There is not much to choose from in May, as I've only watched 7 films this month. 2 will be eliminated, and 5 will move on.
I've seen this miniseries (which I shall from here on out refer to as a movie) a handful of times over the years, and I generally find that I've always enjoyed it. I had just finished reading the book version of It when I decided to give the movie another watch. It had been about 5 years or so since I'd last seen It, and I wanted to know if my reading of the book would change my thoughts on if I liked it or not.
Understandably, they had to change a lot of things to fit the 1000 page book into a 3 hour made for TV movie, so a lot of content was dropped from the novel. I didn't mind this though, and accepted the changes and alterations to the plot that they made. It is a well cast movie, especially in the area of Pennywise and the kid versions of the Losers Club. The adult versions of the kids I was meh about, with the exception of a few.
The way they adapted the story of the book was decent - with the first part of the miniseries mainly focusing on Mike Hanlon's phone calls, and each person's flashbacks to their initial memories of It. Then the second part was about everyone coming to Derry and tracking down It and killing it once and for all.
There are some scary moments, some moments that have not aged well at all. But I enjoyed myself a lot here. As far as book to TV adaptations go there have been a lot worse than this. A LOT worse. I thought this was pretty good.
I visited California earlier in the month, and during my vacation I happened to pass through the Big Sur area on a trip down the coast. Fascinated by what I had seen, I searched for Big Sur on Netflix after I returned home to see if there were any documentaries or travel shows about the area. The only thing to come up was this movie.
I decided to give it a go, despite its one star rating. I should have known better. The movie was terrible. Like, excruciatingly bad. It's about a beatnik author named Jack Kerouac (apparently he is very famous, although I had never heard of him) who spends time at Big Sur to unwind and get away from the "real world". The movie cuts back and forth between his time at Big Sur and his life in the city, where he is a big drinker and womanizer. Often there are voice overs of Jack reading from his novel while collage scenes play out on the screen.
The movie, I am sorry to say, is garbage. Its a confusing mess with unlikable characters and obnoxious ramblings by some dickwad who thinks he is a lot smarter and insightful than he actually is. I liked the scenery in the movie, but that was it. I'd have to say this ranks as one of, if not THE worst, movies I have seen all year. Suffice it to say, it will not be making my top 5 for this month.
Last year I had decided to watch the first two Star Wars prequels, then the TV show the Clone Wars, then Revenge of the Sith in order. Well, the cartoon is taking longer than I had expected to watch, so I decided to go ahead and watch Revenge of the Sith even though I am only on season 4 of the Clone Wars. I just had a really odd urge to watch this movie which I can't explain.
I've always considered this the best of the prequels, the only one I have ever legitimately enjoyed while watching. And this definitely still holds up. Sure there are silly moments with the special effects and the CGI. The acting still isn't wonderful. But on the whole I find this to be much, much better than its predecessors.
The action is better and less corny, the plot moves along at a faster and at a more cohesive clip (get that taxation of trade routes shit out of here), and I just find that I had a really good time watching it. Yeah, the prequels still as a whole suck, but at least they managed to make one decent movie out of the bunch.
I actually had watched this movie a month or two ago, but had forgotten to add it to my list. My only choices were either to not include it on the list at all (which I never really considered) or throw it into the month of May, although I didn't actually watch it in May. So I have decided to go ahead and add it as a May movie. It's my list, I can make up the rules if I want!
I found this movie to be pretty good. It is a fast paced thriller that keeps you guessing with strong twists and turns and a fast moving plot line. It mainly focuses on an escaped convict who returns home to hook up with his ex, who he is devastated to find has been seeing another man in his absence. He confronts her and things go terribly wrong.
Events lead him to the house of a seemingly random stranger. He tells the woman that his car has broken down, and she invites him in. Then, a deadly game of cat and mouse begins. I won't spoil the twists, but the movie definitely takes a few unexpected turns along the way.
The only thing I didn't enjoy about the movie was the fact that the female lead made a lot of questionable choices throughout the film, mainly in how she handles the man who comes to her door in the middle of the night. It is like everything that a woman on her own should NOT do, she does the opposite. But still on the whole it was a solid movie.
It is a little surprising that I never watched this as a kid, seeing as how obsessed I was with the first two TMNT movies. But I was a big fan of Shredder and some of the story lines from the cartoon. When I saw that this movie was moving away from all that (No Shredder, no Krang, no mutant opponents like Baxter Stockman or Rocksteady and Bebop) and had instead decided to focus on time traveling back to feudal Japan, my 12 year old self became supremely annoyed. Plus I had read reviews that the movie was bad.
