Category Archives: Doc’s Movie Reviews

The Odyssey

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The epic novel from Homer, The Odyssey, was released this weekend from director Christopher Nolan, fresh off his Oscar winning Oppenheimer.

I read The Odyssey in high school and so I am familiar with the story of the movie. I have been excited about seeing this since it was announced.

The very general story of The Odyssey was Odysseus (Matt Damon), after winning the war with Troy, tried to return to his home of Ithaca and back to his wife Penelope (Anne Hathaway) and his son Telemachus (Tom Holland). The voyage back to Ithaca faced many serious issues and dangers from the Gods and monsters.

However, the story premise is deeper than just Odysseus trying to get home. It is a deconstruction of the heroic character archetype, diving deep into the choices of our main hero, and as well as the struggles of Penelope and Telemachus and the toxic suitors for Penelope’s hand in marriage.

The movie is an epic film, with amazing look and tremendous performances.

Matt Damon does a remarkable job as Odysseus. He dominated every minute he was on screen and his performance was layered with so much complex subtext. How much of a hero was Odysseus truthfully? I thought Tom Holland gave a top level performance too, with his dedication to trying to find his “dad.” Anne Hathaway was outstanding, especially in the last hour or so of the movie.

The rest of the cast was amazing too including John Leguizamo, Robert Pattinson, Zendaya, Lupita Nyong’o, Charlize Theron, Elliot Page, Samantha Morton, Jon Bernthal, Himesh Patel, Mia Goth, and Benny Safdie.

While there is some CGI involved in the movie (Hey there Polyphemus), it is very limited and most of the film is practical. Because of that, it is such a beautifully shot film, with amazing shots at sea and the cinematography is so on-point that I was really impressed. You do not see films of this scale without a bunch of CGI these days, but Christopher Nolan is a director that limits the amount of CGI used on his picture.

The score was perfect too, building such a tone for every scene. Ludwig Göransson did the score for this movie and, quite possibly, could win his fourth Academy Award for this score, after winning for Sinners, Oppenheimer, and Black Panther.

The film is a touch long, though one is to expect that. The first half hour or so dragged just a touch, but it was a vital stretch to set up everything needed in the film.

While I am not as high on Christopher Nolan as a lot of people are, I will not deny that this is one of his best movies ever, if not his best.

4.8 stars

Evil Dead Burn

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Okay… so I am in the minority on this film.

I hated it.

The Rotten Tomatoes score as of this writing sits at 71% critics and 81% audience. Some of my favorite online reviewers enjoyed the movie.

I hated it.

This one was just not for me.

According to IMDB, “After the loss of her husband, a woman seeks solace with her in-laws. As one by one they transform into deadites, she comes to discover that the vows she took in life – survive even in death.“

This was just a brutal film, filled with nastiness, anger and cruelty, that had remarkably graphic gore and blood, but, for me, it was lacking that fun, humorous aspects of previous Evil Dead films in the franchise. This is officially the sixth Evil Dead film in the franchise and some of them prior I enjoyed. This one just felt like a sludge to get through and when they did add in the humor element, it never felt like it fit.

This felt overlong and replaced the parts of the story, which was the human interactions, with silliness and over-the-top violence.

Clearly, there will be horror fans and fans of the franchise that will love this movie. It just was not the film for me.

I was bored through much of the film and I just wanted it to be over. There was a moment about two-thirds into the movie that I considered walking out and going home, but I stuck it out until the end ( I did leave midway through the mid-credit scene. I said, out loud, “Oh, there’s more.”). I’m not sure between Scary Movie (which I saw on Thursday) and this film, which one I would agree to watch again. With a gun to my head…. ugh, choices…

1 star

Moana (2026)

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Disney has been doing live-action remakes of their animated movies for decades now, but the most recent push of this trend started with Alice in Wonderland in 2010. Since then, we have gotten Maleficent, Cinderella, The Jungle Book, The Lion King (although it is technically all animated), Beauty and the Beast, Dumbo, Aladdin, The Little Mermaid, Mulan, Snow White, and Lilo & Stitch. This weekend, the most recent of the animated movies to receive this treatment debuted in theaters.

