WISH UPON is the very definition of why PG-13 horror movies don’t work anymore. Except for those few rare occasions (such as the first Insidious or the first Ring) they just don’t work. Can you scare people or freak them out anymore with cut away deaths and a millisecond flash of gore? No. You have to rub the audiences’ face in it to get them to fear. I get that you cut it or make it PG-13 to get a wider audience and more box office bucks, but I don’t think these geniuses realize that you are actually doing the exact opposite. And it’s not like R rated horror doesn’t work. Look at The Conjuring movies. Look at Saw back in it’s prime. They worked, and brought in the dough. Wish Upon isn’t terrible by any means, in fact, it’s a lazy half way decent lazy afternoon on Netflix. But the fact that it could’ve been so much more is infuriating, making me wish that sometimes PG-13 didn’t exist.

The main problem with Wish Upon is that it cuts away from EVERY SINGLE DEATH either right when it happens or right before. We see the guts of a dog and a few blood splotches on Joey King’s sweater, and that is it. And there were some cool deaths in this movie, a la Final Destination style. But where as Final Destination wasn’t afraid to have the audience see a sharp bottom of a latter go through someone’s eye, this one doesn’t want to show a female being impaled through the head by a bull statue. It doesn’t want to show a chainsaw decapitating someone. It should want to show shards of glass going through someone as an elevator leads a character to certain doom. It doesn’t want to show a scalp being ripped off. And I’m so mad because you can tell this was shot for an R rating and the little studio douches had their way with it to get the PG-13 rating, hoping that people went flocking to the theaters.

The premise had me flocking to the theater, but the execution makes me not want to recommend it to anyone. It just feels like a lazy production. The actors in this deserved better. Joey King actually gives a pretty good damn performance in this, as does Barb from Stranger Things, Ryan Philieppe and others. And an extreme horror variation on Monkey’s Paw and Button, Button is quite intriguing, but when you get a product like this you just want to pick up a novella and read the short stories again. The editing is so choppy it is nauseating, the deaths and who is going to die is extremely predictable, the ending is extremely predictable too, and they waste a mid credit scene by going with the obvious except for the 1,265 ways that would’ve made a stinger more interesting and at least thinking about a decent sequel.

Some of the characters motivations puzzled me a bit, and the way to overcome and beat this evil wishing box is actually not that hard. I figured out several scenarios in ways that a wish couldn’t ultimately make the box not exist, but then their wouldn’t be a movie right? Well at least there could’ve been a smart and cool ending. The director on this film previously did Annabelle, the first one, which sucked too, so I don’t know why I am going to give this guy a chance anymore. If this thing has a director’s/unrated cut, I might watch it one more time to see if there is any cool gory shots and see if the tension is ramp’d up a little bit.

But that is ‘wishful’ thinking. See what I did there? Like I said, the movie isn’t terrible, it is quite watchable, and someone asked me to give it a rating and I said a solid C, which is better than a lot of D and F’s I’ve given other horror crap this year. This movie could’ve been so much more. It could’ve revitalized The Omen, Final Destination Rube Goldberg plot kills and maybe even brought those franchises back with a vengeance. Instead, horror films are still going to be searching for what “it” genre factor they are going to be for awhile. They can’t decide. In the 90s we had slasher, then in early 2000s we had torture porn, then later 2000s we had supernatural ghost/exorcism phenomenon’s and now horror movies just don’t know where to go anymore. I don’t wish I hadn’t seen this movie, I just wish I had seen a little more effort.

 

 

SPIDER-MAN: HOMECOMING is the BEST Spider-Man film. Period. That’s right, better than the classic Sam Raimi’s Spider-Man 2. Tom Holland is both the best Spider-Man and Peter Parker that has ever been displayed on screen thus far and just like Robert Downey Jr. as Tony Stark or Hugh Jackman as Wolverine, nobody will probably ever take that mantle from him. This movie is perfectly paced, funny, charming, smart, action-packed, a great coming of age story, all fitting well within the Marvel Cinematic Universe. Along with the first Avengers, the first Iron Man, and both Guardians, this is one of the best Marvel Universe films ever, and definitely one of the best films of 2017.

