Tag: The Iron Claw

2024 Film Awards Part 6

On By troubledproductionsIn AwardsLeave a comment

Most Disappointing

A Quiet Place: Day One

I LOVE the first one, I was less enthusiastic about the second, but I still had high hopes for this. It’s okay, I guess. But it never quite reaches the heights of the first one and doesn’t even come close. Ultimately, it just comes off as lesser. Almost like a poorly financed spin-off that was dictated by the studio. There’s zero passion, zero creativity, zero reason to care.

Argylle

I like the Kingsman movies, except maybe the prequel. But I had an inkling this wouldn’t be as good. From the moment I saw the trailer I had worries. Those worries turned out to be well-founded. It should never have been a 12A, Matthew Vaughn needs blood and violence, and the rating stops him from achieving that. I don’t know why the studio didn’t push for an increased rating, and I’m not sure whose decision it was to aim for it. But either way, they should have stopped him. If you’re a record company and you land the Bee Gees, you don’t let them do a death metal album, you tell them to play that funky music.

Joker: Folie A Deux

If this was based on the biggest drop between “expectations when I first heard about it” and “expectations when I finished watching”, this would be top, number one with a bullet, numero uno, the head honcho, the casa del pene, I kind of forgot what I was talking about. Luckily for J: FAD, this is based on “expectations going in”, which saves it. I had heard a lot of talk that this was terrible. I hoped they were wrong, but it did mean I went in expecting it might be bad. Still doesn’t mean I was prepared for exactly HOW bad it was. I haven’t seen a sequel drop off this extreme since Mean Girls to the trailer for Mean Girls 2 (I’m not watching the actual film, I’m not insane).

My Spy: The Eternal City

I actually really enjoyed the first one. The second has all the hallmarks of a “straight-to-DVD sequel released in the 90s”. It feels low budget, it thinks you remember much more about the previous film than you actually do, and it tries so hard to be different (changing location etc), that it forgets to be good.

Mean Girls

I’m a massive fan of the original film, and also a massive fan of the dislike button on the trailer of the second one. I’m also a big Tina Fey fan, and one of my favourite TV shows of all time is a sequel. So I should love this. I did not. It had none of the charm of the original, none of the heart. Also, I didn’t find the songs that good, which in a musical is a bit of a problem. I couldn’t hum a single melody from the entire thing, meanwhile, I can still remember roughly 3 songs from In The Heights, which I watched once, back in 2021 (review here). I suppose I should have expected it when the trailer (which I repeat, is for a MUSICAL featuring original songs) had Olivia Rodrigo. Now, I love Olivia Rodrigo, her music is right up my street, but an existing song on a trailer for a musical just indicates the studio has no faith in the songs, and the stage musical itself doesn’t have enough bangers that people are obsessed with and will be like “OMG they do that song in this, I need to watch”, unlike the trailers for Wicked which showed snippets of songs from the musical, so fans of the musical would get excited. I’m right that that was a weird decision on the studio that released Mean Girls, right? It’s not just me being picky? Anyway, this film is weaker than my lawsuit for false advertising against the owner/operator of a bottomless pit in Spokane.

Winner

Unfrosted

I’m a big fan of Jerry Seinfeld, I consider his sitcom one of the best sitcoms of the 90’s (and there’s a lot of competition there). He has definitely been hit hardest by the Seinfeld Curse, with his biggest success being a vocal performance. That being said, Unfrosted looked promising. Not just with him as a writer, but with an incredibly strong supporting cast. Also, the idea was fucking weird, and I like weird. I don’t like Unfrosted though. It is funny, hilarious even. But it is so disposable. This does not seem like a film from one of the co-creators of one of the biggest sitcoms of all time. This feels like a group of kids dicking about with a video camera and making jokes up as they go along.

Most Surprising

The First Omen

The Omen is a franchise in name only. Nobody ever says “Let’s watch the entire film series”, in fact, I’d say a lot of people don’t even recognise there are more than two, the original and the remake. Added to that, prequels are normally pretty shit. So it’s quite surprising that The First Omen is actually solid. It has one of my favourite jump scares I’ve ever seen, a genuinely gripping story, and some good acting. Immaculate explored similar themes, but The First Omen did it much better.

Transformers One

I’m not too fond of the live-action Transformers movies. I know I watched one of them at the cinema, there’s a chance I might have watched the second one as well, but I genuinely can’t remember. Also, unlike Teenage Mutant Ninja/Hero Turtles, I never had any Transformers toys growing up (if anybody would like to fix that neglect and buy some, contact me), nor were there any video games I played. So I had zero emotional connection with the franchise, until now. This movie is superb. I think it may have helped that I had no connection to the franchise as it meant that I didn’t know who these characters were. This wasn’t like watching X-Men: First Class, knowing that Magneto and Charles will eventually become enemies, this was watching two complete strangers as their friendship slowly disintegrates. It’s a much more mature movie than you’d expect, dealing with themes such as colonialism, disability rights, hierarchal power structures, appeals to authority fallacies, and transforming into a car (all issues that we face). If it was a bit more “safe”, would it have made more money? Probably (it’s hard to tell because of how badly marketed it was). But by going as dark as they did, going as deep as they did, they’ve created something truly remarkable. This WILL be a kid’s favourite movie, and when they watch it again as an adult, they won’t be disappointed or embarrassed. They will fall back in love with it all over again.

Beverly Hills Cop: Axel F

I’m not saying this is a great movie, it’s not. But it’s A LOT better than a sequel 30 years after a disappointing (to others, I still love it) third movie should be. Every New Year’s Eve, me and my family sit down and watch a franchise, in the past, it’s been John Wick, the modern Planet Of The Apes, Back To The Future etc. As the years go on, the choices get harder and harder, primarily because the trajectory for a lot of franchises is downward, and you don’t want to end the night on a low (can you imagine if the last movie you watched in a year was Die Hard 5?). With Axel F, if we watched this franchise, the year wouldn’t end badly. And really that’s all you can ask for.

Winner

Alien: Romulus

I like the Alien franchise, kind of. I’ve watched the first two and enjoyed them, but I’ve also seen Covenant and wasn’t a fan. When Alien is good, it’s phenomenal, among the best thing that exists in the media it’s created in, when it’s bad, it’s Colonial Marines. Romulus could have been bad, it SHOULD have been bad. It’s not, it’s utterly fantastic. It’s creepy, intelligent, and makes the most of what it has. There are so many times when you’re watching films and, as an audience member, you spot things you would have changed, untaken opportunities or wasted moments. Romulus will have less of that than others. It takes a Blue Peter/artist approach to scenes. It looks at what it has to play with (acidic blood, messed up gravity etc), then tries to create something with them. It could have been dumb and made bank, instead they put A LOT of effort into it, and I cannot thank them enough.

I Don’t Get It

Essentially these are for films which received a lot of love, either critically or commercially, that I just did not care about.

The Beekeeper

I heard a lot of people say this is really good, that it would even appeal to people who aren’t fans of the typical Statham films. I’m not buying it. It’s about 5% more interesting than the rest, but that’s not a huge amount. Otherwise, it’s more of the same. It’s Jason Statham walking around and punching people, only this time he has a bad American accent.

Longlegs

A LOT of people loved this, describing it as one of the best horrors of modern times. I respect that, but I didn’t feel it. Primarily because of how exposition-heavy it was, particularly in the final third. Either the studio or the screenwriter didn’t feel confident enough that the story was clear enough for the audience. Once the writer gets more confident, they WILL make my favourite horror movie of the year, of that I am certain. But this isn’t it.

Winner

The Zone Of Interest

Obviously, this was going to win. The review of it was the hardest I’ve ever had to write. I couldn’t articulate WHY I didn’t like it, I just didn’t. That’s annoying as I feel I should. I love serious movies, so it’s not as though I was sitting there thinking “Need more jokes”. I love POWERFUL movies too, I actually went into HMV a few days ago and asked for “Something that will hurt me and make me feel things”. It genuinely got me worried, am I a shitty movie watcher? Why should anybody take my reviews seriously if I don’t like one of the most critically acclaimed movies of the year? In a way, it still bothers me. I find it difficult to reconcile why you should value my opinion alongside my opinion being that I didn’t like this film.

