The birth of the summer blockbuster, Jaws is a tense psychological thriller that, for the most part, lives up to the hype. As a story, Jaws is kind of basic. The writing itself takes no real liberties to differentiate it from any other film of the time, but what made Jaws stand out was the way everything is shot. The scenes filmed from the shark’s perspective are probably some of the most iconic shots in Hollywood. The shots were so impactful that it changed the way I looked at the movie itself. I started looking at those shots of all those people’s bare legs on a beach like it was a restaurant menu. Given the technological boundaries, it’s miraculous Spielberg managed to pull a movie like Jaws off. Rather than having the actual Jaws animatronic in every shot, the music and angles of the shot tell the story to the audience. This kind of film making is something missing in modern cinema, and it’s a shame that it isn’t quite this prominent more often. Another thing that is amazing on the technical side of this movie is the way Spielberg worked around the fact that everything was filmed around water. While this was used to the advantage of the film, it also dragged it back some. While the building of the universe in the first act is made quite well. The way that the protagonists beat the shark is prolonged, eventually, I got somewhat tired of it. This kind of movie where the story is mediocre, but the visual and technical aspects are incredibly impactful is the summer blockbuster at its core. While the story was just okay, it’s important to understand how important Jaws is to the history of film making, so, I will give it a 7.9/10

Clearly, Edgar Wright found something here that he hadn’t in previous films. As opposed to all of his other movies, which were basically all comedic films, Wright cherished the moments that were more serious in Baby Driver. This makes sense, especially due to Edgar Wright’s claim that Baby Driver has been a passion project of his for years. Although this is very different, it’s clear that this is an Edgar Wright movie. Visually, the movie is an absolute treat. All of the car chases and even basic shots are shot in such a way that the eyes of the audience are constantly glued to the screen. Another great part of Baby driver is the soundtrack, it fits the character and the setting quite nicely. Now, both the look and the soundtrack are great pieces for a movie on their own, but Baby Driver puts them together masterfully. In a lot of ways, that’s the entire substance of the movie. At first, I thought this was going to be a gimmick film. The interesting part of this “gimmick” film is that it only is “gimmicky” for the first half. As the film and characters progress, the film itself draws itself further away from the draw of the movie, the music combined with the way the movie is shot. Honestly, I think that Baby Driver suffers from this. The overall story is fine, but there are quite a few problems with it at the very end. For example, why does Jon Hamm’s character keep coming back? He was chased by cops, in a violent car crash, shot, and was in a car that went out of a parking lot (Fast and the Furious style) crashing on the ground in an explosion. Of course, Jon Hamm came back every single time. I understand that this may have been intended to play with the genre, but the way Hamm played the character wasn’t over the top enough to emphasize this. On the other hand, Ansel Elgort gives a brilliant performance, even though he doesn’t talk much, until the very end. So, overall, the film is made very well. However, in terms of story, the ending is quite unsatisfactory. The film suffers from missed moments and broken canon. So, in conclusion, while I have these problems, the movie is extremely fun. I’d give it an 8.7/10

In a recent review of Baron Munchausen I wrote, I mentioned that every Gilliam film seemed that it was trying to be a Monty Python film. That all of the story elements were thrown away for comedy that was, largely, re-used material from Monty Python, in terms of style. Fisher King is not that in the slightest, granted, there is a different writer on the project. But still, it is clear that experiences such as Brazil change Terry Gilliam as a film maker. As a start, Fisher King is a lot darker and emotional. Every single laugh that comes out of this movie is at expense of another equally emotionally impactful moment that directly follows the joke. Other than Robin Williams, though, the movie plays out quite flat. Every laugh we have as an audience is in reaction to Williams’s wackiness. Later on, though, as we learn more about his character, we are forced to rethink how we look on those moments. This puts us on a very similar journey to Jeff Bridge’s character, allowing the audience to connect. So, it is clear that this film does a lot of things right. But there are also a few faults. Personally, I find the look of the film to be kind of bland. There are no shots in this film that truly accompanied the emotions of it. My other big complaint would be the acting. Yes, Robin Williams is very good in this, but other than that, I found most of the characters to be mediocre at best. And finally, it took me a while to get into the world. While the exposition is fine, there were certain beats that needed to happen in the first act that didn’t. For example, Jeff Bridges needed to spend more time with Robin Williams to connect. It seemed somewhat instant in their relationship, which is annoying. There are other things to nitpick at, but truly, as a whole, this a great film. It’s due to the fact that Terry Gilliams and, in this case especially, Robin Williams are huge comedy stars that were ready to prove that they don’t just do comedy. 8.6/10

