Movie Reaction: The Accountant

Formula: Haywire + The Equalizer

"Who is the Accountant?" has been the entire marketing campaign for this movie and it's an effective one. Because, the previews don't answer that. He's an accountant. He's deadly. He isn't emotional. He's everything -- and nothing -- at the same time. No one can accuse the movie of not believing its own hype. It is nothing if not committed to the enigmatic character at its center.

There's a lot working in the movie's favor. I've always liked Ben Affleck. He works in his comfort zone as an actor while finding room to try new variations. The Accountant is Affleck as an autistic Jason Bourne and he plays it well. When he needs to kick ass, he kicks ass. When he needs to get a laugh out of a line-reading or a look, he gets a laugh. He doesn't disappear into the character, which is fine. The character doesn't work without a little movie-star charisma. Anna Kendrick is in a familiar role as well. Imagine if her character from Up in the Air found herself in the middle of an action movie. It features one of the finest "TV All-Stars" supporting casts in recent memory: J.K. Simmons, Jeffrey Tambor, Jean Smart, Cynthia Addai-Robinson, John Lithgow, Jon Bernthal, and Allison Wright. And yes, all of them are playing familiar roles. There's something to be said about obvious casting. If someone is right for the part, they are right for the part. No need to overthink it.

At its heart, The Accountant is a dumb action movie. There's conspiracies and twists, but all it really is is two super soldiers (Affleck and Bernthal) on a collision course with a high body count along the way. And, with a lot of humor. What's not being sold in the trailers and TV spots is the darkly comedic edge it has. Any films I can compare it to would give away some twists, so I'll withhold that much. But, know that it's actually pretty funny.

I'm scared to even begin describing the plot. There's a lot of it. More than there needs to be. Affleck is an accountant for some bad dudes. He's just there for the accounting puzzles though. He can kill anyone with ease --there's plenty of flashbacks to his dad training him extensively -- but it's the puzzles that excite him. J.K. Simmons is an upper-level FBI guy who is blackmailing a younger analyst (Addai-Robinson) to investigate the accountant. Bernthal is a mercenary who is hired to keep one of the accountant's puzzles unsolved. Anna Kendrick is there because she's a junior account who first realized that there is a puzzle for the accountant to solve. Jeffery Tambor was in prison with the accountant at some point. John Lithgow and Jean Smart are siblings who run the company that Kendrick works for and...I give up. It's all very convoluted. There is a difference between smart writing and complex writing.

Overall, the movie is about 10% too cute with all the twists. I'm not someone who likes to figure out twists as I'm watching something. I think it does the movie a disservice to turn it into a game. Even still, I couldn't help but assume most of the twists early on and it did little to inform any of the story. A significant amount of the plot contortions rely on "the protagonist is God" explanations. It failed my One Big Leap test many times over. That would've been fine had it embraced the silliness of it all, but it doesn't do that until it's too late to enjoy it.

I fully appreciate The Accountant for what it is . My only issue is that it is more focused on being clever than entertaining, which drags it down a lot. Usually, the narrower the focus of a scene, the better it is. A strong cast and upstanding of everyone's roles in the cast keeps it going even in during the noisiest plotting. If you really want me to simplify things, here: Go into this expecting The Equalizer, not The Bourne Identity.

Verdict (?): Weakly Don't Recommend 

Movie Reaction: Hell or High Water

Formula: No Country for Old Men / (Heat - Sicario)

Some films are very obvious when trying to figure out what makes them great. A trailer can highlight big, dramatic moments, a showy performance, or amazing special effects. You can distill the best parts down to a couple sentences. Hell of High Water is not one of those films. The only way to explain what makes it great is to see it, because, make no mistake, it is a great movie.

I've been hesitant about seeing this for a while. I saw a trailer for it when it first came out and I wasn't convinced. It's looked like a modern western with some half-baked social commentary thrown in. Jeff Bridges isn't immune to being in bad movies. It's from the same screenwriter as Sicario which I think used the Southwest setting to mask a lot of weaker elements. However, the high ratings (98% Rotten Tomatoes), legitimate Oscar buzz, and praise from at least one friend convinced me to give it a try.

