The third film from the rebooted series Star Trek came out this weekend with Justin Lin, director of Fast & Furious 6, taking over for J.J. Abrams, and provided fans of the franchise a film that boldly went where no one had gone before with action and adventure and characters embodied perfectly by the new cast.

Star Trek Beyond sends viewers on an exciting voyage into the stars, and fills the screen with exciting action throughout.  This film catches the exciting action of the reboots with the intellectual tone of the original series and blends them together into something that feels like classic Trek.

We catch up with the crew of the U.S.S. Enterprise as they are arriving at Starbase Earhart after failing to negotiate a treaty between two warring factions, Captain Kirk (Chris Pine) was starting to feel the strain of this five year mission.  Spock (Zachary Quinto) hears news of the passing of Ambassador Spock (the late Leonard Nemoy) and has to reflect on his own choices.  With the crew slowly being pulled in different directions, the Enterprise heads out to navigate through a nebula to aid a ship whose captain requested assistance.

Unfortunately for Kirk and his crew, the request was a trap and the Enterprise is attacked by a swarm of some kind of creatures.  The Enterprise crashes on the planet below and the crew is scattered into smaller groups, trying to find their way back together.

Meanwhile, the leader of the swarm was Krall (Idris Elba) who was after a “macguffin” that was on the Enterprise, a weapon they tried to present to one of the warring races as a peace offering.  One wonders what Krall would have done had that race of small rock like creatures had accepted the peace offering of this weapon.  Still, Kirk realizes that Krall wants this weapon and keep sit away from him.

The strength of these characters are really seen as they are split into pairs.  Kirk and Chekov (the late Anton Yelchin) are together, searching for the weapon.  Bones (Karl Urban) and Spock are together, with amazing, crackling dialogue that lights up every scene that they share.  Sulu (John Cho) and Uhura (Zoe Saldana) are captives of Krall and Scotty (Simon Pegg) meets up with new, bad ass alien Jaylah (Sofia Boutella).  Each section brought something different and entertaining to the ensemble and moved the movie along.

Karl Urban was, once again, the standout as Doctor “Bones” McCoy.  Urban is so perfect in this role that the iconic character has really become his own.  Urban receives all of the best lines of dialogue and he delivers them with a robust, cantankerous enthusiasm that would make DeForest Kelly proud.  Montgomery “Scotty” Scott, played by movie co-writer Simon Pegg, is also provided with wonderful lines within the script, both funny and compelling.

Idris Elba provides a solid villain for the protagonist, but there were a couple of lines that I am not sure what they were going for.  His motivation was made clearer in the third act of the film, but there were some moments where I was expecting something more about him.  Still, as always, Elba was outstanding as the counter to Kirk.

The action was excellent, though there may have been too much use of shaky camera for my tastes in several of the action scenes.  The use of “Sabotage” by the Beastie Boys in the trailer felt out of place and forced, but the song’s inclusion in the story itself was perfect and made complete sense.  It also provided a fun and rocking moment in Star Trek Beyond that found me nodding my head and tapping my toes along with the crew.

Star Trek Beyond is another outstanding film in the new, rebooted series of films.  There is great action, strong characters we love and has more of a feel of the original show than ever before.

4.2 stars

Several years ago, there was a short film on YouTube with the premise of a creature that would disappear when the lights were on.  It was a sensation on the video web site.  Taking that concept, they expanded it to a 90 minute film.  Was that a mistake?  There were plenty of concerns that the idea of the short would feel too stretched out by trying to have it go a full movie.

I am pleased to say that those concerns should be dismissed.  Lights Out not only does not feel stretched out, it was a remarkably frightening time at the theater.

Martin (Gabriel Bateman) is not sleeping.  He is too afraid to sleep because his mother (Maria Bello) is talking to some mysterious female creature named Diana, who only can be around when the lights are out.  When Martin starts to fall asleep in school, they tried, unsuccessfully, to call his mother.  Instead, they called his half-sister Rebecca (Teresa Palmer), who was estranged from the family, but she knew what was happening…because it had already happened to her.

Lights Out is a fantastic film, with tension and suspense from the early scenes right up until the finale.  The key aspect of this movie is they focus on characters.  We spend some time getting to know Rebecca.  We learn back story involving her mother.  We see how these things cause stress and worry for a really strong little boy in Martin.  We even get a look at Rebecca’s “boyfriend” Bret (Alexander DiPersia).  All of this character development really pays off when these characters are placed in peril later in the film because, unlike a lot of these types of films, we care for what happens to them.  They are not disposable victims for the creature to kill.  They are well imagined and real, engaging characters.

