Here are my picks:

 

Download the Academy Awards Ballot and email your picks to cbmahoney@chicagowolves.com. The person with the most correct picks will win an autographed stick!

Good luck, gang!

Hansel and Gretel

After getting a taste for blood as children, Hansel (Jeremy Renner) and Gretel (Gemma Arterton) have become a witch's worst nightmare. They are the ultimate witch hunters who will go to the max to kill the witch they are after. I didn’t really like this movie. I just thought it was way too gory and it didn’t really have to be. They took some things too far with the killings.

Rating: 1 out of 5 Brads

 

The Impossible

This could possibly be the movie of the year. An account of a family caught, with tens of thousands of strangers, in the mayhem of one of the worst natural catastrophes of our time. I believe it took place in Thailand in 2004 when the tsunami hit. This was a super-emotional movie and was done with great acting. Basically what happens is a family is on vacation for Christmas, and before they know it they are stranded with thousands of other people looking for each other. There are five family members; mom, dad and three boys. The mom and the eldest son (9) go on the trek of their lives to find the rest of their family not even knowing if they are still alive. Wounded and on the verge of death will they be able to find the loved ones they are looking for? I would strongly suggest you find out for yourselves.

Rating: 6 out of 5 Brads ( A bonus Brad!)

Parker

Set amidst the unparalleled wealth and glamor of Palm Beach, Jason Statham and Jennifer Lopez team up to get their cut in the crime thriller PARKER based on the series of best-selling novels by Donald E. Westlake. This movie is pretty much the same as The Italian Job if you have seen that one. Jason Stratham is double-crossed by his team, so he is after them to ensure they don’t complete the job that he was denied to do with them.

Rating: 4 out of 5 Brads

Zero Dark Thirty

This movie is about the Navy Seal 6 Team and their plot to capture the most wanted man in the world. I thought this movie was great. I was on the edge of my seat the entire time wondering what was going to happen next. Now you have to understand going in, that it is still a movie, so some stuff may not have actually happened or they may have exaggerated on some things. But I thought that they did a great job and I enjoyed the movie.

Rating: 5 out of 5 Brads

Gangster Squad

Los Angeles, 1949. Ruthless, Brooklyn-born mob king Mickey Cohen (Sean Penn) runs the show in this town. Reaping the ill-gotten gains from the drugs, the guns, the prostitutes and if he has his way, every wire bet placed west of Chicago. Not only does he have protection from his posse, but he also has cops, politicians and judges. All it took was a couple of special people to get together and decide that they are tired of being scared and threatened by basically one person. These guys go up against all the odds and risk everything to bring down the bully in the city. Will they prevail?

Rating: 5 out of 5 Brads

Broken City

In a broken city full of injustice, ex-cop Billy Taggart (Mark Wahlberg) seeks redemption and revenge after being double-crossed and then framed by its most powerful figure, the mayor (Russell Crowe). Once he realizes that he is doing the mayor's dirty work, Billy Taggart is furious and will stop at nothing to take the mayor down even if he brings himself down doing it.

Rating: 3 out of 5 Brads

Day 1

My All-Star weekend experience started with a flight Saturday night that got me into Providence at around 10:30 pm. I took a town car from the airport with Wolves President of Business Operations Mike Gordon, so I was glad to see someone I knew at the airport to figure out what the plan was. I got to the hotel and pretty much went to bed.

Day 2

I woke up around 10 a.m. and got ready for the day. I had to go get checked in and pick up my passes and drop off my equipment. Once I was finished with that I walked around the city for a bit while I was waiting for my roommate/hometown buddy Victor Bartley, who plays with our rival the Milwaukee Admirals. There was some bashing going back and forth, but it was all in good fun.

Later that night we had the skills competition, which was very cool. The events I was in were the Puck Control relay, the Hardest Shot competition and the Team Breakaway challenge. My best event was the hardest shot. That was also the one I was looking forward to the most. After the skills competition, there was a meet and greet with the fans to sign autographs and just to meet everyone that was involved in making this weekend a success. Everyone did a great job.

Day 3

Today was the Hall of fame induction ceremonies. I thought this was great. It was very cool to hear the stories from all the inductees as well as the honorary captains. All their stories and words of encouragement were great to hear. Congrats to them on their success. After the ceremony I came back to the hotel, ordered some room service and had a little nap.

