Here we go.

I did not hate Batman v. Superman on first viewing, but it was one of those movies that, as I thought back, got worse and worse.  Man of Steel was the same way.  I gave it an overall positive review, but the more I thought about what I had seen, the less I liked it.

I am a huge fan of Marvel.  I always have been.  I will not apologize for that.  I do like the DC characters, and I really was hoping that Suicide Squad would be that film that broke the DC Extended Cinematic Universe’s streak of weaker films.

Then I started hearing about some of the reviews.  At this minute, Suicide Squad is at 29% on Rotten Tomatoes.  Chris Stuckmann gave it a C.  The Schmoes neither had it at fresh.  Suddenly, I was frightened.

Then I saw the movie and you know what… it was pretty good.  I would go out on a limb and say that, in my opinion, it is definitely the best of the recent DC movie universe films.

Amanda Waller (Viola Davis), determined to provide a defense to the metahuman problem, decides to put together a team of the worst of the worst villains to face anything that might be a greater threat to the nation. She put together villains Deadshot (Will Smith), Harley Quinn (Margot Robbie), Killer Croc (Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje),  Diablo (Jay Hernandez), and Captain Boomerang (Jai Courntey) with soldier Rick Flag (Joel Kinnaman) and Japanese swords fighter Katana (Karen Fukuhara).

The team of villains were forced together by Waller with the threat of death, after a bomb was implanted into the villains’ heads.  She sent them after the witch Enchantress (Cara Delevingne), who was trying to take over the world by bringing her brother into the world and creating some weapon.

Positives:  There are several of these.  Will Smith was outstanding as Deadshot.  Deadshot was the most developed of all of the characters, showing a very wonderful relationship with his daughter.  He was funny and well written.

Margot Robbie was perfect as Harley Quinn.  Her relationship with the Joker (Jared Leto) was displayed beautifully.  These two crazy characters really showed themselves as a perfect pair.  Jared Leto’s Joker was a very interesting take on the character.  I was never a fan of the tattoos or grills at first, but they all seemed to work here.

The Squad itself worked very good together.  The charisma shown by the members of the group were great.  In particular, I liked the relationship that developed between Deadshot and Harley Quinn.  I liked how the movie introduced these characters and brought them to the screen.  There was a lot of music used to introduce many of these villains, and I liked most of that.  They may have over used the music a little, but they picked some really good songs, so that was good.

Viola Davis was unbelievable as the downright cold and vicious Amanda Waller.  She was as bad as any of the villains of the Suicide Squad.  Joel Kinnaman was good as Flag, Jai Courtney was surprisingly solid as Boomerang.  Jay Hernandez was okay as Diablo.

The first hour or so was very entertaining.  There was a nice tone for Suicide Squad.  It was still the darker tone much like previous DC movies, but it was able to sprinkle in more humor and fun to the film, something that was dramatically missing from Batman v. Superman.  This film showed that you did not have to constantly making jokes or being light-hearted to make an entertaining film.  It was also not constantly grim and depressing as the other DC movies.

Negatives:  For those who gave this movie a negative review, I can understand why, because it is anything but a perfect movie.  There are several problems with it.

There was just not enough Joker.  Despite being featured heavily in the promotional materials, Jared Leto’s Joker does not appear very often.  This would have been a much better movie had the Joker played a bigger role.

The villain of The Enchantress was horrible.  Her “brother” was worse.  These were probably two of the absolutely worst villains in any comic book movie.  There was no motivation for the characters outside of being evil.  Then, the look of these characters was horrendous.  The Enchantress did all kind of weird movements (like she was constantly doing the hula) and her brother made me think about the Green Lantern movie.  Plus, the expendable monsters they created as canon fodder for the Suicide Squad to kill looked ridiculous.

As good as the start of this movie was, the third act battle was just as bad.  Honestly, this third act really threatened to pull the entire film off the track (and I am sure many of the negative reviews out there were negative because of the last battle scene).  The story leading up to this was a mess, but at least the characters were entertaining and we had solid character moments.  The last fight was very much laughable in many ways.  These great characters that we had been introduced to deserved a better conclusion to their movie.

Killer Croc, especially, but also, to a lesser extend Boomerang and Katana, didn’t have much to do.  They were here to fill out the team and that was about it.  Killer Croc was basically there to grunt or to do something with his strength.

I can see how the finale could ruin this movie for some people, but it did not mess it up for me. I was able to enjoy most of this movie despite the weak ending.  I found myself leaving the theater happy that I saw it.  The miscredits scene was really great and a much better way to introduce some information than we saw in BvS.  Deadshot and Harley Quinn stole the show and I really wanted more Joker.

