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Road House (2024)
Misses the mark a bit, but McGregor is a delight
Set in Florida, it depicts an invincible MMA fighter coming to work as a bouncer at a bar that is targeted by rich land developers. I think Jake Gyllenhaal was great, Daniela Melchior really cute, Billy Magnussen best cast for an entitled rich kid villain, the fights were pretty good, too, but the delight of the film was Connor McGregor. Because how can you counter an invincible MMA fighter except with another invincible MMA fighter, who's also Scottish?
Really, the ideas in the film are not as impactful as the original Road House, mostly because the connections between people were not as strong. Most characters are pretty cardboard so why should we care what happens to them? However the psychopathic glee that McGregor brought to the film actually elevated it to a classic. I can't wait to see the guy in other movies, because he clearly has the charisma and physicality for action movies.
Madame Web (2024)
Wasn't THAT bad
You know you're in for it when most of the reviews are either 1s or 5s, but you expect it to be a film that you either love or hate. Instead you get a mediocre superhero movie.
I don't really care about the politics of the thing, the extensive reshoots, the changing of the story by committee until there was nothing artistic left, I only care if I enjoy watching the film. And it wasn't good, but it wasn't unwatchable either. It made just as much sense as The Flash, but it featured young women and there were no cameos from famous actors or characters. If it were not a "spider-movie" and it was just a random studio making a film, I would have said "meh!" so this is also my rating.
It has a lot of pacing and editing issues and very little actual action, but its greatest sin as far as I am concerned is that it's boring. Honestly, it's got the structure of a video game: the plot is linear, the characters are barely sketched and everything that you see has some direct and immediate impact on the plot. If you need something to happen in another place, the movie instantly goes there, unless there is some interest in heightening the drama, in which case you get a scene that makes no sense like the one with the log truck. And obviously, the ending sucks, because no one in Hollywood seems to be able to write one anymore.
I would have rated it lower, but I see it was hatefully rating-bombed already, so there is no point in it. My advice is to relax, grab some food and a drink and enjoy this like any other silly TV movie.
Road to Perdition (2002)
An adult film to cleanse your palate of all the adolescent fantasies nowadays
You've seen the plot before: tough guy gets something taken from him, so he sets out for revenge. But the way in which this film was done was perfection. There is no smirking vengeful discussion with the enemy, no killing of hundreds of people by skill alone, no pleasure or release in the act of retribution, no random coincidences to push the plot further. This is an adult film, where the characters are adults, even - ironically - the narrating character who is a kid. No adolescent fantasy playing out, but instead complex characters interacting according to the rules of their world and weaving a predictable, but very nice story.
It's a beautifully shot film as well, filled with great actors playing some of the best roles of their lives. I am usually a very critical person, finding issue with things and focusing on them, but for this film, I swear, I can't think of anything. Not the sound, not the music, the plot, the pacing, the story. Everything was great! Bravo!
Damsel (2024)
Another Netflix feminist film featuring Millie Brown that actually works
I have to say that the story is interesting, the sets are great, the effects are good, the acting and the cast quite competent. Just like Enola Holmes before, it has high production quality and it's quite entertaining. All but the ending.
One complaint against this film was the pacing and I agree. This is basically a collection of three parts that have nothing to do with each other: a very long setup, a creature feature and a "moral of the story" ending that fails miserably because it negates a lot of the rest of the film and goes so far down the girl boss path that it just cleanly breaks off and feels like a slap on.
So I have to rate this average. I would have liked it a lot more with a well thought out ending and not just random revenge porn.
Halo Legends (2010)
It looked cheap as hell
I always applaud companion content to a beloved story, so I was kind of having high expectations about Halo Legends. Unfortunately, it all felt really cheap and uncoordinated.
You get seven animated stories in two hours, with various animations styles, various directors and so on, made by Japanese animators. With the considerable talent they've got over there and the resources of 343 Studios and Microsoft, this should have been amazing. Instead, the 2d animation felt like some 1980 anime and the last one, a 3D animated segment that looked like made with the Halo engine, was pretty weak.
But the problem was not really the animation, because I don't care about that, it was the stories. There were not bad per se, but they were not even close to special either. Probably the one with the Arbiter was one of the best, but the animation style was weird and took me out of the story - also it needed a lot more context to be understood, even if you know the lore. I liked the sniper mission one the best, but the childish dialogue again ruined it.
Bottom line: some entertainment value, but ultimately cheap looking and boring.
