Waldorf-1979 Reviews

Civil War (2024)

Terrible message: stay confused and don't cause problems to the elites

[13 April 2024]

Note: I'm a big fan of Garland's work, until this one.

The movie is technically good. Weak script but not terrible. Acting is OK.

This is an anti-war movie. The portrayed factions on purpose don't map to any of the current sides. The idea (or claim of intent) is to make the viewer not be able to identify with either side.

The sides are portrayed as ridiculous and without any good reason. In real life, there have to be strong reasons to go to fight. Even if they are lies or exaggerations. People fight to defend their own ethnicity/nationality/tribe, or to uphold or impose their religion/ideology, or to avenge lost ones. It has to be something very strong to overcome your survival instinct and risk losing your life.

In the movie, journalists are portrayed as the good people who can't understand why the rest are fighting at all. This is the biggest lie of the movie. MEDIA is usually the main way people are stirred into war and conflicts. They define the ENEMY, they vilify it, and convince viewers the other side are non-humans (necessary to convince people to kill others). Any journalist who doesn't align with the MEDIA on either side is banished/cancelled. See how it's playing in both "left" and "right" media nowadays. Same happened in both world wars before.

So this movie pretends to be impartial but it's a LIE. It wants to DEMORALIZE people to NEVER REBEL against tyranny.

Like the ones fueling riots and later, once things get out of hand, cry "why can't we get along?". Media is evil.

History teaches if there's unjust power grab to destroy a republic people should rebel or suffer the consequences for a very long time. And if most people are cowards, GTFO before it's too late. Suffer now or suffer forever as a serf, vassal, or slave. But doing nothing is the worst you can do.

Fallout (2024– )

Fallout: Disney

[11 April 2024]

It's got a high production value and good visuals. And some of the main actors are decent. But there are so many things not to like. The script is terrible. The characters are one dimensional and over the top. The action sequences are worse than a bad 80s TV series. The gore is like the rubber era of the 80s, too. Too much and like the rubber era (kind of like Robocop '87 and Total Recall, but dumber).

The characters and settings look like a kids show. But with all the gore and dark setting it doesn't make any sense.

On top of all that, there's a lack of chemistry among the cast. The actors do their thing but they have to explicitly tell you how they feel all the time.

I guess Amazon Prime likes to make garbage content. It could've been great if Joy-Nolan made it like the first season of Westworld but it looks like they were told to dumb it way down.

The Therapy (2023– )

Well produced but the story...

[7 November 2023]

Actors are quite good, in general. The development of the characters works well for most of the series.

The premise of the story is good. A psychological detective story of a missing/dead girl. But the writer gets lazy and starts using old tropes mid-way. There's no clever foreshadowing or anything like that to make it less bad. Just dumps of cliche shock twists. The made up characters in the protagonist coma dreams.

And the story does some bad sub-plots. Like the doctor doing experiments on rats in a storage unit to find the drug to get the protagonist out of coma. And the hospital drama.

By the 4th episode you can figure out it's going to be a terrible ending. Not because of the plot but because it will be cliche.

Don't waste your time with this.

I wish the production and actors could work together again on a better story. But I have not much hope given the current trend.

Everything Everywhere All at Once (2022)

It's not good at anything

[16 May 2023]

The fighting is clumsy shaky cam and has many cuts as the worst B movies from Hollywood. The actors are not that great (in this film). The story is beyond derivative, it's just a mix up of The One and Marvel's Multiverse. For no reason., they added some made-up goofy environment and side characters. And some progressive issues to make it Hollywood approved.

It's quite telling of the times this hot piece of garbage got so many awards and managed to trick a lot of people to go and watch it. It's not entertaining, it's not funny, it's not good action, it's not original.

I started it with low expectations but even those were shattered within the first 20 minutes.

How did they pick this over Top Gun Maverick, an imperfect movie but in another level at every category compared to this. Or The Whale, a simple movie with great acting and direction?

How is this best film editing, for example.

