3+1 Short Paragraphs: Boy

2010, Taika Waititi (Thor: Ragnarok) -- Amazon

I really do hope that Taika Waititi is exactly as he presents himself in public and through his art -- charmingly disarming and utterly empathetic. During These Times, he's just the sort of inoculation we need against idiocy and callousness. I suspected him of it when we saw Hunt for the Wilderpeople and he generally comes off that way in public. So, it shouldn't surprise me that his earlier endeavours would be of similar ilk.

Boy, the kid not the movie, is Alamein, son of Alamein, a kid living below the poverty line with his grandmother, his little brother and a number of cousins. They mostly fend for themselves, and Grandma has no worry leaving them all on their own while she goes to town for weeks at a time. It's 1984 so the world is not as dangerous. Besides, he has his obsession with Michael Jackson and the fantastical musings of his absent father to keep him company. That is, until his father actually shows up.

Dad is played by Waititi himself in his familiar rambunctious, unhinged self which denotes some very apparent characteristics for Boy's dad -- while Boy idolizes him, seeing the absent man as a rebel and a wild card, we see him as a petulant man-child playing at being a criminal without any understanding of the consequences, nor wishing to deal with them when they eventually happen. Of course, he is charming in his own silly way, but soon even Boy sees through it. This is an incredible coming of age story, as boy learns his fantastical musings may not be so good once reality is interjected, which also applies to Michael Jackson as 2010 would have been deep in the time where people were questioning their devotion to the pop star.

I liked that Boy was through the visual lens of a young boy on the cusp of adolescence. The level of the story telling is from that untainted view point, leaving it entirely up to the viewer to interject their own opinions on what is going on. They are poor -- does it affect them; not at all. Adults are all weird, complicated and all have their own agendas. Sexual hurdles are there, but nobody understands them and everyone fakes that they do. Time is forever as long as you have something familiar to fill it with. Perhaps it is Waititi's own perspective on life, as he does play the manchild in real life, but it does him well, unlike his character in the movie.

3 Short Paragraphs: Jumanji: The Next Level

2019, Jake Kasdan (Bad Teacher) -- download

An annoying aspect of going through so many hiatuses (hiatusi?) is that I am often surprised I just didn't write about a movie. For example, Jumanji: Welcome to the Jungle, or Jumanji 2 if you wish. Kent did but I didn't. Weird. I remember rather liking it, especially Jack Black and Kevin Hart, the latter I normally cannot stand a bit. And Rhys Darby as the NPC was classic. I am thinking every video game based movie needs to now include him as an NPC, even if background.

Surprisingly, this sequel actually let the characters learn from their experiences In Game and grow, so when we met them again, they were evolved as people. I liked that Bethany had become a bit of a social activist post-highschool. I also liked that the consummate nerd Spencer was suffering from this evolution in his friends. That adventure in Jumanji would have been one of the highlights of his life, and coming back to the pressures of mundanity would be hard. So, of course, its because of him that the gang is dragged into the game, along with some other ne'er do wells.

The plot is as light as the first, and disappears from memory pretty quickly, but its what the movie does with its gimmicks that is the most fun. I would have preferred they explore more the tropes of a game sequel and NPCs lives vs players, but the futz up between which Player was which Character was great -- especially Danny DeVito, as a crotchety grampa figure playing Braveheartstone. I hope for the next movie, they explore the idea of an NPC gaining an understanding of the Player world.

3 Short Paragraphs: How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World

2019, Dean DeBlois (How to Train Your Dragon) -- download / BluRay

Meanwhile, this is a franchise I don't want to be meh about. But... maybe... I.... am? I am and always will be a big fan of the first movie, pretty stoked about the second movie and ... well, I got around to seeing this one when I got around to seeing it. Not sure why it took so long, and I don't even have The Pause to blame, as it was long before. Hell, even this post has been sitting in the hopper unwritten with little desire or energy to come out.

The movie picks up a year later from the second movie, with Hiccup and crew spending most of their waking hours finding & rescuing dragons and bringing them back to the island of Berk. The island is getting crowded and becoming somewhat of a target -- so Hiccup decides to find The Hidden World, legendary island where the humans of Berk and their dragon friends can live in peace. Little or none of the continuity from the numerous TV series are brought into the plot, and the legend Stoick left behind seems to have just been tagged on. Adding to the tension, a dragonhunter named Grimmel introduces a female foil for Toothless, a white female version. Yep, girlfriend material.

They do find the Hidden World, a lovely glowy giant mushroom environment perfect for dragons, but not really for humans. So, no utopian vision of dragons and their friends in a Happily Ever After. Not sure why the Berkians don't just then return to Old Berk, but instead they settle on New Berk. Also not sure why dragonhunters could not find the dragons in the Hidden World, if they have been finding dragons all over this northern water-filled world of inhospitable islands, flying dragons and feisty vikings & sheep. There was nothing I disliked about the movie, it was just that despite great animation, the old cast, charming lovable dragons and an incredible super-saturated magical (hidden) world, I just didn't find myself as enthralled about it as I was with the others.

12 for 12: it's like 10 for 10 but longer

[10 for 10 12 for 12, that's 10 12 movies which we give ourselves 10 12 minutes apiece to write about.  Part of our problem is we don't often have the spare hour or two to give to writing a big long review for every movie or TV show we watch.  How about a 10 12-minute non-review full of half-remembered scattershot thoughts? Surely that's doable?   ]

You would think that stuck in quarantine I would have nothing better to do than trade reviews with Toasty every day.  To be honest, nothing would be better than that.  Alas. I still have job. I still have kids.  I still have family. I still have life to attend to even though life seems to have shut down for many.  I'm lucky, I suppose, to be so busy, but downtime would be good.  Escape would be good.  Some of these films provided a modicum of escape, some felt like a prison themselves.

In this [extended] edition:

1. Aladdin (2019) Disney+
2. Sword of Trust (2019) Netflix
3. Uncut Gems (2019) Netflix
4. Starfish (2019) Amazonprime
5. The Phantom Thread (2017) Netflix
6. Dark Phoenix (2019) Crave
7. The Art of Self-Defense (2019) Crave
8. Godzilla: King of the Monsters (2019) Crave
9. The Kid Who Would Be King (2019) Crave
10. Sleeping Beauty (1959) Disney+
11. Tangled (2010) Disney+
12. My Spy (2020) AmazonPrime

....und... gehen!

