evanston_dad
Joined Jan 2005
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Damn you Motion Picture Academy. I had pledged not to spend one more minute of my life watching "Dune" after the first interminable installment, and you go and nominate part 2 for Best Picture.
Here we are again, in the no-humor no man's land where everything is brown when it's not gray, and everyone seriously needs to lighten up. Though you know what? Part 2 is better than part 1, or at least it is for a while. All of the endless exposition that dragged down the first part has already been taken care of, so this one can jump right into some action set pieces, which are admittedly very impressive. But uh oh....mid way through this movie we get more plot which needs....you guessed it....more exposition, and here's me mentally going "yada yada yada" and doing that thing with your hand where you open and close it really fast like a blabbering mouth.
I can take Timothee Chalamet seriously when he's brooding and whispering and looking like an angst-filled teen, but I can't take him seriously when he starts yelling and decides to lead a race of people. And I REALLY can't take Austin Butler seriously. He sounds ridiculous, and why is everything on his planet black and white when people go outside but in color when they stay indoors?
"Dune's" biggest problem is that it doesn't have an entry point that allows a viewer to get past all the sci-fi mumbo jumbo and connect to its story. There's no sense of adventure, or whimsy, or fun. It's all very niche and specific, and though Denis Villaneuve does do some amazing world building, it's a world that leaves me out in the cold. I didn't feel one single emotion while watching this movie.
But whatever. This movie doesn't really need me to like it if its box office and rabid fan base are any indication, so I'll leave love of this franchise to the Dunies and go take myself out to lunch.
Grade: B-
Here we are again, in the no-humor no man's land where everything is brown when it's not gray, and everyone seriously needs to lighten up. Though you know what? Part 2 is better than part 1, or at least it is for a while. All of the endless exposition that dragged down the first part has already been taken care of, so this one can jump right into some action set pieces, which are admittedly very impressive. But uh oh....mid way through this movie we get more plot which needs....you guessed it....more exposition, and here's me mentally going "yada yada yada" and doing that thing with your hand where you open and close it really fast like a blabbering mouth.
I can take Timothee Chalamet seriously when he's brooding and whispering and looking like an angst-filled teen, but I can't take him seriously when he starts yelling and decides to lead a race of people. And I REALLY can't take Austin Butler seriously. He sounds ridiculous, and why is everything on his planet black and white when people go outside but in color when they stay indoors?
"Dune's" biggest problem is that it doesn't have an entry point that allows a viewer to get past all the sci-fi mumbo jumbo and connect to its story. There's no sense of adventure, or whimsy, or fun. It's all very niche and specific, and though Denis Villaneuve does do some amazing world building, it's a world that leaves me out in the cold. I didn't feel one single emotion while watching this movie.
But whatever. This movie doesn't really need me to like it if its box office and rabid fan base are any indication, so I'll leave love of this franchise to the Dunies and go take myself out to lunch.
Grade: B-
A standard issue biopic, this one about Al Jolson.
Jolson was a huge deal in his day, but compared to many of the other famous people who were the subjects of these kinds of films from the 1940s, he doesn't mean much to a modern day audience. Larry Parks hams it up as the famous singer turned movie actor and received a Best Actor Academy Award nomination. Character actor William Demarest also received an Oscar nomination in the supporting category for his performance as Jolson's long time manager, Steve Martin.
Evelyn Keyes is lovely as a fictional version of Ruby Keeler, who Jolson was married to. I'm not sure why she couldn't just play Ruby Keeler in the movie since everyone else was playing an actual person, but whatever.
Though this movie is mostly pedestrian and nothing much to get excited about, there are a couple of moments when Parks shows some real pizazz and screen presence and the film briefly comes alive around him.
"The Jolson Story" won Oscars for Best Musical Scoring and Best Sound Recording, and was also nominated for Best Color Cinematography and Best Film Editing, in addition to its two acting noms.
Grade: B.
Jolson was a huge deal in his day, but compared to many of the other famous people who were the subjects of these kinds of films from the 1940s, he doesn't mean much to a modern day audience. Larry Parks hams it up as the famous singer turned movie actor and received a Best Actor Academy Award nomination. Character actor William Demarest also received an Oscar nomination in the supporting category for his performance as Jolson's long time manager, Steve Martin.
Evelyn Keyes is lovely as a fictional version of Ruby Keeler, who Jolson was married to. I'm not sure why she couldn't just play Ruby Keeler in the movie since everyone else was playing an actual person, but whatever.
Though this movie is mostly pedestrian and nothing much to get excited about, there are a couple of moments when Parks shows some real pizazz and screen presence and the film briefly comes alive around him.
"The Jolson Story" won Oscars for Best Musical Scoring and Best Sound Recording, and was also nominated for Best Color Cinematography and Best Film Editing, in addition to its two acting noms.
Grade: B.
Addiction as a topic can be pretty boring to people who've never struggled with it. I can empathize, but it's such a personal hell, and many times addicts are so unpleasant to be around, that it's very hard to relate. It's also a topic that's been done umpteen million times, and all of the stories start to blend together after a while and seem the same. It's up, then, to the skills of the storyteller and the actors portraying the addicts to give us a reason to care and make us feel like there's a reason for this particular story to be told.
"The Outrun" mostly does that, though it falls a little short and gives into the indie movie cliches you would expect to see in a movie like this. Lots of shots of the main actress, Saoirse Ronan, looking sadly at the sea, or looking sadly out of a window, or looking sadly at her phone. We get it. She's sad.
But Ronan is such a gifted actress that you just want to watch her no matter what she's doing. So if what she's doing is staring out into space looking sad, sign me up. She's also really convincing as a drunk person. So many times I feel like people acting drunk on screen are too hammy and exaggerated to believe, but not Ronan.
So see this movie for its central performance, and try to get over the feeling that she deserves something just a tad bit better than this movie gives her.
Grade: B+
"The Outrun" mostly does that, though it falls a little short and gives into the indie movie cliches you would expect to see in a movie like this. Lots of shots of the main actress, Saoirse Ronan, looking sadly at the sea, or looking sadly out of a window, or looking sadly at her phone. We get it. She's sad.
But Ronan is such a gifted actress that you just want to watch her no matter what she's doing. So if what she's doing is staring out into space looking sad, sign me up. She's also really convincing as a drunk person. So many times I feel like people acting drunk on screen are too hammy and exaggerated to believe, but not Ronan.
So see this movie for its central performance, and try to get over the feeling that she deserves something just a tad bit better than this movie gives her.
Grade: B+