List Price : $14.99Price : $15.98 as of 2012-11-05 11:27 AM
Product Description
Based on Jeff Kinney's Diary of a Wimpy Kid book series, this puzzle set includes two 200 piece puzzles featuring pictures from the first title, Diary of a Wimpy Kid (red box) and the second title, Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Roderick Rules (blue box). For extra fun, if you own copies of the books, try to find the images from the puzzles in them...you could even race a friend to see who finds them first!Each puzzle contains 200 pieces and measures approximately 19 x 14.
200 piece puzzle based on Diary of Wimpky Kid book series
Collect all 4 different puzzle featuring diagrams from each book
Puzzles are made for ages 8 and up
Puzzle size is 19" x 14"
The color of each color box correspondence with color of the book
The original Paranormal Activity felt fresh, and audience reaction was almost as entertaining as the film itself.Documentary style horror films are nothing new of course.Blair Witch started the trend, and films such as Quarantine and Cloverfield have helped evolve the genre.Still, many movie goers typically love or hate these types of films.Although the original was a gem and personal favorite of mine, Paranormal Activity 2 seems to have lost the spark of the original.The first film was written and directed by Orin Peli, and was his first crack at film making.The actors in the original used their real names, and both Katie Featherston and Micah Sloat were initially paid only $500 for their work.The film was purchased by Dreamworks Pictures, who were then bought out by Paramount.I wanted to highlight these facts because I believe they are the root cause of Paranormal Activity 2's issues.The movie sports a new director and a small army of writers.There were two creative choices that I believe were detrimental to the film.The first was the choice to include the characters of the original in the sequel.Paranormal Activity 2's plot runs concurrent with the original, and the primary focus of the film lies with Katie's sister Kristi and her family.I was hoping this film would disconnect itself from the first film.The persistence just doesn't work.The second folly lies in the use of multiple cameras.The plot handles this by implementing a scene in which it appears someone has broken into Kristi's home and tossed the family's belongings about, but nothing appears to be stolen.The family's reaction is to have security cameras installed throughout the home.One of the reason's I enjoyed the first film was it's "less is more" approach when it came to shooting.Any mystery or sense of suspense found in the first film is all but lost on Paranormal Activity 2, simply because the audience is shown everything.Paranormal Activity 2 is a chore to watch.The film focuses far too heavily on it's characters, and not enough on the advertised subject matter.The acting varies in quality.Kristi(Sprague Grayden) was the worst of the crew, and her daughter Ali(Molly Ephraim) the best.There are long stretches of no activity whatsoever, let alone that of the paranormal variety.There were several attempts at what I can only describe as demographic gimmickry.The inclusion of children, and specifically a toddler, seemed to be a cheap tactic aimed at enhancing the fears of parents in the audience.For those who have seen the first film in theatres, one of the most memorable aspects of the Paranormal Activity experience were the audience reactions.Screams from the women, surprised exclamations from the men, and everyone asking if what they just saw was real.I can say without a doubt that audience reaction was not even a factor in Paranormal Activity 2, I never heard a murmur from anyone else in the theatre, and I can't think of a single scene that would elicit such a reaction.Any dramatic points of Paranormal Activity 2 can be seen coming from a mile away.The film also tries to heavily play up the "is this real?" aspect of the documentary style horror film genre.The film opens with a message stating "Paramount Pictures would like to thank the families of the deceased", and the film ends with a black screen, waiting to roll out credits until five minutes have passed.Both Paranormal Activity films are absolute fiction, and I find it hilarious that the filmmakers tried so hard to keep that fact a mystery.I haven't met anyone who believes these films are anything but a fictional production.At this point, I hope the franchise dies.I thought the original was genius, and I believe Orin Peli deserves more credit for the film, instead of a backseat writing position on the sequel.Paramount Pictures made far too many mistakes with the sequel, and I believe this is a perfect example of how not to handle a sequel.
