At the bitter end of World War II, a German deserter and a young woman are drawn into bloody battle with a group of Nazis hunting for hidden gold.
I’ve said it before but Netflix has been having a very rough year when it comes to original movies, Blood & Gold is at the very least a decent one there’s just honestly not whole lot to comment on here.
The movie serves as a nice little love letter to the Italo western and World War II exploitation movies from the 60s and 70s, if you are a fan of those types of movies you are going to get that here. The movie also does have a similar atmosphere that Sisu had although I would say Sisu is definitely the better movie.
The acting is overall not bad, the filming is actually quite nice to look at and there’s a lot of action scenes that are quite thrilling and atmospheric. Blood & Gold is overall not bad at all just nothing really that special.
Dom Toretto and his family are targeted by the vengeful son of drug kingpin Hernan Reyes.
Fast X is the first of the three part finale of the Fast & Furious series, the last few installments in the series particularly Fate Of The Furious and F9 were not good. Luckily Fast X is a huge improvement over the two and is just what the series needed to get back on track (no pun intended).
Performance wise Jason Momoa is easily the standout, while everyone else does a pretty solid job (some far better than others) Momoa takes his performance as the villain and goes full on looney tunes with it. It’s incredibly entertaining and surprisingly never gets old, each time he appears on screen he’s always doing something different or has something entertaining to say. He also comes off as threatening to the other characters in a darkly funny way that works quite well, it’s definitely what the series needed.
Daniela Melchior, Brie Larson, John Cena and Charlize Theron are also pretty solid as well, they have limited amount of screentime (outside of John Cena who gets a decent amount) but they are pretty solid. The action scenes are quite a lot of fun, this is definitely some of the best there’s ever been for the series in a very long time, some action scenes do tend to go on for a bit longer than they should but that’s to be expected at this point.
Honestly the main issue mainly comes from the movie falling apart towards the end mainly due to juggling so many different plot lines, which while yes Fast X is the first part of a three part finale It still has some plot lines that aren’t particularly interesting or have very little going on. It’s nice that the movie gave each of the characters at least something to do, whether those things are interesting is very debatable. The ending is definitely abrupt which again is expected and honestly fits the energy of this franchise quite well.
Honestly there really isn’t much else to say Fast X is the very definition of a Fast & Furious film, if you are a fan of the franchise you will absolutely love this one. It does everything an installment of the series should do and for the most part accomplishes it. However if you are someone who is getting sick of the franchise this one won’t win you over, it is definitely a huge step up from the last few movies but anyone who wishes for the quality of Furious 7, Fast Five or Fast & Furious 6 isn’t going to get that here.
A martial artist-in-training believes she must save her older sister from her impending marriage. After enlisting the help of her friends, she tries to pull off the most ambitious of all wedding heists in the name of independence and sisterhood.
Polite Society is a wild ride and it’s definitely a very interesting one that I’ve been quite curious about.
The acting in particular is very strong here Priya Kansara and Ritu Arya have excellent chemistry between one another, director Nida Manzoor does a beautiful job of capturing this sister bond the two have with one another. Manzoor also manages to make it surprisingly raw and touching in a lot of areas, I say surprising because on the surface the movie seem like just a highly energized action comedy film. But there is so much more than that in fact that doesn’t even begin to describe how much character is in the film.
The film does a fantastic job of mixing the coming of age story genre and the action genre with some comedy thrown in as well, action and coming of age are two genres that you don’t often see mix in film but Manzoor combines them in such an interesting way. She gives these characters so much determination take for example the main character Rita Khan (played by Priya Kansara) she wants to be a stuntwoman, so Manzoor works the action genre into that idea and creates some beautifully done action scenes.
The action scenes are electrifying and really grab the viewer’s attention quickly, there’s a lot of character to them and are overall very entertaining to watch. The film does get a bit more bizarre as it goes on and even then Nida Manzoor still holds on to the film and introduces these bizarre scenes sparingly.
Lastly Polite Society has a ton of heart that really does get the viewer to feel for these characters, it’s a very fast paced journey that you honestly don’t want to stop at all. Be sure to check this one out!
Serial killers Johnny and Clyde are madly in love and on an endless crime spree. They set their sights on robbing crime boss Alana’s casino, which is under the guard of her demonic warrior.
Johnny & Clyde is what happens when you take everything that made Natural Born Killers so disturbing, looney and interesting then proceeded to replace it with the most dull elements possible.
