1/50x2: The Town

History is sometimes bound to repeat itself.

In the case of Doug MacRay (Ben Affleck), it begins to mirror that of his father, Stephen (Chris Cooper) in the Affleck directed The Town.

Doug is a crook, like his father before him, but so far Doug has been one step ahead of the law, unlike his father, who is now serving life in prison.

Doug isn't alone, he has a trio of good friends that help him out, including his best friend James Coughlin (Jeremy Renner). Doug is the brains of the operation, he strategically maps out the perfect heists as to not get hurt and not get caught.

During one such heist, James takes the bank manager Claire Keesey (Rebecca Hall) as a hostage, only to release her once they are far enough away. However, James becomes paranoid that Claire may know something and could turn them in, so Doug 'runs into her' to find out the truth.

Well, one thing leads to another and all of a sudden Claire and Doug are falling for each other - talk about a perfect couple?

James, who has been to jail before, finds out and he becomes increasingly unstable - forcing Doug to do a heist even though it isn't foolproof.

All the while, Det. Adam Frawley (Jon Hamm) believes that he has figured out that Doug's gang was behind the robberies in town, but he needed the evidence to arrest them.

Behind these worker bees is a mastermind, the florist Fergie Colm (Pete Postlethwaite). When Doug confronts him about getting out, Fergie threatens to hurt those he loves.

The final heist is to rob a sacred Boston landmark, Fenway Park. As they prepare, James tells Doug that he has no plans of going to jail - if things go wrong he plans on having a shootout.

The film also stars Blake Lively as Krista Coughlin, who while watching the film doesn't really have much going on, except being a junkie. However, she becomes more and more important as the film roles on.

I thought this was a good way to start my second 50 films list. A great heist movie (although I would have liked a few more heists). But, the overall story was just as good as the heists. I am not sure the hatred for Affleck - sure he has had some missteps, but as of late he has truly done very well for himself. Here he shines as well.

Grade:

Movie Booms I

I must say that the total lack of television on now, thanks to most of the seasons being completed, I have found some extra time to dive into some movies I have been longing to see.

I posted a review of Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull on Saturday, but I was also able to catch four other movies during this extended weekend.

Things started off on Saturday, when on one of the movie channels I noticed that Next was about to start (I am one of those people that can't watch a movie he has never seen, unless it's from start to finish), so I decided to record it and watch it when Kasey went up for his nap.

Next stars Nicolas Cage, Julianne Moore and Jessica Biel. Cage is Cris Johnson, a Las Vegas magician who just might be the real thing. Johnson has this ability to see into the future - but only two minutes ahead and only things involving himself.

The only occurrence of him seeing further into the future involves Liz Cooper (Biel), whom Johnson believes is part of his destiny.

The FBI, however, led by Callie Ferris (Moore) is trying to lure Johnson into helping them find and stop a group of bombers. Johnson, though, just wants to remain normal and resists - until Cooper is kidnapped by the bombers.

I was actually pretty interested in the film, Cage is always hit or miss with me, and he was pretty tolerable here - I was not too impressed with Moore as the FBI agent, however. The movie flowed pretty well - that is until the ending, which I felt ended much too soon. It was a pretty interesting play of events, but I was looking for me.

I would have to give this movie a 3/5 thanks to the disappointing ending.

Sunday night I managed to finally watch a movie I had been interested in seeing since it was in theaters.

The Kingdom revolves around a single incident in Saudi Arabia that involves two U.S. government agents. The agents, who had been stationed at a Saudi Arabian base, were killed when a bomb went off.

The movie stars Jamie Foxx, Jennifer Garner, Jason Bateman and Chris Cooper. Foxx plays Ronald Fleury, who without permission, sneaks himself and three other members of his team into Saudi Arabia to help track down the culprits behind the bombing.

Once there, however, the crew is not allowed to touch anything or go anywhere without supervision - until Fleury gets permission from one of the local princes.

It's hard to explain this movie without truly giving something away, so I will just say that the movie has a lot of action - a few squeamish scenes - and the acting is pretty top-notch. Bateman plays Adam Leavitt, and his character gives some much needed comedy to a very dramatic situation. I give the film a 4/5.

The third movie of the weekend was more of a television movie. I had actually heard that this movie was going to be on during an interview on The Mike O'Meara Show and thought it might be worth a look.

Recount premiered on HBO during the weekend. It stars Kevin Spacey, Ed Begley Jr., Tom Wilkinson, John Hurt, Denis Leary and Laura Dern.

The film is about the 2000 presidential election year between Al Gore and George W. Bush. I have never been a very political person, but this proved to be a very interesting movie.

The entire movie is focused on the state of Florida during the election, a state that proved to give the election - and the presidency - to Bush. Spacey stars as Ron Klain, an attorney for the Gore campaign, who trying everything in his power to find out the correct results of the election.

For those who might not remember, the state of Florida had a series of issues when it came to it's election. A handful of people, believing they were voting for Gore, accidentally voted for Pat Buchanon. Other votes were cast, with what is called a hanging chad (or a punch that didn't go all the way through).

Thanks to this, many votes for Gore were uncounted and thus gave Bush the presidency. There were so many twists and turns to this situation - which basically all came down to the decision of Florida's secretary of state, Katherine Harris (Dern), who decided not to count those that were uncounted. Harris is a Republican - perhaps that had something to do with it.

Like I said I am not too political, but this movie certainly had me enthralled. Imagine what could have been? Would we be in the situation we are now if Gore would have won? Very interesting. My lone complaint is I was hoping the filmmakers would have interviewed the actual lawyers and participants on the two campaigns. I was very interested to hear what say James Baker (Wilkinson) had to say about Bush now - eight year later. Nevertheless, I still give this movie a 4/5.

The final movie I was able to watch this weekend was Breach starring Ryan Phillippe, Chris Cooper. Laura Linney, Gary Cole and Dennis Haysburt.

Phillippe is Eric O'Neill, an upstart in the FBI, who is given his first real assignment as an agent. He is to work for, and investigate, Robert Hanssen (Cooper), an intense, religious, computer intelligence officer.

Hanssen has supposedly been selling off American secrets to the Russians for years, and before his retirement in two months, the FBI is looking to bust him. Phillippe is forced to outwit one of the most intelligent officers he has ever met - and actually begins to like him.

This movie was based on a true story. Hanssen is reportedly the worst spy in the history of the United States. The capturing of Hanssen was the one and only assignment for O'Neill, as he decided to pursue law after the long ordeal.

Breach was an interesting movie which kept me involved, but it didn't have much action - and the 'spy games' used in it weren't as involved as I would have liked. However, it was a good watch so I give it a 3/5.

There you have it - hopefully there will be more of these Movie Booms throughout the summer - as I try to get caught up on the many movies I want to see.