 For those who don't know, the Joker character is who I consider my favourite villain of all time. I say "character" because part of what makes him my favourite is how flexible he can be as far as portrayal goes. While there are so many similarities between so many different versions, they're all really quite unique in their own ways. I won't go through each and every one, but my personal favourites include Jack Nicholson, Heath Ledger, and Mark Hamill. I will admit, however, that Joaquin Phoenix could be added to that list... if it wasn't for this movie.
In the first 'Joker,' I truly appreciated the more dramatic take on it, bringing the mental health situation into play. Essentially, the origin story had a lot to say about the stigmas still attached to mental health problems, and the Joker, himself, ends up being a product of untreated mental health thanks to poor government funding. It was really well done, I appreciated to new take on things, and I enjoyed how they managed to combine his genuine creepiness with a bit of sympathy. It's no fun 'Batman' flick, but it was well executed. A little time unfolded, discussions were had, word of mouth spread, and a lot of people even ended up making Phoenix their new favourite portrayal of the Joker. Then we all received that odd bit of news saying that the sequel would be a musical starring Lady Gaga as Harley Quinn. That was a lot to digest. I was lukewarm to the idea of Gaga being Quinn, and the musical aspect felt odd. But even with all of that, I was still willing to give it a chance, recognizing that he musical aspect of things would tie into the mental health aspect of things, and play out as fantasy. Joker, a.k.a. Arthur Fleck (Phoenix) awaits his trial for his crimes at Arkham State Hospital. His lawyer, Maryanne Stewart (Catherine Keener) plans to use dissociative identity disorder as their defence, hoping to convince the judge that the Joker did the crimes of the previous movie, and not Arthur Fleck. This is pretty much the whole movie - awaiting the trial, and then the trial itself. All in all, at least in my humble opinion, it's kinda boring, and it drags. The only real saving grace could possibly be the arrival of Harleen Quinzel (Gaga), who calls herself "Lee" through the movie. These two meet, not in therapy sessions conducted by Lee as a professional, but in the same hospital. It is mentioned that she has degrees in her field of psychology, but otherwise, here, she's just another patient. She comes to admire the way Arthur pulled off his crimes, and is in love with his destructive and chaotic personality. Real fans of Harley Quinn need not apply,. however, because this is about as far away from Harley as I can imagine, aside from a couple of very basic personality traits, which have already pretty much been mentioned. While the whole trial portion of the film is a bore on its own, the rest of it is just Arthur and Lee putting on some kind of half-assed Broadway show about how much they love each other, and whether or not Lee can be trusted. If you're looking for a dark, violent movie with a dash of dark comedy, you are SOL here. There's a bit of violence, but it's completely crowbarred in, and any supposed jokes fall pretty flat here. And then there's the ending, which seems evidently controversial for fans, but even as a fan, I just plain didn't care either way. I am going to be slightly controversial here, myself, and give the film credit for just one thing. Unfortunately, that one thing happens to be the risks they took with things here in trying something new and different. It flopped on its ass, but at least they were ballsy enough to go for it. In the end, this really ends up being a bit more of an artsy-fartsy film starring the Joker. But the rest of us fans remember Nicholson's art gallery scene from '89, and prefer that more chaotic version of the Joker being artistic. This didn't ruin the character for me or anything, but I can say with full conviction now that Phoenix is NOT my Joker. 1/5
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 This one ended up being advertised this year as what would probably be the next big title in horror, with ads reminiscent of things like 'Blair Witch' or 'Paranormal Activity', touting promises of scares that could potentially change the game in the genre. But, as usual, this too ended up being not entirely bad, but just kind of underwhelming. The whole genre has to stop advertising in such ways just to get butts in seats. In this one, the big tease is Nicolas Cage playing a new horror villain, and that would have been better for them to run with.