Outside of Megan Fox (who needs to fire her agent immediately) there is absolutely nothing here that many Bonnie and Clyde clones haven’t already done, this goes for a more Natural Born Killers approach where they try to capture the performances of Woody Harrelson and Juliette Lewis.
But the movie almost immediately falls flat on it’s face due to the writing being truly terrible in every single way you could imagine, I’m sure Avan Jogia and Ajani Russell are both fine actors they are just given material that I don’t think any actor could have really made it work. A lot of it reads as early 2000s bad fanfiction that wants to be edgy. One of the lines is literally “We could be the darkest fairy tale of all time”
There’s so many plot holes as well even to the point where they start to throw ideas at a wall and somehow come up with a demon, it makes very little sense but the rest of the movie doesn’t make sense so why bother right?
I’m not exactly sure what the overall goal of Johnny & Clyde was but if it was to make you want to watch Natural Born Killers instead then it accomplishes it’s goal quite well.
While fleeing from dangerous assailants, an assassin comes out of hiding to protect her daughter she left earlier in life.
The Mother is yet another Netflix original movie that sadly suffers from being way too forgettable.
There’s moments where Nikki Caro does a decent job in the director’s chair particularly when The Mother (played by Jennifer Lopez) and Zoe (played by Lucy Paez) have this mother and daughter chemistry that is quite strong and really highlights the performances from Jennifer Lopez and Lucy Paez. There’s a few action scenes (towards the end) that are decently done but they are admittedly nothing to write home about.
That’s where the movie really ends with it’s positives, the editing in most of the actions scenes before the third act are awful, they really don’t really tell us much about Jennifer Lopez’s characters. We are told that she’s a ruthless assassin but we barely get to see any of that due to how messy the editing really is.
When the third act rolls around the movie does actually pick up quite a bit surprisingly enough, but at that point it’s a bit too late the time to tell a proper backstory is long gone. Jennifer Lopez and Lucy Paez really do carry the third act and really do the most they can with it plus try to give the movie a proper ending.
Overall The Mother has a decent third act, great performances from Jennifer Lopez and Lucy Paez but not much else. It’s yet another forgettable Netflix original action thriller movie that has nothing new to offer.
Still reeling from the loss of Gamora, Peter Quill must rally his team to defend the universe and protect one of their own. If the mission is not completely successful, it could possibly lead to the end of the Guardians as we know them.
Guardians Of The Galaxy Vol. 3 is the latest installment of the Marvel Cinematic Universe and the final film of the Guardians Of The Galaxy trilogy. The discussion about superhero fatigue or the superhero genre itself putting mediocrity or flat out terrible movies is still a very relevant. Especially given with what we got so far this year, Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania outside of a few performances was a horrible start to phase five and Shazam: Fury Of The Gods suffered very identical problems that Quantumania did and just sort of came and went.
However Guardians Of The Galaxy Vol. 3 is what happens when you focus on far more than just building a cinematic universe, random cameos and actually have very interesting themes with strong writing. The Guardians Of The Galaxy films I consider to be the best of the MCU and a lot of it has to do with how beautifully well written the characters are and James Gunn’s direction which are both very present here.
For starters the character’s are once again incredibly well written here, the film completes a lot of the arcs the characters have went through from the last several years, Chris Pratt once again kills it as Peter Quill, while he doesn’t get as much development here as he did in the previous movies he really doesn’t need to. The last film really wrapped up a lot of his story and in this one it tied up some loose ends which does lead to a very emotional touching end for his journey, it’s one that’s been hinted at for awhile and to see him accomplish it is truly satisfying.
Bradley Cooper is at his absolute best here as Rocket as the trailers and information about the film has said, the film takes a look at Rocket’s backstory which is quite dark, that’s one thing I should mention Vol. 3 is the darkest of the trilogy (heck this might be the darkest film of the MCU if we are going to be honest.) the backstory really does a fantastic job of building Rocket’s character, there’s so many emotions and really makes Rocket one of the most interesting characters of the MCU. There’s so much pain and sadness in the many flashbacks that truly do make you cry, Rocket’s backstory is among some of the best the MCU has ever done and it’s truly beautiful to see his arc be completed.
Dave Bautista as Drax actually goes through quite a lot of development here, he’s shown in the previous films that he really cares about the team, but here you can absolutely see the result of that. It helps that Bautista gives a phenomenal performance and really puts so much heart into the role, it always did seem like he was having a blast playing Drax whenever he was on screen and that shows here.
Karen Gillan as Nebula is yet another highlight performance of the film, while yes Gillan has always killed as Nebula but I would argue she takes the performance to a different level in this one. Not only does her arc complete in this film but it’s such a beautiful end to it as well, especially during one particularly moment at the end that has everyone together, Nebula is by far one of the most developed characters of the MCU and truly one of the most interesting as well.
