"You couldn't be anywhere near Epstein and not know." I have to say the retelling and production quality was outstanding. I had to blink twice with Rufus Sewells make-up and acting. Billie Piper, Gillian Anderson, and Keely Hawes all captivated the perfect amount of acting, "Like a walk in the park." The genius in dialogue and dramatisation, my eyes and ears were hooked. Power in the wrong hands is pure evil, If anything is to be learnt, it's to watch who we give our power to. I do wish it had gone deeper than surface level, but the inside to key events felt good enough.
Midsommar is a complicated beast. Those going for something as linear as Hereditary will be immediately disappointed by Midsommars somewhat convoluted plot elements and meandering pace. I sat in the cinema as the credits rolled by, deep in thought about what I just watched, and if it was any good. Nothing really sat well with me, and the film didn't really connect upon immediate completion, but I gave it time to digest.
Ari Asters two movies are very much at odds with each other. Hereditary slaps you with it's excellent presentation, pace, sense of dread and quality of acting on display. Then, upon further inspection, it's woven plot elements and symbolism shine through on subsequent viewing.
Midsommar is very much the opposite. The film almost dawdles in it's presentation and doesn't fully attack you with it's acting chops or narrative (although Florence is simply stunning in her portrayal of Dani). Midsommar more presents it's parts in a very matter-of-fact fashion, and then leaves it up to you to connect the dots of both the plot and what's on display. While there is far too much to unpack in this small comment section, I'd just like to detail some of my favourite themes on display in Midsommar, and why it went from a 6/10 during my cinema viewing, to a solid 8 - 8.5/10 upon reflection.
--- LONG DISCUSSION OF SPOILERS BELOW THIS POINT ---
One of Midsommars central parallels is the individualism/selfishness of Western life and it's stark comparison to the commune we are introduced to. Examples of this are: During the intro, Dani is going through the trauma of a suicidal family member and her boyfriend, Christian, is encouraged by his friends to abandon her in her time of need telling her to see her therapist as it's not his problem. Christian echos these sentiments directly to Dani about her sister, telling her to leave her alone as she is just doing this for attention. Upon arriving at the commune in Sweden, Mark is unwilling to wait for Dani to be ready to take shrooms. Josh, knowing of Dani's recent trauma involving death, subjects her to the suicide of the elders for his own thesis and research. Christian uses the situation to further his own academic efforts, much to the annoyance of Josh. Everyone is acting in their own self interest regardless of the emotional toll this takes on their friendships. This is a stark contrast to how we see the commune deal with distress, emotion and personal issues. When Dani sees Christian cheating on her, the female members of the commune bawl, weep, scream and cry along with Dani, literally experiencing her burden with her to lessen the load. As described by Pelle, the commune "hold" you during your distress, helping you cope and living through those emotions with you. This is further cemented by the scene earlier in the movie, shortly after Dani's sister commits suicide. We see Dani hunched over Christian's lap overcome with emotion, screaming out the pain of the loss of her sister. Christian is anything but present however, his eyes vacant as if he weren't there with her at all. This is possibly my favourite theme of the movie, as it really paints how alone we are in modern society regardless of how many people we surround ourselves with. How many people are actually there for us in our time of need? Sure, they might be physically present, but are they actually there, sharing our pain? It's truly terrifying to think about.
