March 23, 2023

Nope

Rating: 2 of 5 Tube men
Avoided any information about this, so I wouldn’t have any secrets spoiled. Won’t give away any here. Thought it was just OK. It had some striking visuals, but motivations, or any real character development, was iffy. Story is either increadibly simplistic, or incredibly confusing, and I’m still not sure which. It had an ending, but if I understood what was going on, it was almost a “oops, we’re out of time/money, gotta wrap it up.

March 19, 2023

Barbarian

Rating: 5 of 5 jump scares
Excellent horror/thriller. Starts in a rainstorm, with an overbooked short-term rental. Slowly unravels some details, but only enough to keep you wondering what’s going on. Then, it gets creepy. Um, really creepy. As more is revealed, you realize it’s not a cookie cutter thriller. And, it was suprising (and creepy) all the way to the end.

March 19, 2023

Luther: the Fallen Sun

Rating: 3 of 5 Corpses
Lots of action, doesn’t let up much. Not a very intricate plot, but Elba is a solid lead, and Serkis is a bad bad guy. Some very disturbing visuals, and a lot of corpses.

March 15, 2023

We Have a Ghost

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.

March 12, 2023

The 355

Rating: 1 of 5 shaking cameras
A lot of good material here, nearly all wasted by gaping plot holes, character inconsistencies, and silly tech mumbo jumbo. The annoying shaking camera work (I thought we finally got over using that as a thing) gets even shakier during action scenes, which are already cut in rapid angle change, making them virtually unwatchable. I imagine on the big screen, they’d cause motion sickness. But, during the unbearably long breaks between action scenes, where the plot literally stops dead, you’ll start begging for camera jiggle.

March 4, 2023

Marcel The Shell With Shoes On

Rating: 5 of 5 shells
Cute, hilarious, and emotional. It’s about an adorable if odd-looking 1" tall creature in a shell. That’s it. An documentary of his life. A tenant comes in the Air B&B, starts recording him, and puts the videos online. The dialogue is first rate, the special effects are not ILM, but work really well with the storytelling.

March 2, 2023

The Consultant

Rating: 4 of 5 golden bones
A dark, very creepy story about a mysterious consultant that shows up to take charge after its CEO is killed. Excellent acting (as expected) from Christoph Waltz as the lead. The series slowly exposes more information, while simultaneously creating more mystery. My only complaint is the tertiary characters have little depth to them, and could be played by cardboard cutouts. Only complaint is, the ending still left so many questions unanswered.

February 28, 2023

After Life

Rating: 5 of 5 stars
A wonderful blend of happy, sad, poignient, realistic, funny and tragic. At its core, a journey with a man dealing with the death of his wife. Soon it pulls in the lives of his co-workers, and people he meets. It is excellent at showing each person as an entire character with their assets and flaws, and how each deals with their own personal issues. It’s also a rare complete story, where the last episodes wrap up all the storylines, but not necessarily in a clean or final way, life will go on after the storylines, and the characters will be living through it.

February 25, 2023

The Banshees of Inisherin

Rating: 5 of 5 pints
Beautifully photographed and acted. Wonderful storytelling of two old friends on a small island, one who decides he doesn’t want to be friends anymore. It’s sad, funny, tragic. Motivations are difficult to discern, but it’s enjoyable just to be allowed to observe these characters and their lives.

February 19, 2023

Do Revenge

Rating: 3 of 5 high school students pushing 30
First thought this was going to be a really silly young adult mean girls flick. It was actually somewhat engaging, had some plot twists, and except for the last 30 minutes, kinda interesting. Then, in the last act, it got pretty confusing as to what motivated who and who was doing revenge on who. Add to that, both stars, who are suppose to be in a fancy preparatory high school are in their late 20’s, having to remind yourself that these huge adult parties are being run and attended by high school kids?