The "Slender Man" Rant

Does anyone still care about or remember Slender Man? Initially starting life as a creepypasta story which has since elevated to meme status, the character is likely most well known for the free online PC game "Slender: The Eight Pages". The premise of the game is that you play a camera man or woman exploring the woods at night, you are tasked with finding eight elusive pages all while being stalked by a tall, thin (slender, if you will) faceless creature in a black suit, who begins more aggressive the closer you get to your goal. The game is nothing more than a jump scare nightmare but it doesn't attempt to be, and watching videos of players becoming overly scared by the game's loud noises was entertaining. The game was released in 2012, and interest in the character has been in severe decline since then. So it was quite a surprise when this movie was announced, arriving 5 years too late to pique interest and raise more than a cautious eyebrow. Even with a wise budget of $10-28 million (an exact figure has proven difficult to find), the entire concept of the movie has an air of skepticism about it, with trailers doing little to bring any reassurance that the movie would be more than passable at best. As it turns out, even rock bottom expectations could not be met, as Slender Man is an embarrassing and lazy attempt at film-making, but an insulting and tasteless mess that has cemented itself not only as the worst movie of the year by quite some margin (and so soon after The Festival, sorry) but also quite possibly one of the worst of the decade. But, why? Why is the movie such a travesty in every possible aspect? This is the question I intend to answer, but I cannot do so in a review format. To do so would be to let this movie get off lightly. This movie requires a different structure, to allow us to examine each individual aspect of film-making and point of failure. So with that in mind, I've picked out 7 subheadings to allow a complete autopsy of Slender Man. It's a long and difficult journey ahead, so let's jump in with one of the key features of most movies.

Plot

Quite frankly, I have no idea where to start with this movie, but generally most films have a plot so perhaps that seems to be a reasonable jump pad for this breakdown. As a general point, this one is fairly simple: the plot is extremely dull. In terms of the usual issues of horror movies or in a broader sense those involving spirits, ghosts, or spooky going-ons, a standard point is that nothing is ever explained, which is the case here. That said, a movie does not always need to explain everything. Look at another horror movie from earlier this year, Hereditary. The scares and effectiveness of that movie stems from the fact that we do not always understand what is happening, and to do so requires keen eyes and real thinking about what has happened on screen. Even then, if you do not want to think about it, the movie is just as effective. The atmosphere is built thick and fast, and a lack of understanding builds a real sense of tension - how can you predict what will happen if you do not understand it? This movie also accomplishes this, albeit in the completely wrong way. As soon as the movie starts, within 10 seconds you are instilled with a sense of dread. Being subjected to dull fonts and lazy plot exposition immediately, this is not a sense of dread like that of Hereditary or The Shining; immediately you know that the movie you are watching is going to be bad. As openings go, it sets the tone. The plot of the movie follows a group of teenage girls as they summon Slender Man for no reason at all other than for giggles and then subsequently find themselves haunted by the malevolent spirit. If you think that that sounds like an enjoyable watch, then I think you should perhaps see a psychiatrist. For those of you still here and not on the way to have a brain scan, of course the plot is excruciatingly dull and played out. Quite simply, the movie offers very little outside of the movie troops which we have come to expect from horror movies such of these: exposition, jump scare, exposition, jump scare, rinse and repeat. And that is the entire movie. If that sounds like a total nightmare, then I would say that is a fairly accurate feeling you experience for the entirety of the runtime. The movie attempts to establish a sense of logic through one of (many) scenes explaining the plot, but these rules do not survive 15 minutes into the movie before the writers themselves start to break and bend them as they see fit. The movie is little more than clichés and stereotypes thrown together with little regard for any semblance of sense and reasoning and it only serves to make the experience of sitting through this shambles considerably more tedious than necessary. The only thing that can be said for it is that a 90-minute runtime is mercifully short, although the length of certain scenes and the pacing of the entire movie drag this out to feel considerably longer than it actually is. Believe it or not, however, this is only the beginning, and perhaps even the least offensive of this movie's crimes.

Characters and Acting

Okay, well the story isn't the best but perhaps the movie can still make up for it with its characters and its acting. After all, plenty of movies can make up for a ridiculous story by making the movie an interesting character piece that focuses on the deteriorating relations between the characters, and in this movie in particular the madness they start to suffer. Naturally, however, expecting anything other than cardboard cut outs from this movie was too much and thus we are left with a merry band of morons to lead us through the proceedings. At the helm we have a troupe of four teenage girls who do not speak like girls and so I can only imagine have been written by a middle-aged to elderly old man who has no idea how teenage girls today talk and interact with each other, leading to some suitably hilarious dialogue. Unintentionally hilarious of course, much like the rest of the movie. None of these four girls are particularly interesting, and have very little character. Indeed you will struggle to keep track of exactly who is who. Even their names seem inconsistent. I could swear at one point a girl is called "Ally" but then later another member of the same group calls her "Hal", which only served to left me confused until the credits finally (and mercifully) rolled to solve the mystery of this poor girl's name. None of the girls have any particularly memorable character traits, and so in the absence of being able to remember their names you typically find yourself referring to them by whatever small detail you can recall, which does not tend to be particularly flattering. One is missing, one screams a lot, one is really boring, one is a psychopath, and they all share the common trait of being idiots. Oh the sheer, complete, and frankly insane idiocy on display from these girls is enough to leave anyone with a number of brain cells significantly lesser to when you went in, enough even to justify a visit to the hospital. You may have to be driven there though. Perhaps the most ridiculous issue of character is the identification of a main protagonist. Even in movies with groups of characters at the helm, especially in horror movies there tends to be a main character who uncovers everything that is happening and who acts as the audience surrogate. This movie seems unable to decide who it wants to be said character. The perspective of the movie frequently changes to different character, at some points leaping back and forth between them all while each uncovers different pieces of information much of which does not come together. This scatter-brained approach served only to leave me confused as to who the main character is meant to be, and it is impossible to rule someone out until they leave the movie (whether decidedly or you just realise they are never coming back, which I'll come back to later). Naturally the order in which this happens is from the most talented actress to the least talented, leaving us with an extremely dull and uninspired performance to round out the flick. That said, to say the "most talented" in this movie is more akin to the "least awful", and even then all of the performances are fairly terrible even outside of the main group. Nobody seems to have been told about this little thing called "subtlety", which is fairly key to a good emotional performance, rather than just screaming at the top of your lungs at everything or to quickly cut to a shot where they have an apparent monsoon streaming down their face. Even when they are meant to be happy they come across as barely teetering above tears. Ultimately, this is a band of misfits who you will have no fun spending time with, and truth be told cannot wait to see get picked off. I feel like there is one more character I'm forgetting though...

The Slender Man and Visuals

The final key character in the movie is of course the Slender Man himself. After the nonchalant set-up for the story and build-up to that reveal of the character himself, you would be forgiven for hoping that the crew behind the film might at least put some effort into the look of the titular monster. That they might create a design to strike fear into the audience, and rise to the difficult task of making the concept of the Slender Man into an intimidating reality. I'll give you three guesses what happens. That's right, the reveal is laughably out of the blue, with little to no subtlety or dramatic tension; all of a sudden you are greeted with a hilarious close up of a wrinkled up creature that looks like a lemon or a lime has gone off after being left out too long. That off-fruit has been placed on top of an effigy in a bad second-hand suit and hey presto we have our monster. As you might imagine, the reveal is not especially intimidating. The only thing funnier than how Slender Man looks is his antics and strategies to scare these girls silly. These involve the usual possession (although this tends to involve making someone shake their head and roar a lot in the funniest scene of the movie), and knocking things over, but also more innovative tactics. You see, Slender Man is a spook of the 21st century, and so employs devices such as FaceTime and Messenger to contact and scare the girls, but the writers failed to realise one thing: this is so stupid that it is impossible to take seriously.The only positive I might be able to give at a stretch is that the creature is at least practical, and that an actual bodysuit and mask is being used as opposed to making the creature completely CGI. Of course, this is all irrelevant when we consider just how terrible the costume here is, to the point where it looks as lifelike and believable as it would have done had it been a complete visual effects job in the first place. That being said, there is a reveal in the third act of the movie which I suppose is meant to be the true form of Slender Man. The whole look of this attempts to meld the practical suit with some ropey to say the least CGI, and, as you can imagine, it looks absolutely ridiculous. There are a few other scenes scattered throughout the movie where the Slender Man is shown to have silly tentacles that sprout from his back, again making an attempt to blend the dreadful visual effects with the equally dreadful practical costume. Of course, this makes the movie even more hilarious. At no point can you take this creature seriously when it looks as ridiculous as it does, naturally detracting from the tension and fear you are meant to be feeling through out. The same can be said for the occasional scenes scattered throughout where visuals are used to alter appearances or have a character to do something unnatural. The visuals throughout the entire film are frankly laughable and embarrassing considering especially how far movies have come in recent years in this department. There are a number of key things that can kill the serious atmosphere of a horror movie stone dead. A silly monster and dreadful effects are two, and this movie couples both together in a nice little package.

