Spider-Man: Brand New Day

Spider-Man: Brand New Day is pretty good.

I know what you’re saying… “that’s it Pat… that’s the best you can do for an opening?”

I’m with you. It's is a simpleton’s yawner of a lead sentence. But from me, reviewing another MCU film, “pretty good” is eloquent high praise. 

Thirty-eight previous “Marvel Cinematic Universe" (MCU) films, three solo Spider-Man MCU movies (all with Tom Holland as Spidey #1)—that’s a lot of “Whammm”, “Powww” CGI. And after three MCU Spideys and numerous pre-MCU Spider-Man efforts, it’s a lot of Spider-Man. Hard to find something “brand new”, something fresh to tweak our summer heat-soaked minds… and it’s hard to be great.   

I understand that the decades of Marvel Comic-Book storytelling, beginning with Stan Lee and the crew back in the day, provides a large amount of fodder for superhero film making. But it’s often the same thing over again. There’s been a lot of truly average films among the 38, and some real sleepwalkers too (Ant-Man: Quantumania… stick to your lane Ant-Man). But Spider-Man has always been a bit different… a level better. And Tom Holland’s Spidey has consistently paid out. He does once more in Brand New Day.  

We left Peter Parker in Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021) having erased himself (with help from Doctor Strange) from the planet’s memory to avoid impending universal destruction.  Now we find him in New Day, several years later, fighting New York crime and rebuilding and advancing his Spidey tech from a dank apartment. He is a lone wolf and a lonely spider. Although the world remembers Spider-Man they do not remember Peter Parker. Aunt May is gone (at least in this universe) and he has chosen not to re-introduce himself to his best buddies, MJ (much more than a friend before the memory spell) and Ned Leeds, to keep them safe from those who mean to do him harm. He is a ghost with no friends, no legal identity, and no past connections.

The forced lifestyle is clearly wearing on him. He wants to continue to be guided by his uncle’s now-ancient credo… “with great power…” yada, yada, but to what end? Something is changing. His small-potatoes crime fighting encounters a new perplexing power. He continues his internal wrestle with whether to reunite with the people he loves but does not want to endanger. His Spidey DNA has unexplainably jumped into an overdrive evolution of sorts with some confusing side effects. This brand-new day spawns numerous and sometimes muddled story themes – loneliness, friendship, prudence in the face of change, fear of the different vs. its embrace. 

The journey through New Day’s labyrinth of motifs includes both the derivative and the spectacular. The film can’t avoid giving us several too-common overblown CGI melees – who is fighting whom becomes impossible to discern. But the confrontations with The Hand, a group of mystical red-clad ninja assassins (featured on the movie poster and prominently in the trailer with good reason), are sights to behold. There are also seeds planted for the introduction of other Marvel Comic groups into the already burgeoning MCU, and an organically advanced Spidey that may push himself well beyond his Bronx roots and boundaries. 

All of this makes for a long experience—New Day runs ~2.5 hours. Such length gives its creators time to get themselves into trouble with a criss-cross of story paths that threaten any clear direction. But Holland and his extremely likable gang manage to hit the landing somehow—finding a satisfactory place for the friendly neighborhood Spider-Man to leap off from next time around. New Day, in the end, is a pretty good movie for 38 and counting. 7 out of 10. 

The Odyssey is don't-miss cinematic art

 

Odysseus the Cunning, King of Ithaca, hero of the Trojan War. The legend and the tales of Odysseus’ trickery at the walls of Troy had traveled back to Ithaca and beyond. But his, as many of us already know, was a longer, slower journey.      

The Odyssey is an epic story of wandering and reckoning. A tale as old as time, almost. The multiple story makers, orators and performers the world labels as “Homer” brought about Director Christoper Nolan’s source text millennia ago. The narrative endures that time. Now Nolan imagines it for us again and we applaud (I did… many of the audience did). Because the result is a new visual, mental, and emotional spectacle that should be seen by any enjoyer of the art of cinema. 

Commentary on this film seems ubiquitous. No news feed can be accessed without someone’s opinion appearing in a headline. Several I read described Nolan’s new work as being “loosely” based on the original text. I would disagree with the word “loosely”. Indeed, the key themes of Homer’s poem are all there in this new Odyssey: Odysseus’ departure to war, the tests against the forces of the Gods during his return, the homecoming (nostos), and the underpinning moral codes of Zeus’ law (xenia) that Odysseus negotiates along the way.  Odysseus’ long journey home from war includes encounters with the most famous of Homer’s myths and monsters: the Cyclops Polyphemus, the giant Laestrygonian warriors, Circe the witch, Calypso the nymph, the Sirens, and Hades itself with its ghosts of Odysseus’ past.  

Although this new version is clearly rooted in Homers’ epic poem (my informed opinion), it is certainly Nolan’s Odyssey. The director’s penchant for time manipulation displayed in previous films (Memento, Inception) is in place throughout the telling as he moves Odysseus back and forth from entrapment by Calypso to remembrances of Home, from Troy to the battles with supernatural beasts.  Nolan also adjusts the tenor of the hero’s evolution from the taming of his brutality to the trauma and regret caused by it. 

The awe of the film, and there is much of that, is in the tests. But its power is in the depiction of the very human experience of the leaving and the coming home. That power is made palpable in the theater, in great part, by Matt Damon’s strong performance as Odysseus. In an important monologue near the end of the film, as he explains to his wife why it took him so long to return (he is twenty years gone), he poignantly grasps the disconnect caused by inescapable change over time and the agonizing truth of the impermanence of life, relations, perspective, and belief. 

Nolan is not trying to duplicate Homer’s poem onto the screen—much to the chagrin of numerous always-angry people. Historical accuracy, whatever that means in the retelling of an ancient tale that itself spans hundreds of years in its creation, was not his priority. He has stated that his questions were "What is the best speculation and how can I use that to create a world?" What makes The Odyssey important… what makes it an amazingly impactful view, is that it very successfully allows, forces maybe, audiences to experience a marvelous fantasy in some fantastic past. A place and past that we can sense, that we can marvel at, and feel the very human story within the myth. 9 out of 10. 

Disclosure Day

The much-anticipated Steven Spielberg film, Disclosure Day has arrived—the summation (Spielberg’s own words) of the director’s life in science fiction films which began with Close Encounters of the Third Kind (1977). Like most of the planet, I have enjoyed Spielberg’s work over the years—two of his films are in my top 100 movies: Schindler’s List and Lincoln. Others, Indiana Jones, Jurassic Park, and more, are permanently registered in my mind as I presume they are for many of you. There are flashes of the majesty of those past works in Disclosure Day. The film is solid and, at times, dazzling from an action and technical standpoint. But the story is plagued by incongruities and, eventually, silliness, diminishing the impact of its core theses.   

The principal themes of Disclosure Day are not new to Spielberg’s story telling. Many of his films have ruminated on the spectrum of human reaction to and treatment of the different (Schindler’s List), the mis-understood (Close Encounters), the alien (E.T.). This time Spielberg attempts to weave these themes within a run/chase conspiracy-thriller wrapper. 