Chukwudi Iwuji plays the villain High Evolutionary and it’s quite refreshing to see a villain who isn’t sympathetic at all, one of the problems a lot of people have had with some recent MCU villains is they are always either given a sympathetic backstory or make arguments where someone can say “they are right” while yes that’s not necessarily a bad thing, but when you constantly do it film after film (or show) it starts to become very old. High Evolutionary is straight up evil, he wants to commit genocide and torture creatures he sees as “not perfect” Iwuji’s performance is so unhinged that it’s to the point where it’s quite brilliant. Iwuji says that some inspirations for his performance was William Shakespeare and that really shows, he balances a lot of absolutely unhinged moments with some calm and collected moments.
James Gunn’s direction much like the previous two films is absolutely brilliant, there’s a beautiful blend of comedy and dramatic moments that help the film move along at very steady pace. It tells a beautiful story while making some very hilarious jokes, the music is once against fantastic as well. One scene in particular towards the end uses “Dog Days Are Over” by Florence + The Machine and it’s truly a brilliant use of it, the scene really puts a nice closing on an incredible journey we have had with these characters.
Lastly there’s the film itself and it’s everything that the end of a trilogy should be, it completes the many character arcs while introducing a few new elements that add to the overall themes and characters.
I know it may look like I went on a lot about the characters, but that’s honestly the main source of power in the Guardians Of The Galaxy Trilogy…the characters, since 2014 we have been on a journey with these characters that are quite unique when it comes to the writing style, the team is arguably the characters who went through the most development out of all the characters from the Marvel Cinematic Universe. I believe the reason why these characters and films are so fantastic is mainly development, the characters loving each other like a family and the overall charm.
Guardians Of The Galaxy Vol. 3 is the perfect closer to the trilogy and is among one of the very best films so far this year!
Guardians Of The Galaxy Vol. 3 is playing in theaters.
Members of the Justice League are transported to the world of Remnant and find themselves turned into teenagers. The Remnant heroes combine forces with the Justice League to uncover why their planet has been mysteriously altered.
Before I start I want to make it clear that outside of the Tifa Vs Yang episode from Screw Attack’s Death Battle series I have no knowledge of RWBY, with that said let’s talk about Justice League x RWBY: Super Heroes & Huntsmen, Part One.
Look before I come off as an anti-crossover type person I want to make it clear that I’m not, I am all for studios going crazy with ideas that are completely out of the ordinary. Scooby-Doo and Tom and Jerry have been doing that for years and each time it gets a laugh out of me, Justice League and RWBY are the last things I expected to be combined together. I admire the attempt of doing something completely different however that doesn’t make it good.
The voice acting is a mixed bag Natalie Alyn Lind is by far the standout as Wonder Woman, Nat Wolff being the absolute worst as Batman. A lot of the characters on the DC side of things are so far removed from the original characters it’s actually quite baffling, particularly Batman who I would not blame anyone if they thought he was an entirely different character.
There’s some fine enough action scenes and and the animation does have it’s moments, however a lot of the DC character models almost feel like character skins from a video game. Where there’s very little differences with each of them, as far as everything else goes there’s just honestly not a whole lot here. It’s a very traditional good guys vs bad guys story that has nothing really new to add or say.
I definitely don’t think it’s quite as bad as some people have said, but it’s most certainly not anything good either.
Justice League x RWBY: Super Heroes & Huntsmen, Part One is available on all VOD platforms.
When a detective learns that his missing daughter and a string of high profile bank robberies might be connected, he must go on a mind-bending journey to find his daughter and stop the secret government agency behind the madness.
Hypnotic was the May 1st Regal Mystery Movie and of the ones I’ve went to (I missed the ones for Missing and Sisu) this is definitely one of the better ones. There’s definitely a lot to like about Hypnotic and I applaud Robert Rodriguez for doing his own thing.
The performances can be a bit of a mixed bag at times, I like seeing Ben Affleck take on different roles especially these types of roles. With that said I wouldn’t call his performance good but I will say that it’s pretty entertaining at times, the supporting cast such as Alice Braga and William Fichtner are pretty solid especially Fichtner who does give an intimidating performance.
The many ideas of the movie are decently executed during the first two acts, as both acts are very engaging. There is definitely some questionable editing that makes some scenes a complete and total mess, but for the most part it tells a pretty engaging story. Character development is pretty nonexistent here, sure we are given some information about the characters but we are never really given a backstory, who they really are or why they are doing certain things.
