Delayed Reaction: The Sting

Premise: Two con men come up with a plan to get back at a local crime boss.

 

No one who loves Ocean's Eleven (2001) as much as I do should go this long without seeing The Sting. It's got the exact same formula: movie stars, elaborate heist, wit in between. To be fair though, I did have a reason to be hesitant. I watched the original Ocean's 11 years ago and didn't care for it at all. So, if I didn't like that directly comparable movie from the same era, maybe The Sting wasn't a sure bet. Wrong. This movie is great. It's exactly what I wanted. It's neatly organized into the different stages of the con. The characters are immediately relatable or understandable. The stakes are clear. The twists of the con are predictable but still surprising. This is one of the most satisfying of the Best Picture winners I'm catching up on.

 

Older heist movies are fun because everything is so analog. It's hard to make them in an accessible way for audiences now, because 95% of the work is done by a computer guru with magical hacking abilities. The Sting is a 70s movie about a Depression era con. For them, it's all about timing and training. The only technology is the wiretap. The rest is gumption.

 

Side Rant: OK. I caught this as a free movie on Peacock. I get that they don't have time to check every movie for the best place to insert the commercial breaks, but it's frustrating that they didn't for The Sting. The movie is literally structured with breaks throughout the movie when it switches to a title card for the next chapter. They are spaced evenly throughout the movie and designed to be included in places where people are paying attention. Why not move the commercials to there? Again, I know the answer. I just need to vent.

 

Verdict: Strongly Recommend

Delayed Reaction: You Can Count on Me

Premise: An irresponsible brother comes to visit his sister in the town they grew up in.

 

Kenneth Lonnergan hasn't made many films but there's already a pretty clear formula to them: Start with a tragedy then follow characters as they try to live normal lives. In Margaret it's the stranger dying in the car accident. In Manchester By the Sea, it's Casey Affleck's children dying in a fire. In You Can Count on Me, it's Laura Linney and Mark Ruffalo's parents dying in a car accident when they were kids. As the film with the most distant tragedy, You Can Count on Me is also the most mundane of his movies on the surface. There isn't a ton of plot to the movie. Frankly, Linney's affair with her boss feels included only to have something eventful happen.

 

This movie veers dangerously close to being a "You can't go home movie". That's a movie where a worldly city character goes back to the small town they grew up in so they can realize either that they've outgrown that world or that there's a charm to the slow-paced life of these simple folks. It's very easy to be patronizing with that kind of movie. It makes sense. If screenwriters really believed small town life was superior, then they wouldn't be trying to make it in Hollywood. You Can Count on Me stops short of this though. It's as much Linney's movie as Ruffalo's, so we see both sides of it. Linney seems to like he small town life, but not in a beat-down, all hope has been crushed out of her kind of way. Ruffalo is more worldly, but he has nothing to show for it. The greatest interest in the movie is the conversations the siblings aren't having. Lonnergan's movies are excellent are portraying characters without answers yet they are also not driven by getting those answers.

 

The key to this movie is that Laura Linney and Mark Ruffalo are really good in it. Linney rightly got an Oscar nomination for the role and Ruffalo's lack of a nomination remains one of the biggest mysteries of his career. They are such interesting performers that I didn't really mind how often nothing was happening in the movie.

 

Verdict: Weakly Recommend

Delayed Reaction: Badlands

Premise: A young couple go on a murder spree while on the run after killing the girl's father near the Badlands of South Dakota.

 

I realize the irony of saying this, but it's best to avoid the reviews sometimes. Or, at least save them for afterwards. I knew Badlands was a highly regarded film before I watched it. I avoided looking at reviews and reading about its legacy until afterwards though. Frankly, I'm not sure what movie all these people were watching. A look through the Reception section for the movie on Wikipedia makes it sound like a life-changing, transcendent experience.

