First Time Watches: September 2018
The ninth month of the year used to be my month to catch up
on blindspots. I would watch classic
films that people loved, yet I hadn’t seen.
It was a good month of great films that would broaden my horizon in
movies. I did that two years in a
row. Then I started school and that
whole idea fell into the rearview mirror.
Now September is all about just watching movies when I can because
school makes things busier and I know I’ll have less time to watch movies.
Throughout September, I was able to see thirteen movies for
the first time. They weren’t all
classics. Oh no. They were a variety of old and new. Mostly, they fell on the new side. And the genres were varied as well. There were martial arts movies, horror
movies, family movies, action movies, and there was even a paranoid thriller
tossed in there for good measure. It was
a month of variety, and one that I wouldn’t have changed for anything. Let’s get things started with a trilogy about
the man who trained Bruce Lee.
The first movie in the trilogy was a solid historical
martial arts drama, showcasing a few different styles and a heartfelt storyline
about how war can destroy lives outside of the battlefields. Civilians are as hurt by war as the people
who are fighting. Donnie Yen was great
as the martial arts master, performing every move and emotion with grace,
professionalism, and emotion. He was the
perfect person to play Ip Man. Though it
wasn’t my favourite of the trilogy, the first film was a great introduction to
the world and almost as good as the sequel.
I already sort of spoiled it, but Ip Man 2 was my
favourite of the series. It took the
groundwork that its predecessor had laid down and built on it. The background of the war destroying many
parts of China grew into something more.
The character moved from his hometown to Hong Kong and tried to earn
money through teaching Wing Chun. He had
to go against other martial arts masters to earn their respect, while clashing
with the British military who didn’t think martial arts were a real way of
fighting. Though the first movie might
have been more personal for Ip Man, the story of the sequel had a better
structure. Both were great films. The sequel was slightly better.
The trilogy closed out on a story about the triads and an
aspiring grandmaster intruding upon Ip Man’s life. The fights were some of the most inspired in
the series, but the story didn’t have the same emotional punch, even though
some of the material was far more impactful.
Ip Man’s wife was having health problems, there were parent and child relationship
problems, and Ip Man was reluctant in dealing with the aggressive new
master. It was still a solid movie worth
checking out. It just lacked the
engrossing storylines that the first two had.
The stakes felt smaller.
Snoop Dogg and Dr. Dre teamed up for this comedy about
working at a car wash. Because the two
worked together and seemed like friends in real life, the chemistry was there. The story wasn’t that great, mostly due to
the resolution. Snoop’s character got
Dre’s character the assistant manager job at the car wash and the power went to
his head. Their friendship crumbled. It got resolved thanks to a kidnapping
situation where the characters bonded through saving their boss. It felt like “the enemy of my enemy”
situation that dropped the fact that they were enemies once their mutual enemy
was stopped. The comedy was okay and the
movie ended up being alright. The resolution
just lacked any credibility because of the forgotten conflict between the
friends.
Part of what made the first movie great was that there were
two teams working against each other to be the superior homeowner. Their escalating prank war brought out the
laughs. That and the performances. The second movie felt slightly weaker as the
conflict was changed. In the first, the
parents wanted the simple goal of a calm place to raise a child. The sequel had a whole housing market
thing. It also had a side story where
Zac Efron’s character was trying to find his place in the world after his old
frat brothers were building their lives, which sometimes overtook the main
plot. Neighbors 2 was still funny
and entertaining, with a pretty great tailgating sequence, but the first was a simpler,
which worked better for the comedy.
Every time I mention this movie, I need to also mention that
this was the 1990s movie, not the MCU movie. It was not good. There were two main reasons why. First, nothing made sense. After looking into it for a bit, it seemed to
be a case of the studio thinking it was too long and forcing cuts that hurt the
story. Secondly, everything seemed
empty. There weren’t a lot of people in
the world. There was no real extra work. The city streets had no people on them. Roads only had the cars that the main
characters were in. There were no
workers for the bad guy outside of his main group of henchmen. These two things killed any good. Everything felt off, and not in a good way.
There were two comedies in 2018 that came out, weren’t seen
in theaters, and then got a new life on home video. Game Night was one. Blockers was the other. At its core, Blockers told a good
story that was an interesting spin on the modern comedy. A bunch of parents tried to stop their
daughters from losing their virginity while learning important lessons about
letting their daughters grow up. The
cast was excellent. My main issue with
it was that it went to raunchy heights that took away from the parent-child relationship
at its core. It’s not a classic, but
it’s alright.