Moana, the animated series was released in 2016, and just under ten years later, the live-action film was made and released.

I did not watch the original animated Moana before going to see the new live-action film, which was probably a good idea. I believe if I had watched the animation, I would have not enjoyed the live action version at all. Fact is that the Moana live action is a complete recreation of the 2016 animated version with almost nothing new, and it would have stood out even more had I watched the animated movie in preparation for the new film.

Another problem with the film is that the look of the new film is nowhere near as vibrant and magical as the animated film. This looked like they had a lot of the live action actors filming in front of a green screen or an animated background, which you can see easily. The best section of the film was in the middle of Dwayne Johnson’s song “You’re Welcome” when they animated everything.

Catherine Laga’aia as Moana was probably my favorite part of the film as I thought she was lovely and I could not take my eyes off her. Her performance was solid, and I believe she has potential to be much better in future projects. Laga’aia had a presence on screen that really worked for me.

Dwayne Johnson, who I love so much, felt much more underwhelming than he did in the animated movie. There were times when he was noticeably more thick in the waist and torso area than he was in other moments of the film making me think they did some CGI with him, or perhaps put a muscle suit on him. It was noticeable, and not in a good way.

The songs were all decent, except for “Shiny” by Jemaine Clement as Tamatoa. I thought that sounded terrible, so bad that I wondered if it was the theater’s sound system that was causing the problem. The other songs sounded fine so I am not sure why this standout song sounded so poor to me.

I did enjoy the live action dance sequences showing off Polynesian culture, especially in the opening scenes. I wish the backgrounds would have helped amplify the beauty of the dance, but it did not help it at all.

While it sounds like I did not enjoy this movie, I did like it. It is the same movie as 2016’s Moana, and I loved that movie. It does feel like the same movie, but with less of that Disney magic. If you have never seen the animated movie, this would be a sufficient remake, but if you have Disney + and have never seen the animated movie, watch that version.

2.9 stars

The Invite

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After a terrible movie at first, the afternoon picked up dramatically with the extremely funny and truly unexpected film starring Seth Rogen, Olivia Wilde, Edward Norton and Penelope Cruz called The Invite.

Olivia Wilde directed this film from A24 that went in a way that I had not expected.

According to IMDB, “Joe and Angela’s marriage is on thin ice. When they invite their enigmatic upstairs neighbors for a dinner party, the night spirals into unexpected places.”

The Invite was funny, intelligent, well-written and shocking. The film, basically, took four characters and put them together in an apartment and they carried this film through an amazing film. It feels like a stage play in this way.

Seth Rogen, Olivia Wilde, Edward Norton and Penelope Cruz are absolutely wonderful and they share an amazing chemistry. They bounced back and forth between these characters and the intelligent dialogue was fabulous.

I was very surprised at some of the stuff that they went into during these conversations. I did not expect the way this went. It was funny and turned into a serious film as well. All four of these actors showed a great range in the film and delivered.

I was fully engaged with this movie and I was thoroughly entertained by these talented actors and writers. I was looking forward to this movie and it came through big time.

4.5 stars

Scary Movie (2026)

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I was going to see The Invite at 4 PM today at Cinemark, but I wanted to do a movie in the afternoon to watch to waste the time. The movie that fit into that window the best was a movie that has been out for several weeks, but I had not seen. It was the new film from the Wayans Brothers, Scary Movie.

I was not sure if this was a movie that I wanted to see, because it just did not feel like it was a film that was in my wheelhouse. I had nearly gone a different time, but it just did not work out. So today would be the day for me to see the film from a previous franchise, returned to the public’s eye.

I definitely found a movie to waste my time with.

I hated the newest Scary Movie. Truly hated it.

