Loved

The Light Between Oceans

“A lighthouse keeper and his wife living off the coast of Western Australia raise a baby they rescue from a drifting rowing boat.” IMDB

Prepare the kleenex, you will need them. Oh, what a magical yet deeply heart breaking story with a great cast many of whom you will recognise if you are Australian.

I did not realise going into it that this had people like Garry McDonald and Bryan Brown in it, though that is probably the reason it went onto my “movies I want to see” list. By the time I got to watch it I had forgotten who was in it. What a great surprise for me when the credits were playing at the start, to see those names appear. I am a huge Garry McDonald fan. Had I remembered, I would have watched this movie a lot sooner.

Also Jack Thompson was there as a crusty Aussie seaman, a role I believe he was born to play and should have played a lot more often instead of butchering the American accent as he has been known to do on occasion AKA that time he played the chairman of the joint chiefs of staff in Broken Arrow.

The entire cast was fantastic. Michael Fassbender and Alicia Vikander were especially amazing in this movie, as was Rachel Weisz. I might quietly be turning into a fan of the Fassbender. I also enjoyed Anthony Hayes who has been building up a repertoire of great roles over the years and every role I have seen him in I have enjoyed his performace, particularly memorable was the detective in Animal Kingdom.

I only disliked one thing about this movie and that was a couple of moments of lens flare – a thing that happens when you point a camera at the sun – which broke into the feeling that this was a real story and we were somehow magically taken back in time to the 1920s and suspended in space watching these people live their lives.

I do not mind lens flare on most occasions, in fact there are some times I truly love it, but a movie set in the 1920s before the modern world was a thing is not a good place for it in my opinion. Also pointing the camera at the sun makes it really hard for your audience to look at that shot. :) As you can see from that screenshot I took, my apologies but I wanted to be able to show you what I was talking about. You see the green stripe across the back of the actor there? That is lens flare.

This was not an easy movie to watch at times. It felt incredibly real. At all times minus the few lens flare moments it was beautifully done and the landscapes were haunting.

I would NOT recommend it to anyone who has experienced the loss of a child because this movie explores that subject quite thoroughly from several different angles and it was distressing to me who has not gone through that, I imagine it would be even more so to those who have.

Liked

To Walk Invisible: The Brontë Sisters

“A chronicle of the Brontë sisters’ battle to overcome obstacles and publish their novels, which would become some of the greatest in the English language.” IMDB

A couple of minutes into this movie, I very nearly decided to stop watching it. My hand was on the stop button on the remote. The beginning was very, very weird with what seemed to be a supernatural element, fiery halos above some children. I was thinking, what the heck is this?

Then it looked like it was going to turn into a normal movie with normal characters and I decided to keep watching it, only moments later to have another flashback with the same children who I now recognised as the main characters and they were DEEPLY annoying, screaming and yelling. I was just about to turn it off and say this movie is not for me when it went back to the adult characters and stayed there for a long while, and turned into a movie I really enjoyed. I am very glad I did not turn it off now.

One of my favourite books of all time is The Tenant Of Wildfell Hall. I am not such a fan of the other Brontë books to be honest, I am more a Jane Austen fan. Watching this movie and finding out about their brother Branwell now I completely understand why my favourite book was written.

Branwell had an alcohol and drug problem and all three sisters had to watch his decline via this disease and his eventual death with tuberculosis, which unfortunately took two of the other sisters within 6 months of his death, well before their time. It also robbed all of us of their further literary works.

I did not love the ending of this movie either, for unknown reasons it suddenly switched to present day and took us on a somewhat terrifying whirlwind tour of the museum made from the rectory, in particular the gift shop seemed to get quite a visit from a steadicam operator. BYO motion sickness tablets..

But the part in between was excellent and the costumes and locations were quite good also. You may realise by now that I am a great fan of movies that are set in the past especially anything English and from the Victorian times.

I would recommend it if you are a fan of this kind of movie. Just grit your teeth through the first 5 minutes or so, and you can stop the movie once you get to modern times if you like, nothing happens other than taking a nauseating spin through the museum and gift shop and then one final shot of the three sisters out on the moors.

Disliked

The 9th Life of Louis Drax

“A psychologist who begins working with a young boy who has suffered a near-fatal fall finds himself drawn into a mystery that tests the boundaries of fantasy and reality.” IMDB

Aaron Paul and Jamie Dornan together in a movie? Sign me up, I’m totally on board. Somewhat unfortunately, the two never appear together on screen at the same time in this one. This movie was not what I expected and I would not really recommend it to anyone else.

