My Best Friend’s Exorcism

The title pretty much tells you everything you need to know going into the movie. It takes place in the late 80s and is about best friends Abby and Gretchen. It’s filmed basically the same as an 80s horror movie and I think it succeeds in all the important departments.

You have your cliched group of teens, a fun night that goes wrong, and a developing evil presence that pushes the heroine to her limits. This is a really tight script come to life off the page. The entire cast is great, it’s got plenty of creepy moments with great tension build-up and a couple of gross moments for the wow department.

Elise Fisher who plays Abby carries the entire film. Great casting choice because if that character doesn’t work, the movie doesn’t. The friends have believable relationships and there’s a great mixture of good and bad moments between them. Even before the evil shows up, there are problems between them and Abby is the glue that works to keep them together through thick and thin. I laughed quite a few times and when the horror kicks in, those scenes are all really well done.

I think this is a good starter movie to get someone into horror. It’s tame in terms of violence and gore with enough intensity to get your blood pumping. The characters are great hooks to draw you in and keep you engaged long enough to want to see how it ends. I checked this out on a whim and I’m glad I did.

FireStarter (2022)

Everything about this movie is fine. Just fine. And that’s the problem. There’s nothing in this movie that stands out. When the credits rolled, I started to forget what I just watched.

FireStarter is an adaptation of the Stephen King novel. A couple of things were changed to make it different from the book and the 1984 film adaptation to modernize it a bit and to give the actors more room to do their own thing.

As college students, Alex and Vicky enroll in a study involving a hallucinogenic drug. It ends up giving them telekinesis powers. They get married and have a girl named Charlene (Charlie) who inherits these powers and develops her own, pyrokinesis. The couple hides from the organization that did the studies, knowing that they are going to want to take and study Charlie. When Charlie loses control of her powers at school, it notifies the bad guys and the family has to run.

While the book is 40 or so years old there’s nothing in here that feels new or interesting. Everything is rather predictable and if it isn’t predictable, it’s boring. Zac Efron is the big name in this movie and as Alex, he does an admirable job as husband/protector. The whole cast is good in fact, even if their character is rather cliched.

The big plot point of the movie is the effort to keep Charlie secret. They have to stay off the grid so they have no digital devices which make Charlie stand out from her peers. This adds to her stress which more or less leads to her getting discovered. Alex and Vicky are at odds on how much they should tell Charlie, with Vicky wanting to teach her daughter how to control her powers while Alex wants her to suppress and hide them. The odd thing is that it looks like there’s nothing to really teach Charlie. While the origins of her pyrokinesis eventually come out, she figures out how to use them pretty much on her own. She can suddenly change the type of attack (explosion, fireball, direct spontaneous combustion) and target pretty easily. They did teach her some basic things as we see her try to hold back at the start but there’s nothing to her becoming what is essentially an X-Men.

The VFX look good, the direction is fine and the movie moves at a good clip. There’s just nothing engaging about it. It’s like a polite insult. There’s an attempt at getting emotion and points across but in the end, it doesn’t matter and is easy to ignore.

Love and Monsters

I wouldn’t call this a horror movie, but it does have a lot of gigantic monsters in it. So, a monster movie. I’d label it as a fun adventure movie with a lot of charm and character.

Seven years after mankind blasted an asteroid to keep it from hitting Earth and the resulting toxins rained down and mutated all the insects, we find Joel in his underground community. The insects are so dangerous that the few people who survived were forced to go underground and survive in small groups. Joel is the odd man out in his bunker with no significant other. His contributions are fixing HAM radios and cooking what meager food they can scavenge and grow. He freezes up when he gets scared so he’s always told to stay behind when a threat comes for them. After a gigantic bug breaks into the bunker, Joel reassesses his life and decides that making the 85 mile trek to his ex-girlfriend’s community is his only chance at finding a meaningful life. Just surviving isn’t enough. He and Aimee were separated on the day of the end of the world, but he was fortunate enough to find her using the radio he had fixed.

No one thinks he’ll make it.

Joel’s journey is one of discovery, where he finds out more about himself than he ever thought possible. He goes through a lot, threatened by bugs and people. He also meets good people and one awesome dog who teach him what it takes to survive on the surface.

While the concept is far from original, it’s a really well-made movie with a lot of great characters and story beats. The conflicts he gets into are exciting and Joel is a funny character which makes following him around interesting. His story arc is believable and complete, helped by some fantastic VFX that makes this Bug Earth come to life. A surprise movie experience for me.

Antlers

I liked Antlers a lot. I was in the mood for a monster movie and this fit the bill. There are two stars on the bill, Keri Russell who I’ve loved forever, and Jesse Plemons who first made waves on Breaking Bad. They play siblings, Julia, a middle school teacher, and Paul the local Sheriff. As the movie unfolds you find out they had a traumatic childhood and those issues come back when Julia becomes concerned about one of her students, Lucas. First, his behavior is compromised. Julia recognizes a kid who doesn’t go home to a safe environment. Then, the big tell that he’s dealing with something secret is in his disturbing drawings.

Lucas’ father has gotten in trouble. He goes with his dad to do some kind of business with friends, and his dad tells him to stay out of the building, he’s not going to be long. But it turns out he and his friends found something that was meant to be buried forever and he becomes sick. Lucas, who can barely take care of himself because he’s so young, has to manage his father and younger brother on his own. His father is far beyond what medicine can help with.

The Oregon setting is the perfect location for this story as the environment becomes part of the story. The movie looks very good with quality directing. I really liked the weaving of Julia and Paul’s past with the main plot as it felt natural and made Julia a more fleshed-out character. The escalation of dread and horror is spaced out well so when things go really nuts, it feels right. Creepy in all the best ways, I think Antlers is one of the best horror movies I’ve seen recently.

Hellraiser (2022)

This is what a reboot should do. This is a total resurrection for this franchise where only 1 of the 9 sequels is really worth watching. This script goes back to what made the first so wild and intriguing. Put an oblivious character into the path of a sneaky character with the Lemarchand box, and watch what happens.

Riley is a young woman who is crashing with her brother because she’s fallen on hard times. Her addiction(s) have more or less taken over her life. She’s struggling to keep things together and when her boyfriend Trevor offers her a cut for stealing from some unidentified rich people, she takes it because she’s desperate. It looks simple enough as the business has been abandoned and the safe is easy pickings. What’s in the safe isn’t safe though (surprise, it’s a horror movie!). It’s Lemarchand’s puzzle box. The device that invites Pinhead and pals to come take you to hell. Once that first bit of blood activates the box, it’s a slide into insanity.

