Riot’s Rapid Reviews
Update:
What’s good sports fans?! Figured I owed my recurring readers a quick explanation of my absence from the review blog. Outside of the jam-packed holiday celebrations, abruptly and sadly my 2018 MacBook Pro decided to give me what I’ve come to find out is the “uncommon” black screen of death (planned obsolescence much?). As unfortunate as that is, I haven’t necessarily been in a rush to either replace it or find a way to get a new post up (Riot’s undisciplined nature showing its ugly face). That being said, I was still regularly going to the movies whilst simultaneously doing an absolutely garbage job keeping up on my reading. So I figured I would end 2023 doing a rapid fire of sorts of all the movies I saw during the year that I didn’t take the time to review. Save for one that I particularly enjoyed on streaming, these were all theater features past and current and will be ranked from worst to best regardless of release date.
Silent Night: Silent Night was one of those films that should have had literally everything going for it but somehow managed to completely s*** the bed in nearly every aspect. John Woo directing a violent revenge story is one of those things that action lovers would automatically salivate over and having Joel Kinnaman being the lead (especially after watching his brilliant performance in Season 1 of Netflix’s Altered Carbon), should have been the sweet icing on the cake. The premise of a violent action flick nearly devoid of dialogue was an intriguing concept that simply ran out of steam, mostly because the creators very quickly ran out of action sequences that were interesting enough to not require people speaking. Kinnaman playing the tormented father could have worked if they didn’t include what was clearly a complex relationship with the similarly grieving mother. Outside of the character development that was hamstringed by the lack of dialogue, the fighting scenes go totally off the rails, complete with unbearably illogical choices on Kinnaman’s behalf and the inability of Woo to essentially NOT make him John Wick (because John Wick barely makes sense in its own universe that is far better established). The conclusion of the story is unsatisfactory to say the least and it was certainly one of those films that left me wishing for the time back. Riot’s Rating: 4/10
Transformers: Rise of the Beasts: I’m certain that it’ll be to no one’s surprise that another Transformers movie made it far down the list. What might shock you is: I really didn’t think it was terrible, especially when placed on the landscape of some of its predecessors. In terms of positives, the kid in me was stoked to see the Maximals finally brought to life (I vividly remember watching Beast Wars when I was younger, helping my little brothers transform their surprisingly complicated action figures). As you repeat readers will know, I have never hidden my distaste for Pete Davidson, so color me surprised when I actually enjoyed his voice performance abilities as Mirage. Overall, the graphics were pretty decent and some of the battle sequences had those classic Transformer movie elements that I’d argue keep the franchise running. Being set in the 90’s had cool throwback elements as well, complete with music that really brought on the nostalgia factor. However, Rise of the Beasts suffered the same fate as nearly every one of its previous films. It overly involves the human actors as the catalysts for the final battle result, which I understand is a traditional element of the franchise, but doesn’t match the intensity of maybe the first three films. At least in the past, they used a lot of “trained soldiers” and human elements that actually dealt with warfare. The overall acting was shaky at best and for a movie titled Rise of the Beasts, it severely under-involved the Maximal characters and even eliminated some of the more popular ones entirely. Since it’s been long enough, I don’t see the harm in spoiling the end credits scene, which hints at a crossover of G.I. Joe and the Transformers. I am totally on board with this if they can do it well. It would take the audience back to the original trilogy, adding the human battle element that could actually make sense while simultaneously adding to a nostalgia factor that makes sense. They will be treading on dangerous territory as the standalone G.I. Joe movies were pretty awful. I’m still here for it. Riot’s Rating: 6.5/10
