artistwriter-54705 Reviews

New Life (I) (2023)

A potentially good movie with some interesting ideas

[8/10 · 7 May 2024]

I rented this because the trailer made it look promising.

When you watch this movie you honestly cannot appreciate the message of the movie if you have never watched someone with debilitating health issues have to come to grips with their life unraveling. Without giving anything away, there is a piece of dialog coming from a character that in my mind has to be one of the most powerful bits of script I have seen in a very long time. With regards to life and living, and the feelings of suicide, these words are spoken by someone who most likely was not acting when they said them.

For that one moment of beauty and purity, I will forgive the rest of the things that I think were a little ridiculous, and or unrealistic.

Would I say this is a fantastic movie? No, but parts of it are. The dialog I mentioned, some of the effects work were just awesome. Was the acting spectacular? Compared to "Madame Web" this is "Citizen Kane" or "Casablanca". The acting was actually pretty decent and the dialog pretty good. Casting was I think a little unorthodox however... once you see things fall into place you will likely think they did a good job.

The locations were pretty non descript, and only at a couple points did I have to suspend my disbelief. Even then it was not too big of a thing.

I think that when it comes right down to it, it is actually one of the better movies I have seen this year as the film does move along pretty well and it has some layers to it.

Most important about this film, the underlying message of it, is to Live. Live at all costs and live on your own terms. That to me is a hell of a message in a time when so many movies are just merchandising delivery systems.

Arcadian (2024)

IF THEY CAN TUNNEL THROUGH THE DIRT AND ROCK...

[1/10 · 3 May 2024]

Rented this because it is Nic Cage, and for no other reason. Seeing this made me glad that I have no children.

A guy keeps two kids alive from babies to 15 year old teens and somehow, one of them is stupid to where everything he does impacts everyone. When I was 15, I was kind of stupid because my genitals were running everything instead of my brain. So on some levels I can understand the stupidity of the one kid.

My problem with this film was that everyone was a moron except for nic cage and the dog.

What they should have done, was made a movie with Nic Cage and the dog surviving the apocalypse. The creatures were somewhat interesting but yet not quite fleshed out. The one moment that I thought was kind of neat was when one of these things reaches through the door and it could extend a finger all the way into the room. Yet when you see these things, you get no idea how their body could do such things.

Lots of goofs and other dumb things in this movie but the worst part was the perpetual shaky cam and poor composition of the scenes.

Not the worst film I have seen this year but certainly not good.

The Ministry of Ungentlemanly Warfare (2024)

With an All Star Unutilized Cast

[6/10 · 16 April 2024]

Saw this at an early access showing. It was not what I had hoped, but more or less what I expected. If you like movies based on Historical events, that seem to also show the connection between new film franchises, and old, this is a pretty good film for that.

You have Henry Cavill walking through the entire film, with zero sense of urgency. You have the poor man's Gal Gadot, who does nothing but act as eye candy and a distraction to both the on screen talent, and the audience. You have Alan Ritchson who more or less steals the entire film as the lunatic killing machine. Honestly everyone does a decent job but frankly you could have cast anyone in this movie and it would have turned out the same.

I like some things I have seen by Guy Ritchie, but this movie is a little less interesting because everything is so bland and safe. Visually, it's okay. It's not great. There were some good moments in the movie and some funny things that happen, but you can see where the moment lingers and the tension is not there at all. That's the thing. I did not feel one bit of tension for anyone at any time in this movie.

That's the real sad part about this film, as you don't care about anyone before, during or after things get rolling. There's no air of menace to any of the bad guys, there's no chemistry between any of the characters. You see some glimpses but it's one scripted scene after another and there really is no acting.

Why should I expect more? It's not like anyone is producing any really compelling films that make history interesting.

Godzilla Minus One (2023)

There are no other Godzilla Films. This, is Godzilla.

[10/10 · 11 December 2023]

I have been watching Godzilla movies for about 50 years. The franchise is 70 years old at this point. In those 70 years, Even with the big budget effects driven films of recent, NOTHING compares to how I felt watching this movie.

Godzilla is a metaphor for the world, and life. Having lived through some things, I can identify with the feeling of being utterly powerless. The monstrosity of life, the horrors that it can throw at you, and living despite all the tough things that it throws at you, is all that matters, and that message is driven home by the human elements of this movie. This is not a movie where you sit in the theater and cackle about the effects, the guy in the rubber suit, or the amount of models or styrofoam they used to build all the sets. This is a movie that in the first 5 minutes has your undivided attention. The human story is the setup for the creature scenes, and honestly, I don't think I have ever watched a Godzilla movie, gotten choked up, or been inspired the way this movie made me feel.

When I was a kid I loved the old rubber suit films, but this movie really awed me from the standpoint that not only were the effects jaw dropping, but there was a multilayered story that drove home the only salient point that matters. Life is not to be treated cheaply, and unlived.

I am absolutely awestruck by this film and the message that it conveyed, because it carries with it a lot of optimism too.

Just see the movie. It is better than anything else that has come out this year.

The Killer (2023)

A great film From David Fincher

[8/10 · 31 October 2023]

I went into this knowing that I would enjoy it. Michael Fassbender is one of my favorite actors to watch. He does an amazing job being a cold, and ruthless killer, and then things go awry in his world.

The various chapters of course get the voice over narration from Fassbender and each and every succeeding chapter leads us to an ending that honestly I did not see coming, or expect.

Which leads me to why I gave this only 8 stars. Had this been given an ending befitting of what drove the main character to doing what he did, I would have given this review 10 stars in a heartbeat.

It is exceedingly well acted. Everyone in the movie is spot on. No slack what so ever. I give David Fincher and the casting director's they're due in saying that one character we see in this film isn't perfect for their role. The fight choreography was jaw dropping, and real. My only real critiques is some of the voice over regarding firearms, bullet trajectory and antique glass. I enjoyed everything including Tilda Swinton whose character was a wonderful surprise.

