Zach’s Zany TV Binge Watchin’ Reviews: #BLACKAF (Netflix)

#BLACKAF is basically just a combination of Modern Family’s format combined with Curb Your Enthusiasm’s premise of a middle aged man complaining about almost everything anyone does…but focusing on a black family instead of white, and unfortunately nowhere near as funny as the other two, and also nowhere near as smartly executed as the other two shows. Not to say that’s its bad or terrible, I just don’t think the execution of it lived up to its concept. Instead it feels like it is kind of cheaply ripping off the other two shows at times and just putting a spin on story lines that have been done plenty of times beforehand. It all feels just a little stale. But again, it isn’t awful, but as I’m trying to keep television only having between 10 to 15 shows I watch that are still new on the air total, I don’t think #blackAFd is going to make the cut, and I’m just going to say this is the end of my journey, no season 2 for me. But instead of this being the only paragraph on my review of this, instead of me kindly saying, “I get it, but no thank you, not for me,” I do want to say I appreciate what writer/creator Kenya Barris is trying to do. I haven’t watched any of it, but I heard Black-ish is excellent and that I might want to give that a try if I didn’t care for this show too much. But looking at the man’s career, it is pretty impressive, even though there are a couple of speed bumps along the way, including that new Shaft movie disaster that came out last year (didn’t see it) and yeah, this show was kind of another speed bump. The man is unarguably a very unique talent with a lot of things to say. #blackAF is a noble way to try and say these things, but since the show’s formula copies too much of other shows’ past, and with only a handful of really good one liners but conversations that go on wayyy too long, this was just not the best medium for those messages.

IMDB.com and Wikipedia describes #blackAF as: “A father takes an irreverent and honest approach to parenting and relationships” and “the series stars Barris as a fictionalized version of himself and uncovers the messy, unfiltered, and often hilarious world of what it means to be a ‘new money’ black family trying to ‘get it right’ in a modern world where ‘right’ is no longer a fixed concept.” To add to these descriptions, this whole situational comedy is presented in documentary form, created by her daughter, who is trying to make this documentary of her family to get into college. It’s a noble format to be sure, it just feels too much like Modern Family, and Barris’ constant complaining and just not getting it feels too much like Larry David’s complaints. Listen, I’m a white guy, I know it, and anyone reading this should just write this off as me not being the target audience for this show. But I think I know a little bit about the ways jokes, stories and screenplays are written, so I feel like I have something to say in that area. There is one fantastic, excellent, excellent episode in this series, and it is episode 5, and the episode has Barris and his family going to a sneak preview movie screening of a movie, and everyone in the audience is eating it up except for Barris and his documentary filmmaking daughter. But they are afraid to let anyone know that they didn’t care for the movie, because the filmmaker was black and they wanted didn’t want to disrespect the cause. Fantastic episode, and it happened to be the longest of the eight. But listen closely to the conversations and jokes in that episode, they are ridiculously paid off well while also getting the point across without any filler whatsoever. I just wished the rest of the episode were as well developed, because the rest just float, have too much filler, and to me didn’t have a general purpose.

I wanted to watch this series mainly for one reason from the get go: Rashida Jones. Just like I think she’s an excellent actress in whatever she does, here is no different, in fact, I say she even gets to cut loose a little bit because it seems like, again using Curb Your Enthusiasm’s format, there is a lot of improve. I’ve always liked Rashida Jones, from her early days on Chappelle’s Show, to The Office, to especially Parks and Rec, to the dozen or so movies she’s done, I’ve always enjoyed watching her work. If I were to check out a possible season 2, it would only be to watch her work some more. Everybody here is actually quite decent, with Barris himself eventually coming into his own by the 8th episode, but then again, it’s all forgivable since Larry David took several seasons to not act like he was in a television show. But Rashida Jones is the true star here, and even though I didn’t laugh much at the jokes or cared for the story (family squabbles) I’ve seen a billion times before, she kept my eyes glued to the screen when she was on. Take her character Joya here, and put her in any other, better written show, and she would easily have her Emmy that she deserves. Basically, to sum everything up, I just didn’t care for the show, because to me, it brought nothing new. I’ve seen all the family squabble bits before, I’ve seen all their resolutions, there really are no more ways for shows to put a twist on the same thing, without copycatting and putting together different formats from other shows. This show just wasn’t for me, pure and simple. It might be for you, so don’t take my word #seriousAF.

Zach’s Zany Movie Reviews: THE WRONG MISSY (Netflix…also a Happy Madison production, so you can already see where I’m going with this)

Let’s do a Happy Madison Production check list shall we? If you don’t know what Happy Madison Productions are…you must’ve been quarantining yourself long before COVID-19. As a refresher, Happy Madison is Adam fucking Sandler’s production company that he started after his first several crude and crass comedies did huge business. He took the ‘Happy’ from what is probably his most beloved film, Happy Gilmore, and then took Madison from Billy Madison, his first foray into feature films that abundantly featured man childishness, and boom!, there you have it, his production company. Really, arguably, the only good Happy Madison movies are the early ones: 50 First Dates, Mr. Deeds and Funny People…and I’ll throw a couple of guilty pleasures in there like The Hot Chick, Little Nicky, Click and The Longest Yard remake (Happy Gilmore, Billy Madison, The Wedding Singer, The Waterboy, Tommy Boy, Black Sheep, A Night At The Roxbury, Wayne’s World 1 & 2, Dirty Work & Big Daddy are not included in these because the production company wasn’t formed until Deuce Bigelow: Male Gigolo in 1999, and those were mostly produced by Lorne Michaels and are kind of considered Saturday Night Live films). That’s it, that’s all that is good. Out of Happy Madison pictures you only get 7 to 10 half way decent films (you could put Grandma’s Boy in to get to the latter, but I didn’t really care for that film, I see the appeal though). Out of 50, yes I counted. OUT OF 50. That’s 20%, MAX. And out of those 50, only one is a genuine rom com masterpiece, ironically being 50 First Dates. That is not a good track record. If you go on Wikipedia, and start counting how many Happy Madison production films you like out of those 50, and you get to anywhere above 15…you are a dumb shit. Sorry, but you are. You don’t know good cinema, and you should stop watching shit now. Anyway, sorry for berating you, let’s get to that checklist that makes a Happy Madison film a Happy Madison film, and not in a good way:

