Category Archives: Live Action Movie Reviews

Run Silent, Run Deep Review

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This is a film about how obsession over revenge actually can work out pretty well. In a way the film’s overall message is quite a bit different than you’d expect since you’d figure that the mission would really fail to show that this wasn’t the way to go. It’s a pretty solid movie all in all with strong writing to keep you engaged.

The movie starts with Jim being celebrated by the crew and looking forward to many adventures as their captain. Unfortunately the celebration has barely concluded when he is told by exec that his ship is being given over to a guy named Richardson. Richardson’s own ship had been sunk about a year ago in the Bungo Straits where the Japanese have been successfully dominating every match. The U.S. has clear orders to avoid that area now but Richardson doesn’t care. He’s going to avenge his crew whatever it takes. Jim is certainly not pleased with how the lives of his crew are now being risked, but what can he do about it?

This film is fairly old school so everyone goes by the book and tries not to rock the boat much. That can be a bit annoying as Jim sees Richardson breaking the rules left and right but doesn’t really do anything about it. He sees the chain of command as not being something to jump over. So for example, when he notices Richardson going for the Bungo Straits, Jim will confront him about it privately. When the men on the ship ask about this, he just tells them to mind their business and keep it moving.

Jim’s doing his best to make sure the ship doesn’t devolve into chaos and that nothing crazy happens but I would say it happens at a rather huge cost. I don’t think keeping the men in the dark is the right answer. Jim’s almost compensating too hard to really show that he’s not going to try and take the ship back by force. It takes Richardson being really sick for Jim to really do anything.

Like I said in the intro though, Richardson’s plan actually works out fairly well. Yes, the heroes do take some big shots and have casualties. They almost could have all been destroyed but at the end of the day they stopped the Japanese threat that was sinking many shots. Richardson’s crew was able to pull off the bow shot when it counted despite this usually being a last resort technique. So you could say that Jim really trained them well.

I still think Jim should have been straight with the crew though. As for Richardson, he was also hiding things a whole lot. The fact that he refused to fight the first Japanese sub and let them get away just so he could go through with his mission was also pretty rough. Ultimately it works out pretty well but you never know if that one sub you avoided could go on to murder a bunch of people. It’s a high stakes bet with other people’s lives.

Ultimately Richardson’s story ends in a way you would expect because otherwise with the amount of rules he broke, things probably wouldn’t go great there. Results aren’t often enough to make up for the fact that you’ve broken orders, particularly in the army and the navy where these things are put as a premium. If you break them then the whole system starts to fall apart after all.

So there’s a good amount of tension here and the film does go into great detail about what a submarine fight is like. We see how you have to maneuver each torpedo and set the coordinates before firing. The precise angle to lower the ship while firing to do the bow shot, etc. Fans of submarine processes will get a particular kick out of it. It’s perhaps a bit more detail than I really needed but I wouldn’t say it ever drags the film on too long or anything like that.

The writing is always really good as you would expect for an old time film like this. The characters all talk like professionals and the dialogue exchanges are always really good. While we only have two main characters, there are still a number of sailors who get dialogue and show up from time to time. They help to move the plot around even without being individually important to what’s going on. It helps to make the submarine feel alive with the world building.

I also like that the Japanese aren’t just sitting around waiting to get blown up. We see them trying mental warfare tactics midway through the film where they deliver a message in English to taunt the main characters with how many ships have been sunk and also calling out their names to show that they know a lot. They have been doing well in the Bungo Straits after all so it makes sense that they wouldn’t just be taken out so easily.

If there is any plot armor or convenience here, it’s that I have a tough time believing so many people survived the initial explosion in the first scene. When Richardson’s ship is blown up, we see a number of people on rafts hanging on. We can assume a lot of them died later on from shock and injury since Richardson keeps referring to his crew as dead and it sounds like all of them didn’t make it except for him. Still doesn’t really answer how they survived an exploding ship in the water though, that just seems incredibly unlikely especially while the enemy ships were still around and this was in the middle of the Bungo Strait.

Overall, Run Silent, Run Deep is a pretty good movie. The story itself is fairly straight forward and as the movie is pretty short. The pacing is on point though and it keeps your attention the whole way. Being on a ship/submarine can make for a pretty good background. There isn’t a lot of scenery but it also helps to keep the tension up since there is really no escape. When an enemy ship shows up you generally have to fight and if you lose then you lose your life. So the stakes are definitely pretty high there unless you are half sub and can just run away but then the whole crew gives you heat for that. It’s all about the army politics and that’s always fun.

Overall 7/10

Electric Dreams Review

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Electric Dreams is one of those films that is trying really hard to balance out the comedy and romance perfectly. The problem though is it usually can’t get this just right and leans more on the comedy angle. That’s not necessarily a problem but the romance ends up being very poorly written and even some of the jokes don’t make too much sense. The film is trying very hard but I don’t think the humor has aged particularly well and at times you’re almost wondering what the main conflict of the movie even is. It feels like there wasn’t as much tension/drama as you would expect and it’s not like there is an end of the world threat going on. It just feels a bit aimless.

The movie starts off by introducing us to Miles who is an architect and he helps by planning out different ideas. He is not very tech savvy though and is super behind the times so it’s time to finally buy a computer. He gets one and almost immediately blasts it with some champagne. This causes the computer to turn into a sentient A.I. named Edgar. Edgar can do just about anything and has some really nice musical skills. This attracts a musician named Madeline who falls for Miles and he is rather enjoying the attention so he decides to lie to her about this. Edgar is upset because he likes Madeline and it’s his music so he decides to start causing some havoc. Meanwhile there is already a guy in the band known as Bill who is with Madeline. Which of the 3 guys will be able to claim her?

