2018: A Week of Movies - September 24th to September 30th

Uni hasn't made this easy, but here's the last week of movies I watched. If I had the time to really feel anything about them, this week would be pretty memorable. As always, check out the IMDb links in the titles for a description of the synopsis.

265. Chimes at Midnight (1965) - September 24th

I expect nothing less from Welles at this point; the man has an understanding of Shakespeare that's deep and distinctly his own. Taking that work and focusing on what you identify most strongly with is a pretty bold idea, and the way Welles eschews a lot of the technique and style he was known for in order to focus entirely on actor and performance is alone enough to make this a noteworthy entry in his career, but the film uses it to go further with its concept, taking Shakespeare's influence on modern storytelling in a very literal way while limiting the mode of storytelling to that of Shakespeare's chosen medium. The film feels like a play, but with the addition of techniques used in film to emphasise and exaggerate the performances further. It's honestly really cool to behold, but also the sort of thing that you can't take in with just one viewing. Everything I've said or could say her feels limited by how little time I've spent with it, so I'll say no more, other than to absolutely see this if you're taking a run through Welles' best work. - 8.5/10

266. Session 9 (2001) - September 24th

This was fairly unique and intriguing, a solid mystery horror with some genuine chills to it and a supernatural force that is left blessedly ambiguous and actually does what most other horror forces fail to do an actually get a few people killed. The film isn't astonishing, nor is it always great at what it's trying to do with the paranoid mood it sets, but as fast, fun and forgettable horror is concerned, I'm glad I saw it, and I do recommend it. Special props goes to Peter Mullan in the lead role, pained and desperate for answers to a question he doesn't know as a way of finding meaning in his slowly deteriorating life; it's more than enough to make the role work, and it stands out for how emotional he allowed himself to get as a contrast to how he ultimately acted when under the influence of supernatural force. - 6/10

267. Alien Predator (2018) - September 25th

This might be one of the worst things I've seen all year, but at some point I realised that the monsters were wearing discount cosplay Halo Spartan armour, and I stopped hating it. By every measure, this is cheap and terrible and no-one should watch it, but along the way things got so terrible that it was mildly entertaining. Not quite 'so bad it's good', more like 'so bad I can sit through it', and as awful as it is, if I'm being completely honest, I hated it less than The Predator, but I also expected far more out of that. I only make the comparison because one is obviously a cheap knock-off designed to capitalise on the release of the other; I expect basically nothing from this, and at most I got a terrible fan-film with no sense of direction or plot of performance or anything of note that's only slightly more watchable than the other worst things I've seen all year by being so cheap it's a little endearing. - 2/10

268. Red State (2011) - September 25th

This kind of works as a comedy, but fails as a horror. It's a neat bait-and-switch that doesn't go very far, and the political commentary is obnoxious but not out of place while also allowing for some solid moments of dark comedy, but there's not a lot of tension here besides the initial sermon. That scene is pretty damn good as a chilling revelation of cult attitude and with some tense action and clever follow-up, but the film rarely comes close to feeling this way again. I essentially liked the first half and didn't like the second, which is kind of funny to me, because for the last Kevin Smith film I watched, Tusk, it was the opposite (while I'm here, I like Tusk quite a bit more in retrospect; the movie is too insane not to be enjoyable). The film never quite gets me where it wants me to be, but I saw some potential in the film, and don't dismiss it altogether. - 5.5/10

269. Once Upon a Time in China (1991) - September 26th

This was pretty awesome; it feels like the prototype to basically every Kung Fu Chinese Hero movie ever, with tonnes of fast-paced, well-choreographed action, lots of wire-Fu, more than its fair share of discussion of Chinese nationalism, and a fair amount of hero-worship. It's silly, it's clever in both dialogue and fight progression, and it's fair to say that it's a big part of what my favourite genre of Chinese cinema is today. - 7/10


270. He Got Game (1998) - September 27th

Magic realism is probably my least favourite mode of storytelling, but in the same way I feel about found footage films, it's not the individual idea as it is in how common it is for the technique to be executed lazily. Thankfully, Spike Lee has shown me with He Got Game that you can use to ambiguity magic realism affords you in order to tell a compelling story with deep thematic exploration. The final moment, where Jake passes the last of who he is on to his son, Jesus (as I've said, Lee is the opposite of subtle), is an incredibly powerful moment, and no matter how many of the film's numerous ideas end up going nowhere, this film is beautiful, messy, thematic dynamite for what it says with its core relationship. Add the that the strong performances of both key players in this piece, and you have a really good film. - 7/10

271. The Mechanic (1972) - September 29th

This is kind of good, but also lack focus, and while I'm sure the contrast is intentional, I'm not sure why. The film is at once a slow and meticulous examination of a lonely assassin who is inherently self-destructive, and it's a silly Moore-era James Bond-style action thriller with a bike chase that unmistakably alludes to Live and Let Die. The film wants to be brooding and tragic and melodramatic, but also seems to want to acknowledge the light-hearted and unrealistic nature of its thrills, which is a difficult task to manage that I don't think the film ever quite mixes right. Bronson is really good; without an emotion across his face the man manages to express so much about what he feels and why he does the things that he does. It makes the film a little dry, but also eerily watchable, and despite how empty this film feels at times, I like it just a little bit. - 5.5/10

