Watched some movies on my cruise. Both movies with Gundam referances.
Pacific Rim: Uprising, Perfectly serviceable sequel, some flimsy plot points but overall it was fun enough. Had all the required giant robot frighting.
Ready Player one, I’ve only listened to half the audiobook a few years ago, but I was disappointed that they turned the first challenge into a race instead of a obscure D&D reference. Beyond that the movie seemed to have some questionable editing (like I believe the head of security tags the truck two by drone like at least two different seems it was kinda redundant.) Seemed to spend no time building up the side characters, and it felt like it needed more time to world build and present some of the interesting concepts it just kinda glances over. It’s a fun kids movie but ultimately it could have been better then it’s cookie cutter plot.
Mandy is an artsy take on a revenge film comboed with a bold invitation for Nicholas Cage to Cage all over the place, both overacted and comedic. There’s also a quick scene with Bill “I’m gonna have me some fun” Duke of Predator fame. It’s got funky visuals and camera work. It’s also the last movie with a score by Jóhann Jóhannsson. If you can handle a slow buildup and bloody violence, you should see it.
Edward Scissorhands I hadn’t seen since a kid, but there was an opportunity to watch it a theater. This movie is fucking incredible. The score is fantastic. The acting is great. The setting is a realized nightmare suburbia. It’s delightful to see a movie where you feel like the director had a vision and was able to execute it without compromise.
The Thing (70mm print). I won’t turn down an opportunity to see this movie in a theater. The print had some fading due to age, but was otherwise beautiful. A modern classic.
Patton (70mm print). I had never seen this, and the only name I recognized was George C. Scott of Dr. Strangelove fame. I can see why it’s a classic, and it’s got a few choice quotes that I now have context for—“Rommel, you magnificent bastard. I read your book!” It didn’t feel like three hours. As an aside, the intro credits mention that Jerry Goldsmith did the score. You know what Goldsmith has also scored? Alien! And there are some distinctly Alien horns that are around in the first forty-five minutes of the movie, which delighted me.
Not very good. Exiting but stupid at the start, then really drags in the middle, before a competently done ending. I don’t really go into this kind of movie for the plot, but I’m a bit done with the “I’m sure it’ll go okay when we exploit the dinosaurs this time!.. oh no!” thing.
To be fair, Jurassic Park III has a different story. I’d much rather just an adventure on a dinosaur island, rather than weapons experiments and theme parks. Hopefully the next installment can go in a different direction again.
A Quiet Place is very good, and the central concept is very strong. As long as I don’t think about it too hard, it’s a fun movie I can recommend to anyone who likes monster movies.
A Simple Favor is a funny, great little movie that gave a lot more respect for Paul Fieg. Blake Lively has given one of my favorite performances this year. It’s one of those parody/homage films that isn’t super gutbusting, but is so good at being a parody that it works on it’s own merit as a compelling mystery. The cast is fun except for one annoying character played by Andrew Rannells, but otherwise the movie is like “Man, this drama is nuts but I’m so into it.”
This summer was odd cause I didn’t see too many Blockbusters that wowed me compared to the other genre hits that really landed throughout the season. BlackKklansman is the best Spike Lee film I can remember in a while that’s funny, engaging, and a political gutpunch. Upgrade was a solid genre sci-fi story about AI with incredible action choreography. Crazy Rich Asians was an emotional, gorgeously shot, romcom with an unforgetably wonderful cast. (I can’t remember a romcom filmed in such a grand, epic way) Alpha was a really beautiful man and his dog story that felt like The Revenant without toxic masculinity or navel-gazing bullshit.
Rampage is very stupid, but acknowledges its stupidity and goes with it. Stupid plot, pantomime villains, silly twists and quippy dialogue. It turns out to be a perfectly okay movie, with my one nagging question being “Was anybody ever really begging for a Rampage movie?”