I like Yeoh and Curtis, but this is far from their best.

The Artifice Girl (2022)

Bery dumb idea and melodrama

[8 May 2023]

Even forgiving plot holes like the rest of the world not catching up to the same level of AI development, and looking the other way the plot does not give a simple reason why this AI became sentient, this is a mess of a movie.

It tries to explore AI problems, basically AGI. But it makes the most human-like AI possible which makes it full of emotional drama with no meaning or exploration of anything we've seen before.

This is nothing like Alex Garland's work. This is just guilt and blame and human gotcha plot twists.

And it just picks an explotative subject to bring in more interest. And it's for nothing. Why couldn't they explore it a bit more? Like getting into why the abusers get into that mindset or international child trafficking. But no, it's just a black box barely touched and only used as a dumb plot device.

Speaking of AI, I'm rooting for AIs to replace all these dumb writers.

Only giving it 2 stars just for the passable acting of one of the main characters. The rest are pretty wooden.

The Peripheral: Fuck You and Eat Shit (2022) Season 1, Episode 6

Sagging and slowly decaying

[18 November 2022]

What started as a promising series is reaching boring new lows. Things have to be explained to you. "You are bad but inside you are good so you like me because I'm good but inside I'm bad" and other terrible character exposition.

In this episode, the revelations are useless. Most of what's seen in the future is a digital mirage. The police gets involved with a rather boring inspector plot line. A Klept oligarch is scared of the inspector and has to explain why. Nothing happens in the end.

The killer plot line from the last episode was promising but got into ridiculous Terminator-inspired stupidity. Reminds me of the terrible Waif character in Game of Thrones. They are too obviously building him up to be a tough antagonist or wild card.

More flashback without adding anything to the story. More explanations of the same things.

Useless scenes adding nothing like the kitchen meal and the sheriff scenes.

If the next couple of episodes keep going this way I'm not going to waste more time for a comeback.

A Very Secret Service (2015–2018)

High quality propaganda

[22 September 2022]

Let's start with the good. The production and some of the writing is amazing. The Algiers and Soviet sub-plots are hilarious. The 60s spy movie style is just perfect. Some actors are incredible, like the paranoid schizophrenic spy.

The politics of the show start subtle but as it goes on it starts getting more and more explicit and in your face. Che Guevara is the only cool political figure in the show. French communists are perfect angels, victims of the conservatives. Women are all Mary Sues. Men are either idiots or downright evil, or both. With the only exceptions being an Arab revolutionary and a closeted gay man.

It's telling that most of the bad sub-plots seem to be borrowed from Mad Men and other shows. The funniest parts are the ones criticizing all sides. Like the French-Canadians. I wouldn't be surprised the one-sided political agenda was written separately and forced in. Or perhaps it was the original script and then they realized it was too boring and predictable and they brought in competent unbiased writers.

The second season is much worse and keeps a downward path until the predictable and boring end.

I'd give the first season a 7, and the second season -1.

I'm not French or even remotely related to any of the factions.

Preacher (2016–2019)

All over the place garbage

[18 June 2022]

It looks promising and starts OK. But as with most shows nowadays, characters start behaving erratically and nothing makes sense. Random things happen for other reason than to add things to the weak script.

The Boys (2019– )

Solid 1st season, sloppy 2nd season, garbage by the 3rd season

[17 June 2022]

It starts building an amazing world based on the hard consequences of having ordinary people with unearned superpowers. But this eventually gets stale and the plot turns into typical formulas and by the third season it's just another superhero soap opera worth of Disney.

It's sad as it was so promising in the beginning.

Obi-Wan Kenobi (2022)

Nothing like The Mandalorian

[27 May 2022]

Star Wars becoming dumber and dumber. It's like Disney or Kennedy don't even care anymore. Story is childish and full of holes. Direction is very bad with some scenes not even worth an 80s children TV show. Almost all actors are wooden. Are they happy? Angry? Annoyed? The little girl is perhaps too little to act action, why did they put her through that? (vives of PM). The pacing and editing is also terrible. And the CGI is somehow worse than the Prequels. There are some very poor blue screens you can't pretend not to see.