Being a bike messenger probably won't make you the most popular person on the road.You're darting in and out of traffic, coming close to hitting civilians and generally causing frustration whenever.This occupation can certainly be a difficult way to make a living, but it can be even more difficult if you're like the protagonist in Premium Rush.On this day, he's unknowingly delivering something the could change lives, and maybe even end his.Wilee (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) spends his days on the streets of New York City delivering packages as a bike messenger.He might be the best at what he does and that's because he's a risk taker.His bike only has one gear and he refuses to employ brakes of any kind, since he believes they will get you killed on this job.Although these practices put him at risk for certain accidents he wants to keep his life and has mentally prepared for the usual threats that come with his current occupation.But on this day, the young man who's gained a reputation for being reckless, might be in store for more than just the usual threats.After he goes on a run to receive his last envelope of the day, he runs into something different.He finds himself running for his life as he's being chased by people that seem to want him dead, whatever it is that he's carrying or both.Going in, I was looking forward to a movie that had fast-paced, full throttle, non-stop type of action taking place.Just by watching the trailers you would think that's what you were going to get along with some potentially creative use of bikes flying through high traffic while Wilee is doing all he can to avoid all sorts of trouble.Just thinking about all of the possibilities that could from this movie was intriguing for me.You obviously get some action with Joseph Gordon-Levitt zipping around the streets of "The Big Apple," so that's not truly an issue.The issue is that none of this action is anywhere near fantastic or even memorable.These scenes are just vanilla for the most part and don't contain anything extraordinary or all that fun.It lacks any real punch, there aren't too many bike tricks on display and there's never a sense of actual danger for any of the characters that are on the side of Gordon-Levitt.Because of its lack of danger, Premium Rush feels it was made for release on Nickelodeon or The Disney Channel.You take out the little bit of profanity that you had, a couple of scenes and alter the very end of the film, and that's essentially what you have.Based on what I saw beforehand, I was thinking that I was going to see some things that would be similar to something like Speed or Die Hard with a Vengeance as far as pacing and energy, but it might be geared more toward teenagers.I was wrong and it looks as if their target audience was closer to pre-adolescent kids.They didn't take many risks in creating the story for this film and it's quite obvious that they never really tried or wanted to.I figure that they threw in the profanity and that last part of the final action scene just to make it appear somewhat edgy.They had to know that this film was way too safe and it didn't deliver on what they promised in the trailers or the television advertisements.When looking at the other aspects of the film outside of the action, it should come as no shock that there is a love story going on in Premium Rush.It sometimes feels like there's some sort of love story in every movie released these days.For some reason, I didn't think one would be in here since it's supposed to be this high adrenaline type of movie about some young guy who rides a bike around town for a living and due to the fact that it's barely even an hour and a half long.The truth is, they used the love story to connect the primary story together with some of the characters and to fill in some of the time that would have otherwise been nothing but empty space.It's clear to me that they didn't have a bunch of ideas to work with because of this, and the very bland reasoning for everything that's taking place in the movie.As I said, the movie isn't very long.If you take out most of this extra stuff that's essentially unnecessary, you'd have something that would be lucky to reach the forty five minute mark.Besides the love story, one of the other things that I found to be only good to consume time are the flashbacks that they use to progress the plot.They do explain the story by going back to the recent past, but they also disrupt the action that we are given an opportunity to watch.I would have preferred to see the plot unfold as the movie went on and as the audience, we could see it all unfold over time.Instead of that, they just spell it for us with these scenes and it also kills some of the suspense that could have been added.When I step back and look at the movie, I might have expected too much from it.You're talking about a feature length film that's based on guys who ride bikes around the streets to make deliveries.How much could they possibly add to make an actual feature length movie out of something like this? After seeing it and dissecting it, that would explain why Premium Rush is so short, why they felt the need to overuse an otherwise useless love story and why they included so many scenes where they hit the rewind button to tell the back story.It looks like they just simply had a difficult time coming up with anything interesting to put in the movie.Score. 2/5.Rating. PG-13.Director. David Koepp.Cast. Joseph Gordon-Levitt Dania Ramirez Michael Shannon Wole Parks Jamie Chung Aasif Mandvi.Film Length. 90 minutes.Release Date. August 24, 2012.Distributor. Columbia Pictures.
