Bottoms a masterfully done film with excellent comedic timing.

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.

Bottoms is playing in theaters.

10/10 A+

Sitting In Bars With Cake is a decent character chemistry story.

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

6/10 C+

Miguel Wants To Fight is a fun little coming of age story.

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.

Miguel Wants To Fight is available on Hulu.

7/10 B

Strays is what happens when you only have one or two jokes.

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.

Strays is available on all VOD platforms.

1/10 F

The Monkey King is a forgettable take on Journey To The West.

A Monkey and his magical fighting Stick battle demons, dragons, gods and the greatest adversary of all – Monkey’s ego.

The Monkey King is inspired by the classic Ming Dynasty novel Journey to the West. A novel which inspired one of the most popular franchises in the world Dragon Ball (and personally one of my favorites!) I’m not going to compare the two for obvious reasons, The Monkey King and Dragon Ball are two completely different takes on the iconic story. I will say that I was genuinely interested to see how this movie was going to approach the story and unfortunately it’s a very bland approach.

I’ll start with what worked because the movie does have it’s positives, the animation is actually not entirely bad. While yes it does get a bit repetitive as it goes on, early on in the movie there’s some genuinely great moments in the animation that do standout. The character designs while not anything to write home about get the job done and do have a bit of charm to them.

With that said however what hurts this movie mostly is the writing, despite being inspired on such an iconic story the movie really doesn’t do anything special with it. The characters get very little character development, the jokes are incredibly unfunny and the movie plays out exactly how you think it’s going to. While Jimmy O. Yang can be very fun at times voicing Monkey, Monkey is a very one note character both in how he’s voiced and especially how he’s written. He’s the very typical underdog protagonist who’s cocky (also a jerk to everyone around him) and wants to reach his goal, it’s a type of character who’s been done far better before.

It’s a shame because I do think introducing this influential story to kids is quite an interesting idea but it completely lacks the execution and interest from the viewer, It’s definitely not the worst out there but it’s definitely one of the biggest missed opportunities.

The Monkey King is available on Netflix.

3/10 D-

You Are So Not Invited To My Bat Mitzvah is a cute coming of age film!

It follows Stacey Friedman as she prepares for her Bat Mitzvah, but her plans comedically unravel and threaten to ruin the event.

You Are So Not Invited To My Bat Mitzvah is a cute little film that is basically a Sandler family project and that’s definitely not a bad thing.

Adam Sandler’s daughters Sunny and Sadie Sandler are both incredibly charming, plus Adam Sandler’s wife Jackie Sandler is here as well (although Idina Menzel plays his wife in the film) Together the four really bring such a charming and quite passionate movie that is truly heartwarming, the performances are all around quite great especially from Sunny Sandler who definitely has a bright future career that is truly going to be interesting to watch.

There’s tons of beautiful moments that really show these characters connect to one another, the movie’s raw depictions of these characters is truly beautiful to see and is a very down to earth coming of age story. There’s truly a lot here that is genuinely touching and has much heart poured into it.

The film might struggle a bit when it comes to it’s comedic moments, a lot of the jokes simply don’t land all that well. However the movie does stick the landing when comes to the more dramatic moments and the coming of age elements, there are some genuinely touching family bonding moments that really bring the viewer closer to these characters.

Overall You Are Not Invited To My Bat Mitzvah might not have anything really new to say when it comes to coming of age stories, but this is definitely one of the more authentic feeling ones to come out of Netflix in recent years.

You Are Not Invited To My Bat Mitzvah is available on Netflix.

7/10 B

Quick Review: Vacation Friends 2 (2023)

Marcus lands an all-expenses-paid trip to a Caribbean resort, and he and his wife, Emily, invite their uninhibited besties, Ron and Kyla. But when Kyla’s incarcerated father is released from San Quentin and shows up, things get out of control.

Vacation Friends 2 is the sequel to Vacation Friends which came out in 2021 and I’m over here scratching my head on why they decided to make a sequel. While the first movie wasn’t anything horrible it was certainly not anything to write home about either, Vacation Friends 2 is the very definition of an unnecessary sequel.

The cast really tries here to make it work but there are very few laughs that land, in particular Lil Rel Howery and John Cena really try here but it’s not nearly enough to save this movie. Steve Buscemi (who plays John Cena’s father-in-law) is added to the cast and he plays the very generic father-in-law character who does not get along with John Cena’s character, antics ensue and there’s suddenly a drug/crime plot in the movie.

Steve Buscemi really doesn’t add anything great here, his performance is very flat and really doesn’t do anything to help the movie really stand, as far as the crime plot is concerned it’s about what you expect. Very predictable and does not have any funny moments going on that make it worth it in the end.

Overall there really isn’t a whole lot else to say about Vacation Friends 2, it’s a terrible sequel to an already forgettable movie.

