Zach’s Zany Movie Reviews: GREYHOUND (Apple TV+)

Even though I’m a huge fan of Star Wars The Last Jedi, when describing Apple TV+’s new original film GREYHOUND to my friends, who commented that the 1 hr and 23 minute runtime was “a little short” for a World War II sea battle movie, I had to make a slight joke toward 2017’s very divisive franchise film. I told them, “it’s basically only the chase parts in The Last Jedi, but with shit actually going down.” To describe it for those who haven’t seen or refuse to see The Last Jedi, Greyhound is almost 90 minutes of Tom Hanks going around his battle boat, which is the lead in an Allied convoy trying to bring food and supplies to the British during World War II, and barking commands and orders to try to defend and fight against Nazi U-Boat wolf packs. That’s all it is. There is no character development, there are no long, dragging scenes of little moments between the crew to try and humanize them, no long uplifting speeches from Hanks before the climax of the film, you don’t see any of the Nazi’s in the flesh. It’s simply a “we got to take this important food and shit from point A to point B without being killed by Hitler’s goons, short, sea battle chase” movie. Oh, and there is a overused joke of Hanks being so busy he never ends up eating the meals that are brought to him. That’s it. That’s all you need to know.

This movie was made for the theater, especially with its loud war action designed to make you rumble in your seat and almost destroy your ear drums. It was even supposed to come out the week before Father’s Day weekend. Alas, COVID-19 said to Tom Hanks, “fuck you, I’m going to make you and your wife sick, and then I’m making the film that you wrote and acted in go straight to streaming.” If anyone has gotten the shaft other than those that have gotten sick and died, and the families of those victims by this butt fucking cock sucking virus, it is definitely Tom Hanks. There is a short scene between Tom Hanks and Elizabeth Shue near the beginning of him saying they’ll get married when he gets back, designed to show how war is tragic and separates loved ones, but then this film is off to the races and never really lets up until Hanks and his crew successfully or unsuccessfully make the journey. Other than the sea, missiles, boat action, what have you being completely CGI (don’t worry, it looks impressive), the movie was filmed on an actual boat, the USS Kidd in Baton Rouge. Which is good because it made the claustrophobic atmosphere of the tight quarters seem real and anybody who is anybody wouldn’t have believed for a second if it had been a studio stage made up to look like a real navy ship.

The action of the film, which is basically the whole run time, is very intense, and the climax is very well done and tight, where it comes down to Tom Hands and two U-Boats surrounding the USS Greyhound, firing missiles and then just straight coming at ’em. Hanks can act his way out of a paper bag so no problems in that area whatsoever. Hanks also wrote the screenplay, based on the novel The Good Shepherd by C.S. Forester, and even though I was never in any part of the Navy, all the lingo and orders he commands to his crew sounded legit and well researched. The director, Aaron Schneider, directed one other feature length film, called Get Low that I have seen but don’t quite remember being all that memorable. He does a good job here, his work on 1998’s squid monster movie Deep Rising giving him the most experience to be able to direct a sea war adventure. The film is a solid, decent one time watch. Nothing more, nothing less. Unfortunately its forced premiere into being an Apple TV Plus exclusive instead of the theater because of COVID-19 might be the ultimate nail in the film’s memorable re-watchablility coffin. Then that coffin will have a burial at sea…a sea filled with so much streaming content right now, it will probably be “lost in time…like tears…in rain.”

Zach’s Zany Movie Reviews: THE HIGH NOTE

THE HIGH NOTE is just further proof that you can still make a movie that has been done before, with cliches galore, being mostly predictable, incorporating story beats either copied or completely ripped off of other things…but the pacing of the movie, the acting, the chemistry between the actors, and some original music can end up putting everything together into a very enjoyable, semi-new package. Or maybe my expectations were just really, really low? Doesn’t matter, either way I really enjoyed this film, and my wife who was going to do other things around the house, ended up sitting down and paid attention to the whole thing. This was yet another movie that was supposed to hit theaters early May, but due to the butt fucking phenomenon known as COVID-19, ended up being a premium $19.99 PVOD rental instead in late May. Cut to only a month and a week later, and this movie was available to OWN this week for only $14.99 (see: my patience is virtue quote in my previous review of Trolls World Tour). Yes, I could’ve waited for another 12 days for the rental to go down to $5 or $6, but I read some casual moviegoers reviews saying that the movie is much better than critics like me or grumpy old people were making it out to me, so I took the gamble and just purchased to own. I’m glad that I did, because even though the movie has about a billion familiar story beats with a story that has been done a countless variation of times, I enjoyed every minute of it and would probably keep watching it as sort of a ‘guilty pleasure’ type deal.

