90 - Hot Tub Time Machine

Connection To ZACK AND MIRI MAKE A PORNO - Craig Robinson

I'm a sucker for time travels movies - whether there going backwards or forwards - I like The Butterfly Effect, despite some wonky acting from Ashton Kutcher - but for some reason the first time I watched Hot Tub Time Machine it did nothing for me.

Which is weird because another thing I'm a sucker for his the 80's - which is the exact time period they go back to. So I ended up watching this again, just out of everything's packed away and there is nothing else on the television, and I wouldn't go as far to say my opinion changed to love, but I ended up liking it.

The film literally sees our main characters go through time via a hot tub to the 80's which is when the ski-resort there are at now was booming - John Cusack, Craig Robinson and Rob Corddry even look like there 80's self to other people, the fourth member of the group played by Clark Duke who's Cusack's nephew in this gets to look like himself having not been born then.

To be honest it does shock me even after upgrading to like that this film is getting a sequel, it feels like the films story was told and there is no need for a further adventure in my opinion.

The main 4 do make a good team and there's some faces familiar to 80's movies fans (William Zabka, Crispin Glover, Chevy Chase - yeah I'm aware these had careers before and after that decade). Lizzy Caplan as the love interest for Cusack doesn't particularly have that much to do.

Overall, not my favourite time travel movie at all, there's bits that are at least funny and more stuff clicked for me the second time I saw. Watch like I did if there is nothing else on.

89 - Zack and Miri Make A Porno

Connection To SUPERBAD - Seth Rogen

Do I think it was intentional that Kevin Smith or Miramax wouldn't think it would be the worst thing in the world if people confused it for having some sort of involvement from Judd Apatow?

I think so in my humble opinion, though we have some of Smith's regulars such as Jason Mewes, Jeff Anderson and his wife Jennifer Schwalbach, we have slightly more with connections to Apatow - Seth Rogen, Elizabeth Banks, Craig Robinson and Gerry Bednob (who plays the same character he normally does for Apatow). So yeah that's why I think so.

And to be fair the stuff Apatow as normally done and the stuff Smith as normally do, they've never been a million miles away from each other, both can go gross but show heart at the same time, I just think Apatow (including his producing credits) as got a better oeuvre - I did used to hold Smith in higher esteem but I've think with time I've moved on from him slightly.

Rogen and Banks play platonic best friends since high school, who share an apartment and struggling to pay bills whilst working at coffee shop, some younglings take video of Banks in the back changing and reveals she's wearing granny panties this makes her a minor internet celeb, the pair attend their high school reunion where they get talking to Bobby Long (Brandon Routh) who Banks had a massive crush on, but it's revealed he is gay and they get talking with his boyfriend - played by Justin Long, who talks to them about the gay porn he stars in, the pair decide to cast and star in their own porn movie including friends and people they audition.

If you buy into the premise I think you'll enjoy the film more - predictably Zack and Miri are paired up in their sex scene which ends up being more tender then what porn scenes are usually like which predictably stirs the feelings that ends up causing the rift in their relationship.

I did groan (giggity) that they initially chose Star Wars as the film to do a porn parody of, mostly because that is the most predictable way they could have gone, but they end up having to rewrite it and doing it (giggity again) in the coffee shop after hours... shades of Smith's debut Clerks there.

The supporting cast is cool and as the film goes on you do get a sense of a family unit (giggity) building around them, the cast includes some porno stars past and present alongside the Smith and Apatow clan.

Overall, it's far from limp but it's honestly nothing that Apatow is doing (usually better), there's funny stuff and it's engaging so to me it is worth your time.