Chopping Mall

“Chopping Mall” is a standard movie designed for teenage date nights to scare partners into each other’s arms. It is a simple plot: robots designed for mall security turn into hard-to-destruct killer robots. Their main targets are teenager mall employees partying after hours. There is a little blood and not much gore. Frights come from running from danger, spiders, and snakes. It is designed for teens and not for audiences that prefer “gross out” horror. Teenagers will identify with the teenagers versus machines theme.

As has been noted in similar films, teens in such horror movies generally die in order of their promiscuity. A slight difference is a female, loving but generally chaste, leading character has a significant role in fighting the robots. This is a film for a specific audience. Those who like teenage horror films that are frightening yet not too disturbing, this is a film for fans of that genre.

American Hustle

“American Hustle” is the total package, a superb script with terrific acting and presumably very skilled direction. This script creates characters that grab our interest and through the story and the mannerisms of the actors, we see the directions the characters and stories are heading. This is a highly visual movie as one wishes to study the expressions of the characters and listen closely to their dialogue to determine when something said is the truth or when it is a con.

Some people did not like the film as they found it hard to follow. It does require some attention but it is not overly complex. Of course, the mystery as to who is being conned and how is exactly the point of the movie. It ends well with an amazing con. The person conned has been shown previously in a negative light so viewers have little sympathy for the conned. One can feel sympathy that is well developed for one of the victims. Some may quarrel over the morality of the con, and some may argue that the con needed some luck as in real life it might not have worked, yet that is the edginess of the movie which draws our attention.