Vacation Friends 2 is available on Hulu.

3/10 D-

They Cloned Tyrone is a fun take on the Sci-Fi genre.

A series of eerie events thrusts an unlikely trio onto the trail of a nefarious government conspiracy.

They Cloned Tyrone is a very interesting film that I really can’t help but respect, even if the movie’s ideas are not executed perfectly and it does slip up a bit during the middle of the film. There was clearly a whole lot of creativity, passion and fun put into it.

For starters the cast is excellent, John Boyega continues to show how incredibly talented he really is with tons of memorable scenes here that really drive home the point of how fantastic he is. Jamie Foxx is of course really strong here and Teyonah Parris is incredibly fun especially the interactions between her and Jamie Foxx their presence is fantastic and really gives the characters so much more power when it comes to writing.

The film is beautifully shot and directed, They Cloned Tyrone really serves as a quite strong directional debut for director Juel Taylor. Who really gives these three characters some striking character development that really is beautiful, the film definitely has some inspirations from Get Out (although this one is a lot more comedic) and A Clockwork Orange, Juel Taylor makes these inspirations into his own and brings some creative ideas to the table, on top of that he brings the sci-fi genre into the mix which while does get a bit overstuffed at times is executed quite nicely.

Criticisms are mostly the middle of the movie being a bit too predictable and draws out a bit, the story can get a bit convoluted with combining too many ideas at once. However when the final act rolls around the movie gets back on track with tons of fun moments and some more great character development as well.

They Cloned Tyrone might not be one of my favorite films of this year but is a quite solid one and one that I do recommend giving a look.

They Cloned Tyrone is available on Netflix.

7/10 B

Elemental has charm but is lacking in making it’s ideas stronger.

In a city where fire, water, land, and air residents live together, a fiery young woman and a go-with-the-flow guy discover something elemental: how much they actually have in common.

Well Elemental was definitely an improvement from Peter Sohn’s previous Pixar movie The Good Dinosaur, a few almost immediate noticeable changes are that Elemental is at least trying to tell a story that is a bit more layered (keyword being try which I’ll get to) and the characters are far more interestingly designed as well as being actually written a bit better as well.

The voice acting wasn’t too bad here, granted nobody really hits it out of the park but at least the character models really reflect on the emotions of the cast. The character models despite being mostly very common fire and water elements you see in a lot of different types of media, are still interesting to look at. They have tons of emotions and the characters do have some spots where the writing does make them very likable to the viewer. The music and animation are very well done and during scenes actually can get the viewer emotional, there’s some really strong scenes here with such great voice acting combined with the music that really does feel like Pixar at their best.

Honestly the main problem comes down to the writing, while it’s not anything bad and while I do respect Elemental for trying to go for a more layered story it ultimately doesn’t fully come together as it starts to repeat plots from other movies that have done them far better. First we get an immigrant story setup which really ends up mattering less and less as the story goes on, then we get a follow your dreams long story short these plots don’t mesh well together and really don’t say anything new or aren’t done in a fresh way to get the viewer fully on board.

Despite that however I don’t think Elemental is a bad movie, it’s definitely a harmless movie that I think younger audiences will love and there is a lot of charm here. It just could have been written in a much stronger way to fully execute it’s ideas.

Elemental is available on all VOD platforms.

6/10 C+

Puppy Love is a charming romantic comedy featuring dogs.

After a disastrous first date, Nicole and Max vow’s to lose each other’s numbers until their dogs find a love match. Hilariously mismatched Nicole and Max are forced to become responsible co-parents, but end up finding love themselves.

I watched one of two dog movies that came out this weekend and it wasn’t Strays, anyway Puppy Love is exactly what you sort of expect. It’s a romantic comedy with dogs in the mix, maybe it’s because my expectations were so incredibly low but I actually found this to be cute and enjoyable for what it was.

What makes the movie is Lucy Hale and Grant Gustin while they are both not exactly pulling out very strong performances (although both still do a solid job here) it’s the chemistry that really makes the two work really well together, there’s a genuine amount of charm to the bond Nicole (Lucy Hale) and Max (Grant Gustin) build over the course of the movie.

The dogs are of course adorable and there’s actually a few jokes here that did get a few laughs out of me, with that said there’s also humor that doesn’t work (the scenes with the vet in particular are very very strange.) The relationship between Nicole and Max feels much more grounded than it does in some other romcoms, for one thing we don’t have a cliche break up scene where the relationship was based on a lie or misconception. We get one because both characters actually do have issues and they try to work it out. It’s a very surprisingly grounded approach that I certainly was not expecting.

Overall Puppy Love doesn’t have a whole lot to it, if you like dog movies and romantic comedies you will probably like this one. It’s a quick and easy watch that’s genuinely fun!

Puppy Love is available on Freevee and on all VOD platforms.

6/10 C+