Multiplex Madness
The Cat in the Hat
⭐️⭐️
Genre: Fantasy, Comedy
Director: Erica Rivinoja, Alessandro Carloni
Starring: Bill Hader, Matt Berry, Quinta Brunson, Xochitl Gomez, Giancarlo Esposito, America Ferrera
This is the second attempt to turn the Cat in the Hat into a feature film, following a 2003 live-action disaster starring Mike Myers. I never saw that movie because it looked like it would suffocate my soul. This new animated movie didn't look very good either but it seemed at the very least to be more in tune with the stylings of Dr. Seuss. The thing is, I never thought any Dr. Seuss story actually supported feature length narrative. The Grinch is probably the only one I can understand, because that character has an arc that can reasonably be expanded upon. The Cat in the Hat is a home invader who wrecks the house. I don't know what story you're trying to tell with him. If you're willing to overthink this, then we are inches away from feature films of Go Dog Go and Green Eggs and Ham. And overthink we shall, because now the Cat in the Hat is an agent of some multiversal bureaucracy that encourages children to keep their imagination or something. Think Monsters Inc. but for wasting time instead of making children cry. The Cat also loses a magic stopwatch that reverses time, which also unleashes a shadow demon for some reason.
What is any of this?
Look, there was always going to be a ceiling on how coherent a Cat in the a Hat movie was going to be. Probably the important thing is theming, of which the movie is about embracing change as the main children characters are bummed after moving and learning to accept it. Sure. Good enough, I guess. There are no shortage of children's movies with this story but this suits the Cat in the Hat story. The movie can be imaginative, but it's imagination is also mundane and uninspired. The comedy can have its moments, but it's also repetitious. The movie is a long road of okay enough children's entertainment. I guess if your kids are too young for Wildwood, the movie is better than nothing, but it's also difficult to justify spending money on it at all.
Drummer Boy
⭐️
Genre: Drama, War, Musical
Director: Ben Smallbone, Joel David Smallbone
Starring: Joel David Smallbone, Lucas Leach, Ioan Gruffudd, Melora Hardin, Charles Esten, Beth Easdown, Iain Glen, India Brown
Angel Studios chases Hamilton and does about as well as you'd expect.
The Smallbone family, the people who made the sappy, not-very-good autobiographical film Unsung Hero team up with the most prominent faith company in the biz (that is, when Lionsgate isn't pandering in that direction), telling a bullshit musical that they wrapped around that Little Drummer Boy Christmas song. The main premise centers around two brothers during the American Revolution, one joining the British army and the other with the revolting Colonists. The Colonial officer becomes a marching drummer who learns to win the war by weilding the power of an ADR drumbeat.
The climax to this movie is really funny, and I'm going to spoil it full on because I don't care and nobody who is going to watch this movie is going to read this. The British are about to execute the drummer boy's brother and just stop because he starts beating his drum and it's TOO POWERFUL. They all look in his direction all scared like "OH NO, NOT DRUMMER BOY!" Then his brother starts running toward him when the big bad British guy who is the villain of the movie just opens fire on him and both the drummer boy and the love interest character both run out to him while the both armies just look out at them like "Oh no, someone got shot during a war. How could something like this happen?" I tried not to laugh as hard as I wanted to because the theater was filled with teary-eyed seniors and I would have had so much popcorn thrown at me. What a scene.
If you're wondering if the rest of the movie is just as bad, I'd say it encompasses the cheapness of the movie's sentimental tone. The Smallbone crew loves sap. You could tell this from their last movie and it's even worse here. Co-director Joel Smallbone starred in both movies and I didn't recognize him at first. I originally thought it was because he didn't have that terrible beard, because without it he looks like if Josh Halloway and Henry Cavill made sweet, sweet love and had a child (this is a compliment, he's very handsome without whatever the fuck was going on with that facial hair). Then I realized that the reason for this was that, throughout the entirety of Unsung Hero, he had this "life is unfair" grimmace on his face and he actually has more diverse emotions in this movie. It wasn't until later in the movie where he pursed his lips and looked like he was hiding man-tears when I pointed at the screen and silently shouted in my head "That's the face! That's the Unsung Hero face!"
He has a love triangle with a slave girl and her blonde-haired master, which is one of the most wild creative choices I've seen in any Angel flick because I highly doubt anybody who works at their studio is going to tell a slave tale with nuance and respect. Through most of the movie, you can forget that she is a slave because she is almost talked to as if she were treated as an equal, which is how you can tell this movie is by a white person trying to relate a story about racism. Sometimes it feels like the movie is almost going down the "slavery wasn't that bad, actually" route. It does dive into some dirty details but it's also afraid to get too involved with them, making the movie toothless. If you're going to present an interracial love story in the 1700's, there should be a lot to unpack there that the movie doesn't even touch. There is one aspect of it that adds a little bit of flavor, in that this slave girl was actually the product of her mother being raped by the slave owner, making her the half-sister of the other girl in the love triangle, but the movie never does anything of value with this.