My other favourite theme is who is and isn't a bad person. I've seen many people online say they think Christian is a horrible boyfriend for how he treats Dani. While I can understand their position, I struggle to see how Christian is the bad guy for his actions. Christian finds himself in a dying relationship which he is mentally checked out from but decides to stay to help her through the grief of losing her parents and sister. Christian even goes as far as to bring her on vacation with him to help her through her trauma, even though he wants to split up with her. Would the audience have prefered Christian leave Dani right after she lost her family? That would have been MUCH worse. Do these actions warrant what happens to Christian? I don't think so at all. Christian is so misunderstood in this movie, I can't wait to see it again to draw more conclusions on his character. Is Josh a bad person for wanting to fully envelope himself in a foreign culture? Although we know it is largely for academic gain, Josh does seem to love learning about the culture of these people, wanting to see how they operate and know every intricacy of their faith. Does this warrant his murder for trying to document their sacred texts? Should an outsider be murdered for enjoying and absorbing someone elses culture and customs, or should they be thanked for their interest and passion? (Sidenote, I see Josh's character as a direct reflection of the usual racial stereotypes we see in movies of this ilk. Usually we see the white academic researching the savage native/minority tribe, but Josh is the exactly flip of this, which is a nice touch). Were Connie and Simon wrong for coming into another culture and expressing disgust at their customs? Should they have been so outwardly disgusted and vocal about their disapproval while being welcomed in by the commune? Sure it didn't warrant their ultimate fate, but this small subplot asks an interesting question about outsiders attempting to shape and alter other cultures and customs as it doesn't sit with their ideals.
Other small details:
While it's directly conveyed to the viewer that the red haired girl is attempting to cast a love incantation on Christian via pubes in his pie and runes under his bed, very little attention is given to the fact that Christians drink is a slight shade darker than everyone elses. From the tapestry we see at the start of the festival, we know exactly what the red haired girl has slipped into his drink :face_vomiting: Fantastic subtle horror/grossness.
Pelle talks about how his parents died in a fire and the commune helped him through the trauma of that loss. After the ending, it's pretty clear the fire wasn't an accident, and they evidently died for some kind of ritual.
Artwork above Dani's bed at the beginning shows a girl with crown kissing a bear. While direct foreshadowing to latter events, it also asks the question if this was all fate. Dani's sister's final message reads "I see black now" (potentially a reference to The Black One) before killing herself and her parents. Were Dani's parents 72 and this was the end of their cycle? Was Dani's sister already a distant member of the commune?
Runes are scattered all throughout the film to foreshadow certain character arcs or add more meaning. My favourite hidden rune is the doors to the temple, which when open, make the rune for "Opening" or "Portal". Amazing attention to detail.
Yeah, this movie is much MUCH better on reflection and I absolutely cannot wait to see it again. I really hope Ari's 3 hour 40 minute directors cut is released so there is more to dissect. While not as immediately impressive has Hereditary, Midsommar definitely has the layers and complexity to be a slowburn horror classic.
EDIT: I am now 4 days out from my first viewing and I've not stopped thinking about this movie. I've become a frequent visitor of the films subreddit and have even purchased/listened to the films dread-inducing yet somehow joyous soundtrack a number of times throughout the days. I've been reading up on runes and their meanings, reading up set analysis for hidden meanings and any other small details others can find. A movie hasn't vibed with me like this for a long long time so to reflect this, I think it's only right I bump my score from an 8/10 to a 9/10. When I can get my hands on the digital download/Blu-Ray, I'm sure this might even go higher.
Unexpectedly theatrical and with substance - like gothic thrilling vice laden modern Shakespeare. This is a film about consumption, the weakness and naivety of arrogance, and a complex first love emotion rolling obsession/jealousy/narcissism into one driving force.
There are three acts for me: Oxford, Saltburn, & madness.
The first act didn't work for me till the second act kicked in. I was worried about a overly-parody-fied and caricatured script. Whilst I recognised the feelings and experiences of Oliver at Oxford, the people were too larger than life and the early laughs didn't land properly for me. Laughing at silly posh young people or uber geeks just wasn't my thing. Some of the cruelty and snobbery played out well though.
The second act puts the first into perspective. The first act which shows an alienated and floundering Oliver gain acceptance from a dislikeable group through the actually sane, kind-ish and likeable Felix sets up for the second act. More unlikeable rich people consuming each other and tossing people away like toys. But Oliver has Felix now and has picked up skills in getting things his way, seduction and sweet talking. But the acting from everyone at Saltburn estate is spot on - I properly laughed at Rosamund pikes and Richard e grants moments. Even though they are all spoilt, sheltered, unwittingly arrogant and judgemental - these characters you like, you see their vulnerabilities and insecurities - you have fun when they have fun.