Also, the marketing of this movie was way off base. IMDB describes the film as “A superstar singer and her overworked personal assistant are presented with a choice that could alter the course of their respective careers,” and that’s how the trailers and tv spots sold the movie as, but that’s really describing only HALF of the movie’s 1 hr and 52 minute run time. Dakota Johnson plays the personal assistant and Tracee Ellis Ross (daughter of the incredibly talented singer Diana Ross) plays the superstar and the movie markets itself as JUST the relationship between those two, a la The Devil Wears Prada, except that Ross’s character is much less of an asshole than Meryl Streep was. The real other half of the movie is about Dakota Johnson discovering some new musical talent while she’s out shopping for grocery’s for Ross, a guy named David Cliff, and their relationship as she lies to him, selling herself as an experienced movie producer, because it seems as though Ross’s character doesn’t take any of her career suggestions seriously and Johnson’s career is likely to go nowhere because of it. This is where the movie’s true heart lies, as the acting between Dakota Johnson and the actor that plays David Cliff, Kelvin Harrison Jr. really uplifts, takes flight, and never gets uninteresting. Sure, the stuff between Johnson and Ellis Ross is still there as the Plot A style story, but the resolution of it ends up pretty much how you’d expect, except for ONE HUGE twist that I didn’t see coming, but maybe probably should have.

Doing some research on the crew of the making of this movie, I found out that it was no surprise that I enjoyed this film more than I should’ve, because the director of this movie, a Ms. Nisha Ganatra, also directly the incredibly entertaining movie Late Night, that starred Emma Thompson and Mindy Kaling that came out last year. While I still prefer that film out of the two, mainly due to Mindy Kaling’s incredible screenplay writing ability (not her acting), this film reaches those entertaining heights pretty closely at times. While I don’t watch Blackish, Tracee Ellis Ross is really great here and Ice Cube has now finally been in something decent in awhile since the 21 Jump Street movies. Dakota Johnson though, I think, gives her best performance yet, kind of proving that she probably should’ve said no to that Fifty Shades trilogy when she got offered the part awhile ago. The banter is witty, the dialogue feels fresh although familiar, and the time just passes by as you watch this. Oh, I almost forgot to mention the music! While there are a couple of cover songs, most of the things sung in this, mostly by Kelvin Harrison Jr., was original, felt fresh, and had a fun beat. I am very happy the movie didn’t go the route of having the whole thing just be covers of songs we’ve heard too many times before. The High Note definitely ended on a high note for me, as my wife and I talked about how decent the film was, how much we enjoyed it, how others we know would enjoy it, and that we’d probably enjoy it just as much again on a re watch or two.

Zach’s Zany Movie Reviews: TROLLS WORLD TOUR

“Patience is a virtue. Especially when it comes to $19.99 PVOD rentals.” – Zachary James Alexander

I know I had a couple of guest reviewers take a shot at their thoughts for TROLLS WORLD TOUR a couple of months ago when they foolishly paid $19.99 for a 48 hour rental. Want to guess how much I paid? $5. The kids Universal Dreamworks Animation film was available to rent regularly this week, and since my young little boy likes that kind of shit with a lot of music in it, five bucks seemed like a pretty good deal. And my verdict? It’s honestly not that bad, in fact, I would say it is a superior sequel, as I can’t even remember for the life of me what happened in the first movie, other than I knew I was bored to tears and didn’t care for it. So what made me think this one was decent? Well, it’s really just a harmless 90 minute music video meant for kids and teaches them that all races of people, no matter the skin color or personality, can and should live in harmony. Errr, wait a minute, I said that wrong. It teaches them that all of the different Trolls, with their different varieties and preferred kinds of music, can and should live in harmony. Ah, that’s better. The movie flies by in a fast and frantic pace and is really the movie that Frozen II should’ve been when trying to incorporate political and social messages into its themes. Frozen II went wayyyyyy too dark for children and its end message of “anti-Trump wall and racist values” was eye roll worthy. Argue with me all you want, I proved with instances in my Frozen II review that it was all there. Trolls World Tour is much more light-hearted and doesn’t get too dark even though it still kind of annoyingly wears its messages on its sleeve.

Per IMDB, it describes Trolls World Tour as: “When the Queen of the Hard Rock Trolls tries to take over all the Troll kingdoms, Queen Poppy and her friends try different ways to save all the Trolls.” To add on to that description, the Queen of The Hard Rock Trolls is actually trying to steal all of the Troll kingdoms musical strings (Pop, Funk, Classical, Techno and Country) and convert all of them to JUST hard rock. So basically Hard Rock is Nazi Germany in this instance. Oh, also, half way through the film they mention that the Troll World Map is “outdated” and that there are many more kinds of different trolls and music out there now. See what I mean when I say that it wears its messages on its sleeve? However, it’s harmless and tolerable because of how bright and chipper every story beat is to the very end, even on a 2 second downer note in the climax. It manages to still be a purely innocent kids movie, something that Frozen III should probably take notes on before the script and songs are written for that film in several years. There aren’t many original songs here, the film mostly consists of remixes of current and older songs that you might’ve enjoyed personally or with family and friends over the years. And the remixes are actually kind of cool and catchy. Anna Kendrick, Rachel Bloom, Justin Timberlake and others sing their hearts out in this, and it all sounds good and is enjoyable…to a degree for me.

