Rating: 4 of 5 capers
A nearly perfect Jason Statham vehicle. Action, more action, a little acting, and more action. And for the acting we have Aubrey Plaza, being a snarky, caustic delight, dread pirate Wesley, and Hugh Grant, plus some other folks, but they didn’t capture my interest. A few twists and turns, but it’s an action flick, and it doesn’t disappoint.

Rating: 2 of 5 Batmans
First off, for a movie about the fastest super hero, this movie is hella slow. Seriously. Could have been half the length if they just cut the repetitive and useless scenes. Like maybe an hour? I didn’t really see this from any prior review, but this is DC’s remake of Marvel’s Dr. Strange and the Multiverse of Madness. Toss in a little “Yesterday” changing of the past, and viola, another bad DC movie.

Rating: 4 of 5 vinters
Watched on a whim when I couldn’t sleep, didn’t expect much, but I like Toni Collette, so gave it a shot. Enjoyed it a lot. It was fun, violent, and overall quite entertaining. Plot was unsurprising, but the writing and characters were all interesting. Worth a watch. Maybe only at 2am when you can’t sleep, but whatever works.

Rating: 4 of 5 severed limbs
I expected a ridiculous film. I wasn’t disappointed. It’s bloody, gory, funny, and slightly dramatic. If for no other reason, you should see it because it’s Ray Liotta’s last film. Plot is about as simple as you get. There’s cocaine, a bear finds it, the bear gets a little frisky. I laughed, I cringed, I felt empathy for the bear. I could get all judgy and complain about how if this is entertainment, our society has failed, but basically, this is just a spin on Cujo, which many people consider a classic.

Rating: 3 of 5 CGI dinos
Visually great, although wonderfully generated dinosaurs has been played out by now. Very superficial and common plot. Crash landed on a planet, protagonist struggles against impossible odds to figure out how to escape. That’s the big plot, so mostly, it’s dealing with dinos. But the endless Jurassic Park films already numbed us to that plot-line. So, it’s a chance to watch Adam Driver run around and try out new facial expressions.

Rating: 4.5 of 5 sledgehammers
This looked pretty cheesey when I first saw the poster, before the holidays. Finally showed up for free streaming, so we gave it a shot. It was hillarious. And violent. But, that’s in the title, so can’t really complain about the violence! Simple plot, Santa is visiting a house where the family is being held by armed and violent thieves. And, it has actors you’ll recognize: David Harbour, John Leguizamo, and Beverly D’Angelo lead the cast.

Rating: 2 of 5 puffers
Aliens take over earth, some people don’t like it, and I guess they fight back? Hard to tell, really. I found it confusing, with little to no character development, at it was unclear what was so different about alien rule, or just a global dictatorship. All in all, I’d pass on it, there are a lot of perfectly good aliens take over and are challenged by spunky human flicks out there.

Rating: 3 of 5 stars
Let’s start with the obvious. The big car chase is a 5 out of 5. For fans of classic 60’s cars, and nostalgic views of San Francisco, this movie has them in abundance. However, as a thriller, it’s not very thrilling. In fact, it’s very dark (were hospitals actually this badly lit after the invention of electric lighting?) and fairly slow and plodding about 75% of the time, with remarkably little dialog throughout.

Rating: 4 of 5 warriors
Well acted and beautifully filmed, including massive action sequences. with Viola Davis doing an incredible job as the primary protagonist. Very loosely based on historical events, it’s a facinating story of the woman army of an African King. And the dramatic license is used to explore interpersonal relationships, good vs evil, politics, slavery. All in all, a really well done film.

Rating: 4 of 5 Haunted Houses
As Stefan from SNL says “This movie has everything!”. It’s got a haunted house, a family working out family issues, drama, comedy, action. There are car chases, human chases, police, a secret government agency, a murder myster, Tig Notaro, and a ghost. All in all, an enjoyable flick good enough to overlook its flaws.