rasketeer Reviews

Woman of the Dead (2022– )

a background to shallow to watch

[6/10 · 30 January 2023]

Maybe it is just me but I cannot watch those shallow shows anymore.

First I was excited to see this is an Austrian move until soon I notice it follows the same blueprint like all Austrian movies do.

Small village, bad rich people who think they own everything, a crazy guy, police men who are corrupt/bad This is in literally all Austrian movies.

And then additionally that made no sense.

A small village in the mountains and people seem to not know each other very well?

A habitable hut in the woods... ok. But this hut should be known by everyone in the village. It is about impossible to hide for longer period of time in Austria if you don't know exactly where and how or are lucky.

A police man who doesn't report a crime. Ok, maybe not to the police in the same village. Maybe country capital then? Maybe to the newspaper who will be more than happy to bring such topics?

Mrs Blum, living in the same household with father in law and her two kids, does something completely unusual and brings someone unknown into her house to live there and the only thing she is willing to explain is: 'what is this? An interrogation?' Seriously? This is what she is replying to the father of your just diseased husband. Someone you are living under the same roof with for years and fully trust?

I am now at the start of the second episode and I am already fed up with those scripts that are so far from reality I could watch some Japanese cartoon.

Lone Survivor (2013)

thrilled... then bored

[5/10 · 13 January 2023]

The movie started very good promising to be more realistic than the normal Hollywood braveheart BS mass production.

Then when shooting started it started be become more and more the usual American soldier = super hero like we know from every other war movie.

Starting risking their survival by jumping down cliffs.. twice... with an explosion in the background of course. Normally breaking all bones but still being able to fight and run.

To heroic.self-sacrification for rescuing the team mates... and not being hit by bullets while moving over open ground.

To some random Afghan guy who risks his whole village will be destroyed and everybody murdered by Taliban, just to help an American who looks like he is dying any moment anyways.

Just to be rescued in the last second by half the American army with explosions and enemies dying everywhere.

Oh, and the small boy that magically created a bond to the soldier so they have a heart breaking farewell moment.

The Swimmers (2022)

great movie but...

[5/10 · 24 December 2022]

Great movie. Great acting. Great shots.

The movie is really good in what it is supposed to do... creating emotions. Exactly what the broad audience in western countries want to see to confirm their sympathies for open boarder politices.

The movie might depict the experiences of those two girls but unfortunately this is not what is reality for most people trying to come to Europe.

The movie spends a lot of time to create emotional bound to the actors, primarily by showing them as good, funny, western like, teenage girls. But then the risky, adventurous journey through unkown countries, on their own, suddenly faced serious decisions that may risks their lifes... this looks more like a tourist trip.

Actually there are movies about people on vacation that are more thrilling.

It would have been much better if the movie was not so glorifying.

The Walking Dead (2010–2022)

Started as one of the best TV series and ended in B movie quality

[6/10 · 4 September 2022]

I really loved to watch TWD... until season 9. From there it just went down.. far far down.

If I would started season 9, maybe would have continue watching. But season 11 is so bad, I have to force myself to watch to the end of each episode.

Everything doesn't make sense.

From zombies appearing out of nowhere next to the actors, although they just came from this direction.

Worst opponents who wants to kill each other... except when they have the best opportunity then they don't want to.

Young kids having philosophical talks and eat magic mushrooms (wtf) Countless scenes that maybe should help the audience immerse into the apocalypse... but were so pointless People doing the exact opposite of what would make sense.. to spent time and fill the episode?! Or to just create another risky situation... and waste time How the f* someone decides to leave the camp to go on a search mission that by default can only end in disaster and would not even be successful in best case?

And of course some long lost people appear out of nowhere ...

It is exactly the same as in any other low cost low quality TV series. And this is exactly why I don't watch those series.

Season 11: 1* This unfortunately lowers the overall score, which would have been 9* for me otherwise.

