MOVIE REVIEW: NIGHTMARE ALLEY

 

In 1940s New York, down-on-his-luck Stanton Carlisle endears himself to a clairvoyant and her mentalist husband at a traveling carnival. Using newly acquired knowledge, Carlisle crafts a golden ticket to success by swindling the elite and wealthy. Hoping for a big score, he soon hatches a scheme to con a dangerous tycoon with help from a mysterious psychiatrist who might be his most formidable opponent yet.

Director: Guillermo del Toro

Cast:  Bradley Cooper, Cate Blanchett, Toni Collette, Willem Dafoe, Richard Jenkins, Rooney Mara, Ron Perlman, Mary Steenburgen, David Strathairn

Release Date: December 17, 2021

Genre: Action, Crime, Drama, Thriller

Rated R for strong/bloody violence, some sexual content, nudity and language

Runtime: 2h 30m

Review:

Guillermo del Toro's Nightmare Alley is a lavishly directed film noir morality tale that's as engrossing as it is engaging.  Del Toro channel's plenty of classic noir films in this remake of the 1947 original while adding his own personal twist.  The visually lean heavily on art deco designs with tinges of the macabre which fits with Del Toro's style.  Bradley Cooper is at the center of the film and does impressively well as the charlatan who drives the film.  Cooper's performance transforms as the character evolves over the course of the film's runtime with broad and occasionally more subtle choices.  It's a fascinating performance that blooms as the film moves on.  Willem Dafoe, Toni Collette and David Strathairn carry the majority of the supporting load in the first half of the film with each leaving a strong impression before the scene shifts.  The second half though belongs to Cate Blanchett who's the defacto femme fatale of the piece.  Blanchett's angelic yet menacing face fits the role perfectly as she delivers lines with steely precision and intensity.  This film is an actor's playground which makes its leisurely pacing easier to digest as you appreciate the performances on display.  Nightmare Alley isn't going to be everyone's cup of tea but for those who can appreciate meticulous filmmaking with top notch performances will find plenty to love here.  

A-

MOVIE REVIEW: THE SHAPE OF WATER

Elisa is a mute, isolated woman who works as a cleaning lady in a hidden, high-security government laboratory in 1962 Baltimore. Her life changes forever when she discovers the lab's classified secret -- a mysterious, scaled creature from South America that lives in a water tank. As Elisa develops a unique bond with her new friend, she soon learns that its fate and very survival lies in the hands of a hostile government agent and a marine biologist.

Director: Guillermo del Toro

Release Date: Dec 1, 2017
 
Cast: Sally Hawkins, Michael Shannon, Richard Jenkins, Doug Jones, Michael Stuhlbarg, Octavia Spencer

Rated R for sexual content, graphic nudity, violence and language

Runtime: 2 hr. 3 min. 

Genres: Adventure, Drama, Fantasy

Review:

The Shape of Water is a lovely modern day fable brought to life by Guillermo del Toro.  It’s a fascinating and elegant film that’s got a hopeful sensibility running throughout its runtime.  Guillermo del Toro’s film is visually striking to look at and engaging throughout.  The story paints in broad strokes with most of the characters feeling more like types than actual people but the cast delivers strong enough performances to make it work.  Sally Hawkins is front and center throughout and she delivers a magnetic performance.  Hawkins displays an impressive ability to transmit emotions through looks and mannerisms which allows the audience to follow her characters emotional journey.  It helps that she and Doug Jones, who plays the creature, share some tangible screen chemistry, all displayed non verbally making it even more impressive.  The supporting cast is equally impressive with each leaving their signature on the film.  Richard Jenkins and Octavia Spencer make for a likeable pair of friends for Elisa even though both could have used a bit more depth.  Michael Stuhlbarg’s character is an interesting mixture of grey area where you don’t quite know where he stands until near the end of the film.  Michael Shannon makes for an impressive villain for the piece.  The character is a solid blend of all the negative aspects of white males in post WW2 American and as portrayed by Shannon he one of the most interesting characters in the piece.  Del toro doesn’t quite reach the heights he in did in Pan’s Labyrinth with The Shape of Water but he does deliver another vividly impressive live action fable.  

B+

Cindy Prascik’s Review of Redemption (Hummingbird) & White House Down

Dearest Blog, this week my local cinemas conspired to keep me from seeing a Jason Statham film on opening weekend. However, thanks to my heroes at Xfinity, I not only got to see the movie, but also didn't have to follow through with my threat to boycott the cinema in protest. WHEW!!

