In the not-so-distant future, amid a society madly in love with technology, tech giant Pegazus offers couples the opportunity to share their pregnancies via detachable artificial wombs or pods. So begins Rachel and Alvy’s wild ride to parenthood in this brave new world.
Seems like a running theme with some movies I’ve watched recently has been having good ideas but either poorly executing them or not taking them very far. That’s definitely the case for The Pod Generation.
Emilia Clarke and Chiwetel Ejiofor are both solid in the leading roles and are actually the reason why I watched this movie in the first place, the movie presents a lot of ideas with varying degrees of success. It’s a satirical approach to childbirth there’s a bit of comedy that got a few laughs out of me. But the main focus asking moral questions that the film brings up, plus there’s actually some decent world building that i’m actually quite surprised even happened in movie.
Unfortunately a lot of the movies ideas just don’t go anywhere, it’s very surface level at best and the characters aren’t written very well at all. It almost feels like the movie is holding back from going even bigger, the ending while not bad sets itself up to be something huge but ultimately acts like someone retracting a statement midway through the speech or letter they are discussing.
It’s odd, you have some genuinely solid world building that actually does take time to discuss what this world is and how it’s different than our’s but it forgets to discuss almost everything else. It’s a bit of a shame because the movie itself isn’t terrible, there’s a lot of strong moments and the performances from Clarke and Ejiofor as I said before really make this movie. But sadly this is a very forgettable one.
The Pod Generation is available on all VOD platforms.
Ashley and her daughter turn to Matt, her estranged beach bum father, to help escape a ruthless crime boss.
You would be forgiven if you thought The Retirement Plan was a Netflix original, it has a lot of the similarities that make a bad Netflix original an overdone plot, very few good jokes and a chore to sit through.
The cast at the very least does seem like they are having fun, Nicolas Cage, Ron Perlman and Ashley Greene definitely try the best they can with such a lousy script that only has a handful of moments that are passable at best.
Honestly the main issues here are the plot is very by the numbers and a majority of the movie has no impact at all, the movie attempts to use many twists and double crosses but none of that really matters since the characters are written so poorly. The interactions between Bobo (played by Ron Perlman) and Sarah (played by Thalia Campbell) while somewhat decent ultimately doesn’t lead anywhere, it’s just another kid gets kidnapped and talks to one of the henchmen sort of subplot.
Not even Nicolas Cage can really save this movie, he isn’t really given a whole lot to work with and doesn’t have many lines where he could use his charm, it’s a very limited action comedy with no substance to it at all.
The Retirement Plan is available on all VOD Platforms.
A fiercely independent pilot fighting to keep her family business afloat starts to fall for the man sent by corporate to ground her operation forever, forcing her to choose between her heart and her family.
Love Is in the Air is yet another Netflix romantic comedy movie and it’s no different than what came before it.
There’s only so much I can really say here without sounding like a broken record, this is basically a Hallmark movie if it were Australian. This movie is also Delta Goodman’s first film role since 2005 (Hating Alison Ashley), to be absolutely fair to Goodman she was the best part about this movie by a lot.
The same can’t be said for the rest of the movie where there is very little to engage the viewer, there’s so little going on throughout the movie that by the time the second half of the movie rolls around the viewer has already checked out. A majority of what happens is pretty much every single romantic comedy cliche in the book, I get these Netflix romantic comedies are supposed to have a formula and aren’t supposed to be well written masterpieces. But can’t they at least try to make these movies have more substance to them?
That’s the main problem Love is in the Air is essentially every bad Netflix romantic comedy movie from the past combined into one and while it’s not the absolute worst in the catalogue it’s a movie that people will instantly forget about after viewing.
When the children of the world’s greatest secret agents unwittingly help a powerful game developer unleash a computer virus that gives him control of all technology, they must become spies themselves to save their parents and the world.
Spy Kids: Armageddon is the fifth Spy Kids movie and serves as a reboot to the series, a reboot that was absolutely not needed as well as offering nothing new to the series.
Look I’m well past the age demographic of these movies and I did not go into this movie expecting a masterpiece, however Spy Kids: Armageddon completely misses so much of what made Spy Kids so fun in the first place. I’m not going to act like the Spy Kids movies are well written pieces of cinema but at least the first two had charm too it.
