Wicked: For Good - 9/10
This is just pure peak entertainment (and I've never seen the play or read the book), it feels like every decision made during production was squarely based off whatever is the most entertaining whether it's the music or the comedy or even plot contrivances. It's not too far off of Metal Gear Solid in a sense when it would shoe-horn real world events into the story, but it was fine because it was just more fun that way, and that's essentially Wicked with regards to other Oz lore. The performances are also great, Cynthia Erivo is doing the heavy lifting in the singing/vocals department and Ariana Grande's physical comedy is legit really hilarious. I feel like Michelle Yeoh was miscast because she can't really sing, neither can Jeff Goldblum but he is Jeff fucking Goldblum and is like the perfect Wizard for Oz.
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The Roses - 7/10
Decently solid comedy, it's just fun to watch Benedict Cumberbatch and Olivia Colman bicker back and forth.
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Save the Last Dance - 5/10
Perfectly serviceable teenage/high school romance movie with dancing. I can see why Julia Stiles' "stardom" was short-lived, she really can't act. She has 2 big emotional scenes and she's laughably bad in both of them.
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Lincoln Lawyer - 7/10
I'm pretty sure this movie was trying to be more serious/dramatic than it is. However, the ridiculousness of Matthew McConaughey playing a lawyer being driven around in a Lincoln with NTGUILTY license plates making things right in the most Matthew McConaughey way possible is rather entertaining. The plot also agrees with this ridiculousness featuring some over-the-top twists and turns.
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How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days - 4/10
The setup is unique enough for a romantic comedy. Matthew McConaughey is bet get a chick to fall in love with him to so he could head up some diamond marketing ads and Kate Hudson is writing an article about how to lose a guy in 10 days so their goals are at odds with each other obviously. I didn't really care for the movie overall because most of the movie is both of them being disingeninuine with each other most of the movie and I really hate disingenuineness. Maybe if the movie was more over-the-top their relationship so it was completely unrealistic, then I could had more fun with it.
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Eden - 4/10
This is based off the true story of a handful of people living on the Galapagos Islands in the 1920s/1930s. It's directed by Ron Howard and has some star power in Jude Law, Ana de Armas, and Sydney Sweeney. I just found the movie overall pretty boring. I thought the conflicts among the 3 groups of people would slowly build up as the movie progressed and, I guess they do, but not nearly as much as I was hoping for at least. Some of the dialogue doesn't make sense for the era as one of the characters describes Ana's character like a black hole but that term wasn't around back then. The movie is just a dud.
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Survive Style 5+ - 9/10
A really great and rather unknown Japanese movie. It's a rather quirky and weird Japanese movie that somehow translates really well to the West I feel, it has a few songs in English and ends with Cake's cover of I Will Survive. The movie moves back and forth among 5 different stories; a husband killing his wife and her returning, 3 young theives, a marketing chick that makes "funny" commercials, a family where the father thinks he's a chicken, and hitman Vinnie Jones and a translator walking around asking people what their funciton is. The sets and design are really unique and colorful, the one house feels like the hotel from The Shining but more colorful. It's sad that there's no HD version of this movie, no blu-ray or HD stream and only a DVD release.
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No Other Choice - 6/10
New movie from Park Chan-wook that directed Oldboy and The Handmaiden. This movie just isn't as good as his more known movies. It has a similar style/structure of a character coming up with an extreme and convoluted plan to achieve his goals. The main character gets fired from a paper company and is looking to get a job at another paper company. The main character and a few other side characters are super fucking obsessed with only getting jobs at a paper company and literally won't take any other jobs, it's the weirdest raison d'etre. There is one really great scene in the movie that utilizes music in quite the hilarious fashion. Outside of that, the movie just feels like lesser verison of his other movies. Also, I feel like from watching enough Korean (and Japanese) movies that work is rather toxic as the main character has an issue with a tooth and another character comments that he better see a dentist while he's unemployeed because when he gets a new job he won't have time to get that checked out. You have to work so many hours during the week that you can't go to the dentist in Korea?
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Machete - 6/10
Danny Trejo stars as a ridiculous knife weilding action star in a very purposeful b-movie. The opening is really great with action and cheese but I feel the rest of the movie doesn't live up to that opening and is overall toned down from that, still fun and all. Even the big action scene at the end just doesn't feel as fun or over-the-top as it should be. Lastly, Jessica Alba is super hot in this.
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Planet Terror - 5/10
Kinda like Machete in that it's a purposeful b-movie and also should've been just more fun. The movie has quite a bit of time and scenes where just nothing really fun is happening.
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Desperado - 9/10
Just a classic, super fun action movie that has everything and more than you can hope for. Antonio Banderas is probably the best at shooting guns in a badass style that is also completely so fucking unrealistic and stupid but it somehow just fucking works. The opening scene of Steve Buscemi walking into a bar and telling that story in the most Steve Buscemi way is one of the best openings to a movie ever. Selma Hayek is of course super hot as the love interest. If there's any weakpoint in the movie is that the villain could've been better, he's just very generic overall and not very memorable.
