The Good Dinosaur - 2/5

This movie is very confused. It’s too dour and gritty to be a kids movie, and too whimsical and frivolous for adults. The tone is too lighthearted in some places where it needs to be serious, and the resolution is underwhelming given the scope of the journey. And to make things worse, in an attempt to make the subject matter kid-friendly the dinosaurs ‘drive off’ attackers instead of tearing them to pieces, which actually causes plot holes later on. It’s a mess.

Closest comparison: It’s like The Searchers by way of Rango (2011).

Setting: Western
Plot: Adventure
Tone: Tragedy

The Batman (2022) - 4/5

This movie is yet another reinvention of Batman, this time both more grounded and more gritty than Nolan’s trilogy. It chooses style over convention many times, which could have made the chase scenes hard to follow, for example, but the direction masterfully guides the audience to keep up with the action. Pattinson is good as Bruce Wayne but really shines as Batman, and the script focuses on the intimidatingly silent detective more than the super-human super-rich super-hero. The Riddler’s riddles aren’t sublime, but they’re more than good enough to carry keep the audience intrigued until the answers are revealed. This film’s primary sin is its length, clocking in at four minutes shy of three hours, when a deft editor could have trimmed it down by a solid half hour if he had been allowed to do so.

Closest comparison: It’s like Batman Begins by way of Joker (2019).

Setting: Crime
Plot: Detective
Tone: Thriller