Pete’s Dragon Review (2016)

August 13, 2016 | Rachel's Reviews

Of all the Disney remakes the one I was the most primed for was Pete’s Dragon. That might sound odd but I’m only a marginal fan of the original. In my opinion, the best remakes are films that are good but could use improvement. I don’t get very excited for remakes on films like Beauty and the Beast which are perfect. Anyway, that was my initial interest but quickly I realized this film was remake in name only. This might be concerning but then I read from director David Lowery and loved everything I heard. Then the trailers came out and I really liked what I saw. Here is movie from an indy director with a passion for the project. It is also made for a low budget of $65 million which excites me greatly as I’d like to see Disney make more artistic low budget films.

So all of those factors led me to greatly look forward to Pete’s Dragon. So I went to see it today and I was not disappointed! This is a really special movie. It could probably be called Boy and the Dragon instead of Pete’s Dragon because it doesn’t have much to do with the original. It’s more like ET, Old Yeller, Black Stallion, Sounder or other movies for children about a boy and his dog/creature. These movies were sweet, emotional and helped teach children important life lessons. Such is the case with Pete’s Dragon. It is impeccably made and seems like something from another era.

The story is pretty simple here and it’s not reinventing the wheel but it executes it so well and with such heart. It’s basically about Pete who is raised in the wild with his dragon Elliot. One day Pete gets discovered by Bryce Dallas Howard’s character and they try to help him. Various characters find out about Elliott and have different responses. It’s got an underlying message of faith and believing in things you don’t see (Elliott can be invisible after all).

The story may be simple but it will tug at your heart strings and make you feel really good. All the performances are winning and warm- even the villain is understandable in his fear of the unknown. The child actors are particularly outstanding with Oaks Fegley reminding me of Jacob Trembley in Room. Robert Redford is great. They are all great.

If Disney is going to do these live action retellings this is the kind I want. I want a small film that is carefully made, not a lazy cash grab like Maleficent. This film does its own thing and tells a type of story I haven’t seen at the cinemas in a long time.

Director David Lowery gives us incredible cinematography and the special effects on Elliott are first rate. It looked as good as anything we saw in The Jungle Book. I personally prefer this film to The Jungle Book because that film dragged when it tried to include songs and moments from the original. This is tight storytelling at its best. In a lot of ways it reminded me of The Peanuts Movie. It is old fashioned and simple but full of heart. I loved both movies! There’s no attempt to modernize the characters or make them hip or cool. There’s no cell phones or lame attempts at humor. It is just a boy and his dragon just like Peanuts is about a boy and his dog.

Just everything they did I loved. Even the music I loved. I would encourage you to go see it on the big screen. Let Disney know that this is the type of movie they should be making. It is definitely one of my favorite films of the year and one that I can’t wait to show my nieces someday.

Here is my youtube review: (I’m almost at a 1,000 subscribers on youtube!)

Sausage Party Review (Guest Post)

August 13, 2016August 13, 2016 | Rachel's Reviews

[My twitter friend Travis Fazekas was kind enough to write up a review of the R rated animated film Sausage Party. Please follow him on twitter at @travisfazekas]

Sausage party is one of the most interesting animated movies in recent memory. The movie starts off with a Disney style musical number called the Great Beyond, which is composed by Alan Menken (yes the same Alan Menken who did the music for many Disney classics) and it is just as catchy as his Disney classics.

The animation is delicious and brought to life by co directors Conrad Vernon and Greg Tiernan who truly give the movie a very bright and colorful look with the supermarkets setup.

The plot to the movie is very good, which we see what happens when food is brought home from the supermarket and what happens next well they discover that it ain’t sunshine and rainbows.

The person who believes this the most is Frank (voiced by Seth Rogen) a hot dog who is in love with Brenda (voiced by Kristen Wiig) a bun. Along the way we meet a various characters such as Sammy Bagel Jr (voiced by Edward Norton with a Woody Allen style voice), Tersea del Taco (voiced by Salma Hayek) who has feelings for Brenda and the villain of the movie Douche (voiced by nick kroll). He is upset at Frank and Brenda for what they did to him.