The Blacklist (2013–2023)

Very well made generic espionage series

[6/10 · 29 July 2022]

The first episode was 45 minutes of deja vu. Every scene I have ever seen in a thriller seemed to be combined into this series. And there is absolutely nothing unique to be recognized. But it is very well made, so probably worth watching even when the whole plot, the twist, the joke and the ending is already known 5 minutes before it is shown.

Spiderhead (2022)

So promising but completely wasted at the end

[5/10 · 19 June 2022]

The movie was really so promising and reminded me on the movies in the 70's when film makers still were experimenting, were critical with society and thoughtful.

But suddenly the movie switched to typical cliche and in the end tried to be a comedy?! Seriously??

The Island (2020–2024)

student class level series

[3/10 · 14 December 2021]

Why do German producers make movies / series only like they have learned in text books during education? Guys, those were examples, please stop copy/paste them into actual movies.

Everything seems to be so far from real life I canot connect to anything at all. I have to admit I only saw the first episode but it didn't catch my attention at all.

The pretty outsider girl protecting the bullied nerd but is not bullied herself but had a (sexual) relationship with one of the bad guys without having seemingly any other relationship in school and eventually (pretending) to offer sex for protecting the nerd?! Does someone even think those situation through before writing a movie script?!

The nerd who borrows a suit from is father who weights 100kg more than him.

The good brother bad brother siblings. The bad brother being a drug dealer who sells his drugs like 'Starbucks' (his words). So the buyers have to go to a girls, order what they want, the dealer will get a SMS, get the ordered things and find the buyer for the deal.... WTF seriously?! I mean... seriously?!

The famous person (author) how has his low point in the carrier, is of course excentric, takes of course drugs (and makes an impression like a teenage girl while doing so), has for some reasons no friends and nothing better to do than to go to a remote island.

Those points already sound surreal ... how can someone write a whole script for a series like that?

Nightlife (I) (2020)

undemanding at its best

[3/10 · 14 December 2021]

The comedy is so undemanding but also so lacking of any substance.

Another German unnecessary not funny comedy. I am native German speaker (but not German) and such movies are the reasons why everyone says Germans don't have sense of humor.

If it would be a teenage comedy it might be acceptable but otherwise just no.

The Unforgivable (2021)

trust murderers, they are heroes?!

[4/10 · 14 December 2021]

The story is so artificial, I don't even know what the meaning of the movie is. It is a pitty because the acting was quite good.

In short... a 5 y/o girls can handle a pump-gun and shot a sheriff without breaking any of her bones her 20 y/o sister (15 years difference?!) acts like a complete loonatic but changes to a very reasonable intelligent person during prison time the sisters and the sheriff's family seemed to be close (what?why?) to each other but the sheriff's sons are complete strangers a lawyer invites a complete stranger into his house to watch a drawer she made and came back after years to see this drawer again the same lawyer takes her case just because the lawyer's wife calls her out to be a liar but a second later believes her the fantastic story of a 5y/o kid being the killer... and drives her across the city just because in the end she is the hero ... and fortunately the movie stops here before it become even more silly.. like people have to admit she is a hero, apologize to her, welcome her in the community... and this BS

so what does the movie wanted to tell me except some other weird underdog heroine Hollywood story?!

Cast Away (2000)

I haven't been disappointed

[3/10 · 7 December 2021]

Eventually I took the opportunity to watch Cast Away and it exceeded my expectations. I don't like Tom Hanks and his movies and this one was again It is really amazing how he does not show any emotions. Even a volleyball is more intriguing.

Some examples: mute the movie an replace sounds as follows: Scene when he is on the beach... Monty Python... Scene when he is at the airport and got told the truth... a movie when a guy is waiting for his prom girl Scene when he & H Hunt walks in the room with maps on the table ... Da Vinci Code

If the audience would not know the story and development of the plot, no one would know what each scene is about. Take a picture of a random scene in Cast Away and ask someone who didn't watch the movie what it is about. There will be 1000 different answers, completely contrary to each other.

Right after Cast Away I saw some indi movie with, at this time unknown actors. There wa s scene when the kids got told about the fate of the mother. The emotiona expression of those unknown unexperienced actors looked so real. I could take a picture of this scene and everyone would understand what was going on at this movement in the movie.

