Tag: movies

Film Review: AI Versus The IMF

~ Peter Kanelis ~ Leave a comment

Mission: Impossible-The Final Reckoning is a pretty fun cinematic experience as long as one doesn’t examine the actual plot too closely. Tom Cruise returns as super operative, Ethan Hunt, leader of the Impossible Missions Force, with Christopher McQuarrie as director. McQuarrie also co-wrote the script with Erik Jendresen.

This film continues the storyline which began in the immediate predecessor, Mission: Impossible-Dead Reckoning. Simon Pegg and Ving Rhames also return as Benjo Dunn and Luther Stickell, respectively. Hayley Atwell is back to help Ethan against the battle against a powerful Artificial Intelligence known as the Entity. Angela Bassett, Esai Morales, Pom Klementieff, and Greg Tarzan Davis are included in the cast.

When the film starts, Ethan Hunt has been in hiding for a few months after taking possession of a vital component to controlling the Entity. He rejoins his team and spends much of film trying to stay ahead of Gabriel, played by Esai Morales, who is trying to stop Ethan from achieving his ultimate goal of neutralizing the Entity. Ethan will have to decide who or what may be sacrificed in order to save the world from the Entity’s dominion.

As usual, there are some astonishing and sometimes ludicrous action sequences that are definitely eye-catching. Cruise puts out a strong performance which is likely his last turn as Ethan Hunt. This film is being touted as the final one in the franchise, but when it comes to Hollywood, who can say for sure?

The film is a bit of a jumble when it comes to the plot. There are some engaging callbacks to the earlier installments. Rolf Saxon reprises a role from the first film that was not much more than a cameo, and he has much more substantial part to play here.

There are times when the transition to different locations seems a little jarring, but the film is pretty long anyway. McQuarrie throws in quite a bit of death-defying moments in this film that almost makes it to three hours.

The problem is that Hunt at times seem too superhuman for the suspension of disbelief to be maintained. Although these films are not really designed to be grounded in reality, it is still a bit distracting when Hunt gets himself in some of these outlandish predicaments.

I thought Morales was pretty well cast as the main villain. There was nothing too spectacular about his performance, but he was not particularly bad either.

Overall, I was glad to have made it to the likely end of this franchise, or at least the end of this phase. It’s a film with some flaws and falls short of any real artistic greatness, however it was an enjoyable diversion from the daily pressures of real life. It certainly is better than many of the recent films I have seen.

Film Review: Watch Out For The Thunder

~ Peter Kanelis ~ Leave a comment

Thunderbolts* is the latest cinematic offering from Marvel Studios and actually manages to be a piece of solid entertainment. Eric Pearson and Joanna Calo wrote this engaging script, and Jake Schreier claims the director’s seat and may have breathed a little more life into the superhero film genre. Florence Pugh reprises her role of former Black Widow assassin, Yelena Belova. Sebastian Stan returns as Bucky Barnes, the Winter Soldier, who is now a United States congressman. Of course, that doesn’t mean that Bucky has lost any of his punch. Wyatt Russell, Olga Kurylenko, Lewis Pullman, Hannah John-Kamen, Julia Louis-Dreyfus, and David Harbour are also included in the cast.

Valentina Allegra de Fontaine, played by Louis-Dreyfus, is now the CIA director and has been involved in some controversial black ops which has led to her facing an impeachment. She sets up some of her super-powered operatives to kill each other in a remote lab that also needs to be sanitized to protect her secrets. Yelena, John Walker, Ghost, and an enigma named Bob end up escaping the trap, but Bob is abducted by de Fontaine’s agents where whatever experiments were being conducted on him may continue. The ragtag group of contract killers have only each other to rely on until they are joined by the Winter Soldier, and Yelena’s crazy father figure who is a Russian super soldier known as the Red Guardian. Bob has transformed into a being with frightening abilities and a dark past that fuels the Void within him. This new team of loners and renegades need to figure out how to combine their abilities and save the world without the Avengers to back them up.

Pugh is actually quite fun to watch, and I think the Russian accent she affects is pretty good. I am not so sure about Harbour’s, but he did fine as well with his manic energy as Alexei Shostakov. He was pretty fun to watch, although I also appreciated the chance to catch my breath when he wasn’t onscreen. The cast was pretty well-chosen. Julia Louis-Dreyfus did quite well as a smug elitist with too much power and not much caution in achieving her goals.

