DarienWest Reviews

Star Wars: The Rise Of Skywalker (2019)

The most mediocre, average, and unspecial movie of the entire year

[5/10 · 21 December 2019]

Star Wars, one of the most famous franchises to ever exist on our planet. And it ends with one of the most mediocre movies possibly ever made. There are some really good aspect, some aspects that could've worked if done differently, and there were some aspects that merely existed.

The pacing is all over the place. They fit more rushed content into the first act than Episodes 7 and 8 combined, and the ending drags heavily. The 2 hour 20 minute runtime isn't even that long but it still doesn't feel justified.

The plot is so predictable at times it gets painful. Whenever a new plot point is introduced, if you think you know how it's going to end, you definitely know how it's going to end.

Some of the parts of the soundtrack were good, some were terrible, some were just remade versions from previous movies.

Most of the computer generations looked amazing, but some of it looked atrocious. The main parts where it sucked were some of the funky looking aliens, and there's a scene at the end - you'll see what I mean when you see it.

Most of the character arcs are way too rushed as well. Characters just change sides or have a change in heart with the flip of a switch.

There were several attempts at comedy, but there was only one moment that was intentionally funny. The movie was overall very inconsistent in terms of tone, some parts are trying to be a sitcom but other parts are trying to be a dark thriller.

Despite all these problems this movie does have redeeming qualities that balances it out. The acting across the board exceeds expectations. As mentioned earlier, most of the computer generations and soundtrack pieces were good as well. And the movie certainly wasn't boring. I've seen it once, and I won't see it again. Definitely the most mediocre and unspecial movie of the year, and possibly even the most mediocre movie I've ever seen.

Ford v Ferrari (2019)

Mediocre and Oscar bait

[6/10 · 18 November 2019]

Ford v Ferrari is the most average and mediocre film to release at this point in the year. There is nothing great, good, bad, or terrible about this movie. It's just okay. But considering that great movies do exist, mediocre movies feel unsatisfying by comparison.

The acting is by far the best part of the film. Matt Damon is amazing, Christian Bale is pretty great, and everyone else is just average, which is disappointing considering the notable cast. The child acting wasn't all that good.

The writing is pretty unspecial and average. It takes the classic American underdog trope and does pretty much nothing original with it. There's almost nothing to say on this subject because of how little substance the writing has.

The editing was alright but nothing special. The shot composition was alright but nothing special. The soundtrack... I've already forgotten everything about it, only a day after it came out. The adr was super noticeable and terribly implemented.

Watch this if you are into racing or this story in particular, but for me it felt like a futile attempt at sweeping the Oscars.

Ad Astra (2019)

A collection of many great elements held back by bad writing.

[5/10 · 28 September 2019]

If the writing were ignored, I would give this a 7/10. The acting is pretty solid, Brad Pitt is extremely good at playing his character, the sets and backgrounds are immersive, the music is solid but isn't special, and the CGI is convincing. There were also some decent shots. The only thing hurting that rating is the sound design which is kind of inconsistent at times. There's a scene where the characters are on the moon and shouldn't hear anything except for the radios, and part of the time this is true but there are other parts where you can still hear the outside.

But when you factor in how the plot and characters are written, my rating of the movie gets tanked. The main character doesn't really change throughout the story that much, his motivations or thoughts aren't really explored that much, and throughout the film there are scenes of dialogue in his head which wouldn't have made a difference if they were removed. There were a lot of illogical moments, plot holes, and contrivances which didn't feel as if much care was put into them. The world that this takes place in (the future) isn't very well developed, and even though we visit the Moon and Mars we never really get a glimpse of the society. On Mars we only see about 4 people in total, even though a character mentions that thousands live there. At the beginning another character mentions territorial wars on the Moon... how did that ever happen? Well, they never really say. While I do understand that this is something that the main character most likely already knows, and it would seem awkward if this was explained to them, there has to be some other way it could be explained to the audience.

But with that said, I don't think this movie is entirely bad. I would still recommend it, just to show people how big a difference writing can make in a movie's quality just because of how little it is cared for. Personally I thought most of the film was unengaging, but maybe you have different tastes and can watch this easily.