On the surface, it's all very familiar. Two brothers (Chris Pine and Ben Foster) start robbing some small town banks in Texas to get their family out of financial trouble. Jeff Bridges and Gil Birmingham are the sheriffs trying to catch them. There's very limited interaction between the two pairs, so the movie plays like two movies being weaved together. Pine and Foster are a classic bandit pairing. Pine is the reasonable one. Foster is the loose cannon. They need each other to pull this off, and early on, they accept the likely consequences of their actions. They are brothers and there's a long history to their relationship. They bicker, they fight, and they joke around. It's all sold in the details of how they interact though. Almost the same can be said of Bridges and Birmingham. Bridges is about to retire and takes on this case as his one last thrill before a life of boredom. He's verbally abusive to his partner in a benign way that Birmingham barely even registers anymore. They aren't friends, but they are familiar and comfortable with each other, just like family. It's how those two duos interact that sells the movie. In a lot of ways, Hell or High Water is more similar to the Before series than a traditional "cops and robbers" film.

The West Texas and Oklahoma setting is fully realized. The characters all have guns, drive trucks, and carry intelligence behind their southern accents. I don't know if it's the "real" Texas but it felt like a real place. That's all that matters. The film is shot beautifully. It's not all "landscape porn" of sunsets. Texas is dirty and run down in places while also very pretty to look at in the same scene. Everything looks so big and open. It's not difficult at all to see this as the Wild West not that long ago.

The social commentary wasn't as overbearing as I feared. At this point, I am bored by "banks are evil" stories*, but the film does good work establishing the incompetence of the bank(s) being robbed and explaining the no-win situation the brothers are caught in. It's nuanced in a way most stories about this are not.

*Much like I'd get bored of Russian villains in 1980s movies. At some point, it's just lazy writing.

That's probably the best word for the film overall: nuanced. It's a collection of small moments and character work that come together better than any one part would suggest. I would love to see Bridges in the awards discussion for his casual-brilliance throughout. The ending is just about perfect for the tone of the film. There's no way I can appropriately sell anyone on this film without just seeing it. So, see it.

Verdict (?): Strongly Recommend

Delayed Reaction: Seven Samurai

The Pitch: Seven Samurai are called in to protect a village from bandits.

My first Kurosawa. It's embarrassing that it took me this long. In my defense, this is long as hell and got hard to schedule around.

What immediately struck me was how differently divided it was from the standard movie formula these days. Half the movie is defending the town. That would be the last 30 minutes of a 2+ hour film if made today. The first act establishes the characters and the stakes well, and the second act stays fresh with new ways to fight off the bandits.

It's hard for me to wrap my mind around how influential this was. It may not be the first time different things were done with this structure, but it's the first time all the elements were put together successfully and on a large stage. Because of that, I spent more of the movie thinking about all the other movies that used the same elements. There's really not a bad thing to say about it.

Verdict (?): Weakly Recommend

Delayed Reaction: Lawrence of Arabia

The Pitch: That's not an epic. THIS is an epic.

Wow. That was a doozy.

I've been looking forward to this movie for a while, with a little hesitation. That's a long movie and a big commitment. I watched it in two sittings, which is rare for me, but natural given the structure of the film. This is such a highly regarded film that has been examined countless times in countless ways. I'm not going to provide any special insight, so I'll keep this simple.

I can't believe the production was as large as it was. There's several sequences that broke my brain realizing that all the extras weren't digitally added in. Peter O'Toole is iconic and it's baffling to think he lost the Oscar for this*. Really, all the performances are great. The score is rightfully revered. Even my standard definition DVD looked great. I'd love to see the 70mm cut in theaters some time.
It's hard for me to find anything bad to say about the film. It didn't connect with me at my core. At least, not yet. I think this is a movie that I will only appreciate more over time.

*He lost to Gregory Peck for To Kill a Mockingbird. That's a tough call. Any other year, O'Toole would've won. In fact, look at O'Toole's career 0-8 at the Oscars. Except for maybe a couple early losses, it's remarkable the bad luck he had landing next to other iconic performances. The man lost to Brando (The Godfather), De Niro (Raging Bull), and Kingsley (Gandhi) as well as Wayne (True Grit) as part of a career make-up call a la Leonardo DiCaprio this past year.

Verdict (?): Weakly Recommend

Delayed Reaction: Alien

The Pitch: "Jaws in space." "The Texas Chainsaw Massacre in Space". Whatever actual pitch you want to go with, "in space" is apparently a requirement. Personally, I like "William Friedkin presents Star Wars".

