80s Movie Review - Big Trouble in Little China

Director: John Carpenter
Genre: Action/ Comedy/ Adventure/ Fantasy
Runtime: 99 minutes
Year: 1986
Starring: Kurt Russell, Kim Catrall, Dennis Dun, Victor Wong, James Hong, Kate Burton, Donald Li, Carter Wong, Peter Kwong, James Pax

Description: A rough-and-tumble trucker (Kurt Russell) helps rescue his friend’s fiancée from an ancient sorcerer in a supernatural battle beneath Chinatown.

I WATCHED THIS MOVIE FOR THE 2021 MOVIE CHALLENGE
WEEK 18: A ACTION COMEDY

Review: Jack Burton is a trucker who drives hi self-proclaimed and cherished “Pork Chop Express”, and imposing American truck with which he transports pigs to market. After Jack wins money from his friend Wang Chi, the owner of a restaurant in San Francisco’s Chinatown, he accompanies Wang to the airport and then collects the money. Wang has to go to the airport to pick up his future bride, from Beijing. Before the two reach her, however, she is kidnapped by an aggressive Chinese gang, the “Lords of Death”. When Jack’s truck is stolen he decides to help Wang find his bride. Thus Jack becomes involved in a mysterious quest in which he meets horrible monsters, sorcerers and flying hoodlums.
The script for “Big Trouble in Little China” was initially intended for the sequel to a cult classic: “Buckaroo Banzai”. When that project died and early death, John Carpenter showed interest. The whole thing was rewritten with a major role for Kurt Russell, who gets to show off his comedic talent as misguided anti-hero Jack Burton. The result is a somewhat strange mix of action, adventure, humor and Eastern mysticism and ancient Chinese legends. So don’t be surprised if all sorts of bizarre Power Ranger-like scenes unfold before your eyes, complete with strangely dressed bad guys who possess supernatural powers. Herein lies clearly the charm of the film. “Big Trouble in Little China”, in fact, should absolutely not be taken seriously. Initially the public had great difficulty with this, as evidenced by the disappointing cinema attendance. The film was later given a second change and it got the attention it deserved. In fact, now, it’s a cult classic and cult enthusiasts praise the film for its pulpy entertainment.

Rating: 3,5 / 5

Netflix Friday - Volume 53

Some Netflix film tips for the weekend! And there is something for everyone, since I picked a movie for all the different genres.
 

Action: Suicide Squad (2016)
A secret government agency recruits some of the most dangerous incarcerated super-villains to form a defensive task force. Their first mission: save the world from the apocalypse.
 

Drama: The Green Mile (1999)
The lives of guards on Death Row are affected by one of their charges: a black man (Michael Clarke Duncan) accused od child murder and rape, yet who has a mysterious gift.
 

Comedy: Shazam! (2019)
A newly fostered young boy in search of his mother instead finds unexpected super powers and soon gains a powerful enemy.
 

Animation: The Mitchell’s Vs. the Machines (2021)
A quirky, dysfunctional family’s road trip is upended when they find themselves in the middle of the robot apocalypse and suddenly become humanity’s unlikeliest last hope.
 

Romance: Anna Karenina (2012)
In the late-19^th-century Russian high society, St. Petersburg aristocrat Anna Karenina (Keira Knightley) enters into a life-changing affair with the dashing Count Alexei Vronsky (Aaron Taylor-Johnson)
 

Horror: Bone Tomahawk (2015)
In the dying days of the old west, an elderly sheriff (Kurt Russell) and his posse set out to rescue their town’s doctor from cannibalistic cave dwellers.
 

Science Fiction: Batman V Superman: Dawn of Justice (2016)
Fearing that the actions of Superman (Henry Cavill) are left unchecked, Batman (Ben Affleck) takes on the Man of Steel, while the world wrestles with what king of a hero it really needs.
 

Crime: Assault on Precinct 13 (2005)
A police sergeant (Ethan Hawke) must rally the cops and prisoners together to protect themselves on New Year’s Eve, just as corrupt policemen surround the station with the intent of killing all to keep their deception in the ranks.
 

Thriller: Wind River (2017)
A veteran hunter (Jeremy Renner) helps an FBI agent (Elisabeth Olsen) investigate the murder of a young woman on a Wyoming Native American reservation.
 

Documentary: Seaspiracy (2021)
Passionate about ocean life, a filmmaker sets out to document the harm that humans do to marine species – and uncovers alarming global corruption.
 

Family: Detective Pikachu (2019)
In a world where people collect Pokémon to do battle, a boy comes across an intelligent talking Pikachu (Ryan Reynolds_ who seeks to be a detective.

 

Movie Review - The Little Things

Director: John Lee Hancock
Genre: Crime/ Thriller/ Drama
Runtime: 128 minutes
Year: 2021
Starring: Denzel Washington, Rami Malek, Jared Leto

Description: Kern County Deputy Sheriff Joe Deacon (Denzel Washington) is sent to Los Angeles for what should have been a quick evidence-gathered assignment. Instead, he becomes embroiled in the search for a serial killer who is terrorizing the city.

Review: The films has a more than interesting main theme, but director John Lee Hancock doesn’t succeed in giving enough space to the obsessive background of especially Denzel Washington’s character. With three Oscar-winning actors, Denzel Washington, Jared Leto and Rami Malek, the expectations are high, but surely not met.
The film opens with a girl being chased in her car and in the dark by an almost classic highway-killer. She just managed to get away, and immediately after that we are introduced to Joe Deacon, a deputy who performs his duties in a small desert town. When his boss orders him to pick up some evidence in Los Angeles, he plans a short day trip to this metropolis a little further west. Once there, everyone seems to know him, although police chief Farris is apparently not so happy about the reunion. After all, Deacon turns out to have been pretty hard-headed years ago, even though he was he most promised detective of Los Angeles before that.
Now that role is for Jim Baxter. Although his search for a serial killer is not as successful as he would’ve wanted. He asks Deacon to come along, when yet another body is found. Because Deacon’s evidence-gathering mission is delayed anyway, he decides to tag along. When at the crime scene Deacon immediately assumes his mysterious profiler posture, then we as viewers already know enough: that Deacon was once a really good cop. But give all those dreams and flashbacks to a previous case, we also know that this case might bring back too many bad memories for him.
The film is okay, but it seems they could have perfected it more. The obsessiveness of Deacon isn’t explored to the fullest and Baxter’s perfectionism and arrogance could’ve been more present. This way, the story also would have made a better impression. Now it all feels half-finished, too many things are missing. Without these three top-notch actors, the film would me mediocre. It’s thanks to Washington, Malek an Leto that this film rises above that.
“The Little Things” feels like a David Fincher movie, without it being one. I think Fincher would have made a very different film with the same actors and story. In terms of atmosphere and cinematography, this film is really strong. But the way this film turned out, was a bit of a disappointment in the end. Such a shame, because for a good portion of the film, the tension definitely grabbed me.

Rating: 3 / 5

90s Movie Review - Boys Don't Cry

Director: Kimberly Peirce
Genre: Drama
Runtime: 118 minutes
Year: 1999
Starring: Hilary Swank, Chloë Sevigny, Peter Sarsgaard, Brendan Sexton III, Alicia Goranson, Jeanetta Arnette

Description: A young man named Brandon Teena (Hilary Swank) navigates love, life, and being transgender in rural Nebraska.

Review: WARNING! THIS REVIEW CONTAINS SPOILERS!
Kimberly Peirce filmed the true-life case of Brandon Teena, a transsexual victim of a blunt crime. She decided to create a gripping contemporary drama, and the decision has since been rewarded with two major Oscar nominations, with one turning into a win.
On December 30^th, 1993, two men in Nebraska shot and killed 21-year-old Teena Brandon. While awaiting gender reassignment surgery, the young woman had for years posed as a man under the name Brandon Teena. With that identity, he had arrived a few months earlier in Falls City, a desolate rural hole populated by poorly educated white Americans trying to scape together and existence far from the American Dream. As a boy, Brandon hung out with his later killers, who, like himself could not boast of a spotless criminal record. When the two unstable men found out Brandon’s true identity by an unfortunate coincidence, a predictable violent reaction ensued, during which he was openly humiliated and then raped. After Brandon reported it to the police, the men decided to silence him for good.  
A case like this, in which brute force was combined with a sensational story about a sex change that had remained undiscovered for years, was of course favorite news for the American media, which then also threw themselves wholeheartedly into the dramatic trial of two perpetrators. One of them acted as the star witness, so that is friend was sentenced to death, while he himself ‘mercifully’ got off with three life sentences.
Originally, Kimberly Peirce’s directorial debut was supposed to be about a woman who impersonated a male spy during the American Civil War. However, while searching for sources on gendered behavior, she stumbled upon the Teena case. It is easy to understand what must have attracted Kimberly Peirce to Brandon’s tragic history. Besides the obvious curiosity about how a girl can survive so long as a man in such a harsh environment, the story offers several leads for a compelling drama, such as Brandon’s struggle with sexual identity and his strong desire to be accepted by the unusual romance that blossomed between Brandon and Lana, the ex-girlfriend of one of Brandon’s later assailants.
As Peirce presents it, this love story contributed to Brandon’s final downfall. As a result, the dramatic love couple resembles a modern Romeo and Juliet, for once thwarted in their passion not by rival families, but by the stupidity and intolerance of backward America. This somewhat romantic approach to the affair is especially well served by Chloë Sevigny’s excellent portrayal of Lana, who manages to transcend the cliché image of “white trash” Americans.
Compared to the subtly restrained Sevigny (only nominated for an Oscar), the acting of Hilary Swank, who won an Academy Award for her role, seems rather forced. I can see why a role like this would have been awarded, because her performance compels admiration. And it's clear Swank has put many hours of research and preparations into her performance. It’s mostly the transformation that Swank went through that makes it great, the performance itself is not that extraordinary.  

Rating: 3/ 5

10s Movie Review - Solace

Director: Afonso Poyart
Genre: Crime/ Drama/ Thriller
Runtime: 101 minutes
Year: 2015
Starring: Anthony Hopkins, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, Abbie Cornish, Colin Farrell, Marley Shelton, Kenny Johnson

Description: Psychic John Clancy (Anthony Hopkins) works with the F.B.I. in order to hunt down a serial killer.

Review: John Clancy is a retired psychic crime analyst. When FBI agent Joe Merriweather and his partner Katherine Cowles are confronted with a series of bizarre murders, Clancy is called in to help solve the case and find a serial killer.
Director Afonso Poyart choose not ta make his thriller a lingering whodunnit and pocuses on the psychological side of events. The tension lies in slowly revealing the killer’s exact motivations. For why is he killing seemingly random people, including a child? And, more importantly for the tension, how do you catch someone who already sees everything coming?
Unfortunately, the director delivers the not-very-original story like a double episode od a mediocre crime series. Clancy’s prophetic vision looks like they were ripped together from music videos and 90s thrillers. Full of shots of angelic girls with hair blowing in the wins and snarling wolves. Not only does the film look dated aesthetically; the biggest annoyance is the very mediocre and old-fashioned action, with the low point being a messy and dully portrayed car chase. With that, the camera work is really bad and it really bugs you at times.
Anthony Hopkins is not to blame, he is strong and his chemistry with Colin Farrell is very nice. Unfortunately their acting skills are embedded in a collection of dull conventions and contrived situations. For example, Joe is called away for a phone call as many as three times in the film, so Clancy and the skeptical Cowles are scooped up with each other. In doing so, the makes probably hoped to recall the masterful scenes between Hopkins and Jody Foster in “The Silence of the Lambs”. Without success.

Rating: 2/ 5

Movie Review - Seaspiracy

Director: Ali Tabrizi
Genre: Documentary
Runtime: 89 minutes
Year: 2021
Starring: Ali Tabrizi, Richard O’Barry, Lucy Tabrizi, Peter Hammarstedt, Paul Watson
 
Description: Passionate about ocean life, a filmmaker sets out to document the harm that humans do to marine species – and uncovers alarming global corruption.

Review: Dolphin hunting in Tajii, illegal fishing boats in Liberian waters and ‘bluewashing’ of products. The environment is being degraded by our global personal consumption, but that is the solution? The documentary “Seaspiracy” shines a light on the plight of the oceans. Its important message is clear and although I knew the basic facts, a lot really shocked me.
The ocean has been a source of inspiration for director Ali Tabrizi since he was a child, which is why his passion project focuses on the eight million tons of plastic that humans sump into the ocean each year. The documentary features haunting footage of whales washing up on the southeast coast of England, with hundreds of pounds of plastic in their stomachs, the degraded undersea habitat, animations of the well-known plastic soup in the North Pacific Ocean and the effect on various fish populations.
Is consumer plastic now the cause of ocean pollution Tabrizi finds that consumers are far from being the biggest contributors to environmental pollution plastic straws make u only 0,03 percent of the plastic in the ocean. The biggest source of pollution is commercial fishing. Over 46 percent of the waste in the ocean is made up of fishing nets. Fishing tackle and fishing gear can be found in stranded whales. But there is more: 40 percent of the catch from fishing vessels is ‘bycatch’, or fish that are not marketable and are thrown back into the sea. Dead. This has shrunk fish populations, slowly making the undersea climate inhospitable. And only 1 percent of the world’s oceans are set aside as reserves where fishing is prohibited, and this should be increased to 40 percent, according to the experts, so that nature (and fisheries) can recover.
Tabrizi points out that labels for sustainable fishing, for example for tuna and other seafood, do not add much. A label ‘guarantees’ that the catch of the fish has not harmed marine mammals such as dolphins or other marine animals. But given the number of fishing boats, it it’s impossible to prove how the fish was caught. In fact, the marine Stewardship Council spends most of its money on licenses for its sustainability label (the recognizable blue MSC mark). A huge conflict of interest to indicate that the products are sustainable.
Tabrizi engages in conversations with a variety of experts, such as dolphin activist Ric O’Barry, journalist George Monbiot, marin biologist Sylvia Earle and Captain of Sea Shepherd Paul Watson. Tabrizi also makes a more personal approach by focusing on himself and his journey and adapting his habits. By doing so he emphasizes individual consume responses to what is actually a global, systemic problem. The core message of “Seaspiracy” is that saving the ocean requires a global effort, in which a political response is vital. And everything is well-translated to the audience.
I already adapted my lifestyle a long time ago, by becoming a vegetarian. Which means I don’t eat any animals. What “Cowspiracy” did for meat, “Seaspiracy” does for seafood. And if you still want to eat fish or visit sea aquariums after watching this, then you really didn’t get the message.

Rating: 4,5 / 5

Movie Review - Nomadland

Director: Chloé Zhao
Genre: Drama
Runtime: 107 minutes
Year: 2020
Starring: Frances McDormand, David Strathairn, Gay DeForest, Patricia Grier, Linda May, Angela Reyes, Carl R. Hughes, Douglas G. Soul, Ryan Aquino, Teresa Buchanan, Karie Lynn McDermott Wilder, Brandy Wilber, Makenzie Etcheverry, Bob Wells, Annette Webb, Rachel Bannon, Charlene Swankie, David Strathairn, Bryce Bedsworth, Sherita Deni Coker
 
Description: A woman in her sixties (Frances McDormand) who, after losing everything in the Great Recession, embarks on a journey through the American West, living as a van-dwelling modern-day nomad.

Review: Director Chloé Zhao has made a picture-perfect film about the tragedy of contemporary America. With six nominations of which three turned into wins, this melancholy road movie along a new economic frontier was the big winner at the 93^rd Academy Awards.
The film has a special sense of immersion. The most beautiful light, just after sunrise or before sunset. It streaks across the past glories of the American landscape. Zhao won an Academy Award for director and also took home the best motion picture award. Lead actress Frances McDormand won for her role as Fern, which makes it her third Academy Award win (previously for “Fargo” and “Three Billboards Outside Ebbing, Missouri”). Fern is a sixty-something from the small industrial town of Empire, Nevada, which is wiped off the map after the economic crash in 2008. Quite literally: the entire zip code area no longer exists several years later. When Fern’s husband subsequently dies, there is nothing that binds Fern to her decaying surroundings. She exchanges her house for a converted van and chooses a nomadic existence in search of work.  
“Nomadland” is an adaptation of Jessica Bruder’s 2017 non-fiction book of the same name. McDormand pitched the book to hao and briefly measured herself against the nomadic lifestyle as well. She spent six months in her own van, traveling through seven American states during the filming of “Nomandland”. It provides a particularly authentic picture of life on the road, in part because the other nomads she encounters are played by non-professional actors  who are interpreting versions of themselves.
Zhao is ultimately looking for the sense of dignity that these homeless Americans try to carry with them as they ride out into the horizon. The images are beautiful, but they do not disguise the unbounded melancholy that accompanies them. The heartbreaking encounters between Fern and the nomads are diligently searching for a sense of belonging. This film also emphasizes that it’s about living with loss and grief. Despite everything, the nomads try to find a sense of pride in the life they now lead, which is perhaps the greatest tragedy of contemporary America: that you have to resign yourself to the fact that poverty will be a part of your identity. Zhao and McDormand try to address a deeper layer by showing that there is much more going on beneath the surface of this new economic frontier. What “Nomadland” does a wonderful job of showing is that this layer only reveals itself if you look for it long and thoroughly enough.
“Nomadland” is a beautiful film, which understandably won big at the Oscars.

Rating: 4,5 / 5