Things start looking beautiful in the second act. Sometimes distractingly so. The light play, framing, and camera work are stunning. You feel you are in the throws of first love in the best summer of your life. Sometimes this was at odds with the drama or tension in the story.
Final act madness. The sympathy built up for the family now leads into the thrilling dramatic unwinding. The consumers become the consumed. Arrogance and haughty ideas of invincibility led to weakness and fractures.
This isn't an overly cohesive film for me, but I think that's intentional as mis direction. Clues for the real story are laid throughout and I had guessed the ending about two thirds of the way in. I really enjoyed the moments of summer headiness, where everyone is enjoying each other's company. Sometimes the inter-character drama and tensions were too much for me - almost descending into reality tv pettiness. I think thats intentional to show the unsympathetic side of the upper class and olivers push back - I just don't think it needed so much.
The pacing and focus was a little off for me at times. The film was full of symbolism and clever lines but it almost felt too full sometimes. Like vacillating rapidly between moods. There was a moment where I was full of tears at portrayal of grief when others were laughing - very interesting but it left me feeling a bit all Over the place. But excited!
The score and the setting and sterling acting efforts lift the film up into a grand feeling vision. I was a little disappointed that the tone of the trailers wasn't present in the film at all (bloc party song teaser trailer was amazing) . But the score takes this to a different place - British, establishment, old money, young love, hubris and longing - great score.
The film is exciting and there are unexpected moments and some brave choices too. I enjoyed watching this a lot and am excited for more films. There's a lot to enjoy here. Barry keoghans metamorphosis through the film is really really thrilling. Reliving 2006 is fun too - wish just a bit more was done with the music and feeling of that time. Some duff moments for me too so a 7.
Recommend
Don't believe the pack mentality concerning The Snowman. This Cult of Rotten Tomatoes and piling on after one bad review is a tad ridiculous, especially concerning solid films like this one. For example, I liked the filming style here and found the cinematography often gorgeous.
On the other hand, the story was like a child who tries too hard to be clever, and watching Michael Fassbender act is like making love to someone who's always looking in the mirror when he fucks because he's more interested in his own image than your pleasure. On top of that, what was up with Val Kilmer's voice that they had to dub all of his scenes? Whatever the reason, the Christian Bale Batman voice they chose was extremely distracting...
Bottom line: don't believe everything you read. Like with every other movie, see it and judge it for yourself. Don't let other people tell you what you think!
I keep coming back to this every Christmas. Properly British humour that hits the spot for me.
Hipster academics having Seinfeld conversations in a retro fabulous stage play that takes a post-Thunberg twistaroo into existentialism and crisis. Smart aesthetics, precocious kids, family drama. Heavy flavours of New York arthouse, Woody Allen and David Byrne. Early notes of tiresome pretentious satire but a lingering and satisfying aftertaste.
Other than the sheer charisma of Chris Hemsworth and likability of Miles Teller, there wasn't much carrying the film. The plot is fairly obvious and uninspired (I hope the book is better) and the characters are all somewhat underdeveloped.
Another mediocre Netflix film. It's a very cookie cutter movie. Actually, for Netflix it was good. It just turns out that a good Netflix film is just mediocre when compared to everything else.
With some tweaks to make things less obvious, this could have gone from mediocre to good. Instead of assuming the audience is stupid and unable to figure out whom the bad guys are, make this an intelligent story where things are only partially explained and left open to interpretation. Add nuance to the story to make it interesting.
As it is, it is good enough to watch once and immediately forget. I would never recommend it, but if someone said they were interested, I wouldn't tell them to avoid it. The very definition of mediocre.