Alien is another film in that murky realm of "I've either not seen it before, only partly seen it, or saw it long enough ago that I don't remember it." When in doubt, I like to revisit and give the Delayed Reaction treatment. I'll admit, probably the biggest thing pushing me to see it is a deisre to see everything on The Great Movie Ride at Disney World, and this is probably the best part of the ride.

I think the best thing about this movie is that it refuses to be what it should be. Everything about this has "B-movie Science Fiction" written all over it, and that's not what it is. It's a legitimate scary (arguably horror) movie. It's really not cheesy at all. It takes itself very seriously. The screenplay is patient. It's not in a hurry to put the Alien on the screen, which adds to the tension. There's a lived-in quality to the production design that works with the almost Blue-collar look of the actors. Best of all, despite decades of it being spoiled, the "John Hurt moment" didn't disappoint.

Aspects of the movie are a little dated, but it's clear why this is such a highly regarded and resiliant movie.

Verdict (?): Strongly Recommend

Delayed Reaction: The Squid and the Whale

The Pitch: A dark comedy about a nasty divorce.

Noah Baumbach sure knows how to make endearing unlikable characters. I saw both Frances Ha and Greenberg over the last couple years and and am excited to get to Mistress America soon. The Squid and the Whale is the movie of his I've probably heard about the most. I'm pretty sure Marc Maron raved about it a few times on WTF and didn't Jeff Daniels mention it during his Emmy acceptance speech for The Newsroom?

I had a lot of trouble connecting with this movie. It's deeply personal. That's obvious. Jeff Daniels in particular is insufferable yet engaging. He's loathsome and funny, often in the same breath. I always love Laura Linney. I didn't know that there was a Jesse Eisenberg in 2005, so that was interesting to find out. I can see why the screenplay is highly regarded. Writing is Baumbach's greatest strength.
Despite all that, I struggle to say that I liked the movie. Immediately, I look to the run time. It's only 81 minutes long and felt much longer. That's a bad sign as a gut reaction. Most of issues are with Owen Kline as the younger brother. It felt like they were trying too hard to show how fucked up he was getting. I could at least understand what was going on in the other characters' heads. Kline, I had no idea. Based on the previous movies of Baumbach's that I've like more, maybe I just need Greta Gerwig to be there. Replace Anna Paquin with her and maybe I'd be raving about it.

Verdict (?): Weakly Don't Recommend

Delayed Reaction: The Overnight

The Pitch: A couple that is new to California becomes friends with a strange couple who they spend a night getting to know.

This is an odd little movie. I love the cast. Adam Scott and Taylor Schilling are old pros at playing the straight man in a comic situation. Scott also gets to be a little weird which he does better than he's given credit for. Jason Schwartzman loves playing this kind of self-assured crazy person. I don't know Judith Goderche, but she fits in nicely.

I don't think I found the movie as funny as it was trying to be. That didn't matter much, because everything comes together so nicely and interestingly at the end. I didn't expect it to play out like that and it felt very appropriate for all the adventures leading up to it.

Verdict (?): Weakly Don't Recommend

Movie Reaction: The Birth of a Nation

Formula: 12 Years a Slave + Spartacus

Fuck slavery.

In a way, that's all that The Birth of a Nation is about. And that's plenty. Slavery is, by definition, inhuman and awful and a stain on American and world history. I watch a movie like this, and the last thing I want to hear is how the Civil War was actually about states' rights or how slavery wasn't unique to the United States. I'm not looking at a way to explain it all. It just makes me angry because it all really happened. It's good to be reminded that if left unchecked, peoples' capacity for evil things is pretty high. However, it's also good to be reminded that there are men who will take a stand against a rotten system.

There's a lot about The Birth of a Nation that is familiar. There's only so much variation allowed in a slave narrative. It's the American South in the 1800s. There's black slaves and white slave owners.This is the definition of a black and white issue. The film follows Nat Turner (Nate Parker, who also directed and wrote the screenplay), a slave in Virginia who learned to read as a child and became a preacher. He's a very good preacher and excels at keeping other slaves compliant through his words. His owner (Armie Hammer) rents him out to other owners top keep their slaves compliant too. At these other plantations, he sees all kinds of horrors. Eventually, it becomes too much and he decides to revolt. It's all based on Nat Turner's actual rebellion, which is worth looking up if you have the time.

