Album Review: Kanye West- The Collage Dropout

Rap went through a tough time in the 2004-2008 era, it was dying, and at one point it was almost dead, why? Eminem was on hiatus after releasing the mediocre Encore, Jay-Z and 50 Cent both released music that I wish never came out, and repetitive rappers who have little talent took the spot light, only very few rappers during that era where actually good, rappers like Game, and T.I both gave rap strong enough pushes to keep it going for a short while, and then there is Kanye West, the man who was the reason why rap was still alive during that rough era, but was Kanye good from the beginning? I'd say yes, his first album 'The Collage Dropout' was one of the best albums of the 2000s, the best album to come out in 2004, and the second greatest Kanye album after 2007's 'Graduation'.

Kanye's first album opened with 'We Don't Care' a track which was lyrically genius, and had a beat and rhythm to compliment the lyrics, the second song on the album 'All Falls Down' was strong, in both lyrics, and the beat, but it did not do a excellent job rythemly, the third song 'Spaceship' was passable, the lyrics where good enough, the beat was slow, and the rhythm was also really slow, which gave this song a boring feel.

The album has many highlights, many tracks that where strongly memorable, such as my favorite track on the album, which was a track where Kanye openly explains his faith in the music industry, called 'Jesus Walks' a song that can easily be defined as a masterpiece, another track 'Get em' High' was the second best on the album, which was acceptable lyrically, but the beat and rhythm easily made up for it.

The College Dropout featured a few weak tracks, such as 'Family Business' a slow track lyrically, and rythemly, or 'Last Call' a mixed track, which went as long as twelve minutes, the problem with that is that the song was too long.

The Collage Dropout is definitely an album which surpasses most of the 'talent' in the 2004-2008 era, it was extremely successful in almost every aspect thinkable for music, and overall, it was a strong enough to keep rap alive until Kanye's next album came out.


Album Rating:-

-Lyrics(out of 8)= 8
-Content(out of 8)= 7
-Flow(out of 8)= 7
-Rhythm (out of 8)= 7

-Beats(out of 8)= 7

Total Rating(out of 40)= 36

5 Stars

*Rating System:

0- 7= 0 Stars

8- 14= 1 Star

15- 21= 2 Stars

22- 30= 3 Stars

31- 35= 4 Stars

36- 40= 5 Stars

Album Review: Eminem- The Slim Shady EP

We all know that Eminem started his career with Infinite, but when did he start with his 'Slim Shady' career? If someone says 'the Slim Shady LP' then that means that they were wrong, Eminem's Slim Shady character was introduced back in 1997, in an 8 track EP called 'The Slim Shady EP'.

'The Slim Shady EP' was the first appearance of Eminem's Slim Shady character, the EP explains the origin, and style of Slim Shady and it also tells the world that there will be no limits on the intensity of his lyrics.

There was allot of potential on the Slim Shady EP, because it's Eminem's EP, it goes into a much darker direction, and it's something that nobody has ever tried, but did it live up to its potential? I'm gonna say yes.

The Slim Shady EP was generally very different from many hip-hop EPs or albums, it described Slim Shady with heavy details, and finds the most entertaining way to do it, it opens with a one minute skit that describes how Slim Shady was created, the skit was good, but I think that it could have had more detail and creativity, the second track 'Low, Down, Dirty' let's people in the messed up lyrical style of Slim Shady, it also was one of the best songs on the album, 'Just Don't Give a F_ck' was a classic, it tells everyone that he will keep rapping with his intense and violent lyrics, whether they like it or not 'No One is Iller' featured D12, It was another great track about the album, and it explains that there is nobody with Iller lyrics than Slim Shady.

The worst tracks on the album are probably 'If I Had' which was very repetitive and boring, 'Murder, Murder' was okay, it was dark and intense, but at the same time it was slow, another error of this EP is the length, it's only 8 tracks, which make the errors seem bigger than they really are.

The Slim Shady EP is an excellent introduction to Slim Shady, Eminem developed and improved his skills lyrically and creatively in this EP, despite a few minor errors, the music in the Slim Shady EP makes Eminem sound like he was rapping for a long time, it also got Eminem to a level where he can be compared to rappers like Tupac or Dr. Dre.