Once Upon a Time... in Hollywood (2019)

Best film to come out in 2019 as of now.

[9/10 · 25 September 2019]

The acting is completely perfect across the board. The characters are captivating. The dialogue is intriguing. The comedic scenes are hilarious. There is truly nothing bad to say about this film, and you can tell that Tarantino has set very high standards for himself with this one.

Godzilla: King of the Monsters (2019)

Not that great for a Godzilla film but not as bad as most critics say.

[4/10 · 3 June 2019]

Usually I tend to side with critics in films but for this film most of them went in expecting an entirely different film. They simply missed the point of a Godzilla film. Fans of giant monster films don't care about the human characters or the acting (which honestly did suck in this film), they care about the plot bringing the monsters together, and epic fight scenes.

First, the things the film does good. All of the monsters look quite good. It's pretty obvious in the film that they are computer generated, but they still look quite genuine and aren't bad enough to take you out of the film. The fan service to previous Godzilla films in the Toho films was well placed, as we got to see Mothra, King Ghidorah, and Rodan on the big screen once again. Out of the monsters they could've chosen to add, they chose fan favorite characters that have occurred throughout multiple Godzilla films, while staying true to the abilities that the monsters possess. There were some other references to the original 1954 film that definitely increased the watching experience. Some of the parts from the musical score were perfect for the film. In a few places towards the end there are different variations on the original Godzilla theme. Kyle Chandler was also far and away the best actor in the film.

Now some things I PERSONALLY didn't like. While the texture of Mothra undeniably looked good, I didn't really like the actual model. In this film, Mothra is made to look more like an actual moth, as opposed to looking closer to a butterfly in the Toho interpretations. It's not that bad of a change but I personally was taken out of the film by it.

Now for the bad things. Most of the acting was very bad. Most of the "good" characters were fine, especially Kyle Chandler's portrayal of his character, but that does not save the film from having other terribly acted characters. The villain characters were terrible. The woman and her daughter were terrible. The Asian woman wasn't that good either, but not as bad as some of the other characters. While the monster models looked good, some of the animations (movements and poses) weren't that good. They were fine in the fight scenes but they were usually bad when you could see a close-up on a monster's face. While some of the score was perfect for the film, other parts were completely unmemorable, and after leaving the theater I had already forgotten what they sounded like. And now the main reason why I gave the film 6/10 and not higher: the plot. The plot is extremely thin, and plot is one of the few things that normally matter that I look for in a monster film. The film felt as if it wanted to find a way to get the monsters to fight each other, but made no attempt past that.

Despite these problems I still liked the film. You probably won't enjoy this film if you don't like Godzilla films, in that case I wouldn't recommend the film, but if you have liked other Godzilla films then I don't see why you won't like this one. Sure it's not as good as Godzilla (1954) or Shin Godzilla, or Godzilla vs Biollante, or Godzilla (2014), but it isn't a bad film. Despite the many flaws, I still appreciate everyone who worked on the film for creating a Godzilla that remains somewhat competent, unlike the REALLY bad Godzilla films.

PSA: Don't ever watch Godzilla (1998), Godzilla 2000, All Monsters Attack, or Son of Godzilla. These ones are a waste of time that you will NEVER EVER get back.

Pokémon: Detective Pikachu (2019)

Average. Nothing else, coming from someone who understands the franchise.

[4/10 · 11 May 2019]

There really isn't anything to say about the film. The CGI is average (Pikachu looks very good throughout the entire film), the plot is boring and predictable, and most of the acting is pretty bad. Ryan Renolds carried the film, and Justice Smith as Tim was okay, but the rest of the acting was terrible and over the top. My 5/10 rating is meant to sit in the middle of reviews, whereas to fans this film would work as a 7/10 but only a 3/10 to people who don't know the franchise.

