Blind Sided by the Blind Side

I know, I know…. It’s been a while. But, I’m baaaaaack! I have been a busy kid lately spending a lot of my free time playing Call of Duty (gamer tag: jclawson0) or looking for a job (Can I get a “what what” from my soon to be graduates in the same boat as me) and it has prohibited me from being motivated to write entries. I apologize for my absence and assure you (kind of) that it won’t happen again.

I recently watched the movie the Blind Side (OMG, that movie was like so six months ago! I know I need to get with the times. I also still have a MySpace so sue me). While watching this movie it brought back memories of my years playing football. A big shout out to my fellow 6th grade Jr. Trojans Trent, Denny, Nuss, and everyone else I forgot to mention. Basically you could call us the Cowboys from Little Giants. I got roped into playing on this team with the ‘select few’ and I don’t know why because I was garbage. I managed to rarely play all season, but somehow the highlight of my season was I led the team in interceptions (PUT ME IN COACH!).

Middle school football is kind of a blur in my head seeing as my 7th grade season was brought to a brutal halt after a promotion to the “A” team. Just as I was getting ready to leave my mark and make a name for myself I got raped (not literally… I didn’t go to school here) in a tackling drill that left me rolling around on the ground like a girl (thanks coach, I wasn’t faking it!) with a shattered collarbone.

My freshman year of high school I had the opportunity to be part of quite possibly the worst sports team in my schools history (We went 0-10 and I don’t think we scored more than 10 touchdowns all year. I must say it was truly an honor to be a part of history at a school with such a rich tradition as CG). I was never a good football player and I recognized that. However, I would always find a way to light someone up and look better than I actually was. Me ‘Blind Siding’ someone would usually occur during a punt return. Before the opposing team punted the ball (Keep in mind this probably occurred 4 times all year. We were 0-10 so teams were too busy dancing in the end zone to punt,) I would always pick out the smallest kid. You see, to say that I was weak wouldn’t do me justice. Therefore, I would always pick battles I knew I would win and going after the kid that weighed 88 pounds and looked like this helped ensure that. This was always an enjoyable moment for me especially amidst a 56-0 blowout.

But I digress, and now back to the movie….

Before I give a brief review here are a couple of my initial reactions:

1.)    When did Sandra Bullock become hott? I mean I have never thought she was ugly by any means, but dang I hope my wife is a MILF when she’s 45.

2.)    Country singers can’t be casted as former SEC Basketball stars. I thought that was rule #1 in the film industry.

3.)  The role of Michael Orr did not require a lot of acting or speaking so why not cast this guy?

4.)  Do all high school football coaches down south no nothing about football? Or was it just that character?

I feel that this movie was successful at what it was trying to get across: A ’feel good’ story showing that people can come from nothing and have success. There was much less actual football playing than I had anticipated, but I was still pleased by the overall story. I enjoyed how they got all of the SEC coaches to participate in this film because it gives many viewers who know nothing about the recruiting process more of an inside look to how intense it can be. Believe me, as a senior in high school it was quite the experience for me to have Roy Williams, Bill Self, and Coach K over for dinner all in the same week. I had to decline all of their offers however because my little brother couldn’t get any sweet deals from them (movie reference).The movie however is fairly predictable (Especially if you read the book, ha ha.. I am hilarioussssss). However, even having not read the book, I was still able to control the plot of the movie accurately in my head.

I was not a fan of the opening seen that introduced ‘Big Mike’ for a couple of reasons and here is why:

      1.)   If you are going to showcase a characters athleticism by having him put on a dunk fest like he is Shawn Kemp on NBA Jam, try to make it look a little more realistic. This part was just cheesy and coming from an avid fan of dunking (another topic for another day.. but I got hops..) and ticked me off.

      2.) The relationship between Michael and the little kid he was shooting around with was hardly described. Did they both get into the school? We’re they still friends? Are they not friends according to Facebook (Thanks South Park)? Did Michael sleep with his mom so they aren’t on talking terms? Do they still play Call of Duty: Modern Warfare online together? All of these questions were left unanswered for me.. I just spent much of the movie trying to figure out where that kid went. I was eventually able to make the connection that he dropped out and started running with the bad crowd in the wrong neighborhood. I also realized the underlying message then was probably if you get an opportunity to get out of town and do something great you can take it and run with it, like Orr did, or not, like that other guy and eventually get yourself killed. Which was a good message don’t get me wrong, but my head hurts now from doing all of that thinking and that is not any reason for me to watch a movie. In a nutshell, I would of liked to have seen a little more character/relationship development.

