simonwoodwrites

I love John Carpenter's films and his original film is a beloved one to me so I'm a little biased to the remake. I saw the remake when it came out and it was dreadful. Gave it a rewatch this week and the film is still dreadful. The acting, the cgi, the pace, etc. You name, it's all terrible. It's aged poorly. It has that post 90's Scream vibe in its look and aesthetic that seems more dated than the 79 original. The biggest problem was disassembling the component parts of the story then never bothering to assemble it again so the story is a jumbled mess. There's no feel for the geography of the island, the fog itself does nothing and doesn't provide a threat, the ghosts have no coherent or specific power, the characters are so thinly drawn that major characters were reduced to bit parts and that ending comes out of nowhere. It's feels like a film the makers lost interest in making.

There's a charm to DEATH IN PARADISE that is sadly lacking in BEYOND PARADISE. This spin-off goes wrong in a few places. Firstly, the characters. The supporting cast don't gel anywhere as well as they do on DEATH IN PARADISE. It's not that they are terrible actors. It's just the characters aren't very interesting and not well used. Secondly, the stories. BEYOND PARADISE goes out of its way to avoid a murder of the week story so instead it has these low stakes crimes that aren't that interesting. Thirdly, the threat to shut the police station down. God, this such an overused plot device over the last decade. Lastly, there's a depressing melancholy to the show. The baby storyline from season 1 seemed out of place and unnecessary. In Season 2, each story ends on a sad note whether it's to do with the mother-in-law character or the motive for the crime of the week. For a light show, it is depressing in tone.

The original WHEN A STRANGER CALLS is a cracking movie for so many reasons but it's best remembered for the 20 minute opening scene. Where the remake goes wrong is deciding to center on the that 20 minute segment from the original movie. Instead of developing the concept, it decides to stretch a twenty minute sequence into a movie piece and it just doesn't work. The film doesn't even clock in at 90 minutes and still you can see the filmmakers playing for time. The opening credits take six minutes alone. There's a pointless subplot about a boyfriend to add runtime. There are so many pointless jump scares all in the need to add time on the clock. So the film has no suspense because everything is drawn out because there just isn't enough story to sustain a movie.

I guess this is supposed to be a swimming pool-centric version of Poltergeist, but it lacks all the charm, tension, danger and energy of Poltergeist. It lacks a sharpness and direction. These people buy a house with a pool and something kinda happens to them. It's just so vague as to what we're supposed to be afraid of and what powers it possesses for so long before the exposition could come to the rescue. Oh yeah, hardly anyone goes for a night swim.

Sadly, this is another Blumhouse snoozefest. It's so low energy. Nothing happens with any urgency. The characters and the story just limp along. There are a lot of Blumhouse jump scares to keep the viewer interested but half the jump scares are just there to pep up the pace. The scary monster is just another lazy creature.

Night Swim could've been good if the story and direction had some focus.

I love Guy Ritchie's LOCK, STOCK AND TWO SMOKING BARRELS. And while he's had some good movies since, he's never managed to capture the magic of LOCK, STOCK. This TV show does! It's fun, serious, silly with all the hallmarks of Guy Ritchie's earlier films aka toffs, gangsters, potheads, gypsies, nutters, etc.

The show has a solid story that is well mapped out over the eight episodes. The cast is great. Theo James does really well as the title character. He has a good presence and a nice command of the show.

Overall, I loved it. This is one of the best shows I've seen in a long while and I do hope it comes back for a second season.

Monsieur Spade isn't bad but it doesn't hit the mark. The idea of an older Sam Spade retiring in France sounds good but it is not well executed. The main problem is that it felt like no one read the source material...THE MALTESE FALCON. The book is limited to Spade's perspective of the situation. All previous Sam Spade movies have kept to that format. Monsieur Spade has the perspectives of a bunch of different characters and a bunch of flashbacks. That's not a Spade story. Monsieur Spade suffered from the same thing all the limited series shows this year have suffered from...and that's there wasn't enough story for 6-episodes. It had to go down so many side roads to pad it out. And wow, that ending is awful. The show is enjoyable though thanks to a cracking cast who put in some nice performances.

