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300: Rise of an Empire

I usually hate prequels.  However; neither a sequel nor a prequel, 300: Rise of an Empire is set at the same time as the original movie 300but this time, the action takes place on the sea.  Rise of an Empire comes off to me as a lazy, cheap gimmick attempting to milk a movie franchise dry. We have all seen 300 and marveled at the special effects and cinematic feats it accomplished, so it makes Rise of an Empire look old and dated.  Instead of this film why not give us a Sin City 2 which would seem far more interesting than the same ole same ole. Meh


How to Train Your Dragon 2

As a follow up to the very successful How to Train Your Dragon comes part 2.  This sequel takes place 5 years after the first film and Hiccup and his friends are now in their late teens.  As the world opens up around him, he discovers there is a larger conflict brewing between humans and dragons and finds himself at the center of it.  I’m sure DreamWorks Animation will have another hit on their hands.  


Man of Tai Chi

As a fan of Keanu Reeves’ I’m happy to see him expanding the Marital Arts genre of films.  Man of Tai Chi marks his directorial debut.  Set in modern Beijing, the film follows the spiritual journey of a young martial artist (Tiger Chen) whose awesome Tai Chi skills land him in a highly lucrative underworld fight club.  From the trailer, the plot and outcome appears to be very straight forward; nonetheless I would expect the fight scenes to be delivered from choreographed kung-fu heaven.  If you are into martial arts movies this may be a “must see”.


Seventh Son

For some reason this comes off as Wrath of the Titans in a Medieval / Middle Earth setting.  A long time ago, a young knight (Jeff Bridges) imprisons a lady witch dragon (Julianne Moore).  Years later she escapes and attempts to unleash all that is unholy upon the earth.  Now an old and raggedy Jeff Bridges has to train his new apprentice (Ben Barnes) to defeat the evil witch.  Special effects for the sake of it don’t make a plot interesting or a movie enjoyable, but that’s Hollywood for you.  I suspect we will hear terms in this fictional period piece from the young apprentice like “awesome”, “rad” or “as if”.  Um…I’ll pass.