Christopher Nolan’s Dark Knight trilogy is arguably the best Super Hero trilogy of all time. Not only does it present the audience with the right amount of spectacle to keep the engaged, but it also presents a compelling story with a character arc spanning three films. Where the Dark Knight and Batman Begins have story though, The Dark Knight Rises misses out. Sure, the story does complete Wane’s arc in a very good way, but, it suffers a similar problem to Spider-Man 3. Too many new characters were introduced in this one film, and the studio expected the audience to care for them. One interesting thing I found with The Dark Knight Rises, is that it truly isn’t a Batman movie. In fact, Batman is hardly in it, and Batman is certainly not the protagonist. I believe that this film did something quite creative in, there is no protagonist. This film represents exactly what Nolan wanted from Batman, for Batman to act as a symbol, not just a character. The story itself is quite weak though, if that is due to the lack of the protagonist or not, I’m not quite sure, but it just didn’t seem that there was enough weight to everything going on. There was so much going on at the same time, and I’m not sure why. I believe that this film could have benefited from ditching Bane, sorry Tom Hardy, but nobody wants to hear you promoting a new candy store. Rather, this film could have used one of the other five main villains that this film focuses on, personally, I’d choose Anne Hathaway’s Black Cat, or even the girl who initially got out of the well. The Dark Knight Rises does suffer a fair amount from Bane, which is unfortunate, the character’s backstory could have been used to the advantage of the film, but the character just kind of walked around in a trench coat shouting “I’m gonna blow up the city, and kill all the rich people first.” The Dark Knight Rises is full of weak dialogue like that, I’m not sure if that was actually in the movie, but I wouldn’t be surprised. Also, the so called “twist” at the end where it turns out the one cop was Robin all along was way too predictable. If that reveal happened much earlier, it wouldn’t leave the audience thinking that there would be a fourth movie, and the movie would have had that protagonist the movie was lacking. All of that being said, the film looks great. It’s clear that doing Inception changed the way Nolan directs movies. Every shot in this has compelling colours, and creative angles, and I am fully supportive of that. So, in general, the film looks great and it’s a fitting ending to the character, but the film didn’t need to be 3 hours long, along with the lack of certain basic story beats. 6.8/10

Watching The Trotsky, I didn’t know quite what to expect. I knew it was a comedy, and I knew it was going to heavily reference Communist history. Other than that, I had no idea what I was about to watch. But, in these times especially, a film we go blind into may be just what we need for something refreshing. I’ll start off with what’s great in this movie, the script. Clearly, the writers of this movie did plenty of research and had a very good grasp on how films are structured. The beats of the film are at necessary points, the comedy is good, and each of the characters are well written with clear arcs. But, at least for me, that’s where the great things about this movie. Don’t get me wrong when I say that, everything in this movie is fine, but given how good the script is, I feel that it deserved more. Starting my complaints would be the look of The Trotsky. Due to the history behind this, it feels that they should have been much more creative with the colour pallet, using a lot of red, because, you know, Russia. Instead, someone thought it was a good idea to completely wash out the film of colour. And, no, this isn’t the whole “artistic black and white,” rather, there is colour, but it’s all just really bland. I should also note that although they got some fairly good actors in this, a lot of the chemistry, and even the way that dialogue was read, was off. Those are the things that I hated about this film. But, there’s definitely a lot of mediocre as well. For example, the score is mediocre. At times, the score will come in with an epic Russian choir, but soon, it’s dried out by stereotypical teen pop music in the background, which was also a disappointing problem. Also, there were a few shots that, clearly, the director had fun with. For example, there’s one scene where everyone’s coming into the Social Justice Dance, and the principal gets mad, because he’s the principal. As he turns his head, the shot compares him to a dictator, which was a brilliant and creative shot that I wish this film had done more. So, while I praise the script and a lot of its brilliance, the rest of the film is kind of mediocre at best. There is so much to love in this movie, but a lot more is lacking. 7.4/10

