Change Your Image
Jeremy_Urquhart
Ratings
Most Recently Rated
Lists
An error has ocurred. Please try againReviews
House of the Dragon: We Light the Way (2022)
Another Westeros Wedding
No one can get married in either one of these shows without something bad happening, huh?
I'm new to the show and bad with names, but it was good to see a couple of characters reappear here in a big way after being absent for one or two prior episodes. But, at the same time, so much of the drama here revolves around characters who feel brand-new, and when bad things eventually happen, it just doesn't feel that impactful. I do sincerely feel like this first season of House of the Dragon is rushing things too much.
I am mixed on the show a little more now. The first episode impressed me, but of the last three, I think there has been at least one or two glaring flaws in all, and oftentimes different/unique flaws. I hope it pulls together a little more in the first season's second half.
New Rose Hotel (1998)
New Doze Hotel.
Hey, I dislike capitalism as much as the next guy or gal or anyone of any gender, but New Rose Hotel made me think about how it might be better to watch a pro-capitalism movie that was actually entertaining than an anti-capitalism movie that was boring as sin. New Rose Hotel is boring as sin, almost like anti-cinema. Abel Ferrara wants to waste your time. I guess he's sticking it to the man or something? Are you the man? Am I? Does anyone care? How do people care about what's going on here?
The idea of Ferrara doing something "sci-fi" was intriguing, and a cast headed by Christopher Walken and Willem Dafoe sounds awesome for obvious reasons. But both leads and all the other actors look lost here, with nowhere to head when there's no real direction or any kind of momentum to speak of. You've got kernels of potentially intriguing ideas here, a sometimes agreeable sense of nihilism, and a runtime that is at least slim, but otherwise, this Rose blows.
Flesh+Blood (1985)
Not one of Verhoeven's best, but also not quite one of his worst.
At first I was thinking this felt super novel for Paul Verhoeven, but then I remembered he also did Black Book and Benedetta, so Verhoeven doing a movie with a historical setting isn't a total outlier. It's easiest to think of his American thrillers and sci-fi movies first, but there's an interesting world of Verhoeven flicks outside his late 1980s to early 2000s run that I've been exploring lately. I guess Flesh + Blood marks a bit of a transition, being an early English language effort from the director, but also something made before he really had an English-language win (I mean, you can't really beat RoboCop).
Flesh + Blood is almost restrained on the violence front. Some parts are grisly, but I was definitely surprised by how relatively few decapitations and dismemberments there were, considering all the fighting and death here, and the medieval setting. The raciness is there, though. That's very Verhoeven, for better or worse. Let's say the "European" sensibilities coupled with the language and budget (seemingly) of an American movie made for an interesting contrast.
As a film, it's a bit plodding. I like the really down-and-dirty approach, making Flesh + Blood feel a bit like a period movie deconstruction at its best moments. But, at its lesser moments, it doesn't feel entirely sure of what it is. There only seems to be one way it can all end, made apparent early on, and a good portion of the film therefore feels like waiting for the inevitable. It's an impressive production, and it's got the boldness you typically find in all Verhoeven films, both good and bad. Also, for what its worth, there is a scene here that is very reminiscent of the infamous pool scene in Showgirls, in a movie made a decade earlier, so that was kind of amusing when it happened.
Die Hard (1988)
It's Die Hard.
It being December is as good an excuse as any to revisit this classic.
Always impressed by how well it holds up. It's a tight and efficient screenplay, Willis and Rickman are excellent, and are backed up by a good supporting cast, the pacing is relentless, and all the effects work and action holds up very well.
I remember watching it when I was young and easily bored. I was skeptical that a movie so old (1988 seemed like a long time ago, if you were only 12 and it was 2007) could be good, but I was hooked. In hindsight, I was perhaps a little too young for something pretty bloody, but there is a universal appeal to Die Hard. Anyone can tell they're watching something genuinely great pretty early on, even if they might not love action movies or films made more than a few decades ago. It's a movie that, once it gets going, really sticks its hooks into you and doesn't let go for 2+ hours.
There are small things to pick apart if you're so inclined, but really, it's just such a well-made movie it's hard to do so, in my opinion. If a movie you've seen before (and know several sequels for exist) is still suspenseful, you know it's good filmmaking.
Jersey Boys (2014)
It's just okay.
