Big Hero 6

Plot: Hiro, a bored 14 year old genius, invents mini robots that link up with each other to do cool things--just about everything. He meets other students who make high tech robots too. One student is Hero's brother whose robot is an inflatable medical robot called Baymax. Soon the school burns down with all the mini-robots, and Hiro's brother is killed. Suddenly a villain, wielding a massive number of Hiro's mini-robots, threatens to to destroy the city. Hiro and Baymax join forces with four students to become the Big Hero 6. They battle the villain and avenge the brother.  [imdb]    [photos]

Review: This is a younger kid's superhero movie. In its best moments it is like The Incredibles with likable characters working together. In its worst moments, it is like Power Rangers with robots bashing stuff with colorful weapons. 

The beginning is slow, but after a while we meet the other students who liven things up. Baymax, the inflatable, medical robot, and needs to be coxed into fighting -- a little bit of pacifism in this kid-friendly superhero movie.

Big Hero 6 has a strong soundtrack. The ending has some nice graphics that evoke Studio Ghibli. The characters come together to save the day, and Big Hero 6 ends with a nice positive message -- adult superhero movies are never this sincere (although maybe that is the Japanese influence coming in again.)

Directed by: Don Hall and Chris Williams

Rating: 2.0  stars: Big Hero 6 is good when compared with other kid's movies. As an adult movie, it is a waste of time. 

More: One of the interesting aspects is the American-Japanese cultural fusion they show. With Japanese dialog it will play well in Japan. It is unclear if this is a world vision message or a commercial reality.

Even More: There already are little modular robots that link up to do things. 

Interstellar

Plot: Life on earth is being destroyed by an airborne disease, and everyone is farming since it is so hard to grow food including Cooper (Matthew McConaughey) and his family. Daughter Murph (Mackenzie Foy, Jessica Chasten & Ellen Burstyn) thinks she sees a ghost in her room, and they decode a message from the ghost, sending them to a NASA base. Turns out the Cooper used to be an astronaut, so they send him to Saturn to look for a gateway to another galaxy (just like 2001: a Space Odyssey.) Cooper goes through the gateway to investigate worlds on the other side. They find black holes and barely habitable worlds, and after many struggles Cooper arrives beyond 3-D space where the final resolution takes place.  [imdb]    [photos]

Review: Interstellar is one of the best Sci-Fi movies intellectually: it has big ideas and big motivation. It hits hard on both spirituality and science, and I liked it with my brain. It does not connect emotionally.

There are good scenes too: a great tearful goodbye scene between Coop and Murph which will win Mackenzie Foy many future roles -- so remember her name. There is a suspenseful fight scene, and a gripping tidal wave scene too.

I loved the Hans Zimmer soundtrack, and I am disappointed that individual tracks aren't available to buy. I also liked the silence of space -- that is spaceships did not make jet plane noises like in Star Wars.

As mentioned, I didn't love the movie emotionally. The initial scenes with Coop's dad (John Lithgow) and son, were too slow. Michael Caine's Professor Brand had boring set-up dialog and was really dull.  The ending was a missed opportunity: sleepiness instead of joy. Where were the hugs & kisses? [More in SPOILERS below.]

The photography was a little fuzzy on the giant EPIC screen at MJR in Southgate. I think it was intensionally fuzzy --  see how fuzzy the move poster (above) is. I was not wowed by the space-ship scenes, unlike Star Wars or Star Trek. The spacecraft were work-a-day freighters and not very cool or even interesting. 

Mathew McConaughey was very strong just like he needed to be. I liked two of three Murphs, Chasten and Foy. Anne Hathaway had some good moments. 

Cast: Matthew McConaughey, Mackenzie Foy, Jessica Chastain

Written and directed by: Christopher Nolan

Rating: 3.5 stars: Cool ideas but not always fun-to-watch. It gets 1/2 star for its smartness and strong story. (Not as good as Lucy or Gone Girl. )

1/4

SPOILERS:  [SERIOUSLY DON'T READ THIS]: I loved how the ghosts and "they" were really humans from the future. I liked the concept of a place where time was a spatial dimension, but how every place Coop could see was only one room. Very cool.

I also liked the notion that love transcends space and time.

As mentioned the ending was a missed opportunity. After a lifetime of searching when Murph and Coop reunite, what happens. They didn't even shake hands. Why have her in a hospital room with strangers who did not care about seeing their long-lost hero grandfather. And then in the post ending, Coop is a-drift and is heading back out to space. Does he arrive, and give Brand a hug?  Well no. (About all this end does is set up a sequel.) 

