Haunted Mansion (08.04.23)

 

Pirates of the Caribbean-- a film franchise based on a theme park ride— seemed like such a novel idea in 2003 when the first entry knocked my socks off and immediately became one of my all-time favorite action-adventure movies. Disney, not a company to let good intellectual property go to waste, quickly followed up on this unexpected hit with the Eddie Murphy-led The Haunted Mansion, which by all accounts (I never saw it) not only failed to capture the spirit of the ride it was based on (pun intended), but just wasn’t good overall. Now, twenty years and one adaptation of Jungle Cruise later, the reboot rules tell us that the time is right to once again dig up the idea of bringing these 999 spooks to the big screen and try again for that old Pirates success; unfortunately, the result is much the same, as 2023’s Haunted Mansion is, simply put, not that great either.

As a big fan of the ride, most of the enjoyment I got out of the film was recognizing all of the little references to its source material that are sprinkled throughout, but that mild joy eventually fizzled out because the framework propping up these references turned out to be as rickety as the mansion itself. Haunted Mansion has a great cast full of funny people, but the script that they are beholden to is not particularly funny, nor are the frights that they are subject to particularly frightful. The characters themselves are weak, and only the lead, LaKeith Stanfield, has anything interesting to work with—the rest are boring stereotypes smashed together that claim to be a found family by the end of the film with absolutely no reason for us to believe that is true (and as much as I love Danny DeVito, did that character really need to be in this movie?) Overall Haunted Mansion is just plain boring, the lack of excitement and laughs that amount to anything more than a slight chuckle making the two-hour runtime feel like an interminable slog. By the time it was finally over I wasn’t even enjoying the easter eggs, instead wishing that I was at my own home watching something else without the loud family sitting next to me.

There are some good things about the film—as I said earlier, LaKeith Stanfield does a particularly good job as he does the vast majority of the heavy lifting as our sorrowful lead, and the themes of grief and acceptance in Haunted Mansion are actually done quite well. These give the film a nice emotional heart that it does not feel like it deserves given the state of the rest of the movie.

Maybe Disney will have something better to show in another twenty years. We may even finally have a great Haunted Mansion by the year 2063, if we’re not all permanent residents of the Mansion itself at that point. You should not lose any sleep if you skip this one, though.

Haunted Mansion is now available exclusively in theaters. 

 

This review was first published in the Keizertimes on August 4^th, 2023. Visit at www.keizertimes.com/.

Barbie (07.28.23)

Out of all of the summer blockbusters that I was looking forward to this year, Barbie was not even a blip on my radar. Sure, I had heard that a great director was behind it, and who wouldn’t love seeing Ryan Gosling as a life-sized Ken doll? No, I felt that other things deserved my attention more. But seeing as how the next showing of Oppenheimer wasn’t for another hour or so and I didn’t feel like sitting around outside the theater twiddling my thumbs for that long, I found myself, a lone man in his thirties, watching Barbie instead and feeling only slightly awkward about it amongst all of the kids and their families.  And I’m glad I did, because it turns out that Barbie is awesome.

First of all, Barbie is very, very cool looking. Surreal, beautiful, and very pink, it’s amazing how accurately and joyously director Greta Gerwig and company have managed to convey the Barbie doll experience on a life-sized scale. The sets are incredible and the cinematography is gorgeous, infectiously converting even the most jaded of non-believers into a fan of the world that has been created here. The cast, led by the shining Margot Robbie as the titular doll, brings a smart script to life with a sweet, naïve energy that is impossible not to appreciate, even when the veneer of Barbieworld begins to slip a bit and the ugly real world starts to seep through. When that happens there are genuinely nice emotional beats as Margot and Barbie prove once again that they are more than just pretty faces. And hey, the film is hilarious. Ryan Gosling as (a) Ken? Everything you could hope for. He even sings! Speaking of music, I would not be at all surprised if Barbie was made into a Broadway musical at some point. In fact, I’d be shocked if it wasn’t.

Barbie has some wonderful themes as well, but if there is one criticism I have towards the movie it’s that it simply has too many of them. This might sound a bit silly and pedestrian of me, but some real focus on one or two of the themes could have really hammered the messages home; as it stands, Barbie feels like it flies from topics of feminism to commercialism to existentialism to everything in between at a breakneck pace, diluting some of those messages just a bit in the whiplash. Speaking of diluting the message, I also found it an odd choice to constantly state how different Barbieland is from the real world but also portray the real world (mostly through Will Ferrell’s character and his corporate sidekicks) as almost equally goofy and surreal. But hey, it’s all in good fun and like the rest of the movie it is all done exceptionally well, so I’m not complaining.

