Aria_Athena Reviews

Fog City (2023)

One of the best bad movies I've seen

[5/10 · 18 February 2024]

How can I give this anything less than a five, when I was dying laughing. It starts a bit slow and cringy, but it gets incredibly stupid so fast, I barely noticed. It goes from 0 to a 100 in a single scene. Well, technically it idles at 75.

5 "friends", maybe 7 or 6, who cares, go to some secluded house to do something I forgot about. During the night, they hear a siren and orange fog starts enveloping the area. They immediately panic, start talking how about they are all going to die, blame some nearby factory which belongs to one of the girls' family, start grilling her about what secret chemicals her father is making there and we are still at the point when the movie makes "sense".

If you are looking for a funny horrible film to watch with buddies, this is it. It starts going and never stops. After a certain point, every single action and word coming out of anyone's mouth is incredible. Like literally, not credible. Your brain will have trouble processing the information and will employ laughter as a defence mechanism.

Rebel Moon - Part One: A Child of Fire (2023)

Please, someone get this man a writer

[4/10 · 22 December 2023]

Just get him a good script to direct. His movies look good, very good actually, even though he tends to use slow motion one too many times. I was genuinely interested in what a Zack Snyder Star Wars film would look like. Turns out the answer is "just boring".

It's the definition of style over substance, and as much as I enjoy his style, it's nowhere near enough to keep me interested for 2 and a half hours, let alone 4 (?) movies, I think. I don't care.

After the first hour, which I think was pretty decent, I started zoning out big time. Two characters in act 2 had an overly long introduction, from which the main takeaway, if not the only one, was that they were cool. That was the extent of their character development. I am sure they must had some lines in the film, but I remember none of them. Didn't even get their names to be honest, the only thing I know is that one of them is played by Doona Bae and the other can tame creatures. When you are not invested in any of the characters, you are also not invested in anything that is going on.

This is for me the worst kind of movie, the boring one. Competently made, takes itself very seriously, not bad enough to laugh at it, just tedious.

Moonhaven (2022)

The worst thing a series can be is boring

[2/10 · 18 July 2022]

This one is so mind-bogglingly boooooring. I could complain about the writing, the performances, how cheap it looks, how horribly it is lit, but it all pales in front of how much I do not care about anything that's happening, which on is it's own a rare occurrence. The pilot had a couple of entertaining scenes, but those were probably left in by mistake. For me it's practically unwatchable as it doesn't go one minute before my mind starts wandering about, desperately trying to find something more interesting.

Ms. Marvel (2022)

Goes by pretty fast

[8 June 2022]

Took me 15 minutes to finish the first episode. It's not good enough to be good, it's not bad enough to be bad, it's just boring. The writing is the main culprit here, everything else is more or less middle of the line, but that is not good enough for a series to hold my interest. The main actress is decent given what she has to work with, plus she is portraying a fangirl of Captain Marvel of all people, blowing out of proportion her contribution to the events of a movie she was barely in. Overall it's quite possible you'll find something to like, but I thought it was a waste of time.

Bosch: Legacy (2022– )

Bosch is back, but he is missing something

[7/10 · 11 May 2022]

It's everything Bosch has always been, but I thought we had a "feeling that we can't let go", where is it, what's up with that? Who is responsible for letting it go? I do not approve of the new intro, literally unwatchable, 0/10.

Edit: Now that season 1 has finished, I have to say I liked the first half more than the second half.

Hellbender (2021)

Very decent effort

[5/10 · 24 February 2022]

An indie movie made by a family, which held my interest throughout. Well shot at some places, not so much at others, but overall it looks much better than most small production horror movies you may come across. This was not the amateur hour I've come to expect from similar films. Surprisingly enough, the acting was probably the best part of it. Also enjoyed the music, which was kinda edgy, but just enough. Added a lot of character to the film.

Don't expect a great movie, or even a good one, but it certainly exceeded my expectations and was good for what it was.

Damon's Revenge (2022)

It's a sequel

[1/10 · 29 January 2022]

It's a sequel to Burial Ground Massacre. I knew something was wrong, but when everything is wrong, it's easy to miss it. Anyway, the plot you read on IMDB starts about 1 hour into the movie, don't even remember what happened before that. It has some hilariously bad moments, and overall the line deliveries, sound editing and dialog are all so terrible that you may get a decent laugh out of it. Not 100% sure there was a plot though.

Enemy (2013)

Took me two back to back viewings and a film analysis

[9/10 · 22 January 2022]

To fully understand what happened. To my surprise, the film is not up to interpretation as much as one may think after the first viewing. While I had some trouble with the symbolism, all the pieces are there for us to connect. It's very hard to say anything meaningful about the film without spoiling something.

Ended up truly loving it. Only complaint I have was with the colour pallet. While I understand why the atmosphere of the film was sickly and overbearing, I still had to go through an hour and a half, twice, of this mustard filter. It's important to the movie, yet visually tiresome.

