The pickings are getting SLIM, my friends. Unless I can get my wife and my favorite mother-in-law back into the theater-going experience, I will be forced to watch movies like "Shazam" at home and even worse, be forced to write many words about them.

To be fair, I'd actually wanted to see "Shazam" because I thought I remembered reading here that it was a funny movie with more grown-up-iness about it that your normal superhero movie.

Once again, you people lied to me.

Well - I guess it was y'all. Maybe I heard that somewhere else but I'm going to take the lazy man's way out and try to make you feel guilty and thus owe me something. Like, for instance, buying my book of movie reviews when it comes out. I could use the litrully tens of sales. The book will even include this review which means that if you cop to misleading me on "Shazam" then in actuality, you are a star of my book because I just mentioned you. So 'fess up!

"Shazam" wasn't the worst thing ever, and it does have a few chuckles in it. But it makes the fatal error that so many of these movies makes.

Back story.

Who cares?!? I don't! This movie was 2 hours and 10 minutes long, and about 25% of that was wasted on a back story. Hey, I just had a million-dollar idea! Do you know what someone should do?

Make a movie that is nothing but back stories!

Think about it - a movie that's, say, 2 hours long and features eight 15-minute vignettes that tell the back stories of 8 different superheroes or, I guess, super villians. That's perfect! You could watch the back story of someone like Captain 3-D, The Peacemaker, or Bulletman and Bulletgirl (actual superheroes found by Googling "Obscure superheroes"). If you want to know how a pacifist diplomat became a superhero, surely that can be told in 15 minutes.

Then when The Peacemaker gets his own movie, it starts right up with his high-powered brand of non-violent diplomacy/killing sprees. (I'm not making this up. The Peacemaker makes The Joker look like Ward Cleaver!)

The back story in "Shazam" has a really giant flaw. Some Wizard dude is the Keeper of the Magic and is thus able to keep the Seven Sins locked up. Which CAN'T be true, because you have to look no further than your least-favorite politician in order to see all Seven Sins on full display.

Some poor kid is riding in the back seat of his father's car, getting made fun of by both his big brother AND his father. The dad is a first-class jerk. The brother is messing with the kid's Magic 8-Ball and taunting him mercilessly. You really feel sorry for this kid.

And then his Magic 8-Ball magically transports him to see The Wizard. At this point I bet you too are saying in your mind the phrase, "I put on my robe and wizard hat". Don't lie, you know you are.

The Wizard is looking for just one person that's pure of heart. The Wizard is really old and getting weaker, so he needs to transfer his magic to someone pure of heart - and young - so that the Seven Sins can remain trapped in The Wizard's lair.

Unfortunately, this poor kid doesn't pass the test, as the Seven Sins are able to tempt him. Now, keep this in mind - it turns out that over the years, at least 56 other people have ALSO been magically transported to The Wizard's lair, in hopes that one of them was pure of heart.

None of them are, so they're returned to their lives whereupon nothing much happens to them.

But this poor, bullied, apparently-unloved and sympathetic kid?

HE goes back to reality and for reasons unexplained and not based in logic decides to become the worst villian in the history of villians.

Why?!? He wasn't a bad kid and more than that, he was definitely deserving of sympathy.

NOTE - I am NOT asking for his back story. It's just something that doesn't make sense.

And neither does the selection of Billy Batson as the new Keeper of the Magic. Batson is transported to The Wizard's lair ("I put on my robe and wizard hat") and isn't even tested. Which is good because Billy Batson may not be a horrible person, but he's definitely not pure of heart.

No matter - at this point, The Wizard apparently can't be picky so he transfers his powers to Batson and Shazam! A new superhero is born.

The rest of the movie is OK. There are a few laughs. At first, Shazam is not a very likeable superhero. In fact, he's more interested in grifting people than he is in saving humanity. But he ultimately comes around.

You could do worse than spending 2 hours or so watching this movie. In fact, just spend about an hour and a half and you'll like it even better.

"Shazam" gets 2 1/4 foster kids out of 5 foster kids. Get ready for the sequel, it's definitely coming.