The runner is Daniel Kellner (Josh O’Conner: Knives Out-Wake up the Dead), an employee of a secret government affiliate, the Wardex Corp, who has stolen government files detailing decades of events of human-alien contact. Daniel is supported in his crime by a crew of Wardex defectors convinced that the truth of alien visitors must be revealed to the world. The chaser, Wardex CEO Noah Scanlon (Collin Firth, Kingsmen: The Secret Service) is just as strongly convinced that the planet cannot handle the truth about the alien presence and rushes to track down Kellner and his associates before they can reveal those secrets.  

Concurrently, a television weather person, Margaret Fairchild (Emily Blunt, The Devil Wears Prada 2) has an odd encounter with a small bird in her apartment triggering latent (maybe) telepathic abilities in her. Margaret's seemingly new knowledge and periodic visions lead her toward Daniel and an awareness of their intertwining pasts with the undisclosed aliens and what might be learned from them. 

Disclosure develops some pace and shine in its early running scenes—sweeping camera pans following car chases and train v. vehicle encounters. The associated imagery is familiar and fun. 

The characters are well played by the ensemble cast with some standout supporting performances from Wyatt Russell (son of Goldie Hawn and Kurt Russell), as Margaret’s boyfriend and Courtney Grace who just nails it as a news anchor in the film’s final scene. 

But Disclosure Day stumbles hard in creating a convincing connection among and purpose for its characters and all its moving parts. Disclosure's numerous ideas and theme strings are convoluted and sometimes off target, with too many gaps and questions to congeal into any impactful whole. It’s Citizen Kane-esque ending comes and goes without resonance. 

And so, my anticipation of Disclosure Day’s arrival and of a Spielberg tale, once again, leaving an indelible imprint on my psyche, was for naught. Many critics found the film “Fresh” however, as did most early viewers reporting out on Rotten Tomatoes. So, you may indeed find freshness and profundity in this new and final Spielberg sci-fi. Sadly, I didn’t. 5.5 out or 10. 

The Devil Wears Prada 2 - It's good to see old friends again

It’s been 20 years since we’ve seen the crew of Runway magazine on the big screen. The characters who sent The Devil Wears Prada into rarified levels of popularity and money-making way back in 2006 are that much older and part of our distant and unrefreshed memories. So maybe I should not have been surprised that our reunion in the sequel, The Devil Wears Prada 2, began awkwardly—clunky dialog, stilted delivery—the early scenes of reintroduction were disappointingly ungainly. But Prada 2 might be compared to an aging fashion model’s last trip down the runway; the entrance may be less crisp than in days past but once in the full light and sound of the catwalk, the strut comes back.

Prada 2’s tepid start is all about reassembling the ol’ team and then trying to make us remember how much we liked this bunch: Ann Hathaway’s optimistic but conflicted Andy returns, oddly, to the Runway after being laid off by her shrinking newspaper; Nigel (Stanley Tucci) is still playing second fiddle to Meryl Streep’s ruthless Miranda Priestly; and frenetic Emily (Emily Blunt) is now a senior exec at Dior and remains very interested in herself. The early scenes are heavy with lines from and nods to the 2006 film. Alas, I had begun to steel myself, in my theater luxury recliner, for a nigh two-hour rehash of what had come before—then the new film separated itself from the old. 

The main change in Prada 2 from Prada 1 is role reversal. Turns out there’s a new devil this go around… and it doesn’t wear Prada. Twenty years have significantly altered the Devil/Prada landscape. Print media is failing. Awareness of what style is in or out is now communicated through clicks and learned from TikTok. The old fashion-guard is being pressured and replaced by big tech and big corporations with their executive teams focused more on bottom lines than hem length. Odd tech billionaires and their suited minions are the devil now. The high-and-mighty Miranda Priestly has been defanged to a degree, forced to recognize a new power and where the new money comes from; and forced to concede that she will need the help of others to maintain the little space that is left for her.  

This switcheroo is an easy vehicle to propel the film along but it’s really not that interesting. The true fun of the film, the thing that makes it worth watching is, once again, the well-played characters—our old friends. 

The film and cast finally hit stride when we all return to Italy for Milan Fashion Week. Our posse swaggers through a grand entrance to the event looking really, really good. Madonna’s Vogue blasts forth as the party starts (the old). Then Lady Gaga appears with a new anthem (the new). The lights flash, the models walk, important people connive… and were cruising. 

Prada 2 is by no measure a great work. But it is, at last, fun. The mashing of old and new is not without kinks and stumbles and contrivances to tolerate. But the sweet reunion with old friends is worth the small sorrows that come with it. 6.5 out of 10. 

F1 is cliché... and exhilarating

F1, the new motorsport drama starring Brad Pitt, is undeniably entertaining. The race sequences are beautiful, heart-pounding works of art. Joseph Kosinski’s direction of the action is on point, as it was in Top Gun: Maverick. And Pitt’s charisma, mature but intact, gives the film’s shinny hardware a bit of heart. But the “F” for Formula in the title also describes the film’s formulaic story line. F1 is a spectacle to behold, but behind the mesmerizing speed is a well-worn tale and a very by-the-numbers telling.

 

The fact that F1’s plot is as mechanical as the film’s racing machines does not make it a bad viewing experience—I’m still strongly recommending it. I’m just saying that you’ve seen the narrative before… many times before: damaged and/or aging athlete is revived and presented with a chance (maybe a last chance) at victory, or redemption, or whatever the storyteller decides is the hero’s motivation. 

F1 has such a hero (of course) In Sunny Hayes, a once promising young Formula driver whose career has been derailed by a near fatal accident. After a string of bad decisions and relationships, Sunny has settled on a racer-for-hire existence, searching simply to continue to drive in whatever fast thing he can find. But when a friend and former Lotus teammate (played by Javier Bardem (No Country for Old Men, Dune)) offers Sunny a slot on his floundering F1 APXGP racing team, the highest class of worldwide racing, he takes it, although he is not sure why. And… you can guess the rest. 

Pitt’s ah-shucks, it’s-all-good portrayal of the nomad (physically and emotionally) Hayes’ is comfortable if not compelling. Pitt can still command a scene with, what appears to be, minimal effort. Bardem is also excellent as the desperate racing team owner taking a flyer on his old teammate. The two generate a palpable chemistry with Bardem’s freneticism juxtaposed against Pitt’s what-the-heck vibe. The two eat up the screen as Hayes forges an unlikely and unconventional path toward an impossible checkered flag (maybe). They are each other’s last chances. 

But let’s not get too distracted with characters and plot and the like. Sure, the buddy thing is fun, and an obligatory love interest for Sunny gives us another thing to root for—but it’s all pretty shallow and even a little cheesy at times. No, you should see F1 for the thrill and the tension of the race, because this is the most authentic racing car movie ever made. 

It’s easy to want to compare F1 to other racing movies—the best-picture nominated Ford v Ferrari is the most obvious and highest quality comp. FvF is the better film… the better performance. But F1 is the better ride. 7.5 out of 10. 

