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Billy Lynn's Long Halftime Walk (2016)
A rather awkward experience
Being a person who thought "Life of Pi" was an amazing achievement, I came away from this movie slightly confused. It's an awkward movie showing the difficulties of vets trying (and failing) to reintegrate into a selfish, greedy and overly hostile civilian society.
The first strange decision is filming this movie at very high fps. It instantly feels cheap. Like a Saturday afternoon TV melodrama. It feels strange to see so many big names attached to such a cheap looking film.
Second is the bizarre and laughable close up face shots. Really odd in some cases and (in the case of Steve Martin), comical. The acting throughout is also not great from all involved. Vin diesel and Steve Martin being the most obvious.
There are a few scenes where security personal at the ball game treat the vets very badly and in the last of these, the whole scene is just weird and OTT.
Finally, the actual central battle that takes place is completely underwhelming, very short and oddly paced.
I really expected this to be about a group of vets that tell a story to the media but in reality, something different and far darker happened that was revealed piece by piece throughout the duration of the film. But no.
For those not familiar with PTSD, this movie simply won't hit home but even if it does, it still feels awkward and cheap.
Avatar: The Way of Water (2022)
Expensively Dull
I enjoyed the original Avatar Movie. It trod new ground as far as CGI Cartoon/live action mash-ups were concerned. The story was terribly cliche and had been done many times before but it was an entertaining ride.
The sequel, however, is not fun. The revolutionary CGI looks old fashioned already and seems quaint in a novel way. The story is even more cliched with teen romance/drama seemingly taking front and center. To avoid spoilers, the main bad guy looks particularly weird and causes an extreme Uncanny Valley reaction in me for some reason.
I've been watching the blu ray of this for months and still haven't finished it nor gotten to any meat of the story. I can only do thirty minute chunks before giving up. It's incredibly boring for some reason and at over three hours is just stupidly long. Strip away the fancy glitz and there's nothing new underneath. If Cameron is relying solely on visuals, he's going to come very unstuck with the rest of the pentalogy as the story is either almost non-existent to very thin or has been done better elsewhere. This is throw away cinema at it's finest. Billions of dollars for what amounts to a dull experience that isn't any where near as good as Fern gully....err I mean the original.
Guillermo del Toro's Cabinet of Curiosities (2022)
Generic..
This mini series could've been very good but it seems Del Toro went for visual flair rather than good story -telling. All of the stories are generic, seen it before in every other series (creepshow, 50 states, etc) and the H. P Lovecraft segments have been terribly butchered with only Pickman's model staying slightly close to the original story. Del Toro has produced some excellent movies in his time so why he would put his name to this series is a bit baffling considering the low quality of every story here. They all follow the "path of least resistance" for the viewer. Watchable but forgettable.
Generic and lacking is about as good as it gets. All in, if you miss this series, you won't miss much.
Men (2022)
A Pointless Little Reminder
Beautiful Cinematography just couldn't save this cynical piece of nastiness. The chemical between Men and Woman will always be a mystery and that's what makes relationships between the opposite sexes interesting. There will always be hiccups, sure but to Alex Garland & co. Men are Men and they will never change. Generational, single-minded Nihilistic Gaslighters.
Sorry Garland but this was a demonstration in pointlessness with designs seemingly aimed only to trigger debates.
Next Movie - Women.
Bored.....
From (2022)
Hmmmm.....
"From" is playing out a lot like a TV series that's going to stretch it's ideas as thinly as possible. It plods along with very tiny reveals and fragments of mystery and new information.
Considering this is possibly going to be a single season, it needs to up the pace if it intends to conclude at episode ten. If not, then settle in for a year on year slog akin to "Lost".
So far episode 1 to 3 are okay but definitely have a generic deja vu feel about them.
I've rated 5/10 so far because I do want to reserve judgement until it's moved forward a few episodes. I'll sit on the fence for a while....