Album Rating:-

-Lyrics(out of 8)= 7
-Content(out of 8)= 6
-Flow(out of 8)= 7
-Rhythm (out of 8)= 7
-Beats(out of 8)= 6
Total Rating(out of 40)= 33
4 Stars


*Rating System:
0- 7= 0 Stars
8- 14= 1 Star
15- 21= 2 Stars
22- 30= 3 Stars
31- 35= 4 Stars
36- 40= 5 Stars

Movie Review: Batman Begins

It's amazing on how much Hollywood depends on remakes and reboots, especially with movies that came out in the 80s, or movie franchises that reached their lowest, the 80s group include 'Clash of the Titans', 'The Karate Kid', and 'Dinner for Schmucks', as for movie franchises, there will be 'Superman' or 'Spider-Man' reboots, but what popularized remakes? Which movie franchise was bad enough to press a 'restart' button, that answer is easy: Batman, after two embracing movies that included nipple-costumes, bad acting, and weak characters, Warner Bros. decided to restart the entire series, which was better than ending the franchise or making another sequel, because 'restarting' a series can open up new doors, or lead the franchise into more success, and that's what Batman Begins did.

This new Batman movie went to a different direction, it was darker, and more realistic then any other super-hero movies I've ever seen, which lead to allot of great ideas for the movie, some of those ideas include the plot and events of the movie, the plot is about Bruce Wayne becoming Batman, which seems like a simple plot, but it's events actually more confusing then I thought, there are multiple flashback scenes, some during Wayne's childhood about how he developed his fear of bats, and some during the time when Bruce Wayne was in the beginning of his adult years, developing his skills and facing his fears, both of those flashback events, perfectly built the character, the environment around him, and why he became Batman, however, all of those flashback events in the movie lead to some confusion and made the story seem a bit slow.

As I mentioned, Batman Begins was targeted to go to a more realistic direction, which means that the 'Batmobile' does not look like a sports car, the villains are not cartoonish, and there are no predictable action scenes, Batman Begins gave us darker and more realistic villains, action scenes that give me a 'thriller' feeling, and a Batmobile that actually looked protective and something that someone who's saving people would drive, Batman Begins did it all, which gave Batman begins a more positive and likable feel.

Batman Begins is one of the best super-hero movies to come out, having a few minor flaws, Batman Begins has allot to appreciate, and allot to enjoy, it gave me more thrills then most other super-hero movies to come out, and that's one of the many major reasons why Batman Begins is a work of art.


*Movie Rating:-

-Acting(out of 6)= 6
-Story(out of 8)= 7
-Plot(out of 8)= 6
-Actions(out of 6)= 5
-Effects(out of 4)= 4
-Character Developement(out of 8)= 8
*Overall Rating(out of 40)= 36
5 Stars


*Rating System:
0- 7= 0 Stars
8- 14= 1 Star
15- 21= 2 Stars
22- 30= 3 Stars
31- 35= 4 Stars
36- 40= 5 Stars

Movie Review: Grown Ups

Ever since last year, Hollywood was lacking the amount, and quality of comedy movies, I don't know if the problem was with movies like the lukewarm '17 Again', or the slow and boring 'Funny People', but 2009 lacked comedy quality, it also lacked movie quality in general, as for this year, which was a redeeming year for movies in general, still lacked the amount of direct comedy movies, the only comedy movies that is considered 'direct' this year was 'Grown Ups' which stars the 1991 Saturday Night Live cast, but did it live up with its expectations? Did it deserve to be the only direct comedy to come out this summer? And more importantly, was it entertaining enough to be a comedy worth watching?

Grown Ups has a very simple plot, which is okay for only direct comedy movies, which is about five men who where friends as children, gathering together due to their basketball coach's death, and meeting each other's families for the first time.

As I mentioned, Grown Ups had a simple plot, which Is okay for direct comedy movies because people don't want comedies to have any twists in the plot, comedies are made to make people laugh, but allot of comedies try their best to get themselves a simple plot, but then end up messing up throughout the entire movie, but thankfully, that was not the case with Grown Ups, which came strong on most of its expectations.

Grown Ups had allot of jokes, there where funny jokes, and unfunny jokes, but the majority of jokes in the movie where funny, jokes such as Rob Schneider's character's wife commenting on one of the songs played in a restaurant, Kevin James' character's son being breast fed at 48 months(4 years), all the kids saying that they want to get wasted, after Adam Sandler's character 'explains' what wasted means, and allot more great jokes in the movie, as for the unfunny jokes there was Arrow Roulette which was funny the first time, then unfunny the second, Adam Sandler's character telling his Nanny to study was a bit funny, but got repetitive, also Kevin James' character putting the KFC bucket on his head was very unfunny, but other than those few bad jokes there is really nothing to worry about in the movie.

Grown Ups is generally a very strong movie, despite some repetitive and unfunny jokes, the movie is the best comedy I've seen since 2008, it gave me what I wanted in a comedy m, which is just a simple plot with allot of funny jokes, it reached and maybe surpassed all my expectations, and it redeemed the comedy genre after an entire year and a half that had very few, but boring comedies.

