I'd be pretty hard-pressed to not enjoy a good Scorsese movie, and I'm super happy to see him tackle a subject matter that doesn't necessarily fit in with what we're used to seeing from him. Yes, it's "woke," but it's done so with Scorsese's wonderful writing and direction over some of Hollywood's best actors, who include Scorsese's biggest go-to actors together on screen - Leonardo DiCaprio and Robert De Niro. It also tackles a very disturbing subject matter that, until recently, we've all been ignorant of or just hadn't heard of due to others' ignorance. As the film opens, we're given a little background into the success of the Osage tribe upon finding oil on their Oklahoma reservation. The tribe becomes extremely wealthy, but due to reservation laws, white "guardians" are to manage their money. Said benefactor is a guy named William "King" Hale (De Niro), who acts friendly toward the Osage, bestowing gifts, providing chauffeurs and other services, and speaking their native tongue. However, the audience understands from the get-go that there's something pretty "off" about this guy. Enter Ernest Burkart (DiCaprio), who comes to King, who's his uncle, for some honest work. King starts him off with a chauffeur job and asks for him to take special care of one, Mollie Kyle (Lily Gladstone), which ultimately translates to "get to know her and marry her so we can get some of that money" (just to skip ahead). While things look dirty and underhanded as what seems to be a real love is blossoming between the two, one by one, her family starts getting taken out, which gets the attention of Tom White (Jesse Plemons) of the FBI, who, naturally, come to investigate. I won't go into any more detail about the story here, but one should know that this was all something that really went down. Scorsese does a good job of not glamorizing it with Hollywood style so much as to break our hearts and open our eyes to a long-ignored situation. This is adapted from a book of the same name, but here's a good Wiki article that covers it if you happen to miss out on the movie. But it is definitely worth the three-and-a-half hours of captivating storytelling and acting. That brings me to my next point of the film: the acting from everyone is pretty phenomenal here. If I were to have one slight nitpick about things, it would be that DiCaprio overdoes his exaggerated frown a wee bit throughout the movie. But it's still a great performance alongside the legendary De Niro, who we get to see wear those old-timey driving goggles in this movie, and whether intentional or not, it looks pretty hilarious. But for as great as those two always are, the most impressed I was with her acting in this was Lily Gladstone. It's odd to say, but Gladstone's performance here damn near outshines everyone, including De Niro and DiCaprio. She has quite a range she has to play, from mysterious but intriguing with a sense of humour all the way to physically sick and mournful, and she basically steals the show. But that's not to say that everyone else was bad in comparison by any means; everyone's wonderful in this, and as far as I'm concerned, Scorsese has struck gold again and continues his legacy of being a legendary filmmaker. As mentioned above, in true Scorsese fashion, this is indeed a long one at three-and-a-half hours. It's bound to feel that long to some. But for most, it seems to be that people are coming back from this saying that it didn't, and that's no surprise. Scorsese has a way of bringing you into his movies, where we constantly want to see what happens, along with any pleasant surprises he has in store. This film, though a different kind of Scorsese masterpiece, is still pretty much a masterpiece, and it's great to see that the legendary director hasn't lost his touch in making his audience feel the mass spectrum of emotions. 5/5
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I must admit that when I first saw the trailer for this movie, I pretty well rolled my eyes at it as yet another haunting movie that would be the same as most others. I tend to view them as a typical novelty haunted house in that you go into it, and you're along for a thrill ride using things like jump scares to fulfill your adrenaline needs. It's typically a fun time instead of a traumatizing one, though, with hints of mystery and intrigue accompanying the ride. I tend to enjoy them in their own ways and prefer them to torture porn. However, as I watched the trailer, Detective Hercule Poirot popped up, and I was immediately sold. The idea of giving us a detective horror (and I use the term very loosely) film seemed right up my alley. Many don't realize it, but one old Sherlock film I watched and thoroughly enjoyed was 'The Hound of the Baskervilles'. That would be the 1939 version of the story featuring Basil Rathbone as Holmes. It made for one of those great atmospheric classics. And since I enjoyed the last two Poirot films as their own fun "thrill rides", I found something about bringing back this horror detective story idea super intriguing. This chapter opens up in post-war Venice, Italy, which they made look incredibly inviting, as though it had this rustic quality, like some sort of fancy, beautiful antique. The sort of thing that looks a little homely on the outside, even, dare I say, haunted? There dwells a retired Hercule Poirot (Kenneth Branagh) and his bodyguard, ex-police officer Vitale Portfoglio (Riccardo Scamarcio). On Halloween, Poirot is approached by novelist Ariadne Oliver (Tina Fey) and asked to attend a séance