A look at the life of wild lemurs living in Madagascar. From: IMDb.com

Directed by: David Douglas

Starring: Morgan Freeman & Patricia Wright

Current release date:  April 4, 2014

There are few things more annoying than a simple action flick that gets told in a totally convoluted way, which is taking away most of the fun out of the movie.

This never feels like a complicated or terribly deep movie, yet, you'll most likely still have a hard time following the story. It's mainly because it's not a very focused movie. The story feels all over the place at times and it too often feels like the main characters don't even have a plan to go by and when they do have a plan, it usually is something incredibly silly, unlikely and just plain over-the-top. In any case, it never ever is anything engaging or likable to watch.

Besides, the movie feels like it consists out of two totally different and unrelated halves. The first half of the movie is a simply 'man on a mission' type of movie, involving the Bruce Willis character and the Mary-Louise Parker character as the sidekick/love interest. The second half of the movie however is more of a team on a mission movie, with also far more action in it, in which neither the Bruce Willis or Mary-Louise Parker character plays a big or significant role anymore. It just doesn't feel right and adds to the inconsistency and 'confusion' of the overall movie. It also is disappointing how this movie isn't featuring a strong main villain in it but instead a whole bunch of small ones, who are only in the movie for a couple of minutes. So you don't even always ever really know who the good guys are fighting against but more importantly; you don't even always know or understand what for or why either.

The fact that this movie stars a bunch of 'old' people in it is nothing but a gimmick. It doesn't make this movie any more fun or special to watch. It's like any other ordinary action flick, only executed more poorly than usual. It never becomes a very creative or original movie with anything and when it does, it just doesn't work out because it's usually something far too silly to watch.

Well, it still is far from the worst movie or action flick you can watch but still, of course more was to be expected from a movie starring the likes of Bruce Willis, Helen Mirren, Morgan Freeman, John Malkovich, Brian Cox, Karl Urban and Richard Dreyfuss in it. It doesn't exploits its potential or ever uses its talented cast very well but it at least still offers some mild entertainment, with both its action and comedy.

So, some mild entertainment in an otherwise weak and even somewhat messy action-comedy.

5/10

Watch trailer

An ordinary LEGO minifigure, mistakenly thought to be the extraordinary MasterBuilder, is recruited to join a quest to stop an evil LEGO tyrant from gluing the universe together. From: IMDb.com

Directed by: Phil Lord, Chris Miller & Chris McKay

Starring: Chris Pratt, Elizabeth Banks, Will Arnett and others

Current release date:  April 11, 2014

Three sixty-something friends take a break from their day-to-day lives to throw a bachelor party in Las Vegas for their last remaining single pal. From: IMDb.com

Directed by: Jon Turteltaub

Starring: Robert De Niro, Michael Douglas, Morgan Freeman and others

Current release date:  November 1, 2013

Three sixty-something friends take a break from their day-to-day lives to throw a bachelor party in Las Vegas for their last remaining single pal. From: IMDb.com

Directed by: Jon Turteltaub

Starring: Robert De Niro, Morgan Freeman, Michael Douglas and others

Current release date: November 1, 2013

An ordinary LEGO minifigure, mistakenly thought to be the extraordinary MasterBuilder, is recruited to join a quest to stop an evil LEGO tyrant from gluing the universe together. From: IMDb.com

Directed by: Phil Lord, Chris Miller & Chris McKay

Starring: Elizabeth Banks, Morgan Freeman, Will Arnett and others

Current release date: February 7, 2014

An ordinary LEGO minifigure, mistakenly thought to be the extraordinary MasterBuilder, is recruited to join a quest to stop an evil LEGO tyrant from gluing the universe together. From: IMDb.com

Directed by: Phil Lord, Chris Miller & Chris McKay

Starring: Morgan Freeman, Elizabeth Banks, Will Arnett and others

Current release date: February 7, 2014

Perhaps I'm just weird about certain things but I don't like movies about illusionists. Thing that annoys me about them is that they can make things as crazy as they want, without having to explain anything. And yes, this movie also features all sort of implausible magic tricks in it. It feels like cheating! It should be a law, that when you decide to do a movie about illusionists, you are only allowed to use actual magic tricks and no 'movie magic'.

But besides all of that, this movie has plenty of other problems in it as well. The premise actually still sounded kind of nice and promising to me but I was absolutely annoyed and disappointed by the way certain things played out.

It believes that keep pulling rabbits out of the hat and stack surprise upon surprise, equals being a clever and surprising movie. But more often than not, things just don't add up too well. It's a typical example of a movie that thinks it's being more clever than it in fact truly is. As a matter of fact, the movie is a very lazily written one in some regards. It mostly relies on coincidences and other conveniences for its story. When looking back at this movie, you have to agree on it that certain things just don't make any sense or add up too well, no matter whether you liked the overall movie or not.

And it still is a very easy movie to like. I mean, sure, it's an entertaining one to watch. It has a constant fast pace and some fine actors, that help to keep you interested in the movie, all throughout. It's not the fun heist movie I expected it to be but it certainly is not without its entertainment.

Thing that still at the same time annoys me about its pace is that it's trying to go to fast at times. Sometimes the camera literally can't stand still and it keeps swirling all over the place, even when not an awful lot is happening. No, I'm not talking about shaky cam but swirly cam...shaky cam's lesser known but far more annoying cousin!

Guess you could say that the foremost thing this movie has going for it, is its cast. Not all characters are equally likable but the actors playing them still give a fine performance. I particularly liked Mark Ruffalo and Woody Harrelson in this movie.

Really, calling this movie a terrible one would be crazy in my opinion. It actually, despite everything, still succeeds to bring some entertainment, some good snappy type of dialog and fine performances by its cast. I just wasn't too fond of its story however and the way certain things played out.

6/10

Watch trailer