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Wolfylildoggy
Reviews
The Gentlemen (2024)
Unrelatable
The storyline is absolute nonsense. The actors & direction seem fine but it's impossible to immerse into imagined wealth and waste when you can't care about entitled and basically naïve characters. Who keeps millions in cash with an easily accessible key kept in a box? Who would believe owing millions to gangsters isnt just some long con and not a straight forward loan shark game. It's all ridiculous & lacking basic common sense of writing which is wasteful of the talents of the work that went into this. There HAS to be elements of truth in all fictional stories. I'm available to consult anytime as a hole plot critic for hire. This was a freebie.
In Winter (2017)
Sinnemoto Winter flick
Chick smoking what must be the worlds longest cigarette while credits roll, just so we don't miss out on who made this cigarette commercial possible. It does show her smoking in front of a laundromat, too not just a bar. Lots of super action packed scenes inside the laundromat as our heroine homewrecker gives life saving suggestions to a stranger on what to purchase out of the vending machine, despite the fact he isn't doing any laundry, not creepy in the least.
Fast forward about three hours (it isn't but truly feels like forever) same man is drinking coffee when the waitress asks if hes staying there. She then inexplicably enters his personal space and digs through his items in front of him, although we never know exactly why or how its relevant to a non existing story. Gotta love these "your guess is as good as mine" films. Ahh, but its Minnesota, and us Minnesotans love to brag up our state, even if its boorish. I laughed out loud at the movie synopsis calling an affair a "sexual affair", maybe because part of me is still 12 or maybe affair is usually sexual and it goes without saying, so it seems unnecessary to specify it. Enjoy the melatonin fest.
False Witness (2019)
Hot girl goes to remote area for Internet life coach
Pretty privilege gone wrong is my best assessment. A woman witnesses a policemans murder so she backs out of being a witness, due to extreme PTSD. This is never clear when you actually watch the movie, you would have had to read the description to even know this important part of a ridiculous movie, or make it 30 minutes in to when she says pretty much that.
It starts with our girl in the throes of her panic attacks. She sees villains who aren't there, has an actual cop knock on her door to menacingly intimidate her at home about how she needs to do whats right. She attempts to buy groceries but even that is too much. She doesn't appear to have a job, either. No worries, just get on Youtube & stumble across a random video of a guy selling self help. Apply, click, done. Don't forget a super hot selfie with your online application to random self help bro. Take train to remote, high security location of Youtube bro. Pro tip: don't scream when he breaks out the zip ties for your wrists. No worries, he pops them right off, he's just "unconventional", he knows you won't be calling any cops for help, anyway. You will be totally cured in no time, your imaginary friends told you so.
There was a real chance here to address an actual serious mental health issue, lack of professional compassion, serious points about law enforcement, but it comes off as mockery & falls short in the logic department, something hard to get past in a slow burn story line like this. It wants to be so many things and ends up as a strained, boring story.
The Beach House (2019)
Lets get GLOBAL PEOPLE drop some edis & get concerned about climate change before your beach house is glowing
Thats the whole movie. Pretty much sleep fest scripting giving good actors very little to get excited about. A young couple stays at his familys beach house to discover some of big buck daddys friends are staying too. Awkward. Lets all stay anyway despite not actually knowing each other; should be "relaxing". No? Lets do some edibles with dads friends; should be fine. Maybe even "fun". Oh come to find out dads friends are a couple going through the wifes terminal illness. Yay lets party and talk bio chemistry. This just sounds like someones rich kid weekend was spoiled once & they thought Imma try my hand at what a nightmare weekending with my dads terminally ill friend is. Ughs. Just a cringe fest with no actual story & climate change thrown in for funsies. Good actors but they can't spin this straw script into gold.
Safehouse (2023)
Wondering what comedy writer wrote this
Im no expert about cartels, safe houses, border distances, or ratting people out, but this checks all of the boxes for unrealistic storylines. Our main character lives in Mexicali with her brother, a part time snitch who chose to snitch on the Cartell to border patrol for some quick cash. Gee, sounds like something someone would choose to do when low on funds vs ANYTHING ELSE IN THE ENTIRE UNIVERSE. It wasn't as if the bro had no choice,his mom is on a work visa sending money home so lil sis can make it through med school.
