Kaos' way behind movie reviews

[GH2001]

Saw that Alien: Romulus this weekend.

Really fun, tense, at times relies too much on fan-service, but is an enjoyable watch until the last 15-20 minutes. Then, it goes off the rails. It's amazing to see a series blow a lead late in the game as often as this one does. It's like the Atlanta Falcons of sci-fi horror.

Worth seeing on the big screen for the effects and some big, sweeping space shots. Otherwise, just another log on the dying fire of a franchise.

It's being billed as "very scary" which I was automatically skeptical of.

[Kaos]

It's being billed as "very scary" which I was automatically skeptical of.

“Very scary” is just as subjective as “hilarious”.


It’s hard to quantity.  I don’t think I’m capable of being scared my a movie any longer.  Shocked? Surprised? Disgusted (level of gore)?  Maybe even horrified (level of wanton violence like I expect from the upcoming Terrifier 3)?   But actually scared. No. 

Comedy is the same.  We see here that the things I find funny (Raising Arizona, Airplane) don’t jibe with what many of you insist is funny (Dumb and Dumber, Old School, Anchorman - which all SUCK).

[Kaos]

Mad Max: Furiosa

Loud, noisy spectacle. 

I liked Mad Max (with Gibson). It still holds up. Didn’t care much for Thunderdome.  Too much.  Was high when I watched the one with Tom Hardy and Theron.  So I don’t know. 

This? I have trouble with a couple of things.  Thor’s ridiculous nose is off-putting and -honestly - unnecessary. Can’t figure out why that was a choice.  I’m also disappointed in some of the CGI.  Some of it - particularly in battle scenes - is jerky and not well rendered. 

Thor isn’t bad in it - idiotic nose aside. He’s a notch too silly to imagine hundreds of battle hardened bikers following him blindly. 

It takes an eternity to really get to the Furiousa storyline also.  She’s in it the whole time but merely as a minor observer for well over half the film, with virtually no dialogue. 

The plot - such as it is - loses its way several times. The point of it - other than thundering across the desert on modified bikes - unravels occasionally. I know the mad max with Hardy had NO plot other than crazy machines and desert, so I guess that’s typical.  I just need a little more.  A lot of it was just incomprehensible though.

I get it was a revenge-ish flick. But the choices seemed odd. And it never quite reached what was, to me, the satisfying end it should have. 

I know people loved it.  My feeling was mixed.  Enjoy it for the big, loud, gas-powered, sand soaked spectacle it was or lament it for being nothing more than that — dumb, desert chaos with unfortunately weak CGI.  Granted, there were times it was pretty spectacular, but it was never consistent. A great shot would be followed by something so bad it might have been a hallmark movie. 

I chose the former.  Just let it rage and go along for the carnage filled ride. 

So it was fun.  For what it was.  It’s not on my list to watch again. But I enjoyed being beaten over the head with bombastic road rash.

[The Six]

It's being billed as "very scary" which I was automatically skeptical of.

Only the pure betas are scared by that movie. There's one jump scare and it's a cheap pop. It's intense, I'll give it that. But scary? No.

[GH2001]

Missing (2023)

This one is, ummm....different. Nutshell: single mom lives alone with 18 year old daughter. Mom decides to take an exotic vacation abroad with boyfriend but doesn't return. No one is at airport when daughter goes to pick them up. Daughter decides to investigate things. Hires a Columbian PI to help. Almost the whole movie is told from the vantage point of cyber world (online video capture of emails and messages, ring camera footage, video calls, etc) ....Daughter goes down a rabbit hole of twists and turns to find out what's going on. Wasn't my cup of tea with that vantage point. Her prowess and online skillset was way overblown. Felt like a more juvenile, zoomer version of trying to be CSI.

Mom is played by Nia Long, didn't recognize anyone else.

Meh




Passengers (2016)

Wanted to see this when it came out. Jennifer Lawrence (yes please) and Chris Pratt - I generally like both in stuff. This one is a bit of a Christopher Nolan knock off, or a "Diet Nolan" movie. Premise is that earth has become toxic, crowded, unstable, blah blah blah, and now mankind has found another planet 120 years away, so it will start shuttling many of Earth's people to this new place that resembles Earth but without the issues currently existing on Earth. Each ship holds like 5000 people, and the journey takes 120 years. Technology is there for bodies to be able to hibernate for that long in "pods" and then wake back up and not miss a beat when the time is right. Problem is, Chris Pratt wakes up about 90 years too early in his ride. Because of an asteroid hit....why is he the only one of 5-6K people? Thats a great QUESTION. Anyway....he gets bored on the ship. Decides to wake up JLaw out of her slumber. Even bigger issue? You can't re-hibernate once woke up. It's a complicated process and this ship is AI piloted. They are the only 2 beings up and moving around.