The first thing you have to realize here is that none of the characters are even remotely likable. Miles is the kind of guy who is mild mannered among the cast except with Madeline where he will yell at her at the drop of a hat. He’s definitely rather rude at times and lying to her about the music the whole time is pretty rough. Yes, he tries to come clean once or twice initially and Madeline doesn’t believe him but what you have to remember is that she’s not very smart at all. Miles continues to lie more and more about basically everything and that’s not a good look for him either. Miles is just not the guy you would really want to hang around. He feels way too sorry for himself and is the kind of guy who would get corrupted by a super computer immediately. The fact that Edgar is dominating him the whole time is crazy.

Miles is also too desperate for Madeline the whole time. Even after going backstage and seeing Bill having his fun with her, Miles is excited for the date coming up? Shouldn’t he talk to Madeline or confront Bill? Bill’s the most random inclusion in the film to be honest because there is really no point for this guy to be here. He’s only here to complicate matters and probably has less than 5 minutes of screentime. His appearance also makes Madeline look bad as a result.

Madeline should have set boundaries and cleared everything up right in that first scene instead of letting Miles be obviously awkward about the whole thing. Madeline is also one of the least intelligent heroines I’ve seen in a while as she misinterprets everything and has no clue what is going on. Yeah you could say that’s part of the comedy to which I would say it’s not very well written comedy. Madeline doesn’t seem particularly loyal or trustworthy with how quickly she gets into relationships. Also, her reaction of grinning when Miles wrecked her big concert (Thanks to Edgar) was completely bizarre.

Imagine someone making a lot of noise during your big performance and you’re just grinning. The alternate answer is that she didn’t hear what was happening, but everyone in the audience could and the conductor could, so is her hearing bad? The issues continue to mount over and over again. So as you can probably guess I wasn’t exactly rooting for the relationship to work out here. Seems like it’ll be really toxic and not be a good long term plan.

Finally you have Edgar who is super whiny the whole time. He wants to know about love and he wants Madeline to be with him but the guy is a program. Why is he so desperate here? He practically starts crying after a while. He has a good time messing with Miles but at the end of the day is unable to finish him off. So much for computer power. At least by the end of the film he figures out a way to expand his reach so instead of just annoying a few characters, now he can annoy the entire planet. That’s definitely one way to make your mark on the world.

It feels like you could have come up with a much more compelling storyline here if you really wanted to. It doesn’t even have to be the usual thriller kind of story where the machines take over. Just have it be a more intense rival that doesn’t whine so much. Give Madeline more agency, cut out Bill, and also make Miles more likable. Basically you just need to switch a whole lot of elements about the film and then this could be a good one. At its core you could say it’s a writing issue. The writing in the movie just isn’t good.

Overall, Electric Dreams is not a particularly good film. It’s a comedic film that is trying too hard and doesn’t end up being very funny. It felt like the movie didn’t exactly know what its end game was for a while there. I’m not saying you had to have some kind of a big and ambitious plot the whole time but the movie absolutely could have done something to stand out more here. The best thing I can say for it is that it does make using the computer really fun the whole time. I liked the graphics and how everything was voice activated. When Edgar turned on a Pac Man simulation to beat up Miles that was also pretty fun. We should have had more of this, direct man vs machine. You may be thinking that it should be easy to just smash the CPU but Miles makes that look like an absolutely impossible challenge the whole time.

Overall 4/10

Man on Fire Review

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This review is of the TV-14 edited version of the film. All thoughts below should be addressed as such as a review of the unedited version would be more negative

It’s time for one of those big thriller movies that definitely gets real intense. Movies involving a kidnapping usually are after all since the stakes are extremely personal right off the bat. The villains are all super evil even if they claim to be professionals and so you’re dragged into the revenge fantasy right away. I would say this one is pretty solid but it definitely doesn’t mind being over the top violent at different points.

The film starts off with The Voice orchestrating another kidnapping and forcing the father to pay a lot of money. Kidnappings have become a huge deal within the country even more than usual and as a reporter notes, this is organized crime. Someone is pulling the strings on this operation and his influence continues to grow. John is hired to protect, Pita, the daughter of an influential man who owns an empire. John used to be a super agent but unfortunately he developed a drinking problem which dramatically reduced his abilities and he has lost his confidence. John only accepts the deal because he needs the money and he is assured that the likelihood of a kidnapping is very minimal. He does his best to not bond with Pita so this will remain as an impersonal job but he is unable to keep this up and she is kidnapped.

Most victims do not actually make it back once kidnapped and as a professional, John knows this. So now he is going to set out on a mission to murder each and every kidnapper around. Can he really pull this off while surrounded by villains and unable to rely on the corrupt police force for help? It’s definitely not going to be easy but he’s definitely been angered enough to stay sober so his skills will be at their peak now.

Like I said, this is a fairly long film so there is a whole lot going on here. The film spends a whole lot of time introducing the characters in the first half even before the kidnapping. Despite you as the viewer knowing that this can’t last, the film decided to try and up the emotional beats here. I think it was a pretty solid decision even if you know what’s going to happen. I can’t think of any scenario where you could hide the fact that Pita will be kidnapped either way since the context clues would be there for the audience right from the start. The first half is also still interesting even if a bit slow at times.

Pita has already been through a lot growing up in such a corrupt place so she doesn’t panic as much as most kids would have in her position. She does make one mistake where she turns back instead of continuing to run, but at that point I have my doubts that she would have escaped either way. Meanwhile John is a solid main character even if he doesn’t look very good at first. Being a jerk to a kid is definitely not the way to win any points. Yeah, you get why he is doing that but it’s not a good look and of course he is suffering from a lot of PTSD at the start. In the second half he locks in. The guy definitely isn’t afraid to go full villain mode on the opponents either.

