Pokemon Detective Pikachu (2019)

Pokemon Detective Pikachu (2019)

6/10

Starring

Ryan Reynolds

Justice Smith

Kathryn Newton

Bill Nighy

Directed by Rob Letterman

The movie is not bad – childish, yes, but it will grow on you.
Detective Pikachu starts small, developing gently as it reveals more about the case we’re trying to solve. Well, the case Tim and Pikachu are trying to solve: what happened to Tim’s father, Harry.

The whole Ryan Reynolds voice casting is not as bad as I thought it would be. In fact, it was well done, as he was also responsible for the facial expressions. And in the end, the movie has a surprise you won’t see coming.

One thing I enjoyed most was the way the last thirty minutes of the movie played out. Things moved very fast and were thrilling. You’ll think Pikachu is one way, then it switches to another, and then it ends another way. That twist is well done and something you won’t see coming.

As the first live-action adaptation of the Pokémon franchise, I can say it’s a nice introduction. The CGI was masterful, but I believe for subsequent movies, a better director could bring it to life even more.

The movie introduces Tim, who doesn’t have a Pokémon partner like everyone else. We learn his resentment for this lifestyle stems from his father’s dedication to it and his work.
Tim is told of his father’s death (Harry, his father, was a detective), and when he goes to collect his father’s things, he runs into Pikachu, his father’s Pokémon. He can hear Pikachu talk, which spooks him a lot since humans usually can’t understand Pokémon speech.

But Pikachu assures him that his father isn’t dead and that they need to rescue him. The problem is, Pikachu is struggling to remember things because he has amnesia.

Tim gets on the “let’s save Harry” wagon, and he and Pikachu (who claims to be a detective) start investigating. This leads them to the man who started the whole “living together with Pokémon” lifestyle and his son, who, according to the father, is behind everything going wrong.

Although I enjoyed the movie, one thing I couldn’t get over was the overacting written into Tim Goodman’s character. This was especially prominent in two scenes: when he kept asking everyone if they could hear Pikachu talk and when he was shown a hologram projection of his father’s car crash.
I don’t know if I should blame the actor, Justice Smith, for this or the writers. But the director should have handled his character better, as there were times when his presence was just annoying.

If you’re a fan of the Pokémon franchise, here’s something for you to enjoy. If you just want to see a good movie, you can jump on the train too.

John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum (2019)

John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum

8/10

Starring

Keanu Reeves

Halle Berry

Laurence Fishburne

Mark Dacascos

Directed by Chad Stahelski

This is and will be one of the best movies of 2019. I saw a good movie, and I was entertained. This franchise always seems to get better with every installment. You can bet they challenge themselves, saying, “We must do better,” and they do. Mark Dacascos is always awesome to watch.

After you’re halfway into this movie, you’ll be asking, “What is with these people and dogs?” Also, why do people keep wanting to kill a dog that someone finds joy in?

“John Wick, excommunicado, 20 minutes,” we hear an announcer say as the countdown starts.

The movie starts with a bang as John Wick 3 picks up right where the last one left off. Our man Wick is on the run, and the time for the hunt is ticking fast. The bounty on his head for his crime of killing on Continental grounds is fourteen million dollars, and some people have chosen not to wait for the countdown to end.

The world is fascinating. Whether you’ve been on the John Wick train since the first movie or did a quick catch-up to join in, you’re welcomed with awesomeness. Wick isn’t made to be untouchable, but unkillable. He tries to tie up loose ends before time runs out and the hunt begins.

The movie’s plot continues, and if we remember how this all started, some men killed his dog after he found joy in it following his wife’s death. John is part of an underground and organized world of hitmen and hitwomen. They have their own way of handling things—and themselves.

John hunts down the men who killed his dog and kills them all. He continues his revenge in the second movie, and when he’s done, he’s betrayed by a friend. An act he takes very personally and seriously, which leads to him killing on Continental grounds (which, in the world he lives in, is against the rules—something we’re informed of from the first movie).
This causes the bounty on his head, and now John is being hunted by everyone who thinks they can take him down. The movie features some amazing choreography, from knife throwing and hand-to-hand combat to the gun fights we’re familiar with, which border on incredible.

John continues to call in favors, reaching out to Sofia (Halle Berry) as he tries to meet with someone who he says will give him guidance and help him make amends for what he’s caused.
Now, things aren’t just bad for Wick—they’re bad for everyone who helps him. The High Table, which governs Wick’s world, is angry and is going after everyone he cares about.

