Five Fingers (2006)

Laurence Fishburne plays the part of a Muslim terrorist who captures some Dutch guy in Morocco in order to extract information from him. Throughout the "interrogation" Fishburne plays chess and mind games and systematically cuts off Dutch guy's fingers one by one until he gives up the information. What information exactly? Well the entire movie really boils down to one scene:

(Fishburne is in some abandoned warehouse with Dutch guy chained to a chair)

Laurence Fishburne: You know, if more Westerners played Chess, we wouldn't have many so problems between our cultures. Do you want to play a game of Chess?

Dutch Guy: No.

Laurence Fishburne: I really like jazz music.

Dutch Guy: What?

Laurence Fishburne: Enough! (Fishburne snaps his fingers and an assistant brings out a paper cutter)

Dutch Guy: OH GOD NO!

Laurence Fishburne: Tell me what I need to know.

Dutch Guy: WHAT ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT NO PLEASE NO!

Laurence Fishburne: Last chance.

Dutch Guy: WHAT THE HELL DO YOU WANT?

(Fishburne cuts Dutch Guy's finger off)

Multiply this scene 5 times and you get this shitty movie. So what is this information that Fishburne wants so badly that he is willing to spend hours playing chess and discussing musical preference with some random Dutch guy? Well the audience never knows until the very end. At least, I assume it's revealed at the end because regrettably I couldn't finish watching this movie due to extreme boredom. I expect there was some big secret that tied everything together, but seriously this movie was just Laurence Fishburne speaking really slowly talking about random shit while the Dutch Guy chained to his chair pleads for mercy. The only good part about this movie was that Transporter Chief O'Brien was shot to death in the first 10 minutes.


Also, there was some subplot involving Dutch Guy's Moroccan girlfriend which involved a bunch of flashbacks. Whatever.

Snakes on a Plane (2006)

Okay to begin with, there's too much character development in this movie. I can't believe that I'm saying that, given the already lackluster storyline, but nobody is going to remember that shit for a movie like this. They try to stuff the plane with a diverse character set to spice up the story, but honestly speaking, that isn't what the audience wants. I say kill them all. Blah blah blah. GET TO THE SNAKES ALREADY!
In the next phase, Sam Jackson fights snakes + angry mob. By this time, he's already produced several meme worthy lines in an attempt to get the passengers to shutup. Then he says, "Give these people air!" and that's where the memory file in my neural net processor ends.

There are 2 buff chinese men that do some kind of kung fu or stunt shit in this movie. This is out of a total of 2 chinese men. That's a proportion of 100%.
Rating: 50%

The Medallion (2003)

I remember a time, perhaps in the 90's when Jackie Chan was revered as a brilliant stuntman with titles like Rumble in the Bronx and Supercop under his belt. But now his movies are -what?- slapstick comedy mystical fictions with Jackie Chan making panicky noises the whole time.

Out of his ensemble of his half-assed joke movies, this is one ranks relatively low. He teams up with this aloof Scottish detective that is scared of everything like he has some kind of horrible mental disorder. He would turn corners or open doors, see something unexpected, and scream "whoaaaaaa!!" like 50 or so times in the movie. The Englishman also has an asian supermodel wife. That's weird because at the same time Jackie is flirting with this other caucasian supermodel who is the coworker of the Scottish guy. So he, uh, switched wives or, I'm not sure they know, what?

Anyway in the end the Chinese dragons do some magical shit and Jackie Chan becomes immortal. So, that's cool. The movie ends with Jackie running 100 miles an hour and going "yay!".

Rating: 20%

The Weather Man (2005)

Another great Nicholas Cage movie. I can't even believe that I used to think he was a bad actor because I keep watching his movies and he nails the role every time. I must have mistaken him for a bad actor because of his unenthusiastic face and boring voice, and most of all his embarrassing acting in The Wicker Man. At face value, Nick Cage is unremarkable. Yet, if you roll with his style a bit, his simplistic and unassuming personality seems very appropriate. His narrations here are brilliant. The combination of his disparaging face and his flat voice delivers a succinct but illuminating message.

This movie is highly underrated. Nick Cage's depressing appearance goes well with the fact that his acting career at the time was sucking.
Rating: 80%

Four Brothers (2005)

I didn't really like this. I can tell its a quality movie because Mark Wahlberg is in it, but I've been watching some really good movies lately and this one's a relatively low point in my viewing sequence. One of hollywood's favorite mantras is, "Even bad men love their mothers." So that's where this starts, with the four brothers returning to Detroit to avenge their moms's untimely death.

Hey come to think of it, this was ridiculously similar to the plot of GTA: San Andreas. They might even have the same storyboard.

Both stories start with a dead mother, (what could be more dramatic than that) and pick up with the search for mom's killer. So the movie is just a bunch of hoodies + Wahlberg going around hustling various neighborhood characters. Man are there really people on earth that are this hardcore? The brothers are the toughest of the tough guys.

Mark Wahlberg's urban gangster walk in this movie is retarded. His arms are swinging around like crazy and he bobbs up and down like he's on a merry-go-round. No one in real life would ever have that kind of gait.
Rating: 30%

Lord of War (2005)

I was looking for a light hearted movie, and Nicholas Cage would surely provide it. Going in, I believed that Lord of War was going to be a brusque, shoot the bad guys movie with a shitty plot and a shittier display of acting . Instead, I got an incredibly deep tale of woe about the creed of weapons dealing. Nick Cage's sullen voice narrated the movie, supplying quick justifications behind his character's complex moral decisions.

He starts as a nobody. One day he rationalizes that restaurants will always exist because people will always need to eat. Therefore, weapons dealers will always exist because people will always need to fight each other. "Besides, the margins are better", says Cage. Shrewd reasoning if you ask me. Margins and Need. Ask anyone why they choose their profession and it will be one of those, either good margins or great need.

So Cage goes out into the world and makes his name by selling weapons to one side of a conflict, then the other. Every war in recent history becomes a lucrative business opportunity. His big break came with the dissolution of the USSR, giving him ample armament to flood the market with Soviet military surplus.

So basically, we get a profound explanation for the causes of all modern armed conflict. This movie says that all those blood diamonds and child soldiers are simply byproducts of the war economy surplus. We were in fact responsible for fueling the violence with weapons that we manufactured, packed up, and sold.

Great acting by Nicholas Cage again. Why have his more recent movie sucked so much?
Rating:90%

Lucky # Slevin (2006)

Welcome to the world of crisp, cool crime stories where innocent little Josh Hartnett has to deal with a bunch of brunt gangsters that want money from him. You have to listen to all of them talk their heads off, even if they're not directly related to the plot. You will have to watch the portrayal of a Jewish mafia, which is borderline anti-semitic. You will watch Morgan Freeman be a gangster too, as head of a mob with his matter-of-factly facial expressions. Less words and more staring at your constipated face, is the name of the game.
The girl next door is Lucy Liu, who (is tiny in stature and) spends the movie fawning over Josh Hartnett. She just can't get enough of this guy. Is she really that small? It didn't seem that way in Charlie's Angels.
Anyway in the end, the good guy kills the bad guy, so happily ever after right? Naw, pretty much every character in this movie was a fucker. The bad guy loses, the good guy wins, and I lose for watching this faggoty movie.

Rating: 40%