---

I wasn't a big fan of Disney's animated rebirth in the 90's.  It all seemed like cutesy, sing-songy, little girl shit to my edgy, nerdy teenage self at the time.  By the time I graduated to adulthood, I'd met enough women who lurrrved those films that I changed my tune, of only for their sakes.  Honestly, I still never watched them.  I think I had The Little Mermaid thrust upon me and that was quite enough.  So the original Aladdin (which I *thought* I recently covered but turns out I neglected to write about) held no special place for me.  Therefore there was no true fanboy disdain for any kind of live-action remake, but also there was absolutely zero enthusiasm.  If I gave this a shot, it's because I was once a big fan of both Will Smith and Guy Ritchie so, you know, why not.  Plus the actor playing the titular character (Mena Massoud) is a good Canadian boy, so why not show a little pride.  Plus, it's Disney+...I'm already paying for it, might as well make the best of it, right?

Anyway.  It's fine. Will Smith as the genie, well, he's no Robin Williams, but that's probably a good thing. Watching the animated Aladdin was kind of horrifying, with Williams pulling out one dusty old pop-culture reference after another.  I mean, even the parents of kids watching that film in the 90's would find those corny ass impersonations/references dated, right?  For some reason, people gave Williams a free pass for this kind of crap, because his manic energy would move so fast through these "jokes" that there wasn't time to register the corniness.  Smith, on the other hand, plays it charming, if a bit goofy, but still with heart and smoothness.  The man is still a star, and the screen really does shine brightly with him on it.

Massoud and Naomi Scott are both really, really good in their roles.  They have great chemistry and strong voices.  In fact the whole cast acquits themselves nicely bringing a cartoon to live action, grounding it with a more reality-based focus, while still playing with a heightened, animated (probably more theatrical) zip.  I would have enjoyed it far more if it wasn't a downright ghastly CGI mess.  Good lord it's an ugly, ugly, ugly film. The costuming is nice, the tangible sets, not bad at all, the fake world surrounding it was headache inducing-nightmare stuff. 

[12:54]

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As I write this I just learned earlier in the day that this film's director, Lynn Shelton, tragically passed away.  It should have no bearing on what I have to say about the movie, but I find myself tremendously sad.  Shelton was a talented writer/director on a number of small-budget films (I'm not sure if they're classified as "mumblecore" or not) as well as episodes of great shows like The Good Place, GLOW, and Mad Men. 

Sword of Trust came to my attention via Marc Maron, whose podcast, WTF I have been listening to almost since its inception about a decade ago.  Maron has become a favourite comedian of mine since taking up the podcast, and his personal journey from junkie asshole to top-tier comedian/rehabilitated not-that-bad-a-guy has been a thoroughly enjoyable redemption story in real life.  Maron having developed a likeable on-screen persona as well in his own sitcom Maron, as well as on GLOW has made him someone I actively root for to succeed, because I know he appreciates the success and he works hard for it. 

Sword of Trust is a largely improvised movie with Maron as its co-lead with Michaela Watkins and Jillian Bell.  Watkins and Bell are a couple who inherit a sword, which they learn is a piece of...let's say...alt-right alt-history.  There's a whole underground (percolating above ground these days) reality of alt-right, alt-history that this film is exploring, that dangerous world of Civil War deniers and just, you know, flagrant racists and MAGA turds.  This sword they bring to Maron's pawn shop and the three of them, along with Maron's hapless assistant (Jon Bass) attempt to negotiate this distasteful and ugly underbelly to profit off their own stupidity.  It's a farcical romp that at times hits the heights you hope it hits, but often sits just a shade or two below mellow too often.  The third act is a real comedic gem of genuine twists and turns that make for a truly entertaining picture.

It seems that Maron and Shelton started a relationship as a result of this film and I've enjoyed hearing Maron talk about his life experiences with Shelton on the show in the past year.  They sound like two middle-age people who found a good groove with each other and were really digging it.  In the film, Shelton plays Maron's ex, a junkie who still tries to worm her way into his life, and it's perhaps my favourite part of the film, the goddamn heart that Maron's character shows, even though he knows how painful life with this woman is.  It's a great performance drawn from a director whose work I should've paid more attention to, but will rectify.

[28:42]

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There are people who worship the ground the Safdie Brothers, directors of Uncut Gems, walk on.  I get it, they are undeniably talented.  I could not watch this film. 

I have difficulty with characters who can't see themselves for who they are, and as a result just continually dig deeper and deeper holes for themselves, eventually collapsing the ground around them, threatening to suck everyone around them in the hole with them.  Howard Ratner is such a person.  He's a jeweler in New York City catering to a high-end crowd with a sort of low-end disposition.   He's also a gambling junkie.  And I mean junkie.  He can't help himself and that the film even contemplates having us ride along with him on his journey to finding redemption with a successful bet, rather than any form of acknowledgement of his issues makes for unbearable watching.

We come into Howard's life with it already out of control.  He's fending off collection agents (the kind who bust up body parts), while wheeling and dealing famous basketball player Kevin Garnett in his office.  He has this specific uncut gem which he believes will solve all his problems, but the problem is how unaware of his problems he really is.

Navigating Howard's life is one shit-show after another, awkward and intense to the point that I had to fast forward through entire scenes to release the tension.  The Safdie Bros. certainly know what they're doing in this regard, and they draw one hell of a performance out of Adam Sandler, he's in practically every frame of the film.  But as remarkable as it all is, it's brutally difficult to watch and even more difficult to enjoy.  I admire it, certainly, it's expertly crafted, but woof, not a ride I ever want to get on again.

[38:40]

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I wish I could remember Starfish more than I do, because the impression I have was that I liked it.  The reality is I don't really recall what happens in the film.  It's a low-budget, indie end-of-the-world type story but the specifics are almost all gone from my brain.  Off to wikipedia for a refresher, to see if that sparks some memories (of course, it also eats into my 12 minutes of review time).

Okay, no entry on wikipedia, but here's what IMDB had to tell me about the film: "A unique, intimate portrayal of a girl grieving for the loss of her best friend, which just so happens to take place on the day the world ends."

If I remember correctly, it's a real mood piece, with Virginia Gardner (Marvel's Runaways) having broken into her best friend's apartment over a restaurant following the funeral.  While there she discovers a few disconcerting things she didn't know about her friend, like a rather elaborate radio set-up and a series of cassette tapes that seem pointedly directed towards her.

The next morning she awakens to find the streets deserted, save for one person who issues a warning, and then she sees... something... a savage blur that horrifies her.  The cassettes and the radio lead her to a deeper understanding of her situation, both her literal and metaphorical situation. 

The film is full of tones and noise in place of an instrumental soundtrack, and it's a surreal mood piece for sure.  It's effective and evocative but, obviously, not quite memorable enough.  The style of the film was probably my favourite part.  It seemed modern day, but small town, stuck in the 1980's modern day... a world where the world passed it by.  It's an effective way to create surreality for sure, when the TV is an old picture tube and cassettes are still very much at its core.

