Movie Review Shazam Fury of the Gods

Shazam Fury of the Gods (2023) 

Directed by David Sandberg

Written by Harry Gayden, Chris Morgan 

Starring Zachary Levi, Helen Mirren, Lucy Liu, Adan Brody, D.J Cotrona, Meagan Good, Rachel Zegler 

Release Date March 17th, 2023 

Published March 20th, 2023 

Just as James Gunn is about to explode the D.C Universe, Shazam Fury of the Gods arrives to recall the Snyder-verse heyday as seems to be coming to an end. Yes, we still have an Aquaman sequel and a Flash movie in our future, but the path being cut in the D.C film universe still appears to have reached an end. Whether that is a good or bad thing is entirely subjective to your feelings about D.C's scattershot personification of superheroes in the movies. Sometimes the D.C Universe is dour and bleak and sometimes the D.C Universe is broad and goofy and nothing D.C has done has married these disparate tones despite the a clear sharing of characters across movies definitively linking the movies together. 

Zach Snyder's vision of D.C's future as a wasteland ruled over by a bitter, out of control Superman still clashes violently with the vibrant, colorful and childlike wonder of Wonder Woman 84 and especially Shazam which leans further into the candy color of childhood with Shazam Fury of the Gods. Where Snyder eagerly drained the world of color, going as far as to make black and white versions of his films, Shazam and its sequel, clearly exist in a coloring book universe of childlike imagination and bright, bright colors. Fury of the Gods even has unicorns, albeit, scary snorting, warrior unicorns, they're still unicorns and that flies desperately in the face of Snyder's self-serious to the point of parody vision. 

Perhaps that is why Shazam was never glimpsed in any of Batman/The Flash's visions of the future. There is no place in that universe for an angst-riddled, slacker, dreamer like Billy Batson. Shazam is the guy who would get too confident and get himself absolutely killed by an angry Superman. That actually tracks with the bleakness of the Snyder-verse, now that I am thinking of it. Evil of the future would totally demolish the young heroes of Shazam Fury of the Gods, a group who still marvels over their own powers and obsess about their superhero names. Well, now that I have talked myself into how the D.C Film Universe actually makes sense, via the likely horrific future death of Billy Batson and his family, let's talk about Shazam Fury of the Gods. 

As we join the story, a pair of women dressed as ancient warriors have entered a museum to retrieve a staff. This staff had been used by the big bad of the last Shazam movie. In that film, spoiler alert, Billy Batson busted the staff on the assumption that breaking it would destroy its world destroying magic. What Billy could not know was that the magic in the staff was all that was keeping sisters and ex-Gods, Hespera (Helen Mirren) and Kalypso (Lucy Liu), from entering the human realm. With the staff broken, the sisters come to Earth, reassemble the staff and proceed to murder a museum full of people. These deaths are never referenced again. 

Read my full length review at Geeks.Media 

Movie Review American Cherry

 American Cherry (2023) 

Directed by Marcella Cytrynowicz 

Written by Marcella Cytrynowicz 

Starring Leonora Varela, Matty Cardarople, Hart Denton

Release Date March 17th, 2023 

Published March 16th, 2023 

Is this dull or am I just tired? Probably should not have to wonder about that during a movie. But I did wonder that as I sat through the frankly miserable new teen drama, American Cherry. The film starring Hart Denton and Sara May Sommers as a doomed young couple is an incredibly sad bit of small-town misery porn about incredibly sad teens and negligent small down adults. American Cherry presses buttons hard, doubling down on portraying how dull to the point of agony small town life is and the lengths one troubled teen specifically will go just to break the monotony. 

Hart Denton, from TV's Riverdale, stars in American Cherry as Finn Elliott, a deeply depressed young man. Finn is so bored in his small corner of the Midwest that he is pondering suicide. In fact, the plot of the movie kicks in when Finn, with his constant companion, an old school video camera, is lying in the street hoping one of the few cars that pass his house, runs him over. Finn is rescued at the last moment by one of his High School classmates, Eliza (Sarah May Sommers), who manages to stop an oncoming car just in time. 