What makes this film the perfect Spider-Man film is that it takes everything they got right with the original Spider-Man trilogy and Amazing Spider-Man 2 films, and leaves out all of the bad. No Emo Spider-Man. No too many villians or shitty looking costumes. Spider-Man 2 is great and all but if you really look at the film hard, kind of like The Dark Knight Rises, Spider-Man is not really in the film all that much. This film has the perfect blend of Peter Parker in and out of the costume. It feels like a Spider-Man comic mixed with the awesome animated Spider-Man show we grew up watching as kids. It has a lot of zany and hilarious fun, but also doesn’t go all Batman & Robin on us, while adding some realism and seriousness to the matter. It’s a comedy comic book movie, and it works extremely well as both.

Marvel still doesn’t have the villain problem completely solved…but they are getting pretty damn close. Michael Keaton as The Vulture is the most memorable villain since Loki. Keaton gives humanity to The Vulture, and while he is a bad guy he is not necessarily a bad guy. We get conflicted throughout the film, as conflicted as we got at the end of The Dark Knight with Harvey Dent. I loved the way he becomes the Vulture by what happens during the aftermath of the Battle of New York with the Chitari technology. There is also another two other villains (kind of) that they add in this, but I won’t ruin it here. And there are also nods to other possibly upcomin6 villains as well. If I have to nitpick on one thing here, which I will because it is always good to give constructive criticism, they pull a Cumberbatch/Waltz here, and now we can call it pullling a Cumberbatch/Waltz/Zendaya. If you have no clue what I’m talking about, look it up.

There is so much to say about this film without making this review overly long. I loved everything about it. I love Parker’s best friend Ned, hilarious. I liked Zendaya’s very dry but witty “Michelle.” They pulled a neat twist at the end of the film I didn’t see coming at all. The 2nd post credit sequence (stay all the way through!) was one of the hilarious and best ones yet. Every single action sequence was thrilling, memorable, exciting, and remarkable, I can’t even name my favorite sequence (quite possibly the Washington monument, but the ending plane sequence is great too). I loved all the comedy and jokes, it felt like Peter Parker/Spider-Man from the comic books.

I also really liked that they didn’t overload the film with Robert Downey Jr. either. They really treat him like he is an “and” at the end of the credits on a poster. More than an extended cameo, but not quite a full fledged supporting actor. They give Jon Favareu a more extended role as Happy Hogan, and he is just perfect in the role.  And Marisa Tomei makes a cooler, younger Aunt May. I love that Peter is only 15 in this and even though a 19 year old is playing him, he pulls off the age and can see him in this role for years to come. I loved all the Spidey moves and gadgets. Even the end credits (without the scenes) are fun. This whole film is the definition of fun.

This is one of those rare films I could watch over and over and over again and never be bored. It’s the reason why we go to movies in the first place. Now don’t get me wrong, I loved Wonder Woman too, but this completely blows it out of the water (Sorry Brett.) And to think that this is Jon Watts second feature film as a director, and first major one, and that he pulled this big tentpole film this well is astonishing.

There is really nothing more to say. Go freaking see it. It’s amazing and I wish the film was an hour longer, because I just wanted to hang with Peter. It’s the best Spider-Man film ever made and I doubt any could be better. A masterpiece.

 

Screw it, I enjoyed THE HOUSE, and I know I’m in the minority on this one. It’s an 88 minute pure fantasy escapism and I laughed my ass off during it. Guilty pleasure of the year? Possibly. Maybe it was my fun mood while watching it. The fact I got a signed poster on Cinemark Connections of it? I won’t deny that fact. The movie could’ve been longer and so much more, I’ll admit, and it doesn’t use Poehler and Ferrell to their full potential, but I had a lot of fun watching it. Probably wouldn’t work on cable as the R rating is the reason I laughed a lot, but a perfect rental with friends and family.

Premise is simple: A couple doesn’t receive a college grant that the town provides (because the town “ran out” of funds) so their down on their luck friend (that blows money in Vegas with them) turns his house into a casino and gets the entire town hooked on gambling. They try and hide it from a weird ass cop, and two town committee members with sticks up their asses. The movie doesn’t explore every possibility that could go wrong with this scenario but it does do a lot and what transpires I thought was absolutely hilarious.