With Armageddon there is very little charm, the cast don’t work nearly as well at all. Zackery Levi and Gina Rodriguez as the parents are uninteresting and really phone it in. Connor Esterson and Everly Carganilla as the leads have some decent moments and at the very least do seem like they are having some bit of fun in certain scenes.
It doesn’t help that Armageddon reuses so many plot elements from other movies and makes them worse, for example there’s the part when the family has to fend off skeletons which is from Spy Kids 2, the movie being centered around video games and set inside a video game that’s Spy Kids 3D. Heck even character traits are reused such as a lot of the jokes being at the expense of the brother, the parents not telling the kids they are spies and the sister having a comeback roast. It’s absolute laziness and wants to come off as a throwback type of movie but it isn’t really a throwback when you are just using the exact same ideas but only somehow making them worse.
Everything else that isn’t reused is quite forgettable, some of the action scenes for some reason take themselves a bit too seriously which is completely odd considering the whole point of why people like the first two Spy Kids movies is they don’t take themselves seriously. It’s a very odd tone shift that completely doesn’t work at all.
Overall Spy Kids: Armageddon was a terrible reboot that offered nothing new to the series, I’m sure the age demographic will get a kick out of this one. Everyone else not so much.
After years of being sheltered from the human world, the Turtle brothers set out to win the hearts of New Yorkers and be accepted as normal teenagers. Their new friend, April O’Neil, helps them take on a mysterious crime syndicate, but they soon get in over their heads when an army of mutants is unleashed upon them.
At this point when a new Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles film is released you kind of know what to expect, some of the movies over the years range in quality and there’s always at least some fun to be had (whether it be so bad it’s funny or genuinely fun.) So I went into Mutant Mayhem with the same mindset and in a very interesting way the focus is not only on the action or jokes but there’s an emotional core to it as well.
For starters I truly think casting actual teenagers as the turtles really benefited the film, there is some surprisingly touching moments between the four that the viewer really connects with and really makes you believe that they genuinely care about each other. Nicolas Cantu, Micah Abbey, Brady Noon and Shamon Brown Jr. all do a fantastic job as the turtles and bring so much energy and heart to the roles. We don’t often really get to see the teenager side of the turtles in a lot of these movies, but we get to see that a whole lot here which makes the film quite fresh.
There’s even this coming of age element to the film, the turtles wanting to be accepted into the human world. It’s a very interesting take that sure might not be exactly a brand new idea but it’s a much different direction from what we usually get from these movies and it works really well here. The jokes aren’t entirely the center focus here even with the supporting cast like Seth Rogen (plays Bebop), John Cena (plays Rocksteady) or even Ice Cube (plays Superfly), there’s a strong balance of comedy and more dramatic moments that is carefully done throughout the film.
The animation is also stunning, much like The Bad Guys or Puss In Boots: The Last Wish it’s inspiration comes from the Spidrer-Verse movies yet makes the style it’s own. Between the attention to detail, to the character’s emotions and actions there’s so much detail to the animation that really paints a beautiful picture.
Overall Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem puts the series in a different direction that is absolutely welcome, excellent character moments, energetic animation, touching moments and so much more make this movie worth the ride.
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem is available on all VOD platforms.
On their flight from New York to London, Hadley and Oliver fall in love with each other. However, they lose each other at customs and the possibility of ever meeting each other again seems improbable, but destiny may have a way of changing the odds.
Love At First Sight is yet another Netflix romantic comedy…what a shocker. However this one ends up being a surprisingly decent one, still a very heavily flawed one but one that is at the very least competent.
Haley Lu Richardson and Ben Hardy quite strong as the leads and the movie wastes no time with establishing the strong chemistry between the two in the first act. In particular in the airport, which might not seem like anything different but the movie does a really solid job of connecting these two characters. Which gives the rest of the movie the chance to further develop these characters.
The rest of the cast are quite great Dexter Fletcher and Sally Phillips as the Shakespeare loving parents were genuinely entertaining with an decent amount of laughs as well. The movie is ultimately a straightforward story about fate, it doesn’t really do anything different that hasn’t been done before. But at the very least Love At First Sight has charm to it that is present throughout the movie.
Unpopular best friends PJ and Josie start a high school fight club to meet girls and lose their virginity. They soon find themselves in over their heads when the most popular students start beating each other up in the name of self-defense.
