Maxim’s Movie Reviews and Opinions Blog

Up (2009) PG 96min

Disney/Pixar’s “Up” comes out almost 11 m0nths after release of “WALL-E” last summer. It was written and directed by Pete Docter (Toy Story 1&2, Monster, Inc., WALL-E) and Bob Peterson (Finding Nemo), who also gave his voice to the dog, Dug.

As always, a Pixar movie is preceded with one or [...]

Bookmark

[Read more →]

Monsters vs Aliens – 3D (2009)

“Monsters vs Aliens” is a new 3D animated feature from DreamWorks Animation. Directed by Rob Letterman and Conrad Vernon, written by Maya Forbes, Wallace Wolodarsky, Rob Letterman, Jonathan Aibel and Glenn Berger.
The plot: Susan (Reese Witherspoon) was about to get married to n aspiring TV anchor Derek Dietl (Paul Rudd) when [...]

Bookmark

[Read more →]

12 Rounds (2009)

“12 Rounds” is an action thriller starring WWE’s John Cena (The Marine), Ashley Scott (S.W.A.T., Walking Tall, Into The Blue, The Kingdom) and Aidan Gillen (Shanghai Nights and The Wire TV series) directed by Finnish director Renny Harlin (Die Hard 2, The Nightmare on Elm Street 4, Cliffhanger, Deep Blue Sea, The Long [...]

Bookmark

[Read more →]

Revolutionary Road (2008)

“Revolutionary Road” is a drama set in 1950s based on Robert Yates’s novel and directed by Sam Mendes (Jarhead, Road to Perdition, American Beauty) starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Kate Winslet and Kathy Bates.
The plot: A young couple living in mid-1950s in a Connecticut suburb is going through mid-life crisis while trying to raise [...]

Bookmark

[Read more →]

Slumdog Millionaire (2008)

Slumdog Millionaire is drama co-directed by brilliant directors Danny Boyle (Trainspotting, The Beach, 28 Days Later and more) and Loveleen Tandan (Vanity Fair, Monsoon Wedding etc.) based on Vikas Swarup’s novel with the same title. I had no idea what the movie is about; I just heard from some friends on Facebook that [...]

Bookmark

[Read more →]

The Invisible (2007)

The plot: A talented high-school student is beaten and left for dead by his criminal classmate. He becomes a ghost, helplessly trying to figure out why he was killed and hopefully get his life back – the cops should find his body in time before he’s completely dead.
The good: Quite interesting characters: [...]

Bookmark

[Read more →]

Transsiberian (2008)

The plot: An American couple, Roy (Woody Harrelson) and Jessie (Emily Mortimer) take a 7-day train ride from China, where they completed  a church humanitarian mission, to Moscow on Trans-Siberian railroad. On the train they meet another young couple, a Spaniard Carlos (Eduardo Noriega) and his girlfriend Abby (Kate Mara). Carlos may be running [...]

Bookmark

[Read more →]

Disturbia (2007)

The plot: Kale (Shia LaBeouf) is sentenced to 3 months of house arrest for punching his Spanish teacher. His parole officer recommends to use his time constructively, so for a while he destroys buildings in XBox Live game, but eventually boredom overwhelms him. Fortunately, a hot 18 year old Ashley (Sarah Roemer) moved [...]

Bookmark

[Read more →]

RocknRolla (2008)

This is the first installment of director Guy Ritchie’s trilogy, also written by him.
The plot: When Russian mobster sets up a real-estate scam in London, all the underworld characters appear to get their share of the multi-million euro deal up for grabs. Some of those characters are small-time crooks like One-Two (Gerard [...]

Bookmark

[Read more →]

The Dark Knight (2008)

By now everyone knows that The Dark Knight (a.k.a. Batman Begins 2) has been a boxoffice record-setting sequel to the 2005′ Batman Begins. This menacing graphic novel made for screen was directed by Christopher Nolan, who also directed the original Batman Begins and written by Christopher Nolan and Jonathan Nolan, the [...]

Bookmark

[Read more →]

Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull

19 years after “The Last Crusade”, Indiana Jones is back. So excited to see the favorite character of my childhood.
The plot: 1959. Indiana Jones is kidnapped by KGB agents to help them find the Crystal Skull, whose powers they plan to use to create a mind-controlling [...]

Bookmark

[Read more →]

Yet another sport farce comedy with Will Ferrel and Jon Heder. Directed by Josh Gordon and Will Speck.
The plot: Jimmy MacElroy (Jon Heder of Napoleon Dynamite and The Benchwarmers, he also did a lot of voice overs, such as in Monster House, Robot Chicken, Surf’s Up) was a child ice-skating prodigy adopted from the [...]

Bookmark

[Read more →]

Director – Shawn Levy | Writers – Robert Ben Garant, Thomas Lennon, based on book by Milan Trenc
Cast: Ben Stiller as Larry Daley | Carla Gugino as Rebecca | Dick Van Dyke as Cecil | Mickey Rooney as Gus | Bill Cobbs as Reginald | Robin Williams as Teddy Roosevelt | Patrick Gallagher [...]

Bookmark

[Read more →]

The plot: Narrator (Omar Sharif) talks about a legend about a blue-eyes child. It’s a girl who was discovered by tribal hunters in the mountains clinched to the body of her dead mother. Her mother and their clan were killed or enslaved by the “four-legged demons”. The girl, Evolet (Camilla Belle), is adopted by [...]

Bookmark

[Read more →]

This film comes from a great French director Luc Besson, who is the king of French action movies. Here in the U.S. of A. we know him for creating “The Fifth Element“, which he conceived when he was a teenager, for [briefly] being married to Milla Jovovich, and producing such action flicks as Leon [...]

Bookmark

[Read more →]

Written and directed by Joel and Ethan Coen, this is the best chase movie ever!
The plot: a hunter named Llewelyn Moss (Josh Brolin) walks on the aftermath of a drug deal gone bad in the middle of the desert somewhere in Texas and discovers suitcase with two million dollars. He tries to disappear with [...]

Bookmark

[Read more →]

A clone of “Clear and Present Danger” set in Saudi Arabia in present days. Not very deep, but the action and suspense of the second half of the film is quite good. The film makes the point is there’s more to the price of oil then Dollar amount, but it’s more of a background, a set up for another Hollywood movie.

Bookmark

[Read more →]