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gepetto33
Reviews
Willow (2022)
Sadmartigan :(
It's become apparent that Disney feels some grotesque need to release content on their platform without any deeper thought about what & where to go with it. This is the feeling you get with Willow, and the writing that doesn't even feel amatuer-ish - it feels embarrassing. For everybody on that show, Warwick especially. It's apparent that the writer has no connection with what the character/actor would comfortably say at any given time, prompting him to spew out wordy, awkward lines, that he has to somehow form together into "acting". The dialogue comes across so unnaturally it's embarrassing. Somebody should feel ashamed for this, really.
The last thing you want to do with fantasy is have it come across as modern. Even if you didn't enjoy the Rings of Power show it still has a feel of antiquity about it, about the continuity of what they say and do. About what the characters are concerned with during the course of the show..... but that is not the case here. Here you get Nickelodeon teen drama (that firmly reminds you you're in the year 2022), mixed with half-hearted, poorly conceived fantasy. Which has zero percent of the feel captured in the 1988 movie, and while i can't say that was perfect either it stands as a masterpiece in comparison to this.
Who is to blame here isn't clear. My vote goes to Disney, for coming up with an idea and then going with whatever first idea was presented forth to them, no matter how good or bad it was. The content machine must keep flowing, or else they lose subscribers.. right? Well they will certainly lose people by continuing to release abominations such as this. Ya know i do feel bad, just because i know how severe the internet is going to tear into this one, review-wise. So 6/10 is a mercy from me.
Andor (2022)
Incredible.
We've waited a long time for something of this caliber from the Star Wars IP and Disney has finally delivered.
When something is great there is naturally people out there trying to poke holes in it, of which i've seen "this isn't even star wars, there's no space battles". Well friend, we've received decades of CGI laden drivel that has only served to dilute the epic trio we got 40+ years ago. Maybe it was time for a change - yep, that's exactly what this was.
Andor tells the story of the budding rebellion, and the players involved in escalating the cause. The what, the why, the how, and the who is expertly conveyed over a 12 episode arc. I was surprised when i saw the episode count in the beginning, and now i realize this is part of why everything felt so satisfying by the final episode. No ridiculous space battles needed, just human cause & effect, told by masterful writing. And i really mean that last word.
Andor shows how deep the rebellion had to dig in order to achieve it's means. Gone is the black & white, good & bad polar lense that most stories (even Star Wars) is told through. Luthien is the perfect mastermind in which to execute the will of the rebellion. He travels far into the grey, and delivers a couple epic monologues that make your heart swell in your chest. There's a few epic monologues in this show, both long and short, which relays just how damn good the writing is here. It feels like poetry. It feels like real history.
Forget about seeing Battlecruisers and Tie Fighters, and the Jar Jar anecdotes of the past - Andor is about the struggle for freedom, and the cost it takes to achieve it.
Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness (2022)
The Metaverse implodes on all sides.....
Not gonna lie, i had very high hopes for this movie, and it didn't get close to reaching them. After seeing the (worse) blunder of Thor Love & Thunder i'm starting to realize that Marvel's high volume slate of content is starting to condemn itself from within. I think the original ideas of these movies are getting torn apart, due to time constraints, or random needs for the adherence of "continuity" for the Marvel universe. Which is funny.... considering there hasn't been much up to this point in phase 4. More on that later.
I have all the faith in the world that the Scott Derrickson's MoM would have blown my mind.... could he really not make his own movie and still work within the confines of Marvel continuity? I guess we'll never know, and are likely to keep suffering compromises, in the form of last minute plot changes, reshoots, or otherwise forced deviations from the original ideas. Marvel had some serious misses with Dr Strange and Thor this year, and i really hope they make it up with a proper banger at some point when all the continuity building starts to spell out their greater macro storyline. At this point i don't have a ton of faith in Wakanda Forever, but.... i do think Quantumania has potential, with Kang reverentially capable of bringing some properly high stakes.
With all of the sacrifices being made in plotlines and movie execution i'm having trouble keeping faith with Marvel's macro direction not being well defined this far into phase 4. They need to set way higher stakes within their world-building, and soon.... before their fanbase loses steam completely.
Thor: Love and Thunder (2022)
Edited to death, and beyond....
Coming from a place of voracity and enthusiasm for the MCU, to say Thor L&T was a disappointment would be an understatement. Honestly, giving it a 6 even feels generous. This movie fails on so many accounts; pacing, story building, character development, and so on. Even with so many great tools at their disposal (high caliber actors, effects, director) they still managed to destroy whatever this movie could have been by speeding the plot along to try and meet a 2 hour run time. Christian as Gorr was completely wasted.. his presence in this story felt completely arbitrary, and disposable. The only exciting thing from a fan's perspective was the introduction to the cosmic abstracts, which i'm hoping will be further expanded in future movies.
So my advice would be to come into this movie with low expectations, and hope it exceeds them. But in reality this movie ranks very very low within the MCU's body of work. It's definitely within the top 5 worst marvel movies, without a doubt. It seems i'm not alone in saying so either.
Eyes of Fire (1983)
Evil so strong even the ground itself is poisoned by her presence - the Devil Witch
You could consider 2015's The Witch a direct ode to this film, albeit the opposite in execution. Whereas the Witch provides crisp camera work and artful photography to convey it's mood, Eyes of Fire had none of those tools at it's disposal. It relies solely on a story so terrifying, that even the massive shortcomings with the production and special effects can't slow down the dread it creates. Way moreso than the Witch, which was pretty one-dimensional to me. Sure, if you've never watched a movie before 1991 and aren't used to a degree of "letting yourself be fooled" then you might find EOF as "cheap" or "hokey" by the effects used. But take a look at some of the still images from the movie..... to this day, with all of the colossal budgets available to movies currently none of them come close to invoking the terror that is the Devil Witch and her chthonic visage ((shudder)). I'd argue to say the shortcomings made it MORE terrifying in some ways, relying on creativity instead of budget in order to be effective.
I've grown up on land that looks and FEELS exactly like the location used in this film. I remember being young and filling my head with macabre folk legends, ghost stories, and feeling a sense of dread in the woods at twilight. That is the feeling represented here - if you let it. The antagonist is profound in such a way that is completely unique in my experience - The Valley of the Devil Witch. She IS the land, the trees, and the poisoned water running through it. There is no defeating her without an equally powerful adversary, but one of the light. This introduces the protagonist, Leah, a mute & autistic young girl whom seems helpless only until danger presents itself..... The noose used to hang the adulterous preacher suddenly snaps out of nowhere? Not a coincidence, and we slowly come to realize her importance to the story.
This is a really beautiful plot mechanism in my opinion. Our society thinks of mentally disabled people as being useless and drain on those that care for them, but in this story the "weird" handicapped girl is the hero. Wonderful.
If any movie could benefit from a modern redo, it's Eyes of Fire. Effects and production are the only thing holding this film back from being a masterpiece on a wider scale. Sadly though, i'm 98% sure they would screw it up, and make some trite nonsense with none of the effective aspects from the original film. There might be a couple of directors out there who could pull it off, so only time will tell.