DEATH AND OTHER DETAILS tries to capture the spirit of KNIVES OUT and did at the beginning but lost steam by the end. It kind of set itself up at the beginning that you could solve the mystery if you were paying attention but after the first few episodes it kind of abandoned that approach for flashbacks and side stories and a lot of padding. I got the feeling they weren't sure where they wanted to go with this show. It started off as a variation on Poirot and sidekick archetype but kicked that to the curb. Tonally, it was weird. There's nudity and some pretty spicy language, which I don't have an issue with, but it didn't fit the aesthetic of the show. It's another limited series to come out this year that struggled to fill its episode commitment. This should've been 6 episodes, not 10. There wasn't enough story for it. The wrap-up for the show was a bit weird. A murder got off scot-free. The original murder is never really explained. The Imogene character comes off cold-hearted when it came to the guy she dumped and the guy she fell for.

It's not a terrible show. I actually liked it. Just fell out of love with it as it went on. It felt like a show the makers lost confidence in the concept partway through.

I do have to say hats off to the costume designers. It's the best costumed show on TV and film. The female actors especially were very well attired.

Indiana Jones and The Dial of Destiny is a limp farewell to one of the greatest movie heroes of all time. This film isn't as bad as Crystal Skull but it isn't much better. For me, Raiders of the Lost Ark is one of the greatest movies ever made. And should be used as a template for when coming up with an action flick. Yet no one bothered to follow it for Dial of Destiny. For me, here's where Dial of Destiny went wrong.

* Had to fall back on Nazis for the villain. There has to be a more interesting foe than the Nazis for Indy to go up against.

* The bleakness. Indy has gone from being a respected archeologist to an old duffer that people couldn't care less about. Also Sallah is a cabbie in NY living in some grotty apartment with his family.

* Crap CGI. What made Raiders and other films of its ilk was the exotic locales. In Dial of Destiny, everything was a flat CGI composite.

* Bland villain with a bland plan and a one-dimensional henchman.

* Meanspirited at times. The killing of the CIA agent and Renaldo and his crew especially so.

* Annoying kid sidekick character. Why does there have to be a character like this?

* Phoebe Waller-Bridge's Helena's character is so unlikable giving the same performance we've seen again and again.

* The opening sequence is way too long.

* Toby Jones' Basil character's obsession with the Dial comes out of nowhere.

* The siege of Syracuse is telegraphed from the beginning.

All that the Dial of Destiny did was undermine Indiana Jones' legacies. I hope they will the character alone now. No reboots or remakes. It'll only be worse.

Admittedly, I'm only 3 seasons into the show, but I find Star Trek: Discovery puzzling. I think it's the first Star Trek without a point of view or direction. The original show was all about exploring the galaxy, The Next Generation was the continuing voyages, Deep Space Nine was all about the galaxy coming to a space truck stop and so on so forth. But Discovery, what's the mission statement here? The 1st season was this war with the Klingons. The 2nd season was about following seven red lights and an advert/road test for Star Trek: Strange New Worlds. THe 3rd season is all about digging itself out of the continuity hole Discovery for being all out of whack with the Star Trek canon.

The show does seem to have made a rod for its own back with its continuity issues. Essentially, despite being set 10yrs before the original Star Trek TV show, they have better technology, the mushroom drive, different uniforms, etc. Something they used season 2 to paper over the paradoxical cracks.

It's weird they didn't make Michael Burnham captain. As an officer who has to work with a host of captains. No one is captain of Discovery for more than 10 minutes at a time. She's the lead character but not in charge is a weird setup. It robs her character of importance, especially when Pike was in charge.

There's a professionalism issue with the show. No Discovery character can follow orders! Everyone is going rogue. Not mention Tilly. There's no way someone that unprofessional would be an officer on a cruise ship let alone a starship.

The biggest failing is that it misses the point of what Star Trek is all about. Great allegories about the human condition told as sci-fi. The Next Generation nailed this so well. So many great stories. What do we get with Discovery? A lot of technobabble reeled off at speed, lens flares and annoying camera moves (I'm looking at you 2nd season). Sadly, it's style over very little substance.