Well I Liked It

The opposite of the last one, these are films which either the internet or professional reviewers hated, but I enjoyed (or at the very least didn’t hate them as much as others).

Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire

At the time of writing, this sits on Metacritic with a score of 46. That’s only 1 score higher than the new Hellboy, which is dreadful beyond comparison. I’m not arguing this should be in the high 90s, but it definitely deserves higher than that. Yes, it is a bit too long and unfocused, but it is SO damn charming that it’s hard to see where the hatred comes from. The relationship between Phoebe and Melody is damn sweet (and kind of gay-coded, can’t tell if that was intentional) and it warmed even my bitter and cynical heart.

Boy Kills World

I had no intention of putting this in this section. Primarily because I assumed it was well-reviewed. It was only when looking up the Metacritic score for Ghostbusters that I saw this had a score of 47. How? This is freaking insane. The stunts are badass, the jokes are hilarious, and the performances are everything they need to be. It’s one of the most fun experiences I had last year, and I ate ice cream TWICE!

Winner

Paddington In Peru

This has a Metacritic score 60. I don’t accept that. This deserves a 90 at the very least. It’s not quite as good as the first two, but it is still exactly what we need at this time. I know the world is going to shit: racism has become normalised, there’s war in the middle east, and I dropped my biscuit in my tea. But it’s at times like this when we need something like this; something optimistic, something cute, and most importantly; something kind.

Worst Movie

Nominees Everything here

Winner

The Crow

This was actually difficult. Whilst a lot of films were bad, there wasn’t one that stood out as a lot worse than the others. They were all equally bad. This wins pretty much just because it’s a remake. As such, there is a definite blueprint for how to make it work. They had over 30 years of focus groups and audience feedback to work from. The fact they did that, they had talented performers, as well as a wide variety of screamo bands to use for the soundtrack, and still couldn’t do better than this shit? Nope, fuck you, you suck.

Best Movie

Nominees: Everything here

Winner

Civil War

There are multiple ways to judge a film. Technical brilliance, personal taste, uniqueness. This has all three. But so do quite a few other films nominated. It’s difficult to think of one that stands out above the rest, unlike next year, where it’s already looking like A Real Pain is going to win best film (unless the new Knives Out is incredible), spoilers for a post I won’t write for another 365 days. Really, any of the nominees could have sneaked it. So why did I choose Civil War? Because there was a moment which was so harrowing I was close to leaving just to decompress for a few minutes. No other film has come close to having that effect.

2024 Film Awards: Day Five (The Moments)

On By troubledproductionsIn AwardsLeave a comment

Best Opening

Nominees

American Fiction – Monk talks to a white student

Sums up this film; funny, smart, and sets a fire of fury that it is determined to stoke. Once you witness this scene, you know EXACTLY what film you will watch.

Gladiator 2 – Painted

The usual “quick summary” montage, but done so it looks like it’s been painted. Visually striking, and very beautiful.

Malum – Creepy Creepiness

Police notice saying this is footage from the event. REALLY helps you buy in. Then creepy handheld footage. Well, some of it is creepy (weird chairs etc), and some is so mundane that it becomes creepy. Yes, it feels cheap, but its effective. Then, it transitions into modern times, where you assume the person we meet is our hero. Nope.

Monster – What Is With Minato?

Minato is displaying odd behaviour that is consistent with abuse. When you watch it, it’s good, when you remember it later and understand the full context, it’s great.

Sometimes I Think About Dying – Opening Credits

Look, I just appreciate that they used a different font for the opening credits. Most films don’t, and it shows that the people who made this actually gave a shit about setting tone in every way possible.

Twisters – The Danger Of Wind

Twisters introduces a group of lovable, dynamic characters. Then kills most of them off. I liked it. It was unexpected, plus it showed how dangerous tornados can be, so it set them up as a threat. It’s like when slasher movies start with the killer stabbing someone; establish them as a threat early on so the fear of them lingers over the narrative.

Winner

The Substance – Fading Star

A Walk Of Fame star being constructed and then neglected. The “look at how the world ignores this star until it cracks under pressure” double meaning isn’t exactly subtle. But it looks gorgeous.

Worst Opening

Nominees

Late Night With The Devil – The Explanation

A documentary is investigating the events. Well not really investigating, just playing the show in full. Could have got away with cutting away from it for some sort of modern analysis etc, make it feel more like a documentary. As it is, the opening is just set up, and it all sets up stuff we would be told later anyway.

My Spy: The Eternal City – Dream Sequence

Never open an action movie with a dream sequence. It sets expectations of what the character can do that then can’t be matched. You need to establish what the character is capable of, his strengths, his weaknesses etc. You can’t do that in a dream sequence. A complete waste of time and characterisation.

Winner

Garfield – Animated Movie Opening #12

Garfield starts with happy music. Thus establishing that the studio REALLY don’t understand the character at all. It would be like starting the next Bond movie at a B&B in Clacton. They did this purely because other animated films start the same way, it’s inappropriate for the character, and shows they didn’t really care about making a good movie.

Best Ending

Nominees

Deadpool And Wolverine – Time Of Your Life

A cute montage of the previous Marvel-but-not-MCU movies. With the exception of the X-Men movies, those have been kind of forgotten so it’s nice to see them get some love. It also feels like a love letter to those that paved the way.

I Saw The TV Glow – Owen Breaks Down

The creepiest part of this was that nobody reacted. They all took a mental breakdown as something normal that you shouldn’t concern yourself with. I had some issues with the performance of Smith at some points during Glow, but in this part? He nailed that. The helplessness, the sadness, the sheer terror. Perfection.

Winner

The Iron Claw – Kevin Cries

That’s it. His sons tell him it’s okay to cry. A simple message, but one that is sadly needed. Usually, catharsis in film comes from violence or revenge. It’s kind of sweet to see one come from emotional release.

Worst Ending

Nominees

The First Omen – What Happened To Baby Dame?

The antichrist has been delivered to new parents, and has been named Damian. I mean, we KNEW this would happen. Out of everything that happened in this movie, that was the only thing we did know. It’s been established in the first movie. So what was the point of this? It would be like doing a film about Henry VIII and ending it with “and that man grew up to be king” with dramatic music.

Unfrosted – Where Are They Now?

Purely because of the music choice, which feels like a royalty free song. Considering the cast, this must have had a budget. They used a David Bowie song in the trailer, could they have not stretched to something iconic for the closing?

Winner

Joker: Folie A Deux – Faux-ker

So it turns out the main character of the two Joker movies wasn’t actually the Joker. I’m one of the few people who actually likes the Mandarin twist from Iron Man 3. But if that movie was called “The Mandarin” and he was the main character, I’d be less pleased. I’ve never seen a movie that holds its own audience in contempt as much as this does.

Best Moment

Babes – The Meetcute

Much like Frozen Empire (spoilers for later), Babes needs to make it clear how quickly these characters bond. Especially since the male character dies soon after. Meetcutes can be difficult to pull off, and I haven’t seen it done as masterfully as it was done here in a while.

Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire – Melody And Phoebe

The two characters bond over chess. So incredibly sweet. If this scene wasn’t good, then the plot would fall apart as you wouldn’t buy that Phoebe would be so reckless for someone she only just met. Sometimes you do meet people and instantly click though. The way this is written, and the way it’s performed, make you believe that this is one of those times.

Sometimes I Think About Dying – The Murder Party

The audience knows what Fran is like, but it’s the party where the rest of the characters begin to find out Frans personality. She really opens up to them, and it’s the first glimpse we get of what she’d be like as a friend; funny, warm-hearted, and with a dark sense of humour.

The Beast – Louis The Incel Dickbag

This is almost entirely due to performance. George Mackay gets everything right here. You get his anger, his frustration, but also his sadness. He’s not someone to hate, he’s someone to be pitied. You don’t feel sorry for him because of how hate-filled he is. But you don’t really fear him because of how pathetic he comes across.

