Tuesday, March 24, 2020
Saturday, March 14, 2020
The 2011 movie Contagion
The 2011 movie Contagion is starting to look prophetic. Fortunately, COVID-19 is not as deadly.
Tuesday, March 10, 2020
Onward
A long time ago there was magic. Magic was used to help people and to make their lives better. However, magic was difficult to master, and once people discovered technology which was easier, they forgot about magic.
This feels like a world that could have been much more explored, but the movie plays it safe by having all the characters be no different than modern boring humans. However, that is part of the point, since this is a culture that has lost its heritage. The movie holds a surprise for us, because what seems on the surface like a three-star film, delivers in a big way with a four-star ending. This is by no means the best Pixar film, but Pixar can still work a magic of their own.
Our two main characters, both elves and both brothers, go on a quest to find something magical that will bring back their long-deceased father just for a day so that they meet him. As a result, they discover more about themselves and help their culture regain some of what it lost.
Rating: B+. I would love to see a sequel where they better explore this world.
P.S. There is much stuff in the trailer that didn't make it into the movie. This happens sometimes when a movie undergoes many revisions before being released.
Sunday, March 1, 2020
Thursday, February 27, 2020
Tuesday, February 25, 2020
Tuesday, February 18, 2020
Sonic The Hedgehog
The first trailer for Sonic The Hedgehog sparked an internet backlash because many people thought that the Sonic character looked kind of creepy. The production company responded to the backlash by redoing the animation, and the final result looks fairly good. I noticed some very minor imperfections in the CGI, but nothing too distracting.
Because of the initial backlash, some of the critics expressed great surprise by saying that the movie is actually good. This is not what they were expecting.
Sonic is mostly a kid's film that is not intellectually deep at all, but it has enough jokes that connect and fun stuff to make it a good time. Jim Carrey plays Dr. Robotnik. He is essentially playing a cartoon villain, which he plays way over the top, so much so that I found him annoying, but Jim Carrey is also the funniest when he is way over the top. I was laughing out loud several times, which is a good thing. We get Jim Carrey at his full nuttiness, although it would have been better if he were more restrained.
There is a bar fight scene in the middle of the movie that is mostly gratuitous because it feels like filler. However, like the rest of the movie, it is mildly amusing.
If we compare Sonic to another videogame adaptation, Pokemon Detective Pikachu, the story is much more coherent and less of a mess.
Rating: B.
Sunday, February 9, 2020
Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
I enjoyed the Star Wars sequel trilogy, but in terms of story, it felt like a lost opportunity to do something more significant. What we got was like leftover turkey.
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John Coffey
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John Coffey
Saturday, February 8, 2020
Highly rated movies that people actually hated
There are some interesting choices here because some of the movies listed are really good, and others not so much.
P.S. I didn't like "Crash" despite it winning Best Picture. There were a few critics who also hated it.
I also hated American Beauty that won Best Picture. It was slow, dull and meandering.
https://www.geekycamel.com/highly-rated-movies-that-people-actually-hated/
P.S. I didn't like "Crash" despite it winning Best Picture. There were a few critics who also hated it.
I also hated American Beauty that won Best Picture. It was slow, dull and meandering.
https://www.geekycamel.com/highly-rated-movies-that-people-actually-hated/
1917
I saw 1917 for the second time today and this might be the movie of the decade. Since it opened to limited theaters in 2019, I'm not sure which decade. ☺
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Sunday, February 2, 2020
Thursday, January 30, 2020
The Rise of Skywalker
On the positive side, the film is a grand spectacle, and I pretty much had a blast for the first 75% of it. The last act is still a grand spectacle, and I understand the movie better and what it was trying to do by seeing it a second time.
Wednesday, January 29, 2020
Saturday, January 18, 2020
The King vs. Henry V
Henry V is a 1989 movie by Kenneth Branagh adapted from Shakespeare's play. The King is a 2019 Netflix film covering the same historical events.
