Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness (2022)

I guess that my subconscious related the words in the title - "Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness" - with some recent episodes I got through in the local medical system, without any connection with the movie, but making me to choose this as a subject. Because I actually don't have much to write about it...

The first "Doctor Strange" was slightly different than the rest of the Marvel universe, reason for I decided to give a chance to the sequel too. Even though the reviews are not stellar. And indeed it's not on par with the initial movie, but I think it's still a bit above the level where the Marvel fan armies set the production compared to others. The subject is a bit messy, keeping the spirit of the title, in a minimalistic description revolving around a good wizard battling an evil witch through various universes within the multiverse. I'm really not in the mood to provide more details for what is nothing more than a children's fairy tale.

The main criticism the movie received, from what I heard, targeted the direction of Sam Raimi. About that, even the story is not the best, I can say I felt somehow pleased that finally somebody had the guts to leave some of his own touch to distract a bit the attention from a Marvel multiverse filled with cliche. It's probably not visible to most of today's audience, but for who intersected a bit with Sam Raimi's older movies, not that much the initial Spider-Man trilogy but others like "Evil Dead" or the '90s series of Hercule and Xene, you can feel here a bit of the slightly dark humour from back then, as well as a characteristic "chaos" that provides a nostalgic charm. Three minutes of Bruce Campbell as a pizza salesman is just an example. For these crumbles I'm gonna give it a...

Rating: 3.5 out of 5

The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent (2022)

The shortest summary for "The Unbearable Weight of Massive Talent" would be: a larger budget replica for what was "JCVD" for Jean-Claude Van Damme in 2008, but this time dedicated to Nicolas Cage. In a slightly longer summary, we have a fiction where the main character is the real actor that gets into a "filmic" situation. The concept is not new, but is so rarely used that looking at what we had on the big screen during latest years it's quite refreshing (ironically, given the amount "historical" references).

Nicolas Cage is.. Nicolas Cage, an actor with a declining career path, taking a "job" as special guest to the anniversary party of a superfan, who is also super rich, living on the coast of Spain. We quickly get to find out that the guy is the main target of an entangled investigation covering the kidnapping of a politician's daughter, contacts with the Napoli mafia, and pretty much everything we could find in a classic "action movie". Like that, Nicolas Cage gets promoted from action hero to real agent working for the CIA. And from there the real life starts mixing with the movie life, up to reaching a classic happy end.

The movie doesn't take itself too seriously, and it's good that gets clear from start in a script with a bunch of self-irony, the typical exaggerations found in a '90s action movie, and lots of references to the top box-office roles made by Nicolas Cage during that time. I imagine that quite a lot of the younger public would be lost and not get all the references to "Face Off", "The Rock" or others. It's clearly a movie dedicated to who has watched Nicolas Cage in his top action star period. That's the main ingredient required for getting a real taste of this movie. If you cut this part, what's left is a light comedy with plenty of action, relatively fine as script complexity for this genre. This is different from "JCVD", which I'm not remembering that well, but it left me an impression of more substance within the self-irony at the time I watched it. In the current case, what we have fits to the category "guilty pleasure, fun to watch", but not more than that. Which is perfectly ok, if that's what you'd expect ;)

Rating: 4 out of 5 (I'm nostalgic = quite subjective on this one)

Summer-Fall 2022 Movie Preview

I'm not in the best period healthwise lately, and therefore, not in my best mood to restart blogging. However, I decided to make the traditional quicklist for this period of what's announced for big screen release during the the next half of year. As in my last enumeration of this type I'll go for the ultra-selective variant = let's solve this quickly.

As much as I liked the return to the "Jurassic World", as bad it seemed for me the sequel in "Fallen Kingdom". Still, I'd check on the list the third part of the reboot too = "Jurassic World Dominion" - announced for June. After all, if the expectations are low... who knows ;)

Also in June we have "Lightyear". How did we arrive from the "Toy Story" universe to what we see in the trailer seems to be a mistery deeper than the deep space itself. But I'm sure we'll get the answer in the movie (if it doesn't get swollen by some black hole).

In July, with a feeling of a mix between Tarantino and John Wick (hopefully closer to the second of the series), we'll get to see "Bullet Train". Surprisingly maybe, despite the clear looks of an action movie (with lots of action), this is apparently based on a novel. A Japanese one, as the setting.

