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Reviews
Bodkin (2024)
Solid murder mystery
The dark-comedy-Irish setting works pretty well in this series. 'Ah, must be an Irish thing'-moments are mixed with comedic WTF-moments but not to the point where you lose focus.
I especially liked the performance of David Wilmot as a grunty Irish old man and Siobhán Cullen as the annoyed journalist. I hope she has the chance to star in bigger productions after this. The acting of Will Forte was a bit unfitting in the beginning but it gets better soon.
They story itself is pretty good but not masterclass. Classical thriller story where more and more is revealed during the series. Some minor plot holes in the end and unclarified things but I guess they have left them in for a possible second season.
Solid fun watch for a free weekend.
PS: Have absolutely no clue where people come from when they mention violence to animals. Not a single animal in distress is shown.
The Final: Attack on Wembley (2024)
Fails to make people reflect about what happened
You hear a lot of interview partners and you can see lots of personal recordings and CCTV footage. There is no narrator so all the facts you get are from a more personal point of view.
The interview partners consist of all kinds of people. Normal football fans, people excessively drinking and partying, getting into the stadium without a ticket but also an intimated security guard and an Italian father worrying about the well-being of his daughter. You hear stories about the love of football, racism, threats, physical fights and a little girl being thrown glass beer bottles at. This is sadly the point where the documentary fails hard. Only in the last 3 minutes ONE question is asked about how the hooligans felt about their behaviour this day. Instead we hear about their love of football and of how proud they are of what happened this day. On top of that we get a full 15 minute game summary that could have been 5 minutes max.
It's shocking how many people were willing to put football over the well-being of others. It's also shocking that this documentary misses this central aspect entirely and IMHO normalizes threats and vandalism in football culture.
Dune: Part Two (2024)
Power over spice is power over all
And the power of a brilliant second part is the power to create the best trilogy ever. This film surprised me in ways I didn't think were possible after the first one.
The sound design really stands out and creates with the ever-brilliant music of Hans Zimmer the best audio atmosphere I ever experienced. The stunning landscapes and the visually beautiful effects even got better than the first film which many critics also highly praised back then for the effects. Top-notch visuals also in all the fighting scenes, being it explosions or hand-to-hand combat.
The way the story is presented felt a bit unusual but the more I think about it, I think that it is the right way to make the film appear as boring. You have to carefully watch and listen to every dialogue or even every line. Otherwise you can miss important information and can become a bit confused later. Lots of deep dives into Fremmen culture and believes. For this reason I highly recommend to watch the first film shortly before.
The cast that presents this story part is brilliantly chosen and each and everyone delivers. Timothée Chalamet and Javier Bardem stood out which harmonizes very well with the development of their respective characters.
Can't say how amazed I was by every aspect of this film. Maybe the best sci-fi film in the last decade and if Messiah (Part 3) is just as good as this we have the best trilogy ever created in film history.
Stowaway (2021)
Interesting promise, bad delivery and end
This movie feels like they've run out of budget at the end. Talented actors like Anna Kendrick and a good initial story promise a well-written and stunning movie but it ends in some major plot holes, scientific inaccuracies and stupid decisions of the characters. Even the best actor performance sadly can't recover this.
The team of three astronauts encounter a 4th human on board. While they are not sure if he has placed himself intentionally there, they also notice some issues with the carbondioxide capture system...
This initial setup is a very interesting one to many viewers and raises a lot of ehtical questions, that are also discussed by the main characters. Sci-Fi fans may notice it from some authors of novels.
Each movie character provides a different view, sometimes wants to act on her/his own and in the end they have to work together and/or find a consensus to survive. That concept has worked very well in the movie Passengers but proves to have a lot of shortcomings in this kind of story. Several plotholes as well as scientific inaccuraccies poke the good narrative until it finally destroys itself in the utterly nonsense ending. I was very disappointed in the last half of the movie.
Watch until 50% and write your own ending. That would be way better than the actual one.
Interstellar (2014)
A complete 10/10 package from space
Where does one start here? Best movie I've ever seen so far..
The story allows us to experience very well developed characters. The performance of the actors as well as their character development is 100% in harmony.
Matthew McConaughey particularly has one scene that is not only a meme but hits the heart of every person with a little bit of sympathy. (Got me crying, not gonna lie). Anne Hathawa, Jessica Chastain, Matt Damon as the other main characters also excel at their characters - not only due to their very good performance but also due to the development of their characters. Background story of them is well written and explained to the viewer. You can 100% understand the intentions and goals of them, while the actor also delivers the feelings and emotions. The combination of good writing and acting is insanely good therefore.
All the science fiction aspects of the movie are very close to reality thanks of the involvement of Kip Thorne as an advisor, although there's still some minor part of "fiction" in the science fiction part of the story. But hey, Star Trek communicators were also fiction once. Overall, that concept leads to insane graphical shots of space as well as various scientific and ethical thoughts about time- and space travel. That provokes the question what the viewer would do if faced with the same situation.
Soundtrack by Hans Zimmer is usually a hit, but this one? I'ts a critical hit. Several scenes will stay with you like the soundtrack of Requiem for a Dream. Unless, this time you will probably like it a lot. Two scenes stand out very much but overall it's very nice and fitting.
So, every single aspect of this movie excels which makes me give it a 10/10. 10 years later and I haven't seen a better movie.
PS: Wish I would have seen it in theaters. If you have the chance, go for it!