The real question is why the hell did the guy charge money for snacks at the white house?
IF YOU THROW ANOTHER MOON AT ME I’M GONNA LOSE IT
I felt so many things watching this. It's stunning, it's twisted, it's weird, it's hot. One thing's for sure, it'll be on my mind for quite some time.
I just got back from a preview showing for the new Spider-man movie, and WOW. It is LIT (pardon my language). Soooooo funny with tons of personality and a surprisingly great depth of emotion in quite a few scenes (some tears may have been shed). I love this new take on the comic book hero origin movie and the entire film just screams originality. I wasn't 100% sure on the animated look before, but it really fits into the entire setting and "alternate dimensions" premise of the movie later, which injects a ton of creativity and potential into this new film.
After Sony released Venom, I thought that they should just stop trying with the Spider-verse. However, this new film and universe gives me a completely different perspective. I can't believe something like this came from Sony...
A comedy should be judged by if you laugh. A horror movie should be judged by if it is frightening. If this movie was judged by its ability to put an audience to sleep, it would be great. It's a horror movie, though, so a fail. I'm not saying I saw the end coming, but all the characters acted like they were just serving the plot instead of being actual people. Toni Collette's performance (or was it the script?) was incredibly uneven as she moved from unaffected to completely traumatized...sometimes within the same sequence. I actually liked the final story reveal and it was certainly built throughout. The problem is it took forever to get there and I hated every character so much, I couldn't care less if they lived or died. Garbage that every critic wanted to use "heightened" in a review will be lining up to kiss its ass. Here's the thing...my theater was full and never even a gasp. Did hear one dude snoring, though. See at your own risk.
Was funny when Ed said come over and have dinner and meet Annabelle, the next scene she looked devestated lol.
I'm half tempted to give this full marks just for daring to play Radiohead's Everything in Its Right Place during your typical military in dropship scene. Anyway my boy Gareth knocked out another cracking piece of scifi. You really don't mind when a director takes a few years off and comes back with something like this. There's certainly a fair amount of Rogue One, Blade Runner and Terminator in the mix, the latter of which he takes the Judgement Day plot and turns it on its head defying expectations where I assumed it was going just due to the tropes of the genre.
There's also a lot of stuff on screen for 80mill in comparison to other recent effects heavy films. Gets you wondering if budgets elsewhere escalate to $200 mill mark due to talent demands or that something like this has less behind the scenes VFX artists but take longer to bake? I dunno. Either way, check it out. The trailer gives too much away (as always my opinion) however there's plenty more that isn't shown.
NB. Watch out for the Scarif Easter egg
Timothee Chalamet absolutely won over my heart with this one. When I was growing up I loved both renditions of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory so when I heard they were making a prequel I was definitely intrigued. This was everything my heart could want and more, the songs were sombre and bittersweet - like something out of your childhood dreams. The acting was good, corny at times, but it was the sheer wittiness that gave this film its charm. I would definitely recommend checking this out.
This was a great take on a dark past, bringing comedy and satire to the forefront, and I absolutely loved it! While being comedic, there are many emotional parts to the film, which I was rather surprised to see. One moment you're laughing hard, the next you're on the edge of balling your eyes out. I never would have expected to see a film quite like this done on Nazi Germany, it was very well made.
With this being Roman's first-ever professional acting job, I was incredibly impressed - he is awesome, and I certainly look forward to his next project(s). He was able to capture the rollercoaster of emotions, thoughts and feelings that may be going through a child growing up in Nazi Germany—who is being told who is okay and who is not—with ease. Taika never fails to please me with his work, and Stephen is a very funny actor. The way that Hitler was mocked through Taika really adds into the thought that not everyone is as strong as they are said to be. Thomasin brings in lots of emotion, and Roman just blows the film out of the park.
Seeing it for my 7th time, I think I'd probably upgrade this from one of the best films of 2019 to one of the best films of the decade.
