Review: Mary Poppins Returns

Mary Poppins Returns

Sometimes you walk out of a movie filled with happiness, a kind of effervescent joy that only a truly great cinematic experience can bring.  You might be the only one to experience the sensation, but the giddiness that leaves with you is something you remember years later.

Mary Poppins Returns had me leave the theatre in this way.  The joy - there really isn't another word for it - this movie gave me was something desperately needed.  From the opening bars of '(Underneath the) Lovely London Sky' until the end credits, there is a bubbly jubilation in every frame of the movie.

The main question most will have will be how it compares to the original.  And it compares well!  Emily Blunt gives a stellar turn as the titular Mary, complimenting Julie Andrews' performance from the original.  The movie follows the same basic format as the original - with perhaps a tad more focus on the parents this time around - but still stands as its own movie.  The movie doesn't have a true standout song like 'Feed the Birds,' but how many songs are going to be at that level, in general?

'A Cover is Not the Book' in particular is a great number, and the visuals accompanying it are a highlight of the film.  'The Place Where Lost Things Go' and 'Trip a Little Light Fantastic' are also immensely enjoyable.  The only song I didn't care for (though I imagine others will quite enjoy it) was 'Turning Turtle' - and that had more to do with lost potential with the set piece used during the number.

The performances are all good - the children do well, Blunt is fantastic, Lin-Manual Miranda is a hoot, and Emily Mortimer and Ben Whishaw do great work as the adult Banks children.  In fact, Whishaw gives perhaps the film's best performance - the most serious parts of the movie rely on him and he ably carries them while still maintaining the overall lightness of the film.

Revisiting several famous setpieces from the original hits all the nostalgia spots you expect them to, but the movie doesn't idle on them.  There are new places to visit and the film happily wanders through them.  It also pays homage to the original costumes but does several new and lovely things in this one.

A great movie, one that I will probably see again.  And now to buy the soundtrack...

9.0 out of 10

Review: Hell Fest

Hell Fest

So, when reviewing movies, you have to factor in two major things:  Is the movie entertaining?, and is the movie well made?  Just because a movie is entertaining doesn't necessarily mean it is a good production, just as a well-made movie can be tedious and boring.  You might be asking why I lead my review of Hell Fest with such a statement, and it is because the movie succeeds at one of these two major considerations while failing absolutely in the other.

The basic premise is that a (traveling?) carnival called Hell Fest comes to town and a group of twenty-somethings - yes, teenagers get to survive this time, as the movie decides to focus on college-age people - decide to attend while, unbeknownst to them, a serial killer also attends.

I will be upfront:  The movie does not live up to the premise.  It does create some interesting sets and works as a decent MacGuffin for why no one notices all of the dead bodies, but that is about all the gold spun from the straw that is this script.  None of the kills are especially inventive, although there is one scene that works exceptionally well during the setup but makes no sense upon the reveal. Afterwards, the movie shifts into the Final Chase, so it sort of deflates quickly at that point anyway.

The acting is adequate - no one is especially terrible, although it feels like a waste of both Tony Todd and Bex Taylor-Klaus' talents giving them the roles that they have.  But it doesn't have the clunky acting that usually accompanies a slasher with no big names.

On the plus side, the movie moves along at a quick pace and doesn't overthink the premise to the point of distraction.  It actually does surprise a little bit on who lives and how it ends, but still pays homage to the 'rules' of the horror genre.

The movie still manages to be entertaining.  It won't ever make any Greatest Horror Movies lists, and if it fades into obscurity in 2 years time, it won't be a huge loss to the genre.  But if you have an hour and a half to kill and you like horror movies, there are worst ways to spend your time.

5.0 out of 10.

Review: The Predator

The Predator

The movie isn't worth the emotional energy it takes to be angry at it, yet somehow I still am.  It's the 4th entry in the series (6th if you count the the Alien vs. Predator films), so I shouldn't be expecting too much, but it still somehow manages to disappoint me in such a way that I honestly don't know where to begin.

The movie is a soft reboot of the franchise (it acknowledges 1 and 2, but not the other 3) and focuses on Quinn McKenna (Boyd Holbrook), a sniper who has a run in with a Predator and manages to incapacitate it and sends some of its armor to his estranged wife (Yvonne Strahovski) and son Rory (Jacob Tremblay).  I'd give the name of the wife character, but the movie doesn't care about her, so I'm not sure why I should.

After he mails off the armor, the movie decides to throw out a plethora of plots for the viewer to keep track of with about as much attention as one would expect from a 95 minute movie to have with that many plotlines.