Being Spielberg’s first film, I was expecting the Spielberg magic I was used to in movies like Close Encounters and ET, but, that isn’t what I got. As a movie, it’s fine. It has all of the basic principals to be a good film, the overall plot is based on a wonderful true story, and the relationships are fun. However, even a few hours later, I have forgotten almost the entire movie. And I think that’s due to the shots in the film. No shot seems particularly exciting, there are a few shots where I went to myself, yeah, “that’s Spielberg.” Those shots looked great, were devoted to character, and had everything good about this movie coming together. These are the few moments I remember, but truly, I don’t feel Spielberg had the spark inside of him that he usually possesses. It should also be noted that this movie is incredibly 70s, you can feel the hippie vibe. So in conclusion, the movie is fine, but it just doesn’t seem to work in quite a few places. 5.6/10

This is Taika Waititi’s first feature length film, and although it isn’t perfect, there’s a lot of Waititi’s charm that shows in this movie. I’ll start out by stating the obvious, I am a huge Taika Waititi fan. So, I’m going to go through all of his movies, update the ones I’ve already reviewed, and add the ones I haven’t. I have a huge bias with these, as Taika Waititi made Jojo Rabbit, my favorite movie of all time. But, with that out of the way, I’ll get on to Eagle Vs. Shark. Eagle Vs. Shark is a love story, but one that takes place in a very real world. Basically, without all the young adult nonsense so many films find necessary nowadays. This is where this film finds its purpose. It’s interesting how, boiled down, almost any director’s style is evident with their first movie in its finest form, due to the director not being forced to constantly negotiate with the studio. This is especially prominent with Eagle Vs. Shark. Taika Waititi’s form of comedy is all based around things that everyone has experienced, making everything in the film real to the audience. Eagle Vs. Shark takes this real world comedy, and heightens it. Lily, the protagonist, is an incredibly socially awkward young woman struggling with finding her place in the world. Meanwhile, Jarrod is comically over-confident, even though, he truly has the exact same problems. These characters work well together, which makes this real world feel lived in. The characters make sense due to the acting which, while I did like, I found a little stiff at times. Thus causing the second act to feel a little slow to me. I really enjoyed the first and last act, but it seemed that nothing of major importance happened in the second act. So, while I enjoy the characters/world and the dialogue, I think that the overall production value and sometimes slow pace dampens my liking of the movie. But, none of that can affect the fact that this is a great film that is a must see for any Waititi fans. 7.9/10

This movie has made me tired of Terry Gilliam’s work. That isn’t to say that I didn’t like it, I did. And it’s not like Edgar Wright’s Cornetto trilogy where every movie is the same. No, there was something different about this. The problem with Terry Gilliam’s work, so far, is that it’s trying to be Monty Python. Monty Python is sacred, and it should be left alone, enough said. While this may not be Gilliam’s fault, every actor in his film seem to be trying to act just like a Python character, even down to the way that they talk. Where Brazil was a breath of fresh air, Baron Munchausen was being suffocated and being taken into a dark ally to have your kidney’s cut out. I don’t know, that was the best metaphor I could think of. Baron Munchausen has so much room for characters to be much stronger and unique, but it just doesn’t take that opportunity. Because of this huge problem, so many jokes just fall flat. Now, I really don’t want to bash this movie too much. Because I won’t lie, I had a good time. Baron Munchausen uses some practical effects, which I always appreciate, and it had Robin Williams, need I say more? Even if some jokes just don’t land, the movie is fun. It’s one of those films you can put on and just have a good time, even if you are only half watching. The film itself, in its concept, is unique, and I always appreciate that. So, overall, I don’t have much to say about the movie. It’s fine, but so much of it gets dragged down in the shadow of Python, 6.6/10.

