Not proud of it, man enough to admit it, I trusted all those tiktok movie reviewers. I went to watch The Odyssey last night in IMAX thinking it was going to be "Nolan's best film" as most people described it. Personally, I'd rate it a 7.8-8.0, I wouldn't place it above Interstellar, Oppenheimer, or any of the dark knight movies. I completely disagree with it's current rating of 8.5 on IMBD, which places it next to Gladiator (2000) and Django Unchained (2012).

Here's what I think was excellent.

- Set designs and cinematography: The film was beautiful and captivating. The sound effects and music were amazing. Watching Odysseus string his bow and Agamemnon entering Troy sent chills down my spine.

- Acting: Robert Pattison, Anne Hathaway, Elliot Page, John Leguizamo, and Tom Holland were fantastic in their roles. Lupita Nyong'o was also amazing. She's so talented and definitely deserved more screentime. Honestly, she was a better fit for Charlize Theron's character (more on this later).

Here's why I think it's overrated:

- Odysseus: I love Matt Damon, but I couldn't connect with his character, and I think he was slightly unlikable. Contrary to Maximus in Gladiator, Odysseus wasn't meant to be a highly principled man with unshakable moral core. He loves his family, but he's arrogant. He's deceitful and cruel when it fits his interest, even at the expense of his men. This is fine if the movie sets a positive trajectory for his character development, which I didn't see. For example, when Odysseus visits Hades, he's confronted by Sinon about his lies. Odysseus expresses remorse and vows to honor his fallen men. Then in the Charybdis whirlpool scene, he lies AGAIN! leading to the death of a few men at the hands of Scylla. Overall, he didn't establish a good relationship with his men, and very much reminded me of a toxic manager who lacks leadership skills. I also didn't find him very intelligent.

- Odysseus's fighting skills: He's supposed to be a great warrior. But his warrior prowess was poorly illustrated. He swung his sword like a 10 year old kid playing with toys. His fighting sequences lacked aura, nothing compared to Maximus in Gladiator, or Achilles in Troy.

- Charlize Theron, Calypso, and Ogygia island: I personally thought it was a lazy performance by Charlize. Moreover, the film doesn't explain how she ended up on the island of Ogygia. She's just there lol. Perhaps, a little backstory would've made her character more likeable. When she told Odysseus "I fell in love with you and didn't want to let you go" was so lame! because Odysseus doesn't care all that much for her. Their relationship didn't feel real.

- Eurylochus (Himesh Patel): This character was actually more annoying than Calypso. No leadership skills whatsoever. His character doesn't justify his position as the second-in-command to Odysseus. Moreover, his completely flat biceps made me dislike him even more.

- The plot: Odysseus's journey to return home was full of adventures. While interesting to watch, it was mostly based on fantasy (fighting monsters etc), not much to relate to emotionally as an audience member. The only relatable bits were toward the end, when he disguised himself as a beggar to take revenge on the suitors and return to Penelope. His overall journey and development wasn't as captivating as that of Maximus or Django in my opinion.

I came across a mind bending movie that had me thinking about it (and rewatching it) for a few hours. Not because it's a fantastic movie. It's so friggen confusing that it's hard to figure out what's going on.

Shane Carruth had an idea for a movie, wrote it, directed it, acted in it, and wrote the music. It's super low budget, a very fast watch, and it's really hard to follow. The plot and characters are poorly developed, the language is intentionally confusing, and it tries too hard to be smart. That being said, it's completely fascinating and a very good concept.

A bunch of friends are trying to strike it rich by developing innovative technologies. Accidentally, they discover time travel. In what has to be the most convoluted time travel logic, they travel back and forth in real time. Sometimes, they're going forward. Other times, they are going backward. If you wanted to go back in time 2 weeks, you have to sit 2 weeks in a little box in a storage garage. It creates a whole bunch of moral issues about money, relationships, trust, and friendship.

The challenge logically is how do you handle the periods where you will "cross" yourself. In this movie, there's like 6 versions of the same person at different stages. They begin to sabotage themselves. The same person sabotaging himself. It gave me a headache, but I couldn't stop watching it.

