john wick chapter 2

After the first John Wick movie, there is undeniably some high expectations on whether the sequel can match it, or even surpass it in terms of quality. People are going to want to see more elaborate action set pieces. This movie delivers there. People are going to want to see "The Continental Hotel" again. This movie delivers there. People are going to want to see the story expand the world building of this society of killers and assassins. This movie delivers there. People are going to want to see the stakes raised even higher. This movie delivers there. Most importantly, people are going to want to see John Wick continue to be the badass that he is. This movie definitely delivers there. 

Despite it being easy to praise Chapter 2, I actually don't necessarily think this movie surpasses the original, even though there are strong arguments to say that it did achieve that goal. I'll just concede on the fact that it does at least match the previous entry. While this sequel did some things that I had issues with, the good things it does do helps compensate a lot for it's flaws. Several of those awesome action set pieces the movie has comes to mind as one of the good things. In particular all the sequences between John Wick and Cassian; played by Common, were simply fantastic and so entertaining to watch. Everything with Ian McShane's Winston and Lance Reddick's Charon were also very much welcome. 

Now the conceit of this movie is that it does romanticize a hitman's life of violence and fire arms. Lots of deaths caused by bullets here. If you're not okay with that kind of escapist entertainment, then you definitely shouldn't be watching this. Plot wise, the movie does make an attempt to justify not wanting to be part of that world of killers, but that gets easily over shadowed by seeing John Wick taking out so many enemies with such talent, and in such a cool way. I don't think I'll ever get tired of seeing that. 

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the red turtle

Out of nowhere comes this simple looking but gorgeously animated feature that I've ever seen, with one of the most beautiful musical scores I've heard, that was able to give me all the emotions I felt during the opening montage sequence of Disney's "Up," but in an 80 minutes feature. Reading what I just wrote there, I myself am thinking that I'm giving this movie too high of a praise. Then I'm reminded that I was genuinely moved to tears multiple times during the movie, and found myself having a hard time holding those tears back during the end credits. I guess I'm a sentimental fool, but wow did this movie hit me in all the right spots. 

This animated feature was able to say a lot, for a movie that has the simple premise of a castaway that's stranded on an island, and the not so simple encounter with a red turtle. It's like the melding of a realistic setting and a fantasy situation. What it really is though, is a celebration of the circle of life. From desperation, loneliness, anger, survival, determination, companionship, dreams, family, death, and rebirth, this movie spoke to me in so many levels. All of that achieved through the power of it's own visual narration, and without the use of any dialogue whatsoever. 

Some people might take issue with some of the more fantastical elements of the story, as well as one particular scene that may be hard to watch to the point of giving up on the main character, but don't let that dissuade you from seeing this. "The Red Turtle" will likely not be the most famous animated feature around, but Director Michaël Dudok De Wit should be happy in being able to create a very personal feeling masterpiece of a movie. 

LOVED IT  enjoyedititsokayitsmehitsterrible

the space between us

Predictable. Implausible. Saccharine. Are just a few words to describe this movie in a negative light. There are also the plot conveniences that are there for the sake of moving the narrative along, while constantly pushing your suspension of disbelief. Inconsistencies about the near-future tech and about the lead character's knowledge-base bugged me as well. Gary Oldman swinging for the fences with some over acting didn't help this film's good will. All that makes this sound like a terrible movie right? Well, I honestly thought it was just perfectly okay. 

Looking past the flaws this movie has, you'll find that the premise still has it's heart in the right place as a young adult romance, and that can't be discounted. There are people who will find many reasons to like about this, as it's clearly pandering to a specific target audience who will eat this story up wholeheartedly. The major positive strength of this movie and a reason to see this, would be for Asa Butterfield and Britt Robertson. Both actors are entertaining in their roles, and I enjoyed seeing the two play off each other. If I was a 10 years old kid, I probably would completely fall in love with this movie. So despite the flaws it does have, it's not a horrible movie by any means. 

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the salesman

Although there's a slow burn of a pace here, with several scenes meandering, or coming off seemingly mundane, there still contains some thematically deep layers here to provoke your thoughts. Written and Directed by Asghar Farhandi, it seems like he meticulously laid out the scenes in such a way that little touches of facial reactions to small lines of dialogue becomes more important than they seem to be at first. This film may seem simple enough in the beginning, but it's the growing complication of the premise that will grab hold off you until the end, along with some incredible set pieces that are very arresting to see play out. 

