This Summer was packed with some of the most exciting movies of the year (“Transformers,” “Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince,” “Star Trek” and the list goes on,) and somewhere lost in the middle of the cinematic awesomeness was “The Proposal,” starring Sandra Bullock and Ryan Reynolds.

I’ll admit that I am a fan of the romantic-comedy genre, and this film delivers some cute, good laughs. But that is about it.

Plot Summary

The story begins with Margaret Tate (Bullock); a successful, uptight and generally hated editor-in-chief of a publishing company, who is told she is being deported back to Canada. To save her life in America, she forces her assistant who despises her, Andrew Paxton (Reynolds), to marry her in exchange for a promotion. To make the engagement seem legitimate, Andrew drags Margaret to a secluded Alaskan town that his family owns. Yes, Andrew’s family is filthy rich, and yet it is his goal to become an editor without the financial help of his family. He wants to make it on his own. He’s the touchingly typical good guy.

Upon reaching Andrew’s hometown, Margaret meets his family, including sweet, eccentric Grandma Annie, played by Betty White. The family buys into the fake romance. Margaret is treated to all the bridal festivities, including a very strange striptease from the town waiter/evangelist/wannabe Chippendale’s dancer. This is when Margaret starts feeling the consequences of her actions. She grows a heart and feels guilty for lying to Andrew’s entire family, all the while falling in love with him. And, surprise surprise, Andrew begins falling in love with her; only he does not realize it until Margaret leaves him at the altar (and it takes a strong woman to leave Ryan Reynolds, even if it is for the right reasons). But never fear, Andrew has a revelation and flies back to New York City just in time to save Margaret’s job and love. It’s disappointing that real life can’t be this way, but that’s what Hollywood is for.

The Pros and Cons

Let’s be honest here, the main characters are gorgeous. That’s attention grabbing in itself (no girl is going to say that seeing an almost naked Ryan Reynolds would not make their day, and even the guys wouldn’t mind a little peek at Sandra Bullock). Bullock and Reynolds are an easy-to-love comedic pair. Reynolds is likable with his easy sarcasm, while Bullock has to work for the audiences love in such an uptight role, but she pulls it off well. 1 point for Pros.

While there are some good comedic moments, such Grandma Annie (White) encouraging Margaret and Andrew to have premarital sex with the uber-gross family “baby maker” blanket or Margaret singing “Window to the Wall” with said grandma in the middle of the woods, there is really nothing new or fresh. The acts will still get a chuckle, but it is still nothing special. It’s the same jokes, puns, and stunts audiences have seen before. 1 point for Cons.

Perhaps the saving grace of this movie is, of course, the romance. It’s totally unbelievable that Andrew, who hated Margaret so much for a number of years, could fall in love with her in such a short amount of time. Some could argue that’s true love, I say that’s crap. But it is still a sweet thought and I’m a complete sucker for happy endings. The audience will know how this story ends before the previews even start, but the truth is, that’s just fine. It’s a typical, expected ending viewers will eat up. 1 point for Pros.

The Final Score

Pros: 2

Cons:1

This movie, however stereotypical, is still enjoyable. It’s as cute and sugary sweet as chocolate bunnies at Easter, and everyone could use some candy once in a while. Viewers probably won’t believe the ending, but they’ll still feel better knowing it ended correctly.

See it or Skip it?

See it. It’s not wonderfully awesome, but it is worth renting (since it is now out on DVD and Blue-ray). I would suggest renting before buying, however, because some of you may not be suckers like I am. It’s a perfect date movie or for a night-in with friends. For this movie, expect the expected and you’ll come out happy.

Photo from TouchStone

Video from YouTube

In essence, the title of this article is about the best way to describe the movie, “The Texas Chainsaw Massacre”. This movie has almost no noticable positive aspects. It wasn’t scary, it wasn’t very suspenseful, the acting in the movie was extremely shitty and the pattern of events in the movie allowed the viewer to easily predict pretty much everything to happen next through the entire movie. Provided, many different versions of the movie have been made, so maybe one of them is scary, but not the version that I saw. Even if you’ve never seen a horror movie before in your life, you could sit down and watch this movie and it probably wouldn’t really scare you one bit.

In the movie, five teenagers, or college students (the movie doesn’t specify), are on a roadtrip. They pick up a strange man who’s walking on the side of the road and offer him a ride. The man turns out to be completely insane, and when he attacks the characters with a knife, they immediatly stop and kick him out of the car. The man leaves a strange mark on their car with his own blood as they drive off. The teenagers stop at a gas station a little bit further down the road, and discover that the gas station has no gas, and the owner tells them to come back the next day. They drive over to an old house and decide to stay there. As they end up finding out, the man who owns the house just next door is a psycho maniac who kills people with his chainsaw and one by one as they visit his house, be picks them off until Sally, the only one of the five teenagers left alive, is forced to run from this killer when he’s eliminated the rest of her friends. Sally ends up uncovering a conspiricy going on between this killer, the owner of the gas station, and the strange man they picked up on the road, and she’s forced to fight for her life against all three of them.

The story sounds pretty cool, but when it needed to be made into a movie, the idea was definitly put into the wrong hands. All throughout the movie, the actors act like they have no experience at all. Also, the way that the killer pops up and takes out all the main characters isn’t frightening at all. In fact, the way it happens is like a pattern that eventually becomes extremely predictable. The first character who dies enters the house of the killer, and the killer comes out and hits him, knocks him out and cuts up his body with his chainsaw. The next character goes in to find him because she was with him when he entered the house, and she’s also killed. So naturally, another one of their friends comes looking for them, and when he comes to the killer’s house well, gee, what do you think is going to happen? Sure enough, he dies in the exact same way that his first two friends did.