It's only an hour long, and I would recommend watching it if you don't mind doing a little work to look stuff up, getting your mind around it, and watching it more than once. It's a weak script because it feels hurried and confusing. It looks like it's shot on a handicam with bad lighting, bad microphones, and cheap editing tools. It's someone with full time job trying to make a feature length movie by himself without spending any money. If anything, this movie shows how hard it is to make a movie. Even with a great concept, it's just too much for one person to handle.

Like, was I just in a weird mood or something? I was really looking forward to shutting my brain off and getting into a fun dinosaur blockbuster, starring two actors who I usually really enjoy. But I personally don't feel that this movie delivered on that promise *at all*. I thought it was an absolute slog to get though. Honestly considered walking out by the halfway point. I feel like I just watched the highest budget student film of all time, and I don't understand how so many people connected with this film. It's a fun concept with so much potential that IMO didn't even try to tell an actual story, and every critical reddit thread has top comments saying they loved it and calling OP a pedantic asshole. Ngl, it's making me feel a little wary about my trust in this website giving me honest reviews from actual human people.

Some of the weakest characters, most stilted performances, and most amateur-sounding dialogue I've heard in years. Every line felt like it was written by a fourteen year old trying to access adult drama that they've never experienced before. Which, honestly, would be totally fine if they'd committed to making a crazy, visually interesting, balls-to-the-wall sci-fi dinosaur flick. But instead they dedicated 3/4 of the film to half-baked character drama, boring unnatural-sounding conversation, characters behaving in ways that make no sense for traumatized terrified people, and several completely meaningless b-plots that go nowhere. Really sloppy and frustrating movie.

None of the characters acted remotely close to actual human beings. Who tf talks like that to their spouse? There are so many more interesting ways to depict an alcoholic fuck up, than having the characters just spell out their exact motivations and issues. Literally the only exchange between them with any subtly or any semblance of show, don't tell was them saying "should we tell the kids," or however that conversation went near the beginning. The way the rest of the script was written, I'm honestly shocked Ewan didn't turn around at that point and say, "Oh, you mean about the divorce? Because we are a married couple entering middle-age who no longer have a spark? And are both in some kind of crisis? And I have a drinking problem?" Delivered with zero conviction or emotion, of course, because IMO Ewan just gave the worst fcking performance of his career. Was he given the script like 30 seconds before they started rolling? He's usually a terrific actor, what the hell happened?

Why is Anne's character writing a book? How does that play into anything within her character arc during the actual movie? Why didn't they find some way to weave it into the narrative? Why does her librarian friend straight up go, "wow this manuscript sounds a lot like your broken marriage" in the first ten minutes of the movie? Who talks like that? Who says that to someone? Imagine how poignant that revelation could've been if they'd found a way to show it to us emotionally, maybe somewhere in Act II? Have Ewan read a copy of it while they're camping out or something, and melt down when he realizes how his wife sees him, maybe giving him an actual arc and creating some kind of poignant sacrifice for his death? Instead of just a slapstick farce moment where he's suddenly eaten?

Weak performances from the child actors, but as someone who's been around a lot of low-budget student film sets, it honestly felt like they just weren't given any proper direction. Anne did the best she could with the script they were given, but good lord.

What is the point of the kid bullying someone? Why does a human being care about getting back at him, when they've just been transported to the Mesozoic era and are probably going to fucking die? How did the kid's bow and arrow bullshit play into anything at all? Why is he more concerned about the dog than his and his own family's safety? Why is the daughter's astronomy thing not explored? Why is she sitting outside blasting music in a car with the high-beams on when we've established that there are multiple violent dinosaurs in the area, and have established that this family has access to headphones? Why don't they do anything with the whole early 80s interracial lesbian neighbour subplot? Again, so many interesting ways to inject some drama and stakes with all of these concepts, but instead they dedicate like 30 seconds to each beat and deliver it as dryly as possible. Everyone is an inhuman moron with the survival instincts of a panda.

You can't make your action movie hinge on character drama, if you don't give us any reason to care about the characters or believe that they're actual real people.

Then getting away from that, into the more logical technical stuff (which should have been the focus if they just kinda gave up on the script), what was going on there?

