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Reviews
This Is 40 (2012)
A little bit funny but mostly horrifying
I must admit I watched 'This is 40' in 2023 - 11 years after it was released. Maybe it worked better then. Today it almost feels like Apatow is mocking Leslie Mann in particular. She gets to portray a thoroughly unlikeable woman who lies about her age, taunts her daughter's boyfriend - and lies about it, is bereft of life skills and professional skills (can't even supervise the two only employees who works in the store she owns but never attends), makes up ridiculous house rules to make life horribly for her own family and is socially unstable. Rudd is not nearly as horrible, but hard to care for.
Unfortunately being a romantic comedy, divorce is not really an option for them - but neither really deserves a partner. Perhaps it's a good thing this type of people lock each other down in unbearable marriages so they don't wander freely (and single) among us. Perhaps that's the morale of the story: these picture perfect marriages are in reality the most misunderstood concept in life and coupling. It pretends to be paradise, but it is in reality hell on earth.
Tunna blå linjen (2021)
Probably the best Nordic series for quite a while
Important issues of modern society is delicately balanced on a thin blue line and what we thought was good is actually not ok and sometimes bad is not so bad after all.
In the centre of it all are people from all walks of life. Malmö (where the Thin Blue Line is shot) is by modern standards a multicultural society which on top, and quite surprisingly for especially swedes, has the European record for deaths inflicted by guns. 60 deaths in 2022 and the numbers go up from year the year.
The serious issues at hand for the police in Sweden made this show both important and extremely hard to do properly and good. Writers have themselves walked a thin blue line and the result is absolutely amazing. Even on delicate matters, we learn that police is necessary and dangerous, but above it all they are only humans. Nobody's perfect.
In S2E5 for instance - all the police officers are gathered to discuss race profiling. Although many of them are close friends and from many different backgrounds - and wearing the same uniform, they must shamefully admit that race is an issue even for them and there are only 20 officers in the room. In S2E6 writers try to guess exactly what Christianity is in an extremely modern and efficient society like the Swedish. The result is rather touching and so are the characters. The show captures so many important aspects of 'samhälle' (togetherness) - the Swedish term for society - in the framework of a medium sized town's police department - no matter whether you're Khalid, poor, old, black, Christian or just down on your luck.
She-Hulk: Attorney at Law (2022)
About as exciting as watching green paint dry
Hated all frames. Not even transformations from human to Hulk was done with conviction and power, nor are the cartoonish action sequences. Target audience? Probably 14 year old girls who aspire to go places yet again getting assured, that everything is possible. But this is a story told many times before and - in recent years - probably a little too often. It's getting trivial.
Moreover, I had hoped She Hulk would have been saucy. Girls with muscles are hot and it is a very specific trend, that girls are allowed to - even encouraged to - add trim and muscle to their attire, without losing femininity. So tear her t-shirt a bit, show us your six pack, miss Hulk.
This is all much too Disney. Family entertainment, where the only one who hasn't left the couch midway through episode one, is the youngest daughter - and even she will not muster sufficient staying power on this bland and speculative nonsense. Do She Hulk again, Marvel - angrier, in cut-up shorts and a tiny cotton t-shirt and the teenage girl might tune in - along with her older brother.
The Goldfinch (2019)
A truly great movie
Every time a new character is introduced we care and understand. So good is the casting and the performances. Everyone wants Tartts novel to spring to life cinematically as the masterpiece it is. Oakes Fegley is a gem, Kidman is better than ever in a minor part, but Finn Wolfhard, Luke Wilson, Jeffrey Wright and Ansel Elgort are also fantastic. Sometimes adaptations fail miserably, but not this time. Come for the people, not the bird. Highly recommend.
Retfærdighedens ryttere (2020)
Anders Thomas Jensen has never been better
Anders Thomas Jensen has yet again rounded up his usual cast for yet a little movie about the outsider - and it is amazing. Dialogue brimming with wit and wisdom and everything executed with perfect timing by actors and editors. You will laugh out loud and you will shed a tear and both because your watching brilliance - and just a tiny bit because ATJ subjects you to do so by using the tricks of the trade he now fully master. Perfect.
Tenet (2020)
Not bad, just disappointing
Nolan must have had a tough time editing Tenet. Shooting it was probably a blast (some great scenes along the way), but editing it must have been really, really hard work. And unfortunately he here lost the plot and subsequently any interest. Forget that there should be an extremely subtle meaning to the 2h30 running time and the exorbitant production cost. There isn't, really.
So... "Why so serious?" Nolan might ask. Well, you decided on a somber plot, score and acting, so pardon me if I thought you were joking.
Arkansas (2020)
A novel greatly adapted for your small screen at home
For most of straight-to-Netflix movies, lately we have come to expect nothing but five lines for a semi-retired blockbuster actor to utter in the trailer - and that was more or less it.
This one is great. John Brandon's novel is the movie. All the great lines and the wisdom is at the center of the movie. The plot in Arkansas (a twist and turn crime story about small, medium and kind of big-fish drug dealers down south) is just a vehicle to transport viewers from one great insight of existence to the next.
Best movie on Netflix for a while.