The film parodied a bunch of horror movies over the last few years, specifically Scream as they used the Ghostface killer from that franchise. However, they also poked fun at It Follows, K-Pop Demon Hunters, M3GAN, Nosferatu, White Chicks, Sinners, Get Out, Wednesday (TV show on Netflix), Smile, The Substance, Terrifier 3, and several more. The problem was that none of the parodies had any cleverness to it and the writing was just poor.

The film was just drug jokes, dropping the n-word, sex jokes, and killing a bunch of people. None of them were funny at all. The only pieces that made me smile a bit were the meta jokes or the breaking of the fourth wall. However, they overdid these too.

I did not laugh at this movie and that is a sin for a comedy, especially a spoof film that has all kinds of leeway to be ridiculous. I was hoping that I would enjoy this with the return of the Wayans, but it was clear that I was just not going to.

1 star

The Furious

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The Furious is a English-language Hing Kong martial arts action thriller that came out earlier this year in theaters. It did not stay in theaters very long, and I had wanted to see it there, but scheduling just did not work out. So when it appeared today on Fandango at Home, I rented it immediately to watch this afternoon.

The story is straightforward and fairly simple. A father fought against the people who snatched his daughter for their child trafficking ring. He teamed up with another man who was in search of his journalist wife who had been investigating the traffickers.

However, just because the film has a simple story, does make it a bad movie. In contrast, the film knows what it needed to be and what it needed as a story to get the film where they wanted it to go. Some films like this make the story needlessly convoluted with storylines that do not make sense or are just crammed into the movie in order to have it. The Furious did what it needed and gave us just enough to be engaged.

Our main character, Wang Wie (Xie Miao), was a mute handyman who clearly had some kind of a background that made this guy a real bad ass. Navin (Joe Taslim), the journalist, had some amazing training somewhere too. Those things are not necessary for this film, and it is very important to suspend your disbelief in this area.

The action is just unbelievable. The fighting is the standout of the film as the choreography of this film and its fight scenes are masterful. Words do not do justice for the action/fight scenes that they present in The Furious.

I was impressed with the young girl who played Wie’s daughter Rainy. Her name was Enyou Yang, and she was an awesome part of the film and helped give Wie the humanity he needed.

High energy action and non-stop tension made this a thrilling and completely entertaining movie that reached a level that we have not seen in a long time. It was one of the best films of the year so far.

4.8 stars

Enola Holmes 3

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The Enola Holmes franchise on Netflix has had two really solid, enjoyable movies and now Enola Holmes 3 joined the trilogy in a very effective way.

I hadn’t heard about Enola Holmes 3 coming until some time in mid-June of this year. I had no idea they were doing another one, but I think they presented another winner. Millie Bobby Brown has grown into this role, and she does an admirable job in the role. Her breaking of the fourth wall moments, as she acted as a narrator, worked very well. I realized in the middle of the movie that I had not thought of her as Eleven (from Stranger Things) once. That shows how effective Millie Bobby Brown has been as Sherlock Holmes’ sister.

Sherlock Holmes is kidnapped, disrupting the wedding of Enola Holmes and Lord Tewkesbury. Enola is on the case, investigating the mystery.

Several returning actors reclaimed their roles from previous films of the franchise including Henry Cavill as Sherlock, Helena Bonham Carter as Eudoria Holmes, Louis Partridge as Tewkesbury, Himesh Patel as Dr. Watson, and Susan Wokoma as Edith.

This movie succeeds on the back of Millie Bobby Brown and her relationship with the characters around her. She is very charming as Enola and she and Partridge have great chemistry.

I was not as impressed with the mystery with previous Enola films. I can’t speak about the plot without spoiling so I won’t go into it further.

I found this to be an entertaining addition to the franchise and I thought it was an easy watch. This is a great Netflix film that is worth the time.

4 stars

Minions & Monsters

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I have hated the previous two Minions movies and I have not been a big fan of any of the Despicable Me franchise either, so I was not excited when they announced a new Minions movie.