The guy behind me thought the romance was really funny and kept laughing and making fart noises at it. I can't tell if he was mocking the movie or mocking the idea of a white guy and a Black woman falling in love. It's an Angel movie, so either could be possible.
The musical element isn't great but it's also not the movie's worst aspect. The songs are repetitive pop tunes in a period setting and, frankly, sometimes it feels as if the movie forgets it's supposed to be a musical because it gets way too into itself. It's not necessarily into its own story, more into the schmaltz it thinks its projecting. The most frustrating thing about this movie is how it squanders itself. It has a story about two brothers on opposing sides of a war. That's interesting. It has a subplot about a slave-owner and a slave who is her half-sister. That's also interesting. It spoils both of these by treating the drama of both as garnish for its monotonous power ballads and patriotic sentimentality, undercutting any story it presents.
At one point, I just wrote down in my notes "What a piece of shit." I don't remember what prompted this but I do remember being driven to the point of madness with this movie's ineptitude. Frankly, I've wasted enough time on this. Let's talk about this week's main event...
Godzilla Minus Zero
⭐️⭐️⭐️1/2
Genre: Kaiju, Science Fiction, Thriller
Director: Takashi Yamazaki
Starring: Ryunosuki Kamiki, Minami Hamabe, Min Tanaka, Hidetaka Yoshioka, Masami Nagasawa, Yuki Yamada, Kuranosuke Sasaki, Jun Kunimura, Sakura Ando, Miou Tanaka
Godzilla Minus One was a kaiju film for the Train to Busan generation of monster movie filmmaking, taking normal ventures of extravaganza and intertwining it with soulful indie character-driven stories. It brought the franchise into accolades it has never achieved before and earned an Oscar for its visual effects work, which is incredible when you consider the Godzilla franchise has always been widely mocked for its effects. Going into a direct sequel brings high expectations, but one would hope a second film would be the Dark Knight to Minus One's Batman Begins. Godzilla Minus Zero doesn't quite achieve that, but on the scale of the franchise, it still manages to be an exceptional entry in the series.
Picking up two years after the first film, Kōichi Shikishima is now married to Noriko and fathering little Akiko. He is called back into action when a new monster hatches from a meteorite and evolves into King Ghidorah, a three-headed monster who feasts on electricity. When a newly regenerated Godzilla emerges from the sea, a new plan is set forth to pit him against Ghidorah. Big monster go punch and fight. BOOM! All that fun stuff.
What's interesting to me about the Minus series is that a lot of disaster films use death and destruction as spectacle. In the Minus films, life is cherished and death is something to be mourned. In Minus One, most of the characters who die do so early in the movie, loading trauma onto our characters and leading to a finale where pretty much all of the people we've grown attached to come home safe. With Minus Zero, returning director Takashi Yamazaki takes this ideal to a harrowing level. This is the primary reason Minus Zero has garnered the franchise's first R rating in the U.S., because death is more abundant and Yamazaki wants us to feel the weight of it. The aftermath of Godzilla's Ginza attack from the previous film is examined more thoroughly, as many survivors are left scarred with radiation burns and charred corpses are seen in the wreckage. Ghidorah's attacks are treated similarly, as people, including children, die onscreen and we are also left with scenes of gathering survivors seeking medical attention that calls to mind the original Godzilla film from 1954. Parents of children who are Godzilla fans will want to heed the warning and watch the film beforehand. I'm not sure if it's worse that Godzilla vs. Hedorah melting people (that movie is rated G) or Return of Godzilla showing its own irradiated corpses (that one is PG) but the tone of the scenes definitely skews it as something to be taken more seriously. Minus Zero takes the franchise's echoing of post-bombing Japan and takes it to a more graphic level than we've ever seen.
What I think most people will want to know is whether or not the human story is as good as the last one's. It's not, but that's not to say it's bad, just that I doubt that it will resonate as much. The biggest problem with Minus Zero is when it leans too heavily into trying to re-live beats that Minus One did effectively. The film can be pretty shameless about this, and it feels unnecessary. At the same time, there are plot moments that feel copied from the previous film as well, which made me feel that there was limited point in revisiting these characters if it was just going to put them through the same wringer that they've already been through. And when the movie does pull some new moves, it's not above getting a bit soapy, having people stare off into a distance and talk to themselves in monologue. All of these are the things the film does worse. That doesn't speak for the entirety of the film's human element, though. The film's upped ante on consequences to violence enhances the continuing themes of trauma, because traumatic events keep happening. It brings up more questions of when it's best to serve your country and when its best to serve yourself and your loved ones, coming up with several gray area answers.
