Movies I've Seen - January 2015

After my last movie review, I thought I'd start jotting them down rather than wait a whole year and forget movies released before that same year. Here are the movies I saw in January 2015.

1. Monkey King (2014) - This was another adaptation and highly fantasized telling of Journey to the West. This movie focused on one chapter, telling the origins of the Monkey King and how he rebelled against the Jade Emperor of heaven. In the beginning of the movie, gods and demons were fighting in heaven. If I was a kid, I'd probably enjoy this movie a lot more. It had a horrible script and bad pacing. Events just happen out of nowhere, jumping between scenes. The CGI is on par with late 90s/early 2000s movies. The movie tries to be funny, but fails. Journey to the West (2014) is a better movie.
   
   
   
   
2. The Imitation Game (2014) - Based on the true story of Alan Turing, the father of computer science, when he was hired by the British government with other mathematicians to break The Enigma machine to gain an advantage on Nazi Germany during World War II. Interspersed in the story is his backstory as a kid at a boarding school and when a police investigated a break in to his house later after WWII. They showed his struggles as a homosexual man living in Britain where it was illegal at the time. Great performance by Benedict Cumberbatch. If you haven't seen it, you need to watch it.
   
   
   
   
3. Silver Lining's Playbook (2012) - The movie that gave Jennifer Lawrence the best actress Oscar in 2012. I didn't think her performance were Oscar-worthy compared to other nominees, but her performance was great, nonetheless. Bradley Cooper should have won that year. Most people have seen it, so I'll just post the trailer.
   
   
   
   
4. Taken 3 - There can't be enough Taken movies. This the first movie in the trilogy (so far) that takes place on American soil. The last two movies were in France and Istanbul, chronologically. Things happen, again, forcing Liam Neeson to take matters into his own hands. Deadly stuff, car crashes and Angry Neeson ensues.
   
   
   
   
5. American Sniper - Based on Chris Kyle's autobiography of the same title and his life according to family and friends, American Sniper is about the deadliest sniper in US history. It talked about what he did during the Iraq War after 9/11 and how he handled PTSD. I saw it as an anti-war movie.
   
   
   
   

I'm done.