21 Jump Street & Warrior

I'm going to talk about two entirely different movies. Two opposites, two movie scales that are on extreme ends of two incredibly incomparable spectrums. Only because I owe it to these movies for having impacted me over the last few weeks. I'll start off with 21 Jump Street

Having seen The Vow, I had become a sudden fan of Channing Tatum. Thus, I was excited to hear through various press junkets that he would be promoting a whopping five films in 2012, one of which was 21 Jump Street. I never saw Channing Tatum as much of a funny guy, so I wasn't really sure what to expect. I also wasn't sure how to feel about not having any background whatsoever about the television show starring Johnny Depp for which the film was, I assume, named after. However, knowing that Jonah Hill was a pretty funny guy and some pretty hilarious trailers, I went on a search for pre-screening tickets.

I was more than lucky to have nabbed tickets, because I was so excited about the duo after the film and eager to have found a new actor I was interested in backtracking via films -- Jonah Hill. Now, I don't know about a lot of other girls, but I do find these types of films entertaining, to say the least. I'm not a huge fan of crude humor, nudity, and the like, but I do enjoy a good laugh that comes from some wittiness. 21 Jump Street has a little bit of everything for everyone, and does it without dunking itself in a stockpile of crudeness. It was, for the most part, very tasteful and the Tatum-Hill duo made for an unusually compatible duo. Five final words about the film? -- Can't wait for the sequel.

 credit: http://cdn2.cagepotato.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/warrior-movie-poster.jpeg

I had heard a lot of hype about this movie and wasn't about to get my hopes up for another disappointing film. But, boy was I wrong. Though, I'm totally unfamiliar with MMA and not a fan of the violent fighting that seems to be all the rage for adolescent and grown males alike, I became totally engaged with the film after twenty minutes. What was the story behind this family? Why was this family so resentful of each other? What had torn this family apart? So many questions were running through my mind, but there was only one way to find out the answer: keep watching.

As each minute passed, I was on the edge of my seat and debating who's side I should be on. The movie made it difficult for me to decide for myself who I thought was more deserving and worthy of the honor of winning a championship and a hefty cash prize. It was filmed so well that you ended up rooting for both sides, there was no "winner", per se, in this film because your heart became captured by the frailty of all the characters and the desire for them to reunite as they had been. It was hard to watch at times, but heart-warming and captivating to see how the characters developed and learn more about their inner demons. It is totally worth the 140 minutes of footage of a story like no other that I've seen in a while.