I’m not saying the movie is great, it’s just half way decent. Probably because my expectations were quite low when hitting that play button. But my young son liked it and my wife and I paid attention to it. I got a little more out of it than I was expecting. Heck, I even laughed out loud a couple of times. Mostly scenes that involved Kenan Thompson, as a new troll named Tiny Diamond, whenever he would open his mouth and then a very dry humorish, 2 second, blind-and-you’ll-miss-it laugh involving a troll shaking its ass right in front of another troll’s face who is not amused (it happens in the country Troll scene if you are on the look out for it). There is also a side B, C & D plots that involve Timberlake’s troll actually being able to be in love with Kendrick’s troll (that’s what she said), a troll that lived in the Pop Music part of the world who realizes he’s actually from a different part of it, and a pinky promise that have tiny little pay offs that weren’t too shabby. I can’t stress this enough, it’s a harmless kids movie. It’s not as terrible as some of my friends and professional critics are making it out to be and it’s not the greatest movie ever that probably flew out of some kids mouths while in quarantine. It’s serviceable, it’s there, it easily kills 90 minutes of your boring quarantine life time. You will either jam to the beat of the music or, at the bare minimum, nod your head to it. It’s definitely not worth the $19.99 rental it was in April, but is sure more than a bargain at $5 now.

Zach’s Zany Movie Reviews: DESPERADOS (Netflix)

Good God, can it be next weekend already? Where two new streaming films, The Old Guard & Palm Springs, premiere literally a day before my birthday…and they’ve both already gotten decent reviews? Other than Hamilton on Disney+ this weekend…this new Netflix film…DESPERADOS premiered. And no, it’s not a foreign language film with subtitles. It’s a just a regular, stupid, cheap unfunny, masturbation gag a minute, sex joke romantic comedy about a trio of women looking for something more out of life than they have. And it’s mainly just the three of them, yelling and screaming out dirty stuff every half minute for the entire hour and 45 minute run time. It’s like an R rated version of Ghostbusters 2016, where women who are usually funny in other things improv too much and just yell random shit to see what sticks. And again, none of it does. It literally gave me a headache. And it is disappointing that former Saturday Night Live star Nasim Pedrad would accept this kind of role to play the lead…she must’ve really been desperate (pun intended) to land a job ever since her stint on New Girl went away a couple of years ago. She was great on Saturday Night Live, she maybe should’ve never left, as leaving for that John Mulaney failure of a sitcom was one of the worst career choices I’ve seen out of anyone. This movie is even worse. Speaking of being unable to get separated from New Girl, her love interest in this is the same guy (Lamorne Morris) that she ends up with in the series finale of that show. Did both of them just walk across the studio once the showrunners announced a series wrap for them? Anyway, here’s how to determine if this movie is for you or not: at one point mid way through, Nasim Pedrad gets humped by a dolphin at the edge of a boat and then the dolphin jumps and smacks his giant red aroused sea cock across her face. Did you laugh? I hope not.

Per IMDB, Desperados is described as: “A panicked young woman, with her reluctant friends in tow, rushes to Mexico to try and delete a ranting email she sent to her new boyfriend.” That new boyfriend is played by Robbie Amell, who looked like he did the filmmakers a favor and came over for a couple of breaks while shooting Amazon’s Upload. Completely wasted here. So are Nasim Pedrad’s two friends played by Barry’s Sarah Burns and Pitch Perfect’s Anna Camp. Their plot b and c stories of the former not being able to have a baby with her husband and going to a white woman shaman that’s supposed to give her medicine and/or advice to succeed and then the latter’s decision whether or not to leave her cheating husband are solved in seconds and then thrown to the side just as quickly. The white woman shaman is played by Heather Graham who looks like she doesn’t want to be there, and the ultimate climax (you’ll see pun intended) of the scene that happens between her and Anna Camp didn’t make any sense and was a little tasteless. The main plot of Nasim Pedrad trying to delete Robbie Amell’s e-mail was completely unbelievable and would never have happened. See the reason she wrote the hateful e-mail, is right after they have sex, it seems like he ignores her for 5 days. Instead, right after the e-mail is sent, he calls her and reveals he had an accident and was in a medically induced coma for 5 days. Oh but get this, the doctors don’t want him on the internet or for him to have his computer at all or his phone for a couple of days and just want him to rest and not stress out. The screenplay writers must’ve known this set up was a little hammy, as every few minutes they remind the audience through dialogue and just keep repeating he needs rest over and over. Never mind the fact that there are probably other people worried about him, he needs to rest. Fucking please, even I can’t come up with a way in which it could’ve worked. So Nasim Pedrad has a couple of days to find his phone or computer at the Mexico resort he was staying at, and really stupid shit keeps getting thrown at her so she can’t complete her goal, and that the movie isn’t so short. And she has time to “happen” to bump into a previous bad date at this resort (played by New Girl’s Lamorne Morris) and then start to have great adventures and conversations with him…you see where the movie ends up don’t you? I hope you do.

