PODCAST: Film Focus Episode 4 – X-Men: Apocalypse Review

Howdy people of the internet, as some of you may have seen, recently I started a film podcast entitled Film Focus! And after a week away due to technical difficulties with me laptop, I’m back again and today I’m sharing my thoughts on the recent X-Men: Apocalypse. I’ve already done my written review, but I had a little more to say in my podcast, but here you can get a better sense of how passionate I can get when talking about films in an audio format haha. 😛

Anyway here’s the fourth episode:

As I said before in each episode I’ll cover a different topic and since I don’t have much in the way of listeners or promotion, I’m here to spread the word about my podcast. 🙂 So if you have some spare time on your hands and would like to listen to the ramblings of a passionate/strange man then please check it out, and share it with your friends if you like it. Also you have any feedback or if you’d be interested in joining on future episodes be sure to let me know, until next time, laters! 😀

 

QUICK REVIEW: Warcraft

Howdy people, it is review time again and today I’m going to be talking about Warcraft! Now I have to say my excitement for this film has been in the ‘cautiously optimistic’ department as the trailers were decent, but did not get me super hyped like other 2016 films that have come out so far, and with the mixed reception it’s gotten recently I really was worried. But since I saw it a few hours ago I can share my thoughts here with you lovely people. 🙂

So the story can be described as the following:

“The peaceful realm of Azeroth stands on the brink of war as its civilization faces a fearsome race of invaders: orc warriors fleeing their dying home to colonize another. As a portal opens to connect the two worlds, one army faces destruction and the other faces extinction. From opposing sides, two heroes are set on a collision course that will decide the fate of their family, their people, and their home”

The story of Warcraft, when you strip away the spectacle and law, is a simple one. It is about two worlds colliding and two strong individuals on both sides trying to do their best to sort out the larger problem without too much chaos and bloodshed. This is a familiar tale, and for the most part it worked, but there were some issues. Firstly, Warcraft has the same issue that John Carter and Green Lantern had in the sense that this film has a lot of law and mythology to set up, and a lot of the time feeds you tons of information but there isn’t enough time to digest and understand it. And for me this lead to me forgetting certain character names and locations, and even though there was narration to explain some details, I felt like just a bit more exposition would have helped the narrative. Secondly the pacing was a little off, like I said before there’s a lot of info to take in, and it didn’t help that the film moved from scene to scene so quickly and didn’t give you enough time to settle into the world especially in the beginning, but then later on some moments went on a little too long. And finally some of the character motivations and arcs felt lacking in depth and needed a bit more meat to them in order for us to connect them. That being said, when the story worked there was a lot of interesting moments full of drama, tension and good world-building.

In terms of the cast they were good, but there were some that stood out more than others. Travis Fimmel did well as Sir Anduin Lothar, even though he didn’t differentiate himself much from what I’ve seen in Vikings. He was charming and very chilled out and was one of the most engaging human characters. Ben Schnetzer as Khadgar was initially kind of annoying and silly, but he eventually grew on me. Ben Foster played one of the more intriguing characters as Medivh and it was interesting to see how his arc played out in the film, while Dominic Cooper was valiant and strong as King Llane Wrynn, and Ruth Negga was good but underutilized as Lady Taria Wrynn. Paula Patton was fine as Garona, but I felt like she needed a bit more personality and development. Toby Kebbell did really well as Durotan, he had the strongest and most engaging arc in the film being courageous yet conflicted. Robert Kazinsky was also pretty good as Orgrim Doomhammer and Daniel Wu was pretty solid as Gul’dan.

When it comes to the presentation the film was solid. Visually it was nice, the CGI was handled well especially with the cinematic shots of the  landscape and the detail in the shots orc models as well. Otherwise the visual effects varied between looking good to not bad with some dips in detail during some of the action sequences. And the film score by Ramin Djawadi certainly had its moments where it elevated the action on-screen, however it wasn’t as impactful as some of Djawadi’s previous material.

In conclusion Warcraft wasn’t bad, it was an interesting film with a great fantasy world, nice mythology and cool action sequences. However the characters and story weren’t nearly as engaging as I had hoped. I would have liked something in the vain of The Lord of the Rings Trilogy for this film, and I know that LOTR was based on a very strong book series as opposed to the Warcraft game series, but with the right creative team you can make anything work, and this film was handled as well as it could have been with Duncan Jones at the helm, but the story material wasn’t strong enough.

Rating: 6.5/10

So have you seen Warcraft and if so what did you think of it? Please leave your comments below and I’ll see ya on the next review, laters! 😀

 

QUICK REVIEW: The Nice Guys

Howdy people, got a new review for ya and last night I finally get to talk about The Nice Guys, woo! 🙂 I’m not sure if I’d mentioned this in a previous blog post, but this film was/should have been in my top 11 most anticipated films of 2016 and after seeing all the trailers my hype levels were super high. So how’d the film turn out? Well read on and find out! 😀

So the story can be described as the following:

“A mismatched pair of private eyes investigate the apparent suicide of a fading porn star in 1970s Los Angeles.”

So the story for this film was very interesting. This is a tale of humour, death and conspiracy and it comes together in a very Shane Black manner. While anyone can watch this film, it definitely works better for fans of Black’s work, and for those not satisfied with Iron Man 3 and wanted a little more Kiss Kiss Bang Bang, this film was certainly more in line with the latter with a tone, script and a type of humour that was swift, mature, blunt and continuous. I am not going to lie, it took a little while to get into this story, and that’s not to say that it wasn’t engaging but I thought the story would hook me in a different way. Also some of the humour wasn’t as funny as I’d hoped, maybe it was the timing or the fact that a lot of the best gags were in the trailers, but that’s just from what I observed. However there’s a point when the story shifts gears and got even crazier and more ridiculous than before, and the final act literally just had me laughing and enjoying myself so much!

In terms of the cast they were really good. This kind of film successes of fails on the performance of the leads and luckily Russell Crowe and Ryan Gosling do well as enforcer Jackson Healy and private detective Holland March. These two were an unlikely pairing with Crowe being the no-nonsense tough guy and the Gosling being the humourous, silly and hyperactive guy. Individually they were cool and well-rounded, but it was when they got together when the magic happened with Healy and March having the best comedic pairing I’ve seen in a while due to their different personalities and approaches to work. A nice surprise came in the form of Angourie Rice as Holly March who was so delightful, smart and resource, Rice had a great screen presence and held her own well against the other main actors. Matt Bomer was great as John Boy, I also liked Margaret Qualley as Amelia Kutner, Keith David’s appearance as Older Guy was very welcome and memorable and finally Kim Basinger had a very interesting role as Judith Kutner. Oh and I also really enjoyed the visual style of the film and the 70’s influenced soundtrack crafted by David Buckley and John Ottman.

In conclusion The Nice Guys was a good film. It was a lot of fun to watch as the story unfolded and the madness escalated, and while the humour and story was a little uneven for my liking, when this film hits, it hits hard and I would recommend it especially for those who are fans of Shane Black’s style of films.

Rating: 7.5/10

So have you seen The Nice Guys and if so what did you think of it? Please leave your comments below and I’ll see ya on the next review, laters! 😀

 

EPIC REVIEW: X-Men Apocalypse (SPOILER-FREE)

Howdy ladies and gents, time for another new film review and today I’m talking about the latest X-Men film in the form of X-Men: Apocalypse. Now I’ve gone on record stating that I wasn’t wowed by the trailers for this film, but have been cautiously optimistic about it and after seeing it last night I’m ready to pass judgement!

So the story goes down like this:

“In this latest X-Men chapter, the ancient being who is said to be the first mutant known as Apocalypse rises after years of slumber of cleanse the Earth of the humans and create a new world for mutants. So it is up to the X-Men to stop Apocalypse from completing his nefarious plan”

The story of X-Men: Apocalypse is one of intrigue, surprise and familiarity. The tone is dark and grim with some very dramatic and emotional stuff, however there is also a good deal of humour and light-heartedness to slightly balance things out. What we have is another world-ending adventure, but it was the small character moments in between and the build up which was the most engaging material for me. What this film did well was to introduce Apocalypse and his history in the world, and introduced us to new and returning X-Men characters in a great way (with some having better appearances than others). Also for long-time X-Men film viewers there’s some awesome throwbacks to previous X-Men films which were so delightfully sprinkled throughout. The issues I had with the story was that it felt a little larger than life when compared to the previous X-Men films which were a little more grounded, certain plot points don’t completely pay off, and even though the X-Men timeline is messed up already, this film doesn’t help make things better either. And with director Bryan Singer at the helm I really love it because he helped craft this film world and has a certain style with his direction which makes me smile, but at the same time some of the issues I have with the way he handles these films haven’t been rectified yet, and makes me wish someone else mix things up (like Matthew Vaughn did with First Class).

As for cast it is a pretty large ensemble and for the most part everyone was great in their roles, though some were definitely short-changed. Firstly James McAvoy and Michael Fassbender kill it once again as Professor X and Magneto. Since First Class both of these characters have had very important and captivating story arcs and that continued into this film. I really enjoyed seeing more of an older Professor X with him teaching and still trying to co-exist with humans, but what was much more interesting was Magneto’s arc as he continued to be one of the most tragic and complex characters in the film series with all the drama and conflict he faced. As for Jennifer Lawrence as Raven/Mystique she was fine, the arc that they gave her in this film felt logical and made me understand her motivations, even though several times she felt a little schizophrenic at times. Also Oscar Isaac as Apocalypse was good but also a little underwhelming, I liked the character motivations and what he represented at first, however he was hard to engage/relate to because he felt so alien/robotic. Evan Peters as Quicksilver was certainly a more fully formed character than before with more development and screen time, and luckily he’s just as delightful as he was in his previous adventure except much better in this latest appearance. Oh and Wolverine’s appearance (it’s not a spoiler since he was technically shown in the last trailer), loved it, was a great sequence.

Nicholas Hoult was good as Beast and the return of Rose Byrne as Moira MacTaggert was welcomed too, and Josh Helman was good and had definitely gotten more settled in his role as William Stryker. And then there’s the new versions of the old characters. Of all of them Sophie Turner fared the best as Jean Grey, he character felt fresh and yet familiar, and Turner brought a lovely energy and presence to the character which felt similar to both the comics and films. Tye Sheridan as Scott Summers/Cyclops was also very good and had a lot more of a presence and charisma than what we’ve seen in the past, and I really liked Jean and Scott’s interaction, felt like they had a good introduction and nice chemistry. Kodi Smit-McPhee did great as Nightcrawler, he was able to capture the spirit of what Alan Cummings brought to the role in X2, but added a whole new level of youthful charisma and humour to the role. And Alexandra Shipp as Storm was decent, but the least interesting of the new X-Men as she felt a bit plain and lacking flair.

And then there were was everyone else. Olivia Munn as Psylocke, well, she was alright I guess. I mean maybe I was expecting too much, but I didn’t get to know much about her and she didn’t do much beyond what was seen in the trailers, that being said Munn handled her action scenes well. Ben Hardy as Angel/Archangel was fine, but he felt very plain and undeveloped, while Lana Condor was good as Jubilee but for all the hype that was made about her being in the film her part was incredibly minor. And Lucas Till returned as Alex Summers/Havok had some really good scenes but was in the film much less than I liked.

When it comes to the presentation it was pretty good. Visually the CGI was good with some good attention to detail with the special powers and crazy large-scale action sequences (shout out to the Quicksilver sequence), but I will admit that some of the fight scenes weren’t that exciting and it didn’t help that several of the action scenes were shown in the trailers. And the film score by John Ottman was great and maybe his best work in the X-Men film series so far, this music was diverse, intense, dramatic and was always relevant with what was happening on-screen.

In conclusion X-Men: Apocalypse is another solid film in the X-Men film series, it was not only better than what I’d expected considering that trailers didn’t wow me, but it also featured some of my favourite moments in any X-Men film so far. However there were a few story and character motivation issues that just prevented this film from being greater.

Rating: 7.5/10

So have you seen or are you going to watch X-Men: Apocalypse? Whatever your thoughts are be sure to drop them in the comments below and I’ll see ya on the next review, laters! 😀

 

PODCAST: Film Focus Episode 3 – Godzilla Franchise Discussion

Howdy people of the internet, as some of you may have seen, recently I started a film podcast entitled Film Focus and the first two episodes focused on Captain America: Civil War and today I return to give you my thoughts on the Godzilla franchise. While I’m not the biggest or well-versed fan of this particular IP, I really love what it represents and here I briefly cover my experience with the franchise, the film’s I’ve seen and what I think would be cool for the film series going ahead especially when it comes to the US-produced Godzilla 2 and King Kong vs Godzilla. This episode is a little less scripted and a bit more subjective so hopefully you won’t hold that against me too much.

Anyway here’s the third episode:

As I said before in each episode I’ll cover a different topic and since I don’t have much in the way of listeners or promotion, I’m back here to spread the word about my podcast. 🙂 So if you have some spare time on your hands and would like to listen to the ramblings of a passionate/strange man then please check it out, and share it with your friends if you like it. Also you have any feedback or if you’d be interested in joining on future episodes be sure to let me know, until next time, laters! 😀

 

Saying Goodbye to Agent Carter and The Grinder

Howdy ladies and gents, today I return to the world of blogging to talk about some TV news. Recently it was announced that both Marvel’s Agent Carter and The Grinder were recently cancelled and since they were shows that I really liked I just wanted to reflect on them and share my thoughts on their cancellation.

Agent Carter

Agent Carter has always been a show not appreciated by many, but loved by a select few and in some cases it has even been preferred over Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. too. For me I liked season 1, but this year’s season 2 definitely changed things up and made the stories, tone and character development a heck of lot more interesting and engaging. Now I know that there weren’t a lot of fans of season 2 because of the focus on humour, the more light-hearted tone and a story that wasn’t in line with what took place last season, but some of those elements are what I thought made season 2 fun. This season really dove deeper into the relationship between Peggy and Jarvis and why it was important,the introduction of Dark Matter added an interesting supernatural element, the show covered themes of race, gender and the inner workings of Hollywood well, and finally for the most part Whitney Frost was a pretty solid villain with a good backstory and rise to power. Now good the humour have been toned down? Yes. Would better writing have fixed certain tonal shifts, Peggy’s love triangle and given Whitney Frost more to do beyond being a villain limited to one season? I would think so. And would a heavier focus on Dottie Underwood have made the show more interesting and given the show better continuity with last season? Probably. In the end we’ll never know, I guess the viewership wasn’t high enough and the content wasn’t what a lot of fans were looking for, but I had hoped Agent Carter would at least see a third season just to get some more stories, but I guess maybe some future comics, film flashbacks or a short could fill in the gaps.

The Grinder

Ah The Grinder, tis a shame to see you go, but I guess you weren’t funny enough to stick around. For me I didn’t start this show until early side of March and then got addicted with the first few episodes. What I liked about The Grinder was its meta nature, sel-awareness and over-the-top style and humour, the show was very silly, but in a good way, and for at least the first have of the show, maybe up to around episode 15 the show was on fire, fairly consistent and introduced new scenarios that changed things up but kept the formula of the show intact. I think what happened with the show’s demise was a few of things like: 1) That those who weren’t sold on the first few episodes gave up without giving the show a proper chance. 2) I think the show went on for too long and could have been shortened with less repetition and filler episodes and tighter main narrative. And 3) I think the show ran out of steam about 2/3’s of the way into the show, with the latter stories being more a drag and some of the humour felt less funny and smartly written than in earlier episodes. Regardless of those issues I adored Rob Lowe and his charisma in the role of Dean Sanderson and what he brought to the “The Grinder” TV series inside of the show. Lowe and Fred Savage had good chemistry and I also enjoyed what Mary Elizabeth Ellis brought to the show as well.

It does suck that both of these shows have been axed considering how much fun they were and the potential they had to be more, but I guess that’s just the way things go in the ever-changing world of TV. I just want to say that it was a good time checking these shows out while they were airing and the memories won’t be forgotten. 🙂

So did you watch Agent Carter or The Grinder or both? Whatever your thoughts are be sure to drop them in the comments below and I’ll see ya on the next review, laters! 😀

 

ONE PARAGRAGH REVIEW: Cop Car

Good day to you ladies and gents, how are you? Today I’m coming to you with another film review and today it’ll be on another one of the film’s I missed out on in the cinema last year, Cop Car. I’ve been wanting to check this film out for so long especially after the director, Jon Watts was selected as the director for the upcoming Spider-Man: Homecoming film, and with the positive world of mouth I heard from certain critics my curiosity was high. So without further ado here we go:

With this film I knew very little about it beforehand besides the fact that two kids steal a cop’s car and Kevin Bacon is the most notable name attached to it, so I was technically going in blind. And that was part of the fun/intrigue that came with this film. The premise is unique with these two little daredevil kids going off and stealing a car for fun, but then once the sheriff goes on the hunt for his missing car and other aspects of the story start to come to light, it becomes apparent that the boys have become part of something much more dangerous than anything they could have imagined. At the beginning there’s a heavy focus on the two boys, Travis and Harrison, and while they’re young, naive and have very carefree/rebellious qualities to them, they’re a little frustrating to watch because of their foolishness and lack of respect for the law (but that speaks more to my disliking of watching kids be kids). But once Sheriff Kretzer came into play that’s when I started to pay attention. While the film has a unique story where the possibilities of where it could go are endless, I did find myself a little bored by the pacing and earlier story material with the boys. However after a while the film’s story started to get a little more interesting, and once it gained momentum and certain plot points start to change/interlock then the film had my attention. And what intrigued me the most was the fact that once things started to get darker and more intense the whole mood of the film started to change, from the characters to film’s visual style with the use of colour and lighting, so by the end of the film I was in a totally different frame of mind than when the film started. I really liked the acting across the board, James Freedson-Jackson and Hays Wellford did really good/convincing jobs as Travis and Harrison, while Kevin Bacon brought the right amount of charm and seriousness as Sheriff Kretzer, Camryn Manheim was also good as Bev and seeing Shea Whigham in anything makes me smile and he had a very interesting role to play as Man. Overall I was surprised by how much I liked Cop Car, it was simple yet very effective and had a lot more meat to it in the second half, and this film has only made me more interested to see what Jon Watts does with the new Spider-Man film. 🙂

So that was my review, have you seen Cop Car and if so what did you think of it? Please leave your comments below and I’ll see ya on the next review, laters! 😀

 

PODCAST: Film Focus Episode 2 – Captain America: Civil War Spoiler Session!

Howdy people of the internet, as some of you may have seen, last week I started a film podcast entitled Film Focus and that first episode focused on Captain America: Civil War in a spoiler free review and today I’m return to the recent Marvel film with a spoiler-based discussion. It is slightly longer than the last episode but it’s no too long, I mean originally it was around 1 hour! 😛 But any way in this episode I discus a little more detail: Black Panther and Spider-Man, Vision and Scarlet Witch, discuss the drama in Civil War and why I liked Baron Zemo among other things.

Anyway here’s the second episode:

As I said before in each episode I’ll cover a different topic and since I don’t have much in the way of listeners or promotion, I’m back here to spread the word about my podcast. 🙂 So if you have some spare time on your hands and would like to listen to the ramblings of a passionate/strange man then please check it out, and share it with your friends if you like it. Also you have any feedback or if you’d be interested in joining on future episodes be sure to let me know, until next time, laters! 😀

 

ONE PARAGRAPH REVIEW: Cartel Land

Howdy ladies and gents people, time for another one of my single paragraph reviews and I’m finally going to be talking about a film that I’ve wanted to watch for a while now Cartel Land. This is one of those films I heard mentioned on Collider Movie Talk a few times during last year especially after the release of Sicario and since I like a good documentary I decided to give it a watch today. So without further ado here we go:

Cartel Land for those who aren’t informed gives us as the audience a detailed look at the issues plaguing Mexico in relation to the drugs, illegal immigration and death, and this documentary gives us two stories; Tim “Nailer” Fole and his group (the Arizona Border Reconone) trying to defend the US border and another from inside Mexico where Dr José Mireles and his group (Autodefensas) who united to take out the cartel themselves. This film is about cause and effect, justice and revenge, corruption and war. What this film demonstrated was the how dangerous the cartel are, how far their reach extends in Mexico and the amount of pain they’ve left in the lives of the innocent civilians. There are stories and images of death and violence which is tragic, brutal and raw, it not only makes you sympathetic towards the people of Michoacán but also makes you completely understand why anyone would become a vigilante and fight evil. This film also illustrated what happens when the law the doesn’t work and your government doesn’t take care of the issues that need immediate attention, and whether or not people have the right to take the law into their own hands, and when you do things in the interest of the public whether they choose to accept your or not. Seeing the different points of view but also the similarities between Fole and Mireles in their goal to work outside of the law and combat the cartel was fascinating, but it was certainly more engaging and dramatic seeing the rise of José Mireles and Autodefensas. And the fact that this was and maybe still is happening is crazy to me. In conclusion Cartel Land was a very insightful and pretty intense documentary and I would recommend it because it was shot well, was very insightful and something I think people should be more aware of.

So that was my review, have you seen Cartel Land and if so what did you think of it? Please leave your comments below and I’ll see ya on the next review, laters! 😀

 

I’ve Started a Podcast!

Howdy people of the internet, to all of your who still pay attention to this blog I wanted to announce that I’ve started a film podcast entitled Film Focus and the first episode dropped online today! The reason I started this podcast was due to the fact that for the longest time I’ve wanted to get back into doing reviews online, but after YouTube became a little more stressful and complicated than before I had to bail and rethink my return to the online landscape, and for about a year I’ve wanted to start a podcast but didn’t have a solid idea. But in the last few months I’ve made a lot of plans and movements, and after some setbacks it’s finally a reality. Now I would like some long-term success with this, but at the end of the day I will be doing this for fun and hopefully I’ll still be doing this more than six months from now.

Anyway here’s the first episode:

 

In each episode I’ll cover a different topic and this week’s topic is revolves around my spoiler-free review for Captain America: Civil War. So if you have some spare time on your hands and would something strange yet fun to listen to then please check it out. And if you like it then be sure to share it with your friends! Also if you’d be interested in joining on future episodes be sure to let me know, until next time, laters! 😀