Surprise spolier: the cartel no likey snitches, so they kill the brother, the sister runs off after witnessing her brothers murder, while actively running drom the cartel she runs into a junkyard and viola: stumbles upon an abandoned tunnel system. No worries, the cartel gives up on chasing her and she continues running through the tunnel, the ENTIRE morning and winds up in the USA at none other than a safe house for informants against the cartel. What a coininkydinky. AND it just so happens the cartel has offered a million dollar bounty on this particular safehouses' inhabitants. Of course. To top it off, we get to see our super fast border tunnel runner show off her med school education by bandaging up an FBI agent who is near mortally wounded, after she digs her bare fingers and fishes out a slug. Bravo. She checks the agents pulse and declares her stabilized.
The whole movie is silly but worth the watch so you can giggle at the ridiculous story and direction. Look for the moment our med student emerges from the tunnels and shields her eyes repeatedly as if she has been in pure darkness for months (it was a couple hours but the timeline within the movie makes it seem she was only in there for a few blocks) Later during a car ride the entire area looks very remote and driving takes hours...seems like you could just take a tunnel faster..
HouseBroken (2021)
Enjoyable!
I honestly left this on play for my dogs while I did chores, they sometimes find interest in animated animals. However, I took a break, & found myself laughing at the puns, the nods to iconic movies, characters, places etc. Its clever. I feel as if the writers have a lot of fun writing this. It compelled me to deep dive into the cast, the writers etc. I love this show. Some have compared it to Secret Life of Pets-it is in a sense it gives that voice we all imagine our fur friends have. It takes real imagination and intellect to write and voice animation. The cast nails it, I love the writing, I hope this show takes off there is a lot of potential and its pretty wholesome without being boring. As I write this Im laughing because the animated dogs privates are pixillated. C'mon-Thats just funny. The ones who find it boring should just go watch Joe Rogan to stimulate their elevated sense of taste.
The Hateful Eight (2015)
Jennifer Jason Leigh steals the show
People hype on QT but its Jennifer Jason Leigh who makes this worth watching, this strikes me as a comedy more than anything.
Channing Tatum deserves mention as well, because you forget entirely who his stage persona is to the point you forget its actually him acting in this movie. The story itself isn't that memorable its the performances that outshine the script, the direction and storyline to the point where you could reasonably rewatch it (like I did) and actually have forgotten Channing Tatum had a role in the film, not because he he failed but because he did the character so well you actually forget who is doing it.
I'll Be Watching (2023)
Warning spoilers in case you are sups excited for this
Ok for one the husband is medium dork ugly because he's a total gaslighter, and her cat gets killed via clothes dryer, the hubs suggests she unwittingly did this to the cat, which is preposterous considering she is a. Well aware kitty likes the dryer to sleep in b. The cat is the only one in this movie not trying to hurt this woman. It personally makes me angry when animal characters & child characters are offed in movies. There's too many stories where that is unnecessarily thrown in and no one avenges the deaths at all & its not really a part of anything, it feels like a cheap shot script-wise, because it is for lack of main character development. The actors are great as we know but the script is mundane at best.
Lake Alice (2017)
Comedy/Tragedy SPOILER ALERTS
Day or night? What day is it in this movie? It skips around mid movie so one minute its dinner time so obviously thats when you hop in a shower then its day so drink wine outside for no reason then enter the home and its night again and dinner. Police are inexplicably rude to people they've known for years, who knows why & their harassment of the family is never explained which is probably the most realistic part in this dumpster fire. The opening kidnap scene is never resolved so why was it made? Moms & their adult sons resolve his jealousy issues from being dumped by obviously tag teaming to kill a whole family to "win back the girl" because thats the healthy option & makes mama proud. So "mask up" son we have some Christmas Cheer to spread to any girl that said no to my baby boy! Psycho boys psycho mom also drags the larger rude cop they lit on fire as deadweight despite being a smaller 5 foot older troll of a woman all by herself. The whole thing feels like I wrote it drunk or something. A kid could have written a more sensible script. Enter a third surprise masked killer, the second younger smaller rude cop, at the end. Makes sense to throw a third killer in with no explanation as to why. I give this 3 stars & a 12 pack of beer. Get drunk & it will be a comedy for ya. Actors are just doing what they're told, so the screaming the young actress does is forgiven. Its literally not what anyone would do while hiding from kilers.