I shall certainly be seeing this several more times, and I definitely recommend it.
I have to write a min of 5 words but I could sum it up in one. Meh!
3 Thoughts After Watching ‘Fear Street Part One: 1994’:
Lemme tell you… I loved it! It was nostalgic. It was an homage to so much that has come before (that intro had ‘Scream’ written all over it). But it also had a hefty dose of originality. Great characters you cared about. It took risks. It surprised you. And it was a LOT more mature than I expected it to be. I loved the books way back when, and this made me wanna read them again. Bravo.
I LOVED the LGBT twist in the beginning! Did NOT expect that person to be Sam. Solid execution.
It had a bit of a Hocus Pocus vibe to me, which made the character deaths and the paths into “Rated R” territory that much more effective. It was a weird and welcomed mix.
Bonus Thought: I legit can’t wait for the next one. Super invested.
It’s Superbad mixed with some of that Community type of humour and creativity.
Really well done, I’d recommend this to just about anyone, even if you’re not close to its target audience.
Go and see it!
8.5/10
Its Scream meets The Blair Witch but it still manages to transcend both of those films to become its own thing too. An intriguing setup for the next two Fear Street movies and I for one am looking forward to them.
Fantastic? not quite and still doesn’t live up to the first film but definitely surpasses the second one and definitely brings more nostalgia from the Harry Potter films, loved the magical effects, all cast did well. Negatives- less on the humour this time but i guess it’s like the Harry Potter films on going darker the more you go through also felt a little rushed with the plot and that’s pretty much it but over all it was enjoyable and at times warming.
Macabre to the core, what starts as a jovial evening with past friends quickly becomes a bleak yet almost too relevant look at the world in catastrophe. Not what I expected, and really enjoyed the slow reveal of what was truly happening. Some of the messages here will probably be interpreted differently now after everything that has happened in the real world, but as a dark drama comedy, this is a hit.
Thanks to inspired creature effects, strong performances and a perfect balance between laughs and scares, Krampus deserves to become a perennial Christmas horror classic.
I'm not gonna lie. I laughed my ass off during 22 Jump Street (and so did the entire theater). While it might not have been as fresh as the first one, I enjoyed that the movie completely embraced the fact that it was a blatant money-making sequel and it made the movie all the better (essentially the complete opposite of how The Hangover/Crapover 2 handled it). It actually became quite a bit of the running joke and I nearly died during the credits. Hill and Tatum still have that amazing chemistry in this movie that we remember from the original and shared some pretty close and intense moments in their brolationship. This movie posed very real and deep questions that made me question my own bromosexuality and I loved every second of it. Definitely check this out if you enjoyed the first or love comedy.
Was it the best movie I’ve seen in the world? No. Best movie of an awful year of lockdowns and generally poor productions? Still no.
But does it deserve a 3.5 star rating on IMDb? Hell no!
I love Octavia Spencer and Melissa McCarthy but never seen them act together and never realised they were actual life long friends! Jason Bateman was typically amusing too.
I enjoyed this movie for what it was. It was cheesy, lighthearted and generally a bit of fun.
Strong cast, great premise and perfect setup for The Avengers. The SFX weren't what they could have been but it didn't take anything away from the film. Thoroughly entertaining.
One of those movies that's almost too unique to really be good, but maybe that's ok. It's still plenty entertaining. There's some fun, gory, zombie kills and the musical numbers are generally pretty great. It's got a weird, good, off-kilter energy. I wasn't particularly satisfied by the time I finished it, but I didn't regret my time with it either. It's certainly unique - unlike anything else I've ever watched.
If you're about to watch this movie, you need to know that this is about FRIENDSHIP and not love.
Meryl was great, but I felt the film avoided going into any depth around the controversial decisions during her time as PM; could have been so much better.
Monsters inc is one of the best Pixar films to date. It's the perfect mix of comedy and heartwarming scenes.