Henry V had a falling out with his father, so his father Henry IV appointed Henry's younger brother to be the successor to the monarchy, but Henry's younger brother was killed in battle shortly before Henry IV's death and Henry V became king at the age of 26. He succeeded in conquering France in an ongoing 100-year series of wars between France and England. But he died at the age of 35 and most of his military victories would later be reversed.
Henry V was a young king. Kenneth Branagh played him at the age of 39 in the movie adaption of Shakespeare's play.
One of Henry V's major was victories was at the Battle of Agincourt. It was a battle that he should have lost because he was badly outnumbered, but a combination of strategy and weather worked in his favor. At this battle, it was said that Henry V gave a powerful speech to motivate his men, but history does not record this speech. Shakespeare wrote a fantastic speech for the play ("We happy few. We band of brothers."), but the movie The King substitutes something less grandiose. Shakespeare handles the battle by having the actors march offstage and the battle is not shown, and the movie version only shows a bit of the battle. Instead, the King gives us what feels likes a historical re-creation of the battle.
Whereas the Netflix movie The King seems more historically accurate, the movie Henry V is more fun because it is hard to top Shakespeare.
Rating: The King: B.
Rating: Henry V: A-.
P.S. I watched The King the same day I watched 1917. I failed to notice that Dean-Charles Chapman was in both movies.
P.S. I watched The King the same day I watched 1917. I failed to notice that Dean-Charles Chapman was in both movies.
Wednesday, January 15, 2020
The Drinker Recommends... 1917
I recommend watching this video after watching the movie.
Tuesday, January 14, 2020
Uncut Gems
Adam Sandler plays a jeweler who is also a gambling addict in trouble with the mob, and who can't seem to stop his gambling. He is a bit of a conman because he has to be to keep at bay all the people who are after him. He is also unfaithful to his wife with a couple of affairs, so his wife is planning to divorce him.
This is actually a good performance by Adam Sandler, but my problem with the movie is that it is about unpleasant people doing bad things. In addition, the film is dropping f-bombs literally every five seconds. I didn't hate the movie from start to finish, because the ending is pretty good, but overall I found the movie to be an unpleasant experience. I feel the same way about Uncut Gems as I did about American Beauty; there is no way I want to spend two hours with such horrible people. There is an unpleasant tension as Adam Sandler's character goes from bad to worse. The Guardian said, "Uncut Gems is so stressful it should come with a panic attack warning. Adam Sandler thriller is brilliant, but watching it is a horrible experience." I feel the same way.
All the tension in the film does make it somewhat watchable. I actually considered walking out of the movie, but I wanted to see how the movie ended, so I stayed. I am glad that I saw the ending because it is the only redeeming part of the movie.
Maybe the movie serves as a cautionary tale about the dangers of addiction.
Rating: C.
Saturday, January 11, 2020
1917
The movie 1917 is likely to be one of the best movies I will see this year. It follows a pair of World War I soldiers on a time-critical mission to get a message to another unit so as to avoid an attack that will end in disaster. This is based on a real story told to writer and director Sam Mendes by his grandfather.
The movie is filmed in such a way that it appears to be one continuous shot, except for a couple of obvious breaks. There are continuous shots that last at least 40 minutes. The camera follows the soldiers through long trenches, across fields, into farmhouses, rivers, underground bunkers, and troop transports. This is like another character because I spent the whole movie wondering how on earth did they film this? It is technically very difficult to have everything properly lit while the camera follows the actors through miles of territory.
The movie creates a suspense that is perfect. There is not much direct combat, but the horrible aftermath of combat is everywhere in this movie. On the journey, the soldiers are constantly passing dead bodies and destruction. The way the movie is filmed gives it an extra sense of realism.
The movie is rated R for war violence and a few swear words.
Rating: A+.
Sunday, January 5, 2020
Knives Out
Knives Out is a mystery whodunit in the spirit of Agatha Cristie, but with quite a few twists, which is a given since it is from director Rian Johnson. As entertainment, it works really well, although I didn't find it totally believable and I predicted the twist ending. The movie also tries a little too hard to be a social commentary.
However, Rian Johnson shows that he can make a pretty entertaining movie.