If you're like I used to be and you've experienced the occasional bout of insomnia, then you've more than likely found yourself flipping through the channels at three or four o'clock in the morning hoping to get tired sooner or later.During this time, you might have seen infomercials talking about psychics or shows showing televangelist who magically heal people with life-threatening illnesses.I've seen things like that on television years ago, but I never thought anyone would make a movie about people like that.Apparently, writer/director Rodrigo Corts thought that doing just that was a good idea and that's why we have the movie Red Lights.In the story written by Corts, Margaret Matheson (Sigourney Weaver) and Tom Buckley (Cillian Murphy) are paranormal investigators who make a living disproving supernatural powers and exposing the fraudulent people who claim to have them at their disposal.They believe that these abnormal occurrences are impossible and that everything has to have a logical explanation connected to it.This team has taken on and embarrassed plenty of pretenders, but there is Simon Silver (Robert De Niro), someone who Matheson refuses to go after.Against Matheson's wishes, Buckley and his understudy Sally (Elizabeth Olsen) decide to investigate him anyway.That decision may be prove costly though, and it may give them some answers that they might not want to hear.Red Lights is a weird movie for me to review.After watching it, I was left with very little to really speak about, because it didn't have much to offer in a positive or negative way.We watch these investigators ply their trade and attempt to expose potential frauds, and we also learn a bit about the characters involved and a few of their motives over the course of the film.From there we witness some supernatural activity that may or may not be legitimate and it seems that these investigators are getting deeper and deeper into something that they don't know about.This is where Corts tries to add some suspense to the movie, but it never quite gets there in my opinion.The movie itself was flat and it doesn't accomplish what it set out to accomplish.There are multiple scenes in Red Lights that lead you to believe that the movie will start to get going and the movie will be decent at the very least, but those instances would always amount to nothing due to the fact that it would always seem that the script would always find its way back to mediocrity.This is due in large part to the failed attempts at suspense that I was speaking of.It's hit or miss and many of its hits are eventually fruitless and don't do much as far as furthering or improving on the plot.This movie does boast a cast that has some acting credentials.You have a blend of veterans like Robert De Niro and Sigourney Weaver mixed in with the younger but established Cillian Murphy and the relatively new Elizabeth Olsen.With all of what I would consider to be legitimate acting talent, the director of this movie render the cast useless.Their characters aren't very good and Olsen in particular had very little to actually do except stand in the background and make a comment every once in a while.The others did what they could, but you could feel the lifeless script pulling the movie down despite their efforts.While there aren't that many positives in Red Lights, I will say that the end is nice and it's better than anything else that's shown in the film.It contains a big twist that is at least a fine pay off for your viewing patience and it also helps to explain some of the things that occur throughout the entire film.There is an issue here however.Although the film's climax is intriguing and it does answer some questions, it also creates more questions when you think the movie over and many of those can't be answered if you tried.As much as I like this part of the movie, it blew a large amount of the story out-of-order and pushes the movie into non-sensical territory.In an awkward way, this ending that I think of as having good quality actually hurts Red Lights as a whole when you connect it to all of the previous scenes that came before it.There's a big trade-off here and it's highly unlikely Corts didn't see coming beforehand.You get a nice ending, but you lose so much else when that ending forces the movie not to make much sense at all.As a member of the audience, you sit through this film that doesn't contain anything that ever reaches anywhere near above average only to find yourself wondering how certain characters in the movie missed so many signs that are obvious from the outset and other signs that should have been obvious from the outset.The movie was at least average to slightly below average for me at first, but it took a dip from my point of view after taking the whole thing in.I honestly wanted to like Red Lights, because I enjoy watching films explore the possibilities of the paranormal and the supernatural.I also wanted it to be some good, because it also had a couple of actors that I think highly of in the savvy veteran Robert De Niro and the rising newcomer Elizabeth Olsen.The truth is, no matter how much I wanted it to succeed, it just wasn't a worthwhile experience.The execution is flawed and it appears to be suffering from a sub par script.There's only one person to blame here for these innate flaws that flow through Red Lights, and that's the director who just happened to write it as well.He wanted a smart psychological thriller, but what he got was something that wasn't smart, psychological or the least bit thrilling.Score. 2/5.Rating. R.Director. Rodrigo Corts.Cast. Sigourney Weaver Cillian Murphy Robert De Niro Elizabeth Olsen Toby Jones Joely Richardson.Film Length. 113 minutes.Release Date. July 13, 2012 (Limited).Distributor. Millenium Entertainment.
