I’m actually amazed that this movie was written by a man.  Writer/director Bo Burnham seems to have a such a complete grasp of a middle school girl that it is difficult to believe that this is someone who has only one chromosome in common.

As a middle school teacher, I found myself laughing at this movie in many places because there were things that were so realistic and on the nose that I had seen the exact scenes in my own middle school.  It was a impressive feat.  Many times the school setting in these movies fall more to the stereotypical movie school than the realistic setting, but this one is authentic.

Eighth Grade features the story of Kayla (Elsie Fisher), an eighth grader in the last week of school, trying to make it through the remaining days of middle school before becoming a high schooler. She has to face the self-doubt, the potential ridicule, the hormones and everything else that middle school students face daily.

Kayla has one parent, her father Mark (Josh Hamilton), a wonderful dad, who struggles to communicate with his daughter and to compete with the all-powerful and consuming phone.  Kayla posts videos online giving pointers and tidbits of wisdom that she could do well with following herself.

There were some very funny scenes in this movie and there were some extremely tense and nerve-wracking scenes in this move (especially one that takes place in the back of a car).

Elsie Fisher is tremendous here, beautifully bringing Kayla’s worries, fears and anxieties to life on the screen.  She broadcasts her entire life over social media as so many kids do these days, and I had to laugh when the script called for the line, “Nobody uses Facebook anymore” because I have literally heard that comment from middle school girls.

While the film does not really have the typical narrative structure of a movie, the subject matter is akin to that sort of atypical platform.  It is very much like a middle school kid and it fits very well.  The film follows this final week and the events that happen bring great effect to Kayla.

I must say that there is a beautiful scene around a fire between Kayla and her father which is how all parents should deal with their daughters.

Eighth Grade is a wonderful movie that has an authentic tone and feel to it and it deals with real life topics without hyperbole.  It contains several spectacular performances and makes you squirm in your seat more than once.

4.4 stars

No… these characters are NOT the X-Men.  Nope.  Not at all.

A mysterious “illness” swept across the country doing one of two things to all the children.  It either killed them or it gave them some sort of super power through genetically altering them (see…not X-Men.  No mutants!). The government responded to this, of course, by rounding the remaining children up and putting them into camps.

Each child was tested and they were given a level of danger, ranked by color.  Red was the highest and followed by orange.  These two sets of children were automatically put to death.  The remaining levels of yellow, blue and green were kept in the camps and forced into manual labor.

Even the President’s son (Patrick Gibson) was one of the altered kids, but the president (the terribly underused Bradley Whitford) apparently cured him.

Meanwhile, young Ruby (Lidya Jewett) survived the disease but had not shown her ability until one night she accidentally wiped herself out of the memory of her parents.  Taken to the camp, she spent six years there as the time jumps forward ( I guess nothing of importance happened in that time frame).  Teen Riby was then played by Amanda Stenberg.

At this point, she escaped and joined up with a ragtag bunch of mutan…errrr … um… survivors to try and find the mysterious Slipkid, a rebel helping powered people learn their powers (so NOT Charles Xavier).

Okay, I am going to go really geeky on you for a minute because this really distracted me throughout the entire film.  These power levels were so messed up.  First of all, those characters with mind control powers were listed in the orange section as the second most dangerous.  Ruby was one of those, and, at first, she could only do her mind voodoo if she made skin-to-skin contact (no NOT at all like Rogue), but she later developed it into being able to use it at a distant.  If anyone thinks that mind control isn’t at the highest level of danger, they are just foolish.  Then, when we see Red level characters, they are simply fire breathing characters.  Scary visual but nothing to it.

Then, in the blue level, they included telekinetic powers.  No way.  These powers are way more dangerous than the fire breathers and should be in the orange section while the mind control should be red.  One of the ragtag bunch Ruby meets is Liam (Harris Dickinson) and he is a TK.  At one point in the film, he (SPOILER, if you care) kills a group of five reds by himself easily.  That should prove how dangerous he was.(END OF SPOILER).  He even speaks of how the League (which is a group that are militarizing the survivors to do battle with the government) was trying to teach him to break arms with his TK.  Um… how much longer before you are breaking necks, baby?