The pacing is very nice and it truly does not stop with a third act that is very crazy which shows how far Rogen and co writers Evan Goldberg, Kyle Hunter and Ariel Schaffer will go for a laugh.

The voice cast is perfect which also features Rogen usuals such as James Franco, Jonah Hill, Danny Mcbride and others who truly make their characters unique in their own special way. At 89 minute sausage party is one of the funniest movies of the year and is another hilarious effort from Seth Rogen and Evan Goldberg that definitely earns its R rating, which is not for children

Overall Grade A-

[If any of you see Sausage Party put your comments below. Thanks again to Travis for the review]

Florence Foster Jenkins Review

August 12, 2016 | Rachel's Reviews

It’s easy to see the trailer for Florence Foster Jenkins and think you have it all figured it out. It looks like the singing version of Eddie the Eagle. The person with no talent that somehow makes it to the highest stage in their dream career. Eddie it is ski jumping. Florence it is singing. However, as much as I loved Eddie the Eagle I think the comparison is selling Florence Foster Jenkins a little bit short. There are some odd but intriguing elements to FFJ that really impressed me. It’s a special film I am honestly still processing.

Florence Foster Jenkins stars Meryl Streep as the title character, a real life socialite who dreams of becoming an opera singer who performs at Carnegie Hall. The subversive element is she is rich and so is constantly surrounded by yes men who patronize her and tell her how great she is at singing. They even buy off critics and an entire audience to cheer for her singing.

The strange thing about this element is the movie is unclear whether these people are doing something kind or cruel. Plus, I was never quite sure how in on the scheme Florence is. She is a trained pianist but her health doesn’t allow her to play. Surely she must know she isn’t a good singer? Sometimes it seems like she does and other times it doesnt. I found that intriguing.

Her husband played by Hugh Grant is another unusual character for this type of movie. They have chemistry and you can tell they love each other. And yet they also have an agreement with his dalliances from the marriage with Rebeca Ferguson. At times he could be quite lovely and then others I kind of hated him. It’s very unusual for this type of movie. Is he doing a nice thing by enabling others or should he be honest with his wife?

There’s also an interesting element with the recordings of her terrible singing being requested by soldiers on the radio. Why? What is it about her voice that people at that era want to hear? I find that fascinating and I like that the movie doesn’t give you the answer. It just left me wondering.

Simon Helberg is lovely as her pianist who is embarrassed to be playing Carnegie Hall and other venues for someone like Florence. In some ways he stands in for the viewer- both cheering Florence on and being horrified by the charade going on.

There is an uncomfortable element of class the movie doesn’t really dwell on. Florence was famous for a mantra “some may say that I couldn’t sing but no one can say that I didn’t sing”. That is commendable but the only reason she sang in Carnegie Hall at least was because of her money- a poor person would have to be content badly singing in front of their friends. So in a weird way a message of the movie is ‘you can achieve the impossible if you are rich”.

But on the other hand this untidy messaging makes the film more intriguing. It’s one more example of a slightly subversive element to what should be a cut and dry inspirational story.

Get ready for your Oscar ballots because Meryl Streep will be nominated for this. She is completely lovely in the part. Without question the best female performance I have seen this year so far. All the rest of the performances are good and the production design, costumes, hair and makeup are all first rate.

Like I said in the beginning, it might be easy to discount this film as a cheesy inspirational story but I encourage you to give it a chance. There’s a lot more to it than meets the eye. The characters really made me think about their motives and the morality of their choices.

Overall Grade- A

Suicide Squad Review

August 6, 2016 | Rachel's Reviews

I’ve never been the biggest superhero movie person, but over the years movies like The Avengers and X-Men Days of Future Past have won me over. These movies have clever stories, great scripts and charismatic performances by Oscar level talent. 2014 was a particularly memorable year with only 2 bad superhero movies and 4 outstanding films- Guardians of the Galaxy, Captain America: Winter Soldier, Big Hero 6 and X-Men Days of Future Past. These movies had everything I could want in a superhero movie.

