El Camino Christmas (2017) - Movie Review

The plot: Eric (Luke Grimes) has arrived to El Camino, Arizona, in search of his lost father. However, he soon finds himself in a bizarre hostage situation when he, local policeman Carl Hooker (Vincent D’Onofrio), mother Kate (Michelle Mylett) and her son, and town drunk Larry (Tim Allen) are stuck inside of a liquor store. The officers outside, particularly Sheriff Fuller (Kurtwood Smith) and Deputy Calhoun (Dax Shepard) have no idea what’s going on, and the situation inside is far from cut-and-dry. It’s going to be a long Christmas.

Taken 2 (2012) - Movie Review

With the release of the third film in the Taken series now out, I find myself in a similar position to when Mockingjay came out late last year and needing to catch up a bit. Having not seen the first Taken film in several years, I went back and revisited that one first and… have to admit, it’s a lot better than I remember it being. Maybe it’s with the benefit of hindsight, but re-watching it definitely gave the impression that this was a film that warranted the success it had with Liam Neeson giving something of a career rejuvenating performance as the lead. However, given the severe case of sequelitis Hollywood suffers from, something has become very clear: A film being good on its own is by no means a guarantee that whatever follow-ups said film gets will be good. Sure, some films will be just as good as the original and sometimes may even surpass the original (Dawn Of The Planet Of The Apes and How To Train Your Dragon 2 from last year were great examples of this), but it sadly isn’t always the case.