Shahab Hosseini as the husband Emad, and Taraneh Alidoosti as his wife Rana, are simply fantastic here. Playing a couple who are also stage actors, there's a parallel between their characters' craft and their personal lives. The way they try and keep an outside persona to try and hide their true emotions inside comes into play really well. The boiling build up of Emad's fortitude to follow through on the devastating event that happened may be the main plot that drives the story, but it's also the tragic situation that Rana is put in and how she reacts to it that will break your heart. 

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rings

There were several set pieces in this movie, plus some cool ideas and concepts, that I thought could have actually led to some awesome things to show us. Unfortunately, it just never lived up to anything promising at all. The biggest issue I had with this, is that like typical mainstream horror films nowadays, there's an over reliance for jump scares. I was hoping for a scary movie that has a creepy and tense tone, with unsettling imagery that would haunt my dreams, and this unfortunately didn't really achieve that.

There is a mystery story that we all get to see where it's going, and I suppose it was interesting enough to want to see how it ends, but it still didn't really make up for it's flaws. The flaws being the obvious plot conveniences and ridiculous leaps of faith that this movie had all over the place. Just so many stupid things... What a disappointingly mediocre movie. 

loveditenjoyedititsokay  IT'S MEH  itsterrible 

iboy

I get that there are some really ridiculous superhero origin stories on how they get their powers, but this one really takes a huge suspension of disbelief. HUGE suspension of disbelief! That's the hurdle the audience will have to get over first in order to give this movie a serious commitment to watch through the whole thing. Not only that, but part of the origin story contains a rather dark event that happens to one of the characters, and that's another thing the audience will have to get over to keep watching. With all that said, the rest of the movie is more or less harmless enough. 

This superhero movie doesn't do anything incredibly different than others before it. In fact, it kinda expects you to be familiar with the typical plot tropes that come with this genre of films, as it skips certain expositions that you come to expect from the superhero character. Either way, basically the premise is the typical one man secretly fights against bad people. To be honest, it's not horrible. There's a certain comfortable familiarity to the whole thing, that it's not hard to find things to like about it. 

Once again though, it's that requirement to take huge leaps of faith and the suspension of disbelief that kinda constantly keeps this movie down. If it didn't take itself too seriously, I probably would have had a lot more fun with it. At least the cast that consists of Bill Milner, Maisie Williams, and Rory Kinnear, were good in it. Here's hoping that if there is a sequel to this, they'll do a much better job at it. 

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gold

Inspired by the true events of the Bre-X Mining Fraud of the mid-90s, this movie is unfortunately uninspired. There are themes about idealism, persistence, obsession, greed, and pride in this movie that it can teach us. There's also the whole down-on-his-luck, fast rise to success, then down-on-his-luck again, plot structure that's the moral lesson of this story. Basically, you've already seen this movie. Short of the real-life adaptation aspect, there's nothing new here to really offer, which in turn makes it kinda boring to watch. 

I'll give kudos to Matthew McConaughey though, because he seems to be the only actor here that's really making the effort to make a character that stands out. He is acting his ass off here, and in some cases it can be argued that he is over-acting in scenes that doesn't really need it. At least he tries to bring some energy to this lackluster tale. 

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toni erdmann

The title of this movie is actually the alias of Winfried Conradi, who is a man that likes to joke around with silly gags and insane pranks. In the opening scene, he actually jokes about a mail bomb, so you can see with how far he likes to go with his sense of humor. He isn't the only focus of this story however, as this is also about his daughter Ines Conradi, who is a stressed out workaholic, whose life pretty much only revolves around her job. Her business dealings may be hard enough to handle already, but she also has to deal with her Father's hi-jinks. 

As a Father-Daughter story, this is really charming and amusing in all the right ways. Seeing how far Winfried Conradi takes his Toni Erdmann persona is very entertaining, if not cringe-worthy in the awkward humor variety. Of course he has to drag his daughter along with his jokes, much to her displeasure. It's the connection between the two that really keeps the story moving, and you just want to see where it's going. 

This movie does have a long run time of 162 minutes, and a lot of the scenes are extended sequences that tend to meander at times. However some of those lengthy scenes play off like a comedy routine, and the build up eventually leads to a punch-line that's worth waiting for, or at least allows us to watch what is essentially a train-wreck of a situation. 

lovedit  ENJOYED IT  itsokayitsmehitsterrible

academy awards nominees 2017

I was able to watch all the movies related to the Best Picture, Best Acting nominations, and more, for the 89th Academy Awards. Check out what I said about those movies via the handy hyper-links in this #isawthatmovie blog. 