Spoiler level here will be mild.

First on the weekend's agenda, a Friday night On Demand screening of the new Statham flick Redemption, originally known as Hummingbird.

A tormented ex-special forces soldier does the mob's dirty work while seeking vengeance for a friend's murder.
Everybody knows I love Jason Statham. Jason Statham movies must be seen on opening weekend and, if my schedule permits, I'll burn a vacation day to see them opening day. Even if I don't like anything else about a movie, the fact that it has Jason Statham is good enough for me. Redemption is lucky it has Jason Statham.

Redemption tries to be more than just the average ass-kicking flick. It is a Very Serious Movie, with Very Serious Acting. Nobody in it is so good or so bad as to be worth writing home about, but, as a fan, I enjoy Statham getting to stretch his wings sometimes...and of course there's always a bit of ass-kicking to fall back on. When critiquing actors, I try to avoid taking jabs at anything other than their acting skills; however, here I must note that the leading lady, Polish actress Agata Buzek, has distractingly bad teeth. She's like an honorary member of the Pogues or something.

Redemption is a slow-moving animal, with a couple...um...I couldn't precisely call them "twists," but I'll say "aspects" that might have been intense or even shocking in the hands of more adept filmmakers. Here they are clunky, contrived, and even a little gross, and I wasn't buying any of it. This is a dark, dull, depressing film that builds to an unsatisfying conclusion.

Redemption runs 100 minutes and is rated R for "strong brutal violence, graphic nudity, and language." I've seen some very positive notices, but whatever those folks liked about it, I clearly missed.

Of a possible nine Weasleys, Redemption gets four...all for Jason Statham.

Next up was a Saturday trek to the cinema to see the Olympus Has Fallen reboot, White House Down. Wait...what? It's not the same franchise??? Huh.

While on a tour of the White House with his politics-obsessed young daughter, a Capitol cop ends up having to save the President and the country from a paramilitary invasion.

I've gotten the tired joke out of the way, but, yes, this movie was released far too quickly on the heels of the year's earlier White House invasion flick, Olympus Has Fallen. Where there was nary a chuckle to be had in Olympus Has Fallen, White House Down plays it more like Die Hard, with one-liners and gags to spare.

Channing Tatum seems to be Hollywood's "it" guy of the moment and, while I don't find him particularly hot (yeah, you heard me!), I can't think of a film where I haven't enjoyed him. Here he holds up fine opposite Oscar winner Jamie Foxx, though obviously this movie's much more about action than it is about acting. Foxx is solid as the leader of the free world, and the supporting cast has plenty of familiar faces, including Maggie Gyllenhaal, Richard Jenkins, Jason Clarke, James Woods, and Matt Craven. I was excited to see two of my TV faves, Jimmi Simpson and Kevin Rankin, in pretty important roles.

The action in White House Down is huge and, at times, silly, but great fun. If the movie tends to beat you over the head with certain points (we get it, President Sawyer is a REALLY GOOD GUY!), it's not too hard to forgive because it's with honest intent, and, hey, we were rooting for him anyway. The film's biggest flaw is a runtime of almost two hours and twenty minutes, excessive times 12 for a summer popcorn flick.

White House Down clocks in at a bloated 137 minutes and is rated PG13 for "prolonged sequences of action and violence including intense gunfire and explosions, some language, and a brief sexual image" (musta been very brief...I don't even remember it!).

White House Down is definitely the more fun of the year's "let's blow up Washington" movies, and, of a possible nine Weasleys, it gets seven.

And so, dear Blog, we come again to my favorite time of year, that time when my next trip to the cinema includes something new from Johnny Depp. I am giddy with anticipation.

Until next time...




What the hell...I'll vote for him! ;-)

MOVIE REVIEW: THE CABIN IN THE WOODS

ON VIDEO

THE CABIN IN THE WOODS



Joss Whedon and Drew Goddard team up for this bloody horror satire that offers an inventive twist on the familiar stranded-in-the-woods sub-genre. ~ Rovi

Director: Drew Goddard

Cast: Kristen Connolly, Chris Hemsworth, Anna Hutchison, Fran Kranz, Richard Jenkins

Release Date: Apr 13, 2012

Rated R for strong bloody horror violence and gore, language, drug use and some
sexuality/nudity

Runtime: 1 hr. 45 min.

Genres: Horror, Suspense/Thriller

Runtime: 1 hr. 31 min.

