Kingdom Of The Planet Of The Apes (2024) Film Review

Many years after the reign of Caesar, a young ape goes on a journey that will lead him to question everything he’s been taught about the past and make choices that will define a future for apes and humans alike.

Kingdom Of The Planet Of The Apes is directed by Wes Ball who previously directed all three of The Maze Runner films.

Kingdom Of The Planet Of The Apes is a standalone sequel to War Of The Planet Of The Apes. It’s the fourth film in the Planet Of The Apes reboot films and is the tenth overall film of the franchise.

Planet Of The Apes is a film franchise that I truly love and I’m always excited to hear when a new installment is releasing, I wasn’t sure how they could follow up from the excellent Matt Reeves trilogy (Rise, Dawn and War) but I was interested to see what they were going to do.

This film takes 300 years after War the previous film, Ceaser is dead and almost immediately one of the film’s main themes comes into play…manipulation and twisting someone’s words to mean something else entirely. In this case that someone is Ceaser who taught peace between humans and apes, the film’s main villain Proximus completely alters that and manages to create a clan of apes that believe whatever he says.

The introduction of Proximus is really excellent here, he’s a manipulative monarch that uses others to get what he wants. What really makes him excellent is he’s played by Kevin Durand who gives my favorite performance of the film, what really fascinates me is Durand’s performance whether intentional or not comes off as a direct opposite of Andy Serkis’s performance as Ceaser. Ceaser used his emotions accordingly and was genuinely excellent leader, that came with Andy Serkis completely hitting it out of the park. Proximus is manipulative and has so much power in his voice.

Proximus as a villain is also a lot of fun as well, every time you see him on screen you just sort of want to be the fly in the room to hear the conversations that are being had to get the full impact. It all comes from Kevin Durand’s performance that always makes sure to never go over the top and to truly capture Proximus’s manipulative nature.

The rest of the cast are quite great here Owen Teague plays the main protagonist Noah who the film centers around, a lot of the film is sort of creating a hero’s journey type of story which although not entirely new everything else around it really makes up for it. Peter Macon as Raka and Freya Allan as Mae are also some standouts as well. I don’t think the three are as strong character wise as Proximus is, but they are still a lot of fun and the world around them does compliment them well.

One of the best parts of Kingdom Of The Planet Of The Apes is the atmosphere and the world itself, almost immediately we are struck by incredible visuals that completely capture the beauty of the Reeves trilogy. The film’s beginning moments really set up and give the viewer an idea of what to expect as it takes you on the journey. The atmosphere during the action scenes and the third act is truly fantastic, it’s suspenseful and truly leaves you at the edge of your seat. There’s so much going on and the amount of detail the film goes over is truly great, what’s also great here is that you genuinely care about these characters. Noah starts out as a very basic protagonist but as the film goes on you really start to care for him, you want him to save his family and to succeed in his goal.

Kingdom Of The Planet Of The Apes is a worthy sequel to War and is a very promising start to a new trilogy, I am very interested to see exactly where they go with this series!

Kingdom Of The Planet Of The Apes is playing in theaters.

9/10 A

The Idea Of You (2024) Film Review

A 40-year-old single mum begins an unexpected romance with a 24-year-old boy band singer.

The Idea Of You is directed by Michael Showalter who previously directed The Big Sick (2019), The Lovebirds (2020), The Eyes Of Tammy Faye (2021), Spoiler Alert (2022) and a few others.

Really not a whole lot to comment on with The Idea Of You. It’s a decent surprise that ends up actually exploring a bit more with it’s themes than expected and has some really great moments that compliment the cast quite well.

What’s really keeping this movie afloat are the performances from Anne Hathaway and Nicholas Galitzine both put in so much work here and genuinely have excellent chemistry between one another. There’s absolutely no denying that the two truly light up the screen in any given opportunity during the film, especially Anne Hathaway she really gives such a charming performance that explores a bit of her character Solène. Granted it’s not anything spectacular but the fact it’s even there at all is something that can’t be said for a lot of other films that are loosely based on fan-fiction.

