Xillix Posted September 25, 2017 Share Posted September 25, 2017 Yeah I assumed Christian Bale was like... a LOT older than he really is. Dunno why. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ethan Hunt Posted September 25, 2017 Share Posted September 25, 2017 3 minutes ago, Xillix said: Yeah I assumed Christian Bale was like... a LOT older than he really is. Dunno why. Dude seems to have aged very quickly from being batman to now. Can totally see how you would think that Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cookie Posted September 25, 2017 Author Share Posted September 25, 2017 (edited) Secret Searchers A fairly thin plot and an ending that stretches your suspension of disbelief aren't enough to make this comedy terrible, but the end product is overall kinda mediocre. C America! A well-staged nature documentary that has an honest, heartfelt message at the end. Not much I can say, but families looking for a healthy experience in the dearth of October will find this a good choice. B A Family of Families It's one of those faith-based films which is probably going to raise a big red flag for a lot of people, but it's honestly harmless. It's about people finding comfort in their faith and as far as I could tell it didn't seem to force christianity down your throat necessarily, which is a lot more than I can say for the stuff that comes out of Pure Flix. The super thin story is probably going to be a turn off even for non-demanding audiences though. C Kelsey Came Home The film starts off promisingly enough with the mysterious return of the family's long lost daughter, but derails fairly quickly. First of all, when your daughter has been missing for fifteen years and suddenly shows up at your doorstep, you should probably contact the authorities about that, but we never see the family do so. Second, the ultimate payoff is just tired and beyond trite at this point. How many movies this year haven't there been demons and satanic cults involved? Third, the conditions for being able to perform the ritual at the end are extremely specific stretching to the point of disbelief (are the demons really that picky?). Fourth, the ending is just another one of those kind of whatever, everyone's dead, the evil will never stop, goodnight everyone. I'm getting really sick of them at this point. You can do worse but honestly it's so trite that you'd probably want to watch something worse, at least there's a chance you'd get something unique out of it. D+ Trump's America Micheal Moore tackling Trump could've been interesting, but he doesn't really say or do anything everyone else hasn't already said or done about Trump. The message at the end is earnest, but the movie is rather lacking in insight. C Life is Strange drops tomorrow. Edited September 25, 2017 by cookie Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ChD Posted September 25, 2017 Share Posted September 25, 2017 1 minute ago, cookie said: Life is Strange drops tomorrow. Awww :(. I was expecting it today. Also, 'drops'? I hope you don't mean that in the way that you're going to shoot it down. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cookie Posted September 25, 2017 Author Share Posted September 25, 2017 Just now, ChD said: Awww :(. I was expecting it today. Also, 'drops'? I hope you don't mean that in the way that you're going to shoot it down. It's fairly long so I need time to read and process it so I went through the rest of the month first. It has nothing to do with any opinion I have of it (yet) 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cookie Posted September 25, 2017 Author Share Posted September 25, 2017 (edited) Before I review Life is Strange and proceed with the final two months of the year, I'd like to make an early announcement about my top 25 list. Interspersed with my top 25 countdown I will hand out several awards to the films I've reviewed this year. Some awards will go to good films, some awards will go to bad films. Some will go to films that may be in between but I feel deserve an award for one reason or another. And because I'm incredibly selfish I've named these awards after some of the films I made this year. For those asking, no, none of my films will be nominated (except for the last one if things pan out). The categories are: The Scrooge McDuck Award for Stingiest Studio - As the saying goes: you gotta spend money to earn money. This studio clearly disagreed, and thus has churned out productions where the cheapness is clearly on display, often to the films' detriment. The Voltron Award for Best Combination of Genres - Some films manage to combine genres in ways we haven't seen before and manage to pull it off well. This award is made to recognize those films that have accomplished this feat. The Hunchback Award for Beauty on the Inside - Some movies just look like they'll be terrible from a distance, but once you see them you find that they're entertaining, distinct and even subversive in many ways. This award is made to recognize those films that by all accounts should have been bad but instead blossomed into beautiful butterflies. The Reverse Hunchback Award for Ugliness on the Inside - Some movies just make you go "wow, what happened?! This looked so promising at the start!". These are movies that are clearly aiming for greatness, even taking great risks you have to commend for, but sadly fall flat on their face and by the end leave you frustrated and disappointed. This award is made to recognize those failures. The Rollercoaster Award for Best Thrill Ride - For thrillers only. This award is made to recognize an overlooked genre in a year cramped with disposable horror movies, comedies and cartoon adaptations, and sort out the best of the best. The Faith Award for Most Daring Film - This award is for the good and bad, those films that dared to go the lengths few other movies would go. Either in a "that's very brave of you to tell this story this way" or a "I can't believe you thought telling this story this way was a good idea." Whoever wins dared to dream the most. The Zarkon Award for Best Bad Guy - For evildoers only. A hero is only as good as his nemesis, and there were quite a few baddies that stood out this year. This award is made to recognize the best of the worst. The Cookie Award for Best Movie of the Year - This is the big one. The top 5 of the year will all be nominees here. But only one of them can win. Which one will it be? All winners receive imaginary cookies. Refunds are not available. Edited September 25, 2017 by cookie 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Alpha Posted September 25, 2017 Share Posted September 25, 2017 Reminder Cookie that my whole week is ruined if you don't give me a virtual cookie. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cookie Posted September 25, 2017 Author Share Posted September 25, 2017 Just now, Alpha said: Reminder Cookie that my whole week is ruined if you don't give me a virtual cookie. I make no promises. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ezen Baklattan Posted September 25, 2017 Share Posted September 25, 2017 Now watch you give the awards to yourself. jk, I like this idea, I like it a lot. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hiccup23 Posted September 25, 2017 Share Posted September 25, 2017 Fuck what a savage review of Haunting of WI......what did I do to you @cookie? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cookie Posted September 25, 2017 Author Share Posted September 25, 2017 Just now, Hiccup23 said: Fuck what a savage review of Haunting of WI......what did I do to you @cookie? You did nothing It was just really, really bad. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hiccup23 Posted September 25, 2017 Share Posted September 25, 2017 4 minutes ago, cookie said: You did nothing It was just really, really bad. Lol....the film actually got solid reviews in CAYOM 2.0 and popped up on a few people's Top 25 lists. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cookie Posted September 25, 2017 Author Share Posted September 25, 2017 (edited) Life is Strange I have several points I need to make: Why is there no consistency to Max's powers? Why weren't she able to reverse time when Kate tried to commit suicide? While we're on the subject, Max's powers are introduced randomly without any explanation. How does she do it? How long has she been able to do this? Does her family know she can do this? What's with the random solar eclipse? Solar eclipses aren't some everyday occurrence, you don't just introduce it out of nowhere and don't have it tie in to anything. I understood what the deal was with the stranded whales and the random snowing earlier but a freakin' solar eclipse appearing out of nowhere should make people at least go "huh, that was weird." "This girl just told me this boy is walking around the school with a gun. I'm just gonna have a talk with the boy's parents and not involve the authorities at all, because I am a good principal." "We just broke into the principal's office, let's go have fun in the pool!" Uh... okay? Yes, try on this missing girl's clothes. That totally isn't creepy as shit. So you knew the password to your stepfather's computer, who you've been suspecting is up to something for a while, but never checked it for anything suspicious because you were lazy. Got it. Chloe gets mad at Max for finding proof that Frank had a relationship with Rachel. Uh... why? Wait, Max can suddenly travel several years into the past now? Whaaaa? Yes, have the now quadriplegic Chloe be so sad about the fact that she's quadriplegic that she suddenly wants to kill herself. I'm sure that'll go over well with actual quadriplegics. And this whole alternate timeline business where Max saves Chloe's father only to have Chloe end up as a quadriplegic? Ends up having no impact on the rest of the movie. The movie just stops dead in its tracks for twenty minutes while accomplishing nothing. You find Rachel's corpse and you decide to just leave it there. WHY IS NOBODY CALLING THE POLICE?! Wait, if Mr. Jefferson ends up arrested, who is running the photography contest then? Convenient timing of the year award goes to David. Convenient plot device of the year award goes to Max's nose bleeding and passing out. Did this turn into Evil Dead all of a sudden? What's with all the blood? So because Max saved Chloe early in the movie by changing the timeline the world starts falling apart. Why does it take its sweet ass time to do so? Okay, so Max travels back to the point where she saved Chloe from being killed by Nathan and lets Chloe die thus restoring the timeline to its proper order. But now she knows that Nathan killed her. It's not like the restored timeline erased Max's memory of Chloe, she still knows who she is and who her killer was. And she also knows from the altered timeline that Nathan killed Rachel. But the movie just cuts to Chloe's funeral where Max is super sad and then the movie ends. I refer back to point 12: WHY IS NOBODY CALLING THE POLICE?! If this did happen, we never see it. Is this just a world where law enforcement doesn't exist? I owe @spaghetti! an apology for my Seeing Her rant. This makes Seeing Her look like Flowers For Algernon. I'll be honest: I've never played the original game, but I'm going to assume it makes a hell of a lot more sense than this does. This is just a poor, poor adaptation. I clearly see now where @Ethan Hunt was coming from on this. I don't think it's that bad since there are some good performances, inventive visuals and beautiful cinematography, but the story... at least the way it's told here, it doesn't work. In fact it made me appreciate Seeing Her enough that I'm going to bump that one up a grade. It was bonkers, but at least it was an original property and didn't constantly throw random shit at you. Life is Strange though... it's just a mess. Seeing Her's new grade: B- (a