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Reviews
Big (2023)
A tragic rollercoaster ride through all your emotions
I went in to this not knowing anything about the movie. In the first 3 minutes I told my wife who was going to live and who was going to die. (I was correct.) By the end of the movie I had so lost myself in the characters that, live or die, I cried for each and every one.
Few movies have such rare emotional impact that days later you find yourself affected still. This movie made me rethink so many things. Life, death, what I do with my time, and do I say "I love you" enough? It's that powerful.
We follow the lives of 9 "Families", or rather 8 families and an orphan. Throughout the course of the movie, their lives intertwine and connect to the point that where one family rejoices.... they all rejoice.
Conversely..... where one family is devistated, they all feel the pain. Such as one husband and wife wherein their childs death (notice, no pronouns, you have to face this on your own) breaks them. Going in to room 816, real late at night, to retrieve their child's possessions, the wife completely breaks down --- waking up all the children and the parents staying there --- and we watch as all of the kids and parents come along side this grieving couple to lift them up. It is both heart-wrenching and touching at the same moment.
The real-life honesty is refreshing. Not every child is saved. Several die. This is how life is. We are not watching a fairytale with nice neat Hollow-wood bows and ribbons. This is visceral to the deepest level. Something the American movie mongols have forgotten.
I don't want to spoil the movie, but I will give you several pointers that will help understand what you are seeing.
1) the cartoon war --- is representative of the children's battle with leukemia or cancer. The big blue giants are actually the disease.
2) The monkey is important. I won't give it away, but it blew my mind when I finally connected the dots.
3) Beatifully done.... The guitar girl alternates between colored wigs.... BUT.... there's a point where that stops and the importance is key.
4) bring a lot of tissues / kleenex. You are going to need them. I didn't and my shirt paid the price. By the end of the movie, my sleeves were damp from my tears.
I have not given very many 10 Star ratings. Honestly, this one earned it. I went in expecting to be entertained. I left feeling that a piece of my very soul had been left behind. You'll do well to find a way to see this masterpiece of cinema.
Awake (2021)
It's a far better movie than most reviews let on
Having once spent 42 consequetive hours awake, I understand far better than most all reviewers what the premise of the movie leds to. It's not easy to go without sleep, and the things it does to your brain --- the tricks your mind plays on you --- is not quatifiably demonstrable. That said, the movie actually does a far better job of presenting the facts as they would be.
If you had only 4 days to live --- and knew that everyone else was going to die with you --- what information becomes most important to leave forward to your children who might survive?
You can summarize the entire movie in that question. Most of the other reviewers seemingly die on the question "where's the science?" forgetting that this is not a science movie --- it is a science FICTION movie, grappling with odd concepts and grabbing at possiblities that we're often not prepared to consider. So if you were to pass on IMPORTANT knowledge to your children..... what would you give them, in only 3 days time?
Would you tell them to burn all the books?
Books have a way of codifying information that might not always be factual. This point is made clearly in the escaped prisoner's rant.
Would you teach them the dewey decimal system to make finding information easier?
You're assuming that libraries will survive.
What information would you pass along in only 2 days?
Would you teach them how to drive a car? Would that really be important? How are they ever going to keep an internal combustion engine working? So many moving parts, only one of which needs to break.....
If only 1 day remains, what's important?
You can tell your children "I love you" all you want --- but that's not going to help them hunt for food... stay safe in a blizzard.... how to swim....
Most every reviewer myopically focuses in on the action.... or the plotline..... forgetting the actual premise. In actuality, that's where death comes in --- by becoming so myopically focused on particulars that you lose / lost sight of what's really going on. What's really important.
One hour remains..... what do you teach your children? How to open a can with a can opener? How to fire a rifle? What medicine to take for when you've got a fever? How to use a menstrual pad?
I found this movie to be fascinating as well as terrifying. I found this movie to be just as good as "Children of Men" --- another movie talking about the end of all life as we know it. And the questions it raises.... were well worth considering.
Black Mirror: Loch Henry (2023)
Not really Black Mirror material
I love the technology angle of all of the previous episodes of Black Mirror. It's fascinating to watch how we use technology... and then find it using us. Manipulating us. Driving us.
Yet this episode is sadly out of character. It's a strange murder mystery / horror tale that really feels out of place. After watching... I thought, "This could have been a bad episode of American Horror, and it would have worked better."
Sadly, Netflix, or whoever is fostering the show, chose to throw it in here where it makes no sense.