The Iron Claw – The Afterlife

Considering this is a true story, it could have been considered a mistake to have a dream-like scene in it. It might have made it seem a bit silly. IF it wasn’t done as well as it was here. Many manly tears were shed at this moment. It’s absolutely beautiful, and the person it’s based on approves.

Transformers One – The Start Of Darkness

This is a very good scene on paper. But with the performance? It’s excellent. You truly understand why Megatron and Optimus Prime think the way they do. It’s not contrived or silly, it’s heartbreaking to realise these two characters are headed down dark paths, and they’ll be doing it alone.

Winner

Civil War – The Body Pit

THIS. This was the moment that nearly made me walk out of the cinema because of how bleak it was. I’ve seen similar scenes before (in the same year, in fact), but none of them have hit as hard as this one did. It’s so good that it made me un-nominate a similar scene in Lee, because it would have been weird to have two very similar scenes in one award section.

Worst Moment

Nominees

Venom: The Last Dance – Multi-Symbiote Fight

Not because it’s a bad scene, but because it hints at a much better movie. If the script focused more on setting this up, and had “there’s multiple symbiote attached to characters we’ve grown to care about”, it could have been incredible. As it is? It feels like wasted potential.

The Whip – Here’s Our Plan

The main character explains her plan to her friend. “So where were you thinking of sneaking into?”, then gestures to the houses of parliament. My issue with this was the staging. They were walking over a bridge heading AWAY from the place they were talking about. They would have already walked towards it, walked past it, and walked away from it to set that scene up. It’s more infuriating because the next scene takes place on a bench, they could have done the whole scene from that instead.

Kraven The Hunter – Worst line ever

“She died after that, and I never saw her again”. I don’t think I need to explain why that line is terrible.

The Watched/Watchers – The Entire Third Act

The way it’s written, and the way it’s shot and scored etc leads you to believe the film is about to end. Everything about the scene says it will, then it continues for another 20 or so minutes. 20 minutes which don’t really add anything. The very definition of “and another thing”. I know this was based on a book, but there was a better way of setting it up than they did here.

Trap – Well That’s Just Bad Blocking

I want to say “every moment Saleka is onscreen” but I’m going to get very specific. There’s a shot near the end where Josh’s character is sitting down and talking, and there’s a HUGE corner of the screen being blocked off by an overhanging cupboard. In terms of shot composition, it’s hard to find anything worse in a seasoned directors work. It makes it look like he’s just poking his head around

Winner

Twisters – Near vehicular manslaughter

It feels unfair to put this in the “worst moment” section, let alone have them win it, because there are worse moments. But none negatively affected its movie as much as this one did. One of the first times we see a character, his recklessness and selfishness almost killed the main character by running her off the road. I found it REALLY difficult to like him after that. I didn’t find him charming, I found him annoying because I knew what he was capable of, the kind of person who would throw knives at you “as a joke”, the kind of prick who’d mock your recently dead family members “for the bantz”. Delete that moment, and I’d have liked him. But that few seconds? Nope.

2024 Film Awards: Day Four (The Visuals)

On By troubledproductionsIn AwardsLeave a comment

Best Looking

Nominees

Poor Things

This will be divisive. The shots themselves are undoubtedly beautiful. But the weird fish-eyeness may put some people off. You’ll either be nauseous or entranced. but either way, they will affect your opinion of the film. I won’t lie, they are fucking weird, but so is the film, so it works. There’s a dreamlike quality to a lot of the shots, especially the exterior ones.

The Holdovers

Just watching the trailer gives you an idea of why I like the visuals. Yes, they’re not particularly stunning or incredible. But they really sell the period the film is set in. You can show someone this and tell them it’s from the 70s and they could believe you. I know it is something that just involved a filter and changing the lighting a little bit, but it was really effective.

Sometimes I Think About Dying

Sometimes beauty comes from bright colours, sometimes it comes from fluid motions, and sometimes it comes from making every shot like a painting from the 1800s. This is in the last category. Yes, there’s not much colour, but the use of greys, the use of blank space and desolate backgrounds, it’s art. No, it’s not complicated, but it’s stunning in its own way. This film is why “mise en scene” is talked about.

The Wild Robot

I’ve mentioned in a few of these about how sometimes the visuals match the story and enhance the viewing experience. I’ve mentioned mise en scene, I’ve talked about specific camera techniques etc. With this? All I can say is “Ooooooo, pretty”.

The Substance

Every film released this year was in focus, that’s an obvious point to make. But somehow, The Substance seemed more in focus. Striking visuals

Furiosa: A Mad Max Saga

It’s weird how something with so few colours can look SO good. I personally was not a fan of this movie. But it would be a lie to say it didn’t look absolutely sublime. Every inch of the screen is permeated with love, care, and artistic flair. Hey, I made a rhyme, and it was not even intentional. A lot of films (and video games, mainly video games) use dusty brown colour palettes as an excuse to look blander than a toast sandwich. Furiosa shows that up for the bullshit lazy excuse that it is. You can use that as the basis for your visuals, and still inject beauty, still inject moments of colour. Essentially, you CAN make it so it’s not fucking ugly.

Winner

I Saw The TV Glow

Much like Schoenbrun’s previous work (We’re All Going To The Worlds Fair), there are times when TV Glow makes you feel like you’re in a lava lamp being hypnotised. The bright colours, the cinematography, it’s absolutely stunning. It’s not just beauty for beauty’s sake, the ethereal nature suits the story too, enhancing the illusion the film is trying to sell.

Best Music

Side note, I’m not doing a “worst music”, but if I did, The Fall Guy would have won because of how often it played the same song by a band that f*cking sucks.

Madame Web

There’s a total of around 19 seconds where Madame Web is a good film. The music is 10 of them; when they play The Cranberries, and when they play Yeah Yeah Yeahs. That’s literally half of what is good in this movie, those two song choices.

The Iron Claw

A film’s soundtrack is not just “songs we want you to listen to in the car on the way home”. Sometimes they set the mood, sometimes they describe the characters, and sometimes (like in The Iron Claw) they PERFECTLY encapsulate the era. The visuals don’t really give away the period (outside of buildings which no longer exist), but as soon as you hear the soundtrack you know when the film is set, and you also KNOW it’s the United States, specifically one of the southern states. It would be like if a movie was soundtracked entirely by Blur, Oasis and Pulp, you’d know it’s 90’s England.

Sometimes I Think About Dying

For most of these, I have described the soundtracks as “the use of pre-made songs that have been chosen”, and haven’t delved much into the score. Obviously, that’s about to change, otherwise, that would have been a f*cking weird way to start this entry. Mute YouTube, then watch the trailer for SITAD. I can guarantee you know how it sounds just from the visuals. That’s not a criticism, by the way. It would be weird if this used joyful summer sounds. The music is PERFECT for this.

Winner

I Saw The TV Glow

Much like Worlds Fair, Glow is enhanced by the music choices. It’s not a soundtrack that will stick with you, there’s not really many songs that you’ll remember when its over. But while the film is playing? Alongside the visuals? It’s gorgeous. You can tell every song has been deliberately chosen to enhance the viewing experience. One of the few films I can imagine releasing its soundtrack on cassette and it wouldn’t feel like a gimmick.

Best Effects/CGI

Immaculate/The First Omen

Yes, I’m lumping these two together again, because there are moments for which I genuinely can’t remember which of the two they come from. So take this entry as if the two are a double feature counted as a single film.

The deformed fetuses are horrific, which considering what they are, is good. This has some truly wonderful body horror. When she witnesses the birth of something……well it’s not right, it looks awful, in a good way. There’s something truly unsettling about how the demonic hand comes out of the woman.

Kingdom Of The Planet Of The Apes

The modern Apes movies have always looked spectacular, and there were concerns this wouldn’t match it. Thankfully, it does. The original Superman movie was advertised with the tagline “You will believe a man can fly”. In this? You will believe an ape can speak basic English. You can make criticisms of this movie, but you can never say that the visuals took you out of it.

