mattpope384 Reviews

The Many Saints of Newark (2021)

It was.....Cinematic

[6/10 · 3 October 2021]

To paraphrase one of Patsy Parisi's more famous lines from the series: The Many Saints of Newark IS cinematic....and that's where it's going to disappoint fans.

The film is well shot and directed, the cast does a good job of playing young versions of the series' main cast, and there is saga-like ambition in the use of the Newark race riots to backdrop the action, but The Many Saints of Newark ends up feeling grim and somber, lacking much of the series' dark humor and use of everyday banality as a relatable plot device.

We don't gain insights into why Dickie Moltisanti was such a legendary figure, nor do we come to really understand his influence on young Tony Soprano. Mostly we're just shown that Dickie and Tony's relationship would be the model for Tony and Christopher's.

A storyline focusing on black gangs organizing to take control of the numbers action in their communities, and away from the Italian mob, would make more sense if this had been a two-part opener for a new series. But in the context of a one-off movie it doesn't payoff in any meaningful way other than as an historical insight into what was going on in the Newark underworld at that time (and maybe, obliquely, to the Willie Overalls plot point in the series).

Similarly, and again in a callback to Patsy Parisi, this movie uses the Sopranos' technique of having one actor play a set of twins. In this case though, this subplot also doesn't seem to make much sense. Perhaps the jailhouse discussions between Dickie and Sally were meant to serve the same purpose as Tony's conversations with Dr. Melfi: a Greek Chorus into the protagonist's thought process, but except for one key bit of advice Sally gives at the end, it also seems like a lot of build up for no significant payoff.

There are vignettes meant to indicate Tony's ultimate evolution into a crime boss but nothing really convincing. Perhaps the producers didn't want to be too on-the-nose with young Tony, but an onscreen depiction of something like the robbery of Feech LaManna's card game probably would have made more sense to audiences than the few petty crimes we do see.

Ultimately this would have been a great opener for a new TV series- one that I would definitely want to watch- but as a movie it felt rushed and disjointed, without sufficient time to explore some potentially intriguing characters and themes. It was cinematic in its style and tone but ultimately too thin in its substance to stand alone as an attempt to contextualize the groundbreaking Sopranos series.

Den of Thieves (2018)

Solid and Gritty in the "Heat" Tradition

[7/10 · 22 January 2019]

As has been pointed out, Den of Thieves was clearly influenced by Michael Mann's 1995 cops & robbers masterpiece "Heat". Fortunately though, Den of Thieves manages to be an hommage rather than a lower-budget knock off.

The same themes are explored as Den of Thieves follows the personal and professional lives of a crew of Marine Recon veterans turned A-List bank robbers and the elite - and rogue- team of L.A. Sherrif's Dept. detectives trying to take them down.

The lead cop is Big Nick played especially sleazy by a bulked up Gerard Butler and the lead robber played by Pablo Schreiber is named Merriman (which I found myself wondering if that was an ironic nod to Robin Hood and his Band of Merry Men).

Many of the same themes in Heat are explored as we gain an insight into the personal and professional lives of the law men and the outlaws. We see that the criminals have a sense of loyalty to each other and to family and the cops tend to think of themselves as above the law.

Writer-director-producer Christian Gudegast incorporates much of Mann's signature pacing and atmosphere to good effect here. The film manages to be moody and introspective without ever dragging and the action sequences- particularly the shoot outs- tend to have the attention to verisimilitude that allows the audience to feel some of the tension that the characters are experiencing.

One major shortcoming however, is that in movies like Heat and Collateral, Michael Mann uses the city of Los Angeles as a third co-star. He treats the city and it's environs reverently and the look, feel and tone of L.A. permeates his films.

Although set in L.A., for budget reasons Den of Thieves was filmed in Atlanta and it is apparent. Atlanta is a great town and has been good to the film and TV industries, but it looks and feels nothing like Southern California. This displacement can be felt throughout the movie and is distracting.

Another difference is that I found myself less invested in the two leads than I did in Heat. Although Al Pacino's Vincent Hanna and Robert DeNiro's Neil Cauley we're definitely flawed characters, they were engaging and you were interested in their fundamental conflict. Butler and Schreiber do good work in playing their characters as written, but frankly Merriman is such a flat cypher and Big Nick such a greasy scumbag that I didn't have the same level of engagement around their eventual stand offs.