I headed to the rink around 4:15. When I got to the rink I saw my jersey in my stall and was excited to see number 29. That is the number I wore in college for four years and is probably my favorite number --- not to mention it is also my favorite player Brett Sterling’s number. We won 7-6 in the last seconds of the game.

Overall this was an awesome experience. I am so happy that I had the opportunity to be a part of this. Thanks to everyone for reading and I hope everyone is well.

Photos by Alan Sullivan/AHL

Django Unchained

I feel this movie could win a few awards. This movie is set in the Southern United States, two years before the civil war. Django (Jamie Foxx) is a slave that just happened to be in the right place at the right time.  A German bounty hunter Dr. King Schultz (Christopher Waltz) stops his new owners in transport of the new slaves they had just bought. He was looking for a slave named Django to track the Brittle brothers who had long ago tortured Django and his wife Broomhilda (Kerry Washington). King Schultz promises Django that he will help him track down his wife, if he was to help kill the Brittle brothers for the bounty. Through all their searching, they are eventually lead to the path of Calvin Candie (Leonardo DiCaprio) the owner of Candieland Ranch. This is where slaves are trained and are thrown into battle to fight to the death. This was the opening for Django and King Schultz to get into Candieland to sneakily get Broomhilda out. Once there in Candieland, they are suspected of being un-loyal by Candies' respected house slave Stephen (Samuel Jackson). Once the cover is blown, will the three of them make it out alive?
This movie is rated R
Rating: 5 out of 5 Brads

Parental Guidance

Old school grandparents Artie (Billy Crystal) and Diane (Bette Milder) meet their match when they are asked to babysit their three grandchildren, while their very proper parents (Marisa Tomei and Tom Everett Scott) go away for a work event. When the grandchildren's bad habits meet the grandparent’s tough rules, everything goes for a turn. What both parties learn is that it is being understanding, not being so uptight and respecting what each other has to say are things that will bind a family together.
Rating: 4 out of 5 Brads

 Playing for Keeps

I did go see this movie, but my girlfriend made me do so. In order to keep my Man Card, I am declining to review it.

Guilt Trip

This movie has a cast comprised of Seth Rogen and Barbra Streisand. Andy Brewster (Seth Rogan) is trying to start his new business involving an organic cleaning product. He is about to take on the trip of a lifetime to market and get some contracts for his product. What makes his trip so interesting is that his over the top mother, Joyce (Barbra Streisand), is going to make the trip with him. The trip has more downs than ups, but it makes for a pretty comical movie. I thought that this movie was decent. The funny parts were funny, but there were some parts in the movie that were slow.

RATING: 3 out of 5 Brads

 

Jack Reacher

Jack Reacher is an action packed thriller that will keep you on the edge of your seat the full 2 hours and 15 minutes. Jack Reacher (Tom Cruise) is an ex-military police officer that does not believe in law when it comes to catching a criminal. He sets out to find a mysterious sniper that killed five people in a mass shooting. The detectives are pin pointing an ex-marksman that Jack has dealt with before, but Jack finds the whole thing very fishy and is the only one that can prove the marksman’s innocence. Through a lot of long hours, action packed fight scenes, and corruption, will Jack Reacher prove his innocence and find the murderer?

RATING: 4 out of 5 Brads

Wreck it Ralph

What a great idea by Disney. This movie is great for everyone. Wreck-It Ralph is a video game in which Ralph is the bad guy who tries to destroy a building and Fix-It Felix is a repair man that has to repair all the damage before the building is destroyed. Well, Ralph has come to a conclusion that he does not want to be an outcast anymore simply because he feels he doesn’t have any respect from the characters in his game. Ralph decides to do the unthinkable and escape from his game seeking a medal to prove to the characters in his game that he can be a hero. The thing is, is that once he leaves his game, it now becomes out of order and everyone is now at risk of being permanently stuck in a game that does not work anymore. What will happen next???

RATING: 4 out of 5 Brads

Life of Pi

The idea for this movie comes from a book that was published in 2001. This movie is about a boy with a very distinct personality. He practices many religions and is actually a very smart boy. One day his parents sit him down at the dinner table and tell him that the family and the farm are moving to North America. Well, the ship they are sailing on gets hit by a massive storm. With the boy being the only survivor, he is hurtled into an amazing adventure of faith and discovery. Not only does he have to cope with living stranded at sea, he also has to survive the fierce Bengal Tiger that is on his rescue boat. This is a great story of survival and how Pi and the Tiger both need each other to stay alive.    

