First Word

Rating: ***1/2 I always love an intricate story (since I'm a storyteller) and admire the writer's ability to keep it all straight. The Edge of Tomorrow , the new Tom Cruise movie and co-starring Emily Blunt, was one of those movies with extreme thoughtfulness to details to make it work. The movie begins right as the world is about to be conquered by aliens called Mimics. Tom Cruise's character begins as a cowardly spokesperson who gets suddenly thrust in the invasion on the beach of France (think D Day in World War II). With absolutely no combat experience, Cruise is thrust right into the "shit" and within moments is not only being dropped from an airplane with no experience, but also lands on the ground to face the enemy. He is (naturally) instantly killed, but before his demise he lays eyes on Emily Blunt's character and a look passes between them, and then she dies and Cruise dies ... or so we think. All of a sudden, he wakes up with a jolt back to th...

Every now and then a great film comes out in the off season (meaning Hollywood saves the "popcorn" flicks for Christmas and summer), and Oblivion snuck right in. I'm not sure why Universal didn't save this one for the popcorn fun, but it sure is a great "summer" movie anyway. It's not what you think, and the trailer doesn't give away the slightest hint. At first you think maybe it's like the other great Tom Cruise film Vanilla Sky (loved that title), but I can assure you it's not. It's more twisted and bends your mind a little more, but not quite as deep as Vanilla Sky . Let me say, I love a great mind-bender -- and Oblivion didn't fail my expectations. Right when you think it's one thing, it's another thing altogether -- and you don't connect the dots. I had no idea what was the twist, and it had several great twists. The movie is set 60 years after an attempted alien invasion that involved the aliens destroying ou...