A Quite Place - Day One

A Quiet Place-Day One is the third installment of the A Quiet Place film series and was created as a prequel to the first film. It is also the first of the three to not have John Krasinski (The Office) in the Director’s chair or as a principal script writer.  Whether it’s the change in direction (Michael Samoski (Pig) directed and wrote the script for Day One) or an intentional shift in the approach to telling this monster story, you can sense a difference in the feel of A Quiet Place-Day One right off the bat. And different doesn’t mean bad—there are good examples of action series that have changed pace or scope or purpose after their first installment and had great success—Aliens, Road Warrior, and Terminator Judgement Day come to mind. But in the case of Day One, different also doesn’t mean better. Day One is different than the first two films, but it’s not as good—it’s not as nifty, not has nuanced, not as gripping. 

Krasinski had the benefit in the first installment of having an original and cool diegesis with surprising antagonists. His monsters were sightless creatures overrunning the planet. Their origin was untold. They were simply there, and everywhere, and they were wiping out humanity. The aliens were blind but with an acute sense of hearing, creating a new-born human environment in which survival required silence. It was a good gimmick. And Krasinski used it well in the first two Quiet Place installments, playing with sight and sound and non-sound to create unnerving tension in exercises in noiseless endurance. 

Samoski, on the other hand, is challenged with spinning off a new story with a now familiar premise and players. The title of the new film portends a possible origin tale for the invaders and their prey. But Day One is not that. Day One is a race, a running of the gauntlet, with fresh-face participants simply trying to get from point A to point B under monstrous conditions.   

Samoski’s first gauntlet runner is Samira (Lupita Nyong’o, 12 Years a Slave, Black Panther), a terminally ill cancer patient living in a hospice in New York City with her cat Frodo. That’s right. You heard me. Sam’s got a cat. And we all know that gauntlet runners always go back for the cat. And yes, you’ll be whispering to yourself, as you do during all such films with cats… “just leave the damn cat you idiot!” Eric (Joseph Quinn, Stranger Things) is the second runner, a stunned and frightened British law student who stumbles onto Sam, thanks to the cat of course, in a burned-out Manhattan. Sam is terminal, she is going to die regardless of how she navigates this apocalypse. She’d like one more piece of Patsy’s pizza in Harlem before it all goes away… she just wants to go home.  Eric is just there, scared and desperately in need of another human to run with. 

For the action side of this race, Day One relies heavily, with some effect, on jump scares, chases, and closeups of the film’s killer beasts to shock and frighten. The character study side of the film is more compelling, however. Sam and Eric’s odd partnership and desired finish line seem a foolish contrivance at first but slowly become a believable and even obvious goal of humans laid raw by eminent doom. Indeed, my favorite moments of the film were completely monster-less: a pre-invasion marionette play with a magical floating boy puppet that suddenly collapses in a heap—and allegory of the coming apocalypse; Eric and Sam’s silent but sanguine magic show in a deserted Harlem jazz club.  

These two sides of the film never mesh completely, however, not in a meaningful way. The obstacles that our heroes face along the track could have been anything—zombies, plague, war—their story would be the same. The blind monsters become disconnected background; their newness worn away. 

Nyong’o and Quin are good in this film, they do their best. And Day One is enough of a spectacle and story to be worth a watch in the theater. But we’ve seen this before, even though the pace and the people are different; the shininess of the whole thing is gone. 6 out of 10. 

Wonka: Not as good as we’d hoped

A lot of hype around this movie. I was excited to see it on its opening night. I was hopeful, like the young Willy Wonka I was about to meet. I knew it would be difficult—the original having set such a venerated bar. I promised myself not to give into the temptation to compare. But the new Wonka seemed to want me to do just that, nudging me, as the film started, with those three notes—C, E-flat, B-flat… “Come with me… and you’ll be”—and I was back with Charlie in the chocolate factory. There were more ties to the classic 1971 film, sprinkled throughout. Unfortunately, those old sprinkles are the best parts of Wonka, the new treats underneath are much less memorable.

Notwithstanding the clear attempts to maintain a connection to the original film’s older Wonka, this origin story presents a very different chocolate maker than Gene Wilder’s recluse. Young Willy, played enthusiastically by Timothee Chalamet, has yet to create his great chocolate factory as this tale begins. He is outgoing, generous, hopeful, whimsical. He’s a dreamer and  buoyed in his dream by a lost mother’s promise to be with him when he shares his gifts as a great chocolatier. Missing from this youthful version is the jadedness of the older Wonka; the snarkiness, and the mistrust created by years of the covetous trying to steal his genius. He has yet to learn, as his new band of downtrodden friends will try to teach him, that “the greedy hurt the needy every time”. 

There’s nothing wrong with this take on Wonka’s origin, although numerous big-media critics dislike this more-sugary Willy. It’s not the idea of this story that misses, it’s the telling of it.

At first, the stage, the music, and the story’s many characters and strong cast seem well positioned to make things interesting. Young Wonka encounters a duo of swindlers and winds up in servitude along with a small group of other unfortunates. These members of Team Wonka, however, are duller than their first impression would indicate and are given little to work from the film’s script. Their evil counterparts in the “Chocolate Cartel” are equally flat; a trio of one-gag melodrama villains. Even the excellent effort from Chalamet, who plays Wonka with great verve, is not enough to move the needle much off the half-full mark. Chalamet seems to put everything he as into his new Wonka. This includes his execution of the film's song and dance which is delightful and endearing. But the dances are minor and the tunes unmemorable. His excellent performance makes the mediocrity that surrounds it that much more frustrating.

I should make clear here that Wonka is not an unpleasant film. I suspect most of the younger patrons will give the film a thumbs up—the bones are good as they say. And all will enjoy Hugh Grant’s Oompa-Loompa (we could have used more of Hugh Grant… and a lot more Oompa-Loompas). But that magic was missing. I was patient. I kept waiting for Wonka to kick in… but it never did. 5.5 out of 10. 

Fresh Flash is Better Than Most

So, why The Flash. Why did this movie drag me out of the basement to start writing these reviews again. I’ll tell you why! Because the man’s suit comes out of his ring. That’s why. I was a Marvel kid (and this was when comic books cost 12 cents so that’s a long time ago); I wasn’t into a lot of DC heroes. But the Flash intrigued me, and I bought the comics. I liked fast. I thought I was fast. My favorite athletes were fast, and the Flash was the fastest of them all. But, more importantly, yes, his suit came out of his freeking ring. Fortunately for me, and this review, DC’s depiction of The Flash keeps the suit-in-the-ring thing. If it hadn’t, I would have walked out. I would have. I’m glad it did and a I didn’t because The Flash is a good film. I know there’s a lot of negativity swirling around this movie. Notwithstanding, I found the film to be fun, funny, engaging and, overall, better than most of its ilk. 