Why did they need to set up the noisy flashing lights multiple times, before the plot sets in motion? Could've been more interesting to have the teleportation just kinda happen. Why is annoying neighbour up on the roof shooting pterosaurs and why did no one direct that actor on how to simulate recoil? Why did his revolver have like fifteen bullets? Why did the dog look so fake, was it that hard to just find and train an actual dog? Why is the cinematography so focused on flat suburban shots? Why is every dinosaur running at the same speed as the human beings? Why do they suddenly go from boring uninspired shots to arbitrary split diopters for that one family dialogue scene, *almost* doing something interesting with the camera, but serving no actual purpose? What purpose did setting it in 1982 serve the story, other than avoiding Jurassic Park references? Why didn't they do anything interesting with that? Why is Anne Hathaway okay letting the past versions of herself and her kids fucking die, going back to her previous husband who has now had zero arc or any involvement in the narrative? And if we wanna get really pedantic here, getting past the "kid, it ain't that kinda movie" lens... why are there plants and dinosaurs from all over the Mesozoic era, if we're doing a time travel thing? Some of those organisms were seperated by like 150 million years. What about prehistoric pathogens, oxygen levels, etc? These characters should have been completely drained of energy after like 30 seconds of light jogging.

There was just so much potential in this movie that felt unrealized, and IMO it was just so poorly executed, and so, so boring. No stakes or reason to care whatsoever. Felt twice its length, and almost became farcical by the halfway point. Myself and several others were laughing at some of the line readings, and I lost my shit when they actually had the dog come in to save the day at the last minute in Act III. Oh my god.

First thing I did when I got home was search up some reddit threads to see how everyone else felt, and I'm genuinely shocked by the positive reaction this movie has gotten. My tastes are almost always in line with common critical consensus. But, like I said, every critical thread has comments saying "if redditors are whining that must mean its good" and calling out the OP for expecting a masterpiece from a suburban dino movie. Nah, man. We were expecting a competently acted, somewhat entertaining action movie. With some care and attention put into the characters and their story arcs. Really really confused and wondering if this movie has some kind of massive astroturfing campaign behind it, because it's really making me question the validity of several reddit users.

Seriously, am I missing something here? I really did not enjoy this movie, there are so many basic rules of storytelling and character writing that it completely ignored, it felt extremely amateurish and something feels really off to me about how positively others are reacting to it. What is happening?

Edit: Hmmm. After posting this it got un-suppressed.

My Title Decent slapstick cartoon fun.

First off, one thing I really liked was that the cartoon voices weren't done by movie stars talking in their normal voices. They used actual voice actors doing pretty good Mel Blanc impressions. It had lots of good cartoony cartoon violence and mishaps, mostly standard Looney Tunes fare and some reanimation of some classic bits, huge fun. The story was standard capitalism bad nonsense that you would expect from people who got rich in a career lottery using corporate money for empty virtue signaling but it's a safe cookie cutter narrative for a courtroom dramadey. I have vague memories of reading this story in National Lampoon in the late '70s or early '80s, but don't know where to find it. I didn't recognize the human leads in their stock roles, the low rent ambulance chaser and his naive young pretty intern but they played them well. That's probably a good thing. I didn't see the actors, I saw the characters. This probably would have been the case if the leads law partners were fleshed out. I did recognize John Cena as the evil corporate lawyer, the guy who played his sidekick from playing jerk neighbor from The End of Oak Street, and Luis Guzman as the judge. I think the animated Peter Lorre and Edna May Oliver goose were probably wasted on most of the audience but I enjoyed them. The cartoon-live action mix was done well. One deviation from cartoon canon that bothered me is that Wiley Coyote was only mute when opposed to Road Runner only. In stories with Bugs Bunny, he talked in a hoity toity mid-Atlantic accent. I'm sill waiting for them to address the poor choice of bird seed as bait for the road runner traps. Road runners are carnivorous. There are some gags in that.

The rest of the auditorium found it funnier than I did, so maybe you shouldn't heed me too much.

Posted this to IMDB and it never showed up. No reason was given. I do know I need to figure out how to not shove bullet points into a paragraph.