More: Tesseract: the extra-dimensional place inside the blackhole - that is a four dimensional cube. I came across that on Wikipedia.

Nightcrawler

Plot: Freelance video photographer Lou Bloom (Jake Gyllenhaal) crawls the streets of LA at night, filming for accidents and crime scenes to sell to TV stations for their morning news. Lou is driven to succeed, and he has odd ideas about business that he tells everyone. Soon he gets some scoops and sells them to Nina (Rene Russo) at struggling channel 6. He stumbles into a multiple homicide crime scene, and does some unethical things for better images, and these lead to the closing scenes. {imdb]  [photos]

Review: There is something a little off about Lou Bloom -- we see that immediately. In Nightcrawlers, Lou slides from a hustler who is a little weird, to an overeager paparazzo,  to a twisted manipulator, and finally to an evil man with a character disorder. Perhaps he always had a character disorder? 

Jake Gyllenhaal gives a great performance in making an believable character. My issue with the character is more with the writing than the writing by director Dan Gilroy, which gives us an obsessive loner character who is also people-oriented enough to be a master manipulator. That is an unnatural combination. 

There is one police car chase scene that is exceptional -- very suspenseful and more realistic because they are following the police and trying to film it.

The soundtrack is great -- several interesting pieces. The photography was strong too, especially the chase scene. 

Cast: Jake Gyllenhaal, Rene Russo, Riz Ahmed

Written and directed by: Dan Gilroy; Gilroy is a writer, but he did a nice job here in his first directing assignment.

Rating: 3.0 stars: A good performance by Gyllenhaal; nice chase scenes; some interesting psychological twists. It was not always fun-to-watch because Lou was so creepy. 

More:  Nightcrawler is a thriller not an expose of freelance video photographers because of the twisted mental state of Lou. Lou's business blather is not so different from what pop business gurus say about getting ahead. When Lou does questionable things at first, perhaps this is OK.  As it continues, the moral lapses get greater, and we get a sarcastic critic of small business culture.

Even More: Possible Oscar nomination for Gyllenhaal. 

St Vincent

Plot: 7th grader Oliver (Jaeden Lieberher) moves in next to  drunken asshole Vincent (Bill Murray), and inexplicably his Mom (Melissa McCarthy) signs up Vincent as Oliver's after school baby sitter. Of course, Vincent takes Oliver to the bar, to the track, let's him watch old comedies on TV and introduces him to stripper/prostitute/girlfriend Daka (Naomi Watts). [imdb]    [photos]

Review: Don't see this movie.  That is short and sweet isn't it. I can't believe I paid to watch this. Yuk. 

St Vincent is a black comedy where I was not amused by how big an asshole Vincent is. It was funny that anyone would spend any time with him. I'd bolt the door or maybe move. 

Like many movies, the child's dialog is far too adult -- so much so that it was distracting. Of course, distraction is welcome. 

Happily Melissa McCarthy is likable and fun. I also liked pregnant girlfriend Naomi Watts. The two women had jobs. Vincent just sits on his butt drinking, gambling, and extorting babysitting money from the neighbors. 

Other low lights include the gross eating scene at the end where Bill Murray crudely eats spaghetti with his mouth open. I hated the Dylan music over the end credits. 

It is too big a chore to watch this jerk. I can't believe I paid to watch this. Yuk. 

Cast: Bill Murray, Jaeden Lieberher, Melissa McCarthy, Naomi Watts

Directed by: Theodore Melfi

Rating: 1 lonely star: Usually there needs to be something truly offensive to get a one star rating, but I am going to make an exception. 

 

More: Clint Eastwood was grouchy neighbor in Gran Torino. It was a drama not a black comedy, and Clint's character went through a redemption. It reminded me of much better Bill Murray movie, Scrooged, where Murray starts evil of course is transformed overnight. 

Even More: Yuk. 

Gone Girl

Plot: Nick (Ben Affleck) comes home and his wife Amy (Rosamund Pike) is missing, and there are signs of a fight. He calls the police and they search the town. Nick comes under suspicion. After this, there are big twists that are too much fun to give away.  [imdb]    [photos]

Review: Gone Girl has a long, long wind up to excruciating and clever conclusion. It starts like a murder mystery and ends as twisted psychological thriller. The end is super fun:  four stars.

Just like the book, the ending is creepy and tense and wonderful. Both Nick and Amy are sociopaths bound by that common thread. Both characters were trapped by their actions and the tension between them was so great. 

