We're the Millers Review

From Austin Chronicle...
I do not own this picture/poster. We're the Millers and/or Imp Awards owns it all.

The R-rated comedy gets a little harder with We’re the Millers, pun intended. Among other things, it features an 18-year-old’s swollen, grapefruit-sized testicle on prominent display not once, not twice, but three times. (A pesky tarantula bite causes the gonad’s temporary elephantiasis.) Not since another 18-year-old boinked an apple pie has a movie played teenage male anatomy for such raunchy laughs. It’s only a matter of time until someone crosses the Rubicon with a pants-down, full-on (well, maybe only half-mast) boner that takes good-natured vulgarity to the next graphic level. The question is: Will anyone be shocked? At this rate, it’s unlikely. But if We’re the Millers is any indication, rest assured it will be outrageously funny in the right hands, so to speak.
With its tongue firmly in cheek – as well as in someone’s mouth most of the time – We’re the Millers celebrates family values in a most nontraditional way. It exaggerates the contempt that familiarity can breed between spouses and siblings – the middle finger is the typical means of communication for the members of the faux Miller clan – while depicting the affection and loyalty that develops from the same intimacy. In its own twisted way, it’s a comedic take on the love/hate dynamic that Eugene O’Neill and Edward Albee mined so powerfully in their best work. If you’ve seen the movie’s trailer, you know the storyline. A small-time Denver drug dealer (Sudeikis), who’s deeply in debt to his source, recruits a stripper (Aniston), a geek (Poulter), and a runaway (Roberts) to pose as his wife and kids as part of a plan to smuggle a huge shipment of marijuana from Mexico to the States. His thinking? No one will suspect the gee-willikers foursome of any criminal activity as they cross the international border in a mammoth recreational vehicle packed with enough pot to impress even Willie Nelson. While its plot points are pedestrian at best, the genius – at least, the definite charm – of We’re the Millers is its notion of family as something beyond a simple blood connection, particularly when exigent circumstances create the ties that.


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The Smurfs Sequel Review

From Roger E Bert...
 I do not own this picture/poster. The Smurfs and/or

This weekend, many parents are going to see "The Smurfs 2" under duress. They don't want to disappoint their children, who are wanting to see the film, and won't stop talking about it until they do. As lousy as it is, I won't discourage any parent from going to see "The Smurfs 2." After all, the film's big take-away message is at least partially noble: "love is [not] conditional." Any parent that goes to see "The Smurfs 2" is essentially teaching their children that lesson by example. Adults suffer so that their know-nothing spawn can enjoy all-too-brief happiness: Parenthood 101, right?
Still, you should know that "The Smurfs 2" is a charmless endurance test. It wears you down with tossed-off Smurf-related puns like, "I almost smurfed myself," and "Sometimes, you gotta smurf with the changes." Naturally charming performers like Neil Patrick Harris, Brendan Gleeson, and Hank Azaria are consistently wasted on a script that's like Mad Libs as filled in by a monomaniacal, but schematically programmed spambot ("Well, that was ducked up," one character groans after being transformed into, well, a duck). "The Smurfs 2" is generally moronic and unmoving when it most needs to be cute and disarming. Reluctant parents: you don't need to tell your kids that you won't love them if they like "The Smurfs 2." Instead, you can silently judge them until either you and/or they simply can't bear the thought of talking to each other.


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Growns Up 2 Review

From Variety...
I do not own this picture/poster. Grown Ups 2 and/or Impawards owns it all.
 
The first scene in “Grown Ups 2” depicts a deer urinating directly onto Adam Sandler’s face. The penultimate scene (spoiler alert) depicts the very same deer apparently castrating Taylor Lautner. These bookends are not only the film’s highlights, they also represent the closest it comes to establishing any sort of narrative throughline. Among the slackest, laziest, least movie-like movies released by a major studio in the last decade, “Grown Ups 2” is perhaps the closest Hollywood has yet come to making “Ow! My Balls!” seem like a plausible future project. It is all but guaranteed a strong opening weekend.

SEE MORE: From the July 16, 2013 issue of Variety

A follow-up to 2010’s critically savaged yet massively lucrative “Grown Ups,” this sequel introduces a few changes. Most obviously, although Dennis Dugan is back in the director’s chair and stars Sandler, Kevin James, Chris Rock and David Spade all reprise their roles as high-school buddies turned over-the-hill dads, Rob Schneider is mysteriously missing. But more importantly, while “Grown Ups” made some often cringeworthy attempts to shoehorn maudlin life lessons and character arcs into all the crotch smashing, this sequel barely attempts to function as a piece of narrative filmmaking at all, almost immediately devolving into a hash of frantic, random incidents strung together with the slimmest sliver of coherence

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Chris Copeland to the Pacers. Switching Teams Part 3

From Indy Corn Rows
 I do not own this picture. The NBA and/or Yahoo owns it all.
According to Yahoo! Sports' Adrian Wojnarowski, the Indiana Pacers are nearing a conclusion with New York Knicks free agent Chris Copeland for a two year contract.

