Defendor

Not a well-publicized movie, but an interesting movie, nonetheless.

Defendor stars Woody Harrelson as Arthur Poppington, a man of lower intelligence under the grasp of demons from his childhood. Now a man, Arthur decides to go after the people that are bad - the kinds of people that hurt his mother and made his life scary.

Poppington dresses up in a superhero disguise, calls himself Defendor, but has no special powers. But he does have a lot of nifty ideas. Marbles anyone?

The story is told from memory as Poppington is talking to a psychiatrist (Sandra Oh). When Defendor seeks to destroy the Empire of Industry he comes across a prostitute (Kat Dennings) whom he suspects is being harmed, so he saves her. And she subsequently becomes the love interest.

However, in his quest to rid the town of the bad guys, he accidentally comes across a crooked cop and some actual bad guys. Not having real powers, Defedor finds himself in a tough situation, more than good friend Paul (Michael Kelly) has the ability to help him. Defendor now needs to find a way to win and he's not going to let anything stop him.

Defendor is rated R for violence, language, and some sexual situations. Directed by Peter Stebbings, the movie is an hour and 40 minutes long.

I give Defendor 3 stars. It was a combination of an action movie, a drama, and a comedy. There were parts of the movie that were very sad. Other parts were just plain old silly. As the poster correctly shows - "Darkly Funny". That is a very accurate description of Defendor. Not a bad movie.

Leap Year

Just because I haven't posted a movie review in over a month does not mean that I haven't been watching movies. To the contrary - I've watched a lot of movies. But I'd rather watch movies than write about them. Not to say I don't enjoy writing about the movies. It's like choosing between Reese Witherspoon and Anne Hathaway. I enjoy both.

So anyway, last Friday I watched another Amy Adams movie - Leap Year. It was a romantic comedy - like nearly all of Amy Adams' movies.

In Leap Year, Amy is a pretentious stick in the mud who is dating a pretentious businessman who little convincing aptitude for love. After a disappointing night where she expected to get engaged, she decides that she will propose to him - while in Ireland - on February 29th - leap year.

This is where Amy runs into a series of unfortunate events. Stranded in a town in Southern Ireland, she meets up with Declan (Matthew Goode), whom she convinces to help her get to Dublin so that she can propose.

Declan, however, can see right threw her and is more in touch with what is going on that she realizes, or cares to accept. So you can already tell what is going to happen. She spends a lot of time with him in her journey to get to Dublin. And he drives her crazy.

Predictable. Very predictable. But again, it's a romantic comedy. They are supposed to be soft non-thinking movies. And that it is.

The movie also stars John Lithgow as Amy's father and Adam Scott as her boyfriend.

Directed by Anand Tucker, Leap Year is rated PG. I think this was because 2 unmarried people slept in the same bed and there was some kissing later in the movie. And she got mad a lot. You could totally let your 10 year old watch this movie.

At an hour and 37 minutes long, it is the perfect length.

I give Leap Year 3 stars. Average. It met the formula for a romantic comedy, thus achieving mediocrity.