Saw “Peanut Butter Falcon” this week. Basically it’s a Rain Man type story but it was entertaining. The actor with Downs made me really LOL a few times.
Then saw Jojo Rabbit. Of Parasite, Joker and this one, I liked Jojo Rabbit far and away the best. Every scene with Hitler was pure gold. I loved the weird quirky dialogue and was definitely my style of movie.
Then saw Jojo Rabbit. Of Parasite, Joker and this one, I liked Jojo Rabbit far and away the best. Every scene with Hitler was pure gold. I loved the weird quirky dialogue and was definitely my style of movie.
The supporting cast was so great I was surprised only ScarJo got nominated. I was also surprised to learn that Hitler was played by the director (and writer of the screenplay). But the biggest scene-stealer imo was Jojo's friend Yorki.
Hellboy - The best word to describe this is "needless". About a 1/4 as interesting in plot, direction and character design as the GDT movies. Should've just let him finish the damn trilogy. Perlman was way better too.
Godzilla: King of the Monsters - Whereas the first Godzilla benefitted from the restraint shown by the filmmakers in giving the full reveal of it's Kaiju, this sequel throws countless ones at you every other minute. A little mystery helped the first film and while the cats kind of out of the bag after it, Monsters would've done well to hold back just a little. Like maybe 3 or 4 gigantic monsters instead of 30.
Ford v Ferrari - I'm a sucker for car movies, racing movies especially. While I really enjoyed this and thought the performances were great there’s something about James Mangold’s direction that always leaves me cold. His movies are always competently made but lacking in some, any kind of style. Like @ZooCougar said elsewhere the actor who played “The Deuce”, albeit in limited screen time, probably deserved a supporting actor nom.
Parasite - Not much left to say about how great this was. Great performances (especially by the mom who played her character at the edge of every emotion at once seemingly) coupled with fantastic direction and an incredible, twisty plot. My only grief:
Completely ludicrous that the dad, in that moment where carnage, mayhem and death are happening all around him and his son is laying in a trauma induced seizure, would need to stop and literally pinch his nose in order to retrieve the car keys. Totally took me out of the scene with how over the top they felt they needed to play that. They laid the groundwork there a million times, all they needed was a reflexive step back for a beat from the smell in order to give Mr Kim the motivation he needed for what he did next.
Really it’s a minor quibble though. Still would be my choice for the Oscar of what I’ve seen (missing Little Women and need to finish Marriage Story and The Irishman).
Enemy - Denis Villenueve is probably my favorite working director. I was a little bored by this, took forever to get going. Didn’t help that I watched it in like 3 different sittings either. The central mystery was hohum but the 3rd act made up for it a little. Unsure about the spider imagery throughout, maybe akin to how a spider might lay its eggs on a host so that they might consume the host after birth?
6 Underground - Michael Bay movies these days are like watching an ongoing car crash, except with lots of other car crashes at the same time. Gratuitous violence, terrible humor, over the top and sometimes relentless action. Meh.
Doctor Sleep - Impossible act to follow and all but I still really enjoyed this. Watching Rebecca Ferguson in anything is a pleasure. Lots of nice nods to The Shining.
Jojo Rabbit - Jojo was good and hit the right notes of silliness amidst the despair and devastation of war. A bit more conventional a movie than you might think considering the presence of imaginary best friend Hitler. Good performances all around especially by the young leads. Sam Rockwell was great as usual and even ScarJo managed to inject some whimsy into her performance. Recommended.
Pokemon Detective Pikachu - This is really meant for the Pokémon super fans like @Robertelamin. It was ok. Some wonky CGI. Ryan Reynolds should just do voice work.
Just caught Little Women last night. I enjoyed it very much, more than I thought going in. Of course, I've heard of the book and knew it was about sisters, but that was it. It's very well made and I liked Lady Bird so that's 2 for 2 by Greta Gerwig for me. If your looking for a chick flick for the two of you, you might consider this one.
I miss her as an actress, I hope she's not directing exclusively now. I rewatched "Lola Versus" recently, hadn't seen that in a long time. She kinda plays the same character in most of her films, but she does it very well.
edit--I haven't seen "Little Women" yet but it's definitely on my list. With Saoirse Ronan and Florence Pugh, that's a can't miss for me.
I hadn't really seen anything positive about the latest version of "Charlie's Angels," but I was still a bit curious. Got it from Netflix. I'd say middle of the road action movie, nothing special but not terrible. Certainly a cut above the ludicrous previous rendition w/ Drew Barrymore, Cameron Diaz and Lucy Liu that completely threw physics and gravity out the window. I don't think I'd seen Naomi Scott in anything before (I've been boycotting all the Disney live action remakes of cartoons for a while now), I like her. Had several big plot twists as spy caper movies usually do. A rapid fire series of cameos during the end credits. Probably most are gonna skip it anyway, but I'll give it at least a luke warm recommendation. And it seemed less heavy handed as far as girl power than the latest Terminator flick.