Lighting, Sound, and Cinematography

These are another few aspects of the film that go hand-in-hand with each other, and generally this encompasses the technical aspects of the movie. The entire movie quite simply looks...ugly. It sounds incredibly simplistic, but quite frankly it is also the best way to summarise all of these points. The daytime sequences all look incredibly grainy and on the verge of being out of focus. These are not the main issue, however, given that all of the conversations these girls have seem to be outside in the dead of night, and so it is the night aspects of the movie which deserve the most attention. Not only because they take up the most screen time but also because they are the most incompetent. Let us start with lighting, and from there lead into cinematography. For the most part, the movie is incredibly underexposed. For those of you who does not know what that term means, a good movie or TV episode should be neither over nor under exposed as you might have guessed. Overexposed movies tend to have too much light, with the team behind the movie utilising so much light in an attempt to get that perfect shot that the film looks blown up and in no way realistic. Underexposed - which is this movie's problem - refers to when not enough light is used, and the issue which stems from this is quite simple then. The audience cannot see what is happening. This is the key problem in the indoor sequences, particularly when tension is attempting to be built by having characters wander through empty corridors or houses while the next lazy jump scare lurks around the corner. If the audience cannot see what is happening, then when characters turn and run, we do not see it and do not feel the same fear. The movie becomes considerably more meta at this point as characters are literally, at least from the audience point of view, being scared and running away from loud noises. This is the key reason that the poor lighting and hilariously generic sound design go hand-in-hand as failures of the film, with the clichéd and overplayed violin building up to a fright that we cannot see while a loud crash plays that causes a character to run away. This is the structure that every "scary sequence" in the movie takes. And trust me, once you've seen it a few times, it gets old and you stop laughing, really really quick. The cinematography is for the most part bland and unimpressive, so I don't want to linger too much on it, but there is one key element that must be mentioned. Around 75%  of the movie takes place at night (because that's where these girls have ever conversation apparently but I've discussed the stupidity of the movie to death so let's move on). One might think then, that at the very least, the filmmakers would have the decency to shoot the movie at night. That being said, there are some scenes that look to this not being the case. At least not always the case. A strange green filter is often put over scenes. The sky often looks blown out and overexposed. The colour correction and aesthetic of scenes often looks like the blues and the blacks have been crushed in post production. I am not saying this is the case, and this is for you to make your own mind up about, but all of this looks incredibly suspicious and almost makes the night sequences look as if, horrifically...they were filmed during the day. In 2018. In a Hollywood blockbuster horror movie, with alleged talent working on this movie. What are we coming to as a species when the film industry has got to the point where professional filmmakers cannot be bothered to film at night? With all of this, how could the technical elements of this movie get any more embarrassing?

Editing

Oh, of course, the editing, how could I forget. You don't often see technical elements such as lighting, sound, etc. brought up in a lot of reviews, solely because at the very least movies do these competently. It should then be a testament to this movie, or more accurately a point to its detriment, that I have not only raised all of these, but have felt the need to devote an entire point to the somewhat niche point of editing. You know, that if I have chosen to bring this up as its own separate point that it must be truly terrifying. You do not know the half of it, take my word on that. The movie is honestly completely incomprehensible. This is an issue which extends far beyond a ridiculous story. There are plenty of movies out there with insane stories or films which have complex reveals, twists and turns. Think of a movie that you would describe as either of those things. At the very least, you should be able to follow what is happening, or, in a situation where information is being withheld, be able to consider it and establish what has happened in the movie you just watched. Most movies succeed. This one does not. Characters flit in and out of the movie at a moments notice, and you will almost certainly lose track of what each of them are doing at different points. Random time jumps are inserted throughout the movie for no real reason, and it only serves to confuse the placement of the characters further. The two biggest issues of editing in the movie relates to two of the main characters in the movie who fall victim to Slender Man attacks. You never see either of these characters die, although the film attempts to put across the madness that they are being infected with thanks to his presence in their lives. What we never see is either of these characters die. And yet they disappear from the movie at different points. No other line in the movie mentions them ever again, no hint is ever given to their fate, and for all we know they could be dead, in a mental institution, or absolutely fine. In a horror movie, where the events of the movie are meant to impact characters lives massively and even threaten them, we do not know what has happened to numerous of them by the time the credits roll. The worst part is, I cannot tell whose fault this comes down on. Is the editor competent? Were certain scenes not even in the script in the first place to be cut out? Was the 90-minute runtime studio mandated, thereby forcing the editor to trim scenes in the first place and those were the best options available to him? These are questions we will never know the answer to unless a making-of documentary on this travesty is put together and released (which to be quite frank, I would be incredibly interested to see). Whatever the reasons for this, the editing in the movie ensures that this product is a horribly incoherent mess. At the very least, I should be able to follow a film and understand what happens to its characters, even if the story is ridiculous and the script embarrassing. When a horror movie cannot even be bothered to include the deaths of the main characters and instead just has them disappear from the movie, this should be more than enough to set off the warning lights.

Insulting - A Conclusion

I think it is clear that from all of these points that one for the best words that can be used to describe this movie is "lazy". A script, editing room, cast, visual effects crew, and general filmmaking team who seemed completely content to offer the bare minimum, almost as if they were aware that nobody cares about Slender Man anymore (not that that gives them an excuse). However, I've watched terrible movies before. I've ripped other movies to shreds. What sets this movie apart? What justifies this becoming a rant over a review, and a new format? What is the source of such a deep disdain for this movie in particular? Disregard all of my previous points. Imagine this movie had a smarter plot; better performances; the most impressive effects work of the year; it was competently edited and it actually bothered to fill nighttime sequences at night. Imagine all of that. This movie remains the worst movie of the year and up there with the worst of the decade solely because of its final 30 seconds. I won't spoil the exact nature of the scene here (as if you should care), but it involves one barely developed character reflecting on the events which have happened throughout the movie. They regard the Slender Man as a virus who corrupts people, and the more people speak about him and spread word about him, the more likely they are to become obsessed with him and commit violent acts in his name. The movie is intending to leave a lingering sense of fear, hoping to suggest to the audience that just by watching the movie he might corrupt us. What in actual fact is is extremely distasteful and quite frankly insulting. Back in 2014, in Wisconsin, you might have heard that there was an act of violence carried out by two young girls against a third girl, with near fatal consequences. The reason provided by the girls for the stabbing: an attempt to prove their loyalty to Slender Man, who they believed to be real, and via this become his "proxies" and prevent him from harming their families. The details of the case are not pleasant, and of course this happening relatively recently all things considered has made this a point of controversy for the movie. Certain cinema chains in Wisconsin have refused to screen the movie out of respect while the communities and families associated with the incident have called the movie "distasteful". And I can't say I disagree with that statement, particularly having seen it. The fact that this movie even dares to include not one, but multiple scenes, of characters explaining the madness Slender Man inflicts on people and trying to explain that that is why people commit violent acts, without any meaningful self-awareness, screams of an extreme disconnect - or perhaps blatant nonchalance - for the real life tragedies associated with this character. The fact that the movie even further opts to bookend the movie with this message is the final slap in the face. Ultimately, this movie is not only incompetent and outright embarrassing as a film, but as a concept is tasteless and insulting, cementing it as the worst film of 2018 so far. There is no reason for you to watch this movie, and I cannot recommend enough that you avoid it like the plague.

Pros

• For the second time this year, absolutely nothing

Cons

• A story which is an absolute bore to watch unfold
• Horrendous characters
• Awful acting
• Frequently more funny than scary
• Terrible CGI
• Editing
• The lighting and cinematography
• The laziest movie of the year?
• An outright insulting and tasteless movie

Rating: 0/10

Original Release Date: 24th August, 2018

Starring Joey King, Julia Goldani Telles, Jaz Sinclair, Annalise Basso, Taylor Richardson, Alex Fitzalan, KEvin Chapman and Javier Botet

"The Festival" Movie Review - 2018's Worst Movie?