Sorry, but that whole color thing distracted me the entire film.

The characters are basic and not that exciting.  They are clearly tied closely to the X-Men and are lesser versions.  Amanda Stenberg is good, but she does so many dumb things that I couldn’t believe it.  I wanted to yell at her to wake up.

This film is based on a YA novel of the same name by Alexandra Bracken and that was something I did not know at first, but it makes sense.  The whole thing feels thrown together with too much included but not enough world building for the movie to be effective.  I assume there are more details in the novel that might help put this into context.  Like, for example, have people stopped having children now?  The film never covers that but it certainly implied that there were no children left. If this was a disease, shouldn’t it be okay for people to have more children?  Is that disease still in the air?

The other problem was that the ending of the movie is completely unsatisfying and exists to simply encourage a sequel (HINT, HINT… this one ain’t getting one of those).

This was a very poorly executed movie with characters that will be so much more entertaining and fleshed out when Marvel Studios finally puts out their X-Men movies.

1.5 stars

I really feel like a Woozle right now.

I was very disappointed with the saccharine-sweet Christopher Robin, the new film featuring the characters of A.A. Milne which tells the story of what would happen if Christopher Robin grew up and forgot about the Hundred Acre Woods and his dear friend Winnie the Pooh.

I was really looking forward to this film because I was a fan of Winnie the Pooh as a youth.  Heck, as a child, I had a stuffed Pooh bear on my bed for years.  I anticipated an emotional swelling with tears and a sweeping wave of nostalgia to overtake me making me wish for the old days passed.

Instead, I have a tooth ache from all the sugary sap that was shoved at the story, a story that was sadly too simple to suffice.  And yes… that was a lot of alliteration.

Yes, there are some scenes that work here as well.  Christopher Robin is not a total loss, but they really try their best to remind you of your childhood.  The characters such as Tigger, Eeyore, Piglet, Rabbit, Owl all get their classic lines, and Pooh himself spouts off his backward wisdom throughout the movie.  Most of that is harmless and fun.

Much of the film concept is similar to Hook, the Robin Williams movie where Peter Pan grows up and loses himself.  This time though it is Christopher Robin (Ewan McGregor).  I have to say, I never thought Robin was his last name, although it was in this film.  I always thought it was a middle name and that fact distracted me every time he was called Robin by one of the rotten businessmen such as Giles (Mark Gatiss).

The movie was desperately predictable, formulaic and took zero chances.  It was exactly what you would expect if you heard the premise.

I did like the design of the animated characters.  They were made to look very much like the stuffed toys that they are.  There were some sight gags that were used with this, but those grew tiresome quickly.  Brad Garrett voiced Eeyore, a role that he has been playing since Everybody Loves Raymond.  Hayley Atwell is here too as Christopher Robin’s wife Evelyn, but she is wasted having little to do.  And speaking of wasted, Toby Jones (who voices Owl) is one of the office workers at Christopher Robin’s job.  There is not one office worker that Christopher Robin is trying to keep employed that is anything more than a glorified extra.  I’m not sure why I should feel anything for these people losing their jobs.

Ewan McGregor does fine as the Gin Rummy-hating adult Christopher Robin, who is shown as a deadbeat dad to daughter Madeline (Bronte Carmichael).  There is not much to the character of Madeline.  She’s basically a little girl.

You wouldn’t think they could mess this up, but the Christopher Robin movie is simply not what it should have been.  You can take your kids to the movie and they should like it enough but there is nothing here that will make you fall in love with Pooh and his friends if you aren’t already invested in them.

The disappointment makes this movie feel worse than it is.

2.4 stars

There have been a few times where a celebrity death has affected me strongly. I mean, I am always sad for the loss or for their family, but very few have been a reaction for me.  Robin Williams’ death was like a kick in the gut.

I remember where I was when I learned of the death of this iconic man.  I was at the movie theater in the Quad Cities (now it is called Cinemark, but it may have been something else at the time) waiting to watch a Fathom Events special premiere of The Giver and I had checked Twitter.  I could not believe it.  The film had a pre-show live event and they spoke about him on it as well.  They interviewed Jeff Bridges who was clearly in shock over the news.  It was a surreal night.