Genres: Comedy

Review:

Cabin in the Woods is a Meta film on steroids. The characters as written are archetypes and played as such just like the usual tropes of any generic horror film. Joss Whedon’s film is full of clever twist and nods throughout even though it thinks it’s a lot cleverer than it actually is. As a film, it’s a mash up of the underrated sci-fi horror film Cube and Wes Craven’s A New Nightmare. It’s an interesting and fun little ride that takes itself less and less seriously as the film moves on. Director Drew Goddard gets what Whedon is going for and they both hit the marks they are looking for. Someone looking for a scary movie though won’t find it here, outside of a few jump scares, it’s never really unsettling. More than anything it’s a love letter to movie fans and horror fans in particular. In the process Whedon turns the mirror back on us as viewers of the horror genre, poking plenty of fun at it to, but pointing out all the tropes we’ve become so accustomed to over the years. It all works fairly well even if it’s not perfect or totally original.

B-

[Trailer] The Cabin in the Woods

The long gestating Joss Whedon produced horror project recently got a release date and the trailer has come out.

I’ll admit I only knew a little about the actual film but after watching the trailer I’m a lot more interested than before as it hints to some fun genre bending intrigue.

By the time it hits the screen it’ll be 3 years since it wrapped filming, maybe it’ll be worth the wait.

MOVIE REVIEWS: LET ME IN

IN THEATERS

LET ME IN



John Ajvide Lindqvist's celebrated vampire novel makes the leap to the big screen once again with the second feature adaptation in so many years (Tomas Alfredson's critically acclaimed 2008 hit Let the Right One In, being the first). The sensitive target of vicious bullying at school, 12-year-old Owen (Kodi Smit-McPhee) is a social misfit from a broken home. By day Owen dreams about laying waste to his classroom tormentors; by night his attentions turn to his reclusive neighbors in their austere apartment complex. One evening, as Owen takes out his pent-up aggressions on a tree, his new neighbor Abby (Chloë Grace Moretz) appears over his shoulder. A young girl wise beyond her years, Abby just moved in next door to Owen with her stoic caretaker (Richard Jenkins), who seems to harbor a sinister secret. Compelled by Abby's apparent imperviousness to the harsh winter elements, her frail disposition, and the fact that she's nowhere to be found before the sun falls, Owen senses a kindred soul, and strikes up a friendship with the girl, despite her repeated attempts to maintain an emotional distance. Simultaneously, their community grows vigilant following a series of vicious murders, and Abby's caretaker vanishes without a trace. Later, as Abby begins to grow vulnerable, her bond with Owen strengthens. By the time Owen begins to suspect that his evasive new friend is something other than human, it starts to seem as if Abby could use a good friend after all. Given that his bullies are growing more emboldened by the day, so too, could Owen. ~ Jason Buchanan, Rovi

Director: Matt Reeves

Cast: Chloe Moretz, Kodi Smit-McPhee, Richard Jenkins, Elias Koteas, Cara Buono.

Release Date: Oct 01, 2010

Rated: Strong bloody horror violence, language and a brief sexual situation

Runtime: 1 hr. 55 min.

Genres: Drama

Review:

Remaking an excellent foreign film that came out just a few years ago seems like a recipe for disaster. Let the Right One In is an artistic masterpiece, the type that would make Stanley Kubrick proud. Its direction and acting were all perfectly done, it was chilling beautiful and timeless. Matt Reeves is given the unenviable task of remaking this and he somehow manages to make his version equally beautiful but with more clearly defined themes. Reeves follows the original film very closely changing a few things here and there, changing the setting to New Mexico in the 80’s seem kind of pointless, but mostly stays true to the heart of the story. Reeves uses more CGI than the original and excises the neighbors subplot only to replace them with a detective. His cast is just as impressive as their Swedish counterparts. Chloe Moretz continues to shine here in a measure performance adding a bit more ferocity to the character. Kodi Smith McPhee is perfectly suited for the role and is appropriately awkward, frail and naive. Richard Jenkins has limited screen time but does make the caretaker role more sympathetic and Abby’s relationship with Owen more sinister. It’s a common theme in this version of this story, Reeves avoids ambiguity in general and spells out things that were left for interpretation in the Swedish film. It’s a matter of taste as to whether that a good thing or not. Still, Reeves does succeed in making a wonderful tome whose greatest achievement might be making new fans discover the Swedish film and original book.

B