I don't see anything else besides "Luck" to worth mentioning for August. Not that I'm expecting much from this one, but since I didn't write for quite a while about an animation, I thought it might be a good idea to check two in the current list.

"Don't Worry Darling", to be released in September, has a promising trailer, which doesn't spoil much of the story. That's the good part. However, I found some red flags looking at the screenwriters team, where the previous work is either in the light rom-com area, ranging towards "Titanic II". Hopefully the current one won't sink...

Unfortunately October-November are a bit blank at the moment regarding released trailers, and I don't have any of the titles announced on my waiting list anyway, so we'll stop here. Maybe we'll have a better "harvest" closer to the winter season.

The Age of Innocence (1993)

Most probably five, ten years ago, or maybe even two or three, I would've been terribly bored by two hours of romance-drama mix set at the end of the 19th century. Now, however, "The Age of Innocence" was... comforting; I guess that's the best one-word decription I could use.

I didn't read the novel, but I was expecting something between "Howards End" and any adaptation based on Jane Austen's works. It didn't thread far from that. The surprising part was to find this to be the most non-Scorsese movie out of all the movies I've watched directed by Scorsese. The cinematography by Michael Ballhaus, even though it's clearly not the single collaboration between the two ("Goodfellas", "The Departed", "Gangs of New York"), it's probably more close to the camera work in Coppola's "Dracula", and has some very peculiar nuances (e.g., without any specific reason, we're treated very often with frequent insertions of... food frames :)). The score by Elmer Bernstein fits perfectly, although if you'd separate the soundtrack from the movie it might seem very old school, more towards the '60s-'70s. Finally, the cast, excepting Daniel Day-Lewis, doesn't seem to have many other names in common with the usual list of actors we see in Scorsese's movie credits. What's certain is that all of the above, under his direction, sums up to a movie that doesn't really fit on a home screen. I didn't have the feeling of watching something so clearly made for cinema for quite some time. And considering my 27 inch screen + headphones, unfortunately the reason for that it's not that I have some cinematic experience conditions at my place and I can't make the difference anymore. It's strictly about how cinematic the movie is ;).

I sort of skipped the subject this time. Maybe because 'til the end of the movie what's above was more significant to me, and "the story" was left behind. Briefly, this is about a love triangle in the New York's pre-1900 high society - and all the context seems somehow supperficial. Upt to a point, where, suddenly, and again surprisingly, the development takes a very mature turn as reflection on life & relationships. But, probably that's where the movie's importance falls short, and the book prevails, which as I mentioned, I haven't read. A good extra reason to stick to my spoilers free policy and end this here ;)

Rating: 4 out of 5

Licorice Pizza (2021) ... and a pingback to 1917

I kept thinking if I should or shouldn't write a blog entry this month, not really knowing what movie to pick for it. "1917" was a good fit for the current times - not that much given its context, but more for what's expressing. But 1. I already wrote about it in another entry, a couple years ago and 2. I doubt anyway that my blog's audience intersects with whom I was saying there that should have it on their mandatory watch list. On the other hand maybe it wouldn't be a bad idea for more people to watch it or re-watch it. Although, again, it's debatable if the movie's not either too deep for some to get the actual sense in it, or too depressing for who relates too closely to an armed conflict context. So, I got to "Licorice Pizza" - or the first hippie alternative I could think of.

I don't intend to write a long review. Actually, I don't intend to write an actual review. "Licorice Pizza" is some sort of weird romance with lots of comic nuances set in the 70's California, and a much betted movie I'd say than "Inherent Vice", which takes place during the same time and was written and directed by the same Paul Thomas Anderson (more known probably for "There Will Be Blood"). There's a perfect chemistry between the actors, the writing is excellent and the story... not so important.

More important is that "Licorice Pizza" is what we could call a "comfort movie" as an analogy to a "comfort food". Something you really need from time to time. If not for something else, at least to find out if you didn't know that in 1973 (and a couple times after) there were periods of "oil crisis". And most probably that's something you can survive ;) - at least as long as the rest doesn't get much more close to "1917".

Rating: 4 out of 5