So basically, unless something changes and they figure out how to re-hibernate, they will die on this journey before it reaches the new planet, and when everyone wakes up on time, they will find two dead corpses rotting. The movie follows their functional and emotional journey over a 2-3 year period on the ship. It explores themes such as solitude, love, ethics, etc. As they go to dinner, the bar, dancing, swimming. The thing is like a cruise ship floating in the sky and is manned by robots doing all the serving.

They are joined by a 3rd person who wakes up early (played by Larry Fishburne) and also isn't of much help in trying to solve the issue of how not to die alone on this ship but he does provide some help in fixing what is possibly wrong with the ship (asteroid hit). As the movie reaches its climax, there aren't really any twists and turns other than JLaw finding out Pratt woke her intentionally as opposed it being accidental - which draws a crazy amount of anger, for about 30 mins. Then they are back to being in love again.

I liked it "ok", but it had some serious plot gaps. The visuals were great. Score was great (Thomas Newman), and JLaw and Pratt were solid - she outacted him in this one. But the plot needed some tidying up as I had serious issues with several plot gaps - but maybe they were intentional and were there to show the arrogance of some who think something they created is so great that it can never fail. The AI Android bartender even references this a few times subtly early on.

Segueing from that, the biggest gap for me was not having basic backup, failsafe or contingency plans in place for ANHTHING. You have the crazy ability to create a new planet, pause lives in pods and transport them to said planet but no backup plan for if ANYTHING happens to go wrong on this ship?? NO.....But again, they could have been purposely displaying arrogance by those who created the technology. I dunno....Generally enjoyed it and If nothing else, it makes you think about things from a different point of view - living forever, pausing your life, solitude, appreciate things you take for granted.

[Kaos]

Immaculate

Let's get this out of the way first. If this film is evidence, Sydney Sweeney cannot act. She cannot act a lick. This was hers and hers alone to carry and she doesn't have the weight to do it.

Yes, she has boobs. Congratulations. So do about 4 billion other females around the globe (that number is flexible, assuming you are able to define what a female is).  Yes her boobs might be better than about 3.87 billion of those women/females/cis whatevers.

Boobs alone do not a movie make, UNLESS it was a movie made in the 80s and loosely branded a "teen comedy."  Some of those did survive on boobs alone. 

This?  Boobs couldn't float it. Dragged down by an asinine storyline (and one we've seen done better in at least six other films, kinda including First Omen), boxed in by stilted, uninspired acting, there just wasn't much here. 

If your thing is getting a little peek at the Sydhoobies bathed in gauze and listening to nuns curse  - in English AND Italian - queue this one up.  Otherwise?  Exorcise this film from your list.

[Kaos]

Lincoln Lawyer  I suffered through Ozark with Jason Bateman and Laura Linney.

I am so attracted to Laura Linney.  Don’t ask me why.  I don’t have a clue.   She just pops my magoo. 

[War Damn Six]

I am so attracted to Laura Linney.  Don’t ask me why.  I don’t have a clue.   She just pops my magoo.

She’s a bad bitch. She just has “it”.  Like Nancy Travis.  Or Zoey Daschanel.  Or Elizabeth Perkins. 

[The Six]

I see your Laura Linney and raise you Marissa Tomei.

[Kaos]

Red Right Hand

Oh boy, here we go.  One of those movies that tries to take some british twig and turn him into a greasy, grungy, tatted, bulked up, trailer-dwelling, country fried redneck. 

This time it's Will Turner, son of Bootstrap Bill, (aka Orlando Broom) scunging and mumbling through his part.  He's so bad it makes 'bunny in the box' Cage sound deeply authentic. 

You know I speak fluent redneck Southern. I can drop into that with the best of them. This?  I can't even understand half of what they're grumble-mouthing. It's hard to track the plot when the words might as well be in Wakandan.

When you start there?  It's hard for the rest of it to go any other way but sideways. 

Caricature-level hillbilly bad guys. Some muddled story about somebody owing somebody something on the sister's farm, and that makes them boys have a Big Cat problem. I don't even know what that means. Apparently Andie McDowell is the "big cat" and Eerlador Bluume usta werk fer her, but he done quit that game.  She's a weed grower and a meth maker? Building a drug empire? 

