The Good Dinosaur

The Good Dinosaur begins with an absolutely beautiful scene setting up their alternative version of Earth where the asteroid never hit and dinosaurs got to continue their reign at the top of the hierarchy. All of the nature shots and backgrounds are wonderfully animated and if you had told me they were from a Discovery Chanel nature documentary, I'd probably have believed you. They clearly spent a lot of time and money on these secondary elements, but everything else looks like garbage. The dinosaurs look terrible; like the very worst Illumination knock-off movies. For crying out loud, this is Pixar! How did these terrible character designs and animations pass all the way to theaters? All of the characters look awful: dinosaurs, people, bugs, everything that isn't scenery. It's damn near painful to see the beautiful water effects and physics share the same screen with Arlo looking like a Duplo Block. The animation that should have gotten all the attention looks like crap. The voice acting is okay, but no one does a particularly good job. Although not as bad as the animation, the story is also dreadful. There are so many awful plot conveniences and plot holes, terrible pacing, awful characters, and the most cliche and predictable story imaginable. There are tons of little dumb things that bothered me, like how since the asteroid didn't hit, dinosaurs kept on evolving for millions of years, but they didn't physically change in any way, but instead are somehow now capable of building houses and farming. How the Hell is an Apatosaurus with no thumbs or any gripping ability able to construct, put on, and operate a wooden mechanism to spread seed and how come they have a tool for that, but they are still digging trenches with their heads? Why do the humans (if that's what they are supposed to be) act like canines and not primates? Just because dinosaurs still exist, humans are millions of years behind on their evolutionary track? The Apatosaurus literally only farm corn and don't interact with any other characters, so are we to believe that they survive by only eating corn? There are tons of stupid little things like this that just piss me off, but not nearly as much as the lame, cookie-cutter story that you can predict beat by beat five minutes in. The inauthentic, saccharine moments are so forced, manipulative, and nauseating that I really wanted to turn the movie off. I hated every character and the stupid decisions they made and I hate Disney/Pixar for letting this horse crap make it past story boards. This is easily the worst Pixar movie. Even if we include the awful early Pixar shorts, this is the worst. I was prepared for something super mediocre, but The Good Dinosaur (why is that even the name of the movie?) is abysmal. Just take out all of the characters and sell it as a 90 minute screen saver, because the only thing here that isn't garbage is the backgrounds.

Life As We Know It

Life as We Know It is a perfectly okay movie. It's a 100% generic and cliche romantic comedy that you can predict beat for beat after the first ten minutes. The acting is fine and the secondary cast offers some good laughs, but everything else is painfully average for a rom-com. There isn't anything to really pile on or nitpick, because it's all exactly what you expect it to be. It's a perfectly inoffensive movie to enjoy with a significant other or your mom or whoever you watch this kind of movie with. If someone wanted to watch it, I could watch it again, but I will never watch it again by myself.

The Angry Birds Movie

I bought The Angry Birds Movie assuming it was going to be hilariously bad, but it turns out it's something so much worse; The Angry Birds Movie is painfully average. The animation looks fine, not as good as Pixar but not as bad as Illumination, but just fine. The voice acting is good, although I don't like a fair portion of the voice actors, they didn't do a bad job. The story is very predictable and cliche, but it's not terrible. I hated most of the characters, but a few (like the one Josh Gad plays) are okay. It's clearly a kids movie, but they do make attempts to entertain the adults who are forced to watch it. The issue is that these attempts are very odd choices. There is an uncomfortable amount of sexual humor and innuendo for a kids' movie. I personally have no problem with sexual humor and innuendo, but it feels so wrong and dirty to see a cartoon bird doing pelvic thrusts while talking about making new eggs. They also just throw in random references that are out of place, like The Shinning and 50 Shades of Grey. The Angry Birds Movie isn't offensively bad like Ice Age or Sausage Party, but it also isn't "good bad" like Life is a Jungle or one of the knockoff movies. This movie doesn't do anything particularly well or terribly, everything is just okay. I wanted a dumpster fire, a hard F-, but I got a C-. It's colorful and energetic enough to keep kids entertained, but there isn't any reason for an adult to chose to watch it.

Parasite

Parasite is a story like I've never seen before. The acting was perfect, the cinematography is great, the score is wonderful, but the story is what i loved the most. I went into Parasite with the misinformation that it was a horror and no other information. I'd recommend not looking up any plot information because experiencing it blind was the perfect experience. Parasite works on so many levels that if you just want a comprehensive story that you don't have to have to dig deep into to get meaning and enjoyment, Parasite is fun, shocking, and kind of funny. I loved every character and the chemistry between them all felt very real. If you are someone who wants to rip a movie apart and look at every element under a microscope for symbolism and can't get anything out of a film that isn't stuffed full of allegory, Parasite has a lot to say and it's in every fiber of the movie. The reason Parasite speaks to so many people is that it has a fairly universal message that it tells on multiple levels. I hate movies like Mother! that only work as a series of metaphors and are barely even a story at surface level. If you can get beyond the bar of reading subtitles, Parasite has something or someone you can connect to. I wish the plot was more evenly distributed and we didn't rush through the last half hour, but otherwise I can't find any big faults.