Hands up if you had no idea that The Festival was coming out until a few weeks or a month ago at the latest? I certainly fall into that camp, and it was quite a surprise to suddenly see a movie on the IMDb coming soon page from the creator of The Inbetweeners, which I'm sure most of you will have heard of. Aside from the IMDb page and a single bus banner, however, I struggled to find any information about this movie. There is no Wikipedia page available for it, there's little to no budgetary information available for this thing, and the trailers themselves seemed to have been released a month ago, around the same time this movie seemed to pop into existence. Why, you might ask? Why would a movie choose not to advertise itself until a month before release? And why oh why, would a studio want to realise a movie like this where it is sure to be eaten alive by the like of Christopher Robin releasing this weekend, as well as continuing giants The Meg and Mamma Mia: Here We Go Again? The answer is quite simple: the movie is not even remotely good and the people who made it know it. I watched no trailers for this movie as I had no plans to see it, but the warning signs were all there. The problem I face now, having watched the film, is that I genuinely have no idea where to start with this movie. I've managed to narrow the movie down to three main elements which I need to focus on: the story; the characters and acting; and the humour. This is not the type of movie where I should necessarily be talking about cinematography (which is bland and unimaginative, featuring an overabundance of shots of the whole festival from the sky), or about the editing, or any of the technical aspect (however poorly executed they may be) as this is not the type of movie where these are the focus. Therefore, you can take it for granted that these elements are passable at best, but given that this is not the kind of movie to focus on these, they are not going to add to the movie experience. One small element which is worth mentioning is the music. Given that most of the action takes place at a music festival, director Iain Morris obviously wanted to take the opportunity to include some popular festival songs. It's clear that he loves Mr. Brightside by the Killers, given that I heard that song being used a minimum of three times. The problem is that the movie was filmed largely at the Leeds Music Festival in 2017 and that in itself offers a chance for some live music performances in the midst of films. That might be considered too much to ask, but I don't think it is asking too much for more than three or four popular songs to be used throughout the movie. With this set up, I think expecting a more creative approach is fair.

With those small qualms having been dealt with, let's start examining the three main problems of the movie with the story. Ultimately this one's pretty simple: the movie is nothing you have not seen before and is extremely predictable. The story involves the uptight and not-very-fun Nick (played by The Inbetweeners' Joe Thomas) making a fool of himself at his university graduation when he breaks up with his girlfriend Caitlin (Hannah Tointon). In an attempt to make him feel better, he is dragged to a music festival by best friend Shane (Hammed Animashaun), where he is forced to try and embrace the fun, music, and mud. Thrown in are some subplots relating to strange religious ceremonies, Smurfs, and one-legged Amercian bouncers, but these amount to little more than unfunny bit jokes that I'll come to later. If the main plot sounds clichéd, you'd be right. This is a paper thin story that moves along predictably, with no surprising or funny twists and turns. The entire movie is a series of half-scenes, by which I mean scenes just happen, they do not start and they do not end. There are a number of scenes which start in the middle of conversations, while the main focus of the scene more than often has no set up. Scenes end without any resolution or proper conclusion, and then we swiftly move to another situation. If it sounds like I do not have much to say about the plot, then I'm sorry but there is simply not much to say. All this is is a story about a young guy trying to get back with his ex, while simultaneously making a fool of himself and learning to loosen up. The fact that the movie is set at a music festival is completely coincidental and does not in any way add to the generic plot and pacing. The only thing the movie does which is even remotely different is completely wrap up the ex-girlfriend story halfway through the movie...before restarting the movie and having Nick try to find a girl he spent the night with. If this sounds like a complete nightmare to follow, then you're completely right. All this sudden restart seems to offer is a way to pad out the runtime from a 45-50 minute movie to a 100-minute slog that will have you hating every single moment of the movie. The movie is bloated, predictable, and simply dull. The script is the killer of the movie, and is the source of all of its problems. Believe it or not, however, the plot is the least of the scripts issues.

The face of Nick (Joe Thomas) on the right sums up watching the movie fairly well

The characters, and in turn the acting, is the next step up in where the movie fails. It is still possible for a movie to have very little plot, but to still be extremely well done as a character piece, with the dynamics and development of characters being enough to carry a movie. However, when the movie has characters as weak as these, the experience becomes considerably more irritating. The movie is populated by cardboard cut outs and irritating personalities who surround our three main characters (who we'll dive into in a little bit). From Chris Geere's Brother David to Nick Frost's tattooist to Jemaine Clement's overenthusiastic father-in-law Robin, characters flit in and out of the movie at a moments notice, offering little progression and typically existing for the sole purpose of making one of the movie's sex-based jokes, which make up roughly 95% of the humour in the movie. I'm getting ahead of myself on the humour, though, so we'll come to that soon. The performances from all of the supporting cast are not especially memorable, and I find myself thankful that this movie has an IMDb page at the very least so I can check the names of the characters. The main three offenders, however, are the three leads, who we can go through in turn. Let's start with Claudia O'Doherty's Amy, a festival maniac who our two best friends meet on the train to the festival and who Nick views as forcing herself on them, desperate to be their friends. The entire schtick of this character is that they are annoying, talking for obscene amounts of time without allowing anyone else to get a word in and generally just having quite a grating personality. To O'Doherty's credit, she pulls off this aspect of the character quite perfectly, and she is sure to get on your nerves quickly once she enters the movie. The problem is, however, that being annoying and nothing else is not an excuse. There is some attempt later to explain how she never has any friends and thereby hoping to give the character some emotional depth, but O'Doherty never plays this seriously, instead laughing it off and stopping us as an audience from feeling any emotional connection because of this. If she doesn't care then why should we? This is a problem both for the script - which underdeveloped this - and for the actress - who never plays it seriously enough at the brief intervals where this is attempt. Secondly we have Hammed Animashaun's best friend character Shane. I'll correct myself, sorry, because to use the word "character" in relation to Shane is an insult to better films. Shane has no personality traits outside of being a best friend, and he exists solely to have the extremely predictable moment in the later half of the film where he gets annoyed at the main character only to drop this immediately after. The only other thing he has going for him is that he creates his own music, and is obsessed with a DJ called Hammerhead who wears a mask and just so happens to be playing at the festival. Bet you can't guess where that goes. There's precious little to say about Shane, and honestly you feel bad for Animashaun, who has no material to work with outside of the relationship with Nick, which never feels genuine or remotely believable. With that, we finally come to Joe Thomas' Nick, whose entire character revolves around the fact that he is unlikeable. The character arc he goes on focuses on his transition from being a selfish, uptight, and unlikeable person to a loosened up person...who is still unlikeable. The transition is one that happens with the flick of a switch with no real reason for the change. Indeed, the reason for the change makes no sense, and in actuality should have made Nick worse. The basic problem is that Nick, and indeed everyone else in the movie, is extremely loathsome. They don't change, their personalities are not entertaining or engaging, and they don't act like humans. You spend an hour and 40 minutes of your time watching people who you hate and have unbelievable dynamics. Ultimately, no matter how bad the events of the movie, thanks to the writing and the acting, you can't help but feel, at the end of day, for these people, it could've been worse.