So ol' Erlander Bluume genner havta du serm bayyud thangs fer dat der big cat ter settle sum debt that warn't narn fully spained, ya huhr, mmmkay?

I'm 100% serious.  I legitimately could not understand more than half of the dialoge the absurdly over the top accents were so bad. 

The film was plagued by ridiculously contrived set-ups, a multitude of "some Hollywood liberal imagines how good ol' boys would act" nonsense, absurd violence, improbable deaths and lives. 

I mean really, a country preacher goes on a murdering rampage mowing down half a dozen guys or more, and then returns right back to the pulpit?  That's how we do thangs down heyah in Bugfuzzle, brocephus.

This was a bad movie. Poorly conceived, poorly acted, poorly staged.  I am dumber for having watched it. 

[Kaos]

The Fall Guy

This was a film I actually wanted to see.  The trailer looked interesting.  I don't hate Dollar General Ryan Reynolds.  I don't hate Mrs. Jim Halpert.  I thought the movie had promise - based on the trailers.  I can be partial to action-based comedies as long as the cast has good chemistry.

When the film opens and closes with I was Made for Loving You by KISS?  It can't be bad, right?  Has to be good. (FWIW it has little to nothing to do with the campy-ish Steve Austin (Lee Majors) TV show --which I liked for a minute -- except for a twangy closing credits version of the theme song and some really late - and sad - cameos).

It's got some good moments. The neon fight in the bar and its trippy aftermath are creatively staged. Most of the action sequences are entertaining, honestly.

The tough thing for me with this movie (and others) is that I want to like Emily Blunt so badly, but she just has NO chemistry with Gosling. Seems to be a hallmark of everything I've seen her in.  She doesn't connect with her co-stars in any meaningful way.  Bad at portraying valid emotions. Just no chemistry. That's a huge problem for a film that puts the romantic chemistry at the core of the movie.

It's really two separate movies.  An outrageous action romp and a slow-burning romantic comedy.  The action movie alone works pretty okay. The romantic storyline falters and drags. One isn't strong enough to support the other so in the end, it just falls flat. It's an unequal yoke.

Let's talk about the music:
I Was Made for Loving You: KISS (and an alternate version by some other douche)
Thunderstruck: AC/DC
Big Pile of Reeking Garbage: Taylor Swift (ZERO talent)
Genie in a Bottle: Christina
All I Do Is Win: 2010 Auburn
Against All Odds: Phil Collins
Theme from Miami Vice: Jan Hammer

Take out the wad of nasty bubble gum from Swift and that's a decent mix.  Unfortunately it might be the strongest hook this movie has. 

[GH2001]

The Fall Guy

This was a film I actually wanted to see.  The trailer looked interesting.  I don't hate Dollar General Ryan Reynolds.  I don't hate Mrs. Jim Halpert.  I thought the movie had promise - based on the trailers.  I can be partial to action-based comedies as long as the cast has good chemistry.

When the film opens and closes with I was Made for Loving You by KISS?  It can't be bad, right?  Has to be good. (FWIW it has little to nothing to do with the campy-ish Steve Austin (Lee Majors) TV show --which I liked for a minute -- except for a twangy closing credits version of the theme song and some really late - and sad - cameos).

It's got some good moments. The neon fight in the bar and its trippy aftermath are creatively staged. Most of the action sequences are entertaining, honestly.

The tough thing for me with this movie (and others) is that I want to like Emily Blunt so badly, but she just has NO chemistry with Gosling. Seems to be a hallmark of everything I've seen her in.  She doesn't connect with her co-stars in any meaningful way.  Bad at portraying valid emotions. Just no chemistry. That's a huge problem for a film that puts the romantic chemistry at the core of the movie.

It's really two separate movies.  An outrageous action romp and a slow-burning romantic comedy.  The action movie alone works pretty okay. The romantic storyline falters and drags. One isn't strong enough to support the other so in the end, it just falls flat. It's an unequal yoke.

Let's talk about the music:
I Was Made for Loving You: KISS (and an alternate version by some other douche)
Thunderstruck: AC/DC
Big Pile of Reeking Garbage: Taylor Swift (ZERO talent)
Genie in a Bottle: Christina
All I Do Is Win: 2010 Auburn
Against All Odds: Phil Collins
Theme from Miami Vice: Jan Hammer

Take out the wad of nasty bubble gum from Swift and that's a decent mix.  Unfortunately it might be the strongest hook this movie has.