The special effects were typically well executed. The fight scenes were also quite compelling if as typically implausible as expected in a comic book movie.

The story does get into some themes of despair and the effects of trauma, but there is enough humor peppered throughout to help not get too depressed. Some of the one-liners even landed pretty well,

I don’t think the film is as good as the early Marvel films such as Iron Man and the first Avengers installment, but it sure wasn’t as dubious as some of the more recent offerings in this franchise.

Pugh is still relatively new in the limelight, but she does have plenty of talent and charisma. The scenes she shares with Harbour were often hilarious, but there was one pretty moving moment between their characters.

The film was just good, and I am looking forward to getting together with this cast of misfits again.

Film Reviews: Some Sinners Never Seem To Die

~ Peter Kanelis ~ Leave a comment

Sinners is a new horror film written and directed by Ryan Coogler, and it holds up rather well considering the genre. Coogler has gained some deserved acclaim for Black Panther and the Creed films. This film isn’t going to be the one to knock him off his perch.

Michael B. Jordan has a dual role playing twin brothers known as Smoke and Stack. Okay, the nicknames are a little over the top, but I do still think being called Smoke at least would be kind of cool. Hailee Steinfeld, Jack O’Connell, Wunmu Mosaku, Delroy Lindo, and Miles Caton are included in the cast and are solid choices.

Smoke and Stack leave the urban troubles of gangster-ridden Chicago and return to the Mississippi Delta with a lot of cash and ambitions to open a juke joint in 1932. Past romances seem to be rekindled. Old friends unite to pull off this little party, and troubles involving the Ku Klux Klan aren’t going to be a major headache. Of course, Smoke and Stack are former soldiers and gangsters, so they are not so easily perturbed by racists and killers. When the vampires crash the party, that’s a little different matter.

First of all, the setting is great. Jordan is easily a compelling presence, and he does well with playing both brothers. The cast altogether is quite effective. The brothers have a cousin they recruit for the musical talent. Miles Caton is a great find with his smooth baritone. This seems to be the early days of the blues, and the soundtrack is pretty captivating. The idea in the film is that blues music can have mystical powers when played by the right musician. I can almost buy it after this film.

O’Connell plays the lead vampire, who happens to be Irish, and that culture seems to get kind of a nod as well.

The story takes its time getting going, but once the bad guys are revealed, it gets interesting and would be terrifying if I was a bit more of a nervous disposition.

There are some interesting twists toward the end. There are plenty of vampire flicks, but Coogler seems to found a vein of something original.

This film did ensure that I will be keeping an eye out for Coogler’s next project.

Film Review: The Crooked Man Is About To Get Straightened Out By Hellboy

~ Peter Kanelis ~ Leave a comment

Hellboy: The Crooked Man brings back that demonic superhero who is sometimes known as Big Red. Too bad Hellboy couldn’t return to a more coherent script. Brian Taylor is the director working from a script he had co-written with Christopher Golden and Mike Mignola. Mignola is the creator of Hellboy for Dark Horse Comics.

Jack Kesy has taken over the role which was previously played by Roy Perlman and David Harbour. The cast also includes Jefferson White, Adeline Rudolph, Joseph Marcell, and Leah McNamara.

The year is 1959, and Hellboy and a young agent of the Bureau for Paranormal Research and Defense are on a train taking some strange supernatural spider to their headquarters. The spider suddenly grows to a massive size and initiates a wreck that enables its escape. As Hellboy and Bobbie Jo Song try to retrieve the eight-legged menace, they realize that another supernatural force is in the rural Appalachian region. The encounter a local resident named Tom who once indulged in witchcraft. A malevolent being known as the Crooked Man has returned. Hellboy and his young partner are drawn into another strange battle with demonic forces.

Perlman remains the best version of this character. Kesy is not a terrible lead actor, but the script is rather confusing and doesn’t serve him well. Also, I would have no idea that this was taking place in 1959 if it weren’t for the notice at the beginning of the film.

This also did not seem to have had a comparable production budget as the previous installments. I can normally handle somewhat subpar special effects if the script made more sense.

The film ended up being a bit of a jumble. Hellboy’s wisecracks don’t land as effectively as in other films.

