Tag: 2024

Dub’s Take: Deadpool and Wolverine (2024)

A spoiler-free mini movie review.

NO STAR RATING *

Actor-turned-filmmaker Viggo Mortensen says, “More and more…what passes for critical thinking in terms of reviews… having some understanding of film history, how movies are made—the level is really low. … It matters to me more…than as an actor because the fate of the movie…hangs in the balance as to how it’s received critically.”

On one hand I agree: modern accessibility in media production means that anyone with a passing interest in cinema & an opinion can produce a TikTok video, or free website (ditto), or novel-length Facebook post to showcase it. Film Criticism may be a category of Pulitzer, but Roger Ebert never bragged about his salary like Dan Bilzerian. On the other hand, even if I have the training (I’m a dropout), why would I want to apply Film Theory to a movie that doesn’t justify it?

I could not take one word of “Deadpool 3” seriously, to the extent I feel a shot-by-shot analysis is not necessary – nor do I think homaging “Intolerence” ever crossed the minds of Ryan Reynolds et al while they made it. I could be wrong, but you don’t get more High Concept than a superhero spoof: they’ve been making spoof movies for years, and Marvel needs one now more than ever.

But Deadpool 3 isn’t a spoof. This is a full-fledged Marvel Studios & Disney production, unlike its pre-merger forerunners. And – despite appearances from Jon Favreau’s Happy and the TVA, firmly mounting this instalment in the same canon – it’s so disconnected thematically from the rest, with it’s incessant fourth-wall breaking & non-sequitur humour, sickening violence (the fight in the Honda Odyssey), and litany of profanities, that I have trouble picturing the upcoming “Secret Wars” even using Deadpool at all, unless he’s toned-down by executive order.

Everyone else seems to love this one: “it’s just for fun, Warren”; “it’s some jokes & cameos, stop taking things so seriously.” I’m not a fan of Reynolds’ deadpan improv and that may be part of my problem. But I’m a fan of Hugh Jackman’s, and his appearance here screams a divorce-inspired desire for future financial security. One cameo was fantastic and another appeared stoned the whole time. As a motion picture, it looked, moved, and sounded fine.

No one cares what I think. Deadpool 3 and its box-office success is the contemporary poster-child of ‘critic-proof’.

*this is a reflection of my feelings towards the film’s posterity, and not the film itself. If I were to give D&W a star rating, it’d be a 1.

Poster sourced from impawards.com.

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Dub’s Take: Alien Romulus (2024)

A spoiler-free mini movie review.

1 out of 5

The trailer for “Alien 7” supplied plenty of expectations: that it would be another hackneyed interpretation of a beloved franchise’s Greatest Hits from “Evil Dead 2013” director Fede Alvarez (News Flash: it is); that it would have yet another underdeveloped White female character as the lead – unrelated to the others – who grows from meek to mighty by the credits (it does); and that it would favour fan service & exponential antecedence (not just one Facehugger, but a bushel!) over action scenes that last longer than a finger snap, and taking narrative risks like predecessors “Prometheus” & “Covenant” (you betcha).

But never in my wildest dreams could I have predicted what Fede did here with the teased returning (and deceased) legacy actor, brought back with the help of computers (and I’m sure a healthy donation to their late estate) only to serve as a literal talking head, “Futurama”-style. Even after running through all the major players from all six prior Alien movies in my head to guess who it could have been, I never considered the one it ended up being.

However, the real sin of this decision – aside from its contemptuousness – is that, without knocking David Jonsson’s turn as resident ‘synthetic’ Andy, Alvarez missed a huge opportunity in not bringing back Michael Fassbender’s David. The ‘black goo’ from Covenant plays such a crucial part of the story here that this one casting change could have given fans a cross-generational interpolation of both eras of the franchise, as well as a proper placeholder for the true “Covenant” sequel we never got.

Optimism-bias aside, I found Romulus boring. It’s such a pastiche of the prior films that it has no identity of its own, even copying its finale from “Resurrection”. Cailee Spaeny’s heroine Rain is another identical sibling to Katherine Waterston & Noomi Rapace, and just as superficial. New ideas – such as the cocoon sack and Facehugger evasion tactics – are invalidated by the movie’s nonsensical timeline (when did it make the cocoon?) and continuity cock-ups (the Facehugger swarm disappears from one shot to another). And the best summation of the film’s lack of action is that there’s an entire sequence inspired by the Sentry Gun from the inferior, meandering Special Edition of “Aliens”.