That said, it can be fun in watching Big Nick be a smarmy, alcoholic taunting prick to Merriman's crew and his nemesis FBI agent and Schreiber does bring a dead-eyed menace to his character that should feel familiar to anyone who's ever worked around hardened career criminals.

As someone who generally likes the heist movie genre, I found Den of Thieves a solid, gritty well-paced actioner that is more thoughtful than most. I enjoyed watching it from the comfort of my couch and would check out the sequel if one is made.

It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia: Mac Finds His Pride (2018) Season 13, Episode 10

If Fans Don't like it: F-k 'Em, The Gang Gets Earnest

[10/10 · 8 November 2018]

As many have noted, Season 13 hasn't been Sunny's finest. It has been uneven- sometimes hilarious, sometimes pained and flat.

But writing comedy is hard. Really hard. It's harder than writing drama and Sunny has managed to stay consistently hilarious, insightful and unconventional for over a decade. In fact it's pulled off one of the most difficult feats in popular television history: to build a wildly successful series on a shoestring budget and with thoroughly unsympathetic characters.

So as I watched the Season 13 finale's final four minutes, I kept waiting for the bawdy joke. Then I realized, it wasn't coming.

Confounding expectations once again, Sunny seems to have used its finale to say something, fan reaction be damned.

Having known and cared about LGBTQ people in my life, I have seen up close that coming out is a scary and risky thing. Perhaps I have missed something but after watching the Sunny season 13 finale twice I concluded that the ground breaking show used its platform to acknowledge that reality, without cynicism, without irony, and without using Mac's sexuality as a punchline as it has many times in the past.

In a show that has reveled in the ugliness of human behavior, this episode concluded with one of the most artistically beautiful and earnest sequences in television history. At a time when actual bigotry and violence against LGBTQ people is notably on the rise, Sunny took a moment to put humanity in our faces. If fans who just want a cynical laugh are disappointed: f-k ' em, Mac and the gang had something redeeming to say.

Confounding expectations: ultimately, how Sunny is that?

Kong: Skull Island (2017)

A Vietnam War/ Monster Movie Mash-up that Misfires

[2/10 · 27 March 2018]

All I could think watching Kong: Skull Island was that the director must have grown up watching Platoon (1986), Full Metal Jacket (1987), Hamburger Hill (1987) and every other movie about the Vietnam War and desperately wanted to make a 'Nam movie, but all the studio was willing to give him was a King Kong film.

The final product is a disjointed, illogical mash-up of a film that includes every Vietnam War movie cliche shoe-horned with great contrivance into a King Kong story.

This film goes to absurd lengths to include scenes of Huey helicopters approaching an LZ to a late 60's rock-and-roll soundtrack and soldiers wading chest deep through rice paddies.

Somewhere amidst this is a bland, script and a cast that is entirely forgettable except for a wildly miscast Samuel L. Jackson and a rather pointless John C. Reilly.

This is a Vietnam War movie that hijacks a King Kong movie and ends up with a "huh?" final product that contributes nothing to either genre.

Star Wars: Episode VII - The Force Awakens (2015)

Redeems the Prequels and Offers "A New Hope" for the Franchsie

[9/10 · 28 December 2015]

Episode VII fully redeems the infamous Star Wars prequels. It wouldn't be surprising to learn that JJ Abrams and Lawrence Kasden studied the prequels' many misfires and used them as a guide for what not to do in crafting a new generation Star Wars movie.

Instead of gratuitously forcing in familiar characters like C-3PO and R2D2 as the prequels did, Episode VII reveals each original- trilogy character with a deep sense of iconic value- be it Han and Chewie boarding the Millennium Falcon for the first time in three decades, or the brief war room cameo of Admiral "It's a Trap!" Ackbar.

The wooden acting and stilted dialogue of the self-serious prequels is gone and replaced by great chemistry and a witty banter reminiscent of the originals.

Where the prequels were bathed in cartoonish CGI, Episode VII chooses miniature models and practical effects in a number of places.

The Force Awakens essentially remakes the plot of 1977's A New Hope, but in a way that feels decidedly homage and not derivative.