Like the advertisements said: If you love Barbie this movie is for you. If you hate Barbie, this movie is for you too. Pure joy with a nice lesson or two, you might regret it if you pass this one up.

Barbie is now showing exclusively in theaters.    

 

This review was first published in the Keizertimes on July 28^th, 2023. Visit at www.keizertimes.com.

Mission: Impossible- Dead Reckoning Part 1 (07.21.23)

 

For my money, there are few ongoing film franchises that deliver as consistently high-quality and enjoyable movies as Mission: Impossible. Smart, full of bonkers action scenes and more than a few suicidally dangerous Tom Cruise stunts, the series rarely misses these days, and once that iconic theme music starts playing you know you’re in for a good time at the movies. After twenty-seven years and seven films (and a TV series, but it has little to do with the current big screen juggernaut), the adventures of Ethan Hunt do have a tendency to blur together, however, and this is no more evident than in Mission: Impossible- Dead Reckoning Part 1, another fantastic entry that lives up to the high standards of the series despite its dependency on the same old M:I tropes and cliches that audience members have come to expect at this point.  

Mission: Impossible- Dead Reckoning Part 1 doesn’t really do anything that we as an audience haven’t seen before, but this was more comforting to me than annoying. Tom Cruise has some solid banter with his lovable crew, has to bend the rules to do the right thing, goes to a fancy European party, and does a whole lot of running. Once you’ve seen one, you’ve seen them all. Except not really, since the action set pieces are always fresh and the characters are always engaging, as is the case with M:I’s latest (I particularly liked the addition of Hayley Atwell’s character, who I have a hunch is being set up for a spinoff movie or two once Cruise finally hangs up his running shoes). Dead Reckoning may just have the coolest car chase of the entire series, and there is a sequence on a train that may have raised my blood pressure levels to dangerous heights. And really, isn’t that what we see action movies for? Potential heart attacks?  

Being a bit smarter than your average action franchise, the Mission: Impossible films for me always lie on the border between being just simple enough to understand everything and being a little too complicated for me to keep track of all the moving pieces and motivations. Dead Reckoning falls solidly into the latter camp, as I will have to see it again or read a couple of plot summaries written by smarter people to figure out what exactly was going on a couple of times, but I can’t dock the movie for that. I’m sure it all made sense to the people who weren’t distracted by how attractive Hayley Atwell is.  

Mission: Impossible- Dead Reckoning Part 1 ends satisfactorily despite the fact that it is (surprise!) the first of a two-parter, and I can’t wait to see what comes next. It is an action blockbuster that all of the other action blockbusters wish that they could be. Sure it might play things safe (it might be the only thing that does... stop jumping off of things, Tom, you’re in your sixties!), but why mess with the formula when the formula is this good? 

Mission: Impossible- Dead Reckoning Part 1 is now available in theaters. 

 

This review was first published in the Keizertimes on July 21^st, 2023. Visit at www.keizertimes.com.

Still: A Michael J. Fox Movie (07.07.23)

 

Some heroes don’t wear capes; some wear puffy orange vests, accidently get hit on by a past version of their mother, and drive time traveling DeLoreans. Some heroes simply pretend to be these puffy orange vest-wearing, DeLorean-driving heroes for a few movies (among with other iconic characters in other productions that are equally as classic) before turning to more important matters like raising billions of dollars for Parkinson’s disease research. Michael J. Fox may not see himself as a hero, but to many his example of bravery and unrelenting optimism in the face of adversity certainly qualifies him for the label. Still: A Michael J. Fox Movie is Michael’s story as told by himself, a story that is heartbreaking, heartwarming, funny, life-affirming, and entertaining all at once.  