Devin Townsend: The Retinal Circus (2013)
Amazing Show!!!
Heavy Devvy on absolute top form! This is as much a theatrical production as it is a live gig. Absolutely everyone is on top form and the whole "cast" make sure that it all goes according to plan.
The music is heavy and played without a hitch. Devin sings his heart out along with the angelically voiced Anneke Van Giersbergen. Very professional.
There is a lot of value for money here as the whole show runs around two and a bit hours. It's not a big epic production like Metallica's Through the Never but, in a lot of ways it's much, much better. The whole show feels very personal and there is a lot of love in the room.
All in, this ranks as one of the top live shows. Audio quality is a bit hit and miss as Devvy prefers the "wall of sound" rather than a clean mix, so it can sound a bit muddy at times.
But the overall energy and skill of the performers (all of them) cannot be denied. Truly awesome!
Altitude (2010)
Borderline Lovecraftian with foul characters.
Group of stupid, offensive children fly a plane into a storm and much idiocy ensues. Every character on the plane is horrible and I'm sure the viewer will be rooting for the plane to hit a High Voltage pylon by minute five. Absolutely nobody is interesting in any way and I really can't understand the motivation of the writer or director to allow this to happen. For some reason, it totally kills investment in the movie. At one point, the girl in the driving seat screams, " I'm the pilot!....", which confused me as for the last 10 minutes, not only had she not been flying the plane but she was completely turned round in her seat chatting and arguing with her dead-beat passengers. Her boyfriend (who seems, not only 5 years younger but also completely devoid of any life or character) simply sat in the co-pilot seat staring into the middle distance. The most interesting element in this movie (what was happening outside the plane) was totally under-developed and it all gets strange and confusing as the movie goes on. I found myself tuning out and don't remember how it ends. Didn't bother me too much to be honest....
Probably worth a single viewing but the characters totally ruin it.
The Small Hand (2019)
Worse than the book (if that's possible)
The book "The Small Hand" sold mainly due to it's petite hardback print. As a story, it was completely pointless and forgettable. Somehow, the creators of this movie have managed to cheapen it even further. Absolutely no recommendations here because the story goes nowhere. It (like most of Susan Hill's stories) is about as cliched as it can possibly be and never draws the viewer in at any point. The characters (as in the book) are dull and lifeless. I really look forward to Ghost Stories at Christmas time but TV people tend to rip known stories to shreds and then rebuild them into something completely different and banal so even that little vice has been denied now. If you have to watch an adaptation of something that was on over Christmas, make it Dracula. At least it had some spirit to it....
Dybbuk Box: The Story of Chris Chambers (2019)
Spoiled by poor acting and inconsistencies
When an individual makes a mockumentary, everything needs to be on point for it to be convincing. This starts out really quite well but very soon poor scripting opens gaping holes. "Box must be traded" - character buys it. Packaging of box has no label, etc on delivery. Then, later, the main character points the camera at a "trigger zone" long before the event actually triggers. Like he knew it was going to happen. This absolutely kills suspension of disbelief.
Then later, his friend arrives and the whole thing disintegrates into an amateur short film. Her body language is completely wrong. Her delivery is one of complete boredom. It's like she can't completely remember what she needs to say so her entire motivation for her scenes is simply recalling her lines. Also, the main character says the box stinks. But Sarah doesn't mention it at all. The dybukk legend? Myth? Is really quite interesting but for such a short and personal film, this should've been much tighter and more consistent. 4/10
P.s. I'm fairly sure that if an entity was prodding me all night, I would move to another county/state immediately.
Independence Day: Resurgence (2016)
Messy and Dull...
I've always considered devlin and emmerich to be like uwe boll with a large budget. I wish Hollywood had a retraining program for directors who lose track of basic 101 film making. For instance, in a film of this nature, the first minute or so should set up the threat and then the next 50 or so minutes should establish characters and a main character and the ever looming sense of doom or disaster. The original managed it, jaws did it, earthquake, towering inferno, poseidon adventure, etc. Not so here. After the credits, there is maybe a minute of character establishment then BANG straight into the action....non stop till the end!