Argylle (2024)
Unfortunately, the naysayers have it. This is a bad movie.
One might consider a bad movie something that didn't reach a particular vision, they tried and failed, but I feel more offended by movies that are created exactly as intended and still are filled with flaws. I don't blame rickety old boats, but I do blame vast ships hitting icebergs. And unfortunately, Argylle is a very bad film because it squanders almost every resource it has.
Number one: the actors. Henry Cavill is first billed in the movie and he is followed by an impressive list of celebrities: John Cena, Daniel Singh, Dua Lipa, Richard E. Grant, Samuel L. Jackson, Sophia Boutella. Well, NONE of these actors has any role above the level of a cameo. The only actors are Bryce Dallas Howard, Sam Rockwell and Brian Cranston. It was a criminal underuse of the cast. And I know they would have to pay them, but really, there was no reason for any of them to be part of the film with the roles they had. Another wasted cast member: the cat. YouTube videos make more use of a lovely cat than this film. And by the way, whoever put Bryce in that yellow dress at the end of the film should be fired and never hired again. I am all for hiring people with disabilities, but blind people don't belong in the film fashion industry.
Number two: the story. A light and fun combination of Mission Impossible and Romancing the Stone, it should have been a slam dunk. In this era of people tired of all the remakes, it is time for remixes: take two unrelated films and mix them together. It required no brains, it was so easy. And still they botched it. The plot makes no sense, the twists are obvious and many times redundant, the movie doesn't know if it wants to be fun, action, thriller or romance.
Number three: no art. The final nail in the coffin, this film was utterly predictable. The glaring mistakes, grating tone changes, tasteless style and fashion, story issues, plot holes, the bad CGI, the misuse of actors, the bad acting and sets, none of that was actually unexpected. From the very beginning, the film is SCREAMING at you "I am a silly movie, my makers didn't take me seriously, so why should you?". It's not an endearing quality, but a screeching painful alert that no one actually cared even a bit for the quality of this film and that they knew from the get go it was a by the numbers product, not an artistic endeavor.
Bottom line: Sam Rockwell was great, as always, and that's the only reason I don't rate this into oblivion. However it is an insultingly bad film considering the resources available and you should simply avoid it.
Freud's Last Session (2023)
Two words: self indulgence
Many a time, in pursuit of a more dramatic or artistic result, filmmakers take license with the truth, add stuff, change the order of things, make things up. And what's very mysterious to me is that they tend to overdo this especially when celebrities are involved. Look at the latest biographies that gained a screen adaption: they are drastically veering from factual events. More often the defense for such practices is that art is a form of expression, not of reality, but of the vision of the author. Surely, though, that vision must be predicated upon some amount of fact.
So here we are, watching a film about Freud debating God with C. S. Lewis for one hour and a half, but that seems to say more about Mark St. Germain - who wrote the play, based on a suggestion by someone else who died in the interim, then managed to turn it into a movie where he is the screenwriter - than either Freud, C. S. Lewis or the invented cameos/name drops of Tolkien and Einstein. It might even be more about Anthony Hopkins than anybody else, because all I saw was him being him and not the person of Sigmund Freud. Especially revealing is the small font paragraph at the end of the movie that says Freud met with a young professor right before his death, who might have or might not have been C. S. Lewis. Other than that, so the entire film, is pure conjecture.
How presumptuous and self indulgent, but also unintentionally ironic, to invent something that involves actual famous people who lived, and that thing being talking about the verisimilitude of religion and how people changed the story of a real life carpenter from Nazareth. Then not actually focus on Freud's work, Lewis' work or even Anna Freud's work, but on Freud's fear of death, the Christian reconversion of Lewis and Anna's lesbianism all on the background of the German invasion of Poland and England declaring war. For the entirety of the film, Anna Freud's character runs around London to get medicine to her father, only to arrive with female lover in tow and do a silent scene of determination and acceptance, all while her father was in terrible pain and she had the morphine on her. And there are so many scenes just like this.
Bottom line: haven't seen something so lazy and self indulgent except in movies about actors, meta constructions that feed back into themselves, with no beginning, end, or connection to reality. It's a movie in which Hopkins orates most of the time and everybody else is an extra and that has, as far as I can see, little relation to the actual people depicted in the film.