I think this reboot works the best on the first watch if you know nothing about Hellraiser. Once the puzzle box shows up, you basically know all the rules even though this adaptation of Clive Barker’s short story changes things up. Riley makes a ton of mistakes and it’s easy to think of her as stupid for most of the movie. Because you know what’s going on it gives you advantages she could never have. There’s no reason for her to think that the puzzle box she has is the problem. She’s high when things start getting weird so she doesn’t believe what bits and pieces she remembers seeing. The natural answer to her is, “I’m hallucinating”. And when the first person gets taken, she doesn’t see it happen, they just vanish. Seeing it would have been a bigger tip-off to put things together faster.

But once she does start putting things together, the annoyance with her wanes as she begins to smarten up and works to fix things. There are still some dumb oversights for horror trope reasons (like no one seeing a character taking the box when everyone there would have seen it) but I stayed engaged and was alright about going along with it. Corners are cut when a journal is found that explains everything but I think it works because of the how and why that information was found. And the lore that comes out is cool. Everything that Voight finds out and what he does is satisfying and builds on the original Hellraiser. The arc of mankind’s weakness for temptation and the never-ending yearning for more. Power and greed are dangerous and the evil that exists to exploit and feed off of those aspects is scary. Plus, being manipulated is something everyone is wary of and is a major betrayal. This movie traffics in a lot of sinister emotions that put us on edge.

Speaking of scary, the Cenobites are next level and carry the torch of icon horror figures. Including the Hellpriest, we see six of them. And they all stand out. They are disturbing not in just the way they look but also because they love what they get to do. This movie is drop-dead gorgeous. The visuals are stunning as are the SFX. Tremendous practical effects mixed with CG to blast us off into hellish dimensions. I love the redesigned Pinhead. The classic Doug Bradley version is little more than a guy wearing leather with pins stuck in his face. This Hellpriest played by Jamie Clayton is all carved up and menacing with a wild augmented voice, but is somehow beautiful and graceful. Now that I think about it, I don’t recall ever seeing her walk, so there’s no movement that could be called graceful. She does caress a character’s face but she doesn’t have fingernails so even that is disturbing. Simply standing and observing is terrifying. And the stuff she says you don’t want to hear anyone say. The first full abduction scene legit freaked me out. Phenomenal direction. I haven’t felt that uncomfortable and hoped that this shit better be 100% fantasy since Hostel. As gruesome as this movie gets, there are still aspects of sensuality and erotism that come through. The BDSM motifs aren’t hidden of course. Major credit to the art and design departments of this show. This stuff would make H.R. Giger proud.

I had no idea this was being made until just before the trailer came out a month ago. And like everyone else I’m sure, I thought this would be another one to skip. The trailer was great and the finished product rocks. There is huge potential for a sequel; I hope this team sticks together and makes another one that is even better.

This movie was an absolute blast to watch. There have been a few Predator movies added to the franchise and most of them have been mixed with the Alien franchise. Most of them aren’t good. Prey is a return to form where the story centers on just a few characters, who are outmatched, in a battle for their survival.

Prey takes place a few hundred years before the original Predator film. It is 1719, in the Northern Great Plains, where we meet Naru, a Commanche. She is on a mission to prove herself to her tribespeople. She wants to do more than collect food and practice medicine, she has her sights set on being a warrior. She tells her brother, Taabe, that she is ready for the kuhtaamia–to hunt a dangerous predator solo. The ultimate test between apex predators. Despite her growing skills, he doesn’t think she’s ready. Her mother thinks she wants to do it for the wrong reasons. Others are far more dismissive, thinking she should stay in the role that the tribe culture has long established.

Naru, while out on her own in the woods starts to notice that something odd is happening. She’s finding strange tracks and dead animals killed in odd ways. She sees something in the sky and believes it’s a sign that her time is coming. When Naru tells others of what she sees, they brush it off. The more signs she sees, the more she believes that something new, not a bear or mountain lion that they normally deal with, is circling them.

This movie is smart in its presentation of the characters. It shows you far more than it tells you. You learn about Naru not just by what she says, but by what she does. You recognize that’s she observant and smart long before Taabe defends her coming along on a rescue mission to the other men in the tribe. The movie works so well because it gives you capable and fleshed out characters to care about in a believable environment. The character’s personalities come out naturally through all of the actions and subtle setups that are sprinkled throughout. All of these elements respect the audience’s intelligence, it doesn’t pander with too much exposition. You witness characters change amongst the threats that appear from all angles. The pacing of a growing threat is spot on, which propels the movie. And then when things pop off, it is so satisfying.

The script keeps the characters in the dark for much longer than the audience. We don’t see the Predator in full until far into the movie, but it’s clear what’s happening very early on. The filmmakers know you know what a Predator is. It puts you into the position of wanting the heroes to recognize that they are in danger as fast as possible so that they can come up with a plan to stay alive.

The action scenes are all awesome. It’s a pretty gory affair even with a lot of violence happening off-screen. The VFX are all largely very good and that sells what the Predator is and what it’s doing. Prey pulls all of the best parts of the first two movies, and puts it in a new era to make the journey new and interesting. Everything feels fresh, but familiar which I think is the ultimate goal of a sequel or prequel.

I have a few quibbles but none of them are really worth mentioning because they don’t detract enough from how much I enjoyed this. The trailer for this looked promising and the final film absolutely delivers.

The Batman opens with Bruce Wayne’s voice-over as the audience is introduced to the streets of Gotham City. Two crimes are starting to unfold: an armed robbery and a gang jumping a man in the subway. The armed robber sees the Bat-signal in the sky and gets worried. He looks around, becomes jumpy at the city noises. He looks down a dark alleyway and backs up into oncoming traffic and then flees on foot. The gang of men surround the terrified man and noise from a dark corridor gets everyone’s attention. From the darkness, a man wearing custom armor walks into the scene like a shadow in a dream. The criminals and the audience now know, That’s Batman.

The Batman, at almost 3 hours long, feels a lot like reading a very good 8-10 issue Batman comic book story arc. It has a clear stance from the opening, the world is built out in front of you as new characters are introduced, and a brooding mystery starts to unfurl with Batman at the center of it. I also appreciate the effort in making Gotham City look like a unique city, unlike Christopher Nolan’s “yeah we shot this in Chicago” Gotham City.