Abigail

Horror movies, particularly ones aimed at the audience Abigail is aimed at, need to make sure the kills are good. And how do you do that? By making them look good. If they look silly, or too fake, the audience is immediately taken out (unless the film leans into it). Abigail has some fantastic deaths, and the blood looks REALLY good. It doesn’t just look like water with food colouring, it looks thick, it looks heavy, it looks, well it looks fucking gross. So when you see someone covered in blood, the horror of the moment truly hits you, as opposed to making you think “That’s good makeup”, you think “Oh shit, that’s a lot of blood”.

Sting

Almost entirely due to how good the spider looks. Spiders are tricky to make look real when you increase the size because the way they actually move is weird as hell so when you see it close up there’s something “off” about it, and not in a scary way, in a “this looks stupid” way. Sting somehow manages to look real. I’ve said it before, there is an inkling of a GREAT movie under the surface here, and the visuals are a part of that.

Winner

The Substance

I was thinking twice about having this as a category. What made me decide to go through with it was knowing that The Substance was going to walk away with this award, and I feel I need to show this more love than I have done. In a film about beauty, it’s magnificent at showing ugliness. Not just the big moments, like the giant headf*ck at the end. But also the withered body parts that look suitably gross. The key moment is the first time she takes The Substance, where her back seems to rip apart. This could look painless, as if it’s just something that’s happening like someone opening their mouth. But the makeup up etc means that every inch of that back opening up looks like absolute agony, as it should.

Worst Effects/CGI

Nominees

Alien: Romulus

As much as I hate to give this a negative mark, the Ian Holm head is too off-putting to not mention. Apparently, they have fixed it for the Blu-ray release, but I haven’t got around to watching it yet. Also, I’m not rewarding them for fixing a mistake that shouldn’t have existed in the first place. Films shouldn’t need patches.

Hellboy: The Crooked Man

I’ve said it multiple times; this movie looks like low-budget porn, and the makeup is a big part of that. It looks like they didn’t have enough time to get it done properly, so it looks cheap and weird. Like it’s the base for a shot they’re going to improve later, rather than the finished shot.

Kraven The Hunter

There’s a scene in this movie where it looks like they CGI’d moving lips and blinking eyes on a still image to insert some ADR. It looks exactly as good as I made that sound. The rest of the CGI isn’t much better, with inconsistent effects, cartoonish blood, and “character in panto” levels of makeup, but the “look at what you became” moment is unforgivable.

Godzilla X Kong: The New Empire

When you want to make something look large, it’s not enough to just have low-angle shots for the whole thing. You need comparison, you need the giant monster to stand next to a building or a human, so you can truly be awed by the size. That’s where this movie fails, it spends most of the runtime with the monsters just standing around each other, so they don’t seem particularly impressive. It’s only in the final third when they start to fight in populated areas that you begin to get a sense of scale.

Winner

Argylle

I assumed the bouncing cat would be the worst CGI moment of this movie. Nope. There are multiple moments which look faker than a shop assistant’s smile. I know some things are difficult to make real, and that there will always be something that looks wrong with some moments. But when a close-up of a face looks fake, you’ve done goofed.

Best Stunts/Action Scenes

Nominees

Alien: Romulus

Normally, I reward action scenes based on speed. Romulus is different, the best moments aren’t really fast, but they’re SO well-crafted that I have to commend them. Some action scenes in movies are like smashing a snooker ball into a group of others, and watching them move. Romulus is more like dominos, you spend a lot of time watching them carefully be set up and positioned, and then they finally come down, it takes a while, but it’s immensely satisfying to watch them fall.

Boy Kills World

This came SO close to winning. The TV Show fight at the end is worthy of mention on its own. But there are so many other fights which come close to that. It’s especially remarkable considering its a directorial debut. It’s not just that they’re well-crafted, they’re inventive too, in an obvious way. By which I mean, there are things done that you haven’t seen before, but once they happen you think “Well now I’ve seen it, that was an incredibly obvious thing that should have happened before”. Boy Kills World was criminally under-advertised and undersold, and I highly recommend checking it out. Part of that is how funny it is, how sweet it is, how good the performances are. But none of them would matter if it wasn’t for just how damn entertaining the fights are.

Abigail

Mainly because of how the scenes perfectly blended the violence of death with the beauty of ballet. There’s a simple elegance to Abigail (Simple Elegance Of Abigail would make a grand album title btw) that helps it to stand out in the inevitable sea of clones.

Deadpool And Wolverine

The Deadpool franchise has always had excellent fight scenes, and DAW is no exception. From the moment the beats of Bye Bye Bye kick in and he’s beating people to death with a skeleton, you know you’re in for some inventive shit. The multi-deadpool fight could (and should) have been a lot better. But when the action scenes of DAW are good, they’re incredible and well worth checking out.

Gladiator 2

Have any of you played Condemned? I remember the first time I played that and beat someone with a crowbar. I was used to “hit thing, it falls down” standard physics in video games. But that’s the first time I remember thinking “fuck, that must have hurt” after hitting someone with a weapon. The hits had weight to them, meaning you felt every impact. That’s what Gladiator 2 does. Yes, the sharks are f*cking stupid, but the man-to-man fight scenes all feel spectacular, making you feel as if the lives of any of the characters could be ended in a single moment. It really helps to sell just how brutal and inhumane gladiator fights were, and why it’s a good thing Netflix didn’t make this movie otherwise they’d hold them for real, completely missing the “wow, look how horrible this is, and how horrific a society that allows this to happen would be” point of the movie. Yes, that was a Squid Games reference.

Winner

The Fall Guy

It’s a movie about stunts, if they messed up the action scenes then it would be a complete failure. What I loved about it was how practical the stunts were. David Leitch is tremendous at fight scenes (as anybody who has seen Bullet Train and Atomic Blonde can confirm), but action scenes involving non-humans are much harder. You can fully control a person, if you tell them to move backwards, you have a general idea of what their body parts are going to do, and they’re unlikely to suddenly do a backflip into a nearby fridge. Vehicles are different, a slight variation in speed or ground level can completely change how it reacts. So it’s amazing that Leitch managed to do what he did here, with every piece moving like a finely controlled part of a system. Also, they broke a world record for most cannon rolls in a car. I can’t watch a film that has that level of dedication, and not reward it.

Worst Stunts/Action Scenes

Nominees

Bad Boys: Ride Or Die

I wish the action scenes were better, I really do. But truth be told, they’re bland. I’m assuming they are anyway, I can’t remember them. As good as this franchise has been, it’s always been focused on the dialogue and plot rather than the gunplay. That’s not necessarily a bad thing, but it would be nice if some of the creativity in some of the shots was extended to the action.

Lift

There are many reasons why some action scenes fail. Sometimes it’s the performances, sometimes it’s the choreography, sometimes it’s the CGI. My issue with Lift is much simpler; the idea of the scene itself is too stupid. I’m talking about the “plane flying upside down” moment. It’s a scene so ridiculous (and not in a fun way) that it’s almost impossible to enjoy.

Borderlands

My main issue with the action scenes in Borderland is just how dull they are. There’s no creativity or skill to any of them. They’re also shot with the idea of “we need to see these actors” rather than logic, so characters supposed to be in disguise walk around without masks. There’s no sense of storytelling to them either, they’re just a series of action scenes with no connective tissue.

Winner

Godzilla X Kong: The New Empire

I’m actually not going to talk about the issues I have with size this time. Instead, I’m going to focus on one moment; when the titans etc are fighting on the beach near the end, smashing into buildings and destroying them. This should be epic, we should feel terrified for the people in those buildings. We should notice that there are people who’s lives are being ruined because their home/place of employment is being destroyed. Essentially, it should feel like this fight has an impact. It doesn’t. It feels like if you and I were having a punch-up in a model village. Yes, one of us will fall on a house, but we won’t feel any guilt for the people in it.

2024 Film Awards: Day Three (The Individual)

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Best Performer

Marisa Abela – Back To Black

I wasn’t a fan of the film itself, I found it was a biography that seemed to absolutely detest its lead character. Abela handles the role well, to the point where you sometimes forget you’re not watching Winehouse. The character goes through a lot, but Abela’s performance is consistent throughout.