It's a tough movie to watch. Where other films play up the violence against the slaves in big ways, The Birth of a Nation is starker about it. Everything is casually done. Punishing a slave is treated no differently patching a wall or mending a fence. It's just another part of the day for the owners. At times, bodies are left on the side of the road, not as a message to others, but because no one care to clean it up. There's value in being reminded how slavery really worked rather than thinking of it as an abstract concept.

Nate Parker is strong as the lead. Nat is not always allowed to say what he wants. As a result, so much of the story is told through the look on his face or in his eyes. He doesn't speak much about a revolt until he's made the decision to actually do it. He doesn't have to. You can see him processing it all along, his mental walls getting broken down one by one, until fighting back is the only option. By the time the rebellion happens, it feels long overdue but you understand why it took so long to get there. Nat Turner is a reluctant leader. He's scared. He's intimidated. Most of all, he's not a violent person in nature. And that's just one facet of Parker's work. For a debut feature, his direction is impressive and his screenplay is solid.

This is by no means a perfect film. The rebellion itself is pretty underwhelming. From the moment the Nat decides to arrange the rebellion on, the story is going through the motions. No one seems convinced that it will make a difference, but not in a thematic way. I didn't read anything as "all we have left to do is fight, even if it's a losing battle". It was more like, "this is the part of the story we had to get to". I wanted a perspective on it. Either fill the slaves with hope and cruelly pull it away or let me know the whole time that I'm following dead men. The film lacked either. It essentially lost its point of view until Nat's final scene. Also, I was disappointed that it made Nat's motivations so personal toward the end. There's a difference between revolting because you've seen things that you can't morally allow any longer and revolting because suddenly your situation is as bad as you've seen it be for others.

The Birth of a Nation is a good film, not a great film. It's an angry movie that isn't concerned with making subtle points. It doesn't want to make people feel better. Anger is stream of consciousness though. It's reactive. It's saying "look at this" and letting it speak for itself. I'm not sure if I came away with any new thoughts or insights. It's underlining points that have been made before. That said, there's importance to seeing this that most movies don't have. People need to be reminded sometimes. I'm not sure how the film with settle with me long term. But, it's there if I too need to be reminded.

Verdict (?): Weakly Recommend 

Delayed Reaction: Across the Universe

The Pitch: There's so many Beatles songs, it must be possible to make a rock opera or at least a musical out of them.

I didn't care for the covers. That's what it all comes down to. Across the Universe is intended for people who like The Beatles' music and I definitely do. It plays well for people who like the 60s. Given that I just binged CNN's The Sixties at the expense of a good night's sleep for several nights, I fit that description as well. I'm even a fan of Evan Rachel Wood and Jim Sturgess (the former more than the later). This didn't land with me at all though. It felt too reverse engineered, like the screenwriters had a checklist of the songs they wanted to fit in and made a story that worked for that. I tended to groan when the name of any new character was given. The story was fiarly uninspired. It hits all the beats of the 60s that everyone hits without anything new to say.

This all would've been fine if I liked how they produced the music. And I just didn't care for these versions. Some were played too big. Some were too small. The songs didn't always match the performer. I tend to shy away from remixes and covers as it is, so these weren't exceptional enough to win me over. I can see how other people would like them though.

Verdict (?): Weakly Don't Recommend

October Movie Preview

That September was about as lackluster as I feared. Surely October will get out of the rut from the last couple months. That's when the Oscar players start coming out and a couple studios let out a few tentpole movies, normally ones not part of some huge franchise. And the horror movies. Oh, the horror movies.
Well, October certainly looks better. There's several movies I'm really looking forward to after hearing rumblings from the festival circuit. Those "prestige" movies will need to hold me over, because otherwise, it's not looking too strong. The horror options are mostly studio horror that's trying to appeal to teens and the tentpole movies are from franchises that the movie star leads are dragging with them into significance. Ignore my negativity though. There will be plenty to keep me busy. It's not like I'm going to be so bereft of options that I'll be seeing the Madea movie.

2016
Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | June | Jul | Aug | Sep   
2015

Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | June | Jul | Aug | Sept | Oct | Nov | Dec 

2014

Jan | Feb | Mar | Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec

2013

Mar |  Apr | May | Jun | Jul | Aug | Sep | Oct | Nov | Dec

10/7

The Birth of a Nation
The story of Nat Turner's slave rebellion.
Working For It: It was a Sundance sensation and immediately presumed to be an Oscar player. It looks like an angrier 12 Years a Slave with great ambition.
Working Against It: Writer/director/producer/star Nate Parker is facing some public backlash after news came out that he faced rape charges back in 1999, and he hasn't weathered the press very well. That only matters for the Oscar chances though. Apparently, this is a pretty brutal movie. Even if it's to make a point, I don't particularly care for movies that relish in putting people in pain. That could scare me away until a DVD release.
Verdict: Very likely to see this.