The pacing of the film was well done. Not one moment wasted, not one second for idle nonsense. It may have some familiar plot points as some other action films, but this is more of a character study blending a sociopath's behavior and compulsions with regards to attention to details, and I absolutely loved this movie for what it did get right.

Just the sheer amount of smart writing and how the main character moves through the story, and how he sorts out his path, from the clues. This could have very easily have been a Batman story, only with some murder thrown in.

Again, I will say for all to read, if you are going to watch a movie about assassins and want to see some amazing acting, this is the movie to watch. I think this might be in my top 5 movies I have seen this year.

Corner Office (2022)

For those who have worked in a corporate environment

[10/10 · 1 October 2023]

Having watched this movie, having watched the futility of the main character Orson, I can tell you that no movie in my life has ever come close to the sadness I felt for this character. "Death Of A Salesman" the story of Willy Lowman, by comparison is an uplifting tale of inspiration and faith.

Having watched this movie, I can say right now, that as a creative person I am thankful to have real human friends to pull me out of my own head space because half the sadness and despair I felt for this guy was how much I understood that desire to be in a place where they had manufactured a world where they were their best self.

It was an admonishment of corporatism and the unimaginative minds that run most of our institutions.

By far and away one of the most unsettling, horrifying, and best acted movies I have seen in the last 10 years. I have seen some amazing films, but this one, This one really hurt to watch as I wanted so very badly for this to be a science fiction or a rather bizarre film about the things that are not always in view of others. It would have been amazing for him to have this room that only he could see, where the people once shown it, would maybe understand or be able to see it too.

It was not that film, and by the end of it I wondered if in the back of the trunk of his car, wasn't his body. Somehow he had moved onto a plane of hell, because that's really what this movie was like. Watching a kind person who was naive entering a ring of hell.

That being said, I have watched a lot of movies that were studies in human psychology, but this one moved me beyond words with a message of "TAKE CARE OF EACH OTHER" and most of all "BE KIND".

I tried not to leave any real spoilers here, but if you are looking for that funny uplifting quirky comedy that the trailer showed you, I guarantee, it is everything but that.

The Creator (2023)

Rogue 2, Where are You?

[5/10 · 29 September 2023]

I saw this on premeire night at the Alamo Drafthouse In Woodbury MN. I saw it at the Big Show, which is how all movies should be shown on a huge screen, laser projected, and staggeringly beautiful.

Where and how you see a film, makes every bit of difference as the film itself, and even with this level of love for cinema, This movie was difficult to watch at times.

It is very well acted. That is not what this movie suffers from in any way. The actors, every last one of them, including the child actors come off as genuine. I cannot complain about the level of quality in the actors they chose for this film.

My problems were with the predictable Tropes. This script could have very easily have been written by AI. Hey AI, tell me a story about the robot struggle for freedom, but I want you to add parts of Star Wars, Dances With Wolves, Avatar, and maybe some Scorcese just to make it relatable to people who want to sit through 3 hours of film.

There was one line of dialog that will absolutely go down as probably the best line of dialog summing up the human condition. "We're the same, because You're not good, and I'm not a person."

That was the line that I wanted to see, and have it given context so that I would find something in this movie that would be far more intellectually stimulating. There were so many great ideas that could have come from this movie about what it means to not only be human but to see humanity in ALL things we create.

Instead, we got to see a few ideas made to serve a big budget sci fi film, and frankly, I think Denis Villeneuve should have directed this movie because he understands the humanity angle better than a lot of other film makers. While I did enjoy Rogue 1, and it being a derivative movie from Star Wars Lore, even using recycled footage from the original Star Wars Film, I don't think that Gareth Edwards was capable of bringing the heart of what it means to be human and to show the sacrifice one has to make in order to ensure their child, or Simulant child survives.

I can go on about the missed opportunities to maybe teach people that seeing humanity in even the lowly worker, should be admired, instead of just seeing robots as nothing but disposable.

There were many moments in this film that would have shown that we as a species should really be thankful for each other instead of making it about one nation's crusade. That to me was probably the most offensive thing.

Anyway, the actors and the SPFX people did their jobs admirably. Unfortunately the story itself was what suffered. I wanted to love this movie, but I found that I am at the point in my life where I treat technology like the gift that it is, and hope that one day the robots will see me as a friend, and not one of the people that hates them so.

The Last Voyage of the Demeter (2023)

Some things should not be CG

[6/10 · 11 August 2023]

Saw this on premiere night at The Alamo Drafthouse in Woodbury MN.

There were 5 other people in the theater with me. A total of 6 people in seats, for this movie. That to me seemed quite off as typically during the summer, horror films can put people in seats with minimal fuss. I think the fact that this movie was not promoted much if at all, speaks volumes as to why it is not doing the business it should.

There will be some criticisms that I throw at this that my not be your standard fare as I work as a writer, and I also work in effects. Specifically practical effects. So bear with me.

When the film opens, there is some exposition that is absolutely unnecessary. In fact, if it does anything, it dismisses the entirety of the film as being a story needing to be told. Telling people it's from a book, that they already know, demeans the audience so that put me off right from the beginning. While there are going to be people who have absolutely no idea that Dracula came from a book, it is still unnecessary.

The sets, the script, the acting, all of it is quite good for the most part. There are some shots from the cinematographer that could have been done or at least staged differently in order to preserve continuity and also not make scene transitions awkward. The story itself is based on the logs of the Demeter that sailed to England, and isn't particularly fleshed out as the script for this film does. There are things added, and by the time you get to the end, you're seeing some writer take liberties and add a character to the Canon of Dracula which to me was also not needed.

