I am McLovin, so pass the nuggets

Well, thanks to Labor Day weekend, I managed to catch up on some of this recent batch of movies.  So without further ado, I'm bringing back Reviews McNuggets (half the calories and all of the rambling).

Halloween:  Rob Zombie's remake of John Carpenter's landmark slasher flick starts off with re-inventing just who Michael Myers was.  The first half of the movie is dedicated to showing Myers' family life, the hints at his instability, and of course, the horrific slaughter that led to his confinement for fifteen years.  Fast forward fifteen years, to which we're shown how he managed to escape from the sanitarium and return to his hometown, where he manages to find the one survivor of his bloody night of horror- his bubbly sister Laurie, a bubbly, well-adjusted girl in the burbs of Haddonfield, Illinois.  Waiting for nightfall on Halloween, he makes his move to continue the killing spree that almost ended the Myers line.

I have to say, I was quite surprised.  Knowing Rob Zombie's zeal for excessive gore and crappy movies, I expected MUCH worse.  While some of the scenes are violent and gruesome, he doesn't throw too much out there.  The back story he creates is decent, which includes the origins of the Michael's signature mask.  The second half is the remade portion, which is a compressed retelling of the Carpenter classic.  All in all, a solid effort, with the new Laurie (Scout Taylor-Compton) showing that she has come quite a ways from the teeny-bopper Sleepover.

The Nanny Diaries:  Annie Braddock has just graduated college, is about to break into a new and exciting career when she...totally chokes at the job interview she is late for.  While being miserable in NYC, she saves a kid from a near-accident, which leads to her accepting a job as a nanny for a self-obsessed, narcissistic Fifth Avenue shop-a-holic.  Annie, or rather, Nanny, leads an unglamourous life watching the glamorous live their own, and frequently finds herself at the whims of unbridled selfishness until she is at her breaking point.

Yawn.  While I'm sure the original book is pure Sunshine and Rainbows, this Diet Devil Wears Prada is pretty damn boring.  Linney's Mrs. X pales in comparison to the outrageousness of Streep's Miranda, and the biggest surprise is the unexpected F-bomb ScarJo drops as Annie the Nanny.  While not bad, it's just simply not good.  Recommended only for senior citizens, and people who haven't seen the far better Prada.

Resurrecting the Champ:  Debuting last week, Champ is the story of Denver Times journalist Eric Kerner, who has shown lackluster talent despite his solid credentials and the renown of his father, a famed radio commentator.  While trying interviewing for another publication, Kerner mentions an idea he has (just made up) for a story:  a homeless man claiming to be a boxing champion long thought to be dead.  Grabbing the bull by the horns, Kerner interviews the "Champ", Bob Satterfield.  After his story makes the front page of the magazine, Eric's life changes in ways he hadn't anticipated.

While this movie has been a flop at the theaters, it is a great story.  It does a fantastic job at showing the contrast between who we try to be for others, and what we should actually focus on being for ourselves.  Josh Hartnett and Samuel L. Jackson both do a wonderful job, and Teri Hatcher plays a marvelously written white-washed sepulcher of a human being in Vegas.  If you can't see this before it leaves the big screen, definitely rent it.

Superbad:  The plot is simple enough- three misfits/wallflowers try to make the most of their last opportunity at partying while in high school.  Throw in a shoddy fake ID, two jugs of laundry detergent, crappy cell phone reception, and some doughnuts in the parking lot, and it's a night of mayhem that won't soon be forgotten.

While this treads on some well-covered ground (Porky's, American Pie), it explores new heights in crassness, gross-out humor, and sophomoric jokes.  That said, I don't think I've laughed so hard throughout a movie in a very long time.  Like Apatow's Knocked Up from June, it is doing fairly well at the box office despite the much-deserved R-rating.  Expect a lot of pasty office nerds to walk around saying "I am McLovin", thanks to break-out Christopher Mintz-Plasse.  Hopefully he can capitalize on the wave of exposure better than Jon Heder has.