The Lighthouse (2019)

A glorified film student vanity project which was salvaged by a good performance from Robert Pattinson and an outstanding performance from Willem Dafoe, whose body of work continues to impress. It was wonderfully shot as well.

.25

Parasite (2019) - All unemployed, Ki-taek and his family take peculiar interest in the wealthy and glamorous Parks, as they ingratiate themselves into their lives and get entangled in an unexpected incident.

An already gripping story explodes into a bonkers finale. 4.5/5

PliablyPurple said:

Genesia said:

I saw the documentary Miles Davis: Birth of the Cool last week. It was excellent. (And, yes - there was a mention and video of Prince.)

Going to have to see this soon. I am reading his autobiography at the moment. He mentioned Prince once (so far - only 100 pages in) when talking about the styles of horn playing that Charlie Parker used and one of them was, as Sonny Rollins used to call it, "pecking." A quick glance at the back of the book tells me that P will be mentioned again, but this was in reference to the short horn phrasing that Prince liked to use at the time.

I saw it twice. I second Genesia.

Had a Saturday double feature...

The Revenant and Hostiles - Both movies

Even though these are sperate movies they really felt similiar in many ways. They share a realistic demonstration of the times and the people. Some say "revisionist history" but I lean more towards "just another story". Love westerns and I really enjoy how well these movies were made from the cinematography to the warddrobe, just amazing. The other thing they shared was that both had a very realistic, human experience in them that was pretty powerful which I attribute to the great actors.

Howdy Rodeo, sexton and Genesia! Even 2freaky!

Ace said:

RodeoSchro said:

Ace said:

Howdy Rodeo, sexton and Genesia! Even 2freaky!

Hi Ace!

I saw The Current War: Director's Cut a couple weeks ago. I have to say, it was a little odd. Visually beautiful (executive producer Martin Scorcese), but confusing in key aspects. For example, the action spans nearly 20 years. How did none of the characters age? How did their styles of dress not change, at all? (Especially the female characters. Dress styles changed a lot from 1880 to 1898. And if Nikola Tesla was as big a dandy as they depicted, why didn't his style change, at all?)

That said, the story was good (even if it was only told about an inch deep). I'd give it a middling grade.

Ace said:

Howdy Rodeo, sexton and Genesia! Even 2freaky!

Ace said:

Howdy Rodeo, sexton and Genesia! Even 2freaky!

Hello, Ace! How are things north of the border?

sexton said:

Ace said:

Howdy Rodeo, sexton and Genesia! Even 2freaky!

Hello, Ace! How are things north of the border?

Fucking cold!

Otherwise, all is well here, thanks! How 'bout you?

I've gotta say I was disappointed by this film. I'd seen Ida and liked it very much, so I was expecting more.

The cinematography is gorgeous (esp. in the "Rock Around the Clock" scene), but I felt that the characters were unlikeable, and this was kinda my thought through the whole thing:

'Why do people put themselves through such nonsense in the name of "love"?'


P.S. How come when I [youtube] [/youtube], the videos are no longer rendering when I post?

Hustlers (2019)


Excellent.

Just saw this. Great film. Bale was on point yet again.

Judy (4.5 out of 5 stars). Renee Zellweger kills it! Definitely deserves an oscar!

The Joker 6.5 / 10

Dang it.

There - that's my two-word review for "Ford v. Ferrari" or as it's known in the rest of the world, the far, far, far better title of "LeMans '66". I guess the producers and director figured that since we were so stupid as to miss all the plot holes, we surely weren't smart enough to know what LeMans is.

Seems right.

For some reason unfathomable, this film has Oscar buzz. For what? Poor screenwriting? If they give an Oscar for bad tradecraft, the writers of this movie will surely dominate the field.

It's just spectacularly badly-written. It's full of STUPID SCREENWRITING.

So let's start at the start. With, of course, the obligatory

SPOILER ALERT / SPOILER ALERT / SPOILER ALERT / SPOILER ALERT

Although, what really is there to spoil? Did you think Hollywood would make a movie in which the heroes lost the big race? Or that the hero of the movie - who is a jackass that participates in the most dangerous activity there is - doesn't die in the end?

