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Vis a vis (2015)
Solid season 1 and 2, noticeable drop in quality afterwards.
Its no surprise that most of these 9-10/10 reviews of this show were posted several years ago. The show starts off pretty strong with an intriguing plot, interesting and well-developed characters, and great acting (especially from Najwa Nimri). One thing this show does particularly well is writing its villains. Despite the fact the these villains are terrible humans, they are captivating and provide for some very dark conflict. There is a lot more good things I could say about this show, but since most reviewers on here focus on the positive aspects of Vis a Vis, I thought I would add some criticism.
First off, the show isn't really realistic and you definitely have to suspend your disbelief to accept many of the events that happen as plausible. For instance, inmates get away with wayyyyy too much shenanigans without any guard intervention/repercussions. Inmates are shown easily getting away with assault, gang beating, sexual violence, sexual slavery out in the OPEN (Anabel literally holds an auction to SELL another inmate in the bathroom like its Wolf of Wall Street or something). This particular criticism of inmates getting to strut around like they own the place is unfortunately not exclusive to Season 3/4 either, despite those seasons being worse than the first two.
The main issue with the latter half of the show is the writing. Many characters quite literally disappear once season 2 ends and the prisoners are transferred, and while I understand that the actors have other commitments, the creators did not even try writing the characters off well at all. Miranda disappears along with her developing plot with Sandoval, Valbuena is gone and his previous actions are not addressed. Bambi and Roman don't return either, despite their tight knit with the main character of the show, Macarena. Oh yeah...the "main" character of the show also has about 30 minutes screen time in seasons 3/4 after she falls into a coma and is referenced MAYBE once until she returns, where all her close peers (who seemingly forgot she existed for the past 2 seasons) welcome her back and pretend they missed her. Fabio and his relationship with Macarena is also absent after season 2 as well. All of these abandoned plotlines and characters seriously hindered on my engagement with the show.
Another problem with the writing is that the characters lose their 'character' and become inconsistent as the show progresses. One episode Macarena will be some bad*ss who doesn't follow the rules anymore and will do what it takes to escape, the next episode she doesn't want to escape anymore/sabotages her own escape/etc and goes back to being goodie two-shoes. Curly is constantly changing love interests season 3 onward and it becomes tiring.
The finale of the show felt extremely rushed with how sloppily they conclude the characters' fates. Firstly, did any of the inmates receive punishment for the riot + murder of Sandoval + murder of Sole?? Yes, Sandoval deserved to die and Sole wanted to die and that MORALLY justifies their deaths in the context of the show, but the inmates would still be LEGALLY held responsible for these crimes and receive MASSIVE punishments. Well, don't think about all that logic, lets focus on where the characters are 12 years later! Macarena and Zulema are out of prison (somehow....) and are committing robberies - sounds about right. Curly is still in prison because "she just can't handle freedom XD", uh okay that's a satisfying conclusion for an otherwise bright/hopeful character. None of the characters look 12 years older whatsoever in the 'future' scenes, like they didn't even try in the makeup department. The show makes a mad dash to the finish line and explains nothing in its path.
Despite this overly critical review, I still enjoyed this show, but I wanted to add some criticism on a forum where it receives overwhelming praise. I also decided to check out the spinoff(?) series, The Oasis, and from what I saw in a couple episodes, the show appears to be slamming a nail into its own coffin at this point. Lets just say I gave up at the part where a character started literally barking during what was supposed to be an emotional scene. So yeah, this review is not counting The Oasis season, because then my rating would certainly be lower.
Vis a vis: 7/10 (Season 1-4)
The Dyatlov Pass Incident (2013)
Pretty Messy
I am not sure why I am reviewing a rather unpopular movie 7 years after its release for probably only 2 people to read, but its quarantine and life is boring, so alas. I suppose another reason why I want to write this is because, despite a generally poor reception from critics, the majority of users on this website are treating this movie as if its an underappreciated gem of horror which I find kind of ridiculous. So here is my two cents of why most critics are justified in calling out this movie as a misfire.
To give credit where its due, there are some well done aspects of this movie. For instance, I was never bored or uninterested in the what was happening, so its relatively engaging. The movie was also well-shot for the most part and I enjoyed a lot of the scenery. The movie is surprisingly subtle with its scares sometimes, with creatures sometimes barely being seen lurking in the background ('The Descent' is a horror movie that does this better, but it is still something to appreciate). Additionally, there was actually some good tension building towards the end (albeit, leading up to an ultimately disappointing conclusion).