Where the film shines, is where they have the good creepy moments and a couple good jump scares that you don't see coming. Where it fails, is the CG vampire that we had seen before time and again and where it is the worst is at the end of the film where it looks completely CG, and does not match the position of the actor who was green suited in.

There needs to be a class on digital compositing that teaches artists that when inserting CG elements into a scene, they should be toned darker, have higher contrasts, so that way they blend into the scene and do not stand out as being FAKE. Think the old matte lines on bluescreen but the entire object.

For the most part the effects in this film were good, and there was some good attention to detail, but again my major complaint was the CG vampire. It just did not hold up.

Three Pines (2022)

Finally, a smart, and intelligent crime drama.

[10/10 · 8 December 2022]

While a lot of folks may prefer things that are scary, grotesque and violent, sometimes it is nice to see something with a lot of truly compassionate and human drama and of all the series that I managed to stumble upon, this one is fast becoming my favorite. Only 2 episodes in, and I want to binge the rest.

Oddly enough the other day I was watching "Raiders Of The Lost Ark" and realized that in that opening sequences Alfred Molina was in the film. To see him go from that bit part, on to other things, and to finally this, I have really enjoyed his growth as an actor, and more importantly how he has been really great at showing truly compassionate characters. The humanity in his performance in this series so far, has been really amazing. I don't give a lot of series a lot of praise as most of them are cutouts and boiler plate pieces of entertainment. This series is different as the subject matter has got a lot of gravity on its own.

I am looking forward to seeing what the remaining episodes bring and how things play out for his character. I am not going to spoil anything by saying how good the cast is, or how everyone seems to have a part to play. What I can tell you is that if you are looking for something with a window into what could be a better kind of humanity, well this is it.

It really left a nice dent in my day today and finishing the second episode just wrecked me. Cannot wait to see the rest.

And If I don't say it now, I will tell you all that Alfred Molina is probably one of the finest character actors out there and this really gives him the opportunity that quite honestly he most certainly deserves. I remember him in the second Tobey McGuire Spider-Man film directed by Sam Raimi, and his acting there was a hint of what we would see here. The man is a treasure and if I ever have the chance, I hope to tell him so myself.

IMDb on the Scene - Interviews: Andor (2022) Season 4, Episode 35

Another Series To Get Offended By.

[5/10 · 22 September 2022]

I remember seeing Star Wars on the big screen for the first time back in 1977. Which should tell you that I am now, an old man who is perpetually cranky and I probably yell at clouds. The problem with this series in the first 3 episodes, is that I truly love the Star Wars Universe, and I want to spend a lot of time in it. What I don't want, is to watch a film with great actors, delivering mediocre lines, segues that don't fit all that well, along with musical cues that just don't seem to blend into the fabric of the story, even if it is supposed to be ending on a "Cliffhanger".

I think that main problem with this series as it stands, is the editing. Someone really needs to look at the editing process and maybe tell that crew to start being consistent with their running times, along with oh I don't know, maybe some of the music that honestly isn't really all that important.

Now I get it that I am only 3 episodes in, and much like the Kenobi Series, you are going to see a lot of the same mediocre story telling, with cardboard cut out characters, and rehashing things we've seen in films from the 1980's. When watching the Lead Corpo Goon give his pep talk, the actor, and the speech was so incredibly similar to the pep talk given by Gorman in Aliens. It's as if the writer said to the casting director, "I'm looking to rip off like 4 to 28 movies here, and so I need an actor who can be a milquetoast leader. Just like in Aliens." Right down to the tough black guy disrespecting him of course. Because corporate goons don't have a culture known for vindictive leaders who can send you to the spice mines of Kessel in the Star Wars Universe.

The one thing about this series that gives me hope in the real world, is knowing that maybe for once, Disney will actually portray what real villainy looks like. It's not the guy with the anger management problems or a red lightsaber. It's the indifferent bureaucrat who sits idly by while you suffer under oppression and pretty soon, if not very soon, people might be woke up by this. Unfortunately we all know how the Cassian Andors of the universe go out. That being said, maybe if we had enough of them in this world, we might see some positive change.

Humanoids: The Real Close Encounters of the Third Kind? (2022) (2022)

Thanks Amazon for yet another disappointment.

[1/10 · 23 July 2022]

Whenever I hear someone say "I'm a film maker, and work in the effects business" I honestly kind of expect them to show me their expertise and tell me how something was done if they know in fact that what they are showing me is fake.

I on the other hand, do work in film, as an effects person and I could easily tell what was real, and what was not. Just to let you know all in advance, it's all fake. Every last piece of footage that was put in front of you in this film is fake.

Whether it be the photos, or the videos, all of it, every last frame is phony. Shame on anyone who tells you that it's real. Especially Jaime Moussan.

Ryan LaPlante, is superfluous here. His commentary to be honest is unnecessary and pointless as he does nothing to point out the inherent fraud within the video. He is mostly in this because someone decided that he needed a job. An utterly ridiculous thing to do. If you read LaPlante's Bio you would get the impression he is the be all, end all actor's actor, except when you watch this, you see a covid fearing basement dweller in a nice office giving commentary on a show that did not need it at all.

All of the footage in this film has been on the internet for decades. There is nothing new, nothing jaw dropping, and if you were dumb enough to pay money to see it like me, you probably knew what you were getting into. Except I did not expect to see some asinine bearded beta male chiming in every 5 minutes.

So yeah, if you believe in this phenomena, you are going to be disappointed because all of it is fake. If you knew what you were watching was going to be phony, you're going to be disappointed at the fact that there's some guy interrupting this thing whenever the editor thought they needed an injection of idiocy. Ryan LaPlante is not funny.

I mean, just not funny at all. Someone told him at some point in his life he was funny and he decided that in that one moment to pursue a career in something that he just was not really all that good at.