Dream on!

The premise of this movie is that Lee Iacocca - smack-dab in the middle of the launch of the most important car of the last 50 years, the Ford Mustang - decides that Ford needs to compete in...well...I'm not sure.

Ostensibly, it's to go up against Ferrari in the LeMans race. But LeMans is actually just one race in the World Sportscar Championship series. Which is something that is never disclosed in this movie - even though there's a TERRIBLE scene involving the 24 Hours of Daytona, which was the first race in the Series and was, in fact, won by Ford and their GT40 Mark II.

And in an INCREDIBLE oversight by the moviemakers, the 1966 24 Hours of Daytona was the first time the race covered an entire twenty-four hours (it had been 12 hours long the year before). This might get a little confusing, but let me explain.

In the movie - which gets worse and worse to me the more I examine it - Ford competes in the 1965 LeMans but their car breaks and they don't win. So they come back for the 1966 season and the brand-new 24 Hours of Daytona is the first race of the season.

Instead of focusing on the historically significant fact that this is the first 24 Hours of Daytona - thereby proving Ford and Shelby had what it took to win a 24-hour race - the movie makes up some stupid bet between Carroll Shelby and Henry Ford II, whereby Ford gets Shelby's racing operation if Shebly's car doesn't win this first-in-a-lifetime race.

WTF?!? More on this later, believe me.

I guess now is a good time to begin the actual review because in this movie, one plot hole leads you down numerous other plot holes. You'd need a real Ford GT40 to get through all those rabbit holes before dinner time.

And while I've used the term "plot hole" a lot, what I really mean is "stupidity". So let's see how much STUPID SCREENWRITING we can find in this movie.

It starts at the very beginning. We see Carroll Shelby winning the 1959 24 Hours of LeMans. But despite what the film makers tell you, Shelby wasn't the first American to win that race. In fact, American Phil Hill had been on the winning team the year before, and he wasn't the first American to win that race, either. American driver Luigi Chinetti was on the winning team in 1949.

Anyway, the next thing we see is Shebly at the doctor's office, who tells Shelby that he must quit driving or his heart will blow up. So Shelby quits driving, and becomes a drunk. Which is STUPID SCREENWRITING.

I don't know if Shelby really had a drinking problem, and I bet neither do the film makers. In the movie's third scene, they insinuate that Shelby is passed-out drunk in his tralier on the grounds of some race track, and is too hung over to wake up and participate in whatever he's supposed to do at this race. And then?

There are no more allusions to Shelby and drinking at all.

WTF?!? Why paint the man as a drunk in the third scene of the movie, and then as a tee-totaller for the next 2 hours and 15 minutes?!? Not to mention the fact that Carroll Shelby lived for 46 more years after the 1966 LeMans?!? Why on Earth do they make out Shelby to constantly need medication to prevent dying, when the guy lived on for almost another half century? STUPID SCREENWRITING.

Now we get to Christian Bale. He's getting all the Oscar buzz and I do agree that he did a great job.

He did a great job portraying a character that it is IMPOSSIBLE to like. That is STUPID SCREENWRITING.

Bale's character - actual race car driver Ken Miles - is introduced to us as a true asshole who doesn't follow the rules (or even care about them), berates employees, and wants to fight everyone that ever meets him. Miles throws a wrench at Carroll Shelby, who has committed the sin of trying to get the race organizers to let Miles race, despite Miles's car not complying to the rules because Miles was apparently too lazy to read the new rule book.

In addition to being a jerk, Miles is also portrayed as a tax cheat. And he is the hero.

How in the world are we supposed to root for a guy that is a first-class asshole? Do you need more proof that movie Ken Miles is an asshole?

Shelby approaches Miles about driving for him, and they are to meet the Ford guys at the introduction of the Ford Mustang. Miles tells everyone at Ford - including Henry Ford II - that their car is a piece of junk, and he'd rather drive a Chevy Chevelle. And then Miles is stunned that Ford doesn't want him to drive their race car? STUPID SCREENWRITING.