The Riddler (Paul Dano) is the main antagonist and the movie wastes no time in getting his scheme going. The plot to kill prominent political figures gets Bruce Wayne to re-evaluate his goals and techniques for bringing justice to Gotham City.

Batman is played by Robert Pattinson, who is a hell of an actor. I never doubted his casting in this and the final product proves why he was chosen. I’ll say his Bruce Wayne is very limited in his emotional range but that’s due to where we are in his life. For example, he doesn’t put on the mask of a playboy in public. He hasn’t come to the realization of needing that cover yet.

The movie is largely a new Batman Begins that cuts out a lot of set up time in favor of diving headfirst into a brilliant film noir approach for this Batman tale. Where Christopher Nolan decided to have 20 minutes of Batman in his first movie, director and co-writer Matt Reeves went with 20 minutes of Bruce Wayne. Batman is all up, in, and over this picture and I love it.

I could gush about this movie for ages but I’ll sum most of my love like this. The Batman is the take on Batman I’ve waited more than 20 years to see. It pulls from some of the best parts of the character and shapes them into the launching pad for the greater things to come.

With the decision to start at year 2 of Batman’s career, we watch a Bruce Wayne who is still figuring out what he’s doing. His idea of justice is strictly vengeance at this point. He is incredibly angry because of the murder of his parents when he was a child and he’s more or less looking for reasons to live. He wants to scare the evil of the city with his image and bust the skulls of anyone who dares harm another. He is a new force of the city. His only ally is Lieutenant Gordon (Jeffrey Wright) and the rest of the police force wants to arrest the vigilante they don’t trust. Gordon has to vouch and protect Batman a few times. While we don’t see how their relationship started, we get to see how they are learning to trust and work together through the entire movie.

Alfred (Andy Serkis) has a small part in this movie as Bruce’s anchor. He’s incredibly worried about where it looks like Bruce is headed and does what he can to temper his “son” with advice. When Riddler unearths dirt on Bruce’s parents, it makes Bruce question everything he knows–and what he’s fighting for–including what Alfred means to him.

After the Riddler kills for the first time, we watch Batman and Alfred piece the clues together that Riddler left behind. One possibility leads to a bread crumb, which leads to another, which leads to meaty leads. It’s a ton of fun to watch this unfold (Detective Batman has been underserved in the movies far too much) and it leads him to Selina Kyle (Zoe Kravitz) a.k.a Catwoman who works at Oswald Cobblepot’s (Colin Farrell) a.ka. The Penguin’s nightclub. It’s a fantastic introduction and watching them get involved is a lot of fun. Their ideas and methods clash, coming from very different sides of the city they see and go after things differently. There’s a lot of friction between them but just like with Gordon, we get to see their relationship grow and change. The seeds for what they become in the comic books are planted here.

The other main players, Carmine Falcone (John Turturro) and District Attorney Gil Colson (Peter Sarsgaard) are also perfectly cast and given the time to make their mark. Penguin is fantastic despite not getting a lot of screen time. If I hadn’t known it was Farrell in that role, I never would have guessed it. The prosthetic makeup is phenomenal and his voice and body movement are completely different from Farrell’s. He gets some of the best moments in the film and the possibilities of where they can go with his character are fantastic.

I really like how we get to watch Bruce figure things out as he goes. He’s far from the World’s Greatest Detective that he becomes. He’s very observant but doesn’t figure out everything on his own. He puts things together with Gordon, Alfred, and Selina by talking it out with them. He gets clues wrong which puts him on his back foot. He’s an amazing fighter, but he gets hit because he’s taking on groups of maniacs at a time. He knows that he has to drop every target as fast as he can in order to survive and the fights are brutal. He’s got his basic gadgets like the grappling hook, but he’s still building them out and figuring out what he needs.

A great example of all of this is when he has to flee a building. He makes it up to the roof and stands on the ledge. When realizing how high up he is, his eyes bug out as even he can’t believe what he’s about to do. He pops a squirrel suit enhancement out of his armor to give himself the ability to glide. About to be overtaken, he makes the leap of faith in spectacular fashion but it doesn’t go smoothly.

Production wise, The Batman is nuts. Matt Reeves directed the ever loving stuffing out of this. There are some stunning visuals from start to finish. Beautiful framing and exquisite lighting make specific moments pop just right. The Riddler’s introduction is a perfect example. The movie is so dark (just about all of it takes place at night) that if the cinematography wasn’t on point, it’d collapse under its own weight. Direction, movement, and purpose would have been lost. And the soundtrack! Simply perfect. And the sound design? The best Batmobile scene ever filmed.

I really love this movie. It felt more like 2 hours than 3 to me. Every scene brings something to the table. There’s some goofy and head-scratching stuff here and there, but nothing I can’t go with the flow with. Minor complaints (the cops would not have waited that long to try and take off Batman’s cowl to see who he is) that don’t ruin anything for me. The motivation for Riddler felt believable and works with what’s happening in the world today. I’ve seen some people complain that the final action scene is too much but it worked for me. It does lean the farthest into comic book action where the bulk of the movie works to ground this world in realism, but if I’m watching Batman, hook me up with that. I’m here for mayhem. And guess what? The scary part is that radicalizing people online for a crazy case is happening. It’s been happening for years.

All of this bodes well for a sequel. Bruce Wayne and Batman will be different and stronger. What he goes through with Riddler changes him. I can’t wait to see where this goes, the sky is the limit. Until the Justice League space station is made anyway.

The New York Rangers’ 2-week break ended last night with a tight game win at the conclusion of a 9 round shootout against the Boston Bruins.

• 31-13-4
• 66 points in 48 games
• 6th in the league standings
• Current spread of points for the top 16 is Colorado (72) to Edmonton/LAK (55)

In that time off, many teams played re-scheduled games and now the league is much closer to parity in total games played. The Rangers have 3 rescheduled to play which I think don’t happen until March. But at 48 games, that leaves 34 games left to play in the regular season so we’re a decent amount into the second half of the season already. And things remain looking good.

Beating Boston is a much-needed win; they’re a solid team who is fighting to stay in playoff contention. Last night was a game of inches–a goalie showcase on both ends of the ice–and the Rangers managed to not only tie the game (great to have Chytil come back after missing 6 games AND score a goal) but to take the second point from Boston in such a close contest. K’Andre Miller adds to his value with the surprise-winning shot in the shootout.

