30+ Hollywood Movies to look forward to in 2011

(Read the original article at Techrepublic.)

Last year has been an awesome thrill ride into the world of unknown and visits to the places, not even conceivable by human mind before. The Lovely Bones, took us in the life after death; Alice in wonderful took us to the aftermath of the original; Prince of Persia, took the game to reality; Inception took us on a ride inside dreams and the sequel of Tron, abducted us inside the digital world. While the past year did all that without even a slightest of hesitation, this year, 2011, the excitement is only going to rise.


Following is a list of 30 movies which any self-respected geek must make sure to watch at any cost in the year 2011, along with its storyline and the time of release.
Note: Some descriptions are from IMDB, and release dates can be tentative. 

So buckle up and enjoy the ride.....




1. Sanctum (4 Feb) [ Action | Adventure | Drama ]
From James Cameron comes another movie, that it bound to get all the attention it needs. This time, Cameron is going under water, and exploring maybe the only place left to explore on earth. While Sanctum was inspired from a real story, of survival of a crew of divers, from the underwater caves, James had informed, that it is purely a fiction. Sanctum is going to be 3D, a trend which has become popular with the success of Avatar in 3D.
[Trailer]

2012 - The End - Or Just the Beginning

Image via Wikipedia

12th December 2012:
"Water came rushing in from all sides of the island and submerged the complete city in one sweep. Huge rocks were falling from the skies and blasting like Atom bombs all over the mountains. Rocks started to melt like wax does in the coal and houses began to vaporize in seconds.
The minute longs earthquakes were shattering the landscapes, and buildings were collapsing like when a tower of cards crash when even one card is pushed from its base. Bridges were collapsing, trucks blasting and there was havoc everywhere!"


Just the words above can generate chills in the spine. Now imagine watching the destruction on 30 by 70 feet screen size and dolby digital surround sound. Oh, it has GOT TO BE one of the most Amazing Experience ever. And it was. So much so, that I had to watch it two times to get it through.

The apocalypse of 2012 is based on the myth (or perhaps the truth) of Mayan calender's predicting the end of human civilization to be on the 12th day of 12th Month of the year 2012. Nobody can prove the authenticity of the prediction (unless and otherwise they use a Time machine, of course!), but they can at least create a thrill ride of the events, in a circumstance that it might go true.

Story is the (now) stereotypical, "peoples trying to save themselves from destruction of the earth", type of movies, but its hell of a thrill ride. It was the most anticipated movie for me, when I had watched its trailer, months ago. Many people have criticized 2012 for the lack of its imaginative plot, but I dont think you need more! With the Earth coming to an end, who cares about the story; the people would wonder more, if anybody could survive the apocalyptic date.

Inception - Dare to Dream

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The first thing which comes to mind after you have watched the trailor of Inception, is that you will see Leonardo DiCaprio on the Big screen! It’s a known fact, about him being a good actor, and its hard to imagine him without getting the record-setting "Titanic" in mind. But I am glad to say that Inception may have broken this cliché, and instead many people would now remember him for Inception instead!

Although its very difficult to write a review of Inception, after just a single watch (ya, its that obscure), but this is just an account of my experience and knowledge while doing so.

Plot:

Inception is all about dreams, and its invasion. Few people, has the technology to go inside someone’s dream, and steal what is called the most important thing in the modern world - Information or secrets. "Cobb", the main protagonist of the story (of course Leo), has a job to use their dreams to extract the information, and hence he is called, “extractor”. As the story progresses we watch Cobb and his team  playing with the minds of people that they target, while Cobb trying to deal with his own secrets of his memories. That’s all is needed to Incept the idea of Inception in your minds.

World of the Inception:

“Your mind is the scene of the crime.” - That’s the tag line which Inception has used for its promotion. And quite effortlessly, its justified. The world of Inception is the dream.

Cobb (in the center) with his Team

A dream may just be limited by your imagination, and physics sometimes go for a toss. Anything can happen in a dream. But as in the case of dreams we experience ourselves, any event happening in there, comes to effect because of its some kind of relation to the reality. And any event happening in the real world of the  dreamer, may fall an effect in the dream, the dreamer is watching. (Quiet compelling, isn’t it?)

The connection may seem to be burrowed by the favorite film of all time, "The Matrix", but is far more complicated then that, as you may had or would experience yourself. But more on that later.

Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure

Cover of Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure

Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure (BTEA hereon), is an adventure which must have been the envy of every student who ever wished to make a history project in there school times.

BTEA is a story of two friends, Bill and Ted, and there journey through time, collecting many historical figures, in real person, like the Greek Philosopher - Socrates from about 410 BC, and
Joan of Arc from about 1430 AD to the 16th President of US, and most popular among them, Mr. Abrahim Lincoln. They all are literally captured by the duo in an attempt to pass in their History report!
I know, sounds a little strange, but trust me, its an epic adventure.