Demi Moore – The Substance

It’s hard to think of what hasn’t already been said about Demi Moore in The Substance. Margaret Qualley is good, but Moore is the lynchpin. Qualley’s character is more an idea than a fully formed person, so she doesn’t really need to stretch her skills that much. Moore, however, has to go through so much emotional turmoil. The scene where she has a breakdown and smears her make-up is a masterclass in performance.

Nell Tiger Free – The First Omen

Considering the talent in TFO, it would be easy for Nell Tiger Free to be overshadowed. The knives were going to be out, they always are for lead performers in horror prequels. Those knives will have to be resheathed, Tiger Free does a phenomenal job. She has incredibly expressive eyes, reminds me of Daniel Daluuya in Get Out.

George Mackay – The Beast

Based almost entirely on the incel speech he delivers. I estimate that in roughly 10 years he will be known as one of the great actors of this generation. He’s not always in good films (Marrowbone), but he’s always good. He does have “Fighter in a world war” face, so parts of The Beast are very different from him, really showing his range.

Emma Stone – Poor Things

Emma Stone has a history of traditional leading role parts, but in the last few years she’s got fucking weird, and I’m all for that, because she’s good at it. Her physicality, in particular, is tremendous in this. There’s no point where she seems like a normal human adult. She carries herself in a very unique way that’s mesmerising.

Anne Hathaway – Mothers Instinct

Mothers Instinct would fall apart without Hathaway. Because the audience is never sure whether she’s actually a bitch, or whether she’s just haunted by trauma, she needs to find a way to play it both ways at the same time. If she leans too much in one direction it would give the game away (or seem disingenuous). Most performers would not be able to do what she did as effectively as she did it, and it just adds to the reasons I love her.

Daisy Ridley – Sometimes I Think About Dying

As I said in the year round-up “If your lead character doesn’t say something for 20 minutes and you’re not frustrated, she’s doing a good job.” She’s been unfairly maligned by internet fans for having the temerity, the absolute gall, to be a woman in a modern Star Wars movie. But times like this remind you that she’s actually a FANTASTIC performer. Her subtle expressions and change of vocal performances to every line means she does so much with so little, and I love her for it.

Kate Winslet – Lee

Kate Winslet is one of those performers I’ve never really “got”, primarily because she tends to be in the kind of films I don’t particularly like. But it’s when you see her in something like Lee that you realise “ohhhhh, she’s actually really good at this whole acting thing”. She’s let down by acting alongside performers who aren’t quite on her level. But I absolutely love her performance in this, it’s pain, in a good way.

McKenna Grace – Ghostbusters: Frozen Empire

If she’s in a film I watch, she gets nominated, thems the rules. Plus I nominated her for the same role in the other film, so it would be weird if I didn’t do so here.

Zac Efron – The Iron Claw

Efron looks nothing like who he’s supposed to portray, truth is, almost nobody in this film does. But he carries himself with such presence that it doesn’t matter. People who know the real-life family have complimented him on his performance. Efron seems to be doing everything he can to step out of the shadows of his famous role, and The Iron Claw is another step towards doing that. He shows just how damn good he can be when he’s given the chance. You can see it in his face how his character gets gradually broken down as his family unit continues to disappear. What really nails it, is the final scene when he’s talking to his sons. That moment was one of the most heartbreaking things I’ve ever seen, and I once had my biscuit fall into my cup of tea.

Winner

Cailee Spaeny – Alien: Romulus/Civil War

Both of those performances are award-worthy on their own. She went from “I have no idea who she is” to one of my favourite performers in just two films. I’m genuinely excited to see what she will do in the next Knives Out movie. She has a lot on her shoulders in both these films; in one she’s working alongside much more experienced performers, and in the other? Well it’s a fucking Alien movie and she’s a female lead, she’s going to get attention, and has to be strong enough to not buckle under it. Alien has a tendency to have incredibly strong female leads, and manage to find incredibly talented performers to play them. I was more impressed with Spaeny in Civil War though. Kirsten Dunst is kind of war-weary and cynical, so a character like Spaeny is needed to really sell how horrific everything is. She provides the human viewpoint to an inhuman world, and if Spaeny wasn’t talented, it wouldn’t work. Her character could easily be too tough, which would make it hard to buy into the horror. Alternatively, she could appear too weak, and then you wouldn’t root for her. She has to find a fine balance between “innocent” and “not naive”. She plays it perfectly.

Worst Performance

I should point out, there was a genuinely TERRIBLE performance that I haven’t nominated here. It’s a low-budget movie and it’s the first notable role for the performer who has only ever been credited as “unnamed maid” in things before. Essentially, I felt it would be bullying to name them, and if they googled themselves and stumbled upon me lambasting them and comparing their performance to low-budget porn, I would genuinely feel mortified. Big-name actors, or actors in multi-million dollar films? Yeah, they’re fair game, fuck ’em.

Aaron Dean Eisenberg – The Iron Claw

I often call out fans for disliking a casting because “they’re not exactly like the person they’re supposed to be. The character is 6 foot, and this person is only 5 foot 11. Ruined!”. And I appreciate when castings look nothing like the person, but embody the character. But my word, Eisenberg could not have been less like Ric Flair if he blacked up and spoke with an Australian accent. There is nothing in the real-life Flair in his performance. They say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, well this is an insult.

Jerry Seinfeld – Unfrosted

It reminded me of that episode of Seinfeld where Jerry kept corpsing. Oh wait, that doesn’t narrow it down.

Andy Samberg – Lee

It’s not that his performance is bad in a vacuum, but he’s acting alongside Kate Winslet, so had to be on the top of his game, and it feels like he’s not.

Jack Kesy – Hellboy: The Crooked Man

Think of the performers who have taken the mantle of Hellboy; Ron Perlman, David Habour; two genuine heavyweights who can add gravitas, humour, and physical intimidation to the role. And now? It’s some guy. I’m not saying the character needs to be played by a big-name actor. But it needs someone with presence, someone who you can look at and KNOW “That? That’s a star. Or at the very least, that’s someone I know will beat the shit out of me and make jokes while doing so”. It feels unfair to criticise someone for not having something unreachable. And I’m not saying Kesy is a bad actor, far from it, but he was without a doubt the wrong choice for this role. It would be like casting Christopher Reeves as Superman, in 2024.

Chris Evans – Red One

Much like Kesy in H: TCM, the main issue here was of being miscast. It’s not quite as bad as it was in Hellboy, because we hadn’t already seen Chris Evan’s character in 3 other films being played much better. But it is still an issue, and one I can’t ignore.

Aaron Taylor-Johnson – Kraven The Hunter

Mainly because of his accent. Sorry “accents”, plural, because he couldn’t decide on just one.

Winner

Dakota Johnson – Madame Web

I have issues with the Razzies. I don’t believe they recognise the difference between “this performance was bad” and “this was a performance in a bad movie”. For example; Joker: Folie A Deux had MANY problems, but the performances of Phoenix and Gaga were not among them. So it came as a shock to me that we actually agree on this. Dakota Johnson gave a performance that was so flat that even if you saw it in 3D she’d be 2 dimensional. She looks like she can’t be bothered to show emotion. I recently had incredibly bad toothache which required me to be shot full of painkillers in my jaw. The bottom right of my face was unable to move for half a day, it still did more work than she did in this

Best Character

Nominees

Andy – Alien: Romulus

Yes, I gave Cailee Spaeny the best performer, but Andy’s character was better. Incredibly awkward, disliked by most people, and fond of making terrible puns. Still not entirely sure why I related to him so much.

Monk – American Fiction

Yes, this character has been done before. The “I created this as a joke and now people are taking it seriously” trope is not exactly completely original, especially in regards to black stories, where it has been done before (I’m thinking primarily of 2000’s Bamboozled). But there’s something about the way Monk is written (and performed, that has to be pointed out) that is utterly captivating. You feel his frustration, his anger, and eventually his acceptance. You can tell how beaten down he is by the world, and how (white) people are reacting to his words. He’s also INCREDIBLY funny.

