Mini Mini Reviews #2

“The Omega Man” (1971) – More or less, it’s a lame version of “The Last Man on Earth,” that exchanges all of its subtlety and tension for over the top goofiness and really poor effects. Grade: D+

“Moonstruck” (1987) – A very heartwarming romance with one of the more honest performances out of Nicholas Cage, while also proving how multi-talented Cher can be. Grade: B

“Cleopatra” (1963) – This should be the dictionary definition of extravagant and box office failure. The history behind “Cleopatra” is far more interesting than the movie itself, though that might be due to the four-and-a-half hour runtime. I wouldn’t have nearly as much problems with the film if it wasn’t the longest film I’ve ever watched and nothing about the film justifies that runtime. Grade: C

“The Death of Stalin” (2017) – A nice palette cleanser after “Cleopatra,” “The Death of Stalin” feels like the Russian equivalent of “Dr. Strangelove” focusing on incompetent idiots having to deal with problems they were never prepared for. Great dialogue, wonderful performances, and a hilarious pace that never lets up. Grade: B+

“Cornered” (1945) – A man travels to Argentina to find the Nazi who killed his wife, and the film utlimately becomes more about stopping that same Nazi from controlling some crime syndicate or something. It started out great and Dick Powell’s performance really captures the grief and pain he’s going through, but somewhere along the way the film loses its focus. Grade: C+

“Scoob!” (2020) – One of the best children’s movies in the last year, “Scoob!” is colorful, funny, loyal to the source material, and most importantly, fun. It takes Scooby-Doo to a more personal level than he’s ever been while still having a great sense of humor about it all. The opening is touching and the ensuing sequence where they remake one of the classic Scooby-Doo moments is great to see. Even though it’s aimed for little kids, there’s enough here for older fans of Scooby to enjoy this movie. Grade: B

“A Ghost Story” (2017) – Is it cliche to call this film haunting? One benefit I’ll give “A Ghost Story” is that, in the case of other thought-provoking indie films like “Under the Skin” I’d normally be bored out of my mind with so little happening in the film and even less pontificating. And while there are some annoyingly slow or nonsensical moments in “A Ghost Story,” the film really does drive home how distant, cold and worrisome death can be. It certainly has some bizarre artistic choices, but those choices do lead to a point that makes the whole piece worth it. Grade: C+

“Candyman” (1992) – This is a supernatural horror film way ahead of its time. Much like “The Twilight Zone,” “Candyman” uses myths and legends to talk about issues that plague society, and especially societies that often get unheard, especially in the 1990s. Wonderful writing, spectacular performances, some impressive cinematography, and horrifying effects, this one shows why the myth of Candyman has stuck with us for so long. Grade: A-

“I am a Fugitive from a Chain Gang” (1932) – For 1932, this film is as politically charged and controversial as Hollywood could be, taking a long, hard look at the dehumanization of the criminal justice system and how it defines those who have been in it. This film is brutally honest and horrifying for its time, but surprisingly thrilling, especially due to Paul Muni’s gripping performance as a man caught up in the mechanisms of a corrupt and petty form of justice, and how that changes him from the inside out. Grade: A+

“Horse Feathers” (1932) – Not the best Marx brothers comedy, but this one is certainly worth watching if only for the climatic football game where the brothers go all out. At times, it feels like a cartoon in how energetic and absurd they get. Grade: C+

“Gattaca” (1997) – A thought-provoking piece of speculative fiction, “Gattaca” explores every aspect of how humanity would change if we went all in on the genetic manipulation, both the good and the bad, especially how that would make the best of us possible but also create a new form of descrimination against those who didn’t have their genetics changed. It’s an effective triumphant story, sold by Ethan Hawke’s emotional performance, with some eye-opening world building. Grade: B+

“The Yearling” (1946) – This is your standard, run-of-the-mill boy and his dog story, except that it’s a baby deer instead of a dog, complete with a coming-of-age story about the boy fighting for his home and growing up a little faster than expected. The best part is certainly the boy’s father, played by Gregory Peck, who has the same likable charm we’ve come to admire from him in works like “To Kill A Mockingbird” and “Roman Holiday.” Grade: C

“Murder by Contract” (1958) – This is a barebones film noir about a hitman with a strict code that he adheres to, with a strange sense of superiority that gives him a rather cool edge. Aside from a memorable soundtrack and the coolness of the main character, this is your basic film noir. Grade: C+

“Da 5 Bloods” (2020) – Describing “Da 5 Bloods” as a strange mix of “Do the Right Thing,” “Apocalypse Now” and “The Treasure of the Sierra Madre” would not do this film justice. Much like all of Spike Lee’s best work, this film captures a great pain that is timeless in its relevance, in this case the mistreatment of black soldiers during the Vietnam War and how situations have not improved much since then. Most of this is sold through the tortured performance of Delroy Lindo, a man teetering on the edge of clarity and insanity, and a brilliant fusion of Fred C. Dobbs and Colonel Kurtz. It is eye-opening, impactful, thrilling, visually stunning, and it is Spike Lee in his element. Grade: A

“Underworld U.S.A.” (1961) – If “Mildred Pierce” is the perfect Mother’s Day film noir, then “Underworld U.S.A.” is the perfect Father’s Day noir, about how far one man will go to avenge his old man. What really hits home is that, while we never get to see the father alive, we see just how much he impacts our protagonist (Cliff Robertson) in his day-to-day life, making this a tribute to how much a father influences his son’s life in invisible ways. Grade: B

“San Francisco” (1936) – Aside from the spectacularly executed earthquake special effects and model use that followed that scene, nothing too extraordinary about “San Francisco.” Other than wanting to slap Clark Cable for being the most insensitive, smug, selfish prick on the planet, and that apparently D.W. Griffith co-directed it, which would probably explain why the film wants us to sympathize with the most unlikable man on the planet. Grade: C

“Tokyo Godfathers” (2003) – “San Francisco” could have learned a thing or two from this movie about taking characters that should be unlikable or despised and giving them dimensions, trauma and redemption. Everything about this movie flows together so perfectly, especially the broken homeless family healing each other through actions even they didn’t know they had in themselves. Grade: A-

“A Matter of Life and Death” (1946) – The best way I can describe “A Matter of Life and Death” is as a reverse “Wizard of Oz,” where real life is filled with bright technicolor and new opportunities to explore and love, and the fantastical is shot in black-and-white and is shown to be a dreary, monotonous bureaucracy. If you enjoy “Wizard of Oz,” you should definitely give this one a try. Grade: A-

“The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner” (1962) – Certainly the most angsty, rebellious British film I’ve ever seen. It shows a darker, more honest look at the impoverished side of Britain and the hardships that those people carry. Grade: C+

“I was a Male War Bride” (1949) – One of the better examples of a love-hate relationship I’ve seen in Hollywood movies, where both partners (played by Cary Grant and Ann Sheridan) constantly try to one-up each other in the most showoff-y way possible, which gets on the other’s nerves, while always going out of their way to help the other whenever possible. It is odd that the titular plot of the film, about Cary Grant having to pose as a war bride, only comes in the last 40 minutes, but this light screwball comedy still works throughout. Grade: B