The Rangers had another slow start (out shot 8-2 in the 1st period) but rallied to compete in the rest of the game. Adam Fox is also back and Kappo Kakko is going to be out for at least another month. That’s shocking. His upper-body injury from a month ago now is much more serious than anyone thought. In other Defense developments, Braden Schneider and Zac Jones continue to get more ice time (an added benefit from Patrik Nemeth being MIA) and they are clearly getting more confident.

So looking at the rankings and the schedule, the Rangers have benefits and drawbacks ahead. The 2-week break should be an overall benefit. They are now the most rested team and beating Boston is a great sign coming back. Detroit and Ottawa are next and compared to Boston, neither of them is good. Confident wins but the Rangers can’t get lazy. Every point matters from here on out and all positive momentum (win streaks) is valuable for a good mindset as the playoffs get closer.

Their schedule is relatively easy in terms of games being spread out and how many road games are left. The majority are at home, that’s a big bonus. But there are a lot of top-tier games left to go. Every divisional game that isn’t against the Devils, Flyers, or Islanders, is against a team this is in, or fighting for, a playoff spot. All dangerous. The big one is Pittsburg who is now first in the Metro division (4 points ahead of Rangers, 3 points ahead of Carolina). They’ve been strong all season and are making big waves now. The first game against them is on the 26th (and then 2 games close together a month later). Washington isn’t pleased about Pitt taking off but Boston’s loss last night helps them in their time of struggle (27-15-9).

Tampa (1), Blues (2), Carolina (3), Minnesota (1), Washington (2), Boston (1) are all major threats and likely the hardest contests remaining. Staying healthy is super important and the trade deadline is about a month away and many people think moves will be made (could JT Miller be brought back?!). A lot to keep an eye on as every single day the standings adjust because so many teams are so close in points. The battle for the wild card spots will likely be very close this season.

I was really worried about Malignant after the opening scene. It did not give me a good first impression. Bad acting, bizarre directing choices, and a soundtrack that doesn’t fit. This is a James Wan joint and he loves action and horror, so I settled in to see if he could turn this around. Aside from the soundtrack, the movie ended up winning me over.

After establishing that some kind of dangerous monster in a hospital is the big bad of the movie, we are introduced to Madison. She’s pregnant and her husband sucks. Some serious supernatural stuff happens to them in their home and we’re off to figure out what’s happening. Like many successful suspense/horror movies, Malignant hinges on deception and perspective to keep the audience on their toes. Madison keeps getting visions of people getting killed, with the monster soon directly contacting her. She doesn’t know what’s going on and her sanity is quickly questioned. But when it’s proven that her visions are actually happening in real life, she becomes a suspect. The unraveling of what’s happening–and whether you can trust Madison or not–is the best part of the movie and is done quite well. The last act of the movie is a lot of fun as all hell breaks loose.

Thankfully the bad acting goes away quickly. There’s nothing as ham-fisted and goofy in the actor’s line delivery after the opening scene. I like James Wan as a director. He’s not a fan of static camera placement and always looks for a way to move the camera around a scene in new and interesting ways. Usually, this works. In the opening quarter of the movie, there is a fantastic sequence of Madison running through her house in fear with the camera moving across the ceiling. It looks like you are looking down at a dollhouse with a live person inside of it, going from room to room and then up the stairs. As the walls fly by, sometimes those wipes are used for the camera to zoom closer or further away from her. It’s a really wild visual…I’m not too sure how it was accomplished.

Other times, the direction is heavy-handed, like in the first scene where the whole production looks like the movie was made in the early 2000s (what is with Madison and Sydney’s bangs? They must be terrible wigs. Drove me nuts). Really fast camera movement and editing that looks like it’s trying to be “Xtreme!” but looks more amateurish (a lot like how director Darren Lynn Bousman made his Saw movies look like a music video). One moment that sticks out to me is during the final action scene where someone fires a shotgun and it hits the desk instead of the target. A gigantic hole is made and the camera zooms in on it as the shot is fired. The sudden camera movement sticks out like a sore thumb because it’s distracting and not needed. You are behind the character with the gun, you see the muzzle flash, hear the loud boom, and see the gigantic hole in the desk. There’s no question of what’s happening in front of you, there’s no point in shoving it into the audience’s face. That action scene is fast and wild as it is, more is less in these situations.

The other negative is I never felt like the soundtrack ever fits the tone or theme of what I was watching. It’s a weird, lazy-sounding hybrid of metal and electronic music that more often felt like a distraction than an enhancement.

Back to the good stuff. The movie’s pacing is very good. The ratcheting of the stakes of what is happening and the peril that comes with it keeps the movie from getting stale. Every scene brings new information and the level of carnage is uncorked for the end. For an R rated horror movie, I thought they were pulling punches in the gore department at the start. I think they did so to get keep the mayhem for the last quarter of the movie.

The monster is also very inventive. It moves really weirdly and that’s always off-putting. That’s actually a curse and a blessing because at certain points the movement can make the monster look goofy. It’s so odd it can look funny and it makes you wonder why it’s moving the way it does. But the blessing side of that is you’re not too sure what you’re looking at or where it could have come from. That’s effective monster design and when you get the whole story, you get a great payoff. It’s a mean bugger too, so that’s always fun (the voice feels way too close to what the Scream franchise did though). The origin of the monster, how it comes out to hunt, and how it’s dealt with are all satisfying as well.

The special effects are really good as well. Very little comes off as cheap looking or too ‘off’, so it’s easy to suspend your disbelief and go with the flow. The melting and reforming room effect is a particular stand out.

For any seasoned horror fan, there’s nothing scary here. Scaredy cats will jump in fright a few times as there’s some spooky and grizzly stuff from start to finish. I like how the movie goes from suspense to ghost story, to body horror, and then action film pretty effortlessly. After the other horror movies James Wan has directed, I can see why this script caught his eye.

It’s about 105 minutes long, which is the perfect length for a Halloween treat.

I didn’t find out about this movie until the trailer came out and had the same reaction as most people. Are they going to try and turn Cruella into a sympathetic character? The woman who is all about skinning dogs for a coat? Who asked for this?

Turns out, I did, and I just didn’t know it.

