Tuesday, June 30, 2015

"Terminator Genisys" (2015)

Starring Arnold Schwarzenegger, Emilia Clarke and Jai Courtney
Written by Laeta Kalogridis and Patrick Lussier
Directed by Alan Taylor
Rated PG-13 — Violence, language, brief nudity
Running Time: 126 Minutes
Trailer

In a future decimated by machines controlled by the malevolent artificial intelligence known as Skynet, John Connor (Jason Clarke) leads a human resistance to take back the world. His best friend and lieutenant, Kyle Reese (Jai Courtney) is always loyal and by his side. On the night that the human resistance finally destroys Skynet, ending its machine reign of terror, John reveals the existence of Skynet's last and greatest weapon: a time machine. He also reveals to Reese that Skynet has sent a Terminator back through time to kill his mother, Sarah (Emilia Clarke).

Reese, in love with Sarah after all of John's stories and carrying around her picture for years, volunteers to go back in time to protect her. But as he appears in 1984, things are not as he expected. Instead of the T-800 (a young CGI Arnold Schwarzenegger) that he expects, Reese is attacked by a liquid metal T-1000 (Lee Byung-Hun) and rescued by Sarah and her guardian Terminator (the real Arnold Schwarzenegger).

With Terminators traveling to different time periods again and again, the timeline has become fractured. But although Skynet's Terminators get more and more advanced, the changing timelines has given Kyle Reese an advantage: memories of an alternate life he can use to stop it from ever happening. With a new and even more unstoppable machine after them, Reese, Sarah and "Pops" the Terminator travel from 1984 to 2017 on the ultimate mission to stop Skynet — forever.

Friday, June 12, 2015

"Jurassic World" (2015)

Starring Chris Pratt, Bryce Dallas Howard and Vincent D'Onofrio
Written by Rick Jaffa, Amanda Silver, Derek Connolly and Colin Trevorrow
Directed by Colin Trevorrow
Rated PG-13 — Violence, frightening images, language
Running Time: 123 Minutes
Trailer

Two decades later, John Hammond's dream of a theme park whose attractions are genetically engineered dinosaurs is true. Jurassic World attracts tens of thousands of visitors a day who are wowed by living, breathing dinosaurs before their very eyes. In charge of this wonder is Claire Dearing (Bryce Dallas Howard) who also happens to be hosting her two young nephews at the park while their parents get a divorce, and while the park prepares to unveil its latest attraction: a new hybrid dinosaur they've called the Indominus Rex.

The park's owner, Simon Masrani (Irrfan Khan), wants to make sure that the Indominus' paddock is truly secure, so he orders Claire to bring the park's raptor wrangler Owen Grady (Chris Pratt) to inspect it. But when Owen arrives, he discovers that Indominus is not just any dinosaur. Not only is it vicious to a T, but it is extremely intelligent and has been engineered with a number of characteristics that give it the ability to camouflage itself along with other abilities. It tricks the humans into thinking it's escaped, which allows it to escape, and suddenly the chase is on.

But soon it becomes obvious that the thousands of park visitors are Indominus' target, and that the park's security systems are woefully inadequate against such an advanced adversary... with Claire's nephews lost somewhere out in the wilderness amongst the animals. Worse, Claire finds herself under pressure from InGen security, run by war-hungry Hoskins (Vincent D'Onofrio) who may have other motives beyond simply recapturing the beast.

Monday, June 8, 2015

"The X-Files: Fight the Future" (1998)

Starring David Duchovny, Gillian Anderson and Martin Landau
Written by Chris Carter and Frank Spotnitz
Directed by Rob Bowman
Rated PG-13 — Violence, language
Running Time: 122 Minutes
Trailer

FBI special agents Fox Mulder (David Duchovny) and Dana Scully (Gillian Anderson) have been reassigned following the events of the fifth season of "The X-Files" TV series. When a bomb threat is called in to the Federal Building in Dallas, Texas, Mulder and Scully are among those ordered to search the building. Playing on a hunch, Mulder discovers the bomb is actually in a neighboring building, but is unable to stop it and the building is destroyed.

Later, Mulder is approached by Dr. Alvin Kurtzweil, who reveals to Mulder that the building actually contained a FEMA quarantine office, and that the bodies of three firefighters and a small boy found within it were already dead. With the FBI blaming them for the bomb's destruction, Mulder decides to investigate Kurtzweil's claims. The bodies they find weren't killed by the bomb, but by some kind of alien infection.

The deeper Mulder and Scully get into their investigation, the more resistance they encounter. And the more resistance they encounter, the more dangerous things get. But this is more than just a single cover up, because Mulder and Scully soon find themselves drawn back into the dark conspiracy to hide the existence of extraterrestrials from the people of Earth, and revelations about just what those extraterrestrials want with us.