I never went to see this in the theater, never even got it when it came out on home video. Somehow I completely managed to avoid watching this until I reached the ripe old age of 33 - 21 years after the release of the film.
Unfortunately, the reviews I had read about the movie being bad were true. This was pretty terrible. I was willing to give it a chance, but I just couldn't get into it. The jokes are bad, the story line is uninspired, and the characters and fight scenes are all just as meh as you can be. They had a good thing going with the first two TMNT movies, I don't know why they strayed from the formula here. Shortly after this movie came out, TMNT's popularity faded immensely. I can't help but think that this movie had something to do with that. Thanks a lot, TMNT 3.
You ruined the Turtles for me.
I wasn't sure what to expect of this coming in. I am not a huge Dicaprio fan, nor am I a big fan of "man vs nature" type movies. There are some that I like, such as Life of Pi and Castaway for example. But on the whole I tend to get bored with this genre of film.
It turns out that there is much, much more than man vs nature to this title. The movie is extremely immersive, great location, great atmosphere, great set pieces. You feel like you have actually transported back in time when watching this movie. The acting is great, in particular Tom Hardy's character, who I thought outshined Dicaprio.
I'm a fan of blood, gore, and violence and this movie definitely delivers the goods. The Indian attack, the assault by the bear, the big fight at the end of the film: all awesome. One scene where Leo has to cut open a dead horse Luke Skywalker style and shove himself into its steaming corpse to survive a cold night was particularly awesome to me.
I expected to be bored by the movie. Didn't expect a lot of dialogue, didn't expect much action. I just thought it would be Leonardo Dicaprio trudging around in the snow for 2 plus hours. But this movie had it all. Great location, great acting, great violence and gore. The revenge plot isn't overly innovative or original, but I enjoyed that as well. This is the first time all year I watched a movie where I thought "hey this could actually win my end of the year ranking."
Will it? Maybe. There's still a lot of 2016 left, though.
I'm a big Rocky fan, plus I have heard that this movie was excellent, so it was a no brainer I'd be watching this movie as soon as I could get my grubby mitts on a copy of it.
The film follows Adonis Creed, the bastard son of famed Rocky rival Apollo Creed. Despite having a troubled youth, he grows up to be an exceptionally bright young man who discovers he has a talent for boxing. He leaves behind a promising business career to follow in his father's footsteps in the boxing ring.
He starts at the bottom of the heap and works his way up with the help of his reluctant mentor Rocky Balboa. Stallone is at the top of his game as an old, broken down Rocky who is going through health problems. Michael P Jordan is amazing as Adonis as well. It is a superbly acted movie with a fun root for the underdog plot line. The final scene of the movie is very intense and keeps you on the edge of your seat. You can't help but root for Adonis the whole way through this film as he is one of the most likable characters you ever meet in a movie.
The film is an up and down emotional roller coaster, and definitely left its impression on me. I'd recommend this to anyone, regardless of whether they are familiar with the Rocky series or not. Just as I thought the Revenant was the only film I watched so far that could possibly win my end of year ranking, along comes Creed. Great movie that I plan to watch again before the year is out.
---
What is moving on this month? Well, the pickings are slim with only 7 movies watched in May - and 5 moving on. If you read my write ups at all, you should know this is a no brainer. I hated Big Sur and TMNT 3, and there is no way in hell those movies are moving on.
We shall see Creed, The Revenant, All Good Things, Revenge of the Sith, and It and the end of the year when I rank my top 50 films watched in 2016.
Here's all my combined top fives from each month so far for the year:
Star Wars: The Force Unleashed
Cake
American Sniper
Predator
Friday the 13th Part 2
Cake
American Sniper
Predator
Friday the 13th Part 2
Locke
Evil Dead
Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter
Elysium
Snowpiercer
Room
Manson Family Vacation
Deadpool
Goodnight, Mommy
Unforgiven
Room
Manson Family Vacation
Deadpool
Goodnight, Mommy
Unforgiven
Big Driver
The Martian
Pixels
JFK: The Smoking Gun
It
Creed
The Revenant
Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith
No Good Deed
Here's to a great June of movie watching! I really want to see Captain America Civil War, and I have had a weird craving to watch Zombieland and the Perfect Getaway lately. But who knows what will randomly catch my interest on Netflix?
No comments:
Post a Comment