You deserve a medal if you can buy for a second that these two are best friends

With the plot, characters, and acting dealt with, we come to the greatest crime the movie commits: the humour. All of the jokes in the movie think they are much funnier than they actually are, and quite frankly you are more likely to cringe or become completely confused watching the movie. The humour becomes all the more irritating when you realise that most jokes in the movie is based around one of two topics: toilet humour, or sexual antics. When every scene involves a joke relating to one of these two, and you begin to predict what the joke of the scene, adding to the boredom you feel watching the movie anyway. Take for example a scene in a forest (it of course starts halfway through a conversation, there is no set up to the religious group involved in the scene, and of course there is no real resolution or point to the scene). Two characters stumble upon a religious group about to partake in a marriage, with the laughs seemingly meant to be coming from the reaction to discovering the group. Of course, it soon becomes apparent that the "funny part" of the scene relates to who the man in the marriage is getting married to, and this of course leads to yet another sex joke. The whole movie is incredibly unimaginative and seems content to repeat the same jokes over and over and over again. You still might laugh at the scene, and indeed at the movie, but you will only do so out of either how bad the movie is or the absurdity of the scenes. You might get 3 or 4 laughs total. There are perhaps two exceptions to the focus of the joke through the entire movie. One of these relates to one random recurring drunk character mistaking the main character for Harry Potter. This is one of the moments which might make you laugh out of pure absurdity. The other joke relates to an American bounce character called Pirate (because he has one leg...seriously) mishearing Nick's name and calling him "Lick" for the rest of the movie, which of course every other character finds hilarious and proceeds to join in on. Set aside how mean-spirited the entire joke is, the frequency with which the joke comes up make sit easily the most irritating joke in the entire film. In fact, most of the jokes in the movie, while relating to those topics, are incredibly hurtful. The best comedies relate to the situations characters find themselves in, but the worst focus wholly on jokes which make you laugh at others. There's no cleverness, no visual humour, nothing outside of jokes which are mean tot make you laugh at the misfortunes or jokes made towards others. It's a truly horrible and outright lazy script that is content with doing the bare minimum with the expectation that we as an audience will be willing to accept that.

Smurfs turning up is one of the less absurd jokes in the movie if you can believe it

There is not much left to say about The Festival quite honestly. It is a mess from start to finish, and frankly I wanted to leave around 5 minutes into the movie. It's not even entertainingly bad for the entire duration, the few laughs to be had stemming from the sheer absurdity of what is happening on screen at a few scattered points. For the most part, the movie is simply...bad. Bad is underselling it, of course, when the movie does literally nothing right. Everything that could possibly go wrong with a film like this goes wrong. This is without even considering technical elements such as the (dull) cinematography, (bad) editing, or the (forced) music tracks. The absolute killer of the movie is its dreadful script, which commits ever possible sin that a movie can commit. The story is generic and clichéd, being poorly paced out to make the 100-minute runtime feel significantly longer than it actually is. All of the characters are unlikeable, going through no development or changes over the course of the movie. Written terribly and being paired with terrible performances, it's fair to say they do not make watching the movie any easier. The script has no clever jokes and seems content to repeat the same jokes about toilets, sex, Harry Potter, and mean-spirited jokes about people's names. This movie did not exist a month ago, and it is easy now to see why. No matter how awful you expect this movie to be, it cannot match the experience of watching the final product.

Pros

• Literally nothing

Cons

• Unlikeable and underdeveloped characters
• A generic and predictable plot
• An absolutely horrendous script, with humour more likely to make you cringe or become confused
• All laughs (all 4) are at the absurdity of the film
• A bloated running time
• Poor acting across the board
• Uninspired music choices which are forced into the movie

Rating: 1/10

Original Release Date: 14th August, 2018

Starring Joe Thomas, Hammed Animashaun, Claudia O'Doherty, Jemaine Clement, Hannah Tointon, Kurt Yaeger, Theo Barklem-Biggs, Nick Frost, and Noel Fielding

Summer Movies In Review - Fallout, Skyscraper, Ant-Man and More!

It's been a while since I last talked about movies. The last thing I reviewed was in May with the release of Solo: A Star Wars Story (I wasn't letting that one slide), and the last review I put out was for a TV show! As it's turned out, I've sadly just struggled to find the time to review what I've seen this summer...but I've still seen a few things since then! So rather than waiting until the end of the year to include all of these solely in my end of year review, I decided the best way to catch up would be to give my thoughts on all of the movies I've seen this summer at once. Summer is the time of blockbusters, action and superheroes so there's certainly plenty to talk about. I've kept my thoughts on Solo in here for the sake of completeness, with a link to the full review in there as well. Otherwise though these are all movies which I've not talked about on here yet. With all that said, let's jump right in to the 9 movies which I've seen over the last couple of months. Some are great. Some are awful. And for better or for worse, some are absolutely hilarious. Let's get stuck right in (oh, and I didn't see Mamma Mia! Here We Go Again...sorry).

Deadpool 2

Although the movies drags considerably near the start, there are various shots scattered through the movie where the effects strangely come to pieces, and perhaps most frustratingly the movie seems more content to lean into clichés, it still provides ridiculous and fun popcorn entertainment. Deadpool remains as engaging a main character as always, and it is largely thanks to his humour and interactions with the other characters in the movie that the movie is as hilarious as it is. That said, this movie benefits much more than the original thanks to a developed and emotionally driven story, and David Leitch's background in action boosts the movie considerably in that department. That all being said, there is a strange contradiction to be drawn here in that this emotion doesn't always feel totally earned. Given the nature of the humour adopted in the first film and indeed in the final half of this film, the build in emotional heft feels more like the build-up to a joke that never comes. You don't allow yourself to become attached to the connection as the writers intended because it doesn't seem like the type of situation the Deadpool we've come to know on the big screen would allow himself to be in; he might love his girlfriend, but he's never come across as the type of person who needed anyone else. The character dynamics in this movie work, don't get me wrong, but the adoption of the strangely generic plot in turn weakens the movie - in trying to add heart to elevate the movie above the original, they have in turn weakened the first half of the movie. When we get back to the action in the second half, I found that my enjoyment of the movie picked up considerably, with the filmmakers considerably less anchored by the story they had to set up. In this half, just like the MCU albeit in a totally different way, the people who are making these movies completely understand and know what they are doing. They know what makes Deadpool work to ensure that he never becomes tiring (i.e. teaming him with other characters unwilling to suffer through his non-stop quips and jokes and general schtick) and they know what people want to see. They know that what we want from these movies is just Deadpool being Deadpool with some action in between, and that would be more than enough to ensure that this film made truckloads of money regardless of what any review said. With that being said, the biggest commendation I can give then is the moxy of the writers to try to go beyond this, and inject the film with some sense of stakes and emotional heft. That is works for the most part is even more of a surprise. In the end, Deadpool 2's fun blend of heart, action, and self-awareness makes sure that this is an extremely enjoyable ride that will leave you with a smile on your face...at least for half of it.

Rating: 6/10

Original Release Date: May 18th, 2018

Starring: Ryan Reynolds, Josh Brolin, Zazie Beetz, Julian Dennison, Morena Baccarin, T. J. Miller, Brianna Hildebrand, Eddie Marsan, Terry Crews, Bill Skarsgard, and Rob Delaney

Solo: A Star Wars Story

Full Review Link: "Solo: A Star Wars Story" Movie Review - Remarkably Unremarkable

What is there left to say about this misguided and ultimately pointless movie? It's true that there are some good performances and action, while the effects are on point as always - that I cannot deny. However, that does not excuse the rest of the movie. While the issues of production design are somewhat bland, thee are forgivable and if they were the only issues I had and someone said I was reading too far into the movie then perhaps I could get past that. What I cannot forgive is this script. As I said at the beginning of this review (or maybe rant might be more appropriate for the first half), this movie began as a poor and ill-conceived idea, and was not developed from that. There was no desire to deviate from the formula of a standard adventure plot. There was no desire to find a way to develop and build on existing characters or create new ones. What the writers seemed to think was sufficient was a great deal of fan service and irritating moments where characters almost literally smirk at the camera as lines are delivered or pointless tidbits of information given out. It's just...dull. There is absolutely nothing to it and therefore as a movie fundamentally fails at a basic level. There might be cool effects or relatively fun action, but there is no rewatchability to this. What this is is a series of clips which you might want to watch on YouTube as opposed to having to sit through the other drab 2 hours. Ultimately, this is not only pointless, but it is utterly dull. Is it the worst Star Wars movie? No. Is it a particularly enjoyable movie or well-written? No. Does it have a point? No. It just exists, and it seems that is something I and the rest of the fanbase will simply have to live with. It's just a shame at the end of the day that there was potential for this story, and yet we ended up with something which is quite remarkably unremarkable.