Romulus is short on thrills and heavy on dead, reanimated actors. Forget John Krasinski’s Rogers ad: AI will be replacing all y’all soon enough.

Poster sourced from impawards.com. What do you think? Were you baptized into Alien series snobbery by one of your parents, too? Do you hold out hope for Noah Hawley’s upcoming Alien TV series, even though I thought his “Fargo” show fizzled-out with that time-jump halfway through its first season? Have you also seen the first Alien film an excessive amount of times that you never want to see it again? Let us know in the comments, why don’cha?

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Dub’s Take: Horizon Chapter 1 (2024)

A spoiler-free mini movie review.

3.5 out of 5

In a 2022 interview, actress Emily Blunt said she’s tired of being offered roles for “strong female leads”: “I’m already out. I’m bored. … you spend the whole time acting tough and saying tough things.”

Blunt is not a candidate for a place in Kevin Costner’s Wild West, where the women hold themselves together in the face of relentless adversity. Of the major players in this, the first part of a planned four-part series, Sienna Miller, Jena Malone, and Abbey Lee leave the greatest acting impressions, even if the film’s three-hour runtime still manages to omit information about their backstories.

The greatest strength, then, of “Horizon Chapter/Part 1” was that I was OK with my questions going unanswered until the next film, or not at all. There’s a “flying by the seat of your pants” quality to the narrative, whereby Costner plunks us in the middle of a juicy patch of land in contentious Aboriginal territory, and lets the plot play itself out. In a way, it’s the perfect continuation of “Dances With Wolves”: there, Kevin rode off mid-mission only for a titlecard to inform viewers that the Indigenous genocide continued unabated. Here, the antagonistic Apaches are represented as a dwindling, dissented tribe, holed-up in the mountains, waiting for fate’s intervention.

In my review for Costner’s 2003 feature “Open Range”, I said it lacked the “Costner Factor”, likely due to a critically-induced restraint. By the Costner Factor, I’m referring to the audacity he shows by having his self-acted characters save women and dogs from drowning, fish dead bucks out of water, and drink their own piss. Say what you want about Kevin’s acting, but he’s fearless as a producer.

Here, Costner’s discipline could be laid at his 69 years, but he still frames shots in the curvature of a prostitute’s bust, gets laid even when his character doesn’t want it, and orchestrates at least two of the tensest scenes of encroaching violence outside of a horror film.

“Yellowstone” was good for about three seasons, coincidentally the number Costner was originally contracted for, but I stopped watching the latest when it was clear the show was spinning its wheels in the writers room. Horizon may be taking its sweet time in this first chapter, but I trust Costner more than Taylor Sheridan to carry me over the finish line.

Poster sourced from impawards.com. What do you think? Did you, too, think the “wagon trail” story – despite the promising ensemble of Luke Wilson, Will Patton, and Isabelle Fuhrman – is perfunctory in the face of the ultimate wagon trail simulator that is Taylor Sheridan’s “1883” (even if it was basically garbage)? How many takes of the “boob shot” did Kevin have to do before he got it “just right”? Was it necessary for Costner to use his kid in a short role, only for all the news reports about it to highlight that Kevin “went hard” directing him? Leave your comments below!

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Dub’s Take: The Exorcism (2024)

A spoiler-free mini movie review.

1 out of 5

For “Kingdom of the Planet of the Apes”, I wrote it was this movie season’s poster child for needing an apathetic studio executive to mercifully cut 45 minutes off the overlong film like amputating gangrene. Today’s “The Exorcism” is what happens when you cut too much: it’s abrupt; obfuscating; and, frankly, embarrassing.

The whole time I was trying to put my finger on exactly what wasn’t working: some lousy dialogue and CGI. But I wasn’t expecting a masterpiece: surely a one-star review cheesy lines & VFX does not make?

Nevertheless, events in The Exorcism transpire almost transitionlessly: Russell Crowe’s disgraced actor Tony Miller goes from recovering alcoholic to back on the bottle, and possessed, all in the first act; Samantha Mathis shows up for less than a minute as the executive for the comeback film Miller is working on, and ditto for Sam Worthington as his co-star; and the less said about the slapdash finale with a wasted David Hyde Pierce, the better.

