SYNOPSIS: He's stuck with a partner nobody wants in a city on edge. And tonight, a mystical weapon will unleash chaotic forces.
MOVIE REVIEW:
Netflix has been teasing Bright for over a year, their first blockbuster and probably the first in streaming history as well. Unfortunately, critics have not been kind to the fantasy actioner starring A-lister Will Smith. So is Bright worth all the hype? Is the script by Max Landis (Chronicle, Victor Frankenstein) worth $3.5 million and does it look liked a $90 million movie on the small screen?
Set in an alternate Los Angeles where humans live side by side with fantasy creatures liked Fairies, Orcs and Elves. Our hero, LAPD Officer Daryl Ward (Will Smith) is reluctantly paired up with the only Orc in the police force, Nick Jakoby (a totally unrecognizable The Great Gatsby’s Joel Edgerton). When an evil elf named Leillah (Noomi Rapace) loses herpowerful magic wand to her more sympathetic subordinate, Tikka (Lucy Fry), all hell breaks loose as Ward and Jakoby is caught in a war involving Leillah, gangstas and orcs as the duo went all out to protect Tikka from her enemies.
The Harry Potter franchise and Lord of the Rings trilogy benefitted from an original source material something which Bright obviously lacks. But Landis should be applauded for his efforts in establishing a wildly fantasy buddy-cop action thriller with a backstory about humans and orcs which date back 2000 years ago. We heard dwarves being mentioned in conversation; a dragon can be seen flying above L.A. sky and centaurs as police officers. We guess there’s much more to Landis’ tale that it’s likely too early to totally write off Bright.
Director David Ayer who charmed the audiences with Training Day and End of Watch and offended nearly every movie fan with his take on Suicide Squad is back in familiar territory despite the fantastical elements. Ayer is far more comfortable entertaining his audiences with non-stop exhilarating action sequences that half of the duration is spent on Ward and Jakoby trying to lose their trigger-happy assailants from a nightclub to the main highlight sequence, which took place at a petrol kiosk and a convience store.
The plotting when it is not busy conjuring narrative about the resurrection of a mysterious Dark Lord contains references to social status and racism. The orcs apparently is a reflection of the African-American community who has suffered unjust treatment by the law enforcement while the elves are portrayed as upper class and super rich. The social messages are ambitious though the execution is pretty much forgettable.
Will Smith is always a welcome on the big screen although it’s hard to distinguish between Daryl Ward and Mike Lowery here. His rapport with Joel Edgerton is respectable but Edgerton no doubt puts in more effort with all that heavy makeup from effects gurus Tom Woodruff Jr. and Alec Gillis. Noomi Rapace is thoroughly wasted in the role of Leillah and so is Edgar Ramirez in the role of a FBI investigator from the wizard task force.
Certainly, there’s much to like if you love a buddy cop actioner with a touch of fantasy and Landis’ script while has it’s fair share of flaws is commendable. Production values on the other hand are questionable. The visual effects, which don’t constitute much of the movie, are very much well done and that’s because Ayer prefers to do lots of physical effects and on location shoot. However to be fair, Bright doesn’t really look like a product with a $90 million price tag.
Not tailored for the critics, it’s mostly a modern day fantasy, entertaining nonsensical flick for the masses. Bright is nothing more than a summer, popcorn blockbuster released in late December on Netflix.
MOVIE RATING:
Review by Linus Tee
|
BOOK REVIEW #18: THE LEGO NINJAGO MOVIE THE MAKING OF THE MOVIEPosted on 16 Oct 2017 |
|
TRAILER WATCH - STAR WARS: THE LAST JEDIPosted on 14 Oct 2017 |
|
TRAILER WATCH - THE NEW MUTANTSPosted on 14 Oct 2017 |
Genre: Thriller
Director: Christopher Landon
Cast: Jessica Rothe, Israel Broussard, Ruby Modine, Charles Aitken, Laura Clifton
Runtime: 1 hr 37 mins
Rating: PG13 (Some Violence & Sexual References)
Released By: UIP
Official Website:
Opening Day: 18 October 2017
Synopsis: Blumhouse (Split, Get Out, Whiplash) produces an original and inventive rewinding thriller in Happy Death Day, in which a college student (Jessica Rothe, La La Land) relives the day of her murder with both its unexceptional details and terrifying end until she discovers her killer’s identity.