And there are loose ends to this that never get resolved. What happened to Pia? Why does Davis seem out of place in the ending? And moreso, how do you live with the knowledge of.... being the son of.... yeah, quite a few questions and loose ends here.
If they had moved this to another TV show, a horror show, I might have given it a higher rating, but as it is... they filmed it as a Black Mirror piece, and as such, it stank. It failed to really reach the levels that so many other Black Mirror episodes do with making us think and reconsider our technology-bound lifestyles and their potential futures.
The acting was decent. The Story was OK. The placing was horrid. And the plot conclusion left me puzzling over what I had just watched. Give it a hard pass, there's nothing to see here anymore.
Did it do the same for you?
Travel the Road (2003)
Painful to watch, even moreso given their naivete
What you essentially have here is two friends going on vacation and calling it a missionary trip. There is no preparation. There is no plan. There is no direction. Just hit the road and look for a destination along the way.
Sadly, they endeavor to lay this debacle at the feet of God and make Him the author of this mess. That's not atypical of the modern church's approach to evangelism where everyone is taught to drop "Bible bombs" hoping something connects. John 3:16.... POW!! John 3:16.... POW!!! John 3:16.... POW!!! Strafing runs for Jesus.
What makes this painful to watch is how clueless the audience is to the message. They go forth preaching in English --- as though that was the universal language and everyone understands it perfectly. You can see the confusion and mocking laughter on people's faces all throughout this documentary. One would think that, given the message's importance, they would take the time to make sure it's clearly understood. Nope.... Our vacation for Jesus is not going to be hindered by attempting to find a translator in advance. Clearly these two have never read 1 Corinthians 14:9-10.
I found this Documentary on DVD back in 2007 in a used CD shop in South Dakota. In 2009 I left America to become a missionary myself. I've been on the missions field for 15 years now... because I've invested my life into something I believe is of paramount importance. I've never been back to America, I will probably die here on foreign soil... like the honest missionaries who came before me. True missions work costs an investment of a life.... not a summer vacation.
These two.... invested little and took photos along the way, assuming that God would foot the bill of their travel. True evangelism isn't met by those seeking to profit from the documentary rights... just saying.
How I Caught My Killer (2023)
1 good episode, 8 tragic tales I found boring.
There's an underlying theme to this show that doesn't get spoken about. Since they don't want to openly tell you going into it... I'd simply say, don't bother watching.
1 story of a marine killed in the late 1970's drew me in and held my captivation. It was the only tale here that seemingly broke the mold of this series. Don't get me wrong, every episode is pigeonholed into the same trite and boring pacing. This definitely ain't CSI. But since it was the first episode of them all, it worked better than having it repeated over and over until the formula sickened me.
The other 8 episodes, I begrudgingly watched. By the last one I really just wanted to puke. Why does this even matter outside of the family members and friend who remembered the victims? Would this person have ever impacted my life had they lived? Doubtful, on a huge scale.
Overall, in the pattern of hits or misses with crime shows, this is a miss. Don't waste your time, trust me, there are much better things to do.
Dopesick (2021)
Amazingly well done, well scripted, well acted TRUE story
Everything here is fiction... except that it's not. What plays across your screen is one of the finest TV shows you'll ever watch.... and yet it's likewise the daily stories of millions upon millions of doctors, patients and drug-users across America for the last 30 years.
What makes this show a fascinating binge-watch is how well it carries you along -- swiftly shifting between the 1990's and then, into the early 2000's when the prosecution was making their case against Purdue Pharma. One moment you're watching a small town doctor being told that OxyCotin is the new miracle drug in pain management and the next your in a courtroom where federal agents are pushing for the documentation on Big Pharma's marketing campaign.
I didn't know what I was getting into when I started the show. I didn't come here for Michael Keaton, though I do love his acting. I came from curiousity about what the show was about. "Dopesick" didn't really give me a reference point as to an actual subject.
I jumped in cold and 5 hours later I'm here, writing this review. It really had that kind of affect on my thinking, moving me to want to explain what 294 other IMDb users have before me. My review is not unique... it is simply honest. Something Purdue Pharma has been anything but.....
I do believe that if Dante were to write his epic tale about the levels of hell.... there would be a 10th one added, for those who prey upon society merely for financial gain. And this TV Show gives you anger --- unbelievable anger --- to ignite the passions against such people who would belong in hell for their carefree destruction of so many lives.
The Most Hated Man on the Internet (2022)
Truely scary material when you honestly think about it.
I've been on the internet since the AOL days... a long, long time ago. I learned even back then that people can put on a facade --- and you'd never know real from fake. Ultimately, though, even if they pretend to be something else, it's still themselves they're exposing.
