Mary and the Witch's Flower (2017) - 3/5

When Studio Ponoc split from Studio Ghibli, it took with it the stylistic sensibilities. This looks very much like a Miyazaki film, complete with beautiful scenery and villains labeled ‘misguided’, not ‘evil’. The characters are not as likable or well-realized as their Miyazaki counterparts, though the world building is quite good. The film does end abruptly, in that the last few minutes introduce a new idea that the main character pursues without establishing it at all. Had the script been through a few more drafts it could have been a much better movie.

Closest Comparison: It’s like a mashup of Castle in the Sky, Kiki’s Delivery Service, and Spirited Away, with bits of Howl’s Moving Castle.

Bumblebee - 4/5

I had disregarded the series after the second installment, but when I saw that this was not directed by Michael Bay I decided to watch it. This is what the Transformers movies always should have been. It’s fun and heartfelt, following a smaller story but with big action scenes. Sure, there’s too much “mean is funny” and some contrived character conflict, but it doesn’t detract too much from the movie as a whole. It all comes down to Bumblebee’s relationship with Hailee Steinfeld’s character, and they did that very well.

Closest Comparison: Transformers (2007), done better.

Mary Poppins Returns - 4/5

Tasked with the impossible, this movie does quite well. No one can recreate Julie Andrews’ iconic performance, but Emily Blunt does a great job as the character. There’s singing and dancing, as one might expect, and it follows the beats of the original movie in a way that is more comforting than distracting. Still, it finds plenty of new things to do. They go into a cartoon world again, but this time it’s a ceramic bowl. There are villainous bankers again, but this time with more tie-ins with the children. They even manage to have tear-jerking song that far surpasses the heartfelt “Feed The Birds”. If you like the original, definitely give this one a watch.

Closest Comparison: It’s an updated Mary Poppins with a new coat of paint.

Annihilation - 4/5

It starts out like Arrival, so I wasn’t expecting it to turn into a straight-up horror movie about half way through. That being said, I really enjoyed the ride. It’s beautiful to watch and riveting to think about, keeping its slow pace rich with engagement. It’s great an it’s clever, ambiguous in places but becoming more clear the more you think about it. Even the way the story jumps around is part of the narative iteself. The ending is pretty trippy and psychodelic, putting it squarely in the high concept sci-fi category, but if that’s your jam and you’re ok with the horror elements then definitely give it a watch.

Closest comparison: Arrival, then a Quite Place, then The Fountain

Aquaman - 3/5

This is a very uneven movie. Many times the visuals are stunning, gorgeous even. Then the actors dump exposition on the audience for a several minutes at a time. Jason Momoa is fun and endearing; Amber Heard is grating. Every fight scene has something really cool and something either bad or just dumb. There are two separate villain plots that push the runtime over 2.5 hours, and that would be fine if the dialogue was good or the characters were likable. Unfortunately, the stiff performances and lousy writing won out. Except for a few really great moments, this film is not worth your time.

Closest Comparison: It’s Thor: Ragnarok by way of Jupiter Ascending

Killer Elite (2011) - 3/5

On the whole this is just your standard action flick. It looks really good and the action sequences are slightly above average, but the plot plods along exactly as you might expect. Robert De Niro and Clive Owen elevate the average acting level significantly and Jason Statham is Jason Statham. Apparently it’s based on a true story, which improves some of the mondanity quite a bit. The film isn’t great and it isn’t terrible, but it doesn’t offer anything beyond that.

Closest Comparison: Ronin crossed with The Bourne Ultimatum

Mowgli: Legend of the Jungle (Netflix) - 4/5

This is what Disney’s The Jungle Book (2016) should have been: much more thoughtully constructed, more emotive facial animation on the animals, and an all-around more engaging story. The voice acting is so good I couldn’t tell who anyone was (except Cate Blanchett), and was astonished to see the cast list in the end credits. In Disney’s version Mowgli looks like he has never been outisde before and timidly walks around fallen logs. In this version Mowgli is running on all fours and diving off treebranches. This is a microcosm of the difference in quality between these two movies. Mowgli: Legend of the Jungle is a bit darker than its Disney counterpart, and even though it’s still a family-weight film some parts may be frightening to young children.