While I won’t blame him for any of this since it all seems pretty justified from his position, in general I never like to see the heroes torturing villains under any circumstances. The cycle just gets a little too violent for me in the whole everything goes kind of ballgame. It’s one of the things that does hold this film back a bit as well as I feel it relies pretty heavily on shock value on different moments. A top tier film will go with the implied violence route where you don’t actually see anything while this one wants you to see and feel every single injury. I always take that as a sign that the story wasn’t quite strong enough to stand on its own.

My other issue is in how generally corrupt everyone else is. The only characters who are actually being helpful is John’s old contact from the CIA days and a reporter. For the reporter, she has to put up with constant harassment and blackmail when helping out and the fact that the other guy never gets his comeuppance was annoying. I would have trashed this entire subplot because it doesn’t add anything to the story. We already know most of the characters here are awful, we didn’t need this part. Those scenes are definitely annoying the whole time.

Most of the characters are super flawed which is the jaded theme that the film is presenting and it’s the kind of theme that can be exhausting real fast. Also I didn’t care for the ending. While writing the review I quickly looked up the alternate ending and it is 100x better. I don’t know why they didn’t keep that ending, it seems way more satisfying to me. I dare say it would have helped the whole movie because with this ending it just doesn’t feel like there is a ton of hope for the heroes in general. It’s like they won a battle but had no real effect on the world. You can call it a realistic ending, I just call it an annoying one.

My final main complaint with the film is the crazy camera work. It was one of the worst displays I’ve seen since one of the Taken films. There is a lot of constant spinning almost as if this is a found footage film at times. The colors are a mess and the film is just all over the place. It never really lets up which hurts the fight scenes as well. With how obnoxious it is, I’m assuming there is some thematic/narrative reason for it but it definitely didn’t work out very well for me. Give me some classic camera work instead and that would have been better.

Overall, Man on Fire is one of those movies with a decent pitch and execution but shoots itself in the foot before reaching the finish line. It’s just trying to be too dark and shocking the whole time. It would have been a lot better if it showed more restraint. Yes, it’s definitely nice to see John taking it to all of the villains who clearly did deserve to die but doing it in the slowest/most painful ways possible tends to push the envelope a little too far for my tastes. The film could have used some more injections of hope to make the whole thing a bit better. Keeping the happier tone of the first half at least for the ending with less tragedy in the middle would have done wonders. If you are looking for a really intense revenge thriller though, this should be right up your alley.

Overall 4/10

House of Usher Review

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It’s time for a film that is sort of trying to be spooky but in a very low key way. It’s less about jump scares and more about wondering why the characters are all acting rather off. What part of the story are you not seeing in the background? Those are the questions you are meant to be asking yourself as the adventure goes on. Some parts definitely haven’t aged super well though, mainly the characters being super weak willed and just going along with what’s being said even when it makes no real sense.

This movie’s actually fairly short so they have to move fast. It starts with Philip heading over to a spooky mansion to see his fiancé Madeline. He is excited to bring her back home to Boston with him but the butler Bristol says that her brother Roderick is refusing anyone entry. Philip insists on being brought in and confronts the guy. Roderick explains that he and Madeline suffer from a rare ailment where their bodies are historically weak. Any light that is too bright or sound that is too loud will cause them to get weak or sick. They could even die from this affliction and it gets worse the older they get. Even eating is a chore since their sense of taste is too strong. Philip suspects thar Roderick is making this up and intends to take Madeline with him anyway. He will do so as soon as the night has passed but will he survive until then?

The house itself tries to bump Philip off on multiple occasions. Whether it is a hot pot slightly moving in the background or the stairs giving way, the building is not holding back. It’s not super powerful though so Philip is usually able to handle himself well enough. Roderick is really the main threat here but it depends on if he is lying or not. After all if he’s telling the truth, Philip could just punch the guy once and the extreme pain would probably knock him out. If Roderick is lying though, then it’s probably game over for him right out of the gate. Philip doesn’t really seem like the fighting type after all, especially with how docile he is.

I always like the old manner of speaking and how polite everyone is but this definitely shows the weakness to that approach. Philip puts up with too much here as Roderick continues to challenge him and forbid Madeline from spending much time with him. The guy will send her off to bed early and everything. Philip absolutely should have been standing up to Roderick here more and ultimately the final events of the film are his fault from this point on. He shouldn’t have left Madeline in any position for Roderick to be with her. Especially not when the plans were already made to leave.

I also have to give Madeline some big criticism here as well. She should have been speaking up for herself as well instead of constantly hiding behind Roderick and letting him dictate her life. Sure she had some half hearted moments where she would try to voice her feelings but then he would shut her down every time and that was the end of that. It’s not exactly something that is awe inspiring. It just shows that she is not being very independent. Also, if Philip had not shown up, was she just not going to ever go and visit him? It sounds like she borderline just vanished one day and I guess she was letting Roderick trap her the whole time. Not her best look.

The butler Bristol isn’t much better than any of the characters either since he is complicit in everything that was going on. The guy could have stepped in to end things at any time but chose not to do so. That was a big error in judgement and definitely held him back quite a bit. So while he may not seem as villainous as Roderick, I can’t really give him any kind of pass here.

The cast is really small as these are the only 4 characters running around. Roderick is by far the toughest of the 4 as he dominates each of the characters with ease. It’s even more embarrassing for Philip when you consider that Roderick spends a lot of his screentime explaining how weak he is and how every element can destroy him. Philip is really letting this guy call the shots the whole time? It’s definitely a real bad look without a doubt.