272. The Mechanic (2011) - September 29th

When I saw that this was shorter, I expected the film to trim a lot of the style from the original; less a slow, ponderous piece with an emotionless yet expressive Bronson that seems unclear on what it wants to be, this is more self-serious and focused but also kind of obnoxious in its hand-holding approach to a lot of the plot points. The film can't have you see that Arthur is lonely without also having someone say it out loud, you can't have visual expression of how Arthur works without voice-over narration that only tells you what you already know. I do like some of the changes, particularly to the music, and to the character of Steve, who is far more interesting and sympathetic without taking away from Arthur. Speaking of these two, both actors suit their roles well enough, with Foster offering a lot of that brooding emotional work that is the backbone of his considerable career, and Statham playing something that I like but also think is far too serious for the man who had already done every parody of this type of character. It's not that I can't buy him in his role, I definitely can, but the film takes its melodramatic subject matter too seriously for his work to overcome the silliness of trying to be super brooding in a movie about disaffected assassins in a convoluted plot of betrayal and connection. I guess, in retrospect, it makes me appreciate the silly, James Bond-esque bike chase of the original, goofy tone and all, a little more. This version comes close with its bus fight using every conceivable tool as a weapon, but not quite; it tries to be cool more than funny. That said, I still liked this a little, at least as much as the average Statham flick; even if the tone is too self-serious, the plot and action are excessive enough to be entertaining and the performances at least as good as the original (except for maybe Statham in comparison to Bronson - I'm not sure why, Bronson just has an inescapable 'it' factor) - 5.5/10

Re-watches

56. Mandy (2018) - September 24th

Not a week later and I already re-watched this out of sheer enjoyment. The film is fantastic stuff, all the weird stuff included, because without exception it adds to the mood of this piece, the suffocating air of repressing emotion, the feeling of release falling flat as the pain gets tighter, the distractions and disconnect and humour embedded in to little moments in this film in bizarre and creative ways; the film has only a few points to make, but it keeps making them in new ways, with the dream-like nature of the movie allowing for more than a few curve-balls and some unsubtle imagery about love, zealotry, sexuality and unhealthy internalisation. It might just be my surprise favourite movie of the year. - 8/10

Published October 1st, 2018

2018: A Fortnight of Movies - September 10th to September 23rd

It was assignment crunch time, so I ended up watching fewer movies from the 10th to the 16th, so I've thrown them in with this week. I'm so tired.

253. The Predator (2018) - September 13th

Part of me hated it for what it was, part of me saw the pieces of what it could have been; it's bad, but made with decent parts, and I'm now genuinely curious to see some kind of director's cut, because as ridiculously campy as friendly Predators sounds, it's probably better than what we got. My full review can be found here. - 5/10

254. Halloween III: Season of the Witch (1982) - September 15th

I decided to watch each and every Halloween movie I hadn't seen yet in preparation for the release of the new one, which to my knowledge retcons all of these anyway; this is totally to see how the Halloween movies degraded over the years, and I swear has nothing to do with the fact that its assignment crunch time and I need to pad my numbers, with assignments sucking out my usual enthusiasm for film, leaving me wanting only to watch cheap sequels who I'll feel less poorly about offering my full engagement. Are you convinced? Neither am I.

Anyway, Season of the Witch is the first and only Halloween movie to have nothing to do with Michael Myers: John Carpenter had originally intended this to be the start of an anthology based around, funnily enough, Halloween. Unfortunately, the film didn't do so well at the box office, and just like Friday the 13th, the Halloween series locked themselves in the same tired set of ideas time and again. But we'll get to that soon.

As far as Horror movies go, Season of the Witch is bad, but in the Halloween series it manages to be better than all of its successors bar two. It doesn't execute any of its ideas particularly well, and those ideas could be seen as offensive if taken seriously, but it's the one Halloween to have ideas that don't revolve around Michael Myers, free to come up with a combination of supernatural, sci-fi, and body horror that isn't well done by any means but gets points for creativity. It's also easier to stomach as a dark comedy that plays on genre expectations; rather than a virgin, the main character is a serial adulterer, instead of witchcraft or androids it's both, that sort of thing. It's such a mish-mash of other movie's ideas, with themes against everything from television to commercialisation to the Irish, all put together so bizarrely it's kind of hilarious. - 4.5/10

255. The Producers (1967) - September 15th

Before diving in to the rest of the Halloween franchise, I had a quick look at Mel Brooks' directorial debut. It's about what you'd expect from a film by him about two Jewish men putting on a play called Springtime for Hitler: A Gay Romp With Adolf and Eva at Berchtesgaden in order to get a guaranteed flop and make a lot of money off of investors: it's all in somewhat poor taste, but with such great execution that you can hardly care, especially with how the film pans out. It's great screwball comedy from start to finish. - 8/10

256. Halloween 4: The Return of Michael Myers (1988) - September 15th

We're back to the Halloween franchise, and so is Michael Myers. Unfortunately, John Carpenter isn't back, so we've little hope for quality or understanding of what made the original film work. This is a copycat of the first, with a lot of the same story beats and overall structure, but without the same flow. There's no slow build-up before the nightmare, no chill before the thrill, and in general none of the same panache as the first, save for the ever-enjoyable performance by Donald Pleasence. He's silly and excessive in a way that hearkens back to 30s-era horror; I half-expect a theremin to start playing every time he finishes a sentence. There's really nothing here of note that stands out as unique about the film; it's the first without most of the good bits. - 4/10