However, I had heard some positive word of mouth, especially from online film critic Dan Murrell, a well-know hater of Minion content, and I had some hope.

After seeing Minions & Monsters, I can say without hesitation that this is my favorite Minions movie I have ever seen.

According to IMDB, Minions & Monsters “Follows the Minions in 1920s Hollywood as they search for frightening creatures for their monster movie, partner with a green creature, and must save the planet after unleashing monsters.“

The Minions wind up in Hollywood and that was really fun. The movie had a ton of references and allusions to some of the greatest movies of all time, from Jaws to Casablanca.

There are some real characters in the movie and an actual storyline. They are not incredibly deep, but they are here. There are some big time voice performances too including Trey Parker, Allison Janney, Christoph Waltz, Jeff Bridges, Jesse Eisenberg, Zoey Deutch, Phil LaMarr and Bobby Moynihan.

The animation is wonderful and full of amazing color. The times they switched from the typical animation style into a different one were very effective.

This movie does a great job of appealing to the children in the audience while still giving some jokes and items for the adults, which, again, is not something that is typical in a Minions movie.

This was such a nice surprise. This had a feeling of the Looney Tunes to me. For a movie that I had no desire to see at one point in the year, to a film that was entertaining, it sure tells you that if you keep your mind open, anything could happen. Even a fun and enjoyable minions movie.

3.9 stars

Neighborhood Watch (2025)

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June 30

Movie 30

The June Swoon 5 comes to a close with a film I watched on Hulu this morning called Neighborhood Watch, which starred Jeffrey Dean Morgan and Jack Quaid.

I had been looking for a final film for the June Swoon and my list just did not have any films that made me excited about watching it. My search led me to this movie and I do like Morgan and Quaid very much so I thought this was a good choice to finish with.

According to IMDB, “When a mentally ill young man thinks he witnesses an abduction and the police refuse to believe him, he reluctantly turns to his next-door neighbor, a bitter and retired security guard, to help him find the missing person.”

I really enjoyed this movie. Were there some moments when you had to just go along with the plot? Yes, there were some times when credibility was stretched. However, there were no moments that pulled me out of the story.

I thought Jack Quaid did an excellent job portraying this young, damaged man whose mental illness was a huge factor in his life. Still, you could see the goodness in him and how much he wanted to be something more than what he was.

Jeffrey Dean Morgan’s character was fairly typical for this type of role. He just is such a likable actor that he overcame the stereotypical grumpy, old man archetype.

Together, Morgan and Quaid bring the film to life with the chemistry between them and the interactions between their characters. They grow to care about the other and seeing how gentle Morgan was with Quaid near the end speaks levels.

This movie definitely has some flaws, specifically in the story, but the two lead performances are so engaging that those do not seem to be a problem at all. The film flied by and, if I am being honest, I would have liked even more at the end. I wanted to know what was going to happen to the characters and that tells me the film was a success.

So that brings an end to the June Swoon 5.

The June Swoon will return in June 2027.

Red Sonja (2025)

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June 29

Movie 29

The iconic character of Red Sonja has been hot lately in comic books so it was a good time last year to do another chance at a full length Red Sonja movie.

The sword-and-sorcery flick starred Matilda Lutz as Sonja.

According to IMDB, “Captured and forced to fight for survival, Red Sonja must rally an army of outcasts to reclaim her freedom and take down a tyrant and his ruthless bride.“

The Red Sonja movie was better than I anticipated. I liked this more than the Red Sonja from 1985 with Brigitte Nielsen… quite a bit more actually. I think Matilda Lutz does a great job of bringing Red Sonja to life. I like how she is not an over the top muscular character, because she feels more like what I see in the comics.

Story wise, there was not a ton of original moments in the film. The scenes all felt like I had seen it before in other sword-and-sorcery movies. However, most of these familiar scenes were executed fairly well.

I loved the Conan mention near the end of the film. I would love to see this Red Sonja with King Conan.

