Kaos' way behind movie reviews

[CCTAU]

You had me at Nicholas Cage

I like how Kaos is so suck sink and to the point!

[Kaos]

The Last Laugh

Chevy Chase and Richard Dreyfuss as a manager and a comedian who worked together 50 years ago bolting from the retirement home where they find each other and hitting the road for one last tour.  Dreyfuss' character walked away from his one big shot (a berth on Ed Sullivan) leaving his agent Chase holding the bag.  Each made their own lives before they stumble on each other at the assisted living facility and grow bored with the pampered waiting-to-die lifestyle.  

It's tough seeing Chase this old. Dreyfuss, too. But both are in their mid to late 70s and it's just the reality.  

Chase can still rustle up some of the befuddled goofiness that made his career.  Dreyfuss can still channel some of the frenetic smirk/anger that was his schtick all the way back to Jaws and What About Bob.  

I enjoyed seeing the two work together.  The problem is that the humor just isn't there.  Dreyfuss' jokes are so stale and flat that buying him as a comic, even one who was out of the game for 50 years, clunks really badly and limits the believability.  

We've seen the old guy tries drugs act before. We've seen old guys trying to recapture their glory before.  

I'll say this.  There's enough of the old Chevy Chase glimmer to remind you of why he was so good as Clark Griswold and Irwin Fletcher, but the flashes are so inconsistent that they can't elevate the film above the weak script.  

It wasn't a horrible movie, but it was just so limited by the material that it didn't resonate more than, say, a glass of warm milk.   

[Kaos]

How It Ends

Some end of the world as we know it madness. 

Will, a lawyer, leaves his pregnant fiance in Seattle to meet in Chicago with her stern and disapproving father (the almost always good Forest Whitaker) and get permission to marry. The two spar, their animosity toward each other barely restrained.  While there, some apocalyptic event takes place and the two (along with the rest of the world) are cut off from communication.  They decide to put aside their differences and take a road trip to find the girl. 

Along the way they meet human disaster after human disaster as the world reacts predictably poorly to the end times.  We've seen it before.  Bad guys with shotguns blocking the road and taking supplies.  Women posing as damsels in distress to lure people into a trap.  That doesn't mean the situations the two encounter are any less dramatic. 

The movie was critically panned, so of course I liked it.  While some of the tropes were trite, the performances by Whitaker and whoever played Will were strong enough to keep them from being rote.  Some of the critical scorn was reserved for the fact that the movie never really explained what the apocalyptic event was.  We saw crashed jets, a ruined Seattle covered in ash, ash clouds, trembling earth, loss of satellite communication, and eventually a massive pyroclastic flow but none of the cause.

To me, that was one of the stronger points.  I didn't need to know what destroyed Seattle to appreciate the gravity of its annihilation.  The fact that it was wiped off the map was enough to sustain the narrative.  I also appreciated the fact that the movie didn't wallow around in character development beyond what was necessary to move the plot.  It gave us the basics of the relationships and then let them simmer as the road trip unfolded. 

Movie critics?  Pfffft.  The movie was shot well, the performances were solid and the CGI (while not spectacular) wasn't as jarringly bad as, say, Justice League (which was a to the b to the YSMAL).  I appreciated it for what it was even if it didn't really break any new ground. 

[Kaos]

Bad Day For the Cut 

Nobody you've ever seen in a story about a middle-aged guy taking revenge on some mid-level gangsters that beat his mother to death.  

It's a UK film so it carries some of that lean, gray simplicity that characterizes those exports and that's not a bad thing.  The understated characters and almost morose sense of inevitability that comes with having to do unpleasant tasks are both hallmarks of UK action movies and this one definitely fits the mold.  There's no maniacal bloodthirst or sense of enjoyment that dads/sons/brothers out for vengeance in American films seem to typically exude.  It's more of a "well, *sigh*, I got to go kill them now, so hold tight and maybe we'll grab a pint after?"  

That tends to work for me and so does this movie.  The story was pretty good with a midway exposition that I didn't really anticipate.  Twisting from what appeared to be a simple case of a break-in gone wrong to something with longer tentacles was a little contrived, but it made sense.  When those tentacles grew deeper towards the end it still worked.  