In real life, Ken Miles got along just fine with the Ford guys.

Lee Iacocca - the guy responsible for the Mustang - is apparently also the guy who wants Ford to get into GT racing, so they can reach new, young car buyers. So his idea is that they buy Ferrari. He goes to Italy and meets with Enzo Ferrari, who insults him, Henry Ford II, and the entire Ford Motor Company. Ferrari then sells his company to Fiat.

This greatly irritates Henry Ford II, and now we have Ford v. Ferrari!

No, we don't.

As stated above, this movie is known as "LeMans '66" everywhere else. That's a far better title, even though it doesn't make the movie any better.

Let's be clear - there really is no focus on Ford versus Ferrari in this movie. The film makes throw a few nuggets out there, including an absolutely laughable attempt at making Ferrari's nameless driver some sort of villian straight out of a "Speed Racer" episode. I didn't check the credits but I would not be surprised if the main Ferrari driver character's name is listed as "Skull Duggery".

Here is the one and only Skull Duggery - still the greatest name in all cartoon history:



OK, back to the movie. Ford gives Shebly the green light to build the greatest race car on the planet and then...it just shows up at the airport.

Seriously.

Someone - we're never told who - built the car in England, and then it was shipped over to California for Shelby to work on. We don't see the design process, or the original testing process, or the manufacturing process, or any comparisons of the design to Ferrari's design, or ANYTHING that led up to the actual car being rolled off an airplane on a LAX tarmac.

STUPID SCREENWRITING.

All the while, Ken Miles is busy being an asshole to everyone he ever meets, except for his wife and his son - the two most useless characters in probably any movie ever made. Seriously - they add NOTHING to the movie. Oh, wait - the wife does add one thing!

Cigarettes. Or actually, one cigarette.

You all know how I feel about smoking. It's for losers. And I know, I know - "RodeoSchro, people smoked in the '60's!" Yes, we were dumber back then. And that is portrayed plenty in this movie.

But Ken Miles' wife was not shown to be a smoker. Except once. On a phone call. With nothing more than a burning cigarette in an ashtray. That she never touched. And that played absolutely no part for a character that was a useless character.

So why was it there?

Obviously because a tobacco company paid for it to be there.

I was hoping we were finally better than that, but I guess we aren't.

Anyway, Henry Ford II gets really mad that Enzo Ferrari called him fat and said Ford didn't measure up to his grandfather, Henry Ford. So he tells Shelby a stupid story about how it was Ford that actually won World War II (not FDR or anyone else), and then tells Shelby, "This is war, and it's not Ford's first war, either. We're going to beat Ferrari and I'm going to rub Enzo's nose in it. You have absolute authority to run this program, and you report to no one but me".

Which would be awesome, except not thirty minutes later Shelby is reporting to some smarmy Ford guy named Leo Beebe. STUPID SCREENWRITING.

After Ford's loss due to mechanical failures at LeMans '65 - without Ken Miles on the driving team - Shelby has to take Henry Ford II on a hot lap around LAX in the latest model Ford GT MkII, in order to convince Ford that Ken Miles should be the driver. Why wasn't Miles the driver for this hot lap? Isn't it Miles's driving ability that needs to be on display?

Shelby brought Ford to tears in that test drive, so you would have thought Ford would have said, "Forget Miles - YOU should drive this car, Shelby!" Nope. Henry Ford II breaks down and cries like a little baby, which is his way of saying that Ken Miles can be the driver. Except, Carroll Shebly can't realize he has won and tells Henry Ford II, "Let Ken Miles drive this car at the brand-new 24 Hours of Daytona - which is a fact we're going to ignore - and if Miles wins, he gets to drive at LeMans. And also all the other races in between, but we're not going to mention that either, or barely even acknowledge those races exist. But wait, there's more! If you let Miles race and he loses, you can have mhy company".

STUPID SCREENWRITING.

Of course, Miles wins the 24 Hours of Daytona. And as a matter of fact, I don't even think they mentioned it was a twenty-four race at all.