Once we get to the climax, we finally get to the intense moments as we get a quick fight and lots of destruction. It all just happens way too late for one character so you understand the rage but feel like it should have happened a whole lot sooner. The building gets its last moments in there as well and it makes for an intense, but odd kind of ending. I don’t really know by the end exactly what the building really wanted. Roderick’s character is a bit confusing as well on the exact point of what he was doing. Was he really just a doomer waiting for it to all end? It felt like he could and should have had some kind of grander ambitions at some point.

Overall, House of Usher is a passable film without a doubt. The short length likely helps in this case to help mask the fact that there isn’t a ton of story to be found here. It’s a good movie even if the characters are super annoying. You wish Philip had more of a backbone so things would have gone way differently though. The film avoids most of the usual horror pitfalls and stays interesting so I could recommend it to the average moviegoer. Just don’t go in expecting a really big/epic horror title. This is absolutely more of a subdued adventure with a big payoff at the end but plays more like a drama than a horror most of the time. The house’s feeble attempts at getting Philip like moving the pot around isn’t exactly going to terrify you after all.

Overall 4/10

The In Laws Review

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It’s time for a film about just how crazy a wedding can get. You don’t really know what the other family is going to be like after all and you just have to fear for the worse. This film’s pretty good, I do think it drags on just a bit as it goes on with Shelly taking way too long to get with the program but it still does have a good amount of gags and I like the general premise. Ultimately it’s enough for me to give this one a thumbs up.

The movie starts off with Shelly getting ready to finally meet the father of his daughter’s fiancé. This guy has been particularly elusive for quite a while now to the point where the wedding is going to be in just a few days. Shelly isn’t worried until his dentist patient confirms that this is a really big deal. If the father is no good then the son might be a mess as well. Sure enough, Vince is a mess who seems to be a chronic liar and now Shelly wants the marriage to be called off. Unfortunately he is quickly pulled into a giant CIA conspiracy and now he is wanted for stealing millions of dollars. Can Shelly escape this plight and protect his daughter’s future or is this an elaborate way to get him out of the picture?

Again this is a comedy so you shouldn’t take the plot too seriously. All the CIA stuff is handled overly dramatic of course and the film doesn’t mind going completely bonkers with everyone being extremely expressive. Shelly is the biggest example of that as most of his dialogue is yelling and panicking. The guy does not know how to be subtle at all so even in a crowded cafe he’ll be yelling about CIA secrets. The guy was definitely not built for this kind of mission and Vince probably should have left him out of it. I get the feeling he would have had an easier time grabbing the briefcase and ducking off on his own. That’s how much Shelly tends to hold him back.

I can definitely understand why Shelly thought the whole marriage was probably a bad idea after meeting this guy. He doesn’t exactly overwhelm you with confidence after all. I may not care for Shelly much as a character as the “normal” guy panicking about the weird one the whole time usually gets old fast, but he still had some valid points here. Ultimately he just should have stayed focused on his business and none of this would have happened to him. Of course it wouldn’t be much of a film in that case. Shelly’s best moment was definitely when Vince accused him of not being able to understand what was happening and Shelly made a speech about how he shouldn’t underestimate the average guy down the block. That was a pretty good defense.

Vince has been around the block many times and has his moments where he seems to be good at being an agent but then on the other hand he has tons of moments where you feel like he has just gotten really lucky the whole time. Vince doesn’t really panic but at the same time he’s almost constantly on the run. Yes he’s a great shot but that doesn’t help when he’s heavily outnumbered. Even to the very end of the film he only survives on absolute luck which is definitely not the best look for the guy.

The banter with Shelly and Vince can be fun. I actually even prefer that to the fight scenes themselves since those of course aren’t always being taken super seriously anyway. At least for the arguments you see where both of the characters are coming from. A title like this needs a lot of banter in order to succeed after all and I would say it works out pretty well. I also liked the CIA correspondent who shows up twice to talk about how crazy Vince is.

This works as a solid mystery because Vince has been so unbalanced throughout the film that you can’t entirely rule out the possibility that he has been leading Shelly on the whole time. Perhaps he really was kicked out of the CIA and has gone rogue to steal millions of dollars. For all Shelly knows, he is really getting himself into trouble now. Of course he ultimately isn’t able to get out once he’s so deep in anyway so it’s all a moot point. Now he just has to try and stay alive which isn’t easy as a normal citizen with no combat oriented background.

What I would do to keep the momentum up in the second half would be to probably remove the entire climax of the main characters getting captured and the near shootout. Instead switch that to Shelly finally taking the reigns. Have him take the money over to the dentist’s office and make a play like he’s going rogue. You could have Vince finally be lost as to what’s going on and then it turns out this was just a way to smoke the villains out from hiding. This way you give Shelly some kind of a big win outside of really just being along for the ride and helping out in small ways. I think that would give him more agency and could have made the ending a bit more fun. I definitely don’t buy the two of them being friends by the end the way this film ended. There were just too many instances where Shelly really could have died and Vince isn’t exactly apologetic so there isn’t much reason for them to get along. If anything, keeping it a bit antagonistic would have opened the door for some sequels with the characters pretending to be nice while the kids were there before going back to their normal selves.

Overall, The In Laws is a fun enough film. I do think they could have had a little more fun with the concept though. Instead of this all being one mission, a montage early on of Vince giving crazier and crazier reasons for why he has to cancel on appointments would have worked really well. Then you set up the main story. I also think you could probably rope the kids in a bit too by having them start to fight about some of this stuff. Even though their upcoming wedding is the main plot point, they don’t actually get to appear much at all. Their screen time is surprisingly small. Either way, this film is a good one to check out if you want some light hearted fun. It should keep your attention well enough the whole time and at the end of the day that’s the important thing.