Lee Smith – Civil War

Everything about this character can be summed up in a single line of dialogue: “”Every time I survived a war zone, I thought I was sending a warning home – “Don’t do this”. But here we are.””. Named in tribute to WW2 journalist Lee Miller (who JUST missed out on this list), her tenacity and character earn the honour of her namesake. More than anything else, her character shows the importance of war journalism. It’s difficult to distance yourself and realise you can’t help. But it’s essential to document how everything has gone to shit. I feel that’s an important message for the next four years.

Paddington – Paddington In Peru

It would be so easy for this character to be awful. If miswritten, it would be a very annoying bear, overly optimistic to the point of being naive, and just coming off as kind of annoying. I mean, he is overly optimistic to the point of being naive, but for some reason, it works. He is such a lovable character, incredibly endearing and sweet. It helps that he is pure. He isn’t kind because he wants something out of it, he doesn’t help people so they help him back, he has absolutely zero cynical motivations for his behaviour. In a cold world of greys and dark browns, Paddington is a kaleidoscopic rainbow of warmth

Kevin Von Erich – The Iron Claw

I feel conflicted about this because he’s based on a real person, the only one on this list (sorry to break it to you Paddington fans, he’s not real). But so was Amy Winehouse in Back To Black, and her character was terrible (It’s difficult to find a biography that hates its main character as much as that one does). So I decided to put him in this category, mainly because it highlights how well the script handled him. Watching The Iron Claw is watching a human slowly get broken, and when you think it’s over, things get worse. If this was fiction, you’d think it over the top. So the fact its real makes it more impressive. In fact, it’s actually toned down from reality. He had another brother who passed away, and the film skips the moment where his drunken dad tells him “The only reason you’re alive is that you don’t have the guts to kill yourself like your brothers”. It’s heartbreaking to see what he goes through, and it’s weird to have a film where the “happy” ending is “he cries”.

D-16 – Transformers One

This is pretty much entirely due to my ignorance. I had no idea that character would later turn out to be Megatron. So watching his descent into heeldom was a genuine shock. But it made sense. The building blocks of the evilness were there, and the way he arrived towards the switch made more sense than most films that attempt the same thing. There’s a definitive moment where the change occurs. Before that, he’s a “hmm, that’s not great”, but after it, you can tell he’s heading down a dark path, with nobody to turn the light on (probably due to the high cost of electric bills). It’s heartbreaking to see so many moments where he can be saved, and see those moments pass by again and again.

Winner

Fran – Sometimes I Think About Dying

You will either be bored by this character, or you will GET this character. If you get her, you will emphasise with this character, understand her motivations and meaning, and you will like her. You will see a little bit of yourself in her, and you will be annoyed at what she does and how she self-sabotages her personal relationships, but that annoyance will be because you recognise that you have done the exact same shit in the past, and you KNOW you will do it again in the future because of who you are.

No, just me? Doubt that.

Worst Character

Nominees

Lady Raven – Trap

The character is clearly just a way for M.Night to get his daughter in the movie. Not only is she presented as the most talented and beautiful musician in the world, she’s also smart, integral to the plot and helps defeat the villain. If it wasn’t his daughter, it would still be badly written tripe, but with the caveat of it being his daughter? Fuck that.

Garfield – The Garfield Movie

Who is Garfield? He is a cat. He is snarky. He eats lasagne. But most of all; he is lazy. Who is Garfield in this movie? He’s an action hero with daddy issues. Essentially, he’s just another Chris Pratt character.

Liam – Dear Santa

Only due to the inconsistencies in his character. The writers seem to forget what age he is so he switches between a helpless child and a teen, depending on the joke. It sums up my issues with the whole film; nobody knows what age this film is aimed at, so they try to hit all of them.

Amy Winehouse – Back To Black

I feel weird putting this in here, as she is a real person. But that’s part of the reason I disliked her character in this, it doesn’t feel honest. It’s not “here is who Amy was, she was flawed”, it’s “Here’s who Amy was, and why everyone who says her dad and partner were abusive are wrong, it was all her, they were completely innocent and never did anything wrong”. She isn’t an independent character, she’s a way for two mediocre (at best) men to justify themselves and why they deserve any money she earned.

Winner

Charles Deetz – Beetlejuice Beetlejuice

Jeffrey Jones is a paedophile. Tim Burton decided to get around this by not having him in the film. Instead, they just have the character he played be lionised by everybody, and have a claymation representation of him. Nope. You find out an actor is a paedophile, you don’t have his character in the film at all. Just say the mother divorced and remarried, then kill THAT dad off.

2024 Film Awards: Day One

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Saddest

Nominees

I Saw The TV Glow

A lot of TV Glow is too weird to be counted here. But there’s a scene near the end which is as bleak as it gets. The main character is at work, older, with no achievements, and he has a full-on breakdown, screaming that he’s dying. It’s not the breakdown that is sad or the fact he’s wasted his life, it’s the utter callousness of the other characters, who all just ignore him.

Inside Out 2

I remember when I came out the screening of this, and a little kid said to their parent “That didn’t make sense, why would someone’s brain be against them?”.

Oh that sweet summer child.

Joker: Folie A Deux

The film itself is not good. But there’s a scene in the court where one of his former friends is testifying about Arthur killing someone in his presence in the first movie. He’s talking about how he’s never felt as much fear as he did at that moment, how it haunts him and completely ruined his life. The fear in his voice, and Arthurs reaction to it, when he finally realises the damage he caused, it’s just….it hints at a much better film than what we got.

Civil War

Specifically for the scene where they come across the piles of dead bodies. I mentioned in my review that there was a moment where I felt I had to leave, this was the moment. It’s…..it’s harrowing.

One Life

The first of two holocaust movies in these nominations. The guilt the character feels for not being able to do more oozes off every scene. It’s helped by some pretty darn good performances. This is more personal than the other holocaust movie, and definitely has more parallels to modern life (sadly). This was the first 2024 film I saw, I probably should have gone with something a bit happier. To quote my original review (and still one of my favourite paragraphs):

“It’s a good reminder that the people being helped aren’t soldiers, politicians, or anybody who had a choice in the war or where they live. They were just children who were at constant risk of being arrested and executed just for existing in their current location or as their current ethnicity/religion. It’s impossible to comprehend something similar in modern society.

Unless you’re Ukrainian

or Palestinian”

The Zone Of Interest

Look at what the film about, that should indicate why this film was nominated. I was not a massive fan of this film, but when it worked, it REALLY worked, with one of the characters’ emotional breakdowns mirroring yours (only you’re hopefully not a nazi). But the real sadness comes from how unaffected people are. It’s harrowing how normalised genocide is to some of them, with one of them admitting he couldn’t pay attention to a speech because all he could think about was how he could gas everybody in the room. It’s callous, cruel, and far too true.

Winner

The Iron Claw

Obviously, this was going to be here. I knew the story, and I’m still unsure if that made it better or worse. I want to watch this with someone who knows nothing, to see what’s worse. Because I knew what was going to happen, I saw the set-ups and the train of sadness approach with full knowledge of what would happen. But the surprises may catch you off guard if you don’t know. You may sit there thinking “Ohhhh, one of the brothers died, this is so sad” and think that’s it, that’s the end of the sadness. Spoilers; THAT IS NOT THE END OF THE SADNESS! It just keeps going and going. Yes, it may feel a bit weird to put a film about a singular family as sadder than a holocaust movie, but I argue that’s due to the emotional connections made with the characters. Yes, the numbers are smaller (much smaller), but it hits harder. That’s not sociopathic, it’s natural. It’s why people view the funerals of a relative as sadder than earthquakes in another country. Sadness is all about emotion, and few films are better at realising that than this.

Weirdest

Nominees

Argylle

Not all weird is good. Sometimes weird is a skiing action scene taking place on a floor coated in oil, just after a smoke-filled dance scene set to a song even Waitrose customers would describe as “a bit soppy”. It’s creative, I’ll give it that. It’s not like anything else you’ll see. But it’s also kind of embarrassing to watch. With some baffling creative decisions in terms of visuals.

