Sean’s movie thoughts

I liked the Cotton Club Encore. This is a new cut of the Cotton Club, Francis Ford Coppola’s 1984 movie centered around the famous night club in Harlem. It has almost thirty minutes of footage that was taken out of the original release. Maybe 15 minutes of footage of the original cut has been removed. Gregory Hines was really good in this film. Richard Gere stars and this is not among his best performances. Either that or Hine’s character and story were just more interesting than Gere’s. Bob Hopkins and Fred Gwynne are among the supporting cast. They have some nice moments. Diane Lane was Gere’s love interest and her performance did not great reviews and got a Razzie nomination or award for it. Which seems a bit unfair. I don’t think she had a great role. (The Razzies are the anti-oscars. They are awards for the worst in movies for the year. Some critics suggested that the Razzies have become just cheap shots in recent years and just pile on movies that already have a bad reputatio...

There is not much to Zombieland Double Tap. It is not terrible but it is nothing special. Maybe there is not much to do with this concept. Oh well I made the right choice not seeing this in theaters. It is not terrible and there are a few fun moments. The cast is too talented for this to be a complete waste of time. Zoey Duetch was fun in her role (which maybe should not work as well as it does) but Rosario Dawson might be underused. The returning cast is good.  I don’t think this is worth revisiting. Maybe finishing it was a mistake but it was under 2 hours. If there is ever a third one, I think I will skip it.

I have too many Star Wars audiobooks and novels to be a casual Star Wars fan. I have an affection for the franchise and maybe I was too generous in my last blog post about the Rise of Skywalker. The movie is bad, both as an individual film and as part of a trilogy. It really doesn’t build off the Last Jedi. There are some good points. Adam Driver and Daisey Ridley are good at times and the scene with Han Solo as a memory talking to his son was good. It was the only moving scene in the film. It was also nice to see Lando again, even if the film didn’t do all that much with his return. The death of Carrie Fisher probably hurt the film more than we will ever know. The first film belonged to Harrison Ford, the second film belonged to Mark Hamill, and the third movie was supposed to belong to Carrie Fisher. Obviously her death changed that. Maybe the role of Leia could have been recast but that might have been awkward.  Bringing back the emperor was a bad idea or badly exec...

On one hand, this is not a terrible movie and it has some nice moments. It was nice to see Lando again. On the other hand, it is long (and feels long) and a couple of moments that should have an impact do not have an impact.  (I am trying to avoid plot details.) I am glad I saw the movie but it has problems. There was no plan for this series, I am pretty sure about that. People will say there was a plan but I can say that I can sing like Johnny Cash (trust me, I cannot).  If there was a plan, it was thrown away at some point. There is a plot point that contradicts a major plot point from the previous movie. There are plot points here that make no sense or that the movie does not bother to explain. I, at one point, could explain the post Crisis history of Hawkman, so trust me I when I say a plot point makes no sense. (After the Crisis on Infinite Earths in DC comics, Hawkman's history become complicated and over the years there have been attempts to fix it. Those usually ma...

If you cannot figure out how to make Superman relevant, that is not a problem with the character. Warner Brothers is apparently having a hard time figuring out what to do with Superman. Oh well, I guess I am not surprised. Man of Steel is not terrible but it missed the point of the character. It is less than a month until Star Wars the Rise of Skywalker. I hope it is good. I have no idea if it will be good. I hope it is shorter than the Last Jedi. It felt really long. Then apparently there will be an announcement about the next Star Wars movie in January. Charlie’s Angels bombed. Terminator Dark Fate bombed. Doctor Sleep also bombed. The last month was not good for some studios.

I am not sure why Charlie's Angels bombed. I have heard it is good and the previews looked decent but it bombed. I am not sure why. I was not up for a movie last weekend, so I did not go. Maybe people just were not interested in this film. Maybe nobody wanted a new Charlie's Angels movie. Maybe people just thought this was not a franchise to revisit. Or maybe people felt like it was something they could wait to see on cable. Frozen 2 opens this weekend, maybe some people were waiting for that. Taking a family of four or five to a movie does add up. Terminator Dark Fate bombed and so did Doctor Sleep. I kind of understand why Terminator Dark Fate bombed. Maybe Doctor Fate would have done better if it came out before Halloween.

Doctor Sleep is pretty good. This is the movie based off the Stephen King novel that is a sequel to the Shining. It is a sequel to the movie of the Shining, which King hates. (There are some differences between the novel and the movie.) Danny Torance still has the shining, the psychic ability, and he has moved to a small town.  He is in rough shape from what happened to him as a child. He is not the only one with this power in his little town and there is a group of people who kill people to steal their psychic ability or their souls (the movie could have been clearer about this) and they are coming for a teenage girl in the town. Danny decides to help her. It is good. The only complaint I have is it uses a lot of spooky music. It felt a bit too much at times but otherwise the film is pretty good. (I don’t know if this is a quirk of the director or just a trend in horror movies.) The performances are good. It is a long movie but it moves at a good pace. The situation is interes...