Tag Archives: Thriller

The Spy Who Loved Me Review

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It’s time for more Bond and this time he will have to deal with a rival who may even be on his level. The concept is definitely cool but as the film goes on, you realize that the rival is a paper one. I’ll explain more about that in a minute but needless to say this film still falls into the usual issues of a Bond film. Perhaps that is just the inevitable fate of most Bond adventures.

The film starts with showing us how both Bond and Anya are messing around despite being called the world’s greatest secret agents. Bond manages to murder a bunch of enemy agents as he heads back to base though. MI6 has called him in to find the missing nuclear submarine that someone stole from Russia. Naturally this is a pretty big deal since it is a national crisis. Russia has also sent in their best agent, Anya to find out what’s going on. Both of them will be crossing paths as they uncover the mystery behind this but can they keep their hands to themselves?

I do like the hook of finally seeing another secret agency in the forefront. Surprisingly the films don’t often do this. Sure, other agencies like the CIA are referenced but typically they tend to just get wrecked off screen. That said, the film doesn’t totally commit to the bit as Anya isn’t super skilled. Perhaps relative to some of the other agents but she consistently feels outmatched here. This is why I would call her a rival on paper.

So on paper Anya is a genius, master of martial arts, and her resourcefulness speaks for itself. She should be able to hold her own against anyone. Well, on the field it just doesn’t play out that way. She may be able to defeat Bond at times in word games like when she mentions where the submarine is. Additionally, she is able to defeat him by using his weakness to women and spraying him with a knock out gas. The whole thing was super embarrassing for Bond but when it comes time for a fight, she is dispatched quickly.

She allows Jaws to defeat her even when she had a gun on him and he was unarmed. When she crosses with Bond, she is pitting her karate chop against his gun. Anya just wasn’t ready for this and the fact that she can distract Bond with her charms just feels like a consolation prize at best. I would have liked her to have been out there in the field murdering a ton of fighters and really giving Bond a reason to respect her abilities. Considering the series we’re watching, this will probably only be possible if the rival agent is a guy.

As for Bond, well he looks pretty bad as always. The whole world is in danger with the nuclear weapons here and he’s still trying to make a pass at everybody? Bond needs to lock in at this point and he just doesn’t have enough moments like that. Bond is ready to have his fun and lose the mission which is not what you want a hero to do. I appreciate his smug attitude and how Bond talks down to everyone but it’s still hard to overlook his faults.

Meanwhile Jaws is a solid villain because of his skills even if he lacks the overall charisma that Scaramanga had. Jaws is shown to be borderline superhuman with how he can absorb so many blows. He walks away from a massive car crash at one point with essentially no injuries. Bond is clearly not able to beat him one on one but is quicker so usually the environment ends up being the deciding factor. Jaws mouth is metal after all which makes things difficult for him around magnets.

His boss is technically the head honcho but that guy doesn’t look all that good. I appreciate all the tough talk and how he dispatched several characters in the opening scene. He knows how to stay on top but ultimately gets a little too cocky. His gun needed to be quite a bit shorter to be effective and the trigger needed to be silent. The guy had an interesting goal of wanting humanity to only live beneath the waves though. I’ll give him some points for originality I suppose.

As always the film suffers from fanservice and terrible romances which distract from the main plot. In fact, this time it’s even worse because the plot is completely going against the romance. Anya’s whole plot is to avenge her fiancé but she’s messing around with Bond right away. You could try to defend this by saying that it’s part of her job and she’ll get with everybody in order to further the mission but that really doesn’t help at all. It just pushes forward the worst trope of a female agent which is having to do any of that stuff in the beginning.

Nah you need to be able to solidify her as a top tier threat who doesn’t need to do that. Bond never does either, he just does it for fun. That needs to be dialed back as well so that he can actually be a likable character. The film’s general pacing and story is good but these things hold it back quite a lot. The fanservice is unrelenting and is something you don’t see so much of outside of the Bond films. In a way that’s what makes it so notable here.

I should mention that the songs aren’t all that impressive for me. I didn’t cover that in the prior Bond film but generally none of the songs have moved me so far. They sound decent, I’m certainly not calling them bad. However, I would not be looking them up on Youtube or anything like that. They really lack a better beat or incredible lyrics that force you to rewatch them. These just feel like what you would expect from a Bond film tbh and I don’t really mean that in a good way.

Overall, This film had an interesting premise but didn’t live up to it in classic Bond style. I will always take a plot like this with multiple factions over not having them at all though. If you have liked the Bond films up to now then you should like this one as well. In a lot of ways it is playing the adventure completely straight and that’s not a bad thing for the most part. The series just needs a way to lose the fanservice and then it can one day rise up as one of the all time greats! Until then, it will have to be satisfied with being at the back of the pack when it comes to action/thriller franchises.

Overall 4/10

Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga Review

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

It’s time for another Mad Max film which is naturally not going to go over very well. The franchise has never really managed to make a solid product and this one doesn’t do any better. It jumps straight to pure edge and grim-dark content right from the jump and never really gets any better. The plot itself is fairly thin with the film just being a bunch of padding on top of it. It’ll feel like a 4 hour movie by the time you’re done with it.

The film starts with Dementus’ gang invading Furiosa’s home and they manage to kidnap her and murder her mother. Furiosa is now forced to work for his gang for many years while trying to plot her revenge. Unfortunately, it won’t be easy because he just has so many different henchmen working for him. It’s like going up against an entire army. Dementus is the leader of his gang but even he has to answer to a larger force. This may be where Furiosa can have some hope to turn things around but it won’t be easy. Will she be able to mount a comeback or is all hope already lost?

This is a prequel so you know Furiosa will survive this but it’s more about the journey. How much will she lose before she is finally able to claim victory here? Well, unfortunately the film decides to have her lose quite a lot in the process and so we see just how messed up her life was in the apocalyptic world. Just about every character has been messed up in this timeline though as we’ve seen throughout the movies. There just isn’t any hope left.

