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Palm Springs (2020)
"Ground Hog Day" Goes Potty Mouth with Sex Scenes
This homage (which is a French word for "rip-off") to the beloved Ground Hog Day manages to squeeze out a bit of poignancy, but for the most part it's the same old same old with beer-drinking, more four-letter words, and lots more boinking.
The two leads are appealing, but it's really pretty thin and unoriginal stuff.
Run Hide Fight (2020)
Solid B-movie
Not gonna change anyone's life, but it was nice to watch something where the cops weren't idiots/badguys.
Takes its time getting to the point. Violent, but not gratuitous Decent acting from mostly unknowns.
For a low-budget B-movie, solid and enjoyable. Not too much DCS (dramatically convenient stupidity), and the heroine was convincingly tough and driven across the span of the film. She had mental toughness and wasn't superhuman by any means.
Shadow in the Cloud (2020)
Preposterous, but fun anyway
Paid homage (which is French for "rip-off") to the classic Richard Matheson-penned Twilight Zone episode, but did it in a pretty fun and nutzo way.
Moretz did a good job, and yeah, you have to suspend a LOTTTTTT of disbelief, but, on the other hand...it is about ***********s.
It was just fun, a hell of a lot more fun than "Freaky" (which was really only saved by Vince Vaughn, and was otherwise incredibly predictable) and it was, enjoyment-wise, in another (and better) league than WW84.
Not even the forced "guuurrrrl power" ending could ruin it, just made me wish for a slightly more subtle writer or director at that point.
Too Late (2015)
Hawkes was Great...Movie was pretty meh
I stuck with this art house noir mostly for John Hawkes. The long-takes were an annoying gimmick, and the dialogue was going for a 50's noir patter that seemed artificial and mannered.
In fact, some of the other acting felt like watching a community theatre try to put on "Farewell My Lovely," and not do a very good job at it.
Overall, terrible writing and waste of John Hawkes' time. This is a guy so good that Hollywood doesn't know what to do with him, which is too bad.
Skip this one, and watch "Small Town Crime" instead. It tells a good story without the artifice.
The Silencing (2020)
90% of a good film
Nice ambience, good acting for the most part. Script needed work, especially as it tried to cover some plot holes with DCS (dramatically convenient stupidity). That was a disservice to the actors and the story. But reading that the original director was replaced might account for those lapses.
Saint Frances (2019)
Feels like it was written per a checklist
Or it was an entry in the "Woker Than Thou" festival.
They did check all the boxes:
Abortion? Check.
Multi-racial Lesbian couple with adorable child? Check.
Hateful rich white people who are pro-life? Check.
Guuurl Power (menstruation is groovy, gooey, goodness!)? Check.
Men are either sexual predators/users or soft and aimless boys who don't amount to anything? Check
I'm exaggerating a little bit, but not much.
Which is too bad. The lead actress/screenwriter had an appealing nature, and the actors did a pretty good job, but for the love of creativity, can we have a mean LBGXYZ character once in a while? Not every unpleasant person in the world is a melanin deficient breeder. Sheesh.
Surveillance (2008)
A festering pile of nasty nonsense
And a waste of some good actors' time.
It's not spoiler to say...you won't be surprised by much.
Not the cliched portrayal of small town cops.
Not by "twist" ending.
In fact, the only thing surprising in this entire celluloid cesspool was the use of very good actor Micheal Ironside (generally type-cast as a heavy) in a sympathetic role.
But the rest of it is just garbage.
Underwater (2020)
Better than it had any right to be
The previews told you pretty much everything you needed to know about this movie (why, yes, yes it is basically "Aliens Underwater").
That being said...it's a well-done homage (French for "rip-off") to its betters. The acting is surprisingly good at conveying a convincing sense of the physical and environmental perils of where they are.
Was actually fun, and did a nice job of building to an exciting ending. It was helped by a terrific film score and some nice camera work.
Overlook the physcis and science mistakes, remember you aren't watching National Geographic, and you can have a fun time with this one
Spenser Confidential (2020)
They swung and they missed
They were trying for some a little different, but, sadly, it's a whiff.
Wahlberg and Berg have made a couple of really, really good films ("Patriot's Day" and the deeply unappreciated "Deepwater Horizon") but this attempt at a new franchise based on a long-running series of PI books is a muddled mess.
Berg is better than this.
Wahlberg is better than this with the right material.
Winston Duke is a terrrific actor that Hollywood doesn't know what to do with, and he is so much better than this.
Don't waste your time.
Cedar Rapids (2011)
Festering collection of cliches
Executed in the most obvious and unsurprising fashion.
This film was written, I'm pretty sure, by someone whose only knowledge of Iowa or the people who live there came from movies made by other people who really didn't know what they were talking about.
In addition to the staggering lack of originality---oh, look, the guy who's spouting Christian beliefs in public is---quelle surprise---a money grubbing hypocrite in private. Gosh, we've never seen that before!), the shame of this film (is that it wastes Ed Helm's basic decency.