The Mandalorian was much better in almost every aspect. How is this so much worse? Why couldn't they learn from it?

High Life (2018)

Awful movie

[24 April 2022]

I like A24 and I like Pattinson. But this film is terrible. There are a bunch of (forced) shocking revelations but they practically add nothing to the plot. The doctor killed her kids and is obsessed with reproduction, you expect there's going to be some kind of connection shown but no. Rapes back to back shown in a different light. Why? No apparent reason. The physics is explained by just bringing a name. There's not even a slight hint of explanation in sudden, sharp ending. Dogs in *the same* spaceship docking with them? No reason. Apparently we are expected they survived by eating each other for years if not decades. Whatshername model/actress showing her milking breasts? No need, no reason. A lot of flashbacks to his (and the mother?) childhood but then he says he killed a friend over a dog. No reason. Also it's show mixed so you might believe they are siblings, maybe this was a stupid attempt at trying to confuse the spectator. Who knows, who cares.

The Batman (2022)

Starts OK but it quickly becomes garbage

[24 April 2022]

Matt Reeves is a terrible director and it shows. I don't mind the detective movie slow back and forth but it doesn't reveal anything of use. Some dialogue scenes are just cringy (like the hospital one). Pattinson and Turturro are the only 2 reasonable actors, everyone else is wooden and unbelievable. The ending is beyond bad. And almost 3 hours long? Just why.

Julius Caesar (2012 TV Movie)

Lazy adaptation looking for viewers through shock turns

[17 April 2022]

Cheap way to get publicity: make something European set in Africa. Make as much controversy as possible.

And ironically, this ends up being kind of r@cist. Why not put some original content based on actual African history? That would be refreshing. Some nuanced story with different story structure than the usual Greco-Roman plays.

But no, let's rehash Julius Caesar one more time to save actual creative work.

BBC is just a shadow of its past.

Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021)

Sloppy teen drama with tasteless CGI

[14 April 2022]

I don't mind teen drama. But the writing has to at least match that of Smallville and similar TV shows. This movie is just fanservice using the dumbest cliches and tricks from comic books.

CGI is over the top and as it breaks way too often a basic level of physics and common sense it becomes meaningless. The acting is quite bad, too.

Louis C.K.: Sorry (2021 TV Special)

Louie is back at the top

[25 March 2022]

This special is as good as his best. He goes full on without any filters. Sure some topics are not perfect and will trigger a significant and vocal part of the audience. So what? Remember, this is the guy who made jokes about Chinese babies being ugly and driving under the influence. It's comedy people. If you are going to take everything as true and literal to get triggered, guess what, you'll get triggered.

Richard Prior made jokes about beating women and shooting the car his partner was using to escape him. And that actually happened. Nobody cared.

Humor is how we deal with uncomfortable truths of life. It's our built-in therapy. Take it easy. Grab a beer and watch it as it is and you'll have a great time.

Reacher (2022– )

Good time waster

[16 February 2022]

If you want to see a violent detective thiller, turn off your common sense and tune in.

Acting is OK. Characters are balanced. A couple of mild plot twists are fine.

Pretend it's a superhero comic and it's all fine.

1883 (2021–2022)

Good premise, good production, and some good actors but Mary Sue and Hollywood nonsense ruin it

[6 February 2022]

The premise is great: tough journey for settlers of the old West. The production has some great photography. Several lead actors are great at their job. Gunfights are good.

Now the bad. Isabel May is a good looking young woman. Her character is a big time Mary Sue. She cowboys, she kills, she always knows better, she is always unscathed (except emotionally for an episode or so). Aboriginals are quite Mary Sue themselves, too.

The gunfights look realistic but they always win with some twist in the last second.

Then there's weird things. The settlers don't know how to swim?! Europeans of the 1880s know *less* about water sanitation than Americans? There's too many ridiculous claims.