Eli Roth does it again...or doesn't depending on your point of view. This is another bad film from him. It suffers from all his hallmark annoyances--awful characters you'd cross the street to avoid, immaturity when it comes to humor and worldview, over the top violence to the point of silliness, etc. I know this is supposed to be a parody/homage because it came out of the Grindhouse spoof trailers, but it misses the mark on all levels when it comes to spoof, parody or homage. The comedy doesn't land and homage is just copying scenes and shots from better movies. Thanksgiving's biggest movie crime is that it's just dull. It's cartoonishly over the top and lazily pieced together with lackluster performances.

The shame of it is that I wish Eli Roth would make a banger of a popcorn horror flick. He seems like a nice guy with a genuine love of horror movies but he seems to fall back on making schlock. He needs a good producer to make sure he makes a film with a tight script and to stop him falling back on his indulgences.

This is a really neat concept and setting for a mystery but it lets itself down in a few key areas. There's a lot of thought gone into the aspects of the story and there are lot of areas where little thought has been given. Problem areas being: All these billionaires have come to Iceland to solve the world's problems...but other than two presentations, these people have sat around and done nothing. The flashback/origin story overwhelms the main story at times. After 4 episodes out of six, Darby hasn't done much in the way of investigating anything really in Iceland. Darby seems to wander about magically people don't seem to see her. The hotel is high tech with all these security systems that anyone can subvert. Example: everyone is put on lockdown...yet anyone can leave their room via an exterior door. This is one of a lot of contrivances.

My major gripe is this hotel in Iceland sits on a geothermal power/heat source and there isn't a tree for as far as the eye can see...yet there is a wood burning fireplace in every room...and everyone is there to solve climate crisis!

Overall, I like the show, but the show is light on story and it's struggling to fill a 6-episode commitment. This would've been better as a 3 or 4-episode mini series.

SurrealEstate should be a fun, likeable SyFy show but it's a hot mess. It's another show that poorly establishes itself and struggles with the limitations it has set itself.

A big problem is the supporting cast which is mostly redundant. August, Father Phil and Zooey have so little to do. August as the resident boffin and is a vital character but is underused. Father Phil spent the 1st season at laptop googling exposition and Zooey is just a mean girl receptionist. Phil and Zooey add nothing to the show. The producers must have realized this and tried to give August, Phil and Zooey subplots to flesh their characters out in Season 2. In the case of Phil and Zooey, they gave them such mundane storylines--Phil wants to adopt and Zooey wants to be a real estate agent then doesn't. These storylines are so pointless for a supernatural based show. They should've cut Phil and Zooey after season 1.

The stories for the episodes have been weak for the most part. Susan's powers have been poorly explained and used. THere are logic issues with many of the stories. The worst offender was the episode where they pulled a confidence trick on an evil spirit. The biggest issue is that SurrealEstate is set in the most ghost ridden town in the world and no one mentions it!

If the show centered on Luke, Susan and August with a tighter premise, SurrealEstate would be cracking show.

This film feels like it should've been made in the 80's. Not sure it would've been any better but it would've fit the genre at the time. The story is a bit dated.

The film does suffer in a few respects, namely the characters. No one is very likeable, not even Maggie Q's main character. The main characters are a bunch of friends who are having a bachelorette party but the film falls into the troupe that all the women are catty to each other and don't get along. The antagonists which are a group of men are just as unlikeable due to their 1-dimensional bad guyness.

The story has issues. The film is punctuated with time stamps which don't help because all I keep thinking is what has this character been doing for the last hour? The bad guy's plan to wait the women out made no sense. They should've just rushed the house and wiped everyone in the first minute when they had the upper hand. Maggie Q's character's military tactics don't make a lot of sense and she doesn't save anyone in the end. One of the characters disappears and doesn't show up until the end. The showdown between Maggie Q and the main villain is very lackluster.

The epilogue is the real topper. The stuff with the sheriff is bizarre and the story Maggie Q has told the cops is weird. The odd interaction with the survivors needed explaining. It felt like a story thread was cut or the epilogue was tacked on to get the runtime up to 90 minutes because it was unnecessary/confusing.

Overall another low-budget subpar action flick.

I'll give the film points for an interesting concept but that's about it. IT FOLLOWS highlights a nagging problem with a lot of horror films over the last 10-15years and that's the misconception that a slow, ponderous pace equates to suspense.

