2. February 2008 by Ria.

Tough guy Mark Wahlberg is back as Bob Lee Swagger, a retired marine sniper, who finds himself in a hot mess after he is framed in the killing of a Ethiopian Archbishop, and an assassination attempt of the President of the United States. The movie starts off with Swagger on active duty in the Marines with a comrade who ends up getting killed. Too bad, okay now lets skip to the next scene where Colonel Isaac Johnson (Danny Glover) and his band of goons approach Swagger at his home in Wyoming and asks him if he can help him track down an assassin who plans to kill the President with a high powered rifle. Johnson also asks Swagger which of the three locations (that the President will be attending) will the hit take place.

Swagger has better things to do, like shooting Dinty Moore cans, and tells Johnson to leave. However, he thinks about it for a while, lets his patriotism win him over, then he accepts the job. First he travels to Washington DC, then to Baltimore, and finally Philadelphia to scope out the areas, and probably to give himself a much needed vacation. He then reports back  to Johnson to tell him that Philadelphia is probably the best place for the sniper to take out the President, and in response, Johnson asks Swagger to stay to be a spotter, which he agrees, then walks away in total slow motion coolness.

On the day of the supposed assassination, Swagger tells Johnson to take out the sniper, but ends up getting shot, while the Archbishop goes down too, only he won’t be getting up any time soon. Swagger is shot again and falls out of the window, and eventually limps to safety, after kung-fu-ing an FBI agent Memphis (Pena), and driving off with his car. Swagger temporarily stops the bleeding using marine tactics, and with nowhere else to go, winds up at Sarah’s (fallen comrade widow’s) home. She patches him up, and if I’m not mistaken, starts eyeing him. Sorry Sarah, he’s all mine, you’ll just have to go get someone else. Hey, I think McClaine from Die Hard is available. I’ll try to get his phone number for you.

Let’s switch gears and deal with Memphis, oh, I’m sorry, he’s already being dealt with, since he’s in a lot of hot water for letting Swagger escape. But Memphis realizes there’s something wrong with the whole picture. How is it that an experienced sharpshooting sniper fails to hit his target? Memphis starts doing his own investigation, and ends up getting kidnapped and almost killed, until Swagger comes to his rescue. Since they’re both in hot water, Memphis and Swagger team up to catch the real sniper, and take down Johnson and his posse at the same time.

Good movie, but I think that Swagger’s character was so bland. He needed more personality, like a Sergeant Dignam, the character that Wahlberg played in the movie “The Departed”. Just Imagine Bob Swagger with Dignam’s personality where he’s got curse words flying out of his mouth a mile a minute. Now let’s put the new Swagger into a scene from the movie.

Scene where Swagger meets up with Johnson to give him his analysis of where the sniper may strike.

Johnson: Okay Swagger, what did you find out?

Swagger: Listen, you dumb @##$@@%*! I spent all my money flying from DC to Philadelphia, paying for buses, taxis, and food!  You’d better pay me back for this before kick your @@*%@# ass!

Not bad, now lets try the new Swagger in the scene where he’s wounded and ends up at Sarah’s home.

Sarah: Hello, who’s there?. Swagger: Look you stupid ##%@^@@*!!, you’d better open up this damn door before I kick it open, and beat the living %^^##@@ out of you dumb @%%^##@!

Now, that’s better.

Shooter (Widescreen Edition)

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2. February 2008 by Ria.

Hostel II takes over where the previous one left off. The writers bring back Paxton (Jay Hernandez) for a hot second, but the underground criminals from Slovakia caught up with him in the first twenty minutes of the movie, and took his head right off. Oh well, you know what they say, exercise, eat right, kick some psycho’s ass, and die anyway.

Let’s switch gears and head to Italy where we run into three art students, one in which will be our new hero. You’ve got to feel sorry for the other two, but don’t shed any tears yet. They run into trouble by the name of Axelle (Vera Jordanova) who has a way with words (I guess), and talks them into visiting the infamous hostel in Slovakia that we all know and love.

So they get to the hostel, hand over their passports to the desk clerk, who uploads them on some kind of auction site, to all those rich weirdos who will bet to see who will pay the most money to slice the girls to pieces. The three girls attend a Harvest Festival, where Art Student #1, Lorna the desperate goes off with a total stranger named Roman on a boat ride.

Oh well, I guess she’ll just learn her lesson in the next life, because she’s about to lose the one she has now. Roman and his buddies kidnap her, and she ends up in the dungeon, hung upside down, naked, and shackled by the ankles. An Elite Hunting Client comes in, takes her clothes off, slices and dices Lorna, and bathes in her blood. If you are the squeamish type, this is the time for you to go make some more microwave popcorn, but hurry back, this scene doesn’t last long. Art student #2 goes missing, and Beth (art student #3) starts to gets suspicious. Too late girl, some weirdos are eyeing you, so just run.

Wait, wait! I forgot to tell you about Todd (Richard Burgi), and his friend, Stuart (Roger Bart) who won the bid to slice up art student 2 and Beth. Now Todd is really a pompous jerk, Thinking he’s a bad ass, and all along talking about all the gory things he going to do to art student 2 all the time he’s in Slovakia. Now his friend Stuart (who met Beth at the festival), is a little ambivalent about these things. He gripes about getting the Elite Hunting Tatoo (which all clients must have), in fact, he’s having second thoughts about the whole thing.

I guess that means that he’s only half crazy, so maybe he’ll think twice about hacking up Beth, and save her instead………..NOT!!! After Beth is captured, she comes face to face with Stuart again, who at first decides to let her go, then does a 180 degree Norman Bates on her, and figures it’s probably better to just chop her up, after having flashbacks of his wife who treats him like crap. I tell you, these rich guys are something else. They marry women that are only after their money, and then get mad when they find themselves sleeping on the couch a year later. How is that Beth’s fault?

Don’t worry folks, Beth is not going down so easily. She overpowers Stuart, after getting him into a vulnerable position, you know, that position where a guy thinks he going to get sex, but instead gets the crap beat out of him. Good job Beth, but how are you going to get out of there, here come the guards! She actually buys her way out, after convincing Sasha (CEO of Elite Hunting) that she is rich (she really is) and will give them a good chunk of money to let her go.

Sasha tells her that she must then fulfill the contract and kill Stuart who tries to stop his execution by saying he’ll pay more than Beth is willing to offer. Sorry Stuart, they just found out that you’re a broke joke, and that Todd (who got mauled by the dogs for chickening out of his contract) paid your way there. Oh well, Stuart, it was nice knowing you, Bye! Beth castrates Stuart (his private stuff wasn’t worth looking at anyway) and walks out. You go girl!

Oh wait, Beth is not finished yet, now that she’s experienced killing, she takes her revenge on Axelle (you know, the chick that led her there in the first place), and chops her freaking head off! Hell Yeah! I give this movie two stars and 1/2 stars, plus and extra 2/4 of a star for having a unpredictable plot, and another 2/4 of a star for the hero once again using the thing that we all call a brain, and for getting revenge, so what do we have here, 2+1.5+2 divided by the 2.00+another 1.5 divided by…………WHATEVER 3 STARS!

Check out a scene from the movie. No, its not a torture scene!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VIXaC2-R-LI

Hostel - Part II (Unrated Widescreen Edition)

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