Wakefield

First Hit: Very enjoyable along with being witty, funny and introspective.

Have you ever wanted to just checkout, or get out of the rat race? This story is about how we fall into traps of our day to day life and how one man decided to checkout.

A key moment in the film is when Howard (Bryan Cranston) recalls his wife Diana (Jennifer Garner) telling him “I’m just hoping to make it through the day”. We know the couple is struggling because they each are getting through the marriage with difficulty.

He works in the city and is a highly-paid litigator, she works at a museum as assistant curator. At home he watches her closely and at parties and other gatherings he accuses her of flirting with other men, whereby he gets jealous and for him, and maybe her, this is when he gets aroused enough to have sex.

On his way home one evening, feeling the pressure and unhappiness of his life, the train breaks down because of a power shortage. His wife keeps calling him and he doesn’t answer the phone, he's feeling pressure. He is on the edge of a breakdown. Finally arriving at home, instead of going in the house, he chases down a raccoon and finds himself in a room above the garage. Looking out of the ornamental window, he decides he cannot face his wife and decides to sleep in a chair in the room. Next day, after his wife leaves, he washes up but then gets this crazy idea to sneak out and go back to the attic. But before he does he puts everything back just as if he wasn’t there.

Being able to spy on his wife and kids from the windows in this room, he decides to stay a couple days, then they turn into weeks, which in-turn turn into months. He becomes a homeless person but with a sheltered place to sleep.

He goes out at night and the early morning to collect food from trash cans and wash off in a local lake. As he becomes more engaged with his new life, above the garage, the conversations he has with himself are amazingly poignant about life, each of us and his character. Truly this was a great aspect of this film. The evolutionary aspect of this character as he sees life through the pane of his upstairs hideaway.

I loved the way this was filmed. It made Howard an everyman and how easily things can change and what one can do to find their path to where they want to be.

Cranston was magnificent. He fully engaged with and in this role. His sarcasm, insights and love towards his wife were fully explored. Garner was fantastic. Although having little speaking scenes, watching her be Howard's wife, as seen through his eyes through the small windows, was fascinating. Robin Swicord did an amazing job creating an engaging and fascinating script and expertly directed the actors based on this screenplay.

Overall:  One of the better films to show up on the big screen this year.

Alien: Covenant

First Hit:  This version was laughable if compared this with the engagement, thrills and horror of the first film, ‘Alien’.

The opening sequence has Peter Weyland (Guy Pierce) activating his latest humanoid robot David (Michael Fassbender), who is named after Michelangelo’s statue. After a short discussion about Peter being David’s creator,  the question David asks is, who was Peter’s creator? Peter looks at him and says, he doesn't know but that they will search for mankind’s creator together. This dialogue tells the audience that this question is important to the film.

Then we switch to the spaceship Covenant, which is now just seven years away from landing on a planet they believe is perfect to colonize with ship's the crew, two thousand colonists and a thousand embryos that are all stored on the ship.

Minding the ship as it sails along through space is Walter (Michael Fassbender) who looks like a replica of David. At first I was confused because I thought it was David and that he had been re-named. This is an initial flaw in the film but makes obvious that the two characters, David and Walter, will be the drivers of what happens in the film and the film doesn’t disappoint with this thought as a plot device.

The crew led by Captain Jacob “Jake” Branson (James Franco) who dies immediately because of a neutrino burst that hits the ship. This happens just a few minutes into the movie and starts the story’s spiral into trouble for the ship and crew.

The newly awakened crew is thrust into action to fix the ship’s issues from the neutrino burst and while managing the repairs they receive a transmission from an unknown planet that sounds vaguely familiar to Tennessee (Danny McBride). What he discovers is that it sounds like the song “Country Roads” by John Denver.

Jake’s wife, Daniels (Katherine Waterson), helps the next in command, Orem (Billy Crudup), figure out their next steps to fix the ship and what he needs to do to take charge. The side story that the crew doesn’t respect him plays no aspect in the film’s story and is a waste of dialogue.

