These are the movies I reviewed last week on my blog. Get ready for the whopping 2 films I reviewed last week! One is actually a tv Miniseries. They are both quite good, earning high recommendations from me. Check them out if you have the chance.
September 11, 2016
September 9, 2016
It’s a rural crime thriller where Michael Shannon plays the detective in a dusty desert town. But that’s just one part. The other half is something else. That’s right, a movie within a book … or something like that.
“A wealthy art gallery owner receives a draft of her ex-husband’s new novel, and once she starts reading it she just cannot put it down.” -IMDB
Amy Adams, Jake Gyllenhaal, Michael Shannon, Aaron Taylor-Johnson
Tom Ford
Tom Ford, Austin Wright
Drama, Thriller
R
Fri 09 Dec 2016 UTC
116min
IMDB Rating: 7.5
I like weird films when they come together well. This one does as good as could be expected. The real fin is the world Michael Shannon’s character inhabits. He’s a man on a mission and he’ll do whatever is needed to see justice is enforced. Gyllenhaal is a character in the same story. He’s a sort of “softie” in a hellish situation. In this film, the unthinkable happens to him and he’s forced to deal with it. This is a brutal situation, did I mention that?
Amy Adams character is almost reclusive. She has a job and friends it seems so she probably isn’t a reclusive in all truth. Still, she sits and READS and feels the things that no one should feel. I don’t even think she should feel them. But this is a vengeance film. It’s not the kind you’d think but it is vengeance just the same. If all is fair in love and war, then how about crime on a deserted road? Perhaps the title is the hey, I’m not saying that. I am saying you’ll have to make up your mind. It’s the age-old question of what makes us moral creatures, or are we? Are some among us so cold that they could do these things and do these creatures continue unaffected.
In the end, in love and war, should we step aside and ask second guess ourselves? The truth is so brutal, maybe we shouldn’t. Maybe we’re all nocturnal animals? This is something to think about when you see this film.
Al Pacino has tried to play touchy feely roles but it never works for him. He is a mean ass devil may care murderous dude. That’s why in lots of ways, some people may enjoy part II better. The first is a subdued mafia classic that elicits a response. The second is a study in the evil that is the character played by Al Pacino.
The Godfather: Part II (1974)
R | 3h 22min | Crime, Drama | 20 December 1974 (USA)
The early life and career of Vito Corleone in 1920s New York City is portrayed, while his son, Michael, expands and tightens his grip on the family crime syndicate.
Director: Francis Ford Coppola
Writers: Francis Ford Coppola (screenplay by), Mario Puzo (screenplay by) | 1 more credit »
Stars: Al Pacino, Robert De Niro, Robert Duvall
This is a 3 1/2 hour film. Thankfully, there is an intermission. The music and portrayals of parties and culture within the Italian mafia put me in a trance. You can smell the spaghetti and meatballs. The film flashes back intermittently to the young beginnings of Vito Corleone. He is played by Robert DeNiro. I would say these are distracting but it is so engaging to watch DeNiro play the “young Godfather.” It doesn’t absolve Vito of all guilt for the bloody life he led but it does show why he went that way, because things were so messed up.
The scenes and dialog throughout Michael’s beginnings as the Don draw you in and they are worth watching. I noted how he stayed calm and reserved when people were screwing him over. He was mindful of how things should look as he was cutting their throats later. That’s probably why he was so successful. The flashback scenes were not my favorite and the film did drag on at times. For that reason, I gave it a 7/10. That is 3 less points that the 10/10 I gave the original.
This sequel to ‘Finding Nemo’ pleases with the introduction of some new hilarious characters, a similarly cute story, and the unforgettable talent of Ellen Degeneres.
Ellen DeGeneres, Albert Brooks, Ed O’Neill
Andrew Stanton, Angus MacLane
Andrew Stanton, Victoria Strouse, Bob Peterson, Angus MacLane
PG | 103 min | Animation, Adventure, Comedy
Riley’s Rating:
The question for viewers should not be, “Why is this good?” but rather “Why did it take 13 years to make this sequel?” Some movies are difficult to improve upon and This film betters ‘Finding Nemo’ (2003) in some ways. However, in other ways it is fish food compared to the live bait we viewers took in 2003. For example, no scene touches the amazing dentist office escape sequence in the first movie. Still, there are some new characters and laughs well written in ‘Finding Dory’ that do their own pleasing and that makes it well worth going to see.
The seals are among my favorites. You have two Laurel and Hardy types that love their rock as if it were a heated waterbed at sea. A funny third reminiscent of Beaker from the Muppets, tries to sneak up on the rock to have “a taste” but the two kings of the mountain always shuffle him off. This is a recurrent gag that works very well as comic relief. Then again, do we need comic relief from the amazing comedy of Ellen Degeneres? Not in theory but here she is the voice of the main character. In ‘Finding Nemo’ she herself was that relief. For anyone wondering if she pulls it off as a main comic, yes, she passes with flying colors.
The story is identical to the first one only this time it is set in a wildlife preserve/theme park/museum sort of place. Dory remembers her parents that she lost prior to the first movie and she wants to get back to them somehow. This is made nearly impossible by her short term memory loss. Dory runs across a litany of new fish in the new setting, the most notable is an octopus named “Hank,” voiced by Ed O’Neill. Hank starts out as an antagonist but before long, Dory wins his affection and he ends up being the one who can help her most in getting back to her family. Virtually every aspect of the movie parallels number one so I suppose that could have been improved upon with some original sidebars.