It's not what you'd call great cinema but when you compare it to the typical American fare (say Bruce Willis in Death Wish or even John Wick, Peppermint or -- help me -- anything with Nicholas Cage)?  It's a definite step above.  

Enjoyed it.  Not quite In Bruges (which remains one of my favorites) but you could easily see Brendan Gleeson playing the lead in this as well.  Had that same tenor.  I thought it was a solid movie.  

[Kaos]

Ocean's Eight

Hey, remember when they did Ghostbusters but had an all female cast?  Remember how great that was?  Yeah.  This was a lot like that. 

Ocean's 11 had a breezy, jazzy cool and a well-matched ensemble that played off each other's quirks brilliantly. 

Ocean's 8 has a face full of collagen, cake pans of makeup, very little chemistry among the players and a mis-matched ensemble that fails to reach cohesion. 

Basic storyline:  Danny Ocean is dead (beginning of the ruination) and his sister (Sandra Bullock) is fresh out of jail after being semi-framed by her semi-boyfriend.  She's looking for revenge and sets up a jewel heist that will a) net millions and b) get revenge on the rat boyfriend.  She recruits this supposedly crack group of accomplices that includes Cate Blanchett, Kelly Kapoor, Rhianna, some chinese dude named Aquafina, Helena Bonham Carter Weirdo, and Sarah Paulson to pull it off.  Tedium ensues. 

You cannot change my mind on just how hideous Bullock looks today.  Botox renders her face essentially expressionless. Whatever she's injected into her lips and cheeks combined with the obvious butchery on her nose creates a rigid plastic mask that's eerily reminiscent of Michael Jackson toward his creepy end.  Kelly Kapoor (whatever her name is) also has a face apparently full of plumping injections.  Hers is so bad I spent half the movie unsure whether it was actually her or not.  Paulson is also toting a smaller bag of lip injections but hers at least doesn't completely distort her face. Rhianna appears collagen free, but she cannot act as she clearly proved in Battleship and reinforced here. 

The only person who pulls off the cool vibe this movie needs at all is Cate Blanchett. Don't care much for her in general,  but she did the best she could here with a clunky script and a half-baked backstory.  Bonham Carter wasn't bad and has aged so much better than the rest in this film (because she hasn't resorted to face altering mutilations) but her natural off-beat weirdness had a hard time fitting with the flow the movie wants to create. 

Anne Hathaway contributes some badly scenes but doesn't do anything to elevate the movie.  It was like she was fun constipated and tried really, really hard to squeeze some out but just couldn't in the end.  Also like she thought she was in a completely different film than the rest. 

The movie attempted to capture the glib fun of the Ocean's 11 remake but it failed to get there. Where 11 gave you a reason to care that the criminals got over on the casino (Terry Benedict was a crook and screwed over their pals) here the theft had no altruistic motivation. It was just bitchy greed with revenge tossed in as a secondary plot point.  Ripping off jewels without a noble reason to do so -- or a noble purpose for them after the fact -- turned the "heroines" of this movie into nothing but criminals.  Chopping up historic pieces of jewelry with a wire cutter also seemed utterly wrong.  

At the end, Plasti-face stares at Danny's crypt, takes a drink and says (without moving a single plasticized muscle in her entire face) "you would have loved it."  Wrong.  He would have hated it. 

[Godfather]

Ocean's Eight

Hey, remember when they did Ghostbusters but had an all female cast?  Remember how great that was?  Yeah.  This was a lot like that. 

Ocean's 11 had a breezy, jazzy cool and a well-matched ensemble that played off each other's quirks brilliantly. 

Ocean's 8 has a face full of collagen, cake pans of makeup, very little chemistry among the players and a mis-matched ensemble that fails to reach cohesion. 

Basic storyline:  Danny Ocean is dead (beginning of the ruination) and his sister (Sandra Bullock) is fresh out of jail after being semi-framed by her semi-boyfriend.  She's looking for revenge and sets up a jewel heist that will a) net millions and b) get revenge on the rat boyfriend.  She recruits this supposedly crack group of accomplices that includes Cate Blanchett, Kelly Kapoor, Rhianna, some chinese dude named Aquafina, Helena Bonham Carter Weirdo, and Sarah Paulson to pull it off.  Tedium ensues. 

