Movie star London Clash (Colson Baker). When he wakes up to an implied break up text from the love of his life, his world is turned upside down. And the timing couldn’t be worse because the most important meeting of his career is scheduled for later that same day. Compounded by chaotic roommates, and wildly unpredictable twists and turns, London’s day keeps going downhill until ultimately, he is forced to choose between pursuing his one true love and landing a life-changing, starring role in a major motion picture.
I can definitely say with 100% certainty that I have no idea what actually happened in Machine Gun Kelly’s and Mod Son’s movie Good Mourning, this was the equivalent of some friends randomly making a home video and for some reason a movie studio looked at it and said “hmm this should get a VOD release”. The cast is the most random set of people you could think of, first there’s Machine Gun Kelly and Mod Son who are also in the movie, Megan Fox, Becky G, Dove Cameron, Pete Davidson, Snoop Dogg, Amber Rose, Avril Lavigne, Danny Trejo and a few others. A lot of which just randomly appear for about 2 minutes and then never come back, the plot itself attempts to be some sort of stoner comedy I guess (like I said the movie is such a mess it’s hard to tell what it exactly is trying to be). But absolutely fails at that, the acting is atrocious with no sense of direction at all. Each of the actors acts way too cartoony and the humor is nonexistent. It also doesn’t help that this movie really feels like a bunch of adults who act like teenagers and make so many unfunny stoner jokes/whatever the hell they were trying to say. Speaking of which whatever the point was of this movie or the message is completely lost, mainly due to the very poor script that feels like it was written by some edgy DeviantArt account. If Machine Gun Kelly and Mod Son wanted to make a movie with their friends that’s fine, but if you are planning on actually releasing it at least try and make sure that the movie itself isn’t a complete and nonsensical mess.
Follows a country music duo who seek out the private mansion of their idol and end up in a twisted series of horrors that force them to confront the limits they’d go for their dreams.
Torn Hearts mostly works due to the cast that are genuinely really great Katey Sagal, Abby Quinn and Alexxis Lemire all give performances that are far better than you would expect. Plus the idea of a country horror/thriller movie is a pretty interesting one, as far as execution it doesn’t quite reach it’s full potential. The music is quite great and matches the tone of the movie quite well, but the script leaves a lot more to be desired as it does end up being fairly predictable and holds back a bit. Luckily it does remain entertaining especially with Bea Grant’s direction that is definitely a huge step up from “12 Hour Shift”.
Torn Hearts is available on all VOD Platforms.
6/10 C+
A woman and her daughter find warmth and companionship when her late husband’s combat dog comes to live on their farm. However, they must soon band together when a corrupt sheriff does whatever it takes to get his hands on the family’s land.
This is the third movie this year to feature a dog that was once an ex military/police service dog or tries to become a military/police dog. And it’s the weakest one, at least Dog and Rescued By Ruby had some charm to them at times and some decent acting (for the most part) to back them up, Dakota however does not have any memorable performances that stick out. The writing is pretty much a beat by beat story of these types of movies and the direction has no substance to it at all, there’s a couple cute moments with the dog and Lola Sultan is very charming but that’s not nearly enough to save this movie from being disposable.
As Taiwan succumbs to a viral pandemic that transforms peaceful citizens into sadistic, bloodthirsty maniacs, a young couple must battle to be reunited before they too become infected.
The Sadness is truly one disturbing film that absolutely does not hold back at all, this film asks the question “what if zombies were actually smart and were sadistic rapists” straight off the bat I absolutely love how the film opens, it puts the audience in the middle of a pandemic and shows people just living their normal lives. The film follows Jim (Berant Zhu) and Kat (Regina Lei) who are a young couple who’s day starts out normal enough but quickly falls apart as the virus gets out of control. The film itself is very gory and is hands down the most disturbing zombie film in quite awhile, the film takes the whole zombie premise and completely changes it around, it’s truly a disturbing premise but executed really well. We get a few character moments and see the fear in the character’s eyes, the film really hits out of the park when it comes to filming and combining the setting. We get two completely different parts Jim and Kat where they try to find each other, the attention to detail the background we see of the destruction from the zombies is truly haunting and feels like we are right there with them. A lot of the disturbing moments are very successful mostly due to the acting and the attention to detail, everyone in the film is fantastic in their roles and truly knocks it out of the park. Going into The Sadness knowing as little as possible will make the experience even greater, if you are a fan of zombie films and gore plus like disturbing films than this is film for you.