Perfect Days (2023)
A peaceful fantasy
The typical story has a protagonist starting from a stable position, a crisis disturbing that stability, a climax, then the protagonist reaching a new stable position. Or dying, which I guess it's the most stable. We also see our lives as a collection of stories like that and we measure them by this sequence of small crises and unexpected events. However there is life in between these moments, perfect days of stability and, if not happiness, at least contentment. This is what this film is about: what if nothing happened and one could live their lives in peace? The Japanese lead and environment suggests thought of Zen and other Eastern philosophies, but the film maker is German, so there is no hidden meaning in the film.
However, this is also a fantasy, because while the protagonist enjoys his books, music, breaks in perfect weather in the park while he works as a toilet cleaner and his little plants, we know that the crisis is looming and the film hints at that, but then turns around and keeps the guy safe. The message is clear: enjoy the perfect days, each and every one of them, not because of the extraordinary quality of events, but their very ordinary nature.
Thankfully, the film is just two hours long and, even if it seems a boring premise, time just flows as we follow two weeks in the life of this lonely toilet cleaner. I guess I could recommend the movie if you want to feel peaceful and that life doesn't need to be a struggle for keeping what you've got while trying to get more.
Code 8: Part II (2024)
A decent sequel to a decent average superhero movie
I was reviewing the first film in 2019 and noted that I liked the acting, but the story was formulaic. This one is... exactly the same. It doesn't expand the world of the superhero hating police state any more than it has to and pits the Amell brothers against each other and an evil cop. You can see that the two have huge chemistry and at this time I wonder if their TV career didn't hurt their chances to do more, like Hollywood blockbuster more.
Part II is a perfect sequel to the first film, so perfect as to feel a bit of a clone, all except the Amell brothers who felt to me like they've grown as actors, at least when working together. Could this be turned into a successful franchise, using the talent they have available, the lore they have established and the Netflix resources? I hope so, because all dark superhero stories: Tomorrow People, Powers, Bright, Hancock, etc. Just went nowhere. This is their chance to establish an X-Men style long term franchise, with multiple stories in the same universe, nothing epic, just grounded stuff that is somewhere between the Marvel mania and the DC depression.
Sisu (2022)
Very entertaining
Tom Cruise has nothing on Tommila Jorma. Imagine someone took Mission Impossible, John Wick, Indiana Jones and The Raid and put them in a blender, then made a movie out of the mix. Now imagine it done by Finns :) To be honest, the percentage of Finnish movies that I enjoyed tremendously is way larger than American ones. They mix serious realism, humor and fantasy within interesting and entertaining stories.
In this particular case a group of retreating Germans mess with a tough and relentless old man and get to regret it. There are some really gruesome scenes as well as some that I think were meant to be funny. The Wonder Woman-like scene was clearly in jest, for example, and it was pretty early on. The level of toughness the main character has also shifts from believable to unbelievable to epic fantasy really fast. I kind of regret this, because as hard as it would have been to make this realistic, it was really close for a quarter of an hour, then it all went into the fantastic. There is also a truck full of extras that do nothing the entire film.
This is not the first film coming out from the Tommila-Helander family, Rare Exports from 2010 was also ridiculous and extremely entertaining. I may have to look into everything they've done now. For a 6 million dollar budget, this is absolutely an excellent film.
Bottom line: Extremely entertaining, but also quite forgettable, akin to so many blockbuster action movies nowadays, but done with a lot more style on a percent of the budget. Recommended.
Meikyû monogatari (1987)
Very artistic animation and storytelling, but a bit too clunky
An alternative title to this is Manie-Manie and I think it describes perfectly the style of the film. There are three different unrelated stories: the first is a dream-like trip of a child and his cat in a fantastic circus world, the second is a surrealist racing story and the last is a robot going haywire/satire of the Japanese work culture story. Made by Madhouse, they're all mad.
The animation style is... forceful. It is powerful, yet it lacks subtlety. You can feel it's art, but you don't get anything else out of it. The prose and dialogues are fragmented, clunky. The reason why I wanted to watch this - and in the end the best story of the three - is the last animation: "Construction Cancellation Order", but the other stories were fine, too.
It may seem that I have nothing but criticism for this, but it was entertaining. It felt too artsy and too experimental to be enjoyable. If the first two stories would have had a more classical narrative structure or if the three stories would have had some connection to each other, I am sure this would have been a hit. As such, it's mostly the animation that might make this worth it for you.
The Night Comes for Us (2018)
Better and tighter than The Raid
When The Raid exploded on the screens everyone went crazy. The violence, the blood, the visceral feel, it was new and unexpected. But then there were a lot of other movies that just did the same thing. The same crazy little dudes fighting for nothing and dying in droves. Some tried a bit more story, some tried a little more blood, but it was now old news. And then here comes this film.