“Chariots of Fire” (1981) – On the complete opposite end of the spectrum from “Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner,” this film is all about proper Englishmen and devotion to that prim and elegant lifestyle above all else. Still, the most interesting thing about “Chariots of Fire” was the soundtrack, mostly because the electronic 80s music feels so strange when used for a film set in the 1920s. Grade: B-

“Earth vs. the Flying Saucers” (1956) – What pushes this film above other 1950s sci-fi movies is a few things. Ray Harryhausen’s effects work on the flying saucers breathes new life into something we often take for granted now, the final battle on Washington D.C. still holds up surprisingly well, especially when combined with other effects that aren’t stop motion, and the romance between the two leads (Hugh Marlowe and Joan Taylor) is charming and never overbearing, making the two leads some of the more likable protagonists in any 1950s sci-fi movie. Grade: B

“The 7th Voyage of Sinbad” (1958) – Going in, I thought the only thing of note was going to be Ray Harryhausen’s stop-motion effects, but there are a few other stand out things about this epic fantasy. Namely, Bernard Herrmann’s score is as good as any of his music for Hitchcock’s films, atmospheric and adds a new sense of scope to the many monsters Sinbad must defeat. Still, the Harryhausen’s effects steal the show and take on a life of their own, especially with so many different monsters here, such as a two-headed bird, multiple cyclops, a swash-buckling skeleton, and a fire-breathing dragon. Grade: B

“OSS 117: Cairo, Nest of Spies” (2006) – To be a truly great parody, you have to love what you’re parodying. “Cairo, Nest of Spies” might be the best parody since “Airplane!” because it doesn’t just nail the aesthetic, camera techniques, green screen effects and fight choreography of the James Bond movies, but the views and attitudes of the time period too, putting Bond’s gross misogynistic and insensitive views on full display to show just how out of date they are, without having the dimwitted, backwards spy who doesn’t know any better come across as unlikable. This spy parody blows all of the Austin Powers movies out of the water. Grade: A

Movie Review - "Beneath the Planet of the Apes" (1970)

“Beneath the Planet of the Apes” is the most unnecessary bore I’ve ever seen. Not only does it repeat all of the same notes as the first “Planet of the Apes” for the first half of the movie, but does so without any sense of grandeur. Despite having a new man from our time, Brent (James Franciscus), discovering everything we already knew, he never looks any more interested than he would at the DMV, while never giving us any sense of a character or likability. It also certainly doesn’t help that he looks exactly like Charlton Heston, like the filmmakers wanted us to impose our feelings about Heston’s character onto Brent.

The film gets better in the second half, introducing the now-famous worshippers of an atomic bomb, but even then their behavior is wildly inconsistent and clashes with the ape storylines that it feels like it was taken from a different movie. And for what? An even bleaker and more depressing ending than the first film. At least that ending was shocking and put a new light on the entire movie. But this is just shocking for the sake of a shock. No reflection from the apes after getting undeniable evidence that there was an advanced civilization before them, no mutant trying to be anything more than cruel and manipulative or ever putting up a fight in the end, and no redemption for what’s left of humanity in the face of destruction. There is no message here other than humans are terrible, which shows how little thought was actually put into this movie.

Final Grade: D+

Movie Review - "All This and Heaven Too" (1940)

Yet another Bette Davis period piece and yet another film that meant nothing to me. But unlike her other period pieces like "Jezebel," I can at least point to the reason why this film doesn't work - the whole film is set around a French governess (Davis) recounting her life story and all the juicy drama that unfolded when she was the caretaker of a Baron (Charles Boyer) and his family, including the romance that slowly formed between the two. As Davis tells this story to a bunch of American school girls, she goes into explicit and surprising detail about everything that happened, including bits and pieces that she wasn't around for and could never have known about even if she asked. It's not just that Davis is an unreliable narrator, but a narrator who knows everything despite being the main character in a story that doesn't have her in every scene, especially key scenes that involve the Baron and his wife (Barbara O'Neil) in private. If you stop and think about how Davis knows all of this, the whole timeline falls apart. This is just another forgettable period piece that doesn't expect its audience to think about the story.

Final Grade: D 

Movie Review - "Terminator: Dark Fate" (2019)

The Terminator franchise really should have died after the second film. Not because they could never top "Terminator 2: Judgment Day" (even though they haven't yet), but because they haven't can't come up with anything new and end up redoing the same things again and again, only getting worse with each entry.

If you've seen or even heard of a Terminator film, you can guess the plot and most of the twists - in the future, mankind is fighting a war against an A.I. that became self-aware, who sends an unstoppable killing machine back to our time to kill an important member of the human resistance, while mankind sends someone else back to protect this important person from the Terminator. That idea hasn't changed at all since the first film, only a new person, a young Mexican woman, Dani (Natalia Reyes), and her protector Grace (Mackenzie Davis). And despite the inclusion of Sarah Connor (Linda Hamilton) to give her hardened, unwelcomed advice, she offers nothing to the plot, nor does she offer any real fan service and comes across as a forced, useless character, much like Arnold Schwarzenegger's part in the movie as a old T-800 who joins their fight.

Everything about "Terminator: Dark Fate" feels forced and repetitive, like they had to use the same plot points of saving the messiah or a good Terminator or else the movie wouldn't work. Even though we have a new protagonist, she has the exact same message about the how the future isn't written in stone that John Connor had. For a film franchise so fascinated with the future, it really has been stuck in the past since 1991. There are endless possibilities with a self-aware A.I. sending machines back into the past, like sending one back to protect a founding member of the A.I. while the humans send someone to kill him, but producers are so focused on the one idea of killing one person to stop the future that it has officially lost its luster.

Anything that could have been new or original about "Terminator: Dark Fate" is left vague or unexplored. Despite having all three main characters be female, it never does anything with that. They attempt to get Dani from Mexico City to America, and yet there are little to no comments about immigration and any scenes of Dani leaving her family behind are pushed aside when you realize her family is already dead. What could have been a better concept to explore was what the T-800 did after it fulfilled its purpose, but instead that's summarized in a couple lines about "adopting" a family that has no clue that he's a robot. Even the comedy is uninspired and lackluster, most of the jokes being so predictable or cringe worthy that it makes me wonder why they tried to be funny in the first place.

"Terminator: Dark Fate" is not worth anyone's time or money. It is a sad attempt to cash in on nostalgia and shows that the franchise hasn't changed in nearly thirty years and certainly hasn't improved either. It is predictable, boring and even questionable at times with decisions regarding the T-800's inclusion and the Terminator hunting down these women. Save yourself the effort and just watch "Terminator 2: Judgment Day" again - despite what "Dark Fate" tried to do, that film is a timeless sci-fi action masterpiece.

