Gran Turismo (2023)

Gran Turismo (2023)

 

7/10

Starring

David Harbour

Orlando Bloom

Archie Madekwe

Darren Barnet

 

Directed by Neill Blomkamp

 

Gran Turismo is a fun racing game and the idea to make a movie from someone’s real-life based on the experience they got from this game is epic. This movie is a  biographical sports drama film about the life of Jann Mardenborough.

The movie is intense and tried its best to sidestep away from the dramatic cheesiness of Hollywood films. The part of the movie when the CGI comes in when the character imagines he is in a game car driving off crazy is worth seeing. The idea that this happened to someone makes it crazier to watch.

No matter how good I am at a game, why will I want to make that a reality?

This question went through my mind while watching this film and made me give the character props for even thinking he can do this.

The acting is very nice, and the way the movie takes its adrenaline moments up each turn makes for great TV. I did not even notice that the movie was over an hour long.

I enjoyed seeing a bit of the idea of the game and how anyone in Nissan thought it was a good idea to see if they can take the people who score the highest points in the game to a real-life track and see if they can do the things they do on the screen.

The movie starts with a glimpse of the idea for the game creation, to make players feel like they are on the real track, in a racing game. Then we see Orlando Bloom character Danny a marketing executive, present an idea to the board to get these players who are good at this game and turn them into real racer car drivers. He hired a former driver and now mechanic to train these people to get the best out of the top ten racers in the world.

Jann was selected to be the SIM driver who will now be a real-life racer.

The film did its best not to gloss out the difficulties he would have faced making this transition, the pain and suffering involved. Of course, what is a good film without a made-up rivalry, so this movie also had its own villain.

In the end the movie did justice in my book to having a good time at the cinema, I do not know much about racing, but this movie brought me in and made me read and watch some of the things I only see clips of in adverts.

This movie is easy to see and worth your time if you go to the cinema to see it.

The Equalizer 3 (2023)

 The Equalizer 3 (2023)

 

6/10

 

Starring

Denzel Washington

Dakota Fanning

David Denman

 

Directed by Antoine Fuqua

 

I do not know if this is what we need now, because Hollywood has drained every juice out of making hits that, I was not even excited to go see this film. And judging by the numbers this film pulled from the Box Office, I guess I was not the only one who felt the film business is having a hard time producing movies we will all want to see.

The film was not as good as the first film, and like the second film, it served no purpose at all, just the studios wanting to see if they can squeeze more money from, we the viewers.

What is the point, he is in an impossible position, he allows himself to be captured by guards in a winery, and he breaks free and kills everyone. I already knew this will happen, so the film had to add more twist and turns to make this film stand out, but they did not even bother, it was like they just had to do something to end this film trilogy.

Held him at gunpoint and waiting, for the boss, Lorenzo to show up. This is what Robert (Denzel Washington) wanted, and he kills all of them at the winery, took the money he came to retrieve and got shot and only managed to survive when a kind officer in the Sicilian town took pity on him and took him to a town doctor.

Now he is recouping slowly in this town and calls in a tip to the CIA about some of the dealings he saw in the Sicily winery where he was held. With the CIA investigating, the family of criminals who are running the town where Robert is, started to twist the hands of the store and landowners because they want to own the place. The officer who helped Robert saw footage of the people who did it and for this reason he and his family were attacked.

Robert interferes and tells the crew to leave the town alone, but they refused to listen, and he killed them all. Starting an issue which almost led to his death until the people of the town came to his rescue.

The way the film drags is not as much fun as all the ratings are making it to be. It drags on for too long before things start to take off, and the ending was too abrupt that it made the whole build up a waste of time.

The same way Chloë Grace Moretz was more of a bystander in the first film, so was Dakota Fanning in this one.

You can go see it, if you want to round up you’re the Equalizer watch, but no matter how not up to the standard this film and the one before it was, they are better than the nonsense TV series.

Blue Beetle (2023)

Blue Beetle (2023)

 

5/10

Starring

Xolo Maridueña

Adriana Barraza

Damián Alcázar

Raoul Max Trujillo

 

Directed by Ángel Manuel Soto

 

 

I enjoyed it enough to not think it is the worst superhero film I have seen. The film tries to step up sometimes, but it is hindered by trying to anchor itself in not allowing itself to get too dark. This hindrance is why this film did not reach the needed potential you would expect. It seemed stuck in that cheesy, I am a good guy I cannot kill trend that it becomes annoying.

Then as usual threw in the cheesy trend of, you try to hurt my family and I lose my mind, and I am going to kill, then at the nick of time, I am stopped, to preserve the hero’s moral ground and sanity. Remove all the cheesiness and the predictability, and it is not half bad.

The film is the fourteenth instalment in the DC universe, and it is about the comic book character Blue Beetle, Jamie Reyes. The film explores how Reyes got the Scarab, and they infused into one, and how he managed to have better control over it.

Reyes is a law graduate who came back home from school only to be faced with sad news about their family about to lose their home and his father having had a heart complication.

A fresh graduate, not having a job waiting, got a job cleaning in the mansion of Victoria Kord. Victoria is the sister of Ted Kord and his hellbent on finding a way to use the Scarab, which her brother left behind when he died.

Her niece Jenny who comes to light of this tries to stop her aunt. She steals the Scarab and so that she does not get caught gives it to Jamie. Both had met at Victoria’s mansion the day before, when Jamie stood up for her before her aunt and got fired.

Jamie takes the Scarab home and, upon pressure from his family, opens the box it is contained in, and the Scarab chooses him to bond with.

Victoria has been wanting to see the Scarab bond with someone, so she can extract information about how to make more from it, upon finding out that the stolen Scarab had bonded with Jamie, she sent all her arsenal to go retrieve it.

This film is not a box office hit, and it will not sneak into one, the SAG-AFTRA strike could have been a cause, but I do not think so. The DC train of movies are never a hit and I think this film fell into that trend, even though it is better than some of the movies in the DC universe of films.

So, seeing this film was not a bad viewing experience, but I felt the film would have been a step better than it is if some of the cheesiness were removed.