Intrigued that someone may not want to see him splattered all over the road, Finn begins to see more of Eliza and the two form a tentative romance. That burgeoning romance is tempered by Eliza's own personal drama involving her mother, Louise (Leonor Varela), a struggling alcoholic. Louise and Eliza are estranged not only from Eliza's completely absent bio-dad, but also from her step-dad and step-sister, though Eliza still sees the sister everyday. The separation of their parents have led to Eliza resenting her sister while lamenting her mother's decisions. 

This is all portrayed against a beautifully bucolic setting. The lovely backdrops of a beautiful small town provide a counterpoint to the ugly personal stories that drive the plot of American Cherry. That's a solid approach, juxtaposition is a classic dramatic tool. What doesn't work for me about American Cherry is how the film leans in on being so ugly. Instead of merely being disaffected and sad, Finn is a psychopath. This is a deeply unwell character and the broad, brooding, weirdness of Finn is not a great fit for the drama of Eliza's story which is honestly more compelling in the conflicts it presents. 

At times, Finn's deeply troubled mutterings and obnoxious use of Kurt Vonnegut quotes as a signifier of his superiority over others, make the character appear as if he's visiting the wrong movie. He's the star of the film so, obviously, that's a problem. Sarah May Sommers is delivering a lovely performance filled with the heartbreaking angst of being a teenage girl desperate for a normal life, while Denton is playing a loose adaptation of John Hinckley or Mark David Chapman, loner-killers with delusions of self-importance. 

Find my full length review at Geeks.Media 

 

Movie Review A Little White Lie

A Little White Lie (2023) 

Directed by Michael Maren 

Written by Michael Maren 

Starring Kate Hudson, Michael Shannon, Don Johnson 

Release Date March 3rd, 2023 

Published March 1st, 2023 

Michael Shannon has made his name as an actor by being wildly unique and unpredictable. Those qualities are on incredible display in the new comedy, A Little White Lie. Here, Michael Shannon stars as a man named Shriver, a janitor living a life of desperation and boredom in New York City. Schriver's life is upended when he receives a letter from a college professor, Professor Simone Cleary (Kate Hudson), inviting him to speak at a prestigious but struggling literary conference in Utah. 

This is a little odd as Schriver doesn't remember having written a famous bestseller before pulling a J.D Salinger and disappearing from the literary world. Nevertheless, with prodding from his best friend Lenny (Mark Boone Junior), Schriver accepts the invitation and plans to pretend that he is this mysterious missing author. It's helpful to his scheme that no one has ever seen the famous Schriver, aside from a dark and broody photograph on the back cover of his novel. 

Arriving for the conference we meet the rest of the cast of this unusual comedy. Joining Kate Hudson is Don Johnson as a degenerate fellow professor with a deep admiration for Schriver and his writing. Aja Naomi King, known for role on TV's How to Get Away With Murder, plays a fellow author named Blythe Brown who is suspicious of Shriver from the moment she meets him. And rounding out the main cast are Da'Vine Joy Randolph as a Schriver super-fan and Romy Byrne as Teresa, Professor Cleary's assistant who appears to be in charge of exposition in several scenes. 

There are elements of A Little White Lie that don't work like a highly reductive cameo by beloved character actress Wendie Malick. Malick plays a patron of the college literary department who has a legendary habit of sleeping with famous authors. That's the joke, she sleeps with authors. She's an older woman who likes to have sex and for reasons unexplained, t

his is supposed to be funny. Neither Michael Shannon as the object of her desire or Malick herself are given any time to flesh out what might be funny about this beyond the idea of it. 