Hellboy fans will likely be pleased that another film is out there, and it really isn’t that terrible. It’s an adequate diversion but a very forgettable one in spite of the distinctiveness of Hellboy’s appearance.

Film Review: Charlie Heller Is No Natural Born Killer, But He Can Learn

~ Peter Kanelis ~ Leave a comment

The Amateur just manages to be one of the better films to be released early in 2025 with Rami Malek putting forth a heartfelt performance as CIA cryptographer Charlie Heller, who launches a campaign to avenge the murder of his wife, which will lead him to acquire a different set of abilities. James Hawes is the director of this film, which was written by Ken Nolan and Gary Spinelli. It is based on a novel written in 1981 by Robert Littell.

The cast is a formidable one that includes Laurence Fishburne, Rachel Brosnahan, Holt McCallany, Julianne Nicholson, and Caitriona Balfe.

Charlie Heller is a mild-mannered, ingenious, and somewhat socially awkward CIA nerd who somehow managed to snag a beautiful, charming wife played quite convincingly by Brosnahan, who is about to leave for London on a business trip. Sarah Heller is gunned down in a terrorist attack, which prompts the grieving Charlie to use his smarts to identify the murderers. He is more than a little disappointed when he finds that his colleagues aren’t too willing to move on the information he has provided. He decides to take matter into his own hands and gain the training he needs to accomplish his lethal desire for justice. The point is driven home that he does not quite have the necessary fortitude to be a stone-cold killer. He does have other skills and knowledge that could be of use, however. The superiors in the agency have still misjudged Heller’s determination and talents, and they may eventually regret now working with him. Heller has four suspects to hunt down and is on a dangerous path to confront the man who pulled the trigger.

I thought this was a pretty good film even if the plot seems as old as Time itself. Malek’s performance did evoke more than a little sympathy for his character’s loss, but I am a bit of a sucker for a good revenge plot.

The film does have some great scenery throughout since Heller has quite a bit of traveling to do. There is not much time devoted to clearly explain how Heller was able to get his hands on some of the utensils he acquired to pull off his plan. Still, some of these plot holes are not significant enough to keep me from finding enjoyment in this release.

Malek is a talented actor and appears to be a solid casting choice for this role. I have no real criticism of any of the performances themselves, so that’s a plus.

I had some issues with the editing, which I am finding to be a more common observation in the recent movies I have viewed. The shifts in scenery were a bit jarring at times.

The plot is implausible and relies on a few annoying coincidences, but again it manages to not seem too over the top.

The movie is not the greatest spy thriller of all time, but it’s a long way from the bottom of the barrel and worth the time to kick back with a favorite snack and see how far Charlie will go for vengeance.

Film Review: Hijackers And Vampires Do Not Play Well Together

~ Peter Kanelis ~ Leave a comment

Blood Red Sky is a pretty interesting horror action film directed by Peter Thorwarth, who also cowrote the script alongside Stefan Holtz. It concerns a mother who is soon revealed to be a vampire on her way to America for treatment. The flight gets interrupted when the flight is hijacked, and the mother is unable to control her unnatural urges.

The cast includes Peri Baumeister, Alexander Scheer, Kais Setti, and Dominic Purcell.

Baumeister plays a widow who appears to have leukemia; however, her affliction is even less common and more horrifying. She and her son board a plane where she is going to a treatment facility that could apparently treat her bloodthirsty condition. Her hopes get derailed when the plane gets hijacked. Her curse may be the only weapon she has to protect her son and other passengers.

This is one of the better horror films I have seen recently. It is from a German production company, so that is kind of interesting. Purcell was only cast member I recognized from the television series Prison Break.

Anyway, the visual effects were pretty good. The transformation that Baumeister undergoes was quite impressive.

It’s a pretty gruesome piece of work, but there seemed to be some restraint exercised.

Scheer also deserves a specific shout-out for his performance as one of the hijackers known as Eightball. He seemed to get into his role and was genuinely disturbing.

There are moments between the mother and child that are quite heartbreaking and well-performed. The young actor, Carl Koch, gets a little too shrill at times, but he does a pretty good job overall.

It’s a strange, chaotic script, but it turned out to be a pretty compelling and suspenseful film. If one enjoys vampires mixed with hijacked airplanes, this is a film to not ignore.