Plot #1 is the son being autistic and being able to 'figure out' the alien technology, which puts both the original Predator and the Bigger Predator on his tail, (Plot #2).  Meanwhile, some government guy trying to find the Predator's ship (Plot #3) has Quinn sent to the loony bin where he teams up with a bunch of other soldiers (Plot #4) to rescue his son (Plot #5).  During this, scientist Casey Bracket (Olivia Munn, giving this movie a better performance than it frankly deserves) discovers that the Predators are up to something (Plot #6).  Oh, and also, as mentioned above, a Bigger Predator comes in for reasons that I will get in a moment (Plot #7).  So consider yourself spoiler-warned.

The movie spends quite a bit of time with the soldiers, all of whom have some sort of mental problem that is played for laughs.  They are fairly interesting and do provide some comedic moments, but it plays into the greater tonal problems the movie suffers from - it doesn't take itself seriously enough to be a straight horror film, but keeps trying to have 'stakes' as if it is one.  It kinda wants to be an action movie, but most of the action scenes are incidental.

About halfway through - once the characters are established in the barest sense - the Bigger Predator appears.  Now, one of the bigger focal points of the trailers was that the Bigger Predator was going to come and up the stakes - 'the hunter becomes the hunted' and all that.  Precious little time is afforded to this, and when it finally happens, the audience gets about 5 minutes of that before the Predator is killed and it switches to the Bigger Predator going after the ship. 

However, we do get to focus on the government guy (Sterling K Brown giving the sort of godawful hammy performance the movie actually does deserve while still giving objectively the single worst performance in the film) as he takes Rory to the ship and OH MY GOD WHY DO WE HAVE A HUMAN VILLAIN IN A MOVIE THAT IS SUPPOSED TO BE PREDATOR VS BIGGER PREDATOR?!

There is so much to hate about this movie.  I think the part the pissed me off the most - even though it is an inconsequential joke at best - was where one of the soldiers (who has Tourette's) says 'Shove it up your pussy' (or something similar) to Olivia Munn's character and when she get mad at him for it (not knowing he has Tourette's) all of the soldiers try to convince her that he said something else when she clearly knows that he didn't and JESUS FUCKING CHRIST DO WE REALLY NEED A GASLIGHTING JOKE AFTER SPENDING TWO YEARS OF DEALING WITH THAT SHIT CONSTANTLY FROM OUR PRESIDENT?!  READ THE GODDAMN ROOM!

And the movie tries to have it both ways - spending far too much time with a social justice warrior-type message about autism that it undermines before it starts.  It's almost as if PLAYING THE PTSD AND MENTAL ILLNESSES OF THE SOLDIERS FOR LAUGHS MAKES IT SO THAT NO ONE TAKES YOU SERIOUSLY WHEN YOU TRY TO TALK ABOUT HOW AWESOME AUTISTIC PEOPLE ARE!  FOR FUCK'S SAKE, DID ANYONE READ THIS SCRIPT!?

Production issues?!  MAYBE CUT ALL OF A SINGLE PLOT POINT INSTEAD OF JUST RANDOMLY SHREDDING SHIT LEFT AND RIGHT SO THAT NOTHING MAKES SENSE AND NOTHING GETS EXPLAINED FULLY!

AND WHY THE FUCK ARE YOU GOING TO LEAVE IN TWO SEQUEL HOOKS WHEN YOU OBVIOUSLY THINK THE MOVIE IS A PIECE OF SHIT?!  YOU'RE INSULTING EVERYONE IN THE THEATRE WITH YOUR DAMNED 'LOOK WHAT'S COMING NEXT!' BULLSHIT ENDING WHEN THE MOVIE WAS DECLARED A STINKER BEFORE IT WAS EVEN RELEASED - AS EVIDENCED BY YOUR DAMNED CUTS!

AND WHY WOULD YOU LEAVE IN ALL THE STUPID CLUNKER JOKES WHILE YOU ARE CUTTING ALL THIS SHIT!  YOU HAVE AN AUTISTIC CHILD BLOWING UP A HOUSE FULL OF PEOPLE AS A FUCKING JOKE?!  HOW IS THAT FUNNY?!  HOW DOES IT WORK IN THE CONTEXT OF YOUR FUCKING FILM?!

AND I'M NOT EVEN GOING INTO THE BULLSHIT WITH THE SEXUAL PREDATOR BEING IN THE MOVIE AND CUT AT THE LAST MINUTE!  THIS MOVIE IS INFURIATING ENOUGH WITHOUT HAVING TO DEAL WITH THAT SHIT!  OLIVIA MUNN WAS RIGHT, APOLOGIZE AND IF YOU ARE ONE OF THOSE PEOPLE ACTING LIKE MUNN WAS SOMEHOW WAS AT FAULT, GO SHOVE YOUR HEAD UP YOUR ASS!

3.0 out of 10.

