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Reviews
No Time to Die (2021)
Proof that trailers are often misleading...
After a near two year delay in getting this movie out we've only had trailers to tantalize what we could look forward to with No Time To Die but I have to say there is a big disconnect between what we were previewed and what I saw last night.
My view is that this film doesn't feel like much of a Bond flick simply because it was too emotional and yes, depressing. Introducing a family element to Bond I think was quite unnecessary and really provided little additional substance to the plot. I also feel that the villain was one of the weakest I've ever seen in the 26 Bond movies I've seen that makes Christopher Lee's portrayal of Scaramanga in The Man With The Golden Gun look positively competent by comparison. Rami Malek is a good actor and I feel his talent was wasted in this role given how high the expectations were for Daniel Craig's last outing as 007. The plot itself seemed rather confusing although the motives for Safin made some sense in losing his family to Spectre and his revenge on that organization but it just isn't enough to rescue this movie.
Last, but not least, the ending here was a huge disappointment and not something I would've expected. How this franchise carries on from that is a mystery to me, especially given how the Daniel Craig era was almost a prequel to the films of his predecessors. Every actor brings something unique to this role, and while I wasn't a big fan of Craig initially, I think he held up well and kept the franchise going strong. However, this film along with Quantum of Solace remain the weak links in his five film tenure and I was hoping for so much more but alas it fell way short for me. Certainly not a Bond movie I'd be interested in watching more than once.
Capone (2020)
Major disappointment...hardly worth the $5.99 rental cost
This film had so much potential to tell Capone's life story against the backdrop of his final years sinking into the oblivion that dementia and syphilis did to him. Instead, we get a film that more or less showcases a mumbling, catatonic Tom Hardy sitting around staring into the abyss chomping on cigars and carrots while the supporting cast does very little to keep the story going.
What was missing here was something similar to the first two Godfather films that showed flashbacks of an earlier time and how the characters came to be as they were in the present, and with Capone's history there was much material to work with to make this movie work if they had tried the same. Clocking in at just over 90 minutes there was never enough time in this movie to do anything on that scale or perhaps the budget but it's a wasted effort given this is Hardys second attempt to play Capone which makes we wonder how he could accept this script given the lack of depth. Robert DeNiros portrayal in The Untouchables from 1987 is still the gold standard after more than thirty years
The Appointment (1969)
Underrated film but well worth the watch...
I have to admit after reading certain reviews here that I was skeptical about this movie but as a fan of Omar Sharif's work in many seminal 1960's films such as Doctor Zhivago and Lawrence of Arabia I have to say I wasn't disappointed with this movie in the least.
The Appointment is the kind of film that keeps the viewer guessing as to whether Frederico's worse fears about his wife are about to come true and the story of a man who pushes it all to the brink only to realize the truth at the end which he was so certain of. I was actually a little surprised with the ending because right up until that point you could easily believe the obvious was about to be revealed and so to those saying it was too 'cryptic' I say that was the one asset this film had going for it. Anything less and the story told would've been far less effective.
Just reminds me to be wary of user reviews and reaffirms my appreciation for films of this generation that are often overlooked but so much more compelling than a lot of what passes in the movie theatre today.
The Irishman (2019)
Good film but not great
The premise that Frank Sheeran was behind the murder of Jimmy Hoffa is tenuous at best and so this movie postulates what could've happened versus what did and among the many theories espoused about Hoffa's disappearance this one has much less credibility.
Beyond that I found the movie started to drag out and the last half hour was to the point of unbearable. To keep a viewer interested in a three hour flick is a tough act with the best of stories but there just wasn't enough meat on the bones of this story to hold my attention for that long. To me this film was worth watching for Joe Pesci alone and while De Niro and Pacino but in a solid effort I found nothing really all that worthy that they didn't deliver in other films of higher caliber. Probably best this movie went to Netflix as a theatrical release would've strained people's attention spans.
Joker (2019)
Surreal experience....