Boy Kills World

This leans into its oddness, with some truly jaw-dropping fight scenes alongside some “lol, the main character is deaf” scenes. Imagine if John Wick was a comedy, written by the creators of Airplane before they went all right-wing and “People holding a right-wing president to account are all terrorists!”.

Longlegs

Maybe “weird” isn’t the word I’m looking for here. “Utterly disturbing” would be more accurate. What makes the weirdness stand out is how normal the rest of the film is. A lot of it is played like a straight detective drama, so when Cage is on-screen, or when the murders themselves are looked into, it feels even weirder than it would if it was spooky spooky woo all the way through (like Malum was)

The Beast

This is weird in a non-English movie way. I’m not even sure if “weird” is the right word, I’d say more “hypnotic”. Each scene on its own is relatively normal, but when you see how they interact with each other and tie into the overall narrative, the oddness reveals itself like a flasher on a street corner. It’s a strange watch, where you constantly have to adjust your expectations of traditional narrative structure, remembering scenes that happened in a different time, and playing the current scene alongside that in your head. Essentially, it’s the narrative version of a Mobius strip.

Winner

Poor Things

From the second the trailer came you could tell this was going to be weird. I heard Kinds Of Kindness was weirder, but I wasn’t able to go to the screening of that for health reasons. Poor Things is unique in every aspect. From the script, the story, the performances, the music, and the visuals. There are moments it’s too weird, mainly with the audio being discordant which made it difficult to focus. Emma Stone is on top of her game, you can truly believe she’s not in full control of her faculties. The visuals are also unlike anything else. Not just in the lens choices, but also wit the use of colour, particularly on the exterior shots which at times resemble paintings. You may not agree with every choice made, but it’s easy to tell that everything WAS a choice, nothing was accidental or left to chance. At the very least you have to respect that.

Sweetest

Venom: The Last Dance

Not the whole film, but there are moments which are incredibly touching. Two moments stick out. One is when Venom dances in a hotel room. That’s let down by how out of place it is, but in the moment it’s very sweet to see. The next is probably my favourite scene from the film; the family singing a David Bowie song. There’s a simple truth to the scene that rings through and makes you nostalgic for an experience you’ve never had. As I’ve said before; there are moments when the Venom series has shown just how much potential it has, but not many moments where it’s lived up to them.

Alien: Romulus

Almost entirely due to the relationship between two of the characters, Films like Alien have a problem; how do you make the characters smart enough to be in this situation but not quite smart enough to see the issues before they happen? You can’t have a film where scientists land on a planet then immediately remove their helmets and get infected. Okay, you can have that, but you shouldn’t. One way to excuse characters as making rash decisions is personal emotions. Zombie movies have nailed this down, with almost every single one having a scene where someone is infected and a loved one is hesitant to kill them, resulting in chaos. Romulus has similar moments, where the characters’ love for each other is the driving motivation for what would otherwise be questionable choices. Despite the fact one of them is an android, it’s a very human relationship

Babes

A movie like this lives and dies on the romantic relationship seeming believable. That’s difficult to do when we only meet one of the characters once and then he dies. The meet-cute is so damn believable that it actually made me jealous. Yes, one of the participants dies, but the moments they spend together? It’s fucking adorable.

Humanist Vampire Seeking Consenting Suicidal Person

Again, fucking adorable. This could be terrible and melodramatic. But the central relationship is damn cute that you can’t help but fall in love with it. HVSCSP is flawed, but without the moments (particularly the two of them just sitting there listening to music), it would be a failure. With them? It’s genuinely lovely.

Paddington In Peru

Do I even need to justify this? It’s a Paddington movie, OF COURSE, it’s going to be adorable.

Thelma

It’s difficult to not watch this and fall a little bit in love with how lovely June Squibb is. She plays her role perfectly, with a mix of defencelessness and aged smarts. I like how Thelma didn’t just do the “old lady does a rap” style of comedy. The jokes have actual heart to them, it’s why it works. What could be just a silly dumb comedy, is actually a heartwarming look at ageing, family, and the defenceless you can feel after being scammed. The relationship between her and her grandson are delightfully sweet.

Winner

Monster

I had no idea what Monster was going in, I assumed it wasn’t a biography of the drinks company or the Imagine Dragons song. For a large period of the runtime of the film, I still wasn’t sure. Monster isn’t a film, it’s a puzzle that gradually reveals itself to you. But when it does? Oh my science is it worth it. Once you realise the romantic relationship at the heart of the Rashomon-style narrative, your heart will melt. It may seem like it comes out of nowhere, but that’s only because your brain wasn’t trained to read the foreshadowing. The two characters interacting is damn adorable, especially with the conflicted feelings they obviously have, knowing how the world is against their pairing.

Most Me

This is both the easiest and hardest to explain. They’re essentially the films I think are closest to my personality. Sometimes that’s “These are the films I feel I would have made”, sometimes it’s “I have never identified with a character more”.

American Fiction

It shifts skilfully between incredibly unsubtle satire about race in 2020’s America (especially in regards to expectations and preconceptions placed upon black people), to discussions about family trauma, and then ridiculously silly dialogue about nothing. It makes you laugh, it makes you cry, it makes you feel things. I could never write this movie, but I would really want to.

The Iron Claw

It’s a wrestling movie, this was going to be here. I’m a huge professional wrestling fan, and the backstage stories are fucking insane sometimes. You need a certain personality type to be involved in the business, and those personality types tend to do crazy shit. There are a lot of stories from the history of it which would make good films, but I’m not sure any would be as heartbreaking as this.

Winner

Sometimes I Think About Dying

Yes, I rated this movie lower than the others on this list. So it’s not the best movie of the year, but it is the one I would show people if they wanted to know me. I really identified with the lead character and understood her feelings of preferred isolation. The dreary drudge of day-to-day domestication and how you escape into bleak fantasies to feel something is all too relatable. There’s also something to be said about how she craves human connection but denies it to herself, sabotaging her best chances of happiness and romantic relationships. Yet again, the character I related most to in a movie is a woman, that just keeps happening for some reason.

2024 In Film: Day 10 (The Amazeballs)

On By troubledproductionsIn Year round upLeave a comment

Alien: Romulus
Ups: Tense.
Great performances.
Perfectly ties into the original.
Downs: Some obvious fanservice.
Not enough focus on background characters.
Some of the CGI is a little “off”.
The third act stalls too much.
Best Performer: Cailee Spaeny
Best Moment: The spacewalk through acid blood.
Worst Moment: Not for me, but the “Stay away from her. You bitch” moment has caused a lot of outrage from people.
Opening: A space probe investigates the wreckage of the ship from the first movie. They decide to bring in a large cocooned alien that’s floating nearby. Stupid, but believable.
Closing: Rain enters stasis, with no idea what will happen next. Smart, because it closes the story, but also leaves it open to a sequel if needed.
Best Line: You don’t help her. You run. Get out, however you got in
Original review here

American Fiction
Ups: Incredibly important.
Very funny.
Incredibly intricate plot work.
Downs: Divisive subject matter.
Issa Rae’s character feels slightly underwritten.
Best Performer: Tough, Jeffrey Wright I guess, but Sterling K. Brown is close.
Best Moment: The initial phone call with the publishers.
Worst Moment: The rug pool near the end feels a little unearned.
Opening: A college student complains to her (black) teacher that she’s not comfortable with the N-word, he notes if he can get used to it, she can. Sums up this film; funny, smart, and sets a fire of fury that it is determined to stoke.
Closing: A film based on Monk’s book is being made, and it’s clear that nobody understands the point of his work, leaving him famous but frustrated.
Best Line: “I just think it’s essential to listen to Black voices right now” said by three characters who discount the opinions of the only black people in the room.
Original review here

