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Reviews
Miller's Girl (2024)
Remarkable
I had reservations at first about the casting for miller, but it turned out perfect. In fact I'd say every character is cast to perfection.
Ortega is wonderful. She strikes an impressive balance of femme fatale, and innocence. Of beauty, and wit. Of strength, and vulnerability.
I found the whole thing very well balanced. The premise is pretty unrealistic, and reminiscent of a 19th century play more than of a modern movie. The film really is about the characters, their flaws, their interactions.
The wife is sadistic, from disappointment and despair. The black guy who's a womanizer is also the only one with his bearings right. All the characters are wonderfully nuanced.
And kudos for the over the top cinematography and decor, clearly coming from the mind of someone who's read a tremendous amount.
Beautiful film. Ortega is magnificent.
La bête (2023)
Pompous
What a pompous mess.
The run time is excruciatingly long.
It feels like a really bad black mirror episode made by french people who think they're hot intellectuals and recycle a bunch of science fiction tropes without seeming to understand it.
The acting is wooden, there's an obese black horny lesbian robot, there's no chemistry between the two leads, the husband is such a dork it's painful to watch, and the whole thing is essentially unwatchable.
Had it been a 40min black mirror episode, it could have worked, but there simply isn't enough meat to the story, or talent across actors and directors to stretch this to 2.5 hours.
Wasn't it either Descartes or Einstein that recognized that being concise is way harder than verbose? Incredibly arrogant to make so little so long. Or incompetent. Or both.
Scarface (1983)
A classic, probably best if not rewatched too much
Scarface has attained cult status, and has defined culture in many ways. It embodies the American Dream for the working class, where you can come "from the gutter" and make it big if you dream it big and work hard. It just so happens to involve drugs and violence.
Such bad taste throughout, from interior design to clothing and manners, that might be the best aspect of the movie.
Now, it's actually a pretty average movie, upon re-watching. You may love Al Pacino's performance, or absolutely hate it.
The story is very linear, the characters are pretty one dimensional, the run time is very long, and the characters are all quite unlikable, with the notable exception of Manny.
One redeeming feature is that the story played out so a sequel couldn't be made to milk the IP.
I'd have rated it 6, +1 for the genre defining and cult status.
But, really, i wouldn't want to watch it again.
Knight of Cups (2015)
Hot naked ladies
I couldn't watch this until the end. I like Sartre and Nietzsche as much as the next guy, but a movie is not a book. If you're going to make a movie, you have to edit something that people will be compelled to 1. Watch and 2. Watch in 1 sitting.
The IMDB trivia tell us the process of making the film was a bit of a joke, or if you want to feel intellectual, "unusual". A very long script, yet all the scenes were improvised. Bale had no lines. Malick would randomly send in people into the scene. Actors didn't know what the movie was about. Bale thought one of the actresses was an actual stripper. And so on.
There are plenty of gorgeous women in this, many of whom naked, but a collage of tits and butts with the pretense of a philosophical expose on ennui, existentialism, or whatever the pompous idea we're supposed to ponder, doesn't make for a good movie.
Casino (1995)
Overall, thoroughly underwhelmed. I feel Casino didn't age well.
Scorcese is known to make long movies, and this one felt painfully drawn out. This is yet another Scorcese mafia movie bringing nothing new, and felt stale. Pesci doing his ultra violent midget thing. Deniro doing his business like lead guy. Old fat Italian guys playing mafia bosses being cardboard cutouts. Random executions with 2 dollars worth of special effects.
The narration should have been unnecessary in a 3h movie given how thin the plot really is.
In multiple wide shots, there's a halo highlighting the protagonist, as if we're not smart enough to follow the plot.
Fun fact, Sharon Stone has pretty terrible side teeth.
The casino part of the movie was great, with Deniro being a stellar overseer, taking immense pride in his work. But the movie is about the decay of the relationship between Deniro & Stone. Unfortunately, I don't think Deniro is the right actor to play the husband in this story. I could not understand why he fell for her, or loved her that much for that long. He only narrates that he loves her. Stone, on the other hand, shines in the role of the increasingly crazy wife.