Tomb Raider is just not very good. I’m not sure what it is trying to do. It is really dumb, but not in a fun way like Rampage. The music keeps telling me things are dramatic, but it’s exactly the same music for (1) a mildly illegal bike race in London, (2) chasing bag thieves in Hong Kong, (3) a deadly gun battle in a jungle, (4) death defying antics at the top of a waterfall, and (5) violent deaths while dungeoneering.
The worst part was just how flat the movie was. It wasn’t like playing a video game, nor was it like watching someone else play a video game. More like watching the demo loop of a computer game. Also Tomb Raider the game was really just a way to play through an Indiana Jones adventure, and now this movie version of the game doesn’t add anything we didn’t already see in The Last Crusade.
My expectations for Ready Player One were super low, based almost entirely on having to skim and skip huge chunks of the book just to get to the end. It was a garbage book. One of the only things I liked about it was that, at some points, it did manage to capture the excitement of playing a video game.
The movie fixes almost all my issues with the book, and improves everything about it at every level. It’s a really good kids movie! I really loved it! Turns out Steven Spielberg is really good at directing! Maybe it was my low expectations and how they were blown away at every turn, but I really got into it.
And of all three movies, it was by far the best video game movie. It acknowledges that it is a story about playing a game, and while the prize is big, the worst that can happen is that you lose all your credits and progress, and that you can just start a new character or account or whatever. The danger in the real world is never allowed to raise above mild threat or peril. It allows the cartoon villains to remain cartoonish in a way that supports the tone of the movie, rather than trying to make things dangerous or violent to raise the stakes.
Double feature of The Seventh Seal and Bill & Ted’s Bogus Journey. The oft-parodied former is a classic I’d never seen, and the only star I recognized is Max von Sydow of Dr. Liet Kynes, Father Merrin, and Three-Eye Raven fame, although IMDb also tells me he’s the uncredited voice of Vigo. I expected it to be boring, but it was not.
The latter I definitely saw in theater as a kid, and I remembered the good parts of the first half pretty clearly. Other than Death being funny and a poor sport at board games, this movie is mostly bad. Go watch the first Bill & Ted instead. One funny quip that I didn’t get as a kid, “It worked in Exorcist! One and Three.”
Saw Frankenstein and Bride of Frankenstein as a double feature. I hadn’t seen either in a long time and they kind of run together in my head since things like Young Frankenstein parody scenes from both. Bride was more entertaining, plus it has this weird prologue with Mary Shelley which is a nice improvement over calling her “Mrs. Percy Shelley” in the credits on the original.
There was a birthday party of a dozen or so little girls in the theater, which added some entertaining audience reactions.
A Star Is Born 4 is great. Lady Gaga does a great acting turn and Bradley Cooper actually works pretty damn well as a drunken musician. The songs on a whole are amazing and Gaga’s are unsurprisingly emotional and tender. The side characters aren’t in the movie enough, but really good. This is an Oscar Front Runner and Top 10 Film for sure and worthy of the praise.
Venom is hot fucking garbage. It has Suicide Squad levels of studio meddling with bad editing, missing motivations, and horrid tonal/genre problems. The cast is really misused and given nothing to do. The reason why most people have liked this movie is because they enjoyed Tom Hardy/Venom, but I thought he was completely acting like he was out of his gourd. It’s never boring but this film is like watching a trainwreck you can’t look away from.
Mutafukaz was really good. It feels like Tekkonkinkreet + They Live + GTA. They’re only showing the dub around here but localization is well done. I haven’t read the comic yet but I assume things had to be condensed a lot to fit in a film, I’ll have to pick it up sometime.
Kill Bill Volume 1.
Peak “Cool Tarantino” though not the peak of his storytelling abilities. Excellent violence that is just the right side of cartoonish so as not to be totally horrific.
Master and Commander: The Far Side of the World
Watched for the third time, and it’s still great!
The Abyss
Maybe only the fifth best James Cameron movie, but still very good fun.
It’s a shame that they only ever adapted this book. The entire Aubrey Maturin series is excellent. It’s right up there with the Horatio Hornblower books. I’d love for a TV adaptation of the whole series similar to the Hornblower made-for-TV-movies.