Film Review: Captain America Sees Red

~ Peter Kanelis ~ Leave a comment

Captain America: Brave New World is the latest film added to Marvel Studio’s list of mildly entertaining cinematic experiences in a still over-saturated superhero market. It is a little better than I had heard but not by much.

There are five credited screenwriters for this, including the director, Julius Ornah. The other collaborators are Rob Edwards, Malcolm Spellman, Dalan Mussan, and Peter Glanz.

Anthony Mackie has succeeded Chris Evans as the new Captain America. His superhero moniker in the previous MCU films was the Falcon. Now, he is the new Captain America since the previous one, Steve Rogers, went back in time to be with his lost love and bequeathed his shield to Sam Wilson. Anyway, other cast members include Harrison Ford as now-President Thaddeus “Thunderbolt” Ross, Danny Ramirez, Shira Haas, Tim Blake Nelson, and Giancarlo Esposito.

Nelson reprises his role from The Incredible Hulk film of 2008, which was Dr. Samuel Sterns, a super-intelligent villain who was grievously wronged by Ross for many years.

An old friend of Wilson’s is brainwashed into attempting to assassinate the president. A treaty with Japan falls into peril as they negotiate the handling of a new element known as adamantium. Ross had invited Wilson to a summit at the White House, wanting to discuss the chances of rebuilding the Avengers. The assassination attempt sparks an investigation that leads Captain America to an enemy who was kept in secret. Ross also has to fight off a frightening transformation triggered by his ingestion of gamma radiation. The new Captain America will have quite a fight on his hands to protect his country and the world from enemies within his own government.

Mackie is actually a talented actor and does his best with this role, but I didn’t find his character to be all that interesting. His angst about replacing the previous Captain America is somewhat predictable. He performs his fight scenes quite well. He seems to have trained quite hard to make some of those moves seem so effortless. My lack of enthusiasm for this portrayal has more to do with the writing than Mackie’s casting.

Harrison Ford predictably does a solid job as Thaddeus Ross, a role he took over from the late William Hurt. The previously mentioned frightening transformation is in the trailer, so I am not spoiling much by saying that he becomes the Red Hulk, which is pretty well realized with the assistance of CGI and whatever other special effects gizmos are involved.

I guess I was also distracted by the realization that it took five screenwriters to cobble this thing together. Parts of it did feel a little tacked together.

The film manages to avoid being completely terrible. There are some interesting moments peppered throughout.

Sterns was kind of an interesting adversary with a legitimate beef. Of course, the problem is that he was willing to tolerate a lot of collateral damage for his understandable desire for revenge. Nelson was quite effectively creepy at times. It was nice to see some previously dangling threads from The Incredible Hulk get tied off.

The fight scenes were well done, but Marvel films tend to be consistently effective in that arena.

Overall, the film has some good points such as casting and a semi-interesting plot, but the editing, some of the dialogue, and a rather underwhelming cameo are a little too clumsy for me to forgive.

Film Review: A Little Love And War Come For Marvin

~ Peter Kanelis ~ Leave a comment

Love Hurts is an action-comedy film with a talented cast but a very dubious plot. It took three screenwriters in the shape of Matthew Murray, David Leitch, and Luke Passmore to disappoint this movie watcher. Jonathan Eusebio is a director I have not heard of, and this film isn’t likely to help him much. Ke Huy Quan is in the lead as a successful realtor with a killer past. Other cast members include Ariana DeBose, Daniel Wu, Lio Tipton, and Sean Astin.

Marvin Gable is a very successful real estate agent who has embraced his new life after leaving behind his former criminal associations. He used to work for his brother, a crime lord, who has decided to send some heavy hitters to see if Marvin has heard from a former love, Rose, who he was supposed to kill. There is some missing money being sought. Rose does turn up and needs Marvin to dust off his lethal skills that he has shelved for a while. All sorts of strange assassins converge on the reunited couple, and Marvin is faced with having to lose his new life that he has grown to love.

The basic plot is not that bad. I sort of liked the casting of Quan in this role, however he does not quite pull off the menace when Marvin revers to his former persona. Marvin is described as a “beautiful monster” by his brother. Although the fight scenes are kind of fun, and Quan is able to sell it adequately, I am not sure I could buy that the implied ferocity described by the brother.