Is it that the story is better? Or that there are no more armies of tiny disposable people? No. But the fights are so good. The final battle, between Iwo Uwais and Joe Taslim, is pure art.
Bottom line: Watch the film to kill some time, but set aside 20 minutes so you can enjoy the last part to its true value.
À mon seul désir (2022)
A movie about sexual women who are not afraid or ashamed of it
It is immediately apparent to people trained on American movies that something is really wrong with this film. Girls are unashamedly exploring their sexual freedom and desire, they profit from it, grow as people, love each other and themselves and nothing terrible happens to them in the end. Is that even possible? Isn't being young and sexual and beautiful the ultimate sin that needs divine punishment?
Luckily, this is a French film and it explores the lives of strippers and occasionally sex workers in a benign and wondrously exploratory way. The girls are beautiful and there is lots of nudity, but I didn't feel like it was exploitative. In the end it is a love story on the background of navigating your own desires and needs. Refreshing.
Blood Simple (1984)
Noir story, with some great acting from Emmet Walsh
The first movie of the Coen brothers is also an accessible one. Who would have thought such a thing?
Think of something like The Postman Always Rings Twice, only a little weirder. Worth it to see Frances McDormand young and sexy, and everyone acts well, but the show is completely stolen by Emmet Walsh as the sleazy detective. Instantly believable and detestable in the same measure.
The story is rather simple and if I even mention elements of it here, it might spoil it for you. It's the acting, the way the situations are portrayed and the dissection of the psychology of every character that makes this film a very good one.
So I liked it, I warmly recommend it, but it's a slow paced noir thriller where the details matter more than anything else.
Extraña forma de vida (2023)
Brokeback Mountain meets Misery, on the short side
This is all a 30 minute film about actor performance and filming technique. It takes almost a half of it to get to the part where Pedro Pascal needs to protect a child. Meanwhile, it is all about how two people can lust and then long for each other, while living in an unforgiving world.
It's ridiculous of IMDb to ask reviewers to write a long text about short films, so here's the filler: if you don't like gay men, you shouldn't watch this; if you wanted action, you are not going to get it; if you wanted a heartfelt story about life choices from two people who love exposition, then this is the film for you.
The Fall (2006)
A wonderfully visual storytelling, combining deep symbolism and authentic acting
This is not an easy movie. On the surface is the same formula of the older man telling a story to a child and then showing us what the child sees, but every scene is handcrafted to mean something and to connect to something. This is not a film for children, but for attentive adults, that's why, I believe, it received less than stellar reviews and was not recognized as the great achievement it is.
The imaginary world is visually stunning, while the scenes in "reality" feel so natural and authentic. It is hard to make a nine year old child act with any degree of craft, but in this film the director went further: it made the film around the natural behavior of the child. It is a strange concept: a real story that is only hinted at, with just glimpses of what happens, juxtaposed against a fairy tale with exquisite detail, but not going anywhere. It's the fantastical that informs on the real, through the psyche of both protagonists.
I liked the film quite a lot, but it requires more than the average effort usually spent on consuming a movie.
Killers of the Flower Moon (2023)
Very difficult movie to watch
There are several aspects of this film that have to be taken and rated separately. The settings, the acting, the music, everything is spot on from the viewpoint of the film production.
Then there is the subject, one worth knowing and it alone making this movie worth it, however it is a grueling story to endure, for the entire length of this film, which is over three hours. If you had any doubts about the systematic eradication of the Native Americans through any means by the colonists, as recent as the 1920s, when the story takes place, this film is going to dispel them. It will show you human greed and ugliness to levels that are hard to suffer. You will have to witness this filth without any redeeming qualities for the people involved, no entertainment value in the story.
Based on a non-fiction book written by a reporter, these are real events, presented slowly and methodically, without anything that would make the film entertaining. And while mentioning the slowness and the length, let me also tell you that the film ends with a radio show like production of 20 minutes that storytells the ending. So, after three hours of basically psychological torture and snuff porn, Martin Scorsese needed to summarize what went on next, otherwise there would have been another three hours I guess.
Bottom line: a dramatized documentary you need emotional fortitude to go through, and at the end all you get to feel is despair and no hope for humanity.