The last semblances of authority were wiped out long ago. All that remains are an endless amount of gangs who rule through violence and terror. Forget about human dignity or anything like that. This is all about maximum suffering to everyone and it’s just villain against villain. As Dementus fights with the other group, you don’t have anyone to root for because both groups are equally pure evil. There will be no rest or recovery for either side no matter what happens. It’s true when they say there are no heroes in this film.

Furiosa is naturally a lot more sympathetic than the others running around but even she had to play the game for years. She had to fight under the villains’ banner and murders a whole lot of characters throughout. It would have been nice to have let her just be a full on hero even if it meant breaking the tone that the film was going for. Have her be some sort of super hero who goes around murdering the villains one by one. She could use a lot of run and gun tactics to whittle them down.

That would make for an infinitely more interesting film right away. It would be easy to root for her after all and it would mean less screen time for the villains. The film is incredibly violent so you can expect to be grimacing at every other scene. The whole society within this world is as grim as possible with slaves everywhere and every crime you can think of. The film absolutely succeeds at showing an evil society but never gives you any good reason to be watching the film. It’s like getting a peek into true evil without any large scale destruction at the end to help you feel at least a little satisfaction.

A scene at the end where the world gets destroyed or something like that would have been good. It’s certainly evident that the people who died during the great disaster were the lucky ones since they didn’t have to live through this new situation. Perhaps the films could one day have a twist where a human city does survive somewhere and they have kept law and order but I wouldn’t hold my breath.

Aside from the film just being tragic to sit through, it’s also incredibly long. The film just keeps on going on and on. It’ over 2 hours and the film absolutely feels that long with every scene taking forever. This is one of those films where I really can’t point to a single positive and so it’s one of the first 0s in quite a while. There are just no redeeming values within the title.

The whole film takes place in the dessert so there aren’t any real good visuals to be had here either. Everything is rundown and the characters are all dirty from getting hit with the elements all the time. A lot of characters tend to have big scars or other injuries to help reflect the ugliness of the world which doesn’t exactly earn it any points either. I can admit that this may be a realistic look at how things could be if humanity ever hits rock bottom. You like to hope that there would be some semblance of order left but there are absolutely areas around the world where this happens. So I can’t say that it’s impossible.

It just doesn’t make for a good film. At the end of the day the film is about Furiosa getting her revenge but it takes an extremely long time to even get up to that point. It would have been much more satisfying if the whole film was about her picking off all the villains until she got to the leader, rather than being forced to work for different villains throughout. Let Furiosa get more scenes where she has the advantage rather than trying to claim it after being the underdog the whole time.

Overall, I would definitely recommend skipping this film. At the end of the day it’s about a bunch of villains hurting everybody and the cycle of violence will perpetuate forever. The movie definitely tries to show you as much suffering as possible here so even by the time a villain is defeated, it all rings rather hollow. The other villains will continue destroying whatever and whoever they want. There are no heroes to stop them, nor will any ever show up based on what we’ve seen in the other titles. The whole Mad Max series would need a hard reboot to have any hope and even then I would not like its odds.

Overall 0/10

War of the Worlds (2005) Review

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Now we’re going to be looking at the next installment in the War of the Worlds series. This one tries out the alien invasion plot again with more modern effects. It’s definitely a fun film and this is a good way to see how you can tackle the same plot in massively different ways. If you like action and sci-fi then this will definitely be another winner for you. Things get real dramatic here.

The film starts off with Ray needing to take care of the kids for a few days while his ex-wife heads out. Unfortunately what he didn’t count on was the fact that aliens invade that same day. They send aliens into robots that have been planted throughout the Earth and are quickly destroying all of civilization. They don’t seem to have any concrete weaknesses and the sheer numbers are hard to deal with. They are disintegrating tons of humans all around and their barriers are resisting even the most powerful weapons. Ray needs to find a way to keep his family safe but are there any safe places left in this whole planet?

Right off the bat I can definitely say that this film has way more horror elements than the first film. The updated graphics definitely help with that as you really absorb the scale of destruction here. The visuals also get eerie like when Ray leaves a house and we see a lot of red surrounding the area. The aliens use blood as a type of fertilizer and it certainly looks crazy. At the time his daughter was also missing which ramped up the tension. So you’re not going to be bored at any point during this movie.

Now, the supporting cast is a lot more annoying than in the original though. First you have Rachel who constantly panics during the movie. She does a lot of screaming throughout and rarely locks in. During the scene I mentioned earlier, she went completely silent for over a minute while Ray was calling for her so by the time he locates her, it is too late. She just looked really bad there and staying more calm would have gone a long way. Rachel may be young but she just holds the characters back and gets them into trouble on so many occasions.

Then you have Robbie who is in his total rebellious phase. He listens to a lot of music and antagonizes Ray as much as possible. He doesn’t do anything to make the adventure any easier and even runs off to try and join the army more than once. He’s really just getting in the way during each of those scenes. He tries to have a big moment about telling Ray to just let him go but it was obviously going to be a bad move on his part. I never really softened up on Robbie and so even by the end of the film I didn’t like him.

That means Ray is really the guy who has to hold this together. Fortunately he is a solid main character who quickly gets with the program. He is always moving the family around and does his best to take care of them. It’s not like anybody really expected an alien invasion so he just had to do his best here. Ray manages to get past all of the guilt tripping and while he does break down at several points, he always manages to get back up. He even manages to land a big hit against one of the aliens later on.

Deep into the film we also meet a guy who went crazy after watching a bunch of his fellow soldiers get drained and murdered. It’s easy to see why he cracked but ultimately his role was a tragic one. He needed to make a stand and at least take out a few of the aliens. Instead he started to get really loud throughout and really lost his mind. This forced Ray to make a tough choice there. Technically I was not on Ray’s side there as I think he should have taken Rachel and just left. Worst case if he tries to stop them, then you go for the fight to the death. It was clear that both characters couldn’t stay around each other for long though because their end goals were way different.