Yes, there are jokes that fall flat like every comedy, but not as much as the critics think. And rewatching the trailer I think they cut a lot out of the movie, like the strip club thing, and I would love to see if this ends up having an unrated cut with maybe like 10 more minutes added on to the film, at least one could hope. The ending was a bit of a problem for me too. The screenplay takes a predictable easy way out of the couple’s predicament for providing for their daughter for college. It feels with the casino angle they could’ve come up with something more creative.

I didn’t know Jeremy Renner was in this nor noticed his name featured on the poster, and he could’ve been so much better here, and he feels a little wasted, however his last couple of minutes of screen time is rip roaring hilarious. I’m guessing he was walking around the studio lot and they asked him to come film a couple of scenes real quick.

But not much to say other than if you want some great escapism for a short 88 minutes, this will do the trick IMO. I laughed out loud a bunch, I had fun, so did my wife, and I could see myself watching it over and over later on in life. It’s not a classic like Anchorman or Step Brothers for Ferrell, and never reaches the comedic heights of Parks and Recreation for Poehler, but you could do much worse.

 

THE BAD BATCH is a weird little film by newcomer writer/director Ana Lily Amirpour. She was responsible for the becoming a cult classic gem that I have not seen, A Girl Walks Alone At Night. This film, critic wise, is going both ways. Some are calling it a boring overlong interesting mess, others are calling it a an independent modern masterpiece. Me? I’m somewhere in the middle, closer to the spectrum of masterpiece though then a mess. In fact, I actually thought The Bad Batch was pretty good. While the story was a little lacking, it is gorgeously shot and has a hell of an interesting premise with some good/weird performances. I mean, Jim Carrey is almost uncredited in this as a silent good-natured hermit, bringing one of his best performance since The Truman Show and Man on the Moon. How can you not like a movie like that?

If the trailer is somewhat confusing on what this is about, let me spell it out a little without ruining anything. Apparently, this takes place in the future, where if you are part of “The Bad Batch,” you are actually a prisoner, where you are taken to a gate on the edge of Texas, and are free to roam a land where the American law and way of life no longer applies. Are you are a land full of cannibals, criminals, and scary looking motherfuckers, and the one place of solace this scary desert un-topia has is a place called Comfort that is run by a head honcho named The Dream (played cool and collected by Keanu Reeves). How weird is this film? Well all the ladies that are in The Dream’s home are pregnant and are wearing t-shirts that says “I Have The Dream Inside Me.” Am I right?

Well anyway, this one girl gets sentenced to this place, and right away she is taken by cannibals who eat one of her arms and one of her legs. She still manages to escape and tries to find Comfort.  Jason Mamoa also stars as a man who you don’t quite know who his allegiance lies with. Like I said, the film is really really gorgeously shot. Ms. Amirpour knows her way behind a camera and brings a beautiful landscape to an otherwise haunting and scary open prison system.

I guess the weirdness of this film stuck with me throughout the entire runtime because I was never bored and my eyes were always glued to the screen wondering what was going to happen next. I loved how this world was explained to the audience not by telling us what was going on but by showing us. That’s what I always admire in a film, when it shows and not tells. It’s possible that the weirdness was too good for it’s own good because if a couple of things were tweaked this could’ve been a masterpiece and one of the year’s best films. The story should’ve been tweaked a couple of times (even though I did like the ending). Some of the characters decisions didn’t make much sense when clearly there were plenty of other options (hard to explain without getting into spoilers). I also loved Keanu Reeves as a kind of savior/bad guy and wish they would’ve developed his character a bit more.

And the film does have that main problem: character development. We don’t know much about the main girl, named Arlen, and only find out bits and pieces with nothing big enough or the glue not strong enough to put together. Same goes with Jason Mamoa’s character known only as Miami Man because of the tattoo across his chest. But the best character I really wanted to get to know was Jim Carrey’s Hermit character. Arguably one of Carrey’s best performances he doesn’t say one word, just a desert wanderer that mostly keeps to himself except for when people are in trouble. I could’ve watched a whole movie on just that character alone, and is the reason why I like the movie more than I should.