Still triumphs not only because of its inspiring subject matter, but also because of how it tells its story. As its subtitle indicates, Still: A Michael J. Fox Movie is not a documentary but a cohesive narrative that is cleverly told via footage of Michael J. Fox’s movie and television performances, news footage, home video, and the occasional talking head which is always given by Michael himself speaking as if the audience were a close friend. I’m sure there must have been a recreated scene or two in Still, but for the life of me I could not tell which footage was authentic and which scenes were reenactments because the two blended together so seamlessly. The parallels between the aforementioned movie and television clips and Michael’s own life are sometimes eerily apropos, and the editing work by Michael Harte (who also had the idea of using said footage to begin with) could not be sharper.  Director Davis Guggenheim does a fantastic job at keeping hints of his presence to a bare minimum, instead letting Michael’s humor, wit, and still undiluted charisma drive the show. Because despite the excellent directing and editing, Still: A Michael J. Fox Movie ultimately works as well as it does because Michael J. Fox is Michael J. Fox.  

Despite Michael’s infectious upbeat attitude, Still is still sometimes hard to watch because of how honest it is when discussing and portraying the difficult circumstances that Michael has been saddled with, and I’m not just talking about the Parkinson’s. Michael is not afraid to share his experiences with alcoholism, his blessedly temporary ego highs, and depression, but if there’s one thing I learned from watching this film it’s that Michael not only refuses be pitied, but that he also refuses to let his difficulties bring his spirit down. So why should we as an audience let his struggles get our own spirits down? His story is an uplifting one because he refused to have it any other way, and Still: A Michael J. Fox Movie is an uplifting film because of this stubbornness. If you’re a fan, check it out. If you’re not, check it out anyway. You’ll be glad that you did.  

Still: A Michael J. Fox Movie is now available on Apple TV+. 

 

This review was first published in the Keizertimes on July 7^th, 2023. Visit at www.keizertimes.com/

The Flash (06.30.23)

When it comes to famous superheroes, I’d say that the Flash is definitely up there, even if a lot of people don't know anything about him beyond the fact that he runs really fast. It is therefore kind of surprising that the Scarlet Speedster hasn’t had a movie of his own before now, and it is very unfortunate that when it finally did arrive it had to do so with as much baggage as it does. But despite the numbered days of its parent franchise (DC plans on rebooting their shared movie universe in 2025) and its star that should probably should have gone to prison once or twice, The Flash is still much better than I was expecting, dodgy CGI, sloppy cameos, and messy third act aside.

As a fan of the character, Ezra Miller’s casting as the Flash/Barry Allen has always been questionable to me, and that opinion has not changed. The Barry of the DCEU (DC Extended Universe) might as well be called something else for all the similarity he has with his comic counterpart, but I guess that’s a niche complaint coming from a comic enthusiast, because the reality is that Ezra Miller pulls off a super solid performance here, annoying laugh, goofy-looking run, and criminal history aside. The marketing may have leaned heavily into the return of Michael Keaton as Batman, but Barry is still very much the heart and focus of the story, a testament to Miller’s acting and comedic abilities as well as Christina Hodson's enjoyable script. And yes, it is just as fun to see Keaton's Batman back in action after all of these years as you’d expect, and the addition of Sasha Calle as Supergirl is also quite welcome, even if the character is undercooked and mostly goes unexplored.

The Flash's CGI, on the other hand, is very hard to look at. There were a couple of instances where I thought the horrid computer imagery had to be an odd intentional choice, but I think that was just me trying to justify the video game-looking nonsense I was beholden to for an entire third act that dragged on for far too long. The story kind of falls apart by that point, and the film’s overall lesson of learning to let things go is undermined completely by a certain questionable choice at the end as the filmmakers try to have their cake and eat it too, but the solid emotional core of the movie makes me much more forgiving of these missteps than I would have been otherwise. Equally as messy is the fanservice-y cameos, which range from genuinely exciting to cringingly cheesy to hilariously contrived. Why would that particular character show up? Because people want to see that person in that costume, that’s why. No other reason is given or needed.

In short, The Flash may not be the best superhero movie of the year, or even the season, but if you’re looking for a good time at the movies this summer you can do much, much worse.

The Flash is now playing in theaters. 

 

This review was first published in the Keizertimes on June 30^th, 2023. Visit at www.keizertimes.com/

Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse (06.09.23)

 When I saw Avengers: Infinity War in theaters I was bit annoyed, despite the fact that I absolutely loved it. Seeing some of my favorite characters together for the first time was an incredibly fulfilling and fun experience up until the very end, at which point things just kinda stopped. There was no real resolution to anything, making the tale of Thanos and his quest for magical rocks half of a bigger whole instead of a movie that could stand completely on its own. Films that boil down to elaborate advertisements for the next offering generally bother me, but with the new Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse, the first of a two-part follow-up to 2018’s amazing Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (Into is the first one, Across is the new one, and Beyond will come out next year… keep that in mind, because it can get confusing), the feeling wasn’t too big of a factor, as was the case with Infinity War, just because the film itself is so darned good.