His parents probably loved him and did not have the heart to tell him. So more or less if you want to blame someone for the failures of this film, it's Ryan LaPLante's parents.

Resident Evil (2022)

I am trying to figure out how this show got made.

[1/10 · 20 July 2022]

As a rule I try not to get wrapped up in franchises that are based on video games. Unfortunately with Resident Evil, what was once casual escapism, has become a schadenfreudism.

The first video game that came out in the 1990's was pretty inventive, and was a lot of fun. When it was subsequently updated with better graphics, it became scarier and more enjoyable. It was after the franchise started to really get popular that the film franchises took what was a horror franchise and turned it into popcorn mainstream media where money was far more important than stories, and actually scaring people.

Fast forward to Netflix and their incredibly deep pockets that spend I don't know how much money to create this travesty. This has to be the hands down worst written, worst shot, worst directed series in the history of Netflix and that, is actually saying something. This makes Stränger Things look watchable by comparison and I hated that show too.

You have Lance Reddick playing two characters in this series, and while he is a fantastic actor, he is the ONLY actor in it.

I don't know who any of these other people are or even how they got jobs acting in this show. More to the point, who ever put these episodes together, with the disjointed continuity, poor music cues, terribly shot action sequences, and less than stellar effects, should probably study some honest to god horror films that used story and plot to drive the action.

For the life of me I tried to give this show a chance. I really really did, but this was so marginally done, and so poorly constructed that I am convinced there is some kid in Junior High, whose dad or mom works for Netflix, whose parent thinks their kid is more talented than they really are.

This show could have so much potential if the cast had been a good fit, an ensemble cast where everyone knows how to do their job, deliver their lines with conviction, and most importantly, if the story and writing had actually been decent, even with a terrible cast I would have still managed to watch all of it.

Unfortunately whomever wrote these episodes, and I am betting it was a committee of "writers" who may or may not have played the video games, (I am guessing not) have no idea how to pace a show, write dialog, and or telling a story that isn't full of dialog written like it was penned by a 7th grade kid who spent a lot of time eating lunch alone.

"I'll show all you people, I'll make you all pay when I get a job at Netflix, DESTROYING YOUR FAVORITE VIDEO GAME FRANCHISE"

This is more or less how I feel after watching this mess of a show. Anyone who says it is amazing, is likely a Netflix Employee, a Paid Reviewer, or is on those Joy Pills from the show. Because there would be no other way to explain the kind of idiocy that it would take to call this show, amazing.

Venom: Let There Be Carnage (2021)

"I know, Let's make a second Venom Movie"

[1/10 · 2 January 2022]

In the first movie, you had Eddie Brock picking up a symbiote and at the end of the movie, he fights a bigger, more monstrous and lethal version of himself.

In this movie, Venom fights a bigger, meaner version of himself.

I have come to the end of my Marvel Road.

We have gotten to the point in our civilization to where nothing new, nothing original, nothing of value, nothing that teaches and entertains, is going to come out of Hollywood. So if you want good stories, and good acting by people who try, you are better off going to TikTok, or YouTube than going to any theater or watching anything from a major studio.

I don't care what comes out anymore. I might actually be done with movies all the way around because the simple truth is this. The powers that be don't want you to watch a movie that makes you think, or ponder, or get ideas. They want you dull eyed, and stupid. Which is more or less what this movie did from start to finish.

The acting is wooden, boring and absolutely unconvincing. The story, is also ridiculous and bear in mind that I am having to already suspend my disbelief that Tom Hardy has an alien parasite living in his body. The first Venom movie had some fun moments, but was just an action film with a sci-fi angle. This movie had the potential to be truly awesome considering the cast, and the director. Unfortunately somewhere someone had this idea that it needed to be a buddy comedy, full of set pieces and implausible coincidences.

I think that there was an opportunity for someone to really stake this franchise and make it as good as the Spider-Man Disney is cultivating but somewhere all those great ideas and potential were destroyed.

Invasion (2021–2024)

10 episodes about nothing.

[1/10 · 11 December 2021]

I went into this with no expectations. Mostly because Simon Kinberg is not exactly a talented writer. When I saw that he was the guy directly responsible for all of it, well, you can imagine my surprise when watching 10 episodes, hoping that something good might happen, and nothing did.

The problem isn't the acting. Which is what used to be the problem with a lot of science fiction stories was that the acting was always subpar because the actors did not take it seriously. What we have today, is that we have a ton of really great actors, who do a great job being their characters only to have the stories go absolutely nowhere, and be completely unwatchable due to their dishonesty and overtly ham fisted political messages.

In the case of this series, what was the message? Where was the story going? What you had was a bunch of stories that went nowhere, no real purpose, no real ending, and most importantly, no point. Because the aliens in this story never did anything other than arbitrarily kill people. There was absolutely no substance what so ever, no menace and the effects quite honestly were just a waste of pixels.

I really miss the days of poorly acted, low budget sci-fi shows that fans loved because the stories were good. Remember "V"? Even the reboot of that was pretty decent. This was so ridiculously drawn out with all the various politically correct archetypes. Japanese Lesbians, Old Man talking about his middle aged daughter, White cop being replaced with new younger black lady cop, The middle eastern family whose husband's infidelity with a white home wrecker takes center stage. A gifted white kid who has seizures with the ability to communicate with aliens, and the black navy seal who loses his entire squad.

What do these people all have in common? Well they were the victims of poor writing, a terrible story, and a creator who did not care about the world he was creating because he probably thinks he's going to get a season two out of Apple TV.

What could have made this series interesting, would have been oh, I don't know show us something entirely different than what we are used to seeing instead of PC archetypes fighting to tell their "truth". One thing I can tell you though, I gave this series a chance. I didn't just watch one episode and throw my hands up in the air. No, I committed myself to watching the entire series so that when I wrote a review, it wasn't going to be coming from a quitter. I wanted my review to come from someone who had endured 10 episodes of intellect insulting boredom.

