I’m really over parody movies, and this one is no exception. The cheesy dialog and recycled storylines from more popular movies fail to strike a chord with me. Is it just me, or does it seems like parodies are nothing more than the bullies of the film industry? Makes sense, right, seeing as their sole purpose is to poke fun at other movies with no originality or real substance to them. Well, in the case of Tooken, it appears that we have run out of movies to parody and are resorting to people. Well, not people per se, merely characters brought to life by the same actor; I won’t mention which actor. However, that part should not be that difficult for you to guess once we dive a little deeper.

Tooken centers on Brian Millers (your first clue), a retired CIA operative whose life has life has taken a decline. He works as a mall security guard, his wife has divorced him and is shacking up with a new guy, and his daughter is at the full mercy of her hormones. Let’s hit pause for a second; now, from the provided information you should be able to piece the together who the target of this parody is, that is if you were unable to decipher it from the title. Brian finds himself entangled in a plot involving a group of Albanians, all the while attempting to win back his wife and protect his daughter from essentially herself. Truth be told, too much time was spent on the family dynamic rather than the overall plot. The first half of the movie is a long drawn out version of what the original movie summed up in like fifteen minutes. Watch Brian attempt to win back his wife, and the unprovoked beatings of his daughter’s boyfriend are mildly entertaining but become tedious with each repetition.

"When I first took the deal to become an undercover informant in a biker gang, I did it to save my own skin. But over the next three years, putting bad guys away became my personal mission. I saw it as a chance to make amends for my past mistakes, but I paid a heavy price. I'm Charles Falco, and this is my story." 

So, who the heck is Charles Falco? For a while he was a rather successful meth cook who was pulling in 100 g's a month. He appeared to have it all: fast cars, big house, and a trophy wife. The problem is that he got hooked on his own product. That leads to mistakes, and he lost it all when the cops came busting in to topple his drug empire. He faced 20 years or more in prison, and there was only one way out of the mess. The feds had just lost their informant inside the infamous Vagos motorcycle gang. When I say lost, we're talking a hole in the head followed by an unmarked hole in the desert. Falco could work off his time by infiltrating the gang. Of course, he didn't even know how to ride a bike. This should get interesting, and sometimes it does. The problem is that sometimes it doesn't.

by Dustin P. Anderson

We follow Tony Duran, a washed up performer who was never a big name to anyone, and whose life is starting to fall apart. He has become an obese alcoholic who stacks lies on top of lies in order to not seem like the bad guy to the people who still care about him (all two of them). After one last attempt to get some money so he can pay off some of his increasing debt, his son turns away from him. In the aftermath of this, Tony’s friend Jerry challenges him to become a better person. He gets Tony to sing in front of people (like he once did), and Tony’s eyes finally open to the truth. He sets off to lose some weight, stop drinking, and prepare for a show that Jerry has lined up for him.

Awaken is a fantastic example of the idea that less is more. The film has a great deal going for it: an intriguing story, a rather noteworthy cast, and a strong leading actress, among other things. But at what point do filmmakers decide to say, “when”? Each of the film’s strengths I have listed end up overflowing, causing a rather disappointing mess that could have been avoided with just a little less of everything. Beginning with the interesting concept, the basic plot is as follows: Billie Kope (Natalie Burn) wakes up on an island with no recollection of how she got there. Upon further exploration, she meets a group of people who are being hunted by military personnel for an unknown reason. Once they regroup, she learns that each individual of the group similarly woke up on the island without recollection of getting there. The plot thickens when we learn that they have been carefully selected by their rare blood type and brought to the island as “donors” for clients who are willing to pay top dollar to harvest needed organs for either themselves or their loved ones.

While the idea of “strangers mysteriously appearing somewhere” is a frequently used plot device, I think the initial intervention of harvesting the organs was unique enough to carry the film where it needed to go. However, the writers did not. Instead, they introduce a parallel plotline for Billie’s character. She ends up on the island while following clues, leading to her long-lost sister. Ultimately this plotline was rather weak, and when combined with the more intriguing story, it feels as if it were an awkward juggling act. This hurt the climax of the film, as the falling action involved an underdeveloped bond between Billie and her sister. I appreciate the eagerness to bring more originality into the aforementioned “strangers” formula, but much of the additional plotline didn’t blend well with the initial intriguing concept.