Dave Reviews (craps on) Movies (intermittently and with gusto)

[Dave (imported)]

They made a movie about these?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geo_Storm ... 9-2009.jpg

That's a groaner!

Shame on you.

[madnomadtoo (imported)]

They made a movie about these?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geo_Storm ... 9-2009.jpg

Watch out. I might've bought one of those, except I already had a Honda CRX. Still have it, and it runs great. They're a rare breed now. If you ever peep out your window and see a blue CRX zipping past, it's me.

[Dave (imported)]

THE EQUALIZER

{Let me preface this by saying that I liked THE HITMAN’S BODYGUARD because Ryan Reynolds and Samuel L. Jackson bicker, tease, make you laugh, and generally mock themselves and the movie - - and the little boy in me enjoys the car chases and gunfights and big explosions. The Hitman’s Bodyguard is inane and funny and the characters are engaging.}

THE EQUALIZER starring Denzel Washington as the retired special ops agent who rights wrongs for helpless people is none of that. It is THE EQUALIZER against the Russian Mob and neither is likable or enjoyable unless you like brutal and unemotional killing.

The plot is that The Equalizer is happily retired from whatever stuff he did before and decides that he must come out of retirement when he sees a young girl being prostituted, beaten, and generally abused. So he goes after her pimp and it’s the Russian Mob. A bad guy us sent to

kill the trouble and mucho violence ensues

I found it emotionless and simply ugly, a celebration of violence. There is nothing to the plot but man avenges abused woman to give her a chance at a better life. That’s all there is and there is no reason to keep on dancing to this tune.

[Dave (imported)]

Florence Foster Jenkins

(a movie starring Meryl Streep and Hugh Grant)

In the decade or two of superheroes movies, spy movies, action films, and conquering alien movies, comes a different sort of entertaining comedy. This is a biopic, something take from real life. It is much stranger than fiction. It is a grand celebration of a human spirit that would not be defeated.

Florence Foster Jenkins was a patron of the arts in New York City who believed that she was a great coloratura soprano. For many years, her husband, played by Hugh Grant, succeeded in Keeping her “talents” hidden in subscriptions series and private salons with carefully chosen guests. That works until Florence books her self into Carnegie Hall with 3000 people in the audience.

The reality is that Florence could not sing. Her renditions are unearthly and flat/sharp/discordant, and so much more. Her recordings on Melotone Records (yes, there are real recordings that you can buy) are noted as the world’s worst. It’s fun to watch Florence. Meryl Streep does the singing and truly commits to the part. Her voice is like nothing you ever heard or want to hear again. It’s a charming and fun portrayal. It’s fun to watch Cosme McMoon, her pianist, who is truly thrilled to play Carnegie Hall.

This is a delightfully different movie for our times.

And you can read about the movie persona and the real persona here:

http://www.historyvshollywood.com/reelf ... r-jenkins/

[Dave (imported)]

Dave reviews on a movie #5 -

FINDING CHRISTOPHER ROBIN

This is a sad and heartwarming movie about the good things in life - - family and children. A very good and very poignant drama.

We all know and love Christopher Robin and his friends Pooh, Tigger, Eeyore, Piglet, Owl, and their friends. HOWEVER, Christopher Robin Milne was a real boy, son of A.A. Milne who wrote the books.

AA Milne was a writer for PUNCH magazine and fought in WW1. He returned to Britain with what was then called Shell Shock and we now know as PTSD. In his struggles to cope with PTSD, removes to the country and with a struggle, eventually begins to write the WINNIE THE POOH books. Family and his son’s fantasy help him through the PTSD.

However, Christopher Robin, his son, becomes famous and Christopher Robin resents sharing his stories with the public. While writing Winnie the Pooh helped his father, it was a betrayal to Christopher Robin’s young mind. Eventually, when Christopher Robin becomes a young soldier in WW2 (all the stories of this time period end sadly with WW1-“the war to end all wars” spawning WW2) he discovers what the Winnie the Pooh stories and rhymes meant to other men and reconciles himself to his celebrity.

I enjoyed this as a drama very much. It is a small portion of a story both familiar and hidden.

[Dave (imported)]

There is another CHRISTOPHER ROBIN movie coming out...