Ugh, the more I think about the movie the more of a recommendation I want to give it. As of right now, I think the movie borders on good/great territory, but far from a masterpiece and no where near the mess that people think it is. This is definitely a film though that I’d like to revisit at a time and maybe see something new in it that I didn’t catch the first time. Anyway, if you like weird films, or anything avant garde, this is totally the film for you. But if you are a modern audience participant, this film will most likely confuse the shit out of you and you will hate it’s guts. I liked it and would like to study it some more.

The best thing I can tell you about this film is that this one is at least better than the awful 2nd film and the ho-hum Minions film. What has happened to this franchise? The first film is a lovable tale with a good story that everyone fell in love with. But then people fell too in love with the Minions, and the franchise became a product placement like all the Cars films are. I can’t even remember the 2nd film, only that the Minions stole the show and Gru met Kristen Wiig’s characters, and there was some Mexican bad guy. This film has a more memorable villain, thanks to the comedic voice talents of South Park’s Trey Parker, but even he can’t even save the film from having too many subplots, too much slapstick humor and not enough smart original jokes, and and uninspired main plot. The minions fortunately or unfortunately however you want to look at it, of course steal the show entirely.

Yeah, the two funniest bits in the film are the minions accidentally interrupting a singing competition and the minions life in jail after they leave Gru because “he’s not villainous enough.” So that’s one plot point, let’s count all the other in a 90 minute film. 2. Kristen Wiig’s character wanting to be a good new mother. 3. Agnes wanting to find a real unicorn (the middle child doesn’t get a subplot surprisingly. 4. The older daughter having to ward away this young Danish boy who she took a bite of cheese from (I know, lame, and it’s solved pretty damn quickly that it isn’t even really much of a subplot). 5. Gru dealing with his new long lost brother Dru. 6. Trey Parker’s Balthazar Bratt becoming insane after the cancellation of his tv show and having no reason to take over the world other than he wants to be his character that was on the show and be an excellent “bad boy.” 7. Gru and Kristen Wiig (I don’t care enough to know her characters name) getting fired from the saving the world league they were in and trying to get back in. Jesus.

7 plots and subplots all in the span of 90 minutes. And you could feel it too. The film is way too overstuffed. They could come up with one or two main plots and make a loving, sweet, and coeherant story. Instead they basically ignore the children (which their plot made the first film so sweet, and the children are completely ignored in the second film) and instead focus on slapstick humor between Gru and his brother, and of course, the Minions. Didn’t the Minions get their own movie so they could concentrate on trying to tell an actual story in this third outing? At least that’s what the filmmakers told us when this started getting made. Maybe halfway through they couldn’t come up with any ideas, said “fuck it,” and threw everything out the window.

This film has hardly any original jokes. Everything feels borrowed from other films and most of the jokes are just people falling and getting hurt kind of humor, tons of overused slapstick. The writing here is the laziest since…well, I guess Cars 3, haha. I mean, they couldn’t have come up with another main story featuring the girls mainly, combine that with the good mother thing from Wiig, get rid of the other brother angle, keep Trey Parker (who is the best part of this film by the way and seems like he is happy to be doing something else other than South Park), and it be at least half way decent? It’s been several years since the 2nd one, and you would’ve thought they would’ve learned from their mistakes, but I guess not. Maybe it is time to hire some new writers as well.

There is a but to all this. The but is that kids will enjoy it no matter what. They will love the slapstick stuff, love the minions, love another unicorn story with Agnes, love the ending with the bubble gum town and ripping off the end of Age of Ultron. They will love every second of this film, because kids do not know any better. Which is fine, I’m going to experience all that stuff in several years when my child grows up. But if you are going to make a movie for kids, and ones that adults will need to take their kids too, at least make it decent for the adults as well and not insult their intelligence. The voice work is still great from everyone, even Carrell, who I thought always has done fantastic work in these, but the substance does not match up to style here. At least I can say it was better than 2, but that again isn’t saying all that much. It’s despicable I couldn’t like this film better.