I may want to watch this again some time.  Maybe let it sink in more.  I know it's a metaphor for grief, but I'm not quite sure exactly what it's saying about it...or at least I don't remember if I got it.

[50:07]

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I was big into Paul Thomas Anderson, particularly in the 90's as one of my formative directors, and I was with him up until There Would Be Blood.  After that, I just fell behind.  Apparently The Master is another masterpiece but Inherent Vice is impenetrable.  Both seem like difficult films to sit through.  I sat on The Phantom Thread for a couple years as well, not knowing when I would be in the mood for... well, whatever it was about.  I never was clear on the fact.  For some directors, you should just trust them and see what they present.  Obviously I have issues with trusting Anderson.

But I shouldn't.  The Phantom Thread is a curious slow burn of a movie, about a respectable, well established fashion designer in (I want to say) mid-50's London.  The British-y named Reynolds Woodcock (Daniel Day-Lewis) is a man focused almost exclusively on his craft.  He takes on lovers, but they eventually leave (or rather, are dismissed) once they want more than to just fit into his routine... his very specific and established routine.  It seems like a common, and comfortable cycle for him, his romantic muses, easily discarded, until Alma (Vicky Crieps).   He meets her upcountry, a waitress, not stand-out attractive nor at all glamorous, but something strikes him very specifically about her and he woos her.  She allows herself to be wooed.

But Reynold's need for control over every aspect of his life (and that which he doesn't have control of he defers to his sister/manager Cyril - an amazing Lesley Manville) doesn't suit Alma at all, and as she begins to assert some ownership over their relationship, it causes immense strife in Reynold's life... he cannot create, he cannot function as normal. It gets to a point where he just needs this obstruction out of his life.  But she won't go, and how it plays out is twisted, poetic, kind of funny, in a weird way just, but also a little evil.

I had forgotten how subtly warped Anderson's work can be, and Day-Lewis laps up this kind of material like a cat at a milk bowl.  Crieps goes toe-to-toe with Day-Lewis, and even then, Manville still upstages them both.  These are remarkable performances.

Honestly, this feels like a film that sits right in between The Lobster and The Favourite, two films from director Yorgos Lanthanimos.  I don't know if that means Lanthanimos is cribbing hard from Anderson, or if Anderson, watching Dogtooth and the like is taking new inspiration from one of the best new(ish) directors in the game.  Either way, it's all welcome.  Time to see The Master methinks.

[1:05:07]

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This poster...literally 10x cooler
than anything in the film

(Okay losing time, gotta speed this up)

What a fucking nothing film Dark Phoenix is.  The final film in Fox's X-Men franchise before being acquired by Disney did nothing to redeem the series after the disaster that was both X-Men: Apocalypse and the last shitty retelling of the Dark Pheonix saga in X-Men: The Last Stand.  

There's something inherently broken in these X-Men movies, yet they somehow have managed to squeak out about four or five very entertaining movies and even one watershed superhero film in Logan (I acknowledge its place in the superhero pantheon even if I don't love it because I'm not *that* invested in Wolverine).  I think it has to do with 1) needing  to have either Wolverine or Magneto or both in every film and 2) catering to the star power of the actors involved.  X-Men come an go, there's no need to keep Mystique around for a 4th FILM! As An X-Man! AS THE LEADER OF THE X-MEN!!!  What is happening?

Anyway, this film find Jean Grey (Sophie Turner getting a spotlight she *could* hold if this film knew who it's central character was) infested with the Phoenix Force.  It's done bad things, and it's now doing more bad things and Jean is out of her mind.  There's some aliens, led by Jessica Chastain, who seemingly have no stakes-raising purpose but they're here, causing trouble and manipulating Jean.  I'm still not quite clear why...whether it's revenge or to harness her power, or both?

And then Magneto for some reason has to be involved.  And the X-Men kids who were introduced in the last film, some of them anyway...Cyclops, Nightcrawler, Storm, they're all chasing after Jean but we have no real emotional investment in these people.  What does this movie want to tell us, how does it want us to feel.  It's telling a story, but for who and why?

It looks fine, everyone performs well, but it serves almost no purpose.  It's not trying to correct any mistakes from Apocalypse (except not having Bryan Singer back) and it's not propelling the X-Men forward in any logical way.  It just seems like it's biding time...and if you have time to bide, this will help you bide it, if you want.  Just don't expect to care, like, at all.

[toast's take]

[1:17:01]

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We all have those actors who we just don't like for whatever reason.  Maybe it was something they did in their personal life, or personally to you, or a story you heard second hand, or maybe it's just the way they act, or perhaps something about them just annoys you.  Jesse Eisenberg is easily in my top 5, perhaps even number 1 on my list of actors I can't stand to watch in movies* (*not an actual list I maintain).  It's maybe better said that he's an actor that's actively a deterrent for me to see a film.

Just something about that guy.  The way his nervous energy controls his performances in some films, but then becomes shaky smarminess in others, they're flip sides of an unpleasant coin.  But I must acknowledge he's good at those things.  He really is.  He's built more for the former than the latter, but he's good at both.  I just don't like watching it.

And yet, The Art of Self-Defense is fantastic! I loved this film, and Eisenberg was a big part of what I loved about it.  I mean the film is kind of ridiculous but Eisenberg's anxious nature totally grounds the ridiculousness, and is absolutely essential for its success.

The crux is Eisenberg plays Casey, a Jesse Eisenberg-type character who gets pushed around everywhere he goes.  One night he gets mugged.  Not just mugged but the absolute shit kicked out of him by a motorcycle/dirtbike/moped gang.  After recovering he's an even bigger wreck than before, but he finds karate, run by an alpha aggro zen master (yes, very oxymoronic) who takes a shining to him and entices him into the fold.  Over a few weeks, Casey begins to establish some self confidence (you know, like the normal type a regular person would have) but he's still a bit of a dork around everyone.  Then he's brought into the night classes and things start to spiral in very unexpected ways.

Correction.  The way they spiral out is totally expected, predictable for the most part, except if it wasn't Eisenberg.  You keep thinking this guy is way in over his head, he's never going to get out.  That's what he brings, a grounded sensibility so that the absurd remains a surprise even if expected.

This is the second feature for Riley Stearns and he shows definite control over every aspect of storytelling, from pacing and framing, to aesthetic and style.  It's so expertly crafted.  It's a strange beast, not exactly funny, but too off kilter to be dramatic.  It's kind of Charlie Kaufman-esque but more controlled in how esoteric it gets... it never quite goes too far.  I kind of loved it, in spite of myself.  And now Eisenberg has Vivarium out which looks right up my ally...I may have to reconsider my stance.