3.5 stars

I did not see the original Jason Bourne movies.  I saw the Bourne Legacy with Jeremy Renner and it was okay.  So I did not have any real feelings about Matt Damon returning to this role.  I was coming in to this as a newbie.

Honestly, I didn’t hate it, but I was not a fan either.

Jason Bourne (Matt Damon) comes back after going underground to find answers about the death of his father and how he was recruited into the government program.  CIA Agent Heather Lee (Alicia Vikander) was part of the investigation, led by CIA Director Robert Dewey (Tommy Lee Jones).  Dewey sent the unnamed Asset (Vincent Cassel) after Bourne.  Action happens.

The action was fine, but there was nothing exceptional about the action and I was so tired of the shaky cam shots that permeated the movie.  Now, I hear that the earlier Bourne movies had employed this technique and maybe for some it wouldn’t have felt like a Bourne movie without it, but I feel like that is a cop-out.  I couldn’t tell what was happening a lot of the time.  How am I supposed to enjoy action if I cannot tell what is happening?  This shaky cam stuff is just not fun to watch.

Matt Damon does a good job in the role.  It is clear that he feels comfortable as Jason Bourne and his performance is one of the stronger aspects of the film.  I also enjoyed the performance of Vikander.  She is a star.  My favorite character in the film is Tommy Lee Jones’s CIA Director Robert Dewey, who plays Tommy Lee Jones.  Jones is always fun to watch.

The story had no surprises and the “twists” in the film were painfully obvious.  I found several sections of the Jason Bourne movie kind of dull.

They even had a different angle of the great shot from the trailer of Bourne knocking the fighter out with one punch.  The shot that was actually in the film was so much less impressive than what was in the trailer.  I don’t understand why someone didn’t use the original shot from the trailer cause it was so much better.

I am not a fan of the Bourne movies, but I didn’t have to be to watch this movie.  I just think the film could have been so much better than what it was.

2.8 stars

This looked like just another bad behavior movie that would be like all of the others.  They are never funny.

And yet Bad Mom was better than I thought.

Amy Mitchell (Mila Kunis) is a mom who has so many things to do.  Working at a coffee company, running her children around, PTA and bake sales, and handling the sudden vertigo of the family dog, Amy reached her breaking point.  Then she finds her husband online cheating on her, she kicks him out and heads out to the bar,  She meets up with two other moms, Kiki (Kristen Bell) and Carla (Kathryn Hahn), and they decide that they would now become bad moms.

After becoming bad moms, Amy found things starting to improve.  However, she was still having troubles with the bully PTA president Gwendolyn (Christina Applegate).

Now, Bad Moms is definitely a predictable film, but the three main actresses are funny and have a great chemistry together.  Kristen Bell was my favorite of the three because of how uncommon her character was.  These performances really helped keep this from becoming just another bad behavior comedy.

There was a good message shown in this film as well.  The importance of family, friends, breaking the role of women, and what is important in life is focused on and the film actually does a really good job of it.

Christina Applegate’s movie was a terrible stereotype, until the very end.  That character really has an interesting change at the end. I wish I had more of that throughout the film because I might have found her as more than the just simple bad guy character that you see in all of these films.

In the end, Bad Moms entertained me more than I thought it would.  I thought the actresses were great and the film was funny.  Emjay Anthony was Amy’s son and he is always good.  (I still want him to be the Sam Alexander-Nova in the Marvel Cinematic Universe.  He would be so perfect.)  Yes, it was predictable, but that did not take away from the enjoyment I had.

3.3 stars

An internet based game that can cause people to become crazy and obsessive?  Come on… how can I believe that?

Okay, perhaps the sarcasm is a bit too strong because clearly, the concept behind the new movie called Nerve is not that far of a stretch.  The fact that this could happen is a plus in this film’s column.  However, those cell phone batteries in the movie that never seemed to fail… wow, those batteries were way better than mine.

Shy wallflower Vee (Emma Roberts) finds herself trying to bust out of the shadow of her best friend Sydney (Emily Meade) and so she signs up to the new online game sensation, Nerve, where people sign up as your followers and offer you dares that can earn you cash.  Youhave to complete these dares by filming yourself on your phone and putting them on the Nerve website.  Vee meets up with another player Ian (Dave Franco) and the two of them take on the game.

I found a lot of this movie charming.  I did like the relationship at the start that developed between Vee and Ian.  I was very taken with the lovely Emma Roberts, who was beautiful and carried this film well.  Vee started to come out of her shell as she playfully accepted each increasingly more challenging dares.  These dares would become more and more dangerous as the night moved along.