Final Grade: D

Movie Review - "Zombieland: Double Tap" (2019)

The name of the game in "Zombieland: Double Tap" is pandering. Nearly every joke is a rehash from the first film, or a not-so subtle wink at the camera moment for those who loved "Zombieland." This includes mocking of many tired catch phrases, including loads of jabs at "Time to nut up or shut up," parodies of their own characters, and going through all of Columbus' (Jesse Eisenberg) rules of survival over again, just in case you forgot them. Oh, and of course there's a big reference to Bill Murray.

This would be a problem if the plot actually made sense, but it all falls apart if you give it even the slightest bit of thought, especially in the third act. The majority of the film revolves around the four main leads from the last film trying to find some place to call home, and Little Rock (Abigail Breslin) finding it in the form of a hippie community that melts down all weapons and guns and literally sings pacifist songs despite the zombie horde outside that they attract with fireworks.

How these pacifists survived in a world overrun by zombies for this long is infuriating, but what's worse is that the filmmakers side with the hippies and that they shouldn't be killing the undead that are impossible to reason with and won't stop until they've devoured you. The main characters don't try to argue with the hippies either, they just seem to agree that they live better lives because they destroyed their only form of protection.

"Zombieland: Double Tap" is stupid. All the best parts are taken from the first film and the characters act like morons who just so happen to get everything to go their way. Any ounce of humanity from the first film has been lost to pandering.

Final Grade: D+ 

Why "Godzilla: King of the Monsters" Doesn't Work

When I first saw the negative reviews coming in for "Godzilla: King of the Monsters," I was dismissive and disregarded critics saying the film was bland and didn't deliver the goods. I thought these critics didn't know what they were talking about and that they weren't true Godzilla fans so they couldn't fully appreciate it like I could. How could any movie with a $200 million budget that has Godzilla, Rodan, Mothra and King Ghidorah be as bad as they were making it out to be?

But the truth of the matter is that I was letting my fanboy giddiness override my common sense. Most of the time, when critics universally bash a movie like "King of the Monsters," it is for good reason. But I refused to believe that anything that brought back my childhood nostalgia with a big budget and people who loved the classic Godzilla films as much as I do could be anything but awesome. There was never a doubt in my mind that this wouldn't be the best movie-going experience of the year...that is until our "characters" start forcefully explaining their emotional baggage to the audience like we're a bunch of toddlers who have to told every little detail.

Even for weeks after the film came out, I was in denial about the whole affair, doing my best to convince myself that there is something of merit in "King of the Monsters." Anything to justify the awe of seeing King Ghidorah and Godzilla fighting with all the weight and impact they've always deserved. After all, we live in a wonderful technological age where we can make a talking, violent raccoon who is best friends with a walking tree and make it look convincing enough to care about their bizarre but oddly heart-warming friendship. So of course I'd want nothing more than for a film that makes King Ghidorah more lively and deadly than he's ever been. It would not only satiate my deepest childhood dream of a big budget Godzilla movie that has loads of monster fighting, but it would get people as interested in the classic Godzilla movies as I am.

But now that enough time as past and I've re-watched the film at home, I can understand what those critics were originally talking about. I can only imagine this is the same feeling many Star Wars fans had coming out of "The Last Jedi" or the prequels - disappointment.

Frankly, that is the most apt word to describe "King of the Monsters." It's not the worst Godzilla movie, but I can't think of another film in the franchise that leaves a worst taste in my mouth. This film could have been something special, something that pleases both fans of the franchise and the general audience and reignited the love for giant monster movies that films like "Pacific Rim" and 2014's "Godzilla" have been trying to do for over five years. Instead, it's a mess of a film, confused in so many different ways and it's difficult to point a finger at exactly one thing and say that's what the filmmakers did wrong. What should have been the height of giant monster fights feels like a downgrade from those American films that came before it. There's even part of me that feels like the 1998 "Godzilla" is a better monster movie than this...until I remember how that film makes no sense and tell myself that both films have that in common.

So what exactly doesn't work about "King of the Monsters"? To be honest, I wasn't exactly sure for a while. So many problems all over the place, like trying to fix a house that no one has lived in for twenty years. There doesn't seem to be a root that connects all the problems of the film to one source, it's just spread out like shrapnel from a massive bomb. It was easy to point to the problems of the 2014 "Godzilla" - the bland and unemotional acting does not support the intense and suspenseful monster moments through the film, leading to a forgettable experience when Bryan Cranston or the monsters aren't around. But "King of the Monsters" doesn't really something like that.

Until I thought about the presentation of the movie and its structure and came to a more definitive conclusion - "King of the Monsters" is a bloated, over-the-top action movie, but Godzilla is not an action-based franchise.

"King of the Monsters" has more in common with the "Fast and Furious" franchise than it does with Godzilla. They're both loud, often obnoxious, replace any semblance of logical and intelligence with explosions and fast-paced action sequences and every character is either a walking cliché or stereotype or spouts nothing but clichéd one-liners that you only hear in an action movie. Everything is dumbed down to its most basic elements, like forgoing the inner battle between the U.S. government and Monarch about the secrets of the titans and the conflict of what should be done with them for the sake of humanity, or even the more primal conflict of realizing that mankind has so little control over nature and world when there's monsters out there that can destroy us without even a second thought. Just replace the fast-paced car chases with giant monsters, and that's "King of the Monsters" in a nutshell.

But the problem with this is that Godzilla was never solely about the action. Sure, monsters fighting monsters counts as action, but there's so much more to Godzilla than just kaiju brawls. The 1954 "Godzilla" is an allegory, not just for the horrors of the atomic bomb and nuclear testing, but the turmoil and pain of an entire nation after losing their identity and honor following World War II. "Mothra vs. Godzilla" isn't just about its titular monsters duking it out, but a message about distrust and hatred consuming mankind to the point of destruction and how easily greed can ruin not only one man's life but so many lives. This is what Godzilla is about, it is not an action franchise, but a monster franchise.

Or more specifically, a daikaiju franchise. This is a genre that is steeped in many other genres - monster films of old, like "Dracula," "Frankenstein" and "King Kong," horror, science fiction (in the same way as many 1950s sci-fi movies like "The Day the Earth Stood Still" or "War of the Worlds") and a dash of comedy every now and then. Throw in a bit more action than you'd see in other monster movies and a good helping of Japanese ideologies and you've got the daikaiju genre. I certainly wouldn't classify the Godzilla movies as strictly action or horror or sci-fi, but as a combination of all of them. Much like the debate that Star Wars isn't science fiction, I've come to the same conclusion in both cases - both Godzilla and Star Wars are so many genres that they create their own new genre.

So to see Godzilla reduced to nothing more than a dumb, brainless action movie that has nothing to say other than "giant monsters are cool" is more aggravating than I care to admit.

