10/50x2: Point Break

Johnny Utah (Keanu Reeves) is a former Ohio State quarterback that leads a bunch of rag-tag players to victory......oops, that was The Replacements.

Anyway, Reeves plays yet another former Ohio State quarterback in Point Break. Here, instead of heading back to the gridiron, he becomes an FBI agent.

Utah is a rookie agent that teams up with Angelo Pappas (Gary Busey). Pappas has been tracking a string of robberies in the area by a gang known as the "Ex Presidents" because they each wear a mask of a former president to protect their identity.

Pappas has a theory that this group is a bunch of surfers, and following that theory Utah goes undercover as a guy wanting to learn to surf. He befriends, and lies, to a former orphan Tyler Endicott (Lori Petty) to help him become a better surfer - and also get him in with some of the other surfers.

He is welcomed into a group of surfers led by Bodhi (Patrick Swayze). The group is extremely close and appears to do everything together - but has Utah stumbled upon the correct gang?

The above is really just the beginning. Pappas and Utah do some serious investigating and staking out to track down the "Ex Presidents".

Just a fun ride. Reeves and Swayze are very good in this movies as friends and possible enemies. Petty was also really good as Tyler, a person who Utah lies to and falls in love with.

I have been told to watch this forever, and it has been recommended to me a bunch of times. I now see why. It was a very good, fun movie.

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29/50: Donnie Darko

I have heard many great things about this film. It sort of has become a cult classic among many people, but I never really got around to watching it - and I really had no true interest until I had heard it was so good that I had to at least give it a try.

Donnie Darko stars Jake Gyllenhaal as the titular character. Darko suffers from some sort of mental illness that I don't believe is ever truly said - though it is perceived and mentioned that he may have schizophrenia.

I do not hate Gyllenhaal as an actor, but he has never really jumped off of the screen for me like other actors have. However, in this film he was downright amazing. Probably his best acting performance to date that I have seen.

Anyway, Darko is being led around by what is thought to be a figment of his imagination - that he sees as a very odd and scary looking bunny named Frank. Darko wakes up at night - usually at midnight - and is told by Frank to do random things. During one of these sleepwalking excursions, Darko is able to escape death, which he is then led to believe that Frank saved his life and therefore should listen to whatever Frank tells him to do.

Darko also begins to lash out at school, mostly when it comes to the teachings of Jim Cunningham (Patrick Swayze) who has a sort of infomercial/cult like way to his preachings. He also falls in love with a new girl in school, Gretchen Ross (Jena Malone), who along with her mother has escaped a violent stepfather.

A lot of things begin to happen, and Frank tells Darko to do a lot of bad things - which somehow expose things that many people did not know. It all comes to fruition at the conclusion of the film when everything sort of comes together and is somewhat explained.

There are tons of well-known actors and actresses in this film, including Jake's sister Maggie playing his sister, Elizabeth. Noah Wyle portrays Ken Monnitoff, a science teacher that helps Donnie with the possibility of time travel.

Seth Rogen plays Ricky Danforth, a classmate of Donnie and also a bully, who doesn't appear to have much to do with the actual plot - but does. And finally, Drew Barrymore as Karen Pomeroy, Donnie's English teacher. Her inclusion in the film is still not really understood by me, nor is a few of the other things that go on in the film, but nevertheless I felt she did well in her role.

I did not watch the Director's Cut of the film, so I am not sure if more is explained in that version, but I don't think I totally grasped everything that was meant to be told in the film - and even without knowing that I really enjoyed it.

Like I said, great performance by Gyllenhaal (both of them actually) and I don't think I would have liked it as much if he didn't have a great performance. Also truly enjoyed Jena Malone and Wyle as well - who I am unsure why he doesn't get more film roles.

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1/50: Red Dawn

At the beginning of the year I pledged that I would do my best to watch 50 films I had not seen during the coming year. I once thought this would be a difficult task, but I have already knocked out almost 10 of those movies and it isn't even the end of January. So, I decided to add another 50 to that list - but I must first finish the original 50.

So, the first film of the year that I watched from the list was Red Dawn.

Red Dawn came out in 1984 when I was just three years old, and for some reason (like many of the films on the list) I just never got around to watching it. I had the basic premise down, but I didn't know exactly how things played out.

Let me say, they wasted no time getting to the plot of the film. Not five minutes in and the small town is being attacked by Soviet/Cuban military.

A group of friends led by brothers, Jed (Patrick Swayze) and Matt (Charlie Sheen) find their way to the woods to try and wait out the attack. What they thought would be a few days begins to turn into months - fearing he worst the brothers and Robert (C. Thomas Howell) head back into town to see what is going on. The Soviet/Cuban military has taken over and tossed anyone who owned a gun into a prison, including Jed and Matt's father.

As they head back to their hideout, the group stops at a family friends house for food and shelter - only to be asked to take care of the family's granddaughters, Erica (Lea Thompson) and Toni (Jennifer Grey).

Realizing now that they are all on their own, the young group decides to become a militia - calling themselves 'Wolverines'. They end up being joined by a member of the US military whose plane is shot down, Andrew Tanner (Powers Boothe). Together, they take it upon themselves to take out as many of the Soviet/Cuban forces as possible.

I hear that this film is being remade, which is going to be very difficult. It is hard to believe that even in 1984 military forces could land in a small town undetected - but not in 2011. Plus, the group of kids had no communication to the outside world except a small radio - do you really think nowadays that none of the kids would have a cellphone on them?

I thought it was a pretty decent film. Weird to see a young Patrick Swayze and an even younger Charlie Sheen. Funny to see C. Thomas Howell's character go a little crazy and blood thirsty. And, weird to see so many of these characters in an action/war movie when we are used to them in romantic comedies.

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