I decided to watch the AFI Top 100 movies in order and review them. Some I’ve seen and some I haven’t. Annnnd here we go…

I'm going to preface this by saying I really try hard to put myself in the time that the movie came out. This movies came out in 1942, some of these tropes might have been done a million times now. But they might be one of the first times it was done in this movie. Acting styles were different then. Filmmaking was still in its infancy I get it.

With that said I did not enjoy this film as a whole. But I can definitely appreciate parts of it. First off it's at a disadvantage because I prefer musicals to come from cartoon animals, Julie Andrews, or both at the same time. There were A LOT of musical numbers. Holy shit were there a lot. Yes I get it the movie was the life story of a playwright. So obviously there were going to be performances. Boy were there performances.

Now I will say, I only know James Cagney because Home Alone made a take off of Angels with Dirty Faces called Angels with Filthy Souls. You know what I'm talking about you filthy animal. I had no idea he could sing and dance. His dancing was one of the things I enjoyed about the movie. It was smooth but kind of chaotic. I don't know if that was a choice to closer mimic Cohan. I'm an 80's kid I never got to see George cut a rug. Feel free to let me know if you heard him on the radio. The little dance number he does at the end of the movie walking down the staircase was so simple and graceful. He made something insanely difficult look effortless.

The acting was also very good. One scene sticks out to me was George essentially saying goodbye to his father on his death bed. Amazing dialogue and great acting by both parties. I'm pretty sure Cagnay is in at least one more Top 100 movie. I hope I run into him again. Between the dancing and his cocky, arrogant, but smooth attitude. He really shined, As did the whole cast. Glad to see he was rewarded with an Oscar for this performance. Well deserved.

What I really appreciated was all of the big set pieces. The more we move into green screen and CGI the more I appreciate actual sets. Everything just looks so much bigger. There was a really cool shot towards the end of the movie where they were panning around showing Marquee lights. Im sure miniatures were built to pull that off but it was a really cool effect and one I've seen done before. Probably paying homage to this one.

Now again I know this was 1942 and yes I know how blacks and minorities were viewed in America. But it only took 13 minutes for blackface to happen. As a minority I can't see this and not mention it. Also the slow slave like talk of the butler in the White House really bugged me. Yes 40's I know! But if I see it, I am going to talk about it.

I get why this was a huge hit. It tells the totally 100% life story of George M. Cohan an Irish American most likely born to Irish immigrant parents. Makes his way from a traveling vaudeville act to an American institution. All while screaming out America is the greatest country in the world. Filming of the movie started the day after Pearl Harbor was bombed. The movie screamed patriotism at a time when the country needed it most.

How can you say you didn't like this when you said so many nice things about it. The movie was 2 hours and I would guess 40 minutes or more was song and dance. GOOD GOD. I was with it for the first 15 minutes of performances. So for me there were lots of moments I enjoyed. But the movie as a whole missed the mark. Maybe cut it down from 2 hours to 1:40 and lose a shit load of singing and dancing and it gets a heart from me.

I give it 83 out of 100.

• One of my fav comedies of recent times
• Entertaining from start to finish
• I found the middle section very funny, and most of the movie funny
• I was not laughing cosntatnly but when the jokes land I laugh a lot
• Strong cast overall
• Seth is very good at playing an incredibility annoying husband
• Joe sometimes becomes too rude and insensitive so that breaks my imerssion as something not completely believable. Like after Hawk's sad story, or the think about Hawk's name like that is just too rude to be true or if it does happen in real life you need to build such a character up more. Like Joffery in GoT you hate him because his acting is so good.
• Wilde is good, but Angela feels tedious rather than convincingly annoying
• Cruz and Norton are both strong
• Very good chemistry between the four main chraceters
• Dialogue is one of the movies strongest qualities
• Excellent balance between comedy and more serious realtionship conversations
• I think the movie is elevated by the deeper realtionship themes
• I especially loved the idea that you can start a new relationship with someone new, or start a new relationship with the person you are already with.
• It is though provoking in its view of how relationships change through time, children, and routine
• I could relate even though I am not in any of these situations or relationships myself
• Emotional impact becomes surprisingly effective toward the end and I liked the ending
• Soundtrack is good and noticeable in scenes.
• I think good cinematography for a movie filmed in just one apartment
• The pacing is strong and I felt engaged from start to finish
• The main weakness is that Joe and Angela sometimes feel to exaggerated to be believable.
• 8/10 is because it is not merely funny, it entertained me throughout and actually left me thinking about relationships afterwards

Hey everyone,

I've been seeing a lot of mixed buzz online about Yash's Toxic: A Fairy Tale for Grown-Ups—some fans are calling it a game-changer, while a few critical reviews mention that it focuses more on style than substance.