I think after THE BEGUILED, I’m officially considering writer/director Sofia Coppola a one-hit wonder. And this isn’t even the hit, that would belong to Lost in Translation. The Beguiled is almost everything bad I could say about a film at this moment. Pacing is bad, original (that’s right, it’s a remake) is much better, editing is choppy, acting is ho-hum, character development was awful, direction was one-note, none of the feelings were believable, characters made weird decisions too quickly and it was an absolute snooze fest. Gee Zach, tell me what you really thought about it? Well, I just did, but I guess I could go into some more detail…

The only thing that was good about this film was the dreary mood and the cinematography. It was a pretty looking film. That’s about all the praise you’ll hear from me. Sofia Coppola has directed a bunch of stinkers. I can’t stand Somewhere, The Virgin Suicides, The Bling Ring, and Marie Antoinette. I don’t know why I love Lost In Translation so much. Maybe I need to watch it again to find out if the film still holds up. Sofia Coppola was known for her terrible acting as Corleone’s daughter in Godfather Part III, but I also think she is a terrible writer. Not so much director as she is not bad at all at some camera work, but her screenplays are absolutely dreadful, weird, and just plain Jane.

I mean, I’ve seen the original with Clint Eastwood, and I guess they remade it to make it seem more dreary and dreadful, because while the actions of the characters make sense in the original, they don’t make sense here at all. In fact, I think this movie could’ve been BETTER with about 30 minutes added onto it (it’s only 90) with some more character development. For instance, Colin Farrell talks to Kirsten Dunst’s character ONCE and stares at her in a couple of scenes, he says “I love you,” to her in the next scene, and then is trying to get in Elle Fannings pants less than a minute later. Makes absolutely zero sense. The film only starts to pick up once Colin Farrell re breaks his leg, but the film only has 20 minutes left. The ending is the same as it was in the original, but here it feels less earned.

Farrell is nice one minute and awful the next with no subtext. Even Nicole Kidman’s character, who is icy to him the entire time at one point almost kisses him. There was absolutely no basis for any of the characters actions. No motive. It was complete drivel. Did Sofia Coppola actually watch the original film or did she just skip through it and go, “I think I’ll just make it more dreary and with less substance, that’ll make a good film!”

How Sofia Coppola won the Palme D’or at the Cannes Film Festival for this is beyond me. I’m puzzled unless the other films weren’t that great as well or if the judges were in a weird mood. Just like The Bling Ring, Somewhere, and Marie Antoinette, this is going to be on my worst list at the end of the year. Sofia Coppola needs to direct from someone else’s script, because she needs to quit writing.

Thank the movie Gods, looks like maybe the Summer movie season is really starting to kick in. After the wonderful Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2, it’s been a ho-hum shit kind of summer with big stinkers such as Transformers 5 million, All Eyez On Me, 47 Meters Down, Beatriz At Dinner, Cars 3, It Comes At Night, some would put The Mummy in there, Baywatch. The only other excellent movie we’ve gotten in between all that crap was Wonder Woman. But now, we got Baby Driver, and this Friday, you can experience the wonderful hilarious romantic joy that is THE BIG SICK.

If you don’t know what The Big Sick is, well that baffles me because they’ve been promoting the shit out of it. It’s based on a true story with Kumail Nanjiani, playing himself of course, where he meets his current wife Emily and after being together awhile and shortly after a break up, she ends up in a medically induced coma. The doctors don’t know what is wrong with her, and Kumail meets and hangs around Emily’s parents, waiting to see if Emily will recover and if maybe this whole experience changes him in a way.

Even if this wasn’t a true tale, and the real husband and wife duo just wrote this as a mere piece of fiction, this is still one of the better romantic dramedies to come out in recent years. In fact, this is what Funny People really should have been. What’s funny is that the two correlate very well with the whole stand up comedians and sickness type plot scenario. But what makes this film truly special, and a whole lot better than Funny People ever was, is that it is a true story, this movie feels real even though Kumail is the only one playing himself, and this movie is actually hilarious.

Some would say the movie is too long, running at almost 2 hours. However, I would strongly disagree. The film’s pacing and plot structure are perfect. If the movie was cut any further, I might not have believed the love between Kumail and Emily was real and wasn’t rooting for them to end up together in the end (even though I know they get married in real life). It gets to the sickness gradually, and then when she is in a medically induced coma, his relationship with her parents has perfect progression as well. In fact, in the whole movie I don’t see one scene that could’ve been cut or trimmed. Everything feels necessary. Even the extended scenes with Kumail’s family wanting him to meet and marry a Pakistani girl and their disapproval with his life.