Aquaman and the Lost Kingdom: Going against the advice of multiple people including friends and family (thanks for reluctantly coming along, Josh!) I strapped in to watch the final “death throes” of the DCEU. My words verbatim leaving the theater: “It wasn’t THAT bad!” Reflecting back on it, I stand by the statement. As far as the DCEU catalog goes, I personally think the original Aquaman ranks high as one of the best films they put out, which seems pretty contradictory to general opinion. Jason Momoa was and still is a good fit for the character, however altered from the source content. I think his kid-like persona keeps the audience on his side. That being said, it’s that personality that kind of hurt and helped this iteration of the story. His banter with his half-brother Orm (Patrick Wilson) is the real highlight of the film, keeping things light and funny. But considering the whole point of the plot is that Curry is settling into his role as King, husband, and father, it creates a lot of dissonance with what you see him doing and the choices he makes. After everything is said and done, you don’t think he is more grown up than when the movie started, he was just able to beat the “bad guy.” Speaking of, the villain(s) of the story end up being what is arguably the worst thing about the film. I saw no necessity in bringing Black Manta back as the antagonist and Yahya Abdul-Mateen II’s performance really didn’t bring much impact to the table. And the dispatching of the final, “real baddie” was certainly s low point overall. Entertainment news leaks and controversies put this film through the ringer and it shows in the editing. Too many scenes reek of being haphazardly chopped and sewn together, showing clear signs of panicked editing that didn’t help the overall cohesion of the film. The plotlines are predictable but I don’t necessarily think it hurt the story progression. I surprisingly enjoyed the effects, however asinine, and was greatly impressed with the vast spectrum of bright colors that made the whole undersea and above ground worlds pop. There are a lot of negatives to be sure, but I think my ultra-low expectations left me more entertained than not this time around. Was it the best end to the DCEU run? Probably not. But it was definitely fitting being fairly mediocre like the overall catalog turned out to be. Riot’s Rating: 6.8/10
Wonka: This is probably the most torn about a film the entire year. Wonka was just a jumbled mix of elements I did like and things I wanted to like but simply couldn’t. Let’s start with the negatives as I saw them. Wonka struggles to pick a lane. It felt like the creators were trying to find the middle road between Depp and Wilder’s Wonkas and ended up with one that not only doesn’t make any sort of sense in either timeline, but also doesn’t establish Chalamet as his own identity. The film is absolutely too long and midway through, you’re confronted multiple times with the “when is this going to end and how?” The musical scenes and the tracks themselves aren’t particularly memorable. The film relies heavily on the songs being the film’s exposition, which I’ve mentioned before is a perfectly fine method of pushing a story forward, but you have to do it right. The sheer number of the tracks in this film and the fact that 4-5 of them feel completely unnecessary doesn’t help with this. The actor’s accents being quite literally all over the place (American, British, New Yorker, Irish, etc.) and all in one place kind of took me out of the moment and made the dialogue/interactions between characters awkward. Finally, Hugh Grant as the one and only heavily feature Oompa Loompa was a terribly awkward miss. Considering he has already come out against his own experience and performance is pretty telling. Now, the things I enjoyed. The musical numbers had some pretty exceptional visuals and choreography. Timothee Chalamet, while constrained by the writing and character development did a perfectly fine job and had a surprisingly fantastic singing voice. The overall singing is good even with the lack of captivating songs. The set designs are overall really good and eye catching with Wonka’s original store standing out amongst the rest. And while the animation/CGI has its low moments, there are a few particularly spectacular ones, like the final scene where we see the evolution of Wonka’s factory while Chalamet serenades with a new rendition of the classic Wonka song. If the film was even 20-30min shorter and the crews were more intentional/selective with the music numbers they included, I think this really could have been something great. In the end, it has a decent message and enough nostalgia to make Willy Wonka fans happy. Riot’s Rating: 7/10
The Boy and the Heron: I would argue most fans of Studio Ghibli would agree with the following feeling/sentiment after leaving one of Miyazaki’s films: “I don’t know what the heck I just watched, but man was it cool!” One, if not the only, draw to when HBO MAX originally came out as a streaming application was that they featured the library of Studio Ghibli. While it took us a while to finish, the wife and I intentionally signed up to make our way through the entire collection, finishing it earlier this year before cancelling what was now called MAX. The consensus when we finished, was half of these films were off the rails nutty, half we needed to buy for our own collection, but all were visually unbelievable. The Boy and the Heron certainly falls into the first category and, as a person who is pretty involved with anime and has experienced a lot of direct Japanese culture, I have no idea what this film was ultimately about. There is something kind of freeing about this, where you can sit back and simply bask in the visual spectacle in front of you. Miyazaki and his studio doesn’t necessarily allow this though. His characters are often extremely compelling, however confusing and his insistence in including out-of-this-world elements