The Boss Baby: Family Business (2021) - Movie Review

If anyone ever got pissed off enough by one of my reviews to try and dig up dirt on me (wouldn't be the first time), here’s some for free: I actually liked The Boss Baby. I mean, beyond just being entertaining, I still maintain that that film is a lot smarter than it ever got credit for, with the kind of messaging that hits that family-friendly sweet spot that could benefit audiences of all ages. Yes, seriously. As such, I might be the only… respectable(?) film critic that is willing to give this sequel an honest chance.

Motherless Brooklyn (2020) - Movie Review

A prominent actor decides to write, produce and direct a noir-soaked story as their personal passion project… I’m getting an unwelcome feeling of déjà vu. To go one further, say what you will about Ben Affleck, he at least proved his salt as a filmmaker years before trying this gambit; only other directing credit Edward Norton has is for Keeping The Faith back in 2000, and outside of some uncredited punch-up work, this is Norton’s first attempt at writing a screenplay on his own. The end result isn’t nearly as dire as that lead-up may suggest, but it’s not exactly smelling of roses either.

Arctic Justice (2019) - Movie Review

 

Expecting quality control from a talking animal movie nowadays is like asking for the world to start making sense: Most of us would appreciate it, but the chances of it actually happening seem to keep shrinking with each passing day. The latest effort in this undermined subgenre is yet another piece of disposable product designed to be shipped directly to the bargain bin, but this seems to be yet another new variety of bad, even compared to the films I’ve already covered on here. It’s not just bad; it is so lacking in quality control that it can’t even maintain consistency in its badness. And no, that doesn’t mean that it occasionally stumbles into competency. It just means that it goes from bad to a different kind of bad and back again.

Mission: Impossible - Fallout (2018) - Movie Review

The plot: After a mission goes wrong, the world is under threat by the terrorist group The Apostles, who now have access to enough plutonium to construct nuclear weaponry. Wanting to correct what happened, IMF agent Ethan Hunt (Tom Cruise) once again sets out with his colleagues Luther (Ving Rhames) and Benji (Simon Pegg) to save the world as they go after the stolen plutonium. However, with CIA operative August Walker (Henry Cavill) assigned to watch Ethan's every move in case he goes rogue again, and anarchist Soloman Lane (Sean Harris) plotting his revenge, this will prove to be Ethan's toughest assignment yet.

The Boss Baby (2017) - Movie Review

Well, today’s feature marks another genuine first for this blog. Of all the weird and disheartening pre-ambles I’ve seen leading up to a film, I’ve never really come across a film that actively had to convince that it even existed. Seriously, this film comes across like a one-off joke that Baldwin would make in-between Trump caricaturing, or worse yet an Asylum rip-off of last year’s The Boss. It probably doesn’t help that, in the lead-up to its release, I have only ever seen the teaser trailer for this film which barely showed anything.

 

Between the dubious concept and the minimal sketch-length trailer, I can’t be the only one who thought that this thing was a bit suspect. (And yes, I know, Beauty And The Beast trailer thing; I saw this a few days before that hit the news so, over here, it still feels off) Then again, I had similarly negative thoughts with Dreamworks’ last film Trolls’ pre-amble and I ended up really liking that film. Maybe the same could happen here?

Concussion (2016) - Movie Review

This film is about American football or, as we in Australia call it, 'Baby’s First Ball Sport'. All that padding, the overblown halftime shows, the terminology that makes calculus look straight forward by comparison; I don’t ‘get’ the point of most sports to begin with, but this especially. Or, at the very least, its sheer enormity in terms of deemed importance. Then again, that’s probably a side effect of growing up where the national sport (excluding cricket and outrunning the cassowary) is essentially the same thing only we don’t think little things like protective gear are necessary. Save for cups because, when given the option to protect only one head, only one in a million would choose a helmet. Anyway, long story short, this is going to be another one of those situations where I am going to be a bit more perplexed than the general populace about the importance of the film’s subject matter. Well, as far as the reason why the people involved are getting permanently injured, at least.

Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation (2015) - Movie Review

The Mission: Impossible series of films has had a pretty rocky history all things considered, with each instalment seemingly designed specifically to correct an apparent ‘flaw’ with the previous one. When the first MI film’s intricate plot (read: convoluted and fuelled by blind luck) didn’t connect with audiences, rather than iron out the wrinkles and actually create a story that is as intelligent as it thinks it is unlike that film, the writers just threw it all out and made everything blindingly obvious to everyone involved with the sequel. When that fared even worse, J.J. Abrams decided to delve into the realm of self-parody for MI: 3, making fun of the tropes of the series while doing its best to improve in whatever areas it could. Then came Ghost Protocol, and something happened. All of a sudden, the characters, writing, action beats and effects work harmonised with each other to create easily the best installment out of all of them. So, with the directorial seat being switched out once again as per MI tradition, how does today’s film follow up on that surprise success?

Aloha (2015) - Movie Review

As much as I have frequently shown pessimism about the films I review, I don’t think I’ve come across a film yet that has given me this much reason to do so. Between the laughably appalling tagline "Sometimes you have to say goodbye before you can say hello", which rivals The Impossible’s "Nothing is more powerful than the human spirit" in terms of trite advertising, the extremely by-the-numbers plot as hinted at by the trailer and the sheer frequency at that trailer was shown, to the point where it has been playing in front of every film I’ve gone to see in the last couple months, I find myself largely sick of this movie before I even paid to see the thing. But, keeping in line with the feel-good mentality that permeates these kinds of films, I will try to keep an open mind about this… Let’s see how long that lasts.

Still Alice (2015) - Movie Review

In the world of cinema, there are a number of things that have become acceptable targets for ridicule by pretty much everyone: Battlefield Earth, Plan 9 From Outer Space and The Room are all great examples of this. One such thing that has its hunting season sign up all year round is anything connected with the now-dying phenomenon of Twilight, whether it’s the films themselves, the actors who starred in them or the people who are responsible for them. It may have grown tired, given how readily the world rightfully rained down on the series for years on end, but the after-effects still linger to this day. With the female lead from Twilight, Kristen Stewart, in today’s film, I find it hard to avoid talking about the connection, especially when it feels like the film itself is daring me to do so. After the jump, I’ll explain why.