Following the signal, they find a planet that appears to have everything they need for colonization and it is only a week away. Although the audience knows, as do some of the crew members suspect, the choice to explore this “new” planet will be the wrong choice but they do it anyway. Not much in the way of suspense.

One rule about thrillers is that to be thrilled one must be surprised and given a full dose of suspense or it won’t work well. And from here on the film dives into wasted energy. We are not surprised, nor is there suspense. They land, they discover it isn’t a friendly place, the immensely strong aliens are back and we discover that here, ‘David’ is the creator of life. A few of the crew get away. But remember my third paragraph where I stated that the look alike humanoids David and Walter will be the dark story, it is true.

Fassbender is strong in both roles, David and Walter, but the film doesn’t do much justice to his abilities. Waterson is very good and is a highlight as first the grieving widow. She is strong as the clear headed person who really needs to be in-charge. McBride is funny and very good as Tennessee, the guy who is homey and smart. Crudup is wasted in his minimal role and doesn’t show strength. Dan O’Bannon wrote a mediocre script and screenplay that showed its hand way too early and really lacked suspense. Ridley Scott appears to have been in this for the money because the film is simply uninteresting and is at times, a joke (meaning people laughed out loud and the preposterousness).

Overall:  Don’t waste your time on this poorly conceived story.

Their Finest

First Hit:  A very sweet and thoughtful film about making a propaganda film in World War II England.

The story takes place in London during war time and between the German buzz bombing. Catrin Cole (Gemma Arterton) interviews for, what she thinks is, a secretarial position at the Ministry of Information only to discover she gets the job as scriptwriter for propaganda films. She needs to money as she is supporting herself and her, almost, husband Ellis Cole (Jack Huston) who is an artist and was injured in Spanish Civil War. She's not officially married to Ellis but wears a wedding ring and takes his name.

The British propaganda films, designed to motivate the population to work hard for the war effort, are not being well received. Fellow writer Tom Buckley (Sam Claflin) is hard on Catrin because she’s a woman and screenwriting is a man’s world.

However, he sends her on an assignment based on a newspaper article where twin women stole their father’s boat to go to Dunkirk to help save the lives of men. When Catrin interviews the women, she discovers that the boat stopped off shore. Never getting to Dunkirk, they did get wounded home because some of the boats that came from Dunkirk were overloaded and those boats gave them wounded personnel to take home.

The written article makes it more than what they did, but Catrin, Tom and the film making team make a variation of the adventure. The film uses an older famous actor Ambrose Hilliard (Bill Nighy) as part of the characters and as the only strong actor, he has ideas of how the plot and his part needs to go.

However, he begins to trust Catrin’s writing as she knows what she’s doing and when writing in concert with Tom, they excel.

What was interesting was this film also showed how important women were and their strength in helping the country defeat Germany. It also showed how people had to scale back their lives to support the war effort. I genuinely enjoyed watching Catrin watch the film she wrote and how the audience around her were engaged with the story. This was touching.

Arterton was fantastic in this role. Her reserved, yet expressive ways through the film created a wonderful character. Huston was good as the injured artist. Buckley was strong as Catrin’s fellow writer. His disbelief in women being able to write subtlety changing as the film enfolds was wonderful. Nighy was superb as the aristocratic and self-obsessed actor who comes to appreciate what he has. Gaby Chiappe wrote a wonderful screenplay, which unfolded with greater strength as the film went on. Lone Scherfig did a great job of directing this story and keeping the feel of the time and how films were constructed in the 1940’s just right.

Overall:  I was surprised by how much I liked and felt this film as it moved along.

Snatched

First Hit:  The film never seemed to find its purpose and the pre-release hype of comedic fun was far more than the reality.

Emily (Amy Schumer) is an unhappy desperate woman. When she gets dumped by her up and coming rock and roller boyfriend Michael (Randall Park), she must find someone to go with her to Ecuador on a non-refundable vacation. None of her friends like her enough to go with her, so she asks her mom Linda (Goldie Hawn). Linda is very security oriented and is afraid of going but gets convinced to go.