Once Upon a Time In Hollywood - As noted above the Bruce Lee scene was great. And I am not talented enough to realize that Pitt was Oscar worthy. Seemed like Pitt playing Pitt.
Scary Stories to Tell in the Dark - Some decently chilling creature design, a basic story, and underwhelming main baddie. Like most horror movies, I find it really wasn't scary.
Onward - Followed the Pixar formula pretty closely, but the central plot hit pretty close to home for the wife (father died when she was 9) so it made the whole proceedings oddly personal. Good movie.
Knives Out - It think it thought it was much more clever than it actually was. IMO it was merely ok, I don't think I need to see any more of Benoit Blanc's cases. Who throws up if they lie? So dumb.
Terminator: Dark Fate - I don't know why I stay up to date on some of these long running franchises that ran out of ideas a long time ago. Oh, we now have a new savior of the future humans because the machines sent a Terminator back and wiped out the last savior you say? And now they sent another Terminator to wipe out this one? But the humans sent back someone to protect that savior? And now they are going on a Pepé Le Pew style chase where we know the savior will eventually win out because, well, they have to otherwise the franchise ends? Why not just give us the future timeline all-out war movie that the Terminator franchise should have ended on 4 movies ago now? Oh, right because then the franchise ends. Put it out of it's misery Cameron!
Midway - You know how sometimes with shoddy CGI the animators can't get the weight, physics and sizing quite right for the action set pieces? That's kind of a metaphor for this whole movie. There was no weight behind the portrayals because the cast were largely chosen for their looks instead of their chops. The physics (bear with me) of Ed Skrein attempting an American accent that was constantly betrayed by his natural English one and a Jonas brother trying to sound like he was an Italian from NYC were both laughable. And the sizing was wrong because, although it had a big story to tell, it felt long as it just wasn't very good. See? Perfectly terrible metaphor. Lol. Also I had no issues with the subtitles, all the scenes with the Japanese were subtitled.
Abominable - Some nice animation, plot was fine, but kind of really weird how they Americanized a lot of things for a movie that took place entirely in mainland China.
Spies in Disguise - We're only a week in and we've exhausted the new kid's movie library pretty much, not good. It was passable, kind of hard to get invested in it.
Midway - You know how sometimes with shoddy CGI the animators can't get the weight, physics and sizing quite right for the action set pieces? That's kind of a metaphor for this whole movie. There was no weight behind the portrayals because the cast were largely chosen for their looks instead of their chops. The physics (bear with me) of Ed Skrein attempting an American accent that was constantly betrayed by his natural English one and a Jonas brother trying to sound like he was an Italian from NYC were both laughable. And the sizing was wrong because, although it had a big story to tell, it felt long as it just wasn't very good. See? Perfectly terrible metaphor. Lol. Also I had no issues with the subtitles, all the scenes with the Japanese were subtitled.
Maybe Ed Skrein was there to distract you from noticing that Luke Evans is also from the UK. The huge casting misfire for me was Woody Harrelson as Nimitz. He's come a long way from his days on Cheers, and I think he's a fine actor, but this just didn't work for me. At all.
Crichton was a popular novelist. Much of his work could be considered SciFi eg Jurrssic Park. He adapted some of his popular works for the screen starting with "Coma." He was lucky to secure Sean Connery for the lead (Edward Pierce) in "The Great Train Robbery." In the UK the film had a First beginning the title. There was a theft of more than 2 million pounds from a train, This story was covered in a TV series; that's worth looking for if you can find it streaming free. The film is available to stream for free on several sites including Amazon Prime.
The Crimean war was one of the major inflexion points for change in the Victorian era. Metal ships and the Red Cross are but two of the key points. This was also the first war covered daily by correspondents. The British and the French were fighting Czarist Russia. The soldiers had to be paid; every month gold bullion worth 25,000 English pounds was sent from a London bank to a port, and then shipped to Crimea.
There had never been a robbery of a moving train in 1855; it was widely thought to be impossible. The bank took extra precautions. The bullion was divided between two 500 pound Chubb safes. Each safe needed to have two keys to be opened. All four keys were needed. The car was locked from the outside. Pierce assembled a gang which included a safe man, Agar(Donald Sutherland) and Mirriam (Lesly Ann Down. Their first task was to make copies oft he four keys. One was held by the Bank President, one by the bank manager, and two in the London train station office. They added a second story man and the guard inside the car to tie up loose ends.
Sean Connery still had to climb out of his first class car onto the roof of a moving train. He had to climb from car to car until he reached the baggage car so the outside lock could be unlocked. Connery did this without a stunt double; the train was supposed to have a top speed of 35 mph, but it actually was going over 50 mph..