In addition to Shikishima, Noriko, and Akiko, the character of Noda (or "Doc," as we lovingly refer to him as) and his fabulous hair have a much expanded role in this film, now servicing Japan as a crisis head. Noriko has her own storyline, as her survival in the previous film suddenly thrusts her into a position of interest, to Shikishima's dismay. Akiko also has a bit more to do, as the little actress that they've maintained from the previous film is still surprisingly effective in her role. Captain Akitsu, young crewman Shirō, and neighbor Sumiko all reprise their roles for this movie, though they are limited to supporting roles that are borderline cameos. New characters include Kanji Mirakami, a biologist fighting traumatic flashbacks and seething resentment for America, and Makoto Aoyama, a meteorologist who acts as Noda's assistant, both of which are quality additions. Let it also be known that there are English actors in this movie. Per usual, Japanese films tend to cast English actors based on appearance rather than skill, but I will say this is far from the worst English acting in the franchise. Still, not great.
Surprisingly, I think the monster spectacle outshines the the human story more than I think a lot of people are going to be hoping for. It's not that the movie favors it, because the amount of scenes with Godzilla and Ghidorah is probably not much more than Godzilla's sceentime in the previous film, but the movie has just gotten more vicious and dangerous with it while the human story isn't all that advanced over the previous film. Godzilla and Ghidorah's fights are brutal. This is a level of gore and dismemberment that we have never seen in our beastial battles. It makes sense, as Godzilla had Wolverine level regeneration in the previous film and Ghidorah is similarly durable, so just letting them tear into each other feels exactly like what these two titans would do. The climactic battle is lengthy and takes the effects work of the Minus series to stunning levels, diving into full immersion on an IMAX screen. The other main action scene of the film is an areal chase with Ghidorah, which is just as spellbinding. On top of that, Yamazaki took me by surprise in that he used his CGI setpieces to recreate sequences and shots from 1964's Ghidorah, the Three-Headed Monster, which I thought were just magnificent. He also recreated the poster to 1991's Godzilla vs. King Ghidorah during the final battle by having Ghidorah wrap his body around Godzilla. The action sequences certainly stepped up their game to make up for some stagnancy in the plot.
My one big gripe about Godzilla Minus Zero is that Godzilla films have a history of letting the monsters be the connecting threads between the films and this is a rare example of continuing off the human storyline, and the result might divide people. Minus One brought in the most beloved characters of the franchise and it would have probably been foolhardy to not bring them back. The question then becomes whether or not there is more story for them, especially since the last film had a pretty solid ending that wrapped up everything it needed to. The film could have easily introduced a new batch of characters and had them tell their own personal story. The main reason to return to Minus One's story is to expand upon the questions surrounding Noriko's survival, of which we do get answers but also limited resolution to. In fact, the ending to this film is way more open than the previous film, and it feels like a trilogy capper is inevitable. I hope we get it, because the end of this film is not the final word that I want for these characters and there are several lingering threads that I would hope to see resolved. Minus One worked as a standalone. Making a film that shows us what happens next for these protagonists now just raises more concerns about what else happens next. I'm gonna need that third film, because this won't do at all. I demand satisfaction and a happy ending for my favorite family.
Now, if you don't mind, I'm going to play the remaster of Destroy All Monsters Melee.
Jimmy
⭐️1/2
Genre: Drama, War
Director: Aaron Burns
Starring: KJ Apa, Jason Alexander, Max Casella, Sarah Drew, Julian Works, Neal McDonough, Rob Riggle
I like James Stewart. I like him a lot. It's a Wonderful Life is one of my favorite movies. If Stewart is going to have a biopic that culminates in the making of that film, he deserves better than this.
This film primarily focuses on Stewart during World War II, where he leaves Hollywood and is drafted into the Air Force. The film follows him as he rises up in the ranks and returns homewith PTSD. I'm all for telling this story. This could have been excellent if it were done well. The approach leaves a lot to be desired. Jimmy stylizes itself very closely to the type of Frank Capra films Stewart was making during this period. As good as those films were, this movie also obliviously argues that there is a reason they don't make them like that anymore. The movie is sappy and old fashioned to a fault, as everyone is so busy diving into quaint theatricality that the film is constantly feeling fake. Some moments do resonate quite strongly, while others just make me want to shake the film and yell "If you're going to do melodrama, do it better!" It really hammers the nail in the coffin when it gets to the making of It's a Wonderful Life, which falls into that schmaltzy pitfall of "Everything this movie is going to achieve, we knew it was going to happen. This will be the most important movie ever made." Stop that. You're embarrassing yourself.
I feel bad for KJ Apa. It's really hard to do Jimmy Stewart and not come off as an impressionist. His take does come off as an impression but it's a really good one, and he's trying really hard to put a human behind it. He's practically the only thing in this movie that is approaching the quality that a legend like Stewart deserves. The rest of this movie is just junk.