You cannot change my mind on just how hideous Bullock looks today.  Botox renders her face essentially expressionless. Whatever she's injected into her lips and cheeks combined with the obvious butchery on her nose creates a rigid plastic mask that's eerily reminiscent of Michael Jackson toward his creepy end.  Kelly Kapoor (whatever her name is) also has a face apparently full of plumping injections.  Hers is so bad I spent half the movie unsure whether it was actually her or not.  Paulson is also toting a smaller bag of lip injections but hers at least doesn't completely distort her face. Rhianna appears collagen free, but she cannot act as she clearly proved in Battleship and reinforced here. 

The only person who pulls off the cool vibe this movie needs at all is Cate Blanchett. Don't care much for her in general,  but she did the best she could here with a clunky script and a half-baked backstory.  Bonham Carter wasn't bad and has aged so much better than the rest in this film (because she hasn't resorted to face altering mutilations) but her natural off-beat weirdness had a hard time fitting with the flow the movie wants to create. 

Anne Hathaway contributes some badly scenes but doesn't do anything to elevate the movie.  It was like she was fun constipated and tried really, really hard to squeeze some out but just couldn't in the end.  Also like she thought she was in a completely different film than the rest.

The movie attempted to capture the glib fun of the Ocean's 11 remake but it failed to get there. Where 11 gave you a reason to care that the criminals got over on the casino (Terry Benedict was a crook and screwed over their pals) here the theft had no altruistic motivation. It was just bitchy greed with revenge tossed in as a secondary plot point.  Ripping off jewels without a noble reason to do so -- or a noble purpose for them after the fact -- turned the "heroines" of this movie into nothing but criminals.  Chopping up historic pieces of jewelry with a wire cutter also seemed utterly wrong. 

At the end, Plasti-face stares at Danny's crypt, takes a drink and says (without moving a single plasticized muscle in her entire face) "you would have loved it."  Wrong.  He would have hated it.

So I agree the movie pales in comparison to any of the other Ocean movies, but at least it was watchable.  You can't compare it to Ghostbusters (female cast) that turd is horrible, I have only stomached 5 mins of it before I changed the channel.  The rest of the review I'm good with.

[Kaos]

So I agree the movie pales in comparison to any of the other Ocean movies, but at least it was watchable.  You can't compare it to Ghostbusters (female cast) that turd is horrible, I have only stomached 5 mins of it before I changed the channel.  The rest of the review I'm good with.

Agreed.  Not as bad as Gutbusters starring angry black woman with no talent whatsoever.  

It just gave me the same sort of vibe.  Here's a perfectly good story with a great cast that's a pretty fun, intelligent and clever.  Let's water it down and redo it with a bunch of women!  Can't go wrong.  Championship!! 

Without the novelty of it being all women, the movie would have been a much harder fail.  

[Kaos]

Ouija: Origin of Evil 

Having had an extremely creepy and disturbing interaction with an Ouija board about 25 years ago, I tend to find movies about those truly evil devices more interesting and compelling than, say, possessed dolls (Anabelle) or nuns or clowns.  I don't know for sure that all Ouija boards are connected to something out of the natural realm, but I don't trust them at all.  I won't be in a house or a room that has one in it.  

This movie did a good job of developing some suspense and horror as the damnable thing inserts itself into the life of a grieving family with a spiritual bent.  

Elizabeth Reaser plays the mom, a recently widowed sham fortune teller who ekes out a living performing scam seances and spiritual readings with the help of her two daughters.  Reaser is really odd. Sometimes she looks incredibly hot, others not so much at all. Can't figure that out and she vacillates between hot and not throughout this whole movie. 

