Movie Revue: New Moon

Yes, I finally the time AND money to see New Moon. Incidentally, why is it $6 for a matinee showing of a movie that's been out for a month? Prices at our local theater just went up from $5.50 to $6, and it bugs me.

New Moon stars Taylor Lautner, who spends most of the movie shirtless; Kristen Stewart, who spends most of the movie looking constipated; and Robert Pattinson, who spends most of the movie about to burst into tears. Seriously, for two people who are supposed to be madly in love, Edward and Bella sure don't smile a lot. So, thirty-second recap: After her true love (and vampire) Edward leaves her alone in the woods, painfully normal human Bella sinks into a deep depression. The only one who can bring her out of it is her friend Jacob, who like likes Bella, but Bella doesn't like him that way. Then it turns out that Jacob is a werewolf. Then Bella has to go to Italy to stop Edward from committing vampire suicide.

As I mentioned on last week's show, I am a fan of Twilight, but I am not a screaming Twilight fangirl. As such, I was able to enjoy this movie as a guilty pleasure. The movie seemed to drag at times; as in Twilight, there were scenes where the characters spent most of their screen time staring at each other. I started calling "Line?" whenever the pauses got too long (there were maybe 5 other people in the theater besides me, and I'm sure they couldn't hear my commentary). I'm honestly not sure whether this movie is good, or so bad it's good. I suppose it's some of both; the scenes with the Volturi were genuinely tense, and I liked a lot of the scenes with Bella and Jacob.

Something that bugs me about Twilight, especially now that I know how it all ends, is that Bella ends up with Edward. One of the biggest complaints the Twi-haters like to raise is that Bella and Edward's relationship doesn't seem to be based on anything. They just have passionate true love, for reasons which are never fully explored. Bella and Jacob, on the other hand, have a strong friendship based on things like common interests and even have some inside jokes. And in any other movie, the girl would've dumped the hot-guy-who-leaves-her for the friend-who's-always-been-there.

The special effects were pretty good--better than Twilight--and for the most part, I thought the werewolves looked great. The only part they couldn't get quite right was the eyes. They should have narrowed more when the wolves were trying to be menacing.

Overall: New Moon gets 3 1/2 stars out of 5.

Video Revue: Best and Worst of Disney

Johnny here, "blog-ifying" the latest episode of Video Revue! This week, Monica and I are taking a look at the movies that are, in our opinions, the worst and the best. WHY would they make a sequel to "The Little Mermaid"? For that matter, what about "The Hunchback of Notre Dame"?

As always, you can find us on iTunes or Podshow

Oh, and one more thing: our inbox has been looking really empty lately. Like, really empty, so much so that even our spam isn't good enough to be read on the air. So please, don't forget to send those e-mails to videorevue@gmail.com.

Video Revue: Thumbs Up/Thumbs Down

This week, Johnny and I discuss ten different things that only one of us likes, and debate them a la Siskel and Ebert (in theory, anyway). Which blockbuster movie nearly put Johnny to sleep? Which popular website is full of videos I can't stand? Listen and find out!

As always, you can find us on iTunes or Podshow

If you'd like to weigh in on any of the things we discussed, e-mail us at videorevue@gmail.com.

Next week: our top 5 best and worst Disney movies!