Cruella tells the story of how a young girl named Estella becomes one of Disney’s most iconic film villains, Cruella de Vile. The movie begins in 60s England with Estella around the age of twelve years old. She’s a rebellious and strong-willed kid. She pushes up against authority at school and does not hesitate to defend herself against anyone who crosses her. Catherine, her single mother, does everything she can to give Estella a proper upbringing. When Estella crosses a line at school and gets kicked out, their forced to move to London to go to another school and Catherine reaches out to The Baroness for help. She’s a superstar in the fashion world; Catherine used to work for her as a maid. Partly due to Estella sneaking around The Baroness’ posh party, all hell breaks loose and Catherine is killed in an accident involving the Baranoess’ dalmatians.

Frightened and traumatized from seeing her mother killed, Estella runs away. She stows away in the back of a truck and on her first morning alone, she finds Jasper and Horace stealing for their own survival. She tags along with them, becoming a potent thieving crew. They come up with inventive ways to rip people off and with the sowing skills she first picked up from her mother, Estella creates all of their costumes for disguise.

The bulk of the movie moves ten years ahead where Estella yearns to do more with her life. Her and the boys basically scrape by with each successful theft they pull off and she is clearly very talented in fashion. Her friends end up getting her a proper job that could get her foot in the door to becoming a fashion designer where Estella ends up working under The Baroness.

The movie blasts off from there, with Estella working her ass off for The Baroness who turns out to also be a thief. None of her designs are her own, she just takes from the dozen or so designers who work under her. Never one for authority, Estella rages against the machine, creating Cruella as an alter ego to dethrone The Baroness.

I can’t believe how good this movie is. It’s just mad. The production is off the charts good. The casting is great, the soundtrack is awesome, the direction is incredibly active and creative. It’s punk, goth, and glam mashed together in surprising ways. The action pieces (pretty much all chase scenes) are awesome and the way Cruella keeps upstaging The Baroness is nothing short of brilliant. You will not believe what is possible with a garbage truck until you see this movie. It’s part of one of the best montages ever made.

This movie basically presents Cruella as an anti-hero. It skirts a lot of extremes in what I think are smart ways. This is a pretty family-friendly movie, but it gets pretty dark and intense. The Cruella personality doesn’t suddenly appear. That part of Estella is shown under the surface from the very start. She is a product of her environment. Her dislike of dalmatians makes sense from her trauma and there’s a twist to that part of the story that changes her perspective (and the audience) further. You never see her hurt a dog, she makes a joke about it that foreshadows 101 Dalmatians. The major arc of the movie is watching Estella steadily being worn away. Jasper and Horace see it happening. They don’t like it and they tell her that and try and get her to pull back from the edge that she keeps running up to with The Baroness. She gets more extreme as she’s driven by the overpowering emotions of abandonment, vengeance, and justice. Ultimately, her goal is to get what she’s fairly earned instead of someone ripping it away from her.

This movie is so fresh and unique that I have to remind myself that it’s from Disney. The script is brilliant, I commend the writers for it. The twists are great, the metamorphosis of Estella is satisfying and surprisingly well told. It’s directed by Craig Gillespie, whose last movie was the great I, Tonya. The man knows his craft. Come to think of it, this movie has a lot of parallels with I, Tonya.

Highly recommended.

It’s been two months since my last post, I don’t think I’ve ever gone that long. I know I didn’t post anything in August but I didn’t realize I’ve been away since the middle of July. All this month I’ve been meaning to put an update up and I never get to it. Been busy.

I’ll start getting back in the habit with a New York Rangers update. I don’t have much to say so, this will be easy.

The regular season starts in less than a month and I cannot wait. Pre-season starts 2 weeks before that, and I’ll tune in for all 6 games. I have high hopes for the changes that have been made over the off-season. I think the start of the season will be way better than last season, which was a disaster so that’s not saying much.

A few pieces were moved around in the last few weeks, new guys from the draft. It’s real inside stuff and I won’t pretend I know what I’m talking about. Truth is, no one knows the starting lineup yet. That’s going to be determined in development camp with the rookies right now. Then the whole team hits the ice soon for training camp and pre-season is where the ice chips settle for opening night and beyond. There’s a lot to figure out and smart people being paid to do that are going to figure it out in time.

I have high hopes for coach Gallant, I’m expecting energized veteran players right from the start so I think there is a big upswing to look forward to. We’ll see what shape last year’s rookies are in now too. I know they’re chomping at the bit to prove themselves further and if this team can jell together, watch out.

It’s been a very long time since the last live-action Mortal Kombat movie. The video game series has fallen off in popularity, but the 9th game, which was a reboot in 2011, revitalized the franchise. The following 2 sequels have been very popular so what company can stay away from expanding a hot IP?

The 1995 movie is arguably the first game brought to life as best as you could do. Earthrealm had lost the Mortal Kombat tournament 9 times in a row. One more loss and Outworld, a hostile (to put it mildly) dimension, will be able to invade Earth. So, the world is at stake for a few chosen Earth champions. Critics didn’t like it but fans did and turned out for it. The fight choreography is a standout for an American action film for the time. It stands up well today.

The 1997 sequel was so bad another movie wasn’t made until today.

This 2021 movie restarts the story but it doesn’t repeat the plot of the 1995 movie exactly. Outworld is one win away from invasion but sorcerer Shang Tsung is taking no chances at grabbing the brass ring. He’s cheater in previous tournaments and this time he’s decided to go on the offensive. Assassinate the chosen Earthrealm champions before the tournament, insuring his warriors can dominate whoever Earthrealm defender (and thunder god) Raiden can scrape together for a final showdown.

This change subverts the expectation of seeing a Mortal Kombat tournament in this movie. It never happens because all the fighting is done before the tournament starts, it’s basically all survival to get to the tournament. I have no problems with this change, it fits Shang Tsung well.

Fan-favorite ninjas–Sub Zero and Scorpion–are the highlights of the movie, as you can see in the poster above. The first scene sets up their rivalry, making Scorpion a specter of revenge and Sub Zero as the big bad of the movie.

Let’s start with what I liked. The casting is terrific, as are the costumes. The production as a whole looks good if limited at times. There are a few catchy tunes in the soundtrack, though most of the music is rather forgettable. The SFX are by and large very good. Sub Zero’s ice effects are fantastic, character-specific special moves such as Liu Kang’s fireballs, Kabal’s sprint, and Mileena’s teleport are well translated too. Goro and not-entirely Reptile (it’s his species, but it’s not Reptile) are complete CG characters and they both look and animate extremely well. There’s a lot of great compositing work done, just about everything looks like it fits together. The pops of horror gore for the Fatalities are really well done too, so fans can check that box on the list.

