Months in Review: May, June & July films (part 2)

This is a continuation on the previous post. For all the reviews of the films watched in May read Part 1.

JUNE FILMS

WONDER WOMAN (2017) [ 4/5 ]

A beautifully crafted big-budget Hollywood blockbuster that manages to excel at the little things. Surely some of the source material seems at odds with the more mature theme of female empowerment but, at its conclusion, the latest DC Comics venture comes off as more than the sum of its parts. It helps that Gal Gadot is an excellent choice to play Wonder Woman.

Months in Review: December & January (2016)

How quickly do months fly by when you are busy. It seems like only a week ago I posted my last review. As quickly as my newfound motivation to blog a bit more came to me on January 1st, as quickly it evaporated not from a lack of desire, but from a lack of energy.

With a bit of a delay, I share with you my brief thoughts on the films I had the chance to watch in the last month of 2015 and the first of 2016. A total of 21 films were watched, 12 in December and 9 in January. The average rating was a very good 3.35 out of 5. The following are ordered in the way they were seen:

Film Review: The Hateful Eight (2015)

After eight feature films and an ever more recognizable brand of cinema, we have come to expect a certain type of movie from Quentin Tarantino. He is, in many ways, the gold standard for many young and unapologetic film makers out there that think they have a new and distinct vision to share with the world. In the 1990s, Tarantino represented a break from Hollywood formulas that had been in place for most of the 1980s (with a few exceptions of course). To supplement his unique style of film making, Tarantino had the kind of rebellious anti-establishment personality to match that made his work instant cult favorites.

Month in Review: February

Though I have slightly increased my activity in the blogosphere so far this year, it has been difficult to go through many films. Most of what I’ve watched are blind spots from last year, but I still have a lot of catching up to do. As it has been the case in the last few months, I probably spent more time on a couple of TV shows. First, I went through the first two seasons of BBC’s original series Peaky Blinders and, in the last couple of days of February, I devoured the entire third season of House of Cards (I know…)

Film Review: Django Unchained (2012)

Genre: Drama/ Comedy/ Thriller

Cast: Jamie Foxx (Django), Christoph Waltz (Dr. King Schultz), Leonardo DiCaprio (Calvin Candie), Samuel L. Jackson (Stephen), Kerry Washington (Broomhilda)

Writer/Director: Quentin Tarantino

It usually takes less than 30 seconds to be able to tell if you’re watching a Quentin Tarantino film. In Django Unchained, the director of modern classics like Pulp Fiction opens the story as he usually does: with a hell of a lot of confidence; the kind that drives him to splash the screen with huge blood red letters that go through the main credits as the soundtrack quickly asserts itself to the sound of the title song Django! (by L. Bacalov and R. Roberts). The tone is confident and the film declares its arrival without a second to spare. My appreciation of Tarantino has always been rooted in his attention to detail, where even something as seemingly trivial as the credits can become part of the narrative.

Film Review: The Avengers (2012)

Genre: Action

Cast: Robert Downey Jr. (Iron Man), Scarlett Johansson (Black Widow), Jeremy Renner (Hawkeye), Chris Evans (Capt. America), Chris Hemsworth (Thor), Mark Ruffalo (The Hulk), Samuel L. Jackson (Nick Fury), Tom Hiddlestone (Loki)

Director: Joss Whedon

Writers: Joss Whedon, Zak Penn

Despite the incredibly entertaining and talented cast at its disposal, The Avengers failed to create more than a bombastic spectacle for the senses, one that is as messy, loud, chaotic and corny as they come.

When I first began to think of the review for this film one word kept popping up in my head: unnecessary. From the battleship with “wings”, to the Hulk-proof cage, and the suicidal tendencies of Robert Downey’s Iron Man; The Avengers always opts for more, never for less. In its grandest moment the film depicts a mega battle that stretches the entire area of New York City where throngs of aliens “disembark” from another dimension with no other goal than to immediately attack and destroy the human race. The scale of the scene is so huge there’s no telling where one character is in relation to the other, throwing all concerns for accuracy and continuity out the window.