I also liked the secondary characters here, as they really reflected the world of social media taken to the nth degree.  I was interested in how the relationship between Vee and Sydney was disintegrating the more Vee became her own person.  There was also a relationship with Vee and her friend Tommy (Miles Heizer) that I would have liked more of.

The film, though, really started to weaken as it reached its climax.  In fact, the entire third act falls apart.  Suddenly, there was dark forces behind the game.  Ian had a mysterious past and was in the game for a more dastardly reason (even though we hadn’t seen any of this before) and the hackers, who we hadn’t seen much of anything prior, become a big time deus ex machina.

And the conclusion to the film was downright ridiculous.

There was a “Purge” feel to this film, as we never learned anything about where this game came from, who these mysterious forces behind the game were or why they were so focused on creating this game.  With the villains undefined, when this became a big struggle against the game, things started to not make sense.

The “snitches get stitches” line is just childlike.

Then, the film tried to make a statement about how people can be such horrible people by hiding behind screen names, looking at the community of online line, such as Twitter and message boards.  That felt very forced as well.  The implication was there throughout Nerve.  It did not need to beat us over the head.  It could have been more subtle of a message.

This really felt like a dual film.  One part I enjoyed quite a bit.  I felt entertained for awhile.  The third act really found the movie lacking.  So I was not sure what I was going to do for a score.  I feel as if the film is somewhere between a 2.8- 3.2.  So I will go right in the middle.

3 stars

The Killing Joke is one of the greatest graphic novels of all time.  Perhaps my favorite Batman story, and, certainly, my favorite Joker story of all time.  It was brutal and vicious and very psychological.  Of course, when I heard that the book was being adapted into an animated movie by DC and that it was going to be rated R, I was very excited.

And even more exciting was that Fathom Events would be hosting the movie on the big screen in select movie theaters for one night only.  Well, that eventually became two nights only (as they added July 26th to the original July 25th date) but I knew that I wanted to see this on the big screen.  The DC animated movies have always been extremely well done, and I was sure that The Killing Joke would be no exception.

After seeing it, I would say for sure that it was no exception, but it was not quite as brilliant as I thought it might be.

Here was the thing.  The movie added about 30 minutes of story to the graphic novel.  I understand that fully.  There was no way that the graphic novel’s original story could be adapted for a run time around 90 minutes. As it turned out, with the new material, the film ran for 76 minutes.  And, the only other option was really changing the story around and just barely being recognized as The Killing Joke.

Marvel Studios do this very well.  Captain America: Civil War doe snot resemble the comic series at all.  Basically the theme or overall concept is similar while what the movie does is very different.  That works for Marvel Studios.  However, it would have been disappointing for the animated version of the Killing Joke to follow suit.  The animated version of The Dark Knight Returns was remarkably adapted.

Because of that, DC had to add content to the story.  They chose to spend those thirty minutes or so focusing on Batgirl (Tara Strong).  That was an interesting choice, since Batgirl really is a peripheral character in the Killing Joke.  She was important, but only for motivation.  And there is actually less of that here.

That first 30 minutes feels long, and not vital to what was going to happen.  The whole story arc of Batgirl and the villain Paris (Maury Sterling) was just too tacked on.  The controversial sex scene did not seem to push forward the story either.  If that first section was its own animated episode, it would be fine, but here, it just felt superfluous.

However, once Batman went to see Joker at Arkham Asylum, only to discover that this was not the actual Joker, the story really picked up,  Of course, this was where they started to make a much more faithful adaptation of the comic.

The back story of the Joker is heartbreaking and tragic.  You can almost feel sorry for him, despite the maniacal murderer that he developed into.  This is one of the most epic confrontations between these two characters who are opposites of each other, and the story is such a tale of strength and of the human spirit.

The ending is spot on perfection.  If you do not know how The Killing Joke ends, I will not spoil it for you, but the adaptation to the screen was wonderful.

Reuniting Kevin Conroy and Mark Hamill as the Batman and the Joker was a masterstroke.  No voice actors have nailed their parts like these two.  Mark Hamill’s Joker is so iconic that this is the way most of the generation of Batman fans imagine the Joker to sound.  Many other voice actors who have tried to tackle these two characters over the years simply do imitations.  So it was amazing to hear these two maestros at work again.

The evening’s activities began with a short interview with Mark Hamill, detailing his past as Joker and his reasoning for returning to this role.  I really enjoyed his comments and his story.

Ray Wise (Leland Palmer from Twin Peaks) voiced Commissioner Gordon and he did a fine job as well.  I have always enjoyed Wise’s work and I am glad he continues to add to his resume.