I loved Robin Williams and that loved dated back to his days as Mork, first on Happy Days and then on Mork and Mindy.  He was larger than life and I had never seen anything like him.

You get that feeling again in the HBO documentary, Robin Williams: Come Inside My Mind.  It is a marvel that someone like Robin Williams was able to be shared with us for such a short time that you never really believe how lucky we were.

The documentary tells Robin’s whole life, touching on his childhood, but focusing much more on his rise to fame and his effect on people around him.  We hear from his famous friends such as Billy Crystal, Bobcat Goldthwait, Pam Dawber and his family members too.  The documentary does not shy away from the drugs and alcohol which was a constant struggle for the comedian, though it only touches upon the depression over a diagnosis of Parkinson’s late in his life,

The main component of the doc though is to show just how remarkable the man was.  They shared stories about Robin, highlighted with clips from movies, stand up specials and other events that clearly established how incredibly quick witted and explosively funny Robin was.

There were a lot of videos that I had not expected to see, including Robin in an improv class among others.

And I laughed hard at several of the scenes.

2018 has been a great year for documentaries as this is the fifth exceptional one I have seen so far.  With RBG, Three Identical Strangers, the Andre the Giant one, and Mr. Rogers, the Robin Williams doc is in great company.  If you are a fan of Robin Williams, you need to see this movie.

4.3 stars

I saw a special preview of The Spy That Dumped Me tonight and it was probably not a good idea to see this movie so close to Mission Impossible: Fallout because there was no way to think about this as a spy movie after seeing that other one.

Audrey (Mila Kunis) had been dumped by her boyfriend Drew (Justin Theroux) and she, with the help of her best friend Morgan (Kate McKinnon), was trying to get over it.  However, she found out that Drew was actually a CIA agent and he gave her a package that needed to be delivered to Europe.  Suddenly, Audrey and Morgan are swept up in a convoluted story of international espionage and treason.

I’ll start with the positives, which this film did have.  I really enjoyed the chemistry on screen between Kunis and McKinnon.  They played best friends and they seemed to be that very way.  I bought the relationship between them and that is important since that is the true relationship driving the film.

There were some great actors and actresses appearing in the film beside them:  Paul Reiser, Jane Curtain, Gillian Anderson, and Hasan Minhaj.  Unfortunately, a lot of these actors had little to do in the story and were there for basic cameos.

We also see some growth in Kunis’ character as she goes from having a lack of confidence to being strong enough to become a kick ass spy.

Now, Kate McKinnon was hit and miss.  Her character was so over-the-top throughout the movie that at times she became annoying.  Other times, when she was downplaying her weirdness, the character was considerably more entertaining.  The dialogue between Kunis and McKinnon ranged from funny and witty to nothing but low brow jokes.  The inconsistencies hurt the film.  Then, if you really sat down and look at the plot, some of the twists make no sense and really screw up the narrative the film had been building.

The film also tried to be smarter than it is with a series of obvious twists that you could see coming a mile away.

There were moments in the movie where I found myself laughing, but it was never a lot of laughing.

I feel as if this movie had a chance to be better than it turned out and could have done with some rewriting to focus more on the characters and less on the events.  Though it was not as bad as I thought it could have been, The Spy Who Dumped Me was at best, average.  It certainly was not the best spy movie of the weekend.

2.5 stars

There has been some really good documentaries this year and Three Identical Strangers is yet another one.  It is a story that is so unbelievable that your jaw will drop and you will shake your head.

In 1980. three men, triplets, who were separated at birth and all adopted by different parents, found each other in an amazing coincidences.  The story of the 19-year olds became a huge nationwide story and they became famous.  However, questions about what exactly happened bugged the boys and they wanted to find out the answers.

I don’t want to spoil anything here because part of the amazement of Three Identical Strangers was that I did not know anything about the story going in.  It really is a shocking story with a dark turn that is extremely emotional.

The film focuses on the nature vs. nurture argument that has been debated for years.  Director Tim Wardle reveals his story beautifully, slowly pacing the tale to the point where you can hardly believe this isn’t a made up story.

