Reviews

I will preface this by saying I have not seen the Broadway musical, but I have seen the original many times. I think the original is leaps and bounds better than this, but this was still a fun film and I recommend it for fans of Mean Girls or musicals.

Renee Rapp as Regina George KILLED IT. She was by far the BEST part of this movie. While the Rachel McAdams Regina was a little nicer to your face and sinister behind your back, or delivered mean lines with a smile on her face, Renee Rapp's Regina was just plain mean and it worked. I'm kind of terrified of Renee's Regina. Really, the entire Plastic squad was well cast and had quite a few hilarious moments.

Now, my girl Lindsay Lohan did Cady Heron way better than Angourie Rice did. I understand that Cady is supposed to be a vanilla, kind of forgettable kind of girl, but eventually she is supposed to be a plastic right?! Angourie's Cady is unforgettable. The charm and comedic timing that Lohan brought to the role was completely lost.

The rest of the cast, including Janice and Damien, Tina Fey as the math teacher, and the cameos (I was so hoping for a Amy Poehler cameo but alas my wish did not come true) were a lot of fun.

The music was good, and added some depth and extra info to classic scenes you'll remember from the original Mean Girls Movie.

Overall, it was fun. I'd watch it again to watch Renee Rapp do her thing, but it won't be on repeat like the original Mean Girls is.

Boring about sums it up. We all know that just because a film has a few big names in it doesn't mean it will be great. It tries to be whimsical, but fails. The songs are mediocre. Noodle is supposed to be the heart of the movie, but her acting leaves much to be desired. Yes, she is a child, but if you're going to make a child the emotional center of a movie, that child needs to be able to carry that, and she can't.

Has any sequal/prequel/offshoot of the Wonka universe ever captured the zany magic of the original? I don't think so, so maybe we should stop trying.

This movie was at its best and most fun when people were eating wonka's magical chocolate. Everything in between that was just bad fluff. The repetitiveness of the movie was grating to me. Please stop with the same joke over and over and over again.

The end did come to a sweet conclusion that may make you tear up a bit, but the ride to get there just isn't worth it.

Skip this one. And if you are going to see it, don't bring your three year old with you. Where in the previews did it seem like this would be a movie that would entertain a toddler??? It's a live action musical, for goodness sake. Please save yourself, and everyone else in the theater, a headache, and don't bring your toddler to this movie.

SPOILERS AHEAD!!!

Who thought that a chocolate cartel would be a fun little plot device? This movie was billed as a family film. While sure, there are things in a family film meant to go over the head of the kids in the audience, these are usually throwaway jokes that don't impact understanding of the plot. The chocolate cartel was the WHOLE conflict of the movie. What does a child know about a cartel?

I had absolutely no idea what this movie was about when I started it. All I knew was that the trailer looked queer, and that was enough for me.

Now, what a gorgeous little film. Lots of pretty colors, lots of beautiful people, and lots of amazing rooms and settings. The whole movie is eye candy.

Saltburn is a slow burn, but from the beginning, you get an eerie sense that not all is quite as it seems. That just escalates as the movie goes on, which leads to a twist ending that was not completely unexpected. However, I think that works really well in this movie. If you are paying attention, you can see the ending coming. If it would have been a twist totally out of left field, I don't think it would have worked as well.

Some people will say this movie was too slow. I thought it moved along well enough, slowly building and building and building. I enjoyed the pacing and the character development and setting development that happened over time.

SPOILERS AHEAD!!!

About halfway through the movie, I thought to myself... Is this a horror movie? And I'd say that, in some ways, yes it is, perhaps in the same vein but not nearly as horrific as Midsommer.

Everyone in the movie was weird as heck, but Oliver was by far the weirdest. I can't help but wonder what happened between him and his family after he claimed Saltburn as his own. Did they never hear from him ever again? I'm going to guess that no, they did not, and probably that happened after he left Saltburn that first time.

As someone who loves both politics and horror, this film should have been a slam dunk for me. However, the over the top acting, confusing plot, and the not so subtle message about politics that everyone who pays any ounce of attention to current events is already aware of made it a dud for me.

The movie definitely drew inspiration from Scream, even going as far as casting a Dewey lookalike for their cop character. And while slashers are at their best when they don't take themselves too seriously, there still should be some tension. This movie was all about leaning into the funny, to the detriment of maintaining any sense of doom. Every scene leading up to a kill was so overloaded with dramatic looks or dialogue that you couldn't help but laugh. Oh and if you're expecting jump scares - forget about it.

Even that could have been perhaps forgiven if the plot would have made more sense. But honestly, I'm still not sure what all happened. There was too much going on.

To be honest, I think this film could have left off the graphic kills, as they were poorly executed and instead leaned into a pg-13 rating, tightened up the script to make it make a little more sense and add more tension, and played around more with the highschool caricature characters, and it would have been tremendously better. A silly slasher geared towards teens might have been better. But alas, I'm not sure the political message would have hit as hard with that audience.

SPOILERS AHEAD!!!!!

I'm still trying to figure out the timeline of events and motives of all of the different killers involved in the movie. Melissa wanted to kill Allison because of her dad? Why was Deputy Miller involved? Did he want to kill the commissioner? Why did he kill Britt and Tyler then? Or did Adam kill them? And why go through all this trouble to get rid of the mayoral candidates when Mr. Jackson seemed so well loved that all he would have had to do was run for mayor himself and he probably would have gotten elected.

I also do so hate when a movie hits me over the head with a message. I get it, I get it. Both sides suck.

This movie, in the end, just tried to do way too much. Oh Scream did three killers? We will DOUBLE THAT. Oh people like the Purge? Let's sprinkle that in here too. It seems like they did things just for the sake of doing them. Ultimately, not a well done film, in my opinion.