Review – Ralph Breaks the Internet

Even the preview openly recognizes that Ralph Wrecks the Internet would have been a better title. But we’ve gotta stick with the trendy language the kids are all using, right? This time around our hero’s video game has become antiquated, lost audience and is in danger of being unplugged and replaced. So Ralph and friends take to the information superhighway to generate some retro buzz. Of course things get out of control, and of course there’s a sappy ending solution to the whole mess. Mildly amusing

Review – Wreck It Ralph

The premise is the star of the show here. Of course Disney did the whole what-if-video-game-characters-were-real-people with Tron decades ago. But the extra wrinkle here is fun: what if the bad guy got tired of being the bad guy? Sadly, after the question gets asked, the answer is mostly formulaic silliness. Mildly amusing

Review – Small Foot

Animators use a secret colony of bigfoots (bigfeet?) to teach ham-handed lessons about friendship, xenophobia, mindless adherence to tradition, the manipulative nature of social media, and maybe even other topics they got to after I lost interest. The technical quality is good but not great, and the storytelling is twee without being charming. Mildly amusing

Review – Puss in Boots

The title character was my favorite part of the Shrek series. So I was greatly disappointed that his solo effort turned out to be so bad. The plot – to the extent that there even is one – is meandering and confusing. And Puss himself manages to seem obnoxious rather than his previous charming self. See if desperate

Review – The Incredibles 2

This one’s a lot like the first round, only now Helen’s the super hero while Bob’s stuck at home with the kids. And the antagonist seems more dangerous this time around. Otherwise if you liked the first one then this one’s unlikely to disappoint. Mildly amusing

Review – Train to Busan

Despite hearing good things about this movie, I avoided it for a long time due to skepticism about any zombie story ever meriting the trouble of reading subtitles. But I’m glad I took a chance on it. A variety of characters get stuck on a train during the zombie apocalypse. Despite the trapped-with-zombies clichés, the story keeps moving nicely. And the budget’s big enough to supply good production values. Worth seeing

Review – Ghost Stories (2020)

Despite the unimaginative title, this quartet of supernatural tales from India is quite good. Though naturally some are better than others, the set is stylish as well as spooky. Mildly amusing