End Of Watch [Blu-ray]

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End Of Watch

Even if End of Watch had turned out to be a bad film, I still would have respected it. In both his script and his directing style David Ayer gambles constantly, be it in the way he decides to shoot a particular scene or help the audience get a better understanding of the central characters, and it's impressive how many of those gambles pay off. It?s those chances that Ayer takes that separate his movie from the standard cop drama, elevating it to be a great one.

These risks start at the most basic story levels, as End of Watch isn?t a movie about two cops fighting evil in South Central Los Angeles, but instead about two men, Officer Taylor (Jake Gyllenhaal) and Officer Zavala (Michael Pena), who have a pure bond of friendship and loyalty as officers in the L.A.P.D. Rather than having every scene feature Taylor and Zavala breaking down doors, firing off guns and talking about their mission to stop the big bad gang leader, Ayer instead slows everything down and gives the audience a chance to look into the characters? lives as more than just officers, but also people, attending weddings and quinceaneras. The timeline stretches over a number of months so we watch the relationship between Taylor and his girlfriend (Anna Kendrick), while also seeing Zavala?s wife (Natalie Martinez) give birth to their first son. A through line has the policemen on the heels of some serious evil developing in the city, but Ayer lets it unfold slowly, bouncing back and forth between the different universes of the characters? lives and placing more importance on the audience understanding who these men are than anything else.

End of Watch is a story about two partners, and Ayer couldn?t have done better casting them than Gyllenhaal and Pena. When Taylor and Zavala are riding around on patrol it feels as though Ayer sent the two actors out for a drive with a camera and told them to just speak naturally in character. Their banter is quick-witted but real, the characters discussing the cons of dating a Latin woman (due mostly to the ridiculous number of quinceaneras that you?ll have to attend), white people and coffee, and dealing with their respective significant others. The officers are as tight as brothers and there isn?t a single moment in the movie where you question it. Both Gyllenhaal and Pena put on brilliant performances, but it?s their chemistry that makes the movie work as well as it does.

End of Watch?s cinematography purports that it?s a found footage movie, but it's decidedly not one. At the start it?s explained that Taylor is taking a film class and making a project about his life as a police officer, which gives Ayer the ability to do a lot of handheld shots and first person perspective. While many directors would say, ?Okay, this is the aesthetic of our movie,? Ayer says, ?Screw that,? and peppers scenes with establishing shots and third person perspective ? again, he takes a lot of chances. By breaking convention and ignoring limitation he ends up delivering the audience a hard look at the unique, rough streets of South Central while also capitalizing on the grittiness, realism and intensity that comes with found footage. They work in harmony and the effect is dazzling.

After my screening of End of Watch I almost felt compelled to speed just so that I would get pulled over and I would have an opportunity to say, ?Thank you.? Ayer has spent just about his entire career chronicling tales of the L.A.P.D., with movies like Training Day, The Fast and the Furious, Dark Blue and Harsh Times, but this movie is something more-- intense, gripping, funny, and absolutely fantastic.

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The Watch

Something strange keeps happening in The Watch, a new Ben Stiller-Vince Vaughn comedy that?s apparently sponsored by Costco, Tide and MAGNUM-brand condoms. Residents of a bucolic Ohio suburb discover that their safe haven has been infiltrated by extraterrestrials, yet they react as if they?re being told a new Starbucks is opening at the corner of Main Street and Grand Ave. Though faced with the threat of extinction due to the impending alien invasion, Vaughn would rather stalk his teenage daughter?s Facebook account and Stiller still frets over an infertility problem that?s preventing he and his wife (Rosemarie DeWitt) from having their first child. Would such personal problems still matter if the end of the world were near? Must we still pretend to care?

Such is the crippling identity problem of The Watch, a movie that desperately wants to be Ghostbusters -- where funny actors confront supernatural happenings -- but doesn?t understand what made Ivan Reitman?s classic tick. Director Akiva Schaffer dresses down his A-list comedians in their best ?Average Joe? impersonations, then pits them against an out-of-this-world opponent. Yet no matter what direction Ghostbusters veered (and it often bobbed and weaved in search of the right joke), every punchline was rooted in the search for and battle with ghosts. The Watch, however, picks up, plays with, then quickly drops its alien conceit every few minutes. It?s never quite sure what do with its sci-fi premise, so it winds up doing very little at all.