One of the scenarios that keeps Pedrad from her goal, is that she keeps running into a 12-13 year old that wants to have statutory rape sex with her and then that kids mom shows up a few seconds behind and yells and tries to beat Pedrad’s ass. And she keeps running into them and keeps running into them. It gets very old, very fast. The only decent part in the movie is the chemistry and conversations between Pedrad and Morris. They don’t lose a step going from being charming together in New Girl to being charming together in this, even though he plays it straight, and she’s the mess, where on the Fox show it was vice versa. Lamorne Morris is the best part of this movie, as he’s down to Earth and plays a pretty cool character. This is the second movie he’s stolen out from everyone, even in this shitty year of COVID-19, the first film being Bloodshot. They should give him more stuff to do, and that stuff needs to be in better films. Anyway, this movie is a complete waste of time unless you are an obnoxious woman or man that laughs at this low brow crude and crass comedy that isn’t even smartly written, and your men or women friends are just as stupid and obnoxious as you are. The woman who wrote this hasn’t done anything other than writing for THE FUCKING FAILURE SHOW THAT WAS THE JAMIE KENNEDY EXPERIMENT WAY BACK WHEN. No wonder. The director is a nobody too. Sorry I sound salty, this movie was just a completely waste of talents for everyone involved, and a complete waste of time for an audience that decided to press play. How can Netflix be that desperate (again, pun intended) to put horse shit like this on their platform? This is just one sliver better than Netflix’s The Wrong Missy…but not by much. One of the worst films of 2020.

Zach’s Zany Movie Reviews: HAMILTON (Disney+)

So a little disclaimer about this review, I’ve technically seen and reviewed the stage play musical, HAMILTON, when it came to Dallas a little bit ago. Posted it right here on this blog in fact. So this first paragraph is just going to be me saying how the experience was while watching it on Disney+ and then I’m copying and pasting my old review of the content of the stage play. So if you already read that part of it way back when, other than this intro, you aren’t getting anything new. HOWEVER, if you’ve seen Hamilton on stage, and were on the fence about watching it again on your screen at home, mainly because you didn’t think it could re create the same magic, think again. This is the first required viewing, in my opinion, of something on Disney+ since The Mandalorian debuted last year. You get the original Broadway cast here, Lin Manuel-Miranda, Leslie Odom Jr., Daveed Diggs, the works. Their acting and showmanship are different than the off Broadway cast (not better or worse), and it feels fresh seeing different faces for sure. It’s still the same amazing play, but up close and personal. They didn’t just set a camera in front of the stage and film a live original performance. There’s different camera angles, close ups, fade in and outs, dissolves, putting you right smack dab in the middle of their performance as if you were standing with them on stage. So even if you’ve seen THE ORIGINAL MUSICAL WITH THE ORIGINAL CAST, this is still worth checking out. It’s a completely different experience, fresh even if you’ve listened to everything so much you can rap out lyric by lyric, word by word. This is one of the best musicals of all time. So you know Hollywood will one day, when it’s back up and running, try to make an epic of it on decorated sound stages and location shootings, and they could either knock it out of the park, or it could end up being another…Cats **shiver**. Let’s not think about that right now. The only really complaint I have is I wished they had filmed it without an audience…but then again maybe it wouldn’t have been as good of a performance? To be fair, it wasn’t as distracting as actually being there with a live audience, they never show the audience and the cheering was really short and cut off between small breaks into the next scene. Without further ado, my older review of Hamilton when I saw it with the off Broadway cast in Dallas not too long ago:

So the Broadway touring of HAMILTON is in Texas, and since it is the most buzzed about play since The Book of Mormon, obviously it peaked my interest (the next one to do that might be Harry Potter and The Cursed Child). And since I’m seeing less movies in the theaters nowadays, I thought I could write a short review on my thoughts. Is it worth the hype and all the awards it has won? Absolutely. And now other than The Book of Mormon, it would definitely be a play I could see multiple times and neither feel bored and I’d also feel like I got my money’s worth. Lin-Manuel Miranda wrote a masterpiece. Nothing short of greatness.