the whole excuse to have this movie is Adam Sandler and co. can go on an all expenses paid vacation while shooting another unfunny disaster
if Sandler is no where to be seen, you can bet that his wife has a small role and that 5 to 6 of his dumb ass hack no talent friends, such as Nick Swardson, Rob Schnieder, Vanilla Ice, etc. show up in dumb cameos/small roles (the vacation is for them too you know)
poorly written crude and crass humor that stopped working in 1999.
unfunny over the top unbelievable situations that would never happen in real life
a psychotic character that somehow normalizes in the span of two minutes and has absolutely no character development whatsoever
if David Spade is in it, and if he isn’t playing Joe Dirt, he looks bored out of his mind
since Chris Farley is dead, one of his unfunny brothers show up
lazy direction
you can blame the entirety of the awful experience if you watch one of these on Adam Sandler and Adam Sandler alone.

THE WRONG MISSY checks off ALL OF THESE BOXES. This movie is an unmitigated disaster and easily one of the worst films of 2020 if not THE worst. I would rather watch The Main Event again than this absolutely unfunny garbage of a movie. I can only give this movie one little shred of credit, and that goes to who plays the woman named Missy herself: Lauren Lapkus. She plays the psychotic character in the checklist I just mentioned, she is basically co-lead along with David Spade, and she gives it her all. I completely believed she was a nightmare person that I would never, ever, ever, ever want to hang around with let along meet in real life. Like you don’t want to watch the movie, but you can’t take your eyes off her performance as you are wondering…did they give her actual drugs before each take to get her THAT crazy? The only way I would recommend watching this movie is to just fast forward to the parts with her in it and just see how bat shit crazy her performance gets. It’s a wonder to behold, I have never seen an actor/actress go to that level. It was an experience…I just wish it were in a better film. The Wrong Missy has a stupid premise and quickly gets all the characters to a exotic resort so that all the directors, producers, actors and their families can just go on vacation when Tyler Spindel yelled cut: A man accidentally invites a crazy blind date from his past who shares the same name as the woman of his dreams to his work retreat.

David Spade plays the straight man again, and I usually love when he does so (see guilty pleasure: Lost & Found, NOT a Happy Madison production!), but in this, he couldn’t look more like he wanted to kill himself if he tried. I bet it was all frowns on camera, and then once it was vacation time, his mood probably brightened up a bit. The second Adam Sandler’s friend, Nick Swardson, shows up in this, I rolled my eyes and knew it would be another awful Happy Madison film (and he shows up early in this film with a continual unfunny running joke of he basically knows all of Spade’s characters media passwords and spies on him because he has nothing better to do). There’s every kind of crude and crass joke that has been over done in this: loads of dumb dick & fart jokes, old tone deaf rape jokes, throw up jokes, threesome sex physical Three Stooges comedy jokes, constant disgusting lazy sex jokes, constant disgusting lazy sex jokes, and constant disgusting lazy sex jokes. And it goes on and on and on and on, not one character sympathetic and absolutely no one you can relate to, except if you’ve been on multiple awful dates with a person and just want to get to ghosting them so they leave you alone, and maybe hope to give them a hint to change their behavior, but they won’t, and they will never, ever learn.

Oh, and predictability. Don’t forget that. This movie is the most predictable movie since…I don’t know what. You know that the correct Missy, played by an underused gorgeous Molly Sims, is going to show up at one point, and Spade will realize that he wants to be with the lunatic he’s spent countless minutes trying to get rid of because of a forced 2 second character development where the wrong Missy shows that she can be normal for two seconds…so after those two seconds…I guess Spade decides to fall in love with her character? OH GOD, somebody fucking kill me please. This thing was one long, annoying, unfunny, obnoxious, stupid, lazy, uninspired, unmotivated 90 minute piece of shit. Awful. If you know your Happy Madison production movies, I can only say that it is maybe a step above disasterpieces such as Sandy Wexler or the boring The Week Of. And that is only because of Lauren Lapkus’ bat shit crazy performance as Missy. Watching a couple of those scenes should be your only foray into watching any of this. If you end up watching the whole thing, and think it is actually a decent fucking movie, something is wrong with you and you need to just stop and quarantine yourself even more than you already are. Anybody who likes this movie is stupid. STOO-PID. The Wrong Missy is the wrong movie to be on your Netflix cue. You should really rethink your life if Netflix recommends this title to you. Either that or you need to make sure to hit the thumbs down after you watch the movie to make sure bullshit like this never shows up on the Netflix main screen ever again. Fuck you Adam Sandler…FUCK. YOU. You better be glad that Uncut Gems was that good and not a part of your production company.

Zach’s Zany Movie? Reviews: UNBREAKABLE KIMMY SCHMIDT – KIMMY VS. THE REVEREND (A NETFLIX INTERACTIVE SPECIAL, THE “YOU WIN” CANON ENDING)

Nope, the title of this review is not a mistake, it is that long and I meant to put a question mark after the word movie. Because is this really a movie review? Or a television show review? A little bit of both, so that would make it a TV movie review, which I don’t normally do, (El Camino is shot like a movie, doesn’t count) right? Whatever it is, if UNBREAKABLE KIMMY SCHMIDT: KIMMY VS. THE REVEREND had played it straight and not been a new Netflix Interactive Special, then this whole thing would’ve been DOA. It would’ve been a cheaply made, production money completely going to all the celebrity cameos, awful television movie, like the ones we used to get in the 80s and 90s that were basically just longer episodes of famous hour longs. But due to the fact that this is an interactive special, where you, the viewer, get to choose the path of where the characters and plot go, it’s a couple of slight steps above above the awful comparison I just made. And just because I’m about to say that it probably is the most interesting thing about the entire series of Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt since Season 1, doesn’t mean that it’s that great. It’s tolerable and produced a couple of chuckles out of me, and it shockingly recaptured some of the quirky magic the first season had, but by no means does that mean I’m going to re visit it or the series anytime soon…if ever.

