Being the 9th Batman feature movie (remember the 1st was in the 60s) this movie actually brought new elements to the Batman movie.

I believe this would make this well movie liked and relevant for a long time to come.

This post has been edited by Mov_freak: Mar 7 2022, 08:50 AM

A bit heavy both in them of the look of the movie and story line, for very young kids

Morbius (2022)

Remember in 1999 while you were watching The Matric and bullet time happened and you went, uhhhhh..... ahhhhhh.....

For some odd reason The Matrix Resurrections (2021) totally forgot waht made the 1999 The Matrix great... Great story and great effects

I thought I would have a terrible time at the movies with this film.

Well, the patrons behind me thought that they have the right to kick and put their legs up on the chairs in front of them, as they please...

Back to the movie... it is decent.

The first two act were actually very well done.

The why and why nots of the lead were well fleshed out.

There are scenes in the trailer that was not used....

The visual effects were a supped up bullet time and they are glorious!

Why the heck did The Matrix Resurrections (2021) forget this, I was never figure out.

Where this movie flatter is the last act...


I mostly enjoyed this.

I could do with people shaking my seat less and not see someone shoe near my head and have to add, that is life, you don't always get what you want.

My Two Sen

P.S. There are two short scene at the end but not the end end (eg after ALL the endcredits... Hope this make sense.

Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore (2022)

I want to like this movie.

I really do.

I love the harry potter books and movies (well with the exception of one of the movie).

This is an expensive movie.

The producers, writers and director are Harry Potter Universe veterans.

If you do follow my reviews, the main issue I have with Fantastic Beast movies are the storyline.

I don't think there is a true idea of what they are trying to express to the audience or even a clear pathway to get to the end game

If it was really up to me, they should end the series with this movie.

It does come to some form of conclusion.

Gellert Grindelwald has so far been played by three actors and latest being Mads Mikkelsen.

I don't think Mads Mikkelsen has a strong grasp of Gellert.

I know Ezra Miller is in alot of kaka at this point in time. Seriously, he literally could have phone his performance for this movie in...

They expanded the wizarding world without much explanation and just assume the audience would "buy it".

Some of the Fantastic Beast is way WAY out there....

The only one that seems to hold it together is Jude Law as Albus Dumbledore, not sure if that is enough to keep the series going...

They just had so many things happening and did not know how to keep the audience's focus... Leaving the audience... lacking a better term... exhausted/fatigue...

My Two Sen...

Slave driver...

If all goes well I will be able to review Lost City tomorrow

This post has been edited by Mov_freak: Apr 14 2022, 07:01 PM

The Lost City (2022)

Ahhh...

Sandra.

It has been awhile.

Hollywood used to make this kind of movies and then they decided to be woke.

In the age of Woke

We have Rebel Wilson, Melissa McCathy, Kristen Wiig, Kate McKinnon, Leslie Jones etc

The difference between their comedic work and Sandra Bullock comedic work is... Sandra's roles are never funny because her character is stupid....

There is a difference.

This movie is NOT new.

It has been done before.

From Remington Steel to Romancing the Stone, it's a nice.... update.

Overall, the movie is entertaining.

The chemistry between Brad Pitt and Sandra Bullock is more potent compared with the chemistry Channing Tatum and Sandra Bullock.... But alas


The unfortunate thing about the movie is most of the best bits have been used in the trailer already so....

If you like a date night and want a movie with nothing heavy (storyline wise) this is the exact movie you want to go to

There was a weird censor in the movie. There was a scene where Sandra is in a hotel room and she is drinking from a glass bottle, the bottle is blurred (beer?). Can anyone confirm my observation? Seriously, a blurred beer bottle???

With that

My Two Sen

Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (2022)

So... long story short... is it good?

I think the human character suffered a little with the introduction is Knuckles (Idris Elba) and Tails (Colleen O'Shaughnessey).

As for the CGI character I love the intro of Knuckles!

The only human character that did not suffer in this, is Dr. Robotnik (Jim Carrey). This character is deviously delicious!!

With all that is said and done, this is a great movie to watch with the whole family (there was a whole roll of giggling kids two row ahead of me).

Ultimate, this movie is aimed at the kiddies!

With the above and as always, my two sen.

Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness (2022)

Well, kiddies I hope everyone had a good celebration and brought your big person's pants...

Why?