 The details of the contract have yet to be revealed, but Indiana will add Copeland as a sharpshooter off the bench. The 29-year-old Copeland was a rookie with the Knicks last year, shooting .421 from three point range in a three-point heavy New York offense. There are understandable concerns about Copeland being a player who can contribute at the same level again this year, but Indiana appears to be willing to take the risk on a two-year deal.

Copeland was easy to take note of when the Pacers played the Knicks this past postseason, with Copeland stepping into three pointers (and hitting them) immediately after checking into the game, going 11-20 from three point range in the six game series. Ideally, Copeland won't be relied on too heavily as a necessary shooter or offensive threat in the second unit, but any offensive potency will prove a welcome sign after last year.

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Despicable Me 2 Review

From Roger Ebert...
 I do not own this picture.  Despicable Me 2 and/or El Poder Delas Ideas owns it all.

I enjoyed 2010's "Despicable Me" immensely, so I approached "Despicable Me 2" with a wary eye. "Despicable Me" told a funny, sweet, self-contained story about a guy named Gru (Steve Carrell) who renounces villainy and embraces fatherhood. It ended on a note that required no further speculation. Satisfied viewers like me sang "So Long, Farewell" to Gru and his crew. Reps at Universal looked at "Despicable Me's" $251 million dollar domestic box office gross and sang "Never Can Say Goodbye." So, another summer weekend brings another summer sequel.
"Despicable Me 2" is as serviceable as it is unnecessary. Therein lies the rub for me. Here I sit on the fence between 2-1/2 and 3 stars, unsure of where I will fall. On the "thumbs down" side, there's dissatisfaction with a returning hero who is far blander than his original incarnation; he's been neutered by the one thing that made "Despicable Me"'s ending so satisfying. On the "thumbs-up" side is a series of clever touches made with love and attention by cast and crew. These moments are so good I almost feel despicable for being undecided. So this review is a battle between Evil Film Critic Odie and Emotional Moviegoer Odie. You have a luxury I currently do not: You can look at the star rating above and see who won.
The opening of "Despicable Me 2" is an example of its brash cleverness. An entire intelligence team and their outpost is attacked by a huge horseshoe magnet straight out of that Warner Bros. cartoon subsidiary, The Acme Company. Almost everyone and everything is pulled comically into the sky and relocated, save for a port-a-potty and its terrified inhabitant. This act of vandalism attracts the attention of the AVI, an organization that tracks and reports the kind of villainy Gru partook in back in the days of  "Despicable Me." The AVI sends out agent Lucy (Kristen Wiig) to ask Gru to use his powers of villainous deduction to figure out who's behind these extreme demonstrations of magnetic personality. Lucy's idea of asking nicely is electrocuting Gru with a "lipstick taser" before tossing him into the trunk of her superspy car-slash-plane-slash-boat.


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Dwight Howard the the Houston Rockets. Switching Teams Part 2

From USA Today...
  I do not own this picture. The NBA and/or Streetball owns it all.

After 20 months of twists and turns in the Dwight Howard saga, a person with knowledge of his decision told USA TODAY Sports he will join the Houston Rockets.
The person spoke on the condition of anonymity because his decision had not yet been announced.
After being traded from the Orlando Magic to the Los Angeles Lakers in a four-team deal a year ago, Howard entered the summer unsure of what he might do because of the awful Lakers season that had unfolded.


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Andre Iguodala to the Nuggets. Switching Teams Part 1

 From the NBA Sports Illustrated...
 I do not own this picture. The NBA and/or Zimbio owns it all.
 The Warriors have agreed to sign unrestricted free agent guard/forward Andre Iguodala to a multi-year contract, according to multiple reports.
Yahoo! Sports reports that Iguodala will receive a four-year, $48 million deal from Golden State. USA Today Sports confirms the terms.
“It’s a great opportunity,” Iguodala told NBA.com. “I’m trying to win a championship.”
To make way for Iguodala’s arrival, the Warriors will trade reserve forward Richard Jefferson and reserve center Andris Biedrins to the Jazz, according to NBA.com and the San Jose Mercury News. The Mercury News and CBSSports.com reported that forward Brandon Rush was also headed to the Jazz . Yahoo! Sports reports that Utah will send guard Kevin Murphy to Golden State and receive “multiple draft picks,” including a first-round pick in 2014 and 2017, in exchange for taking on the contracts.


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