A key plot element is her co-dependent relationship with her pimp, but i could not understand it; we're just told, not shown why, that she can't shake him off.
Essentially, my guess is that Scorcese isn't the right writer / director to explore & portray intricate human relationships and emotions, as what he does best is filming Pesci yelling & stabbing people in the neck.
Overall, very little happens over 3h, and we learn even less.
Tires (2024)
Funny
I'm a fan of Shane. Episodes are short so time passes quickly. The premise is really basic so I'm not sure where this could go, but these first six episodes were enjoyable. The writing isn't going to win any awards, there aren't scenes that are really memorable, it's neither really witty nor is it a biting commentary on anything. It's blue collar lives having fun, surviving more than thriving, with their heart in the right place. It's clearly written so that Shane can shine, he does his thing, and it works well enough.
Some comments are calling it a blue collar version of the office, but here you really only have Shane carrying the show, so I don't see this going very far. Getting Netflix to bank a show is a great achievement in itself.
Stealing Beauty (1996)
The fantasy of an old man
This was aggressively dull and cliché at the same time.
Liv Tyler is very pretty, but the story meanders aimlessly along a barely existing plot, with unlikable characters, poor dialogue, and hippies running around naked.
Maybe 3 generations naked together around a small pool is a European fetish?
We don't quite know why Jeremy irons is dying of AIDS given he was in love with Liv's mother.
When Liv finally loses her virginity, it's on her first date with a guy she's known for one day.
Also, put Liv Tyler in the sun for an entire day and you should get a lobster.
Tuscany looked pretty but could have shined a lot better.
Given how solid the cast was, I expected more. I don't understand the fuss around Bertolucci.
X (2022)
Meh
Not bad, but really not that great either.
The premise where the villain is a really old, really horny woman on the farm is fresh. The fact she's just a horny toad very vaguely raises an interesting question of sex drive and desire into old age.
But beyond that, it's very linear and dull. It also feels like the movie takes itself very seriously. None of the characters are likeable, and while everybody plays well, the script just isn't great.
It's not a horror movie that should make you seriously think about the validity of old people having sex, but it's regrettable that the role of the old lady wasn't played by someone actually old. The prosthetics were pretty laughable, and I feel a seasoned female actor could have played the psychotic angle much better. Imagine how terrifying Anthony Hopkins could be as a really old Hannibal. So there's got to be a good actress to cast in the role of a completely psychotic ex beauty queen.
Ultimately underwhelming.
Civil War (2024)
Dreary and sanitized
The story made no sense, in that I didn't understand why people were fighting. I can understand the fog of war, but at least at the start there's got to be a reason for the war and having two camps. Next, Kirsten looked absolutely awful. That's probably not very 2024 to actually say it, but it doesn't make it less true. Next, the pretty girl looked like a kid, so from a love interest standpoint, it was creepy. The fat old guy was cartoonishly fat, ugly and almost entirely useless.
Next, there was no sexual violence. If history teaches us one thing, it's that men during war do horrible things, starting with rape. The fact there's none of that felt very sanitized. Next, the journalists keep jumping in the line of fire as if they wanted to catch bullets, which made no sense.
The whole thing ends up being dreary, dull and sanitized at the same time. Such a nothing burger. Civil wars, owing to books about them, are way more awful. Neighbours, brothers gutting each other open on the street and extreme violence. This was a farce.
Mothers' Instinct (2024)
Financially viable?
The two ladies are Oscar winners, and produced the movie. The rest of the cast was probably paid 18 dollars. The movie is based on a movie based on a book. The whole set consists of two houses next to each other.
So, financially, it probably works, because depending on taxation the girls can choose to either get paid upfront or get their production companies get the profit .
They also get to wear intricate 1960s dresses and hairdos, something that women typically enjoy.
Now the movie itself sucks, hard. The plot holes are pretty meaningful when you reflect for a bit, and even without that, the movie fails to get you invested in the story or the characters.
Gentlemen Broncos (2009)
Atrocious
I really enjoyed Napoleon Dynamite, which has acquired, i think is fair to say, cult status. It was quirky, but it was a nice movie. There were endearing moments and characters.
Now Gentlemen Broncos is just atrocious.