Reaser mom eventually decides to include an Ouija board into her act, fails to follow the three simple instructions (never alone, never in a graveyard and always say goodbye) that are required for "safe" use.  In doing so, she unleashes some demonic hell through the younger of the two girls.  The possessed child is Lulu Wilson who is making a serious career out of playing a creepy kid.  She had a part in Deliver Us From Evil, was in Annabelle: Creation, plays in Haunting of Hill House, and had the primary role here.  She's a cute girl, but does the weird pretty well.  

The story has some conveniences -- why is it they live in a house with a horrific backstory, did the dead husband not have any insurance, how is it lightbulbs still burn after 50 years? -- but it has enough PG-13 frights and disturbing behavior to stand half a notch above the other forumulaic Blumhouse offerings.  

It probably wouldn't have been as good to me without the very personal loathing I have for Ouija boards, but it was still pretty decent.  Well acted and shot well.  

It's not the next great horror offering, but it wasn't awful.  I enjoyed it well enough. 

[Kaos]

The Upside

Kevin Hart and Bryan Cranston in the semi-true story of a quadriplegic (Walter White), his unlikely ex-con caretaker (Hart) and Cranston's protective assistant/friend Nicole Kidman.

Somehow the film was simultaneously overly long and not deep enough.  Hart and Cranston were likeable enough but the intimate exploration of their evolving relationship and how they inadvertently made each other better human beings seemed to only hit the surface.  Much like a sitcom, each little storyline wrapped up neatly and in sometimes improbable/too convenient ways.

The movie also chased rabbits without the proper payoff. For example there was a thread about a stolen book that was given the attention that would indicate it was a significant plot/turning point but then it was so quickly and unrealistically resolved that it felt unfulfilling to even explore.  It wanted to speak to the redemption of man through Hart's checkered past.  It wanted to speak to the invisibility of the handicapped through Cranston's public interactions. It wanted to speak to the healing power of love through the awkward dance between Cranston and Kidman. It wants to speak to classism, racism and bigotry in the reactions of the wealthy friends of Cranston to the ragged edges of Hart. It wants to speak to the difficult relationship between fathers and sons.  It wants to speak to the temptation of the street and the difficulty kids face in resisting its financial pull. It wants to do so many important things that it can't do any of them justice despite the movie's interminable nine hour run time. 

I get that Hart is trying to expand his brand and establish himself as an actor and not just a one-note comedian.  He moves the needle a little, but not enough.  Cranston wants to prove his versatility -- and he's done that.  But this movie didn't let either achieve the emotional impact that it needed.  Maybe it was Hart, maybe it was Cranston, maybe it was an odd/gawky Kidman turn, maybe it was a cliched brief appearance by Juliana Margulies but the film just never quite got there.  It could have used more focus.

The smooth chemistry between Hart and Cranston kept the film from descending into treacle.  The almost natural ebb and flow between the two made it easy to digest -- at least when they weren't wedged into conveniently forced situations designed to propel the film to its next act. 

[Kaos]

Johnny English Strikes Again 

Johnny English (aka Mr. Bean, aka Rowan Atkinson) is one of those characters you either love or hate.  If you enjoy Mr. Bean's awkward, clumsy (Clouseauish) physical comedy, this moderately entertaining film will have a few moments that will appeal to you.  If not... stay away.  

It's breaks no new ground, just wanders around in the same wacky setups in which you typically find a Bean or an English.  Some are funny, some fall flatter than intended.  

I like this kind of British comedy (Fawlty Towers, Benny Hill) and this innocuous film worked for me for the most part.  

[Snaggletiger]

Cold Pursuit

Liam Neeson's latest action flick.  Set in the dead of winter just outside of Denver.  Let me get to the bottom line.  Horrible.  Terribly written.  Unbelievably predictable story line with 4 or 5 blatant loose ends that never get reconciled.  

Are you wanting some one man army Neeson action?  Forget it.  He offs a few guys in less than spectacular fashion early on and the last 3/4 of the flick....nada.  Admittedly its mildly humorous.  Some fairly funny parts.  That's about it.  Not a good movie and a huge let down for anyone looking for Neeson to revive some of his kick ass persona.  