WE WERE SPOILED!!!

Aside from Captain America: Civil War the superhero movies of 2016 have been kind of sucky and unfortunately the latest entry, Suicide Squad does not change that trajectory. Suicide Squad is the latest offering from DC Comics and Warner Brothers and despite promising trailers it fails to deliver on its potential.

After Batman v Superman frustrated many moviegoers in March, Warner Brothers clearly took all the wrong lessons out of the feedback. ‘Make the movies more fun’ is what they heard. So, they rushed David Ayer to write Suicide Squad in 6 weeks and then hacked it to pieces creating a mess of a movie.

That’s not to say there aren’t any redeeming values to Suicide Squad. There are mainly with the casting. All the roles, with 2 exceptions, are well cast. The problem is the script doesn’t give them time to grow as characters or to gel as a unit. Will Smith and Margot Robbie are the standouts as Deadshot and Harley Quinn and I’m curious to see more of them in future films. Viola Davis is also great as Amanda Waller who is an agent forming the Suicide Squad. She is ruthless and you kind of see why she would be interested in super villains.

The story of Suicide Squad is you have this group of villains that are called upon to fight evil metahumans. This is all supposed to be after the events of Batman v Superman but there is never any talk of using the good metahumans like Flash and Wonder Woman (despite briefly seeing Flash in a cameo). And the fact that only 2 of the Suicide Squad are actually metahumans which makes you scratch your head?

The first act of the film starts out clunky with Davis sitting at a table looking through a binder of each of the squad members. Then we see flashback introductions to the characters. It’s kind of like the gossip montages in Ant-Man but repeated over and over again.

But even with that certain characters aren’t introduced at all like Katana. She just walks onto a helicopter and they say ‘oh look it’s Katana. She’s a crazy ninja” (I’m paraphrasing but you get the drift).

So what are they called upon to do? Well, they are supposed to stop an evil being named Enchantress who kind of needs to be worse than the squad in order for the story to work but she’s just not. I normally don’t care about lame villains but she did nothing for me and I felt the special effects were very poor. She creates this ‘brother’ that looked right out of Gods of Egypt. Again, I wouldn’t have cared about a bad villain if I had cared about the rest of the film.

For a movie like this to work it relies on the charisma of the stars and a witty script (this is not a gritty crime drama like The Dark Knight). And the problem with Suicide Squad is the editing is so poorly done that just when characters are starting to interact it cuts away to something that doesn’t matter.

You are supposed to believe that the characters are becoming a family but I didn’t buy it for a second. There’s a moment where Deadshot has to decide whether to hurt Harley Quinn and their relationship wasn’t near built up enough for me to buy his decision. They had one very brief conversation and they are supposed to be big baddies. It didn’t work.

There’s another scene where they are fighting these glob creatures of Enchantress and the creatures stop coming for some reason and they stop fighting evil and have a drink. If the movie had effectively established them as not caring about the mission or stopping the badder guy than I could have bought it but the way it sits it feels random and jarring.

The other confusing part about the movie is why have Enchantress when you have DC’s greatest villain in the film for like 6 minutes? You could have made the Joker the villain and instead you have a lame villain. That would be like Marvel having Loki as a villain for a 5 minute cameo. It makes no sense.

But speaking of the Joker…Jared Leto goes for it as this new take on the character and I personally was not a fan. The Joker is an agent of chaos. He thrives on creating disorder. He is the last person in the world that would want to be an organized crime boss like in this movie. It felt too outright bad-guy where the Joker is supposed to be a believer in the philosophy of chaos. He should be more complex than having damaged tattooed on your forehead!

All that said, if you can go into Suicide Squad and ignore the script and just enjoy the charismatic performances and the fun soundtrack I think you may have an enjoyable time. It’s a lot like Batman Forever. There’s some engaging performances in Batman Forever, some decent music and production design but the story and script are terrible. So if you can enjoy Batman Forever than you will enjoy Suicide Squad.

