Zootopia Two: China To The Rescue

Disney Animation could not get more generic if it tried.

The first film felt paper thin with the idea of the predators vs the prey metaphor working as a stand-in for race relations, everyone could see the very obvious message of not judging others by what they are but rather the content of their character. Yet this film feels the need to push a worn out and frankly reductive metaphor further forward as it has nothing to say otherwise.

In many ways this is the very worst kind of sequel not one that exists due to a need to, but rather one that is just done for profit. Everything feels a bit more low rent, the humour a bit more stale, the voice cast sound like they are going through the motions, they have the woman from Abbot Elementary basically being an animal version of her character from that show, it all feels very low effort.

Finally wherein Disney films of old used to have a clear moral message that the film would teach over the course of its runtime, there is nothing like that here, maybe it is the reliance of shades of grey rather than actually having established heroes and villains or the need to make everything morally complex that leads to this issue it is hard to tell.

Overall, this is just more animated slop that brings down the tone of the whole genre.

1.5/5

Pros.

It is watchable

It has a few unintentional laughs

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A Very Merry Pooh Year: Bring Back Hand Drawn Animation

Summary

Pooh and friends celebrate the holidays.

I needed a pallet cleanser after all of the horrible three dimensional animation I have seen recently for a project I was helping a friend with, so I thought some classic hand drawn animation was just the ticket. Seeing this makes me think about what we have lost, hand drawn animation has so much more heart and soul, even when it combines with three dimensional characters or elements.

I like that this is not just a Christmas film but rather a film that reflects the whole period, there are not many animated New Years films so that was a nice change. I thought that this special did a lot to not only make it feel like Christmas but show how each individual character interacts with the season. The Christmas magic really gave the sweetness of Pooh an extra something.

I would challenge you to watch this special and not even feel a little bit Christmassy, it shows the true meaning of the season and has a wonderful message that is relevant no matter who is watching it or when.

3.5/5

Pros.

It is sweet

It is novel

It is nice to see the different character interact with Christmas

The animation

Cons.

It is slow at times

It has almost a melancholy feel at times

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Gabby’s Dollhouse The Movie

Summary

A girl and her dollhouse, go on an adventure.

So I have not watched the tv series this is based on, this was my first exposure to Gabby, and I have to say it was a strange experience.

On the one hand I liked the weirdness of the film, and some of the odd little one-liners or moments. I am also a big cat person so I enjoyed that aspect of it quite a bit. However, on the other hand I thought there was a surprisingly morose side to this film, the idea of Gabby growing up and how adulthood is presented as a world of depression and misery that is effectively unavoidable was striking and more than a little depressing.

Kristen Wigg here has some fun but it just seems like at actress in need of work, it feels at times like she is debasing herself for money, and there are times wherein you feel a little embarrassed for her.

The music, yes there are songs in this film, is pretty much exactly what you would expect chart soundalike slop, coupled with TikTok dances a few years out of date, this is bad cringe.

Overall, the blood of Dora runs in this film’s veins and I mean that as a compliment, the weirder aspects of the film are enjoyable but there is also bad cringe and depressing messaging to contend with.

3/5
Pros.

The weirdness

A few sweet moments

Well-paced

Cons.

It is depressing

There is bad cringe present

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Jurassic Park: Overrated In The Extreme

Summary

The older I get the more I realise that Steven Spielberg is not a good director.

Removed from a childlike lens of whimsy I wanted to see how this film held up. If it was the masterpiece people seem to think it is, turns out they are wrong.

Whilst I appreciate what this film was doing, when it was doing it, and the lasting impact it has had. That does not change the fact it is just the same thing over and over again, dinosaur attacks, kills a person and moves on to the next, yes there are a few tense scenes where the dinosaurs are looking for people to kill but don’t find anyone, but that’s it. I think if this film had not been so visually impressive when it came out many people wouldn’t have bat an eye, it is just a generic shark film plot but with dinosaurs.