The animation was nothing to write home about, being kind of choppy at times.  The score though was dark and beautiful, perfectly complimenting the darkness that was happening on screen.  The song The Joker sang was a highlight.  Mark Hamill does an amazing job with that song.  There was a short documentary about the music after the film that was also very entertaining.

Overall, the film does a magnificent job of adapting one of the greatest comic issues of all time, but the tacked on section of the film, while understandable and acceptable, was, at best, fine.  It felt too forced and did not add anything to the story that would follow.  However, when you get through the Batgirl material, this film really takes off, with the return of the iconic voices of Batman and Joker, and the dark and twisted story of the Joker and his origin.

3.7 stars

Absolutely Fabulous is anything but fabulous.

I really disliked this movie.

Now, I was unaware of any previous incarnation of this.  Apparently, Absolutely Fabulous, or Ab Fab as it is sometimes referred, is a BBC sitcom featuring these characters, written by Jennifer Saunders, the actress who portrays Edina.  So maybe if you are a fan of this source, perhaps you would enjoy this more than I did.

PR agent Edina (Jennifer Saunders) and her friend Patsy (Joanna Lumley) love the good life, and are accustomed to drinking champagne and going to parties.  However, the world around them see them as people to be avoided or laughed at.  So when the model Kate Moss decides to change her PR people, it sends Edina into a frenzy, hoping to sign her.  However, Edina does not intend to accidentally knock Moss of a balcony and into the Thames.  With the country thinking that Edina had killed the supermodel, Edina tries to escape from her life and find a lifestyle she can appreciate.

My biggest problem with Absolutely Fabulous: The Movie was that I really did not like Edina or Patsy.  They were so despicable that I could not root for them at all.  Yeah, I know that they are supposed to be unlikable, because that is meant to be where the humor comes from, but I just do not enjoy it.  In fact, I have never liked this type of comedy.  Dumb and Dumber was okay.  They were, at least, relatable.  I had no connection to these obnoxious women and their negative attitudes.  Becaus eof that, I could not find much to laugh at.

There were a few chuckle moments, but the film is so over the top that it couldn’t help but have some giggles.

Again, let me state this.  I have never seen the British comedy that this film apparently follows, and I have seen comments that having that background knowledge would help the viewing of the movie.  I cannot say.  I will say that seeing this movie does not inspire me to go and search out those BBC comedies for viewing.

I actually considered leaving before the film was up.  I thought to myself that I could be doing plenty of other things with my time than watching this.  I did stick it out, but the film did not improve.

I hope that if you are a fan of the BBC show that you enjoy this more than I did.

1 star

The third film from the rebooted series Star Trek came out this weekend with Justin Lin, director of Fast & Furious 6, taking over for J.J. Abrams, and provided fans of the franchise a film that boldly went where no one had gone before with action and adventure and characters embodied perfectly by the new cast.

Star Trek Beyond sends viewers on an exciting voyage into the stars, and fills the screen with exciting action throughout.  This film catches the exciting action of the reboots with the intellectual tone of the original series and blends them together into something that feels like classic Trek.

We catch up with the crew of the U.S.S. Enterprise as they are arriving at Starbase Earhart after failing to negotiate a treaty between two warring factions, Captain Kirk (Chris Pine) was starting to feel the strain of this five year mission.  Spock (Zachary Quinto) hears news of the passing of Ambassador Spock (the late Leonard Nemoy) and has to reflect on his own choices.  With the crew slowly being pulled in different directions, the Enterprise heads out to navigate through a nebula to aid a ship whose captain requested assistance.

Unfortunately for Kirk and his crew, the request was a trap and the Enterprise is attacked by a swarm of some kind of creatures.  The Enterprise crashes on the planet below and the crew is scattered into smaller groups, trying to find their way back together.

Meanwhile, the leader of the swarm was Krall (Idris Elba) who was after a “macguffin” that was on the Enterprise, a weapon they tried to present to one of the warring races as a peace offering.  One wonders what Krall would have done had that race of small rock like creatures had accepted the peace offering of this weapon.  Still, Kirk realizes that Krall wants this weapon and keep sit away from him.

The strength of these characters are really seen as they are split into pairs.  Kirk and Chekov (the late Anton Yelchin) are together, searching for the weapon.  Bones (Karl Urban) and Spock are together, with amazing, crackling dialogue that lights up every scene that they share.  Sulu (John Cho) and Uhura (Zoe Saldana) are captives of Krall and Scotty (Simon Pegg) meets up with new, bad ass alien Jaylah (Sofia Boutella).  Each section brought something different and entertaining to the ensemble and moved the movie along.

