We watched it too. It’s so formulaic, but they execute it perfectly. The characters are likeable and fun. The situations are funny. The songs aren’t bad. The ending is satisfactory. Make some popcorn, chill some beer, and enjoy.
The Suicide Squad - Miles better than the previous Suicide Squad, with a deep vein of very dark and violent humor that finally demonstrates that DC can play at the same level as Marvel after a long series of rather shit superhero films. Also, I want Margot Robbie to just play Harley Quinn in every movie she’s in from now on because she makes every film better. I don’t care - romcom, family drama, Disney kid’s film - HARLEY THAT SHIT. And h/t to Lynne Ashe for her wonderful line-less cameos as Mrs Krill.
Jungle Cruise: Yes, it’s Disney movie-fying yet another of their theme park rides but at least my very low expectations meant that it exceeded them. Dwayne Johnson was fine. Emily Blunt was fine. Jack Whitehall was fine (and Disney’s endorsement of an openly gay main character earned a raised eyebrow from me - so woke! 
). Jesse Plemons was rather fun as the German Prince bad guy. The plot - well, it was a plot of sorts. A stupid, nonsensical one reliant on a vast amount of CGI, but it killed a couple of hours on a plane flight. Can’t have everything, I guess.
Excellent.
Watched Sword of Trust (2019) on Netflix. A sensible Alabama pawnbroker (Marc Maron) leads three eccentrics trying to sell an antique sword to a group of scary conspiracy theorists. I give it a B, or maybe a B+ — lightweight, but it’s good-hearted and mostly amusing.
Putney Swope (1969). I had to eject the DVD after 30 minutes. The voice overdub of the lead actor, along with the over-the-top stereotypes of black culture, were cringeworthy. It does not age well.
A couple of weeks ago, we saw Death on the Nile - the new version. I didn’t know the story, so afterwards I read a summary on wiki. Apparently Kenneth Branagh feels the need to make everything “better” or something. I think if I’d read the book first, I’d have really hated the movie. As it was, I was merely unimpressed.
Today, we’re going to see Cyrano - I’m just hoping the previews I’ve seen on TV aren’t giving me false hopes. I really like Peter Dinklage and I like the premise of this version. We shall see…
Cyrano is a musical. And not a very good one, IMHO. On the plus side, it seemed to follow the source material mostly faithfully. I also saw a lot of parallels with Roxanne (the Steve Martin movie) which is one of my favorite movies. On the minus side - the quality of the lyrics was maybe high-school-original-production level. No real poetry or elegance, just predictable, trite rhymes. And the dancing soldiers - the less said, the better.
I was disappointed.
Licorice Pizza, directed by Paul Thomas Anderson (Boogie Nights). Starts off OK but soon becomes disjointed, with vignettes that go nowhere. Love the director, liked how he recreated Southern California in the Seventies here… but this film desperately needed a cohesive plot.
Watched The Vanishing of Sydney Hall on Prime.
I loved it. Told largely in flashbacks, which usually annoys me, its a story of a famous writer who seeks to slip into oblivion over past secrets that haunt him.
Also watched Bad Words, starring and directed by Jason Bateman. I enjoyed it much more than I expected to. Bateman is very funny and it was well paced.
A few weeks back eceryone was out, or sick and inwas up late so I warched the 1970 ish, Murder On the Orient Express. I have not read any of ACs books, or seen anybofbthe movies so may be one of the few unspoiled people of taht movies plot on tbe planet. very enjoyable, well acted, obviously dated but that is not a bad thing, well paced to the actual scenario and no need for a dramatic roof top chase. May look up some of the others of that era.
We watched Eternals as youngest wanted to watch. Tedious dull , icarus could have been replaced with a plank of Ikea shelving. Dont think it was the actors fault , i thought he was good in some other stuff, but it did look like all actor instructions were ‘move to mark, say this in X tone of voice, cut to other actor response’
Saturday was with the 17 year old son who wanted to chill and watch an action movie , pursuaded him to watch The Shawshank Redemption with me ( i had to spring for the fro yo as incentive for my choice)
Unsurprisingly it received rave reviews from him and now he owes me fro yo.
Pretty much, yes. If it weren’t for Karun, the whole thing would have been completely forgettable.
Watched Winter on Fire on Netflix. It’s an excellent documentary about how a student protest in Ukraine turned into a revolution that overthrew the corrupt government in 2014-15. Seeing over a million people marching in protest was astonishing. They kept resisting even after the government response went from beatings, rubber bullets, gas and flash-bangs to live ammunition and snipers. The president at the time, Viktor Yanukovych, fled to Moscow, where he bought a house for $52M and is buddies with Putin.
I saw the 1974 version starring Albert Finney a few months ago, too, having not seen it in many years, and really enjoyed it. I think it was far superior to the recent Kenneth Branagh version.
i was ready for a visitor to leave the other day, so I put on Night of the Hunter. This particular friend is more into current blockbusters and explosion movies. Worked like a champ.
That is such a great movie.
Mr. Jones on Prime, the true story of a reporter who went to Stalin’s Russia to see the “Stalin miracle” for himself. He ends up in Ukraine, where there is a famine killing millions and tries to report on the Big Lie afterwards. A very engrossing film.
I’m sorry to read your friend has such a poor taste in movies. As far as 1950s morality tales go, it’s a damn good one. Might even be said to subvert the genre.
Kong: Skull Island
I have said it before and I will say it again. This is an amazing movie and is one of the most underrated movies of the past 5 years. I love it. Showed it to my son and he loved it to. It’s simply incredible all the way through.
West Side Story - 2021
Hey, this just hit Disney+ included with subscription.
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Did Steven Spielberg do a great job adapting this musical? Yes, he sure did.
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Would fans of West Side Story love this movie? I think they would.
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Is it good enough to be appealing to people that do not like the musical West Side Story? No, and unfortunately this is where I am. It’s just not a great musical and no filmmaking can save it. It’s just not good enough of a musical and the songs are just not all that great.
I’m sure fans of the musical will like it. I find West Side Story kind of lame and boring.
I only made it to the balcony scene before losing interest. The only thing that really sets it apart from the original is that Spielberg’s New York is a lot grimier than the one in the 1961 film or any stage productions I’ve seen. Shoehorning Rita Moreno into the cast seemed kind of pandering and only reminded me of just how good that first film was.