Movie Review:
Not since ‘Scream’ have we seen such a clever reinvention of the teen slasher genre as ‘Happy Death Day’, which also puts a fresh spin on the time-loop premise best associated with the classic 1993 Bill Murray comedy ‘Groundhog Day’.
The conceit is simple yet ingenious – a sorority party girl named Tree (Jessica Rothe) is doomed to die over and over again on her birthday until she figures out just who is behind the pig-baby mask that has been trying to kill her and why. Contrary to expectation, Tree isn’t a likeable character we’d love to root for; in fact, she’s pretty mean and self-involved. She refuses to answer the texts of a guy who had brought her out to Subway on their first day (‘It’s not as if you have a foot-long,” she snarks). She doesn’t care that her roommate Lori (Ruby Modine) has baked her a cupcake for her birthday, dumping it straight into the trash bin in front of Lori after blowing out the candle on top. She is hardly bothered that she is sleeping with her professor (Charles Aitken) who is already married. And to top it off, she indifferently rejects calls from her father whom she has grown estranged from since her mother’s death three years ago. It isn’t any surprise that she will come to realise with resurrection after resurrection just how callous and egoistical she’s been, and come to change her ways for the better by the time she finally learns how to alter her destiny.
But to be sure, this isn’t intended to be some morality tale; rather, director Christopher Landon has fashioned a snappy horror comedy that aims to be amusing and frightening at the same time, though it does the former much better than it does the latter.
A large part of the laughs come from how Landon and writer Scott Lobdell tinkle with the details that mark the start of each replay – waking up at the sound of the bell of the clock tower in the dorm room of a sweet curly-haired male stranger Carter (Israel Broussard), the Asian hipster who bursts into the room talking about her ‘fine vagine’, the global-warming activist who tries collecting her signature in the quadrangle, and last but not least her brief make-out with her Brit lecturer in his office just before his wife comes knocking unannounced – as well as the precautions she takes (albeit unsuccessfully) each time to avoid dying all over again. In particular, the latter is opportunity to revisit genre conventions of where the female typically meets her death (think: her bedroom; the room where she is about to make out with a guy; along a deserted road where she is just pulled over by a highway cop; and not forgetting the dimly lit corridors of a hospital).
Much of the credit for the humour also belongs to the blonde-haired blue-eyed presence of Rothe, who plays a spunky charm to her anti-heroine role. Rothe holds the screen from start to finish with her inexhaustible appeal, and has great chemistry with Broussard especially in the latter half of the movie where they team up to narrow down the list of suspects.
On the other hand, those looking to be scared will probably find themselves disappointed, as the deaths themselves are staged in almost suspense-free settings. Granted, the sight of a killer in a pig-baby mask is creepy, but Langdon seems to be more interested in getting to the start of the next loop than to ensure that each loop ends with a bloody high. Slightly more engaging is the identity of the killer, who in ‘Scream’-like style, could be anyone that Tree had contact with during the course of the day – although it should be said that the film has more than a couple of red herrings, and therefore more than a few false endings before Tree successfully escapes her time maze.
Seeing how the teen slasher genre had literally been done to death, ‘Happy Death Day’ is a faithful addition that ticks all the necessary tropes with a refreshing ‘Groundhog Day’ variation. It is most significantly a lot of fun, marked by a cheeky self-awareness that isn’t afraid to acknowledge its references and (obvious) sources of inspiration. And as a release intended for some Halloween merriment, it is the perfect throwaway entertainment for a similarly throwaway occasion.
Movie Rating:
('Scream' meets 'Groundhog Day' in this refreshing spin on the time-worn teen slasher genre, which is also perfect entertainment for some Halloween merriment)
Review by Gabriel Chong
SYNOPSIS: A typical afternoon in the park turns into a nightmare for single mom Karla Dyson (Academy Award winner Halle Berry) when her son suddenly disappears. Without a cell phone and knowing she has no time to wait for police help, Karla jumps in her own car and sets off in pursuit of the kidnappers. A relentless, edge-of-your-seat chase ensues, where Karla must risk everything to not lose sight of her son. In this tense, action-fueled thriller from the producers of Salt and Transformers, one mother’s heroic attempt to take back her son leads her to ask herself how far she will go to save her child.
MOVIE REVIEW:
Aside from her brief stints as Storm in the lucrative X-Men franchise, Oscar actress Halle Berry has indeed very little memorable screen roles over the years. Kidnap marks the last theatrical release from troubled company, Relativity Media and technically the second major action role for Berry after The Call. We are not counting Catwoman and X-Men in case you are wondering.
