By Luca Newton
Another month is over, and that means another round of films to discuss that I've seen..
The month of August has been a very packed one for me. I've went away several times with my family. Because of this, I haven't seen as much movies this month as previous months, but I have still seen enough to make this post. It's still been a very good month for films for me.. Anyways, let's not waste anymore time!
Mank (Rewatch)
To start the month, I decided to give Mank another go. It was a film from last year I just couldn't enjoy. I previously had it at 2.5/5, but after this rewatch, it went up to 3/5. It still is very flawed, but it's still an incredibly well made and directed film that I respect a hell of a lot more than I enjoy. I hope Fincher's next film is a lot better though.
The Pirates of the Caribbean Franchise
Next, I decided to finally get around to watching all of the Pirates films. This was mainly due to the whole Depp situation really winding me up. I may do a ranking of these later, but just for now I'll say that Dead Man's Chest was absolutely favourite of the 5. It was absolutely incredible and far above the rest of them. I do see the hype behind the series now, and am upset the 6th will be a reboot.. My favourite character has to be Bill Nighy's Davy Jones. Absolutely iconic.
The Suicide Squad (Three times)
The first new movie I watched this month, was James Gunn's The Suicide Squad. Before release, I was very excited for it, and upon watching, it did not disappoint. I've already discussed this film at lengths, but man it is absolutely incredible. So much so that I've seen it 2 other times, and it hit the same both other times. Just an outstanding film.
Guardians of the Galaxy (Rewatch)
This one got better upon this rewatch. It has always been within my top 2 MCU movies, because it has always meant so much to me. And after seeing The Suicide Squad, I decided to watch Guardians again, to compare. And both excel in completely different areas, but nothing matches the heart of Guardians of the Galaxy.
Vivo
Oh, Vivo.. how much potential you had.. When I started this, I was really into it. The music, the dancing, the visuals, the story-telling, the premise. It all had me enthralled and excited for the rest of the film. It, unfortunately, meanders after that strong intro. And by meanders, I really mean nose-dives. We are introduced to this little girl who is incredibly annoying and completely ruins the tone of the film, and reverts it to a dumb kids movie with little to offer for anyone else. All that set-up, leads to the worst song in a musical. I was so disappointed by how mediocre this was.
Zack Snyder's Justice League
Finally got around to this. A 4-hour cut of the Justice League, that instead of being a Frankenstein's monster of Snyder, Whedon and WB, it was fully Snyder's vision and his cut. This meant it was 4 hour long. And that length alone almost made me put it off for a while. I was worried I would be bored shitless, as I haven't liked any of Snyder's work before this. Surprisingly, I really loved Zack Snyder's Justice League. It is truly an epic, in my book. The scale of it is astounding, the visuals are mostly gorgeous and it's not even too slow for me. I loved it as a Justice League movie. The main issue was that a lot of it did still end with CGI overload, but overall it still had great moments and was coherent. It makes me want another Snyder Justice League movie, so by that logic, it definitely worked for me.
Cinderella III: A Twist In Time
This was very random, but I decided to watch Cinderella 3 for the first time, and honestly.. I love it. It's really way better than it has any right to be. Like, this movie is legitimately better than the original. I say this because it focuses on Cinderella and the other characters more in depth, in a way I didn't expect. Anastasia was way more developed than I could have anticipated and both Cinderella and Prince Charming have newfound barrels of personality in the best way possible. All this goes without mentioning the fact this is a time travel movie. It's too crazy.. but that's why it's so good.
Birds of Prey (and the Fantabulous Emancipation of One Harley Quinn) (Rewatch)
I hadn't seen Birds of Prey since its release last year, and didn't remember it much. Upon rewatch, it is exactly how I remember it. Decent fun. To me, it's not the best because I really wanted to see more.. well, Birds of Prey. But I did enjoy it, and thought Ewan McGregor was really fun in his role. The action in the final act is great. I like Black Canary, glad she's getting a movie. Harley Quinn, was good too. I wasn't a fan of Cassandra Cain, she was kinda just there? And a little annoying.
