Shove that package straight up ya A....

CONTRABAND (2012)

You ever walked into someones house and seen a painting on the wall. So you ask them "Hey friend who might I ask painted this wonderful scene?" They turn and smile and say with deep pride "Why I did dear chum" and you start to share your amazement and surprise at somehow not seeing this genius before... but then you realize that it's a paint by number and you call them on it. And they look at you like that doesn't matter, they still painted it...

Ever have that happen? No. Well that is this movie.

So Mark Wahlberg is a former smuggler extraordinaire, that fell in love with Kate (MILF had to - just saw American Reunion, review will B up soon) Beckinsale. He then gives up the life and decides to make babies. Which I mean, considering it's Kate "does anyone look better in leather" Beckinsale, totally understandable. He also opens an alarm company. Which seems to be doing well... Oh and she owns her own Hair studio type place (I'm a guy, I have no idea whether it had a spa or not lol). So they are doing well. Very well. Big house. Good jobs. Ok. Just want us all on the same page.
And den....
Kate's brother who has, against their wishes, stayed in the game, has a smuggling deal go bad. Bad guys will kill him if they don't get their money. So Marky Mark and his funky Bunch (see what I did there... Yeeeah ya do) decide all they can do if a last huge score to clear dear Kate's loved younger brother. Because obviously there are no other options. Big house. Two good jobs. But noooooo other options. Can you guess what happens from there...
if you guessed....
1. Things get way more complicated than expected
2. Dear friends turn out to actually be bad guys
3. Katey Becks ends up in peril
4. Loved younger brother does retarded things that almost ruin everything
5. They must get in way over their heads, and narrowly escape capture
6. They almost get caught.
7. They almost get caught again.
8. They almost get caught again. Again.
9. The good guys live.
10. Bad guys get theirs in cool twisted ways THAT. U. NEVER. SAW. COMING (does that read as sarcastic? It should)
11. Oh they fool everyone and get away with it.
12. Hard Rock song plays over all the final scenes as they wrap up what happen with all your .. um... heroes...

hahahahahhahahaha

Oh god. Did I ruin it for any one? Because that is pretty much the plot of any heist movie of the last two decades (excluding the exceptional INSIDE MAN, and damn it Italian job was sweet). I actually found myself fast forwarding the movie in parts, because I knew what was coming... everything. This film feels like Mark and Kate just needed something to do between blockbusters. There is just so much that doesn't make sense in this film... I won't get into all of it, but I will say.... Really all of this for what, 5, 6, pounds of cocaine? Really. Reeeeeeeally.
Lots of good actors just wasted in this heist by numbers crap-tacu-orgy. Giovanni Ribisi... is just... I mean what the hell is that busted accent? Little Nicky on smack?

People you want a heist flick, Oceans 11, James 007 in the Thomas Crown Affair, Inside man... a long list. Avoid this one. U will be bored. And when you are not, it's only because your brain is going "Why, wait who? What are they doing? Are they high? Why does he have a kid? Why kill... wait... cement?" and the list goes on.

Movie scale 2 out of 5 stars (and that hurts me because, I really have a soft spot for Marky Dubs, and well... a hard spot for Katy B)
Heist movie scale 2.5 out of 5 stars.

- till next

Charles B. Boonsweet

Monster mash, it was a graveyard smash!!

MONSTER BRAWL (2011)

Let me crack an egg of trivia over you all about your old pal Bucklesworth.  Growing up, I used to spend a fair amount of time watching the classic black & white universal horror movies with my Dad.  You know the ones; Frankenstein, Dracula, the Mummy, the Wolfman, etc.  So fast-forwarding to today, you can imagine my excitement when I heard that there was a flick that threw in all those monsters I listed (and a few more) into a wrestling ring to brawl it out tournament-style, with the winner declared the champion and King of Monsters. 

To start, I was quite happy with the casting.  Dave Foley and Art Hindle as the play-by-play commentators, Kevin Nash as a manager, Jimmy "Mouth of the South" Hart doing the ring intros, and UFC referee Herb Dean holding things down in the ring, just to name a few.  All of the non-monster cast was very entertaining, doing justice to the roles they were given.  I personally think a b-movie actor cameo, like Bruce Campbell or Jeffrey Combs for example, would have been a nice touch.  But it wasn't absolutely necessary.

The monster cast/pairing is as follows: you have Cyclops vs. Witch Bitch, Lady Vampire vs. the Mummy, Frankenstein vs. Zombie, and Werewolf vs. Swamp Gut (imagine a more bloated Swamp Thing).  The make-up effects for the most part are good, though 1 or 2 of the monsters could have been done a little better.  For example, Cyclops eye doesn't really move.  And while I'm not a fan of cgi, I don't think it would have been too much to have a cgi eyeball looking around.  But it's not really that big a deal.

The movie itself is chock-full of cheese and awesomeness.  It's in an mma-style atmosphere, with such additions as a monster statistics shot, which is similar to what you'd see in a UFC style.  And before each fight, you get a back story for each monster.  One thing I didn't expect from this flick was that I got into each fight just like I do with any real mma fight, wondering who was gonna win each one.

All in all, it was a giant cheese fest, and incredibly fun to watch.  If you either like mma, old school monsters, or any kind of cheesy, "shut your brain off" kind of movie, you really need to check this one out.  DO IT NOW!!!!

 Movie scale: 4 out of 5 stars
Cheese/action scale: 4 out of 5 stars.


-Because K. K. Bucklesworth says so!!