I do give one caveat here right up front—The Flash is another multi-verse thing. And I understand you may feel completely alternative-universed out. But this time it’s not colliders, or worm holes, or magic… it’s speed. The dang Flash runs so fast (and we find out he’s still learning to run faster) that he can run through space-time creating some sort of ‘speed force”. And he has an idea. Barry Allen (The Flash played by Ezra Miller) lost his mother in his youth and his father was blamed for her death. Allen now believes that he can use his speed to travel back in time and change the one thing that resulted in his mother's death and his father incarceration. Allen’s universe’s Batman (Ben Affleck), a Flash Justice League colleague, warns against such an attempt, reminding Allen that any change he makes to the past may destroy his present and future. The possibility of bringing her back is too much for Allen, however, and he travels back to the day of his mother’s death and prevents it. But as he returns, he is pushed out of the Speed Force by an unknown being and into an alternative 1983 where he finds a younger version of himself and his mother alive. 

It is in this new place that Ezra Miller and the film find something special. Miller shines when portraying, simultaneously, the glitchy Flash alongside his goofball, 18-year-old self. The interaction of the two Flashes (the younger Barry obtains Flash superpowers also) is the best part of the show. Not only are there two Flashes because of Allen’s time-meddling, but there are also two Batmen--the Affleck Batman from Allen’s home universe and a Michael Keaton Batman from the 1983 alternative universe. Affleck is necessary, Keaton in memorable. Keaton plays, with gusto, an aging crimefighter with no more crime to fight, invigorated by the task of helping Allen fix the mess he has made—his obligatory revelation that “I’m Batman” gave me a quick nostalgia chill. He also gives a great explanation of the film’s multiverse using a pile of spaghetti which is a seriously needed primer as the film and its infinite alternatives get confusing near the end. 

Although The Flash does fall prey to the usual superhero movie motif of jamming just too much stuff in, it still is able to maintain a thread of uniqueness. Its story is sound, and it sticks with it to the end. There is a sort of Ground-Hog-Day moment in the final scenes of The Flash where our heroes must face the possibility that no matter how hard they try, bad things happen, or must happen. There is a lot of ties-that-bind stuff that comes out in this dilemma that is moving without being too corny or overly sentimental, and the cast was excellent, especially Miller, in projecting those feelings to the audience. 

Still, lots of criticism out there. The kids say the special effects were bad. The movies’ creators, in a recent interview, explained that the different feel of the special effects was intentional as they wanted to portray a slightly distorted imagery for the Flash’s speed world. Everything did look a little bit off to me--shinny. Whether that was their true intent of not, I was fine with the graphics–they were different… and in the world of superhero movies, different is good. 

The Flash felt fresh to me. And most of that came from Miller giving us a different type of hero. I am not familiar with the details of Ezra Miller’s significant struggles, including recent run-ins with the law. I can understand if people don’t want to see the show because of that. I hope he finds himself and can make the corrections he needs to be better and continue in a positive direction—as I have read he says he is doing. I’d like to see another Flash–and I can’t say that for most superhero films.  7.5 out of 10. 

Jurassic Park/World Mash Up Yields Only Average Results In World Dominion

 

Early on in Jurassic World Dominion, Dr. Ellie Sattler (Laura Dern), returning to the team from the earlier generation of JP Universe characters, engages a baby dinosaur, gives it a rub on its horn, and exclaims with nostalgia “it never gets old”—well Dr. Sattler… it kind of does. It’s clear that World Dominion’s creators spent a lot of money and generated a large amount of CGI code to make the union of the Jurassic Park and the Jurassic World characters special and fresh. And I’ll give them credit for combining the old and new crews without invoking the multi-verse—bless them for this. But very little of the end product is fresh and the few pieces that are new and different are kind of silly. 

Dinosaurs of all shapes and number of teeth now run amok across the planet thanks to the disasters that occurred in the previous Jurassic films. And although these invasive species are now laying waste to the world’s ecosystems (including the human one), the story is the same—nasty humans in big corporations are still trying to exploit the animals for gain in numerous nefarious ways--shocking!  It is within these dire, yet usual, circumstances that our old and new Jurassic Park/World friends gather, like aged and dismissed superheroes, to, once again, rise up and try to save the planet. 

I’ll admit, it was fun to see the old crew—Dern’s Sattler, Sam Neil’s Dr. Alan Grant, and the always slightly askew Dr. Ian Malcolm played by Jeff Goldblum. They’ve gone their separate ways all these years but now unite to uncover a plot by the evil Biosyn Corporation that includes the release of giant prehistoric locusts (of all things) into the global ecosphere. Meanwhile the younger generation from Jurassic World (Chris Pratt’s Raptor training Owen Grady and Bryce Dallas Howard’s Claire Dearing) have hooked up and are attempting to preserve all dinosaurs one animal at a time in the most dangerous and inefficient fashions. Their dinosaur rescue efforts are kind of a side gig for them however, as they have a larger calling--keeping the clone of Charlotte Lockwood (daughter of Dr. Benjamin Lockwood, Dr. Hammonds former partner, see previous films) under cover as the evil corporations are after her too for convoluted reasons. 

Yes, there is a lot going on in World Dominion leading to some truly weak intrigue with our old heroes cloak and daggering their way into Biosyn while the more youthful heroes attempt to stifle the kidnapping of their ward, the young Lockwood. The result is a mash up that seems to aim toward a Mission Impossible and Indiana Jones vibe. Alas, the intrigue and ensuing action is not as clever or as tense as any of Tom Cruise’s MI cappers and Pratt is certainly not Harrison Ford. Soooo, we are left with the dinosaurs. And they are magnificently rendered… again. But how many times have we seen Velociraptors skid arounds turns and bump into walls as they chase elusive humans on slick surfaces. And how many times do we need to experience the “Apex Predator” throw down…? Six times is my guess, as there are six Jurassic Universe films. Steel yourself again for the same close calls. And prepare yourselves again to be relieved when the same escape maneuver is invoked… the magic extended hand. You know the trick, reach your hand out toward the dinosaur who is about to eat you and whisper “eeeeaaaasy Blue (or whatever name you’ve given your dinosaur)”—think Eleven from Stranger Things without the strained face and the nosebleed. It works every time. 

OK, OK… I know, I’m beating a dead T-Rex here, you got my drift long ago—I think World Dominion is significantly silly, in an average and reparative sort of way. It’s still a great looking ride even though you’ve seen most of the props before. Maybe a bigger view of the film’s prettiness would better counterbalance its mild staleness. Take in the film in on the IMAX, I didn’t but it might help. 5 out 10 for World Damion, and happy 4th. 

Older "Maverick" Soars in New Top Gun

How does the saying go… “some things get better with age”? Please add Captain Pete “Maverick” Mitchell and whatever airplane he is riding to the list of those things. It’s taken nearly 40 years, but Cruise’s “Maverick” is back in the big-screen cockpit, flying just as fast and just as hard as ever, but now carrying decades-more baggage. It is undeniable that TG:M’s action is faster and smarter than the first film; but what pushes this film from fun to fantastic is its depth, which its parent film had very little of. Director Joseph Kosinski (Oblivion… another Cruise film) and Cruise have injected the new Top Gun with a surprising amount of heart. Sure, there’s still some cheese ball in it, but the film’s creators have allowed an older, wiser, sadder Maverick to bring a new soul to the action, and the combo makes for the blockbuster of the summer and maybe next summer too; it’s really that good. 