Then the screenwriters make up some dumb idea about changing out an entire braking system. And who do they get to bring up that idea? Why, Ken Miles, of course! And what makes Ken Miles think that changing out an entire braking system is legal? Why, Ken Miles read the LeMans rule book, of course!

Except...this is the same Ken Miles that we're introduced to earlier in a scene whereby he acts like a complete jerk due to the fact that he was too lazy to read a rule book.

STUPID SCREENWRITING.

Then everyone goes to LeMans.

The race starts badly, as for some reason the Ford GT40 MkII's door won't close. That causes Miles to get seriously behind. They fix the door, but now they're in last place. So what does Carroll Shelby do?

He cheats!

First, he steals Ferrari's stop watches.

Then later, he steals a lug nut and drops it on the ground in front of Ferrari's pit area. The crew sees the nut on the ground and believe that they've left a lug nut off one wheel. At least, I guess. They speak in Italian, with no subtitles. However, they never have their car pit. Weird. If the point of Shelby's cheating was to get the Ferrari's car to pit, that fails. So what was the point? To make Carroll Shelby look like a cheater?

STUPID SCREENWRITING.

At any rate, Miles does take the lead. The last Ferrari car - the one driven by Skull Duggery - blows an engine, so Ferrari out. It's a cruise now for Miles and his response is to drive faster than ever. Het sets lap record after lap record, and is four minutes in front.

But Beebe, the Ford executive, tells Henry Ford II, "Hey, you know what would be cool? We have the top three cars. What if we had them all cross the finish line together?" Ford says, "Yeah, neato!" Shelby tells Miles during a pit stop that's what Ford wants and for once, Miles is justifiably an asshole. That's when he starts driving even faster, building an even larger lead.

But one straightaway from the finish, this first-class, Ford-hating, tax-cheating, unlikable asshole decides to do what Ford wants, and slows down so the other Ford cars can join him at the finish line.

They cross it together, and then LeMans screws Miles out of the win by saying that his team mate Bruce McClaren's car had started 60 feet behind Miles's car, meaning McLaren had driven 60 feet further and was therefore the winner.

That actually happened. Some say that in real life, Miles let off the gas at the end because he was mad at Ford, and McLaren finished first that way. But the LeMans people actually did pull out that "McLaren drove 60 feet further" card. We should have been mad that Miles got screwed but by this point of the movie, all I could think was "Couldn't happen to a nicer guy!"

Then Ken Miles dies.

Which was a horrible, horrible way to end a movie. Why kill off the "hero" right after you show him getting screwed out of the top trophy in international racing?

And why have Carroll Shelby recognize his death by looking at a door wedge that had inspired Miles to solve some giant problem the GT40 MkII had, although the actual solving of that problem is never shown or acknowledged in any way, so we just have to assume that Miles's wedge idea was implemented and was successful?

And why did Shelby take the wrench that Miles had thrown at him in the beginning of the movie out of the box he'd had it framed in? He gave the completely superfluous Son of Ken Miles the wrench but did he really want the completely superfluous Son of Ken Miles to actually use the wrench that symbolized all that Ken Miles stood for? (Which to be fair, was mainly anger and sarcasm.)

And why did the movie end with a description of Miles as "beloved", when literally everyone in the movie either hated him, or spent the whole movie apologizing for screwing him?

There is no possible way anyone can leave the theater feeling good.

STUPID SCREENWRITING.

Believe it or not, I could go on and on with more examples of STUPID SCREENWRITING. I, however, am all about positivity. So let's leave this review on a positive note.

Matt Damon's Texas accent is a really good West Texan accent. Too bad Shelby was from East Texas, which has a different accent entirely.

"Ford v. Ferrari" is the epitome of STUPID SCREENWRITING. If you care about facts, continuity or likable characters, avoid this one.

I'm rating this movie as All The Missed Shifts Possible. Go rent a car with a manual transmission and learn how to really drive, instead of watching this.



.

[Edited 11/19/19 15:12pm]

Pain and Glory (Dolor y Gloria) (2019)

A film director reflects on the choices he's made in life as past and present come crashing down around him.