Hunter Moore wanted to "pretend" innocence. He wanted to assume a persona where he could hurt others and laugh at their expense without reprecussion. Thing is, the more you wear a mask, the more the mask actually becomes who you truely are. The fake becomes the real. The "faux" bully becomes the real bully. And that's the way of it.
The documentary exposes how much of a bully Hunter Moore honestly was / is. It takes us step by step on how the website came to be, how it grew into a monster, and how, at the heart of it all, was Hunter uncaring, unmoved by any sympathy and in the end --- how he paid for being the monster he'd grown into.
Most reviewers want to say that this is a lesson on not posting stupid stuff on the internet. They're missing the point. The real lesson here is that our culture wants to reward the bad-boy and so we "pretend" to be that.... not even aware of the fact that the more we play this game.... the more truely despicable we actually are. Hunter played the bad-boy.... and it cost him several years of his life in prison. If you think that's "fun" --- If you think Hunter is admirable and someone to follow --- then you really haven't paid attention to the real cost at the end of that road.
What is actually unsettling in watching this is not the damage done to so many lives, but rather, seeing how many people sidled up to Hunter --- whether claiming to be part of his "family" or by simply making a spiteful comment at IsAnyoneUp --- how many people are actually that rotten to the core.... and don't even see it. And probably don't even see it after reading this.
Jupiter's Legacy (2021)
Secret Sex Lives of Super(?)heroes
I am only 5 episodes into this and I've already grown tired of it. It has a wonderful premise... an intriguing story & backstory... and some interesting characters. It has an odd way of putting things together, but I can follow it.
What kills me is the "Plot - Action - subplot - Sex - plot - Action - sex - subplot - sex" chronicling of the story. It's as if the director decided he wanted to film porn instead of TV.
Others might find this sort of thing engaging, me, I find it rather offensive and unappealing. I don't need soft-porn thrown in my face in order to be entertained. If I wanted that, I'd drop the TV and go to the bedroom with my wife.
Suffice it to say --- Netflix cancelled the show, because of lack of interest. I'm really starting to see why. If you want an engaging, thought-provoking, imaginative superhero story try the Umbrella Academy instead. At least they seem to know how to weave a story and keep it to what matters to compel the narrative forward.
The New Mutants (2020)
Falls flat on every level
Back in 2018 when I first heard about this movie, I was excited. I had read all of the New Mutants series, and the source material was an amazing run of comics.
Then came the first teaser.... WTH???? Since when did The New Mutants become a horror story? The more news that came out over the years, the less and less it seemed like this was THE MARVEL UNIVERSE and more like something straight out of Mojoworld.
I finally got to see this farce on DisneyPlus and.... wow.....what a messed up piece of "Jobby" this movie turned into. Even with the talent of Anya Taylor-Joy and Charlie Heaton, it never manages to raise above the level of junk and into the heady realms of mediocrity.
As a "Super-team" --- this movie is more akin to DC Comic's "The Legion of Substitute Heroes" than it ever pretends to be to that of "The New Mutants", future heirs to the X-men name and franchise.
All in all, I would say, skip the movie. It's not worth the effort or time. Hopefully, some day in the future, Kevin Feige can step forward to give us a true New Mutants movie worthy of the title.... until then, label this one "Tried.... but not enough."
Star Wars: Episode IX - The Rise of Skywalker (2019)
A sad explotation of what used to be great
Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker.
A review (I wrote this on my FB page and posted it here likewise.)
No spoilers.
When you read a comic book, there are certain ACCEPTED limitations on the medium. You only have panels to work with, every panel must advance the story, and thus going from panel A to Panel B doesn't necessarily have to make sense in the FLOW OF ACTION as it does in the flow of storytelling.
When you read a book, the author winds you on a tale of details, most of which matter. BUT... some of them don't. That's generally called "Character developement". As in reading Harry Potter and finding out that he likes tuna sandwiches. It has nothing to do with the story --- it has EVERYTHING to do with creating a character.
When you watch a movie --- a GOOD MOVIE --- the action has flow and continuity. A great example of this is the car chase scene in Matrix: Reloaded (Matrix 2). In that incredible 14 minute scene, every detail is in place. You follow the flow of the action and you know where every player is. Everything actually makes sense (in the Matrix world) and there is no part of the scene which requires you to say "How'd they get there? How'd they do that?" There is complete flow and continuity to the scene, and it propels the story forward.
I read a review by Roger Ebert once which praised "Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back" for a single 3 second scene. Ebert said (I miss him, by the way... he was always the sensible reviewer in my opinion) that it was this MINUTE attention to detail which made George Lucas a genius director / story-teller / producer.