Rating: A-. My initial thought was to give it a B+, but I did find the movie thoroughly entertaining. Knives Out has a 97% rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
Sunday, December 29, 2019
Saturday, December 28, 2019
Mandalorian Season Finale Breakdown! Ending Explained & Easter Eggs You Missed!
Many spoilers. Proceed with caution. Just watch half of this:
Friday, December 27, 2019
Wednesday, December 25, 2019
(8) Roz Weston Reviews 'The Rise Of Skywalker' - YouTube
Roz Weston Reviews 'The Rise Of Skywalker'
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wRJL46wWfUY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wRJL46wWfUY
Friday, December 20, 2019
4 Best And 4 Worst Things In The Rise Of Skywalker - YouTube
You might want to wait till you have seen the movie before you watch this video, but it seems to echo what I said in my review.
Thursday, December 19, 2019
Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker
Star Wars fans are hard to please. If you make a new Star Wars movie that is too much like any of the previous films, i.e. The Force Awakens, the fans complain that the movie just recycles old plots. However, if a Star Wars film takes the franchise in new directions, i.e. The Last Jedi, fans complain that it messes with Star Wars canon and doesn't feel right. When George Lucas made Star Wars movies, each film would visit new exotic locations, introduce new creatures, while presenting new ideas that quite frankly pissed off some of the fans. I think that the Lucas-made Star Wars prequels were brilliant, but there was such a backlash to them that Lucas decided to get out of the Star Wars business altogether and sell the Lucasfilm company to Disney. This is the problem with Star Wars movies: they are either repetitive, or they are original in ways that some of the hardcore fans can't accept. To his credit, George Lucas was always original. Not everyone liked his vision, but he always took each movie in a new direction.
When I saw the first Disney made Star Wars film, The Force Awakens, I felt uneasy afterward. The movie is plenty entertaining, but I wrote that it felt like an imperfect imitation of a Star Wars film, like they almost got it right but not quite. Had Lucas made the movie, it wouldn't have felt so familiar, but instead would have been different, and this would have displeased many people. This is why The Last Jedi feels to me more like a real Star Wars film. The movie was solely Rian Johnson's vision, and he made many questionable choices, but he did what Lucas would do, which is to take us to new exotic locations and introduce new ideas that we had not seen before. However, about half the audience rejected the movie outright. There was such a backlash to The Last Jedi that when the movie Solo came out six months later, hardly anybody went to see it. Disney lost money on Solo, and reportedly there were serious discussions at Disney about how to fix this problem going forward.
One of the problems with The Rise of Skywalker is that it tries too hard to not piss anyone off. It is loaded with crowd-pleasing moments, which makes it entertaining, but it is not very original. Instead of introducing new ideas, new locations, and new creatures, everything is comfortably familiar. The movie tries so hard to be crowd-pleasing that parts of it, especially toward the end, seem a little hokey. The ending has a Return of The Jedi hokiness to it.
I'm not sure that the movie makes sense. They chose to bring back a character in a way that makes no sense at all, but this was probably the most entertaining choice they could have made. There are many twists that are problematic, and the movie proceeds at such a frenetic pace and so much happens and so many characters come and go that it is hard to grasp it all. Had this been a George Lucas film it would have taken time to develop a less complicated story.
The plot is not unlike a video game, where the heroes need to get to a location, but to get there they have find an item, and before they can find the item they have to complete a task, and then they have to complete a sub-task before they can complete the main task. It is enough to make your head spin, and this doesn't quite feel like what a Star Wars movie should be.
On the plus side, the movie is beautifully made.
Because of all this, it is hard for me to take this film as seriously as I would other Star Wars movies. It is not quite the payoff I had hoped for, although there is some payoff. However, I don't think it matters. It is a fast-paced well-made entertaining movie, so the audience just wants to ride with it. It doesn't have to make sense; it just has to entertain and make money.
Rating: B+.
As of today, The Rise of Skywalker has a 56% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. It deserves much better than this.
Wednesday, December 18, 2019
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