Boy Kills World
Ups: Batshit insane.
Funny.
Creative action scenes.
Downs: One of the “twists” is a bit obvious.
Music choices don’t stand out.
Best Performer: Jessica Rothe
Best Moment: The first warehouse fight.
Worst Moment: The “twist” is a little underwhelming
Opening: Boys family are executed. Kind of (it’s explained later). Really well done. Doesn’t quite show the batshit insanity the film later perfects, so tonally doesn’t QUITE match.
Closing: The family are reunited. Sweet, but something about it just doesn’t match the rest of the film.
Best Line: When something’s special enough, you can always go back to it. So let’s make this special. Are you with me?
Original review here

Civil War
Ups: Emotional.
Brutal.
Important.
Downs: More backstory would be nice.
A bit too brutal at times, I felt I needed a break.
Best Performer: Cailee Spaeny
Best Moment: The body pit. Harrowing.
Worst Moment: The death of Lee feels slightly unearned.
Opening: Lee meets Jessie after saving her from an explosion. Quite sweet, and helps explain WHY the characters react to each other as they do. Jessie feels admiration towards Lee, and Lee feels Jessie isn’t careful enough.
Closing: The president gets killed. No idea what will happen next.
Best Line: Every time I survived a war zone, I thought I was sending a warning home – “Don’t do this”. But here we are.
Original review here

Inside Out 2
Ups: Emotional AF.
New cast members and characters blend in perfectly.
“Sometimes you’re the asshole” is an important lesson to learn.
Downs: Very similar to the first one.
Best Performer: Amy Poehler
Best Moment: The panic attack. Seems pretty accurate.
Worst Moment: Joy getting rid of the negative memories makes it seem like she didn’t learn from the first movie.
Opening: A standard “here’s what’s new” showing Riley’s friendships. IO2 does focus more on Riley than the first one, but still not enough.
Closing: Riley finds out if she got on the hockey team. She finds out, we don’t. I get why they went with that, but it is a slightly underwhelming ending.
Best Line: I don’t know how to stop Anxiety. Maybe we can’t. Maybe this is what happens when you grow up. You feel less joy.
Original review here

Paddington In Peru
Ups: Exactly what is needed right now.
Utterly charming.
Funny and weird.
A worthy addition to the franchise.
Downs: Do kind of miss Sally Hawkins.
Kind of predictable at times.
Best Performer: Ben Whishaw. I know other performers are better, but this movie lives and dies on his vocal performance. Carla Tous deserves a special mention though.
Best Moment: Paddington surrounded by other bears. Is very sweet and does make you wonder if he’s staying.
Worst Moment: The Paddington In Peru song. Goes on too long.
Opening: Paddington gets a letter. I will say this, PIP does not take long to get to the actual story.
Closing: Hugh Grant’s back!
Best Line: The Lord works in suspicious circumstances.
Original review here

The Iron Claw
Ups: So damn sad!
Good performances.
Good music.
Does a good job of bringing non-fans into the weird world of professional wrestling.
Downs: Skips over quite a lot, including a whole person.
Chronology is all over the place.
Best Performer: Efron.
Best Moment: The afterlife scene, would have been overly schmaltzy and stupid in something else, but it REALLY works here.
Worst Moment: Ric Flair. A diabolically bad performance.
Opening: Fritz buys an expensive vehicle without telling his wife. Not necessary in terms of narrative, but does a good job of setting up his personality of being overly domineering and hiding it under a veneer of love.
Closing: Kevin cries. It’s actually a huge deal as he’s been suppressing his emotions. His kids promise to always be there for him. Genuinely made me tear up remembering it.
Best Line: “I used to be a brother, now I don’t have any brothers”. Based on a true line. It will BREAK you.
Original review here

Transformers One
Ups: Much more mature than you’d expect it to be.
Looks slick.
Good performances.
Downs: Slight ending fatigue.
Best Performer: Brian Tyree Henry
Best Moment: The start of darkness for Megatron. Damn near perfect. The performance, the emotion, it all makes SOO much sense.
Worst Moment: The race, because as good as it is, it could be better.
Opening: Explains the lore, which I’m very glad of because I’m not that familiar with it.
Closing: The battle lines are drawn. I really hope this gets a sequel.
Best Line: “No, I want to kill him”. The moment everything changes and it becomes brilliant.
Original review here

The Iron Claw (2023) Review

On By troubledproductionsIn ReviewLeave a comment

Synopsis: The triumph and tragedy of the Von Erich brothers, a wrestling family based in Texas during the 70’s and 80’s.

I’m gonna be honest with you guys, girls, both and neither, this film would have had to be TERRIBLE for me not to like it. I watched a documentary about the Von Erichs a few years ago so I knew the tragedy was perfect for a movie. That foreknowledge also meant that what happened was not a surprise. I’m not sure what would be the most devastating way to watch this. If you went in completely blind then you might think “Oh, that moment was very sad. Time to see how the family recovers from this. Wait, now THIS?” and find yourself relentlessly overcome by the constant slew of depressing events, a bit like watching the news in [insert current year]. But is being aware of what’s coming any better? Watching with the knowledge of what’s going to happen is a bit like watching a train slowly fall on an unknowing family having a picnic. You can see something terrible will happen, but you can’t do anything to stop it.

The worst part about this? The reality is actually sadder. There’s another brother who passed away that the film doesn’t show. Imagine that, having so much bad shit happen to your family a two-hour film isn’t enough to fit it all in. There are some other moments where it plays a bit loose with reality. Nothing major, it’s mainly about the chronology of events. A lot of things are made to look like they happened closer to each other than they actually did, creating a false sense of connection to some of them, implying that some events were the direct cause of the tragedies, even when in reality there were years between them. For most people watching, this won’t cause any issues, but for those who know what actually happened, it can be a bit frustrating to watch, but not enough to stop you from enjoying it.

A few wrestling fans might have issues with the cast not really looking much like the people they’re portraying. It’s true, in photos you can’t really see the resemblance. But the way that each actor captures the essence of their character is perfect. With one exception. I try to shy away from bad performances from actors I don’t know, particularly with those who don’t even have a Wikipedia page. It can feel a bit like bullying, and you never know if they might see it and feel discouraged. If you’re a name actor and your performance is shit? Yes, I’ll call you out on your performance, but I do try to be a bit kinder to unknowns. I’m about to break that rule for Aaron Dean Eisenberg. His portrayal of Ric Flair is shocking, and unrecognisable as the character. Ric Flair has a very distinctive vocal cadence, and Eisenberg doesn’t even approach it. At best he sees the correct cadence in the distance and then heads in the opposite direction to buy cheese, walking right past a warehouse that’s currently holding acting workshops. It’s distractingly bad and is the weakest part of a truly great film.

I think everybody should see this film, it’s genuinely fantastic. It will break you, and when you think it’s finished, will break you again. It’s so well done too. There’s a scene set in the afterlife which risks coming off cheesy, especially in such a grounded film. But it REALLY works here, with even the surviving Von Erich coming out in support of it. I’m glad he liked it, as he wasn’t actually involved in production so if he wasn’t a fan of the finished result it would mean the whole thing comes off slightly exploitative. The reaction from most people in the industry, and from family members, has been mostly positive. There’s been a few people who have said it made the father, Fritz Von Erich, look like a dick. I mean, nobody will come out of this thinking he was a good person, but considering it only implied instead of flat-out stating that when he forced his son to give a press conference after a coma it was whilst the son had brain damage, and it doesn’t contain a moment where he drunkenly tells his only surviving son “The only reason you’re still alive is because you’re not man enough to kill yourself like your brothers did”, I’d argue that Fritz The Twat actually got off pretty light.

In summary; watch this film. But FFS pick something nice to treat yourself to afterwards. I’ve watched two holocaust-based movies this year, but they didn’t quite hit home like this did. I think it’s because the holocaust is SO large that it’s hard to truly comprehend. Whereas the themes of The Iron Claw; toxic masculinity, burnout etc. They’re all ones that we see every day all around us, and they’re ones which some people actually still defend as push as good things. So it’s heartbreaking to see the natural ending of a lot of those vices. It’s not something that happens to other people, it’s something we can see happening to all of us. So it has a natural sense of empathy to the way you watch it. Only, you know, it’s empathy with spandex tights and fake fights.