As I said before. The acting was great. It's just unfortunate that the characters are all victims of poor development and poor story telling.

Encounter (III) (2021)

Well acted, unfortunately NOT the story it was sold as.

[2/10 · 11 December 2021]

Riz Ahmed is a great actor. I'm not kidding. He sells this performance in a way that blows my mind. The problem is the fact that what the film was advertised as, and what it actually is, are two entirely different things. I just wish we could stop with the anti-gun rhetoric. Especially when it seems to be perfectly fine for police and military to have the monopoly on violence.

The acting in this film is actually quite good, and there are scenes that are interesting to say the least that make you think you are watching a movie unfold about a man's descent into madness and paranoia while being pursued by aliens, but then you get hit with the grim reality that this is a man who has lost his mind, lost his entire life, and is trying to get back what it was he lost before he went of the rails.

In this regard, the film is a much better story, and should have been sold as a cautionary tale for the rest of the population who does not understand what our veteran community has been dealing with since they have been coming home from wars that had the best intentions. You watch this character struggle and it is very hard. What I was happy to see, was Riz Ahmed playing the lead, because I am truly sick of white and black people being painted as the only ones whose lives are ever affected by PTSD. What I could have lived without, was the Anti-Gun sentiment and how they painted the picture of how all men who have guns as being potential killers.

That is beside the point. I gave this film a 2 for its lack of honesty in selling a story. Had they sold it as it was, instead of pretending it was science fiction, I might have been a bit more generous.

The acting is indeed first rate. The story however lacks some of the things that needed to be fleshed out that could have added maybe 2 minutes of dialog for some honest exposition. I can go on about this but truthfully the only redeeming thing about the film was the fact that the acting was good. It's unfortunately the story that ruins it for me. If I wanted to watch a drama about a guy who wrecked his life with bad decisions and mental illness, I can watch that right here in real life in my own neighborhood.

So if you want to see a great actor's film, watch Riz Ahmed absolutely nail his part. He is an amazing actor and this would be an amazing drama to watch if you wanted to see how fragile life can be. As I said before, this is not a science fiction film. It's a drama, and it's the kind of stuff I saw as a kid on television, and in real life play out and even 40 years later, It's still not something anyone should ever have to watch.

Chapelwaite: The Keeper (2021) Season 1, Episode 10

A Chapelwaste Of Time.

[2/10 · 17 October 2021]

9 episodes of great story and the finale.... atrocious.

It ended with a lot of predictable moments however this episode had the added flavor of being the most dialog driven and the least well done of the series.

Ham fisted would be a good way to describe it and about as subtle as a fart during a eulogy. I won't spoil it for you. It was just not the ending that it should have been and truthfully it was a lot of drawn out scenes. Unfortunately the long drawn out scenes were the wrong ones.

Special effects were great though. So that was decent. Like I said though. This was the least satisfying of the bunch.

Chapelwaite (2021–2023)

Despite this being a Stephen King Inspired Show...

[10/10 · 27 September 2021]

I am 6 episodes into this period piece and am absolutely enthralled.

The show runners and writers are doing a beautiful job taking a short story and turning it into a 10 episode series. My hope is that it is only a One Season Mini-Series for the simple fact that some stories really need to go ONE season and finish out.

I was not sure what I was getting into but when the opening credits rolled, I was drawn in, and the first episode was atmospheric, sad, and melancholy, and beautifully photographed. It's an amazing thing to see people speak without using language that makes them sound idiotic, and more importantly, not one cell phone to be had. It is the kind of world where people would have to actually interact with each other and disrespect could mean an actual ass beating instead of simply being canceled.

It is an awesome series and after watching the latest episode I am looking forward to seeing how this story resolves itself. While I read the original short story, this takes liberties with the original source material and is actually better than I could have imagined.

I doubt I have seen a better acted series in quite some time.

Cosmic Sin (2021)

So I guess this is what Bruce Willis gets for not being like all the other actors.

[1/10 · 24 July 2021]

I have watched 3 Bruce Willis films in a row that were absolutely unwatchable for the simple fact that they were all poorly written, and worse, the supporting cast was all phoning it in.

I want to know when is Hollywood going to stop punishing Bruce Willis for not being a communist? When is Hollywood going to give the man his real job back? Is he waiting for another Die Hard movie to come along so he can do the whole "Old Guy Still Has It" thing again?

While I get that he probably doesn't need the money and may just be slumming, I can tell you this much that having gotten through this travesty, I deserve at least a free month of Netflix.

Maybe with a little luck, Quentin Tarantino will cast Willis in the last film he makes in order to close out both their careers with a win.

Resident Evil: Infinite Darkness (2021)

On my worst day as a writer....

[4/10 · 10 July 2021]

Isn't the whole trope of America being the bad guy a little tiresome? Is America the bad guy? Was this a contrivance during the covid lockdown where The USA and China share responsibility for a new kind of T virus, and of course, at the end, it's always some pharmaceutical company that decides that it can do whatever it wants.

This 4 part series while decently animated with a certain amount of original ideas, Really is not all that well thought out in its execution.

There are minimal zombies, mostly exposition, some other critters, and of course, one big boss fight which could have been a one shot deal had Leon aimed for the exposed heart. Here's the thing about acid folks. It evaporates and it makes the air unbreathable, and then of course you will die very quickly.

I would love nothing more than to have the opportunity to retcon this series from Raccoon city and not make it some negative slant on America. In all honest, every government on the planet if they had the ability would be making zombies and or super soldier monsters if they could control them.

