The Kissing Booth 2 (2020) - Movie Review

Time to make a bit of a correction by addressing a film that I probably should’ve covered earlier. And no, I’m not just talking about this film specifically; I’m talking about the original as well. The first Kissing Booth blew past my radar back in 2018, and I didn’t see much reason to cover it at the time… but with how much Wattpad is shaping up to be the driving force for the next wave of YA adaptations, and that predates After in that trend, I figured it’d help to get that into my working history of the trend. And man, is it lucky I didn’t cover it the year it came out, as it can fit snugly between Venom and Gotti on my worst films of the year list. And honestly, it’s a bit of a toss-up whether this sequel is worse.

Resistance (2020) - Movie Review

Jesse Eisenberg’s casting in this, on paper, sounds like a gag. An actor whose screen persona can be best described as ‘neurotic who never knows when to shut the fuck up’, cast as the world’s most famous mime artist Marcel Marceau. It’s the kind of stunt casting-against-type that Marceau himself experienced when he was tapped for a cameo in Mel Brooks’ Silent Movie (as, ironically, the only character with spoken dialogue), and given how mime is one of the most famously derided performance styles when looked at through a modern lens, it being used as part of a Oscar-thirsty Holocaust drama seems like a recipe for disappointment. But in truth, it fits better than it would seem at first.

The Crime Boss (Arkansas) (2020) - Movie Review

Merely seeing an actor’s body of work isn’t always enough to predict the kind of stories they’ll want to tell if they step behind the camera. Watching Jordan Peele’s sitcom and sketch-com work doesn’t exactly feel like the lead-up to becoming the man currently leading the charge for black horror in the mainstream. Ben Stiller’s frequently-frothy leading man roles feel a bit out of step with his penchant for tearing the entertainment industry several new ones as a director. And in the case of today’s film, seeing Clark Duke as the nerdy Jacob in Hot Tub Time Machine 2 (the only close-to-watchable part of that entire flick) certainly didn’t prepare me for his first step into writing/producing/directing to be this Southern-fried trailer park neo-noir.

City Of Lies (2020) - Movie Review

In the greater mythology of hip-hop, there are few events that serve as true turning points for the culture as much as the untimely death of Biggie Smalls and Tupac Shakur. Partly because of how publicised their living beef was, partly because their deaths made for an argument to turn mainstream hip-hop down a more peaceful direction (Will Smith breaking out on his solo career in the wake of that is no coincidence), and partly because it embodies the inner workings of myth in that we’re still not entirely sure what really happened. They were both gunned down within a short amount of time of each other, and it remains one of the greater unsolved mysteries of the culture, up there with the anxious waiting for Detox to drop before Dr. Dre stopped edging his audience and admitted it wouldn't happen.

The New King Of Comedy (2020) - Movie Review

Stephen Chow’s King Of Comedy is a certified classic. One of the most refined examples of Chow’s unique style of Eastern slapstick, it’s basically one of those films that anyone interested in the acting craft needs to watch, as it covers a pretty wide variety of ‘method’ acting, it’s got some of Chow’s best gags (I’m still giggling at the stuntman-on-fire scene as I’m writing this), and I can pretty much guarantee you’ll feel good after watching it. It is, at the time of writing this, my favourite Chow film. Or, rather, it was… until I saw its spiritual successor.

Same Kind Of Different As Me (2020) - Movie Review

Okay, this film technically came out in 2017 (which was after it spent a good three years on the shelf from its 2014 finish date), but considering it only just became available here in Australia this year, and how royally muffed-up the cinematic release schedule has been across the board all year, I’m counting this as a 2020 movie. This is actually one that I’ve been keeping an eye out for when it would drop over here, and it’s something I hinted at when I reviewed Monster Trucks. Yep, this is another film with Don Burgess attached to it as DOP that seems like a major step-down for such a legendary figure. However, as I’ll get into, this is a much better fit for him than something like Monster Trucks.

Irresistible (2020) - Movie Review

2020 has not been a good year for political satire, at least when it comes to feature-length efforts. Admittedly, this genre has a higher degree of difficulty than most, and COVID fucking up the release schedule is likely delaying most of the good stuff while the disposable shit rises to the top, but there’s also the collective mood to account for as well. It has been a highly turbulent four years, and alongside the rising hostility across party lines, there has also been a rise in the need to vent about such things. A lot of the political cinema this year has had a heavy air of needing to get something off the filmmakers’ chests, but without the clarity needed to make it resonate when describing it to someone else. It is in this mode that Jon Stewart returns to the director’s chair with… well, I hesitate to call it the worst so far, but it is definitely the tamest, which in its own way is even worse.