Square Galaxy

If there is a level of “over the top,” then Eagle Eye begs for this level to be well defined. 

Eagle Eye is an action file directed by D.J. Caruso. It features a young man and a single mother who are brought together and coerced by an anonymous caller into carrying out a terrorist cell’s plot. 

As an action film, Eagle Eye was pretty typical, yet fairly exciting.  You get your standard explosions, exchange of gun fire, high speed car chases, and suspense.  However, there were a few too many, “yeah, right” moments becaues of too many far fetched ideas in the story fundamentals.

While not a “movie of the year,” Eagle Eye was more enjoyable than watching cable TV re-runs.  To my friends, I would probably recommend that they watch it at the cheap theather.

Tonight I watched the 2002 film, About a Boy. One of the themes of the movie deals with the main character’s search for meaning in his life as he admits that he really does nothing in life.

The theme made me think some more about the different things that motivate us in life. In particular, the movie illustrated some of the meaning that comes through service and love to others and family.

Sometimes I’m not sure how much of that meaning I am currently finding. Sometimes its hard being single when you see all your friends going off and getting married. I hate to admit it, but sometimes I even convince myself to have little crushes, because, as I think I’m figuring out, it gives me a little bit of hope of things that may come. To find the meaning and to find the hope, I think these things would help me cope.

Happy May thirteenth. I hope today means something in your life.

Blockbuster does something similar to Netflix, where they will rent you DVD movies through the mail. I recently tried their 14 day trial period, and these are my suggestions to make the most of your trial:

• Sign up for the biggest plan you can get, because after all, this is a free trial. The risk in this though is if you don’t cancel in time, you get charged for the big plan. If you end up liking the service and wanting to continue, you can always switch to a smaller, less expensive plan. (Make sure you switch before your free trial ends)
• Don’t sign up for your trial late at night. Sign up really early in the morning. The idea is to try and get them to ship you your first set of DVD on the same day that you sign up for the trial. I signed up at 8:30am, and they didn’t ship until the next day. Maybe they never ship on the day you sign up, but if you signed up really early in the morning, you would have the best chances.
• Check the calendar, and make sure there are no holidays. If there is a holiday in the middle of your trial, you might not be able to fit a whole extra shipment into your trial.
• Return your DVDs the day after you get them. This might cause a lot of movie watching when you get your whole shipment, but it is a way to maximize the number of free rentals. You could also get creative of other ways to use your rentals without actually spending the immediate time to watch them.
• Returning DVDs directly to the post office as soon as possible will help make sure that they get in the earliest shipment back. If you put them in your regular mailbox, your mail delivery person gets to drive around with them all day.
• Signup for your trial early Wednesday or Thursday mornings. I think this allows you the best weekend watching.
• Cancel your subscription on the 14th day. If you signed up on a Wednesday, make sure you cancel it by Tuesday. When they say 14 trial days, they mean calendar days and not full (24 hour) days. If you signed up Tuesday night, you don’t have until Tuesday night two weeks later to cancel, because they will charge your card Tuesday morning, because it was the 15th day of your trial.
• If you returned DVDs the business a day or two before the end of your trail, wait until the evening before canceling, to give them every opportunity to send you more DVDs just before you cancel.
• Manage your queue just right so that your favorite DVD are the last ones to arrive during your trial. This is because they allow you quite a bit of time to return the DVD that they’ve already sent you. For me, they gave me over a month to return the movies they sent me right before I canceled. If you favorite movies are the last to arrive during your trial, then you can watch them over and over.

And remember, if your Blockbuster free trial wasn’t enough for you, you can get a Netflix free trial as well. Or do some Google searching, and you may be able to find even more services like this providing free trials.

I recently checked Borne Ultimatum out of the RedBox, and watched this thrilling movie on my temporary home theater system. I’ve seen a number of movies over the Christmas break, and this is one of my favorites.

This movie features ex-CIA agent Jason Borne seeking to find out about the top-secret CIA operations which have turned him into a killing monster.

It is pretty easy to make a recommendation for this movie, as it is very similar to the previous two movies in the trilogy. Those people who liked the other Borne movies will like this movie as well. Those who didn’t enjoy the other movies, probably won’t find much to enjoy in this movie either.

This movie was packed with thrilling fast-paced action, but it didn’t seem as novel as it did in the first movie because it is a lot of more-of-the-same type of exciting action. This movie was great in that it had more plot progression than did the previous movies, and it did a fairly good job at tying up the trilogy story line.

I don’t think they should come out with any more Borne movies, if they did, I think the next movie should be called Borne Again. (laugh, its a joke).

1. Lord of the Rings trilogy
2. Spiderman
3. The Incredibles
4. Transformers
5. Eureka season 1
6. Oceans 11
7. Back to the Future trilogy
8. Pride and Prejudice
9. Finding Nemo
10. The Princess Bride
11. Life is Beautiful
12. Star Wars Episodes 2 & 3
13. Star Wars original trilogy (on VHS)
14. Monster’s Inc
15. Ghostbusters
16. Cars
17. Ratatouille
18. Shrek
19. Hook
20. Fantastic 4
21. Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl
22. Apollo 13
23. Toy Story
24. 24 seasons 2&5

Christmas Update: I added some movies to the above list that I received for Christmas.
Update Nov. 7, 2008 Added some movies that I’ve more recently purchased.