The Impossible (2012)

too much Hollywood

[4/10 · 30 November 2021]

Ok, there is a tragic event impacting 100's of thousands of people and the movie is about an American well educated, good situated, tourist family, that magically survived with fatal wounds killing normal people in matter of minutes, just to heroicly help other people.

The movie completely set aside the tragic people must have experience living there and the whole family, their homes, everything they knew.. just vanished in some seconds.

No, oh wait, a movie about a heroic American family would be mucht better because people cannot handle the tragic of real life.

Freaks (2018)

does no one read the scripts anymore?

[4/10 · 28 November 2021]

Or why are movies still so inconsistent in themselves.

It just doesn't make any sense.

The story about how everything came to end in this situation, the current situation in the movie itself, the guy in front of the door, the father not believing in his daughter, the powers that change how they work in curse of the film, the horror movie style mountain.

The Motive (2020–2021)

no direction and too long and just bad

[3/10 · 24 November 2021]

The case seems to be very interesting, this documentary isn't. Nothing missed if skipped.

There is one minute of interview and one minute of old photos and filmed scenes. Some of these scenes are not even real but staged. This alternation between information and footage continues for 4 ours. And even some of the interviews could be skipped completely and it wouldn't change the documentary to the bad.

'Investigative' journalists who don't know how to ask questions. A teenager could do better. Some of the interviews are like this (seriously like this): Interviewee: 'I know some details' Journalist: 'but you want tell me?' Interviewee: 'no' ... 5 seconds slience Journalist: 'if you tell me, would i understand more?' Interviewee: 'yes' ... 10 seconds silence Journalist: 'wow' ... cut WTF was this?!?!

Maid (2021)

Living room glorification of way to serious topic

[3/10 · 13 October 2021]

All around the world, women and kids are suffering because of physical domestic violence and this series seems to try to make a comedy out of it.

It neglets the actual problems of abusive relationships and the difficulties women face, not only during the relationship but also the hard way in to a new life. About 1/3 of all women return to their partners within weeks.

This series shows a young girl who obviously does not have any real problems in life and has hard times because she is clueless of life.

The series starts with Alex leaving with her kid in the middle of the night because her husband became violent against a wall as a result of alcohol consumtion.

Did she never talk to him about his behavior and her fear?

What is her relationship with him at this point in time? Although he wants to talk and offers change, she rejects any talks.

Does Sean, her husband, show typical signs of abusive character? No

She has no job and no money but she owns a car?

The kid literally sleeps 18h a day and don't need food or water or any toilett.

She does not have any plan or clue how she wants to manage the situation but is obviously also not concerned about it.

Now I could list all the wrongly represented situations of what stupid things she did or how people responded to here, which would never happen in real life.

Mother! (2017)

A wonderful depiction

[10/10 · 8 October 2021]

If you just watch the pictures, the are confusing, disturbing, chaotic but their actual meaning is the representation of a person giving everything for someone else and still is not enough and everything she gives is topped by something else, every precious moment is taken to be shared.

I don't want to go into details of the meaning of every scene and why the movie develops the way it does, it would probably take a book to describe.

Every scene is symbolic, really well done.

Kate (I) (2021)

made out of Hollywood bulding blocks for action movies

[5/10 · 13 September 2021]

I liked the start of the movie,.. until 10 minutes in, when it started to bring up cliche after cliche seen hundreds of time in the same or very similar manner.

Somehow I still like the movie, maybe it is the setting, maybe it is how it was shot.

But i just cannot like the rest, mediocre action scenes (some as bad as seen in the 80s) with random additionally violent scenes, I plot so predictable I knew from the 10th minutes what is going to happen until the end, unrealistic character development, ... some of those even remind on B movies.

I didn't finish the movie yet but I though there are only a few minutes left till the end, soon having the most dramatic and surprising showdown in the history of film making... I guess it will not be like this but I already got bored so much I had to have a break when Kate was having the inevitable long discussion with the prime target of her rampage, who of course already was waiting for her to reveal all the non-surprsing plot while the actual villant is just arriving in time for the final battle, but of course managed to take a hostage that has to be rescued by the heroine .... this is not describing the plot but the flaws of the plot which is practically the same.