This is what the movie is about: Wick trying to find the Elder.

You should go see this movie and prepare to be entertained. Wick isn’t the only bad guy in this movie capable of doing amazing things—crossing Sofia is not a good idea. I can’t wait to see Chapter 4.

Don’t Tell Mom The Babysitter’s Dead (1991)

Don’t Tell Mom The Babysitter’s Dead (1991)

5/10

Starring

Christina Applegate

Joanna Cassidy

Keith Coogan

Directed by Stephen Herek

In 1991, Christina Applegate starred in a coming-of-age movie called Don’t Tell Mom the Babysitter’s Dead. The movie is about a group of kids set loose by their mother, who goes on a trip to Australia.
She didn’t leave them alone intentionally, unlike other ’90s movies like Home Alone. These kids are never left on their own on purpose. Their newfound freedom comes with the challenges of the real world. But with some luck and a little adventure, they always find a way to stay on top of the situation, even when everything seems to be falling apart around them. That was the recipe for “leaving kids alone at home” movies.

The movie had a lot of missing elements that could have made it more interesting, and one of the biggest things missing was surprise. There’s nothing in this movie that will take you by surprise. It didn’t even try to impress, and it couldn’t even make you break a smile with its underwhelming plot.

Here’s the story: A mother of five children is taken on a trip to Australia by her boyfriend. She leaves her seventeen-year-old daughter in charge of the home and hires a babysitter to supervise things while she’s gone for two months.
The kids, thinking this will be the best thing ever, are surprised when the babysitter—a presumed sweet old lady—turns out to be a drill sergeant.
Not that they wished the old lady any harm, but one day they walk into her room to find her dead. Not knowing what to do, they ask themselves: Should they tell their mother and have her come home immediately, or should they do something about it and keep their newfound freedom? They decide to keep their freedom, which requires them to drop the lady’s dead body at the morgue.

Unaware of where the money their mother left behind for the two months is, they have to find a way to make money so they can eat. It’s summer break, and each child wants to have fun, but now it’s up to the eldest to find a way to care for the little ones.

By the end of the movie, everything turns out in a way that will make you wonder, “What’s the point?”
There seems to be no lesson learned, and all the children just have a miraculous “we must be responsible” moment. Which is odd, because their irresponsibility and bad behavior mostly just highlight their stupidity. Being left home alone doesn’t mean you have to be a dirty slob.

Wild Wild West (1999)

Wild Wild West (1999)

5/10

Starring

Will Smith

Kevin Kline

Kevin Branagh

Directed by Barry Sonnenfeld

The movie is set in a sort of alternate past. Wild Wild West is a sci-fi western film that’s fun to watch on TV. During its initial release, though, the movie wasn’t a commercial success and received average reviews from critics. You could say its antics and drama were too invested in the plot for the movie to hold up as a masterpiece. What I mean is, the writers spent more time building the perfect plot and adding all the sci-fi elements than they did giving us a fun time at the movies. It was hard to recommend it to a friend to go see in theaters.

Despite its flaws, the movie is fun as a TV movie. Over time, it became one of those films you watch for the same reasons that made it not worth seeing in cinemas back then. Now, when you see it on TV, you can skip the boring bits.

Here’s the plot: General McGrath is believed to be behind a plot to kill the president and take over the United States. All of this happens after the events of the Civil War. Soon, we meet Dr. Arliss Loveless, a man who everyone believes is dead (when I say “everyone,” the movie believes he’s dead). He’s kept alive by a contraption that allows him to move around. He’s survived with only the upper half of his body.

The president calls on his two best detectives—Jim West (played by Will Smith, a shoot-first-ask-questions-later kind of guy) and Artemus Gordon (played by Kevin Kline, a detective who uses disguises and science to get the job done)—to stop McGrath’s plans.
McGrath, who is believed to be the man behind everything, sends a message to the president giving him one week to hand over the government.

The movie tries to make the racist nature of the time seem subtle, and though it introduces traces of it, we see Jim West handle himself like a pro, rising above it all.

It’s arguable that the production cost for this flick was too high, but a ’90s movie starring Will Smith was supposed to be a crowd-puller. It was, to some extent, but not enough to turn a profit.
Still, the movie is fun, and you get to enjoy Will Smith and Kevin Kline as law officers who are all over the place, trying to save the President of the United States in the most entertaining way.

