Reviews

So I gotto admit I'm the occasional sucker for teenage comedies. Hence, once in a while I check some out. This one did not particularly stand out, but it was one of these nights where you just wanna have some dumb fun.

Storywise, we are faced with two teenage girls who made a pact to have prom dates. Sounds even dumber when you spell it out.

Well, the leads were instantly likable and had great chemistry. Other characters did not stand out in any way (with the exception of maybe Vodka Heather...), but were kind of hyper stereotypes. Quite strange in the context of this particular coming of age story.

The movie did not look cheap. The acting was fine. The editing was tight and followed genre conventions. So from a practical perspective, solid movie work.

In summary, a really silly coming of age comedy with enough quirkyness to keep you entertained.

Being a Disney movie, I find it weird though to contrast queer themes with employing hyper stereotyped characters and resolving conflicts with a little good hearted violence. Nevertheless, I had fun. Enjoy!

So after being continuously dissappointed with Disneys Marvel productions after Endgame, as self-proclaimed completionist, I also watched this little chapter.

Let's focus on the lead trio first: I had quite some problems with the first Captain Marvel movie, specifically Brie Larson that came off as a quite unpleasant character and way too perfect in the context of the story. I liked her better here - the story made her not so perfect anymore and she tried to tone down her apparently innate smugness.

Although I wasn't very convinced by the Ms. Marvel tv series, I thought that Iman Vellani gave an engaging and somehow charming performance. Her portrayal as the fangirl worked.

I guess Teyonah Parris did alright, although I kept thinking that her character didn't really bring much to the table apart from being "the explainer".

What did not work was the relationship between Parris and Larsons characters in the story....that just did not resonate.

Let's get to the villain. Well, she had an interesting look. That's all I can say about her. Her motivation is quite dumbed down and her character just felt flat all around. Sad, could have been handled way better in the context of the story.

Visually I'd say it was better than some previous isntallments in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. I didn't mind some CGI imperfections, it was colorful and varied.

Regarding the action scenes I'm torn. They are cut in manner that makes it hard to follow sometimes and nothing special, but they entertained, even though there was no emotional heft in any of them.

The story is as simple as it gets, but at the same time there are so many inconsistent rules and logical flaws that at some point you just give up. The mechanic of the switching places is pretty much just a gimmick that makes barely any sense in the story. It's essentially an amusement park ride, you rush from A to B to C and you never really care why.

What is good and bad at the same time is the pace. It has no lengths so it flies by fast. But it also seems to have been made for the TikTok generation, requiring virtually no attention span. This comes at the cost of character depth. But maybe it's better that way, confer above comments on the story.

Having sad all that, I nevertheless give this a 7. I was entertained by it. It is mindless, it is sometimes cringy but is also ok fun.

So Scott Atkins pretty much always means extraordinary action scenes. Here however, the first five minutes feel more like a gritty drama. Especially the first two minutes with Scott doing his exercises and looking with intense sadness at something made me think this could be something different than the usual stuff he is doing - well nope.

The plot is all over the place. Scott and his movie daughter are apparently in witness protection and some dudes invade his home out of pure stupidity and coincidence. So Scott has to let out his superhero alter ego and brutally murder everyone. Except his daughter of course. Well, since he is all over the news now, he is kind of hunted by the crime boss he was hiding from in witness protection.

Cinematography is actually quite nice. Good camera movement for the nearly exploitative action scenes. Also good editing - you always have an overview what happens, and if you don't, it is intended and enhances suspense a little. The flick uses toned down colors to convey the gritty and realistic feel. In total, I would say the movie is competently shot on a technical level.

The actors...well there is Scott Atkins, who is not known for his acting ability, but for his amazing martial arts. But I think he became quite convincing in the last years. The thing is, he never really has a role that needs his acting chops. It's not different here. Apart from him, there is maybe the main bad guy that is somehow memorable. He does have the physical presence needed, he seems intimidating when he is walking along with his firearms. Acting wise, there is not much happening though.