[1:33:53]

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I was SO ready for Godzilla: King of the Monsters.  Taking what Gareth Edwards gave us in the first film, with more worldbuilding teases from Kong: Skull Island, and the promise of MONSTER FIGHTS GALORE!  I was ready.  Big budget Godzilla here we come!  There's no way this could be a let down.

Except.

Jesus.

What the hell happened here?  We're introduced at the start to Vera Farmiga (ugh, she's in the top 5 list mentioned previously) and her daughter  (Millie Bobbie Brown) at an isolated research station where she's studying the giant monsters, the kaiju, and has developed a sonar that seems to interact with them.  Then Charles Dance shows up and kidnaps them.  We don't see them again for a good long while.

Instead we meet Kyle Chandler, her estranged husband who takes photos of nature, and he's been recruited by the Monarch Group (a great assortment of actors - including Ken Watanabe, Sally Hawkings, Bradley Whitford and even Thomas Middleditch) none of whom we give a crap about because the film doesn't know how to use them for anything other than exposition or speechifying.  There's so much speechifying in this damn movie.  For a film about giant monsters fighting, it's awfully tedious.

The film tries to hard to be more than what it needs to be.  It delivers the monster fights, but it doesn't know how to use them properly.  It continues to deliver us bullshit deviations from the monster fight to whatever personal human stakes there are for characters we haven' t had any reason to care about.

It's a notably expensive looking movie, and the concepts should work, but they're executed so poorly.  Monarch should be an awesome, exciting organization that we as the audience want to be a part of, that we want to be inside of, but most of the time we just want to get to the monsters because we're given nothing of interest in that world.  There's a group out to further the destruction of humanity,but they're given no real gravitas.  In the face of Godzilla, Mothra, King Ghidorah and Rodan, who cares about some eco terrorists?  Well, we should but the film just expects us to hate them but we know them only about as well as the good guys.

There's an attempt at world/universe building but it comes at the expense of good characterization.  Hell, this film has O'Shea Jackson Jr. and he's treated like a glorified extra.  What a bummer of a film.  I only hope they have their shit together for Kong vs Godzilla next year (and if it is good, it's the saving grace that the studio didn't even bother to wait for the crummy box office returns and bad reviews of this one before it pushed ahead with the big crossover).

Love those Japanese posters though.

[toast's take]

[1:48:24]

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I was really rooting for Joe Cornish to really storm the scene with his second directorial feature.  Attack the Block was such a tremendous homage to 80's sci-fi monster horror, while also being exceptionally modern, funny, and, in its own way, magical. Add to that his predecessor work on screenplays with Simon Pegg and Edgar Wright that really showed his understanding of how to play with genre that both advances it and respects its roots, and I was certain his sophomoric effort was going to be gold.  Even after the fine but not glowing reviews for The Kid Who Would Be King came out I still hoped that there was magic that people just weren't seeing laying within.

Turns out, no, it's pretty much what was being said.  It's charming, but slight.  It's playing with Arthurian legends and transposing them into a modern setting, and it's been tried a dozen times and never ever works.  Something about Arthurian legend just seems to be box office poison no matter who is cast or how much money you throw behind it.

This one, at least, has some winning elements, with a young cast that acquits itself very very nicely.  Young Louis Ashborne Serkis (he looks like Andy Serkis's kid because he is Andy Serkis' kid) holds the lead here as Alex, a nerdy, bullied kid who is suddenly called upon by Merlin (co-played by Patrick Stewart and the marvelous Angus Imrie) to be the champion the world needs now.  Alex has a whole fantasy story about what his life should be, and about the father he never knew.  Merlin's narrative plays into this, and his quest to save the world seems aligned with his quest to find his father.

The story meanders a bit here or there and never ramps up to the grand scale adventure it really wants to be.  Cornish seems to be once again trying for an 80's genre here, a mix of "neon fantasy" and "kids adventure", like Krull mashed with The Goonies... he gets about 70% of the way there, but it just never seems to gel.  Perhaps I'm too old, or perhaps storytelling has just changed, or perhaps it's just subject matter.  If anything I think Cornish needed to add more style to the mix, something visual or maybe even audio to the whole thing to pep it up a bit. 

It's resoundingly solid kids entertainment as is, but I feel like it should be one step beyond that coming from Cornish.

[2:04:37]

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The classic Disney animated Sleeping Beauty.  What can you say about a classic like this.  It's stunning.  It's beautiful.  The animation, isn't timeless, it's of it's time and it's perfection, the epitome of the best of its era. 

And it's dreadfully boring.

My daughter and I both fell asleep watching this fairy tale bide its time as it tries to pad out 20 minutes worth of story over its 75 minutes by way of long drawn-out sequences that lead nowhere and provide nothing but visual stimuli accompanied by the most conventional of scores.

The singing (I hesitate to even call them "songs") are anachronistic even for 1959.  It's warbling crooning that was already on the outs with kids (not that I think a Chuck Berry song would have fit any better), but it's all so lilting and stilted.

I liked some of the comedic asides, like the war over a blue or pink dress, or the king and the father of the prince his daughter is to marry having a playful duel of words that turns sour, then friendly again.  I'm not so sure about the repeated turns to the drunkard, although that kind of humour certainly had its place in Vaudeville and depression-era comedy, but it seems aberrant for '59.

I dunno man.  My daughter says that Maleficent is better than this.  But this is a classic, right?  And yet, I find myself thinking that, well, she's kind of right.  The animation is still stunning, but it's not enough.  There's zero character or relationship building here to cling to.

[2:14:37]

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Tangled is another "classic" Disney animated movie I hadn't previously seen, because I remember that at the time it was released I was wondering why Disney was stubbing its toe on CGI animation when Pixar was already killing it.  Basically I dismissed Tangled as an also-ran.

Because it is.

But it's also very entertaining.

Had this been a Pixar release, especially coming on the heels of WALL-E and Up, I would have been tremendously disappointed.  But in a post Cars 2/Brave/Good Dinosaur world, Pixar isn't the infallible entertainment beast it once was, and Disney's original animation arm has given us Zootopia, Wreck-It Ralph and Big Hero 6 among others that are perhaps not equal to Pixar's upper tier, but certainly second-level goodness.  Tangled for sure fits on that shelf alongside them.

In fact, Tangled feels like a classic Disney princess tale for the modern (erm, previous) decade.  It's the princess Rapunzel kidnapped as a baby, kept secluded in a tower so that her wicked (and very passive agressive) mother figure can use her magic hair to keep her young.  Meanwhile the roguish thief Flynn Ryder is on the run having stolen the royal crown, when he encounters Rapunzel.  Their dynamic is fiery and feisty, with Mandy Moore and Zachary Levi bringing a delightful jauntiness to the proceedings.