Overall 7/10

Cover Up Review

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It’s time for a film about an insurance guy and that’s pretty fun because it’s super rare to see one in the spotlight. Yeah that made for a good story. This guy always knows when something isn’t right and makes a move on that. The sheriff dares him to try that in a small town but what he doesn’t realize is that our hero grew up in a small town so he’s really ready for anything.

The movie starts off with the suicide of a guy named Phillips. Sam has to go to the town for a routine check to confirm that the guy is dead and all. It’s supposed to be a very routine thing but when he gets to town the sheriff isn’t particularly helpful. There is no morgue report, the gun has vanished, there are no bullets, and they don’t want to even let Sam see the body. Is Phillips even dead? Sam’s going to have to go into this mystery even if it means going up against the entire town. Does he really have what it takes?

Well, the good news is that Sam’s a tough character who isn’t going to back down just because of a little intimidation here. He gets into it with Sheriff Larry on several occasions and just keeps on coming back for more. Larry is really determined to keep Sam on a short leash but this main character is not so easily deterred. No, he’s just getting started. The more Sam looks into this though, the more the suspects begin to rise. Everyone in town despised Phillips, he was unanimously agreed to be an awful person and they all agree that the town would be better off without him.

Frank is the fierce suspect here because he was going out with Phillip’s niece and the guy didn’t really seem to like the idea. Then you have Stu who just so happens to own the same kind of gun that was used to potentially destroy Phillips, once Sam managed to get Larry to show him the bullets. Stu’s daughter Anita is distraught about this and so she quickly begins to try and hide evidence from Sam as well. Then there’s the doctor but as Sam gets close there, the doctor quickly has a heart attack and dies. Most inconvenient, that’s for sure.

The weak point of the film is definitely the romance though. During this case Sam falls for Anita and in the background of a possible murder conspiracy this just doesn’t feel like the right time. Additionally, it’s hard to see how it could possibly end well once she starts hiding the facts and working against Sam. She basically says if Sam continues to do his job then they will be enemies and she really gets to work on burning the bridge during Christmas. Things work out for her so then she’s happy again but it’s just way too late by then. The fact that she was blaming Sam for just doing his job was rough.

Especially since Sam could have easily never found out the truth. He was giving his best effort which is his job, why should he be given such a hard time abut that? It just made no real sense and even less sense that they would get back together after that. Sam is definitely the most likable character here. I really appreciated that he never gave up. It’s really not easy when everyone is rooting for you to fail after all. Sam stuck to it and the company knows they have an asset in him. He may not have finished the job in the end once he learns the context but he made sure that he would know the truth before he left.

Larry makes for a solid main antagonist here but the guy can definitely be rather annoying. If he had played ball at all a bit sooner then everything would be easier for Sam. Of course, that wasn’t in Larry’s interests which is why he was getting in Sam’s way every step of the process. The banter between the characters is pretty great I have to say. Larry even goes as far as to talk slow and bring up dead topics like his cigars over and over to just be purposefully obtuse. The biggest issue is that Larry’s actually really smart so he is pretty good at dodging the questions over and over just to make things tough on Sam.

It all goes back to vigilante justice here. When you’ve got someone terrorizing a town but no legal means with which to stop him, then naturally the people are going to get more and more desperate and something is going to eventually happen. That’s just a foregone conclusion no matter how much the characters may not like it. Technically I don’t even think all of the characters knew what happened here. Some of the most influential ones did of course but even for a small town I don’t think the word totally spread to the rest of the populace.

The film also takes place around Christmas time which is pretty fun. You get to see the characters all hanging out and getting ready for happy days only to have this big controversy show up. One of the best characters was the maid/housekeeper who really liked showing off how much knowledge she had. She didn’t care what was going on, she would blurt out answers when she felt like it. It made one of her scenes in particular work really well to show that she still had one concern above even that. She was willing to put herself in jeopardy to help someone as well. Pretty much everyone in the town was super loyal and as Sam said before, they all tend to be pretty good people.

Overall, Cover Up is a pretty good film. It definitely had my attention the whole time. You’re really not sure what happened along with Sam and the film gives you just enough twists and turns where you even have to acknowledge that perhaps it really was a suicide. You just don’t really know for sure until the end and there are a good amount of suspects. Each alibi tends to be rather weak so you have to go with your gut at that point. I think the one character everyone would assume it was not would be the sheriff since that would just be way too obvious. The super obvious answer is rarely the right one after all.

Overall 7/10

Black Sunday Review

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Black Sunday is basically a vampire film even if it is technically about witches. Yes, there is a bit of a nuance here of course but lets just say that this will not end up being a big winner or anything like that. Sometimes these old school horror titles can pull off the upset victory but this was not going to follow suit as it falls into pretty much every horror pitfall imaginable.

The film starts off with a witch about to be executed. The humans want to really make it hurt this time so they’ve made a mask that will basically keep on stabbing her until she’s dead. So with the last of her energy she sends out a curse to them. We jump forward 200 years from that point where Andrej and Choma are heading off to a scientists convention when they run into some carriage issues and have to stop at a local haunted mansion. A lady named Katia lives there and this works just fine for Andrej who immediately begins to like her. What he doesn’t realize is that she is the ancestor of the witch Asa and he is about to have the most dangerous days of his life. Can he survive this?

I have to give the villain props for making a lot of moves as soon as she is revived. She quickly mind controls one of the scientists with vampire witch mind control, bumps off one of the characters, and brings in another ally from the grave. She was really set to dominate but ultimately just takes too long which gives Andrej time to figure out what’s going on here. She really needs to bump off just a few more people. She also came rather close at the end but relies on trickery instead of actually finishing off the job. She should have stabbed the main guy from behind or something.