So in essence, the film could have been better with a more interesting script and maybe more interesting dialogue. Some people die and you should be feeling something, but you don't. That is the fault of the script. It is very bare minimum story as set up for really really good action scenes. So really, good movie for Scott Atkins fans and martial arts enthusiasts. The rest of potential audiences won't get much out of the movie though.

Five out of ten for general movie competence and action scenes.

The movie revolves around a group of friends taking a drug that evaporates all inhibitions. So far so good.

This interesting premise and some artsy scenes are pretty much all there is to this flick. The whole rest, nearly all of its runtime is just wasted time - sadly to say at least.

The rather well known actors seem like caricatures - there is overacting and underacting - never consistent, never convincing. The only one that seems to enjoy his role is Pierce Brosnan, actually I would consider his performance one of the highlights in this movie.

The personalities of the characters are plainly sketched and clichés of group dynamics are just thrown in your face. Interesting deeper relationships or conflicts are strangely lacking.

Direction is uninspired - the proclaimed outrageousness that the premise promises is not found in the movie - instead you get minutes of quite uninteresting party scenes that do not even convey the party vibe and even lack the uneasiness it should deliver as it foreshadows the very foreseeable events.

Even if you want to watch this expecting to see some raunchy scenes like a good B-movie might offer you - you will be disappointed. Sadly this movie is actually a time waster. Granted with an interesting premise and some nice Pierce Bronsnan scenes and even a couple of art-house scenes - but very underwhelming as such.

OK. So it's about a science experiment to investigate the effects of prolonged time of isolation of a group in tight space as preparation for space travel, where long periods of no contact with the outside world are expected. Exactly 400 days of said isolation.

They pretty much cast a whole lot of actors from the hit TV series Arrow and The Flash, namely Brandon Routh, Carly Loitz (which I lovingly call 'The Chin'), and Tom Cavanagh.

These actors as well as the endearing premise caused me to watch that movie. And....my hopes pretty much fell apart.

The movie follows a long the typical low budget mystery and 'horror' plots of the 'isolated people' genre. Nothing, and I mean nothing original here with regards to script and direction.

The whole movie gives off the vibes of a Outer Limits episode. The sets feel very cheap. The story leads to nothing. No pay off at all. And at a runtime of 90 minutes it still felt very boring at long periods. Flashbacks try to establish some deeper characterization. But again, no relevance at all for the non-existent character development.

There is only two positive things I can say about the movie. First, the actors try at least a little bit (Brandon Routh and Tom Cavanagh are most often likable, even if they have absolutely nothing to work with from the script). Second, the premise remains interesting. But executed in such a way, it just is a giant case of wasted potential.

As a TV episode or short movie, OK, but with these 90 minutes, you should do something else...watch like 2 Outer Limits episodes.

This movie is about Stanley Milgram, arguably one of the most important social psychologists in our field, and specifically about one of his most important experiment - his obedience to authority experiment.

The movie depicts to my knowledge accurately the setup, conduction, and results of the experiment and goes further, crafting an interesting and weighted portrayal of the man that Stanley Milgram was. The acting is low key, Peter Sarsgaard especially delivers a down to earth performance which shows that he rigorously prepared for the role. All supporting characters (e.g. Winona Ryder, Anton Yelchin) do a good job and no one distracts from the key issues raised by the experiment.

Cinematography is good, although nothing special. Occasionally there are creative moments in direction. When the 4rth wall is broken by Sarsgaard and he speaks directly to the audience, weird things happen in the background, making these moments very endearing and interesting.

There are no thrills or action in this movie, as well as no conventional drama. It is kind of a biopic with a twist, although I would say the biographic aspect is downplayed by the focus on this specific experiment. Many scientific issues are addressed on a side note (e.g. the ethical code of doing experiments, which triggered the proliferation of ethical committees for scientific research).

I would recommend this movie to people who are interested in science, more specifically in psychology (but not exclusively), that do not need action, drama, or thrills and enjoy a well researched and crafted movie with good acting.

