Ant Man and the Wasp: Quantumania was a fun way to lose a couple of hours, but I could never shake the feeling that I was watching highlights from 3 or 4 better films. This is a movie just stuffed to the brim with characters, stories, and concepts that never really get a chance to breathe. On top of that was what should have been an amazingly inventive world kneecapped by effects that are going to age like an open milk container left in the basement. I know that many complained that Marvel's Phase 4 was too slow and meandering, but was packing the next phase into a single film the answer?
Some really good performances hurt by a very uneven adaptation of the play. Aronofsky is just all over the place here, wildly swerving between quiet anguish and what I swear was a Showa-era Godzilla tribute.
Is it the best science Fiction film ever made? No. But is it the best capitalist satire ever made? Well, also no. But it is still a nearly flawless example of both and 80s Verhoeven might be my spirit animal.
The phrase "not for everybody" was tailor-made for this film. It's a meandering, hypnotic twist on Dante's Inferno, if directed by David Lynch and realized by the Brothers Quay. I found it to be intermittently engaging and perhaps 50% too long, but also admit that if one was in the right place when watching it, everything I found slow and indulgent could hit like a freight train. So, my rating is not so much an actual 5, but more of a 3 and an 8 that are quantum entangled. So, YMMV, and probably will.
It is pretty much exactly Anno + Ultraman. While not nearly as successful artisitcally as Shin Godzilla, it's a lot of fun and perhaps the closest we've gotten to anime Anno in live-action. If I was an Ultraman fan this would likely be an 8 or 9 (or a 1, because fandom), but for me or anyone else YMMV a lot.
I know, I know. It's A24 does a Marvel - and that's not wrong. But that reductionist take IS missing the fun, thoughtfulness, and the beauty of a truly singular work.
An absolutely beautiful film with a perfect performance by the perennially overlooked Lee Pace. But its combination of fairy tales and trauma never quite come together for me. I want to love it, but just can't get there.
The rare case of a remake that adds value to an already great film without taking from it at the same time. An absolute master class in tension and wordless character development. I love just about every moment of this movie.
Blumhouse does a Deadly Friend. Never more than it is, but very well executed.