257. Halloween 5: The Revenge of Michael Myers (1989) - September 16th

I feel as if I watched the same movie twice by accident. Aside from the psychic connection stuff (which seems directly lifted from Friday the 13th Part VII: The New Blood, but I don't think anyone remembers that exists), this is a lot of the same stuff from Halloween 4. I even had to double check that characters from the previous one were in fact still supposed to be alive. This whole thing blew right through me like its predecessor; I've watched both and I feel no real reason to care about them one way or another. At the very least, I know by film's end which is the lesser of the two, because the film's ending is some terrible, unexplained massacre that only gets worse when it gets discussed in Halloween 6. I wish I could say I was nearly done, but three more Halloween films feels much more difficult than it probably should. - 3.5/10

258. Mandy (2018) - September 17th

I need to find the time to re-watch this; it's so insane in terms of the visual design and raw emotion expressed on-screen, and the flow to its conflict escalation is fantastic. My full review can be found here. - 8/10

259. Halloween: The Curse of Michael Myers (1995) - September 17th

For the love of God, please make it stop. Not only does this film have almost no sense of tension or style, it completely over-complicates Myers' backstory to include a literal Druid curse to explain why he's unkillable and evil. Gone is any sense of ambiguity about Dr. Loomis' character, no mystical understanding or potential insanity left up to the viewer, just unnecessary and convoluted explanation on top of the same tired affair. The only upside, apart from the same theatrical work from Pleasance and the scream queen work from Harris, is that Paul Rudd is in this, and no matter how much a film does to make me dislike it, he's inherently a saving grace, enough to stop this from being the worst Halloween in the series, if only retroactively. - 2/10

260. Halloween H20: 20 Years Later (1998) - September 18th

Trim the fat and keep the meet. As the new film will soon do to this, H20 works because it ignores all of the crap dished out by the previous three entries and acts simply as a closer to the story started by the first two Halloween movies. Because the film focuses on Laurie Strode and her connection to Michael (without following the Halloween 4 or Rob Zombie Halloween II copout), it can finish what was started around these two characters and bring the franchise back from the brink to be somewhat middling. This isn't anywhere near as good as the original, but after what I've seen, I'm more than happy with something that's passable, especially given the feminist subtext and the ending that comes with it that makes this one of the better resolutions to the idea of the 'final girl' as having value to the audience beyond being blameless. It's not a great or even particularly good film, but it has its fair share of awesome moments that make it worth watching. - 5.5/10

261. Halloween: Resurrection (2002) - September 18th 

And I thought Curse was bad. After H20 trimmed the fat and made for a decent closer to the trilogy, Resurrection comes along to not only undercut the ending of its predecessor but also kill off the main character and go on to be completely worthless as a horror, with discussion of horror as experience and the influx of creative film techniques that's tired before it even starts. What's worst about it all is the title: Myers isn't even resurrected, he just wasn't killed by Laurie at the end of the previous one anymore and then disappeared after that. The culmination of Laurie's character, the first half-decent sequel in 17 years, and this film comes along to make it meaningless. Retcons are supposed to be used to make things better, not an excuse to do something infinitely worse. - 1/10

262. The Green Inferno (2013) - September 19th

I still can't get in to Eli Roth movies. This is my third one, and it's clear that his films have genuine talent put in to them, but their content is so aggressively nihilistic that I struggle to sit through them. I suppose his movies are, to me, what most horror movies are to many others; just as I have been told many times that people don't understand the kick I get from scary movies, I don't get the value of being frustrated or downright furious for two hours with no higher purpose as a form of escapism. I'm not writing the idea off completely, but as of right now it inherently puts all of his films in a poor starting position. Unfortunately, this gets worse, as The Green Inferno isn't quite Knock Knock or even Hostel. Trapped in the Amazon with hungry cannibals as a plot, combined with the solid effects make for a throwback to the likes of Cannibal Holocaust, and the aggressive irony in its messaging is funny some of the time, but as much as I give credit to the film for effectively grossing me out and playing a little with structural expectations, I can't take this sort of film. I think the skill clear in the film's craft makes this experience a little worse for me, because it seems clear to me that Roth could be working on something better. - 3.5/10

263. Insidious: Chapter 3 (2015) - September 20th

Well, three chapters in and the Insidious series has yet to reach great heights or fall to the lowest depths; there's no Halloween among them, but there's also no Halloween: Resurrection. It's much the same style as its predecessors, silly spooky horror that takes itself slightly too seriously to be horror-comedy but isn't scary, haunting, or otherwise affecting enough to be great horror. At this point, the terrible jump scares have to deliberate; if they're some sort of joke between audience and filmmaker, I'm not in on it, the whole approach is just aggravating noise to me. The film otherwise has some neat build-up when it's reinforced by decent emotional beats, and the car accident scene is enough to make me question whether or not this is a horror comedy, but otherwise this is just more of the same stuff, which I'm not invested enough in to really parse through the differences in the details. - 5/10

264. Salvador (1986) - September 22nd

Well, at least I can end this fortnight on a positive note (I know I'm two films short, but I have neither the time nor the energy nor the enthusiasm right now).

James Woods is a terrific actor and gives one of the best performances of his career in Salvador. Oliver Stone's film feels like a suitable continuation to the work he did on Platoon, and while this isn't as good (few things are), it still offers an interesting character study and discussion of partisan politics that reflects the culture at the time and makes for an interesting parallel to today, all carried by Woods' work, ironically enough (not to say anything about him as a person one way or another; I just heard about this film because people were contrasting the man's personal politics with that of the character he portrays here). The film is powerful in how the experience transforms Woods' character over the course of the film; this idea that such up close and personal perspective of war can change you as a person has a direct through-line to Platoon, the same ideas put forward only a few years on. He's so improbable, yet so human; at once you find it hard to believe that he hasn't received this sort of change in perspective before, given his credentials, but at the same time the events of the film put forward this idea that it has, and that the futility of his actions at every turn, this breaking of the individual against the system, is as much a drive for why his character would improve as why he would regress. Wrapping that up in discussion of the politics that drive the system works, and allows for the film's stressed yet idyllic pace, as it fluctuates between reality, the attempts to escape from it, and the attempts to confront it. - 7.5/10

Re-watches

55. The Predator (2018) - September 13th

Yes, I re-watched this the same day I saw it for the first time. No, I did not do it because I particularly loved or hated the movie. I see movies with different people, sometimes there's overlap. This happened with Suicide Squad, which I absolutely hated, and The Last Jedi, which I loved; I can re-watch any movie just as easily as I can the first time.

