Breaking In

First Hit: The best part of the film was that the mother won.

As a suspense film it wasn’t great, however it definitely kept my interest and despite knowing the ending, Shaun Russell (Gabrielle Union) as the main character, gave the audience great intensity.

Shaun’s father Issac (Damien Leake), is a wealthy man who was being indicted in federal court for theft. Out for a run before going to court, he is killed by a truck driven by Sam (Levi Meaden).

Shaun, with her children Jasmine and Glover (Ajiona Alexus and Seth Carr respectively) go out to Issac’s country mansion to clean it up and removed things she may want before she sells it. This house is huge, far from the city and neighbors, and very high-tech.

However, upon reaching the house she suspects that something is wrong and soon finds out that four men are in the house looking for a safe. The killing of Issac, we learn, was planned so that Eddie (Billy Burke), Duncan (Richard Cabral), Peter (Mark Furze), and Sam could rob the home.

To leverage their power over Shaun, the leader Eddie, has the other 3 capture and hold her two children as hostages. The thieves’ hope is to leverage holding her children hostage for knowledge about the location of the safe.

There are several scenes where Shaun gets the better of her children’s’ captors. What didn’t work very well was Sam. In his role, although he tried to sound in control and menacing to both his work team and Shaun, there was a lack of strength and surety of his character. In other words he wasn't quite believable.

I think the house could have been used more as a character than it was. The amount of high-tech in the house and using it to trick or thwart the robbers could have made it more interesting, especially if the kids took control. They did a couple of times, but not enough to make it really stand out.

Union was strong as the mother you didn’t want to cross. She showed athleticism as well and intuitive intelligence in this role. Meaden was very good as the semi-reluctant thief although the idea to rob this home was originally his. Alexus and Carr were excellent as the children. They both created age appropriate interests and actions and the right amount of duress. Burke was good but there was one point in the film, I wondered why the other thieves didn’t just kill him and take over the robbery. Cabral was the best of the thieves. He show immense intimidating intensity. Furze had the smallest robber role and it was OK. Ryan Engle wrote a good script but, as I said, I would have like a better group of thieves and the house could have used more. James McTeigue did a good job of directing the actors in this script. It lacked a certain creativeness, but the film worked.

Overall: I like when the main character is rightfully and clearly driven to save the day, that it was a woman, a mother, made it better.

Top Five

First Hit:  Although there were some funny bits, this film was disappointing.

I’ve been a Chris Rock fan for as long as I can recall. I, unfortunately, came to this film with hopes of seeing something interesting and good.

What I felt was bored about 1/8 of the way in until the last ¼ of the film when it got interesting and with some traction. That is not to say that there weren’t parts in between those two points that I didn’t laugh or enjoy – it is just that they were few and far between. To point out one of those segments was when he was with family or the people he grew up with – they had some funny riffs.

Here “Top Five” refers to the top five rappers each character is asked to state. The film is about Andre Allen (Rock) who is trying to promote what he thinks is a serious film about a black slave uprising in Honduras. The small clips the audience sees of the film shows that it is horrible. He’s also marrying Erica Long (Gabrielle Union) a reality TV star with no discernible talent.

To use a vehicle to discover where Allen is in his life the film uses a reporter Chelsea Brown (Rosario Dawson) who also masquerades as a male New York Times critic by another name who always bashes Allen’s “Hammy” films. Her interviewing him gives context to discover Allen's state of mind. We know what is going to happen at the beginning of the film and the path to the end is predictable and lacks imagination. What is worse the whole “Top Five” bit isn’t strong enough to create a touchstone or transition touchstone.

Rock only stands out when he does a brief standup routine. It is also where he discovers what he’s good at doing. Else Rock is monotone and appears bored. Union is fine as the reality star that wants to marry Allen because she has nothing else going for her. Dawson is the best thing about this film and there are scenes where she shines. J.B. Smoove is strong as Silk, Allen’s bodyguard. Rock both wrote and directed this film and although he had good intentions, it fell flat.

Overall:  This was a poorly constructed film although the intention might have been good.

Think Like a Man

First Hit:  This film served up both truth and laughs.

Film follows 7 men who are close friends and hang out together often.

The film also follows the women whom they meet. So what is thinking like a man entail? It entails reading Steve Harvey’s book “Act Like a Lady, Think Like a Man”.

In this book he gives women advice of how to land men; who are mama’s boys, or can’t commit, or are players, and other behaviors. What happens is that we follow men who are being lured into relationships they actually want by women who are using the techniques written in the book to make the man do what they want.

At one point the men get copies of the book and try to blunt the girl’s attempts but in the end the men want these girls. Through all this is humor, some of it smart, some slapstick, some racial, but mostly it is the kind of humor one expects in the truth.

The bits with the professional basketball players is really funny and I would have liked even more of those scenes.

This film is smart in the way it handles the male and female parts.

This is a very good ensemble piece and although the actors are not largely known (A-list) the acting was strong: Michael Ealy, Jerry Ferrara, Kevin Hart, Terrence Jenkins, Romany Malco, Gary Owen, Chris Brown, Meagan Good, Regina Hall, Taraji P. Henson, Jennifer Lewis, Gabrielle Union, La La Anthony, Wendy Williams and Sherri Shepherd were all funny and good in their roles. Keith Merryman wrote the smart screenplay from Steve Harvey’s book. Tim Story directed this smartly with great movements between couples and scenes.

Overall: I really enjoyed this film because it rang of truth, was smartly written and well directed.