Like its predecessor, one of the coolest parts of Across the Spider-Verse is how perfectly it captures the feel of reading a comic book. The stylish animation, purposefully low framerate, and energetic busyness of it all takes a minute to get used to, but once one does it becomes a singular experience like no other on film. The sheer amount of creativity on screen at any given moment is incredible, from the fight scenes to the quiet moments to the scene transitions. The story itself is pretty straightforward, a miracle in and of itself for a film about multiverse shenanigans, but it works to the movie’s benefit as it instead has us mostly focusing on the characters and their relationships. For what its worth Across does have a slower pace than Into (and I do think that it could have been cut and streamlined just a bit), and I’m not sure how well this will go over with younger audiences, but I did not mind at all because these characters and relationships were just developed so well. The voice acting and script are what sell these, and if I have any criticism towards the former it’s that I occasionally had a hard time understanding a certain cockney-accented character, but I’ll let that slide. I’m sure I didn’t miss anything important.

Do I wish it was a more complete experience? Sure. Across the Spider-Verse doesn’t have any resolution whatsoever at the end and doesn’t have a typical story structure, namely rising action, climax, and all of that good stuff you learned back in high school English class, and that can be a bit unfulfilling if you aren’t expecting it (the scene that is probably  considered the climax felt more like another set-up scene to me). But the journey to that “to be continued” is so cool and heartfelt that it’s hard to not be anything other than wowed. If next year’s Spider-Man: Beyond the Spider-Verse sticks the landing (and at this point I have no reason to believe it won’t) then we might just have one of the best animated trilogies of all time on our hands.

Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse is now playing exclusively in theaters. 

 

This review was first published in the Keizertimes on June 9^th, 2023. Visit at www.keizertimes.com/

White Men Can't Jump (06.02.23)

 

Some movies just don’t need to be remade, no matter how much Hollywood wants us to believe the opposite. If the original is beloved then there is nowhere for the quality to go than down, because we humans love our nostalgia above all else. I never saw 1992's White Men Can’t Jump staring Wesley Snipes and Woody Harrelson, but I can still tell you with close to one hundred percent certainty that it wasn’t a movie that needed a facelift for 2023. I know this simply because I know the original has its fans, and I am sure no one is going to be a fan of this new version. Dull, led by boring and irritating characters, and offering nothing to say about race relations beyond a few surface observations, 2023’s White Men Can’t Jump offers a few chuckles but is ultimately unnecessary and forgettable.

It is clear from the outset that White Men Can’t Jump is going for broke on the whole unlikely bromance thing that other films have done so well in the past, but it is an attempt built on a flimsy foundation of two-dimensional characters and a complete lack of chemistry between the two leads. Kamal (played by Sinqua Walls) is a former high school basketball star that wants to get his former glory back, and that’s about it. Jeremy (played by Jack Harlow) has the same boring motivation with the added baggage of being the most stereotypical and unlikable douche (it’s the only word that really fits, sorry!) you can think of. They make for a thoroughly uninteresting pair, leaving the film to rely on its equally uninteresting story and a mere handful of laughs, most of which are provided by the tertiary friend characters Lorenzo and Speedy (Myles Bullock and Vince Staples, respectively) who are genuinely hilarious and thoroughly steal the show every scene they are in.

Perhaps the most frustrating part of White Men Can’t Jump is how safe the film plays it with its social and racial commentary. Instead of trying for something new, meaningful, and funny, Can’t Jump is content to merely reiterate already well-trodden material, making observations and jokes about as shallow as its title. Even though I have never seen the original film I still felt the distinct impression that I had seen White Men Can’t Jump already many times before as I watched the remake. And why not just revisit one of those films instead? Surely they at least have characters I want to root for instead of a self-obsessed hipster and a blank slate.

White Men Can’t Jump isn’t painful or anything, mind you. It just doesn’t do enough to justify its own existence and instead serves as a reminder that better entertainment of this ilk is out there. Ultimately this is just another unnecessary remake doomed to be forgotten in the shadowy edges of the Hulu catalogue, a place very few will ever tread and even fewer will ever watch.

White Men Can’t Jump is now available on Hulu. 

This review was first published in the Keizertimes on June 2nd, 2023. Visit at www.keizertimes.com/