Gerard Butler movies are always a crapshoot. Some of them are just horrendously stupid such as Geostorm, Gods of Egypt and Playing for Keeps and some are pretty good like Greenland, Copshop, and Olympus Has Fallen. Most of them are basically the same story. Where would his new film, Plane, fall in the Gerard Butler spectrum? Despite the fairly lame title, Plane did not crash. It was a smooth flight.

Gerard Butler was Captain Brodie Torrance, a pilot who had to fly a plane from Singapore to Japan, before he headed off to see his daughter (Haleigh Hekking). Unfortunately, an accused murderer, Louis Gaspare (Mike Colter), was being transported on his flight after recently being captured.

Torrance saw that their flight path was through a bad storm and requested a new path, but the suits in charge told him to stay on the path and fly over it. This was never going to work and, when he tried to follow those instructions, his plane was struck by lightning, knocking out the electrical items on the plane.

With his piloting skills, Torrance was able to navigate the plane in an emergency landing on a nearby island, but, sticking with his luck, the island was a dangerous location, run by a local army and warlord Junmar (Evan Dane Taylor). Torrance needed to search for help and he recruited Gaspare to go with him, and they found nothing but trouble.

This is absolutely a film that is much like many of Gerard Butler’s previous films, but there was some cool things about this. I enjoyed Mike Colter (Netflix’s Luke Cage) and his chemistry with Butler. They did not go too deep into his backstory or why he had been on the run for so many years. They touched on it at a surface level, but I still liked him very much.

Then there was the co-pilot Dele (Yoson An) who was undeniably relatable and played off Butler beautifully. We also go Tony Goldwyn as Scarsdale, one of the head honchos with the airline who was taking no crap from any of the pencil pushers involved. It was great to see a character come in and not question every choice Butler made, which felt different than most films. It was also nice to see Goldwyn, who was the President of the United States in TV’s Scandal for several years.

The absolute best part of the film was the scenes of the plane crash and any time that Captain Torrance was trying to fly the plane. The crash sequence was literally one of the most tense and white knuckle rides I have seen in the movie theater in a long time. The way director Jean-François Richet shot these scenes was fabulous and put me right there in the cockpit with the pilots. It was a thrilling sequence and worked amazingly well.

The film moved rapidly through the scenes, nicely paced. There were some time to feel the tension in each scene, but it never had moments that did not feel as if they belonged. This was a nice, tight hour and forty + minute movie and it moved along wonderfully.

Admittedly, there were plenty of scenes that require you to suspend disbelief because it just would not work any other way. Some of the scenes were the typical action movie fare, but they fit these in with some solid work. The passenger characters were all basic and stereotypical for this type of a film, and they responded in the way that you would expect them to respond. None of the passengers stood out much at all and could have been played by anyone.

I had a lot of fun with Plane. The title was not very good, but it makes sense considering how important of a role the plane played in the story. The story was predictable but exciting. The action was great and those piloting sequences were exceptional. January, which is typically the dumpster for bad films, has been pretty decent so far. Fingers crossed.

4 stars

I am a fan of Edgar Allan Poe. The problem is that, though he has been portrayed several times over the years in movies, I have never seen one that truly worked well. Last year’s Raven’s Hollow was the most recent failure of Hollywood bringing Poe to life on screen.

That was why I was excited when I heard that Christian Bale was headlining a film called The Pale Blue Eye that would include Edgar Allan Poe. Bale was not playing Poe, but Bale is such a strong actor, he would bring credibility to the movie.

Bale played Augustus Landor, a detective who had been recruited to investigate the murder of a West Point cadet. During the investigation, Landor met Cadet Edgar A Poe (Harry Melling) who brought some insight into the case.

I will say it now. Harry Melling is now my favorite version of Edgar Allan Poe on the big screen. I found him just perfectly cast as the macabre poet/author, before fame struck him. He had an unusual appearance, striking for playing Poe, and he brought the melancholy aura associated with the poet.

I also think it was a smart move not to make the murder case an obvious allusion to one of Poe’s works. They tried to do that in Raven’s Hollow and it simple did not work. Perhaps one could make an argument that this could tie into The Tell-Tale Heart, but you have to stretch the movie’s plot to make it fit that concept.

Christian Bale was great, as he always is. There was a pain within him that was there beneath the surface and made this character work so well with Poe. Bale and Welling have a strong connection, helping each other with their awesome performances.

There was a strong cast around these two as well. Gillian Anderson, who has been choosing amazing roles since her days as Dana Scully on the X-Files, was wonderfully off -balance and loony as Mrs. Julia Marquis, the wife of the doctor involved in the case, Dr. Daniel Marquis, played by the ever epic Toby Jones. Robert Duvall was Jean Pepe, a friend and mentor of Landor. Timothy Spall, Peter Pettigrew in the Harry Potter films, was another historical figure appearing in the movie, Superintendent Thayer, who was known as the “Father of West Point.”