The filmmakers don't seem to think that the monsters are any more than vehicles to get to the next action sequence. Sure, the monsters have personalities, but they don't do anything other fight or get us closer to fighting. The biggest example of this is Mothra, who starts out fighting Monarch as they try to contain her for study, while introducing us to our plot MacGuffin, the Orca, and then does nothing until the third act when she's needed again. She then guides our "heroes" to the lost Godzilla, despite having never met Godzilla before, and then doesn't show up again until Godzilla needs help fighting King Ghidorah.

It feels pretty degrading when one of the most beautiful and poetic monsters of all time is nothing more than a plot device.

Part of the problem is dumbing everything down, almost like the filmmakers don't think that the general audience will enjoy a monster movie and just made a cliche action movie with lots of monsters instead. There is so much patronizing and condescending treatment of the audience that there's no room for the monsters to be anything other than action vehicles and plot devices. The previously mentioned scene of our lead mother and her daughter explaining their backstory and summarizing the emotional pathos of the movie is in extremely poor taste, since a lot of this information could come later in the movie in the more quiet moments. But instead, everything has to be spoon-fed to the audience, which only serves to make us seem like we can't appreciate more subtle moments and makes these characters unlikable assholes who talk down to everyone.

Speaking of characters, I don't think there's a single good character in this movie. Not that these actors don't do a good job, it's just that the material they have to work with is poorly written and contrived. Our main lead, Mark (Kyle Chandler), spends most of the movie hating Godzilla for killing his son and yet is eager to get back into helping Monarch track down these monsters and seems to know a lot of about Godzilla's behavior for someone who hates him. He often seems surprised by the presence of monsters, despite the fact that he made a device that allows humans to communicate with monsters. He goes back and forth between despising monsters and being curious about them that it makes him annoying.

Our "villain" is Mark's wife Emma (Vera Farmiga). She was also disturbed by the death of her son and decides to go the psychotic route and unleash all the monsters so that the world can be returned to a peaceful state where humans and monsters can exist together...except that the first monster she frees, King Ghidorah, is set on destroying the entire planet and has no regards for humans or monsters. Naturally, this causes me to raise a few questions, for example, why the hell did you release King Ghidorah, the only other alpha titan, first? Emma was supposed to know more about Ghidorah than anyone else, and yet she overlooked the fact that Ghidorah would bring about chaos and panic around the globe. Also, her plan of releasing all the monsters could have gone wrong so easily, like Monarch changing all her pass codes or locking her own or sending the military to each titan site to make sure she can't get in. But of course, this follows dumb movie logic and the only one who can stop Emma is Mark. Still, she has no fore-thought, just a dumb plan brought on by grief that she has no guarantee will work and a small band of mercenaries that aren't too keen on following her orders. Behold the definition of incompetent.

The third character stuck in the middle of Mark and Emma's awful characterization is their daughter Madison (Millie Bobby Brown), who is superfluous to the story and is only there to stare and yell at the giant monsters and be an annoying twelve year old. She's supposed to be her mother's emotional compass and point out when she screws up...except that the only time she does this is after King Ghidorah starts to change Earth's ecosystem and make all the other monsters serve him. At this point, Emma already knows how much she screwed up, so she doesn't need her daughter to tell her that she's a monster. Not only does this make Emma an even less effective villain, but it shows that Madison served to no purpose to the story. Mark could have gone to stop Emma without Madison around, and Emma's grief was fueled by the death of her other child, leaving Madison with nothing. The only thing she gets to do is be the annoying, bratty kid that only gets more annoying as the film progresses. She is this movie's equivalent of Miki Seguesa.

But those aren't the only awfully written characters. The honor of "worst character of the year" goes to Dr. Rick Stanton (Bradley Whitford), a character designed only to spew terrible, unfunny one-liners such as "My God...zilla!" The guy even has the gall to make a joke out of his colleagues sacrifice when he says that he got Godzilla "juiced." But the worst part of this character is just how gross he comes across, like he's getting turned on by all this monster stuff and makes the worst comment of the movie when Mark asks he's recording the arrival of Mothra and responds with "I record everything...EVERYTHING!" It's one thing to have a character who likes monsters more than other people, but it's another thing entirely when that same character subtly hints that he has hidden cameras in the bathroom and everyone's bedrooms. The fact Whitford said that he modeled his character after Rick from "Rick and Morty" says a lot about how unlikable and disgusting his character is.

Then there are small character things that really bother me, like Sally Hawkins character unceremoniously dying halfway through the movie. It's not even given the same gravitas as Bryan Cranston's death in "Godzilla" because they never bring up her character after she dies. And for Sally Hawkins to get treated like that after that emotionally beautiful performance in "Shape of Water" is just insulting. There's O'Shea Jackson Jr., who basically plays an even more dumbed down role of Will Smith's character in "Independence Day," reduced to just giving over-the-top reactions to all the crazy monster moments and has maybe two lines that he doesn't scream at the top of his lungs. Charles Dance plays the lead mercenary who has some interesting quirks, namely seeing humans as the evil ones destroying the planet while also selling titan DNA for his own benefits, but it's too bad he has about three minutes of screen time and he spends most of that making funny faces at Madison.

But here's the most damning thing of all, I could forgive all of these confused, poorly written and ill-conceived characters if they weren't the main focus of the movie. After all, this is a Godzilla movie that brings back three of his classic foes and allies, so surely that would be most of the focus...right? Nope, we follow these annoying, infuriating characters for about 90% of the movie. This is what those critics were talking about - the characterization is so terrible that it makes most of the movie hard to watch. We spend so much more time with this awful people that even the monster scenes aren't satisfying anymore.

To be fair, the reason the monster scenes in past Godzilla movies work so well is because of the balance between the monsters, the humans and the emotions. If it was all about the monsters, they wouldn't pack any sort of punch. Monster scenes work better when you know about the people those monsters are stepping on. But the flip side of that coin is that if I don't care about these characters, then I don't really care if they die or not. If the movie is going to do such a poor job of making them decent people, then at least give us some good monster action. After all, you've already got the templates for great monsters thanks to dozens of classic monster movies, it really shouldn't be hard to make monsters like Rodan, Mothra and King Ghidorah look amazing.

And yet, somehow, they screw that up too.

How they screw this up is incredibly simple - even when the monsters are trying to rip each other apart, the movie always puts these unlikable douches at the center of everything. We never really get a good moment of just Godzilla and King Ghidorah fighting without cutting back to what our "heroes" are doing, whether that's trying to escape, trying to find someone, spout more stupid one-liners or making comments on the fight. For example, the moment Godzilla and King Ghidorah meet is shown almost entirely from within the helicopter our characters are trapped in and how more difficult their survival gets when Godzilla kicks them aside and Mark gets trapped in a bunch of cables. Very little of the fight is shown because we spend more time watching Mark try to untangle himself.

Why do they spend so much time with Mark trapped in the helicopter? There's two classic monsters fighting each other not even a few yards away! Show that instead!