For those in the know, this is not Netflix’s first “Choose Your Path” Interactive Special. That goes to the awful, awful Black Mirror movie Bandersnatch. The main problem with Bandersnatch’s choose your own adventure storyline is that a lot of the choices the special had you make were completely inconsequential to either what happened directly afterward or later. And all the endings sucked, were too confusing, didn’t make any sense, etc. etc., and the choices weren’t all that seamless editing wise either when put into the overall narrative. The whole thing was a giant, unplanned mess. This Kimmy Schmidt special is a GIANT step in the RIGHT direction. There are several big choices at the beginning of the special that have VERY SIGNIFICANT different paths for how the narrative will unfold later, several big choices at the end as well. In the middle you are a bit more lax, as a wrong choice will trigger pretty amusing little abrupt endings that make it clear to the viewer that your choice is not meant to be taken seriously (or as canon) and will rewind you back to make a different choice. If you don’t give a shit about the endings and don’t care about canon regarding this quirky cast of characters or story line, have fun, there are a shitload of different choices you can make, going through the entire thing is said to get you about an hour and 20 minutes of footage altogether. If you make the correct choice every time, and get to the “You Win” ending straight away, it is basically a hour in television without commercials (42 to 44 minutes) and is a cute and harmless epilogue to the series finale.

Basically this special is only for A. hardcore fans of the series or B. people that actually watched all of the series (like me) even though you might not have cared for most of it. Season 1 is really the only great season of Kimmy Schmidt. They all get progressively worse from there, Season 2 hitting a giant sophomore slump, and it only gets worse and never recovers (unless you could this special as sort of recovering). As each season just chugs along it tries harder and harder to be quirky and funny and it all eventually feels forced, especially season 3 and 4, where you get to the point of eye rolling your eye balls out of your sockets. But if you aren’t a grouch like me and have enjoyed this series from top to bottom, you’ll love this special, I guarantee it. All of the characters you know and love are back and Ellie Kemper still can act her cute little butt off. Jon Hamm still feels like he wants to be there, Carol Kane still has a shit ton of energy, Titus Burgess is still…well Titus, there are a bunch of other small celebrity cameos of which some put a smile to my face, and if anybody gets short changed scene time wise its Jane Krakowski as Jacqueline, but I hated her character anyway so that’s definitely a check mark on the “PRO” side to this special. The best edition though to this universe is easily Harry Potter himself, Daniel Radcliffe, who plays Frederick, Kimmy’s fiance. He is in a lot of this special and thankfully he isn’t wasted. The guy has charm up to the wazoo and I’ve been trying to watch everything he has done post Potter as I think he has always had more potential other than that one role. With this and everything else he’s done recently, I stand here with a smile on face, proud that I was right.

Anyway, with this being the last paragraph of my review, after it if you skip my ranking of all the Kimmy Schmidt Content to date, you’ll see how to get the “You Won” ending if you aren’t in it for the goofy, fake, nonsense paths and want to see the story how it is meant to be, canonically wise. Don’t worry, I only partially ruin the absolute 4 choices you MUST make, but I don’t reveal what happens in the story fully, it’s just a little nudge in the right direction. But if you are a true fan of the series, yet you are one of those people that only want the correct path, once you are done I suggest restarting it and having a bit of fun to see all the different ways things play out with all the different choices. Some of them even got more than a chuckle out of me. But if you haven’t ever been a fan of this series, or you were out ever since you realized Season 2 was a giant bummer, this will not change your mind. It’s the best thing to come out of this world since Season 1…but is that really saying anything? Like I mentioned earlier, if this had just been a TV movie epilogue to the series, with no choices and only one path to the straight and narrow, this would’ve been a giant dud. You can tell that not much thought was put into the linear parts of the story, but more input was made into the fake, abrupt, yet funny, non-canon endings. To give it credit, everything is nice and seamless here, the editing and comedic timing working well while choosing a path, going back after a wrong choice, or to get to the next scene. I do hope that this is the final final ending to the series, we don’t need anything else. Next time, I would love for Netflix to make one big giant original interactive choice movie that doesn’t have any ties to anything previously released on the streaming platform or anywhere else. Time to get the audience that doesn’t want to devote their time to having to watch a whole bunch of something else, just to get to the newly released content. Time to break that habit.

My Ranking of Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt Content:

Season 1
Interactive Special
Season 2
Season 3
Season 4

******SPOILER CORRECT PATH WARNING, ALTHOUGH NOTHING IS REALLY REVEALED*****************

To Get The “You Won” Ending:

This is the only ending that rewards the viewer with the coveted “You Won!” bumper at the end of the show. To get it, you must make Kimmy select the Fun Dress in the very first choice of the game. This is not a Bandersnatch situation, the first question really matters here.

The second crucial choice is to Read The Book when Kimmy gets home from her dress fitting. There’s something in the book Kimmy needs to know for later, and failing to do so early in the game sets up a chain reaction towards crappy, non-canon endings.

Many of the choices in between reading the book and the third act lead to temporary fail states that are easily reversible, so you can pretty much do what you want in the middle a bit (which I suggest you do, it is quite fun) without screwing up the ending, but the game’s final two choices are super important:

Titus must Follow Kimmy when she chases the Reverend through the woods. Ignore the Garden Banquet.