The ending of the movie and a moment of incredible acting on the part of Aaron Paul redeemed it somewhat magically in my eyes. Even so, it is not a movie I would watch again and I think that puts it on the disliked list for me. Which is bizarre seeing how much I love these two actors.

I was not a fan of the story at all, especially the cruelty to hamsters element. Had that happened earlier in the movie I might have switched it off. I really did not like Louis Drax as a character to begin with but when he began to explain his views on owning a pet, I actively started hating him which was troubling to me, as he was a child. I did enjoy Oliver Platt, but I have enjoyed him in so many things, the most favourite being Oliver Babish in The West Wing.

I think this movie proves that you need more than just great actors – the story overall needs to be something people can relate to. This movie had too much fantasy and at times it skewed to the supernatural or science fiction which I do not always enjoy unless it is done very well.. This was not.

I’ve mentioned before that I do not dislike a lot of movies and I was very surprised to find I disliked this one.

Something different this week – here are 3 movies I loved. The more movies I watch, the more I notice they tend to fall into the loved or liked category. Is that good choosing on my part, or on the part of my most favourite actors?

Queen Of Katwe

“A Ugandan girl sees her world rapidly change after being introduced to the game of chess.” IMDB

I know absolutely nothing about chess. I do not understand the game and I have never taken the time to learn about it. There just always seemed to be other things to do. This is a movie about a girl who becomes a chess champion. So I was quite worried going into this that I would not understand what was going on for much of the time. I should not have worried.

This was truly one of the most beautiful movies I have ever seen and I do not mean that in a way like a feast for the eyes, tricky camera angles or amazing photography though there was some great shots in here and I loved the use of colourful costumes and landscapes. I mean beautiful in the story it tells and the people it tells us about. The entire cast is wonderful. David Olewayo and Lupita N’yongo lead a cast of actors who are new to acting but certainly incredibly good at it.

I am a HUGE Lupita fan but my love for her began thanks to her amazing choices fashion wise. Some stars just take the red carpet more seriously than other stars do and Lupita became a fashion icon for me a few years ago when she was nominated for an Oscar for her incredible performance in 12 Years A Slave. She did win it and quite rightly so.

I loved this movie so much, but I particularly loved the ending and then the gorgeous part where they put the actor next to the real person. I cried happy tears, it was so wonderful.

The Girl On The Train

“A divorcee becomes entangled in a missing persons investigation that promises to send shockwaves throughout her life.” IMDB

Wow, this movie got some terrible reviews and I am not quite sure why. Maybe because I came into this knowing absolutely nothing about it, I had not read the book, and I had no expectations at all other than knowing I usually enjoy movies with Emily Blunt in them.

I was pleasantly surprised to see Rebecca Ferguson in this movie, I loved her in The White Queen mini series. Alison Janney snuck in here as a surprise to me as well. I actually really enjoyed this movie. And at one point I looked up at the clock and it was 8:30pm, the next minute I looked up to see an hour had gone by and I had not even noticed it, so entranced and enthralled was I in this story.

I am not going to tell you anything about it at all. My hope is you know as little as I did if and when you see this.

Black Mass

“The true story of Whitey Bulger, the brother of a state senator and the most infamous violent criminal in the history of South Boston.” IMDB

So the thing with Johnny Depp movies is – it will either be one of two things. Incredibly brilliant, or deeply Not Great. In this instance he is ably supported with a great cast including Jesse Plemons, Joel Edgerton, Dakota Johnson, Benedict Cumberbatch and Kevin Bacon. And that is a good thing, because I found Johnny Depp incredibly creepy in this role. The blue eye contacts certainly made him look different.

I have loved Jesse Plemons ever since his epic role as Todd in the final season of Breaking Bad. I was very pleased to see him in this movie – when I sat down to watch it the only cast member I knew about was Johnny Depp. Sometimes that is the best way to watch a movie – completely cold with no idea who is in it. Jesse is very Matt-Damon-Esque in this role, though there is not *quite* enough of him for me.

I was amazed at how you could see almost every single pore and wrinkle on the face of the actors in this movie. The focus was SO deadly sharp! I am afraid my screenshots have not done any justice to the levels of focus in this film.

There was one scene which had one of the best shots of people talking in a car that I have seen in a movie, ever. And we have seen that shot a lot of times, haven’t we?