The Last Temptation of Becky
⭐️1/2
Genre: Comedy, Action, Spy, Thriller
Director: Jenn Wexler
Starring: Lulu Wilson, Kate Seigel, Neil Patrick Harris, Brandon Flynn, Catherine Walker, James Urbaniak
Oh. Boy. Becky's back. My...favorite?
Becky and I have a complicated relationship. I really want to like these movies (and, surprisingly, I've watched all three of them in a theater, even the one during COVID) but they always find that one way to execute their bloody mayhem that will annoy me. I didn't care for the first movie, and I was muted on the second. Now we have a trilogy capper, where the bloodthirsty teenager with rage issues is now a legal adult and working for the government. She's technically not an assassin but that's what she's used for. Some people gotta die and she has to murder someone, so she might as well kill them. Now, the girl who kills Neo Nazis is sent after a family of actual German Nazis who plan to rise the movement to power again.
The Last Temptation of Becky is the worst of the three movies. It's the most poorly concieved and the most poorly made. Putting Becky in a spy setting achieves nothing because Becky is not an inquisitive character. She just points herself in a general direction, screams, and kills everyone in her way. She doesn't care about why, and there is no room for plot. All this noise is just an excuse to get her to Germany so she can break some skulls. Pitting her against literal Nazis does, however, make sense for the absurd escalation of the franchise. If the movie actually had the resources for this, it could probably be fun in an empty calorie, Sisu sort of way. There is a lot of ambition, but it also has the lowest budget. A lot of the violence is low-impact, trying to be more cartoony because they can't make it look real and everything in this movie is stupid, so reality can take a hike. They don't even have the money to do that properly though, leading to an action/comedy that isn't very fun to watch.
Lulu Wilson's love for the character is the one highlight. She clearly wants to keep Becky alive and relevant, and she delivers all of her one-liners with glee. Unfortunately, Becky has always been more of an idea than a character, as she represents the angst and rage of puberty being unleashed in a hyperviolent package. Also, it needs to be said that the older Becky gets, the more she loses that. Wilson is in her twenties now, which likely means it's time to lay Becky to rest. I wouldn't be surprised if she comes back, though. The people who make these movies seem to want her to be immortal.
Wild Horse Nine
⭐️⭐️⭐️1/2
Genre: Comedy, Spy, Thriller
Director: Martin McDonough
Starring: John Malkovich, Sam Rockwell, Steve Buscemi, Tom Waits, Parker Posey
Another banger from Martin McDonough, though I'd argue that Wild Horse Nine doesn't hit the same as the two acclaimed films he preceeded it with, Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri and his masterpiece, The Banshees of Inisherin. That's not to ward people off though, because his sort of outsider, kick-to-the-teeth approach makes his work some of the most accessible and entertaining films you'll see during award season. Wild Horse Nine follows C.I.A. agent Sam Rockwell and his partner John Malkovich, who is battling dementia and dying of cancer, on a detour in Easter Island. Malkovich plans to end his life on the island, but Rockwell's reluctance to help him makes things less than smooth, as does the C.I.A.'s insistence that Malkovich's devil-may-care attitude doesn't lead to any dark secrets spreading. The movie is a little bit like McDonough doing his own version of Of Mice and Men (and Malkovich already did Of Mice and Men, so...); a character study between two friends, loyal to each other but one reckless by nature, in an environment where things are spiraling in an ultimate direction. Sometimes it's too casual to reveal that direction, but it is always witty and engaging. The movie is contemplative about men who made ripples without being seen, often doing bad things because they were told to, wondering what they did it all for and what it makes them. It's interesting because McDonough always keeps the film chatty and everyone is always saying something worth listening to, be it a joke or a serious topic disguised as a joke. I was hanging off of every word, which is par for the course with McDonough's work. Dialogue is his bread and butter, and Malkovich and Rockwell know how to deliver it.
Movies Still Playing At My Theater
Clayface ⭐️⭐️1/2
Heart of the Beast ⭐️⭐️⭐️
Resident Evil ⭐️⭐️
Sense and Sensibility ⭐️⭐️1/2
Street Fighter ⭐️⭐️
Whalefall ⭐️⭐️1/2
Wicker ⭐️⭐️⭐️1/2
Wildwood ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
You Can See Everything ⭐️⭐️⭐️1/2
New To Digital
Angel and the Badman ⭐️1/2
Primetime ⭐️⭐️1/2
Resident Evil ⭐️⭐️
Sense and Sensibility ⭐️⭐️1/2
New To Physical
KPop Demon Hunters ⭐️⭐️⭐️
The End of Oak Street ⭐️⭐️⭐️
Mutiny ⭐️1/2
The Uprising ⭐️⭐️1/2
Coming Soon!
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