It Chapter Two

It Chapter Two is a mess. The acting is great (even if the chemistry isn't as good between the adults as the kids), there were some really cool camera shots, and I liked the little nods to other King novels, but I hated everything else. Chapter Two is almost three hours long, about half an hour longer than the first movie, and you feel every minute. There were so many scenes that accomplish nothing and just being a scene that was in the book doesn't make it any better. There are tons of things from the book that they skipped that would have been great, so the pawn shop scene being in the book doesn't validate its place in the movie. I understand making a few changes, but the ending is so much worse than the book. Stephen King writes terrible endings. Every single one of his books that I have read is great up until act three and then it becomes total dog shit. It Chapter Two is so much worse in every way. There is one bit that I really want to address, but I don't want to spoil anything, so I'll just say that they add dimensions to characters that are in no way even remotely hinted at in the book, in the first movie, or in the first two hours of this movie. It feels like a forced element just to tick a box on the checklist some who will never even see this movie anyway. It's really shame because the cast is great, again not as good as the younger cast, but still great. The CGI is pretty awful, but the script is 85% of what is wrong with this movie. The pacing is just so bad because they spend way too long setting up everything the first movie already set up and constantly deflate all the tension with a random joke. It Chapter Two is far more concerned with trying to be funny than it is trying to be scary. I get that Richie is a comedian, but every fucking scene Bill Hader is in is just him making awful jokes and then they make Eddie joke around the whole movie too. Bill Hader is doing a great job with his character, but his character is so annoying and grating, even worse than Harry Anderson's tone deaf portrayal. Even Pennywise trying to be scary is funny half of the time. In the first movie, he'd being doing something similar and it would be creepy and unsettling, in Chapter Two it's mostly just coming of as comic. The first movie had three co-writers and Chapter Two was just Gary Dauberman and based on the other movies he's written, I feel pretty safe blaming him for this awful script. The CGI is pretty terrible too, but the script is what really tanked this sequel. It Chapter Two is a bastardization of the book and a total waste of the acclaim the first film built. The cast is good and the cinematography was fun. This is everything that isn't garbage.

Shrek 2

The voice acting is still pretty good (Diaz is still the obvious week link) and the animation is still pretty solid, but the humor is a lot better and the story has more meat. Shrek had a good amount of humor, but Shrek 2 really opens the door to jokes that will fly right over kids' heads, but adults will get and there are quite a few references that weren't necessarily funny, but were enjoyable nods. The story is the biggest improvement. Shrek just didn't have enough plot for 90 minutes. The story itself isn't as enjoyable in 2 as in 1, but it's much more eventful and way better paced.

Some Like It Hot

If we cut out half an hour of the endless amount of dead space in this film, it would be almost 4 stars. It's just too long. For two hours, we do get some decent performances and a story that is in no way unique, but at least presented well, but it's just full of stuff we don't need. There were a handful of pretty funny scenes and some of the jokes and set ups were clever, but nowhere near enough to keep me interested for two hours. The absolute worst part is the ending, which isn't as much of an ending as the point at which the movie stops. It doesn't end with a period, but more like a semicolon. Some Like It Hot doesn't really hold up almost 80 years later, but it isn't a total mess. The performances are still pretty okay, it's still kind of funny, and the story isn't as full of cliches as it would be if they remade it today.

Grave Encounters

Grave Encounters is yet another generic found footage film. I liked the first fifteen to twenty minutes where our Zak Baggins wannabe is seen talking about how they've had to fake paranormal activity in their previous episodes and paying a gardener to lie about what he's experienced around the premises. The acting is pretty good (minus Ashleigh Gryzko) and I love the idea of the film, even though it is incredibly generic. The problems start as soon as the hauntings do. The pacing is a huge issue as we are constantly starting and stopping. There are long stretches where nothing happens and we literally just sit with the crew in a closet. When we are moving quicker, nothing makes sense. We don't have any real explanation of who the ghosts/spirits/demons/whatever are or what they want. There are so many scenes that raise thirteen more questions and answer none. I never understood what was going on and by the end, I'd long since given up. The terrible pacing certainly played a role there too. In a way that eerily mimics what happens in the film, the movie is only an hour and a half, but it feels like so much longer. I didn't mind that things took a while to get going, because I like the jabs at paranormal investigation shows and the characters are kind of fun for those fifteen of so minutes, but once the grave encounters begin everything slows down as we spiral through unexplained situations towards a finale that only further confused me. If I had to watch it again, I'd much prefer to stop 20 minutes in; at that point you've experienced all of the positive things about the movie.

Predators

The first Predator was a fine film. The second one was the Leprechaun in the Hood of the Predator series. Predators is a more generic rehash of the first Predator. Adrian Brody pretends to be a badass and lead a ragtag group of stereotypes in a bland battle against their alien abductors. The story is full of holes and inconsistencies. The acting is fine, but I hated our leads (I guess I really only liked the Russian guy and maybe Chris Mannix) and no one was much of a character. The effects were pretty awful for a forty million dollar film, but the worst thing is the score. Predators is basically another thriller movie, but no one told John Debney, who keeps using this plucky song that belongs in a Land Before Time movie where the dinosaurs are meandering through a forest to get to a birthday party. Multiple times, we are getting this whimsical wandering song when we should be building tension and not deflating it. Predators is just a mess. After the credits rolled, all I was left with were questions that they never even hint at answering. It doesn't advance the Predator Series any, but at least it isn't total garbage like Predator 2.

Brittany Runs a Marathon

I only watched this because I loved Jillian Bell in Workaholics and Idiot Sitter and she more than impressed me. The plot is super cliche and overflowing with forced conflict, but it has some good dark humor and it does its message justice. I didn't have any problems with the cast and the cinematography wasn't anything above average, but was serviceable for what is essentially a darker take on a generic "feel good" movie. The overabundance of forced conflict is the only real issue here. We already know all the points we are going to hit, so it's really grating to watch people start arguing purely because the plot needs them to. The only unexpected thing is the ending which is so abrupt and jarring because it just isn't a spot where you end a story. We need like two or three more minutes to be where we need to be. The highlight is the great cast and good humor. The problem is everything else.