The film does contain its share of jump scares, but they seem to do a good job of maintaining the tone of the film and they create serious tension.  And since the characters are important to us, these jump scares do not stand out as blatantly as they might in a lesser film.

Diana (Alicia Vela-Bailey) is very frightening, with her moving int he shadows and only seeing her apparition.  It is less effective later when we see more than just the shadowy figure.  I enjoyed her back story and her connection to Sophie the mother felt very tragic, as if the life of Sophie had been forever tarnished by this ghost.

Gabriel Bateman (who is on CBS’ American Gothic) is amazing here.  Again, everything is resting on this child actor providing the audience with the sufficient fear without being over-the-top.  If this child was not a solid actor, the film would drop off the map.  Fortunately, Bateman was outstanding, playing several levels at the beginning, shouldering the fear all to himself, not only out of need, but out of guilt.  He knew he had to support his mother and he couldn’t just run away.  Then, the bond he formed with his wayward half-sister was wonderful.

I also enjoyed Bret quite a bit.  He was anything but the cliched horror movie boyfriend.  He was funny, very supportive, and heroic.  Because I liked him so much, I was very worried that he would fall victim to Diana.

However, though the typical cliches are in the film, Lights Out actually turns them around, successfully deconstructing them in the process.  There are several examples of this, but I don’t want to spoil it.  Let’s just say that the kids do not do the typical stupid things.  They react like real people would react, and that was refreshing.

Now, the film does change the rules about Diana later in the movie, which was done simply because they needed certain things to happen, but the change is not a major one, and does actually continue t amp up the suspense.  Still, some of the parts later in the film with Diana were the weakest sections of the film.

Lights Out was a really good time, if you enjoy being frightened.  This film had some really solid scares and some good performances by solid actors.  The time used on the characters was time well spent and made us care about what happened to these people.  Lights Out is one of the best horror movies of the year so far.

4.3 stars

Good news.  My childhood has not been ruined.  It is safe and secure.

And to quote the great 21st century philosopher Taylor Swift, “Haters gonna hate, hate, hate, hate, hate.”

I do not believe that I have ever come across a movie that created such a whirlwind storm of hatred before it was ever seen than the reboot version of Ghostbusters.

The hatred began when it was announced that Paul Feig would be directing a reboot of the 1984 classic Ghostbusters featuring an all female cast.  This news was received poorly as some misogynists hid their hatred for the idea of all-female cast behind cries of an unnecessary sequel and claims that this would ruin childhood memories.

Then came the trailers.  Whoever put together this marketing plan for Sony needs to be fired immediately.  The trailers were terrible.  Immediately, the haters jumped on these terrible trailers as a way to hide their misogyny.  And those people who did not mind the casting of four females taking over had to chose their words carefully so as not to upset the feminists who believed the haters were all the same.

However, surprise, surprise… the reviews started coming out for the new Ghostbusters and they were actually pretty good.  Many people were saying that the movie was nowhere as bad as it had looked.  Even the negative reviews were saying that it was okay.  It was certified fresh on Rotten Tomatoes at 74%.

But that did not deter the haters.  They simply dug their heels in and continued to claim that this movie was shit, and that anyone who would give the movie a positive review were bowing to pressure of the feminists (kind of like how Marvel was “buying” off the critics to give Batman v. Superman negative reviews).  I read some YouTube comments on the Schmoes Know movie review of the film and there were so many idiotic comments, spewing vitriol and venom at anyone who might like the film.  One woman made a sensible and intelligent comment and she was chastised and berated for it.  And many of these hate-filled comments were from posters who had not yet seen the movie.

Now, let me say this… if you have seen this movie (with an open mind) and you hate it, that is your prerogative.  Everybody has the right to their subjective opinions when it comes to movies.  If you saw the trailers and decided that the movie looked like shit and chose not to see it, that is also okay.  I have not seen certain movies that I do not think I would enjoy.

However, if you have not seen this movie, then you cannot, under any circumstances, say that the movie IS shit.  That is completely unfair.  There have been all kinds of movies that the trailers looked terrible, but the movie was awesome.  Edge of Tomorrow with Tom Cruise springs to mind.  You may think it looks terrible, but without seeing it, you cannot claim it is terrible.  So many of the YouTube posters, who fall back on anonymity, are in this category of people.

Now, with that out of the way, I went to the IMAX 3D version of Ghostbusters today with an open mind and no expectations.

And I really enjoyed this movie.

Let the hate commence.