The movie is surprising because for a film that was loosely based on Wattpad fan-fiction you would expect these characters to act far more goofy and over the top, but here you get a bit more grounded. Sure you can definitely tell that a lot of the movie was based on a fan-fiction. But due to Michael Showalter’s more grounded approach and a desire to explore the characters you get something a bit different than you usually get with these movies.

I definitely think the movie falters a bit towards the end due to being a bit more on the predictable side of things and does go for some very familiar tropes. But I do think The Idea Of You is a solid film that’s genuinely quite fun!

The Idea Of You is available on Amazon Prime Video.

7/10 B

Infested (2024) Film Review

Passionate about exotic animals, Kaleb brings a venomous spider home, but it accidentally slips away. Soon, residents of the apartment building are battling an army of deadly, rapidly reproducing spiders.

Infested is directed by Sébastien Vanicek which is his directorial debut.

I definitely think it’s fair to say that Infested is the best spider horror film in recent memory. If you recall earlier this year we got Sting which while it had some decent kills and gore that can only get you so far. Luckily Infested is much more focused on the spiders (rather than uninteresting family drama) and there’s solid enough balance between the human characters and the spiders.

Right off the bat the mixture of practical and CG spiders is really strong and gives the film a much more dirty and suspenseful look, that’s also complimented by the camerawork there’s a lot of up close up shots that brings this claustrophobic feel into the film. Especially when you combine it with the location, if you have arachnophobia it’s sure to kick in during the film as it doesn’t hold back at all. There’s some genuinely nasty scenes with these spiders, I think what I do appreciate about these scenes are that they aren’t over the top or incredibly goofy. They have this raw punch to it that makes the film much more effective.

The acting is solid enough, there really isn’t any standout performances here which is to be expected. The writing is solid as well, it’s not anything groundbreaking as the whole being stuck in mostly an apartment building has been seen before such as [REC] (2007). However as I said earlier the film does a great job of taking advantage of the setting, finally there’s a soundtrack that’s focused on rap that I had no idea what to think of at first. But it strangely fits the film quite well, plus it does add some personality to the film to help it standout.

Overall Infested is quite great, now that I have watched this film I think it’s safe to say that the Evil Dead film that Sébastien Vanicek is going to direct will be quite fantastic!

Infested is available on Shudder.

8/10 B+

Stress Positions (2024) Film Review

Terry cares for his injured nephew, a 19-year-old Moroccan model, in strict quarantine at his ex-husband’s Brooklyn home, drawing attention from everyone in his life.

Stress Positions is directed by Theda Hammel which is her directorial debut.

I got to say I was not expecting to really like another COVID-19 era film so soon, usually there’s one great one that comes out of a small batch. The Listener I quite liked even if it did not reach it’s full potential and the same can be said for Stress Positions.

John Early gives a very fun performance here and is doing some incredible face acting as well, which I would argue actually makes the movie much more memorable. Theda Hammel is also in the film while also being one of the writers, is the director, one of the editors and does the music for the film. She gives a quite strong performance as well and is quite charming as well, the film mostly focuses on building and exploring these characters plus what their backgrounds are.

It’s the everyone has a story type of deal which works in this case due to Hammels direction that while does drastically switch in tone at times, still comes off as genuine and earnest in the film’s messaging. The humor is bizarre and I say that in a good way, as it does land some genuinely great laughs. It’s the type of chaotic humor that has so much fun energy to it that you just want to keep seeing more and more.

Stress Positions is at its weakest when it tries to play serious, immediately what comes to mind is the voiceover that is used (mostly during the first act). The voiceover itself is not necessarily bad it’s with the context of the rest of the movie, a lot of the movie as I said before is this bizarre humor that is genuinely a lot of fun. The narration does do a few things that are quite interesting and meaningful during the third act, but unfortunately doesn’t go all the way with said ideas.