There's romance, a bit of action, and a simple but worthy bit of emotional manipulation as well as a kind of great character in Maximus, a guard's horse who seems more competent and determined in the pursuit of Flynn than any human.  It's certainly got its charms and I find it far more palatable than most of the Disney princess oeuvre.

[2:23:07]

---

I'm not sold on Dave Bautista as the "charismatic leading man", even though I've been quite accepting of him as a charismatic supporting player.  He just doesn't command a scene as well as he can interrupt one. 

In My Spy, Bautista plays a badass CIA agent who, well, isn't doing his job properly when he's acting all badass.  He's on thin ice, in fact, in jeopardy of losing his job.  He's given a fairly simple assignment and given a dorky tech partner  (Kristen Schaal) who is just professionally enamored with him.  He's bored and out of his element spying on a single mom and her daughter, anticipating her dead husband's brother, the bad guy, will be reaching out to her.  Schaal wants him to train her while they're doing little but observing and reporting but he has no respect for her.

Chloe Coleman is the little girl, probably 10-ish, and an outcast at the school she's only just started attending.  She's whip-smart and finds out that there are two CIA spies watching her.  So she starts manipulating them into helping her.  Inevitably they bond, Bautista the loner and this latchkey kid.  As well, she starts attempting to set Bautista up with her mother and they both falling for it.  Yes, it's pretty much paint by numbers plotting with the only "new" being the personalities involved.

Young Coleman and Schaal basically take command of most scenes in the film.  Bautista isn't uncomfortable, but he's definitely leaning on them to keep things from falling flat.

It's almost a kid's movie but revels in violence and swearing is soooo casual that it seems like it's only accidentally a kid's movie.  Mostly it's fine. There's a few little chuckles, just as many eye rolls,  and one tiny little feel, but it's also wildly unmemorable and certainly inessential viewing.

3 Short Paragraphs: Toy Story 4

2019, Josh Cooley (primarily in the art dept of Pixar) -- download

*deletes previous attempt*

I need to figure out why movies that leave little impression on me are so hard to write for. I guess it goes back to the fact that I am not writing review, but writing personal blog posts about movies (and TV) that I have seen. Writing a by-the-books-review of a movie that I didn't care one way or the other for is just not going to be interesting to me, or to you. But really, let's be honest, I only care if its interesting to write for me -- as the three of you still reading this anachronistic medium wouldn't notice if I went away.

So, Toy Story, Episode 4: Return of Bo Peep. Did you notice she was gone? I didn't. She got sidelined after Ep 1 but I always had an issue with her anyway. She was not a toy, she was a lamp. This is a world where toys have sentience, but not every single appliance. That we know; did the refrigerator and the toaster have a torrid affair as long as humans and toys were not watching? One can only hope. So then, why a lamp? This movie (4) briefly visits the cosmic question of the Birth of Toys when a spork is hastily given life by the lonely Bonnie, the current owner of our cadre of older toys, including Woody and Buzz. Sporky immediately has an existential crisis which causes no end of trouble for Woody, who is having his own minor midlife crisis. That trouble leads to the troubling reunion of Bo and Woody.

Again, its not that this is a bad movie, but that it did nothing for me. There is some clever writing, some heart felt scenes, some familiar re-treads at humour but for the most part, it just felt like the franchise is in the same boat as Woody and friends --- tired and needing to be just put on the shelf. But unlike these sentient toys, a movie can be forgotten about without causing emotional distress to the movie itself. So Pixar, move on. Or less harshly, Toasty, you don't have to see it just because it was put out.

P.S. Yes, Duke Kaboom (Keanu Reeves) was great. That's all.

Netflix's Teen Rom Com Bomb (no actual bombs, all good stuff really)

To All The Boys I've Loved Before (2018, d. Susan Johnson - Netflix)

To All The Boys I've Loved Before... PS I Still Love You (2020, d. Michael Fimognari - Netflix)

Never Have I Ever (2020, 10 Episodes - Netflix)

If Netflix is consistently nailing one genre, it's not the documentary (those have been anywhere from amazing to problematic) but rather the rom com.  What's more is Netflix's rom com slate is all about allowing people of all different religions, ethnicities, shapes and sizes take the romantic lead spotlight.  It's like the journey of feeling awkward or an outsider is somehow universally relatable.  Of course, most of these rom coms are in the shape of the American experience, and I bet if I branched out a bit I surely would find more from other regions, but I guess it's the (North) American experience that I most relate to and want to explore different sides of.

To All The Boys... explores the nightmare scenario of one's innermost thoughts being shared publicly when the private, unsent letters teenager Lara Jean (Lana Condor) wrote to each of her massive crushes are accidentally sent by her younger sister.  Popular, sporty Peter (Netflix fave and Mark Ruffalo clone Noah Centineo) was the recipient of a letter written a few years earlier, and asks Lara Jean if she will fake date him in order to make his ex-girlfriend jealous.  She thought she'd moved past her crush, but finds herself more than charmed.   But things are complicated since her neighbour and best friend Josh was the recipients of the most recently written letter and she can't face him, since she doesn't really know what (or who) she wants. 

The film is a very charming, classically John Hughes inspired fable of teenaged wooing, based on the novel series by Jennie Han.  That it happens to center around an Asian American lead doesn't change its emotional universality, but Lara Jean's ethnicity doesn't much come into play other than a food reference here or there, so it's not providing much of a distinct perspective on the genre.   While John Corbett (Northern Exposure, Sex and the City) plays her single father, it's not clear if Lara Jean is his biological daughter or stepdaughter...and it doesn't really matter to the overall story (or even really seem to matter to the identity of the character).

The centerpiece is the love square with Lara Jean emotionally involved with both Josh and Peter, and Peter falling for Lara Jean while trying to win back his ex (and Josh's circling back).  That the leads both have decisions to make about who they want to be with doubly invests the audience, and the fact that Peter isn't the typical vainglorious meathead jock, and as much a nice guy as Josh, makes it an even harder choice for who to root for.  There really is the possibility of it going either way (even though the Lara Jean/Peter pairing is the main focus,it's never a certainty).  The cast is universally good to great, with Condor proving an exceptionally endearing romantic lead, and Centineo emerging into romantic leading man status with this picture. 

The first To All The Boys... ends with a pseudo-cliffhanger.  The film to that point had dealt with four of the five boys Lara Jean had sent letters to: Josh, Peter, her gay friend Lucas, and one bounced letter.  In the post credits, the recipient of the fifth letter, John Ambrose, shows up on Lara Jean's doorstep unannounced.  It's almost like it was just a cute joke, and that the filmmakers weren't at all certain about setting up a sequel, as they immediately recast John Ambrose for the second film.

