Capsule Movie Reviews
Dec. 27th, 2017 11:49 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
chuckroStar Wars: The Last Jedi - This was fun, this was funny, this was wholly divergent from the established tropes in a number of places (that's a plus), this was altogether too long and felt more like a six-episode mini-series than a full movie (that's a minus). I liked pretty much everything about fuck-off-I'm-hiding-here Luke, and I was perfectly happy with the revelation about Rey's parentage.
(Aside: I saw a wonderful theory online that Han and Chewie's “boy and his dog” relationship makes much more sense if you consider that Han is the dog. Chewie is the responsible adult who makes most of the real decisions, and it makes the “life debt” make much more sense. You probably wouldn't permanently adopt a person who saved your life, but a heroic dog? You would pamper that pup.)
Mr. Magoo's Christmas Carol - On one hand, except for the part where they swap the Past and Present ghosts (Present comes first, for some reason) and drop the Fran/Fred subplots, this is a startlingly accurate cartoon adaptation. They use a lot of original lines and plot beats. That said, there's very little time spent with Magoo being Magoo, which means it doesn't actually add much to the original. And if I'm not getting bonus character gags, I'd rather be watching Patrick Stewart.
Stasis (Netflix movie) - Several agents are sent to the past by the rebel group in a war-torn future, taking over people's bodies at the moment of their death. But one woman inhabits a teenage girl who remains as a ghostly “remnant”, which causes all sorts of trouble when a hunter arrives from the future to capture them. This feels very YA-aimed-at-girls, and has trouble deciding exactly how its time-travel works (and how much, if at all, history can be changed). Not so great.
What We Do in the Shadows – A Christopher Guest-style mockumentary about vampires in New Zealand, directed by the guy who did Thor: Ragnarok. (And Anton, the lead werewolf, is played by the guy who voices Coran in Voltron: Legendary Defender. His voice is very distinctive.) It's goofy and amusing because the characters aren't actually very good vampires, they're dysfunctional dumbasses who happen to have superpowers. This is worth your time.
(Aside: I saw a wonderful theory online that Han and Chewie's “boy and his dog” relationship makes much more sense if you consider that Han is the dog. Chewie is the responsible adult who makes most of the real decisions, and it makes the “life debt” make much more sense. You probably wouldn't permanently adopt a person who saved your life, but a heroic dog? You would pamper that pup.)
Mr. Magoo's Christmas Carol - On one hand, except for the part where they swap the Past and Present ghosts (Present comes first, for some reason) and drop the Fran/Fred subplots, this is a startlingly accurate cartoon adaptation. They use a lot of original lines and plot beats. That said, there's very little time spent with Magoo being Magoo, which means it doesn't actually add much to the original. And if I'm not getting bonus character gags, I'd rather be watching Patrick Stewart.
Stasis (Netflix movie) - Several agents are sent to the past by the rebel group in a war-torn future, taking over people's bodies at the moment of their death. But one woman inhabits a teenage girl who remains as a ghostly “remnant”, which causes all sorts of trouble when a hunter arrives from the future to capture them. This feels very YA-aimed-at-girls, and has trouble deciding exactly how its time-travel works (and how much, if at all, history can be changed). Not so great.
What We Do in the Shadows – A Christopher Guest-style mockumentary about vampires in New Zealand, directed by the guy who did Thor: Ragnarok. (And Anton, the lead werewolf, is played by the guy who voices Coran in Voltron: Legendary Defender. His voice is very distinctive.) It's goofy and amusing because the characters aren't actually very good vampires, they're dysfunctional dumbasses who happen to have superpowers. This is worth your time.