This film also shows how humanity quickly starts to fragment when things get really tough. They’re all willing to shoot each other to get a working car even if they have no plan beyond that. The crowds get really violent and while the film isn’t as jaded as the original one, it’s always rough to see humanity choking like this. It’s also a reminder that if you are driving through a mob that wants to get into your car, you’re going to need to speed up because if you stop at all then you’re almost certainly going to be murdered.

When a full mob forms like that and they’re all agitated, you’re not going to be able to calm them all down. The fact that Ray had a gun helped to prevent the worst case scenario but of course even then we quickly saw that other people had guns as well. When you’re dealing with sheer numbers, even a gun will only buy you a little bit of time.

The film has really good pacing throughout so you never really feel the length. It did a good job of balancing all the action scenes with the occasional family moment of Ray trying to get through to the others. It also showed how some people will mean well but just don’t realize what’s going on until it’s too late. Ray tries to save one of his work colleagues but the guy was more interested in getting his car back than surviving the apocalypse. That’s just going to happen sometimes. All of the special effects have aged really well and I also liked the sound that occurs when the Tripods show up. Now there was a very nostalgic sound.

Overall, War of the Worlds is a pretty good film. It definitely gets intense throughout as I forgot some things like the plants using their blood conversion machine. The ending still feels a bit forced and rushed but that’s what is usually going to happen when you write a scenario where the humans really have absolutely no shot at victory. If you want to avoid such an ending then you have to equalize both forces at least a little bit. This film is mainly focusing on Ray and his family so we get less of the overall government picture outside of a few moments. Maybe you could have shown some government meanwhiles as they find some weaknesses. Ultimately it would flow better but this is still a satisfying watch.

Overall 7/10

The War of the Worlds Review

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It’s time for the original War of the Worlds film. This one deals with the serious alien invasion that threatens to end all life on the planet. Unless the characters are able to lock in quickly, they will be destroyed. The older these films are, the easier it is to picture a complete alien takeover because there just aren’t enough weapons to fight them. This makes for a fun alien invasion film. Nothing fancy and no gimmicks, it’s just about the humans doing their best and eventually giving up hope.

The main character here is Clayton who happens to be fishing nearby when the first meteor lands. At first people figure it’s just an asteroid and they can make a lot of money off the tourists. Unfortunately it turns out that this is the incoming sign of an alien invasion and the creatures quickly appear all over the world. They are completely immune to conventional weaponry and have incredible numbers at their disposal. Can Clayton find a way to stop them or will he be crushed?

What makes this different from a lot of other alien invasion films is how there isn’t really a lot of hope for the humans. Usually we lose the first encounter but at least find a glimpse of a weakness and start to press the advantage. Instead in this one the humans are so far out of their depth that they are on the back foot the whole time. There is no weakness to be found and so eventually the only option is to give up. The governments may stay strong but the individual citizens quickly succumb to their base instincts of stealing and panicking.

The film is definitely not a good look for the pesky humans everywhere. We get a long scene of them basically attacking anyone in a car and destroying supplies. Even the briefest of hopes is removed once they knock Clayton out and take his devices. It showed a very big weakness that the humans have which is that their bonds are quickly destroyed at the first sign of distress. It almost makes you ready to root for the aliens because you’ve seen all that you’d like to of the ugliness in humanity.

Now there was a moment early on where you figure the weakness for the aliens could be light. They are quick to run from the flashlight in one scene and so that could have been interesting to pursue but the film doesn’t go in that direction. We do get a very sudden ending with their actual weakness. This always comes across as being very abrupt but otherwise the humans had been written into a corner.

Considering how old the film is, I’d say the effects are pretty good. Especially the special effects for when the humans are vaporized by the laser. It just looks a lot newer than I would have expected for this era in time. It’s clear that the film makers did a good job with this one. The general writing and script is also pretty solid. It’s perhaps a more jaded product than many others in its genre with humanity not deciding to band together this time but in a lot of ways it does feel like the more realistic approach. If aliens ever did appear in the real world, I have real doubts that people would stand together to fight them. Most likely there would just be a ton of in fighting the whole time.

Then Clayton is a decent main character but I won’t say that he’s great. Like the rest of humanity, he did completely give up on humanity. In the end he just wanted to find Sylvia so they could be together in their last moments. Romantic perhaps but this guy was one of the last hopes that the world had for victory. To see him just throw it all away was rough. I’m sure many would make the same decision though.

To his credit, Clayton had been trying a whole lot before that. They tried different approaches and possible weapons in order to end the alien threat. It just turned out that none of them were particularly effective here. The barriers that the aliens had were simply too powerful and not something that mere numbers could overcome. Early on the U.S. brings in a bunch of tanks to take on the first UFO and they are all vaporized within seconds.

As for Sylvia, she’s a solid main heroine. She does a good job of launching the exposition when she first showed up to talk about all of the scientists. Technically speaking I’d say the main cast is very small here though. You do have your share of supporting characters running around but there isn’t a lot of time for individual stories. It’s another good thing in the film’s corner which is that it decides to focus a lot on the invasion as a whole. I think that’s the right approach.

As always I will take the stance that trying to peacefully walk to an alien UFO is a bad idea though. We get this in two occasions. Once from a group of 3 guys who were hoping for global fame and then from a preacher who thought that the aliens could be reasoned with. In both cases I think this is just too naive. Even on the off chance that the aliens are peaceful, approaching them is not a bad idea because that will usually be seen as an aggressive move. The aliens have to make the first move and only if it’s a peaceful one can you move forward. Otherwise you just need to trust the government and let them start firing. It may sound callous but it’s the only real option.

