This is the movie about the two guys who are assigned the very grim duty to tell families their son or daughter died overseas fighting for the military. Thing is, this movie is actually only really good when it shows the 6-7 sequences of them doing this duty. Scenes like that are so tragic and powerful, I actually think the rest of the movie does not live up to them.
Truth is, this is also a movie about PTSD and the impact it has on the lives of our two leads. However, this is where the movie is weaker. I just could not completely get pulled into the stories of these guys lives.
Anyway, an OK movie, but honestly quite a bit of a letdown. I have actually had it on my movie queue since it came out and I was surprised to learn it is now 12 years old. I really need to catch up on movies more often.
IMHO it wasn’t a great film in and of itself - in fact it was quite uneven - but it provided closure for the various story and character arcs from the first two films, and had a lot of fun (and fanservice) along the way, so it’s worth watching just for that. Plus the actors playing the daughters were brilliant.
Alex Winter is the less famous of the two leads, but he gave a better performance in this new Bill and Ted. Keanu was less back into character in my opinion.
I’ve watched two Jessie Buckley starring movies- Wild Rose (streaming on Hulu) and Beast which was on Prime. Both were excellent- though very different. Wild Rose is about a Glasgow woman that was recently released from prison and dreams of being a Nashville star. It was very funny and touching. Beast is about a socially awkward girl (and her very odd family) who had a violent incident at school in her past and her new boyfriend who may, or may not, be a serial killer. It kept me guessing until the end- very original and interesting.
Coda - Extremely well done coming of age tale, with the added burden of disability, but depicted from the inside looking out instead of the usual outside looking in. Well acted all around, and all the characters rise above typical stereotypes. By the way, the term “coda” does not mean what you might think.
Ema - I started my summary of Annette with “How to describe this film?” This is another one that is hard to describe in a way that does it justice. Sensual, surreal, emotional, and distant, with a lead that begins and ends her arc as an enigma. In the simplest sense it is the tale of a dysfunctional couple and a sexual roundelay centered around retrieving a child. (But no puppets in this one)
The Protégé - A classic August release. A straightforward action picture with a lot of stereotypes and ultra violence. The perfect thing for a hot August day, retreating into the dark embrace of a movie theater.
Ma Belle, My Beauty - A story about polyamory, set in the south of France. A well done character study that unfolds languorously, as befits the location. Another nice way to spend a couple of hours in the dark.
Confetti - Another disability movie, less nuanced than Coda, but redeemed by some very good performances and a screenplay that doesn’t create any villains (not even the requisite heartless bureaucrat) or resort to the stereotypical immigrant tropes. A nice movie, with a lot of the rough edges sanded off, but sometimes that’s a good thing.
I saw Wrath of Man yesterday. (Three people in the theater.)
Okay, if you like the Guy Ritchie formula. Certainly not his best though. It was darker than his usual crime movies. And there were both significant and insignificant plot holes and implausibilities. (Nemo’s Rule of Plot Holes: The difference between a significant and an insignificant movie plot hole is whether you recognize it while watching the movie or if it doesn’t occur to you until after the movie is over.)
Also, that is the correct spelling of implausibilities, regardless of what the spell check thinks.
My kids wanted to watch the Tobey Maguire Spider-man movies since rumors abound that he may play it again in the forthcoming Tom Holland movie. I hadn’t seen them in a long time and here are some mini reviews.
Overall: They hold up! Fun, well-made, a lot of charm. Sam Raimi did a great job overall.
Spider-man 1 - Good, but a little bit cheesy. Fun movie, the Spider effects still look pretty solid and we laughed quite a bit when Parker tries out his new abilities. A fun movie.
Spider-man 2 - The best of the Maguire ones. Fun all the way through and a thrilling final 30 minutes are just about as good as any other superhero movie out there. A really excellent superhero movie.
Spider-man 3 - Not as bad as my memory had it. We enjoyed it, though it is clearly overcrowded in the final hour. Sandman had nothing to do with this movie. Venom was obviously required from the studio. A good movie, though. Not as bad as many would claim. We still enjoyed it.
No, I’d never seen it before. No, I had no idea it was this out there.
I guess this movie would need its own open-spoiler discussion in order to talk about it. It was both amazing and at times, kind of dull. What a weird story.
The final 30 minutes seem to bring the two previous hours into focus for me. I won’t get into spoilers, but I think that those last 30 minutes really helped me make more sense out of what I’d just seen.
Anyway, not a review. More like a set of thoughts about this very odd movie.
Molly’s Game. I went into it knowing nothing about it, and found it went virtually nowhere I expected it to. But in a good way. Solid performances all around, even if one does find oneself yet again wanting to slap Michael Cera’s stupid smug face a lot.
Just watched Destroyer. A film with NicoleKidman as a burnt out cop
There was a lot of good stuff in there but it didn’t come together for me. Kidman acts well in this but in the films present day she didn’t convince as any kind of veteran police officer. The present day make up looked like an amateur dramatics club attempt at a zombie. Took me right out of the film.
A lot of good ideas in the script but in the end cutting a few out and streamlining the narrative would have created a stronger, better film.
You are a much smarter cookie than I (but I already knew that); it took me several viewings, plus reading many online explanations to make sense of it Which is not to say I disliked it. It definitely intrigued me from the first start but I needed help understanding it. I watch it a couple times a year, and still have to resist covering my eyes duringthe Winky’s Diner scene.
Ah, that is memorable, but I found the ending sequence I linked too way more intense and frightening. I was kind of disturbed at that point.
What a weird movie. Not sure it gets the raves from me it does from others, but certainly interesting(when it wasn’t dull).
It reminds me of Twin Peaks season 3. It was AMAZING…except that a lot of it was very dull. It was probably one of the greatest seasons of a show ever…if you forget all the massively dull and pointless stuff no one edited out because Lynch controlled the whole production and hates editing out his stuff.
Yuuuuuup, same. That scene was truly terrifying the first time I saw it and I always had to close my eyes any times I rewatched it. Pure nightmare fuel.
Ugh! This movie! The final 30 minutes made me question my entire life, as in, “Why the hell did I even attempt to watch anything by David Lynch knowing full well what an Asshole he is?”
Which is not to say I disliked it. It definitely intrigued me from the first start but I needed help understanding it. I watch it a couple times a year, and still have to resist covering my eyes during