The Kissing Booth 3
Sorry i needed to see the conclusion to the trilogy, because these films are next level awful. I really regret watching this film..
Zola
Anyways, onto a good film. Zola was really good. It's interesting how it's a film based on a Twitter thread. But that thread is really quite fascinating. It was brought to the big screen in a really unique way. Distributed by A24, it was definitely on the radar, but the style is so incredible, and I thought it was really investing because of how half disturbing it was. The ending was really abrupt for me though..
Bee Movie (Rewatch)
As I was over with friends, we decided to have a nice Bee Movie rewatch. It's one of those films that are supposed to be bad, but I really can't bring myself to think they are. I mean, it's not by any means an incredible movie, but it is decent. I think the reason I actually like it, is because it's not really trying to be good. It is a huge shitpost of a movie, and just embraces it being a joke. There is no way you can watch this and hate it, because it's so silly, it's actually hilarious in such an ironic way. Its self-awareness is what sells it.
The Nut Job
We were going to watch Megamind, but couldn't find it, so the younger kids put The Nut Job on. We watched, to see if maybe it had some ironic value. Sad to report it has absolutely no ironic value other than one Gangnam Style dance. It's just absolutely abysmal. We turned it off halfway through because nobody was entertained.
Megamind (Rewatch)
Megamind was watched the day after, and that was much more like it. Unlike Bee Movie, Megamind is a genuinely, unironically incredible film. One of my favourite animated movies probably. It's just a parody that goes way past being just a parody, it's really its own thing, with Will Ferrell's best performance probably. It never gets old for me.
Aquaman
Finally decided to see Aquaman, I had missed it in cinemas, and was honestly dodging it because of Amber Heard but I decided to watch it and imagine Amber Heard was someone else. It's kind of a shitpost of a movie to be honest, extremely fun. I think that self-awareness makes it a really fun comic book movie, with a really enthusiastic lead with Jason Momoa. And some really high profile actors like Willem Dafoe and Nicole Kidman.
Free Guy
After good word of mouth, I decided to check out Free Guy. It was good. It's about what you'd expect from this kind of movie. Ryan Reynolds is himself, there's a bunch of references, it's funny. What makes it good is its heart, it has a really good heart with Jodie Comer and Joe Keery's characters, who were the best part of this film. Both characters were really underused in marketing as they're truly the key characters in this, even though Ryan Reynolds starts. It is very much The Lego Movie and The Truman Show fused with GTA Online.
Ghostbusters
Ghostbusters is one of the those films I had never seen, but really wanted to. I finally got around to it on a long car journey, and it was really good. As a Bill Murray fan, I enjoyed his character, and how horny he was for Sigourney Weaver. Although it did really lose me in the last act, it got really insane.
Prisoners
In preparation for Dune, I realised I've not seen much of Denis Villeneuve's library. So I've started watching more of his stuff. I decided to start with Prisoners, and I loved it. As a Fincher fan, I was of course really into the mystery elements of this film. But what I loved was the clear focus on how the events effect these characters, and it gets you really invested into the characters and makes you understand their motivations deeply. This is integral for the mystery and making you actually want to figure it out. Hugh Jackman has his best performance in this, in my opinion. He was incredible at portraying a really stressed and angry father who lost his daughter and can't control anything to get her back faster. That desperation is his downfall. It's masterfully intertwined with religious symbolism. This is the best Denis Villeneuve movie that I have seen so far.
Yes, God, Yes
I think I saw a trailer for this in a YT video reacting to movie trailers and guessing their rating. And this film was surprisingly praised by critics, so that had me intrigued. I finally got around to watching it, and it was pretty decent. I thought it was pretty on the nose, and felt a lot like many other films I'd seen, without much making it really different. Natalie Dyer was great in this, but it's pretty forgettable.