The construct of ...P.S. I Still Love You is one of my hated tropes, that people can't be in a happy relationship and that all it takes is one little thing to create intense friction between a couple.  Lara Jean and Peter are in a happy relationship, but is it getting stale? Is Peter too different from her for they to have a meaningful relationship?  Does the re-emergence of John Ambrose mean she doesn't love Peter as much as she though she did? 

You know, teenagers overthink this shit.  I know I did as a teenager as my volumes of chicken-scratched journals can attest, but at the same time, it's a trope that happens in almost all romantic vehicles, that one lie, or withheld truth, or omission, or deception, or deviant feeling is an immediate grenade between a couple.  It's horribly cliche but even worse it trains (let's face it) mostly young women who what this stuff that relationships are so fragile.

With ...P.S. though, part of the whole story is not just Lara Jean's doubts, but actually being in the presence of John Ambrose who is, on paper, far more her speed, far more her ideal match, because they're so much more alike.  And that leads to attraction, and frustration when Peter is acting like he's *gasp* still his own person while in a relationship. (Also, what exactly happened to her best friend, Josh, who completely disappeared in this one, like he never existed at all).

This second film is still an enjoyable feature, but if the first film was like primo-80's styled, this is like the middling sequels any 80's film produced.  Where the first felt like a legit movie, the sequel felt like the TV spinoff.  With a third movie coming this year, one wonders why they didn't try to draw it out into a season or two of television which seems much more Netflix's speed these days.

For example, we have Never Have I Ever, the Mindy Kaling co-created (with Lang Fisher) and produced (with some episodes scripted by) which feels like To All The Boys... but cranked up to 11 and just blowing the teen romcom out of the water for a sustained 10 episodes. 

Show = much, much better than poster

Where To All The Boys... didn't really have time to get into Lara Jean's familial story all that much, it's a centerpiece here.  Devi is the daughter of immigrant Indian parents.  Within the past year her father passed away, following which she lost the use of her legs for unknown (probably psychological, not medical) reasons.  Devi is strong-willed, confident, overbearing and suffering from debilitating grief which she's barely processing.

For the start of their junior year (that's "American" for Grade 11, or third year of high school), Devi coaxes her two closest friends Fabiola and Eleanor to pursue boys as hard as their academics (not aware that Fabiola is gay)... to the point that Devi approaches the hottest boy in school, swim stud Paxton Hall-Yoshida, and propositions him for guilt free sex. He accepts but she chickens out... somehow along the way with their awkward encounters he starts accepting her as, at the very least, an acquaintance.

Devi's journey through season 1 of Never Have I Ever takes us inside Indian American culture in a way that hasn't been this richly explored before, highlighting the community and social pressures that are in some ways absurd and in others a source of pride, and still others which just are.  It's one of the most marvelous aspects of the show how it does not making fun Indian culture but manages to be respectful, critical and funny about it.

Devi is a hot mess of a character.  She is our lead into her world, our focus, and we like her...mostly, but she's constantly getting in her own way, she has a keen sense of how to make a bad situation worse, and she's selfish.  For fans of The Mindy Project this is no doubt some of Kaling's heightened sense of her own personality coming out in force... the parts she admires about herself, as well as the things she's not so proud of.  Framing around a young woman dealing with intense grief is the genius of the show, as it really hits home how hard it is to resolve that grief over the sudden loss of someone you're so close to (especially as the later episodes point out how Devi's father was the one who got her, and her mother has always been more challenged by her).

But it that's the brilliance, the masterstroke here is tennis legend, and legendary a-hole John McEnroe as the narrator, the defacto inner monologue for Devi.  It seems absurd, but by the end of the first episode makes perfect sense, and reveals layers of meaning/parallels as the series goes on.  It's honestly a gift that keeps on giving, as McEnroe's insights into the life of a teenage, Indian-America young woman (four things which he is not) are continuously hilarious, as well as the small egocentric asides to his own career he puts in.  McEnroe has never been great as a cameo actor elsewhere but he's perfect for narration.

I haven't even really talked about the rom com part of this.  The Mindy Project  also started as a long-form romcom but eventually just graduated into a delightfully absurd workplace comedy as the actors' personas took over the show, but those first couple seasons made it clear that it's a specific genre Kaling loves to explore.  Here again the teen romance angle takes I would say conservatively 40% of the very rich screen time, as Devi contemplates what exactly is happening between her and Paxton while also making a mess of her other relationships with family and friends.  Also early on we're introduced to her lifelong nemesis, Ben.  They have a delightfully contentious relationship, which you know immediately, given their age, means hormones are going to cause everything to get confused.  Like Lara Jean in ...P.S. I Still Love You, you know it's going to come to a decision between the sweet but jocky handsome kid and the nerdy but charming and otherwise sympathetic challenger, but the show wisely weaves away from the romantic entaglements to focus back in on Devi's trauma (while also not ingoring anything else going on).

It's a tremedously charming, hilarious and fun show and not only does the teen rom com genre proud but creates a whole new benchmark in how to make long-form rom com and teen material.  As a Kaling fan, this may just be the best thing she's done yet.

3 Short Paragraphs: The Gentlemen

2019, Guy Ritchie (Snatch) -- download

We open with Matthew McConaughey (awright awright awright), all be-tweeded but still very American, walking into a British pub and ordering a pint. He walks to the juke box and orders up his favourite tune. Then a shadowy figure steps in behind him and we hear the sound of a silence gunshot. Blood sprays the pint of bitter. We begin with an ending.

This movie is peak-Ritchie, in that we get Very British Characters doing very British things, and they are usually crime. If the Ocean's X movies could be a hyper-extension of not only being criminals but also being American, then Ritchie is the auteur of doing it in the UK. In fact he may have established the mould. After that establishing shot, we find out McConaughey is Pearson, a transplanted American, when he was young. In his youth he set himself up as the key guy to get weed for the fellow youths of the gentry. And from there, he became one of Ritchie's signature crime bosses who is destined to beset with trouble.

The plot (not just of the movie, but of the characters) is that Pearson wants to sell his business in anticipation of weed becoming legal within a decade. He doesn't see himself as the mogul of such, so get out while the getting out is good. But others have other plans, including a Tong Gang rising star called Dry Eye (Henry Golding) and a media mogul (Eddie Marsan) who was once slighted by Pearson. And of course, there are some crossed-paths and hijinx, the unfortunately dead Russian junkie and Coach's (Colin Farrell) misguided group of MMA fighters-in-training who also want to be YouTube darling thugs. There is ... just ... so ... much. And.. AND... and, this is all being relayed and embellished by an absolutely lovingly creepy Hugh Grant to Pearson's right hand man Ray (Charlie Hunnam) as a proposed script for a movie, just This Side of Too Clever by not trying to be a pitch for a Peak Ritchie movie.  Nudge nudge wink wink.