Big Daddy (1999)

Big Daddy (1999)

6/10

Starring

Adam Sandler

Dylan and Cole Sprouse

Joey Lauren Adams

Jon Stewart

Directed by Dennis Dugan

Going back to watch an Adam Sandler movie from the ’90s will make you wonder what changed in this guy’s style of filmmaking. I guess, from seeing it, it would be his soul. His old movies had soul—there was an attempt to connect with the viewer. On top of that, they always had soundtracks that were so well-crafted, they made you want to listen and own them.
If you can recall any of his old movies, you’ll understand this better. They may not be masterpieces, but they were enjoyable, and you went through the moments with him.

Yes, this wasn’t one of his best movies, as you can easily pick holes in the plot. From social services’ inability to hand over a child to his rightful father properly, to the raising of the child being made to seem easy and just a fun ride.
The movie’s “fall in love with my best friend’s fiancée’s sister” subplot was lame to the max. If it wasn’t their intention to speed up the romance, she seemed a little too easy to win over—and what a coincidence that she happened to be the one in the park that day.

That aside, no matter how much you can point out the silliness in this movie, the fun is watching Sandler’s character, Sonny, play dad. He sucked at it, and no matter how much he tried to make us believe he had it covered, you could easily see that he didn’t.

The movie’s plot is about a selfish man named Sonny. He’s self-centered and willing to go out of his way to make sure he does nothing and that nothing around him is done as it should be. His girlfriend just dumped him, and he’s finding it hard to get ahead without her. After ruining his best friend’s birthday surprise and proposal, Sonny decides to take it one step further in his loser antics.

He lies to social services, claiming he’s Kevin (his best friend) and that the five-year-old child they dropped at his doorstep (since he and Kevin are roommates) is his.
He does this to make himself seem responsible as he tries to win back his now ex-girlfriend.

She’s not impressed by his “adoption” of a child, and it all blows up in his face. He then decides to keep the child, and we get to see the comedy play out as he raises the child and deals with the repercussions of his lie.

Like I said, the only fun when it comes to Adam Sandler is going back to watch his old movies, because his new ones haven’t made any attempt to please.

Cold Pursuit (2019)

Cold Pursuit (2019)

5/10

Starring

Liam Neeson

Tom Bateman

Tom Jackson

Emmy Rossum

 

Directed by Hans Petter Moland

The end justifies the means, they always say, and so it is with movies. The ending, the conclusion, the final curtain is a summary or full stop to all the mayhem or happenings we’ve enjoyed or endured while watching the movie. The ending of this movie was bland. I felt it needed a stronger conclusion because that would have made all the chaos we saw actually matter.
The movie is a five out of ten and cannot be more because the whole story was set up in a way where you might not predict what happens next, but you couldn’t care less.

The movie didn’t try to impress in any way, and it played to the tune of the character Liam Neeson is known for. One way or another, Neeson has been typecast as either a parent with combat knowledge going after people who hurt his child (Taken, 2008) or a man up against an impossible foe. In this movie, he was both.

Based on the 2014 Norwegian film In Order of Disappearance and directed by the same filmmaker, this movie’s plot is about a man whose son is killed while he’s receiving an award for Citizen of the Year. His life starts to spin out of control, and he attempts to end it when he discovers his son was a victim of a drug cartel.

After finding out the name of the person involved, he begins hunting down the men responsible. The drug cartel, unaware of this enemy, thinks the culprit is an Indian drug lord. After three of the cartel’s men are killed by the father avenging his son’s death, the cartel goes after the drug lord and kills his son. The drug lord then plans revenge against the cartel leader (Viking) and his family. All the while, the father (Neeson) is also plotting how to take down Viking and his family.

Cold Pursuit is what you get when you take different fruits and put them in a blender—the smoothie mix will have its own unique taste, an end you may not have guessed. This movie applies this analogy in two ways.

The first is in the plot. The story revolves around the lives and families of three different people, and if you add the town they’re living in, you get a fourth party that had little or nothing to do with the problem engulfing these three families.

The second implementation of this analogy is the genres. This movie is a mix of black comedy, thriller, drama, and sometimes action.

I, for one, sat through this movie because I was curious to see Neeson in a new role, as I had no idea what the movie was about. In the end, I was somewhat disappointed and sad that I wasn’t entertained in any way by what was happening on screen.