I have a habit of recording movies that I plan on watching
then taking a very long time to get around to seeing any of them. They back up on my PVR. One day, I decided to finally check out this
true story that had been saved on the PVR for about a year. The cast was surprisingly good with Billy
Crudup as the man in charge of the experiment, and people such as Thomas Mann,
Ezra Miller, Tye Sheridan, and Michael Angarano playing the test subjects. The performances made a frightening story all
the more chilling, as you could feel the characters’ deteriorating minds. This one flew under the radar, but it’s an
exceptional telling of what has gone down as one of the worst psychological
experiments ever.
When HMV went out of business in Canada, I got some good
deals from the store. I ended up
grabbing some Criterion Blu-rays for cheap compared to what they normally
cost. One of them was the original
version of The Manchurian Candidate starring Frank Sinatra. I hadn’t seen it before. After a false start one time during the
summer, I finally got around to watching it.
I was blown away. It was one of
the best Cold War thrillers I have ever seen.
Frank Sinatra was at his best, acting wise, in the movie. He believably played the soldier returned
from war only to find out that the war had followed him home in his mind. And the minds of others. It kept up the surprises, twists, and turns
until the final moments.
The first John Wick movie was one that I never had too much
love for. People put so much hype around
it. Some of that was deserved. The action in the first film was pretty
great. The look of it didn’t do much for
me, taking away from my enjoyment. The
sequel changed that. Things looked
better. The world was bigger. The characters felt like they had much more
history. Don’t get me wrong here. The first still had background to the
characters. Opening up the world just
felt like it added more, and I liked the world that was opened into. The action was great. All around, I liked it more than the first.
Shane Black came back to the franchise for the fourth or
sixth installment or whatever, after being in the first Predator and
doing uncredited rewrites on it. His
standard style of action comedy came through in many of the characters, mostly
the ragtag crew that the main character met on the bus. The action was solid, the story was okay, the
performances were pretty good. The
ending, though… That last scene really didn’t fit. It felt out of place not only in the movie,
but in the franchise. I liked The Predator
more than most.
Dan Hall is a director whose work I visit once in a while,
always for the sake of my Sunday “Bad” Movies blog. Every movie I’ve seen of his has been a kid’s
movie. In this one, some siblings came
up with an internet scheme to make money.
It ended up getting them on the radar of criminals, and it was up to one
police officer to help them out. It was
made with a low budget technical quality, but there’s something about it that
made it a little more than Hall’s previous two efforts. The story was stronger. The direction was stronger. There were still some questionably bad
moments, but all around, this one was alright.
This had two things that I really enjoy, most of the
time. The director was Brian Taylor of
the Neveldine/Taylor pairing. The other
ingredient was actor Nicolas Cage. Sure,
they’d been together before in the underwhelming Ghost Rider: Spirit of
Vengeance. But this time was
different. They were each allowed to
play into the eccentricities that made them as entertaining as they were. The Ghost Rider sequel put restraints
on them that weren’t apparent here. The
whole movie was insanity. Parents were
killing their children for no discernable reason that mattered. Nicolas Cage was going full Cage rage as he
destroyed his family and a pool table.
It wasn’t the highest form of entertainment, but it was all out lunacy
that had some highlight moments for everyone involved.
And with that, September came to a close. Thirteen first time watches in the
records. It was a mostly good month with
many more enjoyable movies than duds. If
every month could be like this, I’d have a lot of solid movie-watching months. And that’s not even including the rewatches I
do, which are usually movies I know I like.
October was a little less than September. In fact, there were about half as many first-time
watches because I was going through my usual horror binge of stuff I know and
love. I did end up going to the theater
to see Bad Times at the El Royale and the new Halloween, so those
will come up in the next post. It’ll end
up being a shorter one, though, because there were fewer movies. We’ll see how it goes when this series comes
back.
Before you go, let’s get some plugs out of the way. I write about bad movies over at the Sunday “Bad” Movies blog. I also write about Mighty Morphin Power Rangers on this blog.
Those posts have been picking up a little bit lately. You can find me on Twitter here and
here. You can find me on Instagram here
and here. I’d also suggest you check out
my bud, Jaime Burchardt, on Twitter. He
sometimes writes some things. Other than
that, he’s just a great guy. And
finally, there’s Talk Film Society. I
wrote something there one time and they put it up. They also put up a post about their Top 10 Pixar movies. Check that out
sometime. Maybe now, maybe later. Either way, I’ll see you soon with another
post. Bye!
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