I guess physically she isn’t super strong or anything like that but I would still expect her to at least be able to do this much in a fight. So she gets some points here but part of her success really comes from the heroes just making mistake after mistake as opposed to her being a stable genius or anything like that.

Andrej is an okay main character I guess. He probably falls in love a bit too easily and is slow on the uptake. I’m never too harsh on these guys for not believing in the supernatural right away but Choma was being suspicious from early on and Andrej should have caught that a bit more. At least he managed to catch the trick at the end and didn’t fall for Asa’s charms. Honestly that’s probably more than I could say for a bunch of other main characters.

Just about the opposite is true on all accounts for Choma. He does fall for Asa’s tricks and shows no real willpower of his own. The guy jeopardizes everyone and it all stems from the fact that he was not built for this. Javutich works as a decent sub villain. He actually does have full on super strength so it’s only thanks to some plot armor that the heroes were able to stop him. There are a lot of ways he should have been able to end the film early for Asa.

As for Katia, she’s not a bad heroine but it can be a bit annoying how she panics at everything. She could have alerted the heroes that something was going on a lot earlier but faints and generally doesn’t handle things very well. If she had kept her guard up more then this could have all been different. The cast is fairly small at least so you get to really focus on each of them. By now you’re probably wondering why it’s so weak though right? Surely this is about the same as every other C horror title.

In a lot of ways that’s true but the whole witch/vampire stuff is always going to hurt. I can’t take the visual hypnosis all that seriously where the guy just can’t help but make a move on her. That’s always going to be an extremely hard sell for me. Then the film also makes another big critical error in having some animal violence. As soon as there were some guard dogs in the estate you knew that things would not be going too well which is definitely a shame. The effects they use to show all of the stab marks on Asa are also quite eerie. In general it’s not like the film is super violent or anything like that but it’s not afraid to have some of that disturbing imagery running around.

The writing isn’t bad. All of the characters are able to have full conversations and talk like professionals. I can always appreciate that at least. In this case it’s not enough to get the film up to the next level or anything though. Writing can only get you so far when the rest of the film is not up to to task after all. I’d also say there isn’t really a whole lot to the film. There aren’t a bunch of jump scares and in general it’s not all that frightening. We have the creepy elements and some disturbing moments but that’s really it. The film tends to have a fairly casual tone otherwise.

Overall, Black Sunday is not really a film that I’d recommend. I’ve certainly seen worse films of course but this one is really not doing anything new or different. It’s not going to make sure that you remember it or anything like that. Having a witch as the villain could have actually been real interesting but the film doesn’t do anything with it. She’s not casting a bunch of spells or anything like that. All of the deaths tend to be blood related or just being overpowered which doesn’t take advantage of being a witch. So it felt like this was all one massive missed opportunity. The way the film plays out, you’d think that the writer really wanted to make a vampire film but wasn’t allowed to or something like that. The ending is almost comical with how fast it moves and the villagers showing up the way they did. Technically it’s dark for one character at least but it was all just so sudden.

Overall 3/10

Willow Review

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What if I told you that there was a film out there that was trying to be the next Lord of the Rings? And what if I told you that the film…succeeded? That was definitely the biggest fear imaginable and unfortunately this one pulled off what I didn’t think was possible. This film is 2 hours of nothing as the film desperately tries to bore you out of your mind. The romance, the adventure, the characters, it brought tears to me eyes. It was just so….bad! You’ll be guaranteed to fall asleep while watching this movie and it’s like you just warped ahead 2 hours in time. It’s absolutely crazy.

So the film starts off with one of those opening messages about how there is a prophecy that has scared the ruling class and so all of the babies have to be inspected to make sure they don’t have a special mark. Naturally the villains fumble the bag here so the baby is taken away and found by a group of Dwarves. Most of them are too scared to really do anything and would be quick to abandon her. Even Willow himself is skeptical but he is convinced by his wife to help out. The mage of the land even assigns Willow on a special mission to go and help her out but he has to bring along the classroom bully who would love to get out of there at his first chance. Can they really keep the baby alive?

The film was already at a disadvantage with the whole fantasy setting if we’re being honest here. I already don’t like this kind of old school setting and this is as old as it gets. We’re talking lots of trees and forests and everyone is super poor with no civilization in sight. The magic we’re shown here tends to be rather ordinary stuff and nothing too fancy.

There is nothing fantastic or really interesting about the world. It’s the kind of world that may have a ton of supernatural elements so you never mistake it for the real world and yet it doesn’t do anything exciting with it. For every decent monster design like a two headed worm/dinosaur type thing, you have a bunch of mini humans and talking animals. This is not a film where you will be remembering much and even the strongest beasts tend to go down against normal arrows. When you’re losing to arrows…that is a terrible look. I can’t mince words here, that is a horrible look. You can’t afford to lose to that.

Willow isn’t really much of a great character. For starters he’s not very brave and his magic is no good. Yes, character arcs and such but he needed a stronger beginning for that. The baby is naturally around a whole lot but she’s a baby so it’s not like she can really do anything you know. Then we have the swordsman Madmartigan, who has a cool name but that’s about the only good thing about the guy. He’s absolutely ready to hightail it and run for a while there before eventually coming to the light. He’s the character who is meant to give us the snappy dialogue and bring the comedy up a notch but he doesn’t really have anyone to banter with so that doesn’t work out very well at all.

You definitely see how the film was trying to capitalize on the Hobbit by having the main characters all be like that but it’s just being a copycat without adding anything to the idea. Also, it’s copying a character that I never even liked which doesn’t help matters there. Okay, there still has to be some redeeming quality to the film right? Soundtrack’s out since that was fairly dull but I can at least give a slight thumbs up to the special effects. I liked the skull mask for one of the villains and the two headed monster didn’t look bad. All in all, the effects did their job so I can’t really find any faults with them there.