There seemed to be enough working ingredients that either the story should have been told as drama (concentrating on the strained relationship between Miller and his estranged daughter in-and-around environments non-conducive to healing, like a movie set) or as a harder version of what we got here. For instance, Miller isn’t fired from the meta-film for almost three weeks, and by then he’s so far gone that he’s full-on contorting. Why wasn’t he let go sooner? This could have been solved by having a scene with Mathis saying they’re “over-budget and over-schedule” and another delay would kill the film, but it’s not here.

The Exorcism reeks of being hacked to pieces in post-production, when someone in a suit told the editors to concentrate on the horror instead of the plot. I’m not saying that a longer version actually exists, or that it would be better than what we got in the end: movies lose scenes in the filmmaking process all the time, and the public isn’t always privileged to the DVD leftovers. But I imagine another movie ten-times better lost in a warehouse somewhere: an allegory about moviemaking and how the script becomes its own monster and feasts on the egos of those involved, with Adam Goldberg (doing great work here as the meta-film’s director) the Machiavellian ringmaster.

There’s a more interesting film here that’s had its textured ends removed like calf testicles.

Poster sourced from impawards.com. What do you think? Were you also confused by The Exorcism’s humdrum poster & marketing? Did you, too, consider that it could be a sequel to Crowe’s other horror project from last year “The Pope’s Exorcist”? Is Russell Crowe still enough of a draw for you now that he’s in his career’s third act, that you’ll see a new movie of his based on his huge mug dominating the ads? Do you agree that Hyde Pierce’s amazing performance in 2010’s “The Perfect Host” means he could’ve, should’ve done a more convincing job here? Leave a comment below!

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Dub’s Take: Bad Boys Ride or Die (2024)

A spoiler-free mini movie review.

3 out of 5

“Bad Boys 4” must be the stuff professional movie critics dread: a campy action yarn neither ground-breaking, nor a colossal tire fire. Even without seeing every major 2024 North American theatrical release thus far, I have immense respect for working writers who can pump out 400-words-or-more per screening and still find things to talk about.

There’s much to like about the sequel: sleek cinematography that recalls Billy Gierhart’s direction on the “SWAT” TV show (swooping drone shots a go-go); a refreshingly easy-going Will Smith performance; and at-least 75% mindless entertainment. For most, that will be enough. But a side-story about Martin Lawrence’s Marcus having a near-death experience is too dour; there is wasted opportunity for more action when instead we get more bereavement; and even under two hours, it’s still a bit long. Everything is too long these days.

I don’t think Will Smith is a bad actor: maybe too focused – even in looser caricatures, like here – and his choice of roles is unvarying. Here, his Mike lacks metalepsis, but this is likely the most relaxed we’ll ever see him on-screen. Lawrence is also fine, but this time around, his Marcus is handicapped by a heart attack, and the film’s subsequent riffs on “Fearless” – such as trying to help Mike bond with his estranged son – are too on-the-nose for what’s supposed to be a high-concept action-comedy. The chemistry between the leads is still there thirty-years on (one need only watch the opening scene to agree), but I only laughed out loud once, and it was at DJ Khaled’s cameo.

Ultimately, Bad Boys 4’s visual candy is so sweet that it masks how the script doesn’t take any chances in the same way. Halfway through, the boys are targeted by every LA gang similar to “John Wick 4”, and the film sets up an alleyway confrontation that could have played like an ultra-violent “Anchorman” News Team showdown, but it ends before it begins. Mike & Marcus may be older, but that doesn’t mean the franchise needs to become more rooted in reality as a result.

Maybe swapping Smith’s & Lawrence’s roles for a new property would give everyone – actors & viewers alike – something different to chew on.

Poster sourced from impawards.com. What do you think? Do you think a 90-minute action-comedy where Will Smith plays the goofy Martin Lawrence character and Lawrence plays the serious Smith character would work, or do you think it could only sustain a ten-minute SNL skit? Does anyone even care about the Will Smith “slap” enough anymore – other than Smith himself – to draw parallels between it and Mike’s panic attacks in the film? Leave your comments below!

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