Hamilton is about the life of Alexander Hamilton. But everything is either sung or rapped, incorporates R&B, pop, soul, hip hop, show tunes, and also casts color-consciously of non-white actors as historical figures. The play starts out with his early life as an orphan throughout just the intro song and then we go into straight into adulthood to his tragic death. The play is in two acts, and I don’t think there is a word spoken that isn’t sung. But everything works so perfectly well. Apparently it took Miranda years to write it and do perfect the songs, perfect every single note, and it shows. It is one of the most intricate things I’ve ever heard, so much so that, like Book of Mormon, might be finding and buying the CD to it. Every song is great and catchy, and there are absolutely no lag moments in the play. My favorite part? Probably like a lot of people, I do enjoy when King George III takes the stage.

The stage itself is pretty standard. It consists of a lot of wood and stairs and rope, and then some fake brick to look like old buildings. And it doesn’t change. Not that its a bad thing at all, in fact, I would’ve be shocked if it had been any more intricate because it would’ve taken even longer to get the product out to audiences around the world. One thing that is a little unique about the stage is that it rotates in the middle constantly to convey movement, and is very impressive when mixed in with the choreography to song and dance numbers. As for the acting? It is all impressive. I didn’t take a Playbill from the April 28th, 2019 showing, but if you were one of the actors/dancers in the play, you did a tremendous job. Especially the leads like Hamilton and Burr, the way they could memorize all those songs, movements, and words and make it look like another walk in the part is nothing short of masterful.

So if you are on the fence about seeing this, why? Don’t be. It’s amazing and truly a thing that should be on your bucket list. Whether you are a history buff or even scoff at history, there is something in this play for everyone to enjoy. The play is 2 hours and 55 minutes (including a 15 minute intermission) but you could’ve fooled me, the time just whizzes by extremely fast. If this is the one thing that Lin Manuel-Miranda is remembered by, it wouldn’t be such a bad thing. If there is real magic on the planet, this Broadway play is the closest that it gets to seeing is believing.

Zach’s Zany Movie Reviews: THE F**K-IT LIST (Netflix)

THE F**K-IT LIST, an obviously play on The Bucket List, is not the worst thing to come to Netflix? If that question sounds to you like a back handed compliment, it kind of is. It’s watchable, it’s a movie, it’s not abysmal…but would I ever watch it again? Probably not. It’s just…there. It makes you wonder how movies like this get made yet there are a bunch of good low budget scripts out there desperate to get green lit, but for some reason or another they don’t. This movie could’ve been much better than it is. Instead of being The Bucket List, where Jack Nicholson and Morgan Freeman actually do a lot of the things they write down, the protagonist in this movie video blogs a bunch of stuff that he ends up not doing, but goes viral anyway to inspire a lot of kids to do their own F**k-It lists in life. If the movie had shown him doing things on his list and then in turn getting more viral, the film’s message might’ve actually been earned and had been clearer. This review is going to be insanely short because I don’t know much to say about it. The actors and actresses are decent and you even got some recognizable names such as Jerry O’Connoll, Natalie Zea, Madison Iseman, Andrew Bachlor, and Peter Facinelli, that do a fine job in their small roles. But the real problem is that you have to suspend belief in a lot of what happens in the film, specifically the choices of the protagonist.

This is a long synopsis, but per IMDB, The F**k-It List is described as: “Brett Blackmore is a high school senior whose exemplary GPA and college resume hides the fact that he’s unintentionally sold his childhood for a future he’s not even sure he wants. When his high-school senior prank goes wrong, his life crumbles before his eyes. In frustration he launches the F**k-It List – of all the things he wishes he’d done but was too afraid. The list goes viral and touches a nerve with teenagers everywhere, exposing the educational-industrial complex as a money-machine designed to encourage anxiety-ridden parents to sell their kids into years of Tiger-Mom style servitude. Brett decides he’s going to break free – and make a run for a future of his own design.” Let’s get to the suspension in belief shall we? It’s really the only problems I have with this “okay” film other than Brett not doing much on his list. First off, the “senior prank goes wrong” scenario, is really not his fault. A couple of kids sneak into the school to hack into the computers, possibly to change some things (doesn’t really say), and one of the idiots steps on a gas pipe and breaks it. They go and get Brett to see if he can help, but he can’t and tells them all to get out of there as the room starts filling up with gas. The whole fucking school explodes (no one is hurt or killed) and he takes the rap. Yet…it wasn’t his fault? If I was him, even with a future I didn’t want, there is no fucking way I would’ve taken the rap for that extreme of shit. Also, the actor that plays Brett Blackmore, Eli Brown, is way too good looking and looks like he has a “fuck it” attitude in his face to be believable as a valedictorian let alone a decent kid.