Perhaps it wouldn?t matter, anyway. So many extenuating circumstances secretly conspired against The Watch over the past few months, you could reasonably conclude that God was opposed to the movie ever reaching theaters. For starters, the film had to change its title (and rethink its marketing campaign) after the tragic shooting death of Florida teenager Trayvon Martin at the hands of neighborhood watchman George Zimmerman. As if that wasn?t bad enough, a week before The Watch opens, a lunatic opens fire in a Colorado movie theater, making it difficult to belly laugh at currently insensitive jokes about gunplay, shootouts and campaigns to stop the senseless murders in our suburban community. ?Our society has rules,? Stiller tells a crowd after an unfortunate killing in the film?s first act, and we wince at the bad taste of a joke that?s the victim of poor timing.

The Watch would have to be fall-on-the-floor funny to overcome the obstacles outside events have placed in its path. It?s not.

That?s not to say there aren?t amusing moments in The Watch. It?s just that few of them can be traced back to the four leads. Will Forte plays an arrogant small-town cop who?s an outstandingly bizarre foil to Stiller?s straight-guy routine. R. Lee Ermey milks the umpteenth spoof of his deranged Full Metal Jacket drill sergeant, yet still musters a chuckle simply by swearing and imposing his will. And Billy Crudup saunters out of left field to steal a handful of scenes as Stiller?s mysterious new neighbor. We?re supposed to suspect Crudup?s character of being an alien. The reality of his situation provides a much funnier payoff (and allows director Akiva Schaffer?s The Lonely Island colleagues to make a gratuitously gross but humorous cameo).

Everything funnels through the four-man Watch team, and two guys can?t pull weight. Richard Ayoade guards a secret with his deadpan delivery, and Jonah Hill switches gears to play a borderline psychotic eager to patrol in this suburban ?militia.? Vaughn and Stiller, however, turn out carbon copies of characters from their past. The latter has been playing the put-upon dweeb for so long, he at least discovers a new shade to exploit for The Watch. Vaughn, though, retreats right back to the rapid patter and false bravado he first introduced nearly 15 years ago as Trent in Doug Liman?s Swingers. Vaughn has become a parody of himself at this point.

Schaffer is a talented filmmaker responsible for some hilarious skits and segments with The Lonely Island colleagues Andy Samberg and Jorma Taccone. His claim to fame probably remains Lazy Sunday, the digital short he created for Saturday Night Live. But unless you worship at the altar of Hot Rod (which is possible), Schaffer has yet to transition his creative eye to a feature-length effort, and those hoping The Watch finally was going to be his breakthrough comedy will be forced to keep waiting a little while longer.?

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Vantage Point an Awesome Adrenaline Movie to Watch on DVD Despite Plotholes

I'm constantly amazed at how truly entertaining movies with no redeeming social value always seem to get lousy newspaper reviews while artsy fartsy movies like "No Country for Old Men" get great reviews despite having what I consider the worst 15 minute ending in the history of film. "Vantage Point" is the exact opposite of a chick flick, it's the kind of movie guys who like an adrenaline energy rush, love and cool, hip women,enjoy. I'm assuming an uptight woman probably would hate this kind of movie even though there is no sex or sexual exploitation in it. Oh well, you can't have everything!

I go to a movie for one reason and one reason only, to be entertained. I don't go to a movie to think and use my mind. If you liked "Point Break" with Keanu Reeves and "Crank" with Jason Statham, you'll love "Vantage Point".

"Vantage Point" basically tells the story of an assassination of a U.S. President in a foreign country as seen through the eyes and actions of the characters that were at the scene of the assassination: The President (William Hurt), the Secret Service Agent (Dennis Quaid), the Head Secret Service Agent (Matthew Fox), the tourist (Forest Whitaker) and the members of the assassination team. The majority of the movie revolves around flashbacks of each of these characters that all took place at the same time but reveal new details and answers unfolding. Each flashback doesn't repeat most of what happened in the other flashbacks. My sole criticism of the flashbacks is that they are used one too many times and the last one seemed like a anti-climatic annoyance that you knew was coming. After that, the movie resorts to real time again.

As I said, I really enjoyed the movie as I found it 90 minutes of non-stop entertainment. I did note a lot of plotholes which I won't get into here as I don't want to spoil the movie for you. In short I would give this move a solid B+ as I found it quite entertaining, fast paced and unpredictable like a roller coaster ride. If you watch a movie for redeeming social value and to think, this movie is not for you.

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