Contracted (2013)

Infuriating

[1/10 · 16 January 2022]

I got legitimately annoyed by this movie. No one behaves like a human being. The decisions they make, their reactions to what they are seeing, almost all of them insufferable. You will keep shouting at the monitor "GO TO THE HOSPITAL YOU DING DONG", or "CALL SOMEONE YOU PATHETIC EXCUSE OF A MOTHER". They deserve what they got, every single one of them.

Eternals (2021)

Kinda liked it

[5/10 · 12 January 2022]

Wasn't expecting to to be honest. There was a some overly boring exposition, during which I was mostly zoning out, and the overall plot was silly and over the top, but a lot of it was in service of creating drama between the characters. And that's what I liked, the characters. I thought most the actors did a good job. Gemma Chan's character was in my opinion the weakest one, after Salma Hayek who I don't like at all as an actress but had a minor roll. Yeah there were giant beings called the celestials, which create and destroy galaxies/life and whatever, but the main conflict was between the Eternals themselves and their beliefs. Also I enjoyed some of the action, which is rare for me when there is so much cgi involved.

Still, there are many things that took away from the experience. For example I was confused by Kit Harington and didn't understand why he was in the movie, but spoiler alert, the ending scene was a sequel bait, so I guess we may learn in a few years why this superfluous character was shoehorned in.

The French Dispatch (2021)

Marvelous film

[9/10 · 10 January 2022]

I want to keep this short. My favourite Wes Anderson films are Fantastic Mr Fox and Moonrise Kingdom, and I believe this takes a place amongst them. In my opinion it is his most visually interesting movie thus far, which says a lot. You could watch it without the dialog and probably still have a good time. I didn't think the third part, "Revisions of a Manifesto", was on par with the rest of the film, but it was still rather good.

While I have yet to see P. T. Anderson's and del Toro's movies of this year, this is one of my two favourite movies thus far, alongside Pig, an opinion probably not shared my many.

Don't Look Up (2021)

A satirical allegory

[5/10 · 6 January 2022]

A comedy written and directed by Adam Mckay. For some reference, from his most recent work I really liked The Big Short, while I barely tolerated Vice.

I'll get straight to the point, while I thought the satirical elements were good and laughed quite a bit, if you take the satire away you are left with barely anything. It's 2 hours of compressed satire, and like 10 minutes of more grounded and serious scenes. I thought it started really strong, but after 40 minutes or so I had already burnt out. While I liked the comedy, I was not at all invested in the story and only somewhat invested in the characters. It was very goofy and over the top, making it hard to take anything seriously and connect with the characters on an emotional level, which was a shame because I liked many of the performances quite a bit.

I believe that being a bit more grounded to reality would have helped the film a lot. The last 20 minutes won me over again, when we finally get to connect more with the characters and actually start to care about their fate. The rest of the movie felt like 3 overly long skits, which while funny, watching them back to back without a compelling story to accompany them was a bit too much for me.

The Silent Sea (2021)

Wasn't thilled at the beginning, but ended up being decent.

[31 December 2021]

I was wondering for a few episodes, why is this adventure, sci-fi, drama shot like a horror show? Turns out, it's because for the most part it is one, and to my surprise these horror elements are good. The series doesn't try to scare you, it tries to convey to you the fear the characters feel and it does so rather effectively. While there is barely any gore, characters are constantly under a lot of pressure, and suffer horrifying and painful deaths.

Unfortunately it has pacing issues. I found it to be overly long, not much was happening between episodes 3 and 5. The show would have been much better was it 6 episodes long, or if they had used that extra time to flesh out the characters. Some of them are very superficially written, I could barely tell them apart. It was the last 3 episodes that won me over and the reason I would recommend the Silent Sea. The show really picks up.

I have a couple more complaints, but I also liked many of the shots, the atmosphere, the lightning and sound, and also most of the acting. Doona Bae is good as always, Gong Yoo whom I've only seen in Goblin and Train to Busan also delivered a good performance, tbh all but one did a pretty good job.

Overall it is a character driven sci-fi drama with a lot of horror elements, which has an okayish start, a rather boring middle section and a strong ending. First Korean sci-fi I've seen, give it a try.

Martyrs Lane (2021)

Very interesting movie

[7/10 · 8 December 2021]

I believe that it currently holds such a low score because it has been mislabeled as a horror movie. It is a supernatural drama with some thriller elements. It's about a little girl who by taking something, which did not belong to her, awakens the past, both literally and metaphorically. While it is predictable, it is not about the mystery and the whole plot unravels very well, with quite a few nuanced moment.

Also, it's rather important to note that the kid actors were very decent.

Last Night in Soho (2021)

F in chat for John

[7/10 · 6 December 2021]

Very different film than I'm used to from Edgar Wright, being a psychological thriller and all. I wanted to like it more than I did. Well shot, Thomasin McKenzie and Anya Taylor-Joy were excellent, most of the cast did a good job. I loved the first part of the film, say first 1 hour. Unfortunately the movie didn't manage to keep up with itself for the whole length. In my opinion it steadily declined until the final part, which I also liked quite a bit. Not to say that it stopped being at least decent, just not as great as I found act 1 to be. Also my boy John was done dirty one too many times.