I don't write reviews too often for films I see however as much as I didn't expect much coming into this movie I left with a profound sense of awareness of society around us and just what may set off certain people in such a violent manner after years of taking abuse from others and often for no other reason than careless spite and taking pleasure in someone else's misery.
The movie is truly a social statement more than anything else that many may find odious or hard to swallow but one doesn't have to look far to see how the film speaks to a lot of truths we'd rather ignore and make excuses for.
As for Joaquin Phoenix I never had much of an opinion of his acting abilities but this movie has certainly heightened his standing in my view and rivals if not surpasses Heath Ledger's portrayal in 2008.
Leatherface (2017)
Absolute garbage...
If I could rate this movie into the minus numbers I would because I've never seen a more ridiculous film that is driven entirely by the level of violence it depicts for the sheer pleasure of it. Its films like this that tend to show how bankrupt/devoid Hollywood has become of ideas to make a film instead resorting to feeding off a franchise that goes back to 1973 and has had countless sequels since then.
In this case what you have are a pack of escape psychotics running around killing indiscriminately and a sheriff out for revenge who isn't much better.
What lacks for a storyline is effectively made up with the gorefest deployed here, including a graphic sex scene involving a dead person. Its almost as if there was no desire to create characters here of even the most basic level of complexity to keep the viewer interested and that is sad because the notion of a prequel to this story could've been done in a far more compelling way without the reliance on depicting various methods of killing to make up for it.
What I will say is that this isn't a film for anyone under the age of 18, unlike previous iterations as even I had a hard time sitting through it. I like the horror film genre but those movies that depict varying degrees of violence instead of true suspense just aren't worth the price of admission.
LBJ (2016)
A good effort for a mere chapter in an epic story...
LBJ in many ways parallels Robert Caro's book 'The Passage of Power' which tells the story of Lyndon Johnson at the tail end of his days as Senate Majority Leader, Vice-President and President up until August 1964 with the passing of the Civil Rights Act. Those interested in this story would be well-advised to read the book before watching this movie but even for those who don't, the film is about as historically accurate as you can get for a two hour effort. Many of the quotes in the script are true to words actually spoken by Johnson at one point or another in his career and the scenes between the Kennedys and Johnson are not far off the mark either with my only gripe being that Johnson's speech on civil rights given at Gettysburg in May 1963 was omitted from the film but one that was given a week before JFK's landmark speech on the same topic.
My impression of the film is that overall it was done as well as could be without straining to bore an audience, and a select audience at that, who would watch this movie however I still believe that Bryan Cranston gave the best performance of LBJ in All The Way and that the over-reliance on makeup and prosthetics on Harrelson and even Jennifer Jason Leigh as Lady Bird Johnson was somewhat a distraction. Indeed I'd say Reiner made Harrelson look like LBJ would've by 1968 after the weight of the office and the war in Vietnam had taken its toll rather the way he appeared in the early 1960s but these are minor quibbles.
In the last analysis movies like this will never measure up entirely to the written material out there that provides far more context and understanding of the events described. For example Johnson's reluctance to submit a civil rights bills in late 1963 to Congress along with other measures Kennedy had sent up was rooted in the fact that LBJ knew that every other bill would be either stalled or killed along with civil rights legislation which he would insist be the only thing on the congressional agenda. This explains why in January 1964 he made it a priority to get JFK's tax cuts passed before he would put the full weight of the effort into a civil rights bill. Fundamentally he understood legislative strategy but JFK would never use Johnson in that way because he instinctively knew that by delegating the legislative agenda to Johnson he would be giving him a power centre that would make Kennedy reliant on his vice-president to get anything done and that was something no sitting president could abide by.
Still its good to see LBJ getting his proper due for his achievements that overshadowed anything JFK did and may never have done had he lived. Much changed on November 22, 1963, some for the worse but also much for the better.
HHhH (2017)
Don't listen to the bad reviews here...