I loved the performances of Affleck and Pike. Affleck sold his contrite confession on TV seeming more sincere then confessionals seem in real life. Pike manages a range of emotions, but she is best when she is the driven, smart Amy -- the super-competent Amy. Even though real women aren't like that all the time, she was so good at it that she sells it.

Writer Gillian Flynn brings the tension from the book right to the screen. Even though there are some logic gaps -- the plot twists hold together pretty well.

There is a level where Gone Girl is an allegory for a real marriage -- where two high damaged people stay together by mutual manipulation. The end makes more sense when viewed that way. The end makes sense poetically more than realistically.

More in the spoiler section below.

Cast: Ben Affleck, Rosamund Pike, Carrie Coon

Directed by: David Fincher

Written by:  Gillian Flynn, based on her novel of the same name.

Rating: 4.0 stars: This is what movies should be like. 

More:   The TV reporting plays a major role in the movie, that the book did not need. They become one of the motivating forces in the story. It reminds me of the Hunger Games book in how the media culture can motivate a new kind of evil. 

More with SPOILERS: The two big twists are so jarring even though I had read the book. I was swept along by the dynamic of the movie  Because we had begun to believe that Nick really had done it, when see Amy alive, suddenly we see everything that we thought was wrong.  It happens again when Amy kills Desi (Neal Patrick Harris) and a third time when she drives up to her house in front of the camera crews, and it is just as surprising when Nick gives her a hug on the sidewalk.

The strength of the story is that Amy is a great villain -- she is smart and works endlessly hard on her plan -- then she carries them out -- with a pretty smile. 

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The Drop

Plot: Bob (Tom Hardy) and his cousin Marv (James Gandolfini)  work at a bar owned by Chechen gangsters. Marv needs some money so he enlists Eric Deeds (Matthias Schoenaerts) to rob the bar. Detective Torres (John Ortiz) comes around to investigate to raise the tension level.  Meantime Bob meets Deeds ex-girl friend Nadia (Noomi Repace) and adopts his old dog. This sets a conflict with Deeds that gets deeper as Marv's plan plays out.  [imdb]    [photos]

Review: The Drop is a crime drama with Tom Hardy and Noomi Replace underacting -- very subdued -- almost like Noir movie; but the styling of the movie is gritty not stylized. Despite the subtle acting, the interpersonal scenes are solid and engaging. The dialog is similarly understated.  

The early film evokes Rocky, the boxing movie, wiht scenes about pets being used to introduce a shy potential girlfriend. 

The soundtrack was minimal, and the photography was pretty standard. 

Overall, the slow pacing sapped energy, but the well plotted story steadily increased the tension leading to the surprising end. 

Cast: Tom Hardy, Noomi Repace, James Gandolfini, John Ortiz, Matthias Schoenaerts

Directed by: Michael Roskam (based on the short story by Dennis Lehane)

Rating: 2.5 stars: Slow moving, but still enjoyable. Recommended.

More: Three puppies were used in the filming of the movie. The puppies kept growing too fast. 

Even More. James Gandolfini finished filming prior to his death -- that is there were no scenes rewritten for that reason. 

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Maze Runner

Plot: Thomas (Dylan O'Brien) wakes up in a freight elevator in amnesia. He is in a walled garden that is in the center of a maze.  The other young men have been for years. They don't know why they are there, and every night monsters eat anyone still in the maze. Thomas helps them solve the puzzle of the maze, and set up the sequel. [imdb]    [photos]

Review: Maze Runner is a light-weight horror movie with an over-designed plot that is typical of video games. My biggest problem was the artificialness of the plot which was not only artificial in set-up but kept on getting simpler and less clever (i.e. dumber). There is not any humor and little satire. It is a pretty dumb horror with a post-apocylpse vibe.

Thomas is an interesting character, but everyone else was a blank. I would not mind seeing Dylan O'Brien again.

The movie is dreary with many shots of blank walls. The action scenes are the best part, but the animation of the monsters is only OK. 

Cast: Dylan O'Brien, Ami Ameen, Ki Hong Lee, Kaya Scodelario

Directed by: Wes Ball, who has never made a full length film before.

Based on the novel by: James Dasher, a four book series.

Rating: 1.5 stars: Not recommended. Might be OK if it were on free TV.

More: It was interesting that when a girl (!) shows up in the movie; the guys just leave her alone. No harassment, no romance, no flirting, and certainly no sex. Seems like the script was written for younger actors than the 21-23 year olds that were cast.