Movie Review Okja

Okja (2017) 

Directed by Bong Joon Ho

Written by Bong Joon Ho 

Starring Tilda Swinton, Jake Gyllenhaal, Ahn Seo Hun, Paul Dano 

Release Date June 28th, 2017

Okja is a movie that defies simple description. On the surface, the film resembles a kiddie flick with a friendly monster and a little girl on an adventure to overcome a group of simple-minded adults trying to split them apart or exploit them. The surface of Okja does not do the film justice. Okja is truly one of the most daring and original films of 2017 from one of the master directors of our time, the brilliant Bong Joon-ho.

Find my full length review at Geeks.Media 

Classic Movie Review Jurassic Park

Jurassic Park (1993) 

Directed by Steven Spielberg 

Written by Michael Crichton, David Koepp 

Starring Sam Neill, Laura Dern, Jeff Goldblum, Richard Attenborough 

Release Date June 11th, 1993 

Published June 12th, 1993 

To say that Jurassic Park was ahead of its time in film technique would be an understatement. Somehow, Steven Spielberg made a massive CGI world come to life that still looks good today compared to much more expensive movies that came after it. Spielberg's dinosaurs of 1993 are, for me, more appealing than anything created since by his peers such as George Lucas or James Cameron. Spielberg's magical realism, the grounded story he tells about humans and dinosaurs, is filled with wonders that Lucas and Cameron forego in favor of spectacle. 

Spielberg still believed in actors and performances while Lucas and Cameron appeared to feel that actors got in the way of their vision. Spielberg never lost sight of what truly compels an audience, characters they can relate to, fear for, and root for. In selecting his cast for Jurassic Park he didn't choose giant movie stars, he chose people who were well known for their skillful acting. Sam Neill, Laura Dern, and Jeff Goldblum, the core of the Jurassic Park cast, were actors first and movie stars a distant second. 

Spielberg needed their skillful performances to truly give life to the monsters he was using CGI to bring to life. It would be mildly impressive to see the dinosaurs of Jurassic Park on their own but the dinosaurs take on a greater sense of wonder when actors are able to convince you that the dinosaur is in front of them. The wonder and excitement of these performers is truly what gives life to the CGI creations of Spielberg's brilliant behind the scenes team. 

Jurassic Park kicks off on a horror movie cliché. A black actor is tasked with letting the monstrous T-Rex out of its cage and, in unfortunate horror movie fashion, the black guy dies first. I'm not calling the scene racist, it's not really my place to make that judgment. I'm merely pointing out one well worn trope that was strangely present throughout the history of horror and monster movies. And, make no mistake about it, while I am not sure I would call Jurassic Park a horror movie, it's most certainly a monster movie. 

Dinosaurs in Spielberg's universe, especially the vicious raptors and the horrifying T-Rex, are introduced in classic monster movie fashion. Much the way that Godzilla and his cadre of fellow movie monsters are introduced in their films, Spielberg establishes his monsters as dangerous killers, slows down to show us how beautiful his monsters can be, and then unleashes the monsters upon his heroic human characters. The nature of the suspense of Jurassic Park is no different than the nature of the suspense of 1950s drive-in monster movies that you can easily imagine Spielberg himself having enjoyed. 

Spielberg is undoubtedly making a drive in monster movie, he's just doing it with modern tools unavailable to the forgotten generation of monster movie makers who delighted drive-in audiences of the 50s with the unforgettable sight of giant spiders, aliens, and gorillas. Godzilla is owed a debt as is King Kong who was the T-Rex of 1933, impressing audiences then just as Spielberg's fearsome dinosaur impressed us in 1933. Jurassic Park is a great improvement over the monster movies of the past but Spielberg is also fearlessly paying homage to movies that he grew up with and help generations fall in love with the spectacle of going to the movies. 

Find my full length review at Geeks.Media. 

Movie Review Paulina

Paulina (2015) 

Directed by Santiago Mitre

Written by Santiago Mitre 

Starring Delores Fonzi 

Release Date June 15th, 2015 

Director Santiago Mitre’s Paulina is a sharp and uncompromising story about a sharp and uncompromising character. The Paulina at the center of Paulina is portrayed by actress Dolores Fonzi whose inscrutable face and dispassionate voice crafts a performance that some will find off-putting but that I found to be endlessly fascinating, more so than the weighty issues the film employs Paulina to scrutinize.