Closest comparison: It’s a better version of Disney’s The Jungle Book (2016)

Mortal Engines - 2/5

This is a young adult book turned into a movie, and it is a mess. The story is poorly written, leaving many plot points confused with unsatisfactory explanations. The acting is passable but bland, better only than the writing which is equally dull. The only interesting parts of the movie were one single character, and the visuals. The costuming and vehicle design did a great job of building a world for the charactes to inhabit, if only there were a story and three-dimensional characters to go with them.

Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse - 5/5

This movie is dripping with awesome style, but if it doesn’t appeal to you that will affect your enjoyment of the overall film. There’s still a lot to like beyond that with amazing cinematography, vivid characters, and both meaningful and hilarious dialogue. Seeing alternate universe interpretations of all the well-known Spider-Man canon is a blast. The interactions between Miles and his dad are insightful, and there’s unexpected depth to the interactions between the ‘Spider-People’. Funny, fun, and visually amazing, it doesn’t get much better than this.

Closest comparison: It’s like Spider-Man: Homecoming meets The Lego Movie.

Once Upon a Deadpool - 4/5

This PG-13 re-cut version of Deadpool 2 does a great job of removing (most of) the blood and language. Framing the story in a ‘Princess Bride’ storytelling setting works brilliantly, allowing them to cut around the R-rated bits and throw in new footage and jokes where needed. There are several new scenes that work well, including a Stan Lee post-credits tribute, though if you’re not familiar with The Princess Bride those jokes may be underwhelming. The original cut of Deadpool 2 was slightly better, just because the timing and filming of the scenes was designed for it, but this is a better introduction to the character if you shied away from the other films for content reasons. It’s still irreverent and crass, but toned down considerably.

Ralph Breaks the Internet - 2/5

It’s very modern feminist, to the extent that if whether you enjoy the movie will be largely determined by whether you agree with modern feminism. Beyond that, though, there are several structural issues with the movie. For example, the film invents a character flaw for Ralph just so he can have a flaw to work through in the climax of the film. It’s not too far fetched, but it’s not well-established. In the attempt to promote women, all of the women in the film either don’t have flaws or don’t have their flaws addressed at all, which makes the characters universally bland and uninteresting. Still, there are a few shining lines of comedy and insight that are quickly passed over but are great while they’re being spoken.

Closest comparison: It’s like a cross between Wreck-It Ralph and the Emoji Movie.

Castlevania, Season 2 (Netflix) - 2/5

This season is very inconsistent. The first five episodes are extremely dull and tedious, explaining everyone’s personal stance on everything at an excruciating pace. Then episodes six and seven are the amazing, action-packed spectacle that the entire show should have been, with awesome fights, weapons, monsters, locations, character moments, and spectacle. Then episode eight rewrites all the characters as the least interesting, most annoying versions of themselves with no consistency or relevance to the rest of the show. If you liked the first season, just watch episodes six and seven, and spare yourself the frustration; you’re not missing anything.

Content warnings: language, gore

Hilda (Netflix) - 4/5

On the surface it seems like this is just your average kids show, what with the colorful animation and child protagonists. But the story is much more nuanced than others of its kind. Why doesn’t she go to her mom first when this or that happens, but tries to deal with it herself, as per the trope? That issue is addressed directly in conversation later, something I’ve rarely seen a show do. Of course some of the scenarios wrap up a little too neatly and two episodes in particular treat massive property damage like fun adventurous hijinks with no consequences for those involved, but on the whole this is a great show with positive messages for the whole family.

It’s like a cross between Adventure Time and Steven Universe, but with more nuance.

Creed II - 3/5

Don’t get me wrong, this is still a good movie. It’s an interesting logical continuation of the story from Creed and is enjoyable to watch. It almost crested to a 4/5, but there are just too many plot points that never go anywhere and missed opportunities to have really great moments. All of the interesting camera work from the first installment is gone and the writing turns the story into a family drama. The acting is still good but without the subsance there’s no reason to see this movie over any other.