with her to expose a medium named Joyce Reynolds (Michelle Yeoh) as a fraud. Poirot reluctantly agrees to join her to make short work of this. Opera singer Rowena Drake (Kelly Reilly) meets with them at her Palazzo, and it's explained that she has hired Mrs. Reynolds as a means to communicate with her deceased daughter, Alicia (Rowan Robinson), who apparently committed suicide after a romance went south. Also in the séance's attendance are Rowena's housekeeper, Olga Seminoff (Camille Cottin), Drake's family physician, Leslie Ferrier (Jamie Dornan) and his son, Leopold (Jude Hill), and Reynolds' assistants, Desdemona Holland (Emma Laird) and an American guy named Maxime Gerard (Kyle Allen) who happens to be Alicia's Father, but not in the best of places with Rowena. Poirot is ready to leave after the séance, in which admittedly bizarre and spooky stuff happens. But when one of the group is brutally murdered, the séance turns into a crime scene, and Poirot finds himself on the case once again. However, Poirot has to deal with the ins and outs of reality itself this time and may even have to call his own skepticism into question regarding whether there is a ghostly realm beyond. And I'm just going to go ahead and say it: this is, perhaps obviously for those who know my tastes, probably my favourite of the bunch so far (I don't know how many of these Branagh plans to do). While 'Murder on the Orient Express' and 'Death on the Nile' were entertaining in their own rights, there was no sense of "perfection" from either of them. That may not be the right word, but I'm talking about when something seemingly lines up perfectly for the viewer, as long as we count "perfection" as relative. This provided yours truly with a pretty wonderful balance to what I like to call "toe-dip horror", which is usually the concept of horror translated into a PG-rated or PG-13-rated movie. There's actually a decent jump scare or two here, but it's still a mystery first. Add a sprinkle of good humour and some solid acting and it's a good time, especially for the Spooky Season. I think I can safely recommend this to anyone looking for a Halloween watch this year that's more or less family-friendly. It's a murder mystery, a ghost story, a haunted house movie, and the rustic setting of Venice makes for some really creepy but perfectly natural set pieces. Story-wise, it's also fun to wonder along the way from Poirot's point of view - that of a complete and total skeptic. I also have my skeptical side, but let's be honest here - where's the fun in that? It's just kind of fun seeing a skeptic's point of view get tarnished with something they can't explain. But one thing I can explain is that if you enjoyed the last couple of these, you're in for a real treat with this one! 4/5 NOTE: The following review will eventually be moved to a special 'Fast Franchise' page. Y'know, these movies have been going on now for a solid 20+ years with their shares of ups, downs and altogether WTFs. The 'Fast' franchise has gone through and provided us with what is, in my humble opinion, the mindless action series Hollywood has needed for a long time. I like to think of these movies in a light that shines almost as bright as the Schwarzenegger films of the 80s. NOT everyone is gonna agree with that idea, but I do think people should at least consider it instead of just being harsh with criticisms about how "stupid" it all is. Back in the day, yes, we had our fair share of critics like Siskel and Ebert who would turn their noses up at certain things. But for the most part, going to the movies was about escapism and having fun. So if we got an action-packed Schwarzenegger movie, we all knew we weren't going to those for good plots (excluding some titles of course). We wanted to see witty one-liners, balls-to-the-wall action, and of course, the defiance of physics itself. The 'Fast' franchise offers up all of this, and has reached the point of complete self-awareness, as clearly shown in 'F9'. But really... when do things start to wear thin? In case you couldn't tell, speaking for myself, I'm typically entertained by these movies, but I definitely see some titles as "lesser" than others. This is unfortunately one of those, but I might put it at the higher end of things for reasons I'll get to shortly. To open things up in the meantime, however, the film starts with a flashback to the events of 'Fast 5' in which 'Furious' leads Dom Torretto Vin Diesel and Brian O'Conner (Paul Walker) hijack a safe from the corrupt politician and drug lord, Hernan Reyes (Joaquim de Almeida). Spoiler alert; Reyes is KIA, and happens to be the father of a ruthless man of vengeance named Dante (Jason Momoa) who is out for blood. Meanwhile, we are reintroduced to Dom and his "Family" in the present day, living a happy life of peace with their family still growing. However, Dom, Letty (Michelle Rodriguez) and their son, Brian "Little B" (Leo Abelo Perry) have a literal rude awakening one night from their arch nemesis, a seemingly fatally wounded Cipher (Charlize Theron) who warns them that the "Devil" is on his way and that they share a common enemy in this Dante guy. The rest of the team, including Han (Sung Kang), Roman (Tyrese Gibson), Tej (Chris 'Ludacris' Bridges) Ramsey (Nathalie Emmanuel), meanwhile, has been sent on a mission to Rome. To no one's real surprise, the mission turns out to be a setup, so Dom and Letty leave to intercept, leaving "Little B" with Mia (Jordana Brewster). In Rome, the basic plot grows to be Dante attempting to make Dom