That said, the second viewing is interesting to see if any of my opinions changed between viewings or if I noticed anything new, and in this case the two viewings were too close together for me to really be sure. I think I disliked it more the second time, but I was also exhausted and just wanted to tune out, and even with a double dose of its pro-autism message I don't think they handled the idea any better; making it a super power just seems patronising rather than supportive, especially when by movie's end you've equated the kid with the 'precocious genius' cliche, and a few lines of dialogue suggesting "the next stage of evolution" and claiming "true warrior" status aren't enough to make things work when the film is such a tonal nightmare.

*Note: I get in to some really geeky stuff from here on out, so just skip to the end if you don't care about Predator or Alien lore.

Beyond that, the over-complication of Predator lore when you're already incorporating films whose canon conflicts with the ideas about the Predator species that you're trying to convey is one thing that got to me. This isn't really criticism of the movie, since it has little to do with anything other than an Easter egg in the film that makes the two Alien vs. Predator movies canon to the Predator film series (although that gets murky as the last two Alien films have all but de-canonised those, so the Alien is canon to the Predator series but the Predator is not canon to the Alien series, which isn't anything new; the Alien skull was an Easter egg in Predator 2, but no Alien film has had anything to mention of the Predators). Including that Easter egg has implications about the species, some that fit and some that don't. The idea that humanity was a race that was uplifted by the Predators makes their genetic incorporation of humanity sort of make sense; they played the long game because they saw potential in human DNA, perhaps, hunting humans now and then to see how they've progressed. This even incorporates the Aliens, because they as a species genetically re-combine to form in the first place. That said, the fact that the humans were uplifted for the purpose of Alien hunts also needs to be glossed over a little, as the whole 'traditionalist hunters who choose to limit themselves against their opponents for sport' is at odds with the 'super progressive geneticists whose hunt is largely utilitarian in nature'. It fits better when you incorporate ideas from Predators, with multiple castes with different perspectives on how to progress as a species; honour versus survival being the primary conflict. It all sort of fits, but at the same time de-mystifies the monster, so the nerd in me who loves the Predator concept is intrigued, but the rest of me just wants this all to stop, because this stuff is all introduced through a movie that I like even less than Alien vs. Predator.

*Okay, no more of that.

Anyway, one other thing I appreciated about the re-watch was making sure of what happened to Sterling K. Brown's Traeger. He's the main human villain of the film, but he has a literal 'blink and you'll miss it' death that I had forgotten had happened by the end of the movie and had to piece together in my head how it happened as haphazardly as the people who edited this film. Munn's Casey calls out his name, he turns to look in her direction, his plasma caster goes off as it's facing the back of his head, head explodes. Even from the second viewing, I'm not even sure the plasma caster was charging up, or if he intended to fire at all, or how the plasma caster turned that far with his head, or if there's even a shot of his body crumpling (I... think there is). This feels like another one of Shane Black's jokes that got destroyed in the editing room, just like everything else in this movie worth talking about. - 5/10

Published September 24th, 2018

2018 Film Review: Mandy (2018)

Directed by: Panos Cosmatos
Written by: Panos Cosmatos
Starring: Nicolas Cage, Andrea Riseborough, Linus Roache
IMDb Link

If you like the idea of Nicholas Cage going on a revenge rampage against religious zealots in a world coloured and stylised entirely by neon, synth music and sexual, heavy metal imagery, then this is the movie for you.

Cage is Red Miller, a lumberjack who hunts down and slaughters every member of an insane religious sect after they murder the love of his life, the titular Mandy (Riseborough). That's literally the entire plot; its very bare, with all idyllic romance and haunting build up in the first half, followed by events that feel like an understatement to call "extreme".

The film is all style over substance, and my word, what incredible, inalienable style it is. The film paints it world with a heavy dose of neon, giving it this dream-like quality; mercurial, primal, the film moves from one emotional extreme to another, and the sharp contrast of colour amplifies all of it. The music builds on this idea as well, not just in how it's used but also when it's not used, with a fantastic score that just as easily embeds a sense of foreboding with complete silence as it does agonising unease from a few drawn out notes. That pain can turn to terror so easily here as well, with the hardcore, near-demonic designs of some of the zealots as an image of metal smashed against the neon world. This whole film feels like an exercise in using niche, psychedelic art-house style to tell an otherwise straightforward story; it's the way Red goes about slaughtering these man-made monsters, fueled by literally God knows what, and the way the film manages to consistently surprise with its escalation. No matter how crazy the film gets, it somehow gets crazier.

It's fitting, then, that part of why all this works as well as it does is because of Cage. Regardless of the role he's given, the man always put in his best effort, and in this case the role demanded some of the most incredibly raw emotions; rage and wrath distilled to perfection, the man becomes these concepts, he embodies them in ways only a man of Cage's particular talent can, offering exactly what the role needed to be utterly bewitching. Credit where it's due, Riseborough and Roache and indeed every bit player in this piece offer consistently appropriate performances, but with Cage as the focus this film is as insane as it needs to be.