Finally, Kimmy must Spare the Reverend. Once these four choices are complete, the winning ending is automatically unlocked.

Zach’s Zany TV Binge Watchin’ Reviews: NEVER HAVE I EVER (Season 1, Netflix)

It’s really not that much of a revelation that I don’t like Mindy Kaling very much…as an actress. She’s an incredible fucking writer. She’s written some of the best episodes of The Office, The Mindy Kaling Project, and I really liked the Amazon Original Movie Late Night. She has an incredible ear for dialogue, character, plot, and story. So when I heard she co-created, co-wrote, sometimes even solo wrote many of the ten episodes of the new series NEVER HAVE I EVER, and especially when I found out that she doesn’t even make an appearance in it, I knew I wanted to watch it. No offense to Mindy Kaling as an actress, she has the personality of one, I just think she plays the same person in whatever she does, basically…she just plays herself, and she’s loud, too crude sometimes, and crass, and I just don’t care for it. Anything written by her though, I can’t wait to read or watch. Never Have I Ever is no exception. I fucking loved every minute of this short comedy series and my only problem is that there weren’t more episodes to watch and we’ll probably have to wait a long time for season 2 because of butthold COVID-19. In all the repeated bullshit of television, this really quick and wonderful binge was definitely a breath of fresh air. It’s funny, well acted, the dialogue is snappy and quirky, the characters are all nicely layered, even the supporting ones. It’s just a wonderful show and you should stop reading my review, not because of spoilers, I promise not to give any, but you just need to watch it for yourself. It’s that good.

Per Netflix and IMDB.com the series is about “the complicated life of a modern-day first generation Indian American teenage girl, inspired (not directly based) by Kaling’s own childhood.” That teenage girl is played by Maitreyi Ramakrishnan, and I was really surprised to look her career up, and this is her very first acting credit…ever. She does a phenomenal job for this being her first gig. Phenomenal. Other than two very recognizable narrators (one is just for a special episode dedicated its focus on a different character) who I will not spoil for the fun of it all, the cast is mostly filled with unknowns. And not only is all of their acting great, but all of their characters big and small have fantastic development and arcs and by the end of the ten episode first season one, they feel like a well established television family that I got to know very well and want to spend more time with. This series could’ve played on a regular network like ABC, NBC, FOX, etc. but due to the nature of some of the content (Devi, the main character, wants to lose her virginity to a hot guy and constantly talks about sex) and some well timed choice, yet not overused language, I’m very happy that it isn’t censored and not on Netflix. Makes the entire narrative and situations more relatable. And even though it is a coming of age sitcom, it feels more honest and realistic than most, and that is due to the excellent writing of creators Mindy Kaling, Lang Fisher, & their team. I hope they all stay on for a second season (which is 100% at this point as it’s been in the top ten of Netflix for days now, this series was released last Monday).

Even though I predicted a lot of the things that were going to happen, the show brought them on in a way that kept me interested and wondering how a season two will play out. This season has a well established arc, and you think you know what it is going into the season, but doesn’t really show its true cards near the end. It’s a very strong message about family, and it completely sticks the landing. I’m just also amazed by how much the series subverts your expectations on some of the supporting characters. One character named Ben goes from a completely despicable asshole and morphs into one of the best characters. Another character, Kamala, the cousin of Devi, seems like she’s going to be a stereotypical good looking Indian woman that is too much into her looks, boys, fashion, but again, the show goes in the opposite direction and makes her a very smart and compelling character, another one of the best of the supporting ones. Every character is great here, even the jock the Devi ultimately wants to hook up with. By the time you are done with all ten episodes, you’ll feel like you are at home with the world within the show. It just sucks it’s only ten episodes right now and we might have to wait awhile for Season 2, but I have a feeling it will be worth the wait. The good thing about these 10 episodes is that they are definitely re watchable, over and over until we get a new batch of episodes. When a comedy get re-watchable episodes for me right off the bat, sort of like Seinfeld, Friends, Brooklyn Nine-Nine, etc….that is really saying something. Highly recommend. Never have I ever fallen in love this fast with a comedy series right off the bat. Check it out immediately.

Zach’s Zany Movie Reviews: ALL NIGHT AND A DAY (Netflix)

With ALL NIGHT AND A DAY being the last new Netflix film for a couple of weeks, I’m very relieved that it was a very decent one. More than decent, actually pretty good. Written by the guy that co-wrote Black Panther, which surprised me. I’m going to actually borrow the log line of Netflix first before going into my own description because it’s the best way to describe this film: “As soft-spoken Jahkor (Ashton Sanders) struggles to keep his dream of rapping alive amidst a gang war in Oakland, his ill-fated life and real-world responsibilities drive him further and further across the line of right and wrong with tragic consequences. Landing in prison beside his father, J.D. (Jeffrey Wright) whom he never wanted to be like, Jahkor embarks on an unlikely journey of self-discovery, exploring the events that unite them, in hopes of helping his newborn son break a cycle that feels unavoidable.” Now to add a couple of story details in my own words, this film sort of plays out like a murder mystery. Not the who, but the why. Not really getting into spoilers, Jahkor murders two people right at the beginning of the movie, and the film jumps his time to three places in his life: in prison after the murder, 13 months before the murder, and some scenes of him when he was a young boy in middle school. The film plays with that time really well, no jarring editing, always knowing where it is. The film is very dark and depressing, yet with a hopeful message that no matter where you are at in life, it is still possible to make a change.

