Details

Written by: Rod Boyle

Category: Film

Published: 13 July 2023

Hits: 655

OK, I went into this with really low expectations. Really, really low. 

This was a movie seen more to escape the evening heat & humidity, and to postpone seeing "Asteroid City", which I am rather looking forward to.

Anyways, it conforms to every other film in the franchise - formulaic in the extreme, it gives the audience everything it wants. A smoking Nazi Villain (What's worse nowadays, smoking or being a Nazi?, Hell, let's give 'em both), an archeological treasure that has some hidden "magical" properties, a child with unrealized talents, a god-daughter with unrealized sentiment, bugs, snake-ish creatures, skeletons, etc, etc.

The opening scene, fantastic, a marvelously de-aged Harrison Ford, and in the stunt scenes I have to imagine a marvelously reconstructed Harrison Ford onto the stunt double.

This is impressive, this is the future. It's already here.

It recalls a few years ago when they introduced a de-aged Luke Skywalker into the Mandalorian - badly done, as it were, and computer-savvy fans were quick to redo a much better version of it - now, the CGI is indistinguishable. When Harrison Ford is long dead they'll be making Indiana Jones movies...

...back to the film. I left during the tuk-tuk chase scene in Tangiers, returned after some debating and a cigarette, the chase scene was still going on, I missed nothing. 

And so I stuck it through to the end. 

It was fine, the same schlock that I swallowed hook-line-and sinker when I was a kid, quite possibly better even, only - well, I've seen it all before, and while the quest is different the template, the characters, the film was the same. 

I need something a little more challenging - even for my "dumb-ass-movie" time. 

That said, a lot of the audience were guffawing at the jokes, and making all the right noises at the right times, it hit it's mark with it's target audience - I don't think many were disappointed. Predictable, yes, but that's what they all wanted. Predictable familiarity.

So, in the end, all in all, if you weren't familiar with Indiana Jones this probably wouldn't disappoint. The fault, I suspect, is less with the film than myself. 

Details

Written by: Rod Boyle

Category: Film

Published: 30 June 2023

Hits: 551

The last movie downloaded on my phone, but an absolute Masterpiece. 

A Soviet "Anti-War" film it follows a young conscript after he joins the resistance against German Occupation in Belarus.

Visually spectacular, amazing choreography, casting, acting, cinematography - it takes an entirely different view on war than most Western films - there are no heroes, only victims standing in the midst of surreal and horrifying circumstance. While I've read abundant descriptions and books that take the same tack, I've yet to see it realized as successfully as this in film. 

6/5 Stars, a "Must-See". 

Link: Wikipedia on "Come and See"

Details

Written by: Rod Boyle

Category: Film

Published: 27 June 2023

Hits: 649

2 hours of my life I'll never get back...

I'd heard good things about it, finally got around to watching it. And no. Not my cup of tea, not at all. 

That said, most reviews disagree.

Link: Wiki on Paris, Texas

Details

Written by: Rod Boyle

Category: Film

Published: 21 June 2023

Hits: 495

Don't know how I ended up watching this, I suspect largely due to it's soundtrack. 

Anyways, a depressed young "Largeman" returns home to attend his mother's funeral, only to confront the unresolved reasons he left in the first place and reunite with old school friends. Looking for all the world like a young David Duchovny, it's got a sort of Millennial Rom-Com feel to it, reminding me of John Cusack's "High Fidelity", or any of a number of similar films from a generation before. 

Not bad, not great, merely amusing.

Starring Natalie Portman, Ian Holm and a young Zach Braff (who wrote and directed the film. He later died of Covid Complications in 2020!!!).