There are some dumb lines that don’t fit here and there, but I think the acting is great for everyone. Josh Lawson as Kano is hilarious, Ludi Lin brings the serious Liu Kang to life and Hiroyuki Sanada and Joe Taslim as Scorpion and Sub Zero are perfectly cast. Joe as Sub Zero is a scary dude. He’s completely menacing and intense in every scene he’s in, I’d call him one of the best villains in any action movie. I like Lewis Tan as Cole Young. Cole is a character created for the movie, a representative of the audience of sorts as he’s the only main character who doesn’t know about the weird stuff that’s been going on out of sight from the public. He’s got a good story arc that starts in a low place and ends on a high.

The disappointment comes from a lot of areas. The story is very simple and many characters are undeveloped because of it. There are so many beloved MK characters that making Cole isn’t necessary. I can understand why they did it, but his story is far from fresh. It’s easy to predict what’s going to happen for him.

Many characters don’t do much. Shang Tsung is mostly shown standing and talking. Sure his robe looks sweet, but he’s never that imposing. He gets to do his Fatality from MK 2 which is a treat but I expected more from him. Raiden gets even less screen time and he’s basically a jerk the entire time. Nothing he does is explained too well and he holds back needed information for no reason. You see Kung Lao train Cole more than fight a villain. Mileena, one of the most popular characters is used as…a bodyguard of sorts? She completely misused, has no back story, and gets very little screen time. She looks fantastic though and Sisi Stringer plays her appropriately sinister. I’m willing to bet she’ll be a focus of a sequel where they bring in Kitana and they can get into their story. You really need the sisters to make that whole part of the extensive MK lore work.

I was also expecting way more from the fights. Many of them are filmed up close with many cuts. It’s edited quickly so it can be hard to follow. The first and last fight scenes are the best. Really well shot, very creative, and exciting with a story between the men being told. Jax vs Sub Zero near the beginning and Kano and Sonya in the trailer are the other notable scenes. The attack scene with Reptile is a lot of fun too. It’s really hard to pull off a fight with something that’s invisible look real and it’s done well. Since Reptile is all CG, a lot of planning was done beforehand and it shows. The audio and blocking in the scene work.

The rush to get to fights makes for a very fast-paced movie (which feeds into the ‘not much story and development’ problem). In the third act where the heroes go on the offensive, they have multiple fights going on at the same time. It isn’t handled well. Rapid cutting to each fight takes away from the better fights’ pacing and impact. It comes off as disjointed and amateurish. Jax vs Reiko is a joke. There’s barely any choreography and they try to make up for it with a Fatality. You don’t get to see Mileena, Kabal, or Liu Kang do much hand-to-hand combat. Which is what fans want to see.

For everything the movie does right, there’s something that holds it back. There’s some great fan service sprinkled in and some of it doesn’t work (like trying to get too many catch phrases in). There’s a lot of dumb stuff you have to suspend your disbelief for. Additions were made that don’t work well enough and feel like a waste of time. Like the odd choice to use the dragon mark from the terrible MK: Annihilation movie to get into the tournament or learning how to unlock your special powers. I can see why they thought the ideas were good (it is a nice victory to see Sonya get her dragon mark) but they’re half-baked ideas in the end.

I was hoping for more but I still had a fun time watching this. It doesn’t take itself seriously and it’s ultimately a goofy movie adaptation of a goofy video game. Through most of the movie, I felt like they were holding back. Very few locations and many of them feel very narrow like you can tell there is nothing behind them. The scope of the movie feels more like it’s set on a stage than in a universe. It’s like the goal was to simply get this movie off the ground for it to do well enough to make a much bigger sequel. They can go anywhere with this series and it is a challenge to pick the strongest parts to make a coherent live action movie (there’s a lot of stupid stuff in MK). They could just do a Scorpion and Sub Zero movie and make fans happy.

A more experienced action director and better fight choreographers are needed moving forward. The bar for action movies is very high and Mortal Kombat doesn’t go close or above that standard nearly enough. What stands out for this franchise are the wild characters and their abilities. That’s where the creativity in the action lies. You can make Mortal Kombat fall between the bombastic action of the Marvel movies and the visceral violence of The Raid movies. The potential is there for something really special. With ninjas, gods, sorcerers, and the reanimated dead.

Five years in the making the complete Justice League movie has been released on HBO Max. Including the credits, the run time is 4 hours and 2 minutes. This is the whole DC enchilada. It felt like I was watching a 12-issue comic book series come to life.

Zack Snyder’s Justice League has a chaotic production story that few movies can come close to. It’s been written about ad nauseam and with this Snyder Cut (SC) release, even more detail has come out. For the sake of context, I’ll do an abridged version.

Around 2010, writer/director Zack Snyder was hired to take over the DC film universe after Christopher Nolan finished his three Batman films. Snyder is a love it or hate it director (I like most of what he’s done) and he has a unique look and take on themes and messages for his movies. In 2013, Man of Steel was released with mixed reactions, if on the more positive side. It did well at the box office, being the first Superman movie in seven years. That was the start of Snyder’s overall long-term plans for DC movies.

Batman vs Superman: Dawn of Justice is released in 2016 and gets trashed by critics and is very divisive with fans. It doesn’t make the money Warner Brothers expected. An Ultimate Edition with cut footage was released on home video that improved on some things but that film is still okay-at-best. This where the problems start and an avalanche of events and studio decisions are made. WB is now scared of what Snyder is doing. Afraid they are leaving money on the table with audiences with a too dark take on these superheroes, they want changes. Justice League is filmed under a lot of pressure and when Snyder’s daughter suddenly dies, he and his wife Deborah (who produces his films) leave the project because their priorities rightfully change. They choose their family over fighting with a Hollywood studio with a huge list of changes to Justice League. Writer/director Joss Whedon is hired to rewrite, reshoot, and finish JL for its original 2017 release date. The two-hour movie comes out with reviews that are just as bad and a disappointing box office. With reshoots and advertising, JL has been estimated to cost $300 million and lost $60 million. So no one is happy.