Overall, The War of the Worlds is a pretty good film. In some ways I would say that it doesn’t necessarily stand out a ton from some of the other old alien invasion films but that’s because I tend to enjoy the genre a lot from all angles. I may not have this one in an elevated slot but it doesn’t really make any mistakes and does feel ahead of its time. You can really feel the dread throughout the movie even if the ending is on the happier side. I would recommend checking it out, I think you’ll be surprised at just how advanced the film feels.

Overall 7/10

World War Z Review

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It’s time for a big zombie film. For a while there I felt like I would see ads of this one everywhere. Even to this day I think of it as the most popular zombie film of all time. That’s probably not accurate on a technical level but when I think of zombies I think of The Walking Dead for TV, the Last of US for games (Kinda counts), and World War Z for movies. Now that I’ve finally seen it, I’d say that I understand. It is certainly better than the average zombie film, I’d say that it’s not even close. Most zombie films are absolutely dreadful while this one is good enough where I could even call it an average film. As with many disaster type flicks, I feel like the build up and suspenseful middle tends to hold up better than the climax. It’s not so much that it overstays its welcome but the ending is a bit quieter than you’d expect.

The film starts off with Gerry and his family driving when all of a sudden cops are running around everywhere. A zombie epidemic has started and they are converting all the other humans into zombies. There seems to be no way to stop them and the whole world is going under. The military saves Gerry and his family but at a high price. They want Gerry to rejoin the army so they can go to ground zero of where the zombie virus started. The idea is that they can find a cure this way but obviously it will be dangerous. They also make it clear that Gerry’s family is forfeit if he refuses so he is forced into this. Gerry was one of the greatest agents of all time back in his day but he retired to get away from that life. Unfortunately it looks like he will be going right back into it.

First off I want to say that the film handled this part really well. I like the fact that the government had to completely blackmail Gerry into joining. Otherwise it would have been incredibly foolish to just leave his family at this time. The government is also facing a total crisis so it makes sense that civility would leave the room. They have a planet to save and so the incentives line up for both parties. The general makes a great point that lots of people would like to be saved so if they are going to be taking a spot from someone else, then everyone has to contribute.

Now this does lead to the most forced part of the film though which is Gerry deciding to take a walkie talkie so that he can keep talking to his wife. I wouldn’t mind this if it had an off switch but it is always on. Meaning that she can call him at any time. You remember that the enemies here are zombies right? Any loud noises will wake them up and sacrifice a lot of lives. I thought it was incredibly irresponsible for him to be carrying this and naturally she does call at the worst possible time. I don’t put any blame on her because she couldn’t have possibly known.

Gerry is a seasoned officer and should have known better. As to the film itself, I’d divide it into 3 parts. The initial invasion with Gery running around trying to keep his family safe. The middle with Gery looking for the cure with the government, and then the final act with meeting the scientists and actually working on something. The final act is the weakest by far with the first being the best one. I always like the point of first impact where the characters have to adapt and constantly run around. Gerry quickly realizes that staying mobile was their best bet and so he made sure to do that.

There are no guarantees in this kind of situation but I thought he handled it as well as possible. It was also nice to see that some people were acting friendly and normal like the family that took them in. This isn’t one of those films that takes the position of everyone immediately becoming a criminal jerk even if a lot of people would do that. The body count is pretty high and it’s easy to see why humanity was losing badly here. The sheer amount of zombies is crazy. Now, I do have some reservations about how quickly humanity fell but I think the film addressed about as much as it could have.

Even showing that some areas like Israel and Russia were doing a far better job of combating them than others. Pride ultimately became the main issue for Israel with everyone making the worst possible decisions there. The middle part with the army was still intense with a lot of gun fights going on. I appreciated that the army squad kept things professional and knew how to fight really well. When one of them would get infected, he’d quickly make sure to die to not infect the others. The group clearly knew what to do.

For the last part, it just feels a lot slower. Running around the lab and trying to stay one step ahead of the zombies is just not as intense in this case. It also may be a bit tainted for me because I’m highly skeptical of the weak point that was discovered for the zombies. It felt like it was just a little too broad. There should have been one specific weakness based on a rare illness. Then I could understand but the film made it so general that a whole lot of people should have been spared from the zombies to the point where their weakness would be obvious to everyone.

This is something that is always hard to contend with but for a film like this you need to answer the question of “Why is the main character the first to notice this?” Most films don’t bother to answer that but this one had the rare opportunity to do it and missed. All the film needed to do was introduce Gerry as having a rare blood condition or illness from which he was dying. It would explain why he retired and would also work as a way to connect the dots by the end. It’s not the kind of thing I would really dock points for but I just think it would logically follow a lot better.

I was more impressed by the people who were taking the zombies out during a fight. In the climax we see people using nukes and barricading the zombies in to be shot. Those scenes were pretty fun even if they go by quickly. I also have no real issues with the main ending. It could have led into a sequel pretty well but also works as its own ending. So there’s a lot more to like about this film than the average zombie one. The writing was good and Gerry made for a good main character. The main cast is rather small but the supporting characters were good.

The film does decide to open up with randomly showing animals getting eaten. Perhaps I shouldn’t say randomly as this is clearly to show the virus being spread but that could have been handled a lot better. We avoided the humans getting eaten so this just felt unnecessary. While the film can get a bit violent, it’s clearly much less violent than most films of its genre. The zombies are getting shot and people die but it’s more in a standard summer blockbuster kind of method. I also took a peak at the alternate ending and it gets crazy edgy for no reason so this version of the film is much better.

Honestly the film could have pulled off a 2 point swing to a 7 if it just removed the opening scenes and also sped up the third act. I know some may not want this but the last act should have been a whole lot more explosive. Give me a big fight instead of the one zombie clanking his teeth together for 5 minutes while watching Gerry. The pacing just slows to a crawl here. It’s to make the scenes more scary but the scariest thing is when the zombies are running around. In the real world these would be the worst zombies to fight because of how fast they are. They can even form giant towers and objects with their sheer mass.