Headshot (2016)
Diminishing returns
The Raid was a revelation. Movies like that could be made! But they are hard to do, so in the end The Raid 2 was more about gangsters talking than actual fighting, yet it still had good choreography where it mattered. So people became nostalgic, started wondering whether a Raid 3 would be made. And no, it wouldn't be, for many reasons. But that didn't stop people trying to capitalize on the concept, so here we are: Headshot! If The Raid was poor man's Judge Dredd (no, I don't think one copied the other), Headshot is poor man's Jason Bourrne and yet another contender to "what would Raid 3 have been if it was made".
And it would have been fine, just like so many sequels are pale comparisons to the original, just doing your best with what you have would have been acceptable. But the very thing making you watch the movie, the fighting, sucked. I mean, even Iwo's moves were bad. And I am not dissing the man here, I know that he is a great martial artist, I am complaining about the movie making. Even with such talent, this was a boring and pointless exercise.
If you want to see a whole lot of fake blood, watch this movie. If you want to see great choreography, this is not it.
Gods of the Deep (2023)
Missed Katonics: A decent effort with no budget or any discernable acting skills
Imagine Prometheus combined with The Abyss and set in the H. P. Lovecraft universe of the Cthulhu mythos. Now make it with the budget of a few first year film students' pocket money and also their skill so far and you get Gods of the Deep.
You can't really blame these people, can you? What would you do if you had a dream, but had no idea how to make it happen? You experiment. You try to copy what you know, hoping that some original thought will make an appearance and propel you into your movie celebrity career. It doesn't matter that the actors you can afford can't act or that the sets you can afford are basically a cellar somewhere that you must make look like a submarine. What matters is to put something out there that is not completely crap. And, by the old gods, they succeeded. This is not crap!
On the other hand, it's not much better either. Everything in the film is derivative and the story is really really weak. Hint to future "experiments": first you write it, then you (and as many other people as you can find) read it and only if you like it and they like it do you continue with adapting it into a movie. Because somehow, probably determined by the success of such powerhouses of suck as Marvel, people have got it into their heads that movies and books are different and separate forms of art. No, they are just forms of medium for storytelling. The storytelling IS the art. And unfortunately here, they failed miserably.
And it was almost endearing to see how seriously the film was trying to promote itself because it was starring the famous Rowena Bentley. Only she was not famous. That was pretty funny.
Bottom line: if you consider this the first attempt in a series of incrementally improving projects, then it was a success. Kind of like Elon Musk's first exploding rockets. It promises the possibility of actual film making down the line. If this was their best effort, though... well, it kind of sucked.
Serbuan maut (2011)
Non stop action. The story is not worth mentioning.
The problem with this film is that it was hyped so much, that it's impossible to appreciate it at its true value. I mean, you have a ton of random Asian people fighting a few very good martial artists. And it's very very good! But the plot and the story are ridiculous. There is nothing that actually makes sense.
Therefore, in my mind, I rated this in the category of fight tournament movies, possible made after video games, like Street Fighter or Mortal Kombat. And thus, relative to the drivel in that category, this takes the top spot. Once you get into that mindset, it's easy to just sit back and appreciate the fights.
Bottom line: If you would just extract the scenes where Iko Uwais, Yayan Ruhian and Joe Taslim fight, you would really really enjoy it. The rest is just filler.
Orion and the Dark (2024)
Pretty cute, but very basic, with a focus on generational stories and children coming of age
There isn't much to say about this film. A neurotic child is afraid of everything and so he stumbles upon a fantastical creature that makes him grow out of it. There is also an element of the adult telling the story to his child and the child coming with their own twists and turns, so at no time you feel like anything is actually real or dangerous. It's just "ha ha, funny, he's afraid" or insecure or some other thing trying to pose as deep and meaningful, when in fact is the same faux self deprecation that Americans are crazy about this generation.
At times heartwarming, at times interesting, but to be honest the vast majority of it I was just waiting to get past predictable and mandatory phases of the story to get to the interaction between parents and children. That part was actually the most interesting and the fantastical quest was really boring and derivative.
It's not bad, but it's not great either.
The Tiger's Apprentice (2024)
Great cast, based on a (children's) book, potential completely wasted
This movie had so much potential: it had actual writing as base material, it had a great cast, the animation team was decent and it was released in a period of not much happening. It could have been like a new (old) Pixar movie release. Instead, it was a lazy, formulaic, brain dead production, more focused on making female characters look cool and superior than actually telling a story.