The opening scene of the movie signals us that some things have not changed with “Maverick” in those 40 years as he pushes an experimental jet beyond its mach-10 speed limit to prove a point to the unimpressed brass. The less than glorious result of his stunt puts him in trouble with his commanding officers, a position, we discover, that Maverick has found himself in often since his Top Gun days. Maverick is still the super-skilled stick jockey, but his career seems to have run out of do-overs. In what might be his last chance, Maverick is assigned to return to Top Gun to train (and train only) a crack group of pilots (Top Gun winners themselves) for a near impossible mission to disarm a nuclear threat. 

Thus, the stage is set for our weathered but remarkably young-looking hero. He now must solve the puzzle of the mission; convince his commanding officers that his plan can work; and unify his trainees and select the best of them to execute the mission. Maverick’s solution to the combat Rubik’s Cube seems impossible and the training for and final execution of it yields the most incredible and tense flight combat scenes on film. Mingled with this joy ride are several surprisingly warmhearted and intense moments between Maverick and his team, including his old partner “Goose’s” orphaned son “Rooster”; and a genuinely touching dialog between Cruise’s “Maverick” and his old rival turned protector Val Kilmer’s “Iceman” 

Although certainly fresh, TG:M is not without flaw. Early scenes introducing us to the Top Gun trainees harken back to the silliness and sophmorism of the first film with the incredibly good-looking trainees posturing and strutting about like rutting bucks, calling each other by their very-cool flight names and snickering at each other through pretty faces with strong jaws and cleft chins. Worse, maybe, is a mid-movie, just-skins-no-shirts (except the one female Top Gun pilot) beach football game staged by Maverick to build teamwork, raising the question whether all top Navy pilots spend 40-hours a week in the weight room with their personal trainers, and several more hours in the tanning salons—none of them, by the way, looked like they really knew what to do with a football. These minor missteps are easily outweighed, however, by the rest of the film and the strength of the rest of the film is all about Tom Cruise. When Cruise is on the Top Gun screen the film cooks, when he is not, it doesn’t. Fortunately for us all, he is on the screen a lot. 

It’s a guarantee that the incredibly well-crafted combat acrobatics will thrill… but, in the end, it is this new, old Maverick and his time-informed perspective that gives TG:M the more powerful story that the first film lacked. Maverick once was the cocky daredevil that sacrificed the whole for the one—him. Now real-combat experience, pain, and loss have colored his view and his aim. Along with the thrills and spills, the film reaches to capture that new struggle and those emotions of the old warrior, the pain of leaving people behind to do a dangerous thing, the heartache of responsibility for others and the fear of making a mistake… the same mistake. And the result is good, very good.  It is rare that a sequel so clearly out does its predecessor. Top Gun: Maverick does it in spades. 8.5 out of 10. 

Postscript: Having been raised by a fighter pilot and combat veteran of two wars makes Top Gun and other such films especially intriguing to me… emotional for me. Although my father did not fly the generation fighters that we see in Top Gun, I still get some feeling of what he and others like him experienced (just a super small glimpse) in dangerous times. I also thought that maybe Col. Joe Lambert might look more like a Top Gun pilot than Tom Cruise… you be the judge… who’s the real Maverick? 

The latest shot at Death on the Nile

 

Pleasantly surprised, I believe, is a good description of my feeling after watching Kenneth Branagh’s (Henry V) latest take on Agatha Christie’s 1937 whodunit. The new Death on the Nile is a sequel to his 2017 Murder on the Orient Express with Branagh returning to both direct and again portray Christie’s supreme detective Hercule Poirot: this time he’s sleuthing on a boat instead of a train. Branagh’s Orient Express (2017) was a true yawner. Google “disappointingly dull” and you’ll get a link to a trailer for Murder on the Orient Express—go ahead, try it… it’ll be right at the top. So, maybe Branagh just got better with practice, or maybe it was the presence of Ridley Scott as a producer of this film, but Death on the Nile is much better, more attractive, better paced, sharper, snappier, crisper than its prequel; and the surprising result was a satisfying Tuesday afternoon at the theater. 

For all settings… including sailing vessels, the Agatha Christie murder-mystery formula is constant—assemble a diverse group with members connected by at least one of the seven cardinal sins, then kill somebody and let the fun begin. This time our potential murderers and victims are gathered to celebrate the marriage of the wealthy and beautiful Linnet Ridgeway (Gal Gadot, aka Wonder Woman) to the handsome but jobless Simon Doyle (Armie Hammer). Riches and beauty are usually surrounded by jealousy and greed and the Nile wedding party is chuck full of both—it’s not long after the group embarks on their river cruise that folks start to drop dead. Fortunately for all, Hercule Poirot is on board. Branagh sparkles in his portrayal of the eccentric Belgian super sleuth and his subtle deductions and ruthless examinations of those he suspects… which is everyone. The other pieces in this cloak-and-dagger are also well played with standout performances by a nigh-unrecognizable Annette Benning as a wealthy artist and family friend of the bride, and from newer-comer Emma Mackey (Netflix’ Sex Education) as the obligatory women scorned. Motives mount and suspicions shift and turn, but it’s never clear to you, until the bitter end, who is killing whom… unless you’ve read the book or have seen one the myriad previous screen depictions, or you overhear some yahoo in the seat in front of you who has done one or the other give the killer away to his wife while noshing popcorn… come on!

Poirot is possibly Christie's most famous character. He is certainly the longest running, appearing in more than 30 of her novels. But the fictitious detective himself has always been a bit of mystery—Christie did not spend much time on his origin. Gratefully, and with great benefit to the film, Michael Green’s screenplay gives a bit of a back story—a glimpse at a pivot point in Poirot’s life that has, in part, shaped him into the genius but emotionally dethatched crime solver that he is. The reveal is effectively leveraged throughout the film providing heart to Poirot’s cold path to solving the mystery of Death on the Nile and to Poirot himself. Such value add-on’s do not make Death on the Nile any sort of award winner—and I doubt that was what the film’s creators were shooting for here. But the film is nicely put together and entertaining. You may forget the experience quickly, but you’ll enjoy the few hours of mystery while you’re in it. Death on the Nile gets 6.5 out of 10.

The new Dune does not disappoint

I had very much looked forward to the release of French-Canadian Director Denis Villeneuve’s (Arrival (loved it!), Blade Runner 2049) Dune, being a fan of the source material—Frank Herbert’s classic 1965 science-fiction novel of the same name. The alien societies and vivid otherworld settings created by Herbert have long tempted movie makers. However, Herbert’s dense and detailed meshing of politics, ecology, religion, and mythology in Dune has made adaptation of the novel to the screen notoriously difficult. David Lynch’s 1984 attempt makes my list of 10 worst movies of all time (but that’s another post—that film now has a cult following among those who celebrate badness). So, it was with a mix of fear and hopefulness that I entered the theater. There had been nigh 40 years to ponder the mess of ’84; the technology to render the epic alien-desert landscapes and the sand worms of Dune had evolved… I hoped that it would be better. I hoped they could tell the story. I was not disappointed. 