To fore warn you all, the movie is very bleak, violent, and uses the N word a ton, but if you can get past all that, it tells a great story. The thing I was afraid for the most was that the movie was going to end the way many a tale like this has ended. But it subverted my expectations, the ending even boosting the plot from what came before. I was afraid the why of the murder mystery would end up being disappointing, but it wasn’t at all, and it even added a few twists during the lead up that I didn’t see coming at all. This is a hard life and gangster film through and through, but it felt realistic in the sense that this wasn’t based on a true story and they all became moderately rich and famous like Straight Outta Compton ended (great film too and recommend that highly if you haven’t seen it). The acting is great here, even the new Candyman and Black Manta in Aquaman Yahya Abdul-Mateen II gets a couple of scenes to shine. Jeffrey Wright (Bernard in Westworld; also in the Daniel Craig Bond movies) shows us in a light I’ve never seen him before, as a hard knocks father, and he passes all of it with flying colors. Ashton Sanders as Jahkor carries the film, and his facial expressions pave the way for the emotional journey that is to come, he is great in this as well.

The film is well written and shot, Joe Robert Cole (who also co-wrote Black Panther) managed to craft a dark film that manages to show a tiny bit of light at the end of the very, very murky tunnel, and I appreciate that he went in that direction instead of just going down the route of everyone just dying tragically, which if the film had gone that way, I wouldn’t be recommending it to you now. The film is perfectly paced and flies by even with it’s maybe 10-15 minute too long of a run time of 2 hours. But let’s face facts, this kind of movie wouldn’t get any kind of theater attention today (maybe a small chance at one theater in L.A. and/or New York), so a streaming platform is the best place for it, and really only Netflix fits that bill. Although I could’ve seen HBO pick this up as well, but it would’ve been too soon after the excellent Bad Education. The one masterful excellent part of this film is a several minute tracking shot a little under an hour into the film that deals with Jahkor and his lady walking through a party that features both sides of the gang war going on in the streets, with cars squealing and doing round about tricks, very impressive camera work. Love to see when directors try something a little different than pointing and shooting. But overall, solid Netflix movie. Might not get any recognition other than it being a decent film, but when you are swimming in Netflix shit and once in awhile get a life raft, you got to jump on.

Zach’s Zany Movie Reviews: THE HALF OF IT (Netflix)

I hate it when that “confrontational” cliched climax almost potentially ruins a other wise very good little twist on the triangle romance film you’ve all seen before. THE HALF OF IT is that movie where a girl helps a boy write a letter/improve his image/etc. etc. etc. to get the other girl of his dreams. You know how those end. The boy ends up falling for the girl that is helping him and they live happily ever after. Or vice versa. You know you’ve seen it. Well in this new Netflix movie that came out this weekend, the girl actually likes the girl. But this isn’t really a lesbian story, it’s a story about the start of a beautiful yet unexpected platonic friendship between the boy and the girl helping him. And it all feels realistic except for a couple of the comedic moments and part of the bombastic cliched final act, going into “oh brother…” territory with confessions in front of a large group of people and some cringe worthy dialogue. But then it goes right back into what made it good before the end credits, so I really can’t fault a film for one scene when it didn’t ruin what it was ultimately about. That would just be me being really, really petty, on the level of me ripping apart a movie for absolutely no reason. And while you’ve seen that half of me before, I try to only do it to movies that deserve it.

IMDB.com describes The Half of It with the following: “When smart but cash-strapped teen Ellie Chu agrees to write a love letter for a jock, she doesn’t expect to become his friend – or fall for his crush.” The thing to stay for here is the camaraderie between the “jock”, whose name is Paul, and Ellie. The scenes between them, the crux of the movie and there are many, are fantastic and worth the watch alone. One of the scenes where he is on a date with her crush (Ellie is there observing), whose name is Aster, is laugh out loud funny and uses texting in a way I hadn’t seen in a movie before and was really charming the way the whole thing played out. Listen to me, calling texting ‘charming’. Like I said, I really like the realistic feel of the movie and the dialogue between all the characters is great. Ellen ends up hanging out with Aster alone during one scene and I appreciate that the movie didn’t go down roads that other movies had before. All of it was very refreshing. I’m sure you can see some of the ending coming, but there are parts that did surely surprise. There is even a good little side plot with Ellie and her father that almost brought a tear to my eye near the end. Without trying to ruin anything, the film does contain a final confession confrontation scene that seemed a little out of place in the movie that it is in, and seemed like it should’ve been in some comedy in the 90’s/early 2000’s.

There is even a punch line of dialogue from a background character when this scene ends (it involves a church, a hint if you are a casual movie theater and get to the end credits and have no idea what the fuck I was talking about), and it made me cringe and I still wonder why this part didn’t go through a few drafts, it felt very amateurish. But I mean, the rest of the movie is solid, so again, I can’t hate an entire movie for one scene, especially if that one scene doesn’t ruin the end end, so just take it as I was really nitpicking there. This movie was written and directed by a woman, Alice Wu, that hadn’t written or directed anything since 2004, this is only her second feature film. That’s a damn shame, as she does have a great eye for the camera here, the cinematography is very decent for a small film like this, and she has a real knack for dialogue and scenes playing out originally (except for just the one that I previously discussed). I would like to see more from her and I hope it doesn’t take another 16 years to make it happen. The film is filled with a bunch of unknown actors, but no that everyone does a solid job. Now while this film probably won’t hit my top 20 of the year, it is still a decent one time watch when you compare it to the other crap on the streaming service and the fact that more than half of my worst list this year is filled with movies from Netflix. You don’t know the half of trying to find a decent film on Netflix. I’ll take them wherever I can get them.