Captain Marvel (2019)

Feels like an unpolished script, not a film (spoilers in second half)

[3/10 · 9 April 2019]

The movie wasn't entirely bad. The CGI was overall very exceptional. The blasts, the ships, the age decreasing on Samuel L Jackson, was overall pretty good. However a few scenes did have noticeable green screens which you wouldn't expect from a movie of this budget. Some of the acting was also pretty good. Samuel J Jackson and Ben Mendelsohn did very well, and Brie Larson did alright for what she was given.

Those are my only positives on the film. The rest of the acting is very lackluster, especially from Maria and her daughter. The fight scenes were boring and had absolutely no tension. In every scene people get shot out and die instantly or just get knocked around harmlessly. There really aren't any stakes for Captain Marvel and doesn't develop throughout the story. That's my main problem with the film, even though Thor 1 was a much worse film, at least Thor as a character is much more dynamic compared to Captain Marvel.

Spoiler area: Maria is a terrible character. We keep getting told that Maria is Captain Marvel's best friend, but we are only "shown" this in literally less than 10 seconds worth of flashbacks. The acting of her was also pretty terrible but I don't see how many actors could've pulled it off with this level of writing.

The plot twist of the Skrulls actually being the good guys and the Kree being the bad guys is completely meaningless if you were invested in the first Guardians of the Galaxy. I've heard people defend this by saying "it's just an origin film and of course we would know what happens, it's all about how it affects the main character." But there's absolutely no reason to have sympathy on this since we already know what happens! It doesn't mean anything!

The last thing I want to talk about is the ending fight scene, where Captain Marvel fights all the Kree at the end of the film. I want to compare this fight to the battle between Captain America and Iron Man at the end of Civil War. Aside from Iron Man cracking a few jokes to himself, the fight is very emotional, especially to Captain America, who is forced to fight his friend. In Captain Marvel, however, they turn this into a poor attempt at a James Gunn fight scene with pop culture music playing in the background, trying to give the scene a very light-hearted feel, even when Captain Marvel is literally fighting some of the only people she remembers. But I guess that doesn't matter, now does it, since we are only ever "told" that they are friends.

There's a lot more to say, but most other people have already said it. A dumb fun movie if you turn your brain off.

Star Wars: Resistance (2018–2020)

A kids show that progressively gets better

[18 February 2019]

When this show started I was aboard the hate train because I was tired of Disney's new direction of Star Wars and the first episodes felt really disappointing and boring. As of mid February, the show has gotten quite more promising and interesting than from where it started. All of the characters except for Oscar Isaac's character (Poe Dameron) felt really dumb at the beginning, but became more interesting as they became more developed. The plot at the beginning (which consisted of plane racing) became more of what the show promised, becoming more of a war in space than what we see at the beginning. If you're an adult you probably won't get much out of the show, but it serves as way better of a show for younger folks than Star Wars Rebels does.

Glass (2019)

A disgrace to the previous films

[2/10 · 22 January 2019]

While I wasn't a fan of the 2 previous movies, Unbreakable and Split, they were still quite solid and I could see why a lot of people did enjoy them. But this film was a complete step backward from the previous 2 and gives us a very disappointing ending. It's really hard to write a review on this film because most of it is boring dialogue While I will admit that James Avoy's acting was nothing but good, the same can't be said for the rest of the cast. Either they tried and failed to do something with their 1 dimensional-written character or they just didn't try at all. If McAvoy's character could be written well it makes no sense to me why the others were written horribly. My friend took me to see the movie with him and his brother, and his brother told us that to him the movie felt as if "the entire movie was stuck in the first act." That quotes sums up the movie perfectly. You don't realize that you are reaching the end of the movie until they start throwing dumb plot twists in your face, not because you didn't expect the plot twists, but because the movie just seems to go nowhere. Even though the plot twists aren't expected, they are so ordinary that the story doesn't feel any different after you learn about them (Except for the feeling of disappointment). The soundtrack isn't bad but it is very unfitting for the tone of the movie.

I was going to give this movie 1 star but James McAvoy saved this movie a SINGLE star. People who give this movie 10/10 and only have the reasoning "McAvoy rocks!" are impressed way too easily. Everything this movie does right is greatly overshadowed by it's failures. Hence, 2/10.