3 Short Paragraphs: Charlie's Angels

2019, Elizabeth Banks (Pitch Perfect 2) -- download

Why did I watch this movie? Why did I make the actual effort and download this movie? Let's be honest here. Why do any of these movies get made? Sorry, let me be less facetious as there are many reasons female centric light action movies get made, but that was not my point. We could say I wouldn't be expected to see this movie, for as Elizabeth Banks (who acted, produced, wrote and directed the movie) puts it, men don't go see women do action movies. But again, honestly I didn't know she did the movie until I saw the credits role, and against honestly, that wouldn't have swayed me one way or another. But we can probably agree I do actually gravitate to female oriented action flicks, whether they be created to please men (which I honestly thought was the reason for this one), or agnostic to gender and social implications. But why did I see this movie? Well, because of pretty young women in exotic locales doing action movie tropes. I wasn't expecting John Wick just some distraction and I got it.

Banks takes the previous elements of the franchise and turns them on their head. The Townsend Agency is now more than a California based PI firm, but an international organization with ... well, I really have no idea what's its agenda was, but it was altruistic and extremely well funded. The original Bosley (retconned to be Patrick Stewart in all versions of the franchise) is now Bosley 001 and all his supporting counterparts, including Elizabeth Banks' character are also Bosleys. The women of the org are the Angels. Right off the bat you see she wrote the movie to focus on how men just underestimate what women are capable of. Well Not All Men but most, and the Townsend Agency takes advantage of this in the field. It was a decent focus, having them be All Sexy All the Time as a role not as a weakness. The problem is that the message is too much a cartoon hammer to the head, instead of nuanced. but for a rare moment when we are presented with a woman who runs a smuggling ring of goods women in Turkey cannot access easily, such as birth control and pregnancy tests.

Alas, the movie matches (at least my) expectations in being a dumb action flick. The Red Herring is a magical technological doohickey that is supposed to provide cheap limitless power to the world, but the Bad Guys just want to use it to assassinate people. Once they actually show how difficult it is to implement, the Bad Guys should have realized it was more feasible to just go back to shooting people. Besides limitless power could do pretty well in Evil Lairs. But to be honest (cuz, in this post, it was all I could be) I rather liked the angels -- even Kristen Stewart in a role that could have been Miley Cyrus, was not as annoying as she usually is -- she actually looked like she was having some fun. It was definitely light and action packed, but if Banks wanted to do a proper movie to reboot the franchise and make her name (since McG didn't do so well at it) I would have gone for grittier, more Jason Bourne and made a serious statement on the seriously evil incel / 4chan anti-women movements out there.

Pause: Rewatch: Pause

Sitting in front of the TV is more a chore during These Days then it ever was before. If I was lacking an attention span before The Pause began, its only exacerbated now. Stress affects concentration and stress asks for comfort food. Thus, I find myself re-watching somethings I was not expecting to ReWatch. Chore? Chore?!?! My point is that doing The Right Thing, as in watching new movies or cleaning out things from My List from years past or even completing shows I actually know I will enjoy is just not happening. Thus, old familiar comfort blankets or things that give me a light chuckle float to the top. Also, viewing habits have changed as I now eat my workweek lunch in front of the TV.

I quickly found myself not interested in watching The News when I sat in front of the TV for work-day lunches. So, for small chunks of time, that I don't mind stopping and re-starting when times allows, I like fluffy stuff, usually with lots of explosions. Even BaySplosions.  I wrote about The Island before, which was a ReWatch at the time, and it still pretty much matches my point of view from then. Silly scifi and a very pretty ScarJo.

The best thing about watching this movie right now, is that it takes place in 2019. So, Michael Bay was trying to be prescient by putting it only 15 years into the future, but he didn't get very much correct -- there are no personal rocket bikes, we are not able to produce perfectly adult clones and MSN did not end up as the primary Search Engine, even providing booths on every street corner. Back in 2005, the Power of the Internet was still integrating itself into general society, and the iPhone was still two years away. Dr. Merrick uses a touch screen interface desk, but the MS Surface was also still two years away, but alas, even now 15 years later, we don't have ubiquitous touch screen tables... yet. Technology Futurism is always a fun thing to observe in hindsight.

To me, Marvel movies are now relegated as the perfect comfort food, having seen most of them at least three times previous. While my initial interest in Captain America was not high (I wanted more Act Two), over the years, it has become one of my favourites. That said, I am rather mystified I don't have a post about it, despite it coming out in the year this blog was launched. Kent did, so where is mine?

I like my heroes heroic, and a heroic hero is what These Times need. Most leaders are stepping up, but so so so much of the nation this hero represents are the opposite of his ideals. Can you imagine how he would react to all this we are going through? How he would think of the current president? Steve Rogers is a Good Man in these movies and the crux of everything presented to us is that he would have done all those heroic deeds whether he was nigh invulnerable or not. Peggy sees it right away, well, after she stops staring at those pecs. P.S. Peggy Carter; swoon.

Part of the fun in watching these movies again is recognizing some of the insert actors. Hey, look its Clara Oswald (Jenna Coleman) as Bucky's date. He look it's Margaery Tyrell (Natalie Dormer) as the soldier that makes Peggy jealous. Hey look it's Thorin Oakenshield (Richard Armitage) as the Hydra Spy. While it's not a matter of seeing where people got started (as all were active in film before and long after Marvel) it's fun seeing casting choices based on familiar faces.

I saw Ocean's Eight once before, but barely paid attention, sitting on the sofa playing games on my phone and checking Instagram every 11.5 minutes. It was also during The Dark Period of 2018 where few posts were made. Caper movies are perfect escape choices when you want something whimsical yet al dente.

It begins with Billy Danny Ocean's sister Debbie getting out of prison, much like the original Ocean's Eleven began all those years ago. And like her brother, she's not going straight anytime soon, so she gathers a crew of like minded experts to pull off a score -- stealing the Toussaint, a $150 million Cartier necklace during its unveiling at the Met Gala. Also, Danny's dead?!?  Not likely.

This movie only has a passing nod to the predecessors, but for tone and style, which is good. If they are going to do a female centric version of the movies, we don't need to draw upon the other characters, if but for a bit of world building.