Online, #ReleasetheSnyderCut is started and goes on for years. Rumors about the production swirl, Snyder teases his original plans for the movie during all of this, and the die-hard fans don’t let up on their pressure on WB to let him finish the movie (and universe) he started. I never thought they’d give Snyder the greenlight to finish his movie. Too much was unfinished and director’s cuts like this rarely happen. A few DC movies are made using the events of JL as canon. Then, in May of 2020, it’s publicly announced the SC will be finished and released on HBO Max. The release date March 18, 2021. That was a week ago.

Yes, all of that was the abridged version. Much like the actual movie, everything about this takes a long time to talk about.

Direct and to the point as a review: Zack Snyder’s Justice League is absolutely better than Justice League. It’s now a coherent story with proper build-ups, links to the previous Snyder movies, and quality story payoffs. We get to spend more time with every superhero and they feel like less of a hodgepodge of special people standing in a scene together and more of a team. But, if you don’t like Zach Snyder movies, you won’t like this one.

The plot is exactly the same. Batman forms a team to defend the planet from an attack from an intergalactic conqueror. So why is this move an hour and half longer? All the main characters get their fair share of the spotlight. Nothing is rushed to get a story with a main cast of six superheros done in two hours. Victor Stone gets a legit story arc. Steppenwolf gets a purpose and you get to see him actually do his plan. Barry is built up a bit more and everyone in the Justice League gets to contribute something and change from what they experience. Side characters that were cut down or completely cut are now present. There are now way fewer gaps in basic storytelling logic. No new actions scenes but all of them are expanded with tweaks done in what we’ve already seen in the theatrical cut (no horrific red sky filter in the final action scene!)

Is it the best comic book movie ever made? Nope. Is it one of the best ones? I think so. For DC freaks especially. There is a ton of setups for future movies in this version. I think it’s like five or six. The story told here is the setup for a massive DC cinematic movie universe where a bunch of characters get their own movies and then come back for more Justice League. The SC is doing what Marvel did in reverse. Introduce a bunch of characters in one event movie and spin things off from there. Marvel did the individual origin story of a character, make some sequels that then tie into event movies. That formula has worked really well. What Zach wrote is much harder to do with theatrical movies. It’s a time issue. Snyder does three origin stories in this! That’s nuts! And Flash’s story is the most truncated of the three so it’s safe to say he left that for a solo Flash movie.

The SC isn’t really feasible for a theatrical release. Without HBO Max, what’s in this movie had to have been split in two and some changes made to make two separate but linked stories like Infinity War and Endgame were carefully designed to do. You need to make sure Part 1 stands together well enough to get people to come back for Part 2 of the story six months to a year later. At 3 hours and 50 minutes, this is more of a mini-series than a movie. Since audiences are so used to binge-watching these days, that’s not a tall order for people to do now. That’s why it fits so well on HBO Max. It’s a big honking chunk of content to watch.

Here’s what I don’t get. Snyder filmed about ten minutes of new footage for this. Subtracting that, his original version clocks in at about 220 minutes. That means the shooting script was damn near 220 pages. Why did WB greenlight a comic book opus like that in the first place if they wanted something two to two and half hours long? That a script of 150 pages, tops. Scores of people read this script and approved it. What did they think he was going to come back with? It’s impossible to cut a quality, coherent film from that much material.

So, Joss Whedon stepped into a quagmire right from the jump. I’m not going to get into his ideas for his rewrite or his alleged behavior on set but it’s clear WB told him to do two things. Make the story more light-hearted and get this as close to two hours as you can. The only way to take a 220-page script and get it down to 120 is by taking a chainsaw to it. Which is what he did. He did what he was hired to do and it didn’t make a better movie. He had to jury rig the basic plot into an abridged beginning, middle, and end while adding some nonsense no one wanted. What he did to Victor Stone/Cyborg (Ray Fisher) is awful. His story arc is the best part of Snyder’s movie and just about all of it was taken out making him largely uninteresting.

This movie has every Zach Snyder trademark in every single frame. He has no problems with his comic book movies looking like comics. He holds up superheroes to the viewer like they are all mythical beings. The type of color grading he uses is very deliberate as is his scene framing (I got used to the 4:3 aspect ratio in less than five minutes). His action sequences are totally awesome and you can pull frames that look exactly like a comic panel. He loves slow motion. Absolutely adores the technique. He sits on moments for as long as he damn well pleases. He’s an indulgent filmmaker and that drives a lot of people nuts.

I fall right in the middle of enjoying his indulgences. And because he got to do basically everything he wanted to, there are a lot. I have no problem with how he likes to desaturate the color in his movies. It’s like getting mad at Tim Burton or Quentin Tarantino’s trademark looks. It’s how they see the world through their camera lens. He could absolutely let off on the gas with the slow-mo. When you have a character like Flash where his speed can require it, having it used so much elsewhere takes away the special nature of it. It becomes too far common and can have the opposite intended effect: lessen the impact of an action and wasting time. JJ Abrams took the criticism of his lens flare fetish to heart and I wish Synder would take this criticism in the future. There are also chunks of drawing out moments that simply don’t work. The most obnoxious is when Aquaman returns to the sea for the first time. The village women serenade him out while he finishes a bottle of booze, takes his shirt off, and walks down a dock with the ocean waves consuming him in slow motion. It feels like it’s a two-minute scene but it’s probably closer to a minute in real life. The point is, it’s bad to have the audience sit there and say “I get it” and wait for a scene to end to move on so the story of your movie can start again. There are a few pauses like this that just get in the way. If you were to edit out these moments along with the excessive slow-mo, I bet the movie would be close to ten minutes shorter and you wouldn’t miss a thing.

The added epilogue also isn’t necessary. Snyder has said that he added that scene because he could. And it shows. As much as I liked seeing Jared Leto getting another crack at being the Joker and succeeding at it, what happens doesn’t add anything. It reminds me of the final Lord of the Rings movie and its three endings where I couldn’t believe the movie was still playing. The main story ends, we get the stinger that was meant to set up the next Batman movie with Deathstroke and then this Knightmare scene is tacked on that only makes the movie longer. What you see happen is so far down the potential movie line (which I doubt will ever be made) there’s no reason to care about it. It’s more of a pointless spoiler than anything else with some DC name dropping thrown in for fan service. Multiple movies would have to happen to get to that point in the story we are being shown. We already have a Knightmare flash-forward scene in BvS and with Cyborg in this movie. So….”Okay, I get it.”

