Frequent Flyer from Gabriel Leigh on Vimeo.

I saw M:I:III on opening day.  It was much as Ebert had said it would be - 2 hours of non-stop action.  Is that good, eh, is that bad, eh.  I'm a fan of the action flick, however Mission Impossible is not supposed to be an action series, it's supposed to be intelligent film/television.  The first Mission Impossible movie was not bad, there was some thinking involved, and required.  The second film pretty much abandoned plot, and in its third iteration, the plot is completely a by product something to fill the 2-3 minute segments between action sequences.

There were several times in the movie that I literally laughed out loud at the "drama" unfolding before me.  That's not to say it wasn't dramatic, it was, my problem was that I wasn't as tied up in the moment as the film makers might have liked.  It was obvious what the outcome of this dramatic moment must be in order for the film to continue, and the inevitable ending to come to be.  There was one plot twist that I was angry at myself for not catching, however for now I'm going to say that was one there weren't any clues to, other than simply a Maverick style plot twist, but I'll have to watch the film again to see if there were any clues I missed.

Bottom line - Great action, get lost in the action and don't look to far beyond the current moment, otherwise it will be entirely too predictable.

So I watched "Swing Kids" today it's a great movie I encourage you to watch if if you haven't...

So I spent last weekend in St. Louis, and got to see a couple of movies. One was great, one was, um not.

I saw the third installment of the American Pie franchise, "American Wedding" on Saturday night. It was pretty damn funny, there was a bit of tearing up on my part from laughing so hard. If you are a big fan of Stiffler, and Finch then this is the American Pie movie for you. For me I still felt the 2nd one was the best.

Side note - this was the second nite in a row that we attempted to go and see the movie, the first night the movie theater had mysteriously dissappeared. We found the sign for the theater, but the theater itself was no where to be found, you laugh, but I promise it could happen to you, unless of course you live in Ames or another small little town.

The other movie we saw was "Swimming Pool." Synopsis don't go see it. That is all that really needs to be said, but I know that since it's getting such rave reviews, some of you might need some convincing. Here's the deal, this movie wasn't bad, it just wasn't good. I'm not against thinking movies, but when a movie tries to be a thinking movie just for the sake of being a thinking movie, I tend to have problems with it. This movie was lacking in real plot, character development, and ending. My only deduction is that this movie was in the neighborhood of 4-6 hours when first written/filmed, and then it got cut, and cut, and cut, and no one bothered to watch in once it was spliced back together, until the premiere, and by then it was too late.

Also spent a bit of time down at "The Landing" in search of a good time, it had apparently left earlier with all of the people, so we followed suit, and headed out. The Landing was a bit like a wanna-be Bourbon Street. Down to the uneven bricks. What it was lacking was more than 2 blocks of bars, people, and a good time. I was pretty dissappointed, but so it goes I guess.