The Dead Pool (1988) - 2/5

Not to be confused with Deadpool (2016), this fifth and final installment in the Dirty Harry series is lackluster at best. It forgets to be exciting and instead muddles through the plot just to get to the end. A few simple action scenes and lots of tired hard-boiled detective beats make this movie old hat, even for the era in which it was made. The most fun aspect of it is seeing Liam Neeson and Jim Carrey in bit parts before they were as famous as they are today. On the whole, though, it only amounts to the last gasp of better films.

The Ballad of Buster Scruggs (Netflix) - 5/5

It’s bizarre and amazing, funny and tragic, beautiful and nerve-racking all at the same time. Or rather, in succession, but and it knows what it is every step of the way even if the audience is still trying to figure it out. The Coen brothers lead their audience expertly through various stories, keeping the emotions just where they want them every step of the way. It’s very violent in parts, sometimes played for comedy, sometimes for tragedy. If you like Coen brothers movies it’s a must-see, if you like Westerns don’t let the beginning throw you off. This movie touches on all the different aspects that are central to other Westerns, somehow without giving them short shrift, and there’s nothing else like it.

Creed (2015) - 5/5

I’m not normally drawn to boxing movies, but there’s nothing to criticize with this one. The story is so strong and the acting is incredible by everyone involved. It’s a very moving, powerful film with a clearly stated central theme and message that avoids being preachy. It avoids the tired manufactured drama of lesser films but lets the story carry itself by the sheer weight of its sincerity. Smartly, the director Ryan Coogler tells the story in a way that the audience doesn’t need to have seen any of the Rocky films to understand everything that’s going on in the story. Absolutely impressive cinematography with more oners than Spielberg and to think about than its predecessors, this film is one of the all-time greats for film snobs and popcorn flick lovers alike.

Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales (2017) - 1/5

This movie has nothing to offer except a few neat visuals. Unfortunately, even those are surrounded by an unwatchable mess of bland characters, dumb dialogue, and plot contrivances. So much of this movie does not follow from the premises, making it hard to follow why people are doing what they’re doing and how they think that might work out in their favor, other than that the plot demands it. And it’s a shame because the character design on Javier Bardem’s Captain Salazar is some of the best in the series. Unfortunately his character becomes muddled and confused as the story progresses, as do all the characters, resulting in a clear cash grab from Disney. Even the jokes don’t land. There’s nothing redeemable about this dud of a movie.

V for Vendetta (2005) - 4/5

This is a very politcal and thought-provoking film, but manages to refrain from being preachy by two virtues. Firstly, it is set in a distopian alternate present the is so significantly different from anything existing in the world today that it is remanded to the realm of alegory. And secondly, there is bound to be something in this film with which the viewer will disagree, or at the very least be challenged to think about, no matter what his political leanings. While the Brittish take the view that Guy Faulks was wrong for trying to overthrow the parliament, the film takes the much more American view that “Governments should be afaid of their people”, thought the cast is largely Brittish. It takes much more time to delve into the philosophy than the writers’ previous film, The Matrix, but still contains an excellent action scene near the end. Outstanding performances from Hugo Weaving and Natalie Portman, and absolute one time must-see.

The Nutcracker and the Four Realms - 2/5

It’s unfortunate that this didn’t have a better script, because for the most part the costume and set design are gorgeous. So much care and effort was clearly taken to make everything look amazing, and it does. It feels like Tim Burton by way of Joe Johnston, and even gets perfect creepy at one point, though not scary enough to frighten older children or teens. But the witing is vapid and the story is empty, and much of the acting is painfully stilted. The characters are caracatures, not behaving internally consistently but instead doing and saying whatever the plot needs them to in order to progress the story. There’s a surprising amount of ballet in this movie as well; it’s not enough for ballet lovers, though, and too much for ballet indifferents. All in all, it’s a beautiful mess and not worth your time.

Closest comparison: Alice in Wonderland (Tim Burton, 2010)