Paulina is a success in her field in the Argentine judiciary, on her way toward becoming a lawyer, possibly someday a judge, when she informs her father (Oscar Martinez) that she is giving up her position and her education to teach at a rural school. Paulina’s decision is a fateful one as moving to the rural province outside the Argentine capital of Buenos Aires will not come easily. The scene of Paulina informing her father of her decision is one of incredible power that also happens to be the very first scene of the film.

In one unbroken take, that mostly sticks with Paulina’s enigmatic face as she moves through her father’s home, father and daughter debate the pros and cons, snipe at each other willfully and debate the politics of the region, all in the span of a 5 to 10-minute take. It’s a scene remarkable in its audacity as much as in its scripting. The dialogue is as fiery and passionate even as Paulina herself is self-possessed. Paulina argues her point with fervent words while her face rarely indicates the meaning of the words.

From there Paulina travels to a small village where she is hoping to teach politics to youths who’ve never been exposed to the inner-workings of government and aren’t particularly interested. On Paulina’s first day her entire class walks out after she makes an error while attempting to engage them. The students walk out again the second day when she fails to engage them with a game. Paulina’s struggles with the students are absorbing and yet dizzying. While most of Paulina is subtitled, the dialogue of the students is not transcribed and those who don’t speak the language have only Paulina for context, furthering the intended disconnect between the audience and Paulina while similarly forcing us to identify with her.

Read my full length review at Geeks.Media 

Classic Movie Review Roxanne

Roxanne (1987) 

Directed by Fred Schepisi

Written by Steve Martin 

Starring Steve Martin, Darryl Hannah, Shelley Duvall, Rick Rossovich, Fred Willard 

Release Date June 19th, 1987

Why don’t I love “Roxanne” anymore? The Steve Martin-Darryl Hannah comedy is turning 30 years old this week and will be featured on this week’s I Hate Critics movie review podcast which is being dedicated to the work of Steve Martin, featuring a Steve Martin Top 5 and “The Jerk” as this week’s I Hate Critics Undisputed Classic. So, of course, I watched “Roxanne” and the film left me only mildly amused at best, deeply disappointed at worst.

This confused me because my memory of the film, from being a 10 year old Steve Martin fan, was a non-stop laugh riot. I had a very similar experience when this week I also revisited Martin’s 1980 standup comedy special “In Honor of Steve.” Though my inner 10 year old found delight in Martin’s arrow through the head wackiness and the adult in me could recognize what might be a transgressive sort of anti-comedy peaking around the edges of otherwise earnest prat-falling, I could not find a place between the child and the adult that genuinely enjoyed Martin’s work.

Don’t misunderstand; it’s not that I am arguing Steve Martin isn’t funny, or not in many ways a comic genius, it’s an issue of taste. The adult in me doesn’t find Martin’s antics funny anymore and far too many moments of Roxanne, the extraneous scenes of Martin pulling a random physical gag, the plot friendly but awfully staged gymnastics that his C.B Bales is capable of for the purpose of god knows what, they’re unnecessary and distracting and rarely very funny.

There are multiple examples of these extraneous scenes with only a tenuous connection to the plot of “Roxanne” but let’s look at the very first scene of the film. Let me preface this by saying that I understand the fight scene that begins “Roxanne” is intended to demonstrate that C.D Bales is sensitive about the size of his exceptionally lengthy nose. I also am aware that the film is very loosely based on the play “Cyrano De Bergerac” which also begins with a sword fight. That said, the scene plays awkwardly and doesn’t really shine a positive light on the character of C.D Bales, especially as our introduction to the character.

Read my full review at Geeks.Media linked here. 

Movie Review Transformers Rise of the Beasts

Transformers Rise of the Beasts (2023) 

Directed by Stephen Caple Jr. 

Written by Joby Harold, Daniel Metayer, Josh Peters, Erich Hoeber, Jon Hoeber 

Starring Anthony Ramos, Dominque Fishback, Pete Davidson, Peter Cullen 

Release Date June 9th, 2023 

Published June 9th, 2023 

I'm going to make a strange comparison but here, but hear me out: Transformers is basically, The Little Mermaid market tested for boys. That's not to say that either is gender exclusive, rather merely that the market testing will tend to find the chaotic silliness of Transformers has more appeal among young boys than it does among young girls. Young girls meanwhile, prefer the colorful magic and music of The Little Mermaid to the clattering cacophony of chaos that makes up the Transformers franchise. 