Clint Eastwood almost (but not quite) directs a Scorsese-ish gangster film while also almost (but not quite) directing a musical. The resulting movie, Jersey Girls, is sort of just fine. If I remember it for anything, though, it'll probably be the gimmicky little one-off amusing moments, like Clint Eastwood having a cameo of sorts through old film (or TV) footage, and Joe Pesci technically being a character in the film. Also, one character sounded exactly like George Costanza, and it was distracting. Similarly, another actor distracted me because he looked so much like Steve Buscemi, but Buscemi doesn't have any relatives who are actors from what I can tell (I tried to check).
But yeah, Jersey Boys, it's just okay as far as biopics go. I watched it the same day as Juror #2, and it made me appreciate the fact that that film didn't have the washed-out/desaturated look Eastwood loved using in the 2000s and some of the 2010s. It's on full display in Jersey Boys.
Worst aspect of Jersey Boys was the corny "eureka" moments that sometimes plague music biopics. Even if The Four Seasons did get that name from happening to look at a hotel sign, just leave it out, because it feels so goofy now, when movies do that. Truth can be too preposterous (like with The Iron Claw leaving out one tragedy of many, because audiences wouldn't believe so much bad luck could impact just one family).
Juror #2 (2024)
It's pretty good
Just an efficient, solid, pretty engaging drama. Juror #2 finds just enough of an interesting spin on the whole legal drama/thriller genre to work, and though I think it might come close to being a little heavy-handed near the end, the moral questions that come about from the main juror knowing more about the crime than he lets on prove interesting. It's also nice to see a good courtroom drama that starts with "J" come out in 2024, after a certain other movie really let itself down in the courtroom department.
If this is Clint Eastwood's last film, it's a solid one to go out on. It does remind me of some of his other pretty good films from recent years, like Richard Jewell, American Sniper, and The Mule. Exploring moral issues in a way that feels neutral, but not in a cowardly way. Eastwood makes movies (and/or picks scripts) that don't take easy sides, and even if this last run of movies from him lacks some of the spectacle and big emotional qualities found in his 2000s run (which was generally his strongest decade as a director, I think), I like what his last 10 to 15 years worth of movies have been going for. I also just respect him making films into his 90s.
Juror #2 also has tons of good performances. Good quality acting all around, and it's all very direct and no-nonsense. Would've been nice if this had got more of a theatrical release, but as it stands, it's also a perfect Sunday afternoon kind of movie. More than a little to think about, but not overwhelming. "Relaxing" isn't the right word, but it hits the spot if you want a generally compelling and kinda old-fashioned drama.
Hit Man (2023)
Far from one of Linklater's best, but it still mostly works.
Hit Man is too long, a bit too one-note, and also so flat-looking that it screams Netflix in the worst of ways (even though I believe it was distributed by the streaming service, not produced by), but the stuff that works is enough to carry the whole thing over the finish line. It's a gentle movie, it's a pleasant movie, it's refreshingly calm (and basically violence-free) for a crime flick, and Glen Powell is probably at his best here. He's been solid in a bunch of movies before, and while this isn't a full-on star-is-born kind of performance, he is very good, he is charming, and he carries many of the movie's less exciting scenes.
Hit Man is also effectively romantic without ever pushing things too far. It's tasteful but also just racy enough to not feel like it would offend mild-mannered people (you could almost - ALMOST - watch it with family, but probably not quite), and I bought the romance between Powell and Adria Arjona, which is essential for the final two acts.
It is solid in the writing department, by Richard Linklater standards, but man, he and the other members of the crew in charge of how Hit Man looked dropped the ball. If it looked any worse, I'd be tempted to call Hit Man ugly. Instead, it's just very plain. Nothing pops visually, the sets are just there, and the camera sort of drifts around. I would've loved more energy on that front.
A breezy story, a few funny moments, some fun scenes, and two charismatic leads prove enough to make Hit Man pretty good, in the end. It largely gets by focusing on what works, to the point where I didn't think too much about the lesser parts until after it was over. It feels like prime Netflix content, and not a proper film. I was sad this didn't get a theatrical release until I finally watched it, and though, "Okay, yeah, the big screen probably wouldn't have done much for this one." It's best watched in a living room, preferably with take out, and a drink of choice. It feels like it might've been made for that kind of viewing experience, and maybe that's okay.
8MM (1999)
Weirdly middling
Similar to how Dennis Hopper's character in Blue Velvet will, you know, "anything that moves", I'll happily watch anything with Nicolas Cage, no questions asked.