This gets even worse during the final battle in Boston. After nearly every punch from Godzilla or a bite from Ghidorah, they have to cut back to the humans so they can make some snarky comments. For every ten seconds the movie spends on the monsters fighting, there's another minute of Mark and Emma either running away from the action or trying to find Maddie. Hell, the city is in ruins and it looks like Hell is breaking through the streets, but they're practically driving through the neighborhood like they're out for a Sunday drive while O'Shea Jackson Jr. makes more comments about how he's glad Mark and Emma aren't his parents. Because that's why people came to see a Godzilla movie - for poorly written characters to bicker like a dysfunctional family.

None of the final battle feels rewarding or epic, because it continually cuts back to the human characters at the worst possible moments, never letting the cool moments play out. It never feels like a monster movie because it never spends enough time with the monsters. The only standout moment in the movie with a monster is when Rodan is chasing down the air force while they desperately try to get to King Ghidorah before Rodan kills them all. It is tense, atmospheric, plays up Rodan's size and speed, and might be the most visually pleasing moment of the movie, with little to no dialogue from our main characters. For once, everyone shuts up and lets the monsters be monsters.

If "King of the Monsters" had more scenes like that, I wouldn't be writing about why this movie doesn't work.

I should also point out another reason why most of the monster scenes lack the proper impact - they're unpleasant to look at. The primary colors of this movie are yellow and bright orange, mostly because of the fires from the smoking buildings and the storm that is always around King Ghidorah. While that is an interesting concept, it makes the movie hard to watch because of all the flashing lightning and swirling storm clouds. And if it isn't the unpleasantly colored storm, then the fights are always in the dark. I don't know why, but every American Godzilla movie has pretty much always been set at night. Why can't we see Godzilla in the daylight? Because that might make his fights easier to watch? Because then it wouldn't look like there's a piss-filter over the entire movie?

Due to the poor lighting and lack of focus during the fight scenes, we never get any good moments to take in the designs of Rodan, Mothra and King Ghidorah. We get a vague idea of what they look like, but nothing concrete. Mothra's design is hidden for most of the movie behind clouds and waterfalls, while Ghidorah's wings are always curled back like a dragon (something he never did in the Japanese movies). You never really get the impression that Ghidorah is bigger than Godzilla in this movie because he's always hunched over. While Godzilla's design is certainly improved from the 2014 film and they give him a nice aesthetic with his spines always glowing blue, they didn't do as well with the other monsters.

One thing that I'm on the fence about is the music. Bear McCreary scores the film and he uses the classic Godzilla theme song from the Japanese movies, as well as some older Mothra songs. This really does bring some extra weight and excitement to some scenes, mostly because Akira Ifukube's music fits so well with these monsters, whether they're suits or CGI. I can tell you most of the because moments with Godzila in this movie were because of the classic Godzilla theme playing in the background, making Godzilla seem even more grand in scale. However, not only did McCreary do nothing for the old Rodan or Ghidorah themes (which do exist in the Japanese movies), but there's one thing that often ruins the music - the choir chanting. For some strange reason, McCreary added a choir to the Godzilla theme song and it is the most distracting thing in the movie. It feels like they're cheering for Godzilla or trying to motivate the giant lizard who has no concept of cheering. His music would be phenomenal...if the choir was removed. There's a reason Ifukube never needed a choir for the Japanese Godzilla films, because the music alone carried Godzilla's weight.

But one of the more difficult problems to explain about "King of the Monsters" can only be described as Godzilla's impact being lost in translation. In this movie, and the 2014 film, while Godzilla is portrayed as an unstoppable force of nature, the impression is that he either fights for humanity or is a benevolent god that sympathizes with mankind. This was never the case in the Japanese films. Godzilla was many things in the Japanese films, but he never sided with the military or was ever effectively a pawn of the U.S. government like he is in "King of the Monsters." The implication is that, if we can't kill Godzilla then the government might as well try to recruit him and that is nothing like Godzilla. He's been a symbol of the unbelievable power of nature, an allegory for the atomic bomb, the turmoil and pain of those forgotten in World War II and even a protector, but he is not some ultimate weapon when all else fails. That is reducing Godzilla to nothing more than a plot contrivance.

It's one thing to make Godzilla a guardian of mankind and even a hero, but it's another thing entirely to make him a pawn of these awfully written characters. This is something that would never happen in the Japanese films, but has happened multiple times in the American films because of our pride and bravado - there certainly can't be something out there stronger than us or make us look bad, and even if there was then we can use that for our own benefit!

This is what I mean by "lost in translation." How American filmmakers interpret Godzilla and how he interacts with mankind is vastly different (and inferior) to how Japanese filmmakers interpret Godzilla. Because Japanese filmmakers respect the source material and have felt the weight of how much Godzilla has changed cinema in Japan. Even the more recent "Shin Godzilla" understood this and made a film that not only paid respect to the source material, but upped the size, scale and power to more modern sensibilities, and all to great effect. American filmmakers just see him as an icon of nostalgia at best, and dollar signs at worst. The respect for what Godzilla stands for is lost on American filmmakers.

Case in point - "King of the Monsters" is in love with the atomic bomb. A lot of problems in this movie are solved thanks to the atomic bomb, like bringing Godzilla back to life after being mortally wounded. Even an old reference to something even more powerful than the bomb is used, the Oxygen Destroyer, and that is heralded as a saving grace. I think this might be the most disrespectful thing about "King of the Monsters," the fact that our heroes never bat an eye over using atomic bombs, or something worse than the bomb, to save the day and sing the praises of the bomb and never once think anything bad about the ultimate killing machine. It comes across as the filmmakers being blind to the ultimate moral of the Godzilla franchise about the horrors of atomic bombs and nuclear testing.

This philosophy of the atomic bomb being a good thing in a Godzilla movie is unacceptable. We don't even get a moment of quiet reflection where anyone asks if this is the right thing to do, just diving straight into it. They might as well play the clip from "Dr. Strangelove" and have Godzilla riding a nuclear missile. Even in the 2014 "Godzilla," though they also used an atomic bomb, it was handled with the proper weight and emotion that it deserves, with everyone cowering in fear over what might happen if it goes off and Dr. Serizawa giving a speech about how they're courting with disaster. That film understood that the bomb isn't something that should be handled lightly, but here it's practically used as a joke or another plot macguffin, like all the other macguffins throughout the film.

It's easy for me to say that the filmmakers just didn't "get" Godzilla. The genre is wrong, the focus is wrong, the music is (sometimes) wrong, Godzilla's impact on the story world is wrong, the message is wrong. But the thing is that sometimes they did understand Godzilla. They wouldn't have made a movie with Mothra, King Ghidorah and Rodan if they didn't know about the legacy of these monsters. The basic designs of these monsters are translated well, especially with Ghidorah and Rodan and their mythologies remain intact for the most part. The filmmakers gave enough attention to detail with the monsters to show that they do care about showing why these monsters are so iconic to so many people.

