #1
Woody Harrelson
When I was watching Semi Pro the other day it reminded me how much I fucking hate Woody Harrelson. I know most people have one actor they despise for one reason or another. It could be as simple as hating their acting chops, hating things in their personal life or just plain just not liking the way they look. To me I think its a little of all of it. Ever since I first saw him on Cheers he annoyed me. He just has the doofus look and a smart ass attitude that just makes me want to punch him in the face. Now I dont think he's the worst actor in the world but I do think he's far from good. Normally I dont care about actor's personal life cuz a majority of them are liberal and I would probably never want to watch a movie again if I focused on that. Having said that I do get tired of hearing about his legalize pot movement that he's front in center of. When I first heard he was in No Country For Old Men I was worried he was going to ruin it for me. Luckily he had a minor role and I didnt mind him too much. He was the star of one of my most hated movies ever though. The fucking Natural Born Killers.