I think there is so much to be said about how Bottoms is going to go down as this generation’s Mean Girls (2004) the phrase “this generation’s Mean Girls” often gets thrown around with every high school film that gets a very positive reception. The thing is positive reviews aren’t the only thing that can make something the next Mean Girls. There’s many other factors such as rememberable characters, quotable lines, balancing realistic moments with off the wall ones and finally make it your own add some sort of twist to it that help makes it standout. Luckily that’s what director Emma Seligman (previously directed Shiva Baby) did with Bottoms.
Let’s start with what really holds this film together it’s cast and characters, Rachel Sennott and Ayo Edebiri are truly some of the best talent working today and it absolutely shows here. The chemistry between the two is completely natural and from the very first scene you buy their friendship, it absolutely helps that Sennott and Edebiri both did the shows Ayo and Rachel are Single and Taking The Stage together so in a way Bottoms was just very natural for them. Which is something we often don’t really see, this natural connection right out the gate. The characters PJ (played by Rachel Sennott) and Josie (played by Ayo Edebiri) are both fantastic do actually feel like high school students who are friends, sure there’s off the wall moments but even those feel quite natural as well.
Sennott and Edebiri are masters of comedic timing the two seriously know how to control comedic moments and what makes a certain moment hilarious. They also sprinkle in serious moments as well, that can blend in the comedy effortlessly. The two are truly masters at their craft and it just makes it all the more exciting to see them on screen. The rest of the cast are phenomenal as well Ruby Cruz as Hazel is truly entertaining and has her fair share of hilarious moments, Havana Rose Liu starts out as some sort of popular girl character (Isabel) but quickly turns into actually well developed character that has a some really effective moments.
Marshawn Lynch is perhaps the most surprising of them all, his character Mr. G sort of had the opposite effect that a lot of teacher type of characters in high school films. In most high school films the teacher character is sort of one note and is only there to cheer on the main characters, the script from Emma Seligman and Rachel Sennott almost flip that upside down and give this character some depth. Mr. G is a genuinely interesting character who has plenty of surprisingly strong moments when you factor in outside the film where in a interview Marshawn Lynch explaining that he wants to make things right after not handling his sister coming out as gay in very good way you can tell that Lynch put his all into this performance and it completely works.
The direction from Emma Seligman is phenomenal and she once again shows how excellent she is as a director, she makes something completely different from her already masterful directorial debut “Shiva Baby (2021)” and makes something truly special with Bottoms. A high school film that balances serious moments and hilarious moments with ease, even when some characters only serve to say a few hilarious lines you still feel their importance to the story. There’s truly so much love, care and connection between the cast and the film you can easily tell that this story is important to the cast and they go all out with everything they got. Seligman really translates that so wonderfully and once again shows that she is such an interesting filmmaker.
Finally there’s the writing which like I said earlier was written by Emma Seligman and Rachel Sennott, both of which through the writing give some of the most hilarious jokes and writing I’ve heard so far this year. Most of the humor works due to again the connection between the characters, the masterfully done comedic timing of Rachel Sennott and Ayo Edebiri, plus Emma Seligman’s direction. Underneath all of the film it’s just a huge amount of fun, it’s never boring and always keeps the viewer entertained while also diving into the story with it’s more dramatic moments. Which is helped by the characters being genuinely interesting and being written incredibly well.
Overall Bottoms was a film I was looking forward to for awhile now and it most certainly was not a disappointment. In fact this went completely above my expectations and once again shows Emma Seligman is such an incredible filmmaker that I seriously cannot wait to see what she does next.
Corinne convinces her baker best friend, Jane, to commit to a year of baking cakes and bringing them to bars with the goal of meeting people and developing confidence.
Sitting In Bars With Cake is based on the book of the same name by Audrey Shulman. Going into this movie I had very little knowledge on the surface it seemed like it was going to be another generic Netflix romantic comedy only this time it has a Amazon Prime Video cover paint over it. Plus with Trish Sie in the director’s chair (director of Pitch Perfect 3, Step Up All In and The Sleepover) I really did not expect much at all.
As I’ve said in my reviews I like to be surprised and this movie did do that! While it is very flawed there is a decent amount here to really like. For starters the performances from Yara Shaidi and Odessa A’zion are both fantastic, the chemistry between the two have this raw best friend chemistry that we don’t see very often in some other films in this genre. A’zion continues to impress since her performance from last year’s Hellraiser.
