Movie Reviews from Chris

★★ 1/2  out of ★★★★ ( 👍 ) 65 (2023) Runtime: 93 minutes MPAA:  Rated PG-13 for intense sci-fi action and peril, and brief bloody images. "65" falls into that category of 'it could be better, but at least it's not terrible'.  This is an example of what  Ghosted  would have been if it had maintained its mediocre quality. "65" works best as a survival action film, with enough sequences of Adam Driver fighting dinosaurs and him and another survivor hopping from place to place, blessed with stunning scenery that remains interesting even if there are logic errors, the narrative falters, and that the family drama is underwhelming. It starts off with so much potential, and the concept is so intriguing; advanced human-like civilisations existed 65 million years ago, and that Earth was an unknown planet at the time. Fortunately, it never crumbles to zero after crash-landing on planet Earth and finding a way to escape it. The pacing also feels intentionally...

★★ 1/2 out of ★★★★ Cocaine Bear (2023) Runtime: 95 minutes MPAA:  Rated R for bloody violence and gore, drug content and language throughout. Cocaine Bear is really trying to test our patience, but luckily I have a lot of it. It’s a crazy reimagining of a real-life story, in which an American black bear (known as Pablo Eskobear) was discovered dead in Northern Georgia, 1985, after ingesting fatal doses of cocaine. Drug smuggler Andrew C. Thornton II and an accomplice dropped 40 plastic containers of cocaine and jumped out of the plane above Tennessee, with Thornton dying when his parachute failed to open. After the dead bear was discovered, it was stuffed and is currently displayed at the Kentucky Fun Mall. I hope they’re not planning on Kentucky Fried Bears. Director Elizabeth Banks’ Cocaine Bear, with a script from Jimmy Warden, wants to be the type of B-movie that delivers and does precisely what it’s title says: a bear doing cocaine and going on a murderous rampage. D...

★ 1/2   out of ★★★★ Ghosted (2023) Runtime: 116 minutes MPAA:  Rated PG-13 for sequences of strong violence/action, brief strong language and some sexual content. "Ghosted" has a decent first act, setting up the plot, giving us over-the-top, hilarious action, and several nice but repetitive cameos. Had it consistently maintained its mediocre quality, "Ghosted" would have been so much more tolerable. Unfortunately, this is not the case. It's simultaneously overstuffed and undernourished, throwing in too many threats, characters, themes and stakes, yet never attempting to clearly convey its meaning. The action sequences are clunky, quite badly edited, and generic (mind you, I had a tough time figuring out what was happening at least half of the time), but that it starts off pretty solid and tells us that relationships are not so easy perhaps makes it not entirely terrible? This is essentially a 'Red Notice 2023 version', mixing in huge stars, luxurious loc...

★★★   out of ★★★★ Suzume no Tojimari (2022) [Japanese title:  すずめの戸締まり ] Runtime: 122 minutes MPAA:  Rated PG f or action-peril, language, thematic elements and smoking. "Suzume" works best as an interesting adventure story, and maintains a similar consistency compared to director Makoto Shinkai's previous works, and although the final act doesn't reach its full potential, the messages he has to offer is worth waiting for. Writer/director Makoto Shinkai once again shakes things up and presents to us a film so strange, I'm confident I haven't seen someone and a walking, talking chair chasing a cat across multiple cities in the past year or two. As usual, he never falters in the design section, presenting to us various landscapes, towns, and gargantuan creatures. While "Suzume" is an exhausting yet exhilarating journey about closing doors to prevent natural disasters, I didn't particularly care about whether Suzume and Souta would end up together. ...

★★★ 1/2   out of ★★★★ Weathering with You (2019) [Japanese title:  天気の子 ] Runtime: 112 minutes MPAA:  Rated PG-13 for suggestive material, some violence and language. Makoto Shinkai once again animates his follow up to  Your Name.  with great detail, but it's as visually arresting as conflicting. Weathering with You (which also takes place in the same universe as Your Name.), depicts Tokyo in a constant state of rain and fog, and sporadic moments of sunshine. Some scenes look brilliant, and the rain animation is as fluid and dazzling as you would expect. However, the mist, roaring thunder, and aggressively bright sunlight is admittedly sometimes too much, and makes fine little details in the background rather fuzzy, an unintended distraction. Otherwise, this is a very minor quibble in a film in which I thought punched about as hard as Shinkai's previous feature. Weathering with You is more accessible and as impactful, and while one may compare its more...

★★★ 1/2   out of ★★★★ Your Name. (2016) [Japanese title:  君の名は 。] Runtime: 106 minutes MPAA:  Rated PG for thematic elements, suggestive content, brief language, and smoking. The amount of detail writer/director Makoto Shinkai has put into his film is stunning yet terrifying. He does not need to go that far to animate the GPS pin's speed as Taki scrolls out of the map, or remove the tree beside the bridge in Itomori, in a later picture. The amount of care and attention to his work speaks volumes, and this is one of the best-looking animated films in quite a while. How he controls the shading, how he animates the mist for faraway mountains, and the tiny little billboards in urban cities are scarily on point. As for the film itself, movies like "Your Name." are a puzzle to review. How well "Your Name." works really depends on whether or not you believe there is a special connection between the two main characters. I understand people who disliked it, because on a ...