Friend Request
A girl becomes haunted by a classmate after she defriends her on Facebook.
Working For It: I can make all the jokes I want, but I saw Unfriended in theaters. If there's a clever idea behind it, I'll give a lot of scary movies a chance.
Working Against It: Only, there isn't a clever idea here. It looks dated before it's even been released. If nothing else, a movie like this should be able to pull me in by casting interesting or attractive young people. Sadly, I only know Alycia Debnam-Carey from her work on Fear the Walking Dead, playing a character who annoyed me on a show I had to stop watching.
Verdict: Request denied

The Girl on the Train
Emily Blunt gets tied into the investigation of a woman who goes missing. The woman is part of a couple Blunt watches every day on her train ride.
Working For It: I love Emily Blunt. I'm a big fan of Justin Theroux, Rebecca Ferguson, Luke Evans, and Allison Janney too. I get the feeling that I'll even remember who Haley Bennett is by the end of the year. It looks like a thriller in the vein of Gone Girl which was one of my favorite films of 2014.
Working Against It: I feel like the trailer is designed just to confuse me. It feels like it's trying to hide more than just the twists it promises. As is, it looks like it's trying a little too hard to recapture David Fincher's Gone Girl tone.
Verdict: I'm not even sure that awful reviews could stop me from seeing this.

Middle School: The Worst Years of My Life
A middle schooler leads a revolt against the draconian rule of his school's faculty. Think, Diary of a Wimpy Kid with the principal from The Breakfast Club.
Working For It: Occasionally, there's a kids movie that comes out that get a much better adult cast than it deserves. I don't know if it's because the director or producer is calling in some favors or some other reason. Unaccompanied Minors immediately comes to mind as an example. Middle School has one of those casts as well, including Lauren Graham (Gilmore Girls), Rhetta (Parks & Rec), Andy Daly (Review), and others.
Working Against It: Well, the trailer tells too much of the plot. That's a minor pet peeve. And, the downside to getting good people for the adult cast is that I then feel bad seeing Lauren Graham relegated to sandwich and advice duty or Andy Daly trying to seriously play such an arch character.
Verdict: That's a hard no.

Torchbearer [Limited]
The Duck Dynasty patriarch muses about why god must exist.
Working For It: It could be...interesting to see what his take is.
Working Against It: The only trailer I've seen screams "vanity project" and uses some pretty disgusting comparisons (as well as footage). There's interesting ways to make, essentially, an anti-Religulous. This is not it.
Verdict: Not a chance.

Under the Shadow [Limited]
A mysterious evil haunts a village, more specifically, a mother and a daughter in Tehran in the 1980s.
Working For It: It looks genuinely unnerving. Then again, any horror trailer can be cut to do that. It doesn't give away too much of the story, which I like. I can't make a judgment based on the actors since I don't know any of them. It could be a fun watch. I always mean to watch more foreign horror.
Working Against It: I'm getting some major Happy Feet vibes. I should clarify. The first 90% of Happy Feet was fine, then at the very end, it dropped the rest of the story entirely to get preachy. I can already see how this film could paint some supernatural story the whole time, then just turn into some anti-war message at the very end like a bad M. Night Shaymalan twist. If that can do that without breaking the flow of the rest of the movie, please, by all means do it.  Otherwise, that would just annoy me. These are just the vibes I'm getting though.
Verdict: Eventually, I assume. Not in a theater.

10/14

The Accountant
Ben Affleck is a genius accountant and perhaps something much more nefarious.
Working For It: I'm intrigued by this a lot, but not for the thriller aspects. Everything I've seen so far implies that the movie is about Ben Affleck's character without being told from his perspective. It's about how the world responds to him. If that holds, that's an uncommon way to view a movie and I'd be curious to see that. Even if it fails to be that, I'm seeing a movie with a cast of Ben Affleck, Anna Kendrick, J.K. Simmons, Jeffrey Tambor, and John Lithgow. I just am. Oh, and it's from the director (Gavin O'Connor) of Warrior, one of my favorite movies.
Working Against It: This isn't a genre that I'm blindly forgiving of. I'll still enjoy the hell out of a bad Apatow comedy or a coming of age story, but a high level crime thriller - I'm not as forgiving. That won't stop me from getting in the theater though. And It's not like O'Connor has a perfect track record.
Verdict: An opening weekend lock.