Well, if you do watch this, do note that this can be categories as.... HORROR (my favorite cup of tea)!

There are alot of cheers in the cinema during the movie, so if you can and if it is safe, watch it in a big cinema and crowd!

Benedict Cumberbatch brought it. He really did.

There were alot of speculations about who would cameo here.

Some valid, some not so (hence the cheering).

Overall this is a very entertaining movie.

A really far cry from Marvel's last outing (Eternals)

My only complain would be the scoring, alot of the "Asian" were in the score early in the movie and then it "disappeared"... Magic?

Go watch this. No matter what I say you will. So just go kiddies, just go watch this. Remember to wear your big person's pants.

My Two Sen

P.S. there are two end credit scene, The first one worth it the second, meh...

Top Gun: Maverick (2022)

Top Gun: Maverick is... TOPS!

Jurassic World Dominion (2022)

I wanted to like this movie.

I really did...

So much so that I plunked down a pretty penny to watched this at Imax (Rm33... ).

And the result is...

The movie is meh...

The producer and director literally threw everything at it including the kitchen sink and the final product is just okay...

It looks more like a parade of dinosaurs and not much else...

I am.... disappointed.

Maybe my expectation was too high.

My Two Sen

The Black Phone (2022)

This movie is.... troubling...

Very troubling.

First ,you have the subject matter... Children abduction and murder...

Then you have, what children with a drunk and broken parent can go through.

I was... quite disturbed at certain parts of the movie.

The "lead actor" Mason Thames (who plays Finney) reminds me of Brad Renfro (may he rest in peace).

The main star of the movie for me is actually Madeleine McGraw (who plays Gwe, Finney's sister).

There were some rumblings of how great Ethan Hawke is in the movie... I think he was better in Sinister (2012)...

So, in summary, story is decent, acting good all around and direction was competent.

My main issue with the movie is

This is a dark movie.

It does not portray every single act of violence that occurs (thank goodness) and actually forces the audience to "imagine" the violence that happens to the captured children and that is one of the disturbing thing of the movie, for me...

So if you like movies which main objective is to appall you, this is THE movie!

My Two Sen

Hey, I like practical effects.... done properly...

This post has been edited by Mov_freak: Jul 20 2022, 07:07 PM

He is able to push for practical effects because of his star power.

To some extend, Keanu Reeve's John Wick series, with it's mishmash practical and CGI seems to be the way forward.

DC League of Super-Pets (2022)

Honestly, I did not expect me to say this walking into the cinema.

I had absolutely no expectation for the movie.

Zero.

Nada.

I LOVE this movie.

I absolutely love it to bits!

I have pets most of my life.

Do I anthropomorphize my pets>

You betcha.

Animations had done it for awhile now.

I am always of the school of thought, a good movie, starts with a good storyline.

Does this have a good storyline?

Yes. A simple story, true. Well told nevertheless.

Did they get the right cast?

Yes, yes they did! I don't know who Kate McKinnon is and have to add, her Lulu is simply deliciously devious!

The way the movie characterize the super heroes are hilarious!

Is this movie going to knock the Mavericks, the Jurassic and other big big budget movies off their pedestal?

Maybe not. I do think that if exhibitors are patient, this movie may have long legs in the theaters.

This movie has everything for every age group (well, maybe not the elderly).

I really enjoyed and laughed out loud throughout the movie.

I pleasantly submit to you, my two sen.

Smile (2022)

Well, I admit, I was attracted to this movie by the trailer.

Some first years now, time writers or directors have been delivering good movies to us.

Especially horror movies.

If I remember correction, they directed movies like, Lights Out (2016, David F. Sandberg directorial debut) and Don't Breath (2016, technically Fede Álvarez second feature film)

Director Parker Finn (in his feature directorial debut) also wrote this movie.

The premised is not original and have to add, the delivery is.

Great to see Kal Penn in the movies again.

Sosie Bacon plays a convincing Dr. Rose Cotter.

Out of the three acts, the first act was directed perfectly.

The whole movie rested on Sosie Bacon shoulder and her character gets more and more troubled, so sometimes it was hard to see "her point of view".

At least that was my take away.

The little boy's birthday scene was a highlight to me, though I guess the outcome.

After that the movie became a little more predictable so that may have been my reason for feeling a little let down with the movie.

Overall I did enjoy it.

