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Reviews
Out of Darkness (2022)
Great use of light & cinematography, great first half...and then meh
Amazing job at building suspense, using light, and creative scene transitions. The tension from the fear of the unknown was built up really well Awesome job by the cast and whoever chose the filming location - you really felt the brutality in the barren-ness of the land. Special effects were top notch, the gore wasn't overdone but definitely gave it the R rating.
All that for the film to fall flat in the final act for me. This should not be billed as a horror. This is a thriller, a prehistoric thriller. And a story of survival. Maybe AMC's "Screams Unseen" program needed a filler movie, idk. They relied too much on a twist when they should have kept it supernatural.
Cadillac Man (1990)
w/o Robin Williams it's a 2/10
This was a hectic, disorganized movie. If they stuck with an examination of Jory O'Brien's life it would have done way better as a movie. I was significantly more interested in a fourth wall-breaking, shameless car salesman than in a barely introduced Tim Robbins who holds hostages for the worst reason possible of any hostage movie. For some reason, the clever fourth wall commentary Robin was doing...stops or slows to a crawl during the hostage taking part of the movie. Honestly, missed some prime comedy if they kept it going. The second half of this movie - the "action" part of this "action comedy" - dragged for me and had little coherency. Again, Robin Williams as a car salesman for two hours would have been more entertaining. I lost track of how many times Tim Robbins/Larry needlessly shot the ceiling - it seems they wanted to make him seem threatening without him actually being threatening.
Thor: Love and Thunder (2022)
Was this a film? Or an anthology?
Natalie Portman felt flat as did most of the actors half the time, jokes landed sometimes (best was the goats, probably because it required little script writing tbh), and the whole plot felt disjointed. My favorite part was in the shadow realm, with the Wizard if Oz-esque color change - felt like a solid third act. Did enjoy the surprise fourth act with the kids getting Thor powers, I'm sure kids will be amped on that.
On the Natalie Portman stuff - I think it's in part due to her absence since Dark World but also while Hemsworth seemed to seamlessly switch tones with director changes, I didn't feel that from her.
The plot was...all over. Was it about Got killing gods? Gor kidnapping? Thor killing Zeus? Too many location switches *AND* the guardian piece at the opening dragged on. The sudden voiceover by Korg didn't fit, this film felt like an anthology.
Birds of Prey and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn (2020)
scattered story
Plot's so scattered it's pretty unwatchable. It's one thing to suspend disbelief for a superhero movie, it's another to suspend ALL of it to believe that everyone who has a vendetta against harley quinn happens to find her while she's running from the cops. Love margot robbie but the constant narration negatively inoacts the storytelling...of what story they even have
Godzilla: King of the Monsters (2019)
Godzilla goes super saiyan
Godzilla goes super saiyan. That's the whole plot.
Shazam! (2019)
A top notch superhero comedy.
Behind Christopher Nolan's Batman films in any DC rankings but I'd put it above everything else DC has done. Right behind Deadpool for superhero comedies but ahead of Guardians and Thor: Ragnarok for me. All the adults crushed playing children in adult bodies. A unique an ending as I've seen for superhero movies - I appreciated the creativity. Fight me, DC haters!
(I'm normally a DC hater which is what compelled me to give this review...)
The End of the F***ing World (2017)
Builds tension well
For a dark and twisted show, this show does a great job of raising the tension during the rare completely arbitrary moments it does have, like a meal or a motel stay.
Ocean's Twelve (2004)
Clever ego-fest deserves more credit
This film is fun. Yes, some of the critics were right in that it revealed WXYZ before revealing STUV. Sure. But the cleverness of Ocean's team's primary opponent stealing the egg before they had a chance to being undone by Ocean's team stealing it before he had a chance to is pretty clever. Undoing a trope by using the same trope...
Everyone hates that a bunch of celebrities did a movie together (judging by the first two reviews I read lmao) but compare this to "This Is The End" and, c'mon, at least this celebrity ego fest is a clever ego-fest!
My favorite part of the movie is when character's lines immediately contradicted themselves. Like Eddie Izzard's "isn't it cliche to have a sexy assistant" line right before his sexy assistant walks on screen. There were 3-4 others in there that I really enjoyed.
Also they set up the Julia Roberts switcharoo quite well by grounding the in-movie universe in our world with Topher Grace playing himself. What's the line - "never show a gun in the first act if you don't plan to use it in the third"? This film amends it to "never show a real celebrity in the first act unless you plan to make Julia Roberts play herself in the third."
Heist films are a popular genre. I like that this one took risks and am ambivalent about Matt, George, Brad, et al getting to hang out and pal around in the process. Who cares...honestly. Enjoyable film.