The reason this move was so shitty was mainly because of the acting, and how predictable it was. There are some rather gruesome parts of this movie, but nothing in this movie is really all that scary. Also, there are too many things in this movie that weren’t explained in the end, or at least, if they were explained, they definitly weren’t explained very well. If you’re really into good horror films, this definitly isn’t a movie for you. Actually, if you’re really into good movies at all, this isn’t a movie for you.

Editor’s note: Peter Mason is our Life Manager and an avid watcher of film; mainly those made in this decade. So keep an eye out for his reviews as we give him old classics and watch him get bored. So check out the trailer for this film as well:

The following is an in-depth discussion of the book: Fight Club.

“If you’re male and you’re Christian and living in America, your father is your model for God. And if you never knew your father, if your father bails out or dies or is never at home, what do you believe about God?” What do you believe about God? We believe what we are told about God. But look at your relationship with your father; the lack there of, the past, and the present. Now look at your relationship/view of God. See the similarities?

In Fight Club, both Tyler Durden and the unnamed narrator have no relationship with their fathers, due to both a complete absence and a bail out. Because of this misfortune neither Tyler nor the narrator grew up with a strong masculine figure in their life, which impacted both differently. The narrator seemingly becomes the guy who settles for things, the guy who works 9 p.m to 5 p.m, never questioning, never changing. On the other hand Tyler appears to be more of a macho, masculine man and this is what draws the narrator to him upon their meeting.

After a business trip the narrator arrives at his apartment only to find it blown to smithereens; his perfect life seemingly ruined. Everything he had worked for and paid for was burnt, shattered and sprinkled all over the block. Upon seeing this, he calls Tyler, thinking “deliver me, Tyler” hoping for an escape; for a savior. Just as he had hoped for, Tyler pulls through and offers to meet the narrator at a bar and offers him shelter with one stipulation: “I want you to hit me as hard as you can.” The narrator punches Tyler, and Tyler punches back … soon enough a crowd is drawn and the beginnings of fight club is seen as well as a bond between the narrator and Tyler.

“The first rule of fight club is you don’t talk about fight club … the second rule of fight club is you don’t talk about fight club.” Tyler quickly steps up as leader of this group and is soon recognized as more than another member, but almost a deity. To all of these average, 9 to 5 working men, Tyler is something they all long to be; someone they can look up to. Tyler does becomes their god, despite the relationship how good or how bad any of them have with their fathers. Tyler is their fight club father, he is their leader, and their dictator.

After the narrator moves in with Tyler the bond between the two is strengthened all the time. Tyler begins by teaching the narrator how to make soap, explaining “with enough soap … you could blow up the whole world.” From that day on the narrator seems to become more and more involved with Tyler’s life; going to work with him sabotaging fancy dinner parties, going to fight club and admiring Tyler’s leadership. Soap making becomes more than just a hobby; it is now a source of income.

While Tyler seems to be nothing but a good guy, things begin to get out of control. While the narrator is finally able to overcome his insomnia and sleep more, Tyler is out causing trouble. Fight clubs spring up all over the U.S., and Tyler becomes this mysterious figure. Then, from the various fight clubs, Project Mayhem emerges with the goal to “blast the world free of history.” When the narrator discovers this, his insomnia returns and is often unable to find Tyler. The narrator discovers the mayhem and mischief that is being caused by Tyler’s deadly project, but is still confused about what exactly is happening. To figure out what Tyler has done, he asks many of the project members, but all of them refuse to tell him anything stating “the first rule about Project Mayhem is you don’t talk about Project Mayhem.” While from a religious sense God is not trying to make us all his monkeys in the destruction of the world; Project Mayhem reflects often what life is. We are educated and trained in a specific field, but for what? To those unknowing — which is most everybody — the big picture is unclear and only the small, minuscule details are in focus. “The fifth rule about Project Mayhem is you have to trust Tyler.”

While the Project Mayhem members seem content with their mindless jobs and assignments, the narrator isn’t. He has to know where Tyler is, and then sets out on a nationwide search for him. The narrator’s search for Tyler is much like many religous people seeking God. He was seemingly there at one time and everything made sense, but we fall asleep for a few hours and everything is gone, everything is a mystery; Tyler … God, doesn’t make sense anymore. After an exhausting search, the narrator finally finds relief from his insomnia in Seattle, only to finally find Tyler.

The discovery of Tyler would seem to be the end of the narrator’s journey, but it is not. Tyler then reveals more and more about what he has done while the narrator was sleeping. When we finally “find” God, we think it’s finally over, but more questions and more events unfold that begin to baffle us even more. It’s only in the end are we able to haggle and come to terms with God; it’s only in the end we are able to haggle and come to terms with our inner demons.

If our idea of God is similar to that of our fathers … what about those with no fathers? They will eventually find a male figure in their life, and suddenly, they are God. Everything they’ve ever wanted to be, they are. Tyler Durden proved to be a willing candidate for a father figure, a model for God, perhaps; a spokesperson for change and action. Tyler Durden became the epitome of perfection for the members of fight clubs around the nation, and the selfless Project Mayhem members. To the narrator, Tyler was the father figure he never had … a model for God he never had.

Check out a pivotal scene from the film “Fight Club”, based on the above book: