REVIEW: Courageous

I lost a bet, and because of that I have had to watch and review the movie Courageous.  Before I begin and start talking about the movie, I should state that I should have never taken the bet and anyone who is tempted to take a bet when viewing Courageous is on the line should just pack up and walk away.  If it makes you look like a coward, then so be it.

It should be noted that I am a Christian and this is a Christian movie.  That means that I should love it, correct?  Wrong.  I was pretty upset with what I saw in this movie, and I think that comes from the fact that generally faith based movies are not that good.  The production quality is not as solid as main stream movies, and that sure is the case with Courageous.  It felt more like a 'made for TV' affair than it did something that was destined to be on the big screen.

So, is it a budget issue?  Surely that must be the case, you would think.  The production budget of this movie is two million dollars, which answers the question.  It is not the budget.  Blumhouse productions have made movies for that price, as well as many other studios, that look so much better. The only real answer to the question of why this doesn't look like a cinema movie is the fact that there just isn't the attention to detail that most studios put forth.  It is not as bad as the remake of Left Behind, but it isn't much better, either.

The film focuses mostly on four men, with a token hispanic.  This was better race representation than I was expecting from the movie, to be honest.  As well, not all black people are criminals, and not all criminals are black.  That's another positive for this movie.  I have seen other Christian movies and trailers for Christian movies that seem lost when it comes to racial depiction.

These four men, plus the token hispanic, make a pledge to be solid fathers based off of biblical teaching.  There it is.  That's the plot.  It isn't much of one, and the movie sure takes its sweet time in getting there.  I should mention that this movie is over two hours long, and could have probably been a much snappier and poignant film around an hour and a half.  The film adds on scenes of action with no real connection to the story.  It feels like an attempt to make it more marketable and, as much as I like action, since it has nothing to do with the plot then it really shouldn't be in the movie.

When it comes to the spiritual aspect of the movie, there is nothing subtle about this film.  The faith components are heavy handed, ham-fisted, elements that are laid out in a manner that will probably resonate with people of the same belief system, but will most likely not be intriguing to someone outside of it.  There is a scene where one believer tells a non believer about their faith, and there is no back and forth in that moment.  No questions raised by the 'pagan' to get any sort of apologetics or airing out of the big questions surrounding those who may not be Christians.  It is a missed opportunity, and is a reflection of the poor script in general.

The movie was written by Alex and Stephen Kendrick, and it is a script that could have used a lot of culling.  As I mentioned, there were action sequences, though well shot by director Alex Kendrick, that could have been scrapped from the film.  The movie also tries to balance too much with its tale of five men, and could have been simplified.  There is no shortage of expository dialogue, and, as mentioned previously, the elements around spirituality aren't handled with a great deal of ease.

While I am being very tough on this film, it should be mentioned that it is not the most painful experience in the world.  While it doesn't meet the level that it should be aiming for, it is not the biggest miss in the world.  Where it shines are in the aforementioned action sequences, but I have already mentioned that I don't think they should have even been in the film.  The cinematography isn't the worst, and there are a few small performances that hit the mark (it needs to be noted that in general the acting in this movie is serviceable at best).

I have to say that it sucks to be a Christian and have to watch a movie like this.  It could have done such a better job.  I know that it could have.  The problem is in the lack of attention to detail and the fact that just good enough was what it felt like they were aiming for.  I really wish that there was a better pool of faith based movies to reflect what real religion looks like, but that is not the reality.  We are stuck with what we have, and generally that is barely good enough.

Rating - 1.5 out of 4 stars

REVIEW: Jackie

So many times a Hollywood, Oscar-baiting biopic can be drivel.  There are so many tropes and times that overly manipulative music can play, diminishing the content to something that we have seen a thousand times over.  Luckily, Jackie is not one of those types of movies.  It strays from format and is far from your typical, straightforward biopic.

You may think that the movie would focus a great deal on the fate of the infamous motorcade incident, but it doesn't.  There is only a quick shot at one point of JFK getting shot in the head.  There is no attempt to sensationalize the incident and use its popular narrative to drive the story.  Instead, the movie is about the moments and week after the incident, following Jackie Kennedy as she wades through the different emotions that would wreck havoc on a recent widow who is thrown from a place of power to becoming just an average person.

The backbone to the movie is the stunning performance delivered by Natalie Portman, who plays Jackie.  Words cannot describe the depth of emotion that she is able to bring to the character, from having to wipe her husbands blood off her face shortly after the incident, to realizing that she is getting kicked out of the White House and will have to find a place to live.

I could never imagine the horror of seeing my wife killed in front of my eyes, and I could only guess at the disconnect from reality that would happen in the minutes and days afterwards.  Through Portman's performance, and a solid script from Noah Oppenheim, we are witness to the loss that is felt, as well as the fact that there needs to be some strength shown from the woman who instantly became a former first lady.

Director Pablo Larrain uses the camera well to dictate what the audience feels and to surround us with the hopelessness that Jackie Kennedy faces.  There are many shots that follow her around, from either the front or behind, as she wanders around the White House.  This hit home for me, as personal tragedy had me in a spot where I felt like I was just wandering in circles, not knowing what to do with myself.  The production elements that are on display in Jackie captures that feeling incredibly well, making sure the audience is transported into the heart and soul of the grieving main character.

Accompanying all of the solid acting and wonderful camera shots is an atypical score by Mica Levi.  It uses mostly string instruments, and is far from flowing and melodic.  It is sporadic almost in its tones and notes, jolting to go along with the emotional upheaval that the film portrays.  The music sets the tone early in the film, and cascades along with it throughout, never feeling out of place with what we are seeing on the screen.  There is a very good reason why it was nominated for an Oscar.

One thing that I really liked about Jackie was it's powerful use of profanity.  Only two times is the f-word used, but it is impeccably placed and adds a dynamic punch to the proceedings on screen.  Too often it is a through away word that does not seek its rightful home, but in Jackie it is used to perfection.  I know that this seems to be a small thing to be praising, but it really is a powerful tool in this film.

I should also take a moment to talk about the supporting performances in this film.  Peter Sarsgaard plays the role of Bobby Kennedy, something that is no small task.  As well as having to deal with the assassination of JFK, he still has a vital role to play in politics.  He is a man divided between his own personal experience and the continuing job that he must perform.  Another great performance, although it is a small one with limited lines, is Greta Gerwig as Nancy Tuckerman who seems to be a personal assistant to Jackie.  There are only a few scenes between the two, but Portman and Gerwig show a wonderful chemistry with each other and you get a sense of the strength that the relationship holds through the crisis.

What all of these components do in a whole is create an extremely emotional experience.  This is not an inspirational, feel good, movie.  It is an exercise in the brutal, swirling emotions that would follow such a tragedy.  It is a numbing and depressing affair, the exact experience that Larrain would have us take.

Rating - 3.5 out of 4 Stars

REVIEW: The Founder

Biopics are tricky little films.  Done well, they can not only educate, but they can also put you in the mind of a historical figure.  Done poorly, they are tedious and nothing but drivel.  They are also notorious for being Oscar bait, movies that aim to secure a handful of nominations come awards time.  These films come with great highs, and, as well, great lows.

The Founder is the story of Ray Kroc (Micheal Keaton), a struggling salesman who comes across a booming restaurant in southern California called McDonald's.  He is enraptured by the system that the McDonald brothers, Mac (John Carroll Lynch) and Dick (Nick Offerman) have created.  It is something that hasn't been seen before, and instantly Kroc becomes obsessed with this restaurant.  He sees potential in it, and he pressures the McDonald brothers into allowing him to franchise it.

What is interesting about this movie is the fact that it doesn't take any stance on the moral qualities of Ray Kroc.  He is neither hero nor villain.  He just is.  It is up to the viewer to decide where he lands.  The passion for seeing the franchise progress shifts the compass of Kroc, turning him from someone who has just seized an opportunity to someone who will stop at nothing, not only for the success of the franchise, but for his own personal financial well being.

Michael Keaton is wonderful in this role.  We see him at the beginning of the movie, doing a routine sales pitch, and we feel for the guy.  He is not successful.  He is barely a provider.  He is spending all of his time on the road trying to make a living to support him and his wife, who he barely sees.  It is an incredibly sympathetic situation for a character to be in.  It is the morphing of the character over the course of the film that becomes interesting.

Keaton is able to portray minuscule changes in character that shadow the journey from family man to someone who admits he would step on his opponent if they were drowning.  Ever since starring in Birdman, Keaton has been in a resurgence.  Most well known for his portrayal of Batman, he redefined his career and has been better off for it.  His acting has matured a lot since movies like Multiplicity.  He is refined, and able to dig down deep and pull out masterful performances such as in Birdman and Spotlight.  This is just another movie to add to his ledger of outstanding achievements.

One of the refreshing aspects about The Founder is that it doesn't fall prey to the general tropes and trappings of most biopics (mainly a third act tension that is contrived and pulls away from the main narrative).  These sorts of things affected the hugely popular, and I would almost say over-rated, The Imitation Game and The Theory of Everything.  The Founder's script stays tight to the story of Kroc, and dares not deviate from it.

The only odd occurrence in the movie would be the score, done by Carter Burwell.  It feels like something that is more fit for a Hallmark movie than the seedy character study that is portrayed on screen.  I felt that it took away from the moral ambiguity of the character and insisted on an upbeat, positive bent.  It was at odds with what was happening on the screen, and did not seem to be the best choice of music.

That criticism aside, The Founder is a solid biopic that never strays from the original purpose of telling the story of someone who we could either admire or hate.  Depending on your own personal stance, you will have your own opinions of Ray Kroc as portrayed in this movie.  That is the magic of what director John Lee Hancock (Saving Mr. Banks and The Blind Side) has graced us with.  It is the opportunity to see what personal choices must be made to build an empire, and we are left to decide whether or not it was worth it.

Rating - 3.5 out of 4 stars

REVIEW: The Incredible Jessica James

It took a while for it to happen, but I can't shake the feeling that Netflix has finally arrived.  Since it has been focusing on creating original movies for its streaming service, there have been a number of let downs, movies that have seemed to be ready to strike gold but then failed to do so.  Okja, from Joon-ho Bong, appeared to be the first champion on Netflix since Beasts of no Nation, but I would have to say that felt like it was to be expected.  Joon-ho Bong has a solid catalogue of movies under his belt, and it felt like it was going to be a winner regardless.

The movie that has given me the most confidence in the new Netflix model is the recently released The Incredible Jessica James.  This is the film that feels like a perfect depiction of a director's vision come to the screen.  It makes it feel like Netflix could be a destination stop for film-makers with a concept, just like Blumhouse Productions has become.

The reason why I feel this way is that there is an incredible amount of personality and style behind The Incredible Jessica James.  It has heart, character, and emotion.  It follows the standard beats of someone coming off of a long term relationship and trying to find out what love is, but it does this in its own unique way, keeping it from feeling like its contemporaries.

The backbone behind this tight little movie is the lead character, Jessica James (played by Jessica Williams).  It is a performance from Williams that is worth writing home about.  She not just plays the character, but breathes life into her, making her someone who stands out from the typical film.  She adds energy, making Jessica James the type of person on screen that the audience wishes they were in the company of.  It is the type of performance that transcends the screen and works its way into the heart of the viewer, ultimately causing them to wish nothing but the best for her.

This is a very key thing in a movie like this.  Why would I care about aspects of love and life if I don't first fall in love with the person facing those things?  The core of a film such as this is the journey travelled, and with Williams' performance it is a journey that is well had.  We feel the highs and lows of Jessica James as she tries to move on from her life-engrossing relationship with Damon (Lakeith Stanfield) into a less descriptive one with Boone (Chris O'Dowd)

The chemistry between Williams and O'Dowd is truly something to behold.  They fit well together as two people who are on the rebound and don't quite know what it is that they are looking for.  I have long been a fan of the comedic talents of Chris O'Dowd, but here we get some good dramatic acting from him as well.  It was clear from his performance in Bridesmaids that he was capable of it, and in The Incredible Jessica James he pulls through with some perfectly executed scenes.

Jim Strouse, who both wrote and directed the film, shows a great understanding of both pacing and style.  The movie never lingers too long on any one element, moving at a comfortable speed that never feels rushed.  It is also amped up by the choice of music to be its backdrop, pumping energy into the film that feels perfectly suited to the character of Jessica James.

This is one of those movies that starts with a beat and never deviates from it, even when the tone changes.  While the movie takes us through a number of different circumstances and emotions, it never strays from its overall feel.  It is jam packed with personality, great casting, well delivered comedy, and a message about sticking with your dreams.  It could be the sign that Netflix has now become a contender in the movie distribution realm.

Rating - 3.5 out of 4 stars

REVIEW: Snowden

The last Oliver Stone movie I saw was Savages.  It left me feeling unimpressed.  It lacked compelling characters and had a jerky story telling narrative.  It was a long way from the all time classic, Platoon.  That is one of my favourite war movies of all time, and it shows everything that Oliver Stone is capable of as a director and script writer.  It is a haunting tale of a child born of two fathers in war, needing to choose which one to follow.

Going into Snowden, I didn't know which Oliver Stone to expect.  Would it be the one who crafts characters from the ground up, magnifying their struggles, or would it be the more scattershot version that was seen in Savages?  I can luckily say that it was closer to the former than the latter.

Snowden tells the story of Edward Snowden (played by Joseph Gordon-Levitt), a man who needs little introduction.  The movie starts off with his meeting of members of the press and film-maker Laura Poitras (Melissa Leo).  Those meetings are central to the film, as the rest is the backdrop of Snowden's story of trying to get into the military, and then ending up being a contractor for the CIA and NSA.

The real strength of this movie is the acting performance by Gordon-Levitt, whose portrayal of Edward Snowden is spot on.  He is soft spoken, patient, and eager to learn.  He is also driven by a large moral compass, which may end up being the biggest weakness of the film as well.  When Snowden is confronted with examples of government overreach, there is no real inner turmoil as to how to respond.  It is clear that Oliver Stone sees Edward Snowden as a hero, and this is reflected in the script and how the movie is directed.

This is a problem because the leaks brought to us by Edward Snowden have caused a huge debate over privacy and security.  It is something that is still reverberating today, as those discussions continue with governments wanting back doors into encrypted messaging systems.  Well, that's not true.  They know that saying the word 'back door' is going to rile the public against them because of the intense metadata that they had collected before, so they don't use this word.  But, what they are asking for is essentially that.  The point is, the Snowden leaks are something that have forever changed the landscape of the electronic world, and there are valid points to be seen on both sides.  The movie steers clear of properly making justifications without villainizing the characters central to that argument.  The fact that there is an obvious bias towards what Edward Snowden did does take some of the teeth out of this movie, which could have otherwise served as a great piece to continue the existing debate.

That issue aside, this is a really solid film from Stone, who uses pacing, his shots, and the score Craig Armstrong to create tension and make it roll out like a thriller in some points.  There have been some great movies that are able to create this sort of tension without having scenes with chases and violence, and Snowden stands up as one of them.

Central to the story is the relationship between Edward Snowden and his girlfriend, Lindsay Mills (Shailene Woodley).  Woodley's performance is easily one of her best, and it is of vast importance to the success of this movie to get the power of the relationship right.  For Edward Snowden to release the data, he is having to choose between what's best for the public interest, or what's best for him.  To not disclose it means he gets to keep his life with his love, but to disseminate it means to possibly lose out on the relationship, as he would have to flee the United States.

The chemistry between Gordon-Levitt and Woodley is impeccable.  It is easy to accept them as a couple of love birds, and we are introduced to the struggles that they have to get through to make the relationship work long term.  It is a relationship that is easy to accept and cheer for.  Without that, we would not get a full sense of what was at stake when Edward Snowden made his decision to do what he did.

While I am talking about that, I do realize that I have another small issue with the movie.  It never really invites the audience member into the shoes of Edward Snowden and make them ask if they would do the same thing, risking their lives and their relationships.  This is because the character of Edward Snowden, as portrayed in the movie, is a moving vessel that never really stops to allow the audience to climb aboard.

There have been a few things that I have mentioned as being issues with the movie, but those are more things that arrive out of missed opportunities.  This film could have easily been one of the major cinematic talking points of the last few years, but the bias towards Edward Snowden robbed it of being a topic of discussion in coffee shops and class rooms.  For that, you need to check out the documentary Citizenfour.

While there are issues, what is clear about this movie is that it is a solid work of art.  Stone uses all of the techniques in the book, and borrows some from documentary film making (which could create a disjointed experience for some viewers, but I found it to work).  What we are treated with in the end is a piece of cinema that captures the interest of the viewer, and takes them through the unravelling of one of the biggest social revelations of our time, and it is done while being vastly entertaining at the same time.

Rating - 3.5 out of 4 stars

PS - Melissa Leo is fantastic as always.

REVIEW: Sex and the City

It was messed up right from the beginning.  I should never have taken the bet.  I lost, and I am being punished.  For those who do not know, there was a competition on The Movie Breakdown podcast last year, a podcast that I co-host, where we picked movies that we thought would make the most money in their opening weekends.  I lost, and in a big way.  Because of that, I have had to watch and review movies that were picked as punishment.  They included Smurfs 2 and Sex in the City 2.  A third pick fell off of Netflix, so the replacement for that was the original Sex in the City, meaning I got to have another go-around with the girls in New York city.

Seeing Sex in the City 2 was my first outing into this world that was set up during the popular television show.  It was a mess of a movie, as it had almost no plot and it was extremely difficult to identify with the main characters.  They had major first world problems, and not the kind that you and I may bitch and complain about.  The entire crux of the movie was them trying to get to the airport so that they could fly in first class.  It wasn't that they would miss the opportunity to get home and would be stuck in the UAE, but that they would miss out on first class and have to travel like the rest of us.

Perhaps that is the allure of this franchise.  It is soap opera like in that it depicts a life that the normal person cannot attain and presents it in a way that allows for some fantasy through the vicarious living of the characters.  The main character is Carrie (Sarah Jessica Parker), who is a writer, loves nights on the town with her good friends, and is in a relationship with someone named Mr. Big.  I know that is just a nickname for him, but it is rather silly.

All turns to hell when Big doesn't show up for their wedding, casting the illusion of marriage to the ground for Carrie as she struggles to pull herself back together and get her feet underneath her again. The issue of marriage becomes a major theme for the film, as Carrie's friend Miranda (Cynthia Nixon) is going through a divorce.  Another friend, Samantha (Kim Catrall) is in a monogynous relationship and fantasizes about life prior, when sex could be had with anyone.

So, what is director Michael Patrick King saying about the institution of marriage?  Not a whole lot.  He fails to deeply look at it, and keeps a lot of the realities to the surface.  The one character who is not going through a relational transition is Charlotte (Kristin Davis), and, frankly, she offers very little to the conversation.  She is pretty much a useless character, which is unfortunate because Davis' portrayal of her is really well done.

This film, like its sequel, lacks a conventional plot.  It instead tries to create moments between the friends that are the glue to this bloated run-time.  For it's length of two hours and twenty five minutes, it must be said that the film doesn't drag too long on any one scene, and it has a decent pace.  The problem is that the material just isn't incredibly enticing.  It's not boring, it just isn't a journey through human emotions that would come along with upheavals in long term relationships.

The problem is that you are either in with this fantasy of living the high life in New York city, or you are on the outside.  It has the feeling of a members only club.  You are either endeared to the characters already, or you are left on the outside trying to find a way in.  To be honest, they aren't one dimensional characters, but they aren't necessarily captivating, either.

Without a solid plot, this film just takes us from scene to scene, with the only real binding force being the rise to individual freedom of Carrie.  Perhaps this is enough to pacify viewers and keep them engaged.  The script just doesn't bring enough emphasis to this struggle, and the end result is something more out of a fairy tale than the world that has been created by Michael Patrick King.  There have been many other films that I have seen that are worse, but this one does little to justify the immense run time and keep the viewer engaged.

Rating - 2 out of 4 stars

REVIEW: Logan

Logan (Hugh Jackman), AKA the Wolverine, is washed up and an alcoholic.  He makes a meagre living driving a limousine, using the money to save up for a day when he and the aged Professor X (Patrick Stewart) and he could purchase a boat and live on the ocean.  Charle Xavier is in rough shape, no longer a master of his mind, but deteriorating due to age.  The X-Men are long gone, and all that remains are Wolverine, Professor X, and Caliban (Stephan Merchant), a mutant who helps tend to Xavier and whose power is being able to track down other mutants.

It is a far fall from what we have seen before.  It is a more tender and desperate side of Wolverine, as he is staring down his own aging and having a harder time recovering from the wounds that in his youth were overcome by his ability to heal himself.  It is also a more profane Wolverine, as the film sits tightly in its R-rating.  His passion for helping people and fight for justice are gone.  Now it is just a simple mission to take care of the decrepit mentor from his younger days.

Of course, it wouldn't be much of a movie if there wasn't any story line past that.  Through circumstances, the three remaining mutants find themselves having to help out a little girl as she is chased by a clandestine group of armed and relentless fighters.  The girl, Laura (Dafne Keen) is being hunted because she used to be part of a project to grow people with mutant powers to turn them into soldiers.  To survive, she must make it to Canada where her freedom, and freedom for those like her, exists.

Director James Mangold focuses mostly on the character of Logan, and not worrying about making him the shining example of justice and truth that people who generally follow super heroes pray for.  Mangold shows us someone who is selfish, self destructive, and uncaring for anyone other than Professor X.  He is not the typical type of hero, and that is what makes this movie special.  It is more of a character study, as Logan must come to terms as to what is best for people other than himself.

This is not to say that there are no action sequences in this film.  There sure are, but they are measured and used sparingly.  When they happen, they are shot with a steady hand with with great choreography.  The limited use of action makes the hype for the sequences that we do get more anticipated.  We see Wolverine as he truly is, a beast that viciously rips his opponents apart, something that is difficult to do with a PG-13 rating.

The central premise of the film is what would you do, with your limited abilities (because his advanced age has made his abilities limited), to assist someone else for no other reason than for doing what is right.  When would you help out a stranger if that meant that all you had been working for and hoping for was put in jeopardy?

What stands out most about Logan is the fact that it deals with the mortality of the titular character.  This is someone who is no longer invincible, and has to rely more on his character than on what had once made him great.  This is the type of story that I love.  It was present in Iron Man 3 when Tony Stark was without his suit and had to decide if he could still be a hero without it.  It was what made The Dark Knight so emotionally powerful.  When the heroes become mortals and have to make the same choices that the rest of us would have to make.

Did I mention that the action was used sparingly?  This was evident when there was twenty five minutes left in the film and I wasn't stranded in the chaotic 'final battle' that pretty much all super heroes have for their final forty five minutes of run time.  This shows the devotion to story that Mangold has with this film.  Even with little action, it is never a dull movie, as the characters are always on the run, and it is edited to keep a fast pace that never tires.

In the midst of a storm of super hero movies that all feel like they follow the same beats, save for a few, Logan truly is a special entry into the genre.  With great dialogue and outstanding performances across the board, this is a really well constructed film.  The best thing about it, spoiler alert, is that it isn't used to set up any more stories.  It is a self-contained tale that is of itself.  Hugh Jackman was always the Wolverine, and this is a world class send off to his efforts for this popular character.

Rating - 3.5 out of four stars

Saying Farewell To A Good Time

Two days ago, it was a simple walk to the library.  The day was warm, but not too hot.  There was a gentile breeze flowing through the air that made it absolutely perfect outside.  Hand in hand, my wife and I headed out the door only to discover that the library was closed on Mondays.  A waste of a trip, it would seem.

Not so.  There is a lovely park in Haliburton, right beside the library.  It was the middle of the work day, so not many people were around.  That's great news for an agoraphobe like myself.  The main thing I wanted to do was head back home, but time with my wife on a walk is a good thing, so I decided to push myself and take the seemingly harmless stroll around the quaint little slice of heaven.

The entire walk was spent just trying to mumble my way through conversation as I tried to keep my emotions in check.  I was terrified.  The simple jaunt around the park turned into a mental battle as I fought to keep from losing control and breaking down into tears.  In the end, I was able to muster through it and make it back home.

Once getting through the door, I had a full on panic attack that lasted a long time.  It happened because I pushed myself to do something that normal people do, and that was to be out in public.  It wasn't until around midnight that I settled down and felt 'normal' again.

Anxiety and the fear of being outside are something that I have dealt with for years.  In that time, I have been on a number of different medications, seen multiple counsellors, and feel as though I have made no progress.  It is easy to feel unique and alone in such circumstances, as though there is something terribly wrong with you that nobody else can, or ever will be able to, understand.

One of the best things that happened because of my mental health struggles was the Mind Matters podcast, where Deane Proctor and I got together and were able to share what we, as well as a number of other people, are forced to go through.  It was great to have those conversations, and a privilege to share them with others as we did what we could to battle the stigma around mental health.

I still think I am nuts, but that's another story.

Through the podcast, there was a feeling of connectedness to the audience, speaking to people who may have felt as alone in their struggles as we did.  It was a way to talk about the difficulties of dealing with these issues from within the church, a place where the norm seems to be showing up on Sundays, wearing your best smiles, and pretending that life is good and grand.

The reality is that life isn't always good and grand.  For some of us, each minute of each day isn't good and grand.  We take the sunshine when we get it, but for the most part it feels like we are in a perpetual state of cloud cover and rain.  It is hard to exist in the superficial facade of the Sunday morning service.  And when you do open up and become vulnerable, there are many 'pray it away' solutions offered.  Of course I have tried prayer.  Humans are notorious for praying when things rough.  The simplistic pat answers that people would give makes me, and numerous other people, weary of sharing such struggles in the church.  I wait for the day that a church member tells someone seriously to 'pray away' male pattern baldness.

The benefit of opening up, however, came with the realization that there are other people in the church community like me.  Other closet sufferers who feel alone.  And that was what the podcast was all about.  Providing a place where we could have support and be together in our messiness.  Mind Matters assisted me in my ways of thinking through the subject, forced vulnerability, and gave me motivation.

This week, the decision was mutually made to end the podcast.  It is unfortunate, because of all of the good that it did myself and the way that it was able to be a connection for others.  The fact is that the conversation isn't done (it's far from over), but that our voices in this format had run their course.  We had done what we could, we carried the baton, and both Deane and I will continue to, just not in this format any more.

The hope is that our run with the podcast has encouraged people to be bold and know that they are not alone.  That there is nothing more wrong with them than there is anyone else.  Everybody has issues, ours are just of a stigmatized matter.  With any luck, there may be a few listeners who have decided to share their stories and were able to impact others.  That's the real hope, and one of the goals of what we set out to do.  We were always just a small part of the conversation, and we hope that you will be too.

Box Office Predictions: 'The Mummy' 'Megan Leavey' and 'It Comes At Night'

There are three new entrants to the box office this weekend, and each of them are looking to grab the attention of the movie going crowds.  The big question is if any of them will be able to topple Wonder Woman from first place in the box office.

The movie with the best chances of doing that is The Mummy.  It stars Tom Cruise, and is positioned as a big budget blockbuster.  Special effects, sequences of Mr. Cruise running... this movie would like to believe that it has it all.  There are great expectations mounted on this film, as it is the kick off to Universal's Dark Universe, something that I wrote about recently on the blog.  The expectations aren't just that it will succeed as a movie, but that it will create a launching pad for an entire franchise.

Those expectations are not looking so good at this point.  Currently it has a sour 18% on Rotten Tomatoes, a sign that it could be in some trouble.  To get some comparison here, I am going to look at another Tom Cruise movie that was also an established property, Jack Reacher: Never Go Back.  It had 37% on Rotten Tomatoes and opened up at only $22 million.  Cruise is a recognizable name, that's for sure, but people more generally like to see him in good movies.  Having the name alone doesn't do much.

At the time of writing this, The Mummy has just shy of 15,000 tweets for the day.  Last week at this time, Wonder Woman had well over 130,000 before opening to $105 million.  What is not looking good for The Mummy is that the positive to negative ratio of tweets stands at 3:1.  That's not good at all for a movie that is expected to launch an entire cinematic universe.  Two days ago, that ratio was 2:1.

Probably the most terrifying indicator is the fact that, according to Rotten Tomatoes, only 51% of the audience enjoyed the film.  In an age where word of mouth springs forth as fast as it takes to type something onto your phone, this could be the death of the movie.  There is a chance that there are those that are determined to see the film based off of the recognition of the property, but there are too many signs that people sitting on the fence are going to be staying home.

The Mummy Opening Weekend Prediction - $28 million

Coming from studio A24, is It Comes At Night.  This is a horror film, and this genre has shown in the past that there is room during the summer for horrors to do well.  The trailers make it look like it could be a great film, and the critical reception has been solid.  It currently holds 85% on Rotten Tomatoes, which is something special for a horror film.

The down side is that it hasn't been doing well on social media.  Well, that's difficult to say.  According to boxoffice.com, it is tracking ahead of The Gift on Facebook, yet below The Witch.  This makes it difficult to get an understanding of just how much social media is indicating the performance of this movie.  One Twitter, it has over three thousand tweets for the day, and is sitting at the same 3:1 ratio as The Mummy.  While the critics are on board for this film, Rotten Tomatoes has the audience rating at 52%.

It Comes At Night Opening Weekend Prediction - $8 million

Lastly, we have Megan Leavey starring Kate Mara.  It is being distributed by Bleeker Street, and is opening in just shy of two thousand theatres.  This is a war story that involves a dog, so it could appeal to animal lovers.  They showed that they will go out to theatres with A Dog's Purpose, which opened to a healthy $18 million.  The fact that there are solid reviews (currently at 77% on Rotten Tomatoes) should help this movie out of the gates.

The big question to be asked is if Kate Mara is enough of a star to carry a movie.  Last year, Morgan, opened to only $2 million.  It is currently the ninth worst opening all time for a movie opening in two thousand or more theatres.  Now, these movies are in different genres and there are a number of differing circumstances, but the fact remains that Mara just isn't much of a star yet, even though she is incredibly talented.

Megan Leaves Opening Weekend Prediction - $3 million

Dark Universe: A Board Room Idea That Should Have Stayed There

Opening this upcoming weekend in theatres is The Mummy, hitting four thousand theatres across the United States and Canada.  There is nothing wrong with that.  Why not have a movie about a mummy?  It has been a number of years since Brendan Fraser fought the ancient creature in what was a camp-filled action adventure.  Studios are continuously re-trying cinematic outings, so why not try it again?

It is easy to see that 1999's outing was a success.  It was the eighth highest domestic movie of the year, and scored the third highest opening weekend of 1999 with $43 million, coming in behind Austin Powers: The Spy Who Shagged Me and Star Wars: Episode One - The Phantom Menace.  It spawned a series of movies, one of which (The Scorpion King) is regarded by some to be the launching of Dwayne Johnson's career.  When other properties have been re-created over a shorter period of time, it is not hard to believe that Universal would be looking to do with with The Mummy.

The problem here though is that this is not just the launch of a re-visited movie.  It is the launch of what my podcast co-host, Christopher Spicer, calls a marketing pitch.  Just imagine a corporate board room.  The challenge laid ahead of the suits is to come up with an idea for making money.  One person brings up the idea of bringing back movies from seventy years ago, and they swoon over the idea.  They give the concept an idea and go to the boss with the pitch.  The boss then says for them to take the pitch right to the public.  Not the product, but the pitch.

This is what seems to have happened with Universal's Dark Universe.  It is all about taking the likes of the Bride of Frankenstein, Phantom of the Opera, the Invisible Man, and others into movies and combining them to make a shared universe.  Hey, a shared universe worked for one studio, so why not grab onto properties and make another one?

There are some who may have seen the trailer for the Dark Universe and got excited about it.  However, this is something that should be approached with great skepticism.  That board room pitch just got sold to us when it should have stayed within the company.  People don't care about marketing ideas, they care about movies.  First and foremost should be the idea of selling films to the public, not selling people a marketing ploy.

The timing for this is questionable.  They launched the Dark Universe, along with its own website, ahead of the release of The Mummy.  I honestly think this was a poor decision.  What happens if, and it is quite possible, the film is a bomb?  At the time of writing this, not a single critic on Rotten Tomatoes has seen the movie.  Holding off on critical screenings is sometimes the sign that a movie is not that good.  If they don't have faith in this movie standing up to the critics, why go ahead with marketing the Dark Universe right away.  That being said, it still is Tuesday, so there are a few more nights to go that they could get advanced screenings in.

This is a realm that they have tried to enter already.  Dracula Untold was seen to be the first movie in the recreation of the old Universal Monsters.  That movie, however, was a bit of a dud.  It didn't do well with the critics (getting only 23% on Rotten Tomatoes), and it wasn't gobbled up by movie goers.  It made $23 million its opening weekend, and topped out domestically at $56 million.  Universal had to rely heavily on the international box office to recoup money for this movie.  All of a sudden the talk was that this wasn't meant to kick off the shared universe between Universal monsters.  Instead, the studio would put that hope into the 2017 re-envisioning of The Mummy.

On the bright side, The Mummy does have Tom Cruise in it.  That will help its chances, but as we saw with the $23 million opening of the Dwayne Johnson starring Baywatch and the similar opening of Cruise's latest, Jack Reacher: Never Go Back, big stars aren't the drawing power that they once were. Having a mega-star in a film does not mean that it is going to do well, and against a budget of $125 million, The Mummy will have to do a lot better than Jack Reacher did to make it worth while.  It most likely will, but right now it is tracking for an opening below $40 million, which would mean that, once again, Universal will have to hope on the overseas markets to make the movie profitable.

What Universal should be looking at, instead of any and all reasons to create a shared universe, is the properties that they can bring to the table.  Just because you have something that can be intertwined doesn't mean that it is going to succeed.  Forcing an entrance into a shared universe is not an easy task, as Warner Bros is figuring out with their DC properties.

Universal recently tried to bring back The Wolfman.  Did they do this because they had a unique idea that pushed the concept forward or because it was a recognizable character?  I don't know the answer to that.  I do know the end result.  It opened to $31 million, made a domestic total of near $62 million, and saw a global take of $139 million.  It was a massive disappointment, as the production budget alone was $150 million.  It was a resounding loss for Universal, and perhaps this is what they should be paying attention to right now.

It could be that the creatures that fascinated audiences in the past just aren't compatible for modern movie watchers.  We have seen it before, we have been there and done that.  There are lots of risks to bringing back old properties.  It had better start off with a good story idea, because people won't go and see a movie just because it is recognizable.  The same goes for a marketing strategy.  Basing something solely off of the fact that people can recognize properties means nothing.  There needs to be something to compel people to go to the theatre to see them.

It will be interesting to see how The Mummy does.  I am a firm believer in believing that a story should be told because there is a creative idea behind it, not a marketing pitch.  What works in the board room should stay in the board room.  Don't sell pitches to the audience, sell inspired movies.  This obsession with having a shared universe is not a solid starting point for making movies.  This is a prime example of the business side of the industry, the side that doesn't think about stories but rather thinks about profits.  If that's where they are coming from, that's alright and more power to them.  The signs just aren't there that profits are what they will be seeing with this endeavour.

REVIEW: Handsome: A Netflix Mystery Movie

I am having a difficult time formulating my thoughts around Handsome: A Netlflix Mystery Movie.  It is created as a comedic parody, and runs like a murder mystery.  It is about Gene Handsome, a detective who lives alone with his dog.  Handsome is good at what he does, near retirement, and instructs up and coming detectives about how to do the job.  When a murder occurs, we get to see Handsome put his skills to the test as he sorts through the clues to find out who did it.

It is not like a modern day mystery film, as it reveals its murderer to the audience in a wall-breaking scene at the beginning.  So, what are we left with as the audience?  There is no mystery for us to solve, and we are left with needing to be entertained by the good detective to keep our own interest in play.

The movie runs more like an older television murder mystery show than it does a proper movie.  I haven't watched a lot of those older television shows, so perhaps this movie went right over my head. It could be that this is a deliciously entertaining movie that hits all of the beats and plays with them in a fun way.  I wouldn't know, though.  So, as it is, I must look at it for what it brought to the table for me.

The comedy, and there is plenty of it, carries most of the weight of the movie.  Having said that, this is not as clever in wit as I would have expected from Jeff Garlin, who I have loved since I first saw him in Curb Your Enthusiasm.  The man can deliver the goods, but there is just not a lot to deliver in this movie.  Garlin co-wrote the script with Andrea Seigel, and he directs it as well.  The jokes of the movie can go from broad to lazy, but they never fall into the realm of complete stupidity that you would get from a lot of modern comedies.  This makes it bearable, and there are times that I laughed, although those times were few and far between.

So, if the comedy isn't that outstanding, where does that leave the detective plot?  As I mentioned, the murderer is revealed right away, so there is a great deal of strength that is needed from the policing and investigating side of things to make this story work.  The murder victim is the baby-sitter for a new neighbour of Handsome's, so this one has him working close to home.  There is a nice element about this, because it brings him into contact with his neighbour Nora (Christine Woods).  The two share some moments together where we get to see the unguarded side of Gene Handsome.  Not that he is a particularly guarded individual, but it is a look into his life and where he ended up.

This is key to the success of Handsome: A Netflix Murder Mystery.  We need to identify with the main character, or else it all goes down the toilet.  With the fun of solving the mystery out of the audience's hands, there needs to be something for us to hold onto, and unfortunately the laughs are not enough.  We need to be glued to the protagonist in this one.  They try hard for that, and it is met with some success.  Unfortunately, there is just not enough here to completely grab on to.  The character is likeable enough, and there is some depth to him, but it wasn't the kind of character that really stands out.

It really is a shame, because Garlin is incredibly talented and there are moments in the movie where it shows he is really skilled as a director.  It is just not a complete package, though.  It is far too inconsistent in its delivery.  If you are up for a murder mystery that takes all of the fun out of it, this one may be for you.  For me, I will reserve my full judgement until I see another offering from Garland, believing in the meanwhile that he is capable of more than this.

Box Office Predictions: 'Wonder Woman' and 'Captain Underpants'

I find myself in a very tricky position this week.  Wonder Woman has finally come, and with that there are a number of factors that must be weighed in to get an understanding of where it might fall in the box office.  I liked last weekend better.  It was much more straight forward, and it was easy to get my mind around possibilities for the wide releases.  This is the part of predicting that sucks.  Writing away and having no clue of what the end result will be until it is time to type it.

Before I get to the positives around Wonder Woman, I should start off with the elephant in the room.  That is the Warner Bros' DC shared universe.  This collection of movies (which so far has three entries) is far from organic.  It is forced, and the films have reflected that.  They have not been solid entities and have seen huge diminishes in their first to second week earnings.  Warner Bros should be a little scared.  They are very obviously attempting to mirror Marvel, but Marvel went about it in a different way.  They made singular movies and then strung them together for The Avengers.  It was a process that was a lot more free-flowing than this attempt to play catch up.

The big question is, has the quality of the previous DC movies caused fans to be cautious of Wonder Woman?  I think it has.  There are die-hard fanboys that would think this is not the case, but history has shown that the quality of films catch up on the creators and that good will is not unending.  Zack Snyder's bleak version of the Superman movies was something that Suicide Squad tried to break free from, and yet those attempts couldn't save it from falling 67% into its second weekend.  The die may have already been cast on this shared universe attempt, and people may very well be staying away from this latest film.

That being said, the previous movies did not have the same sort of acclaim heading into their debuts.  Sadly, this is the first 'fresh' DC movie on Rotten Tomatoes since the attempt to create the shared universe.  What Wonder Woman appears to have going for it is that it is actually a good movie and not just something that is created to make more films off of.  Currently it is sitting at 92% on Rotten Tomatoes.  This is sure to help ease the concerns of audience members that have already been burned by DC and Warner Bros.  While it may not have the biggest impact on the film's opening weekend, it is sure to help its longevity in the box office.

While critical reviews have proven to not be a solid indicator of how a superhero movie will do, I will now turn to what is probably the most telling indicator of the excitement around Wonder Woman.  Currently, for Thursday, June 1st, there have been 139,775 tweets about this movie.  That is a lot of energy to be circulating around a film.  It is a sign that there could be a lot of hunger towards a movie that centres around a female protagonist.  It is these Twitter numbers that show we could have a break out hit on our hands.  While the studio is anticipating an opening weekend of $70-75 million, this could prove to be ultra-conservative, and I see Wonder Woman performing a lot better than that.

Wonder Woman Opening Weekend Prediction - $115 million

Opening up alongside of Wonder Woman is Fox's Captain Underpants: The First Epic Movie.  It will have a bit of franchise appeal to those who are familiar with the books, and its hope is to capitalize on the recent lack of animated family fare to attract new fans.  The last animated film in theatres was Smurfs: The Lost Village on April 7.  This is a long time to go between family films, and the drought may be on the side of Captain Underpants here.

The unfortunate thing for Mr. Underpants is that there are a few highly anticipated animated movies soon to hit theatres.  In two weeks we have Cars 3, and then two weekends after that it is Despicable Me 3.  It could be the case that there are families that are waiting for those two films to come out.  Taking a family out to the theatre is no cheap activity, and viewers may be watching their wallets for the more recognizable names later in the month.

While activity on Flixster has been comparable to where The Boss Baby was leading into its opening weekend, other indicators are not there to prove that it will be as popular.  To give you an example of what I mean, The Boss Baby has over 1.3 million likes on Facebook.  Captain Underpants, on the other hand, has only 66 thousand.  That is quite the difference, and it shows that this film is in for a healthy, yet not overly impressive, opening weekend.

Captain Underpants Opening Weekend Prediction - $35 million

REVIEW: Get Out

A normal and happy birthday for me are the simple things in life.  Getting up, having a coffee, and at some point in the day indulging in pop and chips.  This year it was a great birthday.  I got my coffee.  I got a massive plate of nachos.  I got my pop.  All wonderful stuff for a guy who enjoys such things. On top of all of that, my podcast co-host and good friend, Christopher Spicer, got me Get Out.  As a fan of horror films, I was greatly anticipating seeing this film that I had missed out on, and the present was a perfect fit for me and my likings.

Horror movies have seen a creative resurgence in recent years.  It was films like It Follows and The Babadook that made waves in the independent scene.  It seemed to spark something that caught on.  Last year, on the mainstream level, we had solid entrances in The Shallows, Lights Out, and Don't Breathe.  I am sure I am missing some in there.  Oh yes, the Ouija sequel.  I would hate to leave that one off the list.

One of the champions of this horror resurgence is Blumhouse Productions.  It allows, on a micro-budget, film makers to bring their high concept ideas and see them fulfilled without having to worry about studio meddling.  It is from this company that we receive Get Out, a film that is written and directed by Jordan Peele.  People would be right not to immediately think of horror when they hear the name of this comedian, but he shows through the film that this is something that he has a very good sense of creating and executing.

The story focuses on Chris (Daniel Kaluuya) who is going to be spending the weekend meeting his girlfriend Rose's (Allison Williams) family.  There is some tension around this because he is black and she is white, and he doesn't know how the family will respond to the situation.  As it turns out, they are rather welcoming of him.  Her father Dean (Bradley Whitford) and mother Missy (Catherine Keener) welcome him into their home.  He is part of the family, and yet there is something that isn't sitting quite right.

That feeling of something being off follows him around, as all of the other black people he meets are acting rather strangely.  Peele makes it very obvious that something isn't right.  He plays with the subtle sense of racism without ever completely making the film about it.  The situation is obvious to Chris, but not to those around him, who act as though there is nothing out of the ordinary.

Get Out is most certainly a slow building horror film.  It takes a while for things to start happening, but that does not mean that it is stale and un-entertaining.  There are a few minor jump scares thrown in during the build, and I must admit that they got me.  This is because everything in the first act of the film is subtle.  There was no ominous music, no stranger harbingers that are met along the way, or any of the other numerous tropes in horror that are used to keep the viewers interested and engaged.  Peele is able to keep the audience engaged through solid script writing and a cast that are more than up to the challenge of their roles.

The casting may very well be one of the strongest points of the movie.  Everyone is natural in their roles and delivers their lines with a natural air that makes the dialogue flow freely in a way that would in real life.  Whitford and Keener are perfect as the parents.  They are two talents that I always get excited about seeing, and for some reason they are never in nearly enough roles.  They show why that should not be the case in Get Out.  Kaluuya is wonderful in his portrayal of Chris.  It is so easy to become invested in his caring and easy going nature.  It would be great if this was a 'star making' performance for him.  He shows on the screen that he is capable of a number of emotions without ever looking out of place or robotic.

Perhaps what I liked the most about Get Out is that it was just a really well told tale.  There are some horrors that I enjoy that aren't nearly as well told.  It is the ones that are crafted like a good camp fire story that endure.  They may have their faults and may not be classics, but they are entertaining from beginning to end.  A person who is really good at that is Mike Flanagan, and Get Out fits that same feel and mould.

Of course, coming along with Jordan Peele is guaranteed to be comedy.  It is perfectly woven into the movie, and never feels jarring and doesn't take us so far out of the moment that it is difficult to get us back into it.  Lil Rel Howery brings the majority of the laughs.  He plays Rod, the best friend of Chris.  Howery is just another example of the perfect casting of this film.  The funny parts are never outlandish.  That can be the downfall of some films that try to use humour to bridge moments of emotion and tension.  Peele's script shows a fine-tuned knowledge of what to use, when to use it, and how much of it should be used.

I am not going to be arguing that this film is an all time classic.  I don't think it is, but that doesn't mean that it is any less special or significant.  What it is is a balanced, hand crafted piece of art that entertains for the entire run time and brings the audience into the experience.  Really, can anything more be asked of a movie?  There are so many films that entertain, but that don't accept the audience fully in on the journey.  Get Out is strong in this manner, as I was rooting for the protagonist from first introduction to final scene.  The run time flew by.  I had some jumps, I had some laughs, and I was glued to the screen.  Who cares if it won't be remembered alongside films like The Exorcist?  Get Out is horror escapism done with a knowledgeable hand, and for that reason I am sure that I will be seeing it time and time again.

Rating - 3.5 out of 4 stars

REVIEW: Sin City

Visiting films from the past that you have not seen before can be a lot of fun.  However, it is very hard to view the movie in the right light.  Things change in cinema, and what may have been ground breaking at one point in time can be tired and old in the current climate.  It is difficult to put on the glasses of proper perspective and see a movie for what it was when it first hit theatres.

This is the challenge with Sin City.  It is a highly stylized and visually driven movie that holds onto breath with its own personal mode.  It is based off of the graphic novels of the same name by Frank Miller, and the whole nature of the movie is to throw away the normal cinema experience and bring the audience into the world of the graphic novels.  At the time of its release, it truly was a unique and different experience to behold as it set itself apart from mainstream fare.

It is the visual style of the movie that makes the most impact on the viewer.  Yes, it is also propelled by an insane amount of violence, but there have been gratuitously violent movies in the past, so nothing completely new here.  It is the way that it does it that sets it apart.  Mostly portrayed in black and white, Sin City is garnished with the feel of hand drawn frames straight from paper.  This is not only done by way of the visceral, but through the choreography of the sequences.  It defies gravity and logic, spelling out in a way that harkens back to the page flipping action of comic books.

It truly is a feast for the eyes, that is for sure.  It is not to the point of the extreme, though.  There are movies where you can watch it once and then want to view it immediately a second time to catch everything that happens in the background.  Those are the truly amazing visual films.  Movies like Mad Max: Fury Road and The LEGO Movie come to mind.  Those are at a standard where watching the complexities of the entire visual scope is a task within itself.  While Sin City is good, it is not quite at the level of those movies, or a Zootopia.

Guiding the film is a very noir and dated dialogue, headed up by cliche ridden narration.  While that could sound like a criticism, it is actually a positive of the movie.  I rather enjoyed the throw back language and the clunky conversations that are spewed forth.  It is part of the charm of the movie.  It is from a different era, one that fuses different generations into one fantastical location called Basin City.  There was a lot of fun to be had through the dialogue, as well trodden as it may have been.

Directing the movie is Robert Rodriguez and Frank Miller.  I am a general fan of Rodriguez, as I really enjoy his knowledge of film and his unpolished style.  El Mariachi is a favourite of mine.  The man has the ability to take an idea and put a personal spin on it and throw in call backs to cinema past.  I felt a lot of that while watching Sin City.  You can really get a feel for what Rodriguez is doing here, dashed in amongst the stylings of Miller.

I cannot speak too deeply into the directing talents of Frank Miller.  Well, I suppose that's not true.  I have seen two of the three movies that he has directing credits in, those being the two Sin City films.  While the first movie feels fresh and alive, the second felt like generic stylized cinema, something that could have come out of any film school or shot by anyone.  There was no personality and spice to it.  It wasn't a horrible movie, but it was by no means a standout affair.

And hey, Quentin Tarantino gets a guest director credit in there.  The nice thing about Sin City is that you cannot completely tell where the influences of Tarantino come into play.  There are times where a hand or head flops off that could be guided by him, but it is not clear.  Hell, it isn't clear at all who is directing what, and that is a good thing for a movie with multiple helmers.  You don't want it to feel disjointed and sense a change of styles throughout the film.

While the film boasts a wide an varied cast (from Bruce Willis to Alexis Bledel), they are not the standouts of the movie.  The acting is far from the centre piece.  It is probably the most cut rate it could possibly get away with being.  I am pretty sure that this is intentional, but it did not add anything to the movie by being a blandly performed film.  Any of the characters could have been traded out for another actor and it would not have made really any difference.  There is no individual stamp of excellence that holds up in this movie.

I suppose that's part of the problem of this movie.  While it exceeds in some areas, it is nothing special in others.  I can't help but think of how much more vibrant it would have been if there was more energy from the talents in front of the camera.  Sin City definitely stands as a ground breaking movie, and one with a distinct voice.  That does not mean that it stands as an all time classic, which is too bad, because it could have been.

Rating - 3 out of 4 stars

Some Thoughts on Before Midnight

I have now seen Richard Linklater's Before Midnight in the context in which it was meant.  It is a film that I have seen before and reviewed, giving it the much coveted four stars.  This was without much knowledge of the history of Jesse (Ethan Hawke) and Celine (Julie Delpy).  It is just a good movie, and there is no way around that.  It is much different, and yet a lot of the same, as the first two movies.

One way in which it is different, is that it envelopes the directing style of the first two film's unique setup and mashes them together.  We get the long takes that we were treated with in the second film, along side the edited and condensed feeling of the first movie.  While music has been mostly absent, and yet crucial, to the series, we finally have a movie here with a score, courtesy of Graham Reynolds.  And, like the first two films, it has its themes set in love, but this time it takes it to a whole new level.

Love in a spontaneous instant, the thrill of the moment and surrendering to the magical escapism of 'what could have been' is what the first movie is all about.  It is seizing the moment, living in the day, and having the understanding that you did something that you could have very well regretted for every single day of your life afterwards.  It is beauty in youth.  It is the acceptance of the finite, and whether or not having what will be eventually lost was worth what life would have been like having never taken the chance.

That is the first film in a nutshell.  It is told with such boldness, naivety, and extremes.  It is the formation of the Hollywood Prince and Princess story, but with much more realistic and down to earth characters.  This is the version of passion and romance that is tried and true, and it is overly done in so many films.  The magic of love, the palpitations of it.  It is the bended knee and the magical night that will forever be remembered.

In the second movie, love is viewed differently.  It is overcast with regret of what could have been.  Even though these are characters that took a chance, they are characters who are paying for it.  They have been branded permanently by their decision to follow spontaneity and their hearts.  Their concepts of relationships are forever changed, as their formative years experienced a connection that would surely mould the future for anyone.  What they are left with, after the romance, is a view of relationships that are opposite each other.  No longer is it the dreamy visage of someone swooping in with flowers and charm.  It is something much different than that for each character.

And then we have the version of love that is found in Before Midnight.  It is the version of love that books are not written about.  It is the version of love that children are not warned of.  It is the version of love that destroys relationships and causes divorce.  It is the true version of a committed relationship, the hardships that come along with it, and the pain that it would take to see things through.

Linklater does not hold back at all in Before Midnight.  This is not a date movie.  It is not the fantasy that would carry a Sandra Bullock or a Julia Roberts.  There is no Prince Charming.  There is no magic kiss.  There are only two people who have been together for nine years, and the fact that they are comfortable with each other, the force that unleashes the bridles of the mouth and can cause instant pain and regret of words.

It is serious stuff.  We are with a couple on what could easily be the very last night of their once romantic relationship.  We learn that just as guns can be used for promoting either peace or war, so can the mouth.  When you have been with someone for a long period of time, there is a lot that can go unsaid.  It doesn't mean that those things vanish.  They remain, and they build up over time.  All it takes is a breaking of the seal to unleash all of those thoughts, fears, and regrets from the past.

The point of this movie is to show what happens when the romance is gone.  When what you are left with is the decayed sense of butterflies in the stomach, yearning for them to reappear and resigning yourself to the fact that they may be gone for good.  This is love.  It is not packaged in a heart-shaped box, nor is it delivered with roses.  It comes with the devastating knowledge that the honeymoon is over and what you are left with is being paired up with a fallible human being.  This is not what sells tickets on Valentine's Day, but it is what people all over the world truly live with.

This vision of love shows the pain, sacrifice, and work that need to go along with keeping it together and working.  One might ask, why bother making it work if it takes so much energy?  Well, the fact of the matter is that if you leave it behind, you are leaving behind all of the good things that come along with it.  Linklater is keen to show those elements as well, in scenes where Celine and Jesse talk back and forth about life as they walk from their host home to a hotel where they will be spending the night without the kids.  Linklater shows that those moments are the ones that make it worth while, and he points out that they are worth fighting over.

When it is easy to allow something to die, it is difficult to fight for its life.  That is what the main characters must do, or choose is worthwhile, in order for them to have love.  Once again, this isn't portrayed as the type of love that appears on romantic cards, but one that is rooted in knowledge of another person.  It sounds boring, but that is the essence of it.

It is impossible to believe that the feeling of butterflies will always exist.  That you will constantly be swept off of your feet by someone for the rest of your life.  That is the version of relationships that we are sold by mass media, and it is that version of love (and the endless pursuit of that love) that can cause people to fade apart and never be truly happy.  Love is support, but it is also pain.

That pain can hurt the most when you are staring down the barrel a doomed relationship, or at least what may seem that way.  The script, written by Linklater, Hawke, and Delpy, shows the reality of properly dealing with that hurt.  It is what has kept my marriage together, and it is what keeps many together.  That is not giving up.  Just when things seem like they are at their worst, one must let pride stand aside and make another effort.  It can feel the equivalent of conceding that you were wrong, but love shouldn't take score of who was right and who wasn't.  Love should take a second to take a deep breath, compose yourself, and do what you can to get through the maelstrom, even if it means more hurt.

That is the love that is on display in Before Midnight, and it is that love that should resinate with viewers more than Runaway Bride.

Box Office Predictions: 'Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales' and 'Baywatch'

There is a saying, 'better late than never.'  This must have been concocted by someone who had a notorious time being on schedule for things.  There is some truth to the saying, so I will stand by it.  While my predictions piece should have been written yesterday, there is no time like the present to make up for my lack of motivation.

The main draw this weekend is Johnny Depp returning as Captain Jack Sparrow, in Disney's Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales.  There is a lot of love for this character, and that excitement for a return could very well turn into box office dollars.  This is something that I would love to see as I picked it as part of my pool for the summer blockbuster contest held on The Movie Breakdown Podcast.  I want people to remember the charm and mesmerizing performance of Depp, pay no attention to the last Pirates movie, pay no attention to Rotten Tomatoes, and go out to see this film during its opening weekend.

However, that plea may be falling on deaf ears.  There is a very real and thriving beast in the movie landscape, and that creature is known as franchise fatigue.  It strikes its tentacles at almost everything in sight, bringing down returns with each successive outing of a property.  There are some exceptions.  The second Hunger Games performed better than the first.  Most notably is the Iron Man franchise, where each film outdid the previous, at least as far as opening weekends went.

I am doubtful that we will see that happening here.  The first three Pirates movies each made more than the previous (both in opening weekend and domestic grosses), but there was a significant drop with the first film outside of the trilogy, On Stranger Tides.  It opened to $90 million, compared to the $135 million opening weekend of Dead Man's Chest five years prior.  Once again, we have a solid lapse between instalments, and I cannot help but think that the curse of the drop is going to live strong here as well.  They are bringing back Orlando Bloom and Keira Knightley to reprise their old roles, but has too much harm already been done to render this moot?

I think so.  The film mainly relies on the role of Johnny Depp and his ability to draw in quirky roles.  The problem is that audiences have now been there and seen that.  Two of the previous attempts to cash in on this have been failures.  The Lone Ranger (which has almost the exact same Rotten Tomatoes percentage as Dead Men Tell No Tales) opened just shy of $30 million.  A few years later, Alice Through the Looking Glass (which shares the same 30% rating on Rotten Tomatoes as Dead Men) opened to a measly $26 million on a budget of $170 million.  I think we can say that after other flops like Transcendence and Mortdecai Depp is no longer the magnet that he was in the mid 2000s.

The biggest crowd that will be attending theatres to see Jack Sparrow this weekend will undoubtedly be hardcore fans of the franchise.  Even then, we once again come across franchise fatigue.  Are people really going to be wanting to shell out the dollars and see the film, especially since it is rather poorly reviewed?  This, with an insane budget of $230, could be a shipwreck and the second blockbuster failure of the season.

Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales Opening Weekend Prediction - $60 million

For fans of the television show Baywatch, they can finally be fully satisfied as the film comes out in theatres this weekend.  However, they may be a little disappointed if they are expecting it to be similar to the television show.  Judging by the trailers, it is more in line with the kind of remake that 21 Jump Street or even CHIPs was.  It is revamped with an R-rating, and is more using the intellectual property as a catapult for a film.

This worked out really well for 21 Jump Street, but not so great for CHIPs.  Audiences loved the Jump Street movie, as did the critics.  It had a healthy $36 million opening weekend, and the sequel had a massive $57 million opening take.  It shows that the format could work, but what really helped out with this franchise was the fact that it was grounded by solid movies and had adequate star power to propel them to success.

Star power is one thing that Baywatch has.  Say what you will about the drawing power of Zac Efron (or the lack thereof if you are looking at the $1.7 million opening of We Are Your Friends), the real showcase here is Dwayne Johnson.  He hasn't seen a movie debut at less than $20 million since 2013's Snitch.  Lots has happened between then and now, with Johnson being one of the premier names in Hollywood.  It has come with lots of work, and the man has now arrived at the pinnacle.

While lack of critical reception is not always a death blow to comedies, it is difficult to look at the 19% on Rotten Tomatoes and think that it may not be a factor.  If anything, it is a sign that word of mouth coming out of the movie will be harmful to it.  In the age of social media, this can be a real killer.  Thankfully for Johnson and company, the movie has an audience approval rating of 70% on Rotten Tomatoes.  This could mean a less front loaded opening weekend, but I am also not predicting that it will be a massive success.

Baywatch Opening Weekend Prediction - $28 million

REVIEW: The 101-Year-Old Man Who Skipped Out on the Bill and Disappeared

Watching this movie, I didn't feel as though I was missing out on anything.  It is actually the second movie featuring the character Allan Karlsson (played by Robert Gustafsson), and I had no idea that there was a movie prior to it.  All I knew was that there was some sort of shenanigans that happened before the cameras were rolling, and I was fine with it being a mystery.

That is sort of the beauty of this film.  Life has happened to the protagonist, and there needs to be no real explanation of what it was.  It was like the old Venture Brothers episodes that picked up after an amazing feat had happened, and it was just sort of a side thought.  The way the first sequences of the movie unfold, you are immediately sent into the world of this 101 year old man and get to know about the people who are close to him.

At the centre of the story is an old Russian soft drink called Folksoda.  One taste of it leaves a craving that cannot be filled.  It turns out that it was created as a Cold War strategy to have the world trying to emulate the Russian lifestyle instead of that of the Americans.  Even President Nixon couldn't help but become obsessed over the beverage.

We find out that Karlsson used to be a double agent during the Cold War, and was a key figure in the development of Folksoda, even if by accident.  He is not inept, but he is definitely not the sharpest knife in the drawer.  Karlsson is not so dumb as to rekindle thoughts of Bill Murray's The Man Who Knew Too Little, but there are comparisons that can be made.  Both characters are part of something that is bigger than them, but they just do their own thing as circumstance guides the story.

I do have to admit that I am writing this a number of weeks after watching it, but that does not mean that the charm of the film has been lost or dwindled over time.  Sure, my thoughts on the specifics could be washed away, but the memory of the impression of the film stays.  That is always something that you want in a movie.  You don't want to watch it and then forget it right away, but rather have it linger on in some way that keeps you returning to it.  I cannot help but think of the scenes, the music, and the endearing performance of Gustafsson as the ambling old man who bounces from one element of adventure to another.

Assisting Gustafsson in this performance are the supporting cast members who bring a lot of unique identity to them.  My favourite of the bunch is Benny, played by David Wiberg.  Benny is meant to be the comedic relief in a film that is full of comedy already.  Sometimes this can go sideways, but usually, when properly delivered, it is just something extra that is added to a movie to ensure moments of golden laughter.  Benny is the kind of character that tries really hard, but more often than not ends up coming up on the short end of the stick.  It is a natural job by Wiberg, and he is a standout in a scene where he is being question by officers over his interest in Folksoda.

Along side Benny are some equally quirky characters.  None of them are too over the top for the world that had been created for them.  This world functions like the real one, but there are some allowances for the breath of the film and the story that it is telling.  It all leads to a happy romp of a movie.

It is a movie for those who like a break in life, and who crave to see a whimsical stroll with a memorable character.  It is well directed, and has a vision that is coherent to the rest of the movie.  For some reason, this is the type of film that nestles into the corners of my heart and stays for as long as it can.  While this may not be the most critical review (thanks to the time it took for me to write it), I can't help but stand by the fact that this is a film that has a personality and a charm of its own and is waiting to win its way into the hearts of viewers like me.