It's not something I expect for a lot of people to enjoy, but I can't stop thinking about it and I can't recommend it enough if you think you can stomach it.

The Short Version: Mandy is off the chain(saw), face-meltingly crazy; I was enthralled from start to finish and I'm still not quite sure what happened.

Rating: 8/10

Published September 22nd, 2018

2018 Film Review: The Predator (2018)

Directed by: Shane Black
Written by: Shane Black, Fred Dekker
Starring: Boyd Holbrook, Olivia Munn, Jacob Tremblay
IMDb Link

The movie got butchered in the editing room.

Man, I remember being excited for this.

There's so much going on here and none of it fits together. The film seems all over the place with its tone, at once trying to be slight send-up of the original, with gore amplified to the point of silliness and even the Predator making and actual joke (one of the funniest the movie has to offer), all topped off with Shane Black's usual edgy but clever humour, and at the same time behaving as if embarassed of those traits. There are multiple loosely connected storylines that all have their own ideas about what the movie could be that then all get awkwardly mashed in to one narrative that's barely coherent and only made worse by editing so poor it's clear that there are solid chunks of the movie that are either in the wrong place or missing altogether. There's the lady scientist versus the government agency trying to study the Predators, the new take on the original with mentally ill modern soldiers instead of 80s action juggernauts, there's the continuation of ideas from Predators about multiple Predator castes that are at war over how their people do things, and then there's the story about the Predators literally weaponising autism (no, that's not a joke, in fact it's the only part of the movie that seems to be taking itself even a little seriously given the more sensitive nature of the topic, but it being handled slightly more nicely than everything else doesn't mean it was handled any better). The worst part is that none of the individual threads are bad ideas and could each on their own make for a more serviceable movie, but all of them have been thrown together in to this movie, with none of them giving any of the others any room to breathe and all them suffocating before getting a real chance to develop.

This goes for just about everything else in the movie; fun idea, but destroyed by the execution, with only a handful of scenes of genuinely good humour and spine-tingling action coming away clean. It wouldn't even be so bad if that was all the movie was, either, but the movie tries to be more, it tries to be way too much, and with such poor editing doing little to highlight the film's best aspects and hide its worst, the fun quickly turns to exhaustion.

The Short Version: Gore and excess abound, but garbage editing makes over-ambitious writing even worse, and nothing in this movie is good enough to make this any more than just okay.

Rating: 5/10

*After some time, perspective, and a few other movies, I've found that the potential I see in this movie and the love I have for the creatures, the concept, and the original, were all adding up to me rating this higher than I would for a similarly bad movie without the Predators. That said, were they not involved, this would likely be a 4/10 for me.

Published September 18th, 2018

2018: A Week of Movies - September 3rd to September 9th

I only watched one great movie this week, and it was the first one I watched. The rest of the movies this week varied between decent, bad and completely terrible. As always, follow the links in the titles to get a plot overview.

246. Crazy Rich Asians (2018) - September 3rd

This was an utter delight. Skillful and earnest telling of a formulaic story that's supported by cultural recognition and reinforced by heavily stylised filmmaking made this really exciting. My full review can be found here. - 8/10

247. Blood Fest (2018) - September 3rd

I really used to love Rooster Teeth's work, but between this and Lazer Team they're becoming synonymous with outdated and shallow genre savvy storytelling. The overall package isn't offensively bad, but it does come across as very lazy. From obvious and plain-faced call-outs of tropes to nonsense reveals and a baffling ending, this whole thing feels more like a Scary Movie successor than Cabin in the Woods, although its comedy has even less energy than the former and its horror doesn't even approach the latter. I really wanted to like this, and for a few brief moments I did, there are some jokes in this that are real gut-busters and a scene where the meta-commentary is genuinely inspired, as well as consistently excessive and entertaining splatter gore, but those factors barely balance out the film's weak points to make something really middling, and none of what the film brings to the table is unique enough for it to overcome its mediocrity. - 5/10

248. Non-Stop (2014) - September 5th

This, on the other hand, manages to do its sort of throwaway mystery schlock well enough for me to like it. It's not quite the best of its kind, but Non-Stop manages to keep its momentum at all times as Neeson's Bill Marks literally barrels from one end of the plane to the other. There's some attempts as solemnity that go over okay, (Neeson's scene with the little girl is sickeningly cute and I love it, and the reveal about his own daughter being dead goes well enough specifically because of that) and attempts at social commentary that nearly get off the ground, but everything from the cheesy twenty minute timer to the claustrophobic intensity of Neeson's performance, to the obvious fake-outs and the moments where the movie tries to be clever, it all sort of works, if never quite fitting together as well as it conceivably could (The Grey does exist, after all). I've heard people call this the film equivalent of an airplane novel, which could not be a more fitting comparison. - 6/10