8MM certainly has its moments, but overall is really just okay. A slow first half gives way to a more entertaining and exciting second half which then gives way to a bit of a shrug of an ending.
That being said, Cage is good, and the film has its moments, my favourite of which is a scene between Cage and the late, great James Gandolfini, where for a couple of moments, the latter shows off his acting prowess and outshines/out-acts Cage, which is no easy feat.
Serbuan maut 2: Berandal (2014)
Phenomenal
Starting a review with a statement that sounds like a contradiction probably isn't the best thing to do, but The Raid 2 is both better and more flawed than the first movie. I guess, to put it more simply, the highs are higher, and the lows - while more noticeable - barely matter, in the end.
What you lose from The Raid (2011) is the pureness and simplicity of it all. The action is beefier, more varied, and there is overall more of it, but there was something more satisfying about the sheer battle for survival in The Raid.
I love what The Raid 2 is going for narratively more in theory than in execution. It's sort of a gangster/thriller film homage, with shades of Scorsese and John Woo at times, and then it's punctuated with absolutely gonzo action scenes every 10 to 15 minutes. On paper, that sounds like my perfect movie. And the action here is largely perfect, so it's like half my perfect movie. I like the way the narrative expands the scope, and the way it leads to better/more varied action. The prison brawl, the car chase, Hammer Girl's train fight, the nightclub fight while it's snowing (in Indonesia, because why not), and then the whole final half-hour... the plot can be convoluted, but I still like it, just because it's used in a way that allows for so much variety action-wise.
Now, if the story had hit a bit harder, and if I didn't have to watch the movie like four times for it to make sense (this latest viewing I think's the only time I figured out what was going on 100%)... then this would be one of the greatest movies of all time. The non-action stuff shines occasionally; there's a decent twist of sorts, and some of the visuals outside the action scenes pack a punch. But the action is what counts, and it's the action that's perfect. The final hour of this is a 10/10; everything onwards from the gang war and the introductions of Hammer Girl and Baseball Bat, I just love. The main character driving his car right into the building where the last half-hour takes place cracks me up every time. That aforementioned car chase is one of the best I've ever seen, and the final big fight of this movie is, I think, as good as 1 vs. 1 fight scenes can get. It's seven perfect minutes, where every second is just perfect; some of the best choreography, stunt work, and camera work I've ever seen in an action scene, all edited together so well that it feels like genuinely watching two seasoned fighters actually fighting each other to the death.
I could go on. It's not a perfect movie, but The Raid 2 contains many perfect scenes, and for that, I think it's easily up there among the best action movies of the 2010s, and is probably one of my all-time favorite sequels, too, just for how it takes the craziness of The Raid's action and goes to even wilder places. I once really wanted a third Raid movie, but now I've made peace with the fact that they probably can't top this, and I'm happy with the whole thing remaining a duology.
Spetters (1980)
Effectively raw and shocking, but why?
This seems to be one of the more infamous and divisive of Paul Verhoeven's non-American movies, and I didn't feel great about it by the end. It wallows in misery a lot, and it just gets exhausting at a point. Whether that was the point, I don't know. As cinematic nihilism, it's kind of effective, but if I approach it that way, it makes its point well before it ends.
Comparing it to another early Verhoeven film I watched recently, Turkish Delight, makes Spetters look worse. That film was also dark and quite extreme with its content, but there was a sense of balance, purpose, and (relative) briskness there that made that film generally work.
Spetters is an angry youth-focused film, reminding me of some new wave Japanese movies from the 1960s while also feeling like an effort to revolutionise that kind of film, and the American counterparts from the 1950s and 1960s.
The problem isn't so much that it crosses a line or two (what Verhoeven film doesn't?), but the issue I found was that I couldn't really work out what the line-crossing was for, beyond just being an extended primal scream - filled with nihilism, anger, and shocking moments - of a movie. It has some merit as that, which is why I can't call it terrible, but I still feel like it could've/should've been something more.
Anora (2024)
The excitement around this one is mostly deserved.
Maybe coming to Anora a bit later than the rest of the world means it's harder to be head over heels about it, but some of that's on me. I would've loved to have been surprised by it, but hearing non-stop love did make me get a bit carried away expectations-wise. It's a really good movie, and often a great one, but there's an element of being personally too excited (again, it's on me) that made me think "ah, okay, that's it I guess" when the end credits started. I was surprised and kind of punched in the face, but not in the way I was expecting to be punched in the face.
