Just got back from Transformers 13 (or whatever they're up to now).

By this point, anyone who goes to see a Transformers film knows what they're in for - stupid jokes, giant robot fights, pretty women in revealing tops, Mark Wahlburg in a wifebeater, and explosions.

It delivered on all that.

Whilst not a wonder of filmography, it was a solid 2.5 hours of decent fun, and didn't seem to really drag (although you could tell it was a long film, if that makes sense). The plot could have done with trimming, some characters weren't needed, and AMERICAFUCKYEAH was a bit overdone, but... I can look past that for robot-on-robot action. Also dinosaurs and dragons.

A fun film, but maybe not exactly a good one. If you like the look from the trailers, you'll probably enjoy it, otherwise give it a miss.

 

I recently saw Wonder Woman and unlike the rest of world I have to say I was a bit disappointed by the movie. I get that the whole naivety thing was intentional (though I admit that at the beginning I thought that the producers went for a very simplistic portrayal of WW1) but it didn't really work for me and instead seriously lessened my enjoyment of the movie.

On the other hand the romance was not nearly as bad as I feared and the action scenes were top-notch so I still managed to enjoy most of the film.

(Though the scene where they use a public phone in Belgium to talk to "Ares" back in London was so unbelievable that it took my quite a while to get back into the movie...)

 

It was about WW1

 

Newest Dark Tower trailer:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z-XC3FUsmLU

I am actually pretty excited about it. I'm interested in knowing how going into this movie completely blind will be. Usually I've read the books for the adaptations I'm seeing.

 

The Dark Tower looks great. Idris Elba is a great choice but he doesn't look weathered enough for my conception of the gunslinger. I was expecting a touch of gray hair at the temple, give him a more wary face.


Recently saw Batman vs Superman: Dawn of Justice. The plot was completely nonsensical, Ben Affleck was an okay Batman, and the color filter in action scenes is soul-draining-- but the action was pretty good and it had some truly spectacular visuals.

I've given up on Zack Snyder making movies with real plot. I just accept them as some hybrid of surreal music video with lots of spectacular visuals. If he added color back into his movies and decided to have a semi competent editor who dealt solely with ploy holes Snyder's movies would be spectacular because of their visual power.

 

I think Patty Jenkins proved D.C. Can be good.

DC needs to get rid of Snyder if they want to compete with Marvel. It's a director issue.

That said...apparently Whedon is finishing up Justice League?

 

The Foreigner.

Newest movie starring Jackie Chan. It's scheduled for release October 2017, and if the trailer's any indication, I expect this to be lit.

 

Zack Snyder's daughter committed suicide some months ago, so he's stepping away from work for a while. Apparently Whedon's been working on it for a bit anyway in some capacity, but now he's got the full reins.

 

Baby Driver was fucking excellent. The cinematography is fantastic, the way that music is used with almost every movement of the characters is brilliant and the interplay between some of the characters in serious scenes is classic. Jamie Foxx and Kevin Spacey in particular are excellent and when they are on screen its tough not to hang on their every word. Definitely a must see if you can appreciate action movies -- particularly those who like car chase movies but prefer them to be a bit more realistic (ie. not Fast and the Furious).

100% recommend and I think it could end up being one of the best of the summer (and I'm already wishing they would do a sequel).

 

A new trailer for Death Note.

There is a good film hiding in there, but the main actor, while not horrible, just doesn't have a necessary charisma and his hair is simply bad.

 

So they've adapted Death Note? Huh.

The whole thing just doesn't have that eerie atmosphere Death Note ought to have. Plus, the actors don't really match the manga characters. I'm really not expecting much.

...And da fuck is up with Ryuk?

 

Blegh. The only scene from that trailer that even moderately resembled DN was L doing the trademark chair crouch.

 

By very nature of being a movie as opposed to a tv series...its going to be tough to pull off well.

Death note's greatest strength was its pacing imo.

 

I still have hopes for it, guys. Don't step on my dreams :/

 

So I just watched Attraction in a sneak preview and was pleasantly surprised. It is not exactly a great movie but I would call it a solid sci-fi B movie (alien ship crashlands on earth) with good production values, okay acting and serviceable plot.

What makes the movie interesting, and why I thought I mention it here, is that it is an russian movie which makes some elements of its story (which is already a pleasant deviation form the standard "alien invasion" trope) quite a bit more interesting, at least to me. Not only has this movie a strong message of tolerance and anti-war but the guys representing the message are the government/military. Unlike in 99% of those type of movies it is the military commander that argues for a peaceful stance towards the aliens that just crashlanded in moscow an killed a few hundred people while doing so and the government goes with it but the antagonists are also the normally good guys in those type of movies, the local (nationalistic minded and motivated) civilians and it comes with a strong female lead while its "bad" boy is the typical macho russian guy... It still suffers from quite a few tropes and the typical romance but all in all this was pleasant surprise and not at all what I expected at the start when it became clear this was a russian movie financed at least in part by the state....

 

So Baby Driver was good. Not great, as it had some fairly glaring flaws, but still a good experience. I'd probably like to have watched it in a theater where it wasn't quite so loud though.

 

Spiderman was incredible. Loved it. Nailed the dorky humour while also kind of being a down to earth high schooly drama and a coming of age tale.

Oh and don't stay for the second after credits scene (at the end of the whole credits) unless you want to be trolled by Cap.

Spoiler

Oh, and everyone hitting on Marissa ToMay was hilarious.

 

The Disaster Artist trailer

 

Oh sweet virgin Mary I think I just busted a couple ribs. James Franco playing Tommy Wiseau is the deepest possible level of meta. This is going to be phenomenal.

 

Dave Franco is playing Mark, Alison Brie is playing Lisa.... that's quite an incestuous cast. I dig it.