ER - EZ
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Erased [2012]
Escape Room [2019] Escape Room: Tournament of Champions [2021] Eternals [2021]
Europa Report [2013] Event Horizon [1997] Ever After [2018]
Everly [2014] Every Time I Die [2019] Everything Everywhere All at Once [2022]
Evil Dead Rise [2023] Evil Souls [2015] Exam [2009]
Excalibur [1981] The Expendables [2010] The Expendables 2 [2012]
The Expendables 3 [2014] The Expendables 4 [2023] The Exorcist III [1990]
Extinction [2018] Extraction [2022] The Eye [2002]
Eye for an Eye [1996] Eyes of the Dead [2015] Eyes Without a Face [1960]
Erased [2012]

            
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Under the understanding that he was developing security tech, an engineer suddenly finds his company gone and someone wants him and his daughter dead. This was an exciting film that moves at a really quick pace and fills up the story with lots of side characters, twists and turns, a bit of subterfuge and lots of kinetic energy. Aaron Eckhart & Liana Liberato were great as father & daughter and, although there was too much reliance on her emotional decisions messing things up driving the story, this was an exciting ride well worth a bag of popcorn.
Everything Everywhere All at Once [2022]

            

A woman with a mundane and hectic life finds herself recruited to save the multiverse. This a delightfully amusing exercise in structured chaos that easily could have been a disaster but they pulled it off brilliantly. The characters were wonderful and the imagination that went to the writing of this is mind boggling. The constant use of doing illogical actions to jump between verses was a kick keeping the viewer constantly wondering what's going to happen next and how they were going to get there. It isn't fully understandable but it doesn't need to be. Good fun!
Everly [2014]

            
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A sex slave to the Yakuza decides to go to war when her family is threatened. Almost entirely taking place in an apartment, we watch hordes of characters try to kill our heroine but she just won't go down. Although extremely entertaining as a gory, violent, shoot 'em up, I was confused as to what the film wants to be. There are moments of campy humor, moments of serious drama and moments that are just plain dark, all of which never really hit their mark. Salma Hayek was great and I'll watch anything with her in it ..even without a snake. Fair escapist entertainment.
Eyes of the Dead [2015]

            
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Micro budget film featuring a small group of friends on a ranch who find themselves under siege from flesh eating rage monsters. Opening the film with a spoiler was a questionable decision but, from that point on, the film is presented as a continuous single-shot POV of one of the friends. In that, they were very effective at maintaining a level of intensity and dread that solidly kept my attention. The low points are the awkward emotional back story used to fill the empty spaces. Generally good, mindless fun. Oh, and those piglets. I'll never be able to unsee that.
Extraction [2022]

            

Chris Hemsworth, Sam Hargrave, and the Russo Brothers (all MCU alumni) came together to present us with an intense, high action film about an extraction specialist who gets hired to rescue a drug lord's son. The story is almost painfully simple and basically just an excuse to stitch a bunch of highly choreographed action sequences together. But, my goodness they're exciting including an 11+ minute single shot, running battle that is sheer technical genius. What little drama there is was well crafted making us really care about the characters. Nicely done!
Escape Room [2019]

            

6 people are invited to an escape room with a $10k prize. Little did they know they'd be fighting for their lives. Puzzle genre films can, quite often, be contrived with characters doing stupid or illogical things and resorting to simplistic tricks to get through it. This one, however, is very clever and well executed with a good deal of imagination behind the writing. Firmly establishing the players and never having them do something 'out of character' was a huge plus making it feel genuine despite the unrealistic premise. This was fun, intense and an exciting watch.
Escape Room: Tournament of Champions [2021]

            

Survivors of a previous game suddenly find themselves playing it again. This review is on the Extended Cut. I've read the Theatrical Cut is different. The movie was exciting with lots of twists and turns and the escape room puzzles featured some clever tricks. For me, the problem was the acting and directing. The acting wasn't bad but is wasn't great either making them shallow generating little empathy. The directing had them solving puzzles by basically screaming at each other. Methodical cooperation would have improved things. It was still fun.
Evil Dead Rise [2023]

            