I am seriously torn between opinions on this one. I'm actually somewhat of a fan of animal horror movies. I still think Jaws is one of the best horror films out there. I even somehow liked the Orca Rip-off. Seriously, the animal horror genre occupies a major part of the most fun B movies ever (strangely, the ones that come to mind are mostly shark focused....Deep Blue Sea, Ghost Shark, Shark Attack 3: Megalodon...). From my childhood I remember being really scared of titles like Tarantula, Kingdom of Spiders, Frogs, Razorback, Cujo and so on. Well, times change and I know just enjoy some dumb fun. And I really don't know if Grizzly actually fits my bill here.

I admit I was predominantly drawn to this movie by its cast - James Marsden, Thomas Jane, Billy Bob Thornton, and Piper Perabo (which I haven't seen for a long time). So my guess was that with such a pretty well known cast, they would have confidence in the movie and some budget associated with it. And again, I am not sure...

So the actors actually do their job pretty well. Their performance is probably one of the reasons why the movie is sometimes quite gripping and tense. The setting is quite nice - foggy gritty cold forest. The plot is pretty much what you expect...and even if you have low expectations it is kind of a lackluster.

I think the biggest gripe I have is with the bear "effects" and associated with it the cinematography and editing. I am quite astonished how they managed to actually make the bear feel real and menacing and at the same time weirdly harmless. Sometimes the bear appears huge and some of the attacks are really grippy. Other times you feel that the bear is just prancing around like a nice little teddy. They used real bear footage for the most part, which is nice, but somehow feels fake at the same time. No idea how they did that. There is quite an amount of gore as well. And some of the attacks were quite hard to watch - although the victims showed some questionable defense behavior. At the same time, there are a lot of cheap off-screen deaths. This is not similar to Jaws, where it's done tastefully and suspenseful - here it just seems very cheap - like in the average low budget TV movie. That transgresses to a general problem here - the editing. A lot of the scenes are like this: Bear growling - people looking in fear - bear standing - people deciding to run away - bear prancing towards them - people actually running away scared of their life (and that quite authentically) - bear catching up with one of them - people shooting at the bear and missing - bear turning around and running towards the shooter - shooter looking dumb and shooting and missing again - bear closing in on shooter - other people shooting and missing - bear turning towards other people...you catch the drift.

There is just not enough real interaction or shots with the bear and people together convincingly to make this movie really good. As mentioned, the effects are good and bad at the same time - CGI was avoided most of time, and when it was used, it was OK. But generally, it has just this extreme cheap TV movie feel. It is also not over the top, which could have saved it. If there is humor in this movie, it is extreme subtle...to the extend that I'm not sure if I noticed it.

So in sum, really, I have no idea what to make of it. I do not recommend it. That's for sure. But I also do not hate it. I somehow do not really care (despite this long review...). And oh yeah, and the ending is really cheap.

I cannot even summarize the setup for the movie. It's pretty much incoherent rubbish. So we have Marky Mark there, who delivers pretty much your typical Marky Mark performance, as an INVENTOR type of guy with no money. We have a daughter, that is - Bayification alert - gorgeous and has for the entirety of the movie perfect pink lush lipstick on. We have her boyfriend, an Irish wannabe, that is a very annoying character without purpose other than make Marky Mark angry. These characters are supposed to be the emotional core of the movie. However, never, during the whole 165 minutes, you care at all for them.

And of course, we have the Autobots with Optimus Prime, Bumblebee, and others. Well, they are the same as in the other movies, with new designs. You also have some new Transformers making an appearance, which is visually interesting, but does not constitute to a somewhat interesting, sensemaking, or logical plot.

The plot is convoluted without measures. You have no idea why any of the "vilians" do what they do. There is a macguffin again, there is some mentioning of a higher power that created the autobots, there is government conspiracy again, there is an industry guy that wants to make a profit. Plot holes over and over - do not engage your brain in following the story, only use your occipital lobe for the visuals.

Indeed, the film feels like a ride on an amusement park. You watch people stumble from one set piece to another. Why they do that, is not important. The visuals are striking. The amount of detail in the action shots with stuff exploding, autobots crashing, buildings crumbling, and dinobots fighting is impressive. Add a few fanservice shots of the daughter in lovely sunlight and numerous hero posture shots for Marky Mark, and the visuals are nothing really to complain (except maybe a car jump scene pretty much at the beginning....I think physics were not well portrayed here).