We have not had a good scare in a while, and this one does have a few good scares.

If you like horror, give this a try.

You know you want to.



My Two Sen

Dah...

Afraid I would cause a "riot" if I reviewed it here....

Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (2022)

Black Panther (2018) made money. It made alot money than even Disney expected. So it is not a surprise that a sequel was announced and the audience waited eagerly.

How can you talk about the sequel without touching on Chadwick Boseman passing away in in the middle of 2020...

Even more surprise Marvel announced that the sequel would go on and that T'Challa (Chadwick Boseman role) will not be reprise. They would not even create a CGI version of the character!

Audiences were sad and yet curious about how Marvel will pull that off.

The wait is over. The sequel is upon us and it is...

I am getting ahead of myself.

Marvel wasted no time addressing the lost of T'Challa.

The main focus of this movie is Shuri (Letitia Wright) and Queen Ramon(Angela Bassett) wept as would the audience.

The movie than sprinted to the core storyline of the movie.

The director kept his promise, expanding the Black Panther world.

Plot threads from the first movie do get expanded on here.

New characters are introduced.

I can see how some would complained that this movie is "WOKE".

I on the other hand would argue that this movie is "woke" done correctly.

Focusing on the strength of the characters, rather than demanding everyone to respect the characters feminity...

I hope I am making sense.

Yes, on of the new character is Namor (Tenoch Huerta). I like the back story of this character and his world.

So, can Shuri hold up the whole movie on her slender shoulders.

Saying that this is a Shuri centric movie maybe a little misleading.

This movie is very much an assemble movie.

Almost every character has his/her moment to shine.

I do have two grumbles concerning this movie.

The last battle lack..... ooomph...

This movie is very very long... 2 hours 41 minutes!!!

Can scene could have definitely been summarised...

The above, like always, is just my two sen...

The Menu (2022)

Woah!

Calling this movie a black comedy is REAL understatement.

This is a dark DARK movie.

The cast is great.

The cinematography is immaculate.

It has been ages that I had seen Judith Light in anything. Though she is severely underused here.

Not surprising.

You have Ralph Fiennes, Anya Taylor-Joy, Nicholas Hoult & John Leguizamo (another underused character) all stealing their scenes.

We just came out from a pandemic.

Everyone is sick (mentally and physically) of being confined in one place.

There are some really decent movies released so far in 2022. From huge productions like the Marvel and DC films, to film from India (RRR anyone), to the pleasantly surprisingly good (Prey), to the missed opportunity (I am looking at you Nope!???), to the absolute bizarre (Everything Everywhere All at Once, what the...), to the bleak (The Northman, shame on you Shakespeare) and of course the crowd pleaser of the year (Tope Gun Maverick) that gives us a reason to goto the movies.

I seriously am hoping I am not misleading you by stating the other movies here. I am not sure is I would strongly urge you to go to this one.

Truth to be told, I and still processing this movie.

I still have not decided if it is brilliant or madness.

If I have not made it clear is is a very very bleak movie.

If this movie is to be believe, there really isn't good or bad people in the world.

I do wish some charaters are more fleash out. Or at the very least have their motivation made more apparent.

I really don't know if I can say anything more about the movie...

With the above, I present, my two sens....

I am cautiously optimistic about Avatar 2....

This post has been edited by Mov_freak: Dec 1 2022, 09:48 AM

Violent Night (2022)

In 1990, they pushed Kevin too far...

In 2022, they did it to Santa...

Something is gonna hit the fan...

First of all, this is a very VERY violent movie.

The weird thing is our censorship board, blanked out the swear words and left of the minute details of acts of violence.... Hmmmm.....

Second of all

Most of the characters in this movie, has no dimension.

What you know about the characters are what is shown and no more.

Which makes relating to the people difficult.

Third of all

I have very very mix feels about this movie

The production quality is A-Okay

The story...

The violence...

I was expecting a slightly elevated Home Alone violence.

What I got was a very R-rated violence.

I blame it on the trailer.

They sold me apples and I got oranges....

Final thoughts.... This is a very very mix movie.

David Harbour did his best with the material he got.

Everyone else very two dimensional....

I can see why people can enjoy this movie.

I just like parts of it.

I just hope extremist do not take note on how to cause violence...

My Two Sen.

This post has been edited by Mov_freak: Dec 4 2022, 09:15 PM