Also, Brett doesn’t get arrested and the only consequences for his decision to take the rap is that he doesn’t get his high school diploma and that the 7 out of 8 ivy league colleges he was accepted to, take back their offers. But then that doesn’t really matter anyway as Harvard eventually reaches out after he goes viral and asks him to send an essay to possibly get into their elite college anyway. It’s very bizarre and while the film takes it seriously and not as one big joke, there is just no way in fucking hell any of that would happen, other than going viral…maybe. I get the messages of the future of young adults, how we need to make our own life altering decisions and to not just follow the wishes of our parents, but I don’t think the events that happen in this film warrant morals of that type. It’s just a very odd, yet somewhat watchable film. In fact, you’ve seen this teen angst film plenty of times before and needless to say, all those other films do a better job with the content than this one did. Add to the insult and injury? The co-writer and director, Michael Duggan, was nominated for a Primetime Emmy for being a producer of Law & Order. How…what…did….did he like bang his head and get the idea for this weird movie, or did he watch The Bucket List high and thought he should make a teen movie about it but a play on words? I have a feeling those questions would elicit answers that were more interesting than this film. Man, some of these title I keep hitting play on, I’m saying “fuck it” myself. I need to start thinking things through.

Zach’s Zany Movie Reviews: THE WILLOUGHBYS (Netflix)

Netflix sure is stepping up their game when it comes to animated originals. THE WILLOUGHBYS is a fantastic, fun, original, yet weird kids movie that premiered back on the service in April, yet I didn’t hear about it until a recent visit to a friends place in Oklahoma for the weekend. I saw the release date was 2020, and following a recommendation from those friends’ kids that weekend, I decided to check it out. Boy am I glad I did. I’m glad I also waited to watch it with my young son and my wife, because we got to enjoy it together as a family. It’s based on the book by the famous Lois Lowry (I have never heard of this till now, who knew, right?!) and per IMDB it describes the film as: “Convinced they’d be better off raising themselves, the Willoughby children hatch a sneaky plan to send their selfish parents on vacation. The siblings then embark on their own high-flying adventure to find the true meaning of family.” And the whole story is fast paced loveliness with a dash of weird. It has colorful characters, morals about family that don’t try to hit you over the head with the messages, nice original animation that wasn’t trying to rip off anyone else’s work, and fantastic voice work from everyone involved, including, but not limited to: Ricky Gervais, Martin Short, Jane Krakowski, Terry Crews, Maya Rudolph, Alessia Cara (with a wonderful singing voice as well), and Will Forte (who really needed this, as his portrayal of Shaggy in the disappointing Scoob! just recently released seemed to be trying a bit too hard). This and Onward are the only two memorable animated films of the year so far.

This might only be a 2 paragraph review, as I don’t really want to spoil any of the surprises this film has in store for you and yours. Just know that other than the ending, this families predicament is far from predictable. Some wacky shit happens, some really cute shit happens, some dark shit happens, people are accidentally killed (well, if you see certain scenes from my eyes they did), tears will be shed, and smiles will be spread from cheek to cheek. This 2nd time director, Kris Pearn, whose first effort was Cloudy With A Chance Of Meatballs 2, is not a newbie to the animation world, as he worked in the animation departments for a ton of projects like Arthur Christmas, Open Season, and the very underrated Titan A.E. He and his crew do wonderful work here, as this is a film I can see revisiting with my family over and over and over again. After this and Klaus at the end of last year, Netflix really has something going on correctly with their animation productions. Why can’t they take that positive momentum and apply it to the original film department? Or hell, even what they choose to buy from other studios to put on their platform? Needless to say, I’ll always be weary with a new live-action Netflix original. However, I’ll be eager to press the play button if a new release from them is animated.

Zach’s Zany Movie Reviews: FEEL THE BEAT (Netflix)

Instead of my typically 3 to 5 boring paragraph review for FEEL THE BEAT, or what it should’ve been called, “Not Another Competition Movie,” that just debuted on Netflix a couple of weeks ago, I am going to just do a checklist of all Competition & Dance movie cliches and see how many boxes it checks. Per IMDB, Feel The Beat stars Disney’s The Descendants Sofia Carson and describes the film as: “After failing to find success on Broadway, April returns to her hometown and reluctantly is recruited to train a misfit group of young dancers for a big competition.” That’s really all you need to know, you can probably just fish all the cliches out of the one sentence can’t you? Okay, let’s just dive right in shall we?