What hurts this movie mostly is the third act that is way too fast paced and ends very abruptly, granted there are moments during the third act that are very unintentionally hilarious. But it isn’t quite enough to really save it from being a mess.
If it sounds like I didn’t go into much detail with Hypnotic it’s because the movie is hard to really talk about without spoiling. And I really don’t want to do that because I do think the several twists in Hypnotic are interesting and definitely should be seen going in as little as possible. Overall I definitely liked Hypnotic a bit more the more I thought about it, it’s not anything I don’t think I will ever come back to but it is something worth looking into.
During the last days of World War II, a solitary prospector crosses paths with Nazis on a scorched-Earth retreat in northern Finland. When the soldiers decide to steal his gold, they quickly discover they just tangled with no ordinary miner.
Sisu is if you took Mad Max Fury Road and John Wick and asked the question “what if it took place during near the end of World War II?” You would get Sisu a movie that admittedly shares a lot of the same elements as John Wick but still manages to be a complete blast.
Jorma Tommila plays Aatami Korpi a solider who is now a miner and is feared among many rival soldiers some people calling him “immortal” which is quite accurate because this guy picks apart this group of Nazis one by one. Tommila gives a very intimidating performance and really captures the atmosphere the film is going for quite well, the cinematography when combined with the location are very beautiful and makes for some very interesting action scenes. We get to explore around the many battlefields, it has this eeriness to it that is actually quite effective.
The action scenes are quite fantastic, filled to the brim with gore and lots of pretty strong kills that really make the film a very entertaining ride. The action during the last 10 minutes or so does get a little too silly but I guess it does fit the whole “this man is unbeatable” idea, outside of Aatami Korpi the other characters don’t get much in the way of development. The main villains are Bruno Helldorf played by Aksel Hennie and his subordinate Wolf played by Jack Doolan. The performances from Hennie and Doolan are both very good, the characters however are just ultimately higher ranked Nazis. They aren’t that much different from the ones they are leading, except just lasting much longer in the movie.
Overall Sisu thematically might not have a lot going on as it is very straightforward and honestly tells you from the trailer what you are getting, but it is very fun film that is really solid. It’s not going to reinvent the action genre but it is yet another solid one from this year.
During the war in Afghanistan, a local interpreter risks his own life to carry an injured sergeant across miles of gruelling terrain.
Of the two Guy Richie films that have been released this year The Covenant and Operation Fortune: Ruse de Guerre, The Covenant is by far the better of the two.
While The Covenant is not based on a true story the movie does state that there have been situations where interpreters have put themselves on the line of danger to save injured sergeants. First and foremost the performances from Jake Gyllenhaal who plays John Kinley and Dar Salim who plays Ahemd are both quite fantastic here, the bond between is truly fantastic and while yes it’s a cliched question in movie the whole “how far would you go to save someone who saved your life” thing works here.
The first two acts are very well done especially when it comes to atmosphere that truly is thrilling and I really have to say for a first time directing a war movie Guy Richie does a really good job of nailing down the atmosphere of war, it might not be up there with some of the greats such as Hacksaw Ridge, 1917 or All Quiet On The Western Front. But it honestly doesn’t need to be, Richie made the atmosphere his own and made it quite interesting.
Unfortunately The Covenant does suffer from two major flaws the first being the third act, while it isn’t awful as it does keep some thrilling moments which were previously in the first two acts. It doesn’t have a whole lot of development unfortunately, we are introduced to some characters who get about 7 minutes of screentime and then are pretty much never seen again. The action scenes during the third act are nowhere near as thrilling as they were than the first two acts, it turns into an action scene you would expect from over the top action movies. Which yes I get there’s going to be action scenes but I can’t help but feel like that it takes away from the quietness and atmospheric feeling that was in the other two acts.
Lastly there’s the messaging of the movie, while the movie does have a very good intentioned message that interpreters are important and should be talked about more (which I agree with) when it comes to the War in Afghanistan, it honestly doesn’t explore all that much about the interpreters. Outside of Dar Salim’s character Ahmed we aren’t given a whole lot of information about interpreters and how important they are, it’s only at the end of the movie where some text shows up and then the credits show army soldiers being buddies with interpreters. It’s a shame because I do think the topic of interpreters gets very overshadowed and nowhere near as much attention as it should.
With that said I do think The Covenant is a solid movie with some really strong acting and Guy Richie trying to do something a bit different with the war movie genre. There’s a lot to like about this one.
Jerome Reviews... 