I wish everyone got every movie at the same time, because I wonder whether this might happen to other people who get to watch Anora in December/January instead of October (or even earlier).
In the end, though, putting expectations aside, this is extremely well-made. I think it's Sean Baker's longest film, but it goes by the fastest. The pacing is extremely good for something that's about 140 minutes long. A lot of it was funny, some of it was intense, and then parts were quietly sad, and I think I generally felt everything it was trying to make me feel. Mikey Madison is very good, though her character isn't quite as layered as I was hoping. You get some idea about her, but not as much as you'd expect for the titular character of a movie this grounded and this long. I was constantly waiting for one part of this film to kick Anora up a gear, and the fact it never really came was sad.
But that is probably also the point. This is a realistic depiction of a young/carefree/whirlwind romance, and the parts that aren't close to fantasy kind of have to be a bummer for that realistic approach to work. The way it concludes is also something I'll have to sit with, but the boldness is appreciated, albeit not enjoyed.
It's certainly Baker's best film to date. I loved some sequences and overall am only just a little off calling it unequivocally great. Parts are great, the overall thing is strong, but I can't help feeling like I wanted a tiny bit more. Much of that comes from expectations, which are foolish things to have, but I also wonder if I might've felt this way a little had I watched this a few months ago like others got to. I think I might've; probably in a less intense way, but still to some extent.
Steekspel (2012)
Not sure how it came to be, but it's pretty decent for what it is.
Exploring Paul Verhoeven's filmography means eventually stumbling upon Tricked, which runs for just under an hour, but doesn't seem to be a TV movie or part of a series. It was created from some kind of program/competition called Entertainment Experience, and I've been reading about it to try and understand it, but I don't. I don't even know whether calling it a competition is useful or accurate. It was some strange Dutch thing that my brain cannot comprehend or make sense of.
But the resulting film is pretty straightforward. It's short, to the point, and not nearly as crazy as most Verhoeven projects, but it works pretty well as a dark comedy. There's basically a terrible husband, and he's celebrating his 50th birthday, and he has various affairs that collide and mess up aspects of his family and professional life.
From what I can gather about the production, different people initially scripted different parts of what was filmed... but Verhoeven ended up sort of doing his own thing in the end? I don't know. This is confusing. I can usually read about unusual projects and more or less understand and summarize them, but this thing - this Tricked - has kind of tricked me. Words fail me, and I just don't know.
As a movie, it's fine for what it is. It doesn't waste time and it's kind of amusing/entertaining, if a little slight, in the end. It's interesting to see some of these lesser-known Verhoeven films, though, and I'm starting to realize that even if the director's had a couple of misses in his time, he's never seemed to miss twice in a row. The guy's made almost 20 movies, and most are at least pretty good. Even the ones that aren't good are still interesting; the kinds of somewhat bad movies that aren't necessarily bad times to watch.
Yozhik v tumane (1975)
Beautifully strange and strangely beautiful.
Shoutout to the worst Thomas Pynchon book (Bleeding Edge) bringing this strange get compelling short film to my attention. Pynchon loves to mention pop culture that both does exist and doesn't, and I was intrigued enough to check here, and thankfully there really is a Hedgehog in the Fog.
I don't know what's going on here, but it is beautiful and unique. Nothing else out there seems to look quite like the animation on offer here. I was going to call it modern, but not even modern animation really looks this way. It's entirely its own thing, and that's enough to make it worth devoting 10 minutes of your time to. It's a bit sad, it's a bit confusing, and it's all art.
House of the Dragon: King of the Narrow Sea (2022)
Solid
We've got a bit of a pattern going, so far, with the early odd episodes of House of the Dragon being big, flashy, and violent, and the even episodes being a bit slower and focused on character drama and political intrigue.
The events of the third episode are developed in relatively interesting ways, and there is a lot of sleaze in this episode which I didn't anticipate being in a 2020s series based on Game of Thrones. Not saying it's a good or a bad thing, but that show did get a little more prudish in its last couple of seasons... but we're all out in that territory here.
It sets up some interesting pieces that'll be knocked over or rearranged soon, I'm sure. It's not a huge or shocking episode in the traditional sense, but I like what it's going for, in terms of the season overall.
House of the Dragon: Second of His Name (2022)
A little conflicted
To stay positive for now, the third episode of House of the Dragon, Second of His Name, does up the spectacle once more. The first episode of the show was flashy, while the second episode was a bit quieter, and now, episode #3 ups things in terms of action.