The plot is glacially slow in actually getting off the ground with the dinosaurs breaking out, and the film feels so bloated at times that it is distracting. One could argue what it would be like if it was not given to Spielberg at the height of his power and was instead given to someone who actually wanted to make a tight film.

Overall, disappointing and highlighting the very worst of Spielberg

1/5

Pros.

It is visually interesting

Cons.

It is badly paced

The acting isn’t very good

It is repetitive

It is bloated

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Pirates Of The Caribbean World’s End: Bring Back Johnny Depp

Summary

The pirates cast realise that there is no film without Jack Sparrow and so go to Davy Jones’ locker to get him back.

Watching this re-release makes one even more confident in the belief that Johnny Depp is the heart and soul of the Pirates franchise. Not only does his performance anchor the film, but he is a truly likable protagonist, something that modern Hollywood is lacking.

Despite being a long film this film flies by, and has something for everyone with great action, romance and laughs. There is even a little horror peppered in here and there, for people like me. For the most part the film works well across the board.

The main issue with the film is that there are filler scenes that could easily be cut out, as I said earlier for the most part the film is well paced, however, these filler scenes make the film feel just slightly slower at times and that holds the film back.

Moreover, the film leaves far too many lose ends open and I know they thought they were going to do more films, and did, but considering this is the last film with Keira Knightly and Orlando Bloom you would think that they would have given them more of a conclusive ending.

Overall, a near perfect film that just has a few slow scenes holding it back.

4/5

Pros

The action

The romance

The comedy and the horror

It feels like a good ending for the franchise and Jack

Cons

Will and Elizabeth deserve a more definitive ending

A few bloated scenes

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The Fountain Of Youth: Indiana Jones For Beta Males

Summary

John Krasinski does his best Indiana Jones impression.

I don’t understand why Apple TV thought we needed a new globetrotting Indiana Jones esque adventure movie. The last Indie film should have been proof enough against that concept.

Moreover, where films like Indiana Jones and National Treasure were commanded by having a strong lead who was believable in the role, here if anything Krasinski is too soft. He doesn’t have the gruff toughness you would want out of this role, he seems far too affable and silly. He simply reads wrong for the part.

As for the adventure itself it is fairly generic nothing you have not seen before, it is a globe trotting adventure for a magical artifact that in the end they don’t end up taking home as it is too dangerous and needs to be left alone. There is nothing particularly new here, it reads as very low effort adventure fare.

The wider cast are a mixed bag, Eiza Gonzalez is there she has some good fights and has reasonably decent chemistry with Krasinski, Natalie Portman is playing Natalie Portman and is taking an easy pay check. The rest of the cast slip my mind.

Overall, this film shows you why you need a good script and crucially a good idea before you go into filming, simply saying oh they are popular and people like Adventure films, a debatable claim at the moment, is not enough.

2/5

Pros.

Gonzales tries her best

There are a few unintentionally funny moments

Cons.

It is badly paced

It is generic

Krasinski is miscast

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Freakier Friday: Remember Folks Lindsey Lohan Tried To Abduct A Syrian Refugee.

Summary

Friday gets freakier.

What can be said that we didn’t all say in the lead up to this?

There was no need for this film, there was some junk food like appeal to it, with it being warming and hitting with some nostalgia and a little comedy here and there, however, there is nothing of substance nothing that makes you go ‘ah that’s why they need to make this’.

For a contemporary Disney film there was a lot less divisive nonsense than I was expecting, for example I thought for sure one of the characters would be trans gender and then you would have Lohan or Curtis’s character go into that characters body in order to understand the experience of trans people. Yet Disney managed to hold back on that, the closest they go to it is during an early section of the film wherein there is a food fight and a kid is carrying around a rainbow pride flag and manages to get it into every shot.

I think they would be hard-pressed to do a third film as there really isn’t much more they can do with this franchise in terms of the body swapping gimmick, though I am sure they could find a way if this film made them enough money.