Overall, World War Z does a good job of being both intense and scary. It’s the kind of film that really makes you wonder what you would do if the zombie apocalypse was to happen. Hopefully you’d have some high ground but for the first 24 hours, your fellow humans would be another big hassle to deal with. I would have been interested to see what the sequel would do here. Would the whole thing be about fighting the zombies? Maybe they started mutating or something. Ah well, that’ll just be for your imagination now. I may not go as far as to actually recommend this one but if you like zombie films then it is worth a watch.

Overall 5/10

Death Wish Review

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This review is of the TV-14 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 a film that has quite the controversial reputation over the years for how intense it gets. It’s definitely a film that really got the vigilante genre popular and to this day it’s something that it used in many films. The vigilante route is always a hard solution to deny, particularly in a film like this where it seems like the only reasonable answer to all of the violence.

The film starts off by introducing us to Paul who is reminded by his coworker of how much violence is going on in NYC. Paul just tries to keep to himself and still have a good time rather than live in fear but this does catch up to him. His wife is murdered and his daughter is left in a vegetative state where she isn’t really alive anymore. This pushes Paul to start carrying a weapon with him. It proves effective when he is attacked and after a trip to California, Paul finds that he now has a gun when his contact slipped one into his bag. Why have a gun if you’re not going to use it? That’s essentially Paul’s mindset as he becomes the hunter and aims to go after all the criminals.

Surprisingly we never actually get to have Paul meet the villains from the first scene to put them 6 feet under. I can only assume that would be in a sequel or there’s some super deep narrative reason to avoid that. Whatever the reason was, it would have been more satisfying to have seen Paul take them down. He should get that level of reward after everything that he went through. It would have at least been a fun moment to see.

Now where the film really messes up is by going way too far in the opening scene. Films like this always try to really stress just how evil everyone is in order to make the point for the vigilante. Sure, I get that but you don’t really have to go to a 10 on this. Now, fortunately I saw the TV version which seems to gloss over the opening scene pretty well as it’s mostly just mentioned a lot after the fact. If the scene was on screen then this would be a quick and immediate 0/10. So the film is spared from that fate but even then, the whole plot about what they did to Paul’s daughter did not need to be in the film. That level of ugliness has no place in any film.

It’s a real shame too because after that the film is pretty good about not being explicit. There are certainly a lot of people getting shot throughout the movie but it’s not really all that violent in comparison. Paul moves like a trained killer, only using one bullet per target. He then dashes off to get some more crooks. The camera doesn’t linger on the dead all that much and in general a quick bullet wound isn’t going to be too bad.

I thought the movie also did a good job by showing how the political leaders didn’t want to stop Paul either. Rather, they needed to stop the killings but just get him out of there. That way they could still take credit for the drop in crime without having to rely on a vigilante. That kind of self serving mentality absolutely seems realistic to me and certainly not out of the ordinary. Also everyone in the streets were supporting Paul because they are the ones dealing with all of the crime.

Paul shoots at least 10-15 different crook to death here and it may have been more than that. This is a massive difference to the living standards of the neighborhood when you consider that these are all going to be repeat offenders. It’s clear that they were used to committing these crimes and stopping anyone in their way. So lets say on average each crook is robbing someone once day, well you’ve just dropped 30 crimes per person each month.

The city was living in fear and now they aren’t. Again, that’s why vigilantism is so tempting because you are ending crooks who only serve to disrupt everyday people from their lives. It’s clear that this problem was too big for the cops to handle here and so Paul went to work. The film certainly shows the weaknesses of law and order as you would need to try and get proof on these criminals, get some witnesses, wait months for the court date, etc, etc.

Obviously there ae reasons why vigilantism cannot be accepted in every day society. You’ll get lots of copy cats, many with different morals and sets of values. Additionally, you would have to constantly be looking around you since everyone would be very trigger happy. So lots of pros and cons but at least in this film it is clearly the only way to go. The criminals are extremely brazen with how they assault people at all times of the day and at any location. Paul made sure that this won’t be happening quite as often.

The character cast is actually really small in this one. Aside from Paul you do have his son in law who mainly represents the film’s take on what non-vigilantes are doing about things. He is constantly sad about what happened to his wife but isn’t actually doing anything about this. He just hopes that society will get better and talks about how they should have moved away. It’s not a very flattering look for this character.

Then you have the police chief who definitely wants to take Paul down but has no real support to do this. So he’s just really annoyed the whole time since his hands are basically tied behind his back. He’s a fun character to have around and gives some of the rare humor moments within the film. This is largely a serious film after all. It is nice to see Paul enjoying himself as he takes down the crooks though. At times he gets a little too cocky and takes a hit that he shouldn’t but does make short work out of his opponents. In this business t is important to finish off each target or they will be back out there soon enough and Paul will be in even more danger.

Overall, Death Wish is one of those films with a really intense plot. It certainly gives you a lot of reason to be sympathetic to Paul and what he is trying to do here. At the same time, the film just goes too far in order to make that point. That’s what really makes you shake your head here. If the film could have had some more tact then it really could have been remembered as one of the good ones. So ultimately I am going to have to recommend skipping this one. I’m hopeful that the sequels will be better since they can just jump right into the action but this is also the kind of plot that is easy to mess up. It always needs to be handled carefully.

Overall 3/10

Rings Review

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It’s time for another Ring movie and this one is the weakest yet. It’s time for a whole lot of exposition to things that we already know about. There aren’t any real great characters here and the film falls into the usual issue of the whole thing being futile. The main characters have absolutely no chance of claiming victory here and will only continue to be absolutely crushed. The film desperately needs to introduce a villain to fight the demon or something because the humans are not cutting it.

