No Escape is a combination of Behind Enemy Lines meets Argo meets World War Z. Unfortunately, it is not nearly as good as any of these movies. In fact, it wasn’t good at all. It certainly was not the worst movie I had seen in 2015, but thus far, it has been the most disappointing. The previews for this movie make it looks great. If you’ve seen any movie this summer, you’ve undoubtedly seen the extended clip of Owen Wilson, in a last-ditch effort to save his family, hurling his young daughter from the roof of one building to another. It makes the movie look like the most intense movie of the year. Unfortunately, this scene is easily the best of the film, and the movie ultimately falls apart after that. Unfortunately, there is no escape from me giving this movie a poor review. It’s so bad that it’s not even the best movie named No Escape. The 1994 Ray Liotta effort was much better and more deserving of your time.
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Category Archives: Owen Wilson
The Internship (2013)
The most overlooked movie of 2013 may have been Shawn Levy’s (Date Night, Night at the Museum) The Internship. The film reunited Vince Vaughn (Dodgeball, Old School) and Owen Wilson (Hall Pass, Midnight in Paris) for the first time since 2005’s box office mega-hit Wedding Crashers. Fans had been asking for the two to reunite for a movie. Many were calling for a Wedding Crashers 2. It was one of those scenarios where no matter what the pair decided to do, it was destined for failure because it would not be able to live up to the hype. In a way, it’s as if The Internship never got its fair chance, and I include putting myself in that lump sum. I remember when I first saw the trailer for the movie. I was utterly disappointed at the end of the trailer when I saw that the film was only PG-13. I was ready for some R-rated comedy between the duo. I wanted it to be as raunchy as Wedding Crashers. Unless the reviews for the movie were incredible, I knew I was unlikely to see the film in the theater, if at all, because of a rating that I deemed unacceptable for a Vaughn/Wilson comedy. However, I did decide to give it a go when it came on HBO, and I’m so glad I did. It’s a comic gem.
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Hall Pass (2011)
2011 was a great year for comedies. You had Bridesmaids and Crazy, Stupid, Love., both of which finished in my Top for the year. You also had Horrible Bosses and The Hangover Part II, each of which finished just outside my Top 10. Hall Pass is the fourth great comedy for that year and a movie that will cause me to re-evaluate my list shortly. Right now, I’m uncertain whether this finishes just outside the Top 10 of 2011 or if it finishes ahead of Bridesmaids (my current #3). Wherever it falls, nothing will change the fact that it is a hilarious movie. It’s also a movie I almost did not watch because I didn’t like the concept. I like the raunchy humor movie, but the idea of two wives giving their husbands a week-long hall pass where they could do what they wanted to whoever they wanted didn’t appeal to what I valued in a movie. With that said, I’m glad I gave the movie a chance because it was also a really good movie in addition to being an absolute comic gem.
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Midnight in Paris (2011)
Not being the hugest fan of Woody Allen, I had convinced myself I would never see Midnight in Paris when 1) I heard that Owen Wilson was the star and 2) I saw the trailer for the first time. Woody Allen has never done much for me. I can appreciate how much he has contributed to Hover over the years. He really doesn’t take much of a break. More importantly, I like that he writes most of the screenplays for his movies if not all. And while there have been a couple of his films that I did like (most notably Annie Hall and Match Point), for the most part, I have found them to be rather stale. I know he has his die-hard fans who will see anything that he sees. I will most likely only see a Woody Allen movie if it earns a Best Picture Academy Award nomination. Hence, my review.
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Wedding Crashers (2005)
While I admit that I am probably one of the last people on earth to watch Wedding Crashers, I will say that I had it in my possession for over three years. I bought it previously viewed for $5 at Blockbuster a long while ago. It was never a question of if I would watch Wedding Crashers, but just a question of when. When discussing the best comedies of all time, many people (especially people my age and younger) will list Wedding Crashers in the first two or three movies they mention. When I tell them I haven’t seen it yet, I get the response, “Of all the movies you’ve seen, you’ve never seen Wedding Crashers?” So, much like the movie I most recently reviewed (The Green Mile), my expectations for Wedding Crashers were almost unrealistic. However, much like The Green Mile, the movie lived up to the hype. I’m not ready to put it into a top-five comedy of all time, but I will safely put it in the top ten.