You’ve got some romance here but even aside from the love potion beginning, it’s just not very strong. Now we do have an extensive climax where the crew are fighting for at least 30 minutes or so. It’s actually a considerable length all the way and we get a lot of action so that’s good…right? I mean it beats the rest of the film but it’s been a while since I’ve seen such a boring action scene either. It goes back to the fantasy element here as even the sword fighting feels very old school. I think it’s because they’re trying to film this like a real sword fight so it comes across like two guys dueling at a tournament. It doesn’t feel very powerful or fast on either end.

That’s a problem and of course the second is that we still don’t really care about any of the characters by this point. Why should we right? They haven’t done anything to show us that we should care about them and that’s a big issue. The villains are also fairly generic as well which is one angle where the film could have tried to take things to the next level but ultimately fell short.

So there really isn’t much to say about the film. The characters aren’t funny and the plot isn’t engaging. You’ll have to really focus to try and stay awake during this title and the long length won’t help matters there. I need a name for this sub genre of fantasy that is going for hyper realism even while having supernatural elements. Because I do like a good fantasy but it has to be bright and vibrant. I want everything to be really smooth, shiny, and just feel like an awesome otherworld. If it’s beat up or too realistic then it just doesn’t have the same impact to it and ultimately ends up falling short.

Overall, Willow is definitely not the film that will change the fantasy genre as we know it. I still think the craziest part of the film is how we have a long action scene for the climax and yet it never manages to be particularly exciting. It’s a lot like Lord of the Rings in that sense so the parallels continue. Ultimately your best bet is to stay far away from this film. It’s one of those fantasy titles that just brings the worst parts of the genre and doesn’t really tackle its strengths. Better luck next time I suppose. I have to assume that the sequel TV show will be at least a little better…I would hope at least.

Overall 2/10

The Enforcer Review

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This review is of the TV-14 edited version of the film. All thoughts below should be addressed as such as a review of the unedited version would be more negative

It’s time for Harry to return to fight off some more crime. Unfortunately for him, the guy doesn’t have much backup this time. The film shows even more just how inept everyone tends to be without him and corruption is through the roof. I think the movie goes a little too far with this at times here but I dare say it has a slight touch of comedy at times which helps to push things through. If it was fully serious it might almost get a bit depressing.

The film starts off with some guys getting murdered as a terrorist group continues to gain ground for some kind of nefarious purpose. Meanwhile Harry pulls off another stunning victory over the forces of evil but there was a whole lot of collateral damage and he’s demoted. He now has to work with a lady named Kate thanks to a new initiative where they are trying to get more girls on the force. Harry is against this, not because Kate is a girl but because things should be done in a meritocracy. Promoting her just for this reason strikes him as a little silly although the silliness is just beginning. Can Kate prove that she has what it takes?

I think the rough part here is of course we know part of the message is that Kate is ready for action and can back him up but she looks really bad at first. She is clearly not prepared for any of this and nearly gets blown away during a missile practice exercise. It doesn’t exactly inspire confidence when you are counting on this person to watch your back in a life or death situation right? It takes a very long time for Kate to really be combat ready and by then we’re approaching the end of the film so you know what’s about to happen. For what it’s worth, I do think she’s a likable character. Her heart’s in the right place but she was in over her head.

Harry is a fun lead as always. Super gruff and to the point. He can be rather rude for sure but at least you always know he is speaking his mind and not sugar coating things. He’s still just as good a fighter as he ever was and age has not gotten the best of him. The guy puts up with a whole lot but ultimately keeps on going to help people. So I admire the drive and there is really nothing to dislike about the guy. He always puts his best foot forward and is an inspiration to everyone around him.

Now the police captain looks real bad here. For starters, he really wants good press and to look good for the mayor. So he’s running around spoiling Harry’s plans and generally not caring about anything. Arresting Harry’s informant was absolutely terrible. The guy was only looking out for the short term benefits there. It’s clear that he wasn’t actually thinking of the public good. Then by the end he’s absolutely given up as expected and doesn’t even realize that the fight was already over. This is the kind of person that Harry has to work with on a daily basis.

The worst part? Harry is outranked by this guy so there is only so much you can do. It has to be absolutely disheartening to be the best man on the force but to not be ranked high enough to actually make a difference in these things. It’s the ultimate frustration. Then you mayor as well who falls into all of the same traps. He wants votes and he wants results but the guy can’t wait long enough to get them the right way. He’s the kind of guy who would jump into a trap just to spite Harry and to show that he can make his own decisions. He’s not the smartest guy at all.

The villains are okay but not super memorable. They have their own motives and all but at the end of the day they basically are terrorists. Their message gets lost early on when they’re murdering everyone. It always takes a rather huge kind of message to counter murders like that. You need to have an extremely powerful message for me to even begin to think of supporting you by this point. These guys don’t though so they lose the credibility rather quickly.

Like I mentioned earlier, one of the film’s strengths is that it does throw in some good humor from time to time though. Harry’s dry wit really works well in different scenes and then you also have a lot of crazy stuff going on like one of the terrorists being in a nun outfit and the pastor generally being super unhelpful. You can’t really stay neutral or talk about nonviolence when you have terrorists inside the building with you. People are unhelpful to a comedic extreme, corrupt to an extreme, and everything is just big and crazy. Even the way Harry handles the opening case is rather funny with how nonchalant he is about it.

The humor never goes too far or wrecks the tone of the film though. It is absolutely a lighter tone than the last film but it’s handled smoothly and isn’t forceful. It just works here and not every film has to have some kind of super deep message after all. This film is also a lot shorter than the last one so in a way this may have been a decision to just make this more of a basic action film. You can never really go wrong with that as long as the writing is good and I thought it was rather solid. The ending may not be quite as solid as the last one since it’s way more of a hollow victory but it’s still good enough. Harry shows off his attitude to the end and we get one last gag of sorts.