This has the look and feel of an semi-autobiographical film, and if Antonio Banderas has ever been better in a film, then I haven't seen that film. I hope he gets some awards consideration.

.5

The Irishman, by Martin "The Master" Scorsese. JHC, it's great, it's so f+++++g great.

Monumental like Goodfellas or Casino, but with a pure human drama at its core (stubbornness, choice and betrayal). De Niro is a bit rusty in some scenes (mumbling-stuttering perhaps too much) and Pacino delievers his usual post-1974 over-the-top (entertaining) antics, but it works. Seeing Pesci on the big screen again was electrifying. More than three hours of running time but thanks to the usual postmodernist "Scorsese editing" it felt like 2 tight hours. Like someone with a great voice reading a top novel for you, with pauses, jokes, digressions, flashbacks, etc. Also, some kickass shooting scenes and GTA-like killings, directed with class and finesse, not the jumpy camerawork BS.

Vintage wine, the best, simply the best. The movie even taught me how to properly cook hot dogs: with beer. 4,5 / 5. Best movie Netflix will ever do?

Ace said:

I've gotta say I was disappointed by this film. I'd seen Ida and liked it very much, so I was expecting more.

The cinematography is gorgeous (esp. in the "Rock Around the Clock" scene), but I felt that the characters were unlikeable, and this was kinda my thought through the whole thing:

'Why do people put themselves through such nonsense in the name of "love"?'


P.S. How come when I [youtube] [/youtube], the videos are no longer rendering when I post?

I liked this movie, but agree with your criticism in that I couldn't understand why the two main characters remained committed to each other.

Dolor y gloria / Pain & Glory (2019) - A film director reflects on the choices he's made in life as past and present come crashing down around him.

The latest Almodóvar film was not at all on my radar so my initial interest in it was very low, but I found it afterward to be one of the director's most satisfying movies. In particular I loved the big reveal at the end. 4.5/5

sexton said:

Ace said:

Cold War

I've gotta say I was disappointed by this film. I'd seen Ida and liked it very much, so I was expecting more.

The cinematography is gorgeous (esp. in the "Rock Around the Clock" scene), but I felt that the characters were unlikeable, and this was kinda my thought through the whole thing:

'Why do people put themselves through such nonsense in the name of "love"?'

I liked this movie, but agree with your criticism in that I couldn't understand why the two main characters remained committed to each other.

Fair criticism. But it's one of my favorites seen this year.

The Good Liar (2019) - Consummate con man Roy Courtnay has set his sights on his latest mark: the recently widowed Betty McLeish, worth millions. But this time, what should have been a simple swindle escalates into a cat-and-mouse game with the ultimate stakes.

It was clear from the start that Helen Mirren's character was not the naive widow she appeared to be. It was just a matter of waiting until the end to find out why. 3/5

Dark Waters -

Caught an advanced screening of this last night and all I can say is "holy shit". Didn't know what the movie was about, just went and I'm glad I did. Only 4 stars because I think I'm a little traumatized.

Based on a true story but a couple of the lines of dialogue are so relevant to other areas where corporations are today, it's a scary reality that gets no press. Watch the movie and you'll see why.

Corporate lawyer who works for Dow chemicals via a medium size firm discovers how his home town in West Virginia is being poisoned by Dow and what happened as a result. It shows how the ineffectiveness of government oversight and the greed of the corporate giant over the course of decades at the cost of many lives.

It is based on the 2016 article "The Lawyer Who Became DuPont's Worst Nightmare" by Nathaniel Rich, published in The New York Times Magazine. The film stars Mark Ruffalo, Anne Hathaway, Tim Robbins, Victor Garber, Mare Winningham, William Jackson Harper, and Bill Pullman.

namepeace said:

sexton said:

I liked this movie, but agree with your criticism in that I couldn't understand why the two main characters remained committed to each other.

Fair criticism. But it's one of my favorites seen this year.

I liked this line: 'He confused me with my mother and a knife showed him the difference.'

Ace said:

namepeace said:

Fair criticism. But it's one of my favorites seen this year.

I liked this line: 'He confused me with my mother and a knife showed him the difference.'

Indeed