Kevin Hart: What Now?
A Kevin Hart stand-up special in front of a football stadium.
Working For It: I'll admit, a lot of the stupid humor from the opening James Bond spy segment made me chuckle. Hart is a comedian who plays off his energy more than the writing, so he's not as affected by large crowds as others would be.
Working Against It: I kind of hate stand-up movies. Specials I love. By the time they reach feature film level though, it's more about the vanity of the performer and more time is spent on the crowd cheering than the comedian telling the joke.
Verdict: I've got to get to about two dozen stand up specials in my Netflix queue first.

Max Steel
Apparently, Mattel has these Max Steel toys, so now there's a movie.
Working For It: Josh Brener (Bighead from Silicon Valley) gets to be the voice of Max's floating robot friend. I like Josh Brener.
Working Against It: I actually have no issue with the rampant branding in Hollywood right now. I loved the first Transformers movie. I think there's potential for a G.I. Joe movie to eventually be pretty good somewhere down the line. I have no idea what Max Steel is and, based on the trailer, all Max Steel is is "generic". I hope Open Road Films doesn't take too big of a financial hit on this.
Verdict: I can't conceive of a situation in which I'd see this.

Certain Women [Limited]
Kristen Stewart, Michelle Williams (the white one), and Laura Dern are all women trying to live empowered lives in the Northeast U.S.
Working For It: Those three women are enough to at least make me curious. I'm not sure what the story of the film really is. It looks almost like an anthology. That could be cool. The stories all seem interesting in a quiet way.
Working Against It: All I know about writer/director Kelly Reichardt is that she directed a movie with Will Oldham in it which is neat. If that sounds like I'm grasping, you'd be right. This does look a little like it's in the "Sleepy Sundance" category (Prince Avalanche, Results): films that meander for 90 minutes then end out of obligation.
Verdict: I'll be looking for it on Netflix.

Desierto [Limited]
A vigilante border patrol minuteman "shoots him some Mexicans" trying to cross the border.
Working For It: The idea of crossing the US/Mexican border as a horror movie is intriguing. Jeffrey Dean Morgan looks as scary as Gael Garcia Bernal looks scared.
Working Against It: Well, it doesn't help that this has been delayed once already. The trailer plays up the Alfonso Cuaron connection. His son directed this though. As we saw with Morgan last month, being someone's offspring doesn't mean much toward the final product. The trailer gives a way a bit too much of the story.
Verdict: A soft "pass".

10/21

Boo! A Madea Halloween
Madea finds herself in the middle of a horror movie.
Working For It: The more absurd the scenario for the Madea movie, the better the jokes land. And this doesn't appear to take itself so damn seriously.
Working Against It: I'm past the point of being irritated by the Madea movies. They are what they are. Nothing's changing them. I'll continue to avoid them. Make no mistake though, I will not be seeing this.
Verdict: Nope

I'm Not Ashamed
The story of Rachel Scott, one of the victims of the Columbine shooting.
Working For It: ...No.
Working Against It: Eww, this movie makes me feel dirty. I guess Rachel has become sort of figurehead since her death, with her journal writings being published and a foundation being started with her name. This film just looks crass and exploitative though. Perhaps I'm wrong, but I have no desire to find out.
Verdict: I'm actively avoiding it.

Jack Reacher: Never Go Back
Tom Cruise returns as Jack Reacher, a renegade former major in the U.S. Military Police Corps. This time, he has to uncover a government conspiracy to clear his and a friend's (Cobie Smulders') names.
Working For It: The first Jack Reacher movie was fine. This looks similar, only switch out Rosamind Pike with Smulders (who is more likely to get in on the action). Christopher McQuarrie (Mission Impossible: Rogue Nation) is gone from the director's chair, but Edward Zwick (The Last Samurai, Glory) is a fine replacement.
Working Against It: I liked Jack Reacher. I didn't love it. In fact, I struggle to recall any plot point from that movie. In other words, it's a disposable franchise in my mind.
Verdict: It's not like anything else that week looks better.

