MOONRISE KINGDOM

Directed by: Wes Anderson
Starring: Jared Gilman, Kara Hayward, Bruce Willis, Edward Norton, Bill Murray, Frances McDormand, Tilda Swinton, Jason Schwartzman

Running Time: 94 min

I think it is fun being a boy scout. You can learn a lot about making camps, fires and all that stuff that can be useful in the nature. Make it as a movie and add Wes Anderson (his recent adventures are: Fantastic Mr.Fox and The Darjeeling Limited) to the mixture, you get something unique and heartwarming without being too melancholic.

This is your typical Wes Anderson film with unique people, dry jokes, dysfunctional family and a soft color tone everywhere.

The tale centers around two kids in the 60s. One a boy scout named Sam (Jared Gilman), the other the EMO girl, Suzy (Kara Hayward) who made a pact one year ago to run away together in the island of New England.

Sam is an orphan and as he escaped he is still in his boyscout uniform. The escape alert the adults led by Capt. Sharp (Bruce Willis), Scoutmaster Ward (Edward Norton) and followed by Suzy's parent (Bill Murray and Frances McDormand) and involving a social worker (Tilda Swinton). They roam the island looking for the two kids and resolving their issues.

The film is not boring at all, in fact it is funny and exciting in a Wes Anderson way. Through their adventures we learn on how the characters deals with their own reality and how this escape puts together the people in the island together.

One of the best element of Moonrise Kingdom is how the dialogue, no matter how dry it is, can evoke a smile or a nod from the audience. I know the whole event in this film felt surreal, but sometimes, aren't we felt a bit surreal when we deal with our problems?

LOOPER

Directed by: Rian Johnson
Starring: Joseph Gordon Levitt, Bruce Willis, Emily Blunt
Running Time: 118 min

“Time travel has not yet been invented. But thirty years from now, it will have been.”

If you had a chance to kill Hitler when he was a baby, would you do it? The paradox and consequences are confusing and it can make a discussion worthy of several days time with so many pizza boxes lying around.

Looper is this year's Inception (which happened to be starred by Joseph Gordon-Levitt too) and Source Code, a sci-fi that relies heavily on the story, not on the flashy gimmick of time travel. It is also not so hard to understood, however you will always find people scratching their head and asking for explanation.

Joseph Gordon-Levitt is Joe, a Looper who lives in the year of 2042 where the future is not so different than our time. The visual of the film reminds you of Blade Runner (1982) and Star Trek (2009), the future is not as flashy as Windows 8 or Apple based operating system but a dystopic gritty neo-noir one.

As a Looper his job is to kill people being sent from the future (is there any grammar nazi left in the future?) who suddenly pop out in a cane field. Without question Joe kill his object. But what if the object he is about to kill is himself (Bruce Willis) from the future? Will he kill 'himself'?

It is best for you to just know a little about the story, since if I tell you more, it will ruin your pleasure. No need to think hard about the paradox, just enjoy the story. It is more than just time travel, it is about consequences of actions, changes in heart, love of a mother to a child (and vice versa) and moral ambiguities. From the first scene you will be hooked until the end and the music is so damn good it will make you breathless, waiting for the end to come.

I think Rian Johnson can add more complexity to the story and still got people's attention. Levitt is good in impersonating Willis's mannerism, although his face looked like as if he got a botox and nose job too good to be true. Bruce Willis looks more menacing here than in The Expendables 2 and I like it when he hold a machine gun, it feels like Die Hard again.

The action is decent and not too much, which is make sense since the budget is only US$30 million. So not enough money to blow up cars or bridges. The strength lies in the music and a well thought story which makes this film one of this year's best.

TED

Directed by: Seth McFarlane
Starring: Mark Wahlberg, Mila Kunis, Seth McFarlane
Running time: 106 min


"When you hear the sound of thunder, / Don't you get too scared. / Just grab your thunder buddy / And say these magic words: / "Fuck you, thunder! / You can suck my dick! / You can't get me thunder / 'Cause you're just God's farts!"

Well, I am not going to say 'fuck you thunder' since I am not afraid of thunder, or spiders, or zombies but I am afraid of Apache helicopters chasing me in a field. As to why it chases me I think it is because I always watch a movie until the last words in the credit title.

Obnoxious, politically incorrect, rude but funny and frank is who Ted is, a stuffed Teddy Bear comes to life after little John wished he had a friend. Fast forward to the future, John (Wahlberg) a 35 year old guy suffering from arrested adolescence. Working on a car rental company with absurd friends, John dates Lori (Kunis), the beautiful but nice girl next door who just happened to have a better career.

As expected bromance vs romance is happening here as John has to choose between his juvenile bromance with Ted or romance with Lori. But it does not end in a conventional way. In fact Lori is the nice girl and John is the one who has to struggle to contain his inner child. The friendship between Ted and John is typical of males where they can insult each other but still being friends.

For those who are 30 years old or more, they can laugh upon so many jokes in this film. First you have Ted being obnoxious and sexist, then you have Sam Jones make a parody of himself as Flash Gordon and then there's Tom Skeritt and Ryan Reynolds.

I didn't remember when the last time I laugh so loud at the cinema. I know the jokes are adults only but I think McFarlane has succeeded in making a brand new adult themed comedy without having to rely on remakes or frat college jokes but on lists of white trash names. May those names still available, if there is a sequel to be made.