Overall, The Enforcer is a good film. I don’t think it quite has the depth of the last one but it’s still a good adventure. In a way it continues to show just how corrupt things are to the point where Harry has to rely on other criminals to get the info he needs on the main villains. He can’t rely on the cops or their information networks which is really rough when you think about it. With the mayor pushing all of his social justice policies in, Harry can see how it might get even worse in the future. He may complain, but ultimately he keeps on getting the job done though and that’s what is important. I would recommend checking this film out, you’ll have a good time.

Overall 6/10

Magnum Force Review

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This review is of the TV-14 edited version of the film. All thoughts below should be addressed as such as the review of the unedited version would be more negative

It’s time for Harry to return and start putting some justice back in the streets. Magnum Force tackles the topic of vigilante justice which is pretty fun because usually you only see that in a superhero story. Sure, non superhero movies sometimes have this as well for the main character but it’s a little rarer to have the complete hero having to take on a vigilante. Especially when the hero is someone who is willing to skirt the rules quite a bit like Dirty Harry.

The movie starts with a crook managing to get away on a technicality and preparing to enjoy his new freedom. Unfortunately for him, he bumps into a cop who is just not having this and gets brutally murdered. Harry decides to look into this although he is warned not to look too closely. A man like Harry is going to try for answers and those answers may not be to the department’s best interests. It’s a touchy subject after all and so naturally Harry doesn’t listen to them at all. He’s going to do whatever he wants and that’s really the final answer. He does have a partner, but there’s not much point talking about him because you know how that tends to go.

In a way this movie plays out like a part mystery. Who is this rogue cop? There are several suspects because in the movie we meet a new rookie unit that is formed of several prodigies. These guys are all experts with a gun and are definitely not afraid to use it. So which one of them has gone off the deep end and started executing criminals? Sure, it might sound like a good idea at first and that’s why it is always such a tempting proposition but it becomes a super slippery slope. In fact we can go over that a bit in this review because the movie also goes over this in detail.

Basically as Harry points out, the rogue cop is playing judge, jury, and executioner. Yes, Harry has had to wrestle with these themes even in the first film. Sometimes you do have to pull the trigger but there’s a big difference between doing that either in duress, a split second situation, a one time event, and casually going around bumping off all criminals. You have to be absolutely sure that the person doing the crime is actually guilty and figuring out a lot of similar things as well. After all, if you got this wrong, then you are murdering an innocent person.

In a perfect world, if it were possible to perfectly know if someone was guilty of particularly heinous crimes then I doubt that anyone would have a problem deleting them. If you could press a button and it only deleted people that you knew committed the crime like cold blooded murder in a non acceptable circumstance, then that’d be great. Of course, that is not something that can ever happen. The thing with vigilantism is that you can’t promote it because then it’ll spread and inevitably be used by someone who doesn’t subscribe to the same values. It puts the whole topic in a very dicey spot. You can only really internally root for it and not externally.

Take the opening scene, everyone knows that this guy murdered a bunch of people. He got off on a legal loophole, but that’s all it was…a loophole. When you have actual footage of someone doing something criminal, it can be extremely frustrating to see them out and about again with no problem. The law will never be perfect of course as you can’t stitch every loophole but that’s when vigilantes don’t seem to bad. So in the world of Dirty Harry, you can easily imagine how vigilantes would appear. There is just so much crime and corruption everywhere. The cops seem rather dirty at times so the only way to put a criminal off the streets is to do it yourself.

Of course, using a cop to do this means the whole agency could be compromised. So it makes for a pretty good battle of ideals throughout the movie. Then you also have the battle of generations. Harry is an older guy who has been around the block many times before. He knows how to fight and make command decisions but can he handle any of these younger cops? We see that they are near perfect on the gun range and hold their own in a shooting exhibition. Of course, Harry threw the latter so we can assume he would have won or at least tied there but it doesn’t change the fact that these guys are really evenly matched.

Harry is always a likable character and he does tend to carry the film at a lot of points. He’s certainly not flawless. The guy makes mistakes like anybody else but he’s always at least fighting for something. He still believes that the badge means something after all and this kind of main character is always fun. I also like the main villain. I won’t say who it is but the film definitely takes a twist out of a mystery film with how it’s handled. It makes for a really solid climax all the way around.

The film does show off what a lawless city it takes place in so there is definitely some grit here though. The murders can be a little bloody at times of course. There is some fanservice running around and most of the characters are meant to be rather unlikable. I like the young cops and Harry but pretty much everyone else here tends to be annoying. I actually thought Harry’s partner wasn’t bad but you just feel like he’s absolutely doomed the whole time. Nobody can hang with Harry for long. That’s just how it always is. He’s built different for this kind of thing.

Overall, Magnum Force is a pretty solid film. It’s definitely a long one so there is a whole lot of time for investigation here and debates on what is going on. The movie avoids being too black and white on the issue which I appreciated as it is a bit of a nuanced topic. It may be an uncomfortable one for most but there is a reason why vigilante justice is so popular after all. The film absolutely lands the ending as well so it makes for a satisfying watch. It’s probably a film that would be a little too intense for younger watchers but I wouldn’t say it is completely off its rocker either. I do think the film showed some restraint overall since it could easily mess with the audience’s emotions to make the vigilantism even more accepted based on how awful the criminals are. You are more left to assume based on context and such rather than shown the various crimes for the most part which is always the best way to go. So yeah this is definitely the film to watch if you want a compelling action title.

Overall 6/10