The action at the end, though, does feature some improbable plot armor and the (seeming) death of a character who I'd hoped to see more of, owing to how intriguing they were. It was a spectacular scene, in some ways, but the execution and ramifications of it left me a bit confused and saddened.
Elsewhere, Second of His Name also jumps forward in time quite a bit, and while I was anticipating a time skip at some point this season (owing to different actors playing some characters), I would've happily stayed with certain dramatic storylines for longer. I wonder if House of the Dragon is going to continue feeling a bit rushed, because I hope this casual jumping forward of two or more years doesn't set a precedent.
There Will Be Blood (2007)
There will be milkshakes.
I can't lie. There Will Be Blood isn't anywhere close to being my favourite Paul Thomas Anderson film, but I liked it quite a bit more than before on this latest viewing. I think seeing it on the big screen helped. It wasn't as dramatic an improvement as watching 2001: A Space Odyssey on a tv, and not being truly impressed until seeing it in a cinema, but it also wasn't far off. The slow pacing in both films is easier to not notice when you're overwhelmed by what you're seeing and hearing, and when you can't see the time or any other distractions.
Obviously, Daniel Day-Lewis is at his best here, and There Will Be Blood would probably still be good if everything but Day-Lewis underwhelmed. But this is also impressively directed, has a decent number of iconic scenes, and looks grand. I still can't work myself up into a frenzy over Jonny Greenwood's music like so many people do (both for this score and his other ones... I don't believe he would get nearly as much attention as a composer if he wasn't a member of Radiohead), but at least that score sounded more overwhelming - and therefore interesting - with a proper sound system.
It's still a bit too slow a film, I feel, and the point of it all, as far as I can tell, is a bit simple for something so long. I still love the Anderson films with big casts and/or lots of energy over his more psychological character dramas, but still, a lot of this is impressive on a technical front. And those qualities really did shine on the big screen, so I'm happy I got to see it that way (and the screening sold out, which was crazy but also cool to see).
Turks fruit (1973)
An ambitious early film from Paul Verhoeven.
Paul Verhoeven really was very Paul Verhoeven right from the start. This is the oldest film of his I've seen, and one of his earliest efforts as a filmmaker. It's pretty good, and fairly in line with the sorts of things he'd later make... at least his more grounded movies, given it stands apart from the sci-fi and action flicks he's best known for making.
Still, the content is extreme, as is the case with his genre fare, and there's some violence and content that I guess you could call gross. This getting an Oscar nomination for Best Foreign Film, and being so extreme, makes me think more and more that movie watchers were just cooler and more open-minded back in the 1970s.
There were a few moments throughout this that didn't work for me. I kind of get the main characters being bad at communicating for the purposes of drama, but one farcical scene involving someone being too "exposed" when meeting a member of the royalty drove me nuts, because the people who noticed the problem could've just told her to cover up a bit more.
But outside that moment and some of the other scenes that verged on going a bit far, this is pretty good, and definitely interesting. It looks good and successfully tells a very human story - both pretty and ugly at different times - about a chaotic sort of young love. It's certainly not perfect, but it generally works quite well.
Christine (1983)
Sometimes tedious, and sometimes thrilling.
To be blunt, I found Christine a little bit dull compared to most Stephen King adaptations. The idea of a possessed car being able to kill people sounds like loopy fun and, to the film's credit, it tackles the idea more successfully than the surprisingly comparable Maximum Overdrive, which is wilder and messier (not to mention a film actually directed by King himself).
John Carpenter is clearly a superior director, and he doesn't do a bad job. I think the score is very good, when it does get used at least, and he was credited with composing it. Much of the film looks good, and when there's a set piece, it delivers.
I don't think there are enough exciting scenes, though. I can't see much of Christine sticking with me as time goes on. I kind of drifted through it. It was just fine, but also much too slow. It's kind of like It's a Wonderful Life (wild comparison, but bear with me) in that the "plot," as it's usually described, only really gets focused on in the final act, or maybe the final half, if you want to be charitable.
There's just a lot of Christine that's oddly boring and aimless. I might be the problem here, becuase I've grumbled about pacing in this plus the two other most recent films I watched before it: Hollow Man and Wicked: Part 1. Either I've been unlucky with picking well-edited movies, or there's something internal right now that's making it harder to get swept up in a movie. I may be at fault, in which case, there's a chance I'm being too hard on Christine.