Its a fine and dandy movie all in all, but I only like a few of the characters, mainly the suggestive relationship between Ocean (Sandra Bullock) and Lou (Cate Blanchett) and the over the top starlett Daphne (Anne Hathaway). Its a decent enough movie, fun and light, but with nothing to make it stand out.

Why did I watch Evolution again? I don't have any better a reason for doing that than for why it appeared on the streaming services -- both Amazon and Netflix. It was such a dud movie when it came out, not quite a flop (it made its money back) but it wasn't the New Ghostbusters that Reitman had worked it to be. Mainly, I was curious as to why I had actually seen the movie in the theatre had so little memory with me.

So, elevator pitch -- think Ghostbusters but replace ghosts with aliens. A meteor crashes to earth (of course it does) containing a lifeform with a fantastically fast evolution rate. From goo to worms to bugs, it all happens over a few days much to the delight of community college professors David Duchovny and Orlando Bloom. Once things start getting out of hand, like they have to in order to have a movie, the military comes in and messes things up for them. Until they save the day.

For almost twenty years ago, the effects were passable and rather enjoyable. The humour is 14 year old boy eye-rolling, but there is absolutely no chemistry between any of the leads, which is how the silliness of Ghostbusters was sold to us. Can you believe Venkman was a scientist? No, but who cares, as it was Bill Murray doing his usual weird quipping. That ain't in this movie.

Meanwhile, it doesn't matter how many times I watch Willow or how much it has aged, but I love it. Hoping to be George Lucas's Next Big Thing, it never really took off. Its a generic fantasy when generic fantasy was not really a thing, not even in the hands of Disney. You have "hobbit" type creatures, dashing rogues with swords, an evil sorceress, trolls, magic spells and a land to be taken back from a nefarious conqueror -- all epic fantasy, and yet the movies is rather small and light. I love it.

Oh, its hokey and uneven, but its also a lot of fun. Its classic fantasy story telling, in that every major location is always 1 to 3 days walk from each other -- fantasy worlds are always so small. And, I have to admit that Sorsha still does it for me, with all that red hair and Cool Bad Guy armour & weapons. My favourite scene continues to be the visit to the Inn/Tavern as it gave a visual to a very very common aspect of every D&D game I have ever been part of. If there is anything I don't like about the movie, its the use of the classic car/wagon chase scene. I get these are classic elements of adventure movies, but they rarely do it for me. And I find so many many lines still quotable.

"Ignore the bird, follow the river!"

"Vohnkar!"

And of course, after not really being all that eager to re-watch The Rise of Skywalker in the cinema (who was I kidding, I barely get out to the cinema as it is) I didn't really have anything against it NOR did I actually really enjoy it like I did The Last Jedi. But as soon as the downloads appeared (and not on Disney+ as that waited until May the 4th) I had a copy. I waited until I had some quiet afternoons and some housework to do. That pretty much said it all; that I was willing and likely to be distracted from watching it in one go.

As already mentioned, by Kent and me, there is a lot going on in this movie, thus suitable for multiple sittings. There is the opening space chase, the oceans of the moon of Endor, there is the visit to Kijimi where they do something horrid to C3P0 (I have always been in the Droids Are Sentient camp), there is the fight on Pasaana where Rey reveals just how connected she is to her grandfather, there is a rescue on a star destroyer, there is a fight on the back of a star destroyer, and there is a massive scale fight scene on Palpatine's hidey hold planet, where once again I wonder how he hid the construction of thousands of star destroyers? And of course, while this goes on, we have confrontation with Zombie Palpatine and the audience of Sith.

As expected, I didn't get any revelations ReWatching the movie. I was as apathetic about it as I was in the cinema. There are some things I like about it, not many things I dislike about it, but for the most part I am just ... meh.

I must have watched The Sorcerer's Apprentice during one of the hiatuses. Why did I watch it? I don't remember but Nick Cage, Jay Baruchel, Alfred Molina and Teresa Palmer were in it, and I was hoping for light adventure in the theme of Disney's National Treasure but with magic. And, well, that is exactly what I got.

Yes, this is a set-in-modern-day feature film based on the Disney short where Mickey Mouse casts some spells to help him clean up, and ends up making a magical mess of it all. And to be frank, they did a great bit of world building to round out a story around this scene, which they do end up recreating. Back in Ages Olde, Merlin and his apprentices are fighting the good fight against Morgana le Fey, when one of them (Molina) betrays the others (Cage & Monica Belluci); when the battle ends, Horvath (Molina) and Morgana (Alice Krige) are captured and only Balthazar (Cage) is left to pickup the pieces. Merlin's dying words direct Balthy to find The Prime Merlinian (which I kept on hearing as The Prime Millennial), which will pick up where Merlin left off. And immortal Balthy begins his search.

Of course, its Dave (Baruchel).

This is Disney trying to get their own Harry Potter on, at least in look and feel. Its a bombastic movie, wild and fun, with a great sense of adventure. Baruchel pulls off the inexperienced by destined wizard quite well, especially when he adds in his own bit of science, mixing Tesla coils into the casting of spells. All in all its just a lot of fun, if you can get past the Cage looking like he stepped off the cover of a novel in the The Dresden Files modern fantasy novel series.

When Odd Thomas showed up on Amazon, I immediately added it to my expected list of ReWatches, with a certain amount of anticipation. Funny thing, if you look back at my original writing, I was rather blasé (in writing) about it, when I should have been more exuberant. You see, this movie carries a surprisingly amount of emotional weight for a bit of fluff supernatural fiction.

The centre of the movie is that Odd (Anton Yelchin, Star Trek; still sorry he's gone) repeatedly states that he and Stormy (Addison Timlin, Californication) are destined to be together forever. And being a guy who can see the dead, as well as ethereal monsters who are harbingers of great evil, you feel you can trust him when he says that.

So, when the movie swings around to Odd foiling the Great Tragedy he has been expecting the entire movie, but with the unintended sacrifice of Stormy, I was left crying my eyes out. I knew it was going to happen, I knew it was a very sad scene, but weeks and weeks of all this ambient stress and anxiety just came to the surface. The movie ends on a touching scene, where Odd and Stormy spend weeks and weeks together, barricaded inside his apartment. Odd can see, and touch, the dead but they cannot talk to him. So while it is heavily hinted at, when police Chief Porter (Willem Dafoe) and Odd's closest friend comes knocking on their closed door telling Odd, it has to end, he has to come out, he has to let her go, only then does Porter and the others realize Stormy has been there all this time with him. But now its time for Odd to face what has happened, rejoin the world town he saved, and let Stormy move onto the Afterlife. Oh migawd, the tears flowed. It was a great release of pent up anguish.

Alas, we will never get a sequel.