Reviews by ImminentOrbit

This movie won the Academy Award for cinematography and it shows. The scenery of the French Riviera is shown throughout and is done beautifully.

This was a romantic thriller by Alfred Hitchcock. It was amusing enough, but not the caliber of movie that I normally associate with Hitchcock.

The romance was odd and seemed to really be one-sided, with Francie pursuing relentlessly, and John never really seeming all the interested.

The mystery portion wasn't all the convincing, either. The limited number of characters in the movie makes it a pretty easy guess. The behaviour of the police, first chasing him for so long, then letting him go didn't make much sense, or at least why so much time was spent developing the chase only to have it not matter.

Still, it was a decent watch, and it was fun to see an older film on the big screen. 6/10

What an epic start to a great movie. It reminded me of the old school James Bond openings, but with modern effects and action. Really, the entirety of the Kingsman movies are the updated Roger Moore era James Bond films and I couldn't be happier. I definitely enjoy the Daniel Craig Bond, but there is definitely room for this style of spy movie as well.

After the great start, it continued strong. Action packed, funny, and over-the-top, it developed its story and villain and as well as new allies to the Kingsman seamlessly.

I appreciated Eggsy's relationship with his girlfriend. To me, it softened the poor lesson at the end of the first movie of seeing sex as a reward by making her more of a person than simply a trophy.

If I had to find fault, the climax felt weak, especially in comparison to the epic battles fought prior in the movie. Especially the needless sacrifice, considering they supposedly had equipment to detect and avoid the predicament. Additionally, it felt all too easy once they arrived at the final battle.

The villain was clearly evil, but also with a purpose, though it was selfish and for personal gain. The introduction of the secondary villain that would push for the more dire consequences of the evil plot escalated the stakes to a level approaching that of the first movie and made for an unexpected surprise. 8/10

What can be said about this movie? Though it was only 92 minutes, it felt like an eternity. If I was dying, I would watch this movie over and over, filling every minute of my day with it, like Dunbar from Catch-22, making my last moments seemingly last forever. The pacing was poor, with some elements getting too much screen time, and other, more interesting parts mostly being ignored.

Not really very scary, though there were a couple of jump scares that managed to actually startle me. The imagery used was good at being disturbing, but often created more questions than it answered. The story was not really captivating and the characters were terrible.

Sometimes, in horror movies, it is easy to look at a mistake the characters make, or some action they should take and wonder "why don't they just" do something obvious. This movie did a good job of showing why these scenes are often not included, as they were laughably terrible. Trying to delete their accounts, they failed with generic errors. When looking at the code, they see it is magical. Ugh. When confronted by police and the dean of the school, she says she cannot get control of her account, and they offer no assistance, though you'd expect the police department and the IT department of the university to at least be interested in trying something. The most ridiculous part of this was when the dean sat our heroine down and said, "Even if you don't have access and can't remove the video, or delete your account, I'm getting a lot of pressure from the students, so I'm going to have to suspend you for the rest of the semester." Lol. Then, it goes on to have a mostly typical horror movie ending.

Of course, it also suffered from the typical horror movie "whys" as well, like, for instance, why were only some of the friends on her friend list targeted, but not the others? Why could some unfriend her, but others not? Maybe they were closer, real friends? Who cares?

The real tragedy with this movie was that I appreciated the concept. The graphical social media element built into some scenes of the movie was cleverly done. The idea of modern witch was clever. Truly, I am inspired to take the general idea and try to work it into a better story myself. It was an interesting enough concept, maybe it would have been better to not try to tell it as a typical horror story, but a supernatural drama?

The only redeeming quality this movie could have had was that I was going to watch with my pal, Dave, and we could have mocked it together. Unfortunately, there was unexpected traffic, so I was left to deal with the suffering alone. 3/10

This was a fantastic depiction of the events of the Russian Revolution as seen from the eyes of the people affected by it. In short, Dr. Zhivago got a pretty raw deal, as well as most of the Russians. It is concerning how quickly even a little bit of power goes to the head of those who wield it.

The romance of the story is tragic, and not completely a pure thing. For instance, Zhivago's wife is devoted, loyal, and loving, yet he cheats on her. Regardless, the characters do what they must to survive in a dreadful time and it is compelling to watch. 8/10

This was super weird. Trailers made me think it was a horror movie, and it kind of feels like one at points, but I don't think it really is. Tons of symbolism, and clearly an allegory, but parts of the symbolism were hard to fit with the characters. At least it was thought provoking, but don't go expecting horror. 7/10

A princess rebels and we get to see her day covertly touring the city of Rome. It had its share of comedy, and the interaction of the characters kept it entertaining throughout. If modern "romantic comedies" were more in this style, I think I'd be more inclined to watch them. I also appreciate the realism, in that sometimes things don't work out perfectly happy in the end. 8/10

So, the clown is creepy, and there are some scenes that are intense, but I never really felt it was that scary. It also suffered from the typical horror movie problem of wondering why the behavior of the monster changes. Obviously, the easy answer is because the script calls for it, but it lacks in in-story explanation. Same to be said for the kids deciding that they need to stick together, and then, almost seemingly on purpose, run away from each other at every turn.

The story of the kids becoming friends and doing things together was interesting and well done. However, their interactions with literally everyone else in town was over-the-top ridiculous. That all adults were cartoonish villains, and the bullies were over the top aggressive and everywhere, just made it hard to believe. It would have been appropriate if this had been a kids movie, but with an R rating, that clearly was not the intent.

Finally, it didn't help that pretty much every scene of interest was already shown in the trailers. These might have bumped the scare factor, but expecting them took all of the suspense away.

A bummer, cause I was looking forward to this one, but it really had me waiting for it to just end by the cliched finish.

Wow, so amazingly painful, right from the start. Aggravating and annoying behavior masquerading as "comedy". Terrible.

Well, they tried, but the jokes fell short and felt forced. There were a couple of amusing spots, but not enough to make it worth watching. They probably could have done better by editing out the R-rated material and having expanded it to include a larger audience, since maybe some of the jokes would have been funnier to kids? Dunno.

Wow, that was an hour and a half I'll never get back. Dumb from the beginning, I knew it wasn't going to get better when I laughed out loud at the ridiculous and predictable first death. Disjointed, boring, confusing. I found myself wondering if I should make myself finish watching, or just give up. I chose wrong.

Additionally, at the very end, it mentioned Hasbro studios and that it was based on the game, "Ouija" by Hasbro. That might have been the best part of the movie.