Birds of Prey (2020)

R rated teenie girl movie

[3/10 · 11 August 2021]

The movie is quite bad, not being able to deliver anything it tries to be.

Not funny, not emancipating, not apocalyptic crazy, no worthy action, too brutal for nothing, no story, ...

3* for Robbie Margot's performance.

There rest gets a clean 0*

'76 (2016)

I guess it was not a comedy?!

[4/10 · 11 August 2021]

The way the shots are made was like it is a comedy movie.

Some dialogues sound like it was a comedy.

But it is not funny in any way.

The movie was well done but I could not figure out what type of movie it wanted to be and what was the story about until I stopped watching somewhere at the middle.

Naomi Osaka (2021)

s.o...s.l.o.w

[3/10 · 24 July 2021]

I don't know her but I wanted see her experience in her carrier and exploring her roots.

But i stopped after the first few minutes.

There is one spoken sentence every couple of seconds And it is not like something interesting is happening. I could watch her fingers while she was having a massage.

Captive State (2019)

looks like ...

[4/10 · 17 March 2021]

... a B movie, feels like a B movie

it looks like a cheap production The settings, the sourrundings, the decoration, ... everything looks exactly like a B move. It feels misplaced and not correct. The few action scenes are short but made with short quick cuts that actually don't fit together but a lot of thrilling things are going on. Settings and decoration have been chosen to create the impression of post-invasion chaotic times by putting wire here and there, old empty buildings, devastated districts, ... and none of them makes sense.

Some of the flaws... ...simple each scene has at least one. I started to write but after ten lines and not even scratching the surface of the plot, I deleted the lines and summarized it in one line.

Berlin Alexanderplatz (2020)

a movie as good as you think

[3/10 · 19 February 2021]

This is one of the movies you have to see with already the attitude you are going to like it. If you are one of the persons who didn't expect anyrhing, you will have a lots of wtf moments.

The movie is like during movie making classes. The teacher picks one topic, let's say emotional confusion caused by female dominance and superiority with her confronting expression of sexuality and emotion; then let's pick a place, maybe a forest that might represent something and would be artistic, just not have someting that would fit the story; then let's pick some characters, what about the guy we were talking about and some women, that will do it ... and so one of the scenes was created

Seriously, there is no clear line, no explanation, no development

At one point the protagonist loses ground after acting irrational emotional, drifting without hold, perspective option... represented in a 10 second scene You could take this scene, put it in another movie like Hangover, without change. It is so much lacking of any substance.

News of the World (2020)

Well done, +boring

[6/10 · 12 February 2021]

The movie was shot in a great way. The pictures and atmosphere feel authentic (well from a 2021 perspective :D ). The story is nothing new as far as I can tell because I didn't see the movie past the 15th minute. Until to this point I knew already what was happening and what was going to happen. Also there was too much cliché in how the story evolves and how people behave.

Why nowadays, there is no Western movie unnecessarily hitting the apartheit topic?! In the first few minutes a dead black guy is found with a note saying it was because of racism. Why was this important to the story? Why would this guy be killed but the girl kept alive? Why would a black guy even travell there if it is dangerous? Why was this guy ordered by the government to bring the girl somewhere? Why did the girl didn't run away; after the ambush? at each possible occasion before or after? Why is the girl trying to run away just in the night when the Captain Kidd would leave the next day? Why, at the very same night, there were Indians passing by, a few hundreds meter away of a village, full of cattle, at the time when there were tensions between white and Indians, especially when there are valuables close by, ... like cattles? ...and some more just in the first 15 minutes By trying to push so hard the story of 'old man and a girl' and 'good guy against bad world', 'postmodernism guy showing how bad other believes are by projecting them into 300 years ago', ... by using pattern and stereotypes already seen in dozen other movies it becomes ridicilious.