Overall, whilst there is some comforting nostalgia here, it ultimately feels like a desperate cash grab.

2/5

Pros.

It is funny

There is some nostalgia to be had

Cons.

It doesn’t justify its existence

It comes off as a little desperate

Disney being Disney

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The Bad Guys Two: Meet The Bad Girls

Summary

The Bad Guys are back.

I saw this is a double bill with Smurfs, see my review of that now, and suffice it to say I was feeling depressed. I was beginning to think that the days were studios put effort into family films was dead. Then I saw this film. Did it reverse that notion? The answer is mixed.

Whilst this film had far more style and personality that Smurfs which felt AI made, there was also a hollowness to this film as well. The Bad Guys themselves were more likable and had charm, and you cared about the characters, but in terms of the world and the story things just felt bog standard. It felt very much like a narrative you have seen before dressed in a new skin.

I would have liked more time with Wolf, Sam Rockwell, and Diane, Zazie Beetz, to explore their relationship, and the idea of how hard it is for bad guys to be good and readjust to a society that does not want them. This would have been far more interesting that simply having the bad guys be framed by a group of bad girls, yes you can hear my groan. Alas, the film does not even do much with these new bad girls beyond have them be a foil to the bad guys, and set up some future romances, as far as characters go they are quite one dimensional. Perhaps this is done on purpose to give them more ground to mine in a third film.

Overall, serviceable but nothing special.

2.5/5

Pros.

The characters have charm

The animation has passion

Wolf and Diane

Cons.

The world feels hollow

The story is deeply uninspired

It feels predictable.

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Smurfs: Smurfette Is Black Coded Now

Summary

James Corden takes a moment from not paying his writers a fair wage, and insulting waiters to star in the third remake of the Smurfs of the recent past.

Do the Smurfs have any continued relevancy? I would argue that is doubtful, is this better or worse than the previous remakes? I would say that it is of a similar quality. Is it a good film? No. All of the Smurf remakes and reimagining’s have been terrible this is just the latest.

The film is about magic books and has the smurfs go out into the real world, surprise, surprise, whilst I enjoyed the switch between live action and animation I thought the film did not do much with it or really play around. It was very lifeless at times, and felt almost mechanical.

A particularly egregious part of this film is Rihanna as Smurfette, this was done to provide some diversity to the voice cast possibly? They also now have a very clearly LGBTQ+ smurf in the gang. How the Rihanna thing is egregious is the fact that Rihanna has to do several musical numbers, no one else in the film does, and it just feels almost like an advert for an upcoming album rather than a nice accompaniment. Did the makers of the film not think of getting maybe someone younger than the kids might be into for their horrible effort in self-promotion.

Overall, this is why Paramount as a studio has fallen and is being bought out.

1/5

Pros.

Nick Offerman’s character

Cons.

Rihanna

It is boring

It is lifeless

James Corden

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The Legend Of Ochi: Where The Gremlins Train Your Dragons

Summary

A young woman, Helena Zengel, must return a fearsome creature to it’s lair. However, along the way she realises her whole perception of the world is a lie.

Lets get this right out of the way, the premise of this film is How To Train Your Dragon mixed with Gremlins. There is little new about a child’s innocent love for a creature defying the broader societies view of it.

However, where this film soars, to use the film word of the summer, is in the world around this plot. There is something strange and interesting about it, time period wise it is liminal, it could be present day it could be forty years ago, location wise it could be Eastern Europe, a fantastical reinterpretation of Eastern Europe or somewhere all together different. The oddness of the world these characters inhabit and the flourishes that make it feel truly different to anything else that you will see this year.

Willem Dafoe is of course excellent as he often is though I would say that Emily Watson is the real star of the show, her haunting turn of a woman who gave up her child and then realises her want and need to be a mother again is quite captivating.

Overall, an interesting and rich world with some great performances.

3.5/5

Pro

The world

Watson

Dafeo

The creature

Cons.

The story

The ending is a bit too convientent

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