249. The Titan (or Titan) (2018) - September 8th

If only films were as good as their ideas; I like slow and thoughtful sci-fi that asks questions about humanity and existence, but everything in The Titan feels half-baked at best, leading to most of its intriguing initial ideas becoming little more than obvious cliches with no real drive to them. The movie sets the mood and suggests greater drama in the future, but it never really capitalises on that, seemingly unsure of where to go until it ultimately decides to fall back on body horror and corruption of science. It's as if the writer had a great concept but ended up writing it as they were making the film, not really cementing story beats and relying entirely upon the performers as the film begins to shift focus from one main character to another. Unfortunately, Sam Worthington, while watchable, doesn't do enough to elevate this material, and is mired in the sheer lack of direction as everyone else. That said, on a personal note, I can't help but bring to mind Mute as I watch this, another bad sci-fi from this year, which fails for completely different reasons. This is less about the quality of the movies, and more about how films like these two sometimes bring me to adjust or reconsider how I rate movies. Ratings in general are an obligation I dislike a lot, it puts all the pressure of a review on a single number and does nothing to further potential discourse, and with films like this and Mute they feel almost useless, especially when the two are put side-by-side. My instinct was to give this a 4/10, whereas all those months ago I gave Mute a 3.5/10, and that sort of difference can be both nothing but minutia and a world of separation. However, both of those ratings are predicated on different sets of criteria; Titan is lifeless and tries too little, while Mute tries too much and ends up failing at everything. One of those is certainly a more easily watchable film, but the other is far more interesting. Does that sort of difference make one a better movie than another? Some might have a hard and fast answer, but after 989 films and counting, I'm still never sure. I'm only really bringing this up because these are both films that try to ask big questions and use a sci-fi frame to help them explore those questions, but I suppose even in that regard these two aren't really comparable. The pacing, the style, the structure, they're all completely different, and even these aren't enough to define entirely why they both fail in such contrasting ways. Do the ideas of a movie, even if poorly explored, elevate it? Does a painful structural failing completely invalidate a film's goals? Maybe I'm I'm overthinking it, but it's really hard to gauge the value of a film that suggests good concepts without exploring them, just as hard as it is to gauge the value of a film that fails at everything it tries to do but tries to do essentially everything. Then, perhaps to invalidate that entire thought process - 3.5/10  

250. Lake Placid vs. Anaconda (2015) - September 8th

So, there's yet another Lake Placid movie that's just released, and I've never been able to get my hands on a copy of Lake Placid: The Final Chapter, so I skipped straight past it to the follow-up to the final chapter (I love that horror movie franchises do this; it's always "this is your last chance to see this monster on the big screen" but then they make a bunch of money or someone buys the rights to the title super cheap and we get more. I love that the Friday the 13th series did this twice, and I'm both glad and slightly disappointed that the Halloween series didn't quite pull this). 

Anyway, this was a complete waste of time and largely disposable garbage with no real connection between most scenes and is largely an excuse to put two franchises together so that giant crocs and snakes can fight, with CGI so poor that you can hardly imagine how they thought it was worth it; in short, it's slightly better than Lake Placid 3. - 1.5/10

251. Lake Placid: Legacy (2018) - September 8th

Here's the "yet another Lake Placid movie". It's almost as worthless as its predecessor, elevated only in the way films of its ilk like Three-Headed Shark Attack are, in that the film tries to be about something, even if it fails at it entirely. It's almost cute how this film uses its cheap croc horror to make some statements about ethics, but when a movie is this terrible that sort of attempt is a very thin line to walk. Done right, this becomes slightly better than the worst movie ever. Done poorly and you get Deep Blue Sea 2. I mean, all of this is done poorly, but when you get down to this level and watch these sort of movies often enough you find yourself grading these films on a sort of curve, and being slightly more pleasant and thoughtful than Lake Placid vs. Anaconda makes this film not the worst thing ever. At least the pain it inflicts by existing is short, which even technically elevates this stuff above the likes of Transformers: The Last Knight, but I'm not here to rant about that. - 2/10

252. Ocean's Eight (2018) - September 8th

Another case where effort to plot doesn't seem to have gone much further than the premise, the flimsy story of this film is held together and elevated by the combined performances of its leading ladies, who all have a fun time with it and drop a few moments where they remind you how great they are. Bullock and Hathaway are both great and Banchett is never not perfect, with the rest pulling their weight without stealing the show and making the most of what they're given. and that's enough to get over the fact that the movie feels about twenty minutes longer than it should and introduces problems that don't have real thought put in to their solutions. - 6/10

Published September 10th, 2018

2018 Film Review: Crazy Rich Asians (2018)

Directed by: Jon M. Chu
Written by: Peter Chiarelli, Adele Lim, based upon the book by Kevin Kwan
Starring: Constance Wu, Henry Golding, Michelle Yeoh

Romantic Comedy is a generally pulpy genre; A film in the genre can do basically anything as long as it hits a few specific genre staples a long the way. This allows creative storytellers to explore ideas within the scope of those staples, and every now and then someone comes up with something excellent.

Rachel Chu (Wu) is a working class woman, professor of game theory, and daughter to a single mother, who gets invited by her boyfriend Nick Young (Golding) to a family wedding over in Singapore. Once she's over there she finds out that he's the favourite son of the biggest realtors in Singapore, a family so disgustingly rich that a million dollar deal for a piece of unnecessary jewelry happens without a thought. From there, all sorts of melodrama ensues; Rachel has to navigate the family's customs and try to fit in while almost everyone leaves her cold or treats her as lesser, and find the time to accomplish the seemingly impossible task of being good enough for Nick's mother, Eleanor (Yeoh).