Which is why "King of the Monsters" is such a big disappointment. This could have been the greatest Godzilla film, one that honors the legacy of so many classic kaijus and made them bigger than they've ever been. They had more money than probably every Japanese Godzilla film combined and filmmakers who love the source material, in an age where we can bring anything we could possibly imagine to the big screen. They had no excuse not to turn in something that would make long time fans pee their pants in excitement and the general audience love giant monster movies again.

But what did we get? A mess. A confused, uninteresting, poorly written, tonally mixed up, hard to watch mess that has more in common with cliché action movies from the 1990s than it does with any Godzilla movie. Anything of value is undermined by all these inept and inappropriate decisions to make Godzilla as American as possible. In an attempt to make a Godzilla movie that would appeal to the widest audience possible, they lost sight of what makes Godzilla the true King of the Monsters.

Movie Review - "Ready or Not" (2019)

The problem with "Ready or Not" is its inability to pick a genre and stick with it, opting to sometimes go strictly for a reverse home invasion story as the owners chase an innocent woman around their house, while other times going for comedy by making the owners incompetent, and other times going for grotesque horror with lots of blood, dismemberment and mutilation. The film never adequately delves into one of these to its fullest, and comes across as trying way too hard to be taken seriously when it all feels so shallow.

My biggest complaints stem from the ending and how it went against everything that happened in the movie up to that point. Without giving anything away, there's a late supernatural twist to a film never did anything fantastical before that point. There were a couple hints dropped about occult worshipping, but until the final 20 minutes that was played off for laughs at this crazy family's expense. It comes so far out of left field that it ruins the experience that came before it, turning what was a wacky race through a huge mansion into a brainless, predictable dump that would rather go for the big effects shot instead of something hilarious.

It would have been easy for "Ready or Not" to stick with either a thrilling home invasion with horror elements or a horror comedy that might even feel like a satire of other occult movies like "Rosmary's Baby." But instead there was no thought put into this and the film suffers for it. If the film had gone all in on one or the other, preferably the horror comedy angle and really sell how incompetent the bumbling family is, then this could have been a rare treat of horror, but instead this is a tired concept that doesn't take any chances.

Final Grade: D+ 

Movie Review - "Under the Skin" (2013)

Independent movies often feel like the closest cinematic attempts at art - films that are less concerned with dazzling or thrilling audiences, and more focuses on making them think, showing life or society or the human condition from an angle that would be otherwise impossible. As such, I think it's fair to give independent movies a bit more patience and understanding than a big-budget blockbuster as it develops these foreign concepts right before our eyes.

But that patience does have its limits. And "Under the Skin" crossed that limit multiple times over.

To say that "Under the Skin" is slow would be an understatement. The film moves at a painful pace, where I'm convinced that the filmmakers were testing the audience to see if they'd walk out of the theater after so little happened. It was more enjoyable to listen to a ticking clock than it was to watch an alien interact with humanity at a slow pace than slow motion.

Granted, I was onboard with the movie for the first 40 minutes or so, trying to piece together why Scarlett Johansson is luring men with her charms into a black abyss where they're consumed and Scarlett does the same thing many times, with varying degrees of success. There is very little dialogue and lots of scenes of Scarlett staring off into space while she tries to understand "the human." But the film continually tested this patience, repeating the same style of scenes three or four times with only minor changes, turning the intrigue and mystery into tedium and boredom. This is eventually replaced with Scarlett doing her best deer-in-the-headlights impression as she eats cake, tries to have conversations and watch television, all while the pace somehow goes from glacial to absolute zero. I swear that the last third of the movie is just Scarlett looking like she's watching a better movie going on behind the camera.

I get what Johnathan Glazer was going for, an unsettling, unpredictable life form going through baby steps of an entirely different civilization and their customs of eating, conversation and pleasure. It is not just foreign to this woman, it is other worldly. It's an alien attempting to be like us and an alien's interpretation of what humans must be like without ever directly giving her thoughts.

The problem is that this drags on and continually repeats itself far more times than it needed to. It gets to the point where it stops saying something and says nothing, especially when you just have your alien standing around doing literally nothing more than anything else.

While "Under the Skin" is certainly unsettling and even heart wrenching at a few points, I wanted to pull my hair out by the end of this movie. Nothing aggravates me more in movies than a film that feels it is so self important that it can just show people standing around for most of the runtime and call that "art." Even if the film wanted to say something profound, that means nothing if you can't keep my interest.

Final Grade: D+

Movie Review - "Five Easy Pieces" (1970)

I left "Five Easy Pieces" feeling the same as I did with "Easy Rider" - unimpressed and uninterested. From the beginning, I hated Bobby's (Jack Nicholson) casual berating of his girlfriend and general distaste for life. Even as his reasons for this behavior become more clear, there was no saving this character, especially when you add in your typical explosive Nicholson outbursts, only this time to people who certainly don't deserve any of this.

Maybe this just has to do with the way I was raised, but I've never enjoyed any movie where a character takes his/her frustrations and anger out on other people. There's never been anyway to justify this awful behavior and shows that our "hero" has no common decency. Maybe that's the point the movie is trying to go for, but at that point it's already too late - I've shut myself off emotionally from that character. If they can't show any emotion to others, why should I show any for them?

While this does lead to a few well-written moments of anger, especially while Bobby and his girlfriend are on the road, "Five Easy Pieces" never drew me in. It is a cold, ugly, uncaring movie that fumbles around with a message about damaged individuals without ever giving a clear answer. Other than the chicken salad sandwich scene, this one you can certainly skip.

Final Grade: D+ 

Movie Review - "Godzilla: Planet Eater" (2018)

And so the sad, disappointing and remarkably underwhelming animated kaiju trilogy comes to a close, not with a bang, but with a whimper. "Godzilla: Planet Eater" is more of the same we've come to expect from this series of poorly animated movies - a lot of posturing, angst from unlikable characters and treating Godzilla more like a mountain than an actual character or threat. The only difference with this one is that the filmmakers have stopped caring, much like the audience. Everything feels so rushed and thrown together haphazardly that feels like a big mess. I would say that's the perfect way to summarize this entire trilogy, but that would be speaking far too highly of it.

As a fan of animation, this whole series is an eye sore. Nothing in these films looks good and it never truly captures the scope and majesty of a monster that commands the entire planet. As a fan of Godzilla, this trilogy is as big of an insult as any of the worst films in the series, focusing more on emo punk characters and alien religions more than the reason audiences come to see these movies. As a whole, this is a trilogy I'd never recommend to anyone. Even if you like daikaiju films, stick with the worst of the Heisei and Millennium series before watching these.

Final Grade: D-

Movie Review - "Vice" (2018)

Between "Vice" and "The Big Short," I've can safely say that I despise Adam McKay as a director. While "The Big Short" just felt like a whole lot of nothing while being extremely pretentious about it, "Vice" wants to say something important but its presentation and attitude is so egotistical and condescending that it comes across as insulting. Even if everything the film says is factually accurate, McKay treats his audience like idiots that need to be reminded of how stupid they are. And while there are some standout moments and many solid performances, especially from Christian Bale and Amy Adams, I can't say that I'd recommend this film to anyone. "Vice"'s mission seems to be making everyone feel bad about themselves, mostly for letting Dick Cheney happen and for not seeing it coming. It's like a stuck-up jock that just read a book about the George W. Bush presidency and won't leave you alone until you agree with his overly negative opinions.