It helps both films that the intended audiences for each film have not reached their full intellectual development. I'm of the belief that anyone who has reached mental maturity really doesn't enjoy the Transformers movie but rather, are tolerant of its existence. As long as their are children who delight over the silliness of Robots who turn into cars, there will always be an audience for the Transformers. Whether that is a good or bad thing is wholly subjective. 

Transformers Rise of the Beasts tells the story of creatures called Maximals. They have a key to a portal between universes and their home world is destroyed by a giant planet eating robot that wants the portal key in order to reach other planets to eat. Naturally, the Maximals bring their super dangerous portal key to Earth where, millions of years later, the planet eating robot guy sends his minions to retrieve the portal key and kill anything that gets in their way. 

The portal key is discovered on Earth by a museum intern with big dreams of being an archaeologist. Dominique Fishback plays the wide-eyed and curious intern, Elena, who will prove pivotal to protecting the Earth from the robot invaders. The evil robots have a name of some sort but my brain refused to retain that. Elena will soon be partnered with would be criminal and former good guy soldier, Noah (Anthony Ramos). Noah has somehow become partnered with the Transformers and is searching for the portal key on behalf of Optimus Prime (Peter Cullen). 

If you haven't lost interest yet, good for you. I checked out around the time I heard the name 'Maximals.' I understand that some of you may have a nostalgic connection to the robot-animal hybrid. I'm told that the Maximals had their own cartoon show that was popular at one time. That's great, I don't relate to that at all. I played with Transformers as a kid and I think there were  animal Transformers when I was into the toys, but I don't really remember. I stopped caring about Transformers years ago. 

Find my full length review at Geeks.Media 

Classic Movie Review Three of Hearts

Three of Hearts (1993) 

Directed by Yurek Bogayevicz 

Writtten by Adam Greenman, Mitch Glazer 

Starring Kelly Lynch, Billy Baldwin, Sherilyn Fenn, Joe Pantoliano 

Release Date April 30th, 1993 

Published June 8th, 2023 

Going into rewatching 1993's Three of Hearts for the new Everyone's a Critic 1993 podcast, I was concerned how a movie about a lesbian trying to gaslight her ex-girlfriend into coming back to her, via a straight, male, sex-worker, might not have aged well three decades later. I need not have worried. Three of Hearts would have to develop a pulse to be offensive. This non-entity of a rom-com is dimwitted, lazy and ill-conceived. Yes, based on the premise, it's a little offensive as well but not memorably or interestingly so. 

Three of Hearts stars Kelly Lynch as heartbroken Dr. Connie Czapski. Lynch's conception of a lesbian is wearing a leather jacket and a doo-rag. That's about as offensive the movie gets, even its stereotypes are lazy. Connie is heartbroken because her college professor girlfriend, Ellen (Sherilyn Fenn) has dumped her and may not, in fact, be gay at all. She says she doesn't regret her relationship with Connie per se, but she confesses to not being the conception of gay that Connie envisions for her. Whatever that means. 

In an effort to win Ellen back, Connie comes up with a bizarre plan. Needing a date to a wedding where she's playing the role of closeted lesbian, she hires a sex worker to be her date. Billy Baldwin co-stars as the sex worker, Joe Casella. Joe's primary business is sleeping with lonely older women, often married women tired of their boring old husbands or wealthy widows living high off of their insurance settlements. Keeping Joe in touch with new clients is his pal, and pimp, Mickey (Joe Pantoliano). 

The date goes well, Joe charms Connie's family and while he can't get Connie into bed, she's still gay, she does like Joe and it inspires a scheme. She will hire Joe, and give him a place to live, if he seduces and destroys her ex-girlfriend. Connie's assumption is that if Ellen gets her heart broken by a handsome guy, she will come running back to her. The plan, of course, backfires. Joe begins to fall in love with Ellen and Connie... well, she disappears for a while as the movie shoehorns a mob story into the plot. 