For me, this is one of those movies that changes everything. This isn’t the first time I’ve watched Inception, but every time I do, I bring a top out and spin it just to be sure I’m not dreaming. Upon, I think my fourth watch, it’s safe to say that I understand so much more of this movie than I did my first watch. Having a movie that requires multiple watches is always good, honestly, I’m not sure how I missed certain moments of this. But, making a mystery this good is already a huge bonus here. I’m going to sound like a broken record player when I say this, but Christopher Nolan is changing Blockbusters almost as much as Steven Spielberg back in the days of Jaws. Rather than focusing on a previously established franchise (excluding the Dark Knight Trilogy), he finds an original idea and makes an amazing film out of it. These films don’t only have the fast paced moments to keep casual viewers entertained, but also some quieter moments making the story and characters feel rich, making the world feel that it is lived in. With Inception, Nolan takes the concept of going inside dreams and makes it into a heist movie. That wouldn’t work if it weren’t for some of the amazing settings of this movie, some of which were filmed on location. While I would never have a dream as down to earth as any of the dreams in Inception, I’m glad Christopher Nolan made the choice to use settings that are quite normal, this way there is always that small voice in the back of your head questioning whether the characters are dreaming or not. There is plenty of symbolism in this movie to richen the mystery as well. The character of Cobb’s father is seemingly a large clue pointing to what’s real. Even some of the action feels well paced. Note that I say some. As, unfortunately, most of the action in this movie ends up in the final act, which is common, but the way that any threat to the characters is immediately diffused doesn’t really work for me. While the reveals at the end put everything into place in one’s head, all the emotional moments at the end are crammed in next to action scenes, many of which I couldn’t tell what was happening. Inception is a brilliant film. In typical Nolan style, he makes a big budget blockbuster that has A-list stars, but doesn’t get too caught up in what the studio wants so it can make money, he made the Dark Knight trilogy, he’s going to make money. Christopher Nolan knows how to make his movies meaningful to everyone, and seeing this just makes me more excited for Tenet. 9.7/10

Scott Pilgrim may be have, at best, a mediocre story, but, the way the film was made, mostly with its transitions, makes up for this. Scott Pilgrim is a movie about video games, not a video game movie, but a movie about video games. It follows a stereotypical early college guy, played by Michael Cera, who is an absolute nerd. While I find this relatable, the problem is that his character is really the only one who has actual progression throughout the story. One could argue Knives went through a somewhat similar transition, but, when you stop and think, she’s just the same high school girl throughout. Also, while the concept of evil exes is a lot of fun, I feel that it didn’t work having seven. The way it was all spaced out made it seem that the fighting took up 90% of the movie, which, personally, I don’t really care for. So much of this movie was fast paced, which made a fun film, but not a truly good one. That being said, Edgar Wright’s direction of the source material was genius. Adapting something like this to film is no easy feat. In typical Edgar Wright style, the way everything is edited is amazing, in Scott Pilgrim, the transitions are what stand out to me. Ever shot is accompanied by a creative way to move to another location, or even another set of characters. While I have enjoyed all of Edgar Wright’s movies thus far (I only have one left with Baby Driver), it seems like he relies on the fun way he edits to make a compelling story. So, while this is easily my favourite of Edgar Wright’s movies, I wouldn’t rank it as high as some of the previous times I have watched it. 8/10