The movie was originally set to be made for Disney by Disney’s experimental group “Circle 7 Animation.” That didn’t work out and the rights went back to Pixar who created the first animation for Disney on ‘Finding Nemo’ in 2003. In conclusion, I recommend this film to you but with a microscopic caveat that it isn’t base on anything original (to speak of, the search for her parents is slightly different than the other way around in ‘Nemo’). It lost a star from me for that. Still, I had a blast watching it at the drive in. I hope a lot of people get a chance to see this film.
Strengths of this film are its: characters as written, actors and actresses, urban legend story, part documentary style part real action drama. Yep, I’m serious, there are that many strengths. This is a truly great film that I urge everyone to see.
I, Tonya (2017)
R | 2h | Biography, Comedy, Drama | 19 January 2018 (USA)
Competitive ice skater Tonya Harding rises amongst the ranks at the U.S. Figure Skating Championships, but her future in the activity is thrown into doubt when her ex-husband intervenes.
Director: Craig Gillespie
Writer: Steven Rogers
Stars: Margot Robbie, Sebastian Stan, Allison Janney
Margot Robbie saved “Suicide Squad,” let’s face it. But she’s such a powerful actress, we want to see her acting, not saving a cartoon comic movie. “I, Tonya’ gives her that space to work in and she delivers, big time. We know director Craig Gillespie from “Lars and the Real Girl.” That was a well done film and it got him the footing and clout to bring the Tonya Harding story to life. This film is highly well directed, edited, and creatively shot.
In the 80’s when this was actually happening, I was quote aware of it. Just like the OJ Simpson trial, developments were aired on the news show Hard Copy and others. It was impossible to not know the latest detail in this Machiavellian drama. I felt truly bad, along with the rest of America, that Nancy Kerrigan had a kneecap broken. She’s not in this film much but the world really felt her pain. She is an innocent. On the other hand, we all got a vilified impression from the news about Tonya Harding. Unofrtunately or not, that impression has stuck for us 40 somethings until this day.
This film came out to present the true Tonya and let the audience make their decision about what happened. I can say it definitely gave me a more human image of her. It is a funny movie and also contaons drama and vengeance. It’s an all-American tale I would say. We get to see the horrors she suffered from her mother in a trailer park and the discipline she was forced to have as a youth skater.
This is a gem of a film. I highly recommend it to you. I can’t imagine how they could have made it better. 10/10
There’s a new foil for movies and it’s getting more and more prevalent, especially in holiday trailers. It happens when misinformation is conveyed about what a movie is about. This is a funny, cute, well-made animation film but it was advertised to be something that it’s not. Kids are likely to enjoy this more than adults, there’s no humor for grownups.
Louis C.K., Eric Stonestreet, Kevin Hart
Yarrow Cheney, Chris Renaud
Cinco Paul, Ken Daurio, Brian Lynch
Animation, Comedy, Family
Rated PG
90 min
The Secret Life of Plants (1973) is a book by Peter Tompkins and Christopher Bird. It was once part of pop culture consciousness. Among other things, the book and study indicated that plants grow better when they’re spoken to. I can’t help but suspect the sound of the title resonated well when they named this film. It was advertised of a year with a trailer that should pets doing things in their apartments: playing records, rocking out and head banging, and getting a massage from the electric mixer whisk. Those are only the initial scenes. After that they leave the apartment building and have a rip-roaring adventure on the streets of New York. This is no “mellow at home” peek at the secret life of Pets, which is unfortunate, I would have liked to have seen an understated funny film like that.
Katie is Max’s owner, he’s a little white dog. She leaves him in the apartment every day when she goes to work. Through a random sequence of events that don’t need detailing, Max is kidnapped. The dogs in his building, led by Gidget, a female white fluffy dog. The movie consists of finding and rescuing Max. I might add that the kidnappers are a rouge group of animals that have escaped from the animal shelter. The number of animal characters is overwhelming. Short little gags bring you back but most of the movie it’s hard to follow the motivation of any given character. It is a children’s film so I ignored that flaw. Still, movies like Toy Story showed how to have a lot of characters without losing the focus on the primary characters.
There are interesting voices here but honestly, they sort of fade into the collage of action happening in the movie. I usually am very curious to look up who the voices are, not so this time. It’s too busy to hear any soul or expression from the voice actors. There is a scene where Duke is pulling Max on a rope through the water and he says: “You’re not doing great but you’re not drowning and that’s something.” I think that summed up the film for me. It had the flash that would attract the kindergartners but won’t charm the older kids or the adults.
The best thing about this film is the small gag stuff, I wish it had a lot more. For example, when the pets are cleaning up after their party, one yells to the hamster atop the vacuum “Myron Vacuum!” Myron is riding the vacuum in a hilarious way. You have to see it to laugh I think. There are a handful of moments like that. They hold the attention of the viewer. The story is not very tender or endearing. There is never a reference to what time it is that would bring the suspense up remembering when the dog owners are coming home. It felt like they deviated from the original idea and added a Flushed Away type adventure that would be fine for another movie but not this one. This film aspires to be something original but ultimately, it’s like so many other animated films we’re seen come down the pike in recent decades. Because the writing was not endearing to the animals it portrayed and because I felt it was advertised incorrectly, it lost two stars with me. I recommend it for very young kids, say 11 and under.
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