Nicolas Cage has kind of been his own meme for ages now, so when the trailers tried to advertise this movie with his apparent made-up appearance in mind, they kind of dropped the ball. I'm telling you right now, it is NOT a scary makeup job, and Cage's performance, while very good, still comes across as Nicholas Cage being Nicholas Cage. It's a performance I meet in the middle. It could very well be more effective for anyone unfamiliar with Cage, but all I end up seeing here is Cage doing the best with what he has to work with. Potentially clairvoyant FBI agent Lee Harker (Maika Monroe) gets assigned by her supervisor, William Carter (Blair Underwood) to investigate a case of family-related murder-suicides occurring recently in Oregon. Each case involves a series of overwhelming coincidences involving the family members, their daughter's ninth birthdays, all occurring on the 14th of their birth months, and letters left at the crime scene, waiting to be decoded (much like the Zodiac Killer), all signed at the bottom with the name "Longlegs." More or less on her own, Lee digs deeper and deeper into the case, eventually revealing some pretty nasty stuff. But it's not long before her success in the case starts to backfire on her, as Longlegs begins to threaten those close to Lee is she gets too close to him. It's all pretty par for the course when it comes to serial killer horror, and this is a movie that reflects the (in my opinion) much better 'Silence of the Lambs' - so if you're into the genre, and also into true crime, like myself, you're not gonna see a whole hell of a lot here that will blow your mind. While probably to no one's surprise, this is a movie I meet very much in the middle. But I can say with all honesty that if I wasn't into true crime stories or the horror genre in general, this does a pretty good job at providing the audience not only with some decent horror elements, but a story that one might not be surprised to hear on a true crime podcast. It dabbles very lightly in supernatural elements, mostly involving Lee's possibly clairvoyance, and Longlegs' Satan worship. But it does it all on a grounded level, and nothing goes overboard. The film also uses things to its advantage, such as a damn-near complete absence of music, having it all occur in a quaint, rural "every town" (looking like a place where it seems fine to keep your doors unlocked), and making sure our eyes wander to the background with a chance glimpse of something that may or may not be sinister. I mean, atmospherically, between all of that and Cage's performance, they really hit the nail on the head as far as the whole creep factor of the movie goes. Despite how effective it is at being unsettling, however, I still can't get past Nicolas Cage, even if he IS putting on a solid performance. If you know him well, and have seen him in everything, this won't be as good, as all you'll see is Cage being Cagey. BUT, if you're more unfamiliar with his work, the film will be far more effective at what it's trying to do. I liked a lot about this movie, but disliked a chunk of it too, concerning a lot of wooden performances, and a whole weird thing involving dolls that look like victims that didn't feel like it needed to be there. It's one I can hardly recommend one way or another, but still perfectly passable. 3/5  I suppose for this one, I should first talk about the experiences I've had with bikers in the past. Nothing to this extreme, but there were bits and pieces about the lifestyle I picked up on that are quite well-reflected in this movie - first and foremost probably being that bikers aren't just simply "bad people" so much as there's a lot of misunderstanding behind where their "bad" lies. I am by no means an expert or a scholar on the matter, and in fact, I'm terrified of motorcycles (judge as you must), but there was something about this film that felt "right" or "correct."
On one hand, they do a good job of showing what these bikers come across as to the general public, but it does a better job of showing how they act within their club, showing us more of a sort of rough and tumble gang who you wouldn't terribly mind getting a drink with, and they're not necessarily bad people, but at the same time, these guys aren't exactly a picture of innocence either. Almost no scene puts this all across better than the story's opener, and it does it well enough to peak your curiosity to see where things go. However we start by meeting a photography student named Danny Lyon (Mike Faist) and discover that the film is executed in a faux documentary style, as Danny gets the film's story through the mouths of members of the fictional biker club, The Vandals, who are meant to be portraying the Outlaws, circa the 1960s. Foremost among the interviewees, is Kathy Bauer (Jodie Comer), wife of Benny Cross (Austin Butler), a primary member of The Vandals, based in Chicago, and good friend of club founder, Johnny Davis (Tom Hardy). Through several other club members, and mainly Kathy, Danny learns all about the backstory behind Benny, his marriage to Kathy, his place in the Vandals motorcycle club, the club itself, Johnny's leadership, and a biker wannabe who only goes by "The Kid" (Toby Wallace). We furthermore learn the difference between the biker gangs that we all fear and the biker clubs that are a little more misunderstood, and their most unfortunate merging over time. The whole thing is actually pretty damn intriguing, makes for a solid story, and feels a bit more realistic than what Hollywood would typically put forward with a movie like this. I think what I probably appreciated the most about it were the interviews with the secondary and tertiary characters of the plot. As one has probably seen in trailers, some of the more recognizable faces include Norman Reedus as "Funny Sonny", Michael Shannon as "Zipco", but there's quite a few others who add to the charm (yes, I said charm) of the whole experience as well, by telling their stories the way they see it, and adding a bit of humour to the mix. They're really what make the movie more fun than dramatic. This one comes to us from the perhaps lesser-known Jeff Nichols, whose most famous film to date is probably 2012's 'Mud' (if you remember that McConaughey vehicle). I have to admit that this did kind of make me want to check out his other, more obscure projects to see what else he can do. Critically speaking, 'The Bikeriders' does a lot of what I've seen before in things like mafia movies. Having said that, though, the idea of this being a biker club story adds just that little dash of difference necessary to keep it a little more fresh. Personally speaking, I found this to be one of those movies you can enjoy more for its dramatic tone, but you know full well that it may not make it into that "Oscar-worthy" category all the same. I would probably claim it to be one of the all-around better movies I've seen this year, and I'd be hard-pressed to find a lot of problems with it, critically. I would say it probably won't be everyone's cup of tea, but I'd also probably say it's one of my favourites of this year, so I'd say check it out if you're at all curious! 5/5  Here we have yet another high-octane, balls-to-the-wall action revenge flick that follows the ideas of 'Monkey Man' fairly close. Therefore, I will probably be making quite a few comparisons between the two, as they each tell almost the same story (what little story there is to tell), but execute them in such different ways. For as enjoyable as 'Monkey Man' was, though, based on personal taste, I have to say that the execution of what we have here is far more up my alley, and I definitely liked this a bit better.
