There were more good films than bad this week, and thankfully none as outstandingly bad as the bottom of the barrel last week. As always, this assumes you know the movie, so if you haven't seen any of them, do so, or just read the plot summaries in the IMDb links in the titles.
181. Flash Gordon (1980) - July 3rd
This might be the campiest thing ever and I love it. When a movie ends with hawk men flying in formation to spell out 'THANKS FLASH', when a movie uses and abuses every moment of its Queen soundtrack, when a movie has this scene, it can't be anything but a masterpiece, the genuine best kind of so bad it's good, tragically ludicrous film that never takes itself seriously and never fails to entertain. I don't even know what else to say about the movie, really, the football fight invalidates any argument that could be made against the film, and if that isn't enough, just watch every other scene with Brian Blessed. This is as silly as they come, and I adore it. - 7.5/10
182. The Brothers Bloom (2008) - July 3rd
I finally got around to this Rian Johnson feature, and while I liked it, it's also comparatively his weakest film. That's not to say it's bad, in fact it's very nearly very good; it's just that when you have Brick, Looper and The Last Jedi as the only other films you've directed, as well as some of the best (and one of the most divisive) episodes of Breaking Bad under your belt, this seems a little underwhelming by comparison (it's not even the best con man movie I ended up seeing this week, coincidentally enough). For all its outstanding performances, slick editing, snappy dialogue and excellent visual humour (the sugar gag is a great example of this: quick, small, hilarious), the film's ambition outstrips its story delivery, going on and on and on with twist after curtain call over and over, so even for all the charm and good will the film builds up, it quickly begins to lose it over the course of the last half an hour. The film got to its appropriate conclusion, it just felt like forever getting there. - 7/10
183. The Defiant Ones (1958) - July 4th
A movie that deals with the issue of race in the 1950s; well, at the very least it's a good marker for how much (or how little, depending on your perspective) people have been able to develop the idea in film consciousness between then and now. I give the film credit for being progressive for its time and pushing an idea of unity that anyone can get behind, and at the same time cut it slack for failing to address the greater issues and systemic problems it at least recognises exist; the problematic aspects of the film I suppose can only be identified as such because it's the sort of perspective people have generally grown beyond. At the same time, it's hard to suggest that this film's content and how it addresses it have particular value to the topic at hand today, even if I personally know or know of more than a few people that could do with the lesson in humanity that this film offers; the fact that the film does fail to address the greater systemic issues even after identifying that they exist and resorting to simple individual validation makes this film's value in the discussion of race obviously completely overshadowed at this point, with other more recent films capable of giving a greater scope to the problems afflicting people due to systemic problems rather than bringing such issues down to the actions of a few troubled or mistaken people. I guess it's still a better discussion of race than Crash, if nothing else, but that's probably just telling of how bizarrely backward and awful Crash was.
That said, The Defiant Ones still has fantastic work. Regardless of what could be made of the meaning of its content, the film is filled with fantastic performances and strong direction. Curtis and Poitier are both excellent in their own right, but the two of them have an incredible dynamic that cannot be understated. Aside from a few clunky lines that come off as too cartoonish to allow the actors to get to the heart of their individual struggles and mix them in rare moments, the two actors are allowed to express their humanity, their powerless, disparate, conflicted, and ultimately effective humanity. Together, they work things out in a way that I wish wasn't futile. The direction makes some interesting use of visuals as well, the key moment that stands out to me bring Curtis standing on Poitier in order to pull himself out of the mud, and then help Poitier do the same; it's a nice little suggestion about where we've been (keeping minorities down in order to prop ourselves up) and where the movie implores us to go (pulling them out of the mud put them in to). It's obviously white saviour stuff, naively earnest in its own time, but its so consistent and hopeful in its messaging that it's easy to see the value the film once had. This may be a product of its time that we need no longer rely on, but the skill on display is unquestionable. - 7/10
184. The Road (2009) - July 5th
Well, this was soul-crushing and yet motivational, which could be used to describe most of Cormac McCarthy's work. For every moment where it seems like existence needs to end because all of life is terrible, there's a moment of reprieve, a success, a choice to be the best person you can be, a saviour when you need them most. It's a conversation brought up in McCarthy's work and adaptations thereof over and over again; it's literally the centre of the conversation in a story of his that is only a conversation (The Sunset Limited), it was an idea painfully challenged in No Country for Old Men, and it's the core of every pivotal moment in The Road. The central performances of Viggo Mortensen and Kodi Smit-McPhee keep this work going against brutal odds, as innocence and instinct clash against one another with every choice they make, purpose brought down to little more than survival while they try just to be a little bit more than that. It's not as powerful as the book, but differences in adaptation always make this a possibility, so I can't be too hard on the film for that, especially when it carries such conviction in its presentation of events, trying to remain faithful even at points where it feels overly sentimental, committed to the material even if it doesn't always evoke the same or as strong a response. - 7.5/10
185. The Talented Mr. Ripley (1999) - July 5th
I love how much this film just spins further and further out of control, and how it goes so far as to find the perfect punishment for the character of Ripley. It's as fittingly tragic as it is smart yet completely insane, with an creepy performance from Damon that gives Ripley surprising humanity as he struggles with self-identity as much as he does multi-layered con. It's cracking stuff, if a little indulgent, but the ending makes it all worthwhile. - 7.5/10
186. Ant-Man and the Wasp (2018) - July 6th
This was good, but completely forgettable. All the well-directed, high-octane action and Paul Rudd in the world can't make a film memorable when its tone has no effective contrast and the film never stops to think. My full review can be found here. - 6.5/10
187. The Visit (2015) - July 6th