The movie starts with Samara crashing an airplane filled with people because at least two of them had seen the video. Everyone is now doomed and upon their death we cut to the real main characters. Julia is the heroine here and her boyfriend heads off to College but they swear to stay together. They will make the long distance relationship work. Unfortunately he stops returning her calls early on and the last time they spoke he was surrounded by other student who didn’t seem like good influences. Another girl shows up on his computer and starts acting crazy so Julia drives over to find out what’s going on. Unfortunately she is not entering the middle of an ongoing death experiment.

There’s already a lot wrong with this. Holt just comes across as a terrible character. So he willingly joined an experiment about death, knowing full well about the risks. He bought into the explanation that this can help humanity learn some knowledge or something but with the risk it’s not worth it. Basically Professor Gabriel has a lot of students watch the Ring video. Then before the week is up, they get other students to watch it. You can keep on passing the curse along so that nobody dies but the professor waits for a long time to get a tail on this and so people still keep on dying anyway.

Holt’s excuse here is that he left Julia in the dark so that she wouldn’t get involved. It’s a terribly thought out plan. For starters this would make her nervous and want to come over anyway. If she didn’t, then she probably would have just straight up dumped him. In either case, there is no real winning on this one if you use that strategy. Instead he could have just acted like all was normal and at least texted her back once a day. Even letting her know about the experiments and just hiding parts of it would have worked better. So he’s just not very smart.

He’s also not likable for even getting involved with this in the first place. I’d also throw in that if he had roommates with him, he should have warned Julia in the call before she started stripping. Obviously that’s putting her in a really embarrassing situation otherwise. I can’t say that I was a big fan of Skye either because she was quick to watch the video and then was ready to pass it on to someone else. Not a very nice thing to do and it makes her as guilty as the other characters.

How come nobody suggested just making this into a Daisy Chain? Person A gives it to Person B who gives it to Person C who gives it to Person A, etc. You could do that every 3 days and in theory nobody would ever die. It would certainly be a lot safer than their current plan. Perhaps I missed one of the very sketchy rules about copies here but as far as I know this would work. Now admittedly, I still have to stretch some disbelief to understand how Gabriel found out so much about these rules. I guess you could say through a lot of trial and error but it’s always weird to have someone figure out so much about this.

Unfortunately that doesn’t save us from the exposition as we still have Julia and Holt travelling the world to learn more about Samara and her past. This is basically retreading a ton of old ground that we have already went through so I can tell you that this was incredibly dull. We already know that Samara is evil so it’s not like finding out more is going to help. The film introduces another big villain in her father but Samara is not some random victim.

She has been murdering dozens of people for years and has already said that she would never stop. While the father was crazy and evil himself, you knew that he didn’t stand a chance. He was blind so perhaps he figured that would be a natural defense against her curse but what he didn’t realize was that Samara has the ability to restore someone’s eyesight. Checkmate! I know that sounds pretty ridiculous but as long as you keep in mind that she is all powerful then it works out.

So you don’t really have any likable characters here. Gabriel should be treated as another big villain here as well since he was a mass murderer by showing the video to so many people. He may claim it was for science and stuff but that doesn’t give him a free pass. When Samara messes them all over by stopping the video from being copied, you can’t even feel too bad because people were already dying anyway. At least this will stop all of the experiments.

There just comes a point where you wonder what the point of this all is. Samara cannot be defeated or even slowed down at this point. She can take anyone down and even possess others whenever she wants to. You can try to burn the tapes but she will return right away and ignore every attempt to stop her. She seems rather slow so you could in theory run away from her but then she’ll just have you choke from bugs or be in some Final Destination type explosion. There is no escape and there is no way to beat her so everything is absolutely brutal.

I guess I can say that the film is at least not ultra violent. It certainly has its moments but isn’t on the same level as something like Final Destination or Halloween. The film makes up for this with a lot of disturbing imagery and just dark themes in general. This is definitely not what you would call a feel good movie nor does it have much in the way of replay value. There aren’t even a ton of scares to be had. Yeah we get some jump scares and all but the exposition part of the film is reallllly long. Honestly there is no easy way to save this franchise. Giving her a weak point would be a good start but it doesn’t seem like that is in the cards. Maybe at least give us a likable character.

Overall, Rings has more pertinent things to say about long distance relationships than actual lore about Samara. It’s all recycled at this point so you just don’t care. Her father has a good voice for exposition but the character himself is just randomly evil without a whole lot of development. I would definitely recommend staying far away from this film. It doesn’t meaningfully upgrade the Ring series and just takes a few steps back instead. Maybe the next film will be better…one can hope.

Overall 2/10

Sniper 2 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 still pretty crazy to think that the Sniper series has gotten so many movies. It just never seemed like the kind of franchise to break out in that way but hey that means more action scenes for me. This may seem surprising but the second film actually beats the first one. This one just jumps right into the action and doesn’t try to be as gritty as the first one. The heroes have a job to do and they just get right on it.

The movie starts out with Thomas being recruited by the army for one last mission as a sniper. He points out that he was let go because he lost some fingers in the first film but the army explains that they have nobody better. (Translation: They found someone expendable to put in a crazy dangerous mission!) So Thomas is sent abroad for the latest assassination and this time his partner is Jake. Jake was also a really good sniper but he ended up murdering one of his teammates and so he was taken to jail. If he clears this mission, he can get a pardon so that’s the incentive but Thomas has to be careful. This still might not be someone that he can really trust. That’s a tough doubt to have when you’re in a life or death situation.

Now what some may not like here is that a good chunk of the film actually has absolutely nothing to do with Thomas doing any sniping itself. They take down the main target really quickly. A lot of this ends up being running away from an enemy sniper. So you’re sort of flipping the script here. Thomas finds out that the government has been using him once again so now he has to help Jake get someone out of enemy territory but it won’t be easy. The enemies have a powerful sniper of their own who is really good at making high pressure shots.