After a brief prologue in which we sees Berry working her ass off as a diner waitress and knowing that she is a single mother of a six-year-old boy fighting a custody battle with her estranged husband, the audiences are basically treated to a 84 minutes of car ride. Why a car ride? Because Karla’s son is kidnapped at a carnival and she has no choice but to follow the kidnappers on her trusty SUV.
Suspension of belief is a must if you plan to enjoy a movie liked Kidnap as director Luis Preito (Pusher) and screenwriter Knate Lee piled the entire movie with unbelievable coincidences. Why unbelievable? Because despite the massive amount of freeways and crowded town streets, Karla somehow has the ability to track down the kidnappers at every twist and turn, she is in fact a walking GPS!
With all sorts of plausibility gone, there are still not enough thrills, surprises and action to keep the movie going even though Halle Berry puts in a convincing performance as a mother desperate to get her son back. The thriller is further weakened by a climax that again trigger by more convenient dumb storytelling. Kidnap is seriously a weak B-movie headed by an A-list actress. Obviously, with the success of Taken, everyone is desperate to copy the formula. However, not everyone can be Liam Neeson and this title which was shot years back should simply remained locked in the vault.
SPECIAL FEATURES:
A Look Inside Kidnap (3:13) is the standard making-of feature.
AUDIO/VISUAL:
The sound of car crashes played a big part in the movie and the Dolby Digital 5.1 is not shying away from producing a loud, aggressive listening experience. Colours and skin tones look good on DVD in this digitally-shot movie.
MOVIE RATING:
DVD RATING :
Review by Linus Tee
SYNOPSIS: In order to reconnect with his son, a Wall Street broker takes his family to the cabin where he grew up for a hunting trip. But the trip takes a deadly turn when they become entangled in a heist gone bad that results in the broker's son Danny, being kidnapped, forcing his father to recover the stolen loot in exchange for Danny's life.
MOVIE REVIEW:
Bruce Willis teams up for the third time with director Steven C. Miller after Extraction and Marauders to deliver yet another lifeless and flat VOD action thriller funded by Grindstone Entertainment.
Hayden Christensen if anyone can still recall his appearances in the Star Wars prequels plays hotshot Wall Street broker, Will who decides to toughen up his 11 year old son, Danny (a victim of bullying in school by the way) by teaching him hunting over the weekend. Things went south when the father and son pair stumbles upon two men suspected to be involved in a recent robbery in the small town. When Will shot dead one of the men, his other surviving accomplice, Levi (Gethin Anthony) ends up kidnapping Danny in an attempt to force Will to help him retrieve the loot.
Of course at this point of his flagging career, Willis is not one to care much of the movies he is in or the character he is playing. Minimum work, maximum paycheck is probably his motto by now. One can smell the twist miles away with the appearance of Willis’ local police chief Howell. Is he a guy with an ulterior motive? I bet he is even before the climatic finale tells us so.
Christensen who disappear from the Hollywood scene for a prolonged period of time puts in more than a serviceable acting effort as a desperate young father out to save his kid. But his matured performance is easily surpassed by Brit Gethin Anthony who successfully portrays a Southerner out to save his ailing mother-in-law and eventually acting as a cousellor to the withdrawn Danny.
The plotting is easy to follow and for a crime thriller it’s tepid and talky. The action sequences except for an ATV chase in the forest is mostly negligible. For such a tight-budgeted production (the entire shot lasted just two weeks), all they can afford is a few gunshots and nothing more. First Kill is destined to be yet another forgettable action flick featuring the once huge Bruce Willis going through his motion. The only surprises here are Christensen and Gethin Anthony.
SPECIAL FEATURES:
The DVD comes with a Director's Commentary, an 11 minutes Behind the Scenes of First Kill, 5 minutes of Deleted Scenes, Cast/Crew Interviews (missing Bruce Willis) and a First Kill Trailer.
AUDIO/VISUAL:
The digitally shot movie looks great on DVD with perfect detailing and sharp images. The Dolby Digital 5.1 on the other hand boasts a few scenes that features loud surround gunshots, nice ambient effects and a totally unnecessarily loud electronic score.
