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The Chosen (2017)
I'm so very grateful for this series
I love this series which brings Jesus to life in a way no other portrayal has done. My only wish is that they'd have made the dialogue a bit less current, I dislike being jerked back out of the story so often with phrases I feel certain weren't spoken in that time. Not that I think the language should be exactly from that time either, as I don't speak Arabic or any of the languages spoken then, it's just that the phrases are so modern, it snaps me back to present day with a frequency that makes it hard to stay immersed in the story. I've watched the first two seasons, the only ones available on Prime, in two days, and cannot wait for the third season! It's a truly wonderful series. MORE, PLEASE!
Flower (2017)
Stop reading reviews NOW and just watch it. It's weird, this movie.
Seriously, if you haven't seen it, go watch it now! It's weird, this movie.
I was struck by how odd it was to feel so sad for every single character. Very, very sad. Even while I'd been smiling and laughing through much of the movie. All these characters are children, excepting Erica, the protagonist, far too wise for a seventeen-year-old in the "business" of turning a profit off pedophiles. She's raising money to bail her dad out of jail, he's in for attempting to rob a casino. Meanwhile, Erica's mother, with whom she lives, has a mentality much more aligned with a teenager than does Erica. The mother treats Erica more like a girlfriend than a daughter, so her meltdown later in the film where she complains of having given her all seems absurd. The new stepdad-to-be seems marginally more mature, but it's a narrow margin. When she finally gets a gander at her new stepbrother-to-be, Luke, she's rather shocked that her mother didn't tell her that Luke's a "BIG BOY". But, while Luke faces indignations and humiliations aplenty, the only ones he faces from her are offers of oral sex. Yeah... it's weird, this movie.
Then came the ending or at least what begins at about an hour and twenty-two minutes in. So many reviewers have deemed the ending unworthy of even viewing, but I disagree. It saves the movie. It makes sense. It's actually a pretty great ending. I don't know what ending would or could have been any better. This was the ending that just had to be.
Flower is not like any other movie I've seen. In my opinion, it's not comfortably suited to the Rom/Com genre, not being what I'd consider a good first date movie. It's not really comedy, although it's funny enough, in fact a good deal too funny to really feel like a drama either. It's WEIRD, this little flick and difficult to pigeonhole.
All in all, the best thing you can do is to just give it a shot, watch it without expectations, with an open mind. You just might like it as much as I did, and I DID!
Proximity (2020)
Does Demeusy Have MPD?
This one jerked me around pretty good. Isaac Cypress, intelligent NASA/JPL employee though he is, has some issues, he's recovering from a physical ailment received in an accident, he's in psychotherapy, and his therapist asks him to begin a Video Journal/Diary. He's outside on the second? day of journaling with his outdated video recorder and has just wrapped up his daily entry, when a giant meteor comes blazing to Earth, Isaac raises his camera for a brief moment before dropping it where it remains hanging impotently at his side. A short distance away a smoke column is the only evidence that the comet landed. Isaac moves in for a closer look, he's standing staring at the smoke column when he apparently feels the presence of someone standing behind him. Looking over his shoulder, he can't believe what he sees, and as he turns, he FINALLY thinks to turn on his video recorder.
Sometime later, after he's shared his video and the experience he's had with everyone and anyone he can think of to send the video to, and been called out as a HOAXER on National Television, he meets a seemingly sympathetic reporter, "Keith Obberman" (sounds just like Keith Olbermann) who claims to be interested in helping Isaac get the truth out about his story. When Isaac finally resorts to visiting him in his office and agreeing to a Lie Detector Test, the movie TURNS on a DIME.
The Action is cranked WAY up and toward the end of the movie we find Isaac and his allies in a Cabin in the Woods.
Hold on to your seats, because there's another big turn coming! I liked this one, never saw it coming, what the Aliens are actually looking for! Holy Moly!
Bumpy ride, though it was, I did enjoy it, however I wish it weren't SO disjointed.
The Turning (2020)
Perhaps a re-edit would help?
This movie had great potential, my guess is they were in a rush to get it released. The performances were perfectly adequate, the sets were too, but something just kept it all from becoming a successful MIX.
Most likely studio heads butted in and caused it to be hurried and harried, who knows? But had the movie makers been allowed time to make the effort to make appropriate cuts and craft this movie in the way it should have been, it could have been GREAT! It simply wasn't. Watchable, yes. Great, unfortunately not.
This is an updated remake of Henry James', "Turn of the Screw" which has several movie incarnations already. In this version, they're attempting to make statements about mental illness, and it's a shame they missed the mark so completely. There is nothing overtly frightening in this, it's more psychological in its scares, and would have been a wonderful way to broach the subject of mental illness too, but alas, they failed.
Still, the movie is worth a look, if you like grand old homes and their grounds and snooty housekeepers, and Hellion THOROUGHBREDS disguised as children being cared for by incompetent governesses.
Mad Dogs (2015)
Yet ANOTHER Formulaic Male Adolescent Mentality Fantasy
Four rather down and out 40 somethings, each with his own lengthy list of personal problems, i.e., one is taken to the cleaners in a divorce, one has the standard addiction issues, two others aren't as successful or as happy they might be, are flown all expenses paid to a friend's palatial beach side mansion, informed they're to inherit it if anything happens to the rich friend.
Surprise! All manner of mayhem ensues... including a little man in a giant cat head creating the obligatory bloody crux. Writing and Acting are mediocre, but passable. The scenery is the best thing about this show.
Still. why in the HELL do we need another show of this type?
Go watch The Man in the High Castle instead!
Blood Tea and Red String (2006)
Weirdness for Weirdness Sake? Disappointing...
Allow me to begin by saying that I WANTED to like this movie. While it may have certain "qualities" inherent in the culmination of a 13 (or so) year long HOBBY by a woman who has admitted she has no idea what the symbolism of the movie is, why the characters do the things they do or behave in the ways that they behave, neither what their roles actually are, as in the case of the frog with the apparently endless supply of actual (although very pale) hearts and the trippy tea and hallucinogenic red berries... IS he the gardener who cares for the carnivorous plants in the oasis inside the maze? If so, why lure in the "Oak Dwellers" in the first place only to "rescue" them later? In an eggshell, I (personally) was very disappointed in Blood Tea & Red String.