The look and feel of the movie is kind of a lame, bargain basement version of Wes Anderson. There's a clear commitment to a form of aestheticism in the movie, but you can't carry a movie just out of style. And it's poor style in the 1st place.
The characters are either pathetic, obnoxious, or caricatures. It doesn't feel like the director even respects his subject matter.
I'm a fan of FOTC, but Jemaine Clement can't single-handedly carry the story, his role being a caricature more than a character.
All in all, pretty unwatchable.
London (2005)
Excellent
Saw this one in 2024. Jason Statham had hair and played a very troubled man going to therapy.
The women are gorgeous.
The apartments are gorgeous, everybody's rich AF for no apparent reason.
Jessica Biel looked absolutely incredible.
But maybe more importantly, it's a masterpiece of toxic relationships, flawed characters, and pain.
The hero is largely a despicable person with narcissistic traits. London knows he makes her unhappy but struggles to get away, and had her own flaws. Statham has a scene or two where he's frankly incredible, I didn't realise he could act like that.
Based on the ratings and reviews, it looks to me like most missed the point of the movie. It's got Russian or French realism / tragic vibes. The dialogue about God and the drugs and the boobs and the booze are fillers, a setup to discuss two examples of pain, loss, shittiness, love, insecurity. Very human.
Very sad that the director didn't get to make more movies. The fact he got that cast is incredible.
Jessica Biel looked like a goddess.
Arthur the King (2024)
Felt worse than the original story
I wasn't aware of the true story behind the movie, but looking at the pictures at the end, the real life story looks and feels better than the movie.
The movie is very formulaic and stiff. As someone experienced in the outdoors including rock climbing and various situations where you can die, they really did a horrible job at the technical bits, so they could have instead spent more time on the dog and maybe the family life after that.
It's a family movie for sure, but still has a fair bit of swearing and adult themes, as well as outright dangerous behaviour, but it just isn't a good movie.
Meh.
The Gentlemen: Refined Aggression (2024)
Stale
Stale from the first episode. Having seen the movie, the underlying plot obviously was no surprise. I'm a huge Ritchie fan, but this first episode made me question whether to watch the rest or not. He said in interviews he wanted to give a TV show a shot because it'd be a first. In his most recent movies there was a stellar cast. In his earlier work there was a novelty and a sharpness that made Ritchie so iconic.
Here there is none of that. The main guy looks like an underwear model, the lady arranges executions for breakfast but lack the shoulders to make it credible. The story is linear and stale from the outset.
CNBC Originals: Big Shot: The Ozempic Revolution (2024)
Meh
Underwhelming and not very informative.
It covers important points and contains key interviews from big pharma & FDA, which means you get a sanitized message.
Now a few examples what's missing, or barely touched on:
- Ozempic's weight loss is disproportionately muscle loss rather than fat loss. Nobody ever wanted to lose muscle mass, it is what keeps your metabolism up, keeps you moving, and protects you from injuries. That is mentioned in passing once, and it's very easy to miss. I'm not a doctor, but given that people who stop tend to gain the weight right back, if you lost muscle, that could be a key reason why. And either way it's something to be very wary of.
- Ozempic is not approved for weight loss pretty much anywhere but in the US, yet the drug comes from Europe, because it's essentially not considered safe. How that isn't even mentioned is incredible hubris.
This drug is the ultimate vanity subscription business. Alternatively, save your money, lift weights, eat a salad, walk your way out. But a shot's easier. The US is obsessed with the magic pill. This is it.
Ricky Stanicky (2024)
Formulaic but surprisingly funny
This won't win awards but the script is actually pretty funny. Towards the end they really spin it into a nice redemption story, it's done well.
Cena is impressive. He truly is a good comedic actor, and his self deprecating humor gives it a nice depth.
I laughed several times.
Was fun to see stand up comedians Andrew Santino and Jeff Ross in there, both on point.
Zac Efron may ironically be the least convincing of all. Not sure what happened to his face but he lost all youthfulness and it was odd to see. He didn't do a bad job though, owing to the whole story hinging on him.
Watch the credits until the end for an epic TikTok video.
Spaceman (2024)
What?