All in all it was a pretty good ‘movie’, and a subpar sports movie. However, The Blind Side did a great job of luring girls into watching a sports movie. In all honesty, I think it might be a movie that is more targeted towards females due to my reaction and response to this movie. Guys started out excited to watch a sports movie with their sugar momma and left a little let down from a sports stand point. Whereas, the chicks were mad that they couldn’t watch The Notebook again because it wasn’t their night to pick the movie, but in the end they loved this movie because they got to be emotional and shed a tear or two over a truly heartwarming story.

Overall, I give it 2.5/5 Claws

Hit us up at clawandnussreviews@gmail.com with hate mail, love letters, questions, and comments. We appreciate your feedback and follow us on twitter @ClawtomicBAUM for daily movie quotes!

And I’m out,

-0 The Claw

Date Night at Date Night

So its not everyday that my girlfriend and I get to go on a date. Living and going to school’s eight hours apart makes it somewhat difficult. Because of this, we usually have plenty of time to plan out what we are going to do when we do see each other. When I first saw the trailer for Date Night, I knew it would be one that we would go see. I would be in Athens the weekend it premiered, and Emily and I have been systematically catching up on all episodes of The Office (just finished Season 5!) so we are both big Steve Carell fans. So this past weekend we embarked on the most common of dates, dinner and a movie.

The movie centers around a couple (Carell and Tina Fey) tired of the everyday mundane. They decide they are going to have a special night for just the two of them at a chic restaurant in Manhattan. This is when everything goes wrong. After they take someone’s reservation at the restaurant, they are mistaken for another couple that has a beef with a major mob boss. The rest of the movie is an attempt to resolve this big misunderstanding. As a rule, plots that center around ‘big misunderstanding’s’ drive me nuts. I am the type that is always trying to find a logical way that the issue could be resolved, and of course that never happens. So if the movie was any longer than its short 90 minutes, I may have pulled my hair out.

Date Night addresses true love from a different angle than is typical for Hollywood. It makes it real. Love is more about a dedication to the other person. It recognizes the fact that it is not all roses and fireworks. From that point, I found the realness of the plot refreshing. Its not Romeo and Juliet, its just your average couple trying to navigate the day-to-day.

The movie has some funny parts. Fey and Carell do not disappoint. One of my biggest worries was that Carell would play his same Micahel character from the Office. However, he does a great job of changing it up and his part is not marked by extreme awkwardness and silliness. Much of the comedy revolves around typical middle-aged disconnect from pop culture between the couple. I can say with certainty that had any other people been cast for the main roles, the movie would have flopped miserably. The gag reel at the end shows that the two had a blast working together and that they were given a lot of room to ad lib. A cameo by James Franco is also a high part of the film.

All in all, the movie is just ok. As I said, the main plot conflict is weak and does not lead to any of the comical parts of the film. Mark Wahlberg’s entire part is weak and seems out of sync with the rest of the movie. There are a few unnecessarily crude parts and an F bomb that is forced at best. It seems that the movie wasn’t as fun to watch as it was to make. Leaves you wondering what a good story would have done when paired with two of the funniest people in the business.


2.5 stars out of 5

My 1-5 Hitters

My 1-5 Hitters

I apologize for taking so long to get back to this post, but I had to finish up some research, and I can only move as fast as Netflix. This will be the first of hopefully many great Top Five lists to come. Just in time for Opening Day this week, here are my Top 5 Baseball Movies of all-time.

#5 Rookie of the Year
While the premise of the movie is the most far-fetched of the Top 5, how can I not put a movie about the Cubbies on the list? The movie shows some great parts of a game at Wrigley, from riding the train to sitting in the bleachers. Directed by Daniel Stern, this one has a lot of the Home Alone team. A good family movie that has lots of laughs.

#4 Field of Dreams
Few quotes have been immortalized like “if you build it they will come.” Easily Kevin Costner’s best baseball flick (see Bull Durham if you want to be disappointed or For Love of the Game if you want a chick flick). Field of Dreams is a movie that carefully examines relationships (especially father-son) through the magic of baseball. It’s amazing how such a seemingly impossible film can engross you to the point that you no longer question the ghosts of former baseball players playing in a cornfield. Both Costner and James Earl Jones are great. The movie is more than baseball, its reconciliation, its fate and destiny. A true classic from the heartland of America.