At the very least I didn’t feel as manipulated as Batman v Superman and it isn’t as gloomy (although the forced fun added by the studio is so obvious). To me the two movies are about equal in quality but it is a case of picking your poison and what types of problems bother you more than others.

It’s probably very generous but I did like it better than X-Men Apocalypse which underserved all of the characters I love and became destruction porn. I gave X-Men Apocalypse a D+.

So for Suicide Squad Overall Grade- C- for Will Smith and Margot Robbie but I’d say it’s a definite skip.

ps. Those people who started the rotten tomatoes takedown petition are morons.

The Shallows and Cafe Society Reviews

August 4, 2016August 4, 2016 | Rachel's Reviews

I just thought I would give you guys two quick reviews of films I was able to see this week. Ironically both films star Blake Lively in all her gorgeousness but aside from that they couldn’t be more different. Today we are looking at The Shallows and Cafe Society. Neither will make my best of the year list but they are both solid entertaining films.

The Shallows-

Those of us who love Jaws were excited to see what a modern film could do with a killer shark story. In the case of The Shallows we have Jaume Collet-Serra in place of Steven Spielberg and he delivers an entertaining film that isn’t near approaching Jaws but is better than the Jaws sequels so that’s something.

The Shallows stars Blake Lively who looks stunning in her bikini on the beach. She has arrived at a secluded beach in Mexico to swim at her Mother’s favorite spot. It takes a while to get her to the core shark part of the story but since I love the ocean and surfing I didn’t mind that.

However, it was painfully obvious they pasted Lively’s face on another surfer’s body in the surfing scenes. This brings up my major problem with the movie- the visual effects were uniformly poor. I mean look at the shark above. Don’t you think it looks like styrofoam?

When Lively was on the rock and we didn’t know where the shark was then it was tense and exciting (and that’s a lot of the movie) but as soon as they showed the shark it took me out of the film. Collet-Serra should have learned from Spielberg if the shark doesn’t look good don’t show the shark.

It also gets extremely silly towards the end of the movie with Lively lighting the ocean on fire at one point and her spearing the shark with a buoy like a superhero.

Nevertheless, Lively is really good, the ocean looks gorgeous and the survival scenes when she is caring for her leg and trying to figure out what to do were gripping. There’s enough there to give a mild recommendation.

For me 10 Cloverfield Lane is the better small horror movie of the year but if that is too gory for you The Shallows could be just the thing.

Overall Grade- B-

Cafe Society-

I have to say I had an absolutely terrible theater experience seeing Cafe Society. A group of older women were in front of me being loud and one woman literally looked at her phone the entire time. So, perhaps it says something that I liked it as much as I did.

Cafe Society is the latest film from Woody Allen and it’s not one of his best but it is an enjoyable little movie. It’s pretty simple story about Bobby played by Jesse Eisenberg who goes to LA to work for his big time Hollywood agent uncle Phil played by Steve Carell.

He meets Vonnie played by Kristen Stewart who is lovely and luminous in the role. People need to let the Twilight movies go and give Stewart a chance to act. She’s proven herself in movies like Still Alice, Into the Wild, and this that she can be a good actress with the right material. In this movie she has to compete with Blake Lively and yet you still understand why Bobby is in love with her.

Speaking of Blake Lively, man is she beautiful in this movie. It reminded me of Age of Adaline in how well she wears clothes and graces the screen. She is definitely Woody Allen’s shiksa goddess in this film. I also loved Corey Stoll here. He plays Bobby’s mobster brother and I think I just have a crush on the guy. I like him in everything I’ve seen him in.

As you can probably tell from the photos Cafe Society looks great. The costumes and production design are impeccable and it is a pleasant enjoyable story of old town Hollywood.

That said, certain scenes fall flat like when Bobby hires a Jewish call girl. It’s supposed to be funny but it doesn’t work at all. Also, the whole film feels inconsequential. There is nothing memorable about it. It feels extremely derivative of 30 other better Woody Allen films.

