Mediocre Movie Club Movie Reviews

Blade Runner 2049

10/6/2017

A-
3.50

A cop on the hunt for renegade cyborgs unearths a conspiracy.

Directed by Denis Villeneuve
Starring Ryan Gosling, Harrison Ford, and Robin Wright
Review by Phil Crone

Before diving into the review proper, let’s get a couple important questions out of the way…

SHOULD YOU SEE THE ORIGINAL? – Probably, but it isn’t required viewing. A few pieces of the aesthetic might be lost in translation, but you really don’t need much beyond a basic understanding of who Deckard is, who Rachel is, and their relationship. Everything else can be gleaned from context within the movie.

SPOILER-FREE, SHOULD I SEE THIS? – More than likely yes. The pacing is a bit deliberate by today’s standards, but if you like Denis Villeneuve’s previous outings Sicario and especially Arrival, or you’re a fan of the original, you should see this. And try to see it on IMAX or Cinemark xD or something like that, because this is a visual spectacle.

Ok, and with that, onto the show…

15 Comments

A Monster Calls

9/29/2017

1 Comment

B-
2.78

A boy with a terminally ill mother encounters a story-telling tree monster.

Directed by Juan Antonio Bayona
Starring Lewis MacDougall, Felicity Jones, and Liam Neeson
Initial Review by Phil Crone

A Monster Calls should be commended for taking on a difficult subject with a more whimsical approach than we normally see, but confusing underlying decisions ultimately undermine what could have been one of the great movies of 2016. The story starts with a strong enough foundation. Conor is a young boy with a life no one wants: his mother is sick and presumably dying, he has no other significant support system to look to, and he is constantly bullied by another boy who may or may not actually be in love with him, but I digress. His life is almost comically terrible – why not just give him a physical deformity while we’re at it? Conor finds respite in his drawing, and these fantasies manifest themselves in the form of a tree monster who visits Conor with the promise of telling him three stories, after which Conor will reveal “his truth.” The structure is reminiscent of the 2006 modern classic Pan’s Labyrinth, but the similarities begin and end there.

1 Comment

Don't Think Twice

6/24/2017

7 Comments

B
3.08

As their theater closes, an improv troupe contemplates what happens next.

Directed by Mike Birbiglia
Starring Mike Birbiglia, Keegan Michael Key, and Gillian Jacobs
Initial Review by Phil Crone

Over nearly a decade and thousands of hours of listening to The Adam Carolla Show, I’ve become more and more fascinated with the art of improv. Carolla is a gifted improviser, and he will occasionally harp on the important rules of improv and his days in improv in his 20’s while he waited on his big break. That, coupled with my love of Saturday Night Live in my formative years, drew me to the subject matter in “Don’t Think Twice.” Writer/director Mike Birbiglia brings those themes to life in a recognizable way here. I really enjoyed “Don’t Think Twice” for its memorable cast of characters and small moments that will stick with me, even if the overall narrative was a little lacking.

7 Comments

Moonlight

3/3/2017

16 Comments

A-
3.80

A young man's life depicted at three ages.

Directed by Barry Jenkins
Starring Naomie Harris, Mahershala Ali, and Trevante Rhodes
Initial Review by Phil Crone

We all have our criteria for what makes a movie a definitive A+. It could be as simple as just being entertaining. It could be because it has no discernable flaws in a precise checklist. It could be quotability and rewatchability. For me, an A+ is a movie that I keep returning to in my head days and even weeks later, pondering and re-analyzing scenes in my head, finding new takeaways and challenging initial conclusions. I watched “Moonlight” five days ago, and it continues to permeate my thoughts. By my own subjective measure, I believe that makes “Moonlight” an A+. Ultimately, what “Moonlight” does so perfectly is take, on the surface, a very unique and unrecognizable situation and turn that into a universal truth. “Moonlight” is a stark reminder of how much who we are is an influence of who came before us and our intensely human desire to belong and be accepted for who we are.

16 Comments

Me and Earl and the Dying Girl

9/20/2016

8 Comments

B-
2.83

A budding cinephile is guilted into spending time with a cancer-stricken classmate.

Directed by Alfonso Gomez-Rejon
Starring Thomas Mann, RJ Cyler, and Olivia Cooke
Initial Review by Phil Crone

“Me and Earl and the Dying Girl” might pander to critic sensibilities with the famous movie parodies and decidedly hipster references early on, but it’s a great story with a lot of heart built around three likable characters.

The movie lives and dies with its characters, and most of all with Greg. I could see Greg being polarizing, but I found him likable. He’s got a dry sense of humor, rattling off several great lines throughout the movie, and he’s the type of painfully-stunted introvert that I think is easy to root for. We’re getting the story through his eyes, and it’s interesting to see how the story morphs as Greg tells it. His opening line winds up being all we think we need to know about his ruined senior year and terrible movie that killed a girl. As we go along, we feel Greg soften to his situation of being forced into an awkward friendship with Rachel and how it helped him grow as a person. This gave me the sense that Greg didn’t realize how much he cherished his time with Rachel until he’s actually telling the story. This impression is only reiterated by the details as the story progresses. Early scenes feel very stiff, as they should, given the situation Greg and Rachel find themselves in. By the end, I get the sense that Greg began to soften and present a more distorted, lighter side to the affair. He even goes so far as to retract his opening statement of Rachel dying, attempting to convince himself more than the audience that the ending isn’t already written. Ultimately, this gives me the sense that we don’t know the whole story about Earl or Rachel, but in Greg’s version at least, they’re impossible to dislike.

8 Comments

<<Previous

Blade Runner 2049

A-
3.50

A Monster Calls

B-
2.78

Don't Think Twice

B
3.08

Moonlight

A-
3.80

Me and Earl and the Dying Girl

B-
2.83

Authors

Categories

Archives

Blade Runner 2049

A-​3.50

A Monster Calls

B-2.78

Don't Think Twice

B3.08

Moonlight

A-​3.80

Me and Earl and the Dying Girl

B-​2.83

Authors

Categories

Archives

A-
3.50

B-
2.78

B
3.08

A-
3.80

B-
2.83