Now for the bad....First off, none of the characters are well-written, likable, or even really developed at all - making you not care about what ends up happening to them. Our two main characters (Holly and Jensen) are motivated to take on this expedition as they show great interest in the Dyatlov mystery, which makes enough sense, but the other characters' explanations for tagging along are rather silly. Two of the other guys are supposed to be the experienced climbers, but often act out of emotion and nothing they do sets them apart from being more 'experienced' than the others. The other girl is supposed to be their 'sound person' for their documentary but isn't shown to do anything besides holding a boom mic in the first scene. I mean, yeah, the boom mic awkwardly sticks out of her backpack during the beginning parts of their trip, but later she isn't shown doing anything related to sound at all - it's like the movie forgot her entire purpose.
None of the characters were performed well, making much of their cheesy dialogue hard to watch and the emotional scenes come across as unfortunately laughable. Such examples of this poor dialogue include a scene where Holly ( very unconvincingly) sobs about a dream where a "door of darkness" swallows her, hmmmm......okay. Or when Holly tells sound girl "I would never put you in danger!", despite the fact that she has orchestrated for a largely inexperienced group of students to traverse a notoriously deadly mountain....yikes!
After a couple of people die, they end up in some secret military bunker and make some shocking discoveries. The two leads eventually come face-to-face with some horribly computer-generated teleporting monsters that kill their injured friend. Holly and Jensen end up trapped in a cave with a portal that has supernatural properties, teleporting them back to 1959 - the date of the initial Dyatlov incident. Their bodies are dragged back inside the bunker by military people (along with their camera), and they are left on hooks, where they are shown to have to turned into the same mutated monsters that were pursuing them earlier. While this twist is admittedly intriguing, it ultimately asks more questions than it answers, and in turn, the entire movie makes less sense the more you think about it.
The movie is essentially saying that this portal has created a time loop in which the two main leads are turned into creatures and sent back to 1959, in which they (in their creature form) will eventually chase 2013 (regular) Holly and Jensen back to the portal room where they will turn themselves into creatures, repeating the cycle. But how would this cycle even start? Them walking into the portal and turning into creatures would have to be first 'event' to happen in this loop. But the only reason that the Holly and Jensen even end up locked in the portal cave is because the creature versions of themselves chased them into it. So there would be no reason for them to walk through the portal and 'start' the cycle, since nothing would be chasing them the first time? Idk, maybe I am making no sense, but I feel like it is more so that the ending makes no sense and trying to apply logic to it doesn't work.
There are several other logical errors throughout the film. For instance, the camcorder teleports with Holly and Jensen to where the military people find their bodies in 1959, and the military people bring the camcorder back down into the bunker with the bodies. The military people explicitly comment on "how weird and different their clothes" are, which makes sense, but they make absolutely NO comment on the extremely modern camcorder???? You would think one of them would be a little shocked by this very sophisticated recording technology, especially considering they are holding it. Also the 1959 people set the camcorder down on the table, where the 2013 characters find it and review the footage. But what I am wondering is over the course of 50+ years from when it was put down, how this camcorder has any battery left, but whatever maybe that's a nitpick.
Anyway, I applaud anyone who actually read this overly long, unnecessarily thorough review about a movie that no one even cares about anymore! Thank you, goodbye!
Blockers (2018)
I understand why it's enjoyable, but personally not for me
Blockers is what you expect from most Hollywood comedies today and I wouldn't call it below average in that respect, but I felt it fell flat. It's not as if the movie has nothing going for it; the acting is all fine, and there are some good scenes and laughs to be had, but the movie quickly became derivative.
I'm not gonna trash the movie for being predictable (but it's obviously not a good quality either), as it is difficult for a film in this genre not to be, but character actions (where most of the humour draws from) grew to be repetitive and annoying. Leslie Mann's character: "Time to become overly emotional!". John Cena's character: "I'm so naive! I just can't seem to understand these teens!". Barinholtz played the whole cliché of: "I may come off as goofy and incompetent, but I really care about my family!".
A couple of the scenes which got big laughs in the audience I just wasn't able to get into. The humour requires you to suspend all disbelief of how people work and what is even a slightly realistic scenario. I'm not saying all comedies have to be ultra accurate portrayals of human interaction, but Blockers walks a line between nothing being believable, while still not being over the top enough to function as a comedy like Scary Movie or 21 Jump Street.
There is also a particularly bizarre scene featuring John Cena's wife. She goes on some political tangent that they try to pass off as a joke, but it comes off as nothing more than the movie makers forcing a blatant message in the viewers' faces. It's not as if I disagree with what the character is saying either, it was just extremely awkward and out of place.