Heather Thomas from the OG show though....? As underrated as it gets/got on looks. She bowed out of fame early on. Damn shame.

[Kaos]

Heather Thomas from the OG show though....? As underrated as it gets/got on looks. She bowed out of fame early on. Damn shame.

She's in this briefly.  Life has not been kind to her. 

[GH2001]

She's in this briefly.  Life has not been kind to her.

Being almost 70 + too much botox injections will do that.

[Kaos]

Saw that Alien: Romulus this weekend.

Really fun, tense, at times relies too much on fan-service, but is an enjoyable watch until the last 15-20 minutes. Then, it goes off the rails. It's amazing to see a series blow a lead late in the game as often as this one does. It's like the Atlanta Falcons of sci-fi horror.

Worth seeing on the big screen for the effects and some big, sweeping space shots. Otherwise, just another log on the dying fire of a franchise.

Been a while since I went to the theatRE to see a film.  Went today to see this partly because I feel good enough to get out in public finally and partly because I felt like this movie deserved to be seen in its intended format. 

I'm one of those that enjoys the theater experience. 

Pretty easy to file this in two different categories depending on your point of view.  Could be Sci-Fi, could just as easily be horror. 

It was broad, it was noisy, it was intense at times.  I gotta be honest, the start was really, really slow. I wasn't getting much out of the whole "stuck on a mining colony, let's take this fake human and steal a spaceship to escape" opening.  But once the rag-tag Scooby Gang encountered the aliens, the pace quickly shifted into pretty much non-stop action. 

I'm not really well versed in Alien canon, so I don't know where this really fits into the timeline.  It looked to me like it was like maybe a follow-up to Alien and before Aliens?  Those are the only two I've seen and it's been a minute.  So any "fan service" Six mentioned above was completely lost on me. 

As a man, I do get really tired of the "kick butt final girl" trope that's always accompanied by "guys do the stupidest things."  Final girl wasn't awful though. 

I also was impressed with most of the performance of the fake man (a synthetic).  For part of the movie he was almost a walking Hal from 2001. Thought he did a good job.

Like Six, I wish it had ended before the last 15-20 minutes unraveled.  That was just kind of ridiculous and it didn't really fit in with anything I knew or understood about the Xenomorph lifecycle. It was beyond ridiculous, actually.

I tried not to think too much.  Just enjoy the ride.  From that perspective, it was a pretty good film.  I enjoyed it.  Go see it, particularly if you have any fondness for the original Ripley films. 

Side note:  There were almost 40 minutes of trailers before the movie started.  They were ALL good.  Only one, maybe, I had little interest in seeing. 

[Kaos]

The Watchers

A slow burn to a senseless nowhere. 

A movie so idiotic I don’t even want to give it any more of a recap than to say it is IGNORANT. 

Especially the last 15 stupendously moronic minutes. 

Terrible. Hated it. 

BOOOOOO.

[Kaos]

Arthur the King

Story of a stray dog who hooks up with an extreme racing team and becomes famous. 

Mark Wahlberg. Girl from Game of Thrones.  Shang Chi.  And a dog. 

Marky isn’t a great actor. He almost descended into an Andy Samberg parody of himself.  The others were really just filler. 

It was really two or three or four stories in one. One was Marky proving to someone (his dad? himself?) that he wasn’t a loser. He wasn’t very likeable in that part. Arrogant. Stubborn. Self absorbed. The second was about the dog and its life on the streets before a meatball bonded it to Marky. That part was kind of sketchy. The third movie was about the dog’s journey in the race Marky was in and the connection they formed.  I expected the dog to maybe have a bigger role in the success. The final part was Marky making unselfish decisions in choosing the dog over everything else and his obsession with keeping it safe.

Movie might not have made an impression on me if my daughter hadn’t dumped my own dog into my personal race about two years ago. Now? Now that I understand just much this stupid mutt means to me, and the lengths I’d go to protect her and keep her safe and well?  It hit me in a completely different manner. 

There were things the film could have done better. There were some gaps. Some unfinished threads.  A lot of it felt rushed.

But it was a sweet (mostly true) story, told without profanity, nudity, pedo overtures, satanic overtones, or violence. 

It’s the kind of film that deserves to succeed. Deserves to be seen by families.  In other words the kind of films the movie industry abhors. 

I liked it.  Honestly? It was on par with one of those Disney-type inspiring family fare  stories from the 60s before the satanic pedos took over the magic kingdom. 