It starts very well but it quickly devolves into the typical writing junk. I guess it's for a different target demographic. It's a shame.

The Puppet Master: Hunting the Ultimate Conman (2022)

Binge worthy true crime miniseries about a manipulating psychopath

[6 February 2022]

From seeds of truth, this psychopath gets to control people. He uses their fears and gets them mentally exhausted and submit.

Makes you think about current events.

Yellowstone (2018– )

Pulp story with great backgrounds and occasional interesting twists

[4 February 2022]

If you can easily suspend your disbelief this show might be good for you. It has massive plot holes, hand waving, and things that don't make any sense, like how they dispose a lot of bodies and have zero repercussions on breaking the law.

The setting of the story is good and Costner is good (although a bit wooden). Most of the other actors are either weak or perhaps poorly directed.

Plot armor for the main characters ruins it. The antagonists are weak and boring. The cliches are all over the place.

It seems like Hollywood wants to get some rednecks to become environmentalists or some other stupid political ploy. (note: I'm not American)

Boring and dumb. Waste of time. YMMV.

Underwater Federica Pellegrini (2022)

Decent documentary on one of the most important swimming legends

[26 January 2022]

The documentary focuses on her preparation to 2021 Olympics. It also has flashbacks of other times of her 20 year career. Her early Olympics and her comeback with Alberto Constantini. And the trauma of his death.

It could've been better with a bit more editing but it probably had a tight budget.

The Expanse: Babylon's Ashes (2022) Season 6, Episode 6

Thank you Amazon Studios

[14 January 2022]

Some people forget The Expanse was saved by Amazon Studios. We got some good seasons and a proper ending.

Is it perfect? No. Could it have been a better closure? Probably.

But compare this with all the current shows from the last couple of years including Disney's and Netflix's with their seemingly endless pockets. This was great.

Whatever the reason this show didn't make it to wider audiences it was an astounding one. Imagine if we had a truncated ending mid way like when SciFi decided to cancel it.

So thank you, Amazon Studios.

(BTW Prime suggestions are broken, I keep hiding other shows like TWOT and still The Expanse didn't show up)

Wildlands (2017)

Interesting stories about cocaine trafficking history

[21 November 2021]

It must have been hard to find fresh material with so many previous documentaries, movies, and series about cocaine trafficking. But he manages to pull it off. From the opening with the crazy Bolivian jail to the stewardess revenge story.

This is also unusual as it does not depict US authorities in good light. Perhaps because Rusty is Australian and does not give a damn.

Finch (2021)

Not even a stupid movie, and doesn't even have a target audience, avoid!

[8 November 2021]

Nothing happens. They picked end of the world and Wall-E as premises and just did nothing. All the robot stuff is beyond stupid and unexplained, something for dumb kids movie. But then there's all this darkness and fatalism which is definitely not something for kids.

At some points it hints of something going to happen but nothing comes out of it. Just some dark off-screen story.

Tom Hanks career is at its lowest point. It's like he just gave up.

This movie feels like a teaser trailer for an actual movie. A dumb doom and gloom movie also not worth watching.

Mad Men (2007–2015)

Not for everyone but it was a major TV landmark

[23 September 2021]

If you want Marvel or fast paced TV this is not your show.

The writing, production, and casting for this show was incredible. They went out of their way to picture 60s America and it shows.

It does have some weak spots with the soap opera style subplots and way too many Don's sexcapade episodes. But they started curving this by the final seasons.

The characters have huge arcs and the script adds a lot of dimensions to them.

There's a quite a bit of progressive politics in the show but they are done in a reasonable way.

Wrath of Man (2021)

Disappointing film given the talent

[30 May 2021]

This is nothing like the old gangster movies by Guy Ritchie. The plot is trivial and boring.

Jason Statham is wooden and seems like he was still full of roid rage while filming and has zero chemistry with the rest of the cast.

The action scenes are over the top, which is not necessarily bad, but they give nothing in any other way.