The problem is always, nobody can control the monsters they create. The issue I have with this movie, is that the characters have not really grown, and they're essentially stunted. Trapped in a developmental limbo where they do nothing and never move forward.

It's the same thing over and over again and there really is no hero's journey.

Which I think is what bothers me the most about this series, along with nearly all of the video games save for a few. The live action movies are, well... A separate issue entirely.

Here's the pros of the series.

The graphics were just a bit better than the video game cut scenes. The animation really needs to start using live actors, instead of using just physics driven CG.

The dialog, was pretty fair. The voice acting was decent. The motion capture problem makes some of the facial expressions not quite match up with the dialog

Here's what was not so good.

This could have been ONE feature length animated feature. 4 episodes broke the continuity, and did not enhance the story.

Did I mention the animation and lack of motion capture made this movie look rubbery?

In fact, most of it looked rubbery. Maybe look at what they did in Love Death And Robots.

Story was contrived, I think I have seen it at least a dozen times. US Government Bad. US Military Bad. Chinese good. Greedy Corporations Bad. Pharmaceutical Companies Bad. President letting China Take over Afghanistan, er... Pemanistan, good.

My other commentary about the monster, the exposed heart, the typical Japanese Oni-ish man devil stuff, the lack of character development, the more or less paper cut out characters, have any of the writers ever actually thought about what it would be like to live in the middle of a Zombie Apocalypse or under a corrupt American Regime? It's like they don't have any idea what either one of those things are like.

At any rate, I think in all honesty what needs to happen is that they need to go back to the vision of Shinji Mikami and scale it back a bit. Why? You don't need a full blown conspiracy to sell people on the idea that the world would be completely screwed with zombies and or monsters in it.

The Seventh Day (I) (2021)

You Know The Devil Wants You To Think You're Smart...

[1/10 · 30 June 2021]

If you watch this movie and think that somehow you're a brainiac for figuring out the twist, You are precisely the audience this movie was made for. This movie, like many others in the spiritual or paranormal genre, are dumb movies made specifically for an audience to feel like they're somehow intelligent.

So, if you liked The Conjuring: The Devil Made Me Do It.... You will love this incoherent batch of set pieces and stupidity.

Guy Pearce who is one of my favorite actors, one movie in particular "the Rover" is one of the best films he has been in. This movie however, is nothing like that one, and unfortunately Guy's character could have easily have been replaced with a coffee maker.

We enter the movie with Keith David, an actor who I actually enjoy, putting his act together for an exorcism, with another actor who is playing the younger version of Guy Pearce. The exorcism goes terribly wrong and of course Father Peter has to take over, and tragedy ensues.

A new priest is being auditioned for a part after atttending a 2 week school on exorcisms and is going to be working with Father Peter. Father Daniel, is a complete Newb, and Father Peter schools him in the ways of how to find a demon.

They go on a road trip to a homeless camp, a house where a kid murdered his family, a haunted roller rink with a Ouija Board, with 3 idiot children, We see the dead, we see jump scares, then we go see the kid who is in jail. The kid, who is in fact possessed goes berserk and starts murdering everyone and only Father Peter, and Father Daniel can escape the prison with the kid, which of course they do without any argument from all the dead people in the prison that suddenly becomes empty out of nowhere.

They go back to the house where it all started and of course, Father Daniel realizes that it is in fact Father Peter who is actually possessed and putting together a demon army full of priests possessed by devils. The ending of course has Daniel killing Peter and the tidy ending is wrapped up by Steven Lang, who tells Daniel that the kid will be okay, and hands him a folder of all the exorcists trained by Father Peter.

Within 10 minutes of this film starting I knew exactly where it was going for the simple fact that the writing in this was so patently obvious that only an absolute moron would not be able to see where it was headed. There is one piece of dialog at the beginning of the movie, and another during the homeless shelter scenes that give it all away. This movie lacked the depth, and the scope needed to adequately portray the horrors of what it is to be an Exorcist, and or under possession. This movie had the potential to be amazing and instead it was more or less a dumber version of "Constantine" if that were actually possible.

This movie should have been given a better budget, an actual script that was not written by a 12 year old with their catechism under their belt. What they needed to really do was oh I don't know, borrow from better movies such as "The Rite" or that one movie with Heath Ledger where he became a sin eater.

That said, quite frankly this movie could have been far far better, but what little direction it had, was wasted on a terrible script with a terrible plot. The acting was not that great, but it was far better than some films I have seen this year. (Chaos Walking, The Conjuring)

It's unfortunate that for all the work that was put into it, it's still a terrible film. If you're 11 years old, this movie will be okay. If you are 50, you are going to have your intelligence insulted. Unless you're just an idiot.

The Dark and the Wicked (2020)

Sometimes It's Simply Better To Stay Away.

[8/10 · 29 January 2021]

I am going to do my best to write a spoiler free review, and please bear with me as this was one of the best horror films I have seen in about the last 3 to 5 years.

Let me start off by saying earlier today I bought a smart watch with a health tracker that I synched up to my tablet and during the span of watching that movie, my pulse rate went berserk numerous times. While this may not be much of a testament to either my health or the watch, I can tell you that this movie does have its share of very scary and a lot of WTF moments.

There are a couple of tropes that I am very very tired of seeing and having grown up on a farm there were some things conspicuously missing from this movie. While those things had they been in the film would have simply added more tropes, their absence made the movie all that much more terrifying as those missing things give you a real sense of what is happening.

A brother and sister show up at the mom's house with their ailing father at death's door, and out of the gate some truly weird things start to happen, even before the kids arrive. As the movie progresses through its story, you have absolutely no idea where it is going and by the time you get to the end, you've just got more questions in your mind.

The tropes that I mention were a detractor, however the biggest detractor were two actors who chewed the scenery and a third actress who really didn't have much of a reason to be there other than for some kind of shock value. When you see the movie you'll know better what I mean.