Short reviews: Jurassic World, Incredibles 2, and Won't You Be My Neighbor?

The Incredibles 2

I am tired of Pixar doing sequels, but that doesn't mean I wasn't hyped for this one.  The Incredibles is probably the most sequel friendly of all of the movies they have done.  What surprised me the most was the decision to literally pick up exactly where the last movie left off - with the appearance of the Underminer.  The movie doesn't stop from there, instantly jumping into the main plot - the push to allow Supers back out into the open.

The action part of the movie focuses on Elastigirl, and I have to give credit to the filmmakers for continuing to come up with new and inventive ways for her to use her powers.  This shifts Mr. Incredible to a domestic role, and the movie takes the high road of making him struggle without going into easy jokes.

I won't go so far to say that it is better than the original, but it is easily the best sequel thus far (with the caveat that I have not seen Toy Story 3).  Definitely worth checking out if you loved the original.

6.5 out of 10

Jurassic World:  Fallen Kingdom

I went into this film with very low expectations.  In fact, based off of the previews, I jokingly referred to it as "The Lost Park: Jurassic World" given the similarities to the first sequel.  However, despite a script that falls apart with even the slightest bit of thought, the director (J.A. Bayona) manages to create several exciting sequences throughout that keep you entertained, even if they do fail to work under scrutiny.

Despite all this, the movie is very much a 'filler' movie connecting Part 1 to the endgame of Part 3.  It keeps up the pace and doesn't bore you, but it definitely isn't a movie going for a self-contained story.  You get some appearances from Jeff Goldblum and BD Wong, but most of the focus is on Bryce Dallas Howard and Chris Pratt again, and the movie continues the trend/need to have a child around to up the stakes for the danger.

The movie gets a 5 or a 6 out of 10 from me, but it is a very enjoyable 5/6 out of 10.

Won't You Be My Neighbor?

I live in West Texas, so seeing a documentary appear in a theatre near me is a rare occasion, but what a treat it was to see this showing and get a chance to see it.

This documentary is a short look (the movie, with credits, is 93 minutes) at the life of Fred Rogers and the impact he had on children across the United States and his beliefs that shaped the show Mr. Rogers Neighborhood.

The movie does a good job of condensing his life while still hitting on what made the show so important and impactful during that time.

There's not much to say about this other than this is definitely a documentary worth checking out.

9.0 out of 10.

Review: Hereditary

Hereditary

So...  How to begin a review for this movie?  I personally loved it, but I know that many will walk out of this movie hating it.  Much like recent horror films from A24 (The Witch, Under the Skin), it approaches horror in a more cerebral way than most audiences are used to, but the movie gets to you in such a way than even those that don't go for this type of horror will leave the movie unsettled.  It slowly picks at you, methodically building towards a fairly brutal ending.

Without giving too much away, the film follows Annie (Toni Collette), her husband Steve (Gabriel Byrne), and her two children Peter (Alex Wolff) and Charlie (Milly Shapiro) in the aftermath of Annie's mother's death.  It is revealed very quickly that Annie did not have a good relationship with her mother prior to her death, and that strange things went on in the house.

The performances across the board are amazing.  A24 has announced it intends to campaign for an Oscar nomination for Toni Collette, and it would be a deserving nomination.  The way she plays Annie's slow unraveling is a marvel - easily amongst the greatest horror movie performances ever (though if anyone saw 2015's Krampus, they knew Collette was a natural for the genre).

Alex Wolff is also fairly compelling as Peter.  The performance is a bit of a revelation, and he almost manages to steal the movie out from under Collette.  Shapiro and Byrne are given less to do, but the enrich the other two performances fairly well.

One of the smarter directorial decisions was the use of miniatures (Annie is an artist who excels in them) to frame many of the scenes and, in some cases, throw the audience off-kilter by starting with what looks like a miniature before revealing that is in fact the set.

Now, the horror here is more cerebral, as noted earlier, and this is where the movie will prove to be divisive.  There are no real jump scares in this film - it is more focused on the slow burn effect - but several of the scenes stick with you throughout the movie, making you question each scene and its meaning.

The script, from Ari Aster, interweaves memory, hallucination, dreams, and real life fairly seamlessly - effectively using mental illness as a subtext for the horror.

I highly recommend this movie, 9.5 out of 10.

Review: Avengers: Infinity War

Avengers:  Infinity War

So, part 1 of the big Marvel Universe Cinematic Event has finished, and damn does it give you a sucker punch.  No one is safe, the stakes have never been higher, and the ever-present threat of Thanos keeps you on the edge of your seat throughout the experience.

Credit to the entire team for this movie, it is beautiful to look at, even when going to worlds that are not 'pretty,' there is enormous amounts of care and detail put into each location, and it really makes it feel like a cinematic universe rather than a movie franchise.

