Editorials > The Good, The Bad and What Pete Hammond Said for Nov. 21

So, it's almost time for the annual feast of giving smallpox, eating turkey and then having your family slowly turn on each other thanks to turkey and red wine. But there is an escape! You can all got to a movie to release the pressure and try to not kill each other. That's why we've decided to start this new feature where we take the reviews for the latest theatrical releases and give you the pros, cons and what Maxim's Pete "Quote Machine" Hammond thought.

So without further ado, let's take a look at today's newest flicks:

Hitman

Metacritic average: 31

Rotten Tomatoes: 14 percent

The Good: "Hitman is the best movie derived from a violent computer game we've ever seen.

You can take or leave that kind of qualified high-five, but, for us, it was a thoroughly entertaining experience. Think of bargain basement "James Bond" amped up into TV den-sittin', mouse-clickin' overdrive. But with human actors."

-The Washington Post, Desson Thomson

The Bad: "Imagine a picture three or four rungs below what even producer Luc Besson has previously managed on his worst day in this genre, and you’ll get some idea of how bad this movie is: it’s Uwe Boll bad."

-One Guy's Opinion, Dr. Frank Swietek 

And What Pete Hammond Said: "Fans of the game may wish they were playing instead of watching; but if they give it half a chance, they shouldn't be disappointed. Hitman delivers top-notch action, dazzling gunplay, and lots of fireworks. What more could we ask for?"

-Maxim, Pete Hammond 

The Mist

Metacritic average: 61

Rotten Tomatoes: 72 percent

The Good: "Good and creepy, The Mist comes from a Stephen King novella and is more the shape, size and quality of the recent “1408,” likewise taken from a King story, than anything in the persistently fashionable charnel house inhabited by the “Saw” and “Hostel” franchises."

-Chicago Tribune, Michael Phillips 

The Bad: "I'M scared of a lot of things: cancer, al Qaeda, chemical-plant eruptions, careening wrong-way delivery boys on cast-iron Chinese bicycles, teenagers. Land octopi aren't in my top 1000."

-New York Post, Kyle Smith 

And What Pete Hammond Said: "Reminiscent in some ways of the Alfred Hitchcock classic The Birds, we watch as the numbers of winged invaders keep multiplying, spreading their brand of evil and scaring the holy crap out of people. It all leads to an ironic conclusion that represents one of the most shocking movie endings ever."

-Maxim, Pete Hammond 

 
 This Christmas

Metacritic average: 54

Rotten Tomatoes: 61 percent

The Good: "The result is a big, gushy, emotional, secret-driven, family-obsessive casserole, perhaps facile in some of its resolutions, but so full of good heart and love – the real kind, which is scratchy, awkward, difficult to express and doesn't conquer all but just some – that the movie is difficult to resist."

-The Washington Post, Stephen Hunter 

The Bad: "That’s right–this is a Christmas film that actually constructs a happy ending out of the sight of a naked and oiled black man being whipped."

-efilmcritic.com, Peter Sobczynski 

And What Pete Hammond Said: Did not review.

August Rush

Metacritic average: 42

Rotten Tomatoes: 55 percent

The Good: "In the end, this could be the year's most sharply defined love-it-or-hate-it movie."

-The Seattle Post-Intelligencer, William Arnold

The Bad: " Director Kristen Sheridan's new film is August Rush. But she might as well have named it Oliver! 2: Electric Boogaloo."

-The Arizona Republic,  Suzanne Condie Lambert

And What Pete Hammond Said: "It can be admired for trying something a little different from the usual family film, but in the end, it just doesn't work. At all."

-Maxim, Pete Hammond