First off, there's almost a 20 year difference between husband and wife. Which is necessary because there's a baby involved. But there's no indication of a previous marriage. I guess Adam Sandler simply wanted his own astronaut movie, and so we get a pre diabetic old slob of a man as an astronaut, and maybe you make it more plausible, we get some steampunk post communist spacecraft where everything is old and the toilet is broken and they stole Michael Douglas' phone from Wall Street. Maybe next year we'll have Adam Sandler as an 18 year old decathlete ? Why not?
A lot of fake Nutella is consumed. There's a big spider that can fly through space and pass through walls, but that's eaten by maggots and likes Nutella a lot. There's a single astronaut that is sent on a long ass mission on a big ass ship who's a loner, but also who's a major crybaby because #love. Also, he's severely depressed and can't sleep.
There's also a Deus ex machina moment where a Korean ship in the middle of space picks him up.
This felt in such total disrespect of NASA and space missions. What happened to the concept of excellence and sending the best?
Incredibly poor writing. Rather frustrating. Largely absurd. Extremely forgettable. Blah.
Migration (2023)
Lazy and symbolic of our times
Movies of the genre have written history. Something like monster inc was revolutionary. The one about emotions was also an incredible movie.
Usually these movies are very well written so that they appeal to both kids and adults.
This isn't the case here.
The writing is very poor. It's probably made for kids, but for kids only.
It's also a symbol of our times with a strong mom and a beta dad, but also he's the most alpha through the movie because I guess he has his Bruce Willis moment? Either way, poorly written.
The son gets really mad when he's asked / expected to obey, yet he's a preteen. And he saves his parents single handedly.
Given the cost to make these animated movies, you'd think they'd spend more on the story, but no.
Very underwhelming for adults, I guess adequate for children.
The Zone of Interest (2023)
Pretentious
White guilt is in vogue, I guess Nazi guilt is peak white guilt?
Incredibly pretentious, tedious and empty piece of cinema.
Some strong visuals, like the wife trying clothes taken from recent victims.
Also an interesting take on the wife being arguably more evil than the husband, ironically.
Having read harendt s Eichmann in Jerusalem, the banality of evil is well documented. But there's more to Eichmann than just banality. The guy was pretty daft, ambitious, eager to please, and truly devoted to the nazi cause and to his job because this equated for him to being a good man.
In this film, we're just bored. Aggressively, painfully, pompously bored.
You can't a lack of substance with style.
Dreadful, shallow, and frustrating.
VICE News Presents - Sold Out: Ticketmaster and the Resale Racket (2023)
Identifies the problem, fails to suggest a solution
Good but not great documentary on the problem with concert tickets today.
We learn about the monopoly of Ticketmaster, notably from exclusivity contracts with venues. Ticketmaster requires venues to only sell tickets via their platform, and venues therefore feel obligated to use Ticketmaster.
We also learn about the vertical integration of venues and Ticketmaster, which makes this exclusivity clause often moot, given all the profit ends up in the same pocket.
What the docu fails to do is suggest solutions. The problem is evident, benefits Ticketmaster and their venues, but poisons the experience of most music fans & many artists. We also can't ignore the fact that there will always be people willing to pay extra to attend a concert at the last minute.
Economic theory says that there should be competition to balance things out. It's evident that competition doesn't apply here, so you would expect the government to step in, not as a neo-marxist force, but as a force to maintain competition. There's also a real question of where capitalism should stop, because musicians are almost by definition not businessmen at heart, and it is evident that many want to charge the public what they feel is fair, rather than the absolute highest price any concert goer is willing to pay. That spread on most of the tickets sold simply shouldn't be allowed to be captured by parasitic market forces.
You could plausibly think of a stock exchange where at least... 80% (?) of the tickets are sold in the primary market, and like airline tickets, these tickets would be in your name, you can't resell them, maybe except to the platform subject to a sizeable restocking fee (put option)? And allow the last 20% to be traded in the secondary market anonymously? Fans should be able to buy tickets at prices set by the artist with a transparent level of fees. Some people will always pay up to jump the queue. It's about accommodating both. Many venues and artists are also afraid of Ticketmaster, so maybe vertical integration and exclusivity clauses should be banned?