Now let’s get to the acting real quick. I love Kumail Nanjiani on Silicon Valley, but here, even playing himself, he is absolutely fantastic. His Silicon Valley character is completely gone, and here he is, just him, making me have a lump in my throat in one scene where he is completely bombing a stand up comedic act to talk about how he can’t do comedy when the girl that he loves is in a coma. Holly Hunter is great here too, and Zoe Kazan is adorable as Emily, so adorable I wonder if she did the real Emily justice. But the real standout here, as a friend of mine mentioned, is Ray Romano. Ray Romano gives his best performance to date. Better than any episode of Everybody Loves Raymond could ever have given you. He gives Emily’s dad words and story arc life, and he ends up being the most likable character in the movie. If there is only one reason for this film being worth the price of admission, it’s Romano’s performance.

Go see The Big Sick as soon as you can (comes out Friday). Bring a date, see it with friends and family. It is that type of movie. Even being rated R, it is a movie any family would enjoy (if your kids are at least age 13 and up). I don’t think I’m being hasty to call this the best romantic comedy of the year, and that it will end up on my top ten – fifteen list by January 2018. It really is that lovable, wholesome, and good. The two hours flew by, and I wanted to see more of Kumail and Emily’s life, even if it didn’t have a plot too it. This romantic comedy should be the standard when it comes to those types of films. Near perfect, and you definitely won’t get sick of it.

OKJA, just like the previous directors efforts of Snowpiercer and The Host, is a weird little fantastic film. I actually loved this movie a little bit and it is definitely Netflix’s best original movie that it has released yet (which is nice after that God awful War Machine film with Brad Pitt). If you haven’t seen Snowpiercer or The Host, I suggest you watch those films from director Bong Joon-Ho first before digging deep into this film. His films have a grand-smallish scale that brings a lot of weirdness but treats it as if it is absolutely serious. I can’t believe Okja isn’t being released in theaters, because it deserves to be, although I guess Netflix is changing everything about the game as we know it.

If there is one, no two reasons to not miss Okja, it is the peformances from Tilda Swinton and Jake Gyllenhaul. Swinton has two roles as the Mirando sisters, CEO’s of a giant company looking to solve world hunger but also hiding its dirty little secrets to get to that point. She plays the sisters as psychotic and socialistic with one having the personality of a much older grown woman and one with the personality of a teen that gets upset when she doesn’t get what she wants. And the performance is fantastic. Gyllenhaul’s performance might be a little turn off for some. He plays a zoologist and TV personality that is in league with the Mirando sisters. He plays it as if Ace Ventura and Brian Fellows (Tracy Morgan’s character on SNL) has sex and had a baby. It is an off the wall bonkers performance that I can’t decide if it was brilliant, annoying or both. Hearing him screech is a thing that needs to be heard at least once.

If you don’t know what this film is about look into trying to watch a trailer for it. Basically, a girl, with her grandfather, have been raising Okja since birth. Okja is a giant, giant pig animal experimentation hybrid that was made by the Mirando Corporation in ways to solve world hunger, by eating them when they grow up. How it is going to solve world hunger? I’ll let the movie explain that to you if you see it. Anyway, Okja is being used as a patsy to get the world hunger project from getting off the ground and is being brought to a giant parade celebrating the movement in New York City. The girl, named Mija, just loves Okja too much and wants her as a lifetime companion and goes to find Okja when she is taken away from her.

Then you of course have Animal Right Activists looking to free Okja while also exploiting the evils of the Mirando Corporation. And that gang is played by Paul Dano, Steven Yeun (Glenn on the Walking Dead), and Lily Collins. Their performances are all good, but they mostly play it straight and don’t go too off the book in regards to what they have done/played before. The movie itself acts like a giant chase film, with a couple of big action sequences, heartfelt revelations, and a couple of twists and turns.