I found this movie very funny.  The chemistry between the four main actresses (Melissa McCarthy, Kristen Wiig, Kate McKinnon and Lesley Jones) is off the charts exceptional.  You believe they are friends and you connect with them because of that chemistry.  The first 45-60 minutes of the movie are fantastic.  I was amazed how engaged that I was during that first part of the film.  The CGI is very good, and the ghosts looked fabulous.  The dialogue was very clever and quick-witted, especially with the interactions with McCarthy and Wiig.

Lesley Jones, who looked to be easily the worst from the trailers, was probably my favorite character here.  She was incredibly funny and engaging.  She fit in with the group extremely well, and the character made sense.  Way more sense than Ernie Hudson joining the original team did.  She was an expert in New York City and her knowledge was vitally important to the story.

The story was pretty simplistic, but that is not necessarily a bad thing.  If this tried to be too complex, I think the humor would have bogged down and would not have worked as well.

Chris Hemsworth was great here.  He played the bumbling, downright dumb Kevin, the receptionist.  I have heard a couple of different ideas about Hemsworth.  Some people thought he was a stand out with great comedic timing.  Others thought that his act wore thin because he seemed to be cartoon-like stupid that it took them out of the film.  I can see both arguments, but, for me, I laughed ever time Kevin did something stupid, so it obviously did not bother me.

There was also an outcry that every male character in the film was portrayed as stupid and some have indicated that there may be a reverse sexism going on.  Some have said that there would be an outcry if the receptionist was a blonde woman shown to be as stupid as Kevin was shown.  That might have some validity to it, but I would argue that none of the characters of the film were shown in depth enough to make that judgment, except for the four main leads and Kevin.

Another point of contention I have heard is the character of Holtzmann, played by SNL alumni and recent Emmy nominee Kate McKinnon.  Some people thought she stole every scene she was in while others believed that she was acting in a different movie and her cartoon-like performance hampered the film.  Again, to me, I would come in somewhere between these arguments.  I thought she was fine for what she was supposed to be.  Her character was meant to be over-the-top and borderline crazy, and that was what I got.  I did believe that she was capable of creating the Ghostbuster weaponry though, which was her main role in this film.  Because I believed that she was goofy enough to make this work, I did not mind her.

The end credits were a lot of fun, and there was a post credits scene.  This was the best credits I think I had ever seen.  I really enjoyed the way they spliced material into the credits, including a great dance scene from Chris Hemsworth.  This was brazenly original and creative and I hope more films follow this example.

Now, this is not to say that I thought this was a perfect film.  Actually, there were several issues I had with the movie.

The biggest of these issues was the flow of the film was interrupted throughout by cameos and throwbacks to the original Ghostbusters.  A few of these little “Easter Eggs” would be fun, but it seemed like these were coming full steam constantly.  If it was not a cameo by one of the cast of the original (they were all here, except for Rick Moranis), it was a shot that came directly from the first film, or it was a line of dialogue from the script.  A little bit of this would have been clever, but they beat the horse to death with it, over and over again.  I really believe the film felt like it was paying homage to the Ghostbusters legacy, but instead it was only taking away from itself as a film.  Honestly, only a few of these homages even worked where as most of these felt shoehorned/force fed into the story.  They simply drew attention away from what they were trying to do.

The villain of this movie was also REALLY weak.  There was nothing to this character at all.  Rowan North (Neil Casey) was an interesting looking person, and he delivered some effectively creepy lines of dialogue, but there is absolutely zero story behind who he is, where he came from or why he was doing what he was doing.  I don’t need a ton of information on the villain but a little bit allows the viewer to understand and maybe even emphasize with the villain as well.  There was none of that.  Calling Rowan a one-note character is even a stretch.  He was simply a bad guy.

The ending sequence turned into nothing more than a large CGI spotfest.  The action was not compelling or interesting.  There were very few real stakes involved and seemed just to be here for a large scale finale light show.  Each Ghostbuster was able to show off their fighting skills (which apparently they have) and the spotlight was passed around nicely, but there was little to care about here.  Honestly, the thing I cared about most was “would Kevin make it out safely?”.  That shouldn’t have been the first thought in my mind.

I came out of Ghostbusters thinking that this was a really good time at the theater.  I was surprised at how much I enjoyed this movie, and I am very glad that it was able to prove the haters wrong.  Of course, there will still be plenty of people who think this is garbage, despite not seeing it, and to those people, I feel sorry.

This is nowhere as good as the original film, but I would go on record as saying I think this is better than Ghostbusters 2.

3.6 stars

The newest film that is based on a true crime story is The Infiltrator, starring Bryan Cranston as an undercover agent trying to do good in the war against drugs.