 

I mean. The movie is good. It might be my favorite Terrence Malick movie. Martin Sheen and Sissy Spacek are really good in it. I've never seen Sheen that young and cocky before. The movie looks great. Few rival Malick's appreciation of nature on the screen. I love the brief runtime and how it's still able to be such a patient movie.

 

It's perplexing though. I get people losing their minds over something as ambitious as The Tree of Life or The Thin Red Line. Sure, I didn't care for those movies as much, but I get that other people could see more in them. Badlands is a pretty lean movie though. It's a little scattered. Malick is clearly still figuring stuff out. Are people really that blown away by it? Oh well, more power to them. I liked the movie. It certainly had a bitchin' treehouse and I appreciated the wry sense of humor.

 

Verdict: Weakly Recommend

Delayed Reaction: Train to Busan

Premise: The passengers on a train try to get to a safe zone during a zombie apocalypse.

 

Can we all agree that zombie movies aren't horror anymore? Perhaps a small subsect of them still are, but the majority are action movies or thrillers. The only thing that makes them horror is that zombies come from the horror cannon. That's not a knock against zombie movies. It's just, I feel silly saying that Train to Busan is one of the best horror movies I saw this year, when I watched it more like a Mission: Impossible movie than The Ring.

 

Regardless, Train to Busan is very good as whatever genre you want to call it. It's nothing new. We all know the drill. There's a mutation. When people are bit, they turn into fast, aggressive zombies. This takes over the population quickly. The movie follows a decent-sized group of people who slowly get picked off until they get to safety. Train to Busan executes this at a high level though. It builds characters quickly and effectively. It leaves room to discuss things like class and human nature when the stakes are high. This is full of really entertaining scenarios for characters to survive. I love how little plot armor characters have and how quickly it was willing to dispatch some of the most likable characters. The zombie design and especially movements were excellent. I swear. Every time I watch a Korean movie, I come away confused about why I haven't been watching more of them for longer. I'd have to check the full list, but I think Train to Busan is the best zombie movie I've seen since 28 Days Later and by a pretty wide margin.

 

Verdict: Strongly Recommend

Delayed Reaction: The Haunted Mansion

Premise: Married realtors bring their family to a mysterious mansion in hopes of landing the listing only to realize that it's haunted.

 

Do you want to know the worst thing about The Haunted Mansion? I'm going to trick myself into watching this again in another 5 or 10 years. I know it's going to happen and I'm already angry at myself about it. You see, I'm a Disney Park fanatic. The Haunted Mansion attraction is one of my two or three favorites in all the parks. I've been on it countless times and love finding out more about it. I'm the same way about Pirates of the Caribbean. For that attraction, there's a lovely symbiotic relationship between it and first movie. I enjoy both independently. My Disney Park fandom hadn't really solidified until long after The Curse of the Black Pearl (and none of the sequels) became one of my favorite movies. The movie stands on its own, but I love the assorted nods to the attraction and seeing how one informs the other. So, I end up liking both the attraction and the movie even more because of the relationship.

 

The Haunted Mansion attraction has far more lore attached to it, so it seems like I should be able to watch the movie and at least appreciate the way that it plays off the ride. I'm annoyingly determined to realize that The Haunted Mansion movie is actually a masterpiece. I mean, I love Tomorrowland more than the consensus. Why not this?

 

The thing is, The Haunted Mansion is a bad movie. It's not bad because it isn't faithful to the attraction. It's a bad movie and it isn't faithful to the attraction. To be honest, if it stayed truer to the attraction but was a bad movie, I'd probably find an excuse to defend it. I think there's a great movie that could be made off The Haunted Mansion. It has a playful but dark tone. It's full of striking and memorable images. The story of the ride isn't actually very clear but hints at a number of things. Much like Pirates, it's really just a setting. You can place any story into it.