This film did an amazing job of taking great actors and making them super creepy. In particular Joel Edgerton. Whitey killed quite a few people so there are a few murders in the movie. Realistically though they could easily have made this movie without including any of that. There was more than enough story here to fill two movies let alone one.

I loved this more for the sheer quality of the acting and the technical aspects – that sharp focus and what it could do for the film drew me in. If you are a fan of any of the actors involved you might enjoy this as much as I did, otherwise you might want to give it a miss, especially if you do not want to see violent scenes. Well, I don’t want to see them either but I understand their role and purpose, so I tolerate them when they appear.

Loved

The Founder

“The story of Ray Kroc, a salesman who turned two brothers’ innovative fast food eatery, McDonald’s, into one of the biggest restaurant businesses in the world with a combination of ambition, persistence, and ruthlessness.” IMDB

I absolutely loved this movie even though it is basically the story of how Ray Kroc stole pretty much everything from the *actual* founders of Mcdonalds. It was incredibly well done, the script was engaging and it grabbed me right from the start. In the latter half of the film, though, at the exact same time as I was loving it, I was so angry about the story it was telling me so beautifully.

This is probably the best role I have ever seen Michael Keaton perform, and he does it incredibly well. The entire cast is fantastic but especially the Mcdonald Brothers, played by Nick Offerman and John Carroll Lynch.

My favourite part of the movie is when the Mcdonald brothers were telling their story of how they came up with the “speedee” system. I don’t normally put clips from the movies up here but this one was so brilliant I am going to share it.

I almost feel like the Mcdonald brothers could have been a great movie just on their own. I deeply loved those guys and I wanted to spend more time with them. It felt a bit like Mike Ehrmanraut from Breaking Bad – I just want to watch that guy do anything, for hours on end. And in Better Call Saul they are indulging me – I got to watch Mike take a car to pieces last week, it was everything I dreamed it could be.

The phone calls back and forth between Kroc and the Mcdonald brothers were pure gold. It is very hard to make that kind of stuff play on screen as well as it did.

Nice guys finish last of course, and that is exactly what ended up happening to the Mcdonald brothers. But even though you know from the get-go that this will be the eventual outcome, you spend the movie wishing it would turn out differently for them – and that Kroc would get what he deserves, which was NOT a massive fast food and real estate empire.

I do recommend this movie. You will love it yet hate it but there is no doubt you will enjoy every minute of it, especially the precious minutes you will get to spend with the Mcdonald brothers.

Liked

The Invisible Woman

“At the height of his career, Charles Dickens meets a younger woman who becomes his secret lover until his death.” IMDB

I was torn about whether I liked or loved this. 91% of it was loved- the costumes, the locations, the acting, all of this was brilliant. I did not like how it was told in flashback, it made the story quite confusing to me and especially how it ended quite abruptly and never really explained what happened to Charles Dickens or their relationship.

As with so many movies now, I had to go and do some research afterwards to know more. And rightly so, how do you condense a 13 year affair into a movie? This is a story which might have been better told in miniseries form.

This is a movie I would need to watch several more times to decide how I feel about it, so for now it sits squarely in the liked column. I will watch it again just because the costumes were so great.

Disliked

It’s Complicated

“When attending their son’s college graduation, a couple reignite the spark in their relationship. But the complicated fact is they’re divorced and he’s remarried.” IMDB

I never thought I would hate a movie with a cast as great as this, but BOY did I hate this. Meryl Streep, Alec Baldwin, Steve Martin, this should be a winner. It was most definitely not. I spent much of the movie cringing and debating whether I should stop watching this. Deeply terrible. Why did I keep watching this for an hour? WHHHHHYYYYYYYY? For the sake of completion? Because I wanted to know what happened to the characters?

Thankfully, I did switch it off at 1 hour 7 minutes, and I deleted it from the hard drive soon afterwards so I could not be tempted to watch the rest of it. The movie did run for another hour and I am glad I did not waste that time watching it.

When I checked it on IMDB I was unsurprised to find it was written by the same person who wrote The Intern. So now I have a writer to avoid permanently. One stinker is bad, two and you are OUT.

Loved

The Infiltrator

“A U.S. Customs official uncovers a money laundering scheme involving Pablo Escobar.” (IMDB)

Bryan Cranston is one of my favorite actors of all time. Team him up with John Leguizamo who is yet another favourite and chances were this was going to be a winner even if the script is terrible.. but it wasn’t terrible. It was great. I loved everything about it. It felt slightly like a bit more upmarket version of Donnie Brasco.