Child 44 (2015)

Better watch Citizen X

[6/10 · 30 January 2021]

Child 44 is to much Hollywood, to much dramatized with too much cliches. The 'actual story' about the murders came much too short and obviously only there to glue together the dramatization. So everything we know from other movies all too well:

• kid in misery get saved and becomes hero of the nation
• hero is good at heart, thus will be let down
• hero fights against all odds
• in course of his search for truth he finds true love
• super-bad villain on personal vendata against the hero
• bad government institution and organization to fight against
• some pointless actio scenes
• show down villain against hero, and guess who wins
• happy end, villain dead, regime broken, murder found

A movie just written by life itself.

Don't be surprised to not find a lot in the list about the murder story, it was basically non-existing and replaceable with any other possible plot without changing the movie.

The Midnight Sky (2020)

very good made movie but otherwise maeh

[5/10 · 7 January 2021]

Good actors, good visuals but no story and so many fails it is really a shame I don't know why no one, in the whole filming team, screams what BS it is

examples:

• people are evacuated and a mom recognizes just before she enters the helicopter/plane that her kid is missing, starts to scream but stops as one woman says the kid is on another plane (don't know why this woman is lying)
• cliché of old dying man with kid
• kid survives for days, getting herself food, toilet, washing, sleeping, without being noticed
• computer estimates time until they can communicate with the spaceship, but actually the spaceship is still out of reach
• old man and kid starts travelling to another polar station and meet a dying man, no clue why this should be important to the story rather just filling some screentime with something
• they want to spend the night in some container, which of course is on breaking ice and sacks into water
• the old man is wearing just a shirt in polar snow storm during the night and doesn't freeze within seconds but also jumps into cold water to dive for some sinking equipment and still survives the night... wet, in a polar snow storm, in the middle of the night
• the old man loses the kid but she just appears again in the morning, no clue what was this about, except both are again surviving a polar night
• they easily walk the rest of the distance to the station they wanted to get to. a distance they probably could have reached the day before with the snowmobile within an hour, but better to camp in a container?!
• the space ship is hit by ice with the speed of gun bullets but just has minor damage
• of course the crew is capable of repairing each bit and piece of the space ship, like it is not necessary to have studied those things for years and have special tools
• for repairing they use some equipment that was stolen from earth before, why would someone steal technical equipment?
• on the outside mission they send the pregnant woman, why not? and also the woman that vomited several times, like it would not probably kill her if she vomits again in the space suit
• of course there are new ice pieces incoming, exactly when those people are outside and exactly right after they have finished repairs and of course something is jammed so one person is not able to bring herself to safety.
• of course one person got hit and didn't recognize it (ok because of shock) but didn't even feel the force that would come with being hit by something in space

and of course this woman dies in the end. don't ask me what all of this contributes to the story

• earth is destroyed and very likely all people died but some crew members still want to land on earth... because they are so heroic to die in the moment they step on earth... or mentally sick?! who knows
• it is fine for everyone those crew members take away critical knowledge and equipment from the sole survivor of humanity
• now the space ship returns back to the moon to build new cradle of humanity, on a moon that is capable of keeping an atmosphere, which is of course breathable
• so the couple will be new adam & eve, and will have lots of kids, since they don't have TV what else they can do. so 1. generation is save, but who make the generations afterwards? this is illegal in most countries for a reason, for sure not healthy for the gene pool

Replicas (2018)

Too many flaws in the story

[4/10 · 12 November 2020]

There are just too, way too, almost everywhere flaws in the story that did not make sense at all. Beginning with initial event that started it all that just happend the very next day. How his colleague (who happens to be also his only and best friend, of course) reacts. I am not sure, I think he is also his cousin... anyways they do not know about each others family situations. The choice he has to make even doesn't even have to if he would do it one after another. How he uses technology that itself is more valueable than what he is actually researching. Things he does while they would need special infrastructure, environments, ... The old 'download the internet on this USB but hurry up it must not take more than 10 seconds' (mis)understanding how computer work I don't even want to go into more details and there is a lot more to list