Boss Level
Boss Level is an action film with a time loop gimmick. That had me interested, and I saw it was finally coming to Prime, so I downloaded it for the car journey home. It was predictable, and had a focus on a relationship that was ultimately rushed and not overly believable. but it was still really fun to watch and I think Frank Grillo deserves more leading roles in action movies.
Sicario
Honestly, wasn't a fan of this. It's an alright film, but I wasn't overly enthralled with it like I wanted to. It has a great cast with Emily Blunt, Josh Brolin and Benicio Del Toro, and is well made and directed, but it never captivated. Being another Villeneuve film, I expected it to. If I had to say one thing I really liked, was Benicio Del Toro's character, he made the last act so much better, and his personal story was well written, grounded and invested me. But, honestly, apart from that, I didn't enjoy this much.
Doctor Strange (Rewatch)
For real, the most underrated MCU movie ever made. It's one of the best, and yet people always undermine it. Sure, it is pretty formulaic in its structure, but that doesn't really change what they do with the formula, which really excels it above many MCU movies. It's not perfect, of course, but it is incredible imo. The visuals are incredible, the way that the final act unfolds is a spectacle and so unique. and the message is a lot deeper and relatable then most of the other MCU films, and of course, Benedict Cumberbatch is perfect in this role and really embodies it. I don't think I'm ready for Multiverse of Madness...
Wonder Woman 1984
On the polar opposite side of comic book movies, Wonder Woman 1984 is a horrible movie, and a horrible sequel to the 2017 original. Everything about the film is disastrous. I hope that Patty Jenkins didn't have everything to do with the spectacular failure of filmmaking. In this film, this is what those harsh critics see in the better comic book movies, and use this as reference for them. In reality, it's miles below the majority of modern comic book movies. I'd much rather watch Batman vs Superman..
Cruella (Rewatch)
Finally, Cruella came for free on Disney+, and I hadn't seen it since the start of June, and I really wanted to see if my thoughts had updated since. They hadn't. This film is still painfully mediocre. It is, by all technical aspects, a good film, but in every other way it ranges from meh to hilariously bad. I can see why people would love it, but for me it's just a fashion show jukebox movie.
The Green Knight
One of my most anticipated movies, The Green Knight was pulled from UK cinemas last minute in July, which left me really sad. But I've managed to watch it now, and it was worth the wait. I wish I could've seen it in cinemas, but it was enchanting all the same. With the stunning cinematography, great performances, and the great sense of confusion and unsettlement you feel watching it. It is like a puzzle, and it's not for everyone, but for me it was an incredible fantasy adventure film masterfully directed by David Lowery.
CODA
On a great streak, I decided to watch CODA on Apple TV+. Its premise of a family of deaf people with their daughter being the only one not deaf, and how that effects her life as a young girl finding her footing in life, and how she wants to sing, had me interested, and it really delivered. It is a film I scored really highly, higher than I expected to. It's relatively generic in a lot of its coming of age structure, but the reason I can ignore that is because of how insanely well it does them. Lots of CODA should be cringy, but just isn't. By the end, I was so wrapped up and invested in the family, I cried WITH them, in a nostalgic, happy way. Which is odd, and very rare for this kind of film, but it's just the way the film is made, it really connects with you. I absolutely adored it, and think it's an absolute must-watch.
Pig
The last film of the month for me, was Pig, starring Nicholas Cage. This is a film that is why I love cinema. Randomly, I saw this trailer on Twitter and was instantly sold on the insanely weird premise of Nick Cage looking for his pig. But when it actually came out, and I saw it's actually a great film, I got more excited. The fact such an absurd idea can end up being a really grounded nuanced movie about grief and loss is just incredible. I absolutely loved it. It felt like John Wick without the action, which almost made it quite personal, relatable and grounded.
What did you watch this month? I will be posting more this month due to the fact I probably won't be going anywhere this month unlike last.
Thanks for reading!
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