I enjoyed this movie a lot and I especially loved the ending. As I said, I found Harry Melling’s work a Poe to be maybe the best to ever make it on the screen and the rest of the cast brings some fantastic work. The pacing may be a little slow, but I thought gave the characters some good space to breathe and give us plenty of red herrings to keep the mystery mysterious.

The Pale Blue Eye arrived on Netflix this weekend after debuting in selected theaters in 2022.

4.3 stars

The first film in theaters this year that was actually released in the previous year was Tom Hanks’ A Man Called Otto. These films are the ones that are released in limited release in order to qualify for the Academy Awards consideration.

Otto (Tom Hanks) is a grumpy curmudgeon who has appointed himself as the authority within the community that he lives. Griping about cars going the wrong way on the street or recyclables not being in the proper containers, Otto is quick with his
snipe. The other residents of the community seem to take Otto well though.

When a new family moves into the area, including a pregnant mother named Marisol (Mariana Treviño) and a lovable doofus father named Tommy (Manuel Garcia-Rulfo). Their neediness guilts Otto to take his attention away from his own plans and forces him to give aid to the new family.

There was a definite amount of darkness in the story, especially in the background of Otto, which we experience in flashbacks with Tom Hanks real life son, Truman Hanks, playing a younger Otto. By the end of the film, you definitely know why Otto was such a snarky character.

A man Called Otto was absolutely a predictable film, but there is a lot of heart in it and a very entertaining film that had a surprising amount of darkness. I did not expect the film to start off where it did, but it made a lot of sense after we discovered the tragic past of Otto.

The best part of the film was the characters that interacted with Otto, especially Mariana Treviño, who had amazing chemistry with Hanks. The pairing was an exceptional father-daughter type vibe and they were remarkably entertaining together. Other characters really worked well with Hanks’ Otto too including Garcia-Rulfo, Cameron Britton as the eccentric neighbor Jimmy, Anita and Reuben (Juanita Jennings and Peter Lawson Jones), a couple who were once close friends, and Malcolm (Mack Bayda) a young student who was once in Otto’s wife’s class.

Speaking of Otto’s wife, Rachel Keller played Sonya in flashbacks and she appeared to be a shining light in every scene she was in.

Otto started out an unlikable character, but the film knew that the audience was not going to dislike him because Tom Hanks is so beloved. It was clear that the audience wanted to like Otto and gave him the benefit of the doubt because of who was playing the role.

A Man Called Otto was funny, filled with enjoyable characters and had its share of dark drama as well. Yes, the film’s story is fairly predictable and you can see where it is heading, but this is one of those occasions where the predictability is not a drawback and you just enjoy the ride.

3.9 stars

It is January now and we have a horror movie. January typically is the dumpster of the movie release dates. It is the month where the studios drop the films they think are not very good because the studios know people aren’t going to go see them. Every year in the Year in Review Worst List there are films from January in the Top 10 (some in the top 5 even). Most of the time, my expectations are low during the month.

There are exceptions to that rule and M3GAN is one of them. This movie was fun and highly entertaining. Silly perhaps, but entertaining nonetheless.

Young Cady (Violet McGraw) lost her parents in a car accident involving a snow plow on their way to a ski trip and had to go live with her aunt Gemma (Allison Williams), who was a toy designer for a huge company. Gemma was working behind the scenes on a project to create an interactive and engaging life-like girl robot named M3GAN (pronounced Megan) which stands for Model 3 Generative Android.

M3GAN and Cady bonded and became close. Gemma told M3GAN that her prime directive was to protect Cady, both physically and mentally, above all else. As things start to get tougher and Cady started to show strains from the loss of her parents, things started to get dangerous.

The tone of this was awesome. It bounced between a silly, almost humorous tone and tense and anxiousness one. When M3GAN was going through murderous sprees, the film was filled with dramatic moments and an uneasiness fairly earned. And yet, there were many funny, almost ridiculous moments as well and they blended together extremely well.

Jenna Davis was the voice of M3GAN, who was played physically by Amie Donald. Jenna Davis is great as both the caring robot and the menacing killer. Her voice work was exceptional. And the look of the character of M3GAN was sensational. It had the necessary creepiness of the robot doll.

Although many may see this as a female version of Chucky, I think there is more characterization of M3GAN than there was with Chucky. Where as Chucky had an evil spirit involved, M3GAN is that well known theme of the technology gaining sentience and becoming a danger. We have seen this in plenty of other films but this worked well.

The new film from Blumhouse overcame the curse of January and delivered a remarkably engaging and fun film with plenty of violence and some excellent kills and shocking moments. Admittedly, some of the secondary actors felt like they were not the best of actors, but the main performers were great. M3GAN was a much better film than I thought it would be.

2023 is starting off strong.

3.75 stars