MOVIE RATING:
![](\"http://www.moviexclusive.com/image/mx%20star.gif\")
![](\"http://www.moviexclusive.com/image/half%20mx%20star.gif\")
DVD RATING :
Review by Linus Tee
Genre: Horror/Thriller
Director: Sophon Sakdaphisit
Cast: Numthip Jongrachatawiboon, Apichaya Thongkham, Thunyaphat Pattarateerachaicharoen, Panisara Rikulsurakan, Duentem Salitul
Runtime: 1 hr 54 mins
Rating: PG13 (Horror)
Released By: Golden Village Pictures
Official Website:
Opening Day: 16 November 2017
Synopsis: In 1997, the financial crash, known in Thailand as the Tom Yum Goong Crisis, was a disastrous event that crept over Asia and left millionaires bankrupt overnight. A bright future which two best friends, Boum and Ib, pictured together fell apart when they found out that their families were going bankrupt. All of their assets were seized to satisfy their debts. The construction of a premium luxury condominium, which their parents jointly invested in, had been suspended. Unable to accept the harsh truth, they decided to end their lives together at the unfinished tower, where they promised to be together forever. In the end, Ib died all alone. Twenty years later, Boum (Numthip Jongrachatawiboon) becomes a successful real estate entrepreneur. One day, she gets to visit the abandoned tower with her beloved daughter, Bell (Apichaya Thongkham). That night, however, Boum wakes up and finds Bell sleepwalking and talking to herself in the dark. Bell’s sleepwalking condition continues to worsen every night. What concerns Boum the most is that Bell’s action and words in her sleepwalking state frighteningly remind Boum of Ib. What measures will Boum take to release herself from the promise that binds her? “Promise me you won’t leave me.”
Movie Review:
The 47-storey scalloped architectural project that is Sathorn Tower is like the Titanic. It was to be the tallest and most luxurious of buildings in Bangkok, commanding priceless views its prime position. But Thailand’s financial crash in 1997, nicknamed the Tom Yum Goong Crisis, sunk the development and everything was brought to an abrupt halt.
The iconic high-rise fell into disrepair and became a horror location goldmine, with crumbling walls, dank corners, mouldy ceilings and dark corridors. And as all abandoned places tend to, ghostly encounters inevitably started to emerge.
20 years on, Director Sophon Sakdaphisit cashes in on the urban myths that have arisen from the forlorn structure, and against the sad backdrop, invents his own depressing tale of friendship and betrayal in his latest film The Promise.
Boum (Thunyaphat Pattarateerachaicharoen) and Ib (Panisara Rikulsurakan) are your average BFFs. The two girls do everything together, and even their fathers are partners in the promising Sathorn Tower development. All goes well, until the crisis hit.
Faced with bankruptcy, the family situation quickly deteriorates, and to avoid their harsh fates, the girls make a suicide pact. Grim stuff. Worst of all, when Ib goes ahead and ends her life with a shot to her head, it frightens Boum and she backs out from promise. See where this is going?
Twenty years pass and Boum is a real estate entrepreneur. One of her projects pushes her to the edge of closure so she decides to develop her inheritance of the Sathorn Tower. As she convinces Ib’s family to sell their share and goes on-site to spearhead the new project, her daughter Bell (Apichaya Thongkham) also has a relapse and begins sleepwalking. It’s not long before Boum realises that her promise to Ib has come back to haunt her.
Sakdaphisit has a few good notches in the Thai horror department, most notably being the writer for Shutter. His turns at being director has been more mediocre. The Promise is co-written by him, but his directorial curse has followed through and made this offering a little unsatisfying.
The Promise has a great dark premise and it was unfortunate that Sakdaphisit could not fully extract the terrifying elements from the themes of suicide, depression and sacrifice. There are great reveals that stun, such as the plot arc on the fathers, where Sakdaphisit’s trademark turn-of-the-knife keeps things gut-wrenching. But beyond those moments, the movie fails to ripen.
The creepy tower, such a key draw to this film, never really gets its full potential drawn out. There’s a few rooms and corridors being shown but they seem disconnected, making them feel more like sets than a fully realised building.
Some folks who like their jump scares will no doubt be grateful for the earlier part of the film, where audio crashes ensure some seat-jumping action. There’s also an interesting segment where a young boy named Mon (Teerapop Songwaja) with a certain “seeing eye” gets coerced to help Bouem. But these promises of thrills don’t get fully realised and makes The Promise... a little empty.