Zach’s Zany Movie Reviews: DANGEROUS LIES (Netflix)

“If the Lifetime channel says no to a trashy movie…then it must be pretty bad.” – Zach Alexander. Yes, I’m going to trademark my own quote, because it has described a lot of the filth I’ve watched on Netflix and other streaming platforms. Films that probably should’ve been on the Lifetime channel, but an actual entertainment star or two prevent it from airing there. DANGEROUS LIES is the ultimate new Netflix film that honestly probably should’ve been the ultimate new Lifetime film, as all of its cliched plotting, forced and terrible acting, dumb cheap non-surprising twists, eye rolling romance, overacting, predictable plot, and the overall general cheesy cheese of it all is a staple of Lifetime, where Netflix has more of a “meh” or “just a bad” film type vibe. This movie is all kinds of cheesy awful, but here’s the thing, it’s so bad that I was actually paying attention to it the whole time rather than paying attention to other things. That isn’t to say this is a “so bad its good” movie, because I would never ever watch this piece of shit again, but I was laughing at the whole project and didn’t want to miss a chuckle, while trying to piece together the puzzle on why Dangerous Lies was even made. The real mystery, and I kind of want to e-mail them on this, is whether or not Lifetime really said no to this. Because if they did, and Netflix is just going to be a ‘Yes Man’ during this whole 2020 streaming wars quarantine COVID-19 butt fuck type of year…then we are all in serious, serious trouble.

Dangerous Lies stars Riverdale’s Camila Mendes and her eyebrows, along with Jesse T. Usher, and then a bunch of what I’d call mere extended cameos from Elliott Gould, Sasha Alexander, Cam Gigandet and Jamie Chung. All of them should look at their check or direct deposit from this movie in shame. Per me being lazy and quoting IMDB.com: “When a wealthy elderly man dies and unexpectedly leaves his estate to his new caregiver, she’s drawn into a web of deception and murder. If she’s going to survive, she’ll have to question everyone’s motives – even the people she loves.” Doesn’t that sound like a fucking Lifetime movie?!? Here’s the thing though, there shouldn’t be any questioning in this, what is really going on is really nothing that shocking or twisty. Anybody watching this should be easily able to figure out everything by the end of Act I. It doesn’t even try to come up with a dozen red herrings to try and confuse the shit out of you. There is one red herring, and it flashes bright red in your face the entire time. And the acting in this is God awful. I know that Riverdale is supposed to be a dark soap opera based on the Archie comics, so Camila Mendes’ acting in that is appropriate, but here, it’s overacting and cringe worthy. In fact, every time any character says a really cliched, lazy piece of dialogue, you can see the actors about to almost cringe from it coming out of their mouths, even while saying it they know they can’t try and save the line. They are just trying to grin and bear it, which makes their performances hard to watch.

Every single person acting in this screams paycheck. You can tell this was a quick and easy shoot, probably done in one or two weeks, as the plotting and dialogue is very lazy and simple. Who tries the least? Easily Cam Gigandet. Every scene he is in he looks like he took a valium right before the director cries “action!” You knows he’s thinking, “I was the main bad guy in the first Twilight movie and a bunch of other shit like Burlesque when it came out and now I’m relegated to cheesy awful Netflix movies that Lifetime didn’t even want?!?” It’s all bad, even Elliott Gould is acting like he’s Jack Gellar on Friends but more senile. Camila Mendes’ character is the most badly written of the bunch. She’s one of those “nice and honest” characters that is always like, “maybe we shouldn’t do this” one second, but then two seconds later she is doing it and then talking out loud how much regrets her decision. And in this movie, those lines of character dialogue repeat every five minutes with her. So in an hour and 35 minute run time, you do the math of how many times you want to smack your forehead. The fast foward in time ending is one of the worst yet funniest thing I’ve seen all year, I had to pause the film and make sure I was actually on Netflix and not watching a soap opera in the morning on CBS after The Price Is Right.

I’ve been saving the funniest thing for last. The only compliment I can give this film is that its framed really well and the director knows how to work a camera. There are some nice static and dolly shots in that film. Would you like to know the director’s name? MICHAEL SCOTT. I shit you not. And this guy has directed, let’s see, MOVIES ON THE HALLMARK CHANNEL AND LIFETIME!!! HOLY SHIT!!! His whole career is shitty television movies. Unfortunately, the other real Michael Scott’s movie, Threat Level Midnight, is probably better than any of them. (If you are not getting any of my The Office jokes, you should probably quarantine binge that series next, but stop when Steve Carell leaves the show). Dangerous Lies can be easily missed, it’s one of the worst things on Netflix this year, but if you really want to laugh at the ridiculousness of it all, you might get something out of it while it is on in the background with a glass of wine and some girl friends over. That I cannot lie admitting.

Zach’s Zany Movie Reviews: EXTRACTION (Netflix)

Holy shit, three in a row! This has never happened with Netflix originals, but I am not holding my breath for it to keep continuing this trend, especially when we have Dangerous Lies and The Wrong Missy coming out to the streaming platform in the next several weeks, and both of those look like train wrecks. But EXTRACTION is a decent kind of action bad ass train wreck, the only three things that prevent it from being fantastic is the “riddled with more cliches than you know what to do with ho-hum plot”, very little character development, and an ending that might have ruined the entire emotional journey if there ends up being sequels to this thing (which they will because Netflix doesn’t know the difference between their ass or a hole in the ground). The one great thing the movie might be a precursor to is how great director Sam Hargrave’s future career could become. See, he is another stuntman for a bunch of movies turned director, kind of like the previous career of the director of the John Wick movies, Stahelski. After those films and now this, we constantly need more former stuntmen to turn directors. They been in this business for quite a long time and when their bones can’t handle the hits anymore their talent transfers to their eye for the camera. They know the ins and outs, the tricks of the trade, how to frame and shoot an action scene. The key to a successful future though, is a partner screenwriter in crime that can come up with the perfect action plot. That is where this movie doesn’t come up to snuff a bit.