This film may not be perfect but its a solid effort and certainly of interest to those who have studied this period in history and the major players that shaped events as it were. Reinhard Heydrich was just such an individual and what this film does, where 'ANTHROPOID' among others failed, was to show Heydrich beyond just the heroism of the Czech resistance fighters who plotted to kill him for justifiable reasons. Heydrich was never really a political animal nor did he have any interest in the Nazis until his wife came along and convinced him to join. Had he not been cashiered from the Navy its quite likely history would've been written very differently and this movie shows us how these minor events led to the creation of a monster. My only complaint would be that it didn't tell us much about Heydrich's views towards Jews and his role in crafting the Final Solution, but other films like HBOs 'CONSPIRACY' will go along way towards shedding light on that question for interested viewers. The film's inherent weakness is trying to condense over 20 years of Heydrich's life into two hours while also explaining the plot that led to his assassination. That may have been a tall order for any director but at the same time this isn't a film meant for mass consumption. It's not a date movie nor a family affair but is only of interest to those who enjoy history. If you find the topic boring you'll undoubtedly give the movie a low rating but I think as far as this genre is concerned 'THE MAN WITH THE IRON HEART' is certainly a respectable entry in telling the story of one of history's greatest villains.
Dunkirk (2017)
Not the kind of movie I expected...
First let me say that I give this movie top marks for cinematography and how it tells the story strictly from the standpoint of the soldiers on the beach at Dunkirk and the difficulties they faced in escaping the continent for England. Unfortunately at this point the movie loses relevance and goes downhill in a serious way because for any movie depicting events in wartime it is essential that the story be told from the opposing side as well. Christopher Nolan would've been well-advised to watch just about any other film about WW2 from the classics of the 1960s and 1970s up to and including Clint Eastwood's portrayal of events in the Pacific theatre with Flags of our Fathers and Letters from Iwo Jima.
I believe Nolan's response that portraying the German side of the story as irrelevant today is completely misguided but also a distortion of history in the worst possible way. The fact remains that the Allies were able to escape from Dunkirk ONLY because the Germans halted their advance for a period of 48 hours and yet none of this is depicted in the movie or the conflict that may have existed among the German High Command at such a decision and why it was made. Suffice to say this level of breathing room allowed for the successful evacuation on the scale it occurred and not merely because of a few rickety boats coming across the Channel helmed by sporting yachtsmen who answered the call on behalf of Jolly Old England. Its almost a hagiographic assessment of the British when in fact they themselves saw how doomed they were in the words of Lord Gort, the commander of the BEF who stated "I must not conceal from you that a great part of the BEF and its equipment will inevitably be lost in the best of circumstances". Which it was in point of fact as the amount of material left in Dunkirk took quite some time for the British to resupply and even then only with American assistance.
I really wish I could've given this movie 8 or 9 stars because the potential was there for so much more but shooting it in 70MM film just isn't enough to merit a higher rating in my view when a great deal of the story here was completely omitted. For those unfamiliar with these events in time, and in truth Dunkirk is one of those war stories not frequently told, it serves to inform a younger audience in a misleading manner about what really happened, how and most certainly why.
Hail, Caesar! (2016)
Absolute garbage...POSSIBLE SPOILER
I'm not a huge Coen brothers film by any stretch although admittedly I did like" Fargo" and "Intolerable Cruelty" but the simple fact is that 'Hail Caesar' is nothing more than muddled mess with absolutely no story line whatsoever.
What exactly was the point here of Whitlock's kidnapping? Same goes for a slut movie actress played by Scarlett Johansson getting pregnant and needing to 'find a husband'? Then of course there is Channing Tatum's being an alleged Communist and escaping back to the Soviet Union about a nuclear submarine??? All of this may appear to be spoilers but the fact is that the script is disjointed and frankly stupid when in point of a fact a parody of 1950's Hollywood could've been done SO much better. When you look at the talent in this film I think many of these actors want to be in a Coen brothers movie because they sense there is some prestige in it but overall many of them played the equivalent of cameo roles compared to Clooney and Brolin who the film is really centered around.
What is truly laughable is that people thought this was Academy Award material this year or even next and the fact is it's more fitting of a Razzie Award than anything else.