Quick and Dirty Reviews

Bridesmaids (3 out of 5)

With so much buzz, I was honestly expecting so much more from Bridesmaids. With such a great cast including SNL stalwarts Kristen Wig and Maya Rudolph as well as The Office's secretary sweetheart Ellie Kemper. Its all just a bit to familiar and rout, most jokes can be seen coming a mile away and then end up falling flat. There is a surprising sincerity to the proceedings as the girl friendships begin to fall apart and real emotions start to boil. Some genuinely funny moments and some tender relationship bits aren't enough to keep the movie exciting for its overlong run-time of 2 hours. While there are some laughs, mostly provided by Mad Men's Jon Hamm playing a complete slime-ball and sex fiend, they come to far apart to make much of a difference. Bridesmaids just doesn't have what it takes to stand alongside what has become a very competitive genre. It's defiantly not the female version of The Hangover and its not even as good as most of Judd Apatow's films either (Superbad, Knocked Up).

Hesher (3 out of 5)

Hesher has a lot of interesting things to say, not so much from the titular character but the movie itself, unforuntely the movie stumbles by never choosing a storyline and sticking with it, instead opting to dabble in multiple heavily emotional and complicated story threads and in-turn forcing them to lack that certain punch. Hesher stars a washed out and mildly psychotic Joseph Gordon Levitt and he is the best part of the movie, a tornado of chaos with a bi-polar disorder, its insane and hilarious to watch him interact with everyday people specifically to see how they respond. Rainn Wilson and Natalie Portman have small roles in the film, and neither amount to anything but another touchstone in the series of long and emotionally complicated stories. Its a shame Hesher isn't more focused, because the plight of a boy losing his mother and coming to terms with that along with the realization that his life is just one horrible situation after another is a great template. Its a shockingly unsentimental movie given the subject matter, which is refreshing but the movie is often as frantic and unengaged as its titular character.

Tucker and Dale Vs. Evil (4 out of 5)

A hilarious and blood soaked good time, Tucker and Dale Vs. Evil does for evil redneck slasher films what Shaun of the Dead did for zombies movies. Its a heartfelt tale of two redneck lifelong friends who find themselves in one over the top misunderstanding after another. As a group of camping college kids mistake them for cannibalistic hicks, and thus begin to fight them, only to end up killing themselves in absurd ways as Tucker and Dale just try to stay alive long enough to try and explain their side of the story. Tucker is played by the always magnificent Alan Tudyk who gives a great performance for such a schlocky low budget horror comedy, its always great to see people commit to their projects, and never believing their "better than this". As fun as the movie is, it stretches its singular joke as far as it can go, making all the hillbillie jokes grow old and wear thin. Though I will say it is funny to see the evil redneck version of all these slasher movies, makes you think if The Hills Have Eyes was just a giant misunderstanding that could have easily been avoided. Tucker and Dale Vs. Evil is a touching bromance mixed with gory executions and exceedingly hysterical accidents and misunderstandings.