 

Sadly, in 2003, Disney decided that an Eddie Murphy family comedy was the way to go. In hindsight, it's obvious why that was mistake. He was a year removed from the legendary box office disaster The Adventures of Pluto Nash and other than a pair of Oscar hopefuls (Dreamgirls, Dolemite is My Name) and some Shrek sequels, his movie choices since this movie have been a dumpster fire. At the time though, Daddy Day Care was a hit that same summer. He wasn't that far removed from Dr. Dolittle and The Nutty Professor. It was probably fair to think he could carry this movie like Johnny Depp did earlier that summer with Pirates. So, I get the reason for mistake, but this is very much a disengaged Eddie Murphy. That's why so much of his post-2000 career has been awful. Murphy was huge in the 80s and 90s because Eddie Murphy was this comedic force with swagger and charisma who could make just about anything funny. Then, he started thinking he was Eddie Murphy. It's a mistake a lot of movie stars make. People don't like Eddie Murphy. They liked what Eddie Murphy brought to a movie. That's a key distinction. When he starts only bringing Eddie Murphy and nothing else, that's a problem.

 

For all my rambling, I really think the problem with this movie is pretty simple. It should've been PG-13 and it didn't need little kids in it. That's the secret sauce to The Curse of the Black Pearl. Plenty of kids still saw that even despite the rating and lack of children. Frankly, I don't think it's a coincidence that Disney's rise to box office dominance has lined up with their decision to be looser with PG-13 ratings for their movies. This version of The Haunted Mansion was so worried about scaring away young kids that it stripped away the spookiest and most memorable elements of the popular all-ages attraction. So, this movie isn't even as scary as Casper. I suppose there is a way they could've made the movie good while still keeping the young kids around, but having them makes it far too easy to talk down to the audience with the humor.

 

That means the movie wasn't spooky or even that macabre. It wasn't funny. The star wasn't doing anything to make the material work. This was just a bad movie and a complete mistake. I'm hoping they learned their lesson with The Jungle Cruise, coming in 2021.

 

Verdict: Strongly Don't Recommend

Delayed Reaction: Hell House LLC

Premise: A mocumentary investigating a mysterious accident that happened on opening night of a haunted house attraction.

 

Oh man, oh man, oh man. I loooooooved this movie. I had a good run of horror movies this year. My research and recommendations really paid off. I saw at least a half-dozen horror movies that I'd like to see again. It was a rousing success. The only thing it was missing was a movie that I immediately thought about buying because I didn't want to be caught without it when the mood struck me. Well, I found it now.

 

Hell House LLC is one of the best found footage horror movies I've seen, and I've seen many of them. It's my favorite horror sub-genre. I love the reliance on atmosphere. The lo-fi production methods levels the playing field so a greater variety of filmmakers can make this kind of movie. The verisimilitude makes the scares feel more authentic.

 

This movie uses the structure the right way. The mocumentary presentation explains why it's all so well edited. I was really impressed with how well the movie establishes the geography of the hotel. By the end, I could tell exactly where people were going despite the maze-like setup. I started recognizing where manikins should and shouldn't be. That made the whole thing feel more interactive. I could tell when something didn't look right.

 

The story set up works really well. This group is setting up a haunted house, so the film doesn't have to come up with an elaborate excuse for why things look so creepy. That's a struggle the Paranormal Activity series often had to overcome. A house is just a house. A haunted house has a good excuse for scary clowns, dusty rooms, and labyrinthian floor plans.

 

If I was going to nit-pick, I guess the very end doesn't make a ton of sense. How do we have the footage of the "documentarian" at the very end? Was the camera retrieved later or something? If so, by whom and how were they able to retrieve it? And there's the common structural stuff about found footage you just have to go with, like why specific scares happen at certain times? Like, why does the piano keep making noise or why do the manikin heads all turn? The answer is "because it's scary" and that's about it. I've never minded that, but I know it bothers some people.