Full list : http://oscar.go.com  

BEST PICTURE
Arrival
Fences
Hacksaw Ridge
Hell or High Water
Hidden Figures
La La Land
Lion
Manchester By the Sea
Moonlight

BEST ACTRESS
Isabelle Huppert, Elle
Ruth Negga, Loving
Natalie Portman, Jackie
Emma Stone, La La Land
Meryl Streep, Florence Foster Jenkins

BEST ACTOR
Casey Affleck, Manchester by the Sea
Andrew Garfield, Hacksaw Ridge
Ryan Gosling, La La Land
Viggo Mortensen, Captain Fantastic
Denzel Washington, Fences

BEST SUPPORTING ACTRESS
Viola Davis, Fences
Michelle Williams, Manchester by the Sea
Naomie Harris, Moonlight
Nicole Kidman, Lion
Octavia Spencer, Hidden Figures

BEST SUPPORTING ACTOR
Mahershala Ali, Moonlight
Jeff Bridges, Hell or High Water
Lucas Hedges, Manchester by the Sea
Dev Patel, Lion
Michael Shannon, Nocturnal Animals

BEST DIRECTOR
Damien Chazelle, La La Land
Mel Gibson, Hacksaw Ridge
Barry Jenkins, Moonlight
Kenneth Lonergan, Manchester By the Sea
Denis Villeneuve, Arrival

BEST ADAPTED SCREENPLAY
Arrival
Fences
Hidden Figures
Lion
Moonlight

BEST ORIGINAL SCREENPLAY
Hell or High Water
La La Land
The Lobster
Manchester By the Sea
20th Century Women

BEST ANIMATED FEATURE FILM
Kubo and the Two Strings
Moana
My Life as a Zucchini
The Red Turtle
Zootopia

BEST CINEMATOGRAPHY
Arrival
La La Land
Lion
Moonlight
Silence

BEST VISUAL EFFECTS
Deepwater Horizon
Doctor Strange
The Jungle Book
Kubo and the Two Strings
Rogue One: A Star Wars Story

This isn't the full list of course, but many of the other movie reviews can easily be searched for on this blog. I have to say that I am highly disappointed that "Sing Street" didn't get a nod at all. I'm also confused as to why "The Lobster" is even on the list, since it had a foreign film release in 2015. 
Also check out the Spoilers Pleeze podcast, where me and Jiaming discuss the whole nominations list. 

xxx return of xander cage

If you need a movie to be the epitome of such phrases like "mindless entertainment," "it's so bad it's good," "guilty pleasure," or other similar descriptions, then "xXx : Return Of Xander Cage" is the one for you. Full disclosure here, but I've never seen a xXx movie before, and I didn't really know what Xander Cage is returning from, nor do I have any deep knowledge about the previous installments. I'm sure there were some easter eggs or fan service that referenced the past movies, but somehow it didn't seem to matter. This movie was written in a certain way, that anybody could start from here. In fact, I don't think they'll mind. 

Let me be forthright and just say that this movie is dumb, ridiculous, outrageous, unbelievable, silly, and will bombard you with so much stupidity that it's just daring you to stop watching it. With that said, I actually had some fun with this. This is like a cartoon done in live-action, but without the realism, and the general rules of physics don't apply here. This is like what would happen if you mashed up Mission Impossible with The Fast and The Furious, poured Red Bull and Mountain Dew into it, plus include the X Games, Martial Arts, and Parkour, then drop it into a lava pit of the 1980s that includes it's cheesy dialogue, and mix it all with the budget of an action flick from 2010. If you're okay with the result of that combination, then you'll be okay with this. 

I found this movie quite likable because of it's action set pieces, and wow are they crazy enough that you have to be impressed with the film makers for deciding to put all that on screen. From skiing through a jungle, riding a bike on water, running towards traffic on foot, this movie is insane... but in a good way. Just watching Donnie Yen, Deepika Padukone, Ruby Rose kick ass, Tony Jaa being in this, and Toni Collette continuously giving us an angry look, makes the price of admission worth it. Of course the movie also goes out of it's way to unashamedly remind us that Vin Diesel is the guy every man wants to be, and every girl wants to be with, which is a tired trope but works more or less here anyway.

If you're wondering how the overall story is. Don't. While the premise itself is enjoyable, it's nothing you've never seen before, and it has it's plot holes and logical flaws. The story is really just there to string together the action sequences anyway, and the scenes that are blatantly pandering to the audience. What you should take from this movie is that you actually enjoyed the ensemble cast of ridiculous characters in it, and would love to see them together again in another movie. I know I do. 

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