and characters is something that is too hard to ignore. A man hiding within the body of a Heron and exploding out of its mouth is a prime example or having an army of enormous parakeets that want to feast on human flesh is another. How does one reconcile with that? I’m always left wondering (even for the more straight forward stories Ghibli has put out) what parts of Japanese culture are inherent in these stories? Are these story elements something children are told growing up? Are these lessons a part of the overall life outlook of the people? Without more research I’ll probably never know, but I will say for certain that The Boy and the Heron was another visually stunning, artistic masterpiece in a long catalog of similar titles. I may not always understand it, but Miyazaki and Ghibli’s work almost demands respect regardless of whether or not you comprehend what they were trying to say. Riot’s Rating: 8/10
A Good Person: This was a title that unfortunately flew under the radar as far as I could tell. Only really by listening to the Fake Doctors, Real Friends podcast was I even made aware of it to be perfectly honest. I have seen the majority of Zach Braff’s directorial films and to date only am enamored with his first, Garden State. It would be wrong to say that his others aren’t quality films, I just don’t know if they could necessarily be called great. A Good Person falls again within this vein, but I think stands out a little more if simply just for the performance of Florence Pugh. During his podcast, Braff mentioned multiple times that he wrote the part specifically to show off his, at the time, girlfriend’s acting talents. In this, I think both absolutely delivered. Pugh’s emotional journey through the film is a pleasure to watch because of how emotionally destructive it really is. The addict’s journey is hard enough, but dealing with generational trauma as well as the guilt of her past actions on top of it all is absolutely brutal to watch, but Pugh handles all of the emotionally charged moments incredibly well. Morgan Freeman shows that he can still rise up to new challenges in his acting and it was particularly worth it to see him stretch out past the stoic, even-keeled personality he normally portrays. His angry outbursts, complete with out of character swearing was really poignant for the moments and emphasized his character’s journey more than maybe it was intended. The film only suffers in a few moments of dramatics that seem to go too far and had some additional interpersonal confrontations that made absolutely no sense. Braff often deals with a repetitive theme of the main character wanting to leave whatever small town they feel trapped in. I’m just not certain it was necessary for this one. Check out A Good Person for a Florence Pugh acting clinic. Riot’s Rating: 8.2/10
Feast of the Seven Fishes: So there’s a couple reasons that outright I probably shouldn’t be including this film in this review blitz. The first and most obvious being, this film came out in 2019. Second, I didn’t bother taking any notes on it. And third, this is a streaming movie that appears sequestered to the Netflix, released for Christmas only category. It’s become a bit of a tradition in this household to binge watch Christmas movies, no matter the quality, during the holiday season (and by binge watch I mostly mean we put it on and I fall asleep almost immediately, hence the no matter the quality part). There are the few outliers that I am entertained enough to watch and this year it was Feast of the Seven Fishes, to which I absolutely didn’t know existed. Christmas love story movies are probably as cookie cutter as it gets and Seven Fishes isn’t particularly different in terms of narrative structure. What set it apart as I saw it, was above par acting, experienced actors that played elders in the family structure, and young faces that were far better than I was initially giving them credit for. The humor is particularly great in this one and handles the throwback societal dynamics of the 80’s in a tasteful way. I was particularly impressed with the two romantic leads Madison Iseman and Skyler Gisondo and though biased, was belly laughing at nearly every scene with Andrew Schulz in it. The film was heartwarming, hilarious, and steeped in Christmas, family-gathering nostalgia. Check it out before Netflix sequesters it for another year. Riot’s Rating: 8.5/10
The Iron Claw: It’s hard enough to read about the real facts surrounding the Von Erich wrestling family, but when you combine it with exceptional performances and brilliant cinematography, the tragedy is heightened to a soul crushing level. A24 and Lionsgate have what is sure to be a multiple award winner here and I would give particular nods to writer/director Sean Durkin, Cinematographer Matyas Erdely, and actor Zac Efron. First and foremost I was blown away with how this film was shot. Everything was always up close and personal, an aspect that I’ve seen introduced into boxing films that really help highlight the intensity of the matches. The tragedy of the Von Erich family, while almost completely laid upon the shoulders of the father, Fritz (an unapologetically intense portrayal by Holt McCallany) is