Final Grade: D+

Movie Review - "Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Gindelwald" (2018)

 

 

If you were expecting more of the same from "Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald" you will be sadly disappointed, much like me. The film lacks most of the charm of the first film in this new Harry Potter franchise, or the magic of the Potter franchise in general, relying more in weak character development and far too much world building for its own good, given the limited time and scope.

What I enjoyed the most about "Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them" was how relaxed and fun the whole adventure felt. The magical creatures were all inventive and felt wholly unique from our world, while still taking the time to explore what makes them so special and how to befriend them. To add to this, we had the best character in the history of the Potter series - Jacob Kowalski, the muggle with a heart of gold and takes everything the magical world throws at him in stride. In a way, the audience is Jacob in the first film.

But those elements are severely downplayed in "Crimes of Gindelwald" and it only hurts the movie. While it has a few of the same magical creatures from the first film, they hardly get any screen time and don't do much outside of being pretty CGI eye-candy (CGI-candy?). There's only one new magical beast, and while it is given a bit of development, it hardly makes up for the lack of other magical animals. Jacob, on the other hand, returns but gets very little to do. He isn't even given much to react to, since he spends most of his time in a normal house.

What "Crimes of Grindelwald" offers instead of this is a confusing story with far too many characters for its own good, each of them trying to become fully fleshed out characters, with erratic pacing that will give most people emotional whiplash near the end of the movie as it speeds towards a nonsensical climax between its group of rouge wizards and witches fighting the evil Grindelwald (Johnny Depp) as he tries to take command of the magical world so that they can rule over both the magic and non-magic world.

The film speeds along far too quickly for anything to either connect with the audience or make sense, as many plot points are dropped in rapid succession. It is also never clear who is working for which side near the end of the movie, especially characters like Leta Lestrange (Zoe Kravitz) and Thesus Scamander (Callum Turner), brother and arch-rival of the main character Newt Scamander (Eddie Redmayne).

All of this turns what could have been a relaxed and fun fantasy adventure into an overly dark and complicated drama that it really didn't need to be. There are far too many twists and turns, when the story works best when it just builds off the simple imagery of magic in our world. There is little fun to be had with "Crimes of Grindelwald," which is the biggest strike against it.

The performances are the only thing working for the movie, especially from actors like Alison Sudol as Queenie Goldstein and William Nadylam as Yusuf Kama, both being far more emotionally gripping than I would have expected. But beyond this, "Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald" has no magic to speak of, focusing on the wrong things and going far too much in the direction of dark and complex in this mystical, fantastical world.

Final Grade: D+

Hundred-Word Review - "Venom" (2018)

 
On some level, I compliment the filmmakers of "Venom" - clearly they were given the impossible task of making a movie about Spider-Man's most well-known villain without ever mentioning Spider-Man. The problem lies in the execution - Venom is not portrayed as an antagonist or anti-hero, but unlikely superhero, but without any flare or joy for the source material. The actors are giving it everything they have, despite the nonsensical screenplay, abysmal CGI, and everything else working against this movie. This movie reeks of studio interference as it harkens back to the terrible superhero movies of the early 2000s, like "Daredevil" and "Catwoman."

Final Grade: D+

Movie Review - "The Predator" (2018)

While I've never been a big Predator fan, I was onboard with this movie when I learned Shane Black was writing and directing it. The man behind "Kiss Kiss Bang Bang," "Iron Man 3" and the writer of the "Lethal Weapon" movies, Black has always found that perfect middle ground between intense, gripping action and sharp, witty dialogue and making both feel seamlessly intertwined.

Unfortunately, that is not what we get in "The Predator." Instead, we get a muddy, disorganized and hateful movie that doesn't feel connected to the Predator franchise at all. Unfunny and over-reliant on CGI gore, this doesn't even work as a popcorn flick.

The purpose of this movie feels unclear and unfocused. In this tale of Predators arriving in a southern suburban town on Halloween and the group of mercenaries and scientists tasked to take them down, they switch wildly between making these characters relatable and loathsome, trying to play off undesirable behavior as quirky without any explanation or analysis. The filmmakers also seem to forget why these aliens came to our planet, as their motivations swing as much as the likability of our leads. This contributes to an overwhelmingly confusing mess of a gorefest.

The only redeeming qualities are Jacob Tremblay as the main character's autistic son, who gets the most development without shoving autism in the audiences' face, and the mythology building it does for the Predator race by giving them more of a reason to hunt besides the thrill of it. These two elements work even better as they come together to make a fascinatingly positive message to those who deal with autism. While it may not have much else going for it, at least it treats Jacob Tremblay with respect. Even if the action sequences are laughable, the underlying theme is strong.

Final Grade: D+ 

Movie Review - "The Spy Who Dumped Me" (2018)

To be honest, the only reason I went to see "The Spy Who Dumped Me" is because I genuinely find Kate McKinnon to be hilarious in everything she does and because of my celebrity crush on Mila Kunis. On paper, this film seems like a winner - a funny yet tense thriller in the same vein as "Spy," with Mila Kunis and Kate McKinnon running around the globe. Yet this film finds a way to take all the fun and appeal of these two lovely actresses and turns it into a tedious, mean-spirited waste of time.

The biggest problem with "The Spy Who Dumped Me" is that it doesn't know what it wants to do with its two main leads, switching wildly between dead-serious spy action sequences and dirty toilet humor while never stopping to give these girls some traits or personality. Kunis plays Audrey and the only thing we learn about her is that she never finishes anything, while McKinnon plays Morgan who is like if Daffy Duck was reincarnated in the body of a woman and was way too personal with everyone she met. Beyond these quirks and tiny snippets of character, the film never offers a reason for why they act this way or why they would go all around Europe, aside from the script telling them to.

Another problem is the whiplash between its constant genre switching. It's not just that the action and comedy don't compliment each other, like they do in "Spy," but that they're both so off-putting when done back to back. It's night and day between its gritty, gruesome action sequences and fourth-grade level humor, and it's hard to get a read on what this film was going for.

The only thing the action and comedy have in common is that both are unbelievably mean-spirited. In every action sequence, blood and violence is used in extremely graphic detail, while many characters are beat-up or killed for no reason other than to have a body count. The comedy doesn't fair much better, as Audrey and Morgan ruin as many lives as they can throughout Europe without any concern for others. It comes across as the filmmakers having no respect for humanity, especially when our heroes are just as despicable as the villains.

It's hard to get invested in any of this movie when there's more bloodshed than a slasher flick, worse humor than an Adam Sandler comedy, and no redeeming qualities to its cast of characters or their journey.