Protagonist fails in his/her career and she ends up trying to train a bunch of misfits (child, teen, or adult) in what she was good at to get back into his/her career
Protagonist wants to quit training these misfits at the beginning, but eventually the misfits get better and they all grow an everlasting bond
Protagonist has an ‘ex’ that they either left or had a bad break-up with before this career took off, where they spend the whole movie flirting and finally hook up near the end
After forming a bond with the misfits, the opportunity arises, MID COMPETITION MIND YOU, to get back into the protagonist’s career, and at first he/she takes the job, but that bond that they established earlier makes he/she have a chance of heart
But if you are a really oooey-gooey competition/dance movie, even though you leave the new job to go back to your group of misfits, somehow you still keep that job while still being a teacher to them in the end. Basically, you have your cake and eat it too.
One of the misfits the protagonist is trying to train is related to the old/new love interest
You have a bumbling moron of a assistant teacher, most likely a mom or dad that is a few tacos short of a combination plate.
At the beginning of the competition, where the protagonist’s group of misfits still suck ass and embarass themselves in the first leg of the contest, a technicality or a disqualification from another team will send you to the next round regardless of how terrible the group is
The competition sequences combined with the music are the only decent parts in the movie.
The Protagonist only has one supporting parent left, either by a tragic death or one of them was an asshole and left them both early in life. (this one parent left is barely in the film).
EXTRA #11: The Protagonists lose their career at the beginning because they have a mishap in a giant city like New York with the person that evaluates them not minutes later. (In this movie’s case, Sofia Carson steals the cab of the Broadway dance director that ends up running into her on the stage just minutes later. Out of HOW GOD DAMN BIG NEW YORK IS, THE ODDS OF THAT ARE NEAR FUCKING IMPOSSIBLE).

Alright, I think that’s enough. So how many of those boxes does Feel The Beat give a check mark to out of those ten? EVERY SINGLE FUCKING ONE. It’s kind of funny actually, that Eurovision Contest movie I just reviewed a couple of days ago, this checks off a lot of those cliched boxes as well. There’s a but coming, and here it is: this movie isn’t for someone like me, especially if it is straight to VOD/Netflix. I enjoy the occasional Pitch Perfect every now and then, but a movie like that manages to reinvent the genre just a tad rather than completely sticking to the rule book. Either that or the dialogue and chemistry of the lead and/or group makes up for its misgivings. Feel The Beat is a straight to video Netflix film with a small ass budget. It doesn’t have time to do new shit or reinvent anything. This completely sticks to the rule book and doesn’t change a thing about the genre. It has been on Netflix’s top ten most watched programs the past couple of weeks now, which is why I ended up checking it out (I hadn’t even heard of it until I saw it on the list). Sofia Carson also can’t act. Her transformation is completely unbelievable here, and the dialogue doesn’t help her in the slightest. The ragtag group of kids, save for the one that is related to Carson’s ex-boyfriend, are pretty unmemorable. The ex-boyfriend is also too Tom Cruisey Smiley McSmileson, it was so God damn annoying. This whole movie is annoying, unmemorable and very, very cheesy. However, if you are a sucker for that ooey-gooey feel good shit right now, or these movies are usually your jam, especially in these butt fucking unbearable times, I feel ya if you end up liking the beat.

Zach’s Zany Movie Reviews: SEBERG (Amazon Prime)

In the manner of which Chandler says sarcastic comments on the television show Friends: “Could this movie BE any more boring?” SEBERG is super duper boring and it shouldn’t have been with the amount of content the filmmakers could’ve pulled from real life young starlet Jean Seberg’s crazy fast life that tragically ended when she was 40. But no, the movie focuses too much on only 3 years of it, and saves the most interesting aspects to happen either off screen or saved for dumb title cards right before it cuts to end credits. And it’s a shame, because Kristen Stewart gives a hell of a performance, arguably her best yet. And it’s even more of a shame considering that Kristen Stewart is acting like she finally wants to be there in the spotlight of Hollywood’s most prestige actors/actresses, she’s just picking the wrong films to try and have a resurgence in her career. After all, she’s had to apologize for the Twilight Saga multiple times the past several years. The real problem with the movie is that it tells and not shows. The movie jumps in time a little too much and we are told, through just a couple of sentences of dialogue, what has happened to her, and as a audience we are supposed to pick up and imagine those pieces to try and catch up to the present time of where these people are at. Yeah, never ever do that in your movie. Ever.

Always try and show, especially if you have the ability to. And they very much had the ability. This is an Amazon Prime original film, and it is also gorgeously shot, showing the glitz and glamour of Seberg’s home life, with decadent giant houses filled with nice looking amenities. They had to have had the budget or could’ve asked for more, to film these certain scenes we are just told that happened (I don’t want to give these scenes away as they are spoilers to Ms. Seberg’s life, but if you looked her up on Wikipedia and then watched the movie, you’d know what I’m talking about). But no, we are just told, which to me as a film critic, is very frustrating and always almost unforgivable save if you have a low budget and can’t do much, like Amazon Prime’s other recent original movie: The Vast Of Night. I’m reviewing this film because like Just Mercy and Portrait Of A Lady On Fire, the release date is kind of blurry between late 2019 and 2020. Couldn’t not find one theater to see it in when it was out, and then just dumped on Amazon Prime mid May. Well, there is a reason for the random dump, the film isn’t that great. The film is directed by Benedict Andrews, who I’m not familiar with, but when looking at his history, he is mostly a stage play director, which makes total sense, as the whole movie feels like it could be a stage play.