#3 The Natural
This is a guy’s baseball movie. The film succinctly captures what often goes on in the male psyche. The desire to be someone, for people to know you. But more importantly, Roy Hobbs just wanted to play ball. Robert Redford is great and truly looks (sorry for the cliché) natural as a baseball player. Some parts of the movie are just frustrating, but that’s life, and that’s why they’re in there. You want to get out of your chair and yell at Hobbs for staying with the skank, but that’s the choice he made. As the movie says, there’s “The life we learn with and the life we live with after that.” This is a comeback story, that captures the very essence of baseball in a time before instant replay and steroids. Hobbs embodies everything that is good and pure about the sport. He’s not in it for the money, he just wants to play and give it his all.

#2 Major League I & II
So I cheated on this one a little bit. In order to get another movie on the list I clumped both of these movies together, but its my blog, my rules. These movies are among the best in sports comedies. Both are chock full of one-liners from “Are you telling me Jesus Christ can’t hit a curveball?” to “Mine were the deadest!” However, as far as one-liners, Bob Uecker steals the show. Bob not only solidifies the fact that he’s the only thing worth his pay in the Brewers franchise, but also shows some talent as an actor as he portrays the bumbling drunk sportscaster of a dying ball club. The baseball is fairly realistic and the plots are believable enough. What is more important is the common theme. Whether its Margaret Whitton trying to move to Miami or “Wild Thing” Rick Vaughn changing his image to become more marketable, the movies stick to the fact that baseball transcends money, and it makes them a must watch every season.

#1 The Sandlot
While this movie is about baseball, it is more about growing up. Just watching the kids dink around on their field reminds me of summers when my friends and I would play on our own version. Sometimes we had to steal sand from a nearby volleyball court to fill in the infield or to soak up the water, sometimes we would head over to Hampton’s Market for a Jones Soda before the second half of the double billing. But no matter what, we had a good time. That is what this movie is about. Kids growing up and having fun. The movie perfectly captures what young boys do in the summer and perfectly emphasizes the unbreakable bond that is baseball and summertime.


What all of these films capture is the transcendence of baseball, that baseball endures. Neither time, nor money, nor anything else can change baseball. It is truly America’s pastime and in many ways symbolizes what it is to live the American Dream. I know this may have gotten a little sappy, but its true. Most of these films show how baseball can bring people together. Some of my fondest memories of high school are of watching the CG baseball team. Whether it was travelling to Cathedral (shoutout to Pete and Dave G), or playing at the sandlot, or meeting up with old friends to go to a Cubs game, baseball has produced some great memories. These films capture that essence, and the excitement that is Opening Day. So fire up the grill, grab some dogs, sit back and enjoy the game. You’ll be happy you did.

Go Cubs Go!

-Nuss

What are your Top 5 baseball movies of all time?

Obi Wan-derland: A joint Review of Ghost Writer and Alice and Wonderland

Both of these movies are ones that I have wanted to see, but convincing people to see them with me was difficult.  For Alice, the problem was that most of my friends were deterred by the typical dark spin that Burton tends to put on his films.  Ghost Writer on the other hand had an entirely different problem unrelated to the film except in its title.  When you ask someone if they want to see Ghost Writer it sounds a lot like Ghost Rider.  Ghost Rider is where Nicolas Cage sells his soul to become a hell-raising, motorcycle riding, vigilante ablaze.  Not exactly the political conspiracy drama that is Ghost Writer.  But alas, I was able to convince two different groups to see the films, and on the same night (don’t worry I actually paid for both films, no illegal double feature here).

The night began with a 3D trip (trip is good in both senses of the word) into Wonderland.  The movie is somewhat of a sequel to the Disney animated classic and references Alice’s first trip to “Underland” on a couple of separate occasions.  The plot is a sort of fantasy exploration and medieval epic hybrid.  Alice is the chosen one, fated to kill the dragon and set everyone free from the tyrannical Red Queen.  The details to much of the plot are underdeveloped and there is almost no explanation of what happened between the two installments.  The characters were all over the place from a March Hare (who clearly had more than just tea to drink) to Johnny Depp’s Mad Hatter (who for some inexplicable reason gave a William Wallace-esque pre-battle speech, Scottish accent and all).  Much like in Avatar, the 3D presentation of the film is stunning and the sceneries are spectacular.  However, Alice had a couple of unnecessary uses of the technology that came across as cheap 3D tricks.  To be honest, the overall “you go girl” theme actually didn’t bother me a whole lot, but the weak resolution leaves you wanting more.  I usually don’t like Tim Burton films because of his bleak portrayal of the human condition, so I don’t know why I expected this one to be different