*Movie Rating:-

-Acting(out of 6)= 5
-Story(out of 8)= 7
-Plot(out of 8)= 7
-Actions(out of 6)= 5
-Effects(out of 4)= 3
-Character Developement(out of 8)= 6
*Overall Rating(out of 40)= 33
4 Stars
*Rating System:
0- 7= 0 Stars
8- 14= 1 Star
15- 21= 2 Stars
22- 30= 3 Stars
31- 35= 4 Stars
36- 40= 5 Stars

Movie Review: The Expendables

Every once in a while we see a movie which has a huge all-star cast, in 2002 there was 'Catch Me if You Can' which was directed by Spielberg , and stared Decaprio, and Hanks, this year we had 'Grown Ups' a comedy that had the classic Saturday Night Live cast, starring Adam Sandler, Kevin James, and Chris Rock, another movie this year had a huge cast, which was 'Clash of the Titans' which starred Sam Worthington, Ralph Fiennes, Gemma Arterton, and Liam Nelson, but none of the all-star casted movie had as big of a cast as 'The Expendables', which brought together Sylvester Stallone from the Rocky Movies, Jason Statham from the Crank and Transporter movies, Jet Li from The Forbidden Kingdome and The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor, Mickey Rourke from Sin City and Iron Man 2, Terry Crews from Get Smart and Terminator Salvation, Arnold Shwartzenager from the Terminator movies, and Bruce Willis from the Die Hard movies, but now, they all came together to form 'the Expendables' a movie that could easily be defined as one of the best movies of the year.


The Expendables is a pure action movie about a group of mercenaries that get paid allot of money to kill a Mexican dictator, but in Mexico, Stallone's character 'Barny Ross' meets a Mexican rebel and falls in love with her, so Ross and his group have to go save her, the interesting thing about the story is that there are two storylines that end up having the same climax, which was one of the most appreciated things in the movie.

As I mentioned, the Expendables is a pure action movie, meaning that by easily seeing the trailer or reading the plot summery, the viewer can easily know that this movie is packed with action, speaking of the action, it did not disappoint, there where allot of mind blowing action scenes that where all unique in their own way, each action scene gave us something new, something that made it better than the last, but I have to admit, my favorite action scene was one near the end, the movie's climax, that scene was probably one of the most entertaining action scenes I've seen in movie history.

As for the cast, each member did an excellent job in the movie, which gave excellent character development, and it made the characters allot funner to watch, although I must admit, I was disappointed with the little screen time that Schwarzenegger, Willis, and Rourke had, that lead to weak character development for Willis' and Schwarzenegger's characters, and mild character development for Rourke's character.

The Expendables is generally one of the best action movies to come out, the story was strong, the acting was excellent, and the action scenes where incredible, I think the Expendables could have been a perfect movie if it wasn't for the character development issues, but even with this issue, the Expendables is still one of the best action movies I've ever seen, so with my closing comments I have to say: well done Stallone, for bringing some of the best action movie stars together to make one of the best action movies of all-time

*Movie Rating:-

-Acting(out of 6)= 6
-Story(out of 8)= 7
-Plot(out of 8)= 8
-Actions(out of 6)= 6
-Effects(out of 4)= 4
-Character Developement(out of 8)= 5
*Overall Rating(out of 40)= 36
5 Stars

*Rating System:

0- 7= 0 Stars
8- 14= 1 Star
15- 21= 2 Stars
22- 30= 3 Stars
31- 35= 4 Stars
36- 40= 5 Stars

Movie Review: 3:10 To Yuma

2007, a year full of excellent and terrible movies, the excellent movies stand out to be remakes, adoptions, and fresh ideas, the adoptions are 'The Simpsons Movie', 'Transformers' 'Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix' and 'I Am Legend', the fresh idea is 'The Number 23' and the remake is '3:10 to Yuma' which was easily the best movie of the year, and a perfect way to end a year full of successes and struggles.


3:10 to Yuma is a western movie, with a very entertain story about a rancher in desperate need for money, named Dan Evens, but in order to get that money, Dan has to help the law transport a criminal named Ben Wade to a train which will go to a prison in Yuma. My question about the story is if it lived up to what I expected? I'd say it diddent, it surpassed each and every one of them, the story gave us very strong wild-west style action, allot of thrills, many great and strong emotion, and very powerful characters.