IMDB.com describes Seberg as: “Inspired by real events in the life of French New Wave icon Jean Seberg, the late 1960s, Hoover’s FBI targeted her because of her political and romantic involvement with civil rights activist Hakim Jamal.” To elaborate further on IMDB.com’s description. Hakim Jamal was part of the Black Panther movement, which the FBI was deeply scared and paranoid would commit an act of domestic terrorism on white people at the time. The film has the paranoia down pat, and the FBI infiltrating her life is a little interesting, but other than that, it is a snooze fest, consisting of decent performances that are wasted on nothing to do. Anthony Mackie and Zazie Beetz are in this too, playing Hakim and his wife respectively, but Hakim and Seberg’s affair is kind of glossed over with two small throwaway scenes of Beetz telling Stewart/Seberg to back off. There is also a side B plot involving one of the FBI agents, played by Unbroken’s Jack O’ Connell, who actually begins to have sympathy for Seberg’s plight, unfortunately it feels like that sympathy is rushed and just shoved into the ending climax confrontation between him and Seberg. They should’ve just made a biography on her whole life, her rise and fall from fame, and made it a bit longer. This movie only clocks in at a little under an hr and 40 minutes, but it all feels really superficial. If that makes any sense to you. Reading up on her, her life was anything but superficial, and it’s a shame that this boring product is what we got from it.

Zach’s Zany Movie Reviews: 7500 (Amazon Prime)

Ryan Reynolds in a box. Colin Ferrell in a phone booth. And now Joseph Gordon-Levitt in a cockpit. That’s Buried, Phone Booth, and now 7500. What do these three movies have in common? Almost their entire run times take place in these little claustrophobic places and all three leading men are in some sort of predicament to get out of them. And while 7500, which debuted exclusively on Amazon Prime a couple of weeks ago, is probably my least favorite of the three, it is still a very effective little thriller, although some of the choices the screenwriters make are questionable. At first these “advance the plot” choices seem to be very realistic and bold, but then they have characters make really stupid decisions in order to make the movie longer. This movie is about 92 minutes, and 10 could’ve easily been cut out of it. I know that many filmmakers with short films try to get to that solid and tight common 90 minute mark, but if you don’t have the material, you don’t have the material. There is one choice that Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s character makes in the movie that will have you screaming your head off, shouting “why, why didn’t you do that?” over and over again. I can answer that question for all of us, it was strictly to extend the run time unnecessarily.

Per IMDB.com, it describes 7500 as: “When terrorists try to seize control of a Berlin-Paris flight, a soft-spoken young American co-pilot struggles to save the lives of the passengers and crew while forging a surprising connection with one of the hijackers.” A lot of the film is eerily realistic. The way the hijackers try to take over the plane is genius, especially in a world where it is near impossible to get guns, knives, or any other kind of weapon aboard a plane. A lot of the decisions they make and then the decisions that Joseph Gordon-Levitt makes in the process of these 90 minutes are hauntingly brilliant, except for one. Basically, without giving anything away, Joseph Gordon-Levitt has a chance to kill one of the hijackers while he is knocked out, but instead just straps him into the dead head passenger seat. And it’s not really straps in more than it is buckling him up…where if JGL pays attention to the controls to try and find a way to land the plane safely, and then the terrorist wakes up…see what I’m getting at? Should’ve just killed that fucker. I would’ve. Other than that one really frustrating decision (I can think of plenty of ways to have advanced the plot to where it was without doing that), the rest of the movie is very solid.

Joseph Gordon-Levitt acts his ass off, and gives us one of his best performances ever. The film also takes some necessary risks. No character is safe in this, which is something I appreciated as well. The camera shots, angles, what have you, make the entire journey feel really claustrophobic to not just the characters, but to you on your couch at home. This isn’t a Hollywood-ized cockpit, where there is more room than necessary. They filmed inside a real cockpit, which as you know, doesn’t really have that much room. They way director Patrick Vollrath captured everything without cutting anything out of the frame at important times in the movie is unbelievable. Really good work on all sides. If I had one more complaint, is that I didn’t really care for Joseph Gordon-Levitt forging a surprising connection with one of the hijackers. If anything felt out of place in that movie, it was that and the dumb decision he made not to kill one of them early on. The acting when they were forging that connection seemed realistic and true enough, but I don’t know if I could see that happening in the situation that played out, seemed a little too convenient for me, but then again, that just could be me. Anyway, for a solid 92 minute film that mostly takes place in one location, it is a very tight and realistic thriller, just expect one or two moments of forced turbulence to take you off course for a couple of unneeded extra minutes.