Readers should keep in mind here that I viewed the new Dune having read the novel—twice. So, I was familiar with Dune’s far-future story and vocabulary, the politics of its feudal interstellar society, the waste-land planet at the center of it all, and the power struggle for the planet’s “spice” mineral that supports the galactic empire, allows access to its worlds, and extends the minds and lives of its citizens. Thus, mine is a review from a perspective of familiarity—those less familiar may feel differently about this film. I felt, however, that the early scenes were superb as a concise introduction to the complex sociological and physical settings of Dune—more than satisfying even for the novice viewer. These early pieces efficiently introduce the Noble House Atreides, led by The Duke Leto (Oscar Isaac) and his son Paul (Timothee Chalamet), as they are thrust into a battle for the dessert planet Arakis with its native Fremen people and the former rulers of Arakis, the House Harkonnen. These early scenes have great pace, underpinned throughout by Villeneuve’s epic vistas and Hans Zimmer’s pounding score as they crescendo strongly to a mid-movie battle among the planet’s combatants. Here Dune is just what it should be, big and beautiful… Lawrence of Arabia restructured in a future-universe galactic empire, maintaining feudal-world trappings while traveling at beyond light speed among the Empire’s subject planets... the plot is intriguing and its worlds are spectacular.  

Alas, the ambition and excitement of the first half of the film are not sustained completely in the second. The same, however, can be said of Herbert’s acclaimed novel. In both, the story, after its homeric clash of Houses, slows, even lags in parts, as the details of the motivation of the conflict are laid out; the long-game influence of the Bene Gesserit, a sisterhood of spiritual warriors of which Paul’s mother (Rebecca Ferguson) is one, is explored; and the evolution of Paul as visionary and possible prophesied leader of Arakis and more unfurls. Even in these slow moments, however, the sight and sound of the film are enough to make pleasant the more measured story telling of the film’s second half. The talented cast must be given credit too as a sustaining force, although many—Jason Momoa, Josh Brolin and Dave Bautista--receive modest screen time as the characters of Herbert’s sprawling story enter and exit. Ferguson maybe be the best of the lot as Lady Jessica, torn between her desire to protect her son Paul and the requirements of her shrouded legacy as a Bene Gesserit. Chalamet also excels in capturing Paul's gradual awakening from an occasionally snarky teenage Atreides ruler-in-training to understanding the powers of his other birthright bequeathed to him by his mother. 

In the end… oh, wait… there isn’t an end. Be aware that many of you may be frustrated by the planned installment approach for Dune and the “it’s not really the end” climax. The film does include “Part One” in the title, so we were all warned—think Star Wars, Lord of the Rings, Police Academy. Okay, don’t think about Police Academy too long… just know that there’s a lot more sand to walk through after this first Dune chapter. So, lets try to wrap up again: In the end, which is really “just the beginning”, Dune Part One is substantial and right, even exhilarating, from the casting to its story telling, to its epic scale, and I look very much forward to Part Two. Dune Part One is an 8 out of 10. (Dune is streaming on HBOMax, but it really must be seen on the biggest of screens with the biggest of sound system). 

Eastwood swings weakly and misses with Cry Macho

It was Clint Eastwood… 91-year-old Clint Eastwood, yes, granted… but it was still Clint Freaking Eastwood, so why wouldn’t we watch Cry Macho? Turns out… the reasons not to watch this film are myriad.

From a glance at the trailers, Cry Macho looked like another in the line of Gran Torino or The Mule—showing us a past-his-prime anachronism rising, despite it all, to meet a final challenge. In Cry Macho, Eastwood’s protagonist is Mike Milo (played by Clint), a long-retired rodeo star with a long (long, long) life of heartache. Milo’s challenge, as presented by his former boss Howard Polk (played by Dwight Yoakam), is to retrieve Polk’s 13-year-old son Rafa (over played by Eduardo Minett) from “trouble” he has found in Mexico. Milo’s rodeo career was cut short by a serious back injury. The accident, coupled with the death of his wife and son, pushed the Cowboy to depression and self-destruction from which Polk has helped Milo recover, at least to some degree. Now Polk is asking Milo to return the favor and find his son and bring him to the border—the boy is the payback. The plot (based on a 1975 novel by N. Richard Nash) and its challenge are well setup for the redemption of a fallen hero—if only our hero were 30 years younger. The Milo character from the Nash novel was one year removed from his rodeo career when he accepted the heroes challenge; Eastwood’s Milo in Cry Macho is over a half-century away from his wrangling days. It’s a contradiction that plagues the telling of Milo’s story and Eastwood’s direction, and one that the film can’t escape from even if it tried—and it didn’t.

No one should begrudge Eastwood (who also directed Macho) for continuing to make and act in movies. It is clear, even from the mess that is Cry Macho, that he can still, at 91, command the screen. But instead of choosing a character and story that utilize and leverage what Eastwood is today, he asks us to suspend reality and our understanding of the laws of nature so he can pretend to be something that he can no longer be. The film nods only briefly and lightly to the absurdity of Eastwood’s proposal when Rafa asks Milo why, if his father wants him so badly, would he “send and old man to do the job.” The remainder of the story and its characters, however, treat Eastwood’s Milo as if he were Sergeant Highway from Heartbreak Ridge (the aging hero thing worked in Heartbreak… Eastwood was 56 in that one). Through the dull gauntlet the pair face on their journey to the border, Milo is seduced (with unclear motivation) by Rafa’s gangster-like mother (young enough to be Milo’s granddaughter) who also wants to find the boy, he strikes fear in and punches out one of the mother’s young henchmen, falls into a romance with a cantina owner half his age who can’t stop making goo-goo eyes at him, and breaks a wild bronco in a ride that would have surely snapped the real Eastwood completely in half. We watch saddened at the spectacle… shaking our heads, rolling are eyes, groaning at the worst of it, and wondering aloud why Eastwood would choose this hoax—there must have been better things to create.  

The difficulty of Eastwood’s decision to slam a square peg into a round hole seems to poison the rest of the execution of the film—its dialog is awkward; performances, even from the usually interesting Yoakam, are stilted; and the film has an over all lower-budget, made-for-TV feel about it. Eastwood glimmers with the occasional poignant or resonating oration but it is not nearly enough. Here is to Eastwood finding a more appropriate vehicle and giving us one more good flick to wash the bad taste of this one away. Cry Macho is a stinker, 3 out of 10.