Then, you need characters. People you can identify with. Again, nope. No one. They are all strangers to the audience. We either don't like them or can't identify with them because they are 2 dimensional.
You need a story. Something to draw you in and make you care about what is happening. Not here though. It is done on the fly. Literally told to us seconds before the event unfolds. No build, no tension.
Consistency. Independence Day setup a believable threat in the alien tech. Huge ships with fighter craft that had shields. 20 years later, humans have reverse engineered the alien tech. We have hover vehicles, new ground weapons similar to the aliens primary weapon. We have new shiny alien tech cities. We always knew the aliens would return. But what was the one thing we forgot to defend ourselves with? The one thing that the aliens used throughout ID which made the almost invulnerable but we forgot (until it was convenient to the plot)? SHIELDS!!!! The one piece of tech that any normal person would've thought would make a great addition to the safety of mankind and probably the very first thing to be developed. No more car crashes, no more shootings, etc. No, we forgot to use them!!!
So with all the new tech that we've developed since 1996, we get our arses handed to us on a plate within 4 minutes of the movie starting because of an oversight! Which renders the whole tech development plot completely pointless. If trusty f15's and nuclear weapons were used instead, it would've made absolutely no difference to the plot except for a scene near the end where, all of a sudden, we have a shield!!!! Lucky us!!
Finally, the editing is abysmal. No scene lasts longer than 4 or 5 seconds so you can never really take in the full scale of what is on screen. It feels like a series of fast moving flashy images. Intelligent dialogue is also non existent, all the veteran actors simply do what needs to be done and Jeff goldblum just seems bored by it all.
The plot is cliché ridden using unbelievable and lazy ways to advance the story. The 2 hour film is so constantly in your face, that you become numb to it and, ultimately, bored.
This is just another nail in the coffin of modern filmaking. Not one but two total disasters this year. This and ghostbusters! It must be a new record. Two potential blockbusters that are utter stinkers because of lazy direction, lazy screenplay and greedy corporations. I hope these two films sink without trace. God forbid they make any more.
I Am... Gabriel (2012)
Nauseating, bile inducing, self righteous twaddle.....
UUUUURRRRGGGGHHH, A (TV) film about a failing dust bowl community of about 25, somewhere in the God old....oops I meant good old US of A where a young boy, who, appears to have the power of good (yawn) and the acting skills of of the horned one, arrives to put everything to rights. Pretty much every body in the town is a law abiding citizen and a devout church goer. (bile rising hard now). Then the little boy tells everyone how good they are and does some cheesy miracles and the film probably ends on a high note. But I felt so ill watching this pathetic attempt at human salvation that I was hoping someone would actually call social services and get the vomit inducing little man adopted to a family who believe that children should be seen and not heard.
The blonde bloke from "dukes of Hazard" is in it and Dean Cain from Superman is in it. I had much more fun remembering that they were BOTH in Superman!!! Awesome! Anyway, Dukes of Hazard geezer arrives on Set and then Dean cain arrives on set. They look at each other and Dean Cain says "I see your career has gone down the toilet as well". Foul waste of Money and celluloid.
The Woman in Black (2012)
really, really bad!
So, the long awaited remake of 'woman in black' is here and all I can say is . . .What a disaster! Why was the guy who wrote the screen play allowed to leave screenplay college? He has managed to miss almost every single element that made the original film, the radio play, the stage play and the book, so creepy! The film feels horribly rushed with barely any sense of foreboding or dread. Just cheap jump scares which wear horribly thin after a very short time. If Susan Hill had any kind of pride in her work, she would have stopped this piece of moribund film making as soon as the director hired harry potter. Speaking of which, I hope he likes working on the stage because his film career has taken a nasty knock! Poor boy.