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marcojansen2000
Reviews
Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire (2024)
Ghost budget
"Hey, come on - a hundred million will barely get you a script and an 'A' lister nowadays, you want this movie made right we need more money!.....Well, yeah - actually we have a whole bunch of 'A' listers and a whole new generation of wannabe 'A' listers but we just need some more money for the effects, you know these movies need good effects, that's what people wanna see right?.......Oh, your neighbour's kid does ZBrush? Creates all kinds of crazy monsters? Will work for $100 a day? Okay then, we'll get him to do the main villain and I guess we'll rehash some old CG and rely on the cast and script to pull it through."
The plot seemed scrambled like it was relying on Tik-tok addicted scatterbrains to not pay much attention - even though new ghostbusters kept crawling out of the woodwork they couldn't save it. To me, it felt like a handful of actors soaked up the budget and were tasked with distracting the viewer from a leaky plot and budget effects.
If I was making a movie and had to choose between good writing, good actors or good effects, I'd go with writing first, at least a well written plot will keep my attention. In saying that though, I'm not really the target audience and probably expect too much. I still think the original had better effects, plot and acting but maybe my mind just updated it over the years?
Monarch: Legacy of Monsters (2023)
Missing something
Multicultural - check
LGB... - check
Strong female leads - check
Exotic locations - check
Acting - check
References to monsters - check
Story entwined in different timelines - check
Monsters - hmmm
Hey I have an idea for a new monster movie with no monsters. Lets imply monsters and make a lot of references but we'll only show them for a few seconds every few episodes. Lets make this about people in an unbelievable scenario, they'll really have to act their guts out to pull it off. Once people realize its all about the people and not the monsters we're hoping they'll be invested enough to not really care.
The acting is good and I feel like they did their best with a ridiculous idea but people watch monster movies/series for the monsters.
Expend4bles (2023)
Bad Reaction to Action
At first I thought it was a satire but by the end I figured it had more to do with money laundering or just a generous payday for some old school action heroes - where did $100m go exactly?!?
The script could have been written by chatGPT, every action cliche in the book but even in the 80's at least there was some wit here and there. I felt sorry for these actors to the point where I suspected the writers wanted them to look bad.
I think it would have been far more entertaining if they had made it a comedy where they accidentally shoot each other, or run out of breath mid-fight, or even forget what they're doing completely...
The actual story was predictable and lacked any imagination, the effects were flat, the blood splatters were too red and I was yawning during action sequences that relied heavily on moronic henchman not being able to shoot or being too scared to shoot - this could have worked in well with the satire version they should have made. Actually - if you do watch it, do it through a satirical lense and you might get a laugh or two more than intended.