Even if you like Mila Kunis or Kate McKinnon like me, don't waste your money and time on "The Spy Who Dumped Me." This is a dull, unremarkable film that can't make up its mind on what genre it wants to be and doesn't bother to give its leads any character. While Kunis and McKinnon do well with what they're given, this is overshadowed by how ugly and horrific this film can be, always to unnecessary levels. If you want a good spy thriller, save your breath on this one and go see "Mission: Impossible - Fallout" again.

Final Grade: D+

Movie Review - "Cheyenne Autumn" (1964)

"Cheyenne Autumn" is another case where the story of how the film was made is far more interesting than the film itself, much like "Spartacus." This is the last western that John Ford ever made and was based on the true events of Northern Cheyenne Exodus of 1878, as group of nearly 200 Cheyenne Native Americans marched from their designated land in Oklahoma, given to them by the American government, back to their homeland in Wyoming.

Ford chose to make this his last western as a way to apologize to the Native American community after decades of portraying them as the heartless villains in his other westerns, such as "Stagecoach" and "The Searchers." Instead of the rugged cowboy risking his life to save a town or a girl from the clutches of the evil Indians, the roles are reversed - The Native Americans are the heroes for fighting for what they believe in, and the cowboys are the villains for trying to stop them.

That being said, "Cheyenne Autumn" takes a lot of artistic liberties with history, namely the path the Native Americans take to get back home being vastly different and the many side plots of other forces trying to stop them outside of the U.S. cavalry. And although Ford made this film as a way to show his love and passion for the Native American people, it is not without the Hollywood touch that tends to be a bit racist. Namely, several of the lead roles for the Native Americans are played by non-native actors, with the biggest one being Ricardo Montalban played Chief Little Wolf and Gilbert Roland as Chief Dull Knife.

So the whole idea of racial equality is muddy and unclear with this film - it's hard to promote a message about the power of Native Americans when you don't cast native actors in the lead roles.

Beyond this, "Cheyenne Autumn" has no sense of direction or plot. Large chunks of the film are dedicated solely to side plots that never connect to the main plot. This includes a nearly 20-minute sequence involving an elderly Wyatt Earp (played by Jimmy Stewart) hanging out in a saloon and playing poker. Earp never meets up with the Cheyenne, nor does anybody in the town he's in - it's all just comedic filler. Even the presence of Jimmy Stewart in this role doesn't help the meandering plot and dull pacing. But the biggest offender of this huge scene is that it isn't funny, thus wasting everyone's time in a film that's nearly three hours long.

As the final western made by John Ford, it is admirable to make this film as an apology to those who didn't need to be portrayed as the villains. Ford was the one to start the trend of Native Americans being the antagonists in most westerns, which would lead to so many things about cowboys and Indians. So to see the same man that started this trend come forward and say it was wrong of him to do gets my respect.

However, beyond this, there is nothing special about "Cheyenne Autumn." It is dull, without emotion or passion, and is a sign that the western genre was dying as the energy and flare for the dramatic is missing. If you're curious about this film, it's better just to read up on the behind-the-scenes than it is to actually watch this film.

Final Grade: D+

Movie Review - "Tag" (2018)

Truth be told, the only reason I went to go see "Tag" wasn't because this story of grown men playing tag every year for 30 straight years, but because this true story is based in my hometown of Spokane, Washington. To my recollection, this is the first major picture to be based in Spokane since 1985's "Vision Quest" with Matthew Modine, so I was excited to see how they would portray the town I live in on the big screen and if they would show off it's great beauty and wonderful sights, giving this worldwide audience a glimpse of what makes the Inland Northwest so special.

Unfortunately, the most we get is a title card that says "Spokane, Washington" and a banner that shows off the Spokane Lilac Festival. Other than that, it looks like they filmed this whole thing in California, not Washington. There are plenty of opportunities to reference iconic Spokane landmarks, like a bar they go to that isn't an actual bar in Spokane (could have gone with Jack and Dan's) or a country club in "Deer Creek" (there's a small town outside of Spokane called Deer Park, so I'm not sure why they didn't go with that). There are no landmarks addressed in the downtown, no establishing shots of Spokane, and they don't use the city landscape as their personal playground.

Like most movies that claim they're set in a smaller town, the film crew goes nowhere near the town it is set in and try to pass off northern California as any place they want it to be. Hollywood has always done this, but it just feels like a betrayal when you're on the receiving end.

Beyond this, "Tag" still isn't any good and fails to put its unique premise to any entertaining use. It is an unbelievably mean-spirited movie that never tries to give its characters any sort of redemption or likeable qualities other than being the butt of jokes. "Tag" never seems to be interested in the spirit of why these men go to such lengths to tag their friends, including dressing up as elderly women or hiding in the trunks of their cars. Instead, that's replaced with a competitive sense of victory, in a game that has no winners, only losers and non-losers. In fact, that's what all of these characters are - losers.

In this tale of the same five boys who have been playing tag since 1983, four of them decide to pool their talents and work together to bring down Jerry (Jeremy Renner) who has never been tagged in 35 years. These guys not only show up to Jerry's wedding uninvited, but do everything they can to sabotage it in an attempt to make Jerry "it." You'd think this would endear us to Jerry, since he's done nothing but expertly avoid his friends all this time, but then he does equally despicable things, including threatening to kill a man so he can spend the next month in jail where he cannot be tagged.

I get that these men are supposed to be competitive and quick thinking - you'd have to be after playing the same game for so long. But each of them don't treat it like a fun competition. They act like this is a life-or-death matter, as if something massive depends on the outcome of this game of tag.

Each of these men does terrible things over the course of the film that made me hate each of them, except for Sable (Hannibal Buress) who is there for comedic relief only. Ed Helms plays Hogan, who ditches his family, job and life hundreds of miles away from "Spokane" for several weeks. Jake Johnson plays Chilli, who openly lies about his relationship with his wife (at one point saying she's dead, while another time saying they're divorced when they're not), while also mooching off of everyone else around him. Jon Hamm plays Callahan, who may seem like the stiff business man on the outside, but has been in a love triangle with another woman and Chilli since they were kids. Both him and Chilli continue to act like children around her and never commit to their feelings, especially when this woman is fine with being romantically involved with both men. At one point, all of these men combine their terrible qualities as they nearly torture an innocent man just to find out where Jerry is. It's not just that these men treat life like a game, but that they have no remorse or concern for others while acting like petulant children.

Overall, there is very little funny or entertaining about "Tag." Outside of Hannibal Buress' unique style of comedy and Isla Fisher being her typical over-the-top self we came to love after "Wedding Crashers," it never comes across like anyone is having fun. Each character is so wound up so tight into this children's game, there's no joy in any of it. Even then, they're all so unlikable and mean-spirited that it's hard to root for them in this game. While I went into this movie to see how Spokane would be represented, I was unfortunately disappointed by nearly everything about "Tag."

Final Grade: D+