Luke drops into the Rancor pit and has to fight for his life with whatever is there. It's a tense fight, as the Rancor is not a beast to take lightly. In the end, Luke defeats the monster and walks away. HERE IS THE SCENE.... you'll miss it if you don't watch closely. The Rancor lays dead under the door, it's head crushed. Up runs the Rancor's keeper ..... crying... because he's obviously grown attached to the beast.
Does it help the story? Does it give "Character developement"? Does it ever come back to play in any future Star Wars movie? The answer is no. George Lucas simply threw it in because it's a TRUE TO LIFE detail. We all love our pets. Lucas did that more than once in his movies, and these little scenes actually serve to make for a great movie experience. They made his movies "REAL". (A kiss for luck...)
Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker has none of that. it's more like a comic book where the action squences make no sense. Where the story is more important than the visuals and you can skip a page or two and not miss anything crucial.
seriously. I honestly fell asleep last night at one point.... and when I woke back up I felt like I missed NOTHING important for the story.
New characters get thrown in.... with no relevance or developement. OLD CHARACTERS come back and feel so tiring and over-worked that you really wonder why they're there (except maybe to elicite that fanboy cheer... which has nothing to do with good story telling). Sadly.... entire new worlds are introduced.... as if they existed in a vacuum and now we're just supposed to accept that 600,000,000 ships can appear overnight.
In the end... you walk away feeling like Disney has stolen a major part of your childhood... took a dump on it... and served it as "Star Wars: New Brown Hotdogs". The movie, in my opinion, was really that awful.
Logan (2017)
Near-Flawless X-Men Finale.
I saw the movie 2 days ago. It premiered here in Taiwan before America, so I simply got lucky to be in the right place at the right time. I've been an X-men fan since issue Uncanny X-men 129 and the original run of the Hell-Fire Club was nothing short of stunning with it's Dark Pheonix ending. But alas, I gave up comic collecting in 1992 and moved on to other things. Still loved most of the movies... but most of them were based on stories I already knew and loved.
Then came this.
I knew nothing about X-23 before I entered the theater. 2 days of research and I would have to say that I missed out on a very intriguing character. The backstory given in the movie is nearly the same as you would expect it from the books / TV-Show, so there are no surprises there. But what makes this stand out is the performance of one young (OMGOSH SHE'S TWELVE YEARS OLD!!!) actress -- Dafne Keen.
From the moment she bursts onto the screen in full primal fury, you know you need to buckle your seat belts, cause this movie is going places fast. The sheer ferocity of the character is so amazingly well channeled through Dafne's performance that you find yourself stunned as she becomes a brutally lethal killing force. Her performance is so perfect, so incredibly much so, that one of my biggest problems with this movie stems directly from it: Child violence. The movie brims with it. CHILDREN.... killing as if it really meant nothing to do so. As if it were just another video game.
I understand --- they are in the fight for their very survival and thus you do what you have to do --- but seeing it play out is unnerving and at times unsettling.
And yet... still.... Dafne.... wow.
Watching Logan and Professor X bicker like the two old men they actually are (Professor X is in his 90's during this movie, which is said to take place in 2029), you can't help but wonder what put them in the situation they are shown in --- Wolverine a stumbling alcoholic and Charles Xavier on the edge of dementia, suffering from Alzheimer's. It will break your heart to see these once great heroes at the end of their days.
Sir Patrick Stewart's performance is top-notch. You honestly want to cry for his situation throughout the movie. And Hugh Jackman, well, this movie will more than make up for the last two duds. As a final turn for their portraying these characters --- they go out fighting and give us a movie worth seeing again and again, so as to enjoy the subtly of brilliance that is their performances.
There are questions still remaining from all this:
1) What happened in West Chester? 2) Where are all the other mutants & why are there no more being born? 3) Just how did X-23 (and the others) escape and find their way to safety.... and just what safety is there? (It's never shown) 4) What became of the "Days of Future Past" time line set up in the last X-men movie? 5) And if Adamantium is truly the source of the poison that is affecting Logan's healing ---- won't the same be true for X-23 (Laura) at some point?
There are other questions.... but I want to end on this:
It's not often that a movie will surprise you and leave you wishing that they had made it longer... maybe even doubled the time it was presented in.... this is one of those rare movies. It could have been 4 hours long... and it still wouldn't have been enough. You'll understand when you see Laura and Logan in action. It's like pure poetry.
Go see the movie... you won't regret it.