All the same plot-points are there: an opening Stormtrooper assault, a charming spherical droid who sets off on a desert planet carrying important data, a young local who may have facility with the Force who finds the droid, hooks up with roguish allies and flees the desert world on a "piece of junk" freighter that is said to have made the Kessel Run in 12 (not 14) parsecs. There are smugglers, princess-generals, colorful cantina patrons, and a villain in a black mask. A beloved mentor is struck down by a light saber and there is a climactic X-Wing raid at the end to destroy a planet-killing super-weapon.

Not all the choices work. I wasn't a big fan of the new evil overlord Snoke who felt a bit Harry Potter and was literally out-of-scale. And although it's easy to imagine as we look around our own world and see how often today's successful revolution becomes tomorrow's power vacuum, more exposition about how things went from the joyful Ewok party at the end of Episode VI to the dystopian First Order would have fleshed the story out more.

But those are minor points. The Force Awakens accomplishes its most important mission: to infuse nostalgia and reverence for the original trilogy into a blueprint of future Star Wars installments. This movie leaves one with a sense that Star Wars is now properly calibrated for a future trajectory that can, as best as possible, retain the spirit of the George Lucas film that changed movie-making in 1977.

Episodes I-III left a decade- long anxiety that there were no good Star Wars movies left to be made. Episode VII should leave Star Wars fans with – let's say a new hope- that the original magic can be transmitted far into a future sensibility.

Bar Rescue (2011– )

An interesting show, but could do with out the "Reality TV" drama

[6/10 · 6 July 2015]

I have mixed feelings about Bar Rescue.

On the one hand, the typical "Reality" TV formula and attendant drama gets old fast. If you watch Bar Rescue more than once, you learn the formula: a clueless bar owner + Jon Taffer blowing a gasket + a big show down between Taffer and the owner + a disastrous "stress test" + redemption, training, makeover = happy ending.

Personally, I could do without the yelling, screaming, crying, fighting and the needlessly- tight (usually five day) turnaround to "rescue" the bar.

On the other hand, when Mr. Taffer gets in to the analysis of why some bars work and many fail the show becomes very interesting. Learning facts like that a bar that alienates women will likely fail, and that bartenders over-pouring due to a lack of training - or as an effort to boost their tips at the expense of the establishment's inventory- are the kind of insights that make the program watchable.

Taffer's ultimate point is that running a bar is not a good-time job or excuse to party. It is a business and like any small business, if an owner wants to be successful at it he or she has to be ready to effectively deal with the necessary inventory, personnel, budget, compliance and marketing responsibilities.

A challenge Bar Rescue has to contend with is that viewers can easily see for themselves how the rescued bar does after the show's filming.

By the time an episode airs the renovated bar has had a few months to operate under the new recommended fixes. A quick Yelp search usually undermines the rosy ending. In many cases the bar still fails, or reverts to its old habits. The reviews sometimes reveal that the rapid 36-hour renovations done for dramatic effect and production schedules are pretty slap-dash on closer inspection, or that the changes to the bar made by the show were not in compliance with local law.

I actually think Bar Rescue could spruce itself up if it was a more professional, measured presentation that took more time than just five days to really work with transforming a bar. The formulaic theatrics and shouting, coupled with the slapdash renovation and the uncomfortable sense that a lot of the fixes really won't stick detracts from what could be a really interesting program about how to run a successful bar.

The Brink (2015)

A Capable Satire of Current Events

[6/10 · 30 June 2015]

The Brink shows promise as a capable satire of current American foreign policy.

The HBO dark-comedy seems to aspire to the tradition of other TV shows and films that used dark humor to explore national angst, such as the early seasons of M*A*S*H* (and the Robert Altman movie that inspired it) that spoke to America's ambivalence about our Cold War interventions in Eastern Asia. And of course The Brink has already been compared many times to Dr. Strangelove.

The Situation Room scenes capture a "seat-of-the-pants" approach to a major foreign crisis that is probably more authentic than many of us would care to believe. There is no rule book for the President to follow, only the gladiatorial combat of Cabinet secretary egos.

The three principle characters are a hard-drinking Secretary of State with a penchant for call-girls played by Tim Robbins, a middling foreign service officer at the American Embassy in Pakistan played by Jack Black who devotes more time to scoring weed and hitting on female colleagues in the international diplomatic corps than he does to the clean water projects he is ostensibly there to work on, and a U.S. Navy fighter pilot played by Pablo Schreiber, who is up to his neck in personal and financial problems and who supplements his income by selling (and sampling) prescription drugs supplied by his pharmacist ex-wife.