Entrapped (2022)
Costume/details sketch
The acting is up to caliber as far as a sometimes subtitled, other times dubbed series goes, and the script is valid enough. However some serious lack of research on biker politics/attire and even cult politics/attire is far from easy to ignore. Character Baby Lars is a supposed biker gang founder, yet sports a clean cut hairstyle and new leathers, is middle aged and isn't a convincing as being the looming biker hierarchy as the story tries hard to convince us as so. Also, I couldn't get past the costuming of matchy-matchy biker garb that all looked brand spanking new right down to the generic English name patches that say MEMBER and PROSPECT. Just the outfits alone distracted me so much I found it hard to let it go. Even on a budget, a lot could be done to costumes to lend to character believability. Overall, not a terrible waste of time but not on my "you gotta see this" list. No storyline spoilers here just my two cents on the overall.
The Black Phone (2021)
Feels like an origin story
Solid acting, scripting, and attention to detail for the decade in which its set makes this one of the better films in a long while. I don't usually watch anything with violence against children, because after seeing horror for deca.
Gone in the Night (2022)
A Winona Drew Mystery
A little into halfway I guessed the premise to the mystery of the bf disappearing. I did like the breadcrumb "clues" scattered throughout, and the acting is on par with Ryder & Mulrooney. Better than average "Nancy Drew mystery" (my nickname for mysteries) with twists and turns. Moral of the story: use your free rental for a Ryder headliner even if she's playing a naive plant lady.
A Day to Die (2022)
Not horrendous but..
Run of the mill action/crime flick wasn't half bad until we get to Kevin Dillons wife character, someone clearly his daughter's( in real life) age, which ruins it with the misogynistic May/December cliche. Can we normalize not casting grandpa-pa with a super young wife? What is a 60 yr old DEA cop gonna do with a baby as a first time dad? Like, stay alive a bit longer? Please stop casting this way, it's stupid. It actually isnt the end of the world to cast a woman closer to an actors actual age, and real world believable relationships.
Arctic Void (2022)
So you wanna see the Artic
Scenery is lovely, but the storyline leaves you suspended in the cold. Gets as annoying as you think it will when it comes to slow burn, unresolved stories with partial answers. The actors remind me of a sort of Wish wolfpack from the Hangover and if Kevin Spacey had a little brother in the North Pole.
Pursuit (2022)
Comedy of Sorts
I love a good puzzle, that being said, I think its puzzling when movies have tanked so much, are done so badly, the Iphone shot Indie films look high dollar anymore. As I write this I am counting how many times Emile says "Wheres my wife" and wondering who exactly wrote this ridiculous script. Must be hard times over in Hollywood. Cuz dam.
Sand Castles (2014)
Good storyline
In a sea of virtual oil spills for flicks, I have been watching a lot of foreign/indie films. Yes this is low budget, a bit old in movie world, but transcends its financial limitations through realistic ground in its telling. It's worth watching through to its bittersweet finale with more than one surprise revelation. I'm giving a high rating mainly because I don't believe this is a work of fiction, I believe it's someone's actual life story, and if it isn't, many elements of it ring with truth. If you need a blockbuster to be entertained Indie film viewing isn't for you.
Wade in the Water (2019)
Seriously triggering subject matter for some
Some are Indie film fans, some are not-this is above average in Indie world with some shiny acting scenes delivered by actors that with the right direction and production will have their due eventually. Like most Indie films or subtitled you gotta hang in there & work your mind to enjoy it, the blockbuster aspect isn't there to do it for you. Not to be confused with campy B films, Indie movies most times have a crusade or a cause, deliberately multi-dimensional characters; this story being no exception. Worth a watch in the sea of garbage 2020 has exuded. If you're wondering where you have seen the main fella here-he's played a bartender on This Is Us...
Refuge (2010)
Cringey
Watching some so-called well known actors in lesser known older movies lately (2020) has brought an important realization-movies are truly
a team effort, no actor, writer, producer or lone director actually carries an entire movie. That said, this actually had unrealized potential. Some reviews are unnecessarily long & harsh, afterall, if you have the average 90 minutes to watch movies or series, not everything you see is going to be earth shattering or blow you away and you're probably not out writing the next epic yourself. Sometimes the cringe is worth sitting to see for mock entertainment it brings, scenery or
if you're like me, fun fact googling while you watch the cringe unfold. Happy camping folks.