Find my full length review at Geeks.Media 

Movie Review Creed 3

Creed 3 (2023)

Directed by Michael B. Jordan 

Written by Keenan Coogler, Zach Baylin 

Starring Michael B.Jordan. Jonathan Majors, Tessa Thompson 

Release Date March 3rd, 2023 

Published March 2nd, 2023 

Creed 3 is an exceptional film. The culmination of the Rocky/Creed franchise, directed by star Michael B. Jordan, brings not only the story of Adonis Creed to a close but, indeed, the complete evolution of the Rocky franchise to a place of peaceful self realization. A conversation about masculinity, emotional vulnerability, and the various healthy and unhealthy was that men, specifically, process complicated emotions and long term trauma, reaches a place of genuine catharsis in the story of Adonis Creed and his opponent, Diamond 'Dame' Damian Anderson, played by Jonathan Majors. 

Creed 3 opens with a seeming ending. Adonis Creed is having his final fight. Fighting in the famed arena in South Africa where Muhammad Ali had his greatest triumph, Adonis ends his career as the undisputed World Boxing Champion. Cut to three years later and Adonis seems to find that retirement suits him. He's spending a healthy and loving amount of time with his lovely wife, Bianca (Tessa Thompson, and his beautiful daughter, Amara (Mila Davis-Kent), lovingly and gracefully adapting to life as a father to a young hearing impaired child. 

Signs of Adonis' healthy transition to life post-boxing are everywhere including in his professional life working as a boxing promoter. Adonis is training the next generation of fighter including the latest Undisputed World Champion, Felix Chavez (Teofimo Lopez), who is about to fight Creed's former foe turned friend, Victor Drago (Florian Munteanu). Naturally, since all is going so well in Creed's life, he's being set up for a major complication. 

Find my full length review of Creed 3 at Geeks.Media 

Movie Review Rebroken

Rebroken (2023) 

Directed by Kenny Yates 

Written by Scott Hamm Duenas 

Starring Scott Hamm Duenas, Kipp Tribble, Alison Haislip

Release Date March 7th, 2023 

Published March 3rd, 2023 

Rebroken is a bizarre amalgamation of religious drama, horror, suspense, and The Twilight Zone, maybe? It all makes sense but it's so drawn out and melodramatic it becomes impossible to continue to care or pay attention. The film promises to deliver actor Tobin Bell, Jigsaw from the Saw franchise, but he's barely here in a mysterious role where he plays a homeless Jesus figure or possibly a villain leading our hero astray or maybe neither of those things. Mostly, Bell is here to draw in horror movie loyalists who might assume that Rebroken is some kind of Saw offshoot. It most certainly is not. 

Scott Hamm Duenas stars in Rebroken as Will, a struggling alcoholic sentenced to take part in a grief support group. Will's daughter died while in his care while he was crawling inside a bottle of whiskey. Will's life, day to day, never seems to change. He has the same dream about his daughter dying, attends his support group, walks home, grabs a bottle of whiskey and a microwave dinner and drinks himself to sleep. This happens every night and we watch it happen over and over again with little variation until we are begging the movie to do anything different. 

Rebroken finally shifts the story when one of Will's fellow support group members, Lydia (Nija Okoro), points him in the direction of a mysterious homeless man. Von (Tobin Bell) speaks cryptically about Will being on a path and appears to promise Will that his daughter will come back if Will stays on the path and listens to what Von has to tell him. Von gifts Will a series of records labeled with bible verses that feature Von narrating vaguely spiritual, vaguely motivational aphorisms that seem to awaken something in Will. 

Find my full length review at Geeks.Media 

Classic Movie Review Casablanca

Casablanca (1943) 

Directed by Michael Curtiz 

Written by Julias J. Epstein, Phillip G. Epstein, Howard Koch 

Starring Humphrey Bogart, Ingrid Bergman, Paul Henreid, Claud Rains, Peter Lorre 

Release Date January 23rd, 1943 

Published March 4th, 2023 

Casablanca sets the stakes of its story almost immediately. After a brief voiceover setting us within the time of the story of Casablanca, we're thrust into the maelstrom of commerce and treachery of Casablanca. Authorities are in the midst of confronting a man regarding his 'papers.' Contextually, we come to understand that not having up to date papers, presumably related to immigration status and travel, you can be subject to arrest. And we will learn that being arrested, under most circumstances in Casablanca, is a death sentence, a likely trip to a concentration camp. 