The camerawork is an issue here. It's trying to be striking but it strikes out. There are so many slow pans and tracking shots that limp along. A few times the importance of getting the shot meant characters did things that made no sense. There's a lot of unnecessary shots and scenes that go nowhere.

What dragged this film down for me is the low energy, world weary teenagers who slow walk through the story. The characters are so listless. The mumblecore doesn't help with adding any vitality to the characters or the movie.

I wish the film didn't look so drab and grey. There's no warmth to its aesthetic. Combine the drabness with the ponderous camerawork and the listless characters, the film is very sterile.

I don't get the John Carpenter comparisons this film gets. I get the sidewalk shots and the classroom scene are reminiscent of Halloween, but Carpenter films have a lot more energy and pace and great camerawork.

I do feel if this film were in another director's hands, it could be amazing.

This show has an interesting premise but it has a lot of issues that let it down. The show has sorted of doomed itself with the hero, Gabi, having someone held captive in her basement. That scenario can't last long term. With a premise like that it would've worked better as a limited series.

There is a likability problem with this show. Gabi's behavior is very in keeping with someone with PTSD, but it doesn't make her likeable. Her moral arrogance that she is the only one who can make difference and no one else can is irritating. She treats everyone like garbage. Only her crusade counts. Her character needs a lot of humanizing.

I think there is a story issue and that's with Gabi's crew of damaged yet talented coworkers. The coworkers can read other characters in 10-seconds flat yet they haven't picked up on Gabi holding someone captive in her basement. Selective character abilities.

One weird observation...Gabi brings her own lectern to the press conferences outside the police dept. It's a shame we never see her load it in the back of car afterwards. :-)

Overall, it's a decent concept but it's poorly executed.

This an okay show. I had high hopes for it, but the premise has already been done by a couple of shows, especially by PERCEPTION with Eric McCormack. It has an irritating back story involving a bomber. When are TV shows going to stop with a weak B-story that is inserted to hopefully keep us watching every week.

The big issue for me is the supporting cast. I hate to say but they are the least charismatic and interesting supporting cast I can remember being in a show. The supporting cast consists of two college students, the main character's sister and his ex-wife. None of them have any presence sadly, but they are so thinly written. You could remove the college students and sister and they wouldn't be missed because narratively they add nothing. In half the stories, most of these characters aren't even needed in the story and they forced in with uninteresting back stories to make them relevant.

I can't see this one surviving its first season.

I'm hot and cold when it comes to Blumhouse movies. Too many of are formulaic and all look the same aesthetically. However, THE PASSENGER is quite a surprise. It's raw, intense and absorbing. The script is tight and well written. It's well shot (in its starkness). Kyle Gallner and Johnny Berchtold are excellent in their roles. I do appreciate the runtime. Just over 90 minutes is perfect for this kind of story. This is a short, explosive relationship between captor and captive. My only complaint is the ending. It felt tacked on and out of place. The game Randy plays with the little girl at the end seemed a bit on the noise under the circumstances (people who've seen the movie will know what I mean).

Overall, this is a gem of a movie that I hope more people get to see.

THE KILLER is an enjoyable film courtesy of David Fincher's style but it flatters to deceive. When you strip away the voiceover and the sterile aesthetic, there's not a lot to it. Hit man screws up, employer tries to kill him, hit man takes revenge. It's not a particularly original storyline and the storyline is a little too slick for its own good, making it very one note. Michael Fassbender has a pretty easy time of it other than the hand to hand fight scene. The film is more of a hit man's travelogue. One thing I've always liked about David Fincher's films is how beautifully shot they are. Just look at Seven, The Game, Fight Club and even Panic Room, but The Killer is very bland visually. The digital look is not a moviemaker's best friend. It looks cheap and the film comes off like an expensive TV movie.

To be honest, THE MECHANIC with Charles Bronson and ASSASSINS with Sylvester Stallone are better hit man movies with far more interesting stories.

FIVE NIGHTS AT FREDDY'S is another disappointing film from BlumHouse. Unlike the usual paint by numbers Blumhouse flicks, there's actually an interesting story here. Mike's guilt for not protecting his brother is interesting. The problem is trying to drape that over the Five Nights at Freddy's video game framework doesn't work. The animatronics and the fixed setting don't fit with Mike's redemption story. Essentially, they have tried to meld THE BLACK PHONE and the video game together and it falls flat, so there are weird story developments that don't fit and don't make sense. In theory, with this film being success, there's going to be another two more films...but hopefully not. There's no material left to mine.