Unlike many movies, each and every character has a personality very different from the other, one reason is the cast's performance, I can't think of anyone who did a bad job acting in this movie, but there is still such thing as the best actors in the movie, actors such as Christian Bale or Russell Crowe had some of the best performances anyone has ever seen in a movie, other than that, Logan Lerman proved himself to be an excellent actor, Ben Foster and Dallas Roberts did mind-blowing jobs in the movie, also, the whole cast needs to be thanked for making their characters seem realistic as possible.

The movie had many great thrilling wild-west themed action scenes, throughout most the movie, especially the second half, the action was incredibly realistic, and completely fitted in with the wild-west theme, but I do have to admit that in the first half of the movie the first action scene looked fake, and there where one or two scenes where the action happened randomly.

3:10 to Yuma is easily the best movie of 2007 and one of the best movies of all-time, it fell a bit short on very small arias, but otherwise, 3:10 to Yuma shines out to bring back the Wild West genre, and will forever be known as one of the most appreciated movies of all-time.

*Movie Rating:-

-Acting(out of 6)= 6
-Story(out of 8)= 8
-Plot(out of 8)= 7
-Actions(out of 6)= 5
-Effects(out of 4)= 3
-Character Developement(out of 8)= 8
*Overall Rating(out of 40)= 37
5 Stars
*Rating System:
0- 7= 0 Stars
8- 14= 1 Star
15- 21= 2 Stars
22- 30= 3 Stars
31- 35= 4 Stars
36- 40= 5 Stars

Movie Review: Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets

In movies, it's usually hard to tell if the second installment will be better than the first, there was Spider-Man 2, Shrek 2, Toy Story 2, , Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest, and the Dark Knight which stand out as movies that surpassed the quality of the first installment, movies like Iron Man 2 are as good as the first installment, and movies like Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer, Night in the Museum: Battle of the Smithtoniens, and Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen all either lacked or did not reach the quality of the first installment, now for book adoptions, we got a second Lord of the Rings and second Narnia which were better than the first, then there is New Mood, which was a lacking movie, lacked the quality of the first Twilight movie, which ironically also lacked quality, anyway this review is about the second Harry Potter movie, 'Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets' and the point that I'm making is based on one question 'does Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets surpass the quality of the Sorcerer's Stone?'


Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets goes deeper into the world of Harry Potter, as well as the life Tom Riddle, AKA Lord Voldemort, but generally speaking, Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets is about many things, it had many sub plots, such as the new defense against the dark arts teacher, Harry questioning whether he belongs to Gryffindor or Slytherin, prejudice of pureblood wizards, and the main plot, which is about a snake-like monster terrorizing the school, which people be leave, came from the Chamber of Secrets, as a book, it's easy to keep all of those sub-plots work with the main plot, but with movies however, it's very different, it won't work, and it did not work with this one, which is a perfect reason, aside from the movie being slow and easily predictable on why Christopher Columbus should keep things different in the movie.

This Harry Potter movie suffers from the same issues as the last one, such as being too similar to the book, Richard Harris, a childish feeling, but however, in this movie, there are more errors, such as childish humor, a disappointing battle scene between Harry and the Basilisk, a few new, and poorly developed characters, and some repetitivity, but otherwise, the acting and most of the character development is excellent, especially Dobby, a perfectly developed house elf, as for the main three, they continue to develop perfectly as well as most of the cast that where there in the first one.

The Chamber of Secrets is the second straight 'good' potter movie, it has many moments and thrills, but it still does suffer from the first one's mistakes and it also suffered from a few other mistakes as well, and if were expecting Prisoner of Azkaban to be good, then those errors and mistakes need to be fixed.

*Movie Rating:-

-Acting(out of 6)= 4
-Story(out of 8)= 5
-Plot(out of 8)= 6
-Actions(out of 6)= 3
-Effects(out of 4)= 3
-Character Developement(out of 8)= 5
*Overall Rating(out of 40)= 26
3 Stars


*Rating System:
0- 7= 0 Stars
8- 14= 1 Star
15- 21= 2 Stars
22- 30= 3 Stars
31- 35= 4 Stars
36- 40= 5 Stars

Movie Review: Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone

There are many book adoptions coming out, some good, some mixed, and some bad, but the best adoptions, and my favorites, are the Harry Potter movies, each movie was either as good, or an improvement comparing to it's proceeder, each movie brought every new character to life and made them huge movie icons, but when did this series start? Was the first potter movie as good, much worse, or better than all the others? All the answers are here in this review.