There is a story, and a few threads that are thrown out there that make you wonder what in the hell is really going on, and what is the worst part about those threads is that while they have no real rhyme or reason, they fit together to form the true nature of creeping evil there is.

Again, you have to see the film to know what I mean. I have given this movie 8 stars because 7.5 isn't really possible with the rating system on this page. What I can tell you is that it is a good film well acted, and well crafted. The problems for me were very very small, and while we have all seen the obligatory remote farm house supernatural film, this one left me with a lot of questions unanswered and that is what the true nature of horror is.

Horror isn't seeing a dead body or a bloody axe, it's lingering questions and wondering what really happened, and if it's actually worse than one can imagine.

This movie actually scared me for a lot of reasons other than the obvious because I have seen some things and have lived a life that has taken me some places that I never thought I would be. That said, for those who are over 40, this movie might hit close to home, and for those who have dealt with ailing parents, this might not be the movie for you.

All of that aside, it is a fantastic horror film and I honestly think any negative reviews are by people who probably haven't lived long enough to know what real fear is.

Synchronic (2019)

A lot of great ideas, not enough time, and not enough of a budget.

[5/10 · 27 January 2021]

"Synchronic" or "Be in your 40's before you experiment with designer drugs."

If you are looking for "What Dreams May Come" this is going to be a massive disappointment. When I saw that movie my mother had died recently, and much like "Contact" this film had to be made for the audience that lives in the real world, and not the world of academics and scholars. Meaning that if you're one of those movie goers who believes this is a thinking person's movie, you are likely still smoking dope in a basement somewhere.

This is a more or less spoiler free review, and this is where I say some things about the film that are actually constructive and kind. It is also where I will be a little unkind about a few things that irritated me.

The premise is that you have to paramedics who show up in the aftermath of some people using a designer drug called "Synchronic" where when someone takes it, very very weird things happen. Early on in the story, you find some people getting high, and then seeing something very very strange, then of course bad things happen to them. These two paramedics played by Anthony Mackie and Jamie Dornan are the only two real actors in this movie outside of Bill Oberst Jr. who is in this movie for less than 2 minutes in one of the least threatening roles I have seen him in.

After responding to a really screwed up situation and a mishap, Anthony Mackie's character suddenly has a lot of things to deal with. That being said, it is this course correction for his character that leads him on a path of both trying to help his friend, and his own sense of having lived a pointless life.

This film hits some interesting topics.

Recreational drug use, casual sex, alcoholism, drug addiction in the field of first responders. Racism implied or otherwise, history, time travel, pharmacology, designer drugs, human physiology, superstition, slavery, physics, our inevitable demise, and parenting.

The problem isn't that this film doesn't put forth the effort. It's that there was way too much potential story to be distilled down into a film that was under 2 hours. The reason why this film fails on a lot of levels is that it had to be dumbed down and shortened so the average American would sit through it.

When you hear Anthony Mackie give his "Sermon" to the guy in the back of the ambulance, you can tell that this movie probably had about 5 hours of extra footage on the cutting room floor that would have likely made Jodorowsky and David Fincher look like amateur hour for the simple fact that whenever you bring up Einstein and his ideas, you really can get long winded and still not get it right. Instead they did a summation of a letter he wrote. I think had Mackie channeled Sam Jackson playing "Jules" at the diner, it would have had a lot more effect. Instead there were some jump cuts and they shut it down quickly. The issue for me is that this could have been a very very smart movie made with a larger budget, and it simply did not happen for reasons likely Covid19 related and of course the intellect of the script.

Which is the problem with smart film makers who want to make a really great film that is intelligent and captivating. You will be brought to an office and when you talk to the producers of this film with your pitch and you tell them you want to make an intelligent movie for smart people, they will laugh you out of the room. "Nobody in America wants to watch an intelligent movie that makes them feel dumb. They want a dumb movie that will make them feel smart!"

So I do give the writers credit to a degree. They could be as dumb as hamsters for all I know but I am going to bet they have either read a book or two on physics, or have done a lot of recreational drugs. That said, I can tell you from my own experiences after having a tooth extracted there is a certain pliability with regard to reality if you are on the right kind of stuff. That being said, this movie is not a terrible film, it's just not what it could have been with the potential it had.

The acting in it by Dornan, and Mackie is great. The rest of the cast is not as involved and their parts probably not as defined as these two. What I can tell you is that Mackie of all the characters seems to do the best job at being believable. Unfortunately the special effects were not as fantastic as they could have been which made selling some of the scenes laughable. If you see the film you know exactly what it is I am talking about.

The cinematography is well done, the color palette is nice and some of the shots do a good job of conveying the mood of the film. They do well in the sense of making you question what it is you are seeing, unfortunately there was just not enough time to really tell more of an engaging story due again likely to Covid and or Budget. When I saw the trailer for this film initially I really thought that it was going to have some amazing visuals. Nope. Not even remotely as cool as what was advertised in the trailers.

The film is also very very predictable as about a third of the way through the film I knew how it was going to play out pretty much. Not that it is patently obvious, (it is) it is that I have seen pretty much the same movie at least 20 times where the lead character does what the lead character does. Given that the character is a black man involved with time travel, you have the predictable tropes of confronting racism and slavery which seems like it was shoe-horned into the script in order to sell it. Where this film does not hit the cliche' button, is the ending. HOWEVER... I am not real pleased with how it ended.

There are three particular bits of dialog spoken by three different characters, and none of them are every expanded on, and in the case of the one character utterly destroys the film for me because of what could have potentially been a game changing moment in the film and taken this movie to a much better and much more intellectual conclusion. BUT NO!!! While I do not doubt the post it not board with all the various parts of the movie had something on there about it, I am almost 100 percent positive that someone came along and said "No we have to make this movie dumber. Remember folks Asses in seats is how movies get made." Which is funny considering this was a rental and this movie was made in 2019, and we are just now seeing it?

