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Reviews
Mama's Watching (2022)
Really uncomfortable to watch at night
It's really hard to find genuinely scary horror movies that serve a purpose rather than just flooding you with jump-scares. This is where the short film Mama's Watching excels, the story is about a mother who leaves her baby to go on a business trip where she is stuck with a harrassing boss. The encounter awakens memories of a monster from her childhood.
The acting, especially the lead performance by Rose Muirhead is subtle but nuanced. You can almost feel what the character is thinking from the way Rose uses her body language and the way she looks and moves. All that is wondefully done. The lighting was fabulously done as well, changing between light and dark depending on how safe the situation is.
The horror element was really good and it gave me chills but it was honestly the writing that added depth to the horror. It grounded the story in real human trauma, not shying away from showing us that sometimes....we are the monsters we're scared of.
We Are Antarctica (2022)
Not the complete meal but a good soul appetizer
We Are Antarctica aims to teach us about Antarxtica's relationship and its importance to us. It achieves this mostly by showing off brilliant worthy of wallpaper cinematographed beauty of Antarctica and its waters. Director Jack Harries uses the entire 5-sec short 8min runtime to briefly give us a glimpse of everything that is happening or happened to Antarctica. Beautiful vintage style shots, old recordings of explorers, enthralling footage of the wild waves bursting from the body of the Southern Ocean and the wildlife. It serves as an above-average exploration of Antarctica which is understandable because there's only so much you can include in less than 10-mins. The sound quality is really good too and adds to the immersion.
7/10 Worth watching.
Incredibles 2 (2018)
Why this Pixar film doesn't blow my mind: Incredibles 2
Bob Parr: You know where my suit and ties are?
Helen Parr: Burned up when...
Bob Parr, Helen Parr: The jet destroyed our house.
Incredibles 2 Review
Director: Brad Bird
Having no recollection of the first Incredibles movie which i had only even seen fleetingly on tv screens when I was kid, the above quoted line does not relate to me. This is a blind Incredibles 2 review, not bound by nostalgia.
Incredibles 2 is a computer-animated superhero movie whch involves a family of superheroes(called Supers in the work of fiction) known as the Incredibles. The family consists of five members, Bob "Mr. Incredible" the husband, Helen "Elastigirl" the wife, Dashiell Parr "Dash" a young boy, Violet Parr a teenage girl and the baby Jack-Jack, though i don't know why they named their baby that. They all have their own indiviual powers and are basically the main cast of the movie, through out the 1hr.57mins we watch these people go through their own indiviual arcs and character development. Because of the time constraints, these scenes of personal character development are not always balanced. The plot has two main threads, "Elastigirl" going out and doing superhero stuff while Bob stays in the house to take care of the childern until the third act when these separate parts are joined together. If asked to rate the characters on their importance and screen time, the list would be:
1. Helen
2. Bob
3. Jack-Jack
4. Violet
5. Dash
Now seeing that this came from Disney, I'm glad that Incredibles 2 didn't fumble so hard in finding it's story as much as Frozen 2. Both are sequels to, what i remember, very good movies. Both movies have a good premise, tho Incredibles 2 easily beats Frozen 2 in terms of animation and character designs even though later is the newer of the two. It is such a pretty movie and the opening action scene alone sets the tone for the dynamic camera movements and beautifully choreographed action sequences with the pop and sound of a fun summer action movie even though it's animated. There is so much action going on the screen at one point that you forget you're watching a movie and get immersed in whatever's happening on the screen. It helps that Incredibles 2 is less mysterious, the opening is all about superheroes being super and it's fun, reminding you of the time when supeheroes were simple ala Spider-Man 2.
Writing. Incredibles 2 is not just a Disney movie though, it is produced by arguably the most renowned animation studio in America, Pixar. I remember watching Monsters, Inc. And being surprised how much of a workplace feel and vibe they put into a kids movie and how the movie was all the more funny and original for that. They bring some of that charm here, the world feels real, the writing is naunced enough to feel authentic to the characters that are saying those lines. There is an incredible brief but beautifully animated scene in the opening 30 minutes where two characters just sit by the pool and talk about how they have to leave their superhero life behind and find work in the real world because superheroes are illegal now and it's got all the vocabulary and writing to make that scene as real and natural as it could be.
The first half. My fav part of the movie no doubt, the first hour is exactly the kind of movie I would have expected from Pixar. The promise and buildup of Helen working outside as Bob stays in and takes care of the kids is such a fun and unique spin on the usual superhero movie formula and something that companies like Marvel Studios would have never dared to try. It feels organic and of course carries real human depth and connection, being not as stark as just going out to fight villains and save the day. Meanwhile, the kids Violet, Dash and Jack-Jack have their own little real-life problems that they try to deal with though in the case of Jack-Jack it's just the problem of growing up. It really feels like a brilliant start of a natural story.
The second half aka Changing the Nature of a story. Of course it's very amateur to review something based on what it's not but I wholeheartedly think that unlike Frozen 2 where that movie needed a main villain to raise the stakes, the stakes in Incredibles 2 were already compellingly high for our characters because of the buildup from the first half and adding a main villain on top of that just undermined the character's personal struggles and stakes. Now, this wasn't just about working hard to make superheroes legal again or taking care of three growing kids, now this was all about stopping the evil villain. This is done of course to combine the two separate parts of the plot and bring the main characters together but it still felt like something that the writers had to resort to, rather than something that came about naturally. Now, the movie has to make time for the villain in addition to the many characters it was already juggling, there has to be a big villain motivation speech, the part where they do evil stuff, the part where they almost win, all of it feels so weak and uninspired compared to the rest of the film that you loose interest in the plot and are just there for the cool animation. Speaking of which...
Cool animation. No doubt their animation tech has gotten better but it was still mesmerizing to see these computer-animated characters exhibit so many emotions and mannerisms like real people. It's almost like they are animated actors giving real performances. Honestly, that's the best part of this movie, the animation, followed by the choreography in action scenes.
TL'DR: A great movie bogged down by a needless villain and an uninspired third act, which is disappointing coming from Pixar. Also, there are lot of things that are picked up but dropped or never developed further because of this. Worth watching. 7/10
PS: Anybody else think Screenslaver's speech was bomb? Loved it.
Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018)
What A FILM!
This, right here, is the best Spider-Man movie I have ever seen. I love Spider-Man 2 and it will always be special but this movie is a rollercoaster.
What I really love is just how technical the movie is, from comic-book aesthetics to a choppy 12 frames per second animation style. It just makes it look like a comic-book more and more. But the real banger for this movie is it's sweetness. It's so sweet and pretty and the story is so hopeful that you just can't help but get wrapped into it's safe cocoon of hopes and dreams and Spider-Man's.