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Reviews
Rabo de Peixe (2023)
Not good, not bad, just ... Meh
Although entertaining, this show misses the potential it had. Fundamentally, it resulted in an attempt to mimic a Guy Ritchie influenced action/comedy bounded by Portuguese idiosyncrasies and stylistic approach. Now, imagine that in Ritchie's films, the gipsy speaks with a Californian accent or the Eastenders speak with a Chelsea accent, that's similar to what you get when you cast Lisbon-based actors to portray the islanders of the Azores archipelago.
Adding to the many nonsensical bits in the plot, there's an overall lack of realization of the comedic and dramatic heights as a combination of poor writing, directing, editing or acting choices.
Stylistically, there's just something very questionable about Portuguese commercial productions, something like a kitsch folkish vibe with a degrading sense of humour and generalisation of vulgar traits that contributes to the poor acting performances, understandably so, one might add. This results, among other things, in unrealistic dialogue with overusage of slang and curse words. I beg directors: don't make Lisbon-based actors curse on screen! Sounds ridiculous... Exceptions to the above are Rapazote and Del Carlo who deliver solid performances.
So, yeah...
The Matrix Resurrections (2021)
Pointless drivel
From all the sequels, remakes and reboots that lately we have been gifted with, one can only fear for the lack of creativity when it comes to present day commercial film productions; regardless, some of those live up to the brand expectations rewarding both nostalgics and new customers.
This one however, is remarkably bad and I'll spare you the review because it doesn't even deserve our times writing and reading it.
There are plenty of bad productions out there, the difference being most of them do a lot more wit a lot less. Misplaced resources that could do the world a whole lot of good; as a society we should start thinking about where we employ them.
Mad Max: Fury Road (2015)
Deceptive by design
I was literally blown away by how disappointing this movie turned out to be. Granted this only happened due to the high expectations generated by ratings in places such as the present one.
I generally tend to find ratings in IMDb fairly in tune with my own, except when it comes to movies targeted to reach a more specific audience... and Mad Max Fury Road seems to fit precisely in that drawer; it is, come to think of it, a movie made for a specific audience to no less an extent than your regular "chick flick".
The movie itself is "punk rock" all the way through and I am sure this is what Miller intended to achieve so, well done, mate! It would have worked brilliantly for me 15 years ago, the problem is I started listening to other more intricate stuff in between and punk rock just doesn't cut it anymore. Don't get me wrong, the movie isn't bad, it's just been diminished to an overly simplified monotonous repetition of the same basic 2 chords disguised by epic keyboard overtones here and there. It's still punk in all its minimalistic rage and that's why songs last on average 2 minutes and not 2 hours.
I'm alluding here to the general lack of rhythm (for the less musical among you rhythm is not pace/cadence) in this movie, which is understandable since the characters have no context and no opportunity for developing it, they are but animals on a hellish treadmill going full speed sweating those clichés out like there is no tomorrow.
There is one thing that makes this movie shine bright, the depiction of this imaginary desert world is absolutely filled with artistic detail and its rendition is flawless. In this respect Mad Max Fury Road was an absolute delight. The steampunk and cyberpunk influences are clear and although one would expect them in a suburban environment it is this very juxtaposition that enriched the conceptual design of this world. Not surprisingly though, this universe had been presented before, more notably in Beyond Thunderdome (1985); only to reach full splendor in this 2015 iteration.
Much more could be said in favor and against, but ultimately it is what it is, the deliverance of a competent entertainment product, which seems to be the highest achievement attainable for the movie makers of our days. It could have been the defining cinematic opus of our generation... they almost made it, but they had to want it in the first place.