Movie Rating:
(The macabre storyline sits well in the terrifying iconic tower. But The Promise doesn’t milk both assets for their worth and ends up a little unfulfilled)
Review by Morgan Awyong
Genre: Sci-Fi/Thriller
Director: Niels Arden Oplev
Cast: Ellen Page, Diego Luna, Nina Dobrev, James Norton, Kiersey Clemons, Kiefer Sutherland
Runtime: 1 hr 54 mins
Rating: PG13 (Some Disturbing Scenes & Coarse Language)
Released By: Sony Pictures Releasing International
Official Website: https://www.facebook.com/FlatlinersMovie
Opening Day: 18 October 2017
Synopsis: In Flatliners, five medical students, obsessed by the mystery of what lies beyond the confines of life, embark on a daring and dangerous experiment: by stopping their hearts for short periods of time, each triggers a near-death experience – giving them a firsthand account of the afterlife. But as their experiments become increasingly dangerous, they are each haunted by the sins of their pasts, brought on by the paranormal consequences of trespassing to the other side.
Movie Review:
Sony obviously never learnt its lesson. After the disastrous reboot of Ghostbusters, the studio once again dust off one of its cult titles, Flatliners and gave it an unnecessary makeover for the contemporary audiences.
The original 1990 Joel Schumacher (Batman Forever, The Lost Boys) version boasts a stellar cast that includes Kiefer Sutherland (24), Pretty Woman Julia Roberts, a then long hair Kevin Bacon and a pre Backdraft William Baldwin and of course a pretty intriguing plot that sort of explores the afterlife. For all it’s worth, it’s both stylish and scary at that point of time.
27 years later, Sony entrusts the property to Danish director Niels Arden Oplev who helmed the original The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo and Ben Ripley who did the superb Source Code to rework the script. Both relatively competent and proven filmmakers. Alas, nothing in this 2017 version scream of any originality and surprise in fact it’s a total yawn fest from start to finish.
Courtney Holmes (Ellen Page) is a medical student who is obsessed with the idea of the afterlife. In an attempt to find out more, Courtney invited her fellow classmates, rich brat Jamie (James Norton) and Sophia (Kiersey Clemons) to stop her heart for sixty seconds before reviving her in a deserted hospital facility. The experiment at first was deemed a success with Courtney miraculously recalling how to play the piano but when her classmates start to flatline themselves, they realized there are deadly consequences waiting to play out.
No doubt about it, the filmmakers have assembled a bunch of good-looking actors (Norton, Clemons and Nina Dobrev from The Vampire Diaries) and two capable performers, Page and Diego Luna from Rogue One. Not forgetting Kiefer Sutherland who makes an utterly useless cameo as the students’ professor. However, half of the movie plays liked a cheapskate horror thriller by the time the students start to develop hallucinations.
Like a hiker who lost his way in the dense forest, Niels Arden Oplev plies the movie with plenty of jump scares, cheesy CGI and dialogues that the idea of afterlife becomes a mere exploitative tool. The movie abruptly switches from one hallucination to another starting with Courtney who begins to imagine her dead younger sister coming alive while her friends liked Jamie who somehow ended up stabbing himself on his yacht with Sophia trapped in a lift and Dobrev’s character being haunted by a patient.
The list goes on and it reminds one of the Final Destination franchise only this one is a lot milder. It’s PG13 after all. Besides all the cheap scares and loud music, Flatliners’ biggest mistake is not offering a believable reason for the outrageous experiment. Anyone with a decent amount of common sense will know the danger of cutting oxygen to your brain let alone medical students unless you buy the movie message of facing your inner demons via flatlining. That’s definitely a convenient way.
Flatliners is a complete waste of talents (looking at you, Page and Luna) and the $19 million budget. There’s absolutely nothing salvageable in what seems to be one of the worst remakes of all time. With such shoddy releases, Sony needs to get a defibrillator onhand when they release their annual turnover. Someone in the boardroom sure gonna needs it.
Movie Rating:
(Flatliners is as flat as a pancake. At least the pancake can stave off your hunger but this movie doesn’t)
Review by Linus Tee
|
HIGHLIGHTS FROM THE 28TH SINGAPORE INTERNATIONAL FILM FESTIVALPosted on 01 Nov 2017 |
| « Prev | 326 | 327 | 328 | 329 | 330 | 331 | 332 | 333 | 334 | 335 | 336 | Next » |
Most Viewed
No content.