Rating - 3.5 out of 4 stars

REVIEW: Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides

I had always known that I liked the first Pirates of the Caribbean movie.  That was easy to figure out, and I knew it about ten minutes into my first viewing of the film.  The second one was neither here nor there with me, but I had a lot of fun with the third, At World's End.  All in all, it was a comfortable and fun property that spat out a completely watchable trilogy and wrapped everything up nicely by the time the final credits rolled.

But then comes along the curse of pursuing more box office dollars, taking a property that had run its course and deciding to return to it because it was recognizable and ensured good return on investment.  There was no reason at all to tell another tale of Captain Jack Sparrow.  We knew that he was still up to adventure when last we saw him, and that was a nice send off.  He would keep his shenanigans going until the day he died.  We could live with that and create our own sense of what it was that he would be up to.

The point I am getting at here, is that there was no immediate need to return to this universe.  Director Gore Verbinski had taken the reigns and told a tale, and then adequately finished it.  It was a story that was contained, but left open ended.  That's great stuff to be able to pull off.  Let it rest, let it lay down and slumber, living on in collector's hearts on the DVD and Blu-ray shelf.  To dust it off and return to it could end up meaning a forced story that just works to serve as a vessel for further sales.

And that is what I found with On Stranger Tides.  The story finds Jack Sparrow in London and captured with a mission to find the fountain of youth.  Of course, Captain Jack Sparrow doesn't stay shackled for long, and escapes in an over the top sequence, much more over the top than anything we have seen previous.  This sequence sets the ground for the far right escapism that we will be in for in the rest of the film.  I am not trying to say that the first three were realistic, but they were still somewhat contained in what they attempted to pull off.  Sparrow was a clumsy-yet lucky fool with some level of brilliance, not a complete master of all things action.

This is part of the problem with On Stranger Tides.  They seem to have forgotten who Jack Sparrow was and what made him special.  It is Sparrow for the sake of Sparrow.  In some odd way it reminded me of the transformation of Dr. Henry Jones Junior in Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull.  He has become something that he was not before, and that leads to the emptiness that can be felt while watching it.

Joining this adventure is Penelope Cruz as the former love interest of Sparrow and the daughter of notorious pirate, Black Beard.  Playing Black Beard is Ian McShane.  I have been a fan of McShane since seeing him play cold-hearted mobster Teddy Bass in Sexy Beast.  He does well as a pirate, that is for sure.  There can be some credit to director Rob Marshall in shooting how Black Beard is framed, making him appear to be a legend that is larger than the myth.

A theme that reappears from the original trilogy is the amount of characters involved and all of their own personal reasons for following the plot and motivations for action.  It became a little too much in At World's End, and here it feels like it is in there just because the other movies had it.  There is nothing wrong with some simplicity from time to time, and the script probably could have been better served if it stayed with that.

Like the other films, there is a great attention to the costumes and sets, something that is warmly welcomed.  It helps counter balance some of the fantasy elements and over the top action.  It places the viewer in the world and keeps them there through keeping shots from appearing too doctored and altered.  This has been a strength of the entire franchise, and it is nice that they did not stray from that in the fourth movie.

I do wish that I could say that there were a lot of things that stood out in this movie, but that is not the case.  It felt, to me at least, as though it was just an exercise in repetition.  The score wasn't enhanced in any way.  The dialogue was functional, but not electric as it had been in the past.  Captain Barbossa (Geoffrey Rush) wasn't the stand out character that he had been in the past.  And, as mentioned, Jack Sparrow is something that he was not before.  There was just something off about him.  His motivations were not as solid and his actions were not similar to what they had been in the past.

Perhaps I am being too hard on this movie and making it seem like it is a complete waste of time.  That's not the case.  It has some redeeming qualities in the visuals and a few of the performances, namely Ian McShane.  It is just not enough to recommend the film.  It lands in the area of not being good, but not being bad.  That makes writing a review extremely difficult.  A writer wants a muse that is of some extreme quality, making the words flow and criticism sharp and defying.  With something like On Stranger Tides, I am handed something that is without salt and pepper, but still cooked enough to be consumed.

Rating - 2 out of 4 stars

Long Weekend Ramblings

Sometimes life changes.  We sway in the breeze and either try to change with it or rail against it, battling to forge our own fate.  We either follow the flow of the tides or battle against it.  There have been times in life when I have done both.  For the most part, I am an easy going individual who will rather work with the ebbs and flows of life instead of smashing my head against the wall and trying to instil my own vision of what will happen.

That could be a down side to how I ride the rollercoaster of life.  Maybe I am too laid back and too 'go with the flow' for my own good.  I don't know.  I am not reflective enough to make good sense of that.  I do know there have been times where battling for something was worth it, and times when it was a waste of energy.  My bloodstained knuckles weary and tired from attempting to alter my life, and the dust built up on my feet from staying in place for too long while I tried to change the unchangeable.

About half a year ago, I was faced with the very difficult decision of either moving or staying where I was.  There were benefits to both, and I had to try and make up my mind as to what was in my best interest.  What could I accept for the rest of my life, and what I could not.

I like to think that I don't get frozen for too long by such decisions.  I also pretend that I have a logical and fact driven mind that leads me on through the mysteries of life.  When it was time to decide whether to stay in the town I was living in or if it was time for a change my wife and I were able to come to the decision within the matter of a few days.  We didn't rush it, and really looked at a lot of deciding factors to come to our conclusion before the two of us decided that a change was needed, and living in beautiful cottage country Ontario would be the best thing for us in the long term.

A lot of this came down to my mental health issues.  I am a bit of a mess when it comes to that.  It has been over three years since I have been able to hold down a job, and doctors are still trying to find the right medications for me to be on.  On top of my stress and anxiety, I also have a bit of agoraphobia mixed in there.  Moving to a smaller town with a more relaxed pace of life is something that was definitely a positive for my health struggles.  However, it came at quite a cost.

Because of this, I can no longer see movies in the theatre when they come out.  Oh, poor Scott and his first world problems, you may be thinking.  You are right.  There is not a lot that can really be said about that other than it is easily something that I could live without compared to what other people have to go through across the globe.

The problem is that there are few outlets and releases for me and my head full of problems.  Viewing and reviewing movies is one of them.  It keeps me focused and disciplined on something and forced me out of the house at least a few times a week to keep up with The Movie Breakdown podcast that I co-host.  It was logical, and it was creative.  Now, I should have been better at creating written reviews and getting them posted on this damned blog, but that is a story for another time.  It has not always been easy for me to put myself out there in written form.  It is a task that I have battled with and often lost.

That's the real rub.  Writing is something that I want to get into, and my fears have long kept me from really acting on it.  I have a number of manuscripts, but have only really tried to push one of them.  I finished one a few months ago, but have I done anything to get an agent for it?  Nope.  It has sat still and remains locked away on my computer.

I have gotten side tracked.  The point is that I miss watching new releases and reviewing them with my podcast co-host Christopher Spicer.  It was an experience that kept me from getting locked away in my own world and forced me out of my boundaries into different places.  Because of the move, I had to see that dream fade away and resign myself to a much meeker movie viewing life.  It has left me feeling as though I am unable to properly comment on relevant cinema, pulling me out of the epicentre and pushing me to the outlying areas.

In the face of it, I like to think that I have still made the right decision.  It was a challenge to just leave the apartment when living in a city, and it is much easier to get out now, so that is a positive change.  I just wish that I could have it all.  That I didn't have to sacrifice one thing for another.  I am not going to ramble on about how life isn't fair and I have been dealt a bad hand.  I have a great life. I have a loving wife, a great family, and wonderful friends.  I also have a cat that rocks.

With all that I have going for me, I can't help but stare into that hole of what I am missing and recognize the impact that it had on me while I had it.  There still is the podcast, but I feel like a swollen ankle that cannot fit into a running shoe because of my inability to speak into the latest and most relevant works.  Because of the move, I have made the podcast a harder sell because of the lack of insight that I can provide.

So, what is more powerful in life?  Being (or having the hope of being) stable, or having those outlets that define who you are and provide you with release and energy?  Because the journey of the move is still relatively new, it is hard to tell.  I am probably boring you with the thoughts that are spilling out on the page right now.  Does it really matter?  Hell yes, it does.

Transforming from one thing into another may be a beautiful process, but it can also be a brutal one.  A cocoon is not a pretty sight.  It is rather grotesque, actually.  It bears no similarities to what is inside, and what is happening.  It looks like something that should be discarded and left to rot.  I am not saying that I am some sort of butterfly awaiting to be hatched, but I am indeed in some sort of prolonged transformation stage.  Instead of feeling like it is a step forward, it amounts to the endless surge of purgatory, being stuck in an in between stage that has no end in sight.

It is in this purgatory that I feel like I sit, unable to see what is coming up and whether or not it was all worth it.  Is it the destination that matters, or the journey?  Different people will say different things.  All I know is that my path was set, and there is no going back on it.  What it has created is what I have to deal with, and all I can do is hope that it leads to something that was more valuable and cherished than what I left.