Having that said I did have a fun time with Stress Positions it’s a fun and bizarre movie that is not going to be everyone’s cup of tea (especially with the humor) but if you are looking for something a bit different this is a decent choice!

Stress Positions is available on all VOD Platforms.

7/10 B

Tarot (2024) Film Review

Friends unwittingly unleash an unspeakable evil trapped within a cursed deck of tarot cards. One by one, they come face to face with fate, racing against death to escape the future foretold in their readings.

Tarot is directed by Spenser Cohen and Anna Halberg which is their directorial debut.

Tarot is one of those horror films that is often left out of the conversation when it comes to people online or in general talking about their most anticipated horror films of the year and it’s very easy to see why. The movie gives you exactly what the trailer showed a very watered down Final Destination film that forgets a lot of what made those movies so fun. What’s sad is this concept could have easily worked, the idea of cursed Tarot cards and combining with Final Destination rules sounds great on paper. Unfortunately the script happened and the characters here are the very definition of paper thin.

I will be fair and say that there are some slight positives, I do think the creature designs from the tarot cards are pretty neat and have a decent amount of detail on them. I also do think out of the cast Avantika and Jacob Batalon were somewhat decent, that isn’t exactly the highest compliment when you look at the acting in this movie. But at the very least they tried to keep it afloat, unfortunately due to the script their characters are really not given a whole lot to do. Olwen Fouéré is also not bad here but she has absolutely no reason to be here outside of advancing the plot.

That’s where the main problem comes in…the writing, look I’m not going to say Final Destination had outstanding character writing, but at the very least the characters were fun and memorable. All you get here with Tarot is cliched character personalities along with their personalities being tied with the tarot card that are associated with their zodiac sign, that’s basically their entire character not once is anything expanded upon their characters not even the final girl Haley who is played by Harriet Slater gets any meaningful character development. Heck I would argue she is one of the least interesting out of all of them, due to just how bland and uninspired her character really is.

I’m honestly not sure what else to really say here, Tarot is a terrible studio horror movie that by the end of this year nobody is going to remember it. It might be fine enough for younger viewers who want to get into horror (even then I wouldn’t recommend it) but as for everyone else this is not something worth looking into.

Tarot is available on all VOD platforms.

2/10 F

Atlas (2024) Film Review

A brilliant data analyst with a deep distrust of AI finds it may be her only hope when a mission to capture a renegade robot goes awry.

Atlas is directed by Brad Peyton who has previously directed Cats & Dogs: The Revenge Of Kitty Galore (2010), Journey 2: The Mysterious Island (2012), San Andreas (2015), Incarnate (2016) and Rampage (2017).

Look going into Atlas I didn’t expect an Oscar worthy masterpiece especially given a majority of Brad Peyton’s previous work. However there comes a point where “this movie is dumb” isn’t an excuse anymore, the problem here is Atlas is incredibly painful to sit through and quite frankly one of the ugliest and horribly written movies I’ve seen so far this year. Heck there is an argument to be made that this is THE worst movie so far this year.

The performances are dreadful even great actors such as Sterling K. Brown can’t save this mess (it doesn’t help that he really isn’t given a whole lot to really do.) Simu Liu is a terrible villain who’s incredibly one note and has so little to offer performance wise, Jennifer Lopez is truly terrible here as well. I’m not entirely sure what she was going for here, but if it was to come off as a badass heroine she completely missed the mark, her character Atlas Shepherd has no meaningful character development. She’s thrown at the viewer and the movie expects the viewer to instantly connect with her which is not exactly how character development and connecting the viewer with a character works.

The biggest problem here is Atlas has nothing going for it, the movie contains every single sci-fi trope you could possibly think of, it borrows from so many other far better movies, books and video games of the same genre but forgets to do something interesting with those ideas. The writing doesn’t bother to explore anything about this world, the most you get is a brief introduction at the beginning and that’s about it. You are left in the dark for the rest of the movie which is 2 hours which it clearly did not need to be that long.