US Customs agent Robert “Bob” Mazur (Bryan Cranston) is the basis for this film, as he went deep undercover as a money launderer in an attempt to infiltrate Pablo Escobar’s drug cartel in 1985.  Mazur, posing as Bob Musella, is able to befriend Escobar’s top lieutenant Roberto Alcaino (Benjamin Bratt), with the help of a questionable undercover cop named Emir Abreau (John Leguizamo) and a rookie agent Kathy Ertz (Diane Kruger).

The story itself plays out slowly and not nearly as intensely as the film wants, as there seemed to be some implication that the undercover cop has some morale issues in what he/she is doing.  I found that story to be as interesting as the drug stuff itself and I wouldn’t have minded more of a focus on it.  As it is, that felt like a last minute add on in the third act to excuse some lazy writing.

Bryan Cranston continues to show that he is a superb actor who can take any material that he is handed and can wring the most out of it.  Cranston is clearly the best part of this film, displaying amazing emotions with his facial features and his expressiveness.  What tension you feel in this film is based on Cranston’s wonderful performance.  Seeing him go from celebrating an anniversary with his wife into an improvised diatribe against the waiter for show was astounding and is one more example of how this man really elevated everyone around him as well as the scenes that he is in.

The rest of the film feels like your run of the mill crime story.  Without Cranston, this thing fall completely apart.  You would think the story of one of the biggest drug busts of the 20th century, bringing down multiple criminals and one of the largest banks in the world would provide a stronger story than this does, but there really isn’t much else here.  It can even be a little dull at times, especially when Cranston is not around.

Based on Robert Mazur’s book “The Infiltrator: My Secret Life Inside the Dirty Banks Behind Pablo Escobar’s Medellin Cartel”, The Infiltrator has its moments, and it is not a bad movie by any stretch.  It just is not a special movie either.  Without Bryan Cranston, this is completely forgettable.  Fortunately for The Infiltrator, it has Bryan Cranston and that makes this a watchable movie.

3.2 stars

Okay, I didn’t hate this.

I really thought I was going to hate this.  I mean, this type of stupid, bad attitude comedy is not my cup of tea usually, and I am not saying that I liked Mike and Dave Need Wedding Dates, but it did not feel like a complete waste of my life.

High praise, I know.

Mike (Adam Devine) and Dave (Zac Efron) are brothers who have had a tough time growing up.  Their bad behavior and overt partying have ruined many family outings.  So in an attempt to be proactive, Mike and Dave’s father (Stephen Root) and mother (Stephanie Faracy) have come up with an idea to make sure that the boys do not ruin their sister Jeanie’s (Sugar Lyn Beard) wedding.  They insist that the boys bring dates instead of going stag and riling each other up.  But here is the catch.  It must be “nice” girls.

Mike and Dave place an ad on Craigslist as a way to find “nice” girls, looking for two girls to take with them to the wedding (which was being held in Hawaii).  Of course, a free trip to Hawaii stirred up the crazies and Mike and Dave saw many coo-coos.

Definitely not “nice” girls, Tatiana (Aubrey Plaza) and Alice (Anna Kendrick) saw the brothers on television and, since they both needed a vacation, concocted a plan to get Mike and Dave to take them.  In order for this to happen, the girls needed to pretend to be respectable.

And, if  you don’t see where this is heading, you haven’t seen this kind of movie before.  The story is as predictable as it comes.  It is completely paint-by-numbers with the most cliched end imaginable.  Go ahead, tell me what you think will happen…I will almost guarantee you that it will happen.

I really did not enjoy Mike either.  He is played as such an overbearing idiot who feels like it is a good idea to shout his lines every second that he became extremely annoying.  Some of the things he does is just so idiotic that it makes it hard to believe that his brother, the somewhat reasonable one, wouldn’t have told him to get the hell out of his life before this.

I thought Zac Efron was pretty good in this role, even though he has played the same type of character many times.  Efron does have some comedic timing and he helps make several of the jokes hit.  He also has a nice relationship (albeit predictable) with Alice, who he helps get over her tragic break up with her ex at the altar of her own wedding.  Efron and Kendrick work well together.

Plaza and Devine both play similar characters, except for the fact that Plaza’s Tatiana does not require screaming every line.

Stephen Root is very funny as the boys’ consistently disappointed and angry father.

The humor is hit and miss.  There are some funny laughs, but they seem to come from times when the cast is allowed to create the humor themselves.  The funniest bit was the blooper real that played over the credits, showing the ad libbing skills of the cast.  Too bad there was not more of this.

While this movie is not good by any stretch, I did not completely hate it.  For this movie that I was really not looking forward to, should be considered a victory.

2.7 stars