It's definitely decent, but for now, I'm not going to join the camp of people calling it underrated or overlooked. I may still check out the novel version one day.
Wicked: Part I (2024)
A bit drawn out, but parts of it are very strong.
Sneakily released as part 1 of a duology, my biggest complaint when it comes to Wicked is that it just feels too long for half the story. This is pretty epic and sweeping narratively, and it deserves to feel grand, but I think a single 2.5-hour movie would've been grand enough. I'm not familiar with the musical, but I know that's no longer than three hours, so there would've been a relative ease with getting it all in one movie. They want money, though, and releasing like this will get them more money. And there is a lot to like in part 1 of this movie, but the first half of the story didn't need to be this long.
Rant aside, and acknowledging that some of this is too drawn out, when Wicked 1 works, it really works. Some of the sequences here really impress, and it does end undeniably strong. The two leads are both great, and outside some dimly lit scenes, most of the film looks very good.
It also sounds very good. I can understand the appeal of the music part of this musical, and I think lots of the movie feels appropriately cinematic and not stagey. It is just so drawn out, though. Despite great moments, I can't call the movie as a whole great when it's got that one significant flaw. If Part 2 makes the first half look better in hindsight, or serves as a Dune Part 2 kind of upgrade, I may eat my words, or at least snack on some of them.
Hollow Man (2000)
A bit of a miss, sadly.
Hollow Man ponders what an updated, sleazier, CGI-enhanced spin on The Invisible Man would look and feel like. It is not a total disaster, but I was still a bit disappointed. I wonder how this looked in 2000, but now, lots of the special effects involving different layers of a human being disappearing just reminded me of the Robbie Williams Rock DJ music video, which I think works better as a piece of horror than Hollow Man, somehow.
It does look at the things that someone might want to do if they were invisible, and that's kind of what the better old-school Invisible Man movies did. They were kind of wholesome, owing to their age, whereas Hollow Man is all about a complete sicko - who's also going increasingly mad - using his powers for evil. That feels like an extension of what these invisibility heavy movies used to do, but I wish Hollow Man stuck close to the runtime found in most of those Universal horror movies. This film's about two hours, and I don't think there's enough here to fully sustain that runtime.
It takes too long for there to be any sense of danger for the supporting characters, and it didn't really feel like it was trying to be a slow burn. I can potentially forgive the technical shortcomings more than the pacing problems, but I think it overstayed its welcome, and that was the most significant issue.
It's a lesser Verhoeven flick, but it's still kind of watchable and sporadically fun.
Red Rocket (2021)
Starts decently, but ends excellently.
This reminded me of a New Hollywood movie (mean that as a compliment). It's the kind of thing they made in the 1970s, and a bit during the late 1960s and early 1980s, just focusing on a screwed-up character making a mess of things without a ton of story getting in the way. It's not perfectly comparable, but it feels like an evolution of that sort of film from that era, all very clearly taking place in the 2010s and dealing with a kind of adult film industry that didn't exist back then.
It made me think a little of Midnight Cowboy at the start, but then I couldn't help thinking of two Bob Fosse films at a point. The first was Cabaret, because both that film and this one have dramatic political events happening in the background that are kind of ignored while the main characters pursue hedonistic things. And then Star 80 was one I thought about even more, given the main characters in both that and Red Rocket are terrible people who try to groom young women much younger than them. I don't think Red Rocket gets quite as dark as Star 80, but it is uncomfortable... though with a purpose. The protagonist here is intentionally no hero.
But making him the main character is interesting. I drifted a bit and when bad things started happening, I thought "oh no." But then I remembered he deserved every misfortune that came his way, and it suddenly became cathartic. You understand why he is the way he is, and why he does what he does, but it's clear what we're supposed to think of him.
The final 45 minutes of this is pretty fantastic. I wasn't exactly gripped by the first 85 minutes at all times, and I thought it was a bit too long at 130 minutes in total. I generally liked the naturalistic acting, too, but there were just a couple of points where some actors had to really emote, and those moments sadly rang a bit false. Pacing and some inconsistent (but mostly good) perfomrnaces weigh it down a bit, but there's a lot to like in Red Rocket, much to think about, and it has a great final act that's worth getting through the first two acts for.
I look forward to seeing Sean Baker's latest, Anora, when that finally hits Australian cinemas.