I can definitely see this film appealing to a good chunk of people and many will certainly still find it funny. There were some good parts and it had its moments, but it was nothing special.
5/10
Good Kids (2016)
Not exactly sure what I just watched
This movie was kind of a mess from all standpoints. The plot was uninteresting and incoherent. Like, what was the conflict/initial incident even supposed to be? Oh no, their summer of partying has been kind of mediocre...this is so riveting. None of the party scenes were interesting either, "Woah I made a soufflé", "Wow I'm catching food in my mouth" "Oh my, watching someone skinny dipping from a kilo meter away, this sure is scandalous!". And wtf was that dump party at the end? Running around with megaphones and doing mattress fights, no high schoolers do this. Not much was even accomplished in the end. One guy whored himself out and got a yeast infection and was fired from his job. The girl had an unsuccessful relationship where she was cheated on. The karate dude did a bunch of drugs and got fired from his job. And the last guy got a handjob. They only went to like three parties. Barely anything even happened and they're all celebrating at the end as if they just threw Project X.
The characters were unlikable/dumb/underdeveloped. The main guy was insufferable, a hypocrite, and a moron. Talk about being controlling and jealous after he encouraged his female friend to get a boyfriend. Not to mention the irony in all of his criticisms of her relationship, has he ever heard of projection? And oh my god he actually spent over $2000 to fly some girl to his country when he has essentially no proof that she isn't a catfish and he has feelings for another girl...WAT! That literally makes no sense and the girl didn't really serve any purpose in the story, so I am not sure what the excuse is for that stupidity. Aren't these supposed to be the Harvard kids that are too smart for everyone? The karate guy was really annoying and I think was supposed to be the funny character, but that didn't seem to work out as he was just kinda cringey. The other two were more likable and less annoying, but of course they were pretty much the least developed, so there wasn't much to appreciate there. They're all really disruptive/obnoxious in public, and we see from the beginning that they're really recluse, yet they whine about not being invited places. Hmmm, I wonder why.
The humour...ummm was it even meant to be a comedy? I don't even think I cracked a smile at anything that happened. I get that humour is subjective but I seriously cannot think of one joke/funny moment in the whole movie. Oops.
Everyone in the movie acted stupidly unrealistic, I could not relate to any of them even though I am nearly the same age as most of them. That fight scene was one of the dumbest things I have every seen. The karate guy is somehow able to 1v6 a bunch of fully grown men who are twice his size. Like I get that he teaches tai chi or whatever but I am sorry this is not anime or Super Smash Bros, in real life he would get pummeled. And then the cops show up to see 6 unconscious men on the ground surrounded by a bunch of drunk teens and the extent to their investigation is just "They must've deserved it harharhar". Like the cops are just like "Want a ride home in a cop car?", uh okay never mind the guys that may or may not be dead on the ground or the hundred underage drinkers. What world do these people live in?
Was not terrible, but at the same time it kind of was. 4/10
The Secret Life of Walter Mitty (2013)
Boring. Predictable. Unoriginal. Barely even mediocre.
I could rant on and on about how this is nothing more than clichéd nonsense, but I will try to make this as quick as possible.
If you have seen any family Hollywood "comedy" in the past 15 years, you know exactly what's gonna happen, honestly. Now take the word comedy with a grain of salt because I don't even think I cracked a smile at any of the terribly unfunny PG humour. I don't get how anyone older than 10 can watch this movie and wonder what will happen in the end. Right from the get-go it was blatantly obvious that he would get the girl and he wouldn't lose his job. Any "conflict" or "tension" feels so fake and forced because you know nothing bad will happen to the protagonist (how dare a movie be original for once!?). I am not saying you are stupid if you like/enjoy this movie, I could see how it could be an okay family popcorn flick, but anyone who wants anything more than that will be horribly disappointed.
All in all, I just could not bring myself to enjoy it. It gains some points for some pretty awesome cinematography, and the acting was pretty good, but it just feels like I have seen this movie 1000 times already.
4/10
Evil Dead (2013)
First half was great, second half fell apart...
I would like to state that I have never seen any of the other Evil Dead movies (even though I definitely should), so I will be reviewing this as a stand alone film and not comparing it to the movies it was remaking.