I can't figure Shyamalan out sometimes. The Visit is pretty clever for found footage, and I understand that the obnoxiousness of the characters is intentional, but especially in the case of Tyler, my question is: why? I don't blame Ed Oxenbould, he gives a performance appropriate to the material, but his character seems designed entirely to evoke pain in the audience. Obviously, it's going for cringe laughs, but the film is otherwise a fairly effective mix of scary and actually funny, so the sheer force of Tyler's obnoxious speech and behaviour is just awful. Still, the film is otherwise pretty effective, more disgusting than horrifying and inconsistently hilarious, trying very hard to be good while using an in-text reason to justify any and all potential problems with the technical aspects of the film (thought that's par for the course with found footage; if any of the film looks bad it's because it's not supposed to be a professional film). This was interesting to see after having seen Split twice, as it highlights Shyamalan's upward trajectory since After Earth; if The Visit is that much better than After Earth, and Split is that much better than The Visit, here's hoping his next movie Glass will be on par with Unbreakable. - 5.5/10
188. Truth or Dare (2018) - July 7th
Another year, another worst horror movie. Somehow a step down from last year's 'winner' Flatliners, Truth or Dare is a movie that confuses scary for frantic and never tries too hard at the latter so it fails to ever be the former. Not a moment of this film makes for compelling storytelling, with characters so vapid, inconsiderate and dissonant from one another that it's a wonder how any of them came to be friends in the first place. The movie starts by establishing half of the characters as terrible people (main character Olivia's best friend Markie cancels Olivia's charity trip without Olivia's knowledge or consent so that Olivia can come to Spring Break, then reveals herself to be a serial cheater, etc.) and proceeds to make none of them compelling in spite of those traits, punishing most of them as horrors are wont to do, but for some reason choosing to present the key theme, the lesson of the movie, as that it's better to sacrifice countless people you don't know to save your close friends. Seriously, Olivia's arc in this movie is learning to sacrifice nameless, innocent people for the sake of a best friend who spends most of the movie showing how little she consider's Olivia's feelings, because it's apparently better to temporarily stave off death and put innumerable people at risk than it is to die stopping a demon. The theme of the movie is literally selfishness. If the movie had suggested the value of all of Olivia's friends instead of going out of its way to condemn half of them, including the one who makes it to the end, then perhaps this theme could have been emotionally understandable if still morally reprehensible, but as it is the film does nothing to support its own thesis, and we're left with a confused and uncaring approach to everything that the film is about. It gets worse when you consider how little time the film dwells on the deaths of Olivia's friends; it's all quick lip service before moving on without looking back. This doesn't even get in to the plot itself, which is so slap-dashed together you can almost see the writer in the background of every scene shouting "just go with it... please" while the direction tries way too hard to take the film seriously. It's a shame, too, because despite being devoid of any kind of scares the film actually has a fairly slick style, and had this been some sort of teen drama that tried to address the human issues at play here the film might have been passable, or at least just sort of bad; with the rest of the film against it, this style doesn't stop the film from being terrible. - 2.5/10
189. Island of Lost Souls (1932) - July 7th
At least one The Island of Dr. Moreau adaptation managed to do the original story justice. After the middling 70s version and the disastrously ambitious 90s version, as well as a documentary on the same, I went back and checked out the first ever 'talkie' adaptation, and in the context of its time it works considerably better than its peers. As hokey as it is, the film treats its material with an actual sense of horror and tragedy, supported by brooding lighting and spooky camerawork, as well as an appropriately unhinged performance from Charles Laughton as Moreau. Moreau here is probably the key factor that elevates this film above other adaptations; in '77 he was a fairly generic villain, less defined by the character of his insanity than the others, and in '96 Brando just got real weird with it, which while I enjoy for how insane the whole film is in general I think takes away from the single-minded and driven attitude of Moreau. Here Laughton gives an excessively creepy performance tempered by his surprisingly human drive to succeed. He's not complex, but he's compelling for his focus; the character is simply all about his goals and spews them regularly in didactic screed that makes for good classic horror. - 7.5/10
Re-watches
42. Paddington 2 (2017) - July 2nd
This is just the best. Paddington 2 is the most wholesome thing you could ever see, and it comes by it all so honestly that it's impossible not to love. Just watch this if you haven't already, it's all of the best stuff from the first one with a greater sense of restraint, a true family movie that's sweet and innocent and only wants to make people better and feel better about themselves. My only issue is the same one I had the first time, which is how forced the transition from the first to the second act feels, essentially hand-waving the fact that Gruber wouldn't press charges in the offense. It's kid-movie logic that I can mostly, but not entirely, accept, if only because Paddington is an angel who deserves none of it. Again, just watch this if you haven't already, and watch it again if you have. - 9.5/10
43. Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl (2003) - July 8th
It's a shame the series has gone the way it has, because the original is such a fantastic swashbuckling adventure. Depp and Rush are excellent counterparts; these two essentially make the movie as good as it is. The other characters all range from inoffensive to slightly obnoxious, and the action and adventure are all solid without being amazing, but Jack Sparrow and Hector Barbossa are both such well realised and performed characters that they elevate the work considerably. They each work very well on their own, with Depp giving the role such perfect comedic timing, and Rush providing incredible gravitas to such ridiculous ideas (the "ghost stories" speech still chills to the bone despite how silly everything around it is). What makes these two performances even better is how they complement each other in their differences, with Depp's rock star approach contrasting Rush's more classically cheesy one, the two of them playing off of each other to create such great moments ("So what now, Jack Sparrow? Are we to be two immortals, locked in an epic battle until Judgement Day, when the trumpets sound?" "Or you could surrender"). Something that is otherwise somewhere between middling and solid is made really great by these two fantastic performances within. - 8/10
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