I have not read the book, but from the synopsis, it was completely different from the film. Also, it features the most rancid clichés ever: the boy who doesn't know who he is because someone sheltered him, but he's totally special because of his blood, with a wonderful all knowing mentor that dies just before they impart their wisdom and the adolescent American who can't stop and think for a single minute, doing dumb thing after dumb thing, but with a lot of people around him to tell him it wasn't his fault and finding excuses for him, because feelings.
The ending was the worst part, though. After failing miserably in doing ANYTHING, the hero finds in himself - without any effort, really - the one thing he has to do to defeat the evil overpowered opponent. A stroke of luck, followed by a lot of boasting about how he saved the day.
The story was beyond childish. Just think for any amount of time at anything in the film and it either makes no sense or it completely invalidates what it supposedly indicating. The cast was criminally underused. There are basically four characters with actual roles, Michelle Yeoh stealing the show, even with the sorry dialogue they gave her, with the others having a few lines each. I think Patrick Gallagher just says something about slobbering shower, once! The pacing was all over the place, with everything either feeling rushed or glacial. Even the editing, which should be quite fixed and done before any other work starts in animation, was poor.
I had to end the review because I felt like I had to remove stars the more I thought about it. They just appropriated (badly) elements of Chinese culture, turned them into a show even 7 year-olds would probably find nonsensical, then released them as a feature film that cost 300 million dollars. How is that even possible?
Bottom line: stupid.
The Beekeeper (2024)
By the numbers revenge porn Statham movie
I am going to fail this film as being as close to predictable as humanly possible, and still bad. Statham is the new Chuck Norris. He beats everybody up, kills the wicked and stares down the worthy. He is always fast, but compared only to the really slow opponents he has to face. He is always smart, but only compared to the morons stacked up against him. But he's entertaining, unless the story sucks.
And boy, does it suck here. Almost every idea put forth is ridiculous and then completely contradicted just a few minutes later. The editing is bad, there is no one even resembling having fun, except maybe Bobby Naderi. It's 100% by the numbers, a movie scam.
The FBI characters are completely pointless. The Black female agent is there for quota purposes only, as she starts off as incompetent, rude and cocky and she continues to run things on the basis of her arrogance alone, thus invalidating the entire premise of the film! Or maybe justifying it, I don't know. Jeremy Irons looks the same for decades, I don't know how he does it, but in this film even his character is reluctantly doing his job, reduced from a powerful man to an acting puppet in bad situations. Minnie Driver is in this. She answers phones. That's all she does for like three scenes.
Bottom line: Hollywood should have Beekeepers. The only interesting aspect of this movie is that its production seems to parallel almost exactly the plot of the film. Everything but the righteous ending.
On the Rocks (2020)
A fun little story about married life, fathers and daughters and finding yourself
Bill Murray is more charming at 70 than other famous actors at 40. In a way, this film is a vehicle for him, but it's not just that. Rashida Jones makes for a really nice modern New Yorker, both caught in social fantasies and having to be strong and self reliant at the same time. Even Marlon Wayans, in a role where he is not monkeying around, was great. Honorable mention for Jenny Slate, who is basically doing a cameo, as a blabbermouth who can't think (or talk) about anyone else but her.
The story is about a woman writer, mother of two children, stuck at home while her husband is trekking the world "for business" accompanied by a tall beautiful female assistant. Being the daughter of Bill Murray, someone who can't interact with a woman without flirting and who cheated on her mother can't help. Yet the film is not about who's done what, but about the relationships between people: spouses, parents and children and so on. There is a lot of smart dialogue and the vibe of the film is just... warm and nice.
Bottom line: beautiful heartwarming film, with some nice subtle ideas underneath and good direction and acting. Recommended.
Sunrise (2024)
A slow, modern gothic vampire movie
For such a slow paced atmospheric movie, it was very short. The story is simple, yet brutal. A psychopathic redneck and his crazy mother rule a small American town with an iron fist, killing, blackmailing and generally doing bad stuff. The redneck has a particular issue with non-whites, so he goes out of his way to scare them off, run them off or just off them. Guy Pierce was great for the role. And here comes a mysterious stranger - who is not a stranger - back to seek revenge, that being Alex Pettyfer.
There is nothing more than that. The rest is just brooding people, angry people, stupid redneck people and weird creepy soundtrack. Like a very short, slow paced, low budget The Crow.
I don't know why this film is rated so low. Just because people expected action and got "this too shall pass"? Or because people were systematically abused and they didn't seem to be able to do anything about it, which made most watcher feel sick to their stomachs?
Bottom line: Not a masterpiece, but a film worth watching. The IMDb rating is just wrong.