Allen also does the narration in the film which is distracting and helps remind the viewer of all the other films he’s done that are better.

Still, not a bad watch and I’m glad I saw it even with the stupid moviegoers who were with me.

Overall Grade- B

Do you have a favorite animal horror movie like The Shallows? What about your favorite Woody Allen movie? I’d say Jaws is my favorite animal horror movie and Midnight in Paris is my favorite Woody Allen movie with Annie Hall and Blue Jasmine close behind.

Life, Animated Review

August 1, 2016August 1, 2016 | Rachel's Reviews

It’s no secret that 2016 has been kind of a sucky year for movies, particularly blockbusters. Sure there have been some exceptions but for the most part they have been meh to very disappointing. Such is not the case for indie films! I have even found 3 documentaries that I have loved already this year and one of those is a little gem called Life, Animated. All of you animation addicts need to see it!!!

Life, Animated is a documentary made by Roger Ross Williams, based on a memoir by Ron Suskind. It chronicles the story of Ron’s son Owen who is diagnosed with severe autism at the age of 3. We are introduced to Owen at the age of 23 but there is a great deal of home footage that helps give you an idea of Owen as a little boy.

You see Owen connects to the world through animated films, particularly Disney animated films. And when I say connects I mean it quite literally. There is a heartbreaking section where Owen’s parents talk about Owen not being able to speak anything but gibberish for 4 years. Can you imagine not being able to talk to your son for 4 years? Then one day Ron has a breakthrough using an Iago puppet from Aladdin. I was bawling.

The film uses animation to bring to life segments of the film and it works so well (props to Disney for allowing their catalog to be used in clips and recreated in the animation sequences).

In another instance Owen comes up to his Mother after not speaking for years and says “Walter doesn’t want to grow up like Mowgli and Peter Pan”. They are of course stunned by this and it starts them on a journey of communicating to their son through Disney. He literally has every line from every Disney film memorized!

It is not an easy road working with Owen but the movie doesn’t do the “look how perfect and inspirational I am”. This feels like a real family (because it is a real family) and they acknowledge challenges and blessings in just the right way. I particularly liked his brother who ironically is named Walt! He is honest about his responsibilities in caring for his brother and what that is like. The Dad, Ron, is also vulnerable and strong and lovely.

This is not an ‘I am Sam’ type of film where being a special needs person is better or made to inspire us able bodied folks. No, this is just about one family, one person and how animation allowed him to communicate with the world.

This is perhaps personified most in a recurring animated segment based on a story Owen writes as a child. It’s called the Legend of the Lost Sidekicks. These sections almost reminded me of something Tomm Moore would draw. They were peaceful and gave such insight into the way Owen thinks about life.

Particularly with the current election it is easy to feel discouraged and frustrated, so I am grateful for movies like Life, Animated. They help me to understand others better and remind me that good will always outweigh the bad. Sometimes the fandom cultures of the internet can make you forget how special this art we call movies is. Owen’s story reminded of that. It reminded me to get more joy out of these crazy toons I watch all the time. It reminded me to be myself and notice the sidekicks more. It reminded me to be grateful for my voice, my words and my family. It was a great movie!

Overall Grade- A

Here is the trailer if you are interested

Batman: Killing Joke Review (Spoilers)

July 26, 2016July 26, 2016 | Rachel's Reviews

Is there some kind of Batman writers strike I’m unaware of? I have to imagine there are hundreds of thousands of writers penning Batman scripts right now, dying to be made into a movie. And yet out of all that we get two such poorly written scripts as we got this year in Batman v Superman and now Batman: the Killing Joke. That’s right. Unfortunately the animated Batman movie everyone was hoping would redeem the franchise sadly did not. In fact, in my opinion it is even worse.