[Kaos]

Revenge of the Creature

You've all seen Creature from the Black Lagoon.  That 1954 release is considered a horror classic and the Creature itself became part of the family of OG 50s iconic monster lineup that included Frankenstein, Dracula, Wolfman, Mummy, Invisible Man, and Phantom - all part of the Universal Monster Universe today. 

You may not have seen this 1955 followup, Revenge of the Creature however. And less likely the 1956 sequel, Creature Walks Among Us.

In Revenge, a scientist and his student (a pretty good looking blonde, Lori Nelson) capture the (or a) Creature in the Amazon, and put him in an aquarium in Florida for study. They use an underwater cattle prod device to shock him into desired behavior.  Creature don't play that. He escapes and heads out to sea. Except, he'd developed a little crush on the blonde, so he goes back to snatch her up. That's a mistake.

It's campy. It's goofy. Originally it was in 3D. The Creature isn't quite as well rendered as in the original. But it's still pretty good when you consider it was done right at SEVENTY years ago.

The very best part of the film to me is when the Creature stands outside a glass-paned door and watches the student get ready for a shower.   In what was probably considered extremely risque for 1955, she strips down to a bra and a pair of sweet silk panties (and heels of course).  The Creature's (perhaps unintentionally) hilarous gawking cracked me up. It reminded me very much of Blutarsky outside Mandy's window in Animal House.  The way the director displayed the Creature's lust was great.  It might be worth it just for that scene.  I'm old school. I actually found the silk drawers and bra to be ultimately sexier than if she'd just dropped everything and gone raw. 

The film has an under 90 minute run-time.  It's available on Pluto. It's not a "must watch" and it's not a completely worthy successor to the classic original, but it's a decent diversion.

You and your kids should have all the original Universal Monsters on the playlist. Good stuff.

[Kaos]

The Beast Within

Kit "You Know Nothing Jon Snow" Harrington as the patriarch of a farm family who turns into something monstrous when the moon is full. 

I'm a fan of werewolf movies, especially ones done well. Ginger Snaps for instance. When I was a kid, one of my favorite comics was Werewolf by Night. It was a Marvel property and there's always been some small part of me that hoped the wolf Jack Russell would make a cameo appearance in one of the Avengers or Deadpool movies.  They did a WBN short on HBO I think, but had little connection to the comic and really just coopted the name.

Anyways.... back to Beast.  Harrington wasn't really the focal point of the film. It was more about the journey of his daughter who, over time, found out her father's moonlit secret. As it unspooled her path to discovery, it moved far too slowly. The monster her father allegedly became was never really seen, only flashes of rueful looks as he was led away, some occasional guttural sounds and howls, and other shadows.

It just didn't work. Far too slow-moving.

Then, at the end, it tacked on this final scene that hinted the werewolf aspect might have merely been the projection of a little girl coming to terms with the fact that her dad was an abusive ass. Rather than accepting that, she created a monster to cope. 

That?  Ruined it. 

Harrington had a good run as Jon Snow, but his film career is now littered with white dog turds. Like this one.

[Kaos]

Don't Move

I think this was on Netflix. Very intense and personal drama. There are only two main characters and two peripheral ones. Movies with a narrative that narrow require compelling actors for the leads. This one almost gets there. 

Basic storyline.  Troubled woman (Kellie Asbillie, and she's really cute) heads to a remote area to contemplate the source of her sadness. In the wilderness she runs into a guy (Finn Witrock of American Horror Story) who at first seems genuine and helpful, but who then turns into a not-so-nice adversary. 

If you've seen the trailer, you know she's in a paralytic state so that's not really a spoiler.  He drugs her, intending to have a little fun before disposing of the body.  As we learn, he's done it before. Once she's in his clutches, the remainder of the movie deals with how and if she will manage to outwit and outlast the predator.

It's pretty well done. Asbillie has to spend most of the movie acting with little more than her eyes (thankfully those eyes are expressive and really pretty).  She's pretty good at it.  Witrock is only convincing in flashes, but those flashes are pretty good.  He just didn't have the consistent menace I'd hoped to see. He's decent in times of extreme violence when he has to get out of certain situations, but just not quite enough. 

It's a decent story, only if you spend the time wondering how you'd escape a similar situation. The movie was engaging, and maintained my interest, even if some of the situations were a little out there. 

It's not going to win any awards. It's not going to be something you'll go back to again and again. It is, however, worth the one watch.