suffer as much as possible by carelessly tearing apart everything around him - both mentally and physically. To that end, I will give the movie credit for keeping things intense, despite the fact that we all know how well these guys can all defy physics. So much of what helped with that, at least from my perspective, was the way Momoa played this role - one might say "Joker"-like, perhaps bordering on a ripoff, BUT, he still stole the show, in my opinion. Maybe that's just my bias toward chaotic characters though. But while Momoa's addition added a little spice to things, I have to admit that some other characters started to get stale. Speifically, I'm starting to get a bit annoyed with the dynamic of Roman and Tej. They've essentially become a bickering married couple at this point, and it's just not that funny anymore. Our lead, Dom, seems to sort of balance things out here though, if only because he's become his own stereotype. I mean if you think of Dom from the 'Fast' franchise, just about anything he's known to do, from mentioning the importance of family to making constipated-looking mean faces (as seen above), it's all there, and nowadays, that's just a part of the fun of it all. Along the way, we see some old faces and new faces alike, as though the film is a sort of "Greatest Hits" as far as the cast goes, so there's a good amount of fan service going on here - including a dangerous street race, which is the whole reason we started loving these movies in the first place. Altogether, this was still a fun movie, but this brings me back to its self-awareness, and how much is too much? It took all the charm out of how 'F9' did it, and just straight up tells the audience from Brie Larson's (one of the additions) mouth how these movies tend to work. This might be a problem if it weren't for one thing the edning of the film left me with - this is just the beginning of the end! (By the way, if you hate cliffhangers... maybe skip this one, because... damn!) 3/5 I think I'll start this one off by saying that eventually, I'm probably gonna do project on 'John Wick', as it does currently stand as one of my all-time favourite action series. But for now, I'll do a bit of a recap leading up to this. The original 'John Wick' starts us off with our retired titular assassin, John Wick (Keanu Reeves) recently losing his wife. While in mourning, mobster Iosef Tarasov (Alfie Alan) and several of his thugs steal his prized 1969 Ford Mustang Boss 429 and, more importantly, kill his puppy, which was John's wife's last gift to him. The switch goes off in Wick, and he begins what would soon become a four-film revenge killing spree. The first film puts a bounty on Wick's head, as well, trying to stop him at all costs, and as these films go on, that bounty keeps increasing, along with the balls-to-the-wall action that is this collection of films. I'm not gonna go into every detail through all of the movies, because we'll be here all day. But eventually, Wick finds his life as an assassin unavoidable, things go from revenge to survival for him, and every movie kicks the volume up a notch just a little bit with its now famous "Gun-Fu" action. Now, through the series, Wick exacts revenge on the "High Table"; a council of twelve crime lords who have many important people in their pockets. This particular chapter begins with a huge spoiler, but said huge spoiler leads to High Table member, the Marquis Vincent de Gramont (Bill Skarsgård) sending a barrage of unlimited resources after Wick. Namely, a blind, retired High Table assassin, Caine (Donnie Yen), fueled by de Gramont's threat to kill his daughter if he doesn't follow through. And may I say, it has been a while since I've seen Yen do his thing, but the guy is pretty damn amazing at what he does! Also introduced to us here was possibly my new favourite overall character of the series, a bounty hunter who calls himself "Nobody" (Shamier Anderson) and his awesome German Shepherd companion. He's awaiting an increase in John Wick's bounty before following through with his attempt, but it's entirely possible that a private deal with de Gramont could nudge him forward. The interesting thing about both Caine and Nobody is that, even though they are after a bounty for very different reasons, they both seem to be true neutral characters, each with their own reasons to be so. So, I must apologize outright to my readers if any of my plot description got confusing, seeing as even I can see there's probably a detail or two I've omitted that I maybe shouldn't have. But truth be told, seeing this was a little bit last-minute and I didn't have the appropriate amount of time to play catch-up before going in. So even I was a little lost in the beginning, plot-wise, trying to remember what was what. Again, one day I'll turn this into a better review that ties in with the previous three, regarding plot, characters, etc. But for now, I'll focus on how I liked it as a stand-alone. I'm just speaking for myself here, and perhaps this is a bit unfair to the film itself, but I really don't come to these films to take away and remember the storyline and the more important stuff within. I'm here to see John Wick kick ass with his gun-fu, high octane action and line delivery, which is nothing short of "... woah!" Don't get me wrong, I love Keanu Reeves, he's an awesome dude. But I did laugh almost every time he opened his mouth to deliver a line. That's not even a criticism though. For me, it completely adds to what makes this so much fun. Remember back in the day when