I can’t really go into anything else without revealing anything so I am going to cut the review short.  See the movie.

4.5 stars

Whoa.

The latest film in the Mission Impossible franchise, Fallout is one freaking white-knuckle thrill ride with insanity ruling the day and action everywhere.

Tom Cruise is back as Ethan Hunt, leading his IMF team on a mission to recover three plutonium cores that they had lost in a failed mission.  The government is having trouble trusting Hunt so they send CIA Agent August Walker (Henry Cavill) to keep an eye on him.

Fallout is a true sequel to Rogue Nation, the fifth film in the franchise, and it would be a wise choice to have seen that movie to understand what is going on here.  Most of the Mission Impossible films have been basically stand alone/self-contained stories of the same group of characters, but this definitely feels like the second part of Rogue Nation.  That is not a complaint, mind you, but if you have not seen Rogue nation, there are some characters and situations that you may have a difficult time understanding.

The remainder of the time is Tom Cruise doing insane stunts and providing unreal action set pieces.  There is a lot of Tom Cruise running in Fallout so if you love that trope, this will please you.  There is a chance involving motorcycles and one with cars and one on foot and one in helicopters and… man, there is a ton of exciting stunt work.

Famously, Tom Cruise injured himself doing one of the stunts (which was left in the film) and you cannot help but be impressed with the level of commitment from one of the most successful actors in history.  There is no reason why we need Tom Cruise to hang off of a helicopter or learn how to fly a helicopter himself, but he does it anyway and that should be respected.

To its credit, the film does not just settle for mind-blowing action scenes.  There are several real moments of characterization and growth within here as well.  Everybody does a great job with their performances. Ving Rhames has a couple of specifically great scenes here.  Simon Pegg provides just the right amount of humor without pushing it.  Rebecca Ferguson returns and provides a wonderful counter balance to Ethan Hawk.

Henry Cavill is fine here (I am trying to avoid making a comment on the mustache) but I am not sure if the twist involving him was meant to be a twist at all.  If it was meant to be a surprise, the film does a poor job of keeping it.  Personally, I think the film lets the audience in on the twist early and kept it from Ethan and his crew.

It is 147 minutes long, but it did not feel that way.  It was so packed full that I never once felt bored or as if something wasn’t welcome.

My only criticism is that there are a couple of moments where what happened was so over the top that it stretched my willingness to believe (in particular, a scene with a metal hook and the helicopter).

Mission Impossible: Fallout is a fantastic movie with thrills from start to finish.  It has Tom Cruise at the top of his game and takes solid use of the remarkable cast around him.

Choose to accept this mission… you won’t regret it.

4.85 stars

I can easily understand why a fan of DC Comics and their characters may hate Teen Titans Go.  The program takes a serious team of heroes and makes them childish and immature.  I mean…one of these characters is Robin, one of the oldest and most important characters if the DC Universe.  Teen Titans Go is directed toward a very youthful audience and I know there are comic fans who think that is insulting.

And while most of the Teen Titans Go series is not very easy to watch as a comic fan, Teen Titans Go to the Movies is extremely clever, funny and just a lot of fun.  Who’da thunk it?

That does not mean that there are not sections of this movie that are stupid and resorts to fart jokes, poop jokes and other low brow humor for their jokes.  These sections are still dumb and a weakness of this film.

However, the funny and surprisingly well-written parts of the film outweighs the limited amount of poop jokes here.

The Teen Titans, featuring Robin, Cyborg, Beast Boy, Starfire and Raven, are having trouble finding respect among the super hero community because of their immaturity and their likeliness to break into song.  Meanwhile, it seems like every super hero around is having a movie made about them.  Robin desperately wants to have a movie based on himself and he and the team think that if they can find an arch-nemesis, they would be taken more seriously.

That arch-nemesis would turn out to be Slade (Will Arnett), who has started a plan by stealing a specific gem from Star Labs and he uses his mental manipulation to fool the Titans.

The strength and the friendship of the Teen Titans must overcome their own ego and the strain it might put on the team in order to save the world from Slade’s evil plan.

Teen Titans Go to the Movie was quite a surprise.  It was way better than it had a right to be and I found myself laughing and smiling at most of it.