When Alex, an expert assassin, refuses to complete a job for a dangerous criminal organization, he becomes a target. FBI agents and Mexican intelligence are brought in to investigate the trail of bodies, leading them closer to Alex. With the crime syndicate and FBI in hot pursuit, Alex has the skills to stay ahead, except for one thing: he is struggling with severe memory loss, affecting his every move. Alex must question his every action and whom he can ultimately trust.
Memory is yet another Liam Neeson led action movie, this is the second one this year the first being Blacklight. While Memory is slightly better than Blacklight it still falls in the exact same traps as a lot of the other Neeson action movies, once again the only positives are Liam Neeson and Guy Pearce who actually gives the movie some sort of life and some of the action scenes are actually well done this time around. Mostly due to Martin Campbell (Casino Royal, The Foreigner, Golden Eye) being in the director’s chair this time around, while not every single movie of his is a hit he is an overall solid director. So seeing Memory completely fall flat is a tad disappointing, something I didn’t know until after I finished watching it is that Memory is actually a remake of a Belgian film called “The Alzheimer’s Case” or “The Memory Of a Killer. Anyway Memory is basically what you expect, while the premise might sound interesting the film doesn’t explore it all that much and explores it in a very surface level way. Instead it focuses on action movie tropes and creates a messy plot while doing so, Monica Bellucci is sadly a very poorly written villain that feels like her character was more of an after thought than anything else. It also seems that this movie wanted two completely plots one about an aging hitman with early stage Alzheimer’s and then one which follows generic action thriller tropes, but couldn’t decide which one to use so they attempted to combine the two together only to create a giant mess. It’s unfortunate because I do think Memory could have had some sort of potential had there been a better script and more organization.
A high-school cheerleader falls into a coma before her prom. Twenty years later, she awakens and wants to return to high school to reclaim her status and become prom queen.
Senior Year isn’t as bad as a lot of Netflix comedies go, in fact there’s a decent amount to like here. The acting is actually not terrible for what it is, the music actually fits quite well with what it’s going for and I thought some of the early 2000s throwback moments were decent enough. The main problems are a lot of the humor which really tries to appeal to Gen Z and the movie slowly falling into a beat by beat story, Senior Year has a decent start and actually establishes itself quite nicely. But quickly falls into familiar territory and sadly doesn’t do anything quite great with it, there are definitely some touching moments and there’s a nice message in here, but it ultimately ends up being a slightly better Netflix comedy that will be forgotten about.
Senior Year is available on Netflix
5/10 C
A terrifying new horror awaits Laura and her 7-year-old son, Cody, when then they flee her abusive ex-husband and try to settle into a new life in an idyllic and remote lakeside farmhouse. Still traumatized, their physical and mental well-being are pushed to the limit as their fragile existence is threatened.
Monstrous has some great ideas involved but unfortunately doesn’t land at all, outside of Christina Rocco’s performance there really isn’t a whole lot going on here. The set design and some of the effects are pretty okay but a lot of it has the vibe of someone who just finished watching The Babadook and said “how about we make that movie but not as good!” I’m not even particularly a fan of The Babadook but at least that movie knew what it was trying to do, with Monstrous each act feels way too different and has very little sense when it comes to direction. The huge amount of horror cliches don’t quite help the movie either. Monstrous could have easily been something interesting had their been a better director and was better written.
Monstrous is available on all VOD Platforms.
3/10 D-
When 15-year-old Tyson attends public school for the first time, his life changes forever. While helping his father clean up after the football team, he befriends champion marathon runner Aklilu. Never letting his autism hold him back, Tyson becomes determined to run his first marathon in hopes of winning his father’s approval. With the help of an unlikely friend and his parents, he soon learns that anything is possible when you have faith in yourself and the courage to take the first step.