action heroes were known for corny one-liners and we loved it? Well, with that in mind, I really can't complain. What can I really say? It's a 'John Wick' movie, and I feel like by "Chapter 4", its fan-base will be pretty well-established, and I can therefore say with relative ease that if you liked the other three, you'll like this one too. This is a great action series for this generation, and it all starts with an incident that would make any movie fan route for the hero. This is a series that's absolutely perfect for those really bad and frustrating days when you could just scream. On top of all the action, one can even get a good laugh from it, as a lot of the action is actually quite funny, and again, the one-liners. A super solid action series if there ever was one! 4/5 This one comes to us from writer/director Brandon Cronenberg; son of David Cronenberg, the undisputed king of visceral horror, holding such titles under his belt as 'The Fly', 'Scanners', 'eXistenZ' and 'Naked Lunch' just to name a few. With that comes the knowledge that this is probably going to be a weird and messed up kind of movie with that Cronenberg name, and sure enough, this doesn't fail in its delivery. And while there's a fair share of body horror, most of the horror here is psychological. It's good for those seeking the next "WTF did I just watch?" title. Taking place in the bizarre seaside country of Li Tolqa (fictional), writer James Foster (Alexander Skarsgård) and his wife, Em (Cleopatra Coleman) are enjoying a getaway, but do face a few marital problems during their stay. One night, Gabi Bauer (Mia Goth), a fan of James' work, invites the couple to hang out with her and her husband, Alban (Jalil Lespert). Despite fair warnings to stay on the resort in such a place, the four eventually travel the countryside and have a good time (some more than others). However, on their way back, James ends up hitting a local with the car, killing him. Being in a rather corrupt country, this essentially means facing execution. The next day, James is arrested and sentenced to death, which, in this country, means the first-born son of the victim gets to carry out the sentence. As luck would have it, though, James married into money and is able to afford a certain procedure that will allow him to live. Said procedure involves paying to have a clone made of yourself to be executed instead, while you get to live on. And this is where the movie takes a crazy turn. James pays for the procedure and, along with Em, actually sits to watch the execution. But while Em is understandably horrified by the spectacle, James is kind of into it, presumably realizing the power he's been given. While Em is convinced to go back to America, James extends his stay by a week and hangs out with Gabi and Alban a little more. Here is where James and Gabi meet a group of similar tourists who have undergone the same procedure. Without going into spoiler territory, things really take off from here, as the group has this realization of invincibility, as long as they can keep substituting clones for their crimes. Soon, they go after the very people who sentenced them in the first place with thoughts of revenge. But certain questions come into play with all of this, such as obvious morality, but also questioning whether one of these death-row-worthy crimes ever lead to the death of the original person, knowing the clones still retain memories. It should probably be noted that I'm personally not the biggest fan of body/visceral horror, but as I mentioned before, this feels much more psychological. Things most definitely get 'Game of Thrones' level messed up in this movie, and that goes beyond this idea of cloning yourself and then watching a version of yourself get killed in front of your eyes. Like, if that's not truly messed up, I dunno what is. But having said that, I really did feel a sense of symbolism about this idea. I didn't take it as a way to commit suicide and keep living, which I think is what some took away from it. In that case, yeah, it's a WTF kind of flick. But bear with me on this one. My takeaway was that every version of James he saw killed was some part of his personality that he wanted to do away with. When you pay close attention, each one is very different in the way they act, and once killed off, James seems to get some sort of satisfaction from it (usually). I see it as a cautionary tale, in that if we do away with those versions of ourselves that we hate, it doesn't really make us "us" anymore. Even the way it ends sort of lends itself to this idea (I think). But of course, that's a simple interpretation of someone's work of art. Whether that's what Cronenberg meant by it or not, only he knows for sure. I just got the feeling that there was something much deeper to this than met the eye. This belongs to a subgenre of films that make you feel dirty enough to need a shower after watching it, and there's no rush to re-watch it. While I admired some of the concepts behind this, it's still not something I would consider up my alley, despite my whole takeaway from it. I think this one's made for a particular audience I'm not necessarily a part of, but if you like a good "WTF did I just watch" movie, it's not a bad rabbit hole to head down for a good, twisted mind. It's an unusual mixture of intriguing and creepy with haunting aspects to it and the way it plays with the viewer's brain. I really do think that if this is your kind of thing, it's very well worth checking out. But for yours truly, it's a bit too much. 3/5 |