Performances across the board are great, and special mention must be given to Josh Brolin as Thanos, joining the very short list of good Marvel villains (the others being Loki, Killmonger, and Zemo) - and part of what makes him work so well is that he thinks he is the hero.  There is a tendency to make the villains Evil rather than characters with legitimate motivations - though they have used the revenge angle many times - so having this understated performance for a genocidal alien was a change of pace that the movies desperately needed.

There are quite a few cameos scattered throughout the film (one in particular surprised the Hell out of me) and no part of the story feels rushed - just urgent.  No scene is wasted, and it's the rare 2+ hour movie that I wish was longer.

Not much more to go into - not without going into spoilers - but I am very anxious to see the next part of this movie.

8.5 out of 10

Movie Review: A Quiet Place

A Quiet Place

Well, apparently we need all of the comedians to start directing horror films.  First we had Jordan Peele and Get Out (my favorite film from 2017), and now John Krasinski comes out with A Quiet Place, a great creature feature that sets itself apart with a premise that demands near-silence from all of the characters in the movie.

Set sometime in either 2020 or 2021, we are slightly over a year into some sort of not-quite-apocalypse that has forced the world to go silent, as monsters now roam the Earth killing anything that makes a sound.  The movie focuses on a family living in a farmhouse on the outskirts of a town, and how they have adjusted to a world where any noise can get them killed.

Krasinski (starring, writing, and directing this movie) does an incredible job with his world building, down to minor details like having the family use leaves for plates to avoid any sort of scraping sound.  You can tell enormous amounts of thought were put into how any tiny bit of noise can pull in the monsters and how to change their behavior to compensate for this fact.  Felt game pieces for Monopoly, sandy paths, and even some ingenious planning for the arrival of a baby all come together to create a tangible world that these characters are living in.

The performances are across-the-board great.  Krasinski and Emily Blunt both do amazing things with their facial expressions in various scenes.  Blunt, in particular, does an amazing job of portraying someone who is almost always tense but still going about their everyday life - a tightrope act of a performance.  Millicent Simmonds portrays the deaf daughter, and does a spectacular job throughout - displaying a guilt that never truly leaves her that creates tension with Krasinski.  Noah Jupe, the son that finishes out the quartet also does a good job.

The movies does so many things right.  Casting someone who is actually deaf (Simmonds) warmed me to the movie right out the gate.  They explain just enough about the creatures to give them threat, but not so much that they lose their mystery.  The world is obviously larger than what the family experiences, but they aren't privy to information that a random family in the outskirts of the world wouldn't have access to.  And at 95 minutes in length, the movie doesn't overstay its welcome.

While one has typically had to go to the recent wave of Parable Horror movies (The Witch, It Follows, Get Out, The Babadook, to name a few) to get a solid, well-made horror flick, Krasinski manages to breathe fresh life into mainstream horror films with this film.

I'd pay to go to a sequel.  8.5 out of 10

2018 Movie List

The Movies:
Annihilation

Ant-Man and the Wasp

Avengers: Infinity War

Bird Box

Black Panther

Bohemian Rhapsody

The Cloverfield Paradox

Crazy Rich Asians

Deadpool 2

Halloween

Hannah Gadsby: Nanette

Hell Fest (2024 review)

Hereditary

The Incredibles 2

Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom
Mary Poppins Returns
The Meg

The Nutcracker and the Four Realms

Overlord

The Predator

A Quiet Place

Ralph Breaks the Internet

Rampage

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse

A Star is Born

Tomb Raider

Tremors: A Cold Day in Hell

A Wrinkle in Time
Won't You Be My Neighbor?

5 Favorite Movies:

Black Panther

Crazy Rich Asians

Hereditary

Mary Poppins Returns

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (winner)

Best Actress:

Emily Blunt, Mary Poppins Returns

Toni Collette, Hereditary (winner)

Jamie Lee Curtis, Halloween

Lady Gaga, A Star is Born

Natalie Portman, Annihilation

Best Actor:

Chadwick Boseman, Black Panther

Josh Brolin, Avengers: Infinity War

Bradley Cooper, A Star is Born (winner)

Shameik Moore, Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse

Alex Wolff, Hereditary

Best Supporting Actress:

Danai Gurira, Black Panther

Keira Knightley, The Nutcracker and the Four Realms

Lupita Nyong'o, Black Panther

Tessa Thompson, Annihilation

Michelle Yeoh, Crazy Rich Asians (winner)

Best Supporting Actor:

Paul Bettany, Avengers: Infinity War

Sam Elliott, A Star is Born

Nicolas Cage, Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse

Michael B. Jordan, Black Panther (winner)

Ben Whishaw, Mary Poppins Returns