1.5 out of 5 Stars

Needless to say, any doubts I had about watching four hours of movies in theaters were lost after the first film.  I had to see another to get the bad taste out of my mouth.  I was excited to watch James Bond (Pierce Brosnan) and Obi-Wan Kenobi (Ewan McGregor) team up in a political conspiracy drama.  With the exception of the blatant bashes against the CIA and the war on terrorism, the plot was intriguing.  McGregor’s character (known simply as The Ghost throughout the entire film) is thrown into a job writing a memoir for the ex-Prime Minister of Great Britain (Brosnan).  He is to replace the previous writer who’s accidental death seems more than suspicious.  The movie turns into a sort of mystery thriller as McGregor tries to follow what little clues he has found to get to the root of a greater conspiracy.  While it does not usually bother me, the movie starts out slow, and lacks the feeling of momentum necessary to continue at such a pace.  A few aspects of the plot kind of leave the viewer hanging, expecting more to come.  McGregor does a good job as the innocent bystander wrapped into a complex web he could not have foreseen.  He is not on any political quest for justice or ideological tirade which is refreshing.  Rather, he just wants to know what happened and why the pieces do not seem to fit together.  Kim Cattrall’s character was one of the lowlights of the film as she was both forgettable and unnecessary.  After going over the movie and writing the review, I feel as if I was harsher on it than I meant to be.  Don’t get me wrong, I was entertained by this movie and at  parts it is thoroughly engaging.  I just don’t know if it is a film that one would want to watch again and again.

3.5 out of 5 Stars

All in all it was a good night for movies.  I was disappointed by the first (but would still rarely pass up a chance to see a Disney movie in 3D) and the second was much better, but still had some room for improvement.  Hopefully after reading this, you too are not feeling like you chased a rabbit down a hole and bumped your head.

The First Annual Baum Awards

With the Academy Awards this weekend, I’ve decided to give my own awards.  Reader warning:  this will have nothing to do with the criteria that the Academy uses to determine its award winners.  My awards will be given out based on nothing more than my own personal preferences.  And since these are my awards, I will do them a little differently.  Eligibility is determined by whether or not I saw the film in theaters since the last Academy Awards.  Glad that’s all out of the way…on with the show!

Best Animated Movie

Disney Pixar’s Up

This film showed a new side of Pixar. Up is a heartfelt tale of a boy growing up and a man remembering how to be a kid. Pixar greatly redeems itself after the flop that was WALL-E and turns out another animation great. While some of the plot is heavier than a normal Disney family film, it gives the depth to the storyline that resonates with audiences. Adventure, imagination, comedy, and even a little romance all find there way into the latest masterpiece from Disney Pixar.

Best Actor

Christoph Waltz as Col. Hans Landa in Inglourious Basterds

I know that this was a supporting role, but since I decided not to differentiate this year, Waltz wins the Baum.  His character is fundamental in developing a disgust and hate for the Nazis in the film.  The scene where he eats the strudel burns contempt into the viewers heart, and his monologue at the film’s onset stunningly gives insight into the psyche of the man they call the “Jew Hunter.”

Best Actress

Vera Farmiga as Alex Goran in Up In the Air

To be honest, this category was extremely slim pickings.  But, Vera did do a very good job.  Her character was portrayed as the modern woman, the independent woman.  The woman that got what she wanted when she wanted it, but in the end there was also a softer side.  Without giving away the ending, I’ll just say she wins because she fooled me (ok that may give away the ending).

Worst Picture

Public Enemies

This is the second gangster film with two stud actors that has severely disappointed me (see American Gangster). Bale and Depp are both average at best, and the story is extremely weak. While I realize that it is based upon true events, much of the dialogue between Dillenger and his girl had to be created for this film anyways. The plot takes you nowhere and leaves you with a film that has a couple hours of nothing between the few clips that were shown on the trailers.  To be honest, Wolfman was probably worse (read my review!) but this one was much more disappointing and therefore wins the Baum.

And the Baum for Best Picture goes to…

The Book of Eli

Denzel Washington is truly at his finest (a close runner-up for best actor). The post-apocalyptic plot is not like most, in that it does not have any holes and there aren’t any zombies. While some discard the film as religious drivel, it actually does a great job of addressing the interesting theme of what role religion plays in society. The intense action and subsequent gore will deter some, but in no way is it overdone. I was afraid that this would be a Boondock Saints type movie where the Bible is misquoted in order to justify murder and vigilantism. That is not the case at all. Denzel is simply on a mission from God, following a faith that he does not always understand. The colors and music add to a great story that is executed well.  I could go on for a while about different themes throughout this film, but will save your weary reading eyes.  Just know that it wins my approval and the first annual Baum for Best Picture.

I would love to hear your comments on my choices and even your own award winners.  Please send an e-mail to clawandnussreviews@gmail.com and I will post my favorites in an upcoming blog.

Word Life.

-Nuss