There will be TWO movies on "CR"...

What are the chances that the creative minds in Movieland and Hollywood would think the same thoughts?

{that was sarcasm, BTW}

[Dave (imported)]

Dave craps on Transformers: the Last Knight

What can I say but another prize expulsion from the metal anus of the Transformers… This is the only PG-13 movie with mentions of scrotums and King Arthur and the Round Table Legend in one sentence!

Are you ten years old? If so, then this is the movie for you. I actually did enjoy it but I loath that part of me that was entertained by it. Do you like mindless chases, incoherent drivel instead of dialogue, giant metal robots acting like total mechanical anuses? Then this movie is for you.

If you want something meaningful, something intellectual, and something literate - - GO away.

Quote: “The old WW2 sub jumped its moorings.”

{hint: that’s a problem because that particular WW2 Sub is (a) TSTL, (b) a red shirt, and (c) wasted...}

Logic, where does it get you?

Cade Yeager - - Mark Wahlberg of the reality TV show fame, the quintessential underwear model and Bostonian, plays a Texan junkyard owner with six, maybe seven active brain cells. He has a new heroine who is British (and she has an inflated, one-dimensional ego like the rest of the cast) … Lots of cameos from old faces in the original Transformers movie. (I thought they all made career-killing moves back then and They repeated them now. “From Hunger” should be the title.)

There are WIT-WICCANS in this movie in homage to the much despised Shia LaBeouf. WORst of all, no hack writer would be satisfies with smearing and hating on the Wiccans or Druids or some ancient order of Knights — but “WIT-WICCANS.” How about “Lack-of-Wit-Wiccans” ?

Final thoughts — status brainless fun for a popcorn, beer and pizza night with burps, phartes, and ball-scratching masculinity.

[madnomadtoo (imported)]

There is another CHRISTOPHER ROBIN movie coming out...

There will be TWO movies on "CR"...

What are the chances that the creative minds in Movieland and Hollywood would think the same thoughts?

{that was sarcasm, BTW}

The medical phenomenon of twin movie births has long been recognized:

Volcano

Dante's Peak

White House Down

Olympus Has Fallen

Armageddon

Deep Impact

Mission to Mars

The Red Planet

Wyatt Earp

Tombstone

Triplets are occasionally seen. In the late eighties, the Hollywood ovaries spat out:

Vice-Versa

Like Father, Like Son

18 Again

Incredibly, a few months later saw a set of quintuplets:

The Abyss

Lords of the Deep

Leviathan

Deepstar Six

The Rift

But none of this can impugn the integrity of Hollywood visionaries, who constantly seek original and unique means to entertain us and oh my god I forgot my meds again.

[Dave (imported)]

The medical phenomenon of twin movie births has long been recognized:

...

I deserved that list.

And I should say that every review I am reading in anticipation of the release of CHRISTOPHER ROBIN is good. It seems that both movies will be good drama.

And just for those who might be disappointed - - I'll have a new review of some awful movie tomorrow and it will live up to the thread's name.

[Dave (imported)]

Call Me By Your Name is a movie about Elio, the seventeen year old son of a college professor who meets and has an affair with Oliver, a twenty-four research assistant (post-doc or graduate researcher) who is staying at his house for a summer doing research. It is a tender and well-written romantic tale.

The Parent’s summer house is in Northern Italy, Lombardy to be precise and is one of those places with sun and warmth and swimming ponds. It is idyllic for family’s summer house. Slowly, the Elio and Oliver become friends and then lovers.

There is a time in young men’s lives where a friendship with another man can be closer than any other relationship in their lives. It surpasses parents, wives, and children. Most young men find it without sex and discover their adult attitudes and life after it is finished. That is the true “coming of age.”

Where “Call Me By Your Name” stands out is the tenderness and honestly of the portrayal. When the summer is over, Elio’s father delivers a monologue that is simply open, honest, and heartfelt. It is filled with acceptance and love of his son. He speaks to his son of that summer's emotions, feelings, joys and sorrows and he counsels to learn from this summer affair and not rip it from his life but remember it. He counsels his son that we have only one life and it is both pain and the joy. It is still just one life and it passes too quickly. We must live that life as honestly as possible.