To warn you, this movie is Not Rated on Netflix, but it would certainly be rated R if it were in theaters. This movie is not for kids. There are F words a plenty and we do go inside a meat killing floor facility at one point. There is also a scene where Okja is forced to breed later on down the road. But what I loved about the film is that the ending is bittersweet. You get what you expected but then there is that added layer that brings up so much more conflict, but in reality, a little girl couldn’t do everything for everyone.

But the movie was fun. It’s sweet, horrifying, heartfelt, heartbreaking, and just plain enjoyable. It also is a film that makes you think. And while some of the weirdness is a little absurd, it does make sense in that particular universe, and while weird, it is also very serious (you’ll see). Out of Bong-Joo Ho’s films I still like Snowpiercer better, but this is a very close second.  I do like how he is making a hybrid of Japanese and American film atmospheres and techniques. Definitely better than the big budget epic action failure that The Great Wall tried to accomplish. If you have Netflix or know someone that has Netflix, it comes out tomorrow and I suggest checking it out. It is the best their original films have had to offer so far other than their TV shows.

If John Wick Chapter 2 was the coolest movie of the beginning of the year, BABY DRIVER is unarguably the coolest movie of the summer. It’s not only one of the year’s best films (right under John Wick 2 in fact), but the fact is that if you are reading my review, and don’t go see it in a theater with an incredible atmosphere and sound, then you should probably never go to the movies again (unless you have a great excuse like you’re old or you have kids). If you don’t see Baby Driver, you frankly cannot say that you are a movie lover. Because it is a crime to not see this film. Baby Driver is 100% great with absolutely no flaws whatsoever. Great story, great acting, great characters, great shots, great camera work, great dialogue, great soundtrack, great action, great unexpected surprises, great ending, great everything. It’s one of those movies that won’t just be commercially successful but will also be considered a classic many years down the line. It is also Edgar Wright’s best film hands down. Yes, better than Hot Fuzz and Scott Pilgrim Vs. The World.

Baby Driver is a movie that you won’t be able to stop talking about. You won’t be able to stop talking about how the entire movie is basically choreographed to the music that Baby listens too. You won’t be able to stop talking about the action sequences. You won’t be able to stop talking about the great villains this film has. You won’t be able to stop talking about certain deaths and surprises on who the true villains are. You won’t be able to stop talking about the dialogue and our hero and his lady. You won’t be able to stop talking about the excellent soundtrack (tied this year with Guardians Vol. 2). The only time you will stop talking is when you are actually watching the movie.

Anyone who ruins any of the surprises this film has to offer should be bitched slapped…hard…and twice. From the trailer it looks like you might know where the film may go, and you might hear yourself in the film going “ah ha, I know where that will lead.” But you don’t. Not even close. The trailer doesn’t even come close to selling the awesomeness that is this movie. At my screening, their were many gasps, laughs, “oh my God’s” and everyone applauded at the end. This is a star making performance for Ansel Egort and Lily James has never been better either. Kevin Spacey completely rocks the socks off Wright’s dialogue, Eiza Gonzalez steals the scenes in which she has something to say, and even though Jon Berenthal isn’t in the film much, his character makes an everlasting impression.

But let’s talk about Jamie Fox and Jon Hamm. Holy Hammer of Thor, do these two gives their best performances. Jamie Fox makes an incredible villain that you will love to hate and keep begging that the movie gives him some sort of comeuppance. Jon Hamm also goes against type here as well as one of the criminals that Baby has to drive around, and Hamm really really shines when he is angry and has some revenge on his mind. There is a saying that a movie is fantastic if it can bring memorable villains that are equal to the hero’s and neither outshines each other during the course of the runtime. This is that perfect movie that balances all of that to a tee.

And the pacing of this film is masterful. It’s almost two hours and everything just clicks, clicks, clicks together like a perfect puzzle piece. The romance is just as interesting to watch as the action sequences and that is hard for a lot of movies to pull off. Baby Driver is a straight up masterpiece. It’s a film I could watch over and over without ever getting bored. I couldn’t use it just as background noise because I would end up watching the whole thing and not getting any chores done at home. But you need to see this. Actually, you HAVE to. Preferably at a Alamo drafthouse but if not, a theater that has good sound and people won’t talk or text during it. Everything about this movie is cool. Cool Cool Cool.