RATING: 4 out of 5 Brads

Since I haven't posted in a while, I will recap on the tail end of the camp. We headed into Milwaukee last Saturday and came out with a big victory. The boys were pumped to finish off the exhibition season with a win.

Sunday, we had the day off to relax so I decided to head over to a movie. I went and saw Looper with Bruce Willis and Joseph Gordon-Levitt. This movie is about time travelling assassins called loopers. What happens is that in the future if the mob wanted to get rid of someone they would send that person back 30 years in the past where the looper would be waiting to finish them. If you decide to go and see this movie make sure you bring your thinking caps. I thought it was okay but there was lots going on and I found it hard to keep track.

Monday, we had a little conditioning test that included some sprints as well as a longer distance test. After all the tests were complete, we headed over to the bowling alley with all the guys and bowled a bit and played pool. It was great to get all the guys together.

The home opener is this Saturday, October 13, against the Rockford Icehogs at 7:00 pm at the Allstate Arena.

I hope that everyone enjoyed my posts over the last week or so, I really enjoyed doing them. Thanks so much for reading them and have a great week leading up to the big game on Saturday.

Take care Wolves fans. Cheer loud and have fun.

Yesterday we had practice. The first practice was mainly the guys that didn't play in the game Wednesday night. The practice was followed by a stretch just to get the muscles all loosened up. The guys that played in the game Wednesday were on the ice following the first ice session for a practice as well.

After practice we came back to the hotel for lunch. It was a good spread, we had chicken, rice, pasta, salad, rolls as well as ice cream if you were feeling desert. My roommate (Johnny Negrin) and I came back to the room for an hour or so and were bored so we decided to head out to an early movie. This was a bit of an adventure. We had an idea of where to go, but not that well. We ended up driving about two miles too far and then had to turn around. So we missed the previews. We went to see End of Watch with Jake Gyllenhaal and Michael Pena. It is about two L.A.P.D officers that keep making big busts and are in a sense heroes of there department. It was a very good movie. It really puts an officer's life into perspective and the stuff they have to deal with on a daily basis.

After the movie we were trying to figure out how to get back to the hotel. Well, we took another wrong turn and were headed down by the airport. This was the best wrong turn I have ever taken. We were driving and we could see what seemed to be like 100 planes all in a line coming into the airport. I have never seen this before and it was cool to see. Once we got back on track we decided to get Chili's for dinner. We just felt like something fast and somewhat healthy.

There is a game tonight night against Peoria at 7 pm at the Triphahn Community Center and Ice Arena in Hoffman Estates

Thanks for reading I hope your all enjoying my posts.

Yesterday we had a scrimmage. Team A vs Team C. I am glad to say that Team A came up on top 4-1 after the first period. Since all three of the teams had the same amount of goals for and against, we started the second period 0 to 0. So the winning team of the second period was the winner of the little tournament I guess you could say. The second period ended up 0 to 0, so we had a shootout to decide the winning team. I am disappointed to say that team C won the shootout 2-0. After the game we had little workout just to loosen up the muscles. Team B had a practice today and was also followed by the same workout.

We then headed to lunch. We went to a new place today. We headed over to Potbelly's, a sandwich place. Once again this place is great, if you have never been there I would strongly suggest you head there for lunch, just great. I love coming to all of these places that we don't have back home in Vancouver.

After that, I came back to the hotel and relaxed for a bit, watched some TV and dosed off for an hour or so. Woke up, had a protein shake, and got ready for the pick-up party for the season ticket holders. This was great, I got to see some of the people that I had met near the end of last year as well as meet some new fans. It was great to sign autographs and mingle with everyone.

Once I got back to the hotel, I got onto my computer and watched a movie on Netflix. This is one of my favorite things to do outside of hockey. My girlfriend Katie and I are always going to movies. Back at school, we would go to at least one movie a week and sometimes even two. I love seeing the new trailers for up coming movies. The next one that I want to go see is Taken 2. I saw the first one and thought it was really good. I think that Liam Neeson is a good actor. I saw the trailer for it about a month ago and have been excited to see it ever since.

There is a game tonight night against Rockford in Rolling Meadows rink at 7:00 pm.

Thanks for reading and GO WOLVES!!!