[Kaos]

Cold Pursuit

Liam Neeson's latest action flick.  Set in the dead of winter just outside of Denver.  Let me get to the bottom line.  Horrible.  Terribly written.  Unbelievably predictable story line with 4 or 5 blatant loose ends that never get reconciled. 

Are you wanting some one man army Neeson action?  Forget it.  He offs a few guys in less than spectacular fashion early on and the last 3/4 of the flick....nada.  Admittedly its mildly humorous.  Some fairly funny parts.  That's about it.  Not a good movie and a huge let down for anyone looking for Neeson to revive some of his kick ass persona. 

Fun fact. 

This is a shot by shot remake of a Norwegian film called In Order of Disappearance.  It came out about two years ago.  Same guy who directed that directed this. 

[Kaos]

The Prodigy 

R-rated movie about a kid who's got a demon inside him.  Can't be bad, right?  

Truth be told? I spent a good chunk of the movie considering the approachable sexuality of Taylor Schilling (Piper from Orange is the New Black).  She's not hot, really.  She doesn't have a killer body, but there was just something about her normalcy that was sexy.  I forgot what was happening for long stretches of the film while I just considered her.  

She did a reasonably good job of playing the mom of a kid who is maybe possessed by or has become the reincarnation of a weirdo bad guy. 

I have problems with how quickly movie parents are willing to accept some theory that their misbehaving child might have demon issues and this movie hits that same tone.  

The kid was creepy enough. 

Problem here is this movie for its R rating just moved too slowly and never really paid dividends.  Very little gore, not enough of the demon kid, pretty much zero frights.  

And again I'm left to wonder what could have been with this decent concept in the right hands. 

[Kaos]

Uncle Drew 

Difficult to review this movie without being accused of racism, but reality is reality.  Comedies written by, for and with essentially all black casts tend to have a much different resonance than comedies done for a broader audience.   

This movie was intended to appeal to a certain demographic and I am not a part of that target audience.  That doesn't mean that I didn't enjoy the occasional gags or appreciate the random trips into funk/R&B nostalgia that were sprinkled throughout this movie.  I did find the execution of those musical interludes choppily handled and not savored as they should be, but the old tunes were nice. 

There's only so much humor you can wring from a cast comprised almost entirely of current/former basketball players (none of whom can really act) layered in old-man prosthetics.  Give this movie's creators credit, they milked just about every possible nugget of comedy they could out of the ridiculously contrived setups.  

Just to make sure the film hit all the 'black comedy' notes, there was the stereotypical loud-ass, sassy ex girlfriend who bellowed everything she said.  The really smart and sweet young girl who adores her family is also there -- both characters essentially stolen whole cloth from any number of Madea entries.  

Stolen too from Madea was the idiotic and abrasive honky clown (a clear case of reverse racism).  If a white director put a black shuck and jive character in a movie with the same lizard-like reprehensible qualities that black directors seem to often ascribe to their moronic token white characters?  Twitter would be all outraged.  

But I digress.  Predictable story. Telegraphed ending (stolen partially from Grownups).  The same bevy of road-trip tropes we've seen recycled in countless movies.  There was nothing new to be seen here, but still.... it didn't offend.  It just coasted along to the prescribed end and the people populating the film seemed to enjoy themselves enough that the movie was pleasant enough.  

I expected essentially a 90 minute commercial of fake old men playing basketball, which really wasn't good enough for the 90 seconds the commercial got, but in the end it delivered something that, while trite, was a little bit more.  

Note to all filmmakers?  No more of Shaq's big ass.  And I mean that literally.  Please?  

[CCTAU]

But, did the white man actually jump?

[Snaggletiger]

But, did the white man actually jump?

We goin' Sizzler.  We goin' Sizzler.

[GH2001]

Uncle Drew

Difficult to review this movie without being accused of racism, but reality is reality.  Comedies written by, for and with essentially all black casts tend to have a much different resonance than comedies done for a broader audience. 

This movie was intended to appeal to a certain demographic and I am not a part of that target audience.  That doesn't mean that I didn't enjoy the occasional gags or appreciate the random trips into funk/R&B nostalgia that were sprinkled throughout this movie.  I did find the execution of those musical interludes choppily handled and not savored as they should be, but the old tunes were nice.