Tyson’s Run is a very bad movie and there’s no getting around that, however something I will give props to the makers is that they actually casted an autistic actor (Major Dodson) to play an autistic character. In fact Major Dodson is one of the best parts about the movie as well, the part being Barkhad Abdi who I did not expect at all either way he did the best he could with a script that reads like a middle school play. The writing is the main problem here, it’s the most cliched story about an underdog becoming a champion, you have seen it done before and you have seen it done better. Dodson is a very likable lead and has a lot of charm but the script having terrible lines and other characters that are nowhere near as interesting (besides Abdi’s character). Heck the best moments of the movie are when Major Dodson and Barkhad Abdi are on screen together they have great conversations with one another and really show their talent. It’s just a shame everything else is a complete mess and falls completely flat.
A couple desperately try to hide their daughter, Charlie, from a shadowy federal agency that wants to harness her unprecedented gift for turning fire into a weapon of mass destruction. Her father taught her how to defuse her power, but as Charlie turns 11, the fire becomes harder and harder to control. When a mysterious operative finally finds the family, he tries to seize Charlie once and for all — but she has other plans.
Firestarter (2022) is a remake of the 1984 film adaption of the same name (some sources say it’s another adaption and not a remake but who cares.) Stephen King film adaptions have been happening forever now and while it is nice to see such an old trend still make it’s way into the modern day heck some modern Stephen King adaptions are quite great (Gerald’s Game and Doctor Sleep), but like other collection of films you are going to have some that completely miss the mark. The original Firestarter is one movie I was never crazy over, I always saw it as a weaker version of Carrie and is mostly known for Drew Barrymore’s performance. With that said I don’t think it’s a bad movie as there’s plenty to enjoy about it. The same can’t be said for Keith Thomas’s Firestarter, the two positives are Michael Greyeyes performance who’s character is not given the development he deserves) and the score from John Carpenter which is very well done and once again shows how incredible a Carpenter score is. The rest of the movie is a complete and total mess, for starters the acting and writing are both painfully dull. Zac Efron does not have a whole lot to work with mainly due to how limited and messy the script really is, Efron is a great actor and I’m all for him trying out more dramatic roles but this just doesn’t work here. The same can be said with Ryan Kiera Armstrong she’s limited to what she can work with having a line such as “liar liar pants on fire” is a complete embarrassment and would not have worked no matter who was in the role. The characters are poorly written and very poorly developed, instead of giving the characters some personality and a decent story they stick with not even the bare minimum and stick with character tropes, Michael Greyeyes’s character John Rainbird could have been very interesting if given a lot more time, something I actually do think this version did better than the original was Greyeyes as John Rainman, so it’s very unfortunate the movie does not even the bare minimum with Greyeyes. The pacing is a huge issue here, there’s very little time for the viewer to digest what happened or why it happened. It’s way too fast and not in a good way at all, which is why the story and characters feel so underdeveloped. Despite the movie being 94 minutes long it felt like the longest 94 minutes I have sat through so far this year, there’s the other villains who do absolutely nothing and other then talk like a monster who is in one episode from Power Rangers and immediately gets destroyed. Lastly the movie has no idea what it wants to be, at one moment it wants to be a horror movie, then an action movie and then a terrible superhero origin story which is exactly what I feared it was going to try and do from the trailer. At least with the original Firstarter it knew what it wanted to be and it was somewhat entertaining, this new version is like watching paint dry if the paint took twenty times longer to dry, overall Firestarter is a dumpster fire (pun absolutely intended) how you can take a mediocre adaption and actually do far worse is beyond me.
Firestarter is available in theaters and on peacock!
El, an aspiring sneaker designer from Queens, works as a stock boy in a shoe store and hides his artistic talent. Sparks fly after a chance encounter with Kira King, the daughter of sneaker royalty and a Manhattan Princess Charming of sorts. With a nudge from his best friend and a touch of magic, El finds the courage to lace up and dream big.