Crichton's novel deviated from reality in making it more difficult for the gang. Crichton's hair literally caught fire while shooting the train sequence.
This is a classic caper film. It is really enjoyable; there are no deep hidden meanings, no social commentary. They are professional criminals and they did it for the money. Highly recommended.
Crichton was a popular novelist. Much of his work could be considered SciFi eg Jurrssic Park. He adapted some of his popular works for the screen starting with "Coma." He was lucky to secure Sean Connery for the lead (Edward Pierce) in "The Great Train Robbery." In the UK the film had a First beginning the title. There was a theft of more than 2 million pounds from a train, This story was covered in a TV series; that's worth looking for if you can find it streaming free. The film is available to stream for free on several sites including Amazon Prime.
The Crimean war was one of the major inflexion points for change in the Victorian era. Metal ships and the Red Cross are but two of the key points. This was also the first war covered daily by correspondents. The British and the French were fighting Czarist Russia. The soldiers had to be paid; every month gold bullion worth 25,000 English pounds was sent from a London bank to a port, and then shipped to Crimea.
There had never been a robbery of a moving train in 1855; it was widely thought to be impossible. The bank took extra precautions. The bullion was divided between two 500 pound Chubb safes. Each safe needed to have two keys to be opened. All four keys were needed. The car was locked from the outside. Pierce assembled a gang which included a safe man, Agar(Donald Sutherland) and Mirriam (Lesly Ann Down. Their first task was to make copies oft he four keys. One was held by the Bank President, one by the bank manager, and two in the London train station office. They added a second story man and the guard inside the car to tie up loose ends.
Sean Connery still had to climb out of his first class car onto the roof of a moving train. He had to climb from car to car until he reached the baggage car so the outside lock could be unlocked. Connery did this without a stunt double; the train was supposed to have a top speed of 35 mph, but it actually was going over 50 mph..
Crichton's novel deviated from reality in making it more difficult for the gang. Crichton's hair literally caught fire while shooting the train sequence.
This is a classic caper film. It is really enjoyable; there are no deep hidden meanings, no social commentary. They are professional criminals and they did it for the money. Highly recommended.
The Great Train Robbery is the only Micheal Critchton book that I haven't read. I need to find time for it. I love the detail with which he approaches his subject matter.
I wasn't going to watch "Midsommar," but it was free streaming from Kanopy, so what the heck. WTH!? Not sure why I stuck with it til the end. I guess I was hoping for some kind of meaning, but I sure didn't find any. I rarely watch horror movies, every once in a while my curiosity gets the better of me, and I almost always wish I hadn't. Oh well, I still dig Florence Pugh anyway. Do not accept invitations from your Swedish friends to check out the commune/cult they grew up in...
Couple of nights ago I couldn't sleep due to my knee so flipped around for something to fall asleep to. Settled on "Stand Up Guys", which I believe I'd seen bits of before, but never the whole movie. I stayed up to watch the whole thing. There's nothing really remarkable about the story - an old gangster is released from prison and his best friend picks him up with orders to kill the guy by 10am the next day due to a long-standing grievance.
But what is remarkable is that while this movie was made in 2012, Al Pacino and Christopher Walken both recall their best acting from far earlier in their careers before they became caricatures. They are both excellent. The acting appears almost effortless. And Alan Arkin, in a short appearance, pretty much steals every scene he's in with Pacino and Walken, which is no mean feat. There are comedic moments (especially with Arkin) that just fit in seamlessly and are LOL worthy. I really enjoyed this and would watch again. Recommended.
Ad Astra - My wife zonked out on this one. The introverted, emotionless Brad Pitt character had a hunger to find his father, a lost astronaut out near Neptune. Pitt was a pawn, but he breaks loose to get on the ship that was setting out to kill his dad.
Overall decent. I think this acting portrayal was better than his Once Upon A Time in Hollywood deal.
"Twenty Feet From Stardom" This is a great documentary about background singersarlene Love, Judith Hill, Merry Clayton et al. Sting, Bruce Springsteen and many other front men discuss the back-ups, but it is the music, stupid. Don't miss this one. I couldn't write a focused preview/commentary. Singing just doesn't work when you can't hear.
Smokey and the Bandit - 2nd highest grossing film of 1977. Jackie Gleason is a freaking riot as Sheriff Buford T. Justice.
Creed 2 - I'm a sucker for these Rocky films. The Drago father/son relationship is text book dumb. The fight scenes, tho, are really good. Stallone does a good job here. Michael B Jordan is pretty good, too, as Adonis Creed.
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arlene Love, Judith Hill, Merry Clayton et al. Sting, Bruce Springsteen and many other front men discuss the back-ups, but it is the music, stupid. Don't miss this one. I couldn't write a focused preview/commentary. Singing just doesn't work when you can't hear.