low B- but still) Life is Strange's grade: C-/D+ I am so, so sorry @ChD. It just didn't work for me at all. Edited September 25, 2017 by cookie 3 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ChD Posted September 25, 2017 Share Posted September 25, 2017 (edited) Haha, no worries. It's funny because some of the points you mentioned weren't really explained in the game either (like the eclipse and it starting to snow - I imagine they must've showed them in there to show that meddling with time can have some serious side effects, although unexplained). Some were just my fault for trying to cut it down while trying to make it somewhat reasonable and avoiding writing more exposition as to why certain things didn't happen (for example, the principal didn't call the authorities on Nathan because the rich dad card gets played) Edited September 25, 2017 by ChD 1 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ezen Baklattan Posted September 25, 2017 Share Posted September 25, 2017 lol it's positive now so I'll take it. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cookie Posted September 26, 2017 Author Share Posted September 26, 2017 (edited) The Damsel So the actor who played the superhero loses his shit and trashes the convention even injuring several people, and the only repercussion he gets is that he's fired from the show. No arrests, no indictments, no lawsuits, nothing. Does this movie take place in the same universe as Life is Strange? And why does this result in the damsel character being promoted to being the heroine? I mean I'm for more women lead roles in Hollywood and all, but you're telling me they didn't even try to recast the male lead? I somehow doubt that. C- Love at First Sight Four things I need to get out of the way: For a movie called "Love at First Sight" I didn't expect the movie open to the sound of a character getting beat up. Just saying. A typewriter in class? What year is this? You're worried about your kid getting a sunburn? In February? What? So because your mother is overprotective, you decide to move to the Netherlands. Again, what? This is a decent, if confusing romantic drama, mainly because the plot jumps over the place. Depicting an LGBT relationship - one of the partners being a blind person on top of that - with no tragic outcome for a change is commendable. Had I been able to understand what was going on half the time I would've given it a higher grade, but even with that said it's not too bad. C+ Project Classified Wait, if the alien can transfer itself wirelessly to any electronic device, how were they able to study it then? Did they just use pen and paper? And why is Director Connelly trying to starve her team to death to prevent the alien from escaping? You can't have somebody bring food and supplies every now and then. or did she think the alien was able to transmit itself through oranges too? Really, the whole setup is just bizarre. There's an interesting idea here, but it's kinda bogged down by a predictable plot and a forced bad guy with a stupid motivation. But hey at least it's not about satanic demons for a change. C The Whale This movie goes to show that Moby Dick does NOT work in a modern setting, at least not in the way it's done here. The movie doesn't really do anything with the fact that it's set in modern times. There's no commentary to be made, there's no acknowledgment of how whaling has changed since the days the book was published, not even any acknowledgement of the fact that people don't look so kindly on the practice anymore. It's like they copy-pasted the book and slapped on a modern setting and a found footage format (though most of the characters make it out alive so it's hardly "found footage") because that would make their version stand out or something. It's just kinda pointless. C Edited September 26, 2017 by cookie 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hiccup23 Posted September 26, 2017 Share Posted September 26, 2017 I have two more films left. Let's see if you butcher them like you butcher all my other films this year Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Xillix Posted September 26, 2017 Share Posted September 26, 2017 5 minutes ago, cookie said: Project Classified Wait, if the alien can transfer itself wirelessly to any electronic device, how were they able to study it then? Did they just use pen and paper? And why is Director Connelly trying to starve her team to death to prevent the alien from escaping? You can't have somebody bring food and supplies every now and then? Or did she think the alien was able to transmit itself through oranges too? Really, the whole setup is just bizarre. Not every electronic device has wireless capability or an internet connection. Nowhere in the description does it say the AI can transfer itself to "any electronic device." The entire reason it's a big deal that a smartphone gets in is because it DOES have wireless capability and a web connection. Obviously their lab equipment doesn't. And this is a top secret government facility underground where, again, no devices that allow outside communication are allowed. How exactly is she going to order food? Project Classified is a bad, dumb movie, and it's supposed to be, but your reviews seem to have a tendency to try and poke holes in everything and sometimes you kinda miss the point. Not an attack just a constructive criticism. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cookie Posted September 26, 2017 Author Share Posted September 26, 2017 2 minutes ago, Hiccup23 said: I have two more films left. Let's see if you butcher them like you butcher all my other films this year I didn't butcher Mara, Daughter of the Nile... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hiccup23 Posted September 26, 2017 Share Posted September 26, 2017 4 minutes ago, cookie said: I didn't butcher Mara, Daughter of the Nile... I know. I was just Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