There's only so much humor you can wring from a cast comprised almost entirely of current/former basketball players (none of whom can really act) layered in old-man prosthetics.  Give this movie's creators credit, they milked just about every possible nugget of comedy they could out of the ridiculously contrived setups. 

Just to make sure the film hit all the 'black comedy' notes, there was the stereotypical loud-ass, sassy ex girlfriend who bellowed everything she said.  The really smart and sweet young girl who adores her family is also there -- both characters essentially stolen whole cloth from any number of Madea entries. 

Stolen too from Madea was the idiotic and abrasive honky clown (a clear case of reverse racism).  If a white director put a black shuck and jive character in a movie with the same lizard-like reprehensible qualities that black directors seem to often ascribe to their moronic token white characters?  Twitter would be all outraged. 

But I digress.  Predictable story. Telegraphed ending (stolen partially from Grownups).  The same bevy of road-trip tropes we've seen recycled in countless movies.  There was nothing new to be seen here, but still.... it didn't offend.  It just coasted along to the prescribed end and the people populating the film seemed to enjoy themselves enough that the movie was pleasant enough. 

I expected essentially a 90 minute commercial of fake old men playing basketball, which really wasn't good enough for the 90 seconds the commercial got, but in the end it delivered something that, while trite, was a little bit more. 

Note to all filmmakers?  No more of Shaq's big ass.  And I mean that literally.  Please? 

Actuallly enjoyed it. Maybe because that’s the type movie I was expecting and nothing more. It was playful. Light hearted. Had some funny bits. Like you said nothing new and crazy. 

[Kaos]

Equalizer 2

A paint-by-numbers old-guy-kicks-all-kinds-of-ass movie.  

Other than Denzel's performance -- one which he essentially phones in, aka sleepwalks through -- there's nothing really new or innovative in this film.  

Ex military butt kicker Denzel does personal and private revenge, the kind that if it happened in real life would have him incarcerated within a week.  Friend gets killed (and the person behind the killing was clumsily telegraphed, you'd have to be blind not to see it coming) and Denzel takes it murderously personally.  

I tend to like Denzel, but he's low-renting it here.  Sort of like Liam Neeson in the similar cadre of movies he's done where one old guy wipes out battalions of bad guys with a toothpick and a bottle opener.  It's just a payday, nothing more.  

Oh there were some well meaning side stories about taking care of your neighborhood and a hilariously unrealistic interjection about walking away from the gangbanging life, but those were just time-stretching filler in order to get to the requisite 90-plus minutes it takes to have a movie.  

I just got nothing out of it.   

[Snaggletiger]

Equalizer 2

A paint-by-numbers old-guy-kicks-all-kinds-of-ass movie. 

Other than Denzel's performance -- one which he essentially phones in, aka sleepwalks through -- there's nothing really new or innovative in this film. 

Ex military butt kicker Denzel does personal and private revenge, the kind that if it happened in real life would have him incarcerated within a week.  Friend gets killed (and the person behind the killing was clumsily telegraphed, you'd have to be blind not to see it coming) and Denzel takes it murderously personally. 

I tend to like Denzel, but he's low-renting it here.  Sort of like Liam Neeson in the similar cadre of movies he's done where one old guy wipes out battalions of bad guys with a toothpick and a bottle opener.  It's just a payday, nothing more. 

Oh there were some well meaning side stories about taking care of your neighborhood and a hilariously unrealistic interjection about walking away from the gangbanging life, but those were just time-stretching filler in order to get to the requisite 90-plus minutes it takes to have a movie. 

I just got nothing out of it. 

I reviewed it about 10 pages ago so respect my authoritie.  Actually, I enjoyed this one far more than the first.  I thought the first Equalizer was far too slow.  As I've said, I'm a big fan of the one-man demolition squad, if they're done right, which this one was IMO.  Just enough action and just enough quality Denzelness. 

If you want to see one-man demolition done WRONG, see Cold Pursuit, which I reviewed above.     

[Godfather]

Can you give us a rundown of every movie you have seen in the theatres, I have always wanted to know. I need the year as well.