In my opinion, this movie had a very solid first half. I even went into this movie with pretty low expectations after reading and watching some spoiler-free reviews that didn't give it very favourable ratings. The opening scene was pretty freaking creepy to me and it helped introduce the viewers to the concept of "possession" that they will be using in the film. It became apparent, the dark tone that the film was setting for itself right from the get-go and it complemented the film very well. The scenes where the demon was released and Mia getting possessed in the woods were really freaky in my opinion. The scares that they provided felt quite genuine and not tacked on. The movie was setting up rules for itself to follow later in the plot (an example would be "If the demon feasts on five souls, it'll get released from hell"), and at this point I didn't understand the criticism the film was receiving. The first two deaths were very gory and disturbing and the shock value added to the scariness of the movie. Sure, there wasn't all that much character development happening, maybe a plot hole or two, characters were making stupid decisions, but like 95% of horror movies are plagued with of all that but worse these days. I thought the movie was on the right track.
Fast-forward to right about after the second girl died and the movie was starting to go down the drain. Characters decisions became more and more dumb. Scares became cheap and tiresome. A bunch of random sh*t was happening and it actually started to become boring. Logic became less and less apparent (How did Mia speak completely fine in the grave when she cut her tongue in half with an X-Acto knife?). By the finale, the movie literally threw all of the rules it set for itself out the freaking window. I thought the demon need to "claim" five souls before it could rise from the ground? It only possessed four people and one of them got unpossessed (Mia) before it even came out of the ground. That's three souls, not five. Does that one guy who never even got possessed but burned to death in the house count? Because that's still four. Does the dog that Mia killed count?! God, if you're going to try to set up some weird demon logic for your movie, you should at least stick to it. Well, apparently the weird demon/abomination thing rises from the ground anyway for an epic final battle! Jk it's not epic, it's just predictable and boring. Mia rips her own arm off like it's made of mashed potatoes because the demon thing flipped a jeep on her arm. It ends with Mia killing the abomination demon (still don't even know what to call it) and walking off into the sunrise without one of her freaking arms. Are we expected to believe that there is any hope for her and she won't just bleed to death? The bridge was taken out by the flood and I don't think there are any accessible towns nearby. Oh yeah, and they tried to throw in some weird twist in the last 3 seconds by zooming in on the book flipping pages, like it did earlier in the movie when something bad was gonna happen. But it just felt so tacked on and lame. So yeah, to conclude, the second half was pretty terrible.
For some of the things I haven't addressed like the acting, score, atmosphere, and cinematography. Well the acting wasn't as bad as other reviews have stated in my opinion. Jane Levy's (Mia) performance was actually really good and Lou Taylor Pucci's (Eric) performance was also pretty solid. The three other actors who played David, Olivia, and Natalie, their performances ranged from good to mediocre. The score was nothing to remember at all. The atmosphere was actually very well done, very creepy and unsettling. And the cinematography was also quite impressive (for instance, the shots where it showed the demon chasing a character or going to a destination through the forest in first- person view).
All in all, it is an alright horror film. The first half was great, the acting was pretty good, it had a creepy atmosphere and the cinematography was quite impressive. But it was brought down by a tragic second half, some cheap scares, flawed logic, plot holes, forgettable soundtrack and its failure to stay consistent with its own rules that it set for itself at the start.
6/10
Låt den rätte komma in (2008)
Good, but overrated.
Don't really understand the overwhelming amounts of praise for this movie, it was decent, but that's about it.
I guess I will start with the things it did right in my opinion. The acting was very good, even the child actors pulled of really solid performances (child actors usually suck, let's be real). The emotions the characters portrayed felt real. The cinematography was good. And the atmosphere and score set a very dark tone which fit the movie very well.
For the things it did bad. Well first off, the movie got pretty boring at some parts. Like, I get it, you need to develop your characters, but there was so many scenes that were so unnecessary that just dragged the movie along at a very slow pace. There were a few characters that were introduced that had little to no effect on the plot at all and were just boring to watch and wasted time. Most unforgivable, there is literally no plot. What was I rooting for to happen? Where was the rising action? Climax? Falling action? It just seemed like a bunch of stuff was happening that didn't really correlate with everything else and I felt kind of unsatisfied when the movie ended. There was a lot of unanswered questions. Why was that one boy pretending to be Oskar's friend? I thought Eli left, why did she conveniently show up to save Oskar at the pool? And for a movie that was labelled as a "horror" movie, for me at least, I never felt genuinely scared throughout the movie and never felt sympathetic as the characters that died, you either wanted them to die, or just didn't really care much about them.
This movie did all the little things fantastically. Acting, cinematography, atmosphere, score, all spot on. But it was also riddled with many useless scenes and characters, barely even had a plot at all, and wasn't really scary. making it a slightly boring experience.
I would still recommend it for people who like romance or foreign movies (I don't really consider this a horror movie). 7/10