#10: The Town

We finally got to see The Town. It took five of us to finally get up and go on a Tuesday night. Not many people would really care, but I think us living in Boston this year made the movie that much better, at least for me. Ben Affleck did an amazing job, directing, acting and co-writing this movie. Jeremy Renner was great as always as he picks up right where he left off with The Hurt Locker. I think we came to a consensus that we all really enjoyed The Town. Surprisingly, I thought the movie was actually really funny at parts, maybe it's just the characters and their accents but I did happen to laugh out loud at a couple scenes. The Town was just a well-thought out and well-scripted movie. Completely worth seeing. If you get the chance to see it before it leaves theaters I highly recommend it. The previews looked great too, so expect to see lots more good movies this winter.

Overall Rating: 8.6 / 10

- Josh Berg

The Town. I can't mention this movie without reiterating Josh's comment about how cool it was to watch it in Boston. Though we could have predicted them, the "We were just there!" moments made the movie so cool. But that wasn't the only reason I got a kick out of the movie. The first half to two thirds of the movie seemed a little bit flat; a slightly predictable and more than slightly tired plot theme seemed to be the movie's only lifeline, so I wasn't extremely enthused (except, of course, for the neatness of the Boston feel).

The last part of The Town - as everything breaks and we see our hero/director/co-writer's character's situation get interesting - more than makes up for the first half, which (despite my initial impression) didn't serve as much as the main course but as an appetizer of character development. It was a fun ride, for sure. Predictable at times? Yes. Full of cliches? No, but it had its moments.

As a Boston movie blog, it would be a sin to review The Town without at least mentioning the quality of the accents. I don't know if that's really how Ben Affleck talks or what, but he seems to have a very complex and unpredictable algorithm as to which "r" sounds he's going to skip ("Get in the cah.") and which he will articulate with startling strength ("Is that clear?"). As for the rest, they varied from actor to actor, but nobody seemed like a stiff or a try-hard. Not terrible. (Note: I am not from Boston and don't hang out around Southie, but my understanding is that Matt Damon in Good Will Hunting or The Departed has the most accurate Boston accent in Hollywood.)


I recommend this movie. It's not Boondock Saints, but it's a gritty, well-done crime thriller with some of the better character development I've seen in such a movie.

Overall Rating: 8.5 / 10

The Beginning

I'm Taylor Dobbs, a journalism student at Northeastern University with a love for the movies. Josh and I were randomly assigned as roommates in the fall semester of 2010. We quickly figured out that movies were a shared passion of ours. In the first few weeks of school, we watched so many movies together that the idea hatched to try to watch 365 movies in a year. Good movies, bad movies, old movies, new movies. Whatever it is, we want to see it. Obviously, we're trying to lean towards good movies - what we consider to be good, anyways. Between us, we've already got hundreds of movies under our belts, but we'd both like to expand that number. As a general rule, we will try to watch movies that at least one of us has never seen before. The occasional film (read: favorites of both of ours) will be one that we've both seen. Enjoy.

I'm Josh Berg, same as Taylor, I am also a die hard movie goer. I figured that this idea could lead to other people getting out and watching these movies. Whether it's a comedy, drama, thriller, horror, action, mystery, romance, documentary or whatever else that you love, we will give you our best and most honest opinions of all the movies. All in all, we love movies and this is a new beginning to an old tradition. Thank you and hopefully we can make this a fun ride for everyone. Oh yeah and by the way "Rule Number 9: If this is your first night at Beantown's 365, you have to read."