The SC has been reported to cost $70 million to finish. A new score, lots of SFX work, and an added epilogue don’t come cheap. The movie overall looks very good. Steppenwolf looks way better and it was worth the wait to see Darkseid. The Amazon’s are all badasses and Wonder Woman pulls zero punches. It’s night and day seeing her in this compared to Wonder Woman 1984. There are some sketchy visuals though.

Some really suspect CG backgrounds that look more blurry and flat than real and the most egregious visual is at the very beginning. When we first see the Amazon’s guarding their motherbox, the camera comes into the chamber from above and swoops down to the ground level to an Amazon. The motherbox and the stone platform it is sitting on are, for some reason, CG. And it looks terrible. I’m talking Playstation 3 era visuals. Blurry, low-resolution textures that have no right to be seen in a major production in 2021. I have no idea why both of those elements weren’t practical as they are so easy to make and use on set and the motherbox is seen being carried around by actors in the movie so you know they had one. And if they added CG to them in the few simple scenes, why on earth couldn’t they match the quality? Was it the last shot on the list (I know the time the FX studios had on this was very short)?

I had a good time watching this. The Justice League I saw in theaters, isn’t the Justice League I wanted to see. This is much closer to it. It’s a lot of fun seeing these characters in a movie, interacting with each other. The potential for Cyborg to become the next big thing in comic book movies was laid out here and likely isn’t going to happen now. There are a lot of fun action scenes with heroic moments, unexplained easter eggs for die-hard fans, and bizarre head-scratching logic choices that are in every comic book movie. I’m stoked that Zach Snyder got to complete this project the way he wanted to. And this movie (if you cut out the needless epilogue) ends on positive notes. The beginning is intense because the stakes are high. Characters are found in low places in their life and they come through the other side as better people. The messaging is one of a lot of hope.

Now we move on. Snyder might get to make more projects in his sandbox for HBO Max, but WB is going elsewhere with its direction for DC movies. The great James Gunn is delivering Suicide Squad very soon. Matt Reeves’ The Batman is done filming and many big movies are about to start filming (Flash, Shazam 2, Aquaman 2, Black Adam) among others being written (The New Gods, Batgirl, Superman, Booster Gold, Blue Beetle, Zatana, Justice League Dark(maybe)). There’s a lot to look forward to.

Sonic the Hedgehog is now 30 years old. A slew of video games has been released in that time (most of them are bad) along with a mountain of other merchandise. So, it comes as no surprise that no one thought this would be a good movie and the surprise is that it is actually fantastic.

The writers took the smart and logical angle from the very start. How do we get a gigantic talking blue hedgehog (that doesn’t look much like a real hedgehog, but I digress) from another planet to interact with humans on Earth? The story behind Sonic has always been very thin and no one really cares about the lore so they had a lot of runway to tackle this problem. They set up a dramatic escape for kid Sonic from his home planet to ours by using the magic of the gold rings from the games. Boom. A backstory and lore from the games.

Next, how do you get the audience to care about your protagonist? Give him a fun personality and problems people can relate to. For Sonic, he’s a one-of-a-kind dude who’s all alone far from his home. He’s self-sufficient in his survival on Earth but he has to keep himself hidden from the townspeople of Green Hills. Except for the old man who spotted him and keeps trying to trap him. But no one believes him because he’s a crazy old man talking about a gigantic blue creature that moves incredibly fast. Sonic’s big wish is to have a friend or two.

And then we come to, what’s the problem of the story? Where’s the conflict. Here the writer’s figured out how to integrate long-time Sonic villain, Dr. Robotnik. Sonic accidentally sets off a massive power surge (which becomes a McGuffin for Robotnik to covet) that makes his presence known. Robotnik comes onto the scene, Sonic teams up with a local police officer and what do we have now? A buddy comedy with awesome action.

I’m amazed at how good this movie is. Tons of character, a lot of heart, and a well-constructed script that’s perfectly paced and never outlasts its welcome. The cast is terrific. James Marsden as Tom is a great counterbalance to Sonic and it’s a hell of an achievement to make a believable relationship between an animated character and a real actor on screen. Jim Carrey as Dr. Robotnik is a stroke of genius, he’s perfect. The cartoon version of Robotnik was more or less a mustache-twirling Loony Tunes/Tex Avery kind of villain. Carrey pulls that closer to his wheelhouse while not making him too over the top. He’s the right kind of wacky. They also sneak in-game references so that it’s never distracting or feels like fan service. It’s subtle nods for fans to pick out names, places, and designs while the general audience can stick with everything going on naturally.

The SFX are some of the best in the business as well. The CG is animated, rendered, and integrated so well with the live action footage that I never questioned that Sonic wasn’t actually standing in a bar learning how to throw darts or running 100 miles an hour down a road while fighting off a Robotnik tank.

The video game to movie translations have been getting much better recently and it’s about time! I recommend Sonic the Hedgehog to any kid or adult looking for a good adventure to watch.

Hunt for the Wilderpeople opens with a young man named Ricky being delivered to a foster home. It’s an uncomfortable situation, to say the least, but his foster mom Bella is a bright light in a very dark time. She lives in a rural part of New Zealand so Ricky has a lot to adjust to. She does everything she can to help Ricky. Hec, a surly old bushman that Bella has known forever is soon introduced and over the course of a journey that encompasses tragedy, misunderstanding, anger, forgiveness, and love, the Wilderpeople comes to life.

I can’t overstate how much I like this movie. Released in 2016, Wilderpeople is another notch on writer/director/producer/all-around-good-guy Taika Waititi’s belt. The man is a brilliant storyteller who excels at buddy movies. This movie is based on the book “Wild Pork and Watercress” by Barry Crump, so I can’t give all the credit to Waititi for coming up with the story but I can’t think of anyone who currently paints meaningful pictures with heart and humor better than he does.

Most of the movie is with Ricky (Julian Dennison) and Hec (Sam Neill) running through the bush of New Zealand so if they had no chemistry, the movie never would have worked. Most people will know Dennison from his foul-mouthed part in Deadpool 2. I can’t remember the last time I’ve watched Neill in a movie but this is a fantastic reminder of how great an actor he is. Together, they challenge each other to be better people without realizing it.

With the perfect mix of drama, comedy, and action, Hunt for the Wilderpeople is the movie to watch for any mood you’re in. As a matter of fact you should go watch it right now.