Review – The Great Wall

Because the title would be too long if the movie was called The Great Amount of Money We Can Make If the Cast Appeals to Markets in Both the United States and China. Matt Damon, Pedro Pascal and (briefly) Willem Dafoe supplement an otherwise mostly Asian cast in what would otherwise have been a standard, big budget Chinese fantasy action movie. Mildly amusing

Review – The Minotaur (1961)

Aside from a mercifully brief appearance by a sorry excuse for the title beast, this is little more than an Italian sword-and-sandals soap opera from the early 60s. See if desperate

Review – The Land That Time Forgot

I remember taking these movies ever so seriously when I first saw them. Of course I was a pre-teen at the time. All these years later I still find them fun in a crappy sort of way, though perhaps those with no associated sense of childhood nostalgia will react as positively. This is a sequel to The People That Time Forgot, and it completely lives up (or down) to the standards of the original. Mildly amusing

Review – At the Earth’s Core

To this day I wonder what Peter Cushing might have accomplished if he’d gotten a crack at better roles. He was talented. He had good screen presence. And yet more often than not he ended up in crap like this. Edgar Rice Burroughs gets blamed for this silly story about a giant drilling machine that accidentally bores a hole to a subterranean realm in which primitive people are ruled by huge, telekinetic rubber birds. Mildly amusing

Review – Damsel

Someday we’ll reach the point where entire plots can no longer be constructed out of little more than reversal of stereotypical roles. But clearly we haven’t gotten there yet. Millie Bobby Brown stars as a woman designated for sacrifice to a dragon. In the absence of a male rescuer, she becomes her own knight in shining armor. The story drags out a bit, but the effects are good and the action keeps things entertaining. Mildly amusing

Review – Dungeons and Dragons: Honor Among Thieves

Why do D&D movies always have to be silly? Though I admit it’s been many a year since I’ve played, I remember game sessions as being more Lord of the Rings and less Monty Python. They seemed to be going out of their way to populate the story with the more absurd elements from the source material, including an owl bear and a gelatinous cube. The cast has talent (Hugh Grant notwithstanding), and they do what they can to work around a mediocre script and special effects that might have been impressive ten years ago. Mildly amusing

Review – Night at the Museum: Secret of the Tomb

Third verse, worse than the first. Though the action shifts to London this time, we’re still firmly rooted in familiar territory. The tear-jerker ending might have been more effective if any of the rest of the movie had given the audience anything to care about. See if desperate

Review – Night at the Museum: Battle of the Smithsonian

This time around I didn’t go into the experience expecting it to be good, so I wasn’t disappointed when it wasn’t. In this episode the hero from the original is a shopping channel millionaire who gets awkwardly transplanted back into his previous career as a night watchman at the Museum of Natural History in New York. Only now the magical doodad that brings the exhibits to life at night has been shipped to the title location in Washington. Before things can be set aright, the story picks up Amelia Earhart (Amy Adams), George Armstrong Custer (Bill Hader) and Hank Azaria doing his best Boris Karloff impression as the ancient Egyptian villain. The accent and some of the other gags are entertaining, but more often than not the humor follows the drawn-out, un-funny precedent set by the first one. Mildly amusing

Review – 47 Ronin

This production is roughly one third Japanese legend and two thirds Hollywood action movie. Though I understand that adding Keanu Reeves to the mix must have helped sell the concept to box-office-conscious studio executives, the explanation for how a white guy ended up connected to the nobility of feudal Japan took some time and detracted from the main story. Overall the movie is flashy, fast-paced and expensive without being anywhere near as interesting as some other tellings of the tale. Mildly amusing

Review – Onward

This picture will likely be best remembered for its release date. It hit theaters right as the COVID lock-down began in 2020, forcing the studio to take a big box office hit and move the movie straight to Disney Plus. On its own merits, this is a reasonably entertaining situation comedy/drama about two elf brothers trying to magically resurrect their dead father. Dungeons and Dragons fans will derive endless entertainment from seeking out the dozens of sub-references to the game. Mildly amusing

Review – Strange Magic

Because Barbie Fairytopia would be way better if it got a Rock of Ages treatment with a ton of Boomer-and-Gen-X-era love songs. But then again no. See if desperate

Review – Encanto

What a beautiful, awful movie. The story is absolutely uncomfortable: a magical family lives in a magical house. They bully the sister who doesn’t have magic powers, and they ostracize the brother whose gift is precognition of bad fortune. Sure, by the end everybody learns to be better people in an oh-so-Disney way. But it’s a long, sad time getting there. On the other hand, the visuals are incredibly complex and colorful. I wish there had been a way to watch the animation without following the plot at all. Mildly amusing

Review – Luca

Disney once again dives into the realm of merpeople who long to live on land. As with some previous Pixar productions, this movie does a better job of showing off what they can do with digital animation rather than bothering to tell much of a story. Mildly amusing

Review – The Hobbit (1977)

I remember loving this when I first saw it on TV. Of course I was 11 at the time, and standards for quality animation – especially on this side of the Pacific – were generally lower back then. But for the time and place, it’s not bad. The voice cast features some familiar names, including John Huston as Gandalf and Hans Conried as Thorin. In its limited running time, it stays fairly faithful to its well-known source. Mildly amusing

Review – Maleficent: Mistress of Evil

After re-inventing Sleeping Beauty in the first one, this one didn’t have as obvious a plot direction. So it piles on the special effects and serves them up with familiar pro-nature, pro-fairy themes. The battle at the end drags out far too long, but otherwise this is on par with its predecessor. Mildly amusing

Review – Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales

I figured the aphorism was just another meaningless bit of pirate-abilia built into the title of the latest episode of this long-past-its-expiration-date series. But no, it tells a painful truth: this movie genuinely has no tale to tell. Instead, it’s an unpalatable mess of cast members from the previous entries improbably shoehorned in, omnipresent CGI and expensive set pieces, and an amazing burgoo of supernatural geegaws, each governed by a set of rules so complicated they’d put an engine repair manual to shame. I lost interest in this plotless mess right around the time the zombie sharks showed up. See if desperate

Review – Bright

The point here appears to be getting the audience to think about racism by presenting the issues in a comfortable action/fantasy mix. In the course of a single evening a rogue cop with his own brand of justice (Will Smith) gets partnered up with the LAPD’s first orc officer. So sorta like a combo of The Hobbit and Judy Hopps. As a critique of real-world race relations in 21st century America, it’s sophomoric at best. But it actually makes some good points about the weird, sugar-coated fascism of many traditional fantasy stories. Mildly amusing

Review – Hercules (2014)

Here’s another production that dwells in the nether realm between epic action movie and SyFy crapfest. It’s also yet another cynical, postmodern reimagining of a classic hero recast as a mercenary who defeats foes through trickery and help from assistants. Still, the effects and battle sequences are enough to supply what the average audience member is likely to expect. Mildly amusing

Review – How to Train Your Dragon 2

I didn’t like this one quite as much as the first. Toothless is once again in fine form, but the story takes a turn for the depressing. Too much dragon peril and family member death. It was still a good movie. Just not quite up to the high standards set by the original. Mildly amusing

Review – The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies

My memory of Tolkein’s book (one of my favorites when I was a kid) was that the tale pretty much ended where this movie began. Oddly, that’s what happened in the movie, too. Smaug dies, and the rest of Middle Earth goes to fighting over the spoils. Bereft of significant plot developments, this chapter swiftly devolves into a relentless parade of noisy battle sequences. Like an amusement park ride, it’s a fun experience without being much of a story. Mildly amusing