Wo de shaonu shidai (2015)
A truly magical journey that will leave you breathless and crying
I've lived in Taiwan for 7 years now. I've seen movies like Jay Chou's "Secret" put a fine twist on the Sci-Fi genre, Cape #7 dominate the box office (pulling in half a billion dollars in Taiwan's currency) and KANO leave an amazing lasting impression --- yet nothing prepared me for the stunning beauty of this simple love story set mostly in 1994 era Haulien.
Though the movie has modern day bookends (opening & closing the movie is a sort of "Where did it all go wrong" prologue) the main brunt of the time is spent following Truly Lin as she matures through her senior year of high school. What starts as a simple coming of age story starts taking on a life of it's own through the sheer force of the main two characters, Lin Truly & Hsu TaiYu. (In Chinese, last names are first)
Vivian Sung plays the younger version of Truly Lin and Darren Wang the younger version of TaiYu Hsu. Both actors bring such amazing life to the characters that midway through the movie you will have forgotten there are other characters actually in the movie. They both dominate the movie powerfully, showing vividly the awkwardness, determination, innocence and zest for life that so accompany being a teenager. Doubtless, the way these two play off each other will be studied for years to come and copied by many Taiwanese directors and screen writers. Their performance was honestly flawless.
I don't want to spoil the movie in any way, but I've already seen it three times in one week and it is really hard not to sing the praise of something so magical --- I guess the simplest way to put it is that this is one of the most breathtaking movies I've ever seen, start to finish. As one of my ESL students remarked on her Facebook page, "went to the bathroom after the movie, and every girl there was puffy-eyed from crying." It really will do that to you, even after the credits start rolling.
Iron Man Three (2013)
Well worth seeing twice
Given that the top review here is one that whines and groans and moans about how "bad" this movie is compared to Avengers --- I'm gonna tell you up front that Yes, Avengers was impressive. But I'll floor you by saying that Iron Man 3 held it's own and was the best of the lot.
In Iron Man 1 & 2 we saw the ego of Tony Stark, playboy billionaire who felt he had nothing to loose, so why not build a toy only he could play with. Both movies were about ego. Nothing more, nothing less. And as the comics showed us --- Tony Stark really is all ego.
But here in the real world we have things that we love that we are always fearful of losing. This movie brings that back home and shows us that for all his boisterous noise and grandiose ideas ---- Tony Stark really is a guy like the rest of us who cares about SOMETHING in this world other than himself. Consider for a moment the fact that in IM1 & 2 most of the "save the world" good deeds were really just something for Mr Stark to do to bolster his self-image in the media. Here --- we have a hero who actually realizes it's not always about himself. Sometimes you need to step back and let others help you along if you're really gonna progress.
All that said --- Guy Pearce's role was pitch perfect. Ben Kingsley's character was eerie, creepy and stunning to the end... I love that the man can give you a surprise you don't see coming --- and keep a straight face about himself. The villains were impressive and the Iron Man Suit upgrades even more so --- but the heart of this story really is Tony Stark finding out that the world isn't always about himself. Ego is a prison that makes it hard to love anyone other than yourself... and without love, what is life anyway?
The Divide (2011)
Epic portrayal of the basest element of Evolution: The strong divide.
The movie was supposed to be a Sci-Fi movie which I usually like. This one talked (on the box) about how a group of people survive a nuclear holocaust in a basement. What the box didn't say is that it's a complete portrayal of how evolution works on a social scale ---- Survival of the fittest doesn't always mean survival of the nicest, brightest, best or those having any sort of redeemable "Human" qualities.
As the movie progresses, and things devolve from bad to worse to horrible to incomprehensible --- I kept wondering, how can they ever make this movie "likable" --- they didn't. At no time did they try to present what happened in any "Soft" form. It was completely tragic from the moment they closed the Bomb shelter door to the moment where they all killed one another .... violently.
My only gratitude towards the movie director was for taking out the one lone child early in this picture. How he chose to do so makes no sense and adds many complications to an already complicated story --- but that all aside, it was a relief that the child was not subjected to the whims of the few who alternately held power. I would have shuddered to even think where that would have led.
This movie was budgeted at $3,000,000 to make. It grossed $22,000 in the theaters making for a profit LOSS of $2,978,000. Maybe it's time for Hollywood to finally start re-thinking it's policy for funding trash like this.... because apparently people aren't interested.
I have never felt so sick to my stomach after watching a movie.... this was, regrettably, one of the worst movies I have ever viewed in my life and not even worth the rental fee. Do yourself a favor --- rent something else.