There were so many DC Comic characters in the movie that I had a heck of a good time just looking at the crowd in the film’s movie theater and trying to name everyone.  Never would you see such characters as The Spectre, Deadman, Ms. Martian, Shazam, Booster Gold, Zatanna, Plastic Man, Elongated Man, Jonah Hex, Swamp Thing in the same scene with Batman, Superman, Wonder Woman, Green Lantern, Aquaman and Flash.  It was amazing to see the artists’ rendition of these comic book characters that many of the audience members (certainly not the children in attendance) would have no idea who they were.

But even more than that was the fact that Teen Titans Go to the Movies is really a satire of the comic book movie genre and provides some really funny self-deprecating humor on the subject.  Comic book movies are not the only genre the film targets as it has a remarkably clever Back to the Future section of the film, a series of strangely catchy musical numbers and meta/fourth wall breaking moments.

And there are two specific Stan Lee cameos (voiced by Stan the Man himself) and a pre-credit scene that might make the haters smile just a little.

While I have never been a fan of the show, this film was way better than I ever imagined and I found myself laughing throughout.  I was constantly amazed at what I was seeing on screen (I am not sure, but I think I saw a movie poster in the background featuring Superman with a mustache…hey there Justice League).  As a comic book fan, I saw Easter eggs galore in almost every scene and I was astounded by what they got away with.  The whole Batman origin joke made me laugh out loud (not sure anyone else understood it in my theater).

This was really good and, while I could use less fart/poop jokes, I understand why they are here.  I also think something like Teen Titans Go to the Movies could help the comics. How many people might wonder about characters they see here only to find that they are real DC characters?

4 stars

Mind… blown.

Boots Riley is the writer/director of this movie and it is his first feature film.  Riley is a rapper/activist who apparently has some serious opinions to share.  You can tell because he spares no topic in the satire called Sorry To Bother You.

The film stars Lakeith Stanfield as Cassius Green who is in desperate need for a job so he applies at a telemarketing company.  He struggles with the job until co-worker Danny Glover drops a hint for him.  He says to use his “white voice.”  The white voice was something that Cassius could do tremendously well and it made him unbelievably successful at the company.  In fact, he is promoted to the position of “powercaller” upstairs.  His new massive success gets him invited to a high brow party thrown by CEO Steve Lift (Armie Hammer) where everything explodes.

That’s about all I can tell you because if I were to spoil this movie, you would not believe me.  The film was rocking along until that party and then EVERYTHING WENT NUTS!  And that is in a good way.

This film is satirizing all kinds of topics from the world today:  racial tensions, unions, fake celebrities, Americans’ viewing habits, large companies, SPIN controlling the thoughts of people, Capitalism,  art, relationships, the news media… there is probably more here, but it is all just blasting at you that it is hard to remember them all.  That might be a bit of a problem for the film where if they had focused on one or two, the message might have been clearer.

However, the presentation of this was just so amazingly provided that I almost wouldn’t want it any different.  I heard a lot of critics compare this to the film Swiss Army Man, and that tone/feeling of this movie does bring that to mind.  I loved Swiss Army Man, by the way so that is a huge compliment from me.  However, I know that Swiss Army Man was and I would expect Sorry to Bother You will be polarizing for the public because the ideas are presented in a manner in which they are not expecting.  I found it remarkably original and courageous, but many may find it pretentious.

Tessa Thompson is here as well, playing Cassius’s girlfriend, Detroit.  She is a great character as well, who takes a stand for the working people, though may not necessarily be as much of a supporter as she thinks she is.

There are scenes in this movie that you will not believe that you are seeing in a regular film.  It is so over-the-top that I left the theater with the letters WTF stuck in my head.  I loved a movie was able to create that uncertainty in me and do it with a creative manner than I had never seen before.  Honest to God, the film started in one path and suddenly changed paths midway through.  I did not see it coming and it was wonderful.  There were scenes that I could not believe I was laughing at.

Great performances from all the cast, including some great cameos and voice overs, unbelievable twists and turns, and a satire over just about everything that can be satirized.  Sorry To Bother You is a great film that takes HUGE risks and I hope it pays off.

4.8 stars