While the basics might suggest standard rom-com fare, the film elevates its ideas by the way it incorporates its culture in to the reasoning for everything that happens, and fleshes out characters in ways that reflect said culture with both a critical and a celebratory eye. At the best of times this means that moments which could otherwise be construed as contrived instead lead to dizzying highs and crushing lows that other great films have been known to offer. The story beats with Eleanor are all predictable, expected even, but the film goes out of its way to make the moments have weight to them that both make sense for her character and look to the culture the film lives in for reference (the performances help too; Yeoh is her usual phenomenal self with incredible composure, and Wu plays off of her very well with raw emotion). The sassy friends who support Rachel can't be done without, but the writing is hilarious and actors Awkwafina and Nico Santos give fun, sometimes show-stealing performances. The usual melodrama of all kinds are abundant, and while some plot threads are streamlined for time and specific moments feel rushed for the same reason, it all just fits through the consistency of theme. The story isn't a re-invention of the genre, but by recognising its tropes and earnestly building upon them in significant ways, Crazy Rich Asians becomes a really, really good example of it.

This is in turn supported by some really skillful and stylish film techniques on display. Director Chu utilises some notable long takes with genuine purpose, exploring the setting while keeping Rachel in frame, allowing for the rich factor to really show off while also highlighting Rachel's isolation. Then there's the wedding scene, which was so beautiful I believe my heart skipped a beat when the music paused. It's stylish and decadent and yet strangely pure, a visual juxtaposition of how money can get in the way of things and how none of that matters in moments like these, with the slight irony of how much more is added by having the amount of money to do a wedding this ostentatious. It's both excessive and appropriate, which is perhaps the best way to describe the direction of a film titled Crazy Rich Asians.

The Short Version: A recognition, discussion, criticism, and celebration of its culture, combined with some truly fantastic film techniques, gives life to this tried and true formula of love, laughter and melodrama.

Rating: 8/10

Published September 7th, 2018

2018: A Week of Movies - August 27th to September 2nd

239. Universal Soldier (1992) - August 27th

I doubt I'll ever tire of these 90s action schlock pieces. Despite the fact that most of them are so bland that it can be hard to tell the differences between them, there's a certain charm, a comfort perhaps, to how obviously bad they are, always cheesy in a way that hearkens back to their spiritual predecessors from the 80s, but without the star power or charisma or originality to make them unforgettable. You know going in that it'll be bad and you know exactly why, but the underpinnings of the film are essentially a shadow of something great, so the film is both mildly entertaining and enjoyable to pick apart, and there's nothing easier to watch because it. In the case of Universal Soldier, the best part of this is that Dolph Lungdren definitely knows this and plays his part accordingly. He overemphasises the puns and gives every terrible line its excessive due, with a look in his eye and a smirk on his face that shows he knows this is the type of movie you shouldn't try to maintain your dignity in, and he has a lot of fun because of it. Van Damme doesn't quite reach the same heights of ironic enjoyment; he still has a little fun and doesn't exactly take the role seriously, but he's still the protagonist and as a result trying to walk away from this with a smidgen of genuine respect, which obviously doesn't work because this movie is so bad that it's slightly worse than Street Fighter, and Van Damme came out of that looking better precisely because he seemed okay with being a little goofy. Aside from a few flashes of fun from the three main characters, this film is painfully generic in terms of story structure, action, and theme. Bits of military dehumanisation and government corruption play out as obviously as you would expect in a film that's merely replicating old sci-fi/action ideas; it's not just the ideas of the movie, but how they're executed, that feel dated, even at the time of release. The action is hardly bombastic enough for the type of movie, only reaching an appropriate peak by its finale. This is hardly worse than other subpar schlock of its kind, but that's part of what makes it just a little worse; it doesn't do anything to stand out, and only Lungdren's performance and the few puns he's given feel somewhat memorable. - 4/10

240. The Hurt Locker (2009) - August 28th

This was apparently the only Best Picture winner I haven't seen from the last decade, and I'm at once sorry that I'd been missing out for so long and glad that I've finally seen it, because it's near-masterpiece level filmmaking. The film is so evocative, leaving you on this near-constant edge and able to tilt you ever so slightly whenever it wants. Director Kathryn Bigelow and Cinematographer Barry Ackroyd put you right in the dirt, up close and personal with every experience of the soldiers, but deliberate in action when they pull you out of it; you at once see events essentially as the soldiers see it, and as a sort of disorienting, out-of-body experience, which fits beautifully with the nuance given to Renner's character, at once contrasting our audience reaction with Renner's, and highlighting Renner's reckless addiction to this sort of action in his life, disconnecting from himself in order to approach a situation with fervour despite the danger. This is consistently the best aspect of the movie, especially as it regularly brushes up against Mackie's perspective that yearns for life beyond this, but this is probably no better shown than in the scene with the cluster of IEDs, which is the first time all of these elements are brought to fever pitch; not everything feels quite yet solidified about the characters yet, so it's not quite foregone how they'll behave and how things will go, and at the same time they're well developed enough by this point that you're starting to have an idea. The conflict both within the characters and between the characters is laid over this incredibly tense action involving very real stakes, and is shot in a way that both emphasises how gritty this all is and suggests with incredible visual execution so much about Renner's character. - 9/10, maybe 9.5.