There may be some issues where you have to suspend your disbelief quite a bit but that is normal for a thriller. The biggest instance of this absolutely has to be when the characters hijack a bus and then run through a bunch of cars. They break away to run from the enemy soldiers but you don’t see how they could have possibly escaped. Jake is captured quickly so we see that every soldier stops searching even though they knew that they were chasing two guys. Thomas just hides around the corner and nobody goes on to check. Seems a bit farfetched right?

In general you were always going to have a hard time trying to find a way for the two soldiers to go into a super urban environment, bump someone off and then escape. That’s hard to do and so the film doesn’t always make a convincing case for it. Still, the pacing is always good and this is a very explosive film. Someone is basically always shooting at the main characters here. Ultimately Thomas makes for a pretty good character here as well.

I thought the subplot about him not being able to see well would be a bigger deal but surprisingly that plot doesn’t matter after the opening shot. He is basically able to shoot and fight normally. He isn’t the kind of guy who talks too much and just gets the job done. That works pretty well for the main character and his experience really came in handy here.

As for Jake, well I can’t say that I liked his plan. It’s the kind of plan that usually has a 99% chance of failure. Somehow he was able to pull it off here thanks to plot armor and all but that doesn’t make it a good one. He was still a good ally to have and was much better than the spotter from the fist film. Jake is an actual professional who could hold his own in comparison. During the climax he takes down a ton of enemy combatants on his own.

The most annoying character has to be the guy that they are trying to rescue. He’s one of those classic pacifists who talks about how war is bad and everyone who participates in it is terrible. Yeah war is a bad thing of course but not every combatant is in on it. Thomas is here to try and make the world a better place and Jake is actively trying to save this guy. There are times when violence is necessary for the greater good and the absolute stance on how it’s bad is always a bad thing. Sure enough, this guy comes around by the end but it’s a bit late for that. It’s just such an obvious thing to realize that it shouldn’t be an actual twist or anything.

The main heroine here is Sophia and for most of the film I figured she would be the traitor. She is quite helpful and knows the best places to snipe from and where the villains will be at their weakest. Without her the main sniper duo would have had a much tougher time of it. Sophia ends up being a pretty solid character. Definitely someone who is taking an active role in this conflict as opposed to just sitting around watch. This whole adventure is happening in her country after all.

There isn’t much to Sniper 2 beyond being an action title so how much you enjoy it will depend on how much you like that premise. I don’t think it’s inherently a bad thing to be hyper focused like this. For the most part the film isn’t throwing a ton of twists at you and the formula follows a lot of what happened in the first film. When you see the plot description of the film you can guess a lot of what will happen from there. Not every individual twist but the general flow. The character cast is very small as well. If you’re watching for some good gunfights then you’ve come to the right place.

Overall, Sniper 2 is the definition of a classic action film. I thought the execution was pretty good to that end and had a good time watching the film. You won’t be bored or anything. The film can get violent at times but not nearly as much as the first one. This is more nonchalant about the battles so it doesn’t dwell for too long on any one scene. Naturally if you don’t enjoy films about war time situations and fights then you should skip this one but then there wouldn’t have been much to save it in general. I’m not sure I really see any future Sniper films improving further on the formula here but I’ll still be curious to see how they turn out.

Overall 6/10

Flight 7500 Review

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I think a problem that some slow burn films have is that you need to have a great payoff at the end. I love a good setup phase but if there is no big climax then you did something wrong. This film spends an incredible amount of time setting up the characters and establishing an eerie atmosphere only to have no real plan on how to deal with this. As a result we get a very underwhelming climax that will just leave you shaking your head.

The film starts by showing us a bunch of characters getting onto a plane. They are as unlikable as possible and I’ll get into them in a moment. Still, everyone just has to make it through the flight but unfortunately a guy starts bleeding and dies really quickly. There may be some contagion on board now and weird things begin to happen. Flickering lights, spirits and aberrations, etc. Maybe everyone is just getting a little stressed out? They need to simply survive until the end of the film…but will they?

Weird things happening is a fun setup here so we’re still in business. One of the big problems though is in making everyone so unlikable. I know this is usually a tool to help make sure you don’t mind seeing them all die but it feels like this tends to backfire most of the time. There is just usually not a good reason to do this and it does play a part in the film’s failure. Better characters could have really made a difference here.

First you’ve got Jake who doesn’t believe in the capitalist system and wants to steal as many things as possible. He will make money off the grid and live in whatever way he sees fit. No rules can stop him. This guy just looks out for himself and you can probably guess that he will be one of the first ones to go. He’s quite brazen about breaking protocol and there is just nothing good about him.

Then you have Lance who is acting strange the whole time and brings a big briefcase with him. You could blame a lot of the problems on this guy to be honest. He’s not as mean as some of the other characters but does give off a tough vibe from the start. Lance is clearly not here to talk to the other characters at all. Then there is Jacinta and at first it seems like the only bad thing about her is that she’s goth which is a little funny to be honest. Well, after that she does seem to be a little too into death like trying to feel some blood which will just spread the virus if that’s going around. Her speech to Rick also felt a little bit like she was starting to flirt with how their actions don’t matter or how good they were in life.

Definitely a terrible mindset to have. Of course I can’t give Rick any real points either. He just got married and yet he can’t help but stare at Jacinta the whole time? You have to absolutely do better than that. It doesn’t matter how pretty she may be or what her fashion sense is, he literally just got married. Come on now. Rick may not be as bad as some of the other characters but that was not a good look for him.

Meanwhile his wife Liz is constantly complaining about everyone. She panics a whole lot and just finds a way to find faults with everyone. She is never happy and is determined to make this flight a very long one for everyone. You wonder how she and Rick even got together in the first place based on their scenes. He must have really been desperate or she just changed a whole lot.