 

This was a greatly fun movie to watch at home in the dark by myself right before going to bed. And, by that, I mean it left me massively on edge, nervous, and too unsettled to sleep. I know that does nothing to convince non-horror fans to watch it, but for everyone else, it's a ringing endorsement. Now, my next big question is do I watch any of the sequels and risk them dispelling the charm of this first one?

 

Verdict: Strongly Recommend

Delayed Reaction: 537 Votes

Premise: A documentary about the direct connection between the Elian Gonzalez story and Bush's win in Florida in 2000.

 

As I say often, there are mainly two types of documentaries. I call them 'Theses' and 'Explorations'. The main difference is whether it seems like the filmmaker knew the conclusion going into the project. Explorations are investigations into a topic to see what the documentarian finds out. These are guided more by their subjects. Theses come in with a point and are structured to defend that point. I like Explorations more, because they feel like they have an open mind. Theses bother me, because I feel like they are trying to sell me something. There are good Theses though. 13th is pretty good, for example. To make a good Theses though, the argument has to be really well structured. It also needs to at least hint at challenges to its argument. I hate walking away from a documentary thinking I only heard one side of an argument.

 

537 Votes spends most of its run offering a compelling theory then whiffs toward the end and completely lost me at the very end. The idea is really interesting. The 2000 presidential election famously came down to a close race in Florida. 537 Votes poses the theory that you can trace Gore's troubles in Florida back to Cuban-American displeasure at how the Clinton administration handled the Elian Gonzalez situation. It's a smart theory. They defend it well and entertainingly. I like all the use of clips from The Daily Show and other late night shows to remind us of the temperature of the situation at the time. Once the movie moves to the election though, its work feels done. I was already convinced. Once it actually gets to the election, it becomes a story about how Republicans stole the election. That's a weird move, because it undermines the first half of the movie. If the Elian Gonzalez ordeal mobilized and anti-Democrat Cuban population, then pointing to the slim margin Bush won by makes the point beautifully. Instead, the movie argues that Republicans then stole the election. And they don't do a great job making that case anyway. It talks about the "Brooks Brother riot" and how that stopped the second recount, but it's not like Gore had taken the lead in that recount before it was stopped. The first half of the movie was very clear and persuasive, then the second half was more scattered and unfocused.

 

Finally, the very end of the movie just felt like sour grapes. I was stunned when they just threw out the idea that there probably would've been no 9/11 had Gore been elected without any further explanation. That's a bold claim that really needed to be more than a throwaway line. The documentary rather hilariously attributes every bad thing that happened in the last 20 years to Bush winning. That actually made me trust the documentary less retroactively. If it was that seriously slanted toward Gore at the end, what else did they slant earlier in the movie?

 

I thought this was a mostly entertaining and informative documentary that made some bafflingly dumb decisions at the end that discredited a lot of what came before it. This probably wasn't the best pre-election viewing for me.

 

Verdict: Weakly Don't Recommend

Quick Reaction: Hamlet (1948)

At this point Hamlet is that song that's been over-played on the radio so much that you start to hate it. It's a good song. I'd like to hear it on occasion, but not every day on multiple stations and in ads and at parties and at karaoke. Like, I probably wouldn't mind the Black Eyed Peas that much normally, but the entire Elephunk album is ruined to me because of how ever-present it was when I was in high school. And that's where Hamlet is with me now. I've seen enough versions and adaptations. I've seen reimaginings. I've read the play and studied it in school. I think the only thing I haven't done is actually see it live as a play (you know, its intended presentation). I'm tired of it. I'd rather see riffs on The Tempest or one of the lesser known histories. Or, you know, not Shakespeare even.

 

So, I have very little to say about Laurence Olivier's Hamlet. It's one of the Best Picture winners I've been looking forward to the least just because I knew exactly what to expect from it. It's a good Hamlet adaptation. It's appropriate that Olivier won his Oscar for this. It's about the driest win I can imagine though.

 

Verdict: Weakly Don't Recommend

Delayed Reaction: The Witches

Premise: A young boy who is turned into a mouse fights a coven of witches staying at his hotel with the help of his grandmother.