As an editorial: the Schreiber character, Lt. Zeke Tilson, requires the greatest suspension of disbelief. For pretty much the exact reasons depicted in the show, the Navy has many layers of regular fitness evaluations, flight physicals and random drug screenings to make sure a screw-up like Tilson would never get near the cockpit of a $30 million F/A-18 fighter-bomber.

Robbins admirably walks a fine-line between affability and smugness. For all his character's excesses, his Secretary of State Walter Larsen is developing as someone fiercely committed to peace and diplomacy and keeping bloodshed from spiraling out of control.

Jack Black is good in these darker roles and he infuses what could easily be a one-note character with a compelling sense of appreciation for the gravity of events he suddenly finds himself in.

The show is rounded out by an excellent supporting cast who all shine in their secondary roles. Esai Morales is convincing as a chief executive who has to think about what seems presidential while trying not to let on that he feels in over his head. Maribeth Monroe is excellent as Larsen's chief assistant and confidant who knows that if she can manage her bosses many human failings, he may actually be able to do some good in the world, and some of the show's best comedic lines have been delivered by Eric Ladin's Glenn "Jammer" Taylor- who rides shotgun as Tilson's naval flight officer- stoned out of his gourde on morphine while his finger is literally on a trigger that could start World War III.

Aasif Mandvi is fantastic as Jack Black's embassy driver and local connection. His character Rafiq is a great stand-in for young moderates throughout Central Asia who hope to see their nations move towards modernity and who often feel trapped between the volatility in the own country's leadership and their suspicions about feckless interference from the West.

So far The Brink has delivered some good laughs, but not as consistently as the similarly satirical Veep. The cast is all very good and their chemistry seems to be gelling.

While The Brink won't achieve the iconic status of a M*A*S*H* or Dr. Strangelove, it may one day be a program we can look back on and get a good sense of the angst and uncertainty of a time when drone-strikes, the toxic mix of nuclear weapons and religious zealotry, and America confronting the limits of its military "solutions" was front-and-center on the minds of those who set policy, those who carry out policy and those who have to live with those policies.

Kingsman: The Secret Service (2014)

If you doubt that movies today are made for adolescent boys...

[2/10 · 7 June 2015]

If you doubt that movies today are largely made for adolescent boys (or men who still think like them) then you haven't seen Kingsman: The Secret Service.

And the fact that this film did well at the box office makes me think that the Samuel L. Jackson character, Richmond Valentine, is right about humanity's bleak prospects.

I feel dumber for having seen Kingsman. In particular there is a lecherous- even predatory- interaction at the very end between the lead character "Eggsy" and a Scandinavian princess that is a gratuitous contrivance to denigrate and sexualize a relatively strong female character.

The message in this movie is that the world can only be saved by wealthy white men who have avoided the estate tax and that the true evildoers are those who believe in climate change....oh, and Barack Obama's head explodes - all of which kind of torpedoes the notion of liberal Hollywood.

The film has a promising start in the direction of James Bond for the 8-second attention-span world. Initially the action is so silly and over the top and the characters so absurdly two-dimensional that it's hard to take it as more than mindless popcorn fun.

There's also some witty dialog between Colin Firth's Galahad and Sam Jackson's Valentine that menacingly send up traditional spy-movie tropes. A few bracingly cold-hearted twists occur during the new-agents' training that let you know the movie will not be trafficking in many feel-good clichés.

But then Kingsman devolves into an unimaginative morass of dehumanization and schlock and eventually the film becomes little more than a first-person-shooter video game. Literally, there is a scene in the film's climax where the action briefly switches to Eggsy's perspective as he runs down a corridor shooting henchmen that is indistinguishable from a commercial for a combat shooter video game.

Firth and Jackson are likable. Michael Caine is- well Michael Caine being an Englishman. As Eggsy, Taron Egerton is entirely interchangeable with any other young actor and equally as forgettable.

I have often thought that Hollywood serves as a pretty good counter-argument to the notion of free markets naturally producing the highest quality to meet the public's demand. That Kingsman: Secret Service did well at the Box Office and will no doubt spawn bigger, louder, dumber, more violent and retrograde sequels only serves as a depressing reminder that crap sells and sells well.

Runner Runner (2013)

Big Name Cast, Stylistic Direction, Tired Story, Weak Script

[4/10 · 5 September 2014]

Runner Runner is a tired formula, but since it's a formula that I usually like, I gave the movie a watch.