Extraction stars Thor…errr I mean a character named Tyler (Chris Hemsworth) who is a a fearless black market mercenary with a tragic past and he embarks on the most deadly extraction of his career when he’s enlisted to rescue the kidnapped son of an imprisoned international crime lord. Chris Hemsworth I already think is a great actor, and here he is no different. He gives his all mentally and physically too. I’ve seen some behind the scenes stuff with this film, and he was choreography wise brought his A+ game. Due to him only having the littlest character development this movie has, he seemed like he brought his A+ acting game as well, especially in the latter half. The action in this movie is incredible. I’ve heard it called “Diet John Wick” and I’ve have to say that is pretty accurate. The movie isn’t as hard core as John Wick is, but it gets close at times, especially when it displays the little snippets of gun fu and a bunch of double taps and head shots. The grand show is almost about halfway through the film and it contains this really long car chase mixed in with some running and hiding. It is made to look like a one shot/take kind of thing, even though you can completely see where the cuts would be. And some of the CGI in it is kind of noticeable, but damn if it isn’t thrilling. This film is a straight up action film, with a couple of beats here and there to take a break, including an extended cameo from a very famous Stranger Things alum. The problem with the film isn’t the action, it’s the smaller details that all the non stop action hopes that you fail to see.

Such as, there is no character development with anyone except for Chris Hemsworth’s character. And even his has nothing you haven’t seen before. The movie is very predictable, with double and triple crosses you can see coming from a mile away. The whole scene with the Stranger Things alum was very unnecessary, cliched, and a dumb twist makes the alum just one of the many characters he/she has played in other films of this caliber (if you know this actors filmography, you’ll know what I mean when it happens.) The plot is pretty straight forward and doesn’t contain an ounce of originality. What else? Hmmm, well, I don’t want to say much about the ending to not spoil it for you, but basically, if the ending is what I think it is, it basically ruins one character’s journey, as it seems like it was a set up for inevitable sequels. I smell studio involvement, and you’ll smell it too once you watch it and see how it ends. But, it is entertaining as hell, so I basically forgave all that stuff while I was watching it and didn’t start to nitpick until that ending. The movie was written by Joe Russo, once of his first writing features, and maybe he should give the reins to someone else next time and just stick to directing with his directing partner, his brother Anthony. It’s a great one or two time watch for sure, a definite step above the also one time watch watchable movie I just saw Underwater. If there is a sequel to this thing, who knows what will happens when stuff is starting to get green lit and filmed again, I just hope they can extract a better story and script from someone’s brain, because fool me once, shame on you, but I can’t ignore it if the mediocrity happens again.

Zach’s Zany Movie Reviews: TIGERTAIL (Netflix)

So doing the math on all of this hardcore Netflix ‘original’ (or fuck, any streaming service original, really) movie watching because of all the theaters (fuck you COVID-19) being closed and still needing to write reviews because it is my passion to do so, the ratio, from my count, is around 10 to 2. 10 really shitty Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, Hulu, Disney+ or Apple TV+ original features I have to slog my way through just to find 2 really, really decent ones. Yeesh. Now granted, watching something like Netflix’s The Main Event…I’m just asking to be kicked in my ever-lovin’ movie adoring nuts, but come on, when are these executives going to watch the shit that they buy and after having suffered through that suckage are they going start to make tougher decisions on what they are going to put on their platform? Are we really having to suffer more and more of their cheap choices and only get one good diamond in the rough out of the bunch every so often? Yep. And it’s never going to change and I’ve just now accepted that fact. There are some people that watch the cheap shit out and still eat it up, Lord knows why…dumb fucks. I don’t even know why I am complaining in this review, considering that I am going to give TIGERTAIL, a Netflix ‘original’ film that came out about two weeks ago from one of the creators (and Emmy winner) of Netflix’s great series Master Of None (Alan Yang; I want another season God damn it, no one gives a shit about Aziz Ansari’s heavy quote on quote “sexual harassment” misconduct anymore, if you can even call it that) a solid recommendation. I’m just tired of the shit I have to maneuver through the cold dark smelly abyss just to get to something half way decent such as this film.

The great Alan Yang, who is also a producer, writer and director on such great television shows as The Good Place, Parks and Recreation, gives us his first feature film here, and it is more sad, somber, and depressing than I would’ve liked, but he is clearly a FANTASTIC storyteller. All of his previous experience just elevates his (obviously very personal) film out of the mediocre crap that we are getting on streaming platforms right now into something that might even be a must watch when coming around to the Oscars next year…if they aren’t cancelled that is. Tigertail is about an older gentleman named Pin-Jui who, after coming home from his mothers funeral in Taiwan, reminisces about his life before he immigrated to America and the early years after he arrived there. After certain events unfold you realize that he’s viewed his entire life as one big regret which has made him estranged from his ex-wife and children. Is it too late to make amends with everyone and tie up loose ends? Obviously to answer those questions, you’ll have to watch the movie. There are a fair amount of subtitles in this movie, but kind of like the recent The Farewell, English is used in most of the present day America scenes. But forget the subtitles, if that is what is stopping you from watching films, you may need to reconsider your priorities. The subtitles are easy to read and don’t distract from the overall experience of the film.

The film is also a tight and easy 91 minutes long. No filler. In fact, if I had any complaints about this movie is that it is a little uneven in its storytelling and should’ve been longer to flesh out the narrative a bit more. I would’ve gladly spend another 30 minutes seeing more Pin-Jui’s life in America with his young children than just one or two flashbacks. I have a feeling there are many scenes on the cutting room floor, as John Cho was supposed to be in this movie but said his scenes got cut, and we only see the boy as a young child once, which was kind of strange as the movie really only shows a possible solution for making amends with his daughter and not his son. But if he’s estranged from both and doesn’t have a good relationship with him either, shouldn’t the story have involved both of them? That’s the unevenness I’m talking about that bothered me a little. I’m wondering if it was cut up by producers and if there is a director’s cut out there somewhere. I would be more than happy to view this film again if it was a bit longer. The acting here is great. I’ve known Tzi Ma ever since he played the kidnapped daughter’s father in Rush Hour and his time as one of Jack Bauer’s greatest villain on 24. Here he plays it straight, strict, selfish, stubborn yet sorrowful, a fantastic contrast from his likable father character he played in the aforementioned The Farewell.