The Art House genre may not be that popular in film, but it's something that a growing number of movie fans may continue to get into as time goes by.The movies of this genre offer their own unique perspective and are usually geared toward a specific audience.They focus more on character development and may not have a clear beginning, middle or end either.The genre's description would probably best describe Gianni Di Gregorio's film The Salt of Life.In The Salt of Life, Gianni Di Gregorio stars as a retired man named Gianni.He goes through life dealing with his overbearing and not so frugal mother (Valeria De Franciscis), his daughter (Teresa Di Gregorio), his daughter's slacker boyfriend (Michelangelo Ciminale), his young and incredibly attractive neighbor (Aylin Prandi) and many more people.Gianni feels that there is something missing in his life and he finds out what it may be when he sees many of his fellow older friends find love with beautiful younger women.He decides to go looking for love and he enlists the help of friends to do it.His only problem finding the time to do this? He still has to deal with the responsibilities of life.The Salt of Life basically tells the story of life through the eyes of a lovelorn old man.We don't usually get movies from that perspective, so it was unique based on that alone.We find our lead character Gianni going through life attempting to find a purpose.He's coming to terms with being an old man, but he's still wants more.That's where some of the film stands out.It becomes an interesting process watching him go across town and while he learns about his reality.It shows some of the truths of aging and the revelations that may come with it.This poses questions that are rarely asked on-screen and the answers being given are sometimes delivered in a humorous and "to the point" way.The answers, the actors and the story turn the movie into something that's wise, funny and warm-hearted in many ways.It appears to be handled and created by someone who knows about life and is broadcasting what he knows to the screen.It's interesting watching this film that Di Gregorio directed, co-wrote and starred in.He uses the real names of many of the actors and even uses his actual daughter to play his on-screen daughter.It looks like he's just having fun with it and did a solid job in the process.This movie is an impressive feat, because of what it is and due to the fact that it's only the second film that the multi-talented Di Gregorio has directed so far.Many of the characters in The Salt of Life are like normal everyday people.There are no outrageous personalities that you'd normally get in the American made versions of these types of films about family.They're down to earth and a lot of viewers may even recognize some of the traits in the characters in some of the people that they may know in their own lives.When it comes to the style and comedy in The Salt of Life, I would say that it's close to what I saw in Jeff, Who Lives at Home.It's subtle and comfortably fits into the real world.As far as the premise is concerned, it's somewhat similar to movies like Superbad, but it features a retired sixty year old man instead of a bunch of kids and it's far more charming and innocent.To see an older man living in a world of wonder as if he was a teenager is way more engaging than I would have ever thought it could be.The Salt of Life is a nice, breezy and delightful movie.You can say that Gianni Di Gregorio makes light of being an older man and he uses a few odd situations to do it.The movie itself is so positive and bright that you might not even notice how negative some of the actual parts of the story are.Something like this should probably more depressing and miserable, but he turns it around and makes it into something cheerful and entertaining instead.This doesn't contain comedy that's would be considered "Laugh Out Loud" funny, but it does have several moments that will make I really liked.The good comes from the comedic subtleties that are in the film and the sense of normalcy and reality that's included with it.This is a movie that manages to be lively and vibrant in spite of the laid back tone and despondent back story that it adheres to.Score. 3/5.Rating. NR.Director. Gianni di Gregorio.Cast.Gianni Di GregorioValeria De FranciscisAlfonso SantagataElisabetta PiccolomniAylin PrandiValeria CavalliKristina CepragaMichelangelo CiminaleTeresa Di Gregorio.Film Length. 90 minutes.Release Date. March 2, 2012 (Limited).Distributor. Zeitgeist Films.Country. Italy.
List Price : $14.95Price : $47.98 as of 2012-09-26 11:13 AM
Product Description
Middle school is horrific enough for any 5th grader's first day. But for Bill Dookes, it's a festering, rotting, undead nightmare! Since Bill's deadbeat dad got arrested trying to burn the house down for the insurance, Mom's had to make ends meet by volunteering to various medical research companies for cash. This would be fine if she hadn't brought home a mysterious zombie virus! Now Bill has to deal with skin problems and body chemistry changes that make puberty look like a walk in the park! And then there's his ever-growing appetite for BRAINS!