I sincerely wanted this to be good because I love Mask of the Phantasm and list it as one of my top 50 favorite animated films of all time. To read that post click here. I had reason to be hopeful. They were going with an R rating which could mean they were taking some creative risks (I checked it out and it isn’t too hard an R so I decided it was acceptable for me). They had a really strong trailer and most importantly the original cast of Kevin Conroy and Mark Hamill are back as Batman and Joker with great voice actress Tara Strong as Batgirl. This sounded great!

What a letdown!

Ok. Let’s talk about Batgirl aka Barbara Gordon.

The first 30 minutes are actually her story. The trailer is very deceiving in that regard. Joker does not appear in the film until the 37 minute mark and it is only a 75 minute movie. I’d love to see Batgirl but alas we have another poorly written female superhero character. Barbara Gordon is a character out of a soap opera (please don’t do that to Wonder Woman DC. please!). When her and Batman interact it didn’t feel genuine or earned at all. I didn’t even like her design which is very boob-focused. I know why artists design female characters this way (look at the rebooted female Power Rangers designs which are also very boob-focused). But it’s such a cheap way of making a character sexy. Batgirl should be sexy because of who she is not because she has a ridiculously large bosom.

She’s also a throwback to female characters I thought we had moved past. She’s basically a plot device for the male characters to trick, manipulate, encourage and rape (you read right) whenever the story needs her. She makes no plans herself aside from looking in a mirror and saying ‘Barbara what are you doing?’. Sigh. Give me a Mary Sue any day over this kind of convenient woman. Batman’s character is once again very flat and we get almost no Bruce Wayne. I mean next to nothing. So any kind of hiding who he is or struggles with how he is treating Batgirl are completely lost in a gruff bland guy wearing a mask. I think you may see Alfred once but it’s mostly just Batman grumbling about Batgirl getting in his way and other bland things. He might as well have been made of cardboard.

It’s called Killing Joke and you’d think that Joker and Batman would be together a lot. At least the trailer would leave you to believe that. Alas, just like Batman v Superman the title fight is very brief (about 7 minutes) and it resolves in a completely nonsensical way given the character development we’d seen so far. Then they give additional endings after the fight and I didn’t buy it for one second.

The animation isn’t even that good with nothing really special about it. It all feels like images we’ve seen before with amusement park rides and shadowy figures. When will they learn that just having a dark color palate doesn’t make something dark. You could have something truly disturbing in the sunlight. I mean Jaws creates fear and it is on a sun-dripped beach. It’s the characters that we get to know when they are taken to dark places that it becomes dark. Come on Hollywood- do better!

We also get another origin story because that’s exactly what we all needed right? Sigh…And it’s not even an interesting origin story but one with more corny melodrama. There have been like 30 animated Batman movies let alone the live action. Does anyone in the world not know how the Joker became the Joker? or how Bruce’s parents are killed? (I’m talking to you Batman v Superman). We all get it. Move on to something interesting in a story!

I’m so disappointed. At this point my hopes are on Lego Batman to save the character. I get that those who love the comic book may love this. I can’t say one way or another. All I know is I didn’t like it and was very letdown by it.
As far as the adult content it’s there but nothing really shocking or interesting done with it. No pencil in the eye moment for people who like that kind of thing. Blast…

The only really good thing I can say about this film is that the voice cast is strong as expected. I just wish they had been given something strong to do. It feels like they kind of decided last minute to make it R rated instead of it being an integral part of the design and story.

Maybe other people will like it but I thought it was a soapy mess and I really hated the way they portrayed Barbara Gordon. Next time make her an actual character that makes choices and then has a real story arc instead of a cog in your dopey movies timeline.

Overall Grade- D+

Absolutely Fabulous: The Movie Review (Mild Spoilers)

July 22, 2016July 22, 2016 | Rachel's Reviews

Comedy is really hard to write you guys. It really is and you need only look at the last few years as proof of that. By my count this year there have been 14 comedies I haven’t really laughed much in. Isn’t that a depressing statistic? There have been a few standouts that did make me laugh such as Barbershop: the Next Cut, Central Intelligence and Ghostbusters but that’s about it.