While it mostly held my interest, there was no getting around the fact that this movie is tired and played out. Once you get past the marquee cast and the stylized direction you realize that the script is fundamentally unoriginal and that you have already seen this story done better in films like Wall Street, Boiler Room, 21 and Rounders.

The "aspiring and smart young hustler gets discovered by a charismatic mentor who he later becomes disillusioned with and betrays to save his a**" story line is so familiar at this point that it's probably ready for a Jim Abrahams type parody.

Ben Affleck's "Ivan Block" is so reminiscent of his Jim Young character from Boiler Room that it is easy to imagine Block is actually just Jim Young 13 years later after getting out of prison and changing his name, becoming a bit more sophisticated with age and finding a new and even better way to get rich by scamming suckers.

Despite Justin Timberlake's obvious charm and talent, he has yet to really register as a significant presence on the big screen and this is another forgettable role for him. It's not that his performance is bad, it isn't, but it feels entirely interchangeable with just about any other young actor- Timberlake puts no personal stamp on the part.

Gemma Arterton also fades into the background of the picture which is telling. When I first saw Arteron in a fairly small role in Quantum of Solace, her screen presence was hard to take your eyes off of. It is a testament then to the blandness of her character's development in Runner Runner that she too feels like an interchangeable cliché.

When I read that Brad Furman had directed Runner Runner, it made sense why I found the film stylistically appealing in terms of pacing, visuals, sets, photography and even performances. Furman also directed one of my recent favorites: The Lincoln Lawyer, an equally stylish but vastly superior film in terms of story line and character development.

That Runner Runner feels a lot like the poker movie Rounders is explained by the fact that both movies had the same screenwriters. Unfortunately, the technique of having the sharp-witted protagonist narrate poker strategy as a metaphor for the movie action just feels redundant in this film.

As a viewer who tends to look for some degree of verisimilitude regarding law enforcement in these kind of crime thrillers, Runner Runner continues the tradition of Hollywood never portraying an FBI agent in a manner that feels remotely believable. In real life, FBI agents are not likely to be edgy eccentrics or burn outs. They tend to be Type-A high-achievers ambitious to succeed in a large bureaucratic organization. Anthony Mackie's Agent Shavers joins other depictions of movie G-Men who feel in no way authentic. Again, it's not the actor's fault, it's just a poorly written and developed character.

In short: the big name cast and stylistic direction can't overcome the tired story and weak script. If you like the formula that has been done better in Wall Street, Goodfellas, Rounders, Boiler Room, 21, Wolf of Wall Street, etc than you may enjoy investing 90 minutes in this film. But I'd suggest only doing so when it when it comes on cable and not going out of your way to see it.

Caddyshack II (1988)

Caddyshack 2: A Cautionary Tale of Bad Sequel Making

[1/10 · 15 June 2014]

Caddyshack 2 is a study in god awful sequels. Along with Blues Brothers 2000 and Beverly Hills Cop III, CS2 is in the trinity of terrible sequels to 80's comedy classics.

The basic plot of CS2 is the same as the first: a vaguely ethnic new-money guy crashes the WASP-y Bushwood Country Club. There are subplots about a groundskeeper and a gopher and young people learning to stand on principle, and it all climaxes in a golf match. But the original Caddyshack felt like a raunchy celebrity roast; the sequel feels like a lame afterschool special.

CS2 was rated PG while the original was rated R. This highlights sequel kiss-of-death # 1: the studio wanted it to appeal to a wider audience (read: something for the kiddies).

No part of the first Caddyshack is for kids; even the Gopher is more like a good acid trip (does anyone else see that dancing gopher?) – than a family friendly puppet. CS promoted sex and drugs and a contempt for authority. That's because it was directed and headlined by comedians who also promoted sex and drugs and a general contempt for authority.

But the studio wanted a family accessible sequel since the PG rating is generally seen in Hollywood as better for box office returns.