241. Solaris (2002) - August 29th

Somehow even smaller in scope than Tarkovsky's film, this is still an intriguing and ponderous sci-fi in its own right, just stripped down from an already low-key film; Kelvin doesn't even have family to consider in this version, his character arc and therefore the audience's perception is almost entirely about his lorn love. That's not a bad thing, per se, it just means that the themes pertaining to the individual have less to juxtapose against the power of an incomprehensible being; the film does address this by reducing the overall meaning of the Solaris planet to individual perspective, but as an immediate reaction I'm not sure how I feel about this. As for everything else, the performances, the tighter editing that maintains the slow and considerate pace of the story, the intimacy of it all with that ever so slight and intentional discomfort nagging at every corner, it's all in aid of a version of the story that does less, but does what it does very well. I do love this sort of stuff, films that put the universe against the existence of a single person; the way themes are discussed always go one of two ways, either deeply personal or completely impersonal, either Solaris, or 2001. The disconnect in this the gives it a dream-like quality, like we're truly inside someone else's head, connecting us with Kelvin who connects us to Rheya, and the film has incredibly emotional strength because of it. This is just as true of the Tarkovsky version, of course, but it's a feat to replicate a subset of those emotions in a way that's seemingly distinct to this little niche of sci-fi. - 7/10

242. Bowfinger (1999) - August 29th

Ah, Eddie Murphy, there was a time where your work was some of the funniest in comedy; Bowfinger certainly echoes those halcyon days. Of course, I give credit to Steve Martin too, who is technically the main character and has his fair share of good jokes, but Murphy's delivery is so genuine and hilarious; it's so refreshing to see him and not think that his soul has been sucked out of him the same way it has Adam Sandler. The film is a great send-up of Hollywood in general as well, both of the unforgiving filmmaking industry and of the culture, with the MindHead cult and Murphy's conspiracy and sexual proclivities making for some of the most cutting lines in the film. Combine that with the film's cynical take on stardom through Heather Graham's ever-wonderful work, and you have a truly biting piece of work that feels way ahead of its time, while still being a laugh-out-loud-a-minute comedy. At the same time, however, so much cynicism is ultimately bad for the film, as its plot and satire become mean-spirited a lot. Murphy's Kit Ramsey is genuinely mentally unwell, but is ultimately dehumanised by the con that is the film's central plot, his sickness exploited by Martin's Bowfinger. I can see how the film tries to okay this by making Bowfinger a generally despicable person at all times, his scenes with Graham's Daisy both fast and witty and uncomfortably too real, but with his ultimate success and the support of 'the little guy', he's put too much in a positive light for his meaner actions to be addressed in some way by the film. It's still a really funny film, one of the better straight comedies I've seen over the last three years, but that meanness is more often than not a problem for me. - 7/10

243. Without a Clue (1988) - August 31st

This had a genuinely hilarious premise; Holmes as a character created by Watson and portrayed by a buffoon actor is both a great twist on the classic Holmes and Watson dynamic with some meta-commentary about Doyle getting sick of Holmes thrown in. Unfortunately, the premise can only carry the film so far, and while the comedy keeps it afloat most of the time, notable chunks of this end up being frustrating, some of the jokes are far too drawn out in terms of dialogue to be particularly funny, and the film's jump out of the classic Holmes and Watson dynamic is followed very quickly by a slump in to more formulaic territory of learning to appreciate friends. It's honestly fine; Caine and Kingsley can basically do no wrong in their parts and make a lot out of what they're given, but neither of them are given much at the same time, so their individual parts work well but rarely flourish together, with most of their combined scenes stuck on the initial idea of Holmes as buffoon without building much on it until they're apart. - 5.5/10

244. 13 Going on 30 (2004) - August 31st

Andy Serkis does the moon walk to Michael Jackson's Thriller; that alone is enough for me to love this film far more than I expected to. It's not a great film by any means, with a plodding, predictable plot and only a handful of notable performances (Serkis, Greer and to an extent Ruffalo), with nothing else about it really standing out aside from perhaps the prototype of 80s nostalgia as culture, but as saccharin as this is I just can't help but like it for the light-hearted fun it manages to have. It's more than a little catty, which is great, and goes for the obvious cringe humour, which is not so great, but it always tries to be a laugh first, which makes up for the sometimes strange and unconvincing melodrama, and makes the sentimentality of its message more palatable. Plus, once again, you have Andy Serkis dancing to Thriller, ending with a moon walk; that is peak cinema if I've ever seen it. - 6/10

245. Magic in the Moonlight (2014) - September 1st

This feels like lifeless self-parody. Magic in the Moonlight has all the simplistic theming of Woody Allen's other later works without any of the complex emotional nuance that makes exploration of those themes compelling. The ideas of rationalism, cynicism, faith, and the fluctuations of all three feels half-baked and forced, with so little energy to them that it's a wonder they even bothered. Such material leaves similarly underdone performances; Firth and Stone are terrific actors, but there's hardly anything written for them that works well between them, with only Firth's constant jabs having any sort of vigour. None of it is egregious, mind you; it's simply bland, inoffensive and shallow. Still, a moment should be taken to appreciate the cinematography, colour grading and shot composition; the movie looks gorgeous, with a brightly coloured haze over that complements the slow tracking shots and enhance the film's dreamlike state, in turn adding to the "magic realism as mood and ruse" style that the film is going for. - 5/10

Re-watches

54. Creed (2015) - August 27th

This is still one of my favourite films of 2015. The passion, the melodrama, the character-rich action, it's all so perfect as a successor to the Rocky franchise. It's well and truly following the formula, even forcing certain aspects to apply in a way that builds character; Adonis being adopted in to a rich background but then dropping that in favour of what he sees as his true calling and a chance to make a name for himself is both fantastic character development and it allows him to more easily follow Rocky's arc with only the specifics changed. On top of that, the fantastic camera work that keeps the audience right in on the action, allowing every punch to hit with maximum impact as the story emphasises why these hits matter so much. Combine that with the powerful performances from both Jordan and Stallone, and the dynamic caused by the contrast in their approach, the force of passion and drive versus the weight of experience and doubt, it all makes for some truly hard-hitting stuff that leaves you on a dizzying high of emotion. - 8.5/10

Published September 2nd, 2018