The first Harry Potter movie, follows the book closely, but however, it followed it too closely that the movie felt very slow in some parts, as well as very predictable in many other parts, which is a major reason why book adoptions should not follow the books exactly, anyway, this potter movie is about Harry's first year in Hogwarts, the time when he thought when he was 'just Harry', the time when he was discovering that he was famous, and when he discovers that the man who killed his parents, the darkest wizard who ever lived, 'Lord Voldemort' is regaining his power, all these ideas put into development in this movie was excellent, which leads us into the climax, which is the introduction of the excitement of this series, when Harry discovers that Voldemort was near him this whole time, that Voldemort wanted the Sorcerer's stone to regain his full power, this one scene started the entire conflict between Harry and Voldemort.

Most characters where developed perfectly in the movie, as well as strongly portrayed by the cast, especially the big three, which where Harry, Ron, and Herminie, who where all played perfectly by Denial Radcliff, Rupert Grint, and Emma Watson, back in there rookie years as actors, but however, there was one poorly developed and poorly played character , Albus Dumbledore, who was the Headmaster of Hogwarts, who was played by Richard Harris, who made Dumbledore look like an old man who was numerous diseases, and in the books, Dumbledore does not have numerous diseases.

The movie did an excellent job in portraying bravery, and emotion, it did a perfect job in showing every emotion, but unfortionetly, and those emotions are covered up by the movie's childish mood.

Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone was an enjoyable movie, with a few errors which were minor and major, such as Richard Harris, who was a major error, the movie being predictable and too similar to the book, which is an error between being minor or major, and the childish mood in the movie, which is a minor error, but otherwise, we see a very strong effort in Character Development, emotion, themes, and plot.

*Movie Rating:-

-Acting(out of 6)= 4

-Story(out of 8)= 6

-Plot(out of 8)= 6
-Actions(out of 6)= 4
-Effects(out of 4)= 3
-Character Developement(out of 8)= 7
*Overall Rating(out of 40)= 30
3 Stars

*Rating System:

0- 7= 0 Stars
8- 14= 1 Star
15- 21= 2 Stars
22- 30= 3 Stars
31- 35= 4 Stars
36- 40= 5 Stars

Movie Review: Catch Me if You Can

Catch Me if You Can, one of the many movies that had an all-star cast and crew, along with 'The Expendables', a movie which I have not seen yet, 'Clash of the Titans' a movie which had an incredible cast, but unfortionetly it did not reach it's expectations, or 'Topic Thunder' a movie which went much higher than I expected , and now there is 'Catch me if You Can' which is directed by the legendary director Steven Spielberg who gave us 'Jaws', 'E.T', 'Gremlins', the 'Indiana Jones' movies, and the first two 'Jurassic Park movies, it stars Leonardo Decaprio, years before he was in 'Shutter Island', or the greatest movie ever seen, better known as 'Inception', and it also stars Tom Hanks, the man who did the voice of Woody in the Story Movies, and stared in the 2009 movie 'Angels and Demons', alone they where big in movies, but together, in a movie which ironically did not include Comedy, Action, or Special Effects, they did an excellent job.

Catch Me if You Can is based on a true story, it's about a man named Frank Abagnale, who made millions of dollars by being an Airline co-pilot, a Doctor, and a Loyar, but it was all successful cons and deceptions, then after that, an FBI agent, named Carl Henratty, but Frank, is always one step ahead of Carl, and Carl has to get ahead of Frank in order to arrest him.

The movie's story is entertaining, it's also smart, and shows the rise and fall of a con artist without putting in any action scenes or jokes, it mainly stays in the point, has many smart ideas , has a very strong and interesting script, and keeps the viewers entertained through most the movie.

The movie takes place in the 60s, and the theme of the movie compliments that very well, unlike many other movies that are in the 60s, or TV shows that take place in the 60s, the actors also complement the theme very well, the acting performances where some of the best I've seen.

But unfortionetly, there where a few minor errors, such as the very beginning of the movie, which I felt had nothing to do with the movie, also there where some scenes that where boring, and the fact that the movie sometimes switched from 1963 to 1969 was a bit annoying.

Catch Me if You Can was generally one of the most appreciated movies yet, it keeps the viewer entertained throughout the movie, but with some admitingly slow scenes, the acting was strong, the story and theme where both fantastic, and generally, Catch me if You Can is one of those movies which I won't mind watching time and time again, something that an all-star cast is made of.

 

*Movie Rating:-

-Acting(out of 6)= 6

-Story(out of 8)= 8

-Plot(out of 8)= 8

-Actions(out of 6)= 4

-Effects(out of 4)= 3

-Character Developement(out of 8)= 7

*Overall Rating(out of 40)= 36

5 Stars



*Rating System:

0- 7= 0 Stars
8- 14= 1 Star
15- 21= 2 Stars
22- 30= 3 Stars
31- 35= 4 Stars
36- 40= 5 Stars