Browse Author: andy

Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines

Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines (2003): Jonathan Mostow

(Movie trailer voice): After Judgment Day came and went, they tried Y2K. When that didn’t work, they tried going back in time, again, to the future, of the first two times they tried it.

ONE SENTENCE PLOT SUMMARY: Now an off-the-grid adult, John Connor, future leader of the human resistance against murderous Skynet, faces one more attempt on his life from a future terminator.  Continue Reading

For Your Eyes Only

For Your Eyes Only (1981): John Glen

For Your Eyes Only was supposed to follow The Spy Who Loved Me, but the success of a certain space-based Best Picture nominee from 1977 sent producers back to their libraries to look up Moonraker.

The James Bond action returns to Earth, and delves beneath its waters for some stunts that probably rate as some of the series’s most difficult.

ONE SENTENCE PLOT SUMMARY: James Bond tracks a Greek smuggler who stole a British missile targeting system and plans to sell it to the Soviet Union.

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Avengers: Endgame

Avengers: Endgame (2019): Anthony & Joe Russo

One year after the incredible, world-breaking, superhero-killing Infinity War, The Russo brothers return with the climactic Avengers: Endgame.

All these heroes have real names and hero names, and I’m going to switch between them often with little rhyme or reason. You’ve been warned.

ONE SENTENCE PLOT SUMMARY: The living superheroes figure out how to move on from Thanos’s devastating, life-halving Snap, then they figure out how to undo it so they don’t have to move on.

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Avengers: Infinity War

2018

Anthony & Joe Russo

Avengers: Infinity War and its follow up Endgame represented the largest undertaking in Hollywood history. How to wrap up stories and character arcs from a decade’s worth of movies?

ONE SENTENCE PLOT SUMMARY: Marvel’s heroes band together to stop Thanos, a gigantic purple being determined to gather six Infinity Stones and use them to wipe out half of life with a snap of his fingers.

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Moonraker

Moonraker (1979): Lewis Gilbert

The landmark success of a certain movie set in a galaxy far, far away caused the producers of the James Bond franchise to make Moonraker the next 007 movie down the pike.

ONE SENTENCE PLOT SUMMARY: James Bond tracks a maniacal industrial magnate and his plot to kill most people on Earth and start a new society from space.

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Hacksaw Ridge

Hacksaw Ridge (2016): Mel Gibson

Ten years and loads of tabloid covers passed between Mel Gibson’s previous directorial output Apocalypto and Hacksaw Ridge. Hollywood essentially blacklisted him for a decade partly for his deeply anti-Semitic remarks following a DUI arrest in 2006.

Hollywood, like America, loves second chances, and Gibson got one with this story of a man who went to war without fighting.

ONE SENTENCE PLOT SUMMARY: A conscientious objector and Army medic holds onto personal beliefs and saves dozens of lives without firing a shot during one of the bloodiest battles of World War II.

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The Spy Who Loved Me

The Spy Who Loved Me (1977): Lewis Gilbert

The James Bond experiment reached its 15th anniversary with its 10th movie and first partial remake. While the first two Roger Moore movies were interesting departures from the Sean Connery era and dips into different film styles, The Spy Who Loved Me revealed a creative team lacking in ideas.

ONE SENTENCE PLOT SUMMARY: James Bond teams with a Soviet spy to stop a madman from stealing submarines and starting a nuclear war.

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Immortals

Immortals (2011): Tarsem Singh

The massive success of 300 spawned imitators. The Clash and Wrath of the Titans movies certainly got made thanks to Gerard Butler and his band of shredded abdominals. Falling in middle is the bleak fantasy Immortals, featuring a future Superman.

ONE SENTENCE PLOT SUMMARY: Humble Greek peasant Theseus must avenge his mother’s death, find a weapon of mass destruction, fight the king of an army, and hope the Olympian gods defeat the Titans, all so he can live a simple life. 

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The Man with the Golden Gun

The Man with the Golden Gun (1974): Guy Hamilton

Rolling along with the new Bond, The Man with the Golden Gun represented the last time original producer Saltzman stepped stirred the pot. He departed after selling his share to cover debts, and the resulting legal tie-ups held back production for three years. That probably turned into a blessing, because signs of Bond fatigue were racking up. The public needed a break.

ONE SENTENCE PLOT SUMMARY: James Bond travels to Thailand to help save the solar industry, but mostly to play The Most Dangerous Game with Francisco Scaramanga, the world’s most dangerous assassin and man with the golden gun.  Continue Reading

RECAP: Captain Marvel

Captain Marvel (2019): Anna Boden & Ryan Fleck

It took 11 years, but Marvel finally released a female-led stand-alone entry into the Marvel Cinematic Universe. The character alluded to but not mentioned in Avengers: Infinity War needed an introduction before her presumed-essential role in Avengers: Endgame, released later in the year.

ONE SENTENCE PLOT SUMMARY: An human-turned-Kree becomes more powerful when she returns to Earth to learn her identity and battle some aliens bent on destroying the home planet she doesn’t remember.  Continue Reading