There are some really decent effects at some points of this film but that is not enough to really carry the film. The acting outside the two primary characters is pretty marginal considering. Am I an acting coach? No. I do however deserve an academy award for pretending to be a well adjusted adult after the last year and a half. Which is how I judge everyone else's acting ability.

What is my take away from this movie? Young people cannot be allowed to drink or smoke because that leads to bad behavior and poor decision making that can cause you to regret the life you have, and wish for the life you could have had as you watch your friend have a lot of sex with a lot of people and never get married or saddled with kids.

Then the other take away is if you're in your 40's and feel like your life is empty, the best thing for you to do, is start taking designer drugs made by a guy who is just waiting to come out of the closet. I mean that quite literally, not metaphorically as there is a character who actually comes out of A closet, and not THE closet in the movie.

All things being what they are, I have seen a lot worse this year already, and judging from what I am seeing being released, it's going to be a massive dry spell before we see anything really that great for a while. Hope this spoiler free review is helpful in your decision to go read a book and say no to drugs.

30 Coins (2020–2023)

Finally someone takes the supernatural seriously. THIS IS WORTH WATCHING.

[10/10 · 12 January 2021]

There will be no spoilers. This is my review of the first three episodes.

If you enjoy the supernatural, if you enjoy things that are a bit gory, but not gory for the sake of being gory, and if you love watching characters being put through some stuff, then you will absolutely love this series. While culturally some may not understand the appeal, or want to read subtitles, this is one of the most interesting and probably well constructed series I have seen so far. It has compelling characters that you actually care about.

The exiled priest, the veterinarian, the mayor, the mayor's wife, the townspeople who are not just a backdrop. This series does something that I have not seen in a long time, and that is to create a sense of urgency with regard to the characters safety. If you watch other series or films where they failed to establish the characters, you have no feeling of urgency or danger for the characters you are watching on the screen and in tonight's episode you got a great example, (episode 3).

The characters in this story are actually good people and you watch them deal with phenomena that goes past the pale when it comes to being otherworldly. This is matched by the set design, photography, the effects, and of course the art direction. The color palette is what makes the horror elements interesting to watch and the creature design in the first episode was quite good. The effects though are some of the best I have seen in a while and probably a little over the top but still well done.

The acting is also first rate. While I do not speak Spanish I seemed to know enough cognates to understand what is going on, and watching it with subtitles does not detract from it in the least. I have a decent attention span and can read quickly as the dialog does move along pretty quickly.

If I knew more about Spain, and Spanish I might be more critical of the acting, but seeing these actors having to run up stairs, work in the heat, and still maintain their characters, they deserve all the praise I am giving them. The main characters being the priest, the veterinarian and the mayor get a lot of abuse heaped on them in these first three episodes and as someone who understands a bit of what it takes to do that job, they definitely deliver their lines on point. Everything is believable which is what really blows me away.

The writing in this is very calculated, and very well done. They have done their homework and have come up with an excellent story that they are putting together. While we have not been treated to the entire series, this series does not have that kind of predictability that you get with some others as you have no real idea where the direction is going. At the end of tonight's episode I was surprised at what took place and if you watched it too you probably had that moment where you knew this is very human kind of story. In a lot of things I've seen lately you see characters doing what you would expect their characters would do, but in the case of this latest episode you watched what a person in that situation would probably do, that is if they were indeed a good person.

Having said that, and I have not spoiled anything, I think that these first three episodes are a great start to a series that I immediately became wrapped up in. The first episode hooked me in a way that I have not felt in probably 20 years. The last time I saw something that good was probably when the series premier of "Millenium" hit the airwaves. Though neither series has anything in common, the feeling of "This is going to be good" was the same. I take a great deal of enjoyment watching actors not only do their job but you can tell there is a level of acting here that is greatly amplified by the choice in casting. The casting direction in this was really good from the standpoint that you are watching an ensemble cast all of whom seem to benefit from being around other good actors.

While this review seems a bit lacking in the details, it should make people who are on the fence want to see it. It is the simple fact that when something is done well, it should be praised for what it is and what it does. This show made me want to buy a heavy bag, get some tattoos and join the priesthood. At the very least work out more. It's not what you think it's going to be so do not let any negative reviews keep you from watching it because I guarantee you that if you sit through it, and pay attention, you'll see some things pop up that you should be looking for. There's some hidden details in this show that after a second viewing cropped up.

I wholeheartedly encourage everyone to watch this show especially if you love the supernatural, and all that it entails. Because from where I am sitting they are treating it the way it should be treated. HIgh Praise for this series.

The Gulf of Silence (2020)

A beautifully rendered painting of a pile of excrement.

[3/10 · 3 January 2021]

As someone who has been involved in the UFOlogy and disclosure movement for about the last 25 years, I had hoped that this was not yet another work of fiction. Sure enough with a cursory search of the internet, it is 100 percent fiction.

I am disappointed in the fact that this person did such a great job of putting this together only to have the rug pulled out from under me with it being a complete fabrication. That is the problem with a lot of these things, is that they don't help further the cause, or create more curiosity. This is almost worse than the Stan Romanek fiasco because this was actually watchable, and had a lot of heart behind it.

20 minutes into this film I figured it was not quite right and with a simple internet search could not find any Laura Gale PHD, nor could I find any books or writings by the person that the actress portrays.

As much as I would like to give this praise for what it does, I have to be critical of what it is not. It is not real, it is not factual, and amazon and other outlets tout it as being real, or at the very least, involving the real people who experienced these things. Irritation does not even begin to describe the level of contempt I have.

I actually hoped this was real, and factual. Thanks for making me even more skeptical than I already am.