Be forewarned, while there is light at the end of the tunnel, the movie is kind of depressing. Living your full life in regret for that many years is gotta be something that weighs heavily on a person. It starts right when he leaves for America, abandoning a girl who loves him to marry someone that he doesn’t love, only for a ticket to America, where he can hopefully bring his mother along in due time once he makes enough money, to get her out of the awful factory conditions that she currently works in. Phew, that’s a mouthful. Not only do these decisions weight on the character, they begin to weight on the viewer as you begin to ask yourself, what would you have done differently. And a film that makes you think long after the credits have rolled, is alright in my book. The film is shot very well and the dialogue is clean and precise, I have a good feeling that writer/director Alan Yang is going to move on to great things if he is given the chance to be involved in future feature films. He has a solid eye for the camera as the cinematography is gorgeous, especially when we see scenes out in the field of Taiwan, or his childhood home in/on Tigertail. You could tell this was very personal, as Alan Yang is basically the male child in this movie, telling his family’s tale. The only thing I don’t understand was why didn’t he incorporate his self/character in the film a bit more. It would’ve been a more well rounded film and potentially even masterful. I’ll take this over any ‘The Main Event’ like films on Netflix any day of the week, but am I being an asshole for asking for more? That’s another question you’ll have to ask yourself if you read my review and decide to watch this tale.

Zach’s Zany Movie Reviews: SERGIO (Netflix)

Holy Carole Baskin, what the fuck went wrong with SERGIO, a new Netflix ‘original’ film that just came out this past weekend? I mean, the only entertaining parts are the 3 brief scenes the main protagonist is talking politics (making America look like absolute shit, I wanted more of that!) and a gratuitous, unneeded yet welcomed by me sex scene that involves the beautiful Ana De Armas, once again throwing inhibition (and her clothes) to the wind. I mean seriously…if you look at all her past work, she is the Kate Winslet of a new generation. The film is a giant slap in the face to the real life United Nations diplomat Sergio Vieira de Mello and instead being a biographical film about his life and how he tried to change politics, life and reason for the Iraqi people amid the fallout of the Iraq War in 2003 instead is a…love story? Showing how the guy kind of neglected his kids in the long run (current and estranged wife not given one second of fictional screen time) to sleep and fall in love with a beautiful woman half his age? YIKES. Add on top of that the wrong choice to play with time a bit, inter cutting too many random times between trapped in the basement of the hotel where he was working in Baghdad because of a terrorist bombing and the uninteresting love story. Did the ACADEMY NOMINATED SCREENWRITER (Dallas Buyers Club) of this (Craig Borten) not read through his script, and realize the most interesting parts of the film were the small bits where Sergio talks politics to other politicians and leaders? Or did the funding people get involved and thought people wouldn’t think that kind of stuff were interesting? Or did the director change everything just because he wanted to see Ana De Armas naked up close and personal? Who knows?

But what I do know is that this movie is an absolute bore and snore fest. BO-RING. The non boring part of the whole thing was me doing research on the behind the scenes of the film and the politician himself to see what the fuck went wrong with this tale that is obviously filled with ripe narrative storytelling fruit when reading in between the lines. And I pinpointed it down to the most obvious answer: the director also directed a 2009 film also entitled Sergio…that is a documentary film (and probably much better than this drivel) about the politician, using real life footage to tell his entire political life story, digging deep into his believes and policies. They barely touch on the stupid love story in that bullshit, why couldn’t they have just done a straight forward doc to feature film. Yeah sure, you are basically just remaking your documentary with actors that can really act, and throw in some original cinematography and location shooting…but if your documentary won a bunch of accolades…why mess with that formula? And it’s so frustrating because when you take the few short great scenes of Sergio (played wonderfully by Wagner Moura) trying to make foreign places better by trying to help people with his strategies and beliefs, and if they would’ve cut the love story completely, or had it as a small side plot D or E, this film could’ve been something special. But no, you get Sergio and Ana De Armas flirting and fucking each other for an hour and a half out of the 2 hour run time. “Oh, Sergio, I did my homework on you and even though I like you and I want to fuck you, I found out that you are still currently married.” “But I like you and want to fuck you too and my wife is really just a stranger to me in this day and age.” “Oh that’s true, so make out with me in the next scene and fuck me later when we get to know each other better.” If you couldn’t tell I’m rolling my eyes right now.

Even though Armas and Moura have great chemistry in the movie, their chemistry is in the wrong love story, in the wrong movie. I literally did not care about their characters when they were with each other. I cared about the real Sergio, and what he did to try and make others lives better. How he called out devious American politicians and their bullshit. I wanted more of those scenes. Don’t get me wrong, I appreciate a naked Ana De Armas as much as the next straight male (or lesbian, not trying to exclude you all) but as a movie goer, and not just your average one, I expect much more out of the movies I watch, nude women or sex scene be damned. There didn’t need to be a sex scene in this movie at all, and I have a sneaking suspicion that there wasn’t really one in the script, and then Ana De Armas got signed on, the director saw she didn’t have a no nudity clause in her contract, and the pervert in him decided to add that scene, just so he could see her nude up close and personal for a couple of hours. Did his giant ego from getting accolades over his documentary over a decade ago hide his boner? Probably not. And just to reiterate, I’m just speculating here, I highly doubt that is all what really happened (or am I?). I guess the one thing that this film managed to do correctly was make me actually want to seek out that documentary. I bet it is a solid and interesting true life watch. Netflix’s Sergio (just another one of the dozen Netflix clunkers to have already come out in 2020) is just another one of those cases where glorifying a real life story and ultimately making a Hollywood-esque tale where people would want to pay attention only to the fantasy and not the cold hard nitty gritty facts, really and truly, just backfired and bombed (pun intended) like a motherfucker.