This is a far from perfect film, but I did enjoy watching it. There was nothing here that made me dislike it. It is a good use of the character of Red Sonja.

The Great Flood (2025)

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June 28

Movie 28

We are down to three final days of June for the June Swoon, with today’s entry being a Korean sci-fi/disaster film called The Great Flood.

According to IMDB, “A great flood has hit planet Earth. People, including An Na and Hee Jo struggle to survive in their apartment building, which is sinking into the water. An Na is an AI development researcher and Hee Jo belongs to a human resource security team, who is trying to save An Na from the disaster. But why is Hee Jo trying to save An Na and who is behind it?“

There are some solid moments in The Great Flood. However, the film takes way too many sudden shifts to be effective. Every time the sci-fi elements work their way into the story, it weakens what had come before it. They dropped the sci-fi story in the middle of this disaster film about a flood and it pulled me out of what was happening.

These different genres did not play well together in this movie. An Na (Kim Da-Mi) does a good job of showing the panic of the situation and her desperation in trying to recover her son, Ja-In (Kwon Eun-sung). The kid was both decent in his role and extremely annoying, depending on what the plot needed him t be.

The film looked great and some of the flooding scenes were really strong. However, the sci-fi scenes just messed with the story and the imagery of the sci-fi stuff did not work for me.

I got to the point where the characters lost me and I did not feel compelled to root for them any longer. The film felt way longer than the run time would indicate and had me wondering how much longer it was going.

Still, it was not the worst movie of the June Swoon 5, and if you get past the story aspects of the sci-fi, the disaster movie scenes were solid. It’s a mishmash of a film that could have been better than it was.

Urchin (2025)

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June 27

Movie 27

The June Swoon 5 takes a serious turn into the world of independent film with a British movie called Urchin, written and directed by Harris Dickinson.

According to IMDB, “A young addict living on the streets of London is given a shot at redemption, but his road to recovery soon curdles into a strange odyssey from which he may never escape.”

When I called this an independent film, this is what I would consider a clear definition of that term. This movie is not about a plot. It follows the main character of Mike in scenes from his life as he moves through it. It is absolutely a character study about Mike, this homeless addict who has to do things to survive. Those things lead to him facing consequences. Every scene is basically scenes of his life and the story is basically Mike’s life.

Frank Dillane played Mike and he does a tremendous job in his role. You feel for him even as he is making poor choices.

Another trait of an independent movie is that the ending is a weird, artsy end. Urchin has that and I am not sure how I feel about it. It doesn’t fit with the rest of the movie so it felt like it came out of nowhere and it leaves the film up for serious interpretation.

I thought this was an intriguing movie, but I am not sure how I felt about the ending. Great performances and a tone of sadness surrounds the movie. It is very emoptional.

Supergirl

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I went to the next DCU movie today, which was Supergirl. I had heard so many negative things about this movie… well, not necessarily negative, but more like middling. People were calling it forgettable and meh, so I went into the film with low expectations, but an open mind.

I tell you what… I really enjoyed this movie. Based on the classic Supergirl story “Woman of Tomorrow,” Supergirl gave us a Supergirl that we had not seen before on the big screen. I will admit that I was not a huge fan of the “Woman of Tomorrow” comic book storyline, which I know places me in the minority.

We get a Kara who is flying to red sun planets so she did not have her powers, meaning that she could get drunk. On the planet, she encountered young Ruthye (Eve Ridley) who is in search of revenge against Krem (Matthias Schoenaerts), a brutal killer who had killed her family. Krem then shot and poisoned Krypto, inspiring Kara to try and save her dog.

Even those critics who did not like the film had positives to say about Milly Alcock as Kara/Supergirl. She is truly a revelation as the character. I think her performance was outstanding and I have a lot of positive thoughts about Alcock moving forward in the DCU.

On the other side, Matthias Schoenaerts’s performance as Krem was a major drawback for this movie. I disliked the way he played this character. Krem had the chance to be such a frighteningly sinister character, but he was so weird in his dialogue and the way he delivered it. He was my least favorite part of Supergirl.