The costumes, the lighting, the amazing homes on occasion contrasted with the reality of the lives of those undercover. Underneath it all there was this great tension, like at any minute everything could go very wrong indeed, and now and then things did go very wrong.

This movie did receive some mixed reviews elsewhere. Diane Kruger was impossibly gorgeous, Benjamin Bratt appears in a very silver foxy role – and silver suits him – Juliet Aubrey was great as the long suffering wife of an undercover agent and Olympia Dukakis has a small but effortlessly fabulous part especially delightful for those of us who have loved her since the mid 80’s.

I do feel the need to read the book this was based on now.

Liked

Life

“A photographer for Life Magazine is assigned to shoot pictures of James Dean.” (IMDB)

Dane DeHaan and Robert Pattinson together on screen. I should have been literally glued to my chair, laptop lid closed, watching this. I’ve been fans of both of these guys for years now. Sadly the movie did not grab me. I found the runaround that James Dean gave Dennis Stock far too annoying. In fact the way he treated everyone deeply irritated me.

I think the truth is, Dane was doing way too good a job here of almost inhabiting the skin of James Dean and I just did not like that guy. It probably does not help that I know almost nothing about him and have never seen any of his movies. I am sure if you are a James Dean fan perhaps you would have enjoyed this movie far more than I did.

The one time this movie did grab me was when James went to a dance at his old high school. On that occasion he was charming and lovely to the people there. If this movie had been about that guy I saw in that moment, I probably would have loved this. But by all accounts, that is not who James Dean was at all.

Robert Pattinson has a habit of choosing not great projects. I sat through a couple of really deeply terrible movies just because he was in them. I mean, hello, The Rover. This one was ok and he was ok in it. But not ok enough to keep my laptop closed for the entire movie.

The costumes were pretty great, as were the locations. In general this movie was very well done. It is just a shame the person it was all about was so annoying.

Disliked

Patriots Day

“The story of the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing and the aftermath, which includes the city-wide manhunt to find the terrorists responsible.” IMDB

Obviously as this is based on a real event where people were injured and killed, his movie is NOT for anyone who can’t deal with gory images. I understand they are kinda sorta telling the story of what happened but I think they could have gone a little lighter on showing the injuries.

Also I think if you are going to put an actor as well known as John Goodman into heavy makeup and dark eyebrows to resemble someone else, that is a Not Great idea. Every time I heard his voice I was freaked out by what he looked like. It also has Kevin Bacon which is never a bad thing.

Mark Wahlberg is pretty incredible in his role, but I am a fan of his. If you don’t like him you are probably not going to enjoy this movie, because his character is central to everything that happened – and it is a completely fictional character. There was no one police officer involved in almost every aspect of the bombing and aftermath. There were many wonderful people who did not have their part of the story told here.

That is where the film falls down for me – it is impossible to suspend my disbelief. I would have preferred a version with the “real” police officers played by actors, but then it would not have been so Wahlberg-esque. This is an important story and I feel it would have been better to stick to facts not make up a convenient character for “movie” reasons.

I was quite horrified at what they did with the “interrogation” of the wife, especially holding up a printed out photo of her dead husband which I do suspect may have been the real image, I never saw it myself though so I can’t be certain. That was unexpected and quite gory and unnecessary.

On the plus side, I did think J.K. Simmons was amazing as Sergeant Jeffrey Pugliese especially in the Watertown shootout scenes. Alex Wolff as Dzhokhar Tsarnaev and Themo Melikidze as Tamerlan Tsarnaev did some amazing work in tough roles as the terrorist brothers. Jimmy O. Yang was incredible as Dun Meng and that particular aspect of the story is one many are unaware of.

Would I recommend it as a movie to watch? That is such a difficult question. Probably not and that is a shame. This was a missed opportunity to tell the real story of what happened, not some half-real half-fake version.

All of these movies are older movies from 2015 and 2016. They would now be available on DVD as well as via various movie streaming services. 

Loved

The Siege of Jadotville

“Irish Commandant Pat Quinlan leads a stand off with troops against French and Belgian Mercenaries in the Congo during the early 1960s.” IMDB

Unknown to a lot of the world, Jamie Dornan is in fact an excellent actor. If you’d seen any of the Fifty Shades shiznit you could be forgiven for thinking otherwise. If you’d seen The Fall, the Irish series in which Jamie plays a serial killer you would know how excellent he is. If they give him some good material and allow him to use his Irish accent the results are sure to be fantastic.