A very funny guy, he was the human heart of "The Hangover." But crap like this film (and the Hangover sequels) instead revel in the imagined stupidity and small mindedness of the characters, which only reveals more completely the creator's own prejudice and bias.
In short, the move is crap.
Doctor Sleep (2019)
Very well done, but undone by a terrible ending
This is the rare film that has a worse ending than the source Stephen King novel.
One of the real problems with many of Mr. King's longer novels is that the power of his imagination exceeds his ability to pay off the story he created. (SPOILERS) The most egregious example can be found with "IT" (GIANT SPIDER FROM SPACE) and the longest shaggy dog joke known to man, "The Dark Tower"("you wasted your time coming this far because the wheel of ka turns and turns and everything you went through with the characters was for nothing!").
The novel Dr. Sleep was one of King's more solid efforts of the last 20 years, and as noted in the headlines, had a far more successful, exciting, and satisfying ending than the film.
The film itself, overall, was solid. Very nice performances (esp by Rebecca Fergueson and Cliff Curtis), the scares were more creepy than gross and much of the awfulness happened off screen. The throw-backs to the Kubrick film "The Shining" were well done (see the actress playing Wendy Torrence).
But the ending was junk, cobbled together from the novel The Shining, and it made the hero Danny Torrence kind of a putz, as if they channeling the weakest of King's own endings.
Worth a watch since the Director is so talented, but, damn, what a disappointment at the end.
Snatchers (2019)
Low Budget, but Smart Enough to be Funny
When you are working with very little money, you have to get creative. You can't camouflage the weakness of your material with "Oh, hey, let's spend another $10,000,00 on special effects to distract people from the fact we have no actual story." See "Ad Astra" for a perfect example of this puffery.
That being said, this is a film made by folks who know not only what they want to do, but are very well-versed in the conventions they are spoofing. Add in some very good acting by many of the youngsters, clever camera work and sound effects, and it was a very good time.
It wasn't Hamlet and it never pretends to be. If you want some goofy laughs, this isn't a bad way to spend an hour and a half.
Gemini Man (2019)
Not quite a festering pile of fail.
Saw "Gemini Man" tonight.
Not the festering pile of fail that reviewers claimed.
Story was about 80% there, but fell apart on antagonist and fell asleep on the ending.
Real problems:
1) The villain (Clive Owen, completely wasted). Nothing original there, nothing new in the characterization or portrayal. Think back to the original Robocop. Kurtwood Smith was a sleazy hitman, but he played it funny, insouciant, like a lark. That was new and fresh.
2) The effects were ZOMG bad, right out of Matrix 2 and how the Army of Neos looked like they were overtaxing a PC with a ten year old graphics card. Sheesh.
Lead actors acquitted themselves well (Benedict Wong, Mary Elizabeth Winstead, and Will Smith).
Diverting, but ultimately disappointing.
Terminator: Dark Fate (2019)
Terminator: Purgatory
Saw the new "Terminator" movie with my 25 year-old son. I once read that Purgatory could be described as the waiting room for Heaven.
The marginally adequate film should have been called "Terminator: Purgatory," as it was just a time-filler for audiences waiting for another truly awesome (aka "good story-telling without eco-political posturing"), inventive film.
There was almost nothing in the movie we hadn't seen before. And poor Linda Hamilton, who is nearly 70, moved stiffly, like a 70 year old woman when she wasn't being stunt-doubled across the screen. The fact that we didn't care about anyone in the film didn't help any, either.
Ghost Light (2018)
An original idea, funny yet achieves a creepy vibe
Movie gets 8 stars for being an original concept alone. But the execution lives up to those 8 stars, as well.
Bare bones outline is in the synop. But they give us some "stock" characters working in summer stock, yet those characters take some very interesting turns.
Great acting by most every one, including the female lead and Cary Elwes, who has to act like a bad actor.
Funny, surprising, and yes, as noted, achieves a very creepy (and strangely satisfying) vibe at the end. Well worth your time.
Godzilla: King of the Monsters (2019)
It is rather Shakespearean...
Saw "Godzilla King of Monsters" with my son tonight. 2 possible reviews:
Shakespeare "Full of sound and fury, signifying nothing."
Calvin/Hobbes "Giant Rubbery Monsters duke it out in big city. Who says foreign film is inaccessible?"
Advantage: Calvin.
Black Summer (2019)
Roshoman Zombies: Limited Budget/Creativity
Made it 1.5 episodes. Characters just driving/running aimlessly around a generic suburb, occasionally fleeing Fast-Runner Zombies straight out of World War Z. Apparently, none of the characters (except the black criminal, now there's an original take) have ever heard of defending themselves before, because no one has a baseball bat or even a steel pipe to fend off the walking dead.
Couldn't decide if this was an art project about the existential pointlessness of life (especially the interminable scenes of driving the same streets without getting anywhere), or if it was simply as a sign of how exhausted the entire Zombie genre has gotten, or if it was an indication of how creatively bankrupt the creators were.
Regardless of the answer, skip this festering pile of fail.