The movie itself is ugly, the CGI is incredibly undercooked and really seems like it was rushed out the door for release, even the big CGI moments in this movie look disastrous. I have seen straight to video sci-fi films that look far more appealing to the eye than this, films where there was so much passion and even if they didn’t have the best writing you still respect the amount of work that was put into making them. I can’t say the same for Atlas this is a prime example of a sci-fi movie that fails on every single level.

Atlas is available on Netflix

Disgrace To Cinema F

Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire (2024) Film Review

Godzilla and the almighty Kong face a colossal threat hidden deep within the planet, challenging their very existence and the survival of the human race.

Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire is directed by Adam Wingard who has previously directed Godzilla vs. Kong (2021), Death Note (2017), Blair Witch (2016), The Guest (2014), You’re Next (2013) and a few others. The film servers as a sequel to Godzilla vs. Kong (2021), the fifth film in the Monsterverse and the 38th film in the overall Godzilla franchise.

I was kind of excited for Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire especially after its predecessor Godzilla vs. Kong (2021) which was a genuinely fun movie that I would even go as far as to say that I really liked it. Unfortunately with The New Empire a lot of what made the previous movie exciting is completely absent here and is very noticeable drop in quality.

Rebecca Hall is pretty solid here once again and the addition of Dan Stevens who’s just having the time of his life here is always great. Stevens is some of the movie’s best moments mainly due to making the human character parts more fun and a bit more interesting. Where as I actually did not mind the human characters in the previous movie, it does feel like once again the human characters have become such a chore to watch, they were poorly written in Godzilla: King Of The Monsters (2019) and they are somehow even more poorly written here.

The action scenes with Godzilla and King Kong are fine enough, but part of the charm with the previous movie is we hadn’t seen Godzilla and Kong face off on the big screen in years. This movie doing the exact same sort of thing again loses the impact and hype that the first movie left the viewer. It doesn’t help that there really isn’t anything here that makes the movie itself standout. Sure the fights look really neat and there’s undeniably some cheer worthy moments, but is there really anything here that’s particularly memorable?

If anything the monsters interacting with each other Suko and King Kong for example is genuinely funny at times (the rest of the humor just does not work at all) and much more memorable than a lot of the action scenes. The New Empire really seems like they put together a half baked plot and threw some monsters on the screen and said “let’s hope for the best.” I wasn’t expecting an Oscar worthy script but seeing how the Monsterverse has shown in the past that there can be really great writing, it’s disappointing to see it get bogged down this low.

Having that said I did have fun with this movie for the most part, but this is definitely something I’m never going to go back to. If you just want some neat action scenes you might like this fine enough.

Godzilla x Kong: The New Empire is available on all VOD platforms.

5/10 C

Turtles All The Way Down (2024) Film Review

When a 16-year-old struggling with obsessive-compulsive disorder reconnects with her childhood crush, she faces the potential of finding love and happiness despite her mental condition.

Turtles All The Way Down is directed by Hannah Marks director of After Everything (2018), Mark, Mary & Some Other People (2021) and Don’t Make Me Go (2022).

When I saw that a new John Green film adaptation was being released I was very skeptical, even though I really liked The Fault In Our Stars (2014) and thought Paper Towns (2015) was fine enough. The era of John Green’s peak popularity is well passed now combined with the fact that this was releasing on MAX (previously known as HBO Max) really came off as some sort of cash grab….as I have said in the past I like to be proven wrong and I definitely was here.

Hannah Marks is a director who has really shown through her work that she can make the characters and audiences connect incredibly easily. With a story like Turtles All The Way Down that is incredibly necessary and she really does an excellent job of doing so. The performances are very grounded here especially the performance from Isabela Merced who truly gives such a touching performance combine that with some actually effective filmmaking that’s able to communicate what Merced’s character Aza is feeling and going through and you have yourself something pretty meaningful.