One would think that two gifted comediennes together in a film could make the circumstances of being kidnapped funny, but they don’t. Yes, there are a few lighthearted and funny moments  and scenes, but mostly it is a poorly constructed action film with attempts to make it funny.

It just didn’t work and wasn’t believable in any way, shape or form. When they meet Ruth and Barb (Wanda Sykes and Joan Cusack respectively) this film might have taken a more comedic turn, however the film only used them in the end.

The bits with Jeffery (Ike Barinholtz), who was Linda’s son, were supposed to be funny. But his house bound character was poorly constructed, not believable and insipid.

Schumer was not funny and certainly not very good as an action figure. Not sure if it was the script or direction but this film failed her, or she failed the film. Hawn was worse. I have watched Hawn from the mid 1960’s and I’ve never seen her more constrained and out of place. This was not the right role for her. Sykes was OK and did her best to bring some excitement and comedy to this film. Cusack was the best thing in the film. Barinholtz was very poor and did not make his role believable. Katie Dippold didn’t write a comedic film. It was a lost action film with comediennes in the lead roles. Jonathan Levine directed this mess and did it no favors by not driving this film to either action or comedy because this didn’t work this way.

Overall: This film is mostly a waste of time.

Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2

First Hit:  At times funny, tongue in cheek and farfetched, but isn’t strong enough to make it memorable the next day.

The best parts of Volume 1, was the irreverent humor used to make the unbelievable story and places they visit, fun. Volume 2 does all this a little better.

Star-Lord AKA Peter Quill (Chris Pratt) is with his compatriots; Gamora (Zoe Saldana), Drax (Dave Bautista), Baby Groot (Vin Diesel), and Rocket (Bradley Cooper), and they are off on another adventure. They saved the galaxy before now they're here to do it again.

Whom do they save it from? Peter's father Ego (Kurt Russell) and a reluctant Mantis (Pom Klementieff) who is the one person that can make Ego sleep and relax. Also, for different reasons, Yondu (Michael Rooker) and Nebula (Karen Gillan) want to hurt Peter and his crew as well.

After years of not knowing who his father was, all of sudden Peter is confronted with his father, Ego. Ego lives on planet Ego and is a God of sorts. He traveled to many planets to plant his lights, which he controls through his powers. He's looking for a progeny that can assist him in making the light devices to bloom and take over the worlds he’s planted these things on. Additionally, while on the planets planting his light plants, the story has Ego planting his seed in many women on these planets as well. One of them was Peter’s mom, Meredith (Laura Haddock). However out of all the progeny Ego tests to see who can help him activate the lights, Peter is the only one who shares, and has, Ego's super powers.

The problem is Peter’s eclectic family doesn’t buy the Ego’s premise about wanting to be a loving father and when Peter figures out that Ego is planning control and destruction, he knows he has to kill his father.

All through this, Nubula is trying to kill Yondu now that he’s teamed up with Peter and his team. Then there is Stakar Ogord (Sylvester Stallone) who wants to kill Yondu as well.

In the end there is a life and death struggle for the galaxy and the team wins again and I know I’m letting the cat out of the bag, but we all knew the ending anyway.

Pratt is fun, on the edge of silly, but carries the ability to be both serious and irreverent all at the same time. Saldana is wonderful as the illusive Gamora. Bautista has some of the funniest lines and it’s fun to watch him. Diesel is funny and appropriately constrained as small Groot. Cooper as Rocket was fantastic. Klementieff was great as Mantis. I loved the way she danced between surety and lack of confidence. Russell was really engaged and full of life in this part. Gillan was strong as the golden leader of another planet’s race. Rooker was perfect as the guy who wanted to be good and support the team, but also live within the rules of his own clan. Stallone was OK as Ogord. James Gunn and Dan Abnett wrote a perfect irreverent script that held together through a highly improbable story. Gunn did a great job of providing the right level of effects and joyful fun scenes. Everyone got a chance to shine.

Overall:  This was as good and probably better than Volume 1.