Black Christmas (2019)

Terrible, but also very funny

[3/10 · 6 December 2021]

Doesn't hold a candle to the original, but I regret nothing. We need more funny, terrible """horror""" films, and less boring ones. I can't stress enough how this is a film you watch with your friends to have a laugh, and not an actual horror movie you watch at night.

The Craft: Legacy (2020)

This is a "so bad that is good" kind of movie.

[3/10 · 6 December 2021]

I've seen the first Craft movie, of which this is technically a sequel, and I remember enjoying it quite a bit. Now this film was exactly what I thought it was going to be, plus everything I ironically thought it was going to be. Watched it with a friend for a laugh and we indeed had a laugh. F in chat for Timmy.

Cowboy Bebop (2021)

Oh no, what they did to my boy.

[3/10 · 20 November 2021]

I only watched 1 episode, so I'll refrain from giving it the ace that it truly deserves. I couldn't do that to myself, I had to stop. The opening scene is all you need to see to get a feel about the show. The casting is probably the most glaring offence. If you've seen the original show, you will have to give it try for curiosity's sake. If you haven't, just watch the original. It hurts me physically how much this pales in comparison.

Finch (2021)

Grew on me

[7/10 · 6 November 2021]

I wasn't very warm in the beginning, but it really grew on me. Without spoiling too much, it is about a highly intelligent man who builds a robot with a very advance AI, capable of even "dreaming", for no reason other than taking care of his dog after his death. But at the same time the dog in the movie is symbolic for what mankind left behind after it finished itself off. So in the end we have a reclusive and antisocial man securing with his last breath the future of mankind's "survivor".

The Power of the Dog (2021)

A bit too much of a slow burn for my taste

[6/10 · 16 September 2021]

It's a heavy drama which takes place in the old west. It mostly focuses on a rancher, Phil (Cumberbatch), whose toxic personality drags down everyone around him.

For me, in the end the film payed off. I really liked where it went and how it ended, but I was quite bored during the second act. The movie had a slow start, which I thought it handled well, and then the pace got even slower. While I can't point out anything specific that was superfluous, 2 hour seemed too long. I remember the beginning, I remember the ending and some key plot moments, but I barely remember anything that happened in between.

Malignant (I) (2021)

In the end it was worth the watch

[5/10 · 10 September 2021]

The movie had a terrible 3 minutes introduction which put me of, but it wasn't very representative of the overall quality. Still, I wasn't very engaged with what was happening for most of the time. Then it got disturbing for like 5 minutes and then it got really funny. It ended up being an enjoyable watch.

The first 1 hour and 20 was a bit of a drag, but the last 30 minutes salvaged the experience. I cautiously recommend it.

Also I can't ignore all the 10/10 incoherent and grammatically incorrect reviews. What even is this?

Escape Room: Tournament of Champions (2021)

Not even the worst thing I've seen all day

[4/10 · 8 September 2021]

But still not a good movie. I don't remember whether I've watched the first movie and I suspect in a year's time I wont remember if I've seen either of them.

Worst line in the film was the title drop, easily on the same level as "What are we, some kind of suicide squad?". That's the level of writing you should expect, but at least the movie was short enough to not be too boring.

SAS: Red Notice (2021)

Ruby Rose, terrible as always

[3/10 · 31 August 2021]

No one involved watched the final cut of this film. Not that I blame them, but the I'm pretty sure the sound editor's computer's notifications made it in the movie at least 3 times. How do you miss that? Sound mixing was also pretty bad. One could barely hear the actors speak at times, while the explosions kept the whole neighbourhood awake. Not even going to touch the writing.

I had it playing as background noise on a second monitor, so I didn't suffer much, but I do feel bad for poor Joan Elizabeth Malkin, to whom this movie is dedicated.

Reminiscence (2021)

A bittersweet tragedy

[5/10 · 21 August 2021]

It is more of a romance than a sci-fi film. It takes place in a bleak dystopian future, with the focal point being the romanticised relationship between Nick (Hugh Jackman) and Mae (Rebecca Ferguson). It is also very reminiscent of a film noir style of mystery.

The movie is full of exposition, which although usually bothers me a lot, I was fine with for the most part. But it is a thing and it did heavily impact aspects like the world building, where we kept being told how it works instead of being shown more.

Amongst the overly romanticised portrayal of their relationship and the over-reliance on exposition, what bothered me was some of the dialog. Quite often they would launch themselves into long monologues overflowing with tropes and metaphors. Every important character had at least one of those, with some parts being repeated. I think Lisa Joy took it a bit too far.

Overall the writing is solid, the acting is great, visuals are pretty good for the most part and I liked the ending a lot. But if someone was to tell me they found the movie boring, I wouldn't contest it.

Flower (I) (2017)

Lost its way

[4/10 · 7 August 2021]

The movie takes a turn midway through, for which I only harbour negative emotions. It had a strong start, good performances from the main actors and then BOOM, the film underwent a radical change which did a disservice to everything it had built up up to that point. I feel let down more than anything else.