In the end, Ten Rings is like all the rest

 

I had sworn off Marvel Superhero movies—at least for a spell. But they said Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings was different… I should have known better. I like Marvel Movies. I was a Marvel comic book kid back in the day. But after 24 Marvel Universe films (Ten Rings is the 25th), I’ve tired some of the super-hero action film arc which always ends in the overblown boss battle and the inevitable set up for the next installment… always propping the next installment.  I had hoped that featuring an new “second tier” marvel hero might give the genre a chance to display a different spirit and trajectory—might be less over-the-top.  And Ten Rings had a hopeful start; it was intriguing in its early stages when its heroes were unencumbered by complicated mythology, magical messiness, and the din and confusion that eventually come in these films as the focus evolves (or devolves) from story to the collision of superpowers. The Legend of Ten Rings was different for a while and then it was just all of the rest… meh. 

It’s not that Ten Rings is bad movie—It has its strengths. One is the casting of Awkwafina (Ocean’s 8, Crazy Rich Asians) as the hero Shang-Chi’s (played by Simu Liu) friend-slash-side kick. Known more for her rap and comedic chops than for action flims, Awkwafina’s Katy provides personality and fun to the introduction of Shang-Chi’s back story of a secret past life with a powerful but broken family. The two close friends work together as hotel valets. Shang is using this unassuming lifestyle to hide from his past life and his misguided and sometimes criminal super-powered father (Xu Wenwu, better known, or represented, in the Marvel Universe as the Mandarin, see Iron Man 3), and Katy is searching for her own path outside of the high expectations of her family and friends. This well-crafted shared uncertainty of place creates a bond between the two that nicely underpins the course of the film. A second highlight is the sweet hand-to-hand fighting that ensues when Shang’s past finally catches up to him. During an attack by a family gang attempting to recover a pendant gifted to Shang by his mother, Shang reveals hidden fighting skills honed under his father's draconian training methods producing the slickest actions scenes of the film—Bruce and Jackie would be proud of the Kung Fu Fighting (well… maybe not Bruce). Alas, from there the clean lines of the early stages of story and action become muddled by the powers of his father’s Ten Rings (mystical weapons of unknown origin), a magical hidden village, an array of mythological beasts, imprisoned soul-consuming reptile minions, and Ben Kingsley and a faceless dog.    

I note that a quick look at the summary review stats for Ten Rings indicates that most of the professional critics and viewers have no problem with the fantasy-heavy and frenetic montage of plot and action components—Ten Rings is Certified Fresh according to Rotten Tomatoes. I agree that the film is entraining—my complaint is that each rendition of superhero film, including this one, reverts to what seems to be an obligation to, in the end, create such a plethora of action and mind-boggling escalation of superpowers that the viewer struggles to comprehend what is what and who is who in the fight. Everything must be thrown from the screen at us as if the volume of it was the ultimate measure of “fresh” or entertaining. Maybe it is. Maybe I am missing something. I just think it would be nice to see a new Marvel superhero arc equation—one that doesn’t end up at the same coordinates as all of the rest. Still... 6 out of 10. 

Jungle Cruise is a silly, fun trip

 

If not a majority, then certainly a substantial percent of folks living in this country have been on Disneyland’s Jungle Cruise ride. And if you were over 4-years old the first time you took the cruise, you probably wondered why you spent the time. There’s no doubt, the ride is terrible—from the corn ball (and dated) surprises planted in the murky waters of the fake Amazon to the low-brow, pun-laden, attempts at comedy (and studies have proven that the pun is the lowest form of humor… it’s science) from your ship’s Captain, it’s just the worst. And yet we continue to go on the ride through the years… there’s always a line out the back. And I think we do it because we are all in on the joke and the ridiculous ride has evolved into something enjoyable, fun, and nostalgic. And so it is with Jungle Cruise the movie—it’s also silly and fun, but, unlike the ride itself, a fairly well made piece of entertainment.   

The idea for a feature film based on the Jungle Cruise ride was conceived years ago after the success of Pirates of the Caribbean: The Curse of the Black Pearl. I’ll note that Jungle Cruise is not as good as the first Pirates movie—makes sense, Pirates is the better ride too; but it does succeed at many levels by using a similar formula to Pirates—a combination of acceptable story line, colorful characters and cast, and execution that holds tight to the spirit and attributes of the ride. Dwayne The Rock Johnson, who produced the film, is solid as Frank the Jungle Cruise skipper.  Emily Blunt (A Quite Place 2) is loads of fun playing botanist Lily Houghton who enlists Frank to guide her to a mythical tree of Amazon legend whose flower can cure any disease. Johnson and Blunt fight and flirt along the dangerous trip creating an effective Grant-Hepburn-like hate-love chemistry. The casting of the films other rich characters is also on the mark, particularly the assignment of Jesse Peimons (the FX Fargo series) as a sinister and quite-mad German aristocrat who is after the same tree to aid the Reich in prevailing in the ongoing first World War, and Edgar Ramirez as a 16th century Spanish conquistador cursed to eternally reside on the river for his unworthy attempt to exploit the tree's powers.   

Maybe you are all stroking your chins now… squinting your eyes and thinking about German war-time conquests, snakes, hero-heroin love-hate relationships, and sea-fairing undead… have we seen this somewhere before? Maybe just down the Disney Adventure Land road—cough, the Indiana Jones ride… cough, cough, Captain Sparrow? It is true that Jungle Cruise looks a lot like previous swashbuckling classics—heck, there’s even a scene with Johnson and Blunt swinging on a vine that looks almost identical to Michael Douglas and Kathleen Turner’s aerials in Romancing the Stone back in the day. But these usages are more of an eye-wink homage to the genre than artifacts of lazy writing. The film does suffer, however, from a common adventure/action-picture malady—that is, too much action in the action. There are so many moving pieces to some of the later confrontation scenes that the end effect is more disarray than excitement. Jungle Cruise is also better in its first half, with the dimwitted fun diffusing more to spectacle in the second. And yet, a smile prevailed across my face as the film ended. Satisfactions with mediocrity or something else? Go see it and decide for yourselves – 7 out of 10. 

A Quiet Place Part II is not the best sequel ever made, but it's good enough

In 2018, silence meant survival in the film A Quiet Place. In that first installment, Director John Krasinski (The Office) created a world where sound, made in the open, summoned blind creatures of unknown origin but with a certain purpose, and that purpose was to kill whatever created the vibration tickling their acute alien (we presume) hearing. Krasinski used that artifice to generate a fresh source of high anxiety for the viewer, and it worked… it worked really well. For A Quiet Place Part II, Krasinski told us he was bringing more of the same and also promised to answer the questions left by the first including the origin of the invading monster horde. The most important question to be answered, however, was whether the sequel would grab its audience like the first did... in other words, how long would the quiet be interesting? 

A Quiet Place Part II opens with day zero of its version of the apocalypse during which we are harshly reminded of what the Abbott family and their small town community are up against—and that would be giant , super-fast, insect-like creatures appearing from seemingly nowhere and everywhere to wreak havoc on anything (but humans mainly) that so much as sneezes. It is implied in this opening that the monster mayhem is wide spread… that is, the human race might be in trouble. Krasinski moves quickly, however, away from that bit of world-scope context and back to the very local story of what is left of the Abbot family versus the sightless killers. If you saw the first film, you will recall that Krasinski’s character, the family’s father, did not make it, having sacrificed himself to save his family. Evelyn, the mother (Emily Blunt), remains now in Part II, guarding over a hyper-anxious son Marcus, his deaf sister Regan, and an infant baby. Their home base has been destroyed and they must venture out to find a new safe place. Carefully observed and charted signs indicate that there are other survivors near; but are they friend or foe in this new, every-person-for-themselves world?  

