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John Wick: Chapter 4 (2023)
Action-packed and mind-blowing
The John Wick franchise was something I've never seen before. Glad I took a trip to the cinema, because this movie was absolutely mind-blowing. This film just kept on pumping adrenaline for the entire 3 hours runtime; there was one wide shot from the ceiling, where I watched John Wick absolutely obliterate 30 gunman with a modified shotgun. Donnie Yen's performance was excellent and way beyond my expectations. In this film, you can't find a single actor that didn't add to the adrenaline rush and didn't contribute to Wick being an absolute menace. The entire film is an action-packed feast, and an absolute blast. 10/10.
On the other hand, the film did render me confused with the introduction of High Table and relationships between Wick's friends. It made the plot development a bit too confusing for a new viewer of the franchise. Also, John Wick's death seemed way too sudden and led straight to the end. The film communicated a solid story, 7/10. Also, probably would've been higher if I had watched the other 3 films in the franchise before hand.
Overall, a thrilling, powerful, and one of the best action films that actually brings out the action.
Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania (2023)
It's like copying homework but getting a lower mark
Let me just say that this movie didn't leave me with a good impression about Marvel.
I'm a new viewer and haven't watched the other two films in the trilogy, but I'm pretty sure they are much better works because this is close to horrendous as a Marvel film. The production is quality is fine, except the quantum world only gives off strong Star War vibes. Other than burning money to establish the colorful, cool visuals effects, I can't see any originality or creativity compared to other Marvel films. It has a different look but the exact same core. Which was dissapointing for sure.
Obviously, movie doesn't have to rely on visuals, but this movie also sucked at telling the story. Without connecting to the MCU universe and looking at it as a separate film, the characterization is almost a complete disaster. Not only was the plot generic and followed the same Marvel stereotype, but to a new viewer, it failed to connect the audience and the characters. They were either static throughout the film, or round characters with straight up bad character developments (Cassie, for one).
If I was a Marvel fan and knew more about MCU, I might've given a higher rating, but this film simply would not attract any new viewers to the Marvel Universe who didn't watch the prequels.
Liu lang di qiu 2 (2023)
Amazing production, mediocre plot
Viewed this film a while ago and wanted to write a review. There might be some spoilers.
As a sci-fi film, one thing that it accomplished was the production quality; the visual effects matches the top films at Hollywood and around the world, and the production team behind definitely spent a lot of time and money just on building the sets and putting the scene together. I have not watched many of sci-fi movies, but WE-II is visually as effective as some of the best out there (Interstellar for example), and wins against any of its competitors in the Chinese market for sure. The space elevator visuals was especially well done and left a strong impression for sure.
The storyline on the other hand is a little mediocre, and stereotypic especially near the end of the movie. There's three main storylines. Even though the film is nearly 3 hours long, it still feels messy when I try to piece the story lines together. An example of this is that parts of the line for Liu PeiQiang, the main character, is too stereotypic and protruding. From the movie, we can tell that his family is a major driving factor for many of his decisions (such as leaving a spot in the underground cities for his family). However, his wife and son was not deeply involved in the plot at all; the son's main purpose was also to allude to the prequel. Although it's nothing like a major flaw, when you try to piece three storylines together, the overall characterization begins to feel very odd.
A nice detail I wanted to point out is Andy Lau's story line, when he uploaded himself and his daughter to the cloud and uses that to decipher the code even after he perished. I did feel like some unnecessary decisions led to that moment, but it was a nice touch.
The main flaw of the movie though is the awkward theme that it tries to present. Throughout the movie, I saw way too many themes, ideas, conflicts being presented, which in parts contributed to the messy storylines. The digital vs. Reality life was already a philosophical topic, but director also touches on many different themes like family, love, and presented united heroism. Trying to capture too many things at once only made the story a little dull and uninteresting in parts, other than the visuals. We see Tu HengYu singlehandedly destroyed the engines on the moon, which in the grand plot is quite an awkward and unnecessary moment. If there was better security, the last hour of the film wouldn't even happen. Because of one person, hundreds were sent on a suicide mission, which is very forced and unnatural for the plot development. It was nice to see the movie focus itself on a global scale, but the presence of "communal spirit" amongst groups of characters was way too often and unnecessary in places as well
Overall, I do believe that this film is a milestone for Chinese sci-fi movies and still a decent film, but it still has a lot to polish in terms of the storyline and plot.