There have been way too movies like “Isn’t It Romantic” starring Rebel Wilson made over the years where someone gets hit on the head and then falls into a completely different world either because they believe they are different like last years “I Feel Pretty” with Amy Schumer or because they are in a dream world because they are in a coma like this story. Some of the messages of Isn’t It Romantic are very good, including the belief that so many Romantic Comedies give the world a false example of what relationships really are. A person has to love themself first before they can love someone else, very true. However, the story was not strong enough despite these messages to recommend and ironically became a movie that the main character hates – a bad romantic comedy.

It seemed like the screenplay for this movie was green-lighted entirely because of the log-line: “A woman who hates romantic comedies hits her head and winds up in a world of romantic comedies”. I am amazed that this story was considered good enough to provide millions in funding and make a movie from it. There are definitely way better ideas than this one and all aspiring screenwriters wonder why some movies are made and others are not.

You have to admire actress Rebel Wilson for being a successful and bankable in Hollywood as one of the very few overweight actors to not only star in but now produce their own movies. Isn’t it Romantic reunites actor Adam Devine as Rebel Wilson’s love interest with almost the same relationship they had in the first 2 Pitch Perfect films. These two seem completely incompatible physically and perhaps that is part of the joke here, but there is nothing I found funny in this movie. Actors Liam Hemsworth and Priyanka Chopra are also in this movie for reasons that have nothing to do with the story, and everything to do with increasing the box office.

The Rotten Tomatoes rating for this movie is an anemic 65% and I am more in the 50% range, believing that this movie should be missed.

To take the horrors of Word War I from film that is over 100 years old and then fix the wear and tear, age, speed and color – and then make a 2 hour documentary called “They Shall Not Grow Old” is an incredible scientific and movie making achievement. Most people would probably think that film this old, regardless of how many times it has been copied would not even exist, much less to be able to correct the many problems to make a new documentary about World War I.

There are many circumstances out of our control in life that can make you a successful human being and just as many that can make you a failure or a young person who horribly dies in war. Being a young man born in the early 1890’s or the early 1920’s virtually guaranteed that your life would probably include being drafted into 2 of the most horrible wars in human history and not only dying young, but horribly. Even if you survived, the odds were even higher that you would be badly wounded or have psychological scars that will never heal for the rest of your life.

Director Peter Jackson spent years creating a 2 hour documentary and story about the horrendous hardship’s of World War I that was fought during 1914-1918. The restored film footage covered the constant shelling from both the British and the Germans, the commonplace reality of death and dismemberment, the days and weeks of sitting around waiting for another battle to start, lack of food and suffering, the use of chemical weapons, the disgusting bathroom realities and even some pictures of trench foot, where the only solution was amputation. There is no way any human being can tell someone outside of a war like this what it was like, even with a high quality produced documentary like this one. Surprisingly, after the war the returning veterans were not treated well, and most could not find any work, even encountering indifference to what they have been through. This documentary also has narration throughout from many of the soldiers who lived through this horrible war, and if there is one flaw in this movie it is that many of the accents are so thick that very often you cannot understand what they are saying.

At the beginning of this documentary, Peter Jackson tells the audience that at the end of the credits he will address the audience after the closing credits to summarize much of the film restoration science was accomplished. Unfortunately the ending credits were way too long and annoying to sit through to wait for Peter Jackson. A better idea would have been to show Peter Jackson’s technical explanation right after the movie and then end the movie with the credits.

For anyone interested in world history and the history of World War I, this is a must see documentary, but prepare yourself for some very disturbing pictures and video. All wars are horrendous and should never exist in life but they will probably always exist. Humanity, even 100 years ago, is extremely accomplished at the cruel art of killing people.

The Rotten Tomatoes ratings for They Shall Not Grow Old are 99% and I agree with this rating and highly recommend this very impressive documentary.

As most people would probably agree, the title of this movie, “What Men Want” as well as the original from 2000 “What Women Want”, should be “What Men Think” and “What Women Think”, due to the fact that the entire premise is the main character suddenly having the ability to hear what the opposite sex is thinking. Aside from the impossible idea behind this film, the situations and dialogue that can spring from an idea like this are endless and potentially very entertaining. Unfortunately, this movie does not take anywhere near advantage of some very good scene and dialogue ideas, and in too many cases, takes the easy raunchy route. The original “What Women Want” released in 2000 was at best a below average movie and considering Mel Gibson was the star, reminds us that the year 2000 was 19 long years ago. Releasing a remake of an average movie does not make much sense, unless the remake has a significantly better twist and plot idea than the original. Unfortunately this remake fails on too many levels and is not nearly as good as the original.

What Men Want stars Taraji P. Henson as an employee of a sports agency and of all people Brian Bosworth, the former football and action star from the early 90’s who I have not seen in any movie in many years. You have to admire Bosworth for not giving up on acting given his very few acting parts in the last 10 years, acting is a very tough profession. Tracy Morgan is also in this movie playing the father of a high school basketball star about to go to the pros. I thought Morgan’s use of language and his funny way of talking was not enough to fix the dialogue in this script. This movie once again fails the audience movie rule for any comedy – nobody laughed in the theater I was in, an obvious must for any good comedy movie. “When Harry Met Sally” released 30 years ago, still stands out as a standard for all comedy films, as well as Annie Hall in 1977. There has never been a comedy movie released since 1989 that I have seen that comes close to these two all time classics in my opinion.

A good number of of the scenes involving back stabbing and office politics were realistic, very well done, and just about the only good thing in this entire story. There was one line at the end that I thought was very profound and basically stated: “nobody should ever derive their sense of self worth from the opinions of others”. An idea we should all live by.

The ratings for this movie on IMDB are a very low 3.2 and 47% on Rotten Tomatoes, I agree with both scores. What Men Want should be skipped.