Karl Urban was, once again, the standout as Doctor “Bones” McCoy.  Urban is so perfect in this role that the iconic character has really become his own.  Urban receives all of the best lines of dialogue and he delivers them with a robust, cantankerous enthusiasm that would make DeForest Kelly proud.  Montgomery “Scotty” Scott, played by movie co-writer Simon Pegg, is also provided with wonderful lines within the script, both funny and compelling.

Idris Elba provides a solid villain for the protagonist, but there were a couple of lines that I am not sure what they were going for.  His motivation was made clearer in the third act of the film, but there were some moments where I was expecting something more about him.  Still, as always, Elba was outstanding as the counter to Kirk.

The action was excellent, though there may have been too much use of shaky camera for my tastes in several of the action scenes.  The use of “Sabotage” by the Beastie Boys in the trailer felt out of place and forced, but the song’s inclusion in the story itself was perfect and made complete sense.  It also provided a fun and rocking moment in Star Trek Beyond that found me nodding my head and tapping my toes along with the crew.

Star Trek Beyond is another outstanding film in the new, rebooted series of films.  There is great action, strong characters we love and has more of a feel of the original show than ever before.

4.2 stars

Several years ago, there was a short film on YouTube with the premise of a creature that would disappear when the lights were on.  It was a sensation on the video web site.  Taking that concept, they expanded it to a 90 minute film.  Was that a mistake?  There were plenty of concerns that the idea of the short would feel too stretched out by trying to have it go a full movie.

I am pleased to say that those concerns should be dismissed.  Lights Out not only does not feel stretched out, it was a remarkably frightening time at the theater.

Martin (Gabriel Bateman) is not sleeping.  He is too afraid to sleep because his mother (Maria Bello) is talking to some mysterious female creature named Diana, who only can be around when the lights are out.  When Martin starts to fall asleep in school, they tried, unsuccessfully, to call his mother.  Instead, they called his half-sister Rebecca (Teresa Palmer), who was estranged from the family, but she knew what was happening…because it had already happened to her.

Lights Out is a fantastic film, with tension and suspense from the early scenes right up until the finale.  The key aspect of this movie is they focus on characters.  We spend some time getting to know Rebecca.  We learn back story involving her mother.  We see how these things cause stress and worry for a really strong little boy in Martin.  We even get a look at Rebecca’s “boyfriend” Bret (Alexander DiPersia).  All of this character development really pays off when these characters are placed in peril later in the film because, unlike a lot of these types of films, we care for what happens to them.  They are not disposable victims for the creature to kill.  They are well imagined and real, engaging characters.

The film does contain its share of jump scares, but they seem to do a good job of maintaining the tone of the film and they create serious tension.  And since the characters are important to us, these jump scares do not stand out as blatantly as they might in a lesser film.

Diana (Alicia Vela-Bailey) is very frightening, with her moving int he shadows and only seeing her apparition.  It is less effective later when we see more than just the shadowy figure.  I enjoyed her back story and her connection to Sophie the mother felt very tragic, as if the life of Sophie had been forever tarnished by this ghost.

Gabriel Bateman (who is on CBS’ American Gothic) is amazing here.  Again, everything is resting on this child actor providing the audience with the sufficient fear without being over-the-top.  If this child was not a solid actor, the film would drop off the map.  Fortunately, Bateman was outstanding, playing several levels at the beginning, shouldering the fear all to himself, not only out of need, but out of guilt.  He knew he had to support his mother and he couldn’t just run away.  Then, the bond he formed with his wayward half-sister was wonderful.

I also enjoyed Bret quite a bit.  He was anything but the cliched horror movie boyfriend.  He was funny, very supportive, and heroic.  Because I liked him so much, I was very worried that he would fall victim to Diana.

However, though the typical cliches are in the film, Lights Out actually turns them around, successfully deconstructing them in the process.  There are several examples of this, but I don’t want to spoil it.  Let’s just say that the kids do not do the typical stupid things.  They react like real people would react, and that was refreshing.

Now, the film does change the rules about Diana later in the movie, which was done simply because they needed certain things to happen, but the change is not a major one, and does actually continue t amp up the suspense.  Still, some of the parts later in the film with Diana were the weakest sections of the film.

Lights Out was a really good time, if you enjoy being frightened.  This film had some really solid scares and some good performances by solid actors.  The time used on the characters was time well spent and made us care about what happened to these people.  Lights Out is one of the best horror movies of the year so far.

4.3 stars