still shared amongst his sons who have similar yet wildly different reactions to the pressure they’re being placed under to achieve wrestling greatness. A good portion of the emotional and physical wounds are self-inflicted literally and figuratively. While Efron is certainly the standout of the film and gave what I would argue is the performance of his career (not even mentioning his unbelievable physical transformation) the chemistry between him and his co-stars is palpable. Romantically, Lily James serves perfectly in her role as Efron’s love interest/wife and the brotherly dynamic comes off about as real as it gets with Jeremy Allen White, Harris Dickinson, and Stanley Simons. Like any good sports drama, the film takes the audience through the highs of these wrestler’s lives before systematically breaking us down with each tragic fate of the brothers. The degradation of Efrons psyche is hard enough to watch, but coupled with the mother’s (Maura Tierney) guilt of outliving her children and the hard-nosed near indifference of the father only adds to the disaster. The theme of trying to escape a family “curse” is certainly driven home when you consider the Von Erich’s story was so catastrophic, the creators didn’t even have the time to include a whole other brother!! What you come to find though, is that if they are cursed by anything, it’s mainly by an unending string of bad choices. The only negative comment I would offer is that Jeremy Allen White is underused and that’s simply because he was so good, you wanted more scenes than he was given. This wrestling family’s story in The Iron Claw (which even I was unaware of even though I was a big wrestling fan as a child and teenager) is an absolute must see. Come for the stunning cinematography and stay for the incredible performances. Riot’s Rating: 9.9/10
Godzilla Minus One: Talk about a film that came seemingly out of nowhere to blow the world away. This movie maybe have undercut every kaiju based movie, essentially rewriting what it means to make one. Minus One does what I think no other kaiju movie has successfully done so far and that is seamlessly create a compelling human element while simultaneously making a truly terrifying monster. Minus One took away the “savior role” that recent iterations of the massive lizard have portrayed. Godzilla is unapologetically a bad guy again and it absolutely freakin’ works! There isn’t a moment in the film where it doesn’t run chills up your spine, whether or not it’s the initial appearance when Godzilla is smaller and moves/fights like a dinosaur straight out of the scariest Jurassic Park movie, or when it’s in the water chasing down battleships, or tearing through the city with its reimagined, atom-bomb like explosive ray. Godzilla’s new blast ray is terrifying in the absolute visceral way it’s activated and released. Charging up from its tail, each spiked spine piece locks into place and turns blue as the energy makes its way up to the head. When the power is released, Godzilla whips its head forward in a brutal display of sheer chaos, turning its target/contact point into the site of an atom-bomb-like explosion. I found this to be far more interesting and scarier than the laser-beam version that’s been showing up of late and the callousness of the destruction it causes makes this version of Godzilla all the more terrifying. A subtle change to its eye design, circular pupils/irises and visible whites in its eyes made this Godzilla more human than lizard and somehow conveyed a malice that I don’t think was present in other iterations. Amazingly, all of those positives aren’t the legitimate selling point of the movie. The emotionally charged journey of the protagonists Koichi and Noriko is what I would argue the element that really elevates this Godzilla above all other kaiju movies. Koichi, a kamikaze pilot in WWII who shirks his duty, must go through the crushing journey of dealing with the shame of his cowardice, the redemption arc of building a life for his adopted family with Noriko, and then climax of his final faceoff with Godzilla and his own fate. The acting is superb throughout and the emotional conclusions are only matched by the uncertainty of what might come next. Godzilla Minus One is 100% the must-see movie of the year and QR Fiction’s very first perfect score. Go see it while you still can. Riot’s Rating: 10/10
Welp, that’s it for 2023! I’m sure there is a few movies I missed blurbing about but I’m certain you’ve all had enough, if you’ve made it this far! I’d say overall this year was a bit of a mixed bag for film, but the standouts were pretty spectacular. 2024 has what I would argue waaaay too many sequels on deck and more than half of them, I’m certainly worried for. But you never know what will come along and surprise you. Outside of the film universe, next year probably has a lot of awful things in store for us as a nation. The best we can do is be good to the people around us, spend less time on social media and the news, and get back to the basics of what makes life worth living. Best of luck to everyone and their New Year’s Resolutions!
Happy New Year from Quiet Riot!
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