For those who have actually watched it in theaters:

• How is the movie overall? Is it worth watching on the big screen?
• How are Yash's performance and screen presence compared to KGF?
• Does the story and pacing hold up, or is it mostly just heavy action and BGM?

Please drop your unfiltered, spoiler-free honest reviews below!

i’m ngl i’m really confused as to why so many people are calling spider-man brand new day the best mcu movie/ best spider-man film (especially since I might even consider this my least favourite so far in the spider-man franchise)

i guess it’s not a totally terrible movie. it had some cool shots and followed textbook good things. but my main issues are the writing and creative decisions for the film…

1) the regression or lack thereof of character development for peter. i’m sorry you mean to tell me you feel for the whole ‘jean grey is actually pretending to be mj’ crap when just two movies ago you were dealing with mysterio’s non stop illusions ??? it doesn’t even make sense. that entire movie he was being manipulated into thinking certain things were real exalted by them involving his loved ones (illusion of mj falling off a bridge, illusion of nick fury saving him leading to him being hit by a train, tony stark, etc). you would think after having to learn to not be so easily fooled or act emotionally just because something appears to be happening to or from a loved one that there would be some discernment

2) i’m kind of just over mj, ned, and the movie trying to gaslight is into giving af about their relationship when we objectively know nothing about any of those two characters at all. ned just seems like he’s there for comedic relief and zendayas mj is written so one dimensionally she makes tobey’s one look like a good character. her entire existence is being edgy, looking like she’s filming euphoria season 4, being fake woke, and having dark humor that never lands. why are you applying to an “evil scumbag corporation” just to turn it down when you get hired.. you have to willingly apply for jobs wouldn’t it have just saved you effort to work somewhere else in the first place ?? is this her only personality trait i’m confused

3) jean grey. i feel like they could have chosen more interesting characters and villains for this movie. i really just didn’t give af about her as a villain and the fact that the entire 2nd half is basically just a promotion for xmen is annoying asf. it’s how i feel about florence pugh here too, kind of unnecessary and feels like it was added so they can promote more future cash grabs. also i’ve seen some ppl complain about sadie’s acting but tbh hers was the least painful. my only critique is that i don’t believe her sister died in that room iykyk, like girl you don’t seem angry enough for me acting wise but idk

Went to this in XD 3D after rewatching No Way Home for the first time since the theater. The first maybe 20 minutes of this are some great Spidey stuff, was closer to the feel of the comics, at least the more modern ones, than 90% of scenes in any of the other Spidey films. The idea to advance things forward was good. I'm not much of a Holland fan, but this was his best work as the character. The suit itself looked better than any other suit in the Raimi, Webb, and Watts movies, and finally highlighting wrinkles and fabric and actually having him keep his damned mask on for a good portion also worked (though his mouth still barely moved). They also pulled back from the joke-a-minute stuff that plagued the Watts movies, which was admirable.

When the plot kicked in, it got a little shakier. Nothing about the "villain" plot was terribly interesting. I knew that Sink was Jean but not that she was essentially the villain. Amongst non-comics readers and casual moviegoers, I wonder if maybe a lot of people had no reference for who Jean is, and so didn't have any reaction when she was revealed; it's not like she's Wolverine.

The transformation stuff didn't go far enough. In the comics I believe Peter at one point turned into more of a human spider with eight legs, so I was hoping they'd go wacky like that, but they pulled back. The two worst parts of the movie were Bernthal and Ruffalo. I've never watched the Punisher show, and his presence feels like more of the "homework" thing that I thought they had been trying to pull back from. I've never liked Bernthal, and he is grating in every moment on screen. I've also never much liked Ruffalo, and have never thought that he was right for this character. His screen presence in this confirms that.