Nevertheless, the action feels plumb, it has no weight, and the fact that the movie stumbles from one action scene to another, kind of weighs you out. You even get tired of the action.

Given all these problems, I am not sure for who I can recommend this. if you like CGI and robots, and can draw your entire enjoyment from astonishing visuals, go for it. If you want to spent your time in any case with a purpose, do not. There are other summer blockbusters that plainly deliver something, instead of pretty much nothing.

I went into this movie without much preknowledge about it. A bunch of college students cover their student loans by doing scams with credit cards. One day they trick the wrong person and a crime boss urges them to pay their debt of 2 million dollars in 2 weeks. That is the basic setup from where the film draws its suspense and interest. I have to say it kind of fails to deliver, though.

The beginning does a good job of filling in the characters and is enjoyable. The characters seem to follow the typical role prototypes. Camera direction is competent, there are very beautiful shots, and the few action scenes are not bad. On a side note, Emma Rigby looks gorgeous in here, although she has a very barbie-like vibe going on. The thought crossed my mind that the movie title actually fit her best...

The actual heist they are planning is a lackluster. In the end, you realize that it is actually dumb, and there are some major plot holes involved. There are moment where you scratch your head wondering how dumb the characters act.

There are tons of alternatives with better script, story and acting. Nevertheless, if you are in the mood for a lightly fun little heist movie, you may watch it. You won't miss something, though.

This movie depicts a crime that actually happened many times in the US. What could have been a simple telephone prank caused a lot of people great despair and long lasting psychological damage.

The reaction of a lot of people who have watched this movie is a surprising amount of anger towards it. They cannot believe how 'stupid' people can be and therefore just throw this away as unrealistic crap.

I disagree. Being a psychologist, the complete compliance of some of the characters in the movie does not surprise me at all. Authority can make us do things we normally would and there is a development here occurring that makes the steps taken more likely to really occur. At first, the protagonist thinks that she has nothing to hide and that it will all be over quickly. From there on, there are taken small steps that gradually escalate. These small steps are quite effective because you already took steps, so you ask yourself "what does this one thing more matter?". And there was also fear involved, a very strong motivator for behaviour.

From a movie crafting perspective, I have very little complaints. The atmosphere is perfectly captured in my opinion. The acting for the most part is very convincing and realistic - first of all the manager. A small complaint I have is regarding the casting of the accused girl. I hope this does not come across as weird, but the fact she has had surgery done on her breasts broke the appearance of the realistic setting a bit for me. Furthermore, from my research regarding the matter, when the story progresses, the real victim actually portrayed severe accounts of fear and despair, whereas in the movie she comes more across as bored and resignated. The connection that the audience established with her in the beginning of the movie kind of broke away at the mid part. That is sad and could have made the movie more impactful.

However, in general, the movie is well made, and what is more important, very provoking. People interested in realistic dramas/thrillers that revolve around psychological manipulation should watch this.

Having recently watched a Battlestar Galactica marathon, I must confess that the only reason this little movie caught my eye was that Jamie Bamber was in it. As I often enjoy watching what TV actors do after their successful years I must say that this was an experience I did not expect. From the start, the movie throws the audience right in the plot. Jamie Bamber plays a serial killer vigilante that enjoys increasing popularity among the general public. Things unravel in a straight forward manner with the occasional twist. The amount of detail in composing the shots was generally way above a movie with that budget level. It is one of those films where the graphic violence is felt very intensely instead of just being gory, thereby giving away a very gritty and dark feeling. The performance of Jamie Bamber is exceptionally intense. Some might call it over the top but in the context of the movie it delivers very well. The story is endearing to the point that I was grapped right away and wanted to know how it all unravelled. It carries quite a lot of social commentary if you want to be open about those things. If not, it can still be watched as a genre piece that entertains. In comparison with Law Abiding Cititzen with Gerald Butler, an A-list movie with a quite similar general setup, I clearly favor John Doe: Vigilante. It feels way more real and carries more impact. In general, I can recommend the movie to all that like dark, gritty, and intense films and do not have a problem with large amounts of violence.