Released just about 10 months before second part of Back to the Future Trilogy, BTEA makes little or no attempt to face the paradoxes of time travel. And the way which story goes, kinda looks childish, but who's complaining? Its quiet an adventure and visually good for its time. The best part: you get to travel in a tunnel of time and can actually "see" the time flowing, and going to a particular time is as convenient as dialling a number in the booth, literally!


If you have seen The Matrix, you would be amazed by the teen look of Keanu Reeves. I mean, I recognized much later in the movie that he was the Matrix superstar! What can I tell you about Matrix? I believe it was a landmark in the history of Hollywood. And there are just two kinds of movies, those made before the Matix and those after. But thats another story.

BTEA definitely comes among the tops in my list of must see time travel movies.
Just for the record, these are some of the people you can expect to meet in BTEA.



(From Left to Right) Socrates, John Or Arc, Abrahim Lincoln, Genghis Khan, Beethoven.

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Napolean Dynamite - No its not a War Story

Image via Wikipedia

The first thing that may come to mind after reading the title "Napolean Dynamite", would either be that this is some kind of a Historical story or a historical War movie. But let me tell you that it is infact neither of the two! Its a name of the guy, played by Jon Heder. He may be a nerd or having some kind of Mental disorder, the clarity of which is not clear in the story. (Do let me know, if it clears to you).

To quote IMDB, this movie is about "A listless and alienated teenager, (who) decides to help his new friend win the class presidency in their small western high school, while he must deal with his bizarre family life back home."

I watched this movie, just for the sake of curiosity, cause I had heard many opinions about it. Dont remember, if it was positive or not, but I certainly fell in love with the characters. There's something about him, that makes him familiar. His geekiness, maybe, or the way he says, :Gosh! There's a kind of innocence, a child inside him, which I think prevails inside me too.

Clockstoppers - being Hyper

Have you ever wished you had more time, when all of your friends are shouting at you, for being late to the party, and you are struggling with your dress, which is failing to put on the right place, just at the right time. Or have you ever being frustrated for being late at the class or at the office, afraid of how might your boss react?

Image via Wikipedia

Almost everyone of us, have demanded more time then we get. And its the only thing that instead flies, with the promise that it would never return.... Okay, I sometimes carry away, when I talk about "Time". So I was saying that if you ever had the shortage of seconds, then the Clock from the movie, Clockstoppers is a gadget you will have to dream of. "Dream" because it would take extreme luck for you to acquire such a device, on which there would be the eyes of some of the villians, who will try to snatch it from you, at every tick of the second you proceed with the clock.

Well, in the story of Clockstopper, the lead role, gets his hand on such a watch, which on the press of a button makes you so fast, that everything around seems to be so slow, that you get the illusion of time being stopped, when actually time IS flying like it always does, but with an extremely slow rate! (Umm.. good physics, isn't it?) And now you can do whatever you can imagine in, what is called as "Hypertime". Now any verb, prefixed with Hyper, is bound to sound cool, and this is no exception!

What makes this story interesting, other than the fact, that it uses Einstein's Theory of Relativity, is the adventure with which the boy is accompanied with that clock. And the best part is he gets to know about that time stopping; okay, time slowing gadget with her girlfriend, and together they try to make full use of it! Hey, don't get bad ideas in you mind! They are children for god's sake. They use this power to... well, I don't want to write a spoiler.

The fact is, they don't get to use its power, cause as in a typical Hollywood movie, there are bad guys, who is trying to get that gadget, for some evil intentions! And that's when the adventure comes, and the survival race begins.

Clockstoppers, is quite a nice movie, nice for kids, cause in terms of the story, it doesn't qualify for big guys. But still, a fun movie to watch, cause it shows, the hidden desire among all of us - to stop time.

Keep an eye on this gadget. You may not go back in time, with that clock, but you sure can go Hyper!

The Ruins – Better not watch this!

I saw this movie by chance, when I cached its beginning, on TV at night. And I think, I would have been better, without it. The movie is so gross; I get goose bumps whenever I remember those scenes. Those horrible situations!

"The Ruins" is a horror movie, although not the best in its genre, but still a great deal to follow for someone like me! The plot involves a few tourists travelling to an ancient Mayan temple of Mexican Jungle, where they became the target of carnivorous plants, ready to eat them alive! Yes you read it right, and it does sound creepy.

Well, I have nothing to write more. If you do want to watch this; then let me warn you - this movie is not for the faint of hearts. And I am sure, even strong hearts would want to skip this one. It contains every thing that makes it irresistible to avoid. And I am glad I saw it on TV, cause most of the horror was censored. Sometimes censoring is good ;)