We follow Aza throughout the film and see what she is going through with her OCD, there’s some quite effective moments that easily connect the viewer with Aza something a lot of other films in the young adult adaption genre tend to struggle with. Isabela Merced is able to bring this grounded performance center stage and make each and every scene that much more believable, Cree who plays Daisy is also quite great here as well. She isn’t exactly the most developed character but her bond with Aza is completely buyable and well grounded.

Outside of a very underdeveloped subplot about a missing billionaire that really feels a bit tacked on, the film does a pretty solid job with its storytelling. It moves at a nice pace that keeps the story moving along and never feels rushed, the movie definitely could have went a bit deeper with Aza and her OCD but what’s presented is very sweet and absolutely works in the context of the story.

Turtles All The Way Down is available on MAX

8/10 B+

Humane (2024) Film Review

A global environmental collapse forces world leaders to take extreme measures to reduce Earth’s population.

Humane is directed by Caitlin Cronenberg which is her directorial debut.

Immediately what stood out to me about this movie is Caitlin Cronenberg in the director’s chair, we now have three Cronenberg’s directing which I’m not complaining at all. Humane is one of those movies where the ideas of the movie are better than the movie itself although for the most part I still think the movie is decent enough.

The performances are pretty solid, while the characters could have used a lot more work in the development department the performances especially from Jay Baruchel are a lot of fun. Baruchel and Emily Hampshire in particular work incredibly well together and actually kind of humorous at times as well. The rest of the cast aren’t anything too crazy but they match the dark humorous tone the movie is going for.

I will say that Caitlin Cronenberg did a solid job with the directing and worked with what she could with the very undercooked script from Michael Sparaga, the atmosphere is absolutely there and quite honestly reminds me of a mix of The Purge (2013) and Ready Or Not (2019) although I do think it actually accomplishes far more than The Purge (2013) especially when trying to get it’s message across (even though Humane doesn’t do that very well either).

The main problem here is the writing, there’s tons of ideas floating around in the movie such as classism, climate crisis and a few others. How the movie executes these ideas however leave so much more to be desired, the bare bone execution briefly explores these topics but never bothers to explore them in any meaningful way. Sure the movie ramps up towards the end and the gore is nice, there’s even hints at the movie potential diving deeper yet it never happens.

It’s frustrating because Humane isn’t a bad movie, despite the very lacking execution everything else is quite fun to watch. There’s some darkly hilarious moments that gave me a couple laughs, it just takes a bit to get going. I definitely think Caitlin Cronenberg has a lot of potential and is a filmmaker still keeping an eye out for in the future.

Humane is available on all VOD platforms.

6/10 C+

Arcadian (2024) Film Review

In the near future on a decimated Earth, Paul and his twin sons find tranquility by day but terror by night when ferocious creatures awaken and consume all living souls in their path. When Paul is nearly killed, the boys come up with a desperate plan for survival, using everything their father taught them to keep him alive.

Arcadian is directed by Benjamin Brewer who previously directed Beneath Contempt (2011) and Trust (2016).

You would think that a monster movie featuring Nicolas Cage who is the leading role would have a lot to talk about. But that’s oddly enough not the case here which is where a lot of the disappointment comes in.

The performances are not bad here Nicolas Cage gives a solid performance even if for a lot of the movie despite being in the leading role he is not really given a lot to do. When the movie does focus on his character Paul that’s where the movie shines, while Jaeden Martell, Maxwell Jenkins and Sadie Soverall give solid performances their characters are missing a ton of character development and result to your typical teenage characters.

The creature designs are at the very least fun and there are some thrilling moments to spice the movie up a bit, unfortunately the rest of the movie ends up amounting to yet another post apocalyptic movie that doesn’t do anything new for the genre. Which is a shame because I do like the premise and there are a lot of glances of a solid movie here it’s just surrounded by a lot undercooked writing and story elements.

Arcadian is available on all VOD platforms.

4/10 D+