What is clear is that any concert system that is to the detriment of both the artist and the fans is bad. Market good. Monopoly / cartel bad.
Wonka (2023)
Terrible
I found myself skipping through, watched the beginning and the last quarter. It's awful on many levels.
I loved Paddington, both in fact. They were wonderful.
I also loved Ronald Dahl s books as a kid.
I also remember fondly the Johnny Depp version.
Now this one was an infuriating mess. Chamalet can't sing, which is a big deal given this happens to be a musical, and I dislike musicals.
The writing is terrible, the acting is terrible, the characters are so cliché yet incredibly bad, it's like an AI wrote a Dickens novel for chickens. Dreadful really.
Even the cgi was bad. It's also pretty nihilistic as everybody is a terrible person, down to the church staff.
We deserved better. And the legacy of this IP also deserved better.
Self Reliance (2023)
A movie of our times
I would typically rate this 7, but given how many bad movies i've seen recently, i'll rate this 8.
Admirable performance Jake Johnson to write, direct and star in this.
A man lets himself get trapped in a comfortable routine of working out alone, office job, and having a beer in the evening after he gets dumped by his long term girlfriend precisely for these reasons.
It takes a very special kind of TV show, god's hand, really, to make him confront his ex, meet his estranged father, make new friends, and meet new people.
Given various western countries are declaring a "loneliness epidemic", this ought to resonate.
It could have been more, but it didn't need to be more to be worth a watch. It's executed well, the script is good enough, it's what cinema is meant to be.
Hell Camp: Teen Nightmare (2023)
Meh
Bad parenting outsourced to bad people.
The irony of how terrible Steve's family becomes is incredible. For someone selling services around discipline and self actualization, the fact his kids were doing heroin and ended in prison is just hilarious.
The wife, who clearly has a loyalty card at the plastic surgeon office, apparently didn't police her kids any more than Steve himself, and they failed spectacularly as parents. Luckily, Steve died young.
Even more ironic is that American pursuit of the magic pill to treat anything. You're a terrible parent and your kid is turning terrible? Send them to an expensive terrible camp about which you do zero due diligence, if you're lucky the kid will die and you'll get some insurance money. Worst case, he's off your hands for a while. Either way it's not your fault.
And the last irony: it's a thriving industry to this day.
Overall not a good documentary. A lot of screen time is given to Steve's family who is clearly up its own ass and doesn't bring much. It's also very one sided. Little work is done around following the money, or where Steve was and what he was doing most of the time.
Feels like a gen z documentary. Half assed, outraged, and ultimately rather pointless.
Dave Chappelle: The Dreamer (2023)
Winner takes all
Fame sells, as long as Chapelle whips up one hour specials, Netflix will buy them because his brand is that strong. However bad they can be. This one was so very bland.
But I still watched it because it's Dave Chappelle.
Just like we as a group still go see fast and furious movies, however horrendous they get.
Money will finance what makes more money, and paying Chapelle for a stand-up is so low risk that it makes sense.
But it doesn't make it good.
Dave just phoned in the work here, and seriously started to sound like he's got a god complex.
Looking forward to the next generation of comedians.
The Machinist (2004)
I like the idea of a Dostoevsky movie as much as the next guy, but...
I like the idea of a Dostoevsky movie as much as the next guy, but i didn't realize how much i would dislike the execution.
1st, Bale looks ghoulish. Sure, he's traumatized and can't sleep or eat, but it was so extreme that it felt unnecessary & distracting. At some point i wondered if this was actor narcissism through self flagellation or some kind of award seeking emotional blackmail.
2nd, the pace was painful. A slow burn is one thing, but it's got to be good. This isn't. Usual suspects had a great payout, this didn't.
3rd, why did we get a highly intellectual machinist? This feels like the erotic dream of some writer fantasizing about a blue collar reading Dostoevsky. It is statistically possible, but unlikely. Also, I'm not sure that fishing, driving a red Firebird, and reading Dostoevsky makes a whole lot of sense. And at the very least it warrants an explaination.
Ultimately, i had to fast forward quite a bit, as this became physically painful to watch, but out of sheer frustration and boredom. This is no Requiem for a dream nor American history X.
I dont understand the hype.