Movie Review: The Champagne Gang

I watched The Champagne Gang on Youtube in the free movies section. This rather boring and predictable movie is based on a true story of four youngsters who live a high life stealing from grocery stores, pharmacies, and other commercial establishments. A gang of four young, sexy, athletic, and well spoken girls live in California and their way of making a living is by stealing cigarettes, alcohol and other easy to dispose items from grocery stores.

In the process they come across one of the hardened criminals who trains them in the art of breaking safes and breaking into grocery stores. He trains them to strike at the right time, i.e. when the safes are full of the weekly collections and when their theft would not be discovered instantly. The four girls also get trained in the art of disabling electronic security systems.

Soon they are breaking into stores and stealing large amounts of money, stamps and other valuables. The money makes them live the high life, driving flashy cars, living in a great home, visiting the fanciest clubs, etc. Of course the law catches up with them and they get caught. Smart girls they are they make a deal with the judiciary and get away with a simple 2-year sentence in which the four continue to share the same cell.

The movie is worth watching if you have lots of time on hand, if you don't watch it then you have not missed a whole lot.

Movie Review: 21 Jump Street

One thing about Americans, they have the capability of selling anything to anyone. Just like few Bollywood film makers take bits and pieces of several English movies and make one Hindi film, Sony pictures has made a full length feature film out of a TV series. I must say they have been quite successful at that and I am pretty sure this movie will be followed up by a series of others.

I wouldn't have even heard of the movie if not for a website http://www.gofobo.com which sent me two free passes to pre-release screening of the movie. Of course every movie buff in DFW seemed to be in the line to watch the free movie but we did manage to get in and grab a decent seat.

The movie deals with the highly over rated and mythical "High School Experience" in America. An age when kids are learning to be independent, party, try out recreational drugs, learn smoking and drinking habits, and mature into presumably "responsible adults". Jona Hill is Schmidt a nerdy high school kid who is dreaming about going to the prom with the hottest chick in school. Of course the girl rejects him. On the other hand is Channing Tatum playing Jenko, an academically dumb but sporty and cool kid in the school. He barely makes a grade and results in getting barred from attending the prom.

Fast forward seven years, the duo land up in the same class of the Police Academy and graduate to become bicycle cops. They are looking to arrest someone and make a name but only end up making fools of themselves. The chief fed up with their antics transfers them to a undercover unit known as 21 Jump Street. The head of the unit is trying to recruit young underachieving officers who look like high school kids to infiltrate high school and bust a crime ring that is selling a lethal drug to teenagers.

The rest of the story is how the duo fit into the high school life and how roles get reversed. Schmidt becomes the cool guy in sports, and drama, while Jenko becomes a nerd who hacks into the school's drug dealers phone. The movie is a laughter riot, it is definitely worth watching.

21 Jump Street is releasing in theaters on March 16, 2012, try to catch it first day first show.