So I went into the theater on Monday for an advanced screening of Absolutely Fabulous: The Movie hoping above all else to laugh. I needed a good laugh. Sadly the movie didn’t give me much to chuckle about.

Absolutely Fabulous: the Movie is of course based on the characters from the British TV show. Edina and Patsy are now nearing retirement age and finding themselves becoming less relevant by the day. They are still the bad examples they always were with their partying ways but in the days of reality TV antics nobody really cares any more. Still, Edina needs to save her PR firm so they want to sign Kate Moss as a client. However, she ends up dying and the ladies become suspects on the run!

This seems like a funny set up and there are a couple laughs but they are too few and far between for me. Jennifer Saunders is great at the physical comedy and knows how to do a drunk walk better than most but it grows old quick

I think part of the problem is the jokes become very repetitive. Patsy is selfish. Edina is a narcissistic hot mess who screws everything up and that’s repeated in various forms again and again.

There is also a dated quality to the jokes. Back in the 90s when the show originally aired such antics were so outrageous. Now in the world of reality TV narcissism it feels overdone and played out.

Chris Colfer from Glee had some really nice moments as does Rebel Wilson as a hilarious flight attendant but in a way these fresh young talents were a reminder of the stale gag of the AbFab women. Sorry if that sounds harsh but it’s how I felt.

Julia Sawalha feels very awkward as Saffy, Edina’s daughter but I did like a scene where she sings At 17 by Janis Ian in a drag queen club. Colfer is great in this scene as well.

There are lots of cameos like most comedies these days (over 60 listed cameos in this film) and a few like Wilson work but a lot fizzle. And a number of characters are underused such as the rival PR pro played by Celia Imrie.

I particularly didn’t like a sequence where they go to Cannes and swindle an old rich lady. When humor like that fizzles it feels really mean. Edina also drags her granddaughter Lola through all of this without notifying her mother. This seemed too cold even for her. When you are involving a child in this kind of nonsense to me it changes the tone and is harder to laugh at. They also endanger the life of a friend of theirs and don’t give it even a moments thought beyond their own problems. Again if the jokes work I can forgive it but it didn’t, so it feels mean. Laughter excuses all as they say and this didn’t have enough.

I feel bad in a way because I really wanted to laugh but about 80% of the gags just lay flat and didn’t make me laugh. I was left thinking ‘why is that funny?’.

I don’t know what grade to give it because humor is so subjective but I must own I don’t see why this is 81% and Zoolander 2 is at 23%. The two movies are extremely similar. They both are about are ‘sequels’ to properties people love, about ‘has-beens’ in fashion, and their selfish escapades across Europe. They both have lots of cameos and the style of the jokes are very similar. I certainly don’t think this is 4 times better but what do I know. Zoolander 2 actually may have even made me laugh more.

All that said, there are a few laughs and the ladies give it their all. I’m giving it the same grade I gave Zoolander 2 which is probably very generous and proof how hard up I am for a laugh.

Overall Grade C

This is definitely a pretty strong R rating so you’ve been warned.

The BFG Review (Spoilers)

July 20, 2016July 21, 2016 | Rachel's Reviews

So The BFG came out while I was in Spain but I have been able to catch up and saw it on Monday. And what did I think after I saw it? It was okay but it could have been much better. Like Bridge of Spies last year I left feeling underwhelmed by Steven Spielberg’s latest offering. I will still never understand why Bridge of Spies got nominated for best picture and was on so many top 10 lists. Beats me! To me both films have the same problems. Neither are awful films but they are both kind of boring and forgettable.

The BFG was my 4th most anticipated film of the year so suffice it to say I am very disappointed by this response but this year seems to be the year of the disappointment at the cinema. Oh well! It’s not a total disaster by any means so let’s talk about it.