I thought that I would have problems with the character of Ruthye in the movie, because I did have a problem with that character in the comics. However, I thought this was a strong addition to the film. There were a couple of moments when I thought she was getting whiny, but they did not take away from the story or the character for me.

Two big cameos in the film: Superman and Lobo. I loved the use of David Corenswet’s Superman in the film. He felt perfectly used and helped center Kara in the tale. While I thought Jason Momoa was awesome as Lobo, I am not sure that the character of Lobo was really needed for the story. He felt a little crammed into the movie. Again, it is not that Jason Momoa was bad, because he wasn’t. I just feel that he did not play enough of a significance for the roll.

The other area that I had a problem with the music. Some of the needledrops did not fit well and were distracting to the film. There was a time in a bar on this other planet where the band started singing “Cheek to Cheek,” the earth song that was so out of place.

I was engaged and enthusiastic about Supergirl and Milly Alcock’s portrayal. I had heard so many bad things about Supergirl, but I truly thought this was exceptional. The humor worked. The film looked pretty good. The characters were great (with the exception of the villain). The film moved quickly and worked well.

4.3 stars

Chainsaw Man – The Movie: Reze Arc

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June 26

Movie 26

I was able to pick up Chainsaw Man – The Movie: Reze Arc on Amazon yesterday during Prime Days, I had to do a quick Wikipedia search which told me that this was a sequel to Tatsuki Fujimoto’s Chainsaw Man, a season of manga from Japan.

According to IMDB, “Denji became ‘Chainsaw Man’, a boy with a devil’s heart, and is now part of Special Division 4’s devil hunters. After a date with Makima, the woman of his dreams, Denji takes shelter from the rain. There he meets Reze, a girl who works in a café.”

I will say that I was confused by this for a good chunk of the runtime. It makes sense since I never watched the manga series Chainsaw Man that preceded this. I am sure that if I had watched that series, I would be considerably more up to date with what was going on in this movie.

However, despite the fact that a lot of the details were confusing, I enjoyed this animated film. There were a bunch of positives. I did love the character of Denji as himself. He was very relatable and I liked spending time in the movie with him. The character designs on all of these manga characters were savage and very eye-popping. The animation was beautiful, as one would expect in this format.

The violence was brutal, bloody and barbaric. The last twenty minutes of the film was as violent as any film from last year.

But the violence was not the reason this film stood out. It was the relationship between Denji and Reze, which took several turns during the film, but it absolutely shined through the story.

I watched the English dubbing with a series of voice actors who did a solid job. Some of the main voice actors included Ryan Colt Levy, Alexis Tipton, Suzie Yeung, Derick Snow, Sarah Wiedenheft, and Josh Bangle.

I have a feeling that a fan of the show would have been even more enthusiastic over this movie. I thought it was pretty good as is.

Diablo

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June 25

Movie 25

I rented Diablo off Fandango at Home this morning for the June Swoon 5. It had a solid Rotten Tomatoes score and I thought this was a nice addition to the month.

I was wrong.

I hated this movie.

According to IMDB, “Kris Chaney, a recently released ex-convict embarks on a perilous mission. He kidnaps Elisa, daughter of Vicente, a powerful gangster, which puts them in danger from El Corvo, a psychopathic killer seeking revenge against Vicente’s family.”

I had so many problems with this movie. For one, they introduced a bunch of characters but gave me zero reason to like any of them. Because of that, these characters were all flat and stereotypical. The plot was contrived and predictable. The dialogue was wooden and dull. Even the action scenes were fairly run-of-the-mill.

The villain, El Corvo, played by Marko Zaror, had some interesting scenes and was probably the best part of the film. He seemed like a Bond villain.

I was checked out within the first twenty minutes, but I had another hour + to go.

Big disappointment and probably my least favorite film of the June Swoon 5 so far.