This film was a sloppy affair. Mainly story issues. Lots of logic issues and convenience plotting. How exactly did the boogeyman attach itself to this family because there was no reason for it. The protagonist's mean girl friends were complete assholes considering the protagonist had lost her mother. There are lots of contradictions like when the protagonist complains about no one asking how she's doing when one minute earlier she blows off a kid who just told her how sorry he was about her losing her mom. Again with the protagonist, she does things to fight the boogeyman that somebody had just tried that didn't work. Another horror film where characters in peril can't be heard with other people in the house. Too many characters acted in a way that was needed for the story regardless of how realistic.

Not a bad film. Just a really poor one. With a bit more care, it could've been a good one.

I guess this film was taking a swing at influencers and content creators and the Tik Tok generation. Also how people chase a dream regardless of how broken it is. It was trying to show there are real world consequences for narcissism I think.

The film ran out of steam once Jess meets her client Tom. It's really hard to carry a film with two characters in a single location. SLEUTH is one of the few stories to carry off that kind of intensity and FOLLOW HER didn't.

The big reveal shook things up but ultimately didn't go anywhere and the ending was predictable.

In the end, FOLLOW HER is a slew of ideas that fail to come together as a cohesive concept.

The is an odd adaptation of Christie's HALLOWEEN PARTY and even odder Kenneth Branagh-Poirot adaptation. Branagh and Michael Green seem to have forgotten what thy did in the previous film (which also had some continuity issues). Namely Poirot has gone from the world famous detective to a detective who is famous because of Ariadne Oliver's best selling novels... :-/

There are bigger issues with the film. It's nice to have a Branagh-Poirot movie that isn't an ugly CGI mess, but this one is so dark. There's a lot of fancy camerawork and editing that is supposed to be cool but it is pretty clumsy. The film lacks any build or escalation. There's no real beginning middle or end. So I was surprised Poirot points the finger at the killer...the end.

Halloween Party was a poor choice for a Poirot adaptation. The story isn't that complex. I do wish Kenneth Branagh and Michael Green would do entertaining Poirot film. After three pretty dull attempts we're owed a good one.

I was looking forward to NO ONE WILL SAVE YOU, but this thing felt flat. I'm a big fan of Kaitlyn Dever and she does a great job in her role but I wish this film had been better for her. The no dialogue is interesting but very little else works in this film. The problems I had with it was we've seen these aliens a million times before, we'd heard click-click alien language before, and much of the story and visuals was cribbed from Close Encounters, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, War of the Worlds, X-Files, etc. The bigger issue is the story development. The aliens come for girl, girl kills alien, new alien comes for girl, girl kills alien again, another alien comes for girl and girl kills alien and so on. The repetition makes the short run time drag. The alien abduction aspect reveals what Kaitlyn Dever's character did and no wonder she's pariah. It didn't make her sympathetic character. The final outcome while original I guess again makes you lose sympathy for the main character. A very disappointing film.

This is an odd film. It's not terrible but it's not particularly good either. It wants to be an Agatha Christie style murder mystery but it falls flat. The problem lay with the script. There's a lot of stiff dialogue for the actors to deliver, but it's an oddly constructed story. It starts off okay with a bunch of people being invited to an island, but once the characters arrive at the mysterious manor house, the story loses direction. Everyone is a suspect without much to back it up. There aren't any clues for the characters to follow. So the whole thing stalls after 20 minutes or so and it treads waters until the killer is revealed. Despite a lot of recognizable TV actors, it does come off as an amateur stage play production by the end of it.

I'll be upfront and say I know very little about Goosebumps and I didn't watch the TV show from the 90's. It wasn't something I grew up with. So I also low expectations for the show, but I saw Justin Long was in the show and I'm up for anything he's in. Also also, the trailer caught my attention.

I have to say I've been pleasantly surprised by the show. The first episode was a little uneven, but it's developed in a really engaging show. The story and the mystery is good. The cast is good. The special effects are very well done in places. There's some good tension. Yes, there's somewhat of a CW vibe to the show as others have mentioned. However, overall, it's a very good show and well worth your time.