Written by Roald Dahl, The BFG, tells the story of a little girl named Sophie who is taken from her bed in an orphanage in the middle of the night by a giant named BFG (Big Friendly Giant). He takes her to Giant Country where he is the only nice giant. The rest like to eat humans or “beans” as they call them. It turns out that the other giants are bullying (another tolerance message for 2016) the BFG and Sophie will have none of it. The BFG is kind of like the Sandman and he brings dreams to humans. Sophie and BFG create and execute a plan to involve the Queen of England to capture the Giants and live happily ever after.

The casting is probably the strongest part of The BFG. Little Ruby Barnhill is a revelation as Sophie. She’s not too adorably cute and precocious but is still very charming. She feels like a real little girl. Also Mark Rylance is warm and natural as The BFG. I also enjoyed seeing Penelope Wilton of Downton Abbey fame as Queen Elizabeth. She gets some much needed laughs especially trying frobscottle, the flatulence inducing soda BFG loves.

In some ways watching The BFG felt a little bit like what a Richard Linklater film would be like if he tried fantasy. It doesn’t have a strong plot but is mostly about relationships and characters talking. The problem is Linklater is a master of dialogue where let’s be honest that has never been Spielberg’s strength. It takes an hour and a half for anything to really happen in the film. Most of it is BFG explaining the world to Sophie.

One thing that confused me is why is BFG the only giant who has a house and a job? He’s the only one that has heard of a snozzcucumber? The giants are never shown going into London to get ‘beans’ as they call it so what do they eat? What do they do all day? It’s like they exist just to bother BFG. They literally sleep right outside his house. Isn’t that odd? They seem horrified when a rainstorm comes in the film but they live outside. Surely they would be used to rain? I don’t remember in the book, but I thought they went and did things in the city. Why is BFG the only one who collects dreams? Who gave him that job? Who told him how to do it? Are there other giants doing it in other cities and towns? You get the idea. There are lots of questions

The production design is wonderful throughout. I loved the jars of dreams and when BFG and Sophie dive into the dream world it looked magical. This will probably sound like an unflattering comparison but the way the dreams looked kind of reminded me of the fairies in The Black Cauldron. I also liked the labels on all the dreams like ‘I is naked at my wedding’. That was very creative. The motion capture on Mark Rylance as BFG was also excellent. It felt like a real character that actually looked that way- not the pasty look in early motion capture films like Monster House and Polar Express.

Spielberg does make an odd choice that I don’t really understand in the narrative. They add a backstory to BFG that is not in the book. In this version BFG had a previous boy that he raised who wore a red jacket. Sophie gets taken to his little room still full of drawings and things. The boy even taught BFG how to read and write. But he was eaten by the Giants. I don’t see what this adds to the story? I don’t know if this was supposed to create tension but it felt unnecessary to me. Sophie is already threatened by Giants. We don’t need them to be more threatening. Is it supposed to make BFG more sympathetic and wounded? I guess but that never really pays off. It kind of ends up feeling awkward more than poignant.

There is some nice humor particularly towards the end which I enjoyed. The scenes where they are preparing breakfast for BFG was a lot of fun. However, it does seem like a little too late.

A film that did this story a lot better was last year’s Paddington. It’s about a creature coming to London and meeting ordinary people, with a baddie out to get him. But Paddington is so much sweeter, funnier and has much more story to keep it going. And Paddington’s visuals are equally strong as in the BFG.

One thing Paddington did not have is a score from John Williams. Honestly I think The BFG is one of the best we’ve heard from Williams in a long time. I loved it!

So in the end The BFG is a mixed bag. Great production values, performances, music, with its heart in the right place. It’s not a bad watch it just could have been great and it’s not. The writing isn’t strong enough for how little plot there is, and I was left asking a lot of questions about the giants and the world presented. If the dialogue had grasped me enough I would not have cared about such questions.

I’m bummed because if this had been better it could have been a real catalyst for new stories instead of remakes for Disney. Oh well. On to Pete’s Dragon, which I don’t care what others say I’m excited for. Ha

I don’t know what grade to give this one because it’s not like I was miserable. It’s passable. I guess I will give it:

Overall Grade- C+