An earthquake isolates an old apartment building and reveals a vault with lots of demon conjuring goodies. Let the bloodbath begin. My hats off to Lee Cronin (writer / director) for fully embracing the Evil Dead mythos and slamming us along side the head with an assault of demonic violence and squishy good fun that us fans are thriving for. With steady pacing, good dialogue, adequate acting and stellar make-up, fx and imaginative gags and kills, this tension and anxiety filled mishmash of malevolence can only be described as jolly good fun. Let 'er rip!
Extinction [2018]

            

A man has nightmare visions of an alien invasion. Then there's a real invasion. The first half of this film is quite compelling. The invasion sequence, although too dark, was handled well with aewsome, immersive sound that made you feel you like you were right in the middle of it. Unfortunately, the 'big' reveal came off as lazy and simplistic ...I had far better story lines running in my head and the horrors of intolerance was not one of them. Then after this big reveal? ...another contrived chase sequence and that's it. Apt example of a great premise totally wasted.
Evil Souls [2015]

         
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People who knew each other as kids are kidnapped by a psycho who terrorizes and tortures them. This is a no-budget, amateur production that blatantly looks the part. The priest was acted well and the old lady in the mental health facility was genuinely disturbing but the others were bad, especially the non-authentic psycho who was just a long haired dude acting like an obnoxious loon. They could have given us far more backstory but stuck to the cheap thrills. It held my interest for 90 mins but the final scene was incomprehensible and resolved nothing.
Exam [2009]

         
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8 candidates, vying for a highly coveted position in a mysterious corporation, enter a final exam where they have 80 minutes to answer one question ...and they don't know what the question is. Reminiscent of films like Cube, this exquisitely well-written psychological character study has our candidates going from confusion to helpful cooperation to resentment to hostility to outright chaos and violence as the human need to win takes on monumental proportions. Top if off with an ending that shows the question was there all along, but missed by everyone, was perfect.
The Exorcist III [1990]

            
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A series of brutal killings, reminiscent of a serial killer's victims from 15 years before, leads a detective to a man locked up in a mental hospital who seems to know quite a lot about the murders. Didn't pay much attention to the sequels until I was told that I ought to see this one. What a surprise! Superbly written and directed by William Peter Blatty featuring outstanding performances by everyone, especially the powerhouse acting of George C. Scott and Brad Dourif (with all the best quotable lines) as they square off against each other. Great entertainment!
Eternals [2021]

            
  
Before the Infinity Stones, there were the Celestials who created a race of beings known as Eternals sent to various worlds to protect from savage beasts known as Deviants. Covering a time span of 7,000 years, we get to know the Eternals sorta well. As far as MCU films go, this is a somewhat weak film, we don't care about the characters as much as usual, some of their development was a bit shallow, and some of the concepts required more explanation. I was mystified on a few points as to what was happening. Still good MCU excitement and eye candy.
The Eye [2002]
aka Gin gwai
         

A young woman sees for the first time since she was 2 due to a corneal transplant. Then she begins seeing dead people. Overly melodramatic with dreadful pacing, once the film establishes she can see dead people, the viewer is trapped into watching her misery for more than 30 mins with no progression to the story. When things finally do start moving forward again, it got more interesting but still dragged out ad nauseum and the ending was a downer. Would have been much more exciting as a half hour Twilight Zone episode.
Eye for an Eye [1996]

            

After a rapist/murderer is released on a technicality, the mother of the victim plans a scheme to kill the offender. Despite all the familiar faces and John Schlesinger directing, this film is sort of lifeless. I think it's because there's hardly any musical score at all so there's really no sense of tension, danger, threat, etc., it just falls flat ...not to mention being rather slow-paced. I don't think Sally Fields was the right choice for the part, either. The vengeful climax was fitting and entertaining but nothing we haven't seen before.
Eyes Without a Face [1960]
aka Les yeux sans visage
         
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A doctor scalps the faces off of women in hopes of successfully grafting the face onto his daughter who lost hers in an auto accident. Artfully stylistic and phenomenally dull pretty much sums this one up. I know people go crazy for these art films and, yes ...they are interesting from a artistic point of view. But watching a car pull into a driveway, driver get out, walk into house, take off hat and coat, dramatic pause, walk up flight of stairs, dramatic pause, walk up another flight of stairs ...to me, that's just padding without purpose and it bores me to death.
Europa Report [2013]