Thus, we are in the market. Authorities in full uniform confront a well-dressed man and ask to see his papers. Fearful, the man tries to say that he simply does not have them with him. They threaten to arrest him and in desperate ploy, he suddenly finds his papers in his suit jacket. The papers are out of date and the man is once again set to be arrested. He makes one last desperate attempt to escape, shoving past the authorities and making a run for it. The man is shot in the back. Thus, what is at stake if you don't have proper documentation in Casablanca? It's not just your freedom, it's your life. 

This is the set up for introducing our MacGuffin, to borrow Hitchcock's term. The MacGuffin, for the uninitiated, is the name Hitchcock gave to the nebulous thing that everyone in a given movie wants. A MacGuffin can be just about anything as long as it drives the characters in the film to desire it and willingly risk everything to get it. In Casablanca, the MacGuffin are the "Letters of Transit." These are papers that would allow someone to leave Casablanca. It's a means of escaping legally from authorities, specifically, in the case of Casablanca, escaping from the Nazis. 

Full length review at Geeks.Media 

Movie Review 10 Things I Hate About You

10 Things I Hate About You (1999) 

Directed by Gil Junger

Written by Karen McCullah, Kirsten Smith 

Starring Julia Stiles, Heath Ledger, Joseph Gordon Levitt, Larisa Oleynik

Release Date March 31st, 1999 

Published March 5th, 2023 

It is a genuine effort that I have to make to like 10 Things I Hate About You. It's, honestly, a chore. I want to love this movie. I know that I did love it when it was released in 1999. But, I was also a relatively young film critic with a serious crush on Julia Stiles and a desire to be Heath Ledger. To say my objectivity was compromised would be very fair. Watching it again as the classic for the March 6th, 2023, episode of the Everyone's a Critic Movie Review Podcast, the chore of trying to be someone who likes 10 Things I Hate About You really presented itself. 

10 Things I Hate About You stars Julia Stiles as Kat Stratford. Kat is the 'Shrew' who must be 'Tamed' in the Shakespearean sense, the film is a loose adaptation of the Bard's Taming of the Shrew and the filmmakers really, really, want you to remember that. Awkward dialogue exchanges and obvious name conventions make the forced effort to underline Shakespeare thuddingly obvious if you aren't willing yourself to ignore the awkwardness. 

Kat has developed a reputation for beating up the boys at her High School. She refuses to date anyone as she sees the High School boys as beneath her. The story of 10 Things I Hate About You kicks in when a pair of boys begin to vie for the affection of Kat's sister, Bianca (Larisa Oleynik). When Bianca approaches her father for permission to date he decides that Bianca can date only when her sister decides to date. Knowing Kat, that may not happen until she leaves for college. 

Armed with this information from Bianca, nice guy Cameron (Joseph Gordon Levitt) and High School bad boy Joey Donner (Andrew Keegan), launch a plan. They will pay someone to seduce Kat into dating. After After being turned down by a series of guys who put over Kat's reputation as a ballbuster of a most literal sort, the schemers settle on Patrick Verona (Heath Ledger), a student with a reputation of his own. It's rumored that Patrick has been to jail, he's spent time in a mental institution and, he ate an entire duck. 

If anyone is crazy enough to try and date Kat Stratford, it's Patrick Verona. The plan works but, of course, Patrick falls for Kat and when Joey figures out that Cameron is more likely to get a date with Bianca than he is, the plan goes awry in the most obviously expected fashion. There truly is no mystery or even a shred of suspense to this plot. Kat is going to find out that Patrick was paid to date her and she's going to be hurt by that. How the movie resolves that plot is deeply unsatisfying despite a strong, tearful effort by a very game Julia Stiles. 

Read the full length review at Geeks.Media