Joe has, apparently, been seeing the wife of a gangster while said gangster was in prison. The gangster is out of prison now and looking to take revenge on the man who was sleeping with his wife. For a while, Mickey is able to keep the heat off of Joe but when Joe tells Mickey he wants to get out of being a gigolo, Mickey lets the mobster have Joe and Joe is nearly beaten to death, saved only by Connie's quick thinking after she's randomly brought into this plot in the third act. 

Three of Hearts was infamous at the time of its release after co-star Sherilyn Fenn began speaking out about mistreatment on the set. Fenn claimed that director Yurek Bogayevicz was openly angry with her for not wanting to strip down for the part. Fenn was already going to be quite nude in another 1993 release, Boxing Helena and had been topless in a forgettable horror movie called Meridian: Kiss of the Beast and she was worried about being typecast for sexy roles. Her reticence to take off her clothes boiled over on the set and may have contributed to several rewrites of the script during production. 

Beyond that, Three of Hearts is a desperately mundane and oddly crafted rom-com-drama. The movie is never funny but it doesn't have the weight to be dramatic. It just sort of lays there and enacts a plot that never comes to life. As with many movies of the time period, no one seems concerned about the actual ugliness of the plot at hand. A woman attempts to destroy her girlfriend emotionally and trick her to coming back to her. There is a dark streak of homophobia at play there and, in general, it's just an ugly plot all around. 

Find my full length review at Geeks.Media. 

Classic Movie Review Sliver

Sliver (1993) 

Directed by Phillip Noyce 

Written by Joe Esterhas

Starring Sharon Stone, Billy Baldwin, Tom Berenger

Release Date May 21st, 1993 

Published June 8th, 2023 

Why is the movie Sliver called Sliver? I believe it's the name of the building where the movie is set but that is such a tossed off mention that I am genuinely uncertain. I can extrapolate that it is a loose metaphor for the films central relationship between Sharon Stone and Billy Baldwin. By that I mean, he is someone who can painfully get under her skin, like a sliver. Get it? That's not explicit in the text of Sliver, but it's the best that I have been able to come up with. I spent a lot of time thinking about the title, Sliver, while watching the movie Sliver, because thinking about the title was more entertaining. 

Sliver is a softcore thriller with the pretense of being a high minded drama. Director Phillip Noyce and writer Joe Esterhas seem to think they have something to say about voyeurism and sexuality but it is clear where their prurient interests truly lie. They want to watch very attractive people have sex and they've made a movie to cover for their fetish. This was not an uncommon thing among male filmmakers at the time. In fact, movie covering for my fetish could be its very own sub-genre of 1990s cinema. 

Sliver stars Sharon Stone as Carly Norris, a rich book editor living in New York City. She jumps at the chance to move into a new apartment despite the apartment having a haunting past. A woman, who looks a lot like Carly, may or may not have been murdered in this very apartment by having been thrown off of the balcony. Oh well, look at all that natural light. New York real estate, am I right. If New Yorkers rejected every apartment where a murder occurred, there'd be few places to live. 

Carly moves in and it is zero minutes before creeps are breathing down her neck. First up is a famous author of 'erotic' thrillers, Jack Landsford (Tom Berenger). He's a former cop who uses his cases as inspiration for his creepy fantasies. So, he's a fan insert for Noyce and Esterhas. Perhaps its a case of Berenger being the stand in for who they really are while the other love interest, Billy Baldwin, is the fantasy of who the writer and director wish they were, a handsome and smooth talking ladies man who's still a major creep at heart. 

The central portion of Sliver is devoted to figuring out who killed that woman who lived in Carly's apartment. But that doesn't actually matter in the end. There are two major crimes happening and no one in Sliver is free from being implicated, aside from the beautiful, innocent, naive character played by Sharon Stone. You can see the flaws inherent in that right? Sharon Stone's talent is not necessarily playing either innocent or naive. That's no shade to Stone, she's just way too elegant and intelligent for the movie and character she's trapped within. 

The murder is just a red herring, a hook to draw you toward what is far more interesting and fetishistic for the writer and director, voyeurism. Billy Baldwin's creep character, Zeke Hawkins, is a secret billionaire who owns the building in which he, Carly and Berenger's creep writer lives. Zeke has installed cameras everywhere in the building, every apartment, every room, especially in the bathrooms. He spends his days sitting in his command center penthouse watching everyone all the time. 

Find my full length review at Filthy.Media