I’ll give Sneakerella this it wasn’t AS bad as I expected but that doesn’t make it a good movie (far from it), but the positives are mostly the acting from Chosen Jacobs, Lexi Underwood and Juan Chioran (who gets underutilized), the singing voices are pretty strong particularly the 3 I just mentioned have great singing voices and the choreography is actually pretty well done. There’s some genuine good moments during the singing segments as well as dancing segments that are touching. What completely hurts this movie however is the fact it’s a Cinderella story, this is the type of movie that did not need to be a Cinderella story. I think this would have largely benefited if it was it’s own thing and it did some changing around, granted they did change a few things from the typical Cinderella story but it wasn’t enough to warrant doing another one. Especially when we just had James Corden as a mouse last year, as far as the rest of the movie goes if you have seen Cinderella before you have already seen this one. Once again Sneakerella is yet another Disney+ movie that feels like a Disney Channel Original Movie except with a slightly higher budget, had Sneakerella been a dance movie something similar to Step Up for example and changed the plot around as well as the writing. This could have been something at least passable but as it stands it’s yet another Cinderella Story that will be quickly forgotten about. Sneakerella isn’t horrendous it’s just very forgettable, it might be a good watch for kids but for everyone else don’t bother.
Some friends who are enjoying a weekend steal a couple of jet skis, race them out to sea and end up in a horrific head-on collision. They struggle to find a way home with a badly injured friend while predators lurk below the water.
Great shark movies are very rare let alone decent ones, so it’s very refreshing when a movie like Shark Bait comes along and does exactly what it’s set out to do. Sure it has a ton of flaws and isn’t perfect however there’s definitely genuine effort here that does help the movie cross the finish line. The kills and gore while do take some time are worth in the end and actually deliver with some very decent makeup as well, the acting is surprisingly pretty alright for what the movie is. The writing does feel beat by beat at times and can become a bit cliched as it goes on, but the atmosphere that is pretty thrilling combined with some solid acting moments makes Shark Bait standout among a very crowded genre.
A struggling actress and housewife becomes involved with her new gardener, who gives her the attention and sensitivity she craves. However, he is not who he seems.
Private Property is a remake of the 1960 movie of the same name, a movie of which was very controversial at the time when it was released. So it’s very puzzling why a 2022 version exists, outside of Ashley Benson’s performance and a few decent shots there’s very little in the way of positives. Everything else is about as generic as you can get when it comes to straight to VOD thrillers, it’s once again in the category I like to call “thriller of the week” where it just exists because studios need to put something out and that’s the case here. The writing is about what you expect as well as the rest of the acting, not much else to say here.
Private Property is available on all VOD platforms.
Nelly, an 8-year-old girl, has just lost her beloved grandmother and is helping her parents clean out her mother’s childhood home. One day, her mom abruptly leaves, and Nelly meets a girl her age as she’s building a tree house in the woods.
Céline Sciamma once again captures human emotion and makes an incredible film out of it, Petite Maman is only 73 minutes long but tells quite a lot in such beautiful ways. For starters the acting is as if you are watching ordinary people and not actors, it’s truly beautiful and captures the atmosphere of the film. The primary theme here is childhood and everything in the film especially the performances and writing compliment that very well, Gabrielle Sanz and Josephine Sanz are some of the best child actors I’ve ever seen in a film. There’s some nostalgia and childhood memory in their performances (if that makes sense) their performances take you back to your childhood and remind you of the times you were outside and discovering the world around you. This film definitely spoke to me on a personal level, one of the many places I lived in my childhood was Kentucky and as a kid I would go outside and explore around the neighborhood. This film made me think of those memories and actually made me cry as well, seeing the two characters Marion and Nelly get to know each other and grow their friendship is truly beautiful it really portrays childhood friendships so accurately to the point where it’s brilliant on every single level. The film only bring 73 minutes truly benefits it as well, plus it honestly sticks with the theme of the movie. This could be reaching here but childhood is a small period of time, so it would make since for a film that has the theme of childhood which the portrayal is incredibly accurate to be only 73 minutes long. Overall Petite Maman is a truly brilliant film that hits all the notes it needs to, this is a special film that I highly recommend checking out.
Jerome Reviews... 