The staff isn’t free of fault either. One of the main hostesses is Laura and she is actively having an affair with the pilot Pete even though he is married. He has told her that he will get a divorce so they can be together forever and she actually bought this. Of course it doesn’t ultimately matter if that is true or not. He’s still married at the moment so both characters look terrible here.

Then you have Suzy who may by default be the most reasonable character here but even she is a bit iffy. She basically admits that she is only with her current boyfriend because he’s a safe bet. She actually still likes her ex a lot more and so the poor guy doesn’t even know this. That’s just tragic when you really think about it. Suzy probably has the roughest end though so you feel bad for her. When the monster goes after her, absolutely nobody makes a move to help her. They just run away which is insane. You can see how this character cast is completely unlikable right? There are other characters as well but you get the idea of it. The plane tends to feel pretty empty considering how many people are around as well and while this is for the twist later on, it is incredibly forced that nobody comments on this.

So what about the monster? Well, we never really get to see it. There are flashes and you might see an arm but for the most part even by the end you don’t really get a full shot. You’re waiting for things to start happening after all the ominous moments but there is absolutely no payoff. The film has a big twist at the end but it’s just so lame. It’s one of those twists that just seems to exist but there is no reason for it.

It’s a boring ending and I wanted something more direct. The film leads us on with a Shinigami doll so you’re expecting an actual figure for them to fight but that’s not the case. It feels like a Shyamalan and certainly not one of the good ones. The film loses all momentum here and also becomes another one of those titles where everything was pointless. Thanks to the twist, nothing ever really mattered. Every action the characters took was futile and that’s always going to be a sore spot for me. You need to write these things in a way where the actions matter or else the viewing won’t be satisfying, let alone a rewatch.

Overall, I would say this is a movie you will want to skip out on. It’s just not a good title. The film really ends on a whimper and almost forgets that it is supposed to be a horror film by the end. You do get some unnerving visuals although I would say they tend to just be more on the gross side like the one guy who was bleeding a lot. We have a jump scare early on and then the film starts to abandon that as well. It just feels like there was no big plan here so in the end everything just fell apart. It’s a shame because a plane is a great place for a horror moment considering that there is no way out. Better luck next time I suppose.

Overall 4/10

War Hunt Review

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This is one of those films that really gets into the nitty gritty of how war can really change a person. The soldiers involved in this war are really brought to the brink with one of them completely cracking. Although the film leaves the door open on if he was already broken before the term even started or if the service just widened the gap here.

The film takes place near the end of the Korean war. They are all hoping for peace but in the meantime the US army is tasked with making sure that they don’t lose any ground and that Korea really feels their muscle. Each day without a peace treaty is supposed to feel painful. The main character here is Loomis and he has been assigned to a new squad. Everything seems normal at first, except for on guy named Endore. He routinely goes outside at night on solo missions and seems a little off. Loomis quickly finds out that he is going around murdering enemy soldiers…but what can he do about this?

Now you may be wondering what the issue is. Well, there’s a big difference between taking down enemy soldiers mid combat vs seeking them out at night for private executions. Especially with the war winding down. Endore even runs around their dead bodies for some kind of weird ritual and the whole thing seems crazy. Unfortunately the only advice Loomis gets is to stay away from Endore. Yeah…that’s not very helpful now is it? It’s not like Loomis is a captain after all so he doesn’t have much power.

Adding onto the previous issues is the fact that he ends up twisting his foot and is out of action for a bit. Loomis completely froze up during his first fire fight and had to be saved by Endore. Things really couldn’t get much worse for the lead. Meanwhile there is a kid named Charlie who shows up by the camp. Loomis tries to be friends with him but Endore gets in the way as he doesn’t want Charlie to be having any fun. He seems to be training him as a future soldier of war.

It’s all a rather grim state of affairs. Even when the war is just about over, you still have more characters dying. It’s a mix of letting their guards down and just the tough luck of war. Until things are actually resolved, there is always going to be some danger. The captain did his best to stress this but it still didn’t result in a perfect outcome. You definitely can’t say that the film was trying to glamorize the war at all.

This movie is fairly quick so it all goes by rather quickly. After all there is only one-two main fights here and most of it is about the characters just trying to survive. At one point the Koreans launch a fairly big offensive where they just start bombing everything. They unleash massive amounts of firepower while Loomis and the other soldiers have to hunker down. It’s a tough mental battle as well because you don’t know when the enemies will run out of ammo and stop firing.

I think this probably would have been enough story to fill in the plot but I suppose adding in the crazy soldier helped to add more explosive drama in. It’s really hard to deal with a villain on your side during war time. There just isn’t any time to worry about that. The captain did good in taking decisive action when he had to. Loomis was yelling at him to stop and all but that was a moment of kill or be killed. I don’t believe there was any time to waver there even if it did result in another death. It was regrettable but his hand was forced at that point.

It just would have been nice if they could have saved the kid as well. I don’t think the orphanage life would have been great but Loomis was right that it would still be worlds better than trying to survive in the middle of nowhere on a war torn path. At least the kid would have had a chance and could have learned how to be a kid after that was stolen away from him. Letting Charlie remain in the wilderness definitely added onto the tragedy of the story. Made this into a full on sad ending rather than being ambiguous.

I was surprised that Loomis didn’t really have a big final scene though. After he froze during the first battle, I kind of thought that he would be the one to land the final shot. Show that he was now ready for what war entailed and that could be the mixed message about how war changes everyone in some way. Instead he was mostly helpless at the end anyway. I know it was a tough moment so I’m not trying to blame him too much but he really never got to step up.

Overall, I would definitely recommend War Hunt. It’s a pretty good film. It’s intense without being exploitive or anything like that. You can understand the grim tone and what has happened to the characters without the movie having to go all out in spoon feeding the answers to you. I would also say that the short length of the movie helps prevent it from dragging on. I don’t think you would have benefitted much from an extra 30 minutes as it would have really just been more detailed moments for the plots you already had at the ready.

Overall 6/10