tx-30948 Reviews

Drone Wars (2016)

Mediocre acting only surpassed by ridiculous special effects and blend characters

[1/10 · 30 August 2018]

Why do people still produce movies that heavily rely on special effect with mediocre ones, equivalent or worse to what was possible 20 years ago?

On top of that, acting is really mediocre: it's clear the "actors" are here only because they need to pay their rents and groceries.

It is hard to care about the characters: we only wish they all dies ASAP so this horrible visual experience they call a movie ends.

Blockers (2018)

Here we go again: another "comedy" that is not funny

[1/10 · 13 August 2018]

Out of 1h40, I laughed (moderately) less than 5 times...

The vast majority of the supposedly fun moments fall a cliff, and start to become very annoying as the film repeats these.

The film is also often vulgar, but it is not fun. It re-uses many of the tricks seen elsewhere (e.g. vomit in American Pie), but without the appropriate timing and expected effect.

The film includes several scenes with some good ideas, which are unfortunately not well executed or thought through.

Several scenes are also supposed to be more high level speech / morale, but this is quite boring and out of place.

This film is a huge disappointment and waste of time.

Set It Up (2018)

Not very funny, over-exaggerated acting of the horrible bosses

[2/10 · 15 June 2018]

The trailer looked promising to me, and reminded me of Horrible Bosses 1 & 2, which I quite enjoyed.

I also like three of the four main actors, as I already know them from various appearances (Scream Queens, Ally McBeal etc.). Only the actor playing the male boss was unknown to me.

Unfortunately, the movie was a big, big let down.

First, for a supposed comedy, it was not very funny, brining laughter only once in a while and moderately. This is the opposite of Horrible Bosses.

Another major negative relates to the bosses, and this is a key difference with the Horrible Bosses movies.

The male boss' reactions and talk are so exaggerated they are unbelievable. Of course, he has to be horrible, but he almost only appears screaming or so, yelling at people, and there is nothing that could make us feel he is a human. It is impossible to get immersed or willing to follow what happens to him, which is not what should happen.

The female boss is less exaggerated overall, although many times, she's also inhuman given the ovelyr-excessive reactions and talk.

In Horrible Bosses, bosses were real humans (acting badly). I wanted to know what would happen to them. They were also more present.

The two lead characters (the bosses' assistants) are OK-ish, although the way they accept what their bosses ask them to do and how they treat them is not always believable or relatable. While I liked Glen Powell a lot in Screem Queens, he appears rather transparent and superficial in this movie. Zoey Deutch performance and contribution was OK I suppose.

The lead assistants' partners are moderately present. The female assistant's boyfriend is barely visible, but the male assistant's girlfriend is somewhat more present.

Also disturbing to me, it is unclear whether the movie wants to be a romance. While many parts point to that, there is a significant amount of vulgarity, which is hard to reconcile with true romance.

At the end of the day, a promising cast and idea, but a horrible output.

Center of My World (2016)

Too many useless scenes / dialogues. Message often unclear on back and forth b/w unrelated scenes

[2/10 · 6 June 2018]

Another film that ruins a good idea and materials. There are too many useless scenes / dialogues. For instance, who cares about whether the co-lead actor loves spaghetti or any other dish? Or seeing trivial actions such as walking, bicycling etc.. No one watches this movie for that purpose.

A lot of the scenes appear to exist only to justify and reach the nearly 2-hour film duration. But quantity is not quality.

The narrative process is often confusing and makes us wonder what the message is supposed to be. There is a lot of back and forth between scenes set at different times / showing totally different things, and the link between the two is unclear.

The co-lead (the non-manly one) does not appear empathic and friendly. When negative things happen to him, not only did I not feel sorry, but quite the opposite. This should not be the case...

Filming is also not that great, as often, the camera is slightly shaking. The focus on the characters' face to see their expressions is too often limited and short, preventing us from really connecting to the characters and understanding their feelings.

On the positive side, the co-lead (the manly guy) is really great to look at.

Beach Rats (2017)

Promising pitch and actors, poor execution on excess of useless scenes

[3/10 · 3 June 2018]

I was really excited to see the movie given the pitch and the actors, especially the lead. He's young, sexy and manly.

Unfortunately, the movie turned a pain to watch on an endless series of painfully useless scenes. Who cares about seeing someone putting a cigarette in a bin, or bringing the garbage out?

Only about 20% or so of the movie brings any value. What a waste!

Really interesting story plots should have been explored. What about his coming out to his friends? How could he have done that (one by one, all at once)? Or maybe they could have discovered it by chance? Then, what about their reactions? This would have made excellent materials.

Also, one of the lead's friend could seem ambiguous (given the way he looks), but it is hard to assess whether there is anything. The movie could have explored this path.

But it's true that developing captivating stories is more difficult than filming someone walking on a street or smoking a cigarette...

At the end of the day, a really frustrating experience with great materials (pitch + actors) thrown away...