For me, the idea of a revenge film that tries to reach the bar 'John Wick' has set is a bit of a tired concept. I do tend to have fun with them, but at the same time, its understandable that people might be getting sick of them. Hell, even seeing this movie almost paralleling 'Monkey Man' upon its release, even I said "another revenge film?" However, upon seeing the trailer for this, it added a couple of little details that managed to draw me in. It was clearly made for fun as opposed to heavy drama, it seemed to be influenced mostly by video games, and the narration of H. Jon Benjamin added a cherry to this revenge sundae of a movie. An unnamed city is run by the corrupt Van Der Koy family; artistic wannabe, Gideon (Brett Gelman), the harsh and heartless Melanie (Michelle Dockery), her equally heartless husband, Glen (Sharlto Copley) and head of the family, Hilda (Famke Janssen). An annual event the family hosts known as "The Culling" chooses twelve seemingly random victims to be murdered on live television for entertainment, suggesting the ideas we have of what the Colosseum in Rome once was have resurfaced in this dystopian future. One might also compare the ideas here to 'The Hunger Games' for a more modern take. One day, a boy we only ever know as "Boy" (Cameron & Nicholas Crovetti), his little sister and best friend, Mina (Quinn Copeland) and their mother (Rolanda Marais) are brought to the town square, and Hilda executes both Mina and her mother in preparation for The Culling, leaving Boy for death, deaf and mute. Eventually, Boy is found by an unnamed Shaman (Yayan Ruhian), and to make a long story short, the Shaman trains Boy through the years so that he can follow through with his revenge on the Van Der Koys for killing his family in cold blood. As a result of Boy's inability to speak or hear, he has created his own inner monologue (H. Jon Benjamin) whose voice he took from his favourite arcade game he used to play with Mina. He has also learned to read lips, which yields some pretty hilarious results when he can't see the lips moving clearly. There are a few moments here when nonsense is uttered because of improper lip reading, and with my love of random humour, it really just adds to things for me with a fun and, in my opinion, creative idea. Boy also constantly hallucinates Mina, who seems to be trying to help with on his mission, offering advice and perhaps a bit of a conscience. As mentioned earlier, there's a lot here that could be compared to 'Monkey Man'. Aside from the basic revenge plot, 'Monkey Man' has a similar lead name with "Kid," they both feature a funny sidekick type, here being Andrew Koji as Basho, and Sharlto Copley shows up in both as a despicable character. As far as which is better, it will all be a matter of taste, and it feels like it reflects the time of disaster movies in the late 90s when there was two of something a lot of the time, like 'Volcano'/'Dante's Peak' or 'Armageddon'/'Deep Impact'. Despite quality of either, you'll end up picking one that speaks to you a bit more. In the case of 'Monkey Man' vs 'Boy Kills World,' the big selling points for me on 'Boy' being "better" include much better fight choreography, much less shaky cam and the fact that it takes itself less seriously and almost feels like parody. It makes its heavily game-influenced execution known from the get-go, and reminds me of other non-video-game-based movies that make for good video game movies, like 'Scott Pilgrim.' To top things off, the blood is nice and over-the-top, almost adding to the absurdity of it all. While 'Monkey Man' may be preferred by some, I can say honestly that I had more fun with this one. 4/5 |
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