There is a quite a bit of swearing in this movie. It is understandable given the situation the characters are placed in. I felt a bit like swearing just watching it. I did not know anything about this historical event and this is exactly the reason why movies like this are made.

The rest of the cast truly stepped up to the plate, in particular Conor MacNeill and Sam Keeley were stand outs. It was so wonderful that they could include the grandson of Pat Quinlan in the cast.

What an incredible – and surprisingly uplifting – story – none of which I will spoil for you – and it is told extremely well. I think this might be one of the best movies I am likely to see this year. We will see!

Death Comes To Pemberley

“Elizabeth and Darcy, now six years married, are preparing for their annual ball when festivities are brought to an abrupt halt. “ IMDB

Technically this is a 3 part mini-series, not a movie. This was made in 2013. I saw it back then and loved it but a recent read of the book inspired a rewatch.

Some members of the cast who were unknown to me on first viewing have gone on to significant careers – in particular Matthew Rhys appeared in The Americans, Matthew Goode appeared in decent roles in The Good Wife and Downton Abbey just after making this, Jenna Coleman has gone on to a huge starring role in Victoria, Eleanor Tomlinson went on to a fantastic role in Poldark and James Norton next appeared in War and Peace and Happy Valley.

Essentially this little mini series packs a huge punch not just in star power but also in excellence overall – the production quality is incredibly high, the locations are gorgeous, the costumes are very well done. It is everything great about British television in one beautiful package and I highly recommend you find it and watch it. While Colin Firth will always be my favourite Mr Darcy, I think Matthew Rhys did an excellent job here, and his sideburns were very impressive indeed.

Liked

Z for Zachariah

“In the wake of a disaster that wipes out most of civilization, two men and a young woman find themselves in an emotionally charged love triangle as the last known survivors.” IMDB

I loved this book growing up, it is one that I borrowed many times from the library but I never owned it. It has been a long time since I read the book. I enjoyed this movie because Chiwetel Ejiofor is an incredible actor – I have loved him since Kinky Boots. Margot Robbie was great.

But then The Eyebrows AKA Chris Pine showed up. I’d forgotten he was in the movie. This took the movie from loved to liked for me. Your mileage may vary. Maybe you like The Eyebrows. :)

The Whole Truth

“A defense attorney works to get his teenage client acquitted of murdering his wealthy father.” IMDB

This is a courtroom drama with Keanu Reeves and Renee Zellweger. It should have been excellent. The whole truth is, the storylines were terrible. I get the concept the writer was going for, to try and have all these possible truths and only one whole truth, but one of the possible truths they went with was just plain cringeworthy to say the least.

The idea of having the person on trial flat out refusing to speak to their lawyer or anyone else at all felt quite ridiculous. If you are a fan of Keanu or Renee, you may enjoy this even despite the bad storylines. Even though I enjoyed their performances enough to put this film in the liked category, I would not recommend this film to anyone else.

Disliked

Fifty Shades Darker

“While Christian wrestles with his inner demons, Anastasia must confront the anger and envy of the women who came before her.” IMDB

I liked the first movie and I am a big fan of both Jamie Dornan and Dakota Johnson but boy did the director really screw this up. Or maybe it is all the fault of E L James herself. Maybe the only reason the first movie was semi-good was because the director worked and fought hard to get her own vision on the screen and not the vision of the book author.

Though why the vision of any author or any director would have Anastasia running around in her underwear and yet Christian wears track pants in the gym.. that will forever remain a mystery. I have never seen a man have so much sex with his clothes on as Christian Grey does.

I’ll watch the last one but only because I like completion and I like the two main stars. It was the same director for the final two movies and they were filmed all at once so I expect Freed to be just as dismal.

The Intern

“70-year-old widower Ben Whittaker has discovered that retirement isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. Seizing an opportunity to get back in the game, he becomes a senior intern at an online fashion site, founded and run by Jules Ostin.” IMDB

I thought this was going to be great but wow, what a waste of a great cast. I would have said you can’t really take Anne Hathaway and Robert De Niro and create a stinker of a movie but boy they sure accomplished that. This was bad. Very very bad. If you are looking for a great “workplace” movie, my suggestion is Morning Glory, track that down and give this one a big miss.