Tag Archives: Movie Review

Reviews

Hail, Caesar

HailCaesarSo far this year I’ve seen three movies, and all of them have been a lot of fun. Hail, Caesar currently sits at the bottom of my list, but it’s well above the Threshold of Disappointment.

Hail, Caesar is a movie for movie people. It’s full of SAG in-jokes and homages that I’m sure I only caught a few of, since I did not major in film. It was still a lot of fun for me. It demands to be patiently watched, like you’d watch a sunset, or perhaps a neighbor’s open window.

Does that sound creepy? Well, parts of this movie had that same level of creepy in them. Bits that felt like a lampooning of American culture in the 1950’s were lifted directly out of our history. It’s creepy that stuff like that really happened.

The jokes worked, and the musical numbers were wonderful, and the story itself, while seeming disjointed at first, was a really good one that I’m happy to have been told.

Crossposted, Journal, Reviews

Kung Fu Panda 3

KungFuPanda3I am impressed.

I was not expecting the Kung Fu Panda franchise to become an epic martial arts trilogy, but with Kung Fu Panda 3 the writers looked sequelitis in the eye, and then shot for the moon. Which they hit. This mixes at least two metaphors, but with the Dreamworks crescent moon logo in the blend I think I’m allowed the indulgence.

Put another way, they took a big risk, and it paid off.

Back in 2011 Kung Fu Panda 2 left me amazed, and more than a little surprised. The craft on display there was exemplary, and in all of the best ways. Kung Fu Panda 3 brought that same level of craft to the screen, and put paid on promises made in the first two movies. I’d say more, but some of the payoff is very much worth not spoiling.

There’s a line early on which I will spoil for you. (I’m quoting from memory, so please excuse any errors.)

“If you only do what you can, you will never become more than you are.” —Master Shifu (Dustin Hoffman)

Kung Fu Panda 3 clears my Threshold of Awesome, and takes the #1 slot for the year. Not hard, given that as of this writing¹ I’ve seen exactly two movies, but impressive nonetheless.

¹UPDATE: And now it is July 9th. My 2016 list has 18 films on it, and Kung Fu Panda 3 is still on top. I watched the Kung Fu Panda 3 Blu-Ray² last night, and stand by my rankings.  

²As Blu-Rays go, it’s fine, provided you’re just there for the film. The Panda Party song and Panda Paws featurettes are disappointing. The deleted scenes (Faux Paws) is a nice tool for writers, though, because the directors tell us why these scenes, which were quite good, had to be cut. 

 

Reviews

Deadpool: Pretty Good For February

DeadpoolI enjoyed Deadpool, but I don’t have any desire to see it again. I have a deep appreciation for a well-crafted joke, and Deadpool was full of those, but of necessity the jokes were contextualized with stuff I don’t love sitting through.

It’s hard to figure out which side of the cart this horse should be on, and the cart itself is carrying a chicken and an egg. Is it gratuitous violence when commentary upon the gratuitous violence is part of the story? Taken as a whole, the movie works really well, but I only want to take it once. The other Marvel movies have been more inviting, and I’ve seen some of them several times (except the Wolverine origin story, which I saw exactly one more time than I wish I had. So, you know, once.)

Films that demonstrate amazing understanding of the craft are usually a pleasure to watch, and re-watch. Deadpool was truly amazing in a great many ways, but while I had fun in the theater, I didn’t have Threshold-of-Awesome fun. I will, however, concede that the craft on display in Deadpool was top-notch, and was perfect for that particular character.

I’ll slap a ranking on this one after I have seen a couple more movies this year. Kung Fu Panda 3 and Hail Caesar are next on my hit list. I’ll be in touch.

Reviews

The Expanse. It is Just. That. Good.

I’m amazed by how good SyFy’s The Expanse is.

TheExpanseIt is head-and-shoulders above anything else in TV science-fiction, with the possible exception of The Martian, which was a movie. Yes, I include Star Trek, Babylon V, and Firefly.

Here’s my stake in the ground: In 2020 we’ll look at the state of science fiction programming, and ask ourselves how we got into this golden age. Then we’ll look back and say “ah. The Expanse. It set a new bar, and for the last five years everybody has been racing to clear it.”

The Expanse has flaws, sure. It’s a television program, after all. The series of books from which it is drawn are solid, but they’re not epic-level standouts of literary science fiction. That’s okay. They’re worlds better than what usually gets turned into TV programming, and the folks working on them are doing everything they can to convince us that the characters we’re following live in space, on asteroids, in accelerating vessels, and (most importantly) in our future.

This is science fiction that manages sense-of-wonder without sugar coating the dangers of space exploration. It is science fiction that depicts many of the grim realities of human nature, while still instilling hope for the amazing things humans can, and will, create. It is science fiction that does not feel like high-magic fantasy wrapped in robots and ray-guns.

Minor spoiler: There’s one scene in particular during which a vessel loses power, and stops accelerating. Everything starts floating. Then a hole gets punched through the cabin. The characters still able to move spend no more than three seconds looking shocked, and then they do what people who live in space do. They patch the holes so they don’t run out of air.

The Expanse is very non-episodic, much like Netflix’s Daredevil. Each episode is one act in a multi-act story, and while these acts have beginnings, middles, and ends, the overarching story is never lost as we drive forward. I bought the Season Pass on Amazon because I expect to binge watch this at least a couple of times before (huzzah it got renewed!) Season Two comes out.

We’re only six seven episodes in, and the season is short, but if you love science fiction, and you have sufficient discretionary income to let you comfortably put some money where your mouth is, this one’s worth buying now.

Content alert: There’s some PG-13 nudity in episode 1, presumably to rope puerile male viewers into thinking this is Game of Thrones (episodes 2 through 6 have none of that in them). Also, there is PG-13 violence, and can I just say that arterial spray in null-gee is terrifying?