Rating: 3/10

Original Release Date: May 25th, 2018

Starring Alden Ehrenreich, Woody Harrelson, Emilia Clarke, Donald Glover, Phoebe Waller-Bridge, Thandie Newton, Jon Favreau, Joonas Suotamo, and Paul Bettany

Ocean's 8

The Ocean's franchise was the latest series to this year be subjected to the "all female reboot/sequel" trend which is currently doing the rounds, although this movie thankfully had considerably more successful results than last years disastrous Ghostbusters. This is more successful for a few reasons. The most notable of these is the talented cast. Although the initial announcement of this movie may have been met with some trepidation, a few minds at least were calmed by the signing of big name talents such as Sandra Bullock, Cate Blanchett, and Anne Hathaway, as well as up-and-comers such as Sarah Paulson. The cast of this movie is great and thankfully live up to the expectations. Each of them knows exactly how to play their characters without them becoming grating or annoying (although Awkwafina comes dangerously close, she is thankfully restricted by less dialogue than some of the cast), and the chemistry between them is electric. Even Rihanna didn't annoy me...that much. The second point this movie got right is possibly the most important part of any movie and that is the director, Gary Ross. Responsible for the first Hunger Games movie, and also for writing Big back in 1988, Ross emulates the style of original Ocean's director Steven Soderbergh to a tee. There's a clear understanding throughout the movie that the character dynamics are the real bread and butter of the movie and the focus on these is wise. The editing is stylish, utilising the same comic panel transitions the series has become famous for, while the cinematography and shot composition is slick and well done. Where the movie doesn't work is the script. It's generic, clichéd, and often a boring slog. The heist of the movie, which involves a plot to rob the MET Gala in New York, is exceedingly simple and lacks the tension of the earlier movies in the series. While the group does encounter some problems with the plan throughout, ultimately these are overcome with very little difficulty, while also generally not requiring any specific skills a member of the group has. Effectively, you know the story of the movie going in and the beats you expect the plot to hit it routinely does. There's no real surprises in store (cameos aside), and there's no villain to add any real tension into the mix (no, Richard Armitage's ex-boyfriend does not count as a bad guy because he never encounters the group and he effectively amounts to a bit character). The humour in the movie can be very hit and miss as well, particularly when James Corden makes a late third act entry into the fray playing himself pretending to be an insurance investigator. Clearly, Ocean's 8 is a mixed bag. From a production stand point, the movie is well done, and the cast has excellent chemistry. It's the script that ultimately brings the movie down, with inconsistent humour, and the most standard by-the-numbers plot you can expect to see in this kind of movie. If you're not expecting high art, you could get some entertainment value out of this but otherwise, it may be decidedly more rough.

Rating: 5/10

Original Release Date: June 8th, 2018

Starring: Sandra Bullock, Cate Blanchett, Anne Hathaway, Mindy Kaling, Sarah Paulson, Awkwafina, Rihanna, Helena Bonham Carter, Richard Armitage, and James Corden

Hereditary

Hereditary is, above all, a victim of its own marketing. While I was lucky enough to avoid all trailers and footage for the movie side one 30-second clip that was nearly included in a video I watched (this is absolutely the experience you should aim for if at all possible, I put the trailer in for an option and for consistency), after seeing them after the film itself, as well as marketing quotes like "This generation's The Exorcist", I felt that audiences could have been strangely misled into seeing this film. Advertised as one of the scariest movies of all time and seeming to boast a slew of horror sequences, this is not really a fair representation of the movie at all. In fact, for the first half of the movie, there seems to be little to no supernatural activity. The movie initially seems to more be a comment on grief and regret, and the effect which this has on a person, especially following a death in the family. Any paranormal events in the movie at first are only seen by certain people, carrying an implication that this could be all in their heads, making the movie a much more psychological horror far away from genre tropes. The movie even opens with a shot of a doll house to suggest that everything we're about to watch is somewhat artificial, and that maybe we should not take everything we're seeing at face value. And then Toni Collette's Annie is involved in a seance sequence and the movie seems to from then on out be more content to lead into clichés and stereotypes. Indeed, the final half of the movie is much more standard mainstream horror, and almost feels studio mandated to ensure that the movie could still be watched and somewhat enjoyed by general audiences. I am certainly not going to deny that the final 20 minutes of the movie is perhaps the scariest sequence I have ever watched in a cinema, and at the very least one of the scariest sequences of all time. As with the rest of the movie, the cinematography, lighting, sound design, and music in this sequence is impeccable, and the slow escalation brings a horror that jump scare movies could only dream of achieving. The music of the movie is of particular note, given that there isn't any music for large portions of the movie, which does wonders for the slow-building nature and atmosphere director Ari Aster has sought out to achieve. This is also a movie where the explanation is one you will certainly have to think about. Again, it feels like director Aster wanted to leave the ending considerably more ambiguous but was asked to include more hints. However, this is still an extremely confusing set of reveals the audience is subjected to and it will certainly not be to all tastes. The movie is at times so brutal, so relentless, and so disturbing that I would completely understand someone telling me they didn't enjoy. I certainly didn't enjoy watching the whole thing. This wasn't helped by a bloated 2 hour runtime that feels as though it could easily be trimmed down. The acting is also worthy of a mention. All of the performances of the movie are excellent, but Toni Collette in particular gives a career-best, potentially Oscar-worthy performance which is alone worth seeing the movie for. Ultimately, there is plenty to like about Hereditary but it is certainly not to all tastes. Well-acted and produced certainly but held back by a script that at times feels pretentious and generic, this is movie that should not have been marketed as a straight horror but instead an insight into the effects of grief with psychological horror elements and a lean into those elements at the end. If you go in knowing what you're getting, and prepared for it, this is certainly an easier pill to swallow, and at the least an interesting and engaging watch.

Rating: 7/10

Original Release Date: June 8th, 2018

Starring: Toni Collette, Alex Wolff, Milly Shapiro, Ann Dowd, and Gabriel Byrne

Incredibles 2

If I had to some up this movie quite simply, Incredibles 2 is more of what you loved about the original. Hampered only by an admittedly predictable story (there's a villain reveal at the end of the second act which sticks out like a sore thumb and that you can see coming from miles away), the movie more than makes up for it by focusing on the dynamics of the various characters both old and new, and providing them with interesting motivations and conflicts. It's difficult to imagine not becoming wholly engrossed in the family drama and invested in these characters even despite this being an animated movie. All of this is helped by some stunning animation and the drama being surrounded by an onslaught of sequences which can make you laugh or provide a surprising adrenaline rush through the intense action set pieces. The action in this movie stands with this years own Infinity War as potentially some of the most heart-racing action seen in a superhero movie in recent years, using the powers of the Incredibles themselves as well as those of their allies, old and new, in tandem with a slew of interesting new gadgets and additions. Michael Giacchino's score is also excellent and provides the perfect blend of emotion and intensity in the background of the film. That's not to mention the theme songs written for Mr. Incredible, Elastigirl, and Frozone, harkening back to the gloriously campy superhero days of the 60s and sure to put a smile on even the most stone-hearted viewers face. As I say, it's more of the same, and that's okay ultimately. Fans have been waiting 14 years to see a continuation to these characters and this movie not only provides an immensely satisfying follow-up, but also works well as a device to introduce new audiences to these characters, as is necessary with a gap as long as we were forced to suffer. It's admirable of Pixar to have waited until they had a proper story to tell before making this movie, while also maintaining the heart of the original. In story, this is of course a different movie (and I will never understand comments arguing that this is the same movie repeated) but in essence, it's everything you know and love. Superpowers and action act as a backdrop to a story about family, and it is the dynamic of the central cast and those same themes that give the movie the heart of other Pixar movies. It's been a long wait, yes, but it's safe to say that the Incredibles are back and, with that same soul, it's like they never left.

