Sean’s movie thoughts

I don’t give grades to my movie thoughts. Part of it is that I agree with the late critic Roger Ebert that some people get too hung up on grades. Ebert thought grades are relative especially in terms of genre, readers seemed to think grades were not relative. If Ebert gave a comedy three stars and gave a drama two and 1/2 stars, I don’t think he necessarily meant the comedy was better than the drama. As amateur film critic, I don’t see every major film released. There are films I see previewed and I just think that I am not interested in that or that doesn’t look good. (Sometimes I later watch a film that I skipped in theaters and it was better than I thought it would be.) Since I tend to be selective in seeing movies, if I gave grades I would be probably be giving out a lot of A’s and B’s and maybe the occasional C or D. I might not be the harshest critic, even amateur critic, in the land but if I went to every major release maybe I’d give more D’s and the occasional F’s. Maybe I ...

Polaroid is a movie that was supposed to come out in 2017 but it got pushed back after the Harry Weinstein scandal. That might be the most interesting thing about the film. The director later went on to direct the new Child’s Play film. Kathryn Prescott plays a young woman named Bird. She is given an antique Polaroid camera by a friend.  He seemed to want to be more than a friend. People start dying after she takes their picture with the camera. Also whatever happens to the photo happens to the person in the photo or people in the photo. If you have a mad crush on Kathryn Prescott, that is a reason to see this film. If you don’t, well maybe you have no reason to see this film. The trailer probably has the best shock in the film, so maybe don't watch the trailer if you want to see this. This film is dark. I don't mean thematically. I mean that the lightning is an issue and at times I could hardly see what was happening. I am not sure if it was intentional. It is not terr...

I heard the new Rambo Last Blood is bad. Reviews are bad, even the review on Bloody Disgusting is pretty bad. Oh well, maybe some franchises are not meant to last forever. I've heard this movie described as a Taken knock off that turns into a Saw knock off. One of the film critics I follow was accused of being woke for noticing that all the Mexican characters are scummy. If all the Mexican characters in a film are scummy, noticing that doesn't make you woke, it makes you awake. Also I am not sure what is wrong with being woke. I am not sure why Stallone wanted to bring Rambo back one more time. Maybe there was an interview that I missed but I thought Stallone had pretty much put the character to bed. I think I will skip this movie at theaters and maybe catch up with it later. Or maybe I will never catch up with it.

New episode of my podcast  is up. I still enjoy doing it. It is not getting a lot of attention but I have a few people listening. It is not scripted but I think I might start using bullet points. I think the longest episode is 18 minutes. I don’t go really heavy into plot details for each movie, these episodes are more thoughts than formal review and in some episodes I talk about two or three movies. I don’t do trailer reactions. At least I have not so far and there are no plans to change that. This episode covers Rocketman and Yesterday.

Jillian Bell might be best known for comedies. She was in Rough Night, Goosebumps, and one of the Jump Street movies. She takes a more dramatic role in this film. She plays Brittany, a twenty-eight year old woman who is trying to get her life back on track. After a doctor tells her that she needs to loose weight, she starts to run. I think she was trying to get the doctor to write her a prescription for Adderalll when she saw him. She makes some new friends while running and eventually they start training for the New York Marathon. She loses a friend along the way. Brittany’s life had gotten off track, for lack of a better phrase. She has a dead end job or least a job that is not a long term job and she parties a lot but she is not happy. Running gives her a start to change her life but there are some obstacles. Brittany herself is an obstacle at times. I liked this movie. I had seen good reviews for the movie and the movie lived up to them. I thought Bell was good as Brittany, s...

Sylvester Stallone has made some good movies, maybe a great movie or 2, and some bad movies. Lock Up might be a bad one but I like it anyway. Stallone plays a criminal named Frank who is transferred to a bad prison. (It is not the worst prison I have seen in films.) The warden of the bad prison (Donald Sutherland) has a grudge against Frank. Basically the plot involves the Warden trying to break Frank. Frank is just trying to survive but he can be pushed too far. Some guards see the things going on and seem uncomfortable. They are not uncomfortable enough to do anything. Stallone is likable as Frank. The rest of the cast is pretty good. John Amos plays the head of the guards. It seems a long way from his role as the father on Good Times. Sutherland is good as the warden, he is as evil as any of the prisoners. Is this worth seeing if you haven’t seen it? Maybe. I have said before that I like an action movie with smaller stakes and I tend to like Stallone. This is melodramatic at t...

Yesterday is kind of fun. It is kind of corny. One day the power goes out around the world and only one man remembers the Beatles. This man, Jack, uses the Beatles’ music to launch his career. Is it wrong? The movie doesn’t think so. Lily James played Cinderella. (You could call Miss James a Disney princess in a sense.) This movie gives her a slightly unflattering hair cut. If it is supposed to make her seem frumpy or something like that, it really doesn’t. It would be nice if the movie gave her more to do. Maybe her next movie will give her more to do. The performances are good. Ed Sheran has fun playing a version of himself. Himesh Patel is very likable as Jack. The central conceit makes no sense. The central conceit is never explained, so I guess it is not too that makes no sense. The music is, of  course, good.

I liked It Chapter 2. It is a little long but I cannot think of anything I’d cut out of the film. This movie starts 27 years after the events of It Chapter One and Pennywise is once again stalking Derry, Maine. Mike is the only one who stayed in Derry and he calls the others back to fulfill their oath. The movie is long but I cannot think of how I’d edit it though. There are 6 main characters and they split up at times, so  maybe that contributes to the film’s length. I think there was one bad musical choice. (There was one musical choice in Captain Marvel that I thought was wrong.) The film is not too gory. This movie is pretty good. It is entertaining.Bill Hader is pretty good and Jessica Chastain is better here than she was in X-men Dark Phoenix. I don’t think I have seen Hader in any dramatic role but he was good. The other main cast members are good too but Chastain and Bill Hader are probably the strongest. The young cast returns from the first film for flashbacks and/o...

I re-watched Action Jackson. Carl Weathers stars as Jericho ‘Action’ Jackson a Detroit cop. He gets involved in a case of murders involving the automobile industry. Craig T. Nelson stars as the villain. vanity plays his mistress who later gets involved with Jackson. It is not a great film but I liked Weathers in the role. Weathers remains best known as Apollo Creed from the Rocky series. Vanity was likable as the leading lady and Nelson was appropriately creepy as the villain. Sharon Stone had a role as Nelson’s wife. There are a pair of cops, one African American and one white, who appear from time to time. They are introduced talking to a purse snatcher named Albert. They tell Albert tall tales about Action Jackson. When Albert meets Jackson, Albert faints.  That was fun. This was not a huge hit and there were no sequels. It is probably not worth tracking down if you have not already seen it. A bit of nostalgia probably is needed to enjoy the film.