And so there are literally Looney Toons cartoon characters in Caddy Shack 2. Instead of Rodney Dangerfield's hilariously profane Al Czervik, we get a cornball Jackie Mason as a developer-with-a-heart-of-gold. Instead of the class warfare middle finger of Caddyshack, CS2 brings a saccharine "Up-With-People" message about self-acceptance. Bill Murray's brilliant comedic menace as the burned out Carl the Groundskeeper, is replaced by a grating Dan Aykroyd. Aykroyd is best as the straight man (Elwood Blues on SNL, Joe Friday, Louis Winthorp ). When he goes for zany like he does in CS2 he is like the unhip but well-meaning uncle at a family gathering who likes to do funny voices for the tots but then uses the same shtick when coming over to talk to the adults.

CS2's second sequel kiss-of-death is the lazy attempt to recycle the original film. Even though Chevy Chase was the only original cast member to return, CS2 limply retreads most of Caddyshack's other character types. Robert Stack is no Ted Knight and Jonathan Silverman is too bland to fill Michael O'Keefe's shoes in the Danny Noonan role.

Coming back as Ty Webb, Chase's one stab at edginess in CS2 is a bizarre and unnecessary scene in which he chases off a table full of attractive women in the club's lounge by propositioning each of them with silly euphemisms for sex. The joke falls woefully flat and is out of character with the charming Ty of the original.

The third sequel kiss-of-death plaguing CS2 is its troubled development history. Harold Ramis, who co-wrote and directed the original, was reluctantly coerced into scripting a sequel. Rodney Dangerfield initially pushed hard for a sequel, but later pulled out over creative differences with the studio. Ramis also dropped out and urged the studio to let the sequel die. Instead the studio brought in other writers and director Allan Arkush who had more experience with TV than big screen filmmaking, (which may explain why CS2 feels like a made-for-TV project). Other than Chase, none of the original cast wanted anything to do with the sequel. Lawsuits popped up over the use of characters and unfulfilled contracts. All indications were that CS2 was a project that should have been terminated in early development but, as is the case with many Hollywood disasters, the suits saw dollar signs and ignored the warnings of the creatives.

Caddyshack 2 is simply unacceptable. It's only redeeming value is as a cautionary tale for future filmmakers and studio execs about how to kill a comedy classic's name by attaching an abominable sequel to it.

Rock of Ages (2012)

Fascinated by Rock of Ages

[8/10 · 4 January 2014]

I suspect that reactions to Rock of Ages are more emotional than technical.

I loved this movie even though there are many technical reasons why I shouldn't. For instance, I am generally not a fan of musicals. I never saw the big deal about Grease and I had zero interest in seeing Mamma Mia or Hairspray. ROA is a camp-fest and has a feel-good Hollywood ending (more so than the Broadway musical does), but I am still compelled to watch ROA whenever its on.

This movie resonates for me for reasons that are largely personal and emotional. For one, I love stories about L.A. (even though ironically, it was actually filmed in Florida). As a kid growing up on the East Coast, my unconscious dream was to grow up and move to California (which I did). Hollywood Blvd, Wilshire Blvd, Sunset, Santa Monica- even in New Jersey I knew these names long before I became a resident of the Golden State. So the fantasy-like depiction of LA as a place where people go to launch their lives and shape their destinies- warts and all- had resonance.

Second is the timing of the movie. ROA starts in May of 1987 when I was a junior in high school. I loved hard rock and heavy metal at that time: AC/DC, Iron Maiden, Ozzy Osbourne when I was an angsty adolescent and the more pop-ish hard rock of Poison and Def Leppard as a teen.

Having the music of my idealistic youth re-imagined as a story was fun and intriguing (although it freaks me out that Julianne Hough wasn't even born until about a year until after the time period this movie was set-about when I was graduating HS).

And of course, the movie is just fun in my opinion. A great diversion to lose yourself in. Very little serious edge - just a chance to enjoy some campy silliness while vainly reveling in the music of one's youth and remembering the excitement of being ready to start one's life and its seemingly endless possibilities.

Of course the performances are fun. Hough is adorable in my opinion and Diego Boneta has a genuine rocker voice and presence. Brand, Gill, Baldwin and Akerman we're comedic and charming in their roles and Tom Cruise really did create a compelling Axel Rose/Jim Morrison spirit. Silly as it was, ROA is also a pretty good history lesson of the late 80's rock scene on the Sunset and the encroaching rise of 90's boyband pop.

There is one thing that I really disliked about the movie however, which is why I took away a star: there was no reason to include the character of Heyman the Baboon. I am not a fan of using wild animals for human entertainment and there was no plot need for this character to be in the movie. It was just a throw in for the kiddies, I suspect.