Ariana DeBose is quite a find. She is beautiful and seems to have a pretty good sense of comic timing when needed. She really sells the mischievous streak in Rose quite convincingly.

The problem with the film is an incoherent plot. The villains just become a bit too cartoonish. I understand that this was supposed to be a comedic venture, but the jokes just don’t land.

I do think that Ke Huy Quan deserves another chance in a lead role. He is kind of the best thing about this film, but the script didn’t help him shine that much.

The story had some loose threads, and it isn’t clear as to what decisions Marvin made about his future at the end of the chaotic chase.

There are a few bright spots in the film, but the experience as a whole was a bit more of a letdown than even I was expecting.

Film Review: Some Flights Should Be Missed

~ Peter Kanelis ~ Leave a comment

Flight Risk is an adequately entertaining action film directed by Mel Gibson. The script came from the computer of Jared Rosenberg. Mark Wahlberg, Michelle Dockery and Topher Grace are the main stars of this film.

Michelle Dockery plays a US Marshal taking an important witness to New York from Anchorage on a small plane. Wahlberg plays the pilot who turns out to be on a crime family’s payroll and is hired to make sure that Topher Grace’s Winston doesn’t spill the tea in court. Most of the story takes place on the plane where Wahlberg gets to unleash his inner psycho.

The story is a bit implausible, but the performances are just strong enough to make that somewhat forgivable. Wahlberg actually does a decent job of behaving with terrifying and convincing savagery at times. Grace actually does well as the nervous, sometimes witty, accountant to a mob family who has decided to switch sides. Dockery’s performance as Deputy Madolyn Harris is fine as well.

Really, the writing is a bit of a letdown in this one. The cast members do the best they can, but the film ends not being one of Gibson’s best directorial efforts. There is still some evidence that Gibson retains some of his skills because the movie could have been a lot worse.

It’s a pretty forgettable popcorn flick, but at least it’s not going to be remembered for belonging on a cinematic trash heap.

Film Review: A New Wolf Man Unleashed

~ Peter Kanelis ~ Leave a comment

Wolf Man is an adequate iteration of a common horror film figure directed by Leigh Whannell. Whannell co-wrote this script with Corbett Tuck. It’s a reasonable cinematic distraction and has some suspense, but it’s still unremarkable.

The film stars Christopher Abbott, Julia Garner, Sam Jaegar, and Matilda Firth. None of the cast appear to be the most recognizable Hollywood names, but they delivered reasonably solid performances. I sort of liked that I was not that familiar with this cast because it did help the film seem somewhat fresher.

We are introduced to the lead character, Blake Lovell, as a child who had a strange encounter in the woods when hunting with his father. The father is a difficult, paranoid man and his behavior left an unfavorable on his son, who has grown up, gotten married, and sired a daughter. Blake gets notice that his father, who had disappeared in the woods sometime, has been declared dead. Blake and his wife, Charlotte, have been enduring a tense marriage and agree that a trip to the Oregon wilderness could help them find some peace. Of course, this is a horror film, and they are stalked by a strange creature that has wounded Blake. Blake begins to undergo a slow transformation into something much more dangerously feral. Charlotte and their daughter are forced to fight for survival with the first beast in the forest, and eventually the husband and father begins to succumb to a new bestial hunger.

The visual effects are fine, and there are a few moments of real suspense. The performances were not noticeably bad. The background of this family was not all that interesting or intriguing. It’s another couple with some marital tension on the verge of likely separation. I found Blake Lovell to be somewhat bland as a family man. I don’t think it’s the fault of the actor. He did as well as he could. There was an interesting method he employed to instill some sense of confidence in his daughter. That relationship was kind of charming. Julia Garner was fine as the overworked journalist wife. There just wasn’t much I found charming enough about her for me to care that much if she got caught by the werewolf and torn to shreds.

The daughter played by Matilda Firth was performed well enough. I may have only cared about her survival because I am not sociopathic enough to really want to see a child become snack food, however.

The location was great; however, I am Oregonian by birth, so that may not be an unbiased opinion.

The visual effects were pretty good, but of course they were going to be.

It’s not a terrible film, but it’s another average, forgettable release that doesn’t leave much of an impression.