Keeping Up with the Joneses
Isla Fisher and Zach Galifianakis find out that their perfect new neighbors (Gal Gadot and Jon Hamm) are international spies.
Working For It: I really like three fourths of that cast, and even Zach Galifianakis I like in theory. It's from the director of Superbad (Greg Motolla), so there's eternal goodwill there. Fisher in particular I don't get to see enough.
Working Against It: Some movies feel like they are the first house in a new neighborhood. Others are like a new street that's being built up in an existing neighborhood. Then, others, are like trying to build a house in the space between two houses that have been around forever right next to each other. I'm sure this movie will be amusing enough, but I can't help but compare it to the dozens of other movies out there that look exactly like it. And I'd be way more comfortable if this looked like more of an ensemble than Galifianakis-led.
Verdict: Maybe if someone else convinces me.

Ouija: Origin of Evil
The story of the original evil Ouija board from all the way back in the 60s.
Working For It: I love the hell out of Mike Flannagan, more specifically, his film Oculus (and Hush to a lesser degree). His involvement alone piques my interest. The Ouija idea is versatile enough to not be weighed down by previous installments being underwhelming and I do like Elizabeth Reaser.
Working Against It: Of all the genres that have had films inspired by a toy or game, horror is probably the toughest sell. It's especially hard when it looks like the instruction from the studio was "Make The Conjuring but with a Ouija board."
Verdict: I'm open to it if the buzz is good. Otherwise, probably not.

American Pastoral [Limited]
Ewan McGregor directs and stars in the adaptation of the Pulitzer Prize winning novel about a middle class man whose life blows up thanks to his rebellious teenage daughter in 1968.
Working For It: I'm curious to see McGregor's directorial debut. He's surrounded himself with a nice cast including Jennifer Connelly (wife), Dakota Fanning (daughter), Uzo Aduba, and Molly Parker. This is the rare acclaimed novel that I've actually read before, so the ability to examine it as an adaptation is enticing as well.
Working Against It: This is a tricky story to translate to film with the right tone. Directing debuts for actors go poorly about as often as they go well (if not more so) so I worry about this.
Verdict: Unless reviews are awful, I'll be looking for it.

In a Valley of Violence [Limited]
In the wild west, a town of thugs tries to take down a mysterious stranger (Ethan Hawke) and they find themselves outmatched.
Working For It: It's a Blumhouse production. While they occasionally do, non-horror, it's notable whenever they don't. The director is known for making horror movies though and has a V/H/S credit to his name (always a plus). It's a fun cast assembled. In addition to Hawke, there's John Travolta, Karen Gillan, Taissa Farmga, Toby Huss, and James Ransone. Basically, this appears to be a Wild West First Blood with more humor. I can get behind that.
Working Against It: A lot of BlumHouse movies begin with a "wouldn't this be cool?" idea. Some turn out great (The Gift, Creep, Oculus). Others wear themselves out quickly (The Lazarus Effect, The Purge). It's hard to tell where this will land.
Verdict: I'm in no hurry but I am interested.

Moonlight [Limited]
The coming of age story of a gay black man who tries to find his place in the world, growing up in a rough Miami neighborhood.
Working For It: The festival circuit has been going crazy for this film over the last month. It's looking like a strong Oscar contender and not just as a response to the #OscarSoWhite controversy. It's full of a lot of familiar faces, not familiar names, other than maybe Naomie Harris.
Working Against It: Despite all the adulation I've been hearing for it, I don't really know what it's about. It's told in three parts, when the central character, Kevin, is 9, 16, and 20-something. That's about all I know.
Verdict: It's very likely that I see it.

10/28

Inferno
Tom Hanks is back for another Robert Langdon movie, this time fighting amnesia and a lethal global virus with Felicity Jones at his side.
Working For It: Ron Howard is still behind the camera. While that's not a guarantee of high quality (In the Heart of the Sea), it's telling any time a director stays with a franchise through three installments. It doesn't get better than Tom Hanks as far as I'm concerned. Like Hanks, Felicity Jones could be used better in something else, but I'll watch her in just about anything.
Working Against It: The Da Vinci Code was fine. Angels & Demons was entirely forgettable (Honestly, I remember something about priests and that's it). I have no desire for another installment. They are nicely stand-alone and fine. That's all the excitement I can muster.
Verdict: Maybe, leaning toward no.