House of the Dragon: The Rogue Prince (2022)
Slow but intriguing
The small-scale episodes of Game of Thrones were always underrated, because that show did political drama (in a fantasy setting) well, and The Rogue Prince suggests House of the Dragon is keen to follow in that tradition. There are a few spectacular shots here, but there's not much by way of action or other spectacle, but that's okay. I'm impressed that all the actors already seem so comfortable with their characters, and the events of the first episode are already having interesting consequences. The episode kind of introduces an intriguing threat we haven't seen much at this stage, and the final scene of the episode makes me excited at the prospect of further conflict. It's a table-setting hour of television, but an effective, well-acted, and mostly well-written one.
House of the Dragon: The Heirs of the Dragon (2022)
Quite good
I'm entering into House of the Dragon a bit late, with a few things ahead spoiled, but that's okay. It feels new enough that I know I'll be surprised by some things (or hoping at least), and it's been long enough since watching Game of Thrones that I'm happy to re-enter this world.
And The Heirs of the Dragon is all about reminding one of the scale Game of Thrones had. There's a sense of fun to seeing some old locations, but they're also forging ahead straight away with all new characters, and I like that it's all far back enough that any characters who survive the series will have passed away long before Game of Thrones started. I guess we know what will happen to the dragons, but everyone else is fair game, and I like that feeling.
Gamer (2009)
A little better (and maybe even smarter) than what the critic reviews might suggest.
I probably would've loved this if I'd seen it at 14, when it came out, hated it if I watched it 5 to 10 years ago, but kind of dig it now. I guess it's better than I'd been led to believe, and made me think of Sucker Punch and the way that movie generally critiques the sorts of things people blame it for having. Granted, I think both Gamer and Sucker Punch are flawed in other ways, but they both might be movies people just didn't fully get back in the late 2000s and early 2010s. Also, the movies are quite different, but they both take risks by mainstream American standards and had similar critical receptions, so I don't think it's entirely unfounded to think of one while watching the other.
The casting for Gamer was almost great. Michael C. Hall was the MVP as a super fun antagonist. It's just a shame he disappeared for about 45 minutes there - pretty much the entire second act and a decent chunk of the third act. I was happy that John Leguizamo exited the movie early, though. He's consistently the worst part of just about every movie he appears in, and I don't like his vibe. But, to try and stay positive, Gerard Butler was well-utilized here as beefy/generic action movie protagonist, and Terry Crews was fun as an absolute psycho. Ludacris just plays the same character he plays in the Fast & Furious movies, I'm pretty sure. I like seeing him show up in stuff, but I wonder whether he has any range at all. Maybe he doesn't need range. Maybe being Ludacris is enough.
Gamer has some interesting ideas and sci-fi concepts, a handful of solid action scenes, and an admirably bold visual style. Those elements and some of the performances make it work. I don't think it's paced well, losing momentum the more removed from the action Michael C. Hall is, and it takes a little while to fully set up the rules of its strange dystopian world. But I mostly liked it, even with the clunkiness of its writing and editing. The chaos in the visual style and the ridiculous performances mostly feel appropriate, but the choppiness of its writing/assembly (and an extended appearance from The Pest himself) weigh it down quite a bit.
Lagaan: Once Upon a Time in India (2001)
An all-time great sports movie
Kind of reminded me of Seven Samurai in a way, except set in India instead of Japan, and featuring cricket as the main source of physical conflict instead of swordplay and fighting.
Also: I find cricket pretty boring, in general. Yet I was so invested in this movie the whole time. It does a great job at developing some fairly simple yet also very entertaining characters, both heroic and villainous (Guran was easily my favourite of the bunch). This does help make the climactic cricket match all the more engaging and even nail-biting.
It's more than just a sports movie about cricket, though; it also happens to be a historical epic, a romance, and a musical. It juggles all these genres surprisingly well, and while I was expecting to enjoy it but find it a tad overstuffed and overlong (which happens to me sometimes with Indian films), I genuinely thought this one justified its lengthy running time, and it didn't feel almost four hours long thanks to its solid pacing.
Also helps that it looks so beautiful- with fantastic scenery and excellent camerawork- and has a great sense of scale. Also: generally really liked most of the musical numbers. I think there was only one I wasn't a huge fan of, and maybe another one or two that felt a couple of minutes or so too long, but they generally worked for me overall... and like many a (occasionally ignorant) western viewer, musical numbers in Indian films aren't always something I can click with. Thankfully here, the songs are really catchy and well-performed.