 

I don't know the Roald Dahl novel. I don't know the 1990 movie either. So, I can't say how closely this movie sticks to either. All I can say is that this is definitely a kid’s movie. I watched this because why wouldn't I watch a movie with Anne Hathaway, Octavia Spencer, and Stanley Tucci; especially one that lets Hathaway go as big as she wants? It became quickly clear though that this movie wasn't that concerned with all-age appeal.

 

I like the oddness. This very much is Robert Zemeckis' attempt to blend his Death Becomes Her quirk with his kid-friendly sensibilities from more recent movies like The Polar Express and A Christmas Carol. I think it somewhat works. This movie is weird. The witches look odd, like the concoction of a child's imagination. Chris Rock's narration weaves between sounding like a personal narrative and folklore. I even appreciate the darkness of the kids never getting turned back into humans after becoming mice. Mostly though, I love all the choices Hathaway is making throughout. They don't all work, but they sure are fun to watch. Every Oscar winner should be allowed one role like this so they can get it out of their system.

 

OK. I think I've been appropriately nice enough. Now I can say that I really just didn't care for this movie. It certainly didn't feel like it was concerned with appealing to me as an audience (which is fine). I would've liked a little more wit to the movie. I think the secret sauce to turning a "kids movie" into a "family movie" is realizing that it's fine to put in jokes that will go over a kid's head. The movie feels a little forgettable, and worse, anonymous. This barely even registers as a Robert Zemeckis movie. It could've been made by nearly any competent director the same way. Frankly, your appreciation of this movie will only go as far as Hathaway's performance takes you. For me, that was not quite far enough.

 

Verdict: Weakly Don't Recommend

Delayed Reaction: 1BR

Premise: A woman moves into a new apartment building to discover there's a nefarious reason behind the closeness of all her new neighbors.

 

Stay with me, please.

 

There are two ways to get open in basketball. You can either design a play or make a move to outsmart your opponent or you can run around like a bat out of hell quick enough that your defender can't keep up. Most of the best movie surprises resemble the first strategy. They are built off genius misdirects that completely fool people. Then there are movies like 1BR that churn through events so quickly that you can't keep up. Five minutes into 1BR, you know the big twist. Clearly, the neighbors are in a cult or something like it. What I didn't expect was how quickly the movie reveals that. I figured the cat would be phase one of several phases of the protagonist, Sarah (Nicole Brydon Bloom), coming to realize something was wrong with the place. Instead, that's revealed in the first 20 minutes or so and the game of the movie becomes figuring out how quickly they'd move to the next beat and what stopping point they would choose.

 

Not a lot of movies opt for this method. It's hard to churn through so much plot in a satisfying way. This kind of structure doesn't get as much attention after the fact either. "[Luke] I am your father" is a much better conversation than "I knew he was his father, but I didn't think they'd tell me that in minute 10". It's just as effective in the moment though and is a great defense against puzzle-solver audiences.

 

So, I enjoyed not knowing how far 1BR was going to take things. That alone gives the movie a pass in my book. I'm glad I watched this as part of a NetflixParty with friends. In my opinion, thriller horror is better with friends. Scary horror is better alone. Scary horror makes me afraid of every creak and tap I hear. Being around someone else can cut that tension. Thriller horror works best with others, because you can collectively address the "are they going to go there?" question. You can make an event out of when the cat will die or how the friend is going to show back up. By myself, that just wouldn't've played as well.

 

No one in the cast stuck out as doing anything that great. They were functional. This is the kind of horror movie that could've gotten away with a "name" in the lead role. Like, throw a Sarah Bolger into the lead role and tell me she doesn't add to it. The mythology of the movie doesn't make great sense upon closer inspection and the "reprogramming" scenes went on a little long. I could easily envision a better version of this movie, but the one we got was ok.

 

Verdict: Weakly Don't Recommend