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ljawster
Reviews
The Portable Door (2023)
Decent popcorn flick, endings a bit of a let down.
Just watched this in what is a early screening. It's a decent popcorn flick even if it tries a little hard to confuse the viewer. Deliberately I think we're meant to share the male leads confusion at what's happening to him.
The ending is telegraphed well in advance and I felt a bit of a let down. Probably just me in that I really disliked him winding up with the female lead who was such an entitled animal of choice they had to tone her down after the first few minutes and she still felt like a "I'll date you till I find someone better personality." Who's only with the lead because he has a unique power. Even laying her aside the ending felt like it had no real stakes as we see the only two sighting hit each other cleanly multiple times and do no damage. On top of which while its obviously meant to be a food triumphs over evil it felt more like neutral animal farmer winning against corporate mass production farmer. Seriously the "good guy" is completely unconcerned at the idea two "humans" will die in a few days.
Anyway decent flick to relax and unwind with, could be fun for tween or young kids though the humours a bit more adult than some may feel comfortable with but nothing more than a few dating jokes nothing especially crude.
Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore (2022)
while better than the predecessor the film has several flaws.
Well I may as well start by addressing the new Grindelwald in the room, I don't like him. Now I want to be clear I am not talking about the actors here but the character of Grindelwald. In the previous films he wasn't so much a supremacist as a survivalist. He believed Muggles and Wizards would inevitably come into conflict and the war should be fought now as muggle technology was advancing to the point magic more not be enough to oppose it. For the greater good mad sense because he was doing what he must because he could not because he believed there was a better pureblood status. Whether you were born to magic users or muggles was irrelevant as long as YOU had magic. It made him different to previous villains. Now he's just another supremacist continually harping on pure blood status, long bloodlines and frankly he's become one dimensional and far less interesting which is not good in the antagonist. The depth and difference to his character could have easily been kept with Mads in the role. Instead his rallying cry is now purebloods forever.
Moving on to the rest of the film there are sadly several flaws in the writing and pacing. These range from severe conflicts with previously established rules of the Harry Potter world such as the killing curse being blocked in this film whereas it was previously stated to be umblockable hence Harrys surviving it to be unique to the usual film conveniences of events happening just when convenient when it makes no sense in the context of the film. Not giving examples here as they would be spoilers.
On the subject of other characters Tina is barely in the film for reasons that seem dubious in light of events in previous films and Nagini is just gone.
Now on the other hand we do see a lot more magical duels and battles which is nice though personally I felt the use of slow motion in some of them was a detriment rather than a help. We also get to see a bit more of the wizarding world though again sadly they skip over some things that if your going to make a 2 and a half hour movie and them such an important part of the plot they could attend to be fleshed out some more.
Overall I'd put it a bit above the previous film but the massive change in Grindelwalds character, plot and pacing issues drag it down below most of the Harry Potter films. On its own it'd be an average film but viewed in context of the series and world it is in it drops to the bottom of average with 5 stars.
If your a fan of Harry Potter it's probably worth seeing for the chance to view a bit more of the world. If your a fan of the fantastic beasts series I'd recommend giving it a miss as you probably won't enjoy it that much. If your neither it might be worth waiting till it comes out on a streaming service rather than paying cinema prices.
Death on the Nile (2022)
Average with heavy social commentary.
Visually impressive if you like me aren't bothered by CGI or it's quality and honestly I felt the beards looked more tacked on than the pyramids. It also mostly followed the original story which was good
The biggest issue I had was the semi-regular social commentary with the exception of one character (I remember being like that in the original version) felt delivered in an extremely heavy handed and non-organic manner that didn't progress the story. For example there is a scene where a character is shot and the sassy black woman (replacement for a secondary character) says they deserved it and I couldn't help but roll my eyes thinking if the gender roles had been reversed that would never have been said to someone who's been stalked and terrorised for months before saying on their honeymoon with someone else the good memories have soured if it was even love to begin with and got shot for it. Similarly inserting a monologue excusing the victims getting a person of colour kicked out of a swimming pool as the result of bad daddy teaching when a young girl of wealth in that period would be getting this message and behaviour from a lot of other sources. Same with the doctor now English rather than Austrian going on about bucktoothed nobility and people all over the world needing help. There are exceptions like Cousin Andrews muttered comments about how the police would treat a brown man that at least flowed in the moment but most of them felt to me out of place and heavy handed commentaries inserted to comment rather than progress the story or be a natural part of the character. Which is an issue in a film that has a runtime over 2 hours.
Other issues with the film are more personal taste e.g. Giving Poirot a tragic back story he didnt need and ending with him shaving off his moustache to show he's ready to love again. However I very much didn't like the resolution of the murders. It made one of the murderers less independent and controlled than in the original while changing Poirots lethal kindness in letting them chose their manner of death to an emotion wrought loss of control all in favour of avenging a friend. Which felt out of character for both him and the victim. I don't just mean out of character of the original book but out of character in how they were presented in the film up to that point.
Edit
My feelings on the social commentary were just confirmed by seeing Delicious. In that film it flows much better, doesn't yank you out of the film and makes sense as it's set in days leading up to the French Revolution. Meanwhile the focus is and remains on the founding of the first French restaurant with the commentary supporting and enhancing that story. If you don't mind French subtitles and a film that focuses on narrative and emotion rather than action I'd recommend seeing that instead. It's also nearly 2 hours but didnt feel like it to me.