            
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An ultra-realistic travelogue of a manned flight to Europa to search for signs of life. Presented as the occurrences that took place aboard the ship filmed through a variety of cameras, flight comms and computer data that comprised the last communications from the ship. Giving equal attention to the actual events on Europa and the human psyche in dealing with scientific discovery vs total catastrophe, this film was tense, personal, and highly visual.
The Expendables [2010]

            

A group of mercenaries get hired to kill a general of an island nation for $5mil. Upon doing some reconnaissance, things get personal. Movies that feature old action stars are fun for me simply because I grew up watching these guys and they're still putting out action films. And, wow... what an action film! Sylvester Stallone has proven that he can direct. This film has some of the best choreographed action and fight scenes I've witnessed ...and filmed properly so that they're discernible. Great, exciting stuff!!
The Expendables 2 [2012]

            


Our crew of motley old timers are coerced into retrieving at item in a plane crash by the CIA to pay back a debt. Story's good, action is top shelf, of course, and the banter is always great fun and quite enjoyable. It was pretty cool to see practically every major action star since the '80's make an appearance, as well. Doesn't seem quite as tight as the first one, storywise, but good fun, nonetheless.
The Expendables 3 [2014]

            

Another CIA job goes sour except, this time, an arms dealer turns out to be an ex-Expendable that was supposed to be dead. Barney decides to go after him with a new crew. Three movies into the franchise and the films are still just as fun and exciting. Part of that excitement is the new but very familiar faces that keep showing up. And to have Ronda Rousey as one of the new faces?? No complaints here. Lots of intense action with exceptional choreography. They still rock!
The Expendables 4 [2023]
aka Expend4bles
            

They are hired to stop a nuclear confrontation. Unlike any of the other films, this one only has 4 alumni and mostly unknowns ...except the highly promoted 50 Cent who just walks around a lot. Obviously low budget with far less banter and wit relegating it to basically an action B-movie with awful CGI just a step or two above an Asylum film. But, I don't rate movies on bad CGI and budget constraints but rather how entertaining it is. In this case, it was fun visiting the old characters again, the action was exciting and, overall, my wife and I thoroughly enjoyed it.
Every Time I Die [2019]

            
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A thought provoking tale of guilt, denial, and an untethered soul triggered by an affair among friends. That's all you should know going into this because anything more would spoil the numerous little twists and discoveries this journey takes. You won't fully understand what's happening for the first hour and that's exactly as it should be. Don't read any movie descriptions as most basically tell you far too much. Watch the appropriately cryptic trailer instead. This is actually a well written, nicely designed thriller that kept me guessing throughout.
Ever After [2018]
aka EndZeit
            
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First off, this is NOT a zombie movie. It is a deeply personal journey of survival in a post-apocalyptic, zombie infested world. Two girls, one incredibly apathetic and the other just pathetic, find themselves stuck in the wilderness between two human occupied cities. Although the film has an atmosphere of constant danger, it's only occasionally realized. Most of the film is just the two girls moralizing, philosophizing, dredging up guilts of the past, etc., making it rather dull. Wasn't bad but if I'd known it wasn't a zombie film, per se, I might have skipped it.
Excalibur [1981]

            

An epic version of one of the many stories surrounding King Arthur and his sword of power, Excalibur. The director, John Boorman, wanted to do The Lord of the Rings but couldn't get the rights so he did this instead ...and quite well. Although a bit dated by today's historical fantasy standards, it's still quite compelling with a cast of actors that were virtually unknown then but are big stars now. Nostalgic, exciting story that's well worth the 2 1/2 hour sit through.
Event Horizon [1997]

            
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If you travel to another dimension and back, what might you bring back with you? This Barker / Lovecraftian premise has produced some truly horrific tales (From Beyond, Hellraiser, The Mist) but this film tends to just hand us a series of gruesome events that aren't very horrific or satisfying. Even the visions of hell are nothing more than quick flashes that you can't appreciate. It's not bad, and I did like it quite a bit ...it just doesn't seem to embrace its premise as well as it's promising.
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