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Reviews
Ai-naki mori de sakebe (2019)
Not for the Faint of Heart
In certain ways this film reminds me of Bong Joon Ho's "Parasite"....except "The Forest of Love" is that film on acid and punk rock.
The two films share a heavy social critique of their respective societies...both with a mixture of black comedy and drama. However, where Parasite feels more restrained and refined this film is pedal to the metal excess...almost 3 whole hours of increasing amounts of sex and violence. The pace of the story and characters is hilariously illogical (on purpose) at times...while their plot is both heartbreaking and despicable. The most important part for me was that for every moment in which I wondered "duuude (and duudeettes) what am I watching?" I wanted to keep watching until the end. To paraphrase another reviewer...it's not perfect...but it's certainly not forgettable.
I haven't seen any of this director's other films, but it's clear he had a distinct style for this film that I have never seen before . The insanity is very well executed. In lesser hands a film like this would have fallen completely apart. It's a very unique film that I'd encourage people who like movies to watch. However, it's definitely not for kids or someone who may be having suicidal thoughts.
The Dark Tower (2017)
Trying to hard...
As someone who has read all the books... And the books attached to the books...there was no way a screenwriter could cram all the things a fan could desire.
There are some... interesting choices to the film. The fact that Roland has the horn of the Eld tells fans of the books that this will be a whole new adventure.
However... This new adventure in my opinion is trying a bit too hard. The whole bullet time effects and action sequences are just silly and feel out of place here. The plot of the film feels as if it's moving too fast to actually care about what's at stake.
Which brings me back to this being a new adventure, "The man in black fled across the desert, and the gunslinger followed."
I honestly feel like just doing a more faithful adaptation of "The Gunslinger" would have been great. Having Jake die as he does in the novel would have given Roland depth and added weight to his quest. Not to mention having Mid World slowly reveal itself as it did in the books would have added mystery and a sense of exploration.
I'm sure some people really liked this film. In my opinion it could have been paced a little more slowly.
Ghost Wars (2017)
Decent but Inconsistent
So yeah, it's called "Ghost Wars". If you can get passed the title , there's a surprisingly good story. After the first episode, this series really picks up steam. It features some excellent character acting that carries the story along.
I think this series does suffer two flaws... Without giving away spoilers, these flaws might be there to leave the door open for a season 2:
1) The character arcs are inconsistent. I know this is subjective, but as a writer I found that often times (especially towards the end) a character makes a choice or series of choices only to have those choices seemingly reversed by an event or decision that seemed to drop out of the air. But like I said, it's up to you.
2) We never put a face to what the evil is. I get that it's "Ghost Wars", and there is a suggestion towards the end that ( again, don't want to ruin it!) it's simply the afterlife vs the living, like the title indicates. But the odd thing is that for a 2018 series there's a lot dedicated to the issue of the existence of God. Which meant that "the bad guys" also mentioned places like hell, demonic presences as well as demonstrations of God's power towards the evil plaguing the town . After the death of a certain character (and then something at the very end which is head scratching) -it seemed as if this was dropped completely. This was, to me, one of the most interesting themes of season 1, especially how the writers tied it to the rest of the story.
As I mentioned before, it definitely seems that the writers are positioning themselves for a season 2. Lots of doors have been left open and despite being a bit disappointed with the story at times, I hope they make a season 2.