There’s some really heartbreaking moments in the film that are seriously quite powerful, the movie also doesn’t forget to sprinkle in some fun moments that stand along the somber ones. You genuinely feel the friendship between Jane (played by Yana Shahidi) and Corinne (played by Odessa A’zion) which only makes the eventual hard hitting moments that much stronger.
Unfortunately what does hold this movie down is the almost 2 hour runtime, which you really start to feel towards the middle of the movie. There’s definitely some patting, I can definitely see what they were trying to go for with using as much time to connect the audience with these characters. But a nearly 2 hour runtime wasn’t exactly necessary to do that.
Overall Sitting In Bars With Cake is still a decent movie that definitely surprised me, it might not be anything new to the genre. But it’s a decently effective one that if you are a fan of the genre I do recommend watching.
Sitting in Bars With Cake is available on Amazon Prime Video
In a neighbourhood where fighting is stitched into the fabric of everyday life, Miguel has never found himself in one. However, when a combination of events turn his life upside down, Miguel and his friends enter into a series of misadventures.
There really isn’t a whole lot to say about Miguel Wants To Fight, it’s another coming of age story that seemed like it was going to repeat a bunch of plot threads and in some ways it does. But what backs the movie up is the heart of the movie and some surprisingly quite raw moments.
The acting all around is pretty great this is definitely one of those cases where it seems like everyone involved had an absolute blast while being on set. That’s always good to see and it really helps with the cast easily connecting to one another, one thing this movie does exceptionally well is capture the feeling of overreaction. What may seem like the end of the world to them, it really doesn’t end up being that and things will go on like normal.
The whole idea of the movie is Miguel (played by Tyler Dean Flores) asks his best friends David (played by Christian Vunipola), Cass (played by Imani Lewis) and Srini (played by Suraj Partha) to help him get into a fight before he moves away, it’s a fun setup that actually does feel genuine. The feeling of overreaction comes in when Miguel doesn’t want to tell his friends about him moving, he worries what will happen and such, plus with wanting to get into a fight and how he will look during it. What if he loses, what will his friends think of him? There’s some genuinely interesting moments here that really shine through.
It helps that the movie is a very quick and easy watch with a runtime of 75 minutes long, the movie moves at a quick but steady pace that doesn’t outrun the viewer. Miguel Wants To Fight might not be one of the absolute greatest coming of age films but it has a ton of heart and passion put into it making it a very fun watch.
Abandoned on the mean city streets by his lowlife owner, Doug, a naive but lovable dog named Reggie falls in with a fast-talking, foul-mouthed Boston Terrier and his gang of strays. Determined to seek revenge, Reggie and his new canine pals embark on an epic adventure to get him home and make Doug pay for his dirty deed.
Strays in concept is not entirely a bad one, a rated R take on the whole talking dog movie genre could have led into being somewhat of a satire. It might not have been a very in depth one but it could have been a fun one, unfortunately that’s not what’s shown here instead we are given the exact same jokes for 93 minutes until the movie ends.
The one thing I will give this movie is there is one joke that doesn’t involve dogs humping, pooping or cursing and that’s the cameo with Josh Gad who plays Narrator Dog, it’s a genuinely funny scene that laughed quite a bit at. Had the movie used some of that humor instead of being incredibly one note I think this could have been a genuinely funny movie.
The rest of the movie as I said before is a lot of the exact same thing, every five seconds you get a joke that involves either dogs humping things, dogs pooping or peeing and dogs cursing. It’s the same exact thing over and over again, the movie ultimately leads down to this “it’s funny because the dog said fuck” type of route very early on and never attempts to go down a different one. It’s essentially one joke stretched into a 93 minute movie.
The cast is wasted and can only give these characters the character trait the script provides, there is this sort of interesting take about abusive relationships Reggie (played by Will Farrell) really loves his owner Doug (played by Will Forte) what he doesn’t realize but slowly throughout the movie realizes that Doug does not like him and the other characters around Reggie almost immediately pick up on that. I’m not entirely sure if that was the intention if it was it’s well intended but everything else surrounding it definitely takes away from it.
Strays is the very definition of a movie that has a decent premise that could make for something hilarious but constantly repeating the same jokes every five seconds quickly takes away what could have been great.
Jerome Reviews... 