Although the intrigue of the premise may be reduced this time around (we're familiar with these things' modus operandi from the first film), a Quiet Place Part II is still provocative... at least most of the time.  With the family’s patriarch gone, Krasinski smartly moves the story’s focus onto daughter Regan played by Utahn (and Mueller Park Jr. High School alum) Millicent Simmonds. The film is at its best when it is switching the viewer from the perspective of a hearing person to the silence of Regan’s world. This is especially effective during alien attacks, but Simmonds steals most of the non-action scenes as well as she becomes the family’s best bet for survival. QP2 is a bit less crisp in its second half, however, as it settles into a more worn alien invasion tale—humans versus a foe that appears invincible but has a chink in its armor.  Sci-fi and monster thrillers from War of the Worlds to Signs have excelled in this box but it comes off as a bit boiler plate in Part II.  

QP2 is slightly less fresh than its parent but still worth a big-screen view.  Krasinski breaks his promise though—the sequel answers very few of the questions spawned in the first film. Which means you can look forward to a third installment. A Quiet Place Part 2 gets 7 out of 10. 

Godzilla vs Kong is more stupid fun

OK folks! I’m fully vaccinated and back in the movie houses. And what better way to start my renewed life than with a view and a review of the horrendously ridiculous Godzilla vs. Kong. When the first of the Legendary’s MonsterVerse Godzilla reboots came out in 2014, I wrote that the film Godzilla (clever title) was a paradox—a simultaneously terrible and wonderful film and the worst film I might ever recommend you pay to see. Leap forward to this fourth installment of the MonsterVerse, Godzilla vs. Kong: the creators of the reboot have had nigh on a decade to alter or evolve the course of large-lizard films, and yet… their direction remains the same—Godzilla vs. Kong, like the first three MonsterVerse flicks, is an imbecilic, nonsensical, glorious ride… which is just how it should be... or must be.

Who would dare tamper with the Godzilla movie series mojo anyway? Is it even possible to take a more serious and sensible stab at it and what would be the point? Would anybody really be enriched by a probing essay on the depths of Godzilla’s psyche? Would any of us be better people if we heard anything close to a physically feasible explanation for the modern-day existence of a 200-story-tall ape living on an uncharted island and a giant, chubby reptile with pine trees growing on its back? Of course we wouldn’t, so why put forth the effort to do such things. Better, as the film's creators (Adam Wingard directed from a screenplay by Eric Pearson and Max Borenstein) reckoned, to plow your imagination and resources into the majesty and hilarity of the massive-monster throw down. And plow they did—Godzilla vs Kong has monster mayhem in spades including monster on monster fisticuffs (Kong has a great right cross). Their battles are spectacular and spell-binding events. They continue to be staged in the most massive of cityscapes to maximize destruction amid the punches, laser blasts, and tail tosses. And adding to this joy is the constant tease of possibly getting the answer to the question we’ve been asking ourselves all of our lives… what if Godzilla fought King Kong, who would win? 

Between the magnificent skirmishes, we are pummeled with stupidity of course—hollow earth monster origins theories, monster-skull DNA-driven titan robots, monster-to-monster ESP, and so on.  These fantasies are explained by the scientists in Kong’s corner, by a band of conspiracy theorist on Team Godzilla, and, of course, by evil people looking to exploit the monsters for their greedy objectives. These groups are satisfyingly outrageous, but the unforced error that Godzilla vs. Kong commits is that they, or the things they say, are not clever enough. Outrageousness is always better when it is delivered with humor… something that Godzilla vs Kong has very little of. Not that it doesn’t try. Comic relief is intended to come from Team Godzilla led by Millie Bobby Brown (Eleven from Stranger Things) returning to the scene from Godzilla, King of the Monsters. But Millie and her posse of nerds whiff repeatedly in their attempts at humor as they search for the reason for Godzilla’s sudden reappearance and why the big toad is in such a bad mood. Stupid movies can still be witty; and wit can be bought… so please go hire the Guardians of the Galaxy writers for Godzilla 5 and make us all a little happier.   

Although the trifecta of stunning, asinine, and funny is not achieved in Godzilla vs Kong, the film is still a good time. And now that we’re all feeling more confident about our immune systems, I strongly recommend springing for tickets to see these monsters duke it out on the big screen (the film is also streaming on HBOMax). Godzilla vs Kong gets a 6 out of 10. It’s really the highest rating that any Godzilla movies past, present, or future can get… and it’s still good enough. 

Knives Out

Sometimes you come across a movie that just hits the sweet spot—something crisp and fun and nicely satisfying—and you walk out of the theater with a slight smile on your face thinking… that was swell. Knives Out is such a film. And go figure, delivered to us this holiday season in a hard-to-find-nowadays wrapping—the classic whodunit. The genre may be infrequently used lately but you know the drill—someone has been murdered (usually someone important and/or rich), lots of likely suspects in close quarters, and a sleuth with nigh super human deductive powers. Knives Out lacks none of these. But the film is more than classic formula, it has that special it. Acclaimed writer and director Rian Johnson (Brick, Looper, Star Wars: The Last Jedi) has injected the schtick with an intelligent whimsy and stylized the glorious cast of suspects and their Clue-board setting into a feast for eyes, mind, and funny bone. 

Successful crime novelist Harlan Thrombey (Christopher Plummer) has died, violently, in his ornate mansion, the night of his birthday party attended by all of his loving family members. Ruled a suicide initially, now enter Benoit Blanc (Daniel Craig), private investigator of “great renown” into the investigation. His presence and purpose in the investigation is a mystery in and of itself, but his skill is not, and he immediately finds reason to suspect foul play and begins to untangle the “twisted web” laid out before him. He is surrounded by the usual numerous suspect motivations: greed, jealousy, desperation, fear. But Blanc has a special gift for seeing the trajectory of the mystery and, thus, the ability to follow it to its inevitable landing place… the truth. The ensemble cast is perfectly over-stuffed and wonderful, especially Michael Shannon (as usual) playing the son-in-law heading Thrombey’s publication business and in fear of losing his place in the family fortune, and Christ Evans as the reckless black-sheep grandchild who Harlan sees so much of his young self in. But Craig steals most scenes with Blanc’s “Fog-Horn-Leg-Horn” drawl and the projection of an all-knowing yet little-revealing understanding of the complex pieces of the game that is afoot. The case is, indeed, following an arc, and you know that Blanc see’s it which just builds our anticipation to see it too.

Knives Out is simply smart, off-balance fun and sharp as a tack. A throwback yes, you could say, and yet completely fresh. The film is, in a word, delightful and we all require a little delight in our lives; go see this one. 8.5 out of 10.