Amen, brother, amen. Funny thing was, I went to see “Ad Astra” with friends and I was amazed that one of my friends had a completely different take on it than I did, and was recommending it over a later lunch to another friend. I was reluctant to criticize his reaction to the movie, but since she liked “The Martian”, I felt compelled to caution her that this is not that kind of movie, the visuals are great but the kooky script required a greater suspension of disbelief than I could muster. 
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The Art of Self-Defence. My favourite undernourished weakling, Jesse Eisenberg, gets beaten to a pulp.
This also happens in the film, and as a result he starts taking karate classes at a dojo that takes things just a bit too far. This is a very well done black comedy, shot with a kind of grim certainty that this is funny, which gives it an extra deadpan fillip. Many of the observations about martial arts and testosterone-fuelled bullshit are spot on, and several taken to their logical extremes. Loved it.
What Jesse Eisenberg, in his ego fueled ambition to remake the iconic Lex Luthor into his own creation, along with director Zack Snyder, did in the terrible “Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice” taints any potential enjoyment I might get from Eisenberg’s other performances.
Perhaps that’s my issue, not his, but it’s hard for me to move past it. Some folks rightly criticize he went to far in copying Heath Ledger, but my issue is more about how bad his interpretation of Lex Luthor was, and his total disregard for the fans of an established franchise.
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This movie was the “Highlander: the Source” of the Rambo series.
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The Peanut Butter Falcon. Your basic feel good film, with a little more heart than usual. I enjoyed it, but there’s not a lot to it.
Dragged Across Concrete. Two crooked cops rob crooks. Now, I really liked this despite the lightweight treatment of their racism. It had a cold, meticulous feel to it, with a well-planned robbery, and the cops carrying out a robbery of their own. Gibson is much much better than Vaughn, and he has the better role (Tattiawna Jones as Vaughn’s girlfriend is a particularly lightweight part, a black woman who gives her racist cop boyfriend no trouble) with a family to look after (also doubles and then triples down on the racism). Whereas Gibson’s racism seems earned (don’t laugh!), Vaughn’s does not, and Tory Kittles as an underwritten black lead is left to carry a “See, I’ve included black people and they’re definitely not all bad.” story thread with the help of a partner who is barely there as a character. In between these two pairs, we have a trio of clinical robbers, working with a kind of impartial savagery, who are impressive, impassive, and intimidating. It makes for an involving film, despite being almost 160 minutes long.
I just got back from Star Wars. Don’t worry, no spoilers here. I don’t have the critical eye or the journalistic skills of some of you, but I’ll try give it a go.
The movie is not the best Star Wars, but it isn’t the worst Star Wars. It wasn’t an epic story, but there are certainly epic moments. I got the same feelings from it that I got from the final season of Game of Thrones - not all the payoffs felt earned and some of the story threads from the past movies just fizzled out. I also feel like the movie tried to course correct from the fan reaction from The Last Jedi and some of the story arcs seemed to come out of nowhere. Then again, it isn’t as if Star Wars hasn’t been doing this all along. Empire just opened on an ice planet; Jedi saw Luke becoming a Jedi Knight out of nowhere. This one throws a crazy MacGuffin at you in the crawl and runs with it from there.
Don’t get me wrong, I enjoyed it because, after all, I don’t go to a Star Wars movie for depth and meaning; I want my lightsabers and spaceships and aliens, and this movie delivers those in spades.
I am one of the seeming few that actually didn’t mind The Last Jedi (overall, that is; some side stories were silly). That said, seeing this latest movie makes me wish Abrams had done all three because I think here would have been a better flow to the trilogy and less course correcting.
Also, great music as always with some excellent cues, especially near the end.
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The Man Who Killed Hitler and then The Bigfoot. There isn’t enough here for a film. There’s a lot of flashbacks, which means you don’t even get to watch Sam Elliot, which is a great shame. It does have some good ideas, and some poignant moments, but the ‘big’ scenes of the film are somewhat lacking, and the flashbacks don’t have the punch to create much excitement or tension.
“Okay, so he assassinates Hitler. How does he get away?”
“It doesn’t matter, he just does. He obviously gets away, because it’s a flashback.”
I saw Star Wars for the second time, this time with my son. I have to say I really liked it the second time around; instead of having expectations or looking closely for answers I just enjoyed the ride, which is how Star Wars should be enjoyed.
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A Simple Favour. A fairly standard thriller livened up by Anna Kendrick and some above-average Feigness. A good way to pass the time.
Marriage Story. Not a bad film, I just think it contains too many stupid, elementary errors even for two people who still sort-of love each other. It’s not so much the film isn’t good, it’s that the plot requires stupidities in order for it to be this film, when a much milder version would have been more honest.
The Meyerowitz Stories. Another Baumbach job, and a really good one. This felt like a real, dysfunctional family. Some actual acting from Adam Sandler, plus Dustin Hoffman turning in an effortlessly accomplished patriarch role, and consummate excellence from Ben Stiller, Emma Thompson, and Elizabeth Marvel (dark horse for best actor in the whole film).
Here Alone. An interesting premise of a woman alone after a zombie apocalypse shat away as it insists upon introducing more characters and fucking things up with uninteresting interactions.
1917 was everything I was hoping it would be and more. It may not do as well at the Oscars, but it certainly deserves all of the accolades it picked up at the Golden Globes. I’m now adding every Roger Deakin movie that I haven’t seen to my Netflix queue.
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Saw 1917 on Friday, I was amazed by it. I woke up today and was glad to see that it won the top award at the Producers Guild Awards last night.
… the Darryl F. Zanuck Award, which has gone on to win the best picture Oscar 21 out of 30 times — including the past two years, with “Green Book” and “The Shape of Water.”
Knives Out. Possibly a cast too good for one film to hold, or at least one too big for this film, as there’s plenty of quality here and not enough of it on display. A competent, entertaining whodunit, with Daniel Craig Foghorn Leghorning through his scenes with some delight.
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Uncut Gems. While the Safdies might be two men in a one-trick-pony costume, it’s still quite a trick, and it’s carried by Adam Sandler giving one of his best performances (not difficult, I grant you), while Khondji makes it all look incredibly good. A frantic, frenetic crowded argument of a film, watching Sandler paddle furiously just to stay afloat and knock everyone around in his thrashing, including himself, is magnetic viewing.
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I didn’t think it was possible to sigh for the entire length of a film.
I was wrong. Having read about it as it was happening, this film just cemented it in my head. Absolutely beyond the pale.
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1917: Well, that was certainly a film wasn’t it. Technically impressive, but there was nothing really there that was WWI beyond the set dressing. Had more in common with a Call of Duty game. Ridiculous plot, nice visuals. One day we might get a film about WWI, and not the myths.
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I don’t disagree that the plot was over the top, however I was pleasantly surprised when I realized 1917 involved the historical German withdrawal to the Hindenburg Line, in front of the Brits, where the Germans were successful in disguising their withdrawal and desolated the area with booby traps and destruction, to include chopping down orchards.
I’m not an expert on WWI, but again I was surprised and enjoyed seeing the history that I read about in Peter Hart’s “Bloody April: Slaughter in the Skies over Arras, 1917” incorporated as part of the story. 
Yep, the setting was good. Apart from that, it didn’t particularly impress me, and the writer in particular has said some extremely stupid shit about WWI, including claiming she couldn’t research online and had to use decades-old books. This came as a great surprise to me, as WWI scholarship has arguably never been stronger, especially when it comes to dispelling myths, and as for online resources, I spent five years doing WWI research for the centenary, most of it online.
I’m not convinced they care overly much what actually happened, they just want to tell a story. The setting is more and more incidental the less one cares, so I feel it would be better served as a Star Wars film or something. It certainly has the Star Wars habit of including absolutely nonsensical shots for the spectacle alone.