Rating: 9/10

Original Release Date: 15th June, 2018

Starring: Holly Hunter, Craig T. Nelson, Sarah Vowell, Huck Milner, Samuel L. Jackson, Bob Odenkirk, Catherine Keener, Jonathan Banks, Michael Bird, Sophia Bush, and Brad Bird

Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom

Jurassic World was released back in 2015 with the intent to revitalise the Jurassic Park franchise with the addition of exciting new leads Chris Pratt and Bryce Dallas Howard as well as some interesting new hybrid dinos to face off against the iconic T-Rex and Velociraptors. In actuality, Colin Trevorrow's effort was met with a decidedly mixed reception although it still managed to gross over a billion dollars worldwide. A sequel was thus guaranteed, but the reins were handed this time round to horror director J. A. Bayona. A $170 million budget to a director relatively unexperienced in the action genre this new set of movies seem to be aiming for? What could go wrong? As it turns out, quite a bit, but not as much as it could have done. The visual effects are once again on point, with the dinosaurs being seamlessly melded into the real world, while the new hybrids also boast some interesting and eye-popping designs. The acting from the two leads is also good, with their characters being better written this time around, while the chemistry between the two feels considerably stronger. The action in the movie is also fun, especially in the second half, while the cinematography also feels on point. There are some particularly beautiful shots in the first half on the island, although the second half certainly is not lacking in its memorable shots (see the shot of the Indoraptor on the roof of the mansion roaring while lightning flashes in the background). With those positives out of the way, however, where the movie is let down the most is (as with most summer blockbusters this year) in its script. You may have noticed that I referred there repeatedly to a first half and a second half and the reason for that is because, unlike other movies which follow a conventional structure and try to flow naturally throughout, Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom seems content to treat itself as two movies: one set on an island with an exploding volcano; and one more horror-themed segment set in a mansion (three guesses which of these is better directed going by the directors expertise). These plots are poorly bridged and tonally dissonant, and you will struggle to escape the sense that the movie switches to another halfway through, only with the same characters. Speaking of characters, aside from the two leads (although there are still lost issues there), the characters and other performances in this movie are absolutely dreadful for the most part. A number of actors are given virtually nothing to do throughout, including Toby Jones, B.D. Wong, and Jeff Goldblum. However, while they have nothing to do, they are not as annoying as a number of whose additions. Rafe Spall plays the "villain" of the movie but is an irritating presence, although the worst of the lot is Justice Smith's Franklin, who you will want to strangle from the moment he arrives on screen. That feeling does not go away. Oh, and the ending of the movie. I of course do not want to give anything away, but all excitement I might have had for the next movie in the series has died instantly. There are some good things in this movie, don't get me wrong. However, unfortunately the negatives far outweigh the positives, and generally Jurassic World is proving itself in my eyes to be a franchise of very little quality, but is never going to stop making money. That said, if they get a completely new cast, writers, director, and composer, then maybe we can have some hope for the show. Don't count on it.

Rating: 4/10

Original Release Date: 22nd June, 2018

Starring: Chris Pratt, Bryce Dallas Howard, Rafe Spall, Justice Smith, Daniella Pineda, James Cromwell, Toby Jones, B.D. Wong, Ted Levine, Isabella Sermon and Jeff Goldblum 

Skyscraper

So from the horrors of Jurassic World: Fallen Kingdom we come to the hilariously awful Skyscraper. Described throughout the course of its production as an "Original Concept Movie", the plot of the movie involves the ever-entertaining Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson playing Will Sawyer, an amputee security expert, who must break into the tallest building in the world  in order to save the building - and his family - from some cartoon terrorists with hammy accents seeking a secret that the owner of the building is trying to hide. If you take out the tallest building in the world aspect, and think that that sounds like Die Hard, and about as far from an original concept as you can imagine, then you would be right. This is one of the most by-the-numbers plots in a summer blockbuster in years, although it is admittedly a (somewhat mercilessly) well-paced and snappy movie. It may be clichéd and by the books, but it does not waste any more of your time than is absolutely necessary. The action in the movie kick starts fairly quickly, which you'll also be thankful for given that this is the most delightfully bonkers aspect of the movie. Have you ever wanted to see the Rock climb up a crane tower without showing any indication of being affected by the helicopters blowing wind all around him or the killer cold of the height? No problem. Have you ever wanted to see Dwayne Johnson climb one of the tallest buildings in the world on the outside using duct tape on his hands and feet? What about that same actor using a prosthetic leg as part of the action beats? In case you couldn't tell, the movie is frankly about as insane as it gets, and it doesn't let up. Credit should also be given to the Rock's committed performance. It's clear how passionate he is about this project and his performance is the only one in the movie worth watching, solely due to this. Where the movie falls to pieces is everything else. The script is dreadful, offering no character development, leaving you with, for the most part, a cast of cardboard cut-outs. Not only that, but there are so many plot holes that it is effectively a black hole, while the sheer numbers of conveniences present never ceased to amaze me. The acting for the most part offers much to be desired but then again, as I said, it's not as if the actors had much to work with. And while the action might be fun and goofy, it is mind-numbingly stupid. Oh, and who could forget the dreadful CGI. To be quite honest, I would not recommend this movie if you are not prepared to finish it with approximately half of the brain cells that you start with. The movie is ridiculous in concept and any shred of fun to be found stems from this and the action, and of course the Rock's performance. If you're looking for anything deeper, stay clear. If you don't take the movie too seriously, however, then there are plenty of laughs to be had albeit at the expense of the movie itself.

Rating: 3/10

Original Release Date: 13th July, 2018

Starring: Dwayne Johnson, Neve Campbell, Chin Han, Roland Moller, Pablo Schreiber, Byron Mann, Hannah Quinlivan, and Noah Taylor

Ant-Man and the Wasp

It was never going to be an easy feat to be the Marvel movie to have to come off the back of the epic scale of Avengers: Infinity War. For that task, however, the studio opted to go down a (literally) smaller, and more humorous route, likely to be considered a palette cleanser after the intensity of Infinity War. Thus we have Ant-Man and the Wasp, which promises the debut of Evangeline Lilly as the titular flying insect (in costume at least), who is teaming up with Paul Rudd's Scott Lang AKA Ant-Man, who is still trying to balance his family life and his desire to help Hank Pym (Michael Douglas) and Hope through being Ant-Man. Not to mention the consequences of his actions in Civil War. It's the central dynamic between the two leads that is the big success of the movie. Rudd and Lilly have electric chemistry and it is endlessly entertaining to watch them bounce off of and bicker with each other. When the two are together on screen, the movie is at its best. The rest of the cast is, for the most part, equally excellent, although their characters are decidedly not as strong, nor is there a dynamic even close to watching that of the superhero partners. Michael Douglas is thankfully given much more to do in this outing as Hank Pym, his sarcastic comments well placed throughout the movie and always managing a laugh. Michael Peña is also great once again as Luis but he thankfully is not overused and never outstays his welcome to become tiresome. Legends Laurence Fishburne and Michelle Pfeiffer also do the best with what they are given, but strangely the script gives neither actor a character particularly worth their talents (in this movie at least, who knows what the future holds). Where the movie is noticeably different from other Marvel movies is in its villain situation, in that...there isn't really a villain. The closest we get is Walton Goggins' Sonny Burch, who has very little screen presence and fails to make much of an impression, amounting to little more than a two bit secondary villain. Hannah John-Kamen initially seems to be fulfilling villain duties as Ghost, but thankfully John-Kamen gets much more of a character to work with, with fleshed out motivation and a strong emotional backstory, leaving you not remembering her as much of a villain in the first place. The action in the movie is also extremely entertaining. Much like the first movie and indeed Ant-Man's appearance in Civil War, the shrinking and growing technology of both the Ant-Man and Wasp suits allows director Peyton Reed to get inventive with these sequences, and the use of vehicles, blasters, and other technology makes for an interesting extra dimension that the first film lacked. The cinematography, music, and visual effects are also once again excellent. Where the movie has some more problems is in its story and script. I found the humour itself to be much more hit and miss than the first film. When the movie is funny, it is riotously funny, with one sequence in a school in particular standing out. However, there are some tiring running jokes and characters that tend to make you roll your eyes more than even smile (see Randall Park's character of FBI agent Jimmy Woo for the prime example). The story is also the routine and formulaic Marvel story we've come to expect, even if the villain is not a standard addition to the Marvel rogues gallery, with the plot generally hitting all of the beats you are expecting to exactly when you expect them to. It's clear to see that the movie is saved largely by its central dynamic, performances, and action, while it is let down by a generic story and a number of underdeveloped characters. That said, there is much more to like here than there is not. Being elevated above the first film by virtue of a stronger connection between Rudd and Lilly, and of course the addition of the Wasp, Ant-Man and the Wasp is a standard Marvel movie that doesn't match the heights of this year's recent efforts, but is still a fun an consistently entertaining outing.

Rating: 7/10

Original Release Date: 6th July, 2018

Starring: Paul Rudd, Evangeline Lilly, Michael Peña, Michael Douglas, Hannah John-Kamen, Walton Goggins, Randall Park, Laurence Fishburne, and Michelle Pfeiffer

Mission: Impossible - Fallout

The latest movie I've seen this summer is also the best, and quite possibly the best movie I've seen this year. The Mission: Impossible franchise has now been going for 20 years and it seems difficult to imagine that the schtick of the series has not yet become stale. That said, this is a series which is helped largely by the input of different directors for each entry, giving each movie a unique tone and style, thereby keeping it fresh and interesting for the most part. So what makes this movie so special as the best movie in the franchise? This is actually the first time a director has returned to the series, with Christopher McQuarrie back on directing duties fresh off of Rogue Nation, and continuing the story he began in that movie. However, not only is this the first continuing story the franchise has seen, but it is easily the most personal. Rather than beginning the movie with the usual bombastic action sequence or show of Tom Cruise's insanity, the movie instead takes its time, spending 15 minutes to build to the opening credits, allowing us to understand the motivation of Ethan Hunt and his determination to not let any of his team die. It's easily the deepest insight we've ever had into the mind of Ethan, and it certainly gives the action and the stakes a more personal edge. By spending a small amount of time to let the audience get into the mindset of the character and understand him a little more, particularly coming off of the events of the last movie, the intensity of the action increases  tenfold, as action tends to when we have a deeper understanding of a characters motivations and what is driving them through what should effectively be a suicide mission for the entire film. Speaking of action, the set pieces in this movie are phenomenal as I'm sure you've heard by now, with this film destined to be remembered as one of the great action movies of, at the very least, the decade. The visual effects are excellent and any CGI implemented into the stunt work is flawless, being completely unnoticeable if it is even there at all. The stunt work is incredible (props of course to the (impossibly) 56-year old Tom Cruise for amazing us all as always), and these sequences are guaranteed to get your heart racing as you are thrust from Paris to London to the Middle East. The cinematography is incredible throughout, capturing the beauty of these locations.The characters and acting on display are also great. Tom Cruise's Ethan Hunt remains as fun a character as always while being helped by some extra development in this outing, while the dynamic within his IMF team is great once again. Particularly props to Rebecca Ferguson's Ilsa Faust, cementing herself as the best female lead of this series, Sean Harris as the villainous scenery chewing Solomon Lane, and Henry Cavill's career best performance as imposing CIA agent August Walker. The music by Lorne Balfe is also great, using a truly unique blend of tracks and instruments, but is cleverly only used where appropriate. Some action sequences, such as the bathroom fight, have no music for the most part, elevating the intensity of the scene further, and you feel every hit. All in all, this is an absolutely excellent movie that pushes itself beyond the boundaries of a typical action movie, offering not only great action but fun dynamics and characters, excellent acting, and a clear desire to tell a much more personal story than the series has ever seen.

Rating: 10/10

Original Release Date: 27th July, 2018

Starring: Tom Cruise, Henry Cavill, Rebecca Ferguson, Ving Rhames, Simon Pegg, Sean Harris, Vanessa Kirby, Michelle Monaghan, Angela Bassett, and Alec Baldwin

"Solo: A Star Wars Story" Movie Review - Remarkably Unremarkable

The amount of comparisons available to be drawn between Solo: A Star Wars Story, and DC's ill-fated Suicide Squad is quite frankly embarrassing and hilarious, not least in relation to the quality of both films in question. You may have noticed that I haven't bothered in this review to give a backdrop to the universe the film is set in, the idea behind it, or the production of the movie itself. There are three main reasons for that. The first is simple: you know what Star Wars is and there is a high chance that you also know who Han Solo is. Even if you haven't seen the movies you'll likely be familiar to some extent with the existence of the intergalactic behemoth and I see no reason to set out the universe when there are whole videos and articles across the Internet devoted entirely to doing that in much greater depth. The second point is fairly similar, which is to say that the production of this movie has become infamous to say the least. An incredibly troubled production not least because of the departure of original directors Phil Lord and Chris Miller followed by the swift bringing in of (the incredibly safe) Ron Howard to finish the job, I'd recommend reading up on this if you're interested; to be honest, it serves as an explanation for many of the film's more egregious issues. Thirdly, in case you couldn't tell, this movie is such a dull and pointless waste of time that I would rather just begin explaining the movie's positives and (extensive) negatives instead of wasting both your time and my own outlining the background. Even though I suppose I just did that briefly. The plot of the latest entry into the Star Wars franchise revolves around a young Han Solo (Alden Ehrenreich) setting out into the world driven by personal motivations but finds himself caught up with a group of criminals, including his iconic sidekick Chewbacca, a young Lando Calrissian (Donald Glover) and some other quirky characters, who are soon sent on a seemingly impossible mission for a powerful mastermind. Quite similar to another movie I mentioned near the start. The primary problem with the plot is that straight from the off you understand exactly where this story is going and where it is going to end up. This is an incredibly safe movie all things considered, a comment which can apply equally to all aspects of the movie but which is especially true of the script in general. The movie could have offered an interesting twist on the heist genre, blending the usual plot with a comedic tone and a Star Wars setting. It's strange then that Ron Howard (who reportedly reshot around 70% of the movie) seemed so content to settle for a predictable and formulaic plot structure. It makes the movie feel bland immediately and feel boring throughout. For a world such as Star Wars with an extensive backdrop, history, and worlds to explore, it seems like a wasted opportunity more than anything else. The tone of the movie is a mess also. The movie really is a Frankenstein's monster, a product of what happens when the visions of two different directors clash and do not mesh in any way. Whereas the movie started clearly as a comedy under the direction of Lord and Miller, it was transformed into a drama by Howard. However, certain elements were kept from the original version and not changed, and therefore the tone feels incredibly inconsistent. The most notable example is of the character of L3, Lando's female droid and played by Pheobe Waller-Bridge. Hints of the characters' relations to others as well as personality traits initially seem to be played up as jokes, the characters themselves rolling their eyes and on the verge of laughing. However, in a mission to remove all sense of personality from the movie, in the very next sequence, these are played completely straight and in an attempt to extract sympathy and emotion from the audience. In short, it's a messy affair, as well as a dull one.

The reason the writers might seem to have blocked themselves into this situation is that this movie is built as the embodiment of fan service. A handful of lines taken from the original trilogy are what form the basis of this movie. "I completed the Kessel Run in 12 parsecs" - better throw that in there. "He won the Falcon from me in a game of sabaac" - that sounds like we could throw it in. This is the mindset I can only imagine the writers had. It is on these that a cohesive and genuinely engaging plot was attempted to be built. Is it really a wonder that the writers found themselves reduced to a formula familiar to anyone who has watched a heist movie before and predictable to everyone else? However, as opposed to, God forbid, developing this structure and building on the characters of the movie in a meaningful way (don't worry, we'll get to that soon enough), they choose to flesh out the movie to the laboriously long 2 hour and 15 minute runtime by way of a barrage of action sequences, flashing colours, and, the point of this segment, fan service. Fan service, in the mind of the Kasdans (the writers), is the name of the game when it comes to this movie. There are numerous moments devoted entirely to these small lines from the original movies, and in fairness some of these are the best scenes in the movie (the gambling sequences stand out in particular due to the acting, production design, lighting, and actual tension). However, the issue of these relates to the much bigger problem of Han's character which I'll discuss in much more depth below. There are also some other moments which act as winks to the camera, a smirk at the audience as certain lines and delivery act as a method for certain questions to be raised and quickly answered. Not that these are questions you have ever wondered or cared to have answered prior to the release of this film of course. No, like I said, this is simply padding to a movie which has no story to tell. This began as a poorly conceived idea, and was barely developed from that, leaving the writers, director(s), producers, and everyone else involved with the movie with no option but to fall back on fan service, fan service, and, you guessed it, more fan service. Ultimately, there is nothing wrong with fan service in movies, of course there isn't. The problem with the execution of it in this movie, however, can be summed up in a remarkably simple way: the questions it answers are those nobody really wanted the answer to, and the questions it raises or sets up are ones which nobody cares about and/or finds interesting. Therefore, it does nothing to improve your engagement in the movie (with the exception perhaps of one moment in the final third although this is almost guaranteed to either confuse non-fans or make those familiar with the lore roll their eyes), and as a result makes this movie not only a drab and predictable experience, but also an exasperating one.

Alden Ehrenreich does his best to bring the same charisma to the role as the iconic Harrison Ford

All that said, it is possible to still enjoy a movie even when the plot falls short or certain elements feel forced when it still has good characters and good performances. Well, the movie certainly has a lot of characters. A lot of static characters. What I mean by the term "static characters" is that they do not change over the course of the movie; they act in certain manner or have a certain disposition at the beginning of the plot and, even after the events of the plot which often personally effect them, they are the same at the end. As a result, they are not interesting to work and it becomes difficult to become engaged in any of their acts or care about them at a decent level. Of course, we know Han, Chewie, and Lando will survive the movie but, as with Rogue One 2 years ago, as the movie is otherwise populated by an entirely new set of characters, the benefit should be that we do not know what will happen to them, whether they die or not. It is the job of the writers to build interesting arcs and develop these characters so that we care about them, so that we become attached to them and so, most importantly of all perhaps, we are interested in their journeys. But the movie seems content to not do that. Emilia Clarke's Qi'ra has probably the closest thing to what could be described as an "arc" but the character herself does not really change over the course of the movie and simply takes advantage of different situations. Woody Harrelson's Beckett is also part of some scenes early in the movie which seem to lay the groundwork for the character to grow and change away from how we initially meet him, but the movie yet again drops the ball, and seemingly forgets these scenes ever happens. Despite the gravity and weight the scenes should carry for the character, he carries on as normal and is the same from the beginning to the end. Also, for everyone referencing L3 (Phoebe Waller-Bridge) as one of the highlights and funniest parts of the movie, I quite simply cannot understand the points of view. I don't know what else to say about this irritating, pandering and frankly confusing presence. The same can be said of returning characters such as Lando, who has charisma and nothing more. It feels yet again that the writers failed to take the opportunity to build on that character - ultimately, we learn nothing new about him and it is simply a carbon copy of what we have already seen. That said, the greatest offence the movie commits with regards characters is in relation to Han himself and this relates to two main points, but both significantly weaken the character. Firstly, when we first meet Han in A New Hope, even before he undergoes any development, part of the fun of the character is the mystery he carries with him. Events are referenced with no context and different people hate him for reasons untold and it makes the character somewhat interesting. His name is also ludicrous and the fact he can speak Wookie isn't explained but we just accept it because this is Star Wars. This is obviously relating to the point I mentioned before about answering questions we didn't need answered so I won't spend much more time on this. Much more importantly, the second point regards how this movie fundamentally weakens the character of Han. Think again about A New Hope. The entire time Han is on screen, he is in it for himself. All he cares about is his money, even when saving a Princess, with no desire to be part of something bigger and leaves just before the attack on the original Death Star. Therefore, when he returns to help the heroes with their attack, it is surprising to us because this is NOT in character. We understand that, thanks to his experiences with Luke, Ben, and Leia, he has changed as a character and does actually care about others; he is the rogue with a heart of gold that we all hoped he would be, even if he still won't admit it himself. This is good character development this movie sets out to destroy. From the very start of this movie, we are shown quite explicitly that Han does care about others, he wants to be a part of a team, and his entire motivation for the most part is to help someone and later to help many many others. This is his character at the start and his character at the end (yet another static character). The problem here is that this weakens the character of Han in the original trilogy significantly. It completely removes the surprise of the original movie relating to the character's return as this clearly shows that he would have probably done this anyway; there is no shock, no surprise, and with this movie in mind (for those of you saying that the original movie can still be taken on its own, the fact is that this is still one franchise and one universe and this movie supposedly relates to the same character and therefore it is a valid consideration) the character is turned from an interesting turncoat rogue into a love sick puppy dog.

Emilia Clarke's Qi'ra promises more excitement in this image than is ever delivered

Now for the most shocking part of this whole review: it's not all bad. Believe it or not, there are some good points in the movie. For example, some of the performances are good. Not all of them. Emilia Clarke is an offender of particular note who seems to be phoning in the performance for a pay cheque, as is Woody Harrelson, with both failing to bring any weight or presence to their already weak characters although the latter fairs slightly better. The rest of the actors are doing the best with what they have to work with. Disney quite frankly threw lead actor Alden Ehrenreich under the bus a few months before release in an already troubled production by accidentally "leaking" (although maybe I'm being cynical) that an acting coach had been brought in to help him on set. It's a shame that this happened, because it seems to have led to a lot of unwarranted fear. He does fine with what he has. It's difficult to see how he could have done better with what was in the (in case I haven't made it clear already) awful script. The two best performances in the movie are Paul Bettany and Donald Glover. Paul Bettany plays the villain, gangster Dryden Vos. Make no mistake, referring to him as a "character" is generous but Bettany is having the time of his life on screen, and gives an incredibly fun and over the top performance, at the very least making sure he is an entertaining presence for his unfortunately short screen time. Donald Glover's Lando is also a highlight, with Glover bringing a great deal of charisma and charm to the character that makes him a delight to watch. Make no mistake, as a result of the script (that little chestnut again), this amounts to little more than an impression of Billy Dee Williams but damn does he do it well, with you completely believing this is a younger version of the same character from the moment you meet him. However, he again suffers from being criminally underused. Let's talk about the action, which is in general quite fun to watch. It moves at a good pace, and the effects work (more on that briefly in a little bit) ensures you are engaged in the sequence fully. When the script doesn't intervene with dreadful dialogue to make you remember the rest of the movie, you can easily become immersed in the action and at these points the movie becomes considerably more enjoyable to watch. That said, even these sequences are unremarkable. While the beats may be fun, helped largely by the Star Wars setting and universe, these are still nothing we haven't seen before. There's a big space monster to make a smuggling run more interesting. There's a sequence which in hindsight is almost an exact rip-off of the Rey/Kylo Ren/Snoke throne room confrontation from The Last Jedi in terms of the themes and set-up it carries. There's a sequence in trenches with lots of random explosions and nothing but shots of soldiers looking while a generic drill sergeant commander shouts "get out there!" The fact is that none of these are original concepts, and completely fails to capitalise on the science fiction genre and the imagination it allows you to exercise. You could have done anything with this setting, but like the rest of the movie the action beats are content to fall back on extremely familiar tropes. That said, they are still fun so if you can get past that I completely understand and they are enjoyable. Regards the rest of the production design, the sets are usual look excellent but the costume design is a shockingly bland area. Han walks around in a leather jacket for the whole movie while Qi'ra seems to be wearing Earth clothes. Lando's wardrobe is colourful but I never imagined that he only wore capes as the writers seem to have done. I suppose they saw that the original Lando wore a cape and went with that. The cinematography is serviceable but fails to capture the sweeping and spine-tingling moments of the other movies in the franchise, despite John Powell's best efforts to capture some magic through his score.The effects work is probably the only area of the movie which I can praise unconditionally. At the very least we can trust a Star Wars movie to always be excellent to look at. Unfortunately, apart from that, as you can see, it's often difficult to find another part of the movie which is consistently good, although there are undoubtedly some good moments.

Donald Glover's Lando is a shining light in the movie but is sadly underused

What is there left to say about the misguided and ultimately pointless movie? It's true that there are some good performances and action, while the effects are on point as always - that I cannot deny. However, that does not excuse the rest of the movie. While the issues of production design are somewhat bland, thee are forgivable and if they were the only issues I had and someone said I was reading too far into the movie then perhaps I could get past that. What I cannot forgive is this script. As I said at the beginning of this review (or maybe rant might be more appropriate for the first half), this movie began as a poor and ill-conceived idea, and was not developed from that. There was no desire to deviate from the formula of a standard adventure plot. There was no desire to find a way to develop and build on existing characters or create new ones. What the writers seemed to think was sufficient was a great deal of fan service and irritating moments where characters almost literally smirk at the camera as lines are delivered or pointless tidbits of information given out. It's just...dull. There is absolutely nothing to it and therefore as a movie fundamentally fails at a basic level. There might be cool effects or relatively fun action, but there is no rewatchability to this. What this is is a series of clips which you might want to watch on YouTube as opposed to having to sit through the other drab 2 hours. Ultimately, this is not only pointless, but it is utterly dull. Is it the worst Star Wars movie? No. Is it a particularly enjoyable movie or well-written? No. Does it have a point? No. It just exists, and it seems that is something I and the rest of the fanbase will simply have to live with. It's just a shame at the end of the day that there was potential for this story, and yet we ended up with something which is quite remarkably unremarkable.

Pros

• Some decent performances
• Reliable effects work
• Some fun action beats

Cons

• Formulaic and predictable plot and structure
• Fan service over development
• Weakens existing characters and introduces even weaker ones
• Bland cinematography and costume design
• Irritating winks to the camera
• A tonal mess
• Pointless